"One cannot please people," sighs Pistasch, several days after the
lawn-tennis party, while, cigar between his teeth, a hat adorned with a
cock's plume on the back of his head, his smoking jacket open over his
broad chest, he tries to solve a difficult problem in billiards. "One
cannot please people."
"Hm! I think this sentence belonged to Solomon's _repertoire_ of
phrases," grumbles Sempaly, who, stretched out in a deep arm-chair, is
looking over an old _Revue des Deux Mondes_.
"Solomon! Solomon!" says Pistasch, clutching his soft golden hair. "Was
not that the Jew in the Leopoldstadt, whose money rate was so cheap,
only three per cent, _per mese_?"
Count Kamenz considers it "chic" to have forgotten his Bible history.
"Do not make yourself out stupider than you are," Scirocco admonishes
him. "We can be quite satisfied without that."
"Thanks, you see one can never please people," repeats Pistasch,
shrugging his shoulders in droll despair. "After the sacrificial meal,
Mimi rejoices me with a remark upon my stiffness to the Lanzberg. I
show the latter much-calumniated beauty some slight attention and
accept an invitation to lawn-tennis at her house. Mimi reproaches me
concerning my morals. In order to satisfy her demands I yesterday
paid court to a sixteen-year-old dove; she reproaches me for
my inconsequence, says with feeling, 'One does not trifle with
love!'--there, it sounds as if it were a bit from a play." Pistasch
turns to Sempaly.
"Yes, it is the title of a play in which at the end some one is
stabbed," says Scirocco, looking up from his reading.
"Thank you, Rudi; one can always learn from you," assures Pistasch.
"You are the first who has discovered that--I pity you," replies
Sempaly, sarcastically.
"Surely not because I am weak in history and literature," says
Pistasch, phlegmatically. "Bah! if one of us only knows who he is, he
knows what he needs."
"Yes, everything else would only confuse him," says Scirocco,
seriously.
"Precisely," answers Pistasch, coolly. He now sits on the corner of the
billiard table, both hands in his pockets, in the large room with its
faded leather furniture. "But confess that your sister maltreats me,
after I have tried so hard to please her."
"Too hard, perhaps," says Scirocco, and looks gloomily at his cousin.
Is the latter the only one who does not perceive that the Countess
would prefer to preserve him in a cage, secure from the attacks of
audacious women and mothers? "'_Ce sont toujour les concessions qui ont
perdu les grands hommes_,' Philippe Egalite remarked on his way to
execution," he continues, and takes his cousin's ostentatious _naivete_
for what it is really worth.
"That might be called forcing history," cries Rhoeden, entering at this
moment, and hearing the last phrase.
"Who was Philippe Egalite?" asks Pistasch, with unembarrassed--yes,
boasted ignorance.
"A man who, in order to make himself loved by the masses, voted for the
death of his cousin, the king, made himself riding trousers of the
_ancien regime_, and was beheaded by the masses by way of thanks."
"Ah! my historical knowledge is extensively widened--but if I only knew
to whom to make love!"
"_Il y avait une fois un seducteur qui cherchait de l'ouvrage_,"
remarks Eugene.
"_Je crois Men qu'il cherchait!_" yawns Pistasch. "Really, it is not
only on Mimi's and morality's account that I do not dare try it with
the Lanzberg--but she is so magnificently prudish! Now I do not object
to a little prudishness, that is piquant, but quite so much! Recently
she, for really nothing at all----"
"Ah, really, for nothing at all?" repeats Scirocco, looking sharply at
his cousin.
"Well, not exactly for nothing at all," the latter admits, grumblingly,
"but on my word, for a very slight cause, she gave me a dissertation
upon her dignity, and that she felt bound to keep the honorable name
which she bears spotless."
"She is quite right," declares Sempaly, sharply.
Pistasch laughs rudely. "Well, Rudi, between ourselves, it is
nevertheless a little droll to think so much of this name, to boast of
its spotlessness--hm!"
Rhoeden displays the indifference of a man who knows that the
conversation is upon delicate subjects, and retires to a window recess,
where he unfolds a letter. A servant enters and reports that "The
Countess begs the Baron to come to the music-room," whereupon Rhoeden
vanishes.
Scarcely has the door closed behind him when Scirocco bursts out
violently: "You are a muttonhead, Pistasch; the little banker is a
hundred times cleverer than you."
"He needs it," says Pistasch, coolly.
"Can you not be silent before him?" Scirocco attacks him.
"No," replies Pistasch, lazily; "I have never accustomed myself to
keeping secrets; respectable people have no secrets. Besides, Lanzberg
begins to be fairly unbearable, his manner has become so unsteady, so
nervous; he no longer finishes a single sentence correctly, has not an
opinion of his own, and crouches like a whipped dog. He makes me
nervous."
"Are you of stone, have you no heart?" cries Scirocco.
