The valet served the tea. The prince had provided for everything, remembered everything. He had even brought English biscuits.
The little repast exerted a very cheering influence upon the depressed spirits of the countess. But she took the first cup to the invalid who, revived by the unaccustomed stimulant, rose at once, imagining that a miracle had been wrought, for she could walk again. The Gross family now left the room. The prince and the countess sipped their tea in silence. What were they to say when the valet, who always accompanied his master on his journeys, understood all the languages which the countess spoke fluently?
The prince was grave and thoughtful. After they had drank the tea, he kissed her hand. "Let me go now--we must both have rest, you for your nerves and I for my feelings. I wish you a good night's sleep."
"Prince, I can say that you have been infinitely charming to-day, and have risen much in my esteem."
"I am glad to hear it, Countess, though a trifle depressed by the consciousness that I owe this favor to a cup of tea and a pair of dry slippers," replied the prince with apparent composure. Then he took his hat and left the room.
And this is love? thought the countess, shrugging her shoulders. What was she to do? She did not feel at all inclined to sleep. People are never more disposed to chat than after hardships successfully endured. She had had her tea, had been warmed, served, and tended. For the first time since her arrival she was comfortable, and now she must go to bed. At ten o'clock in the evening, the hour when she usually drove from the theatre to some evening entertainment.
The prince had gone and the Gross family came in to ask if she wanted anything more.
"No, but you are ready to go to bed, and I ought to return to my room, should I not?" replied the countess.
Just at that moment the door was flung open and a head like the bronze cast of the bust of a Roman emperor appeared. A face which in truth seemed as if carved from bronze, keen eagle eyes, a nose slightly hooked, an imperious, delicately moulded brow, short hair combed upward, and an expression of bitter, sad, but irresistible energy on the compressed lips. As the quick eyes perceived the countess, the head was drawn back with the speed of lightning. But old Gross, proud of his son, called him back.
"Come in, come in and be presented to this lady, people don't run away so."
The young man, somewhat annoyed, returned.
"My son, Ludwig, principal of the drawing school," said old Gross. Ludwig's artist eyes glided over the countess; she felt the glance of the connoisseur, knew, that he could appreciate her beauty. What a delight to see herself, among these simple folk, suddenly reflected in an artist's eyes and find that the picture came back beautiful. How happened so exquisite a crystal, which can be polished only in the workshops of the highest education and art, to be in such surroundings? The countess noted with ever increasing amazement the striking face and the proud poise of the head on the small, compact, yet classically formed figure. She knew at the first moment that this was a man in the true sense of the word, and she gave him her hand as though greeting an old acquaintance from the kingdom of the ideal. It seemed as if she must ask: "How do you come here?"
Ludwig Gross read the question on her lips. He possessed the vision from which even the thoughts must be guarded, or he would guess them.
"I must ask your pardon for disturbing you. I have just come from the meeting and only wanted to see my sister. I heard she was ill."
"Oh, I feel quite well again," the latter answered.
"Yes," said the countess in a somewhat embarrassed tone, "you will be vexed with the intruder who has brought so much anxiety and alarm into your house? I reproach myself for being so foolish as to have wanted another lodging, but at first I thought that the ceiling would fall upon me, and I was afraid."
"Oh, I understand that perfectly when persons are not accustomed to low rooms. It was difficult for me to become used to them again when I returned from Munich."
"You were at the Academy?"
"Yes, Countess."
"Will you not take off your wet coat and sit down?"
"I should not like to disturb you, Countess."
"But you won't disturb me at all; come, let us have a little chat."
Ludwig Gross laid his hat and overcoat aside, took a chair, and sat down opposite to the lady. Just at that moment a carriage drove up. The strangers who had engaged the rooms refused to the prince had arrived, and the family hastened out to receive and help them. The countess and Ludwig were left alone.
"What were you discussing at so late an hour?" asked the countess.
"Dore sent us this evening two engravings of his two Passion pictures; he is interested in our play, so we were obliged to discuss the best way of expressing our gratitude and to decide upon the place where they shall be hung. There is no time for such consultations during the day."
