Produced by Steven desJardins and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
[Illustration: The Devil ILLUSTRATED MOLNAR]
[Illustration: DR. MILLAR: "WHAT AN IDEAL COUPLE YOU TWO WOULD
MAKE."--Page 56. By Permission of Henry W. Savage.]
THE DEVIL
A TRAGEDY OF THE HEART AND CONSCIENCE
_Novelized by Joseph O'Brien from Henry W. Savage's great play_
BY FERENC MOLNAR
NEW YORK
GROSSET & DUNLAP
PUBLISHERS
COPYRIGHT, 1908, BY AMERICAN-JOURNAL-EXAMINER.
COPYRIGHT, 1908, BY J. S. OGILVIE PUBLISHING COMPANY.
FOREWORD
There is a great lesson for all women and men in this wonderful story.
It is one that will impress with its power. But I am glad to say that I
do not believe fully in its truth. The Devil here wins his victory, as
he has won many. But each year, as men and women get better, the
victories of Satan are fewer. Good men and good women fight against evil
and do not yield.
This tragic, heart-breaking story, by the wonderful new writer, tells
one side of the battle between good and evil that goes on in every human
heart. It has its lesson for all men and women.
It is a powerful warning against playing with fire. Its lesson, taught
in the downfall of the man and woman, is "Keep away from evil, and the
appearance of evil."
BEATRICE FAIRFAX.
THE CHARACTERS
Karl Mahler An Artist
Heinrich His Valet
Mimi His Model
Herman Hofmann A Banker
Olga Hofmann The Banker's Wife
The Devil Calling Himself Dr. Millar
Elsa Berg An Heiress
The scenes are laid in Vienna, Austria, in Karl
Mahler's studio, and in the conservatory
reception-room at the Hofmanns', and all the
events transpire within the space of one day.
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
PAGE.
DR. MILLAR: "WHAT AN IDEAL COUPLE YOU TWO WOULD MAKE" Frontispiece
MIMI: "YOU DO NOT LOVE ME; YOU HAVE CEASED TO CARE FOR ME" 16
"CALL ME DR. MILLAR. MY SOCIAL POSITION IS BEYOND QUESTION" 40
"THE ART DEALER," HE SAID SARCASTICALLY 70
"THEY SEEM TO BE GROWING FOND OF EACH OTHER," OLGA SAID JEALOUSLY 108
"LET ONLY YOUR BARE NECK SHOW ABOVE YOUR CLOAK, AND THE TIPS OF 115
YOUR SHOES BENEATH IT"
"I HAVE BEGUN THIS, LET ME FINISH IT. LET ME DICTATE THIS LETTER" 136
"I WANTED TO FEEL THAT YOU LOVED ME AS I HOPED YOU DID" 173
NOTE:--The illustrations used in this book are reproduced from scenes in
Henry W. Savage's production of "The Devil," the only version approved
by the author.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
FOREWORD 3
CHAPTER I 9
CHAPTER II 19
CHAPTER III 34
CHAPTER IV 45
CHAPTER V 56
CHAPTER VI 72
CHAPTER VII 83
CHAPTER VIII 88
CHAPTER IX 104
CHAPTER X 134
CHAPTER XI 156
CHAPTER XII 162
CHAPTER XIII 168
CHAPTER XIV 175
THE MORAL OF "THE DEVIL" 185
THE DEVIL
CHAPTER I
Herman Hofmann, the wealthy banker, and his beautiful young wife, Olga,
had as their guest at dinner Karl Mahler, an artist. Some years earlier,
before Hofmann married, Mahler, befriended by his family, had been sent
away to Paris to study art. Olga, at that time a dependent ward in the
Hofmann family, and the poor young art student loved each other with the
sweet, pure affection of boy and girl.
In the absence of Karl, Olga yielded to the pressing suit of Herman and
the importunities of her own relatives, all poor, and became his wife.
