"That is too bad. This mania really begins to surpass all limits. I
must forbid Reinhold all cultivation of music if he continues to pursue
it in so senseless a manner."
With these words, the merchant Almbach opened a family council, which
took place in the parlour, in his wife's and daughter's presence, and
at which, fortunately, the special object of the same did not assist.
Herr Almbach, a man about fifty, whose quiet, measured, almost pedantic
manner, generally served as a pattern for all the office people,
appeared to have quite lost his equilibrium to-day, by the above-named
mania, as he continued, in great excitement--
"The bookkeeper came home this morning about four o'clock from the
jubilee, which I had left directly after midnight. From the bridge he
sees the garden house lighted up, and hears Reinhold raving over the
notes, and lost to all sense of sight and hearing. Of course he could
not accompany me to the feast! he declared himself to be ill; but his
'unbearable headache' did not hinder him from maltreating the piano in
the icy-cold garden-room until morning's dawn. I shall be hearing again
from my partners that my son-in-law has been doing his utmost in
uselessness as well as in carelessness. It is hardly credible! The
youngest clerk understands the books better, and has more interest in
the business, than the partner and future head of the house of 'Almbach
& Co.' My whole life long have I worked and toiled to make my firm
secure and respected, and now I have the prospect of leaving it, at
last, in such hands."
"I always told you that you should have forbidden his associating with
the Music-Director, Wilkins," interrupted Frau Almbach, "he is to blame
for it all; no one could get on with that misanthropical, musical fool.
Everyone hated and avoided him, but with Reinhold that was all the more
reason to form the most intimate friendship with him. Day after day he
was there, and there alone was laid the foundation of all this musical
nonsense, which his master seems to have bequeathed to him at his
death. It is hardly bearable since he had the old man's legacy--the
piano--in the house. Ella, what do you say, then, to this behaviour of
your husband?"
The young wife, to whom the last words were addressed, had so far not
spoken a syllable. She sat in the window, her head bent over her
sewing, and only looked up as this direct question was addressed to
her.
"I, dear mother?"
"Yes, you, my child, as the affair affects you most. Or do you really
not feel the irresponsible manner in which Reinhold neglects you and
your child?"
"He is so fond of music," said Ella, softly.
"Do you excuse him also?" said her mother, excitedly. "That is just the
misfortune, he cares for it more than for wife or child; he never asks
for either of you if he can only sit at his piano and improvise. Have
you no idea of what a wife can and must demand from her husband, and
that, above all, it is her duty to bring him to reason? But to be sure,
nothing is ever to be expected of you."
The young wife certainly did not look as if much were to be expected of
her. She had little that was attractive in her appearance, and the one
thing about her that could perhaps be called pretty, the delicate,
still girlishly slender figure, was entirely hidden under a most
unbecoming house dress, which in its boundless plainness was more
suggestive of a servant than of the daughter of the house, and was made
so as to disguise any possible advantages which there might be. Only a
narrow strip of the fair hair, which lay smoothly parted on her brow,
was visible, the rest disappeared entirely under a cap more suited to
her mother's years, and offering a peculiar contrast to the face of the
barely twenty-years-old wife. This pale face with its downcast eyes,
was not adapted to arouse any interest; it had no expression, there lay
in it something stolid, vacant, that nearly approached to stupidity,
and at this moment, when she let her sewing drop and looked at her
mother, it betrayed such helpless nervousness and senselessness, that
Almbach felt obliged to come to his daughter's assistance.
"Leave Ella alone!" said he in that half-angry, half-compassionate tone
with which one rejects the interference of a child, "you know nothing
is to be done with her, and what could she effect here?"
He shrugged his shoulders and continued bitterly; "That is the reward
for the sacrifice of adopting my brother's orphan children! Hugo throws
all gratitude, all reason and education in my face, and runs away
secretly; and Reinhold, who has grown up in my house, under my eyes,
causes me the greatest anxiety, with his good-for-nothing hankering
after all fancies. But with him, at all events, I have kept the reins
in my hand, and I shall draw them so tightly now, that he shall lose
all inclination to chafe against them any more."
"Yes, Hugo's ingratitude was really outrageous!" Frau Almbach joined
in. "To fly from our house at night, in a fog, and go to sea, 'to try
his luck alone in the world,' as he said in the impudent letter of
farewell which he left behind him! Two years since there actually came
a letter to Reinhold from the Captain; and the former hinted only
lately, quite openly, about his probable return. I fear he knows
something positive about it."
