"Erika! Erika!" old Countess Lenzdorff calls in a joyful voice across
the garden of the Hotel Britannia. "Erika!"
The old lady is sitting by the breast-work bordering on the Canal
Grande. Erika is coming out of a side-door of the hotel. Her
grandmother had sent her upstairs for her parasol. How strange the girl
looks, with cheeks so white and lips so feverishly red! But that is a
secondary matter: what must strike every one who looks at her to-day is
the transfigured light in her eyes,--a light shining as through tears.
"Come quickly!" her grandmother calls. "I have a surprise for you." But
Erika does not come quickly: she walks slowly through the blooming
garden to her grandmother, who has an open letter in her hand.
The little garden is basking in the sunshine; the heavens are
cloudless; the lagoon looks as if it were sprinkled with diamonds, as
the black gondolas glide past, the sinewy brown throats of the
gondoliers shining like bronze. In the fragrant garden can be heard,
now loud, now faint, the sound of gay voices on the water mingled with
the constant lapping of the waves and the jangle of church-bells.
"From whom does this letter come?" her grandmother asks Erika, with a
smile.
"I--I cannot imagine," the girl murmurs. Her pale cheeks grow paler,
and a fixed look comes into her shining eyes.
"Indeed? From whom should a letter come which I am so glad to receive?"
Erika starts.
"From Goswyn!" says her grandmother. "But what a face is that!"
"Am I to be as glad as you are because Goswyn at last condescends to
take some notice of the kind sympathy you have shown him?" says Erika.
But the old hard intonation of her voice is gone: it sounds weary and
dull.
"Never mind!" her grandmother rejoins, triumphantly. "First read the
letter, and then tell me if you still have the faintest disposition to
be vexed with him. Whether you have any regard for him or not, the
letter will please you. He asks, among other things, whether we shall
be in Venice next week, and if he may come to us here."
Erika holds the letter in her hands, but when she fixes her eyes upon
it the bold distinct characters swim before them. She looks away into
the dazzling sunlight above the lagoon.
Among the black gondolas with white lanterns she now perceives Prince
Helmy in his yellow cutter, which usually lies at anchor in front of
the Hotel Britannia. Espying the two ladies, the Prince clambers up to
them over one or two gondolas, and asks, "Can you ladies not be induced
to intrust yourselves to me? It would be far pleasanter to go to
Chioggia in my cutter than in the steamer."
"It certainly would," the old Countess replies, with more amiability
than she is wont to display towards Prince Helmy. "But," she adds,
"unfortunately I cannot have that pleasure. I have promised to act as
chaperon to Constance Muehlberg's party, and I cannot disappoint her."
"I'm sorry."
At this moment a merry old voice cries, "Your obedient servant,
ladies!" It is Count Treurenberg, dressed in a light summer suit, all
ready for the excursion to Chioggia. "You are going to Chioggia too?"
"We are."
"'Tis a pity you cannot go with us."
"I have just been telling them," observes Prince Helmy.
"Do you know whether Lozoncyi is to be of the party?" asks Treurenberg.
"I have no idea," Countess Lenzdorff replies, rather coldly.
"What do you think of the wife who has made her appearance so suddenly?
Something of a surprise, eh?"
"A surprise which does not interest me much," the Countess replies,
haughtily.
"Of course not. But there are some of our Venetian beauties who could
hardly say as much. 'Tis odd that the fellow should have been so
close-mouthed concerning his 'indissoluble tie.' I saw him once in
Paris with the individual in question, but I never dreamed that that
yellow-haired dame had any legitimate claim upon him. Probably a
youthful folly."
"A millstone that he has hung about his neck," Prince Helmy says,
feelingly,--"a burden that will weigh him down to the earth. I am very
sorry for him."
"H'm!" Count Treurenberg drawls, "my pity is not so easily excited.
Such women make an artist's life very comfortable; and she certainly
has interfered but little with him hitherto." He rubs his hands with a
significant glance.
"Are you ready, Count?" Prince Helmy asks, after the pause that follows
Treurenberg's words.
