Ehrenberg turned to Nürnberger. "You will doubtless be glad to know
that my son Oskar is an Anti-Semite as well."
Frau Ehrenberg sighed gently. "It's a fixed idea of his," she said to
Nürnberger. "He sees Anti-Semites everywhere, even in his own family."
"That is the latest Jewish national disease," said Nürnberger. "I
myself have only succeeded up to the present in making the acquaintance
of one genuine Anti-Semite. I'm afraid I am bound to admit, dear Herr
Ehrenberg, that it was a well-known Zionist leader."
Ehrenberg could only make an eloquent gesture.
Demeter Stanzides and Willy Eissler came in and immediately spread
an atmosphere of vivid brilliancy around them. Demeter wore his
uniform lightly and magnificently, as though it were a fancy costume
rather than a military dress; Willy stood there in a dinner jacket
looking tall and pale and as if he had been keeping late hours, and
then immediately gathered up the reins of the conversation, while
his pleasantly hoarse voice rasped through the air with amiable
imperiousness.
He gave an account of the preparations for an aristocratic theatrical
performance in which he was adviser, producer and actor, just as he had
been last year, and described a meeting of the young lords, where, if
his account was to be believed, every one had behaved as though they
were in a lunatic asylum, and then went on to treat them to a humorous
dialogue between two countesses whose mannerisms he managed to take off
in a most delightful way. Ehrenberg was always very amused by Willy
Eissler. The vague feeling that this Hungarian Jew managed somehow
or other to outwit and make a fool of that whole feudal set, whom
personally he hated so much, filled him with respect for the young man.
Else sat at the little table in the corner with Demeter and made him
tell her about the _Isle of Wight_. "You were there with your friend?"
she inquired, "weren't you, Prince Karl Friedrich?"
"My friend the Prince?... that's not quite right, Fräulein Else. The
Prince has no friends, nor have I. We're neither of us the type to have
friends."
"He must be an interesting man according to all one hears."
"Interesting--I don't know about that. At any rate he's thought over a
lot of things which people in his position are not usually accustomed
to bother their heads about very much. Perhaps he'd have managed to do
all kinds of things too, if he'd been left to himself. Well, who knows,
it was perhaps better for him that they kept a tight hold on him, for
him and for the country too in the long run. One man alone can do
nothing--never in this life. That's why it's best to let matters slide
and get out of things, as he did."
Else looked at him somewhat coldly. "You're so philosophical to-day,
what is it? It seems to me that Willy Eissler has spoilt you."
"Willy spoilt me?"
"Yes, you know you shouldn't associate with such clever people."
"Why not?"
"You should simply be young, shine, live, and then when there's nothing
more to do, do whatever you like ... but without bothering about
yourself and the world."
"You should have told me that before, Fräulein Else; once a man's
started getting clever...."
Else shook her head. "But perhaps in your case it might have been
avoided," she said quite seriously. And then they both had to laugh.
The chandelier was lighted up. George Wergenthin and Heinrich Bermann
had come in. Invited by a smile George sat down by Else's side.
"I knew that you would come," she said disingenuously but warmly as
she pressed his hand; she was more glad than she thought she would have
been that he should sit opposite to her after so long an interval, that
she could see again his proud gracious face and hear again his somewhat
gentle yet warm voice.
Frau Wyner appeared, a little woman with a high colour, jolly and
awkward. Her daughter Sissy was with her. The groups got broken up in
the "general post" of mutual greetings.
"Well, have you composed that song for me yet?" Sissy asked George with
laughing eyes and laughing lips, as she played with one of her gloves
and moved about like a snake in her dark-green shimmering dress.
"A song?" asked George. He really didn't remember.
"Or waltz or something. But you promised me to dedicate something
to me." While she spoke her looks were wandering round. They glowed
into the eyes of Willy, passed caressingly by Demeter and addressed
a sphinx-like question to Heinrich Bermann. It seemed as though
will-o'-the-wisps were dancing through the drawing-room.
Frau Wyner suddenly came up to her daughter. She flushed deeply. "Sissy
is really so silly.... What are you thinking of, Sissy? Baron George
has had more important things to do this year than to compose things
for you."
"Oh not at all," said George politely.
"You buried your father, that's no trifle."