"Are you familiar with all of Dore's pictures?"
"Certainly, Countess."
"And do you like him?"
"I admire him. I do not agree with him in every particular, but he is a genius, and genius has a right to forgiveness for faults which mediocrity should never venture to commit, and indeed never will."
"Very true," replied the lady.
"I think," Ludwig Gross continued, "that he resembles Hamerling. There is kinship between the two men. Hamerling, too, repels us here and there, but with him, as with Dore, every line and every stroke flashes with that electric spark which belongs only to the genuine work of art."
His companion gazed at him in amazement.
"You have read Hamerling?"
"Certainly. Who is not familiar with his 'Ahasuerus?'"
"I, for instance," she replied with a faint blush.
"Oh, Countess, you must read it. There is a vigor, an acerbity, the repressed anguish and wrath of a noble nature against the pitifulness of mankind, which must impress every one upon whose soul the questions of life have ever cast their shadows, though I know not whether this is the case with you."
"More than is perhaps supposed," she answered, drawing a long breath. "We are all pessimists, but Hamerling must be a stronger one than is well for a poet."
"That is not quite correct," replied Ludwig. "He is a pessimist just so far as accords with the poesy of our age. Did not Auerbach once say: 'Pessimism is the grief of the world, which has no more tears!' This applies to Hamerling, also. His poetry has that bitter flavor, which is required by a generation that has passed the stage when sweets please the palate and tears relieve the heart."
"Your words are very true. But how do you explain--it would be interesting to hear from you--how do you explain, in this mood of the times, the attraction which draws such throngs to the Passion Play?"
Ludwig Gross leaned back in his chair, and his stern brow relaxed under the bright influence of a beautiful thought.
"One extreme, as is well known, follows another. The human heart will always long for tears, and the world's tearless anguish will therefore yield to a gentler mood. I think that the rush to our simple play is a symptom of this change. People come here to learn to weep once more."
The countess rested her clasped hands on the table and gazed long and earnestly at Ludwig Gross. Her whole nature was kindled, her eyes lingered admiringly upon the modest little man, who did not seem at all conscious of his own superiority. "To learn to weep!" she repeated, nodding gently. "Yes, we might all need that. But do you believe we shall learn it here?"
Ludwig Gross gazed at her smiling. "You will not ask that question at this hour on the evening of the day after tomorrow."
He seemed to her a physician who possessed a remedy which he knows cannot fail. And she began to trust him like a physician.
"May I be perfectly frank?" she asked in a winning tone.
"I beg that you will be so, Countess."
"I am surprised to find a man like you here. I had not supposed there were such people in the village. But you were away a long time, you are probably no longer a representative citizen of Ammergau?"
Ludwig Gross raised his head proudly. "Certainly I am, Countess. If there was ever a true citizen of Ammergau, I am one. Learn to know us better, and you will soon be convinced that we are all of one mind. Though one has perhaps learned more than another, that is a mere accident; the same purpose, the same idea, unites us all."
"But what binds men of such talent to this remote village? Are you married?"
The bitter expression around the artist's mouth deepened as though cut by some invisible instrument. "No, Countess, my circumstances do not permit it; I have renounced this happiness."
The lady perceived that she had touched a sensitive spot, but she desired to probe the wound to learn whether it might be healed. "Is your salary so small that you could not support a family?"
"If I wish to aid my own family, and that is certainly my first duty, I cannot found a home."
"How is that possible. Does so rich a community pay its teacher so poorly?"
"It does as well as it can, Countess. It has fixed a salary of twelve hundred marks for my position; that is all that can be expected."
"For this place, yes. But if you were in Munich, you would easily obtain twice or three times as much."
"Even five times," answered Ludwig, smiling. "I had offers from two art-industrial institutes, one of which promised a salary of four thousand, the other of six thousand marks per annum. But that did not matter when the most sacred duties to my home were concerned."
