Since Theodore was a member of the upper classes the scandal was
hushed up. A few years later he passed his final, and was sent by the
doctor to Spa. The amount of quinine which he had taken had affected
his knees and he walked with two sticks. At Spa he looked so ill that
he was a conspicuous figure even in a crowd of invalids.
But an unmarried woman of thirty-five, a German, took compassion on
the unhappy man. She spent many hours with him in a lonely summer
arbour in the park, discussing the problems of life. She was a member
of a big evangelical society, whose object was the raising of the
moral standard. She showed him prospectuses for newspapers and
magazines, the principal mission of which was the suppression of
prostitution.
“Look at me,” she said, “I am thirty-five years old and enjoy
excellent health! What fools’ talk it is to say that immorality is a
necessary evil. I have watched and fought a good fight for Christ’s
sake.”
The young clergyman silently compared her well-developed figure, her
large hips, with his own wasted body.
“What a difference there is between human beings in this world,” was
his unspoken comment.
In the autumn the Rev. Theodore Wennerstroem and Sophia Leidschütz,
spinster, were engaged to be married.
“Saved!” sighed the father, when the news reached him in his house at
Stockholm.
“I wonder how it will end,” thought the brother in his barracks. “I’m
afraid that my poor Theodore is ‘one of those Asra who die when they
love.’”
Theodore Wennerstroem was married. Nine months after the wedding his
wife presented him with a boy who suffered from rickets--another
thirteen months and Theodore Wennerstroem had breathed his last.
The doctor who filled up the certificate of death, looked at the fine
healthy woman, who stood weeping by the small coffin which contained
the skeleton of her young husband of not much over twenty years.
“The plus was too great, the minus too small,” he thought, “and
therefore the plus devoured the minus.”
But the father, who received the news of his son’s death on a Sunday,
sat down to read a sermon. When he had finished, he fell into a brown
study.
“There must be something very wrong with a world where virtue is
rewarded with death,” he thought.
And the virtuous widow, _née_ Leidschütz, had two more husbands and
eight children, wrote pamphlets on overpopulation and immorality. But
her brother-in-law called her a cursed woman who killed her husbands.
The anything but virtuous lieutenant married and was father of six
children. He got promotion and lived happily to the end of his life.
LOVE AND BREAD
The assistant had not thought of studying the price of wheat before he
called on the major to ask him for the hand of his daughter; but the
major had studied it.
“I love her,” said the assistant.
“What’s your salary?” said the old man.
“Well, twelve hundred crowns, at present; but we love one another....”
“That has nothing to do with me; twelve hundred crowns is not enough.”
“And then I make a little in addition to my salary, and Louisa knows
that my heart....”
“Don’t talk nonsense! How much in addition to your salary?”
He seized paper and pencil.
“And my feelings....”
“How much in addition to your salary?”
And he drew hieroglyphics on the blotting paper.
“Oh! We’ll get on well enough, if only....”
“Are you going to answer my question or not? How much in addition to
your salary? Figures! figures, my boy! Facts!”
“I do translations at ten crowns a sheet; I give French lessons, I am
promised proof-correcting....”
“Promises aren’t facts! Figures, my boy! Figures! Look here, now, I’ll
put it down. What are you translating?”
“What am I translating? I can’t tell you straight off.”
“You can’t tell me straight off? You are engaged on a translation, you
say; can’t you tell me what it is? Don’t talk such rubbish!”
“I am translating Guizot’s _History of Civilisation_, twenty-five
sheets.”
“At ten crowns a sheet makes two hundred and fifty crowns. And then?”
“And then? How can I tell beforehand?”
“Indeed, can’t you tell beforehand? But you ought to know. You seem to
imagine that being married simply means living together and amusing
yourselves! No, my dear boy, there will be children, and children
require feeding and clothing.”
“There needn’t be babies directly, if one loves _as we love_ one
another.”
“How the dickens do you love one another?”
“_As we love_ one another.” He put his hand on his waistcoat.
“And won’t there be any children if people love as you love? You must
be mad! But you are a decent, respectable member of society, and
therefore I’ll give my consent; but make good use of the time, my boy,
and increase your income, for hard times are coming. The price of
wheat is rising.”