George looked straight in front of him.
But Frau Wyner went on speaking quite unperturbed. "And your father
wasn't old, was he? And such a handsome man.... Is it true that he was
a chemist?"
"No," answered George calmly. "He was President of the Botanical
Society." Heinrich with one arm on the shut piano-top was speaking to
Else.
"So you've been in Germany?" she asked.
"Yes," replied Heinrich. "I've been back a fairly long time, four or
five weeks."
"And when are you going back again?"
"I don't know, perhaps never."
"Come, you don't believe that yourself--what are you working at?" she
added quickly.
"All kinds of things," he answered. "I'm going through a rather
restless time. I sketch out a lot but I finish nothing. I'm very rarely
keen on completing things, obviously I lose all my interest in things
too quickly."
"And people too," added Else.
"Possibly. Only unhappily one's emotions remain attached to people
after one's reason has long ago decided to have nothing more to do
with them. A poet--if you will allow me to use the expression--must
go away from every one who no longer presents any riddle to him ...
particularly from any one whom he loves."
"They say," suggested Else, "that it is just those whom we know least
that we love."
"That's what Nürnberger makes out, but it's not quite right. If it
were really so, my dear Else, then life would probably be much more
beautiful than it is. No, we know those whom we love much better
than we do other people--but we know them with a feeling of shame,
bitterness and with the fear that others may know them as well as
we do. Love means this--being afraid that the faults which we have
discovered in the person we love may be revealed to others. Love means
this--being able to look into the future and curse this very gift....
Love means this--knowing some one so that it smashes one."
Else leant on the piano in her childish lady-like way and listened to
him curiously. How much she liked him in moments like this! She would
have liked to have stroked his hair again consolingly, as she had done
before on the lake when he had been torn by his love for that other
woman, but when he suddenly retired into his shell, coldly and drily,
and looked as though all his fire had been extinguished she felt that
she could never live with him, and she would be bound to run away
after a few weeks ... with a Spanish officer or a violin _virtuoso_.
"It is a good thing," she said somewhat condescendingly, "that you see
something of George Wergenthin. He'll have a sound influence on you. He
is quieter than you are. I don't think that he is so gifted as you are,
and I am sure that he is not so clever."
"What do you know about his gifts?" interrupted Heinrich almost rudely.
George came up and asked Else if they couldn't have the pleasure
to-night of hearing one of her songs. She didn't want to. Besides
she was principally studying opera parts nowadays. That interested
her more. As a matter of fact she was far from having a lyrical
temperament. George asked her jokingly if she didn't have perhaps the
secret intention of going on the stage?
"With my little bit of a voice!" said Else.
Nürnberger was standing near them. "That wouldn't be an obstacle,"
he observed. "Why, I feel quite positive that a modern critic would
soon turn up who would boom you as an important singer for the very
reason that you have no voice, but who would discover some other
gift in you by way of compensation, as, for instance, your gift for
characterisation, just as we have to-day certain painters who have
no sense of colour but only intellect; and celebrated authors who
never have the vaguest ideas but who succeed in discovering the most
unsuitable epithets for every noun they use."
Else noticed that Nürnberger's manner of speaking got on George's
nerves. She turned to him. "I should like to show you something," she
said, and took a few steps towards the music-case.
George followed her.
"Here is a collection of old Italian folksongs. I should like you to
show me the best. I myself don't know enough about it."
"I can't understand," said George gently, "how you can stand any one
like that man Nürnberger near you. He spreads around him an absolute
atmosphere of distrust and malice."
"As I've often told you, George, you're no judge of character. After
all, what do you know about him? He's different from what you think he
is; just ask your friend Heinrich Bermann."
"Oh, I know well enough that he raves about him, too," replied George.
"You're speaking about Nürnberger?" asked Frau Ehrenberg, who had just
joined them.
"George can't stand him," said Else in her casual way.
"Well, you're doing him a great injustice, if that's the case. Have you
ever read anything of his?"
George shook his head.
"Not even his novel which made so great a sensation fifteen or sixteen
years ago? That is really a shame. We've just lent it to Hofrat Wilt.
I tell you he was quite flabbergasted at the way in which the whole of
present-day Austria is anticipated in that book, written all that time
ago."