The Count is ready, and takes leave of the ladies. Shortly afterwards
they see him in the cutter with the Prince, who is helping his two
sailors to hoist the tiny sail. The gentlemen wave a respectful
farewell to the Lenzdorffs; the cutter glides off, at first slowly from
among the gondolas, then more and more swiftly, skimming the water like
a bird in the direction of the line of foam which marks the boundary of
the open sea.
It is a trifle which has made the weight upon Erika's heart heavier in
the last minute. She has said to herself that never again after
to-morrow will a man accord her the respectful courtesy just shown her
by the two gentlemen in the cutter.
Her attack of cowardice is a short one, however. Immediately afterwards
she feels the joy of a fanatic who delights in suffering one pang more
for his convictions.
"I cannot see why we have not been called to lunch," Countess Lenzdorff
remarks, consulting her watch; then, observing Erika, she is startled
by the girl's looks. "What is the matter with you?" she asks, and when
the girl's only answer is a rapid change of colour, the thought occurs
to her for the first time, "Is it possible that she cares for
Lozoncyi?--my proud Erika?" She observes her grand-daughter narrowly,
and an ugly suspicion invades her heart. "What reply shall I make to
Goswyn?" she thinks. "Good heavens! I had no idea! Perhaps it is only
fancy. But if---- It would be my fault. And people call me shrewd! Poor
child!"
Meanwhile, Fritz announces that lunch is served.
"My child, you are eating nothing," the old Countess says anxiously to
her grand-daughter, who is doing her best to swallow a morsel of food.
"I am not very well," Erika replies, in a faint, weary voice. How often
those tones will ring through the old Countess's soul! "I have a slight
headache," and she puts her hand to her head; "I feel as if a storm
were coming; but there is not a cloud in the sky."
"So, there is not a cloud to be seen. The sunshine is so powerful in
the dining-hall that the shades have to be drawn down, thus diffusing a
gray twilight through the room.
"Let us go to our rooms," says the old Countess, with a sigh of
discouragement. They go, and Erika seems to be making ready for the
proposed expedition. But when her grandmother, fully arrayed, enters
the girl's room half an hour afterwards, she finds her in a long white
dressing-gown with loosened hair, leaning back in an easy-chair.
"My child, my child! what is the matter with you?" the old lady
exclaims, in terror.
"Nothing," the girl replies, without lifting her downcast eyes. "A
headache. You can see I meant to go, but I cannot: you must go without
me. Give all kinds of affectionate messages to Constance, and tell her
how sorry I am."
"My dear child, I cannot go with those people if you are not well," the
old lady says, beginning to take off her gloves. "No human being could
expect me to do that."
Erika is trembling violently. "But, grandmother," she replies, "it is
only a headache. You can do me no good by staying at home, and you know
I cannot bear to make a disturbance."
"Yes, yes," says the grandmother. "But lie down, at least, my darling."
"You could not disappoint Constance Muehlberg: you know she depends upon
you, she needs your support," Erika goes on, persuasively.
"Yes, that is true," the Countess admits.
She notices that Erika has hastily brushed away tears from her eyes,
and the suspicion which had assailed her below in the garden is
strengthened. Perhaps it would be better to leave the girl in peace for
a while, she says to herself.
Meanwhile, Marianne appears, to say that the Countess Muehlberg is
awaiting the ladies below in her gondola.
"Go, grandmother dear," Erika says, faintly; "go!"
"Yes, I will go; but first let me see you lie down, my child." She
conducts Erika to the bed. "How you tremble! You can hardly stand." She
arranges her long dressing-gown, strokes the girl's cheek, and kisses
her forehead. She has reached the door, when she hears a low voice
behind her say, "Grandmother!"
She turns. Erika is half sitting up in bed, looking after her. "What is
it, my child?"
"Nothing, only I was thinking just now that I have not treated you as I
ought, sometimes lately. Forgive me, grandmother!"