The assistant grew red in the face when he heard the last words, but
his joy at the old man’s consent was so great that he seized his hand
and kissed it. Heaven knew how happy he was! When he walked for the
first time down the street with his future bride on his arm, they both
radiated light; it seemed to them that the passers-by stood still and
lined the road in honour of their triumphal march; and they walked
along with proud eyes, squared shoulders and elastic steps.
In the evening he called at her house; they sat down in the centre of
the room and read proofs; she helped him. “He’s a good sort,” chuckled
the old man. When they had finished, he took her in his arms and said:
“Now we have earned three crowns,” and then he kissed her. On the
following evening they went to the theatre and he took her home in a
cab, and that cost twelve crowns.
Sometimes, when he ought to have given a lesson in the evening, he (is
there anything a man will not do for love’s sake?) cancelled his lesson
and took her out for a walk instead.
But the wedding-day approached. They were very busy. They had to
choose the furniture. They began with the most important purchases.
Louisa had not intended to be present when he bought the bedroom
furniture, but when it came to the point she went with him. They
bought two beds, which were, of course, to stand side by side. The
furniture had to be walnut, every single piece real walnut. And they
must have spring mattresses covered with red and white striped tick,
and bolsters filled with down; and two eiderdown quilts, exactly
alike. Louisa chose blue, because she was very fair.
They went to the best stores. They could not do without a red
hanging-lamp and a Venus made of plaster of Paris. Then they bought a
dinner-service; and six dozen differently shaped glasses with cut
edges; and knives and forks, grooved and engraved with their initials.
And then the kitchen utensils! Mama had to accompany them to see to
those.
And what a lot he had to do besides! There were bills to accept,
journeys to the banks and interviews with tradespeople and artisans;
a flat had to be found and curtains had to be put up. He saw to
everything. Of course he had to neglect his work; but once he was
married, he would soon make up for it.
They were only going to take two rooms to begin with, for they were
going to be frightfully economical. And as they were only going to
have two rooms, they could afford to furnish them well. He rented two
rooms and a kitchen on the first floor in Government Street, for six
hundred crowns. When Louisa remarked that they might just as well have
taken three rooms and a kitchen on the fourth floor for five hundred
crowns, he was a little embarrassed; but what did it matter if only
they loved one another? Yes, of course, Louisa agreed, but couldn’t
they have loved one another just as well in four rooms at a lower
rent, as in three at a higher? Yes, he admitted that he had been
foolish, but what _did_ it matter so long as they loved one another?
The rooms were furnished. The bed-room looked like a little temple.
The two beds stood side by side, like two carriages. The rays of the
sun fell on the blue eiderdown quilt, the white, white sheets and the
little pillow-slips which an elderly maiden aunt had embroidered with
their monogram; the latter consisted of two huge letters, formed of
flowers, joined together in one single embrace, and kissing here and
there, wherever they touched, at the corners. The bride had her own
little alcove, which was screened off by a Japanese screen. The
drawing-room, which was also dining-room, study and morning-room,
contained her piano, (which had cost twelve hundred crowns) his
writing-table with twelve pigeon-holes, (every single piece of it real
walnut) a pier-glass, armchairs; a sideboard and a dining-table. “It
looks as if nice people lived here,” they said, and they could not
understand why people wanted a separate dining-room, which always looked
so cheerless with its cane chairs.
The wedding took place on a Saturday. Sunday dawned, the first day of
their married life. Oh! what a life it was! Wasn’t it lovely to be
married! Wasn’t marriage a splendid institution! One was allowed one’s
own way in everything, and parents and relations came and congratulated
one into the bargain.
At nine o’clock in the morning their bedroom was still dark. He
wouldn’t open the shutters to let in daylight, but re-lighted the red
lamp which threw its bewitching light on the blue eiderdown, the white
sheets, a little crumpled now, and the Venus made of plaster of Paris,
who stood there rosy-red and without shame. And the red light also
fell on his little wife who nestled in her pillows with a look of
contrition, and yet so refreshed as if she had never slept so well in
all her life. There was no traffic in the street to-day for it was
Sunday, and the church-bells were calling people to the morning
service with exulting, eager voices, as if they wanted all the world
to come to church and praise Him who had created men and women.
He whispered to his little bride to shut her eyes so that he might get
up and order breakfast. She buried her head in the pillows, while he
slipped on his dressing-gown and went behind the screen to dress.
A broad radiant path of sunlight lay on the sitting-room floor; he did
not know whether it was spring or summer, autumn or winter; he only
knew that it was Sunday!
