With the advent of spring a new and gayer existence began for Mrs.
Czepanek.
He was soon coming, that was certain. But even if the time was short,
why spend it over that disgusting sewing? There was a less wearing way
of making a living.
The thing was simple enough--rent an apartment of nine rooms, buy the
furniture on credit, and have a plate hung on the outside of the house
inscribed: "Board and Lodging for Students." As for the rest, well, a
way would be found.
This little set of thoughts took exclusive possession of Mrs. Czepanek's
poor brain, riddled like a sieve by the incessant whirr of the
sewing-machine.
Though such a careless existence appealed to Lilly's fancy, she
harboured some small doubts. In the first place the clamouring,
threatening duns that had besieged their home after papa's departure
were still fresh in her shuddering memory. Then she did not see quite
clearly where so many students, enough to fill a nine-room apartment,
were suddenly to come from after the beginning of the summer semester,
since all had secured quarters already.
But her mother would listen to no objections.
"I will go to the directors, I will go to the mayor, I will--" and the
attic room resounded with the new triumphant, "I will--"
Now began a series of mysterious expeditions. Frequently, when Lilly
returned from school, she could tell at the bottom of the stairs that
the machine, whose industrious clatter had greeted her for years, was at
a standstill, and she would find the key to the room under the door-mat.
As the time drew near for the great event, the mother became more
taciturn. A crafty smile lay on her face, which, but for an admixture of
scorn, was like the smile parents wear before Christmas. She painted her
cheeks more carefully than ever, and the jar of rouge, which previously
she had kept locked away from Lilly, reposed unabashed on the top of the
chest.
But money grew rapidly scarcer. Lilly had to give up every minute she
could spare from school work to make up for her mother's remissness,
while Mrs. Czepanek went about calculating and speculating. She put her
foot to the treadle only on rare occasions, when Lilly pled with her
urgently. The delivery of finished articles became more and more
irregular, and the two women were in danger of losing their entire means
of subsistence.
Lilly's vast hoard of youthful strength threatened to give out. Yet this
did not cause her overmuch concern.
"Something'll turn up," she thought.
If only she could have gotten one good night's rest, instead of lying
dressed on the edge of the bed from two to six in the morning, she would
not have grudged her mother her youthful intoxication born of young
hopes.
Lilly sat in school with tired, reddened eyes, a filmy veil between her
and the world, between her and the thoughts she was expected to think.
Her teachers began to find fault with her.
It was high time for the new life to begin.
It began on a hot, drab July day.
On returning from school Lilly saw two waggons standing outside the door
loaded with furniture smelling of fresh varnish. Even before she set
foot on the lowest step she could hear her mother's shrill voice
apparently raised in altercation with strangers.
Lilly ran upstairs, her heart beating fast. Two drivers wearing black
leather aprons were standing there, one with a bill in his hand
demanding money. A look of amusement was on their red faces. Mrs.
Czepanek was tripping to and fro, running her fingers through her
freshly-curled hair and screaming all sorts of things about rascality
and broken promises and grinding down the poor. Whereupon the men
laughed, and said they'd like to get back home that day.
This set Mrs. Czepanek off completely. She tried to snatch the bill from
the man's hand. He refused to give it up, and she set to pummelling him
with her fists.
Lilly sprang between them, caught hold of her mother, who fought
desperately, and called to the men to leave, telling them everything
would be arranged. So the men took themselves off.
Her mother's wrath now descended upon Lilly.
"If you hadn't come," she screamed, "I would have gotten hold of the
receipt, and everything would have been all right. Now I have to go
there to-morrow again, while if you hadn't mixed in, the furniture could
have been unpacked in the new apartment this very day."
"What new apartment?"
Mrs. Czepanek laughed. How could Lilly be so stupid? Did she think her
mother had been going about idle all that time?