"Really, is that so?" said George, without conviction.
"You have no idea," continued Frau Ehrenberg, "of the applause with
which Nürnberger was then hailed; one could go so far as to say that
all doors sprang open before him."
"Perhaps he found that enough," observed Else, with an air of
meditative wisdom.
Heinrich was standing by the piano engaged in conversation with
Nürnberger, and was making an effort, as he frequently did, to persuade
him to undertake a new work or to bring out an edition of previous
writings.
Nürnberger would not agree. He was filled with positive horror at
the thought of seeing his name a prey to publicity again, of plunging
again into a literary vortex which seemed to him as repulsive as it was
fatuous. He had no desire to enter the competition. What was the point?
Intriguing cliques that no longer made any attempt at concealment were
at work everywhere. Did there remain a single man of sound talent and
honest aspirations who did not have to face every minute the prospect
of being dragged down into the dirt? Was there a blockhead in the
country who could not boast of having been hailed as a genius in some
rag or other? Had celebrity in these days anything at all to do with
honour, and was being ignored and forgotten worth even a single shrug
of regret? And who could know after all what verdicts would pass as the
correct ones in the future? Were not the fools really the geniuses and
the geniuses really the fools? It would be ridiculous to allow himself
to be tempted to stake his peace of mind and even his self-respect on
a game where even the greatest possible win held out no promise of any
satisfaction.
"None at all?" queried Heinrich. "I'll grant you as much as you like
about fame, wealth, world-wide influence--but for a man, simply because
all these things are of dubious advantage, to relinquish something so
absolutely indubitable as the moments of inner consciousness of one's
own power----"
"Inner consciousness of power? Why don't you say straight away the
happiness of creating?"
"It does exist, Nürnberger."
"It may be so; why, I even think I remember that I felt something
like that myself now and then, a very long time ago ... only, as you
no doubt know, as the years went by I completely lost the faculty of
deceiving myself."
"Perhaps you only think so," replied Heinrich. "Who knows if it is not
that very faculty of self-deception which you have developed more
strongly than any other as the years went by?"
Nürnberger laughed. "Do you know how I feel when I hear you talk like
that? just like a fencing-master feels who gets a thrust in the heart
from one of his own pupils."
"And not even one of his best," said Heinrich.
Herr Ehrenberg suddenly appeared in the doorway, to the astonishment of
his wife, who had presumed that he would be by now on his way to the
station. He led a young lady by the hand. She was dressed simply in
black, and had her hair done extraordinarily high after a fashion that
was now out of date. Her lips were full and red, the eyes in the pale
vivid face had a clear hard gaze.
"Come along," said Ehrenberg with some malice in his small eyes, and
led the visitor straight up to Else, who was chatting with Stanzides.
"I've brought a visitor for you."
Else held out her hand. "But this is nice." She introduced them--"Herr
Demeter Stanzides--Fräulein Therese Golowski."
Therese bowed slightly and let her gaze rest on him for a while with a
little embarrassment as though she were scrutinising a beautiful beast,
then she turned to Else: "If I had known that you had such a lot of
visitors."
"Do you know what she looks like?" said Stanzides softly to George.
"Like a Russian student, don't you think?"
George nodded. "That's about it. I know her. She is a school-friend
of Fräulein Else's, and now she's playing a leading part among
the Socialists. Just think of it! she's just been in prison for
_lèse-majesté_, I believe."
"Yes, I think I've read something about it," replied Demeter. "One
should really get to know a person of that type more intimately. She's
pretty. Her face might be made of ivory."
"And her features show a lot of energy," added George. "Her brother
too is an extraordinary fellow, a pianist and a mathematician, and the
father's supposed to be a ruined Jewish skin-dealer."
"It's really a strange race," observed Demeter.
In the meanwhile Frau Ehrenberg had come up to Therese. She considered
it correct not to show any surprise. "Sit down, Therese," she said.
"And how have you been getting on all this time? Since you've devoted
yourself to political life you don't bother about your old friends any
more."
"Yes, I'm afraid my work gives me very little time to pay private
visits," replied Therese, thrusting out her chin, in a way that made
her face look masculine and almost ugly.
