VILLA ELSA
Such in brief was the scene that stretched out around him and
enveloped his attention and interest. There was not majesty that
would offend, but rather a cosy formality that is the absence of
style. It cured somewhat the homesick inclinations that quite
naturally haunted him after a wearying day of travel and as
nightfall drew down about his loneliness. He was bound for the
home of a strange family, speaking a tongue in which he was far
from glib. It had been written, though, that the Bucher young
people had learned English pretty well at school.
Kirtley reached his destination to find that the parents were
waiting expectantly to receive him. With German consciousness, they
were stuffily attired for this novel and important event. After
staunch greetings he was led into the house past a big angry dog
that stood guard tempestuously at the door. Gard found later that
such savage barking was quite a feature of the Teuton threshold, and
might be considered one bristling aspect or cause of the ungenial
development of the social spirit in Germany. _Cave canem_ can hardly
be called a suitable first attraction toward the spread of
hospitality. He feared he was going to be bitten and wished his
welcome had not been complicated with shudders.
The entrance to Villa Elsa consisted of a hallway swimming in heady
odors from the strong cooking in the adjacent kitchen. Kirtley stood
for a moment stifled. But he was to become more used to the lusty
smells that roam about, presumptuous and fortifying, in German
households and of which, indeed, all German existence is resolutely
redolent. Strength, whether in barking dogs or fumes or what-not,
appeals to the race.
In the passage-way, too, Gard was struck by the presence of various
weapons, and shields, hunting horns, sundry pairs of large boots,
military or shooting garments, belts loaded with cartridges. It
seemed almost like the combative entry to some museum of armor.
Taken together with the embattled dog, it suggested a defended
fortress rather than a peaceful fireside.
"How pugnacious!" Gard declared to himself.
In the entry Ernst was called, and he came promptly forth, a smiling
lad of fifteen, with a musing face, his thick light hair thrown back
and run through meditatively by his fingers. He conducted Gard up
two flights to a good-sized but snug room where he was to abide. A
linden tree courted the window panes with its green branches.
Just the place for a fellow who wants to get away from the world and
read!--Kirtley thought.
On his nightstand lay, with characteristic Teuton foresight, the
names and addresses of a language teacher and of a music teacher
who were duly "recommending themselves" to him in the German idiom.
Lists of purchasable text books and musical editions from houses
which, in the thoroughly informed Teuton manner, had got wind of
his coming, also opened before him.
"They evidently expect me to begin to-morrow morning. No loss of
time." He laughed to himself.
His trunk and satchel were in his room in a few minutes with all the
certainty and punctuality of the imperial-royal service. "_Essen
fertig!_" was soon vociferated up the stairway by the cook Tekla,
whose bulky young form Gard had glimpsed in the kitchen. Not sure of
being summoned he did not emerge until Ernst tapped on the door--
"Meester Kirtley, please come to eating."
At table the elder son was introduced--Rudolph, called Rudi, a youth
of about Gard's age. There was an unseemly scar on his face and
something oblique in his look. Engineering was given as his
profession, but he affected the German military strut and was
forward and crammed with ready-made conclusions on most subjects.
But Herr Bucher reigned here as elsewhere about Villa Elsa as
absolute master. He alone spoke with authority. Reverence was
first of all due him. Gard soon saw how the wife and children,
notwithstanding their stirring presences, were on a secondary plane.
How different in the land where he had come from where they are
quite free to rule in the house! The sturdy Frau was submissive,
energetically helpful. But in her husband's absence she assumed his
stentorian command.
The manner of eating was frankly informal and ungainly. Evidences of
sharp discipline one moment; the next, awkward short-cuts. The
Germans have never been able to harmonize these extremes into a
medium of easy formality or sightly smoothness. At the Bucher table
each one reached across for the food with scarce an apology--a plan
jerkily interrupted at times by Tekla, who stuck things at Gard as
if she were going to hit him. The strong provender heaped up in
abundance, rank in smell and usually unappetizing in color,
interfered at first with his hunger. And the drinking was, of
course, of a copiousness he had little dreamed of.
