CHAPTER IX

Frau Permaneder was going along Broad Street in a great hurry. There

was something abandoned about her air: she showed almost none of the

impressive bearing usual to her on the street. Hunted and harassed,

in almost violent haste, she had as it were been able to save only a

remnant of her dignity--like a beaten king who gathers what is left of

his army about him to seek safety in the arms of flight.

She looked pitiable indeed. Her upper lip, that arched upper lip that

had always done its share to give charm to her face, was quivering now,

and the eyes were large with apprehension. They were very bright and

stared fixedly ahead of her, as though they too were hurrying onward.

Her hair came in disorder from under her close hat, and her face showed

the pale yellow tint which it always had when her digestion took a turn

for the worse.

Her digestion was obviously worse in these days. The family noticed

that on Thursdays. And no matter how hard every one tried to keep off

the rocks, the conversation always made straight for them and stuck

there: on the subject of Hugo Weinschenk’s trial. Frau Permaneder

herself led up to it. She would call on God and her fellow men to tell

her how Public Prosecutor Moritz Hagenström could sleep of nights. For

her part, she could not understand it--she never would! Her agitation

increased with every word. “Thank you, I can’t eat,” she would say, and

push away her plate. She would elevate her shoulders, toss her head,

and in the height of her passion fall back upon the practice, acquired

in her Munich years, of taking nothing but beer, cold Bavarian beer,

poured into an empty stomach, the nerves of which were in rebellion

and would revenge themselves bitterly. Toward the end of the meal she

always had to get up and go down to the garden or the court, where she

suffered the most dreadful fits of nausea, leaning upon Ida Jungmann

or Riekchen Severin. Her stomach would finally relieve itself of its

contents, and contract with spasms of pain, which sometimes lasted for

minutes and would continue at intervals for a long time.

It was about three in the afternoon, a windy, rainy January day. Frau

Permaneder turned the corner at Fishers’ Lane and hurried down the

steep declivity to her brother’s house. After a hasty knock she went

from the court straight into the bureau, her eye flying across the

desks to where the Senator sat in his seat by the window. She made such

an imploring motion with her head that he put down his pen without more

ado and went to her.

“Well?” he said, one eyebrow lifted.

“A moment, Thomas--it’s very pressing; there’s no time to waste.”

He opened the baize door of his private office, closed it behind him

when they were both inside, and looked at his sister inquiringly.

“Tom,” she said, her voice quavering, wringing her hands inside her

muff, “you must give it to us--lay it out for us--you will, won’t

you?--the money for the bond, I mean. We haven’t it--where should we

get twenty-five thousand marks from, I should like to know? You will

get them back--you’ll get them back all too soon, I’m afraid. You

understand--the thing is this: in short, they have reached a point

where Hagenström demands immediate arrest or else a bond of twenty-five

thousand marks. And Weinschenk will give you his word not to stir from

the spot--”

“Has it really come to that?” the Senator said, shaking his head.

“Yes, they have succeeded in getting that far, the villains!” Frau

Permaneder sank upon the sofa with an impotent sob. “And they will go

on; they will go on to the end, Tom.”

“Tony,” he said, and sat down sidewise by his mahogany desk, crossing

one leg over the other and leaning his head on his hand, “tell me

straight out, do you still have faith in his innocence?”

She sobbed once or twice before she answered, hopelessly: “Oh, no, Tom.

How could I? I’ve seen so much evil in the world. I haven’t believed

in it from the beginning, even, though I tried my very best. Life

makes it so very hard, you know, to believe in any one’s innocence.

Oh, no--I’ve had doubts of his good conscience for a long time, and

Erica has not known what to make of him--she confessed it to me, with

tears--on account of his behaviour at home. We haven’t talked about

it, of course. He got ruder and ruder, and kept demanding all the time

that Erica should be lively and divert his mind and make him forget his

troubles. And he broke the dishes when she wasn’t. You can’t imagine

what it was like, when he shut himself up evenings with his papers:

when anybody knocked, you could hear him jump up and shout ‘Who’s

there?’”

They were silent.

“But suppose he _is_ guilty, Tom. Suppose he did do it,” began Frau

Permaneder afresh, and her voice gathered strength. “He wasn’t working

for his own pocket, but for the company--and then--good Heavens, in

this life, people have to realize--there are other things to be taken

into consideration. He married into our family--he is one of us, now.

They can’t just go and stick him into prison like that!”

He shrugged his shoulders.

“What are you shrugging your shoulders for, Tom? Do you mean that

you are willing to sit down under the last and crowning insult these

adventurers think they can offer us? We must do something! He mustn’t

be convicted! Aren’t you the Burgomaster’s right hand? My God, can’t

the Senate just pardon him if it likes? You know, before I came to

you, I nearly went to Cremer, to get him--to implore him to intervene

and take a stand in the matter--he is Chief of Police--”

“Oh, child, that is all just nonsense.”

“Nonsense, Tom? And Erica? And the child?” said she, lifting up her

muff, with her two imploring hands inside. She was still a moment, she

let her arms fall, her chin began to quiver, and two great tears ran

down from under her drooping lids. She added softly, “And me?”

“Oh, Tony, be brave,” said the Senator. Her helplessness went through

him. He pushed his chair up to hers and stroked her hair, in an effort

to console her. “Everything isn’t over, yet. Perhaps it will come out

all right. Of course I will give you the money--that goes without

saying--and Breslauer’s very clever.”

She shook her head, weeping.

“No, Tom, it will not come out all right. I’ve no hope that it will.

They will convict him, and put him in prison--and then the hard time

will come for Erica and me. Her dowry is gone: it all went to the

setting-out, the furniture and pictures; we sha’n’t get a quarter of it

back by selling. And the salary was always spent. We never put a penny

by. We will go back to Mother, if she will take us, until he is free.

And then where can we go? We’ll just have to sit on the rocks.” She

sobbed.

“On the rocks?”

“Oh, that’s just an expression--a figure. What I mean is, it won’t turn

out all right. I’ve had too much to bear--I don’t know how I came to

deserve it all--but I can’t hope any more. Erica will be like me--with

Grünlich and Permaneder. But now you can see just how it is--and how it

all comes over you! Could I help it? Could any one help it, I ask you,

Tom?” she repeated drearily, and looked at him with her tear-swimming

eyes. “Everything I’ve ever undertaken has gone wrong and turned to

misfortune--and I’ve meant everything so well. God knows I have! And

now this too-- This is the last straw--the very last.”

She wept, leaning on the arm which he gently put about her: wept over

her ruined life and the quenching of this last hope.

A week later, Herr Director Hugo Weinschenk was sentenced to three and

a half years’ imprisonment, and arrested at once.

There was a very large crowd at the final session. Lawyer Breslauer of

Berlin made a speech for the defence the like of which had never been

heard before. Gosch the broker went about for weeks afterward bursting

with enthusiasm for the masterly pathos and irony it displayed.

Christian Buddenbrook heard it too, and afterward got behind a table

at the club, with a pile of newspapers in front of him, and reproduced

the whole speech. At home he declared that jurisprudence was the

finest profession there was, and he thought it would just have suited

him. The Public Prosecutor himself, Dr. Moritz Hagenström, who was a

great connoisseur, said in private that the speech had been a genuine

treat to him. But the famous advocate’s talents did not prevent his

colleagues from thumping him on the back and telling him he had not

pulled the wool over their eyes.

The necessary sale followed upon the disappearance of the Director;

and when it was over, people in town began gradually to forget about

Hugo Weinschenk. But the Misses Buddenbrook, sitting on Thursday at the

family table, declared that they had known the first moment, from the

man’s eyes, that he was not straight, that his conscience was bad, and

that there would be trouble in the end. Certain considerations, which

they wished now they had not regarded, had led them to suppress these

painful observations.

PART NINE

CHAPTER I

Senator Buddenbrook followed the two gentlemen, old Dr. Grabow and

young Dr. Langhals, out of the Frau Consul’s bed-chamber into the

breakfast-room and closed the door.

“May I ask you to give me a moment, gentlemen?” he said, and led them

up the steps, through the corridor, and into the landscape-room, where,

on account of the raw, damp weather, the stove was already burning.

“You will understand my anxiety,” he said. “Sit down and tell me

something reassuring, if possible.”

“Zounds, my dear Senator,” answered Dr. Grabow, leaning back

comfortably, his chin in his neck-cloth, his hat-brim propped in both

hands against his stomach. Dr. Langhals put his top-hat down on the

carpet beside him and regarded his hands, which were exceptionally

small and covered with hair. He was a heavy dark man with a pointed

beard, a pompadour hair-cut, beautiful eyes, and a vain expression.

“There is positively no reason for serious disquiet at present,” Dr.

Grabow went on. “When we take into consideration our honoured patient’s

powers of resistance--my word, I think, as an old and tried councillor,

I ought to know what that resistance is--it is simply astonishing, for

her years, I must say.”

“Yes, precisely: for her years,” said the Senator, uneasily, twisting

his moustaches.

“I don’t say,” went on Dr. Grabow, in his gentle voice, “that your dear

Mother will be walking out to-morrow. You can tell that by looking at

her, of course. There is no denying that the inflammation has taken a

disappointing turn in the last twenty-four hours. The chill yesterday

afternoon did not please me at all, and to-day there is actually pain

in the side. And some fever--oh, nothing to speak of, but still-- In

short, my dear Senator, we shall probably have to reckon with the

troublesome fact that the lung is slightly affected.”

“Inflammation of the lungs then?” asked the Senator, and looked from

one physician to the other.