Frau Ehrenberg vacillated as to whether she should or should not make
any reference to the term of imprisonment which Therese had just
served. It was certainly to be borne in mind there was scarcely another
house in Vienna where ladies who had been locked up a short time ago,
were allowed to call.
"And how is your brother?" asked Else.
"He's doing his service this year," answered Therese. "You can imagine
pretty well how he's getting on." And she looked ironically at
Demeter's hussar uniform.
"I suppose he doesn't get much opportunity there for playing the
piano," said Frau Ehrenberg.
"Oh, he's given up all thoughts of being a pianist," replied Therese.
"He's all for politics now." And turning with a smile to Demeter she
added: "Of course you won't give him away, Herr Oberlieutenant?"
Stanzides laughed somewhat awkwardly.
"What do you mean by politics?" asked Herr Ehrenberg. "Does he want to
get into the Cabinet?"
"Not in Austria at any rate," replied Therese. "He is a Zionist, you
know."
"What?" exclaimed Ehrenberg, and his visage beamed.
"That's certainly a subject on which we don't quite agree," added
Therese.
"My dear Therese ..." began Ehrenberg.
"You'll miss your train, my dear," interrupted his wife.
"I'm not going to miss my train, and anyway, another one goes
to-morrow. My dear Therese, this is the only thing I want to say--each
person should find happiness in his own way. But in this case your
brother and not you is the cleverer of you two. Excuse me, I'm perhaps
a layman in politics, but I assure you, Therese, exactly the same thing
will happen to you Jewish Social Democrats as happened to the Jewish
Liberals and German Nationalists."
"How do you mean?" asked Therese haughtily. "In what way will the same
thing happen to us?"
"In what way...? I'll tell you soon enough. Who created the Liberal
movement in Austria?... the Jews. By whom have the Jews been betrayed
and deserted? By the Liberals. Who created the National-German
movement in Austria? the Jews. By whom were the Jews left in the
lurch?... what--left in the lurch!... Spat upon like dogs!... By the
National-Germans, and precisely the same thing will happen in the case
of Socialism and Communism. As soon as you've drawn the chestnuts out
of the fire they'll start driving you away from the table. It always
has been so and always will be so."
"We will wait and see," Therese replied quietly.
George and Demeter looked at each other like two friends marooned
together on a desert island.
Oskar, who had come in during the middle of his father's speech,
compressed his lips and was very embarrassed. But they all felt a kind
of deliverance when Ehrenberg suddenly looked at his watch and took his
leave.
"We certainly shan't agree to-day," he said to Therese.
Therese smiled. "Scarcely. Hope you will enjoy your journey and I want
once more to ... to thank you in the name of...."
"Hush!" said Ehrenberg and vanished.
"What are you thanking papa for?" said Else.
"For a gift of money for which I came to ask him in the most shameless
manner. Apart from him there is not a single rich man in the circle of
my acquaintances. I am not in a position to speak of the purpose for
which it is wanted."
Frau Ehrenberg came up to Bermann and Nürnberger, who were continuing
their conversation over the top of the piano, and said softly: "Of
course you know that she"--then she looked at Therese--"has just been
released from prison."
"I read about it," said Heinrich.
Nürnberger half shut his eyes and cast a glance at the group in the
corner where the three girls were talking to Stanzides and Willy
Eissler and shook his head.
"What cynicism are you suppressing?" said Frau Ehrenberg.
"I was just thinking how easily it might have come about for Fräulein
Else to have languished two months in prison and for Fräulein Therese
to have held receptions in a stylish drawing-room as daughter of the
house."
"Easily come about?"
"Herr Ehrenberg has had good luck, Herr Golowski bad luck.... Perhaps
that is the only difference."
"Look here, now, Nürnberger," said Heinrich, "you're not going to deny
that such a thing as individuality exists in the world.... Else and
Therese are rather different characters you know."
"I think so too," observed Frau Ehrenberg.
Nürnberger shrugged his shoulders. "They are both young girls, quite
gifted, quite pretty ... everything else is more or less of an
accidental appanage, just as it is with most young women--most people,
in fact."
Heinrich shook his head energetically. "No, no," he said, "life is
really not as simple as all that."
"That doesn't make it simpler, my dear Heinrich."
Frau Ehrenberg turned her eyes towards the door and beamed.
