Berger

“ I say I am afraid, because Berger is a most unhappy man. The bright lights of his brilliant wit play upon a dark background full of storms. He is standing alone in the world, misjudged by everybody, feared by many, loved by none. ”

“ Berger started at once, Franz following behind him. As they went along, Berger fancied he heard a sob. He looked round: there were tears in the old servant's eyes. When they got into the residence, Berger turned to him and said: "Be a man, Franz."
Then the old fellow could contain himself no longer; bright tears coursed down his cheeks. "Dr. Berger," he stammered. He had bent over his hand and kissed it before Berger could prevent him. "Have pity on me! Tell me what has been going on the last two months! We often speak to Brigitta about it--I am told nothing! Why? ”

“ For half an hour I was telling him about my condition and how I always get a head-ache now if I have to think. But he stuck to his point, 'you will have to undertake the matter: you must exert yourself!' Good Heavens! what power of exertion has one left at seventy years of age! Well, good morning, dear Dr. Berger! But it's odious--most odious!"
Berger looked after the old man as he painfully hobbled along: "And in such hands," he thought, "rests the fate of my two friends."
Under the weight of this thought, he had not the courage to face Sendlingen. ”

“ Oh, and this man is noble and sensitive!"
"You are unjust to him in that, too," protested Berger. "And in that most of all. That he who can usually read the hearts of men like a book, has not thought of this most obvious and natural thing, shows best of all how greatly his misery has distracted and desolated him. He only wants one thing: to come to you, to console you, to console himself in you." ”

“ Berger drew himself up to his full height; his eyes blazed with anger as he stepped between her and the crowd.
"Oh, what crowds of people!" murmured the poor girl. Her cheeks and forehead glowed in a fever-heat of shame: but the colour soon went and her grief-worn face was white again; the look of her eyes was weary and faint. "To think that one should have to suffer so much before dying."
"You will not die!" He spoke slowly, distinctly, as one speaks to a deaf person. "You will live, and after you have satisfied the justice of men, you will begin life over again. ”

“ When Berger reflected how one act dovetailed into another, how link fitted into link in the chain of cause and effect, how all these people could not have acted otherwise than they were obliged to act, how guilt had of necessity supervened, and now retribution, the strong man shuddered from head to foot: he had to bow his head before that pitiless, all-just power for which he knew no name ... But was it really all-just? If all these people, if Sendlingen and Victorine had not acted otherwise than their nature and circumstances commanded, why had they to suffer for it so frightfully? ”

“ CHAPTER VI. Weighed down by sorrow, Berger proceeded homewards. To the solitary bachelor Sendlingen was more than a friend, he was a dearly loved brother. He was struck to the heart, as by a personal affliction, with compassion for this fate, this terrible fate, so suddenly and destructively breaking in upon a beneficent life, like a desolating flood.
Would this flood ever subside again and the soil bring forth flowers and fruit? The strong man's looks darkened as he thought of the future: worse than the evil itself seemed to him the manner in which it affected his friend. ”

“ Again the thought rose in Berger's mind which a few weeks ago had comforted him and lifted him above the misery of the moment: that there was a solution of these complications, a great, a liberating solution--there must be, just because this man was what he was! But even now he did not know how to find this solution; one thing only was clear to him: if Sendlingen undertook the inquiry and thus saved his child, it would be an act for which there would be all manner of excuses but it would assuredly not be that great, saving act of which he dreamt! ”

“ He talked for a long time of the excellencies of the work, but Berger hardly heard him, and was silent and absent-minded for the rest of the evening. When Moldenhauer retired to his cabin for the night, Berger still remained on deck; he was fascinated, he said, by this wondrous spectacle of the night.
And indeed the aspect of the scene was strange enough and not without its charm. The moon-light lay in a faint glimmer on the stream that here, having almost poured forth its endless waters, was slowly flowing with a gentle murmur towards its grave, the vast sandy plain of the sea. ”

