SMALL SOULS
BY
LOUIS COUPERUS
Author of "The Footsteps of Fate," etc.
TRANSLATED BY
ALEXANDER TEIXEIRA DE MATTOS
NEW YORK
DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY
1914
TRANSLATOR'S NOTE
This story is translated from the Dutch of Louis Couperus, the foremost
novelist in a country which has lately had the good sense to join the
Berne Convention. Friends who have seen my version in manuscript suggest
to me that certain details of the action and dialogue strike an exotic
note to English ears and may therefore need some interpretation. But I
could not bring myself to burden a work of fiction with an array of
foot-notes nor to believe that it is really necessary to explain to
readers of Couperus' fellow-countryman, "Maarten Maartens," that Dutch
men and women of the upper classes still call their parents "Papa" and
"Mamma," as the English did in the sixties, and still drink tea after
dinner, as the English did in the forties; that, in Holland, persons of
quality are not addressed by their titles in conversation; that it is
not quite correct, or that it is at least a departure from the
aristocratic tradition, for a lady of family _not_ to wash up her own
breakfast-china at the table; that the Dutch speak of Java as India and
sometimes marry native wives, who, _nihilo obstante_, are "received" by
the "family" at home.
I have done my best, by a complicated and perhaps only partly successful
system of italics, hyphens and dots, to render the various
eccentricities of speech of Cateau van Lowe, Adolphine van Saetzema and
Aunt Ruyvenaer. The few Malay words employed by the last-named, by Otto
van Naghel's wife and by her native nurse are explained in notes as and
when they occur.
_Small Souls_ is the first of a series of four novels describing the
fortunes of the Van Lowe family and known in Holland by the generic
title of _The Books of the Small Souls_. The remainder will be
translated and published if and as the antecedent volumes find favour
with English and American readers. They are called: _The Later Life, The
Twilight of the Souls and Dr. Adriaan_.
ALEXANDER TEIXEIRA DE MATTOS.
CHELSEA, 4 _December_, 1913.
SMALL SOULS
CHAPTER I
It was pouring with rain; and Dorine van Lowe was tired out when, by way
of a last visit, she dropped in on Karel and Cateau just before dinner.
But Dorine was pleased with herself. She had gone out immediately after
lunch and had trotted and trammed all over the Hague; she had done much,
if not everything; and her tired face looked very glad and her bright
black eyes sparkled.
"Have meneer and mevrouw gone in to dinner yet, Sientje?" she asked,
nervous and breathless, in a sudden fright lest she should be too late.
"No, miss, but it's just on six," said Sientje, severely.
Dorine van Lowe whisked through the hall and rushed upstairs, forgetting
to put her wet umbrella in the stand. She clutched it in one hand,
together with her skirt, which she forgot to let fall; in her arm she
held a parcel pressed close to her, under her cape; in the other hand
she carried her muff and her old black satin reticule; with the same
hand, making a superhuman effort, she felt for her pocket-handkerchief
and managed to blow her nose without dropping anything but four or five
tram-tickets, which flew around her on every side.
Old Sientje followed her with her glance, severely. Then she went to the
kitchen, fetched a cloth, silently wiped up a trail of rain and drops
along the hall and staircase and carefully picked the tram-tickets off
the stair-carpet.
Dorine walked into her brother's study. Karel van Lowe was sitting
placidly by a good fire, reading; his smooth-shaven face shone pink and
young. He wore his thick, glossy hair neatly combed and brushed into a
fine tuft; he dyed his moustache black; and, like Dorine, he had the
black eyes of the Van Lowes. His broad figure looked comfortable and
well-fed in his spruce clothes; his waistcoat lay in thick creases over
his stomach; and his watch-chain rose and fell with his regular
breathing. He seemed calm and healthy, full of calculating prudence and
quiet selfishness. He gently put aside the magazine which he was
reading, as though he felt that he was in for it, that he would have to
listen to his sister for a quarter of an hour at least; but he made up
his mind to interrupt her pretty often. So he rubbed his large, fat,
pink hands and looked at Dorine impassively; and his glance seemed to
convey:
"Go on, I'm listening, I can't help myself...."