Felician had just come in. With all the sureness of a sleep-walker he
walked up to the hostess and kissed her hand. "I have just had the
pleasure of meeting Herr Ehrenberg on the steps; he told me he was
going off to Corfu. It must be awfully beautiful out there."
"You know Corfu?"
"Yes, a memory of my childhood." He greeted Nürnberger and Bermann, and
they all talked about the South for which Bermann longed and in which
Nürnberger did not believe.
George gave his brother a hand-shake which meant a salutation and a
goodbye at the same time. As he unobtrusively disappeared through the
open door of the dining-room he looked round again, noticed Marianne
sitting in the furthest corner of the drawing-room and looking at
him ironically through her lorgnette. This woman had always had the
mysterious gift of suddenly being present without one realising where
she came from. And then a veiled lady came up to him on the steps.
"Don't be in such a hurry, you can surely wait another moment," she
said. "One really shouldn't spoil women so.... I wonder if you'd be
in such a hurry, you know, if you were going to keep an appointment
with me...? But you prefer to be non-committal. Probably because
you're afraid that my husband will shoot you when he comes back from
Stockholm. I mean he's probably got as far as Copenhagen to-day. But
he places absolute confidence in me. And he's quite right too. For I'm
able to swear to you that no one has managed to get any further than a
kiss on my hand.... No, to tell the full truth, on my neck, here. Of
course, you believe, too, that I have had an affair with Stanzides?
No, he wouldn't be at all in my line! I positively loathe handsome men.
I couldn't find anything in your brother Felician either...."
One could form no idea when the veiled lady would leave off speaking,
for it was Frau Oberberger. Similar conduct in other women would
have betokened a specific overture, but that was not so in her case.
In spite of the dubious impression created by her whole manner the
world had never been able to fix her so far with a single lover. She
lived in a strange, but apparently happy, childless marriage. Her
brilliant handsome husband, a geologist by profession, had undertaken
scientific expeditions in days gone by, when, so Hofrat Wilt used to
assert, he had set more store by the good travelling and facilities and
unimpeachable cooking of the districts in question than on their being
actually unexplored. But for some years past he had given up travelling
in favour of lecturing and ladykilling. When he was at home he lived
with his wife in the best _camaraderie_. George had frequently, though
never seriously, considered the possibility of a liaison with Frau
Oberberger. He was even one of those who had kissed her neck, a fact
which she probably did not remember herself. And as she threw back
her veil now George again surrendered himself with pleasure to the
fascination of this face, which though no longer in its first flush
of youth was yet both charming and animated. He wanted to take up the
conversation, but she went on speaking. "Do you know you're very pale?
a nice life you must be leading. What kind of a woman is it who is
responsible for taking you away from me this time?"
Hofrat Wilt, with his usual silent step, suddenly stood by them. With
a casual air of gallantry and superiority he threw them a "Good-day,
beauteous lady, Hullo, Baron," and started to go on.
But Frau Oberberger thought it fitting to inform him first that Baron
George was just going to one of his usual orgies--she then followed
Hofrat up to the second story at the risk, as she remarked, of his
being taken for her ninety-fifth lover if he presented himself at
Ehrenberg's at the same time as she did.
It was seven o'clock before George could settle himself in a fly
and drive to Mariahilf. He felt quite exhausted by the two hours at
Ehrenberg's and he was even more than usually glad at the meeting
with Anna which was before him. Since that morning at the miniature
exhibition they had seen each other nearly every day; in parks,
picture-galleries, at her house. They usually talked about the little
incidents of their life or gossiped about books or music. They did not
often talk of the past, but when they did it was without doubts or
misgivings. For so far as Anna was concerned the adventures from which
George had just come were far from being surrounded with the uncanny
atmosphere of mystery; while George gathered from her own jesting
allusions that she herself had already experienced more than one
infatuation, though that did not cause him to lose the serenity of his
good spirits or even to ask her any further questions.
He had kissed her for the first time eight days ago, in an empty room
in the Liechtentein Gallery, and from that moment Anna had employed the
familiar 'du,' as though a less intimate appellation would have rung
somewhat false. The fly stopped at a street corner. George got out, lit
a cigarette and walked up and down opposite the house out of which Anna
was due to come.
