It was long after eleven, but nothing had been seen of Gieshübler as
yet. "I can't wait any longer," Geert had said, whose duties called
him away. "If Gieshübler comes while I am gone, receive him as kindly
as possible and the call will go especially well. He must not become
embarrassed. When he is ill at ease he cannot find a word to say, or
says the queerest kind of things. But if you can win his confidence
and put him in a good humor he will talk like a book. Well, you will
do that easily enough. Don't expect me before three; there is a great
deal to do over across the way. And the matter of the room upstairs we
will consider further. Doubtless, the best thing will be to leave it
as it is."
With that Innstetten went away and left his young wife alone. She sat,
leaning back, in a quiet, snug corner by the window, and, as she
looked out, rested her left arm on a small side leaf drawn out of the
cylindrical desk. The street was the chief thoroughfare leading to the
beach, for which reason there was a great deal of traffic here in the
summer time, but now, in the middle of November, it was all empty and
quiet, and only a few poor children, whose parents lived in thatched
cottages clear at the further edge of the "Plantation" came clattering
by in their wooden shoes. But Effi felt none of this loneliness, for
her fancy was still engaged with the strange things she had seen a
short time before during her examination of the house.
This examination began with the kitchen, which had a range of modern
make, while an electric wire ran along the ceiling and into the maids'
room. These two improvements had only recently been made, and Effi was
pleased when Innstetten told her about them. Next they went from the
kitchen back into the hall and from there out into the court, the
first half of which was little more than a narrow passage-way running
along between the two side wings of the house. In these wings were to
be found all the other rooms set apart for house-keeping purposes. In
the right the maids' room, the manservant's room, and the mangling
room; to the left the coachman's quarters, situated between the stable
and the carriage shed and occupied by the Kruse family. Over this room
was the chicken house, while a trap door in the roof of the stable
furnished ingress and egress for the pigeons. Effi had inspected all
these parts of the house with a great deal of interest, but this
interest was exceeded by far when, upon returning from the court to
the front of the house, she followed Innstetten's leading and climbed
the stairway to the upper story. The stairs were askew, ramshackly,
and dark; but the hall, to which they led, almost gave one a cheerful
sensation, because it had a great deal of light and a good view of the
surrounding landscape. In one direction it looked out over the roofs
of the outskirts of the city and the "Plantation," toward a Dutch
windmill standing high up on a dune; in the other it looked out upon
the Kessine, which here, just above its mouth, was rather broad and
stately. It was a striking view and Effi did not hesitate to give
lively expression to her pleasure. "Yes, very beautiful, very
picturesque," answered Innstetten, without going more into detail, and
then opened a double door to the right, with leaves hanging somewhat
askew, which led into the so-called social room. This room ran clear
across the whole story. Both front and back windows were open and the
oft-mentioned curtains swung back and forth in the strong draft. From
the middle of one side wall projected an open fireplace with a large
stone mantlepiece, while on the opposite wall there hung a few tin
candlesticks, each with two candle sockets, just like those downstairs
in the hall, except that everything looked dingy and neglected. Effi
was somewhat disappointed and frankly said so. Then she remarked that
she would rather look at the rooms across the hall than at this
miserable, deserted social room. "To tell the truth, there is
absolutely nothing over there," answered Innstetten, but he opened the
doors nevertheless. Here were four rooms with one window each, all
tinted yellow, to match the social room, and all completely empty,
except that in one there stood three rush-bottomed chairs, with seats
broken through. On the back of one was pasted a little picture, only
half a finger long, representing a Chinaman in blue coat and wide
yellow trousers, with a low-crowned hat on his head. Effi saw it and
said: "What is the Chinaman doing here?" Innstetten himself seemed
surprised at the picture and assured her that he did not know. "Either
Christel or Johanna has pasted it there. Child's play. You can see it
is cut out of a primer." Effi agreed with that and was only surprised
that Innstetten took everything so seriously, as though it meant
something after all.
Then she cast another glance into the social room and said, in effect,
that it was really a pity all that room should stand empty. "We have
only three rooms downstairs and if anybody comes to visit us we shall
not know whither to turn. Don't you think one could make two handsome
guest rooms out of the social room? This would just suit mama. She
could sleep in the back room and would have the view of the river and
the two moles, and from the front room she could see the city and the
Dutch windmill. In Hohen-Cremmen we have even to this day only a
German windmill. Now say, what do you think of it? Next May mama will
surely come."
Innstetten agreed to everything, only he said finally: "That is all
very well. But after all it will be better if we give your mama rooms
over in the district councillor's office building. The whole second
story is vacant there, just as it is here, and she will have more
privacy there."
That was the result, so to speak, which the first walk around through
the house accomplished. Effi then made her toilette, but not so
quickly as Innstetten had supposed, and now she was sitting in her
husband's room, turning her thoughts first to the little Chinaman
upstairs, then to Gieshübler, who still did not come. To be sure, a
quarter of an hour before, a stoop-shouldered and almost deformed
little gentleman in an elegant short fur coat and a very
smooth-brushed silk hat, too tall for his proportions, had walked
past on the other side of the street and had glanced over at her
window. But that could hardly have been Gieshübler. No, this
stoop-shouldered man, who had such a distinguished air about him, must
have been the presiding judge, and she recalled then that she had once
seen such a person at a reception given by Aunt Therese, but it
suddenly occurred to her that Kessin had only a lower court judge.
