part in the Passion."
"Oh, how harsh!" cried the countess; "And in a land where human beings
are so near to nature, and in circumstances where the poor girls are so
little guarded."
"Yes, we are aware of that--and Josepha is a heavy loss to us in the
play--but these rules have come down to us from our ancestors and must
be rigidly maintained. Yet the girl takes it too much to heart, she
weeps day and night, so that people never pass the house to avoid
hearing her lamentations, and now she wants to kill herself, the
foolish lass."
"Oh, it's very well for you to talk, it's very well for you to talk,"
now burst from the girls lips in accents tremulous with passion.
"First, try once what it is to have the whole world point at you. When
the Englishmen, and the strangers from all the foreign countries in the
world, come and want to see the famous Josepha Freyer, who played in
the last Passion, and fairly drag the soul out of your body with their
questions about the reason that you no longer act in it. Wait till you
have to tell each person the story of your own disgrace, that it may be
carried through the whole earth and know that your name is branded
wherever men speak of the Passion Play. First try what it is to hide in
a corner like a criminal, while they are acting in the Passion, and
bragging and giving themselves airs as if they were saints, while
thousands upon thousands listen devoutly. Ah, I alone am shut out, and
yet I know that _no one_ can act as I do." She drew herself up proudly,
and flung the magnificent traditional locks of the Magdalene back on
her shoulders. "Just seek such a Magdalene as I was--you will find
none. And then to be forced to hear people who are passing ask: 'Why
doesn't Josepha Freyer play the Magdalene this year?' And then there
are whispers, shrugs, and laughter, some one says, 'then she would suit
the character exactly.' And when people pass the house they point at
it--it seems as if I could feel it through the walls--and mutter:
'That's where the Penitent lives!' No, I won't bear it. I only waited
till there was a heavy storm to make the water deep enough for me to
drown myself. And I've been prevented even in this."
"Josepha!" said the countess, deeply moved, "will you go with me--away
from Ammergau, to another, a very different world, where you and your
disgrace are unknown?"
Josepha gazed at the stranger as if in a dream.
"I believe," the lady added, "that my losing my maid to-day was an act
of Providence in your behalf. Will you take her place?"
"Thank heaven!" said old Gross. "Brighter days will dawn for you,
Josepha!"
Josepha stood still with her hands clasped, tears were streaming down
her cheeks.
"Why, do you hesitate to accept my offer?" asked the countess, greatly
perplexed.
"Oh, don't be angry with me--I am sincerely grateful; but what do I
care for all these things, if I am no longer permitted to act the
Magdalene?" burst in unutterable anguish from the very depths of the
girl's soul.
"What an ambition!" said the countess to Andreas in astonishment.
"Yes, that is the way with them all here--they would rather lose their
lives than a part in the Passion!" he answered in a low tone. "But,
child, you could not always play the Magdalene--in ten years you would
be too old for it," he said soothingly to the despairing Josepha.
"Oh that's a very different thing--when we have grown grey with honors,
we know that we must give it up--but so--" and again she gazed
longingly at the beautiful, deep, rushing water, where it would be so
cool, so pleasant to rest--which she had vowed to seek, and now could
not keep her word.
"Do you love your child, Josepha?" asked Countess Wildenau.
"It died directly after it was born."
"Do you love your mother?"
"No, she was always unkind and harsh to me, and now she has lost her
mind."
"Do you love your lover?" the lady persisted.
"Yes--but he is dead! A poacher shot him--he was a forester."
"Then you have no one for whom you care to live?"
"No one!"
"Then come with me and try whether you cannot love me well enough to
make it worth while to live for me! Will you?"
"Yes, your Highness, I will try!" replied the girl, fixing her large
eyes with an expression of mingled inquiry and admiration upon the
countess. A beautiful glow of gratitude and confidence gradually
transfigured the grief-worn face: "I think I could do anything for
you."
"Come with me then--at once, poor child--I will save you! Your
relatives will not object."
"Oh, no! They will be glad to have me go away."
"And your cousin, the--the--" she does not know herself why she
hesitates to pronounce the name.
"The Christ-Freyer?" said Josepha finishing the sentence. "Oh! he has
not spoken to me for a year, except to say what was absolutely
necessary, he cannot get over my having brought disgrace upon his
unsullied name. It has made him disgusted with life here and, if it
were not for the Christ, he would not stay in Ammergau. He is so severe
in such things."
"So _severe!_" the countess repeated, thoughtfully.
The clock in the steeple of the Ammergau church struck two.
"It is late," said the countess, "the poor thing needs rest." She
wrapped her own cloak around the girl.
"Come, lonely heart, I will warm you."
She turned once more to drink in the loveliness of the exquisite scene.
"Night of miracle, I thank thee."