The whole effect created a distinctly unsympathetic impression. It
ran full tilt against Gard's anticipations. Rebner had led him to
expect always the best among the Germans. Were they not the most
advanced of humans? Were they not the patterns whom he should model
himself after in the laudatory desire for self-improvement? He was
naturally curious to see the young lady of the household, all the
more as he wondered how she would blend into this blunt picture. She
did not appear and he heard no reference to her. But there was a
vacant place.
Much struggling occurred over the mutual endeavors to carry on
conversation. With the English which the sons had learned and with
Gard's German which he found a strange article on its native ground,
headway was made after a fashion. His bloodless American college
variety of the language was very weak to buffet about in these
billows of idioms and colloquialisms.
The family, in its emphatic substantiality, was most friendly and
eager to please. They urged food and fluid upon him in a way that
would have dismayed his Yankee doctor. He found himself eating and
drinking to an extent he had never imagined. This sort of thing, he
concluded half-despairingly, would either be the making of him or
kill him. At home the general fear was about too much. Here satiety,
over-satiety, seemed to be the rule as at all German firesides.
While he dreaded to think what his abstemious digestive apparatus
would do, his new friends took not amiss the bountiful spilling of
edibles and liquids upon their napkins spread conspicuously over
their breasts. Laundering must be cheap in Germany. That was one
good thing.
Gard did not forget that this was represented to be a highly
instructed and cultivated circle. The members had graduated from the
best schools or held degrees from standard universities. He kept
asking himself in what guises the much advertised German excellence
was yet to appear in this domestic group whose culture and virtues
had been so extolled. If these manners and habits were part of its
perfect ripened fruit, then American education and life were indeed
obviously blighted. He could not help noticing that all hands had
not been necessarily washed before meal-time, and that finger nails
were unblushingly uncleaned and unkempt. An accidental glimpse under
the immense flowing white beard of his host revealed the absence of
a shirt collar, and the neck evidently relied on its untrimmed
hairiness as an excuse for not being customarily washed.
It became apparent to Kirtley after a month that personal cleanness
and neatness in Germany were not particularly considered as next to
godliness. The gold braid, spick and span uniforms and other showy
gear, were apt to cover dirty bodies and soiled underwear. Alas, the
Germans could not wash in beer. He wondered why his old enthusiastic
mentor had never given him a hint of these things. Likely he did not
know. Distance often increases eloquence in proportion as it breeds
ignorance.
With the exhilaration of the bounteous meal, however, Gard's spirits
rose to a height he had not known in a long time. If conversation
languished over the stony roads of the duality of expression,
glasses were clinked together again and a new topic was hopefully
started. When it seemed proper to him that the end of the repast
should be in sight, a new course would be brought in, usually
accompanied boisterously by the two family dogs, including the
ferocious beast who had given Gard the shivers. The animals
conducted themselves with a ravenous freedom around the board,
alternately being petted and fed and allowed to lick plates, only to
be in turn kicked out and shrieked after, with a chair occasionally
upset in the rumpus. This habit of kicking animals, things and
persons Gard later observed was prevalent among the Teutons, whose
appropriate fondness for conveniently big boots and large stout
shoes at the same time discourages any vanity about small feet. It
is a part of their military predilection.
At the end of a couple of hours dinner was brought to a close.
Fräulein had not yet put in an appearance, and it now came out that
she was "at lesson." She must have stayed for another class. After
his gastronomic feat Gard did not know whether he felt sick or never
better in his life. What's more, he did not seem to care, his senses
were so pleasantly numbed.
On his way up to his room, in the dim hall, he caught sight of a
young woman hanging up her wrap. Mussed strands of straw-colored
hair shone down her shoulders and sent a sudden thrill of gladness
through his veins. He had never seen but one Wagner opera and that
was "The Twilight of the Gods," with its aureate Rhine maidens
bathing in that delicious revelry of divine music. The arrival at
last of the daughter of the house, as he assumed this was, brought
back a flash of all that golden loveliness.
In his sleep that first night, vast trenchers of food and tankards
of drink disported in happy confusion with goddesses blond and
magical.