Then everything was revealed. The nine-room apartment had already been
rented, and all they needed to do was move in. Even the plate had
already been made. When hung it would act like magic. So much for the
outside. But hadn't she self-sacrificingly strained every nerve on the
inside equipment, too? She wasn't going to describe the furniture, for
it might make her angry again, but--
She had bought curtains for twelve windows--the pattern a Chinese lady
and a palm leaf. And six rugs, good ones, because students usually have
a pretty heavy tramp, and cheap stuff would wear out like chiffon. Big
English wash basins with gold flowers, the pattern exactly matching the
pattern of the ten stands. Unfortunately the dishes were not ready for
delivery because it always took three or four weeks to have the monogram
burnt in. But they would have to have something to eat from, so for the
meantime she had bought a cheaper set--for eighteen people--everything
thoroughly refined and respectable. She had been very clever and very
careful in the entire matter.
While engaged in this description, Mrs. Czepanek walked about the
centre-table with long shambling steps. Her small eyes, with the traces
of many sleepless hours upon them, glistened and gleamed, and beneath
the false glowed the genuine red on her haggard cheeks.
Lilly, who was beginning to be a bit uneasy, ventured to inquire
concerning the payments. Her mother simply laughed at her.
"You are either a lady and impress the tradespeople, or you are not a
lady. I think that I, the wife of Kilian Czepanek, conductor of the
singing society, am thoroughly entitled to be treated with respect."
"Are the things at the apartment?"
Mrs. Czepanek laughed again.
"What should I do with them before the apartment is in order? Apartments
have to be freshly painted and papered." Then with the graceful gesture
which only the ability to pay bestows upon a person, she added: "I was
especially careful in selecting the wall-paper to get artistic
patterns."
Lilly had a sickish feeling. It was like being in doubt as to whether or
not your schoolmates were teasing you.
Added to all the other annoyances nothing had been gotten for dinner.
Lilly set the coffee on to boil and put the afternoon rolls on the
table. Well, then, they would simply skip a meal again. The two
Czepaneks had grown nimble in that sort of skipping.
The mother hastily gulped down the hot drink. No time must be lost, she
said, they would have to get at the packing.
At this point she was seized by another attack of fury.
"Hadn't you held my hands, you good-for-nothing, you," she screamed, "we
should have had that lovely furniture in its place by to-morrow morning.
As it is, we shall have to move in with all this trash. What _will_ the
people say when they see it?"
She tore at her artificial curls and despairingly brandished the
bread-knife, with which she was slicing her roll.
Then she turned up the sleeves of her blouse, and said the packing
should begin.
She emptied the wardrobe and piled the clothes over the bottom of the
bed. The underwear and linen, the contents of their linen chest, she
sent flying over the floor.
The sinews of her withered arms jerked, the sweat trickled down her
forehead.
Lilly, watching the aimless pother with an oppressed feeling at her
heart, noticed the score of the Song of Songs, the home's greatest
treasure, lying on the floor, heedlessly thrown there by her mother
along with nightgowns and bed-clothes.
She stooped to pick it up.
"What are you after with the Song of Songs?" screamed the mother. She
had been kneeling, and now jumped to her feet.
"Nothing," said Lilly in surprise. "I was just going to put it on the
table."
"You lie," the mother screeched, "you low-down thing. You want to steal
it, the way you stole the receipt. I'll spoil your little game for you."
Lilly suddenly saw a gleaming something pass before her eyes, and felt a
pain at her throat, felt something warm spread soothingly down to her
left breast.
Not until her mother prepared for a second thrust did Lilly realise it
was the bread-knife she was holding in her hand. She uttered a piercing
scream, and grasped her mother's wrist.
But the mother had developed giant strength, and Lilly would probably
have succumbed in the struggle that ensued, had not the noise they made
drawn the neighbours to the spot.
Mrs. Czepanek was caught from behind, and bound with handkerchiefs. She
held the bread-knife in a tight clutch, which the strongest man could
not relax, and did not drop it until an opiate had been administered by
the physician who had hurried to the scene.
Lilly's wound was dressed, and she was taken to the hospital, where she
remained temporarily, because they did not know what else to do with
her. While at the hospital she learned that her mother had been placed
in the district insane asylum, and in all likelihood would never come
out of it again.
Lilly was left alone in the world.