Karl returned to find the sweetheart whom he had kissed for the first
time when he told her good-by, married to another. He was not greatly
shocked at the discovery, the life of an art student in Paris having
somewhat dimmed the memory of his boyhood's love, and neither he nor
Olga alluded to their early romance.
For six years the two had been friends, although they never saw each
other alone. Karl was a frequent visitor at their house and Herman was
his devoted and loyal friend. Olga honestly believed that she loved her
husband and had long ago forgotten her love for Karl. Lately she had
interested herself in his future to the extent of proposing for him a
bride, Elsa Berg, a beautiful and youthful heiress, and she had arranged
a grand ball, to be given so that the two young people might be brought
together.
In all the six years of her married life Olga had never visited Karl's
studio. Karl had never even offered to paint her portrait. Although
neither would confess it, some secret prompting made them fear to break
down the barriers of convention, and they remained to each other
chaperoned and safe. On this evening, however, when Karl was with them,
the subject of a portrait of Olga came up for the first time, and Herman
declared that it must be painted.
"She is more beautiful than any of your models or your patrons," he said
to Karl.
Olga was strangely disturbed, she could not tell why. She blushed and
looked at Karl, whom the proposition seemed to excite to strange
eagerness. She did not trust herself to speak, but listened to the
artist and her husband.
Neither Olga nor Karl could have defined the strange, conflicting
emotions with which they separately received Herman's proposition.
Unwillingly Olga's mind traveled swiftly back to the old days and her
girlhood, and she recalled the day of Karl's departure, the day he took
her in his arms and kissed her lips and said:
"I love you, Olga; I will not forget."
The memory thrilled her and the color flamed into her cheeks. Karl
looked at her, so enraptured and absorbed that he could scarcely give
attention to Herman, who rattled on about the portrait. It was finally
settled that the first sitting should be the following day at Karl's
studio, where Olga would be left with him alone.
It was there that Olga was then to encounter the materialization of the
impulses she had been, only half unconsciously, struggling against for
six years; the spirit of evil purpose against which good contends; the
incarnation of the arch fiend in the attractive shape of a suave,
polished, plausible, eloquent man of the world, whose cynicism bridged
the years of married life; whose subtle suggestions colored afresh the
faded dreams which she believed faintly remembered, and believed would
come no more.
Karl left them with the promise of a sitting on the morrow.
Karl's fitful slumber was disturbed that night by vague half dreams
which oppressed him when he arose. He was filled with misgiving, doubt,
uncertainty. His thoughts, half formed, disturbing, were of Olga.
He tried to think of marriage with Elsa, but it was without enthusiasm.
Warm, beautiful, affectionate, she made no impression on his heart,
which seemed like ice.
He looked around the studio with aversion.
The pictures on the walls seemed no longer to represent the aspiration
of the artist; they were mementos of the models who had posed and
flirted and talked scandal within his walls.
He paced the floor restlessly, nervously, twisting his unlighted
cigarette in his fingers until it crumbled, his mouth tight, his
eyebrows drawn together. Then he seized his hat and overcoat and flung
himself out of the door into the gathering winter storm.
For an hour he plunged through the snow, the chaos of the storm matching
his mood. Almost exhausted, he turned back toward his home and entered.
The room glowed warmly. In front of the inviting fire was the big
arm-chair with its wide seat, comfortable cushions and high pulpit back.
As he laid aside his greatcoat he stepped toward the chair, intending to
bury himself in its depths and surrender to his mood. A shudder ran over
him and he drew back, staring at the seat.
It was empty, his eyes assured him, but he could not rid himself of a
feeling that it was occupied. He pressed his hands to his eyes and then
flung them outward with the gesture of one distraught.
"I am going mad!" he thought.
He called loudly, harshly:
"Heinrich! Heinrich!"
His old servant, alarmed at the unwonted violence of his master's voice,
hastened into the room. Karl flung aside his coat and Heinrich held for
him his velvet dressing jacket. He slipped into it, shook himself, and
lighted a cigarette. His hands shook with nervousness, and he held them
out from him that he might look at them.
"Oh, what a terrible sight!" he groaned.