“Yes--pneumonia,” said Dr. Langhals, with a solemn and correct bow.

“A slight inflammation, however, and confined to the right side,”

answered the family physician. “We will do our best to localize it.”

“Then there is ground for serious concern, after all?” The Senator sat

quite still and looked the speaker full in the face.

“Concern--oh, we must be concerned to limit the affection. We must ease

the cough, and go at the fever energetically. The quinine will see to

that. And by the by, my dear Senator, let me warn you against feeling

alarm over single symptoms, you know. If the difficulty in breathing

increases, or there should be a little delirium in the night, or a good

deal of discharge to-morrow--a sort of rusty-looking mucous, with a

little blood in it--well, all that is to be expected, entirely regular

and normal. Do reassure dear Madame Permaneder on this point too--she

is nursing the patient with such devotion.--How is she feeling? I quite

forgot to ask how she has been, in the last few days.”

“She is about as usual,” the Senator said. “I have not heard of

anything new. She is not taking much thought for her own condition,

these days--”

“Of course, of course. And, apropos: your sister needs rest, especially

at night, and Mamsell Severin has not time to give her all the rest

she needs. What about a nurse, my dear Senator? Why not have one of

our good Grey Sisters, in whom you feel such an interest? The Mother

Superior would be glad to send you one.”

“You consider it necessary?”

“I am only suggesting it. The sisters are invaluable--their experience

and calmness are always so soothing to the patient, especially in an

illness like this, where there is a succession of disquieting symptoms.

Well--let me repeat, no anxiety, my dear Senator. And we shall see, we

shall see. We will have another talk this evening.”

“Positively,” said Dr. Langhals, took his hat and got up, with his

colleague. But the Senator had not finished: he had another question,

another test to make.

“Gentlemen,” he said, “one word more. My brother Christian is a nervous

man. He cannot stand much. Do you advise me to send him word? Should I

suggest to him to come home?”

“Your brother Christian is not in town?”

“No, he is in Hamburg--for a short time, on business, I understand.”

Dr. Grabow gave his colleague a glance. Then he laughingly shook the

Senator’s hand and said, “Well, we’ll let him attend to his business in

peace. No use upsetting him unnecessarily. If any change comes which

seems to make it advisable, to quiet the patient, or to raise her

spirits--well, there is plenty of time still, plenty of time.”

The gentlemen traversed the pillared hall and stood on the steps

awhile, talking about other matters: politics, and the agitations and

changes due to the war just then ended.

“Well, good times will be coming now, eh, Herr Senator? Money in the

country, and fresh confidence everywhere.”

And the Senator partially agreed with him. He said that the grain

trade with Russia had been greatly stimulated since the outbreak of

war, and mentioned the dimensions to which the import trade in oats

had attained--though the profit, it was true, had been very unevenly

divided.

The physicians took their leave, and Senator Buddenbrook turned to

go back to the sick-room. He revolved what Dr. Grabow had said. He

had spoken with reserve--he gave the impression of avoiding anything

definite. The single plain word was “inflammation of the lungs”; which

became no more reassuring after Dr. Langhals added the scientific

terminology. Pneumonia--at the Frau Consul’s age. The fact that there

were two physicians coming and going was in itself disquieting. Grabow

had arranged that very unobtrusively. He intended to retire before

long, and as young Dr. Langhals would then be taking over the practice,

he, Dr. Grabow, would be pleased if he might bring him in now and again.

When the Senator entered the darkened room, his mien appeared alert and

his bearing energetic. He was used to hiding his cares and weariness

under an air of calmness and poise; and the mask glided over his

features as he opened the door, almost as though by a single act of

will.

Frau Permaneder sat by the high bed, the hangings of which were thrust

back, and held her mother’s hand. The old lady was propped up on

pillows. She turned her head as her son came in, and looked searchingly

with her pale blue eyes into his face--a look of calm self-control, yet

of deliberate insistence. Coming as it did, slightly sidewise, there

was almost something sinister about it, too. Two red spots stood out

upon the pallor of her cheeks, but there were no signs of weakness or

exhaustion. The old lady was very wide awake, more so in fact than

those around her--for, after all, she was the person most concerned.

And she mistrusted this illness; she was not at all disposed to lie

down and let it have its own way.

“What did they say, Thomas?” she asked in a brisk, decided voice which

made her cough directly. She tried to keep the cough behind her closed

lips, but it burst out and made her put her hand to her side.

“They said,” answered the Senator, when the spasm was over, stroking

her hand, “they said that our dear, good mother will be up again in a

few days. The wretched cough is responsible for your lying here. The

lung is of course slightly affected--it is not exactly inflammation,”

he hastened to say, as he saw her narrowing gaze, “but even if it

were, that needn’t necessarily be so bad. It might be much worse,” he

finished. “In short, the lung is somewhat irritated, and they may be

right--where is Mamsell Severin?”

“Gone to the chemist’s,” said Frau Permaneder.

“Yes, you see. She has gone to the chemist’s again, and you look as

though you might go to sleep any minute, Tony. No, it isn’t good

enough. If only for a day or so, we should have a nurse in, don’t you

think so? I will find out if my Mother Superior up at the Grey Sisters

has any one free.”

“Thomas,” said the Frau Consul, this time in a more cautious voice, so

as not to let loose another cough, “believe me, you cause a good deal

of feeling by your protection of the Catholic order against the black

Protestant Sisters. You have shown the Catholics a distinct preference.

Pastor Pringsheim complained to me about it very strenuously a little

time ago.”

“Well, he needn’t. I am convinced that the Grey Sisters are more

faithful, devoted, and self-sacrificing than the Black ones are. The

Protestants aren’t the real thing. They all marry the first chance

they get. They are worldly, egotistical, and ordinary, while the Grey

Sisters are perfectly disinterested. I am sure they are much nearer

Heaven. And they are better for us for the very reason that they owe me

some gratitude. What should we have done without Sister Leandra when

Hanno had convulsions? I only hope she is free!”

And Sister Leandra came. She put down her cloak and little handbag,

took off the grey veil which she wore on the street over her white one,

and went softly about her work, in her gentle, friendly way, the rosary

at her waist clicking as she moved. She remained a day and a night with

the querulous, not always patient sufferer, and then withdrew, almost

apologetic over the human weakness that enforced a little repose. She

was replaced by another sister, but came back again after she had slept.

The Frau Consul required constant attendance at her bedside. The worse

her condition grew, the more she bent all her thoughts and all her

energies upon her illness, for which she felt a naïve hatred. Nearly

all her life she had been a woman of the world, with a quiet, native,

and permanent love of life and good living. Yet she had filled her

latter years with piety and charitable deeds: largely out of loyalty

toward her dead husband, but also, perhaps, by reason of an unconscious

impulse which bade her make her peace with Heaven for her own strong

vitality, and induce it to grant her a gentle death despite the

tenacious clutch she had always had on life. But the gentle death was

not to be hers. Despite many a sore trial, her form was quite unbowed,

her eyes still clear. She still loved to set a good table, to dress

well and richly, to ignore events that were unpleasant, and to share

with complacency in the high regard that was everywhere felt for her

son. And now this illness, this inflammation of the lungs, had attacked

her erect form without any previous warning, without any preparation

to soften the blow. There had been no spiritual anticipation, none of

that mining and sapping of the forces which slowly, painfully estranges

us from life and rouses in us the sweet longing for a better world,

for the end, for peace. No, the old Frau Consul, despite the spiritual

courses of her latter years, felt scarce prepared to die; and she was

filled with agony of spirit at the thought that if this were indeed the

end, then this illness, of itself, in awful haste, in the last hour,

must, with bodily torments, break down her spirit and bring her to

surrender.

She prayed much; but almost more she watched, as often as she

was conscious, over her own condition: felt her pulse, took her

temperature, and fought her cough. But the pulse was poor, the

temperature mounted after falling a little, and she passed from

chills to fever and delirium; her cough increased, bringing up a

blood-impregnated mucous, and she was alarmed by the difficulty she

had in breathing. It was accounted for by the fact that now not only a

lobe of the right lung, but the whole right lung, was affected, with

even distinct traces of a process in the left, which Dr. Langhals,

looking at his nails, called hepatization, and about which Dr. Grabow

said nothing at all. The fever wasted the patient relentlessly. The

digestion failed. Slowly, inexorably, the decline of strength went on.

She followed it. She took eagerly, whenever she could, the concentrated

nourishment which they gave her. She knew the hours for her medicines

better than the nurse; and she was so absorbed in watching the progress

of her case that she hardly spoke to any one but the physicians, and

displayed actual interest only when talking with them. Callers had

been admitted in the beginning, and the old ladies of her social

circle, pastors’ wives and members of the Jerusalem evenings, came to

see her; but she received them with apathy and soon dismissed them.

Her relatives felt the difference in the old lady’s greeting: it was

almost disdainful, as though she were saying to them: “You can’t do

anything for me.” Even when little Hanno came, in a good hour, she only

stroked his cheek and turned away. Her manner said more plainly than

words: “Children, you are all very good--but--perhaps--I may be dying!”

She received the two physicians, on the other hand, with very lively

interest, and went into the details of her condition.

One day the Gerhardt ladies appeared, the descendants of Paul Gerhardt.