"I am under no obligations to Lanzberg," grumbles Pistasch, very
defiantly. "I----"
"Yes, you would be ashamed to protect him a little," says Scirocco,
cuttingly. "Recently when L---- remarked to you that you seemed to
associate with Lanzberg a great deal, you replied, 'Yes, he has a
pretty wife!' Really, Pistasch, at that moment, in my eyes, you stood
morally lower than poor Felix."
"Really," Pistasch imitates his cousin's tragic tone, "I think I have
blundered into an educational institution! Lectures and nothing but
lectures! First you, then Mimi. How you can permit yourself to compare
me with a man like a 'certain Lanzberg.'"
"Do not talk yourself into useless heat, my dear fellow," says
Scirocco, laying his hand on his shoulder. "At present I feel just as
inclined to fight a duel with you as I should to cut my own brother's
throat. Consider a little and you will come to the conclusion that you
are in the wrong."
Scirocco leaves the billiard-room. For a while Pistasch pushes the
ivory balls over the green table with furious zeal, then he throws
himself irritably into an arm-chair.
Yes, he feels plainly that he is in the wrong, but he cannot resolve to
change his behavior to Felix. He might at least avoid him, but just
now, because and in defiance of Linda's prudishness, he does not wish
to. His prejudice against Linda was nothing but arrogant affectation,
but his antipathy to Felix is sincere; it almost resembles that
aversion which many egoistic men feel for one mortally ill.
Rhoeden spends an hour in teaching the Countess--a totally unmusical
woman who does not know a note, has no feeling for rhythm, but
possesses a good voice and a great desire to shine in that
direction--twelve bars of a new Italian romance of Tosti.
He goes his little way, pursues his little aim, and will attain it.
Only two years ago young aristocrats invited him exclusively to stag
parties, hunts, etc.; then Count F---- wrote a little operetta for a
society tenor. The tenor, a young diplomat, after the first rehearsal
of the operetta was transferred to Constantinople--universal
consternation. They had about resolved to surrender the operetta, which
was to be performed for a charitable object, to a professional when
Pistasch proposed his old Theresanium comrade, Eugene. Eugene, with his
unusually beautiful voice, sang the little role charmingly; all were
delighted with his singing, his graceful acting. At one stroke he
became the fashion.
His passion for Linda, Eugene had long buried under his worldly egoism;
he was glad that he had been prevented from the foolishness of a
marriage with her. He planned quite a different match, made use of his
opportunities, and meanwhile was in no hurry. He knew very well on what
footing he stood with society, knew that they wished to fasten upon him
Countess Fifi R----, who was red-haired and somewhat hump-backed, or
even Countess Clarisse, who was scrofulous and had been much gossiped
about, knew it and laughed at it. He was still young and could wait.
Social vanity was his religion, the world his god, to whom, however, he
did not pay such passionate, credulous homage as Linda, for example,
but always with an ironical smile on his lips.
After he had gone through the romance with the Countess for perhaps a
hundred times, had finally taught her text, melody, and even a
sentimental mordent, and is now dismissed from duty, Eugene looks into
the billiard-room again before he goes to his own room, and finds
Pistasch, between thick clouds of smoke, occupied with a tschibouk.
"Do I disturb you?" he asks, gayly.
"Oh, heavens, no! I have long been weary of my own society," sighs
Pistasch with feeling.
"I have an amusing bit of news for you, Pistasch," continues Rhoeden,
approaching him. "My uncle Harfink"--Eugene always speaks of his
relations in a mocking tone, somewhat as one kind of cripples speak of
their humps--"my uncle Harfink--you remember his first wife, whom you
knew, is dead--well, he has married again!"
"Wish him much happiness," replies Pistasch, who does not see why that
should interest him particularly.
"He has married, and none other than the famous Juanita," says Rhoeden,
with the calmness of a virtuoso who is sure of his effect.
Pistasch drops his pipe, springs up from his armchair.
"Harfink--married--Juanita, the----" he interrupts himself.
"Yes," says Rhoeden, calmly, "the same Juanita who in her day ruined
poor Lanzberg."
"Hm! So you know the story?" asks Pistasch, breathing freely in the
consciousness that now all discretion is unnecessary.
"It will go no further through me," Rhoeden assures him solemnly. "But
is not that delightful? My uncle writes me that he has married the
aforesaid celebrity, and as his digestion is still not as good as it
might be, they have gone to Marienbad for their wedding trip. He begs
me to reconcile his daughter to his step, and to find out what kind of
a reception his wife may expect in Traunberg. Piquant, eh? Very
piquant!"
A shrill bell announces lunch.
"Rudi! Mimi!" cries Pistasch, rushing into the dining-room, where both
these, together with Elli and Mademoiselle, are assembled, "old Harfink
has married the Juanita, and has gone to Marienbad for his wedding
trip. Is not that magnificent, is not that famous?"