The old lady clasps the trembling girl in her arms. "Little goose!"
she says. "As if that were of any consequence, my darling! Only go
quietly to sleep, that I may find you well when I return. Where is my
pocket-handkerchief? Oh, there is Goswyn's letter: when you are a
little better you can read it. You need not be afraid that I shall try
to persuade you; that time has gone by; but I think the letter ought to
please you. At all events, it is something to have inspired so
thoroughly excellent a man with so deep and true an affection; and you
will see, too, that you have been unjust to him. Good-bye, my darling,
good-bye."
For the last time Erika presses the delicate old hand to her lips. The
Countess has gone. Erika is alone. She has locked her door, and is
sitting on her bed with Goswyn's letter open on her lap. Her tears are
falling thick and fast upon it. It reads as follows:
"My very dear old Friend,--
"Shall you be in Venice next week, and may I come to you there? I do
not want you to tell me if I have any chance: I shall come at all
events, unless Countess Erika is actually betrothed. This is plain
speaking, is it not?
"Have you known, or have you not known, that through all these years
since my rejection by the Countess Erika not a day has passed for me
that has not been filled with thoughts of her? In any case my conduct
must have seemed inexplicable to you: probably you have thought me
ridiculously sensitive. It is true, ridiculous sensitiveness, as I now
see, has been the true cause of my foolish, unjustifiable behaviour,
but it has not been the sensitiveness of a rejected suitor. God forbid!
"I should never have been provoked by the Countess Erika's rejection of
me,--no, never,--even if it had not been conveyed in so bewitching a
way that one ought to have kneeled down and adored her for it. There
was another reason for my sensitiveness. A certain person, whose name
there is no need to mention, hinted that I was in pursuit of Countess
Erika's money. From that moment my peace of mind was at an end. I could
not go near her again, because, to speak plainly, I was conscious that
I was not a suitable match for her.
"You think this petty. I think it is petty myself,--so petty that I
despise myself, and simply ask, am I any more worthy of so glorious a
creature, now that I have a few more marks a year to spend?
"I dread being punished for my obstinate stupidity. Perhaps there was
no possibility of my winning her heart, but it was worth a trial, and
she has a right to reproach me for never in all these years making that
trial. Inconceivable as my long delay must appear to you, I am sure you
can understand why I have not thus appealed to you lately, so soon
after the terrible misfortune that has befallen me.
"It was too horrible!
"In addition to my sincere sorrow for my brother's death, I am
tormented by the sensation that I never sufficiently prized the
nobility of character which his last moments revealed. To turn so
terrible a catastrophe to my advantage would have been to me
impossible. I could not have done it, even although I had not been so
crushed by the manner of his death that all desire, all love of life,
has for some weeks seemed dead within me.
"Yesterday I met Frau von Norbin, who has lately returned from her
Italian tour. She informed me that Prince Nimbsch is paying devoted
attention to Countess Erika, although at present with small
encouragement.
"Jealousy has roused me from my lethargy. And now I ask you once more,
may I come to Venice? Unless something unforeseen should occur, I could
obtain a leave without much trouble. Again I repeat, I do not ask you
what chance I have,--I know that I have none at present,--but I only
ask you, may I come?
"Impatiently awaiting your answer, I am faithfully yours,
"G. v. Sydow."
She read the letter to the last word, her tears flowing faster and
faster. Then she threw herself on the bed, and buried her face among
the pillows. A yearning desire assailed her heart, and thrilled through
her every nerve, calling aloud, "Turn back! turn back!" But it was too
late; she would not turn back. She was entirely possessed by the
illusion that she was about to do something grand and elevating.
A low knock at the door recalled her to herself. It was Marianne, who,
instructed by the old Countess, came to see if she would not have a cup
of tea.
"By and by, Marianne," she called, without opening the door. "I want
nothing at present. I am better."
Marianne left, and Erika looked at her watch. Four o'clock! It was time
to begin her final preparations.
She gathered together all her trinkets,--an unusually large and
valuable collection for a girl. She had been fond of jewelry, and her
grandmother had denied her nothing. Without one longing thought of
them, she selected all that were of special value, running through her
fingers five strings of beautiful pearls, and calculating as she did so
their probable worth. These she added to the heap, and then wrapped all
together in a package, upon which she wrote "For the Poor." Then she
sat down at her writing-table and explained her last wishes, arranging
everything as one would who contemplated suicide. Not one of her
numerous _protegees_ did she forget, commending them all to her
grandmother's care.