While she was still following out this chain of thought the object of
her reflections, who had apparently been taking a morning stroll, or
perhaps a promenade around the "Plantation" to bolster up his courage,
came in sight again, and a minute later Frederick entered to announce
Apothecary Gieshübler.
"Ask him kindly to come in."
The poor young wife's heart fluttered, for it was the first time that
she had to appear as a housewife, to say nothing of the first woman of
the city.
Frederick helped Gieshübler take off his fur coat and then opened the
door.
Effi extended her hand to the timidly entering caller, who kissed it
with a certain amount of fervor. The young wife seemed to have made a
great impression upon him immediately.
"My husband has already told me--But I am receiving you here in my
husband's room,--he is over at the office and may be back any moment.
May I ask you to step into my room?"
Gieshübler followed Effi, who led the way into the adjoining room,
where she pointed to one of the arm chairs, as she herself sat down on
the sofa. "I wish I could tell you what a great pleasure it was
yesterday to receive the beautiful flowers with your card. I
straightway ceased to feel myself a stranger here and when I mentioned
the fact to Innstetten he told me we should unquestionably be good
friends."
"Did he say that? The good councillor. In the councillor and you, most
gracious Lady,--I beg your permission to say it--two dear people have
been united. For what kind of a man your husband is, I know, and what
kind of a woman you are, most gracious Lady, I see."
"Provided only you do not look at me with too friendly eyes. I am so
very young. And youth--"
"Ah, most gracious Lady, say nothing against youth. Youth, even with
all its mistakes, is still beautiful and lovable, and age, even with
its virtues, is not good for much. Personally I have, it is true, no
right to say anything about this subject. About age I might have,
perhaps, but not about youth, for, to be frank, I was never young.
Persons with my misfortune are never young. That, it may as well be
said, is the saddest feature of the case. One has no true spirit, one
has no self-confidence, one hardly ventures to ask a lady for the
honor of a dance, because one does not desire to cause her an
embarrassment, and thus the years go by and one grows old, and life
has been poor and empty."
Effi gave him her hand. "Oh, you must not say such things. We women
are by no means so bad."
"Oh, no, certainly not."
"And when I recall," continued Effi, "what all I have experienced--it
is not much, for I have gone out but little, and have almost always
lived in the country--but when I recall it, I find that, after all, we
always love what is worthy of love. And then I see, too, at once that
you are different from other men. We women have sharp eyes in such
matters. Perhaps in your case the name has something to do with it.
That was always a favorite assertion of our old pastor Niemeyer. The
name, he loved to say, especially the forename, has a certain
mysterious determining influence; and Alonzo Gieshübler, in my
opinion, opens to one a whole new world, indeed I feel almost tempted
to say, Alonzo is a romantic name, a fastidious name."
Gieshübler smiled with a very unusual degree of satisfaction and
mustered up the courage to lay aside his silk hat, which up to this
time he had been turning in his hand. "Yes, most gracious Lady, you
hit the nail on the head that time."
Oh, I understand. I have heard about the consuls, of Kessin is said to
have so many, and at the home of the Spanish consul your father
presumably made the acquaintance of the daughter of a sea-captain, a
beautiful Andalusian girl, I suppose; Andalusian girls are always
beautiful."
"Precisely as you suppose, most gracious Lady. And my mother really
was a beautiful woman, ill as it behooves me personally to undertake
to prove it. But when your husband came here three years ago she was
still alive and still had the same fiery eyes as in her youth. He will
confirm my statement. I personally take more after the Gieshüblers,
who are people of little account, so far as external features are
concerned, but otherwise tolerably well favored. We have been living
here now for four generations, a full hundred years, and if there were
an apothecary nobility--"
"You would have a right to claim it. And I, for my part, accept your
claim as proved, and that beyond question. For us who come of old
families it is a very easy matter, because we gladly recognize every
sort of noble-mindedness, no matter from what source it may come. At
least that is the way I was brought up by my father, as well as by my
mother. I am a Briest by birth and am descended from the Briest, who,
the day before the battle of Fehrbellin, led the sudden attack on
Rathenow, of which you may perhaps have heard."
"Oh, certainly, most gracious Lady, that, you know, is my specialty."
"Well then I am a von Briest. And my father has said to me more than
a hundred times: Effi,--for that is my name--Effi, here is our
beginning, and here only. When Froben traded the horse, he was that
moment a nobleman, and when Luther said, 'here I stand,' he was more
than ever a nobleman. And I think, Mr. Gieshübler, Innstetten was
quite right when he assured me you and I should be good friends."
Gieshübler would have liked nothing better than to make her a
declaration of love then and there, and to ask that he might fight and
die for her as a Cid or some other campeador. But as that was out of
the question, and his heart could no longer endure the situation, he
arose from his seat, looked for his hat, which he fortunately found at
once, and, after again kissing the young wife's hand, withdrew quickly
from her presence without saying another word.