His bachelor life was receding into the background like something ugly
and dark; the sight of his little home stirred his heart with a faint
recollection of the home of his childhood, and at the same time held
out a glorious promise for the future.
How strong he felt! The future appeared to him like a mountain coming
to meet him. He would breathe on it and the mountain would fall down
at his feet like sand; he would fly away, far above gables and
chimneys, holding his little wife in his arm.
He collected his clothes which were scattered all over the room; he
found his white neck-tie hanging on a picture frame; it looked like a
big white butterfly.
He went into the kitchen. How the new copper vessels sparkled, the new
tin kettles shone! And all this belonged to him and to her! He called
the maid who came out of her room in her petticoat. But he did not
notice it, nor did he notice that her shoulders were bare. For him
there was but one woman in all the world. He spoke to the girl as a
father would to his daughter. He told her to go to the restaurant and
order breakfast, at once, a first-rate breakfast. Porter and Burgundy!
The manager knew his taste. She was to give him his regards.
He went out of the kitchen and knocked at the bed-room door.
“May I come in?”
There was a little startled scream.
“Oh, no, darling, wait a bit!”
He laid the breakfast table himself. When the breakfast was brought
from the restaurant, he served it on her new breakfast set. He folded
the dinner napkins according to all the rules of art. He wiped the
wine-glasses, and finally took her bridal-bouquet and put it in a vase
before her place.
When she emerged from her bed-room in her embroidered morning gown and
stepped into the brilliant sunlight, she felt just a tiny bit faint;
he helped her into the armchair, made her drink a little liqueur out
of a liqueur glass and eat a caviare sandwich.
What fun it all was! One could please oneself when one was married.
What would Mama have said if she had seen her daughter drinking
liqueurs at this hour of the morning!
He waited on her as if she were still his fiancee. What a breakfast
they were having on the first morning after their wedding! And nobody
had a right to say a word. Everything was perfectly right and proper,
one could enjoy oneself with the very best of consciences, and that
was the most delightful part of it all. It was not for the first time
that he was eating such a breakfast, but what a difference between
then and now! He had been restless and dissatisfied then; he could not
bear to think of it, now. And as he drank a glass of genuine Swedish
porter after the oysters, he felt the deepest contempt for all
bachelors.
“How stupid of people not to get married! Such selfishness! They ought
to be taxed like dogs.”
“I’m sorry for those poor men who haven’t the means to get married,”
replied his demure little wife kindly, “for I am sure, if they had the
means they would all get married.”
A little pang shot through the assistant’s heart; for a moment he felt
afraid, lest he had been a little too venturesome. All his happiness
rested on the solution of a financial problem, and if, if.... Pooh! A
glass of Burgundy! Now he would work! They should see!
“Game? With cranberries and cucumbers!” The young wife was a little
startled, but it was really delicious.
“Lewis, darling,” she put a trembling little hand on his arm, “can we
afford it?”
Fortunately she said “we.”
“Pooh! It doesn’t matter for once! Later on we can dine on potatoes
and herrings.”
“Can you eat potatoes and herrings?”
“I should think so!”
“When you have been drinking more than is good for you, and expect a
beefsteak after the herring?”
“Nonsense! Nothing of the kind! Your health, sweetheart! The game is
excellent! So are these artichokes!”
“No, but you are mad, darling! Artichokes at this time of the year!
What a bill you will have to pay!”
“Bill! Aren’t they good? Don’t you think that it is glorious to be
alive? Oh! It’s splendid, splendid!”
At six o’clock in the afternoon a carriage drove up to the front door.
The young wife would have been angry if it had not been so pleasant to
loll luxuriously on the soft cushions, while they were being slowly
driven to the Deer Park.
“It’s just like lying on a couch,” whispered Lewis.
She playfully hit his fingers with her sunshade. Mutual acquaintances
bowed to them from the footpath. Friends waved their hands to him as
if they were saying:
“Hallo! you rascal, you have come into a fortune!”
How small the passers-by looked, how smooth the street was, how pleasant
their ride on springs and cushions!
Life should always be like that.
It went on for a whole month. Balls, visits, dinners, theatres.
Sometimes, of course, they remained at home. And at home it was more
pleasant than anywhere else. How lovely, for instance, to carry off
one’s wife from her parents’ house, after supper, without saying as
much as “by your leave,” put her into a closed carriage, slam the
door, nod to her people and say: “Now we’re off home, to our own four
walls! And there we’ll do exactly what we like!”
