There is not much to be said of the period which now ensued. Outwardly
everything went on as usual. The void made by the flight of the
insubordinate member of the family seemed to be felt by no one except
myself and the silent Uncle Joachim; at least, her name was never
mentioned. True, pauses in the conversation at table were more
frequent, and were usually broken--not always with much taste--by a
remark from my little pupil. There had been no gayety before in this
strangely constituted circle, and I don't remember ever having heard a
really hearty laugh. But, since the event, the master of the house
seemed to desire to keep his family under still more rigid spiritual
control. The blessing invoked upon the food often extended into a short
homily, and on Sunday afternoons he held services of his own, by the
aid of some Lutheran tracts, from which he extracted so confused a
theology that I was often compelled to exercise great self-control in
order not to give the rein to my old love for debate. On such occasions
he indulged in rancorous allusions to stray sheep and lost souls, spite
of the presence of the servants, who nudged one another, and afterward
let their tongues wag freely in the servants' hall.
I wished myself a hundred miles away, for it seemed to me as if the
veil, which hitherto had only allowed me to see the vague outlines of
persons and things in the household, was suddenly torn away, and I
experienced a sense of almost physical discomfort, which increased with
every passing week.
The most puzzling thing was that, spite of the promise I had given my
worshiped idol at our last meeting, I had become suspicious even of
her. When I imagined her in the society of the strange actor, my hand
involuntarily clinched, and I was strongly inclined to pronounce the
whole female sex, which had seemed to me so supernatural and adorable
in this individual, nothing better than the body-guard of the enemy of
mankind.
I was by no means reconciled to her, but on the contrary still more
deeply wounded, when, a fortnight after her disappearance, I received
the printed announcement of her marriage to Herr Konstantin Spielberg,
theatrical manager. I had still cherished a secret hope that she would
repent the false step into which her exaggerated sense of justice had
led her, and withdraw from the turbid, bottomless swamp she had
entered, pure as a swan that needs only to shake its wings to cast off
everything that could besmirch it.
True, with my knowledge of her, I ought not to have been surprised that
she should take upon herself all the consequences of her hasty step,
yet it roused a feeling of such intense bitterness that it made me
fairly ill, and for twenty-four hours I would see no one, as if the
sight of any human face must awaken a sense of shame.
I knew that she had written long letters to her aunt and Uncle Joachim,
letters in which she had probably attempted to justify her conduct. But
I did not venture to make any inquiries about them. More than once,
when I met her beloved uncle, my tongue was on the point of asking the
question what threat he had used to deter his brother from pursuing the
fugitive. I vaguely suspected that I should learn things in her favor.
But, as the old gentleman did not commence the subject, I was forced to
say to myself that, little friendship as he felt for his brother, he
probably considered it unseemly to afford a stranger a glimpse of the
circumstances that did no honor to the name they both bore.
Not until long after did I obtain a clear understanding of the matter.
Even from the poor, timid baroness, I could obtain no information,
though, since the loss of her affectionate young confidante, she
had shown me even greater kindness than before. Nay, since I had
offered to supply Fraeulein Luise's place at the evening games of
cards, I was regularly assured of her friendly feeling by a warm clasp
from her little wrinkled hand on my arrival and departure. Very soon
she bestowed upon me another office which her niece had formerly
filled--that of her High Almoner. I now perceived, with reverent
emotion, how from her invalid chair she was the guardian angel of all
the poor and wretched in the village; and the wan little face, with its
bony nose and low forehead, really gained a gleam of youthful grace
when I informed her of the recovery of some sick person, or the
gratitude of a poor woman to whom her help in some desperate strait had
restored the courage to live.
Besides the quiet satisfaction I felt in my own modest share in these
deeds of charity, I had one great pleasure--my little pupil was
becoming more and more fond of me. Through all his ungovernableness he
had retained a dim consciousness of right and wrong, and when he
perceived the patient love I gave him he felt the obligation not to be
indebted to me, and therefore vented his instinctive rudenesses on
others. His progress in study continued to be extremely slow. But he
disarmed my displeasure by a frank confession of his faults and
laziness, and the entreaty that I would not attribute to ill-will what
was a part of his nature.
I hoped to gradually obtain an influence over this perverse
disposition, but I was not allowed time to do so. With this fact there
was a strange story connected.
* * * * *
The day after the flight of the Canoness, as Fraeulein Leopoldine needed
a companion, Mademoiselle Suzon had moved into the vacant tower-room
below me. From this time, also, the Frenchwoman was present at the
history lessons, during which she made herself very troublesome by
asking foolish questions and coquettishly endeavoring to turn the
tiresome teaching into empty conversation. But I said nothing about it,
knowing that a complaint to the baron would have been futile.
Neither did I trouble myself about the extraordinary marks of favor
with which the cunning creature began to annoy me.