"Hugo shall not cross my threshold," declared the merchant, with a
solemn motion of his hand. "I know nothing of this interchange of
letters with Reinhold, and will know nothing. Let them correspond
behind my back, but if the unadvised youth should have the audacity to
appear before me, he will learn what the anger of an offended uncle and
guardian is."
While the parents prepared to discuss this apparently often-treated
theme, with the wonted details and ire, Ella had left the room
unnoticed and now descended the staircase leading to the office,
situated on the ground floor. The young wife knew that now, at midday,
all the people would be absent, and this probably lent her courage to
enter.
It was a large gloomy room; whose bare walls and barred windows caused
it somewhat to resemble a prison. No trouble had been taken to impart
any comfort or even a pleasant appearance to the office. And what for?
What belonged to work was there; the rest was luxury, and luxury was a
thing that the house of Almbach and Co., notwithstanding its
notoriously not inconsiderable wealth, did not allow itself.
At present no one was to be found in the room, excepting the young man,
who sat at a desk with a big ledger open before him. He looked pale and
as if he had been up late; his eyes, which should have been busy with
figures, were fixed on the narrow strip of the sun's rays which fell
slantingly across the room. In his gaze was something of the longing
and bitterness of a prisoner, to whom the sunshine, penetrating into
his cell, brings news of life and freedom from without. He hardly
turned his head at the opening of the door, and asked indifferently--
"What is it? What do you want, Ella?"
Every other wife at the second question would have gone to her husband
and put her arm round his shoulder. Ella remained standing close to the
doorway. It sounded far too icily cold, this "What do you want?" she
evidently was not welcome.
"I wished to ask how your headache is?" she began, shyly.
"My headache?" Reinhold recollected himself suddenly. "Ah, yes, I think
it has gone."
The young wife closed the door and came a step or two nearer.
"My parents are very furious again, that you were not at the feast
yesterday, and were playing, instead, the whole night long," she told
him hesitatingly.
Reinhold knitted his brows. "Who told them? you perhaps?"
"I?" her voice sounded half like a reproach. "The bookkeeper saw the
garden house lighted up, and heard you playing as he returned this
morning."
An expression of contemptuous scorn played around the young man's lips,
"Ah! I certainly had not thought of that. I did not believe that those
gentlemen, after their jubilee, would have time or inclination left for
observations. To be sure for spying they are always ready enough."
"My father thinks--" began Ella, again.
"What does he think?" shouted Reinhold. "Is it not enough for him that
from morning to evening I am bound to this office; does he even grudge
me the refreshment I seek at night in music? I thought that I and my
piano had been banished far enough; that the garden house lay so
distant and so isolated, that I could run no risk of disturbing the
sleep of the righteous in the house. Fortunately no one can hear a
sound."
"Not so," said the young wife, softly, "I hear every note when all is
still around, and I alone lie awake."
Reinhold turned round and looked at his wife. She stood with downcast
eyes and thoroughly expressionless face before him. His glance swept
slowly down her figure as though he were unconsciously drawing some
comparison, and the bitterness in his features became more plainly
displayed.
"I am sorry for it," he replied coldly, "but I cannot help your windows
looking into the garden. Close your shutters in future, then it is to
be hoped that my musical extravagances will not disturb your sleep any
more."
He turned over the pages of his book, and appeared to lose himself
again in his calculations. Ella waited about a minute longer, but as
she saw that not the least notice was taken of her presence, she went
away as noiselessly as she came.
She had hardly left before Reinhold flung the ledger from him
with a passionate movement. His glance, which fell upon the
contemptuously-treated object, and was cast around the office, showed
the most bitter hatred; then he laid his head on both arms and closed
his eyes, as if he wished to see and hear no more of the whole
surroundings.
"God greet you, Reinhold!" said a strange voice suddenly, quite close
to him.
He started up, and looked bewildered and inquiringly at the stranger in
sailor's clothes, who had entered unnoticed and now stood before him.
Suddenly, however, a recollection seemed to shoot through him, as with
a cry of joy, he threw himself on the new-comer's breast.
"Is it possible, Hugo!--you here already?"
Two powerful arms embraced him firmly, and a pair of warm lips were
pressed again and again upon his.
"Do you really know me still? I should have picked you out from amongst
hundreds. Certainly you do look rather different from the little
Reinhold I left behind here. Well, with me I suppose it is not much
better."
The first words still sounded full of deep emotion; but the latter
already bore a somewhat merrier tone. Reinhold's arm still lay fondly
round his brother's neck.
