CHAPTER II.
AN INALIENABLE POSSESSION.
The next morning came the tidings that the groom whom Sonnenkamp haddismissed shortly before his journey, suspecting him of being a spy ofPranken's, had been arrested in the capital in the very act of offeringfor sale a large silver goblet. Roland brought the news to Eric, andthis was only one of the many interruptions liable at any moment tobreak in upon the hours of study and thought, in consequence of thisrobbery. Of what use were lessons when the mind was thus excited? Whatlasting impression could be made? At one time Eric thought of goinghunting more frequently with Roland, in order to amuse him and let himgain fresh elasticity and powers of observation by the pursuit of newobjects. But he finally decided on the opposite course, that of helpinghis pupil not by amusement, but by closer application to his studies.Great was his satisfaction, therefore, at having Roland say to him,--
"Let us forget all else and quietly go on with our work."
The boy's love of study had received an impulse which made everyinterruption distasteful to him, and led him to look for his bestpleasures in his books.
Roland soon became conscious of a fresh energy in Eric, without beingable to conjecture its cause; it was the exaltation that follows adanger escaped, escaped by one's own effort. Whenever Eric thought ofthe days at Wolfsgarten, and his trifling with those feelings whichshould be the finest of the human heart, he seemed to himself a thief.He had recklessly staked the entire capital which he had so laboriouslywon; he had allowed himself, under a pretended interchange of noblethoughts, to toy with Bella: to flirt, as he called it in plainlanguage, with Clodwig's wife. To his mind, he had violated asanctuary; how small, how infinitely small in comparison, seemed theoffence of these poor people! He felt deeply humbled in his own eyes.How gladly would he have made a pilgrimage with Roland to some templewhere he could purify himself, and where Roland could gain newstrength! Whither should he turn?
It is easier for one wearied in the exciting race of life, and burdenedin conscience, to enter into the invisible temple built with hands thaninto the visible temple of science; yet Eric succeeded in doing this.What he would with difficulty have accomplished for himself, perhapswould have failed to accomplish, he did from duty to another. He losthimself in the love of knowledge, and everything became clearer andmore intelligible. As an experienced swimmer delights in the onwardrush of the waves, dives below the surface to rise again to the light,and with vigorous arms divides the waters; so Eric plunged intoscience, and felt his heart swell with joy when the mighty waves roaredtowards him. Gone were all petty fears and anxieties, all self-contest.
In Roland, too, deep currents were stirred. He often went about as in adream. The ground beneath him, which he now knew to be in constantmotion, swam before his eyes: the heavens were no longer there; the oldworld was dissolved and a new one revealed; while mingling with allthis new life within him was the thought that all private propertywould be abolished, and poverty and riches divided equally among men.Eric observed this excitement in the mind of his pupil. Roland said tohim one day timidly,--
"Tell me, Eric, if there will ever come to be no more private propertyin the world, and consequently no more thieves."
Eric was startled to see how this strange idea had taken hold of theboy. He explained that he had only brought that up as an illustration;the thing itself was an impossibility; he had only meant to show what aradical change might be worked in the minds and lives of men.
Fresh evidences of this unaccountable tendency of the boy's thoughtswere constantly appearing. One day he asked Eric to go with him to thehuntsman's, to see how his wife and children were faring. He said hehad met the man's son, a cooper in the service of the Wine-count, alittle while ago, and had offered to shake hands with him, telling himthe son was not to blame for what the father had done, even if he haddone anything wrong, which he certainly had not; but that the cooperhad stared at him, and instead of taking his offered hand, had drawnhis hammer from his leather apron, swung it back and forth for a while,and finally walked off.
When Eric and Roland approached the huntsman's house, the birds in thecages were singing, busiest among them the blackbird, with hisincessant chirp of thanksgiving, and the dogs were bounding merrily.The wife looked ill and slatternly, and was full of complaints. Shetold how she had wanted to let all the birds out after her husband wastaken to prison, but her son, the cooper, insisted on everything beingleft as it was till his father came back, which was sure to be verysoon; Sevenpiper had in the mean while undertaken to do part of herhusband's work, and the cooper attended to the night duties, though hehad to work so hard through the day. Everything should be doneproperly, that the place might be kept open for her husband.
Eric offered her a sum of money, which she refused, saying that herson, the cooper, had forbidden her to accept anything from Sonnenkamp'sfamily.
"If this man is innocent, as I believe he is," said Roland, when theywere in the villa again, "what can make up to him for all the anxietyand distress he has had to suffer?"
Eric had no satisfactory answer to give; he could only say that thiswas another proof of the fact that the best things in life could not besupplied by money.