One of the least of these was, that I rarely returned home from a walk
without finding in my room a bouquet of flowers or a few choice fruits,
filched from the garden or the green-house. Even at table she did not
restrain herself in the least from making all sorts of advances to me,
praising my lessons, repeating admirable remarks of which I had no
recollection, and keeping up a fusillade of glances, which greatly
incensed me, because it seemed to show distinctly that we were on the
best possible terms with each other. In my innocence, I was mainly
disturbed lest it should place me in a false light before the eyes of
my employer and his wife. To Uncle Joachim I had made no secret of my
dislike. The baroness's confidence in my honor and virtue, however,
seemed immovable, and the baron appeared to be merely amused by this
shadow of flirtation between his awkward tutor and the family friend,
without seeing any cause for suspicion in it.
The affair pursued its course in this way for several weeks. Sometimes,
from the open window beneath mine, I heard, instead of the dear
"Orpheus" melody, most unmusical sighs and incoherent French verses,
declaimed to moon and stars, but whose real object I knew only too
well. Then I shut my own casement with an intentionally loud slam, and
preferred to dispense with the delicious coolness of the autumn night
rather than seem to listen to the tender soliloquies of this detestable
hypocrite.
She perceived that she made no progress in this way, and resolved to
risk a bold stroke.
It had already happened several times--accidentally, as I, unsuspicious
novice, supposed--that, when going up to my room, I passed the
Fraeulein's door just at the moment she was putting her shoes outside. I
had then forced myself to exchange a few courteous words with her, but
escaped her efforts to carry on a more familiar conversation in the
dimly-lighted corridor as quickly as possible by a hasty "_Bonne nuit,
mademoiselle!_"
How different would have been my demeanor if my former neighbor in the
tower, whose shoes and speech were both less ornate, had met me here
even once to say good-night!
One evening my game with the old lady had been unusually prolonged.
Mademoiselle Suzon, after her victory at chess over the baron, and
obligatory courtesy to the baroness, had glided out of the room; the
master of the house, making no concealment of his impatience, paced up
and down the spacious apartment, frowning angrily; the servants
occasionally glanced sleepily through the glass doors, to see if it
were not bed-time. At last we finished, and I could take leave of my
employers. My old patroness pressed my hand with a friendly glance, the
baron nodded silently, but, as it seemed to me, with a sarcastic smile.
I took the candle from the servant who was waiting outside, and, in a
mood of dull ill-temper which was now almost always dominant, mounted
the stairs to my lofty lodging.
I thought the delay would at least insure safety from my tormentor. But
as, walking on tip-toe, I reached the story where her room was
situated, the door gently opened, and an arm in a white night-dress
noiselessly placed the well-known pair of dainty shoes on the floor.
I stopped, holding my breath and shading the candle with my hand. But,
as the door showed no sign of closing, I resolved to rush straight on
and pretend to be deaf and blind.
But I had reckoned without my host. The door was suddenly thrown wide
open, and the French spook, in a most bewitching _negligee_ costume,
stood directly before me.
"_Bonsoir, Monsieur le Candidat!_" I heard her whisper, and then
followed a long, half tender, half reproachful speech in her
Franco-German jargon, of which I only understood that she was angry
with me--yes, seriously offended, because I so openly shunned her. She
could bear it no longer, and desired at last to know what grudge I had
against her, why I treated her like an enemy. She knew, of course, that
she could bear no comparison with Fraeulein Luise, to whom I had been so
completely devoted. She was only a simple French girl, and had no other
_qualites_ than her good heart and her virtue. But, since I was such a
chivalrous young man, and treated everybody else so kindly and
politely, she must suppose that she had given me some special offense;
and, if this were the case, she would gladly apologize for her fault if
she could thereby put an end to the icy coldness with which I treated
her.
As she spoke, the wretch gazed at me with such an humble, childlike
expression in her crafty black eyes, that I, poor simpleton, completely
lost countenance.
I stammered a few French phrases--I should have found it more difficult
to lie in German--assured her of my profound _estime_, and that she had
made a deplorable _erreur_, and, with a low bow, was hurrying away,
when I felt the arm that carried the candle seized in a firm clasp.
"I thank you for those noble words," said the smooth serpent, fixing
her glittering eyes so intently on my face that I could not help
lowering my own like a detected criminal.
"If you knew, _Monsieur Jean_, how happy your _sympathie_, your cordial
warmth makes me! Ah, _mon ami_, I am not what I perhaps seem to you, a
superficial, selfish creature, who avails herself of her position in
this house to gain some advantage. If you knew how this dependence,
this forbearance humiliates me! My youth was so brilliant, so happy! If
any one had told me then that I should ever enter a foreign German
household--"
And she now began to relate to me in French, with incredible fluency,
the romance of her life, not more than half of which could I
understand. But as, spite of my inexperience, I retained a sufficient
degree of calmness to believe that even this half contained far more
fiction than fact, I at last, relapsing into my former incivility,
showed evident signs of impatience, and was just in the act of gently
shaking off the hand that still held my arm, when her eyes filled with
tears as she talked of her worshiped mother, and that honorable man,
her father.