After everything in this respect that was necessary, or at least that
she considered necessary, was arranged, she reflected that she must
write a farewell to her grandmother.
It was a terribly hard task, but after she had begun her letter there
seemed to be no end to it. She covered three sheets, and there were yet
many loving things to say. Now first she comprehended all that her
grandmother had been to her of late years. She forgot how often the old
Countess's philosophy had grated upon her, how often she had rebelled
against it. How hard it was to leave her! But retreat was not to be
thought of.
And she wrote on.
At last she concluded with, "Every one else will point the finger of
scorn at me; you will bewail my course, but you will not call it evil,
only foolish. Poor, dear grandmother! And you will mourn over the
misery which I have voluntarily brought upon myself. It is terrible
that I cannot fulfil the mission in life which lies so clearly before
me without giving you pain. But I cannot help it! One thing consoles
me. I know how large-minded you are: you will have to choose between
the world and me, and you will be strong enough to resign the world and
to turn to me, and then nothing will be wanting to me in my new life,
let people slander me as they will!"
Three times did Erika fold up the letter, and three times did she open
it again to add something to it.
At last it was finished. She put with it into the envelope the draft of
her wishes as to the disposal of the effects she left behind her, and
then asked herself where she should put the letter so that her
grandmother might find it instantly upon her return. At first she took
it to the Countess's room, but then, reflecting that the old lady would
come at once to her bedside to see how she was, she laid it, with eyes
streaming with tears, upon the table beside her bed. "Poor
grandmother!" She kissed the letter tenderly as she left it.
Now everything was finished: she had only to dress herself. But she was
not content. Once more she sat down at her writing-table and wrote.
This time the words came slowly and with difficulty from her pen, as if
each one were torn singly from her bleeding heart.
"My dear, faithful Friend,"--she began,--"Do not come to Venice. When
this letter reaches you I shall have vanished from the world in which
you live. I could not endure to have you hear from strangers of the
step I am about to take, and so I write to you myself. Yes, when you
read this letter I shall have broken with all that has constituted my
life hitherto, and shall have fled with--with a married man. How
grieved you will be when you read this! My whole soul cries out with
pain as I think of it.
"You will not understand it. 'Erika Lenzdorff fled with a married man!'
It sounds incredible, does it not?
"You know that I am not light-minded, nor corrupt, and so you will
believe me when I tell you that the reasons which have induced me to
take so terrible a step are unanswerable in my mind.
"I can redeem the life of a noble and gifted man. His moral nature is
deteriorating, he suffers frightfully, and I cannot avoid the
conviction that without me he must go to destruction.
"He hoped to be able to procure a divorce from his wife. It was
impossible. Without hesitation I resolved of my own accord to follow
him. In the midst of the agony which it has cost me to break with all
my former associations, I am sustained by a sense of right.
"It is grand and beautiful to suffer for a noble and highly-gifted
fellow-being,--beautiful to be able to say, 'Providence has chosen me
to shed light into his darkened soul.' I do not waste a thought upon
what I resign in thus fulfilling my mission, but the consciousness of
the pain I shall cause my dear grandmother and you weighs me to the
earth. She will forgive me, and you, my poor friend, you will forget
me. I would gladly find consolation in this conviction; but no, it does
not comfort me. Of all that I must give up with my old life, your
friendship is what I shall lack most painfully.
"Goswyn! for God's sake do not judge me falsely and harshly! What I do,
I do in the absolute conviction that it is right. If this conviction
should ever fail me, then---- But I cannot harbour that idea!--it would
be too terrible. I cannot be mistaken!
"I have a fearful attack of cowardice as I write to you, and a sudden
dread takes possession of me. Am I equal to the task I have undertaken?
Will he always be content to live apart from the world with me alone?