They came in their mantles, with their flat shepherdess hats and their

provision-baskets, from visiting the poor, and could not be prevented

from seeing their sick friend. They were left alone with her, and God

only knows what they said as they sat at her bedside. But when they

departed, their eyes and their faces were more gentle, more radiant,

more blissfully remote than ever; while the Frau Consul lay within,

with just such eyes and just such an expression, quite still, quite

peaceful, more peaceful than ever before; her breath came very softly

and at long intervals, and she was visibly declining from weakness to

weakness. Frau Permaneder murmured a strong word in the wake of the

Gerhardt ladies, and sent at once for the physicians. The two gentlemen

had barely entered the sick-chamber when a surprising alteration took

place in the patient. She stirred, she moved, she almost sat up. The

sight of her trusted and faithful professional advisers brought her

back to earth at a bound. She put out her hands to them and began:

“Welcome, gentlemen. To-day, in the course of the day--”

The illness had attacked both lungs--of that there was no more room for

doubt.

“Yes, my dear Senator,” Dr. Grabow said, and took Thomas Buddenbrook by

the hand, “it is now both lungs--we have not been able to prevent it.

That is always serious, you know as well as I do. I should not attempt

to deceive you. No matter what the age of the patient, the condition

is serious; and if you ask me again to-day whether in my opinion your

brother should be written to--or perhaps a telegram would be better--I

should hesitate to deter you from it. How is he, by the way? A good

fellow, Christian; I’ve always liked him immensely.--But for Heaven’s

sake, my dear Senator, don’t draw any exaggerated conclusions from what

I say. There is no immediate danger--I am foolish to take the word in

my mouth! But still--under the circumstances, you know, one must reckon

with the unexpected. We are very well satisfied with your mother as a

patient. She helps all she can, she doesn’t leave us in the lurch; no,

on my word, she is an incomparable patient! So there is still great

hope, my dear sir. And we must hope for the best.”

But there is a moment when hope becomes something artificial and

insincere. There is a change in the patient. He alters--there is

something strange about him--he is not as he was in life. He speaks,

but we do not know how to reply: what he says is strange, it seems to

cut off his retreat back to life, it condemns him to death. And when

that moment comes, even if he is our dearest upon this earth, we do not

know how to wish him back. If we could bid him arise and walk, he would

be as frightful as one risen from his coffin.

Dreadful symptoms of the coming dissolution showed themselves, even

though the organs, still in command of a tenacious will, continued

to function. It had now been weeks since Frau Consul first took to

her bed with a cold; and she began to have bed sores. They would

not heal, and grew worse and worse. She could not sleep, because of

pain, coughing and shortness of breath, and also because she herself

clung to consciousness with all her might. Only for minutes at a time

did she lose herself in fever; but now she began, even when she was

conscious, to talk to people who had long been dead. One afternoon, in

the twilight, she said suddenly, in a loud, fervent, anxious voice,

“Yes, my dear Jean, I am coming!” And the immediacy of the reply was

such that one almost thought to hear the voice of the deceased Consul

calling her.

Christian arrived. He came from Hamburg, where he had been, he said,

on business. He only stopped a short time in the sick-room, and left

it, his eyes roving wildly, rubbing his forehead, and saying “It’s

frightful--it’s frightful--I can’t stand it any longer.”

Pastor Pringsheim came, measured Sister Leandra with a chilling glance,

and prayed with a beautifully modulated voice at the bedside.

Then came the brief “lightening”: the flickering up of the dying flame.

The fever slackened; there was a deceptive return of strength, and a

few plain, hopeful words, that brought tears of joy to the eyes of the

watchers at the bedside.

“Children, we shall keep her; you’ll see, we shall keep her after all!”

cried Thomas Buddenbrook. “She will be with us next Christmas!”

But even in the next night, shortly after Gerda and her husband

had gone to bed, they were summoned back to Meng Street by Frau

Permaneder, for the mother was struggling with death. A cold rain was

falling, and a high wind drove it against the window-panes.

The bed-chamber, as the Senator and his wife entered it, was lighted

by two sconces burning on the table; and both physicians were present.

Christian too had been summoned from his room, and sat with his back

to the bed and his forehead bowed in his hands. They had sent for the

dying woman’s brother, Justus Kröger, and he would shortly be here.

Frau Permaneder and Erica were sobbing softly at the foot of the bed.

Sister Leandra and Mamsell Severin had nothing more to do, and stood

gazing in sadness on the face of the dying.

The Frau Consul lay on her back, supported by a quantity of pillows.

With both her blue-veined hands, once so beautiful, now so emaciated,

she ceaselessly stroked the coverlet in trembling haste. Her head in

the white nightcap moved from side to side with dreadful regularity.

Her lips were drawn inward, and opened and closed with a snap at every

tortured effort to breathe, while the sunken eyes roved back and forth

or rested with an envious look on those who stood about her bed, up and

dressed and able to breathe. They were alive, they belonged to life;

but they could help her no more than this, to make the sacrifice that

consisted in watching her die.... And the night wore on, without any

change.

“How long can it go on, like this?” asked Thomas Buddenbrook, in a low

tone, drawing Dr. Grabow away to the bottom of the room, while Dr.

Langhals was undertaking some sort of injection to give relief to the

patient. Frau Permaneder, her handkerchief in her hand, followed her

brother.

“I can’t tell, my dear Senator,” answered Dr. Grabow. “Your dear mother

may be released in the next few minutes, or she may live for hours. It

is a process of strangulation: an oedema--”

“I know,” said Frau Permaneder, and nodded while the tears ran down her

cheeks. “It often happens in cases of inflammation of the lungs--a

sort of watery fluid forms, and when it gets very bad the patient

cannot breathe any more. Yes, I know.”

The Senator, his hands folded, looked over at the bed.

“How frightfully she must suffer,” he whispered.

“No,” Dr. Grabow said, just as softly, but in a tone of authority,

while his long, mild countenance wrinkled more than ever. “That is a

mistake, my dear friend, believe me. The consciousness is very clouded.

These are largely reflex motions which you see; depend upon it.” And

Thomas answered: “God grant it”--but a child could have seen from

the Frau Consul’s eyes that she was entirely conscious and realized

everything.

They took their places again. Consul Kröger came and sat bowed over his

cane at the bedside, with reddened eyelids.

The movements of the patient increased. This body, delivered over to

death, was possessed by a terrible unrest, an unspeakable craving, an

abandonment of helplessness, from head to foot. The pathetic, imploring

eyes now closed with the rustling movement of the head from side to

side, now opened with a heart-breaking expression, so wide that the

little veins of the eyeballs stood out blood-red. And she was still

conscious!

A little after three, Christian got up. “I can’t stand it any more,” he

said, and went out, limping, and supporting himself on the furniture on

his way to the door. Erica Weinschenk and Mamsell Severin had fallen

asleep to the monotonous sound of the raucous breathing, and sat rosy

with slumber on their chairs.

About four it grew much worse. They lifted the patient and wiped

the perspiration from her brow. Her breathing threatened to

stop altogether. “Let me sleep,” she managed to say. “Give me a

sleeping-draught.” Alas, they could give her nothing to make her sleep.

Suddenly she began again to reply to voices which the others could not

hear. “Yes, Jean, not much longer now.” And then, “Yes, dear Clara, I

am coming.”

The struggle began afresh. Was this a wrestling with death? Ah, no, for

it had become a wrestling with life for death, on the part of the dying

woman. “I want--,” she panted, “I want--I cannot--let me sleep! Have

mercy, gentlemen--let me sleep!”

Frau Permaneder sobbed aloud as she listened, and Thomas groaned

softly, clutching his head a moment with both hands. But the physicians

knew their duty: they were obliged, under all circumstances, to

preserve life just as long as possible; and a narcotic would have

effected an unresisting and immediate giving-up of the ghost. Doctors

were not made to bring death into the world, but to preserve life at

any cost. There was a religious and moral basis for this law, which

they had known, once, though they did not have it in mind at the

moment. So they strengthened the heart action by various devices, and

even improved the breathing by causing the patient to retch.

By five the struggle was at its height. The Frau Consul, erect in

convulsions, with staring eyes, thrust wildly about her with her arms

as though trying to clutch after some support or to reach the hands

which she felt stretching toward her. She was answering constantly in

every direction to voices which she alone heard, and which evidently

became more numerous and urgent. Not only her dead husband and

daughter, but her parents, parents-in-law, and other relatives who had

passed before her into death, seemed to summon her; and she called them

all by name--though the names were some of them not familiar to her

children. “Yes,” she cried, “yes, I am coming now--at once--a moment--I

cannot--oh, let me sleep!”

At half-past five there was a moment of quiet. And then over her aged

and distorted features there passed a look of ineffable joy, a profound

and quivering tenderness; like lightning she stretched up her arms and

cried out, with an immediate suddenness swift as a blow, so that one

felt there was not a second’s space between what she heard and what she

answered, with an expression of absolute submission and a boundless and

fervid devotion: “Here I am!” and parted.

They were all amazed. What was it? Who had called her? To whose summons

had she responded thus instantly?

Some one drew back the curtains and put out the candles, and Dr. Grabow

gently closed the eyes of the dead.

They all shivered in the autumn dawn that filled the room with its

sallow light. Sister Leandra covered the mirror of the toilet table

with a cloth.

CHAPTER II

Through the open door Frau Permaneder could be seen praying in the

chamber of death. She knelt there alone, at a chair near the bed, with

her mourning garments flowing about her on the floor. While she prayed,

her hands folded before her on the seat of the chair, she could hear

her brother and sister-in-law in the breakfast-room, where they stood

and waited for the prayer to come to an end. But she did not hurry

on that account. She finished, coughed her usual little dry cough,

gathered her gown about her, and rose from the chair, then moved toward

her relatives with a perfectly dignified bearing in which there was no

trace of confusion.

“Thomas,” she said, with a note of asperity in her voice, “it strikes

me, that as far as Severin is concerned, our blessed mother was

cherishing a viper in her bosom.”