“ But Sendlingen was so calm that it struck Berger as almost peculiar. "I have had time to get accustomed to these thoughts," he said.
"How do you think of living now?" asked Berger.
"I shall move to Gratz," replied Sendlingen quickly; he had manifestly given utterance to a long-cherished resolve.
"Won't you be too lonely there?" objected Berger. "Why won't you go to Vienna? By the inheritance from your wife, you are a rich man who does not require to select the Pensionopolis on the Mur on account of its cheapness. ”

“ Leonora!" repeated Berger, closing the medallion again and putting it away. "And now I hope you will know who I am, and what the account is which we have to settle."
The count had turned pale even under his rouge; his false teeth rattled; he had to sit down in an arm-chair which stood near the table, as he could not stand any longer.
Berger seemed to enjoy the wretched sight.
"How the coward trembles!" he said. "How the mean heart in the hollow bosom knocks against the ribs for the sake of a useless bit of life! Miserable coward! You can seduce girls, but you cannot face a man! ”

“ Sendlingen had hardly finished dressing, when the sound of music and the shouts of the crowd, announced the approach of the procession. He was obliged to yield to his friend's pressure and go out on the balcony. There was a red glimmer from the direction of the river, and like a giant fire-serpent, the procession wound its way through the crowd. It stopped before the hotel, the torch-bearers formed themselves in line in the broad street. Unceasingly, endlessly, like the roar of wild waves, resounded the cheers.
Berger's eyes sparkled. "This is a moment which few men live to see," he said. ”

“ She will die before you receive the decision."
"God forbid!" cried Berger.
The Governor shook his head. "She would be free in that case," he said. "Why should you wish her to live? What do you hope to attain? Commutation to penal servitude for life, or imprisonment for twenty years! Does that strike you as being better? I don't think so; in my profession it is impossible to believe it, Dr. Berger. Well, as you think best! If you want to speak to Victorine Lippert, the warder shall take you round." ”

“ The warder looked at him amazed. "Well, such as we--naturally enough--are at least entitled to our thoughts," he replied. "There has been a run upon this cell since yesterday as if it contained a princess! First the doctor. Father Rohn and you, Herr Berger--and now his Lordship the Chief Justice, and all in little more than an hour's time. That doesn't occur every day, and I know the reason for it."
Berger forced himself to smile. "Of course you do, because you're such a smart fellow, Höbinger! ”

“ I cannot help these poor people--besides Werner himself will hardly be able to find them guilty. And the cases are not parallel; I should have broken my oath if I had presided at the trial: I do not break it if I obey the Minister's command."
"That is true," retorted Berger. "But I can only say: Seek some other consolation, Victor,--this is unworthy of you! For you have always been, like me, of the opinion that it is every man's duty to protect the right, and prevent wrong, so long as there is breath in his body! ”

“ They had come out to the front of the station and had got into Berger's sleigh. "To my house!" he called to the driver!
"What are you thinking of?" asked Sendlingen.
"You forget that you have no longer a habitable home!" cried Berger. "There is such a veritable hurly-burly at the residence, that even Franz hardly knows his way about--where do you mean to stay?"
"At the Hofmann Hotel," replied Sendlingen. "I have already commissioned Franz to take rooms there. It is impossible for me to stay with you, George. Please do not press me. I cannot do it." ”

“ I don't suppose it will be particularly agreeable to you," laughed the old Judge, leaning confidentially on Berger's arm. "Though for the matter of that you may be quite indifferent about it: you have done your duty, your appeal was certainly splendidly drawn up, but what further interest can you have in this person? For she is a thoroughly good-for-nothing person, and that's why she is dying so young! What stories that servant-girl has told me about her, stories, my dear doctor, that an old barrack-wall would have blushed to hear. ”

“ Too many things had happened that could never be forgiven and forgotten. I had preferred others to her, and she had preferred another man to me. That Prince Waldenberg was her betrothed."
"Why do you say was?"
"Because I found them leaving town. She had recollected at the last moment that she had a heart in her bosom whose longing not all the riches of the world could satisfy."
"Strange! strange!" murmured Berger. "You, both of you: the baron's son who makes common cause with the people, and the low-born man's son who sits among princes, are rivals for the favor of the same lady! ”