"But these are superhuman sacrifices. Who can expect you to banish yourself here and resign everything which the world outside would lavish upon you in the richest measure? Everyone must consider himself first."
"Why, Countess, Ammergau would die out if everybody was of that opinion."
"Oh! let those remain who are suited to the place, who have learned and can do nothing more. But men of talent and education, like you, who can claim something better, belong outside."
"On the contrary, Countess, they belong here," Ludwig eagerly answered. "What would become of the Passion Play if all who have learned and can do something should go away, and only the uneducated and the ignorant remain? Do you suppose that there are not a number of people here, who, according to your ideas, would have deserved 'a better fate?' We have enough of them, but go among us and learn whether any one complains. If he should, he would be unworthy the name of a son of Ammergau!" He paused a moment, his bronzed face grew darker. "Do you imagine," he added, "that we could perform such a work, perform it in a manner which, in some degree, fulfills the aesthetic demand of modern taste, without possessing, in our midst, men of intellect and culture? It is bad enough that necessity compels many a talented native of Ammergau to seek his fortune outside, but the man to whom his home still gives even a bit of bread must be content with it, and without thinking of what he might have gained outside, devote his powers to the ideal interests of his fellow citizens."
"That is a grand and noble thought, but I don't understand why you speak as if the people of Ammergau were so poor. What becomes of the vast sums gained by the Passion Play?"
Ludwig Gross smiled bitterly. "I expected that question, it comes from all sides. The Passion Play does not enrich individuals, for the few hundred marks, more or less, which each of the six hundred actors receives, do not cover the deficit of all the work which the people must neglect. The revenue is partly consumed by the expenses, partly used for the common benefit, for schools and teachers. The principal sums are swallowed by the Leine and the Ammer! The ravages of these malicious mountain streams require means which our community could never raise, save for the receipts of the Passion Play, and even these are barely sufficient for the most needful outlay."
"Is it possible? Those little streams!" cried the countess.
"Would flood all Ammergau," Gross answered, "if we did not constantly labor to prevent it. We should be a poor, stunted people, worn down by fever, our whole mountain valley would be a desolate swamp. The Passion Play alone saves us from destruction--the Christ who once ruled the waves actually holds back from us the destroying element which would gradually devour land and people. But, for that very reason, the individual has learned here, as perhaps nowhere else in the world, to live and sacrifice himself for the community! The community is comprised to us in the idea of the Passion Play. We know that our existence depends upon it, even our intellectual life, for it protects us from the savagery into which a people continually struggling with want and need so easily lapses. It raises us above the common herd, gives even the poorest man an innate dignity and self-respect, which never suffer him to sink to base excesses."
"I understand that," the countess answered.
"Then can you wonder that not one of us hesitates to devote property, life, and every power of his soul to this work of saving our home, our poor, oppressed home, ever forced to straggle for its very existence?"
"What a man!" the countess involuntarily exclaimed aloud. Ludwig Gross had folded his arms across his breast, as if to restrain the pulsations of his throbbing heart. His whole being thrilled with the deepest, noblest emotions. He rose and took his hat, like a person whose principle it is to shut every emotion within his own bosom, and when a mighty one overpowers him, to hide himself that he may also hide the feeling.
"No," cried the countess, "you must not leave me so, you rare, noble-hearted man. You have just done me the greatest service which can be rendered. You have made my heart leap with joy at the discovery of a genuine human being. Ah! it is a cordial in this world of conventional masks! Give me your hand! I am beginning to understand why Providence sent me here. That must indeed be a great cause which rears such men and binds such powers in its service."
Ludwig Gross once more stood calm and quiet before her. "I thank you, Countess, in the name of the cause for which I live and die."
"And, in the name of that cause, which I do not understand, yet dimly apprehend, I beg you, let us be friends. Will you? Clasp hands upon it."
A kindly expression flitted over the grave man's iron countenance, and he warmly grasped the little hand.
"With all my heart, Countess."
She held the small, slender artist-hand in a close clasp, mournfully reading in the calm features of the stern, noble face the story of bitter suffering and sacrifice graven upon it.