“What makes you think that?”

“I am perfectly furious with her. I shall try to behave with dignity,

but--has the woman any right to disturb us at this solemn moment by her

common ways?”

“What has she been doing?”

“Well in the first place, she is outrageously greedy. She goes to the

wardrobe and takes out Mother’s silk gowns, folds them over her arm,

and starts to retire. ‘Why, Riekchen,’ I say, ‘what are you doing with

those?’ ‘Frau Consul promised me.’ ‘My dear Severin!’ I say, and show

her, in a perfectly ladylike way, what I think of her unseemly haste.

Do you think it did any good? She took not only the silk gowns, but

a bundle of underwear as well, and went out. I can’t come to blows

with her, can I? And it isn’t Severin alone. There are wash-baskets

full of stuff going out of the house. The servants divide up things

before my face--Severin has the keys to the cupboards. I said to her:

‘Fräulein Severin, I shall be much obliged for the keys.’ And she told

me, in good set terms, that I’ve nothing to say to her, she’s not in

my service, I didn’t engage her, and she will keep the keys until she

leaves!”

“Have you the keys to the silver-chest? Good. Let the rest go. That

sort of thing is inevitable when a household breaks up, especially when

the rule has been rather lax already. I don’t want to make any scenes.

The linen is old and worn. We can see what there is there. Have you the

lists? Good. We’ll have a look at them.”

They went into the bed-chamber and stood a while in silence by the

bed; Frau Antonie removed the white cloth from the face of the dead.

The Frau Consul was arrayed in the silk garment in which she would

that afternoon lie upon her bier in the hall. Twenty-eight hours had

passed since she drew her last breath. The mouth and chin, without the

false teeth, looked sunken and senile, and the pointed chin projected

sharply. All three tried their best to recognize their mother’s face

in this sunken countenance before them, with its eyelids inexorably

closed. But under the old lady’s Sunday cap there showed, as in life,

the smooth, reddish-brown wig over which the Misses Buddenbrook had so

often made merry. Flowers were strewn on the coverlet.

“The most beautiful wreaths have come,” said Frau Permaneder. “From all

the families in town, simply from everybody. I had everything carried

up to the corridor. You must look at them afterwards, Gerda and Tom.

They are heart-breakingly lovely.”

“How are they progressing down in the hall?” asked the Senator.

“They will soon be done, Tom. Jacobs has taken the greatest pains.

And the--” she choked down a sob--“the coffin has come. But you must

take off your things, my dears,” she went on, carefully replacing

the white cloth over the face of the dead. “It is cold in here, but

there is a little fire in the breakfast-room. Let me help you, Gerda.

Such an elegant mantle, one must be careful with it. Let me give you

a kiss--you know I love you, even if you have always despised me. No,

I won’t make your hair untidy when I take off your hat-- Your lovely

hair! Such hair Mother had too, when she was young. She was never so

splendid as you are, but there was a time, and since I was born, too,

when she was really beautiful. How true it is, isn’t it, what your old

Grobleben always says: we must all return to earth at last: such a

simple man, too. Here, Tom. These are the most important lists.”

They returned to the next room and sat down at the round table, while

the Senator took up the paper, on which was a list of the objects

to be divided among the nearest heirs. Frau Permaneder’s eyes never

left her brother’s face, and her own wore a strained, excited look.

There was something in her mind, a question hard to put, upon which,

nevertheless, all her thoughts were bent, and which must, in the next

few hours, come up for discussion.

“I think,” said the Senator, “we may as well keep to the usual rule,

that presents go back; so--”

His wife interrupted him.

“Pardon me, Thomas. It seems to me--where is Christian?”

“Oh, goodness, yes, Christian!” cried Frau Permaneder. “We’ve forgotten

him!”

She went to ring the bell. But at the same moment Christian opened the

door. He entered rather quickly, closed it behind him with a slight

bang, and stood there frowning, his little deep round eyes not resting

on anybody, but rolling from side to side. His mouth opened and shut

under the bushy red moustaches. His mood seemed irritated and defiant.

“I heard you were here,” he said. “If the things are to be talked

about, it is proper that I should be told.”

“We were just about to call you,” the Senator said indifferently. “Sit

down.”

His eyes rested, as he spoke, on the white studs in Christian’s shirt.

He himself was in irreproachable mourning: a black cloth coat, blinding

white shirt set off at the collar with a black tie, and black studs

instead of the gold ones he usually wore. Christian saw his glance. He

drew up a chair to the table and sat down, saying as he did so, with a

gesture toward his shirt, “I know I have on white studs. I haven’t got

round to buying black--or rather, I haven’t bothered. In the last few

years I’ve seen times when I had to borrow money for tooth-powder, and

go to bed by the light of a match. I don’t know that I am altogether

and entirely to blame. Anyhow, there are other things in the world more

important than black studs. I don’t set much store by appearances--I

never have.”

Gerda looked at him as he spoke, and now she gave a little laugh. The

Senator remarked: “I doubt if you could bear out the truth of that last

statement.”

“No? Perhaps you know better than I do, Thomas. I say I don’t set much

store by them. I’ve seen too much of the world, and lived with too

many different sorts of men, with too many different ways, to care

what--and anyhow, I am a grown man”--his voice grew suddenly loud--“I

am forty-three years old, and my own master and in a position to warn

everybody not to mix in my affairs.”

The Senator was quite astonished. “It seems to me you have something on

your mind, my friend,” he said. “As far as the studs go, I haven’t so

much as mentioned them, if my memory serves me. Wear whatever mourning

you choose, or none at all if that pleases you; but don’t imagine you

make any impression on me with your cheap broad-mindedness--”

“I am not trying to make an impression on you.”

“Tom--Christian!” said Frau Permaneder. “Don’t let us have any hard

words--not to-day--when in the next room-- Just go on, Thomas.

Presents are to be returned? That is only right.”

And Thomas went on. He began with the large things, and wrote down for

himself the articles he could use in his own house: the candelabra in

the dining-room, the great carved chest that stood in the downstairs

entry. Frau Permaneder paid extraordinarily close attention. No matter

what the article was, the future possession of which was at the moment

in question, she would say with an incomparable air, “Oh, well, I’m

willing to take it”--as if the whole world owed her thanks for her act

of self-sacrifice. She accepted for herself, her daughter, and her

granddaughter far and away the largest share of the furnishings.

Christian had some pieces of furniture, an Empire table-clock and the

harmonium. He seemed satisfied enough. But when they came to dividing

the table-linen and silver and the sets of dishes, he displayed, to the

great astonishment of the others, an eagerness that was almost avidity.

“What about me?” he would say. “I must ask you not to forget me,

please.”

“Who is forgetting you? Look: I’ve put a whole tea-service and a

silver tray down to you. I’ve taken the gilt Sunday service, as we are

probably the only ones who would have a use for it.”

“I’m willing to take the everyday onion pattern,” said Frau Permaneder.

“And what about me?” cried Christian. He was possessed now by that

excitement which sometimes seized him and sat so extraordinarily on his

haggard cheek. “I certainly want a share in the dishes. And how many

forks and spoons do I get? Almost none at all, it seems to me.”

“But, my dear man, what do you want of them? You have no use for them

at all. I don’t understand. It is better the things should continue in

the family--”

“But suppose I say I want them--if only in remembrance of Mother,”

Christian cried defiantly.

To which the Senator impatiently replied, “I don’t feel much like

making jokes; but am I to judge from your words that you would like

to put a soup-tureen on your chest of drawers and keep it there in

memory of Mother? Please don’t get the idea that we want to cheat you

out of your share. If you get less of the effects, you will get more

elsewhere. The same is true of the linen.”

“I don’t want the money. I want the linen and dishes.”

“Whatever for?”

Christian’s reply to this was one that made Gerda Buddenbrook turn

and gaze at him with an enigmatic expression in her eyes. The Senator

hastily donned his pince-nez to look the better, and Frau Permaneder

simply folded her hands. He said: “Well, I am thinking of getting

married, sooner or later.”

He said this rather low and quickly, with a short gesture, as though he

were tossing something to his brother across the table. Then he leaned

back, avoiding their eyes, looking surly, defiant, and yet extremely

embarrassed. There was a long pause. At last the Senator broke it by

saying:

“I must say, Christian, your ideas come rather late. That is, of

course, if this really is anything serious, and not the same kind of

thing you proposed to Mother a while ago.”

“My intentions have remained what they were,” Christian said. He did

not look at anybody or change his expression.

“That is impossible, I should think. Were you waiting for Mother’s

death--?”

“I had that amount of consideration, yes. You seem to think, Thomas,

that you have a monopoly of all the tact and feeling in the world--”

“I don’t know what justifies you in making remarks like that. And,

moreover, I must admire the extent of your consideration. On the day

after Mother’s death, you propose to display your lack of filial

feeling by--”

“Only because the subject came up. But the point is that now Mother

cannot be affected by any step I may take--no more to-day than she

would be a year from now. Good Lord, Thomas, Mother couldn’t have

any actual _right_--but I saw it from her point of view, and had

consideration for that, as long as she lived. She was an old woman, a

woman of a past generation, with different views about life--”

“I can only say that I concur with her absolutely in this particular

view.”

“I cannot be bothered about that.”

“But you will be bothered about it, my dear sir.”

Christian looked at him.

“No,” he shouted. “I won’t! I can’t do it. Suppose I tell you I can’t?

I must know what I have to do, mustn’t I? I am a grown man--”

“You don’t in the least know what you have to do. Your being what you

call a grown man is only very external.”

