Spring brought renewed hope and promise of brighter times for Frau
Czepanek. So certain was she that in a very short time now her husband
would return, that she determined to give up the needlework drudgery
and find a pleasanter way of making a living. It would be simple enough
to rent a floor consisting of nine rooms, to furnish them on credit,
and put up a plate with the inscription "Board and Lodging for
Students." Once start the enterprise and the rest would follow. The
idea took possession of Frau Czepanek's brain, half dazed as it was
from the perpetual maddening whir of the sewing-machine. Lilly, though
she liked the prospect of a less strenuous life, entertained doubts as
to the scheme working. She remembered, with a shudder, the abusive
threats of the duns who had bombarded them after papa's departure, and
she failed to see where enough students were to come from to fill nine
rooms when the summer term had begun and all had found other
accommodation. But her mother would not listen to reason. The attic
resounded with her triumphant "I shall do this," and "I shall do that."
She announced her intention of calling on the mayor, and going to the
council of the college to get them to recommend her.
In these days she set out on mysterious expeditions alone, and when
Lilly came in from school she was no longer greeted at the bottom of
the stairs by the familiar din of the sewing-machine. She would find
the front-door key under the mat. Her mother became more reserved and
secretive as the time for the great plunge drew nearer. Her face wore
the suppressed smile of parents before a Christmas tree, only that
there was a certain defiant contempt in it as well. She painted herself
more thickly than ever, and the rouge-pot, which once had been hidden
from Lilly's eyes, stood flaunting itself openly on the chest of
drawers. Money did not grow more plentiful. Lilly had to devote every
minute she could spare from her lessons to make up for mamma's neglect.
Frau Czepanek set her feet on the treadles only on rare occasions when
Lilly urged her to resume the work, which was delivered more and more
irregularly, so that mother and daughter stood in danger of losing the
employment on which their existence depended. Lilly, young and vigorous
though she was, felt her strength severely taxed, but she took it
calmly, assuring herself optimistically that "something would turn up
before long." She would not have grudged her mother the intoxication of
her new-born hopes so much, if she could have had her proper nights'
rest instead of having to lie in her clothes on the outside of the bed
from two till six in the morning. In school Lilly sat with heavy red
eyes, unable to see or think as she was expected to do, and masters
began to complain of her, more and more frequently.
It was high time for the change to come, and fate ordained that it
should come on a sultry grey July day, when Lilly, returning home from
school, saw two vans standing at the door, crammed with furniture
smelling of recently applied varnish, and heard her mother's shrill
tones in converse with strangers. With a beating heart she ran up the
steps. Two carmen in leather aprons, with amused red faces, one with an
open bill in his hand, were demanding payment. Frau Czepanek, running
her fingers through the hair which she had just frizzed with the
curling-tongs, marched up and down the room and shouted bitter
reproaches about broken promises and extortionate rascally conduct. The
men simply laughed at her, and reminded her that they wanted to get
home that night. Then Frau Czepanek, in a fury, tried to snatch the
bill from the carman, and when he declined to give it up she started
belabouring him with her fists. Lilly quickly sprang between them,
seized her struggling mother's wrists and ordered the men to go,
assuring them everything would be arranged. They obeyed, and now her
mother's wrath descended on Lilly.
"If you had not interfered," she yelled, "I should have got the receipt
out of them, and the furniture would have been unpacked to-night in the
new flat. You've spoilt it all, and I shall now have to be at them
again to-morrow."
"The new flat!" echoed Lilly. "What new flat?"
Frau Czepanek laughed. How stupid Lilly was! Did she think that she had
been doing nothing all this time? And then it all came out. The flat of
nine rooms had been taken and they were to move in at once. The plate
even was already engraved, and when hung up would have a magical
effect. She had made every sacrifice, strained every nerve, that the
rooms should be furnished in a way worthy of their exterior. She had
bought curtains for twelve windows in a Chinese pattern; six good rugs
to bear the tread of students, who wore out cheap carpets like muslin,
and large-sized English jugs and basins, in white and gold, to put on
the marble washstands. The dinner service, which she had also
purchased, was not ready, as it took some time to get a monogram burnt
in, but they could make shift with a common set of sixteen pieces for
the present. She had expended great care and thrift on her choice of
things, and everything would be in perfect taste.
She wandered restlessly, as she talked, round the table in the middle
of the room. Her small narrow eyes, that looked as if they hadn't
closed in sleep for many a night, glittered, and under the rouge on her
hollow cheeks burned the scarlet flush of fever.
Lilly, who began to feel a little uncomfortable, ventured to ask what
had been done about paying for the things.
Her question was laughed to scorn. "If you are a lady, you can do
anything with the tradespeople. They know that I, as the wife of Kilian
Czepanek, musical conductor, am entitled to respect and to credit; or
they ought to know it."
"Has all the furniture been taken to the flat?" Lilly queried again.
Frau Czepanek's merriment was renewed. "Before the rooms are ready, you
goose? Not likely! Rooms have to be painted, papered, and decorated. I
have taken no end of trouble to select artistic papers," she added,
with the grand air of a person whose powers of paying are unlimited.
A sickening feeling of perplexity took possession of Lilly. It was like
not being sure whether your school-fellows were making a fool of you or
not. There was nothing for dinner too, which made matters worse. Lilly
set the coffee on the hob to boil and put the rolls on the table. They
would have to skip dinner to-day. The Czepanek household had become
quite expert in the art of skipping meals.
Lilly's mother said no time must be lost before beginning to pack, and
she gulped down her coffee hurriedly. Then suddenly she got into
another towering rage.
"If only you hadn't held my hands, you idiot!" she screamed, "we should
have got that lovely new furniture into its place by to-morrow. Now we
shall have to move in with this rubbish. What will people think when
they see it?"
She ran her fingers through her singed locks and brandished the
bread-knife with which she was cutting her roll in half. Next she
turned up her sleeves, put on her blue working apron, and declared that
she would start the packing that very instant. She turned out the
wardrobe and piled clothes on the foot of the bed. Underwear and linen
out of the linen-press she scattered over the floor in wildest
confusion.
The veins stood out in knots on her shrivelled arms, perspiration ran
down her face. Lilly, with a feeling of oppression at her heart, looked
on. When she saw the score of "The Song of Songs," their dearest
treasure, carelessly thrown on the floor, she stooped to pick it up
from amongst the litter of sheets and nightgowns.
"What are you doing with 'The Song of Songs'?" cried her mother, rising
in haste from her knees.
"Nothing," said Lilly in surprise. "I was merely putting it on the
table."
"You're a liar," the woman screeched, "and an abandoned girl! You want
to steal the score from me as you stole the receipt. But I'll be even
with you!"
Lilly, to her horror, saw a sudden flash of steel before her eyes, felt
a sharp pain at her throat and something warm trickling soothingly over
her left breast.
It was not till her mother attempted a second thrust that Lilly
realised it was the bread-knife that her mother held in her hand. With
a piercing scream, she grasped her mother's wrist; but she had
developed all at once the strength of a lioness, and Lilly would most
probably have been worsted in the struggle if neighbours had not rushed
in to see what all the noise was about.
Frau Czepanek was caught from behind and bound with towels, the
bread-knife still clenched in her hand with a tenacity that no power on
earth could loosen. Not till the doctor, who was called in to give her
a soothing draught, came did she let it fall. Lilly's wound was
dressed, and she was taken to the hospital, where she was kept because
no one knew what to do with her. There she learnt, in due course, that
her mother had been removed to the provincial lunatic asylum, of which
she was likely to be an inmate for the rest of her days. Lilly was
alone in the world.