"And you come so suddenly, so completely unannounced? I only expected
you in a few weeks' time."
"We have had an unusually quick voyage," said the young captain,
cheerfully, "and once I was in the harbour, I could not stay a minute
longer on board, I must come to you. Thank God, I found you alone! I
was afraid I should have to pass the purgatorial fire of domestic anger
and to fight my way through the united relatives in order to reach
you."
Reinhold's face, still beaming with the pleasure of meeting again,
became overcast at this recollection, and his arm fell slowly down.
"No one has seen you surely?" he asked, "you know how my uncle feels
towards you, since--"
"Since I withdrew myself from his _all-wise_ rule, which wished to
screw me absolutely to the office table, and ran away?" interrupted
Hugo. "Yes, I know; and I should have liked to look on at the row that
broke loose in the house when they discovered I had fled. But the story
is nearly ten years old. The 'good-for-nothing' is not dead and ruined,
as the family have, no doubt, prophecied hundreds of times, and wished
oftener; he returns as a most respected captain of a most splendid
ship, with all possible recommendations to your principal houses of
business. Should these mercantile and maritime advantages not at last
soften the heart of the angry house of Almbach and Co.?"
Reinhold suppressed a sigh, "Do not joke, Hugo! you do not know my
uncle--do not know the life in his house."
"No, I went away at the night time," asserted the Captain, "and that
was most sensible; you should do the same."
"What are you thinking about? My wife--my child?"
"Ah yes!" said Hugo, somewhat confused. "I always forget you are
married. Poor boy! they chained you fast by times. Such a betrothal
altar is the safest bolt to thrust before all possible longing for
freedom. There, do not fly out at once! I am quite willing to believe
they did not regularly force you to say 'yes.' But how you came to do
it, my uncle will probably have to answer for; and the melancholy
attitude in which I found you, does not say much for the happiness of a
young husband. Let me look into your eyes, that I may see how it really
is."
He seized him unceremoniously by his arm, and drew him towards the
window. Here in broad daylight, one could see, for the first time, how
very unlike the brothers were, notwithstanding an undeniable
resemblance in their features. The Captain, the elder of the two, was
strongly, and yet gracefully built, his handsome, open countenance was
browned by sun and air; his hair curled lightly, and his brown eyes
sparkled with love of life and courage; his carriage was easy and
firm, like that of a man accustomed to move in the most varied
surroundings and circumstances, and his whole bearing had a species of
self-confidence which broke forth at every opportunity, with, at the
same time, such a fresh, open kindliness, that it was difficult to
resist him.
Reinhold, his junior by a few years, made a totally different
impression. He was slighter, paler than his brother; his hair and eyes
were darker, and the latter had a serious, even gloomy expression. But
there lay on this brow, and in those eyes, something which attracted
all the more, as they did not disclose all which lay behind them. Hugo
was, perhaps, the handsomer of the two, and yet a comparison was sure
to be drawn unconditionally in favour of the younger brother, who
possessed, in the highest degree, that rare and dangerous charm of
being interesting, to which, often the most perfect beauty must give
way.
The young man made a hasty attempt to withdraw from the threatened
inspection. "You cannot remain here," he said, decidedly, "uncle may
enter at any moment, and then there would be a terrible scene. I will
take you to the garden house for the present, which I have had fitted
up for my sole use. You will hardly dare to appear before the family,
and your arrival must be known. I will tell them."
"And bear all the storm alone?" interrupted the Captain. "I beg your
pardon, but that is my affair! I am going up at once to my uncle and
aunt, and shall introduce myself as their obedient nephew!"
"But Hugo! are you out of your senses? You have no idea of the state of
affairs here."
"Exactly! The strongest fortresses are taken by surprise, and I have
long looked forward to one day entering like a bomb amongst the stormy
relations, and to seeing what sort of a grimace they would make. But
one thing more. Reinhold, you must give me your promise to remain
quietly below until I return. You shall not be placed in the painful
position of witnessing how the weight of the family wrath is poured
upon my erring head. You might wish to catch some of it out of
brotherly self-sacrifice, and that would disturb all my plans of
campaign. Jonas, come in!"
He opened the door and admitted a man, who, until now, had waited
outside in the passage. "That is my brother. Look well at him! You have
to report yourself to him, and pay him your respects. Once more,
Reinhold, promise me not to enter the family parlour for the next
half-hour. I shall bring all to order up there by myself, if I have
even to take the whole barrack by storm."