“I know very well what I have to do. In the first place, I have to act

like a man of honour! You don’t know how the thing stands. With Tony

and Gerda here we can’t really talk--but I have already told you I have

responsibilities-- The last child, little Gisela--”

“I know nothing about any little Gisela--and I don’t care to. I am

perfectly convinced they are making a fool of you. In any case, what

sort of responsibility can you have toward a person like the one you

have in mind--other than the legal one, which you can perform as

before--?”

“Person, Thomas, _person_? You are making a mistake about her. Aline--”

“Silence!” roared Senator Buddenbrook in a voice like thunder. The two

brothers glared across the table into each other’s faces. Thomas was

pale and trembling with scorn; the rims of Christian’s deep little eyes

had got suddenly red, his mouth and eyes spread wide open, his lean

cheeks seemed nothing but hollows, and a pair of red patches showed

just under the cheek-bones. Gerda looked rather disdainfully from one

to the other, and Tony wrung her hands, imploring--“Tom, Christian!

And Mother lying there in the next room!”

“You have no sense of shame,” went on the Senator. “How can you bring

yourself--what must it cost you--to mention that name, on this spot,

under these circumstances? You have a lack of feeling that amounts to a

disease!”

“Will you tell me why I should not mention Aline’s name?” Christian was

so beside himself that Gerda looked at him with increasing intentness.

“I do mention it, as you hear, Thomas; I intend to marry her--for I

have a longing for a home, and for peace and quiet--and I insist--you

hear the word I use--I insist that you keep out of my affairs. I am

free. I am my own master!”

“Oh, you fool, you! When you hear the will read, you will see just how

much you are your own master! You won’t get the chance to squander

Mother’s inheritance as you have run through with the thirty thousand

marks already! I have been made the guardian of your affairs, and I

will see to it that you never get your hands on more than a monthly sum

at a time--that I swear!”

“Well, you know better than I who it was that instigated Mother to make

such a will! But I am surprised, very much so, that Mother did not give

the office to somebody that had a little more brotherly feeling for me

than you have.” Christian no longer knew what he was saying; he leaned

over the table, knocking on it all the while with his knuckle, glaring

up, red-eyed, his moustaches bristling, at his brother, who, on his

side, stood looking down at him, pale, and with half-closed lids.

Christian went on, and his voice was hollow and rasping. “Your heart

is full of coldness and ill-will toward me, all the while. As far back

as I can remember I have felt cold in your presence--you freeze me

with a perfect stream of icy contempt. You may think that is a strange

expression, but what I feel is just like that. You repulse me, just by

looking at me--and you hardly ever even so much as look at me. How

have you got a right to treat me like that? You are a man too, you

have your own weaknesses. You have always been a better son to our

parents; but if you really stood so much closer to them than I do, you

might have absorbed a little of their Christian charity. If you have

no brotherly love to spare for me, you might have had some Christlike

love. But you are entirely without affection. You never came near me in

the hospital, when I lay there and suffered with rheumatism--”

“I have more serious things to think about than your illnesses. And my

own health--”

“Oh, come, Thomas, your health is magnificent. You wouldn’t be sitting

here for what you are, if your health weren’t far and away better than

mine.”

“I may be perhaps worse off than you are!”

“Worse than I am--come, that’s too much! Gerda, Tony! He says he is

worse off than I am. Perhaps it was you that came near dying, in

Hamburg, of rheumatism. Perhaps you have had to endure torments in your

left side, perfectly indescribable torments, for every little trifling

irregularity! Perhaps all your nerves are short on the left side! All

the authorities say that is what is the matter with me. Perhaps it

happens to you that you come into your room when it is getting dark and

see a man sitting on the sofa, nodding at you, when there is no man

there?”

“Christian!” Frau Permaneder burst out in horror. “What are you saying?

And, my God! what are you quarrelling about? Is it an honour for one

to be worse off than the other? If it were, Gerda and I might have

something to say, too.--And with Mother lying in there! How can you?”

“Don’t you realize, you fool,” cried Thomas Buddenbrook, in a passion,

“that all these horrors are the consequence and effect of your vices,

your idleness, and your self-tormenting? Go to work! Stop petting your

condition and talking about it! If you do go crazy--and I tell you

plainly I don’t think it at all unlikely--I shan’t be able to shed a

tear; for it will be entirely your own fault.”

“No, and when I die you won’t shed any tears either.”

“You won’t die,” said the Senator bitingly.

“I shan’t die? Very good, I shan’t die, then. We’ll see who dies first.

Work! Suppose I can’t work? My God! I can’t do the same thing long

at a time! It kills me. If you have been able to, and are able to,

thank God for it, but don’t sit in judgment on others, for it isn’t

a virtue. God gives strength to one, and not to another. But that is

the way you are made, Thomas. You are self-righteous. Oh, wait, that

is not what I am going to say, nor what I accuse you of. I don’t know

where to begin, and however much I can say is only a millionth part of

the feeling I have in my heart against you. You have made a position

for yourself in life; and there you stand, and push everything away

which might possibly disturb your equilibrium for a moment--for your

equilibrium is the most precious thing in the world to you. But it

isn’t the most precious thing in life, Thomas--no, before God, it is

not. You are an egotist, that is what you are. I am still fond of you,

even when you are angry, and tread on me, and thunder me down. But

when you get silent: when somebody says something and you are suddenly

dumb, and withdraw yourself, quite elegant and remote, and repulse

people like a wall and leave the other fellow to his shame, without

any chance of justifying himself--! Yes, you are without pity, without

love, without humility.--Oh,” he cried, and stretched both arms in

front of him, palms outward, as though pushing everything away from

him, “Oh, how sick I am of all this tact and propriety, this poise and

refinement--sick to death of it!”

The outburst was so genuine, so heart-felt, it sounded so full of

loathing and satiety, that it was actually crushing. Thomas shrank a

little and looked down in front of him, weary and without a word.

At last he said, and his voice had a ring of feeling, “I have become

what I am because I did not want to become what you are. If I have

inwardly shrunk from you, it has been because I needed to guard

myself--your being, and your existence, are a danger to me--that is the

truth.”

There was another pause, and then he went on, in a crisper tone: “Well,

we have wandered far away from the subject. You have read me a lecture

on my character--a somewhat muddled lecture, with a grain of truth in

it. But we are not talking about me, but about you. You are thinking of

marrying; and I should like to convince you that it is impossible for

you to carry out your plan. In the first place, the interest I shall be

able to pay you on your capital will not be a very encouraging sum--”

“Aline has put some away.”

The Senator swallowed, and controlled himself. “You mean you would

mingle your mother’s inheritance with the--savings of this lady?”

“Yes. I want a home, and somebody who will be sympathetic when I am

ill. And we suit each other very well. We are both rather damaged

goods, so to speak--”

“And you intend, further, to adopt the existing children and legitimize

them?”

“Yes.”

“So that after your death your inheritance would pass to them?” As

the Senator said this, Frau Permaneder laid her hand on his arm and

murmured adjuringly, “Thomas! Mother is lying in the next room!”

“Yes,” answered Christian. “That would be the way it would be.”

“Well, you shan’t do it, then,” shouted the Senator, and sprang up.

Christian got behind his chair, which he clutched with one hand. His

chin went down on his breast; he looked apprehensive as well as angry.

“You shan’t do it,” repeated Thomas, almost senseless with anger;

pale, trembling, jerking convulsively. “As long as I am alive it

won’t happen. I swear it--so take care! There’s enough money gone

already, what with bad luck and foolishness and rascality, without

your throwing a quarter of Mother’s inheritance into this creature’s

lap--and her bastards’--and that after another quarter has been snapped

up by Tiburtius! You’ve brought enough disgrace on the family already,

without bringing us home a courtesan for a sister-in-law, and giving

our name to her children. I forbid it, do you hear? I forbid it!”

he shouted, in a voice that made the room ring, and Frau Permaneder

squeeze herself weeping into the corner of the sofa. “And I advise

you not to attempt to defy me! Up to now I have only despised you and

ignored you: but if you try any tricks, if you bring the worse to

the worst, we’ll see who will come out ahead! You can look out for

yourself! I shan’t have any mercy! I’ll have you declared incompetent,

I’ll get you shut up, I’ll ruin you--I’ll ruin you, you understand?”

“And I tell _you_--” Thus it all began over again, and went on and on:

a battle of words, destructive, futile, lamentable, without any purpose

other than to insult, to wound, to cut one another to the quick.

Christian came back to his brother’s character and cited examples of

Thomas’s egotism--painful anecdotes out of the distant past, which he,

Christian, had never forgotten, but carried about with him to feed his

bitterness. And the Senator retorted with scorn, and with threats which

he regretted a moment later. Gerda leaned her head on her hand and

watched them, with an expression in her eyes impossible to read. Frau

Permaneder repeated over and over again, in her despair: “And Mother

lying there in the next room!”

Christian, who at the end had been walking up and down in the room, at

last forsook the field.

“Very good, we shall see!” he shouted. With his eyes red, his

moustaches ruffled, his handkerchief in his hand, his coat wide open,

hot and beside himself, he went out of the door and slammed it behind

him.

In the sudden stillness the Senator stood for a moment upright and

gazed after his brother. Then he sat down without a word and took up

the papers jerkily. He went curtly through the remaining business, then

leaned back and twisted his moustaches through his fingers, lost in

thought.

Frau Permaneder’s anxiety made her heart beat loudly. The question, the

great question, could now not be put off any longer. It must come up,

and he must answer; but was her brother now in a mood to be governed by

gentleness and filial piety? Alas, she feared not.

