‘Better thou and I were lying hidden from the heart's disgrace,
Rolled in one another's arms, and silent in a long embrace.'
LORD TENNYSON.
NEXT day a party on horseback approached Leitmeritz by the road beside the river. Their leader was young Vaclav, the Paneč of Pihel; and beside him, on Rabstein, rode a lady, in a close-fitting robe of white, the color of mourning. Lucaz, the new squire, and Karel, the page, rode behind them; the rest were attendants of lower rank.
They paused, observing with curiosity a crowd by the river, apparently gathered around some object which they could not see. Some of the crowd were uttering cries and lamentations. Karel spurred his horse forward. ‘Shall I go and see what it is, Paneč?’ he asked Václav.
‘So do,' answered Václav. But as Karel turned to go someone came towards them from the crowd.
As soon as the approaching figure became distinctly visible, the whole party set up a unanimous shout of joy; and with a common impulse everyone, except Zedenka, sprang to the ground, and advanced to meet Master Hubert. ‘Welcome! welcome!’ was the universal cry.
But Hubert's face was grave and sad as he grasped the outstretched hand of Václav. ‘Come to Zedenka,' said Vaclav briefly, leading him to where she sat.
How Hubert had dreamed of this moment! How, through all his perils, he had longed for it, yearned for it as the traveler in Sahara yearns for the water-brooks! Now at last it had come, and it was quite other than he dreamed! His lips pressed the hand of Zedenka, his eyes looked into her eyes, yet he thought the while, not of love, but of death. ‘Parma,' he said sadly, ‘it is over.'
Zedenka bowed her head. ‘I knew it,' she answered. ‘Dear, good Frantisek! He is, then, a martyr of God?'
‘Yes, he has glorified God.'
`In the fire?’ said Václav.
‘No; God called him home by an easier path,' said Hubert, pointing to the sunlit waters of the Elbe. ‘As thou saidst in Constance, "Water does not hurt like fire." '
‘Then bring me to poor broken-hearted Aninka,' said Zedenka. ‘I have come to comfort her, and to take her back with me to Pihel. Henceforth she shall be my sister.'
‘Palma, she is comforted.'
‘Thank God! But then, great anguish stuns at first. It is the after-days that are terrible.'
‘For her,' said Hubert, ‘there will be no terrible after-days.'
Something in his voice struck both Zedenka and Vaclav with a kind of surprise. ‘From thy words,' said Vaclav, ‘one might almost think they had slain her too. As for the crusaders, there is nothing too bad for them. But her father-her own father! Speak, Hubert, in God's name! What has befallen the poor girl? '
‘The best thing that could befall her. She and Frantisek are together.'
‘I shall slay Peichler with this hand as a monster!’ cried Václav. ‘To murder his own child! '
‘Spare thy wrath, Václav. Peichler has enough to answer for, but not that. Mistress Aninka followed Frantisek into the water.'
‘Then she meant to die with him?' said Václav.
‘I think, rather, she meant to save him;’ Hubert answered, ‘She had with her the means of severing his bonds. And, indeed, she had freed his hands.'
‘She meant life or death—with him,' said Zedenka softly. ‘She has found it,' Hubert continued. ‘We knew no more until today. All yesterday the soldiers lined the banks, lest any of the martyrs, though bound hand and foot, might struggle to the shore, and be rescued. But today we are allowed to seek for our dead and to bury them. Parma, are you brave enough to see what the river has just given back to us?'
‘Aninka is dear to me in death as in life,' said Zedenka.
Hubert drew near and helped her to dismount. Rabstein whinnied, and thrust towards him his beautiful head, expecting a caress; and Hubert patted his neck ere he turned to lead the way to the group beside the river. Václav followed, with all the rest, except two or three who remained in charge of the horses.
The crowd divided to let them pass. There in the midst, on the green grass starred with flowers, the sleepers lay. Loving, reverent hands had smoothed the damp, disheveled hair, covered the disfigured faces with a snow-white kerchief, arranged and straightened the disordered clothing. But there was one thing no human hand could do. The clasp of the dead hand defied the utmost strength of the living to unloose it. Those two lay locked in one another's arms, as if defying earth and hell to divide them now.
Zedenka stood gazing on the dead, but chiefly on the gentle girl she had loved so well. Her cheek and lips were white as marble, but she neither spoke nor wept. Those around her stood in silence also. At last she knelt down on the grass, and touched reverently with her lips the cold and rigid hand of Frantisek, For he is a martyr of God,' she said. Then, brave in her great love, she uncovered the face of Aninka, and kissed her lip to lip. But at the sight and touch her ‘tears brake forth at last like rain.' For some minutes she sobbed without restraint. Then she rose up slowly, still weeping, and said, stretching out her hand, ‘Hubert, take me away.'
Hubert took her hand in silence and led her out of the throng. Then he said, ‘Parma, be comforted; it is well with them.'
‘It is well,' she sobbed. ‘Nothing can divide them now.' That evening devout men carried Frantisek and Aninka to their burial, and with tears and lamentations laid them ‘in one grave.' Amongst those who came to see the funeral was the Jewish doctor.
‘I respect your martyrs, though I do not understand them,' he said to Hubert. ‘I own it is not John Hum who has made these; it is more like that which made John Hum. What that may be, I know not. But farewell, Master Hubert, for I am going to the Kaiser. Some of these crusaders will give me safe escort to his headquarters.'
Zedenka meanwhile was standing by the grave and trying to console the broken-hearted Alsbeta. ‘Come with me to Pihel, mother,' she said. ‘We will mourn together for your child. She was very dear to me.'
Hubert drew near, and prayed Zedenka to allow him to lead her from the sad spot.
She gave him her hand simply and trustfully, as she had done a while ago by the river-side.
They went on a few paces in silence, then Zedenka said, as if to herself, ‘Thank God! They have had—they have—forever.’
‘Canst thou thank God, Pánna, that they loved, that they wedded, for this?'
She turned, and flashed an expressive look upon him through her tears. ‘Yes,' she answered, ‘they are thanking Him together now.'
At the words Hubert's strong heart quivered through and through. The answer, which was also a question, sprang unawares from his lip. ‘Palma, couldest thou give what Aninka gave to Frantisek—to me—for this? '
She trembled, but did not speak.
‘Wilt thou?’ His hand closed upon her hand, his eyes looked into her eyes, and this time love, not death, was in them. ‘Thou knowest my heart has lain at thy feet these long years. Thou knowest, too, that death—that martyrdom—may be our next day's task and calling. Wilt thou, then, take, and give, though it may be for this? '
‘I take and I give,' said Zedenka softly, 'for this, and for heaven beyond.'