He was out of the door before his brother could make any remonstrance.
Still half-bewildered by the rapid changes of the last ten minutes, he
looked at the broad, square figure of the new arrival, who set a
good-sized portmanteau down on the floor, and planted himself close
beside it.
"Seaman Wilhelm Jonas, of the 'Ellida,' now in the service of Herr
Captain Almbach!" reported he, systematically, and attempted a movement
at the same time, probably intended to be a bow, but which did not bear
the least similarity to the desired courtesy.
"All right," said Reinhold, abruptly, "you can leave the luggage here
at present! I must first hear how long my brother proposes remaining."
"We are to stay here a few days with his uncle," assured Jonas, very
quietly.
"Oh! is that decided already?"
"Quite positively."
"I do not understand Hugo," murmured Reinhold. "He appears to have no
idea of what is before him, and yet my letters must have prepared him
for it. I cannot possibly let him bear the storm alone."
He made a movement towards the door, but this was quite blocked up by
the sailor's broad figure, who, even at the young man's displeased
glance of enquiry, did not move from his position.
"The Captain said that he would bring all to order up yonder by
himself," he explained laconically, "so he will do it. He succeeds in
everything."
"Really?" asked Reinhold, somewhat struck by the insuperable confidence
of the words, "You seem to know my brother well."
"Very well."
Hesitating whether he should accede to Hugo's wish, Reinhold went to
the window which looked into the court, and became aware of three or
four faces, expressive of boundless curiosity, belonging to the
servants, who were trying to obtain a peep into the office. The young
man allowed a sound of suppressed annoyance to escape him, and turned
again to the sailor.
"My brother's arrival seems to be known in the house already, said he
hastily. Strangers are not such a rarity in the office, and the
curiosity is evidently directed to you."
"It does not matter," muttered Jonas, "even if the whole nest becomes
rebellious and stares at us. That sort of thing is nothing new. The
savages in the South Sea Islands do just the same when our 'Ellida'
lies-to."
The question may remain undecided, as to whether the comparison just
drawn was exactly flattering to the inhabitants of the house.
Fortunately no one but Reinhold heard it, and he considered it
necessary to remove the object of this curiosity. He desired him to
enter the adjoining room and wait there; he himself remained behind and
listened uneasily if quarrelling voices were to be heard, but to be
sure the family parlour lay in the upper story and at the other side of
the house. The young man debated with himself as to whether he should
remain true to the half-promise which he had made to Hugo, and leave
him to manage alone, or if he should not, at least, attempt to cover
the unavoidable retreat, as, that such lay before Hugo, he believed to
be certain. He had too often heard the condemning verdict accorded to
his brother by the family, not to dread a scene, in which even the
former would be unable to hold his own, but he also knew his own
position towards his uncle too well, not to say to himself that his
interference would merely make matters worse.
More than half-an-hour had passed in this painful anxiety, when at last
steps were heard and the Captain entered.
"Here I am, the affair is settled."
"What is settled?" asked Reinhold, hastily.
"Well, the pardon of course. As much-beloved nephew, I have this moment
lain alternately in the arms of my uncle and aunt. Come upstairs with
me, Reinhold! you are missing in the reconciliation _tableau_, but you
must be prepared for endless emotion; they are all crying together."
His brother looked at him doubtfully. "I do not know, Hugo, if this be
meant for fun, or--"
The young Captain laughed mischievously. "You seem to have little
confidence in my diplomatic talents. But all the same, do not think
that the affair was easily settled. I was certainly prepared for a
storm. But here raged a regular tornado--bah, we sailors are accustomed
to such things--and when at last I could obtain speech, which
certainly was not for some time, the victory was already decided. I
represented the return of the lost son with a masterly hand; I called
heaven and earth as witnesses of my reformation. I ventured upon
falling at their feet--that took, at least with my aunt--I now made
sure of the hesitating female flank, in order to storm the centre in
conjunction with it, and the victory was brilliant. Forgiveness in due
form--general emotion and embraces--group of reconciliation--my Heaven,
do not look so incredulous. I assure you I am speaking in all
seriousness."
Reinhold shook his head, yet unconsciously he drew a breath of relief.
"Comprehend it, who can! I should have thought it impossible! Have
you"--the question sounded peculiarly uncertain--"have you seen my
wife?"
"To be sure," said Hugo, slyly. "That is to say, I have certainly not
seen much of her, and heard even less, as she remained quite passive
during the scene, and did not even cry like the rest. The same little
cousin Eleonore still, who always sat so quietly and shyly in her
corner, out of which even our wildest boyish teasings did not drive
her--and she has become your wife! But now, above all, I must admire
the representative of the house of Almbach! Where is he?"