“And--Tom--,” she began, looking down into her lap, and then up, as

she made a timid effort to read his thoughts. “The furniture--you have

taken everything into consideration of course--the things that belong

to us, I mean to Erica and me and the little one, they remain here with

us? In short, the house--what about it?” she finished, and furtively

wrung her hands.

The Senator did not answer at once. He went on for a while twisting his

moustaches and drearily meditating. Then he drew a deep breath and sat

up.

“The house?” he said. “Of course it belongs to all of us, to you and

me, and Christian--and, queerly enough, to Pastor Tiburtius too. I

can’t decide anything about it by myself. I have to get your consent.

But obviously the thing to do is to sell as soon as possible,” he

concluded, shrugging his shoulders. Yet something crossed his face,

after all, as though he were startled by his own words.

Frau Permaneder’s head sank deep on her breast; her hands stopped

pressing themselves together; she relaxed all over.

“Our consent,” she repeated after a pause, sadly, and rather bitterly

as well. “Dear me, Tom, you know you will do whatever you think

best--the rest of us are not likely to withhold our consent for long.

But if we might put in a word--to beg you,” she, went on, almost dully,

but her lip was trembling too--“the house--Mother’s house--the family

home, in which we have all been so happy! We must sell it--?”

The Senator shrugged his shoulders again. “Child, you will believe

me when I tell you that I feel everything you can say, as much as

you do yourself. But those are only our feelings; they aren’t actual

objections. What has to be done, remains the problem. Here we have this

great piece of property--what shall we do with it? For years back, ever

since Father’s death, the whole back part has been going to pieces. A

family of cats is living rent-free in the billiard-room, and you can’t

walk there for fear of going through the floor. Of course, if I did

not have my house in Fishers’ Lane-- But I have, and what should I do

with it? Do you think I might sell that instead? Tell me yourself, to

whom? I should lose half the money I put into it. We have property

enough, Tony; we have far too much, in fact. The granary buildings, and

two great houses. The invested capital is out of all proportion to the

value of the property. No, no, we must sell.”

But Frau Permaneder was not listening. She was sitting bent over on the

sofa, withdrawn into herself with her own thoughts.

“Our house,” she murmured. “I remember the housewarming. We were no

bigger than that. The whole family was there. And Uncle Hoffstede

read a poem. It is in the family papers. I know it by heart. Venus

Anadyomene. The landscape-room. The dining-hall! And strange people--!”

“Yes, Tony. They must have felt the same--the family of whom

Grandfather bought the house. They had lost their money and had to give

up their home, and they are all dead and gone now. Everything has its

time. We ought to be grateful to God that we are better off than the

Ratenkamps, and are not saying good-bye to the house under such sorry

circumstances as theirs.”

Sobs, long, painful sobs, interrupted him. Frau Permaneder so abandoned

herself to her grief that she did not even dry the tears that ran down

her cheeks. She sat bent over, and the warm drops fell unheeded upon

the hands lying limp in her lap.

“Tom,” said she, and there was a gentle, touching decision in her

voice, which, a moment before her sobs had threatened to choke, “you

can’t understand how I feel at this hour--you cannot understand your

sister’s feelings! Things have not gone well with her in this life.--I

have had everything to bear that fate could think of to inflict upon

me. But I have borne it all without flinching, Tom: all my troubles

with Grünlich and Permaneder and Weinschenk. For, however my life

seemed to go awry, I was never quite lost. I had always a safe haven to

fly to. Even this last time, when everything came to an end, when they

took away Weinschenk to prison, ‘Mother,’ I said, ‘may we come to you?’

And she said, ‘Yes, my children, come!’ Do you remember, Tom, when we

were little, and played war, there was always a little spot marked off

for us to run to, where we could be safe and not be touched until we

were rested again? Mother’s house, this house, was my little spot, my

refuge in life, Tom. And now--it must be sold--”

She leaned back, buried her face in her handkerchief, and wept

unrestrainedly.

He drew down one of her hands and held it in his own.

“I know, dear Tony, I know it all. But we must be sensible. Our

dear good Mother is gone. We cannot bring her back. And so-- It is

madness to keep the house as dead capital. Shall we turn it into a

tenement-house? I know it is painful to think of strangers living here;

but after all it is better you should _not_ see it. You must take a

nice, pretty little house or flat somewhere for yourself and your

family--outside the Castle Gate, for example. Or would you rather stop

on here and let out floors to different families? And you still have

the family: Gerda and me, and the Buddenbrooks in Broad Street, and the

Krögers, and Therese Weichbrodt, and Clothilde--that is, if Clothilde

will condescend to associate with us, now that she’s become a lady of

the Order of St. John--it’s so very exclusive, you know!”

She gave a sigh that was already partly a laugh, and mopped her

eyes with her handkerchief, looking like a hurt child whom somebody

is helping, with a jest, to forget its pain. Then she resolutely

cleared her face and put herself to rights, tossing her head with the

characteristic gesture and bringing her chin down on her breast.

“Yes, Tom,” she said, and blinked with her tear-reddened eyes,

“I’ll be good now; I am already. You must forgive me--and you too,

Gerda--for breaking down like that. But it may happen to any one, you

know. It is a weakness. But, believe me, it is only outward. I am a

woman steeled by misfortunes. And that about the dead capital is very

convincing to me, Tom--I’ve enough intelligence to understand that

much, anyhow. I can only repeat that you must do what you think best.

You must think and act for us all; for Gerda and I are only women, and

Christian--well, God help him, poor soul! We cannot oppose you, for

whatever we could say would be only sentiment, not real objections, it

is very plain. To whom will you sell it, Tom? Do you think it will go

off right away?”

“Ah, child--how do I know? But I talked a little this morning with

old Gosch the broker; he did not seem disinclined to undertake the

business.”

“That is a good idea, Tom. Siegismund Gosch has his weaknesses,

of course. That thing about his translation from the Spanish--I

can’t remember the man’s name, but it is very odd, one must admit.

However, he was Father’s friend, and he is an honest man through and

through.--What shall you ask? A hundred thousand marks would be the

least, I should think.”

And “A hundred thousand marks would be the least, wouldn’t it, Tom?”

she was still asking, the door-knob in her hand, as the Senator and his

wife went down the steps. Then she was alone, and stood there in the

middle of the room with her hands clasped palms down in front of her,

looking all around with large, helpless eyes. Her head, heavy with the

weight of her thoughts, adorned with the little black lace cap, sank

slowly, shaking all the while, deeper and deeper on one shoulder.

CHAPTER III

Little Johann was to go to take his farewell of his grandmother’s

mortal remains. His father so arranged it, and, though Hanno was

afraid, he made not a syllable of objection. At table, the day after

the Frau Consul’s dying struggle, the Senator, in his son’s presence

and apparently with design, had commented harshly upon the conduct

of Uncle Christian, who had slipped away and gone to bed when the

patient’s suffering was at its height. “That was his nerves, Thomas,”

Gerda had answered. But with a glance at Hanno, which had not escaped

the child, the Senator had severely retorted that an excuse was not in

place. The agony of their departed mother had been so sore that one had

felt ashamed even to be sitting there free from pain--not to mention

entertaining the cowardly thought of trying to escape any suffering of

mind called up by the sight. From which, Hanno had gathered that it

would not be safe to object to the visit to the open coffin.

The room looked as strange to him as it had at Christmas, when, on the

day before the funeral, between his father and his mother, he entered

it from the hall. There was a half-circle of potted plants, arranged

alternately with high silver candelabra; and against the dark green

leaves gleamed from a black pedestal the marble copy of Thorwaldsen’s

Christ, which belonged in the corridor outside. Black crape hangings

fluttered everywhere in the draught, hiding the sky-blue tapestries and

the smiling immortals who had looked down from these walls upon so many

festive dinner-tables. Little Johann stood beside the bier among his

black-clad relatives. He had a broad mourning band on his own sailor

suit, and his senses felt misty with the scent from countless bouquets

and wreaths--and with another odour that came wafted now and then on a

current of air, and smelled strange, yet somehow familiar.

He stood beside the bier and looked at the motionless white figure

stretched out there severe and solemn, amid white satin. This was not

Grandmamma. There was her Sunday cap with the white silk ribbons, and

her red-brown hair beneath it. But the pinched nose was not hers, nor

the drawn lips, nor the sharp chin, nor the yellow, translucent hands,

whose coldness and stiffness one could see. This was a wax-doll--to

dress it up and lay it out like that seemed rather horrible. He looked

across to the landscape-room, as though the real Grandmamma might

appear there the next minute. But she did not come: she was dead. Death

had turned her for ever into this wax figure that kept its lids and

lips so forbiddingly closed.

He stood resting on his left leg, the right knee bent, balancing

lightly on the toe, and clutched his sailor knot with one hand, the

other hanging down. He held his head on one side, the curly light-brown

locks swaying over the temples, and looked with his gold-brown,

blue-encircled eyes in brooding repugnance upon the face of the dead.

His breath came long and shuddering, for he kept expecting that

strange, puzzling odour which all the scent of the flowers sometimes

failed to disguise. When the odour came, and he perceived it, he drew

his brows still more together, his lip trembled, and the long sigh

which he gave was so like a tearless sob that Frau Permaneder bent over

and kissed him and took him away.