“ His majesty consents to withdraw the troops as soon as you lay down your arms." "And as soon as we offer our throats to the knife!" cried a tremendous voice, and a man suddenly stood by the side of the orator in the white cravat.
It was Berger. His gray hair was hanging wildly around his uncovered head; his eyes were burning as if the revolution itself had taken his form and voice. "Will," he continued, "you hesitate, and fear, and negotiate, while your brethren are murdered in the next street? Are you ever going on trusting, you trusting, deceived, cheated people. ”

“ Next morning about nine o'clock, when Berger had just sat down at his writing-table, there was a violent knock at his door and a clerk of the Law Courts rushed in. "Dr. Berger!" he cried, breathlessly, "Herr von Werner urgently begs you to go to him at once. Victorine Lippert has escaped from the prison in the night."
Berger turned deadly pale. "Escaped?"
"Or been taken out!" continued the clerk. "Herr von Werner hopes you may be able to give some hint as to who could have interested themselves in the person." ”

“ It was Prince Frederick von Berger. Did they not have to pay for the tenancy of their miserable hovels to his steward, who lived in the castle itself? Oh, yes. He was a great man—a very great man. This was only one of his estates, and one which he never visited. One could not blame him. It was scarcely attractive to a man who owned a palace in Berlin. Then the storming of the cruel Baltic, which robbed them of comrades every year. Who would live on its bitter, desolate shores unless tied there by the stress of existence? ”

“ We will beat Von Berger at his own game, and once we are in America we can snap our fingers at the whole race. I will tell you now Von Berger threatened me yesterday again. He it was who deprived me of my command at Borga. He it was who superseded me over here. He it is who has given me the life of a cur ever since. Now I shall pay him in a way he little suspects. I will dictate this letter for you, Vita, and when it is written you will address it to your father and enclose it under cover to Sir Andrew Farlow at Dorby Towers. ”

“ Was not Berger far superior to him in strength of mind, as well as in nobility of soul? And yet, and yet--"that I may fully measure the depth of this wretchedness, that I may touch with my own hands the incredible," the poor man had said, when he fell into the arms of the rope-dancer. Was that, then, the last conclusion of wisdom? The high-minded idealist saw himself excelled by the rude slave of sensuality in courage of life and joyousness of life! The pupil of Plato acknowledged a drunken clown as his master! ”

“ I shouted, putting my back against the door, "you shan't butcher a free Englishman like a sheep! The first among you who stirs, drops!"
A man sprang at me. I saw along the sights of my Derringer the gleam of a knife and the demoniacal face of Gustave Berger. ”

“ Berger heard him say as he went by, "her lover, the young Count, has got her out." The two female warders of the Infirmary cells were there too, sobbing.
Berger entered the Chief Justice's Chambers. Baron Dernegg and the Governor of the prison were with Werner. At a side-table sat a clerk; a crucifix and two unlighted candles were beside him. "At last!" cried Werner. "I begged you so particularly to come at once. There is not a moment to be lost. Light the candles!" he called to the clerk. ”

“ At length Major Stultz spoke: “Mr. Hamilton, may I beg of you to drive a little slower—Crescenz’s nerves are not in a state to bear——”
“Why, good gracious, Crescenz!” exclaimed Madame Berger, “you don’t mean to say you are frightened? Mr. Hamilton drives so well that there is not the slightest danger.” ”

“ Berger signed to Franz to leave the room. Not until the door was closed behind him did he approach the sick man, and take his hand, and look searchingly into his face. It reassured him to see that, though his eyes were dim, they no longer looked wild and restless as they did a few hours ago.
"You are going to her?" he asked. "That must not be."
"I must!" cried Sendlingen despairingly. "It is the one thought to which I cling to avoid madness. When I awoke--I was so perplexed and desolate, I felt my misery returning--then I heard Rohn's voice in the next room. ”