Dorine stood near his writing-table, which was in the middle of the prim
room, while he remained sitting by the fire.
"I've been to all of them!" Dorine began triumphantly.
"To Bertha?"
"To Bertha."
"To Gerrit?"
"To Gerrit."
"To Adolphine?"
"And to Ernst and Paul: I've been to all of them!" said Dorine,
triumphantly. "And they've all promised to come."
"Dorine, would you mind putting your umbrella outside? It's so wet."
Dorine put her umbrella in the passage outside the door and she now also
let fall her skirt, the hem of which showed an edge of wet mud at which
her brother kept staring as though hypnotized.
"And what did Bertha say?" he asked, pretending to be interested, but
giving all his attention to the wet hem.
"Well, Bertha was very nice! I must say, Bertha was very nice!" said
Dorine; and the tears, always so ready with her, came into her dark
eyes. "She was very busy with the girls, drawing up the lists of
invitations for Emilie's wedding; and to-morrow they have one of their
official dinners. But she said at once that, if Mamma wished it, we must
all of us obey her wish and go to Mamma's to-night to meet Constance.
And Van Naghel, who came in for a moment, said so too. Bertha never
agreed with Mamma, about encouraging Constance to come back to Holland;
but, now that things had gone as far as they had, she said she would
look upon Constance as a sister again, quite as a sister."
"And what did Van Naghel say?" asked Karel van Lowe.
Karel was not really interested in what his brother-in-law, Van Naghel
van Voorde, the colonial secretary, had said, but he had a methodical
mind and, now that he knew Bertha's opinion, he also wanted to know her
husband's opinion and the opinion of all the other brothers and sisters.
Meanwhile, he continued to look at the wet hem of Dorine's skirt and
longed to ask her not to touch his paper-knife and paper-weight, which
she kept playing with half-nervously; but he said nothing, calculating
within himself that, presently, when Dorine was gone, he would have a
moment, before dinner, to put everything straight.
"Well, I gathered from what Van Naghel said that he hoped Constance
would show the greatest tact and not be too pushing at first, but that,
as their brother-in-law, he would welcome Van der Welcke and Constance
very cordially."
Karel nodded placidly, to show that he understood what lay at the back
of Van Naghel's words and that he quite agreed.
"And what did Van Saetzema and Adolphine say?"
"Well, of course, I had more trouble with Adolphine than with any of the
others!" cried Dorine, triumphantly waving the paper-knife, while Karel
anxiously followed the movements of her hand. "First, she didn't want to
come and said that Mamma had no morals and all that sort of thing. I
answered that I respected her views; that, of course, every one was free
to think as he pleased; but that she must not forget that Mamma was an
old woman, a very old woman, and that we ought to try and make her happy
in her old age. Then I said that Constance was Mamma's child as much as
any of us; and that it was only natural for Mamma to want us all to take
Constance back as a sister, as it had all happened so very long ago and
she had been married to Van der Welcke for fifteen years and their boy
is thirteen...."
"Dorine, please, would you mind leaving the paper-weight alone? Else all
those letters are sure to get mixed.... And what did Adolphine say to
that?"
"Well, at first, Adolphine wouldn't hear of going, said she was afraid
of Constance' bad influence on the girls, said she couldn't possibly
take them. In fact, she talked like a fool. But, when I told her that
Van Naghel and Bertha were coming and that not a word had been said
about their girls--that they were coming too--then Adolphine said that
she would come after all and bring her girls. And Gerrit and
Ernst"--Dorine opened Karel's stamp-box, but shut it again at once,
terrified when she saw the stamps neatly arranged in the compartments,
according to their values--"I saw Gerrit and Ernst too; and Adeline
spoke very nicely; and Paul...."
A gong sounded.
"That's dinner," said Karel. "I suppose you won't stay, Dorine? I don't
think there's much: Cateau and I always dine so simply...."
"Oh, I eat very little; I should like to stay, if I may; then we can all
go on to Mamma's afterwards...."