And after the Senator and his wife, and Frau Permaneder and Erica, had

received for long hours the condolences of the entire town, Elisabeth

Buddenbrook, born Kröger, was consigned to earth. The out-of-town

families, from Hamburg and Frankfort, came to the funeral and, for the

last time, received hospitality in Meng Street. And the hosts of the

sympathizers filled the hall and the landscape-room, the corridor

and the pillared hall; and Pastor Pringsheim of St. Mary’s, erect

among burning tapers at the head of the coffin, turning his face up to

heaven, his hands folded beneath his chin, preached the funeral sermon.

He praised in resounding tones the qualities of the departed: he

praised her refinement and humility, her piety and cheer, her

mildness and her charity. He spoke of the Jerusalem evenings and the

Sunday-school; he gilded with matchless oratory the whole long rich and

happy earthly course of her who had left them; and when he came to the

end, since the word “end” needed some sort of qualifying adjective, he

spoke of her “peaceful end.”

Frau Permaneder was quite aware of the dignity, the representative

bearing, which she owed to herself and the community in this hour. She,

her daughter Erica, and her granddaughter Elisabeth occupied the most

conspicuous places of honour, close to the pastor at the head of the

coffin; while Thomas, Gerda, Clothilde, and little Johann, as likewise

old Consul Kröger, who had a chair to sit in, were content, as were

the relatives of the second class, to occupy less prominent places.

Frau Permaneder stood there, very erect, her shoulders elevated, her

black-bordered handkerchief between her folded hands; and her pride

in the chief rôle which it fell to her lot to perform was so great as

sometimes entirely to obscure her grief. Conscious of being the focus

of all eyes, she kept her own discreetly cast down; yet now and again

she could not resist letting them stray over the assembly, in which she

noted the presence of Julchen Möllendorpf, born Hagenström, and her

husband. Yes, they had all had to come: Möllendorpfs, Kistenmakers,

Langhals, Överdiecks--before Tony Buddenbrook left her parental roof

for ever, they had all gathered here, to offer her, despite Grünlich,

despite Permaneder, despite Hugo Weinschenk, their sympathy and

condolences.

Pastor Pringsheim’s sermon went on, turning the knife in the wound that

death had made: he caused each person present to remember his own

dead, he knew how to make tears flow where none would have flowed of

themselves--and for this the weeping ones were grateful to him. When he

mentioned the Jerusalem evenings, all the old friends of the dead began

to sob--excepting Madame Kethelsen, who did not hear a word he said,

but stared straight before her with the remote air of the deaf, and

the Gerhardt sisters, the descendants of Paul, who stood hand in hand

in a corner, their eyes glowing. They were glad for the death of their

friend, and could have envied her but that envy and unkindness were

foreign to their natures.

Poor Mademoiselle Weichbrodt blew her nose all the time, with a short,

emphatic sound. The Misses Buddenbrook did not weep. It was not their

habit. Their bearing, less angular than usual, expressed a mild

satisfaction with the impartial justice of death.

Pastor Pringsheim’s last “amen” resounded, and the four bearers, in

their black three-cornered hats, their black cloaks billowing out

behind them with the swiftness of their advance, came softly in and

put their hands upon the coffin. They were four lackeys, known to

everybody, who were engaged to hand the heavy dishes at every large

dinner in the best circles, and who drank Möllendorpf’s claret out of

the carafes, between the courses. But, also, they were indispensable at

every funeral of the first or second class, being of large experience

in this kind of work. They knew that the harshness of this moment,

when the coffin was laid hold upon by strange hands and borne away

from the survivors, must be ameliorated by tact and swiftness. Their

movements were quick, agile, and noiseless; hardly had any one time to

be sensible of the pain of the situation, before they had lifted the

burden from the bier to their shoulders, and the flower-covered casket

swayed away smoothly and with decorum through the pillared hall.

The ladies pressed tenderly about Frau Permaneder and her daughter to

offer their sympathy. They took her hand and murmured, with drooping

eyes, precisely no more and no less than what on such occasions must be

murmured; while the gentlemen made ready to go down to the carriages.

Then came, in a long, black procession, the slow drive through the

grey, misty streets out through the Burg Thor, along the leafless

avenue in a cold driving rain, to the cemetery, where the funeral march

sounded behind half-bare shrubbery on the edge of the little grove, and

the great sandstone cross marked the Buddenbrook family lot. The stone

lid of the grave, carven with the family arms, lay close to the black

hole framed in dripping greens.

A place had been prepared down below for the new-comer. In the last few

days, the Senator had supervised the work of pushing aside the remains

of a few early Buddenbrooks. The music sounded, the coffin swayed on

the ropes above the open depth of masonry; with a gentle commotion it

glided down. Pastor Pringsheim, who had put on pulse-warmers, began to

speak afresh, his voice ringing fervid and emotional above the open

grave. He bent over the grave and spoke to the dead, calling her by

her full name, and blessed her with the sign of the cross. His voice

ceased; all the gentlemen held their top-hats in front of their faces

with their black-gloved hands; and the sun came out a little. It had

stopped raining, and into the sound of the single drops that fell

from the trees and bushes there broke now and then the short, fine,

questioning twitter of a bird.

All the gentlemen turned a moment to press the hands of the sons and

brother of the dead once more.

Thomas Buddenbrook, as the others filed by, stood between his brother

Christian and his uncle Justus. His thick dark woollen overcoat was

dewed with fine silver drops. He had begun of late to grow a little

stout, the single sign of age in his carefully preserved exterior,

and his cheeks, behind the pointed protruding ends of his moustaches,

looked rounder than they used; but it was a pale and sallow roundness,

without blood or life. He held each man’s hand a moment in his own, and

his slightly reddened eyes looked them all, with weary politeness, in

the face.

CHAPTER IV

A week later there sat in Senator Buddenbrook’s private office, in

the leather chair beside the writing-desk, a little smooth-shaven old

man with snow-white hair falling over his brow and temples. He sat in

a crouching position, supporting both hands on the white top of his

crutch-cane, and his pointed chin on his hands; while he directed at

the Senator a look of such malevolence, such a crafty, penetrating

glance, that one wondered why the latter did not avoid contact with

such a man as this. But the Senator sat apparently at ease, leaning

back in his chair, talking to this baleful apparition as to a harmless

ordinary citizen. Broker Siegismund Gosch and the head of the firm of

Johann Buddenbrook were discussing the price of the Meng Street house.

It took a long time. The offer of twenty-eight thousand thaler made

by Herr Gosch seemed too low to the Senator, and the broker called

heaven to witness that it would be an act of madness to add a single

groschen to the sum. Thomas Buddenbrook spoke of the central position

and unusual extent of the property; but Herr Gosch, with picturesque

gestures, in low and sibilant tones, expatiated upon the criminal risk

he would be running. He waxed almost poetic. Ha! Could his honoured

friend tell him when, to whom, for how much, he would be able to get

rid of the house again? How often, in the course of the century, would

there be a demand for such a house? Perhaps his friend and patron could

assure him that to-morrow, on the train from Buchen, there was arriving

an Indian nabob who wished to establish himself in the Buddenbrook

mansion? He, Siegismund Gosch, would have it on his hands, simply on

his hands, and it would be the ruin of him. He would be a beaten man,

his race would be run, his grave dug--yes, it would be dug--and, as the

phrase enchanted him, he repeated it, and added something more about

chattering apes and clods of earth falling upon the lid of his coffin.

But the Senator was not satisfied. He spoke of the ease with which the

property could be divided, emphasized his responsibility toward his

sister, and remained by the sum of thirty thousand thaler. After which

he had to listen, with a mixture of enjoyment and impatience, to a

rejoinder from Herr Gosch, which lasted some two hours, during which

the broker sounded, as it were, all the registers of his character. He

played two rôles at once: first, the hypocritical villain, with a sweet

voice, his head on one side, and a smile of open-hearted simplicity.

Stretching out his large, white hand, with the long, trembling fingers,

he said “Agree, my dear young patron: eighty-four thousand marks--it is

the offer of an honest old man.” But a child could have seen that this

was all lies and treachery--a deceiving mask, behind which the man’s

deep villainy peeped forth.

Thomas Buddenbrook finally declared that he must take time to think,

and that in any case he must consult his sister, before he accepted the

twenty-eight thousand thaler--which was unlikely. Then he turned the

conversation to indifferent topics and asked Herr Gosch about business

and his health.

Things were going badly with Herr Gosch. He made a fine, sweeping

gesture to wave away the imputation that he was a prosperous man.

The burdens of old age approached, they were at hand even now; as

aforesaid, his grave was dug. He could not even carry his glass of grog

to his lips without spilling half of it, his arm trembled so like the

devil. It did no good to curse. The will no longer availed. And yet--!

He had his life behind him--not such a poor life, after all. He had

looked at the world with his eyes open. Revolutions had thundered by,

their waves had beat upon his heart--so to speak. Ha! Those were other

times, when he had stood at the side of Consul Johann Buddenbrook,

the Senator’s father, at that historic sitting, and defied the fury

of the raging mob. A frightful experience! No, his life had not been

poor, either outwardly or inwardly. Hang it--he had been conscious of

powers--and as the power is, so is the ideal--as Feuerbach says. And

even now--even now, his soul was not impoverished, his heart was still

young: it had never ceased, and would never cease, to be capable of

great emotions, to live fervently in and for his ideals. They would

go with him to his grave.--But were ideals, after all, meant to be

realized? No, a thousand times no! We might long for the stars, but

should we ever reach them? No, hope, not realization, was the most

beautiful thing in life: “L’espérance, tout trompeuse qu’elle est,

sert au moins à nous mener à la fin de la vie par un chemin agréable.”

