Doctor Wilhelm was summoned away, and after a while Frederick succeeded
in taking leave of Toussaint and his wife. He remained alone. The clear
heavens, the deep blue sea, smooth as glass, calmed as if by a miracle,
the music, the dancing, the sunlight, and the dear, sweet, pacifying,
all-forgiving letter of his mother--it was in his pocket--awakened in him
a fresh, pleasant sense of vitality.
"Life," he said to himself, "is always this way or that, a moment filled
with pain or pleasure, with darkness or brightness, with sunlight or
heavy, black clouds; and according to the moment in which we view our
past and future, these will darken or brighten. Should existence in the
shining light possess lesser reality than existence in the dark?" "No, it
should not," was the answer that came from everything within and about
him, filling him with youthful, almost childlike joy.
Frederick had pushed back his slouched hat, had unbuttoned his light
overcoat, and was standing with his arms crooked over the railing. He
looked out upon the sea. He felt the pulse beats of the engines, his ears
were filled with the pliant, melodious chords of the Viennese waltz; the
whole world had turned into a brilliant, lively, sparkling ballroom. He
had suffered and caused others to suffer. Now he embraced all those
through whom he had suffered and who had suffered through him, and seemed
to wed them in blissful intoxication.
At this point Ingigerd Hahlström passed by with the giant Von Halm.
Frederick heard her say she did not dance, that dancing was an insipid
pleasure. With that, he started away from the railing, went up to the
Canadian, and in a peculiar, fiery German manner ruthlessly drew her away
from the young American, who was completely taken aback. It was evident
that the delicate, exotic woman, whose breast rose and fell convulsively,
took pleasure in that strong conqueror's arm as they circled about in the
dance.
At the conclusion of the dance, he found himself under the necessity of
murdering French and English with her for a time and was very glad when
he could gracefully deliver her over again to the jealous young American.
Stoss was being transported across the deck by his valet, who, as always,
held him by his coat collar.
"My private overland and oversea express," he called to Frederick.
Frederick pulled up a steamer chair for him in a sudden impulse to chat
with Stoss.
"If the weather remains like this," said Stoss, after his valet had
carefully and skilfully seated him in the chair, "we can reach Hoboken
some time on Tuesday. But only if the weather does remain like this. The
captain tells me that when we are running under full steam, as now, we
make sixteen knots an hour."
Frederick started. So Tuesday this life under the same roof with Ingigerd
was to end.
Frederick had been profoundly humiliated by the coarse insult offered him
in the smoking-room. He knew of no other way to escape the impression of
it except by a sort of ostrich policy. For that reason he had passed over
the incident lightly when speaking to Doctor Wilhelm. Once his feeling of
delicacy, smarting like a sensitive nerve, had ceased to ache so
intensely, he looked upon the scandal much as a somnambulist would
look upon the thing that has awakened him and guarded him against a
humiliating fall. For more than half an hour his passion for the little
devil of a dancer had turned into disgust and repugnance, until now he
suddenly had to admit once again that separation from her was
inconceivable.
"That little dancer is a piquant wench," said Stoss, as if he had divined
Frederick's thoughts. "It would not seem at all strange to me if an
inexperienced man were to fall into her toils. I think she resembles one
of the younger Barrison sisters, who sing 'Linger Longer Lucy, Linger
Longer Loo.' A man must certainly don armour in dealing with her."
"I am completely at a loss to understand," lied Frederick, "how I ever
came to fall under suspicion with that creature. She is of absolutely no
interest to me."
"Good Lord, Doctor von Kammacher! Who doesn't fall under suspicion with
her?" He laughed unblushingly. "I myself did."
Frederick suffered. He looked sidewise at the armless trunk, and his soul
writhed in humiliation at the thought of his own ridiculousness.
Stoss went on to philosophise on erotics in general. He, the Don Juan
without arms, read Frederick a lecture on the art of handling women.
This led to his boasting, which detracted markedly from his quality of
fineness. His intellect also shrank in direct proportion to the increase
of his vanity. Something seemed to be working in him impelling him to
impress people at all costs with his successes as a man.
A servant-girl led two children by. Frederick drew a breath of relief,
for she diverted Stoss from his unsavoury theme.
"Well, Rosa," he called, "how is Mrs. Liebling?" It was his habit to
obtrude himself upon everybody. From the gossip of Bulke, his valet, he
had learned of Rosa and her cross. The difficult lady she served was the
excitable person of whom the barber had told Frederick and with whom he
was acquainted from certain impressions of his hearing. Rosa, who was
carrying Ella Liebling, a girl of five years, on her crimson arm, looked
pleased and laughed.
"She is not coming on deck. She's taken up with fortune-telling and
table-turning."
Bulke, in whose eyes Rosa seemed to have found unqualified favour, took
Siegfried Liebling, a boy of seven, from her hand and helped her place
both children safely in steamer chairs.
"There is nothing to beat a crazy woman," Stoss declared. "That Mrs.
Liebling actually called in Mr. Pfundner, the head-steward, to help her
with Rosa"--the very Rosa, who unwearyingly and self-sacrificingly
worked for her day and night, in good weather and bad. The worst to be
said against her was that at utmost she was a little too ready with her
tongue.