"Monsieur?" Heinrich said inquiringly.
"Has any one been here?" Karl asked.
"No, Monsieur, only Ma'm'selle Mimi. She is waiting in the studio to
pose."
With an impatient gesture Karl walked across the room, picked up a
newspaper, flung himself on a couch and held the sheet before his eyes.
He did not even see the print, but he persisted, trying to banish his
restless thoughts.
Heinrich, solicitously brushing and folding Karl's coat, waited. The
artist looked at him impatiently:
"Tell Ma'm'selle Mimi I shall not need her to-day. She may go."
"Yes, Monsieur," Heinrich said.
The servant stepped to the door of the studio and threw it open. He
called out:
"Ma'm'selle, Monsieur Karl says he will not need you to-day; you may go
home."
Heinrich withdrew. Karl lay at full length on the couch, holding the
paper before him.
A young woman, daintily featured, with rounded figure whose lines showed
through her close-fitting costume, burst into the room.
Although conscious of her presence and irritated, Karl did not look. He
pretended to be absorbed in his newspaper. Mimi looked at him and
waited, but as he did not speak, she ventured timidly:
"Aren't you going to paint me to-day?"
"Er--no, not to-day."
"Do you not love me any more, Karl?"
The newspaper rattled with the artist's impatience and irritation, but
he did not answer. Mimi approached him.
"You do not love me; you have ceased to care for me. Ah, Karl, when you
loved me you painted me every day. Now you paint nothing but
landscapes."
[Illustration: MIMI: "YOU DO NOT LOVE ME; YOU HAVE CEASED TO CARE FOR
ME."--Page 16.
By Permission of Henry W. Savage.]
Karl forced a laugh.
"Nonsense!" he said. "You talk like a silly child, Mimi."
"You say that now, but you did not say such things when you loved me,
Karl. It is always the way with us poor models. At first it is, 'Ah,
what shoulders, what beautiful coloring, what perfect ankles!' Then you
paint us every day.
"And then it is, 'What in the world have you done with your figure? It
is all angles!' or, 'What on earth have you put on your face? It is as
yellow as old parchment.' And then you paint landscapes."
Mimi burst into tears, and vigorously dabbed her eyes with her
handkerchief. She was an extremely pretty girl of the bourgeois type,
with heavy coils of straw-colored hair piled high on her head, and big
blue eyes that were quick to weep.
Karl arose, threw aside his paper and essayed to comfort her.
"There, there," he said, patting her shoulder, "don't cry, Mimi; you are
full of folly to-day."
As quick to smile as she had been to cry, Mimi unveiled her eyes and
looked at him eagerly, her lips parting over her white teeth.
"Then you do love me, Karl? Ah, tell me that you love me."
"Yes."
"And you will paint me again? If not to-day, perhaps to-morrow?"
"Perhaps, but I am very busy."
He turned from her and sat on the couch again. Mimi's mood suddenly
turned to anger, and she cried out at him furiously:
"I know that you do not love me, and I know why. You are going to be
married.
"Yes, yes," as Karl made an impatient gesture; "I know it is true."
"You are very silly, Mimi," he said.
"Ah, no; I am not. It is true what I have said. I have heard all about
it, but I did not believe it, because I was a fool. You are going to
marry Ma'm'selle Elsa Berg, who is said to be very beautiful and who
will be a great heiress; and then you will forget me, as you would be
glad to do now."
"Where in the devil have you heard all of this?" Karl demanded,
springing angrily to his feet.
"It does not matter; you cannot deny that it is true."
Then her mood changed swiftly to contrition, and she went close to Karl.
"But forgive me; I know it must be. I have always known, and I must have
annoyed you. We models are always annoying--in our street clothes.
Forgive me, Karl."
She looked appealingly at Karl, and he was moved.
"Never mind, Mimi; run along home, now, and I promise to paint you
again, perhaps to-morrow, perhaps the next day."
She threw her arms around his neck and kissed him. Then she fled from
the room. Karl flung himself down on the couch again and hid his face
with his arms.