La Rochefoucauld said that, and it was fine, wasn’t it? Oh, yes, his

honoured friend and patron, of course, did not need to console himself

with that sort of thing. The waves of life had lifted him high on their

shoulders, and fortune played about his brow. But for the lonely and

submerged, who dreamed alone in the darkness--

Suddenly--“_You_ are happy,” he said, laying his hand on the Senator’s

knee, and looking up at him with swimming eyes. “Don’t deny it--it

would be sacrilege. You are happy. You hold fortune in your arms.

You have reached out your strong arms and conquered her--your strong

hands,” he corrected himself, not liking the sound of “arms” twice so

close together. He was silent, and the Senator’s deprecating, patient

reply went unheard. He seemed to be darkly dreaming for a moment; then

he got up.

“We have been chatting,” he said, “but we came together on business.

Time is money. Let us not waste it in hesitation. Listen to me. Since

it is you: since it is you, you understand--” here it almost looked as

though Herr Gosch was about to give way again to another rhapsody; but

he restrained himself. He made a wide, sweeping gesture, and cried:

“Twenty-nine thousand thaler, eighty-seven thousand marks current, for

your mother’s house! Is it a bargain?” And Senator Buddenbrook agreed.

Frau Permaneder, of course, found the sum ridiculously small.

Considering the memories that clung about it, she would have thought

a million down no more than an honest price for their old home. But

she rapidly adjusted herself--the more readily that her thoughts and

efforts were soon taken up by plans for the future.

She rejoiced from the bottom of her heart over all the good furniture

that had fallen to her share. And though there was no idea of bustling

her away from under the parental roof, she plunged at once, with the

greatest zest, into the business of finding and renting a new home. The

leave-taking would be hard--the very thought of it brought tears to

her eyes. But the prospect of a change was not without its own charm

too. It was almost like another setting-out--the fourth one! And so

again she looked at houses and visited Jacob’s; again she bargained for

portières and stair-carpets. And while she did all that, her heart beat

faster--yes, even the heart of this old woman who was steeled by the

misfortunes of life!

Weeks passed like this: four, five, six weeks. The first snow fell,

the stoves crackled. Winter was here again; and the Buddenbrooks began

to consider sadly what sort of Christmas feast they should have this

year. But now something happened: something surprising and dramatic

beyond all words, something that simply knocked you off your feet. Frau

Permaneder paused in the midst of her business, like one paralyzed.

“Thomas,” she said, “am I crazy? Is Gosch dreaming? It is too absurd,

too outlandish--” She held her temples with both her hands. The Senator

shrugged his shoulders.

“My dear child, nothing at all is decided yet. But there is the

possibility--and if you think it over quietly, you will see that there

is nothing so extraordinary about it, after all. It is a little

startling, I admit. It gave me a start when Gosch first told me. But

absurd? What makes it absurd?”

“I should die,” said she. She sat down in a chair and stopped there

without moving.

What was going on? Simply that a buyer had appeared for the house; or,

rather, a possible purchaser showed a desire to go over it, with a view

to negotiations. And this possible purchaser was--Hermann Hagenström,

wholesale dealer and Consul for the Kingdom of Portugal.

When the first rumour reached Frau Permaneder, she was stunned,

incredulous, incapable of grasping the idea. But when the rumour became

concrete, when it actually took shape in the person of Consul Hermann

Hagenström, standing, as it were, before the door, then she pulled

herself together, and animation came back to her.

“This must not happen, Thomas. As long as I live, it must not happen.

When one sells one’s house, one is bound to look out for the sort of

master it gets. Our Mother’s house! Our house! The landscape-room!”

“But what stands in the way?”

“What stands in the way? Heavens, Thomas! Mountains stand in the

way--or they ought to! But he doesn’t see them, this fat man with

the snub nose! He doesn’t care about them. He has no delicacy and no

feeling--he is like the beasts that perish. From time immemorial the

Hagenströms and we have been rivals. Old Heinrich played Father and

Grandfather some dirty tricks; and if Hermann hasn’t tripped you up

yet, it is only because he hasn’t had a chance. When we were children,

I boxed his ears in the open street, for very good reasons; and his

precious little sister Julchen nearly scratched me to pieces for it.

That was all childishness, then. But they have always looked on and

enjoyed it whenever we had a piece of bad luck--and it was mostly I

myself who gave them the pleasure. God willed it so. Whatever the

Consul did to injure you or overreach you in a business way, that I

can’t speak of, Tom. You must know better than I. But the last straw

was when Erica made a good marriage and he wormed around and wormed

around until he managed to spoil it and get her husband shut up,

through his brother, who is a cat! And now they have the nerve--”

“Listen, Tony. In the first place, we have nothing more to say in the

matter. We made our bargain with Gosch, and he has the right to deal

with whomever he likes. But there is a sort of irony about it, after

all--”

“Irony? Well, if you like to call it that--but what I call it is a

disgrace, a slap in the face; because that is just what it would be.

You don’t realize what it would be like, in the least. But it would

mean to everybody that the Buddenbrook family are finished and done

for: they clear out, and the Hagenströms squeeze into their place,

rattlety-bang! No, Thomas, never will I consent to sit by while this

goes on. I will never stir a finger in such baseness. Let him come here

if he dares. I won’t receive him, you may be sure of that. I will sit

in my room with my daughter and my granddaughter, and turn the key in

the door, and forbid him to enter.--That is just what I will do.”

“I know, Tony, you will do what you think best; and you will probably

consider well beforehand if it will be wise not to preserve the

ordinary social forms. For of course you don’t imagine that Consul

Hagenström would feel wounded by your conduct? Not in the least, my

child. It would neither please nor displease him--he would simply be

mildly surprised, that is all. The trouble is, you imagine he has the

same feelings toward you that you have toward him. That is a mistake,

Tony. He does not hate us in the least. He doesn’t hate anybody. He

is highly successful and extremely good-natured. As I’ve told you

more than ten times already, he would speak to you on the street with

the utmost cordiality if you didn’t put on such a belligerent air.

I’m sure he is surprised at it--for two minutes; of course not enough

to upset the equilibrium of a man to whom nobody can do any harm.

What is it you reproach him with? Suppose he has outstripped me in

business, and even now and then got ahead of me in some public affair?

That only means he is a better business man and a cleverer politician

than I am.--There’s no reason at all for you to laugh in that scornful

way.--But to come back to the house. The truth is, it has lost most of

its old significance for us--that has gradually passed over to mine.

I say this to console you in advance; on the other hand, it is plain

why Consul Hagenström is thinking of buying. These people have come

up in the world, their family is growing, they have married into the

Möllendorpf family, and become equal to the best in money and position.

But so far, there has been something lacking, the outward sign of their

position, which they were evidently willing to do without: the historic

consecration--the legitimization, so to speak. But now they seem to

have made up their minds to have that too; and some of it they will get

by moving into a house like this one. You wait and see: mark my words,

the Consul will preserve everything as much as possible as it is, he

will even keep the ‘Dominus providebit’ over the door--though, to do

him justice, it hasn’t been the Lord at all, but Hermann Hagenström

himself, single-handed, that has put the family and the firm where they

are!”

“Bravo, Tom! Oh, it does do me good to hear you say something spiteful

about them once in a while! That’s really all I want! Oh, if I only had

your head! Wouldn’t I just give it to him! But there you stand--”

“You see, my head doesn’t really do me much good.”

“There you stand, I say, with that awful calmness, which I simply don’t

understand at all, and tell me how Hermann Hagenström does things. Ah,

you may talk as you like, but you have a heart in your body, the same

as I have myself, and I simply don’t believe you feel as calm inside as

you make out. All the things you say are nothing but your own efforts

to console yourself.”

“Now, Tony, you are getting pert. What I _do_ is all you have anything

to do with--what I think is my own affair.”

“Tell me one thing, Tom: wouldn’t it be like a nightmare to you?”

“Exactly.”

“Like something you dreamed in a fever?”

“Why not?”

“Like the most ridiculous kind of farce?”

“There, there, now, that’s enough!”

And Consul Hagenström appeared in Meng Street, accompanied by Herr

Gosch, who held his Jesuit hat in his hand, crouched over like a

conspirator, and peered past the maid into the landscape-room even

while he handed her his card.

Hermann Hagenström looked the City man to the life: an imposing Stock

Exchange figure, in a coat the fur of which seemed a foot long,

standing open over an English winter suit of good fuzzy yellow-green

tweed. He was so uncommonly fat that not only his chin, but the whole

lower part of his face, was double--a fact which his full short-trimmed

blond beard could not disguise. When he moved his forehead or eyebrows,

deep folds came even in the smoothly shorn skin of his skull. His

nose lay flatter upon his upper lip than ever, and breathed down into

his moustaches. Now and then his mouth had to come to the rescue and

fly open for a deep breath. When it did this it always made a little

smacking noise, as the tongue came away from the roof of his mouth.

Frau Permaneder coloured when she heard this once well-known sound. A

vision of lemon-buns with truffled sausage on top, almost threatened,

for a moment, the stony dignity of her bearing. She sat on the sofa,

her arms crossed and her shoulders lifted, in an exquisitely fitting

black gown with flounces up to the waist, and a dainty mourning cap on

her smooth hair. As the two gentlemen entered, she made a remark to

her brother the Senator, in a calm, indifferent tone. He had not had

the heart to leave her in the lurch at this hour; and he now walked to

the middle of the room to meet their guests, while Tony remained on

the sofa. He exchanged a hearty greeting with Herr Gosch and a correct

and courteous one with the Consul; then Tony rose of her own accord,

performed a measured bow to both of them at once, and, without any

excess of zeal, associated herself with her brother’s invitation to the

two gentlemen to be seated.