"I am prepared for that also. If his feeling for me should wane, my
task will be done, he will need me no longer. Then I will vanish from
his life, and from life itself, like a poor taper that is extinguished
when the sun rises. I shall have the courage to extinguish it; it will
be a trifle in comparison with what I am now doing. Oh, God! how hard
it is! Goswyn, adieu! One thing more, and this I tell you because this
is my farewell to you. Whether it will console you, or add one more
pang to your sorrow, I cannot tell, but I am constrained to lay bare my
heart before you: these are as it were the words of a dying woman. If
last autumn you had said one kind word to me, I should now have been
your wife, and you should not have repented it! All that is over. Fate
had another destiny in store for me.
"Once more, farewell!
"Forgive me for causing you pain, and sometimes think of your poor
friend,
"Erika Lenzdorff."
Now all was done. She put on her travelling-dress, a plain dark suit in
which she was wont to pay visits to the poor.
She looked at the clock--seven! One half-hour more, and she must go;
and she could not go without something to lend her physical strength.
She rang for a cup of tea, swallowed it hastily, and for the last time
walked through the four rooms occupied by her grandmother and herself.
Then she took her travelling-bag, which she had packed with a few
necessaries, put on her straw hat, and went.
It was half-past seven: the servants were at their evening meal. No one
noticed her departure at so unusual an hour. How often she had been
seen leaving the hotel in the same dress to visit her poor people!
She walked for some distance, and dropped her letter to Goswyn into the
nearest post-box, feeling as she did so that she was casting her whole
life thus far into a dark gulf whence it could never be recovered. Then
she hired a gondola, an open one,--she could find no other,--and it
pushed off with her.
She was very weary; with her eyes fixed on vacancy, she leaned back
among the black cushions.
The tragic wretchedness of the situation no longer impressed her. She
only felt that she was about to undertake a journey. If it were but
over! Sssh--sssh--the strokes of the oars sounded monotonously in her
ears: the gondola glided rapidly over the water.
The garish daylight had faded; the spring twilight, with its
incomparably poetic charm, was casting its transparent veil over
Venice. The gondola glided on.
Erika's battle was fought. She leaned back, pale and still, with
gleaming eyes. The sound of the church-bells droned in her ears. Dulled
to all that lay behind her, she was conscious of nothing save of the
enthusiasm of a young hero ready to brave death for a sacred cause.
Around her was the breath of the waning spring, and beneath her was the
sobbing of the waves.
It was later by about an hour and a half. The old Countess, who had
felt it her duty to be present at the fete, had not thought herself
obliged to remain until its close. She was very uneasy about Erika, and
had gratefully accepted Prince Nimbsch's offer to take her home in his
cutter, leaving Constance Muehlberg and her guests, with the Hungarian
band that had been telegraphed for from Vienna for their amusement, to
return to Venice in the steamer.
With the velocity of a skimming swallow the little vessel shot through
the water. Prince Nimbsch, leaving the management of the sail entirely
to his sailors, leaned back beside the old lady among his very new
velvet cushions, and made good-humoured, although futile, efforts to
entertain her. She was absent: her thoughts were occupied with Erika's
altered appearance.
"Poor child!" she thought, "I was foolish. It was my fault; but how
could I suspect it? She seemed so strong, so unsusceptible. It is the
same folly, the same disease that attacks us all once in a lifetime. I
had it myself: I can hardly remember it now. It hurts,--it hurts very
much. But she has a strong character and a clear head. I am very sorry;
I might have prevented it, if I had only known. My poor, proud Erika!
What shall I write to Goswyn? Of course that he must come. I think she
will be glad to see him: this cannot go very deep; but I am very
sorry."
Venice lay before them, gray and shadowy, a reflection of the pale
summer sky, whence the sun had long disappeared, and where the stars
were not yet visible.
They reached the hotel, and the old Countess looked up at Erika's
windows. "She is not in her boudoir," she said to herself. "Perhaps she
is asleep."
"Tell Countess Erika how stupid the _fete_ was, thanks to her absence,"
the young Austrian said as he took his leave, "and how we all
anathematized that headache for depriving us of her society. I shall
call to-morrow, and hope to find her quite well again."
He kissed the old lady's hand, and she hurried upstairs to her rooms.
