Directly, there came a change in this regular movement. The moaning ceased, the eyelids opened feebly, the eyes looked inquiringly around, and the lips tried to say something.
"Father!" whispered Johannes, trembling, while he looked anxiously into the seeking eyes. The weary glance rested upon him, and a faint, faint smile furrowed the hollow cheeks. The thin closed hand was lifted from the sheet, and made an uncertain movement toward Johannes – then fell again, powerless.
"Come, come!" said Pluizer. "No scenes here!"
"Step aside, Johannes," said Doctor Cijfer, "we must see what can be done."
The doctor began his examination, and Johannes left the bed and went to stand by the window. He looked at the sunny grass and the clear sky, and at the broad chestnut leaves where the big flies sat – shining blue in the sunlight. The moaning began again with the same regularity.
A blackbird hopped through the tall grass in the garden – great red and black butterflies were hovering over the flower-beds, and there reached Johannes from out the foliage of the tallest trees the soft, coaxing coo of the wood-doves.
In the room the moaning continued – never ceasing. He had to listen to it – and it came regularly – as unpreventable as the falling drop that causes madness. In suspense he waited through each interval, and it always came again – frightful as the footstep of approaching death.
All out-of-doors was wrapped in warm, mellow sunlight. Everything was happy and basking in it. The grass-blades thrilled and the leaves sighed in the sweet warmth. Above the highest tree tops, deep in the abounding blue, a heron was soaring in peaceful flight.
Johannes could not understand – it was an enigma to him. All was so confused and dark in his soul. "How can all this be in me at the same time?" he thought.
"Is this really I? Is that my father – my own father? Mine – Johannes'?"
It was as if he spoke of a stranger. It was all a tale that he had heard. Some one had told him of Johannes, and of the house where he lived, and of the father whom he had forsaken, and who was now dying. He himself was not that one – he had heard about him. It was a sad, sad story. But it did not concern himself.
But yes – yes – he was that same Johannes!
"I do not understand the case," said Doctor Cijfer, standing up. "It is a very obscure malady."
Pluizer stepped up to Johannes.
"Are you not going to give it a look, Johannes? It is an interesting case. The doctor does not know it."
"Leave me alone," said Johannes, without turning round. "I cannot think."
But Pluizer went behind him and whispered sharply in his ear, according to his wont:
"Cannot think! Did you fancy you could not think? There you are wrong. You must think. You need not be gazing into the green trees nor the blue sky. That will not help. Windekind is not coming. And the sick man there is going to die. You must have seen that as well as we. But what do you think his trouble is?"
"I do not know – I will not know!"
Johannes said nothing more, but listened to the moaning that had a plaintive and reproachful sound. Doctor Cijfer was writing notes in a little book. At the head of the bed sat the dark figure that had followed them. His head was bowed, his long hand extended toward the sufferer, and his deep-set eyes were fixed upon the clock.
The sharp whispering in his ear began again.
"What makes you look so sad, Johannes? You have your heart's desire now. There are the dunes, there the sunbeams through the verdure, there the flitting butterflies and the singing birds. What more do you want? Are you waiting for Windekind? If he be anywhere, he must be there. Why does he not come? Would he be afraid of this dark friend at the bedside? Yet always he was there!"
"Do you not see, Johannes, that it has all been imagination?
"Do you hear that moaning? It sounds lighter than it did a while ago. You can know that it will soon cease altogether. But what of that? There must have been a great many such groans while you were running around outside in the garden among the wild-roses. Why do you stay here crying, instead of going to the dunes as you used to? Look outside! Flowers and fragrance and singing everywhere just as if nothing had happened. Why do you not take part in all that life and gladness?
"First, you complained, and longed to be here; and after I have brought you where you wished to be, you still are not content. See! I will let you go. Stroll through the high grass – lie in the cool shade – let the flies buzz about you – inhale the fragrance of the fresh young herbs. I release you. Go, now! Find Windekind again!
"You will not? Then do you now believe in me alone? Is what I have told you true? Do I lie, or does Windekind?
"Listen to the moans! – so short and weak! They will soon cease.
"Do not look so agonized, Johannes. The sooner it is over the better. There could be no more long walks now; you will never again look for violets with him. With whom do you think he has taken his walks, during the past two years – while you were away? You cannot ask him now. You never will know. After this you will have to content yourself with me. If you had made my acquaintance a little earlier, you would not look so pitiful now. You are a long way yet from being what you ought to be. Do you think Doctor Cijfer in your place would look as you do? It would make him about as sad as that cat is – purring there in the sunshine. And it is well. What is the use of being so wretched? Did the flowers teach you that? They do not grieve when one of them is plucked. Is not that lucky? They know nothing, therefore they are happy. You have only begun to know things; and now you must know everything, in order to be happy. I alone can teach you. All or nothing.
"Listen to me. What is the difference whether that is your father or not? He is a man who is dying; that is a common occurrence.
"Do you hear the moaning still? Very feeble, is it not? He is near his end."
Johannes looked toward the bed in fearful distress.
Simon, the cat, dropped from the window-seat, stretched himself, and curled up purring on the bed close beside the dying man.
The poor, tired head moved no more. It lay still, pressed into the pillow; yet from the half-open mouth there still came, at intervals, short, exhausted sounds.
They grew softer – softer – scarcely audible.
Then Death turned his dark eyes from the clock to rest them upon the down-sunken head. He raised his hand – and all was still.
An ashen shadow crept over the stiffening face.
Silence – dreary, lonely silence!
Johannes waited – waited.
But the recurring groans had ceased. All was still – utterly, awfully still.
The strain of the long hours of listening was suspended, and it seemed to Johannes as if his soul were released, and falling into black and bottomless depths.
He fell deeper and deeper. It grew stiller and darker around him.
Then he heard Pluizer's voice, as if from far away. "Hey, ho! Another story told."
"That is good," said Doctor Cijfer. "Now you can find out what the trouble was. I leave that to you. I must away."
While still half in a dream, Johannes saw the gleam of burnished knives.
The cat ruffed up his back. It was cold next the body, and he sought the sunshine again.
Johannes saw Pluizer take a knife, examine it carefully, and approach the bed with it.
Then Johannes shook off his stupor. Before Pluizer could reach the bed he was standing in front of him.
"What