"You are exciting yourself too much, mademoiselle," I said. "It is
late--you must go to rest--to-morrow, if you wish--"
Meantime I glanced into her room, which looked very untidy. The bed was
already opened, and on the little night-table stood a candle which
illumined the picture of the Madonna on the wall and a small black
crucifix beneath it.
"Oh, _mon ami_!" she sobbed, pressing my arm as if she needed
some support in her grief, "_si vous saviez! Mon c[oe]ur est si
sensible--tous les malheurs de ma vie_--" and then came a fresh torrent
of revelations of her most private affairs, till terror brought cold
drops of perspiration to my forehead and, in my helplessness, I could
finally think of no other expedient than to whisper: "Calm yourself,
Mademoiselle Suzon! Somebody is coming--if we should be found here--!"
Her features suddenly changed their expression, she half closed her
eyes, as if fainting, and murmuring with a gesture of horror: "Mon
Dieu--je suis perdue!" tottered backward and would have fallen, had I
not sprung forward and caught her with my free arm.
Instantly I felt her throw her arm over my shoulder, clinging to me as
if unconscious, and while we stood in this attitude and undoubtedly
formed a very striking group, which I myself lighted effectively with
the candle I held aloft, hasty footsteps, which I had only pretended to
hear, actually did come up the staircase, and at the end of the
corridor appeared the tall figure of one of the footmen, who served as
the baron's valet.
I was wild with rage and shame at having allowed myself to be caught in
this suspicious position, and the thought darted like lightning through
my brain that the whole scene had been merely a prearranged farce, to
which in my good-natured simplicity I had fallen a victim! The fellow's
manner strengthened this belief, as he grinned at me with insolent
cunning. Besides, he had no reason to come here at this hour.
Yet I retained sufficient composure to say quietly: "Mademoiselle has
been taken ill. Wake the housekeeper, Christoph, and see that she is
put to bed. I wish her a speedy recovery."
With these words I unceremoniously laid her on the floor, and walked
off as calmly as if entirely indifferent to what was happening behind
my back.
Yet every one will understand that I could not fall asleep very quickly
that night. Again and again I called myself an ass for having entered
this clumsy trap, and for the first time in my life learned that a good
conscience is not always a soft pillow. True, when I asked myself how a
trained man of the world would have acted in this situation, I could
find no reply. But my contempt for the female sex increased that night
to such a degree, and gained so large an access of dread and horror,
that for the first time I envied the anchorites who, to escape from the
sight of these fiends, retreated to some wilderness, where if any
appeared to them and might perchance lure to sin, though they did not
come straight from Hades, at least the hermits could not be surprised
by inquisitive lackeys.
* * * * *
The next morning, just after I had risen with so disagreeable a tang on
my tongue from the scene of the previous night that I could not make up
my mind to touch any breakfast, I suddenly heard a heavy step in the
corridor outside, which I recognized with terror as the baron's.
I did not doubt for an instant that the hour of judgment had struck,
and the whole affair had been planned to obtain a sufficient excuse for
my dismissal--I was perfectly aware how little I had concealed my
feelings toward the outlawed member of the family, the lost soul of
this household. After the first shock of surprise, I really felt glad
that the climax had been reached without any volition of mine, and
armed myself with all the pride and defiance of a pure conscience.
What was my amazement when my employer, after knocking courteously,
entered my room with his most cordial smile, which I had not seen for a
long time, and sat down on my hard sofa with the utmost affability.
He began by requesting me to give my pupil a holiday, as the family
intended to drive to a neighboring estate. Then he launched into
praises of the good influences I had exerted over Achatz, and expressed
the hope that I might still long devote myself to his education, even
if the other duties of my office claimed my attention--for the old
pastor could not remain longer; his sermons showed that he was falling
more and more into the childishness of old age. He had determined to
pension him very shortly, even if it were against his wish, and give
the office to me, though I could not move into the parsonage till after
Christmas, as a suitable residence must first be found for the old
couple.
I was so surprised by this offer--after having prepared myself for the
most furious rage--that I could only thank my kind patron with a few
clumsy words.
"Oh, my dear Weissbrod," he replied, gazing out of the window with his
handsome bright eyes, like an aristocrat who is accustomed to dispense
favors, "you need not give me any special thanks. I know what I possess
in you, and hope that we shall understand each other better in future.
Of course, I should have wished you to treat me with more frankness,
but I understand and pardon your reticence. You thought me a rigid
judge of the conscience, from whom it would be best to conceal all
human weaknesses. You ought to have believed me a better Christian, one
who is mindful of the words relating to the forgiveness of his erring
brother: 'I say not unto thee, until seven times; but until seventy
times seven.' Besides, youth has no virtue, and a future pastor is not
to blame if he remembers the proverb: 'The pastor when settling for
life wants a wife.'"
He smiled with patronizing significance, rose, went to my bookcase,
and, while gazing thoughtfully for the tenth time at the names of
Neander and Marheineke on the backs of the volumes, remarked with
apparent calmness:
"When do you expect to be married?"