Reinhold looked up, and for a moment a bright gleam drove all the
gloominess away from his face. "My boy? I will show him to you. Come,
we will go up to him."
"Thank God, at last a sign of happiness in your face," said the
Captain, with a seriousness of which one would hardly have deemed his
merry nature capable, and he added in a lowered voice, "I have sought
for it in vain so far."
* * * * *
The firm of Almbach and Co. belonged to that class whose names on the
Exchange, as well as in the commercial world generally, were of some
position, without being of conspicuous importance. The relations
between its head and Consul Erlau were not only of a business nature;
they dated from earlier times, when both, equally young and meanless,
were apprenticed in the same office, the one to raise himself until he
became a rich merchant, whose ships sailed on every ocean and whose
connections extended to every quarter of the globe--the other to found
a modest business, which never reached beyond certain bounds. Almbach
avoided all more daring speculations, all greater undertakings, which
he was by no means the man to superintend or guide; he preferred a
moderate, but steady gain, which also fell to his share to the fullest
extent. His social position was certainly as different from that of
Consul Erlau as was his old-fashioned gloomy house in Canal Street,
with its high gables and barred office windows, from the princely
furnished palace at the Harbour. The friendship between the former
youthful companions had gradually diminished, but it was certainly
Almbach who was principally to blame for it. He could not be reconciled
to the Consul after the latter had become a millionaire, living in the
style suited to that position. Perhaps he could not forgive him for
occupying the first place, while he himself only stood in the third or
fourth rank, and well as he knew how to utilise the advantages which
the intimate acquaintance with the great firm of Erlau opened to him,
yet he held, all the more, to his strictly middle-class, and somewhat
old-frankish household, and kept aloof from all communication with that
of the Consul. The latter's invitations had ceased when he saw that
they were never accepted; for years the mutual meetings had been
restricted to those occasional ones on Exchange or some chance place,
and lately Almbach had even, when any business matters required a
personal interview, let his son-in-law represent him. It was decidedly
disagreeable to him, that on this occasion the young man had received
the invitation to the opera and the succeeding evening party, and
impossible as it was to refuse this civility, the merchant did not
attempt to disguise from his family his dissatisfaction at Reinhold's
introduction into the "nabob's life," the designation with which he
usually honoured his old friend's household.
Notwithstanding all this, Almbach was a well-to-do, even, as was
maintained by many, a very rich man, and on this account the centre and
support of numerous relations not blessed with over-much fortune. In
this manner the care of his two orphaned nephews, whom their father, a
ship's captain, had left quite without resources, fell to his charge.
Almbach had only one child, to whose existence he had never attached
very much importance, as she was a girl. The Consul and his wife were
the little one's god-parents, and it might always be considered as an
act of self-conquest, that Almbach gave his daughter Frau Erlau's name,
as he particularly hated the aristocratic, romantic-sounding "Eleonore"
and soon changed it for the much simpler "Ella." This designation was
also more suitable, as Ella Almbach was considered by every one to be,
not only a simple, but even a very contracted-minded being, whose
horizon never was extended beyond the trifling domestic events of
housekeeping. The child had formerly been very sickly, and this may
have had a crippling effect upon the development of her mental
faculties. They were indeed of a very inferior order, and the very
prejudiced, strictly domestic education in her father's house,
excluding every other circle of ideas and thought, did not appear
adapted to give them a higher direction. Thus, then, the girl had
grown up quiet and shy, always overlooked, everywhere set aside, and
without the least value, even amongst her nearest relations. They
were wont to consider her quite incapable of self-dependence, even
half-irresponsible, and her eventual marriage did not change things at
all.
Neither of the young people raised any objection to the long-cherished,
and to them long-known, plan of a union. A girl of seventeen and a man
of twenty-two have certainly not much self-decision, least of all when
they have grown up under such repressed circumstances. Besides, in this
case, there was also the habit of always living together, which had
created a sort of liking, although in Reinhold it was really only
pitying tolerance, and in Ella secret fear of her mentally superior
cousin. They gave their hands obediently at the betrothal, which was
followed, after a year's reprieve, by the wedding. Almbach's sceptre
swayed over both as much after as before it, he allowed his new
son-in-law, who, as far as the name went, was literally his partner, as
little independence in the business as his wife did the young mistress
in the household.