After a few minutes she came out of the door, he rushed across the
street to meet her and kissed her hand ecstatically. Following her
habit, for she was in the habit of reading on her journeys, she carried
a book with her in a pressed leather cover.
"It is quite cool, Anna," said George, took the book out of her hand
and helped her into the jacket which she had been carrying over her arm.
"I was a little bit late you see," she said, "and I was very impatient
to see you. Yes," she added with a smile, "one's temperament will break
out now and again. What do you think of my new dress?" she added as
they walked on.
"It suits you very well."
"They thought at my lesson that I looked like a lady-in-waiting."
"Who thought so?"
"Frau Bittner herself and her two daughters whom I am teaching."
"I should rather say, like an Arch-Duchess."
Anna nodded with satisfaction.
"And now tell me, Anna, all that's happened to you since yesterday."
She began quite seriously: "Twelve o'clock, after I left you at the
door of our house, dinner in the family circle. Rested a little in
the afternoon, and thought about you. Pupils from four to six-thirty,
then read 'Grüner Heinrich,' and the evening paper. Too lazy to go out
again, messed about at home. Supper. The usual domestic scene."
"Your brother?" queried George.
She answered with a "Yes" that ruled out all further questions. "A
little music after supper.... Even tried to sing."
"Were you satisfied?"
"It was quite good enough for me, anyway," she said, and George thought
he detected a slight note of melancholy in her tone. She quickly went
on with her report. "Went to bed at half-past ten, slept well, got up
early at eight ... one can't lie in bed any longer in our house ...
dressed till half-past nine, was about the house till eleven...."
"... Messing about," added George.
"Right. Then went on to Weils, gave the boy a lesson."
"How old is he?" asked George.
"Thirteen," replied Anna.
"Well, after all that is not so young."
"Quite so," said Anna. "But you can set your mind at rest when I inform
you that he loves his Aunt Adele, a sentimental blonde of thirty-three,
and is not thinking for the time being of breaking his troth to her....
Well, to continue the record. Got home at one-thirty, had my meal
alone, thank Heaven! Father already at the office, mamma in a state of
sleep. Rested again from three to four, thought even more about you,
and more seriously too, than yesterday, then went shopping in town,
gloves, safety pins and something for mamma, and then drove on the
tram, reading all the way to Mariahilf, to the two Bittner kiddies....
So now you know all. Satisfied?"
"Except for the boy of thirteen."
"Well, I agree that that might be a bit upsetting. But now we should
like to know if you haven't got even more sinister confessions to make
to me."
They were in a narrow silent street, which seemed quite strange to
George, and Anna took his arm.
"I have just come from Ehrenbergs'," he began.
"Well?" queried Anna. "Did they try very much to inveigle you?"
"No, I can't go so far as that. Of course they seemed a little hurt
that I did not go to Auhof this summer," he added.
"Did dear little Else perform?" Anna asked.
"No; of course I don't know what happened after I left."
"It won't be worth the trouble now," said Anna with exuberant mirth.
"You are wrong, Anna. There are people there for whom it is quite worth
while singing."
"Who?"
"Heinrich Bermann, Willy Eissler, Demeter Stanzides...."
"Oh, Stanzides!" exclaimed Anna. "Now I am really sorry that I wasn't
there too."
"It seems to me," said George, "that that is a true word spoken in
jest."
"Quite so," replied Anna. "I think Demeter is really desperately
handsome."
George was silent for a few seconds and suddenly asked, with more
emotion than he usually manifested: "Is it he then...?"
"What 'he' do you mean?"
"The one you ... loved more than me."
She smiled, nestled closer up to him and answered simply, though a
little ironically: "Am I really supposed to have been fonder of any one
else than of you?"
"You confessed it to me yourself," replied George.
"But I also confess to you that I should love you in time more than I
have loved or ever could love any one else."
"Are you quite sure about that, Anna?"
"Yes, George, I am quite certain of it."
They had now come again into a more lively street and reluctantly let
go of each other's arms.
They remained standing in front of various shops. They discovered a
photographer's show-case by a house-door and were very much amused
by the laboriously-natural poses in which golden and silver wedding
couples, cadets, cooks in their Sunday best and ladies in masked fancy
dress were taken.