ANTON
It was only this I wished to tell you, mother: I know that you have made Louise feel sad.
MRS. HAMMELEV (_with anxiety_)
Has she then told you?--
ANTON
She has told me nothing; but don’t you think I know her voice? And there was a false note vibrating in it. Have you anything against her? If you have--tell me.
MRS. HAMMELEV (_avoiding the question_)
Why, I scarcely know her--
ANTON
Then I can only think that you are worried on account of me. It doesn’t seem to you that I ought to take the responsibility of founding a family--I who have to stumble along and feel my way like a mole here in this pitiful world.
MRS. HAMMELEV
But, my dear boy, how can you say so!
ANTON
Oh, yes, _it is that_. What else could it be? But now I want to tell you one thing. You who have your sight often think of us blind ones as of feeble-minded beings. We know nothing, we are fit for nothing. But that is where you are mistaken. We are just like other human beings: we can think and dream, can love and hate just like others. You know--sometimes when I stand before an audience, it seems to me as if I were all alone. There is nobody whose soul or thoughts reach me; nobody who can disturb me. I am like the fertile soil that is left to take care of itself; there is an abundance of sunshine saved within me. That is why I feel life so strongly--like something warm and fruitful within me. And it is this feeling that gives me faith; that tells me I have a future awaiting me in spite of all.
MRS. HAMMELEV
Thank God for that, Anton! Thank God for that!
ANTON
But perhaps you mean to say that what Louise feels for me is nothing but pity; that she will cease to care sooner or later. If that is what you think, I want to tell you something--I want to tell you how we first learned to know each other.
MRS. HAMMELEV
No, you need not tell me that, Anton.
ANTON
But I want you to listen to me. You remember, no doubt, a few years ago--I had graduated from the conservatory--had had the best of teachers--and the time came for me when I had to get something to do. But nobody wished to have anything to do with a blind musician--who could not see. So I had to take a position out of town--
MRS. HAMMELEV
In the café, yes.
ANTON
Should we, perhaps, rather say in the barroom. Or in a place still worse. All around me nothing but rough, vulgar, and drunken talk of wanton women and beasts of men. And ’midst all this noise and the smell of liquor I had to sit and play music that was disgusting to me--only for the alms that they cared to throw to me. For it was for alms that I played. Right above the place where I sat there was nailed a sign: “Don’t forget the blind musician!”--
MRS. HAMMELEV
My poor boy! My poor, poor boy!--
ANTON
It was then that I wrote to you; I had to have a human being to whom I could open my heart. It was for that reason I didn’t or couldn’t spare your feelings.
MRS. HAMMELEV
Nobody could be nearer to you than your mother.
ANTON
Do you remember how you answered me? That I should hope and trust that I might come to the place where all eyes are opened and all tears are dried.
MRS. HAMMELEV
I had fought with God over you. But I thought He wouldn’t listen to my prayers--not as I wished Him to do. It was then I began to think there was only one consolation.
ANTON (_nodding_)
Death--yes. What else could there have been? Death is charitable, if one will only wait for it. But to wait--that was what seemed so hard to me--
MRS. HAMMELEV
For God’s sake, Anton.
ANTON
Don’t take it so to heart, mother; it is over now--long ago. But that evening, on going home, I searched my way down to the river. Of what importance in life could a poor blind musician ever be? And the Lord would not have turned me away if I had come a little too early to Him, I don’t believe.
MRS. HAMMELEV
God have mercy! And I could be at rest here at home. Why didn’t I know, why couldn’t I have thought, that you were so much in need!
ANTON
Probably because nothing happened; because nothing was meant to happen. It is strange to think how often a mere chance can change a whole life. Chance would have it that evening that I went astray and passed through streets where I had never been before. I had fumbled around about an hour’s time when I felt somebody touch my hand, and a woman’s voice asked whether I had trouble in finding my way. I have become used to judging people by their voices, and I said to myself at once: “Here is one who is also in despair and who, like you, is wishing for a river, too.” And I opened my heart to her.
MRS. HAMMELEV
And that woman--that--was--
ANTON
That was Louise--yes. And I wasn’t mistaken in her. She had gone through many things; as much as I had. But she didn’t look for the river any more. She had got over that. Well, I went home with her to her little room. She lived in a hall-room. In the daytime she went out sewing.
MRS. HAMMELEV
You went home with her--in the middle of the night!
ANTON (_with a smile_)
Yes, mother. I am not used to finding much difference between day and night. To me it is all one color. And she dared not let me go. Who knows--perhaps I might have found the river, anyhow, then. So she sat up all night and talked to me about life and its joys.
MRS. HAMMELEV
Life and its joys. And I--
ANTON
Yes, mother--that you have given to me. Well, that was not all she did. She didn’t only _speak_ to me. She gave me a place to sleep and she gave me food to eat, so that I shouldn’t have to play any more in the barroom. For fourteen days she shared every penny of her wages with me. And in the afternoon, when she came home from her work, we went out together to look for a position for me. She advertised and put in applications for me, and--thank God! at last I got a position as an organist. Then came the stipend and then the rest. And during all my struggles she remained by my side.
MRS. HAMMELEV (_tenderly_)
She has been much to you, Anton.
ANTON
She has been everything to me, mother, everything. Should anybody take her away from me, they’ll take my life at the same time.
MRS. HAMMELEV (_frightened, agonized_)
Anton--Oh, no--
ANTON
Yes, for I would believe God had regretted that He did not let me go into the river that night, after all. (_He rises and gropes his way_.) It’s strange--it seems to me as if the room suddenly had become so different. It is just as if I wasn’t at home here any more. Isn’t that Louise’s steps I hear above me now?