She softly entered Erika's apartments. The boudoir was dark, as she had
seen from below. She gently opened the door of the bedroom; that was
dark also. Had the poor child gone to bed? She approached the bed very
softly, not to disturb her, and stooped above it. There was no one
there.
A foreboding of something terrible instantly took possession of her.
For a moment she lost her head: she grew dizzy, and would have screamed
and alarmed the house, but her voice died in her throat. Suddenly
something fluttered down from the table upon which she leaned to
support herself. She stooped to pick it up: it was a letter. She turned
on the electric light and read it through. After the first few lines,
half blind with grief, she would have tossed it aside,--what could it
contain that she did not now know?--but at last she read it through,
read every word to the very end, feeding her pain with each tender,
loving expression of the unhappy, mistaken girl.
Not for one moment did she blame Erika for what had happened: she
blamed herself alone. She accused herself of plunging Erika into
wretchedness, as years before she had done with her daughter-in-law.
She had required of both of them that they should accede to her
materialistic views. She had never allowed them to entertain any
idealistic conception of life. She had never understood that such
idealism was a necessity of their existence, and that if deprived of it
in one shape they would take refuge in some exaggeration which
might shield them from a life of coldly-calculating egotism. Her
daughter-in-law's unhappiness had not affected her much; her
grand-daughter's misery would blot the sun from her sky.
She was so clear-sighted: ah, why was she so, when she could see
nothing but what agonized her?
For a creature like Erika it was as impossible to disregard the
dictates of morality as it would be to breathe in the moon with lungs
constructed for the atmosphere of the earth.
There were women capable of braving the opinions of the world and of
quietly going on their way, women for whom the pillory was converted
into a pedestal as soon as they stood in it. But Erika was not one of
these. Before the stars in their courses had twice appeared in the
heavens she would writhe in misery. She had none of that self-exalting
quality which must veil the moral lack of which she would surely be
made conscious. Yes, she would then find no other name for the
sacrifice she had made to the wretch who had been willing to receive it
at her hands than the one which the world has given to it for centuries
when it has been made to men by worthless women, inspired by no lofty
desire. In her own eyes she would be a fallen woman.
The moisture stood upon the old Countess's forehead. "My Erika! my
proud, glorious Erika!" she murmured. She knew that the peril of a
woman's fall must be measured by the moral height from which she falls.
And Erika had fallen from a very lofty height. Her life was ruined.
Once more she opened Erika's letter and read the line, "You will have
to choose between the world and me." Choose! As if there could be any
question of choice. Of course she was ready to open her arms to her and
do for her what she alone could; but what could she do?
Suddenly a picture arose in her memory,--a terrible picture.
In the waiting-room of a railway-station she had once seen among some
emigrants a poor woman with a child, a boy about six or seven years
old. His face was frightfully disfigured by scars. All the passers-by
stared at him, and some nudged one another and whispered together. The
child first grew scarlet, then very restless, and finally burst into a
passion of tears; whereupon the mother sat down upon a bench and hid
the poor face in her lap.
A quarter of an hour later, when the Countess passed the same spot the
woman was still there with the child's face in her lap. She sat stiffly
erect, glaring at the unfeeling crowd whose cruel curiosity had so hurt
the boy, and with her rough hand she gently stroked his short light
hair. The sight had made a profound impression upon the Countess. "She
cannot sit there always, concealing in her lap her child's deformity,"
she said to herself: "sooner or later she must again expose the poor
creature to the gaze of the crowd."
What now recalled this poor, powerless mother to her mind?
She could do no more for Erika than hide her head in her lap from the
contemptuous curiosity of the world. So entirely did this thought take
possession of her imagination that she seemed to feel the warm weight
of the poor humiliated head upon her knee; she raised her hand to
stroke it, when with a start she awoke to consciousness. "Ah, even that
will be denied me," she thought. "As soon as Erika comes to herself,
she will cast away her life. Yes, all is over,--all,--all!"
Marianne came into the room. She waved her away without a word. She
never thought of inventing a reason to the maid for Erika's absence.
She sat there mute and motionless, looking into the future. A vast
misfortune seemed to have engulfed the world, and she alone was left to
suffer, she alone was to blame.