Amadeus Voss said: “He will not enter upon the conflict. He has been
placed before the final choice. You think: ‘Oh, it is only his family
that would make him submit and conform.’ But the family is to-day
the decisive factor of power in the state. It is the cornerstone and
keystone of millennial stratifications and crystallizations. He who
defies it is outlawed; he has nowhere to lay his head. He is placed in
a perpetual position of criminality, and that wears down the strongest.”
“His people seem to have made a considerable impression on you,”
Lamprecht remarked.
“I discuss a principle and you speak of persons,” Voss replied,
irritably. “Refute me on my own ground, if you don’t mind. As a matter
of fact, I saw no one face to face except Wahnschaffe’s brother,
Wolfgang. He invited me, ostensibly to obtain information, but in fact
to test me. A remarkable chap; representative to the last degree. He
is penetrated by the unshakable seriousness of those who have counted
every rung of the social ladder and measured all social distances to a
millimetre. Ready for anything; venal through and through; stopping at
nothing; cruel by nature, and consistent through lack of mind. I don’t
deny the impressiveness of such an extraordinarily pure type. You can’t
image a better object lesson of all that constitutes the society of the
period.”
“And, of course, you took Christian’s part, and declared that you were
unapproachable and unbribable for diplomatic services?” Johanna asked,
in a tone of subtle carelessness. “Or didn’t you?” She walked up and
down in order to lay the board for Christian, whom she yearned for with
a deep impatience.
Michael did not take his eyes from the face of Amadeus Voss.
“I never dreamed of such folly,” Amadeus answered. “My occupation is
research, not moralizing. I have ceased sacrificing myself to phantoms.
I no longer believe in ideas or in the victory of ideas. So far as I am
concerned, the battle has been decided, and peace has been made. Why
should I not admit it frankly? I have made a pact with things as they
are. Do not call it cynicism; it is an honest confession of my sincere
self. It is the fruit of the insight I have gained into the useful, the
effective, into all that helps man actually and tangibly. There was no
necessity in the wide world for me to become a martyr. Martyrs confuse
the world; they tear open the hell of our agonies, and do so quite in
vain. When or where has pain ever been assuaged or healed through pain?
Once upon a time I went the way of sighs and the way of the cross; I
know what it means to suffer for dreams and spill one’s blood for the
unattainable; breast to breast have I wrestled with Satan till at last
it became clear to me: you can strip him off only if you give yourself
to the world wholly and without chaffering. Nor must you look back,
or, like Lot’s wife, you will be turned into a pillar of salt. Thus I
overcame the devil, or, if you prefer, myself.”
“It was, to say the least, a very weighty and significant
transformation,” said Johanna, cutting the buns in half and buttering
them. Her gestures were of an exquisitely calculated ease and charm.
“And what did you finally say to Wolfgang Wahnschaffe?” asked Botho von
Thüngen. He sat beside the window, and from time to time looked out
into the yard, for in him too there was a deep desire for Christian’s
presence. In each of them was a dark feeling of his nearness.
“I told him just about what I think,” Voss answered. “I said: ‘The
best thing you can do is to let everything take its natural course.
He will be entangled in his own snares. Resistance offers support,
persecution creates aureoles. Why should you want to crown him with
an aureole? A structure of paradoxes must be permitted to fall of its
own weight. All the visions of Saint Anthony have not the converting
power of one instant of real knowledge. There must be no wall about him
and no bridge for his feet; then he will want to erect walls and build
bridges. Have patience,’ I said, ‘have patience. I who was the midwife
of his soul on the road of conversion may take it upon myself to
prophesy; and I prophesy that the day is not far off when he will lust
after a woman’s lips.’ For this, I confess, was the thing that mainly
gave me pause--this life without Eros. And it was not satiety, no, it
was not, but a true and entire renunciation. But let Eros once awaken,
and he will find his way back. Nor is the day far off.” His face had a
look of fanatical certitude.
“It will be another Eros, not him you name,” said Thüngen.
Then Michael arose, looked upon Voss with burning eyes, and cried out
to him: “Betrayer!”
Amadeus Voss gave a start. “Eh, little worm, what’s gotten into you?”
he murmured, contemptuously.
“Betrayer!” Michael said.
Voss approached him with a threatening gesture.
“Michael! Amadeus!” Johanna admonished, beseechingly, and laid her hand
on Voss’s arm.
And while she did so, the door was opened softly, and the little
Stübbe girl slipped silently into the room. She was neatly dressed as
always. Her two blond braids were wound about her head and made her
pain-touched child’s face seem even older and more madonna-like. She
looked about her, and when she caught sight of Michael, she went up to
him and handed him a letter. Thereupon she left the room again.
Michael unfolded the letter and read it, and all the colour left his
face. It slipped from his hand. Lamprecht picked it up. “Does it
concern us too?” he asked, with a clear presentiment. “Is it from him?”
Michael nodded and Lamprecht read the letter aloud: “Dear Michael:--I
take this way of saying farewell to you, and beg you to greet our
friends. I must go away from here now, and you will not receive any
news of me. Let no one try to seek me out. It seemed simpler and more
useful to me to depart in this way than to put off and confuse the
unavoidable by explanations and questions. I have taken with me the
few things of mine that were in Karen’s rooms. They all went into a
little travelling bag. What remains you can pack into the box in the
other room; there are a few necessities--some linen and a suit of
clothes. Perhaps I shall find it possible to have these sent after
me, but it is uncertain. For you, Michael, I am sending one thousand
marks to Lamprecht, in order that your instruction may be continued
for a time; it may also serve in time of need. Johanna will find in
the house-agent’s care to-morrow, when I shall send it, an envelope
containing two hundred and fifty marks. Perhaps she will be kind enough
to use this money to satisfy a few obligations that I leave behind.
Once more: Greet our friends. Cling to them. Farewell. Be brave. Think
of Ruth. Your Christian Wahnschaffe.”
They had all arisen and grouped themselves about Lamprecht. Shaken to
the soul, Lamprecht spoke: “I am his, now and in future, in heart and
mind.”
“What is the meaning of it, and what the reason?” Thüngen asked, in the
shy stillness.
“Exactly like Wahnschaffe,” Voss’s voice was heard. “Flat and wooden as
a police regulation.”
“Be silent,” Johanna breathed at him, in her soul’s pain. “Be silent,
Judas!”
No other word was said. They all stood about the table, but the place
that had been laid for Christian remained empty. Twilight was beginning
to fall, and one after another they went away. Amadeus Voss approached
Johanna, and said: “That word you spoke to me, following the boy’s
example, will burn your soul yet, I promise you.”
Michael, rapt from the things about him, looked upward with visionary,
gleaming eyes.
In weary melancholy Johanna said to herself: “How runs the
stage-direction in the old comedies? Exit. Yes, exit. Short and sweet.
Exit Johanna. Go your ways.” She threw a last look around the dim room,
and, lean and shadowy, was the last to slip through the door.