Karel van Lowe gave one more look at the muddy hem; he remembered that
the dining-room had been cleaned that day; and he could restrain himself
no longer:
"Dorine," he said, in despair, "in that case, won't you let Marie brush
you down first?"
Then, at last, Dorine realized that she was not fit to be seen, after
trotting and tramming the whole afternoon in the rain. She looked in the
glass: when she had taken off her wet cape, she would be less
presentable than ever. And so she dolefully changed her mind:
"You're right, Karel, I don't look nice; and my boots are wet: I think I
had better go home and change for the evening. So good-bye for the
present, Karel."
"Good-bye, Dorine."
The gong sounded again. Dorine clutched her reticule, hunted all round
the room for her umbrella, until she remembered that it was outside, and
hurried away, while Karel repaired the disorder on his writing-table and
put the paper-weight and paper-knife straight.
In the hall, Dorine met her round-faced sister-in-law staring at her
with startled eyes like an owl's. Cateau asked, in a slow, whining voice
that emphasized every third or fourth word:
"Oh, Do-rine ... are you re-ally ... staying to din-ner?"
"No, thanks, Cateau; it's very kind of you, but I must change my things.
They're all coming this evening, to Mamma's."
"Oh, are they all ... com-ing?"
"Yes.... And I am so glad.... Well, don't let me keep you. Karel will
tell you all about it. So good-bye, till later...."
She hurried away; Sientje let her out, severely.
Karel and Cateau sat down to dinner. They had no children; they were now
living in the Hague, after many years spent in a pretty village in
Utrecht, where Karel had been burgomaster. They had a large and handsome
house in the Oranjestraat; they kept three servants; they kept a
carriage. They loved good fare and took their meals by themselves, just
the two of them; they never entertained: there were no small dinners,
for relations, nor dinner-parties, for friends. They lived according to
the rules of opulent respectability. Everything in their large house,
with its heavy, comfortable furniture, was solid and respectable, in no
wise luxurious. They both looked healthy and opulent and Dutch and
respectable. Cateau was a heavy woman of forty, with a pair of startled
round eyes in a round face, and she always wore a neat, smooth,
well-fitting dress, brown, black or blue. They lived by the clock: in
the morning, Karel took a walk, always the same walk, through the Woods;
after lunch, Cateau did her shopping; once a week, they paid a round of
visits together; and that was the only time when they went out together.
They were always at home in the evening, except on Sundays, when they
went to Mamma van Lowe's. Notwithstanding their comfortable life, their
three servants and their carriage, they were thrifty. They considered it
a sin and a shame to spend money on a theatre, an exhibition, or a book.
Every spring and autumn, they bought what they needed for their house
and wardrobe, so as to have everything good and nice; but that was all.
Their one vice was their table. They lived exceedingly well, but kept
the fact from the family and always said that they lived so very simply
that they could never ask an unexpected visitor to stay. And, as they
never invited anybody, the secret of their dainty table did not leak
out. They had a first-rate cook and Cateau kept a tight rein upon her,
telling her that meneer was so particular. But they both feasted, daily.
And, at their meals, they would exchange a glance of intelligence, as
though relishing some voluptuous moment of mutual gratification, because
everything was so good. Softly smacking their lips, they drank a good
glass of good red wine. And then, at dessert, Karel's face beamed fiery
red and Cateau blinked her eyes, as though tickled to her marrow. Then
they went into the sitting-room and sat down at the round table, with
their hands folded in their laps, to digest in silence. Karel, for
appearance' sake, would undo the parcel from the circulating library.
Now and again, they looked at each other, reflecting complacently that
Anna had cooked that dinner beautifully. But, as they considered that
this enjoyment was sinful and, above all, un-Dutch, they never spoke of
their enjoyment and enjoyed in silence.
This evening, they reckoned out that they had quite an hour left in
which to digest their dinner by the big stove; and, as they did not like
Mamma's tea, they had a cup of tea at home. At eight o'clock, Sientje
came to say that the brougham was at the door. So as not to let the
brougham wait longer than necessary in the rain and spoil, they got up
at once, put on cloak and great-coat and started. They did not so much
mind if the horse got wet, for the horse was jobbed; but the brougham
was their own.