And then to have a little supper at home and sit over it, talking and
gossiping until the small hours of the morning.
Lewis was always very sensible at home, at least in theory. One day
his wife put him to the test by giving him salt salmon, potatoes
boiled in milk and oatmeal soup for dinner. Oh! how he enjoyed it! He
was sick of elaborate menus.
On the following Friday, when she again suggested salt salmon for
dinner, Lewis came home, carrying two ptarmigans! He called to her
from the threshold:
“Just imagine, Lou, a most extraordinary thing happened! A most
extraordinary thing!”
“Well, what is it?”
“You’ll hardly believe me when I tell you that I bought a brace of
ptarmigans, bought them myself at the market for--guess!”
His little wife seemed more annoyed than curious.
“Just think! One crown the two!”
“I have bought ptarmigans at eightpence the brace; but--” she added in
a more conciliatory tone, so as not to upset him altogether, “that was
in a very cold winter.”
“Well, but you must admit that I bought them very cheaply.”
Was there anything she would not admit in order to see him happy?
She had ordered boiled groats for dinner, as an experiment. But after
Lewis had eaten a ptarmigan, he regretted that he could not eat as
much of the groats as he would have liked, in order to show her that
he was really very fond of groats. He liked groats very much indeed--milk
did not agree with him after his attack of ague. He couldn’t take milk,
but groats he would like to see on his table every evening, every blessed
evening of his life, if only she wouldn’t be angry with him.
And groats never again appeared on his table.
When they had been married for six weeks, the young wife fell ill. She
suffered from headaches and sickness. It could not be anything serious,
just a little cold. But this sickness? Had she eaten anything which had
disagreed with her? Hadn’t all the copper vessels new coatings of tin?
He sent for the doctor. The doctor smiled and said it was all right.
“What was all right? Oh! Nonsense! It wasn’t possible. How could it
have been possible? No, surely, the bed-room paper was to blame. It
must contain arsenic. Let us send a piece to the chemist’s at once and
have it tested.”
“Entirely free from arsenic,” reported the chemist.
“How strange! No arsenic in the wall papers?”
The young wife was still ill. He consulted a medical book and whispered
a question in her ear. “There now! a hot bath!”
Four weeks later the midwife declared that everything was “as it
should be.”
“As it should be? Well, of course! Only it was somewhat premature!”
But as it could not, be helped, they were delighted. Fancy, a baby!
They would be papa and mama! What should they call him? For, of course,
it would be a boy. No doubt, it would. But now she had a serious
conversation with her husband! There had been no translating or
proof-correcting since their marriage. And his salary alone was not
sufficient.
“Yes, they had given no thought to the morrow. But, dear me, one was
young only once! Now, however, there would be a change.”
On the following morning the assistant called on an old schoolfriend,
a registrar, to ask him to stand security for a loan.
“You see, my dear fellow, when one is about to become a father, one
has to consider how to meet increasing expenses.”
“Quite so, old man,” answered the registrar, “therefore I have been
unable to get married. But you are fortunate in having the means.”
The assistant hesitated to make his request. How could he have the
audacity to ask this poor bachelor to help him to provide the expenses
for the coming event? This bachelor, who had not the means to found a
family of his own? He could not bring himself to do it.
When he came home to dinner, his wife told him that two gentlemen had
called to see him.
“What did they look like? Were they young? Did they wear eye-glasses?
Then there was no doubt, they were two lieutenants, old friends of his
whom he had met at Vaxholm.”
“No, they couldn’t have been lieutenants; they were too old for that.”
“Then he knew; they were old college friends from Upsala, probably P.
who was a lecturer, and O. who was a curate, now. They had come to see
how their old pal was shaping as a husband.”
“No, they didn’t come from Upsala, they came from Stockholm.”
The maid was called in and cross-examined. She thought the callers had
been shabbily dressed and had carried sticks.
“Sticks! I can’t make out what sort of people they can have been.
Well, we’ll know soon enough, as they said they would call again. But
to change the subject, I happened to see a basket of hothouse
strawberries at a really ridiculous price; it really is absurd! Just
imagine, hothouse strawberries at one and sixpence a basket! And at
this time of the year!”
“But, my darling, what is this extravagance to lead to?”
“It’ll be all right. I have got an order for a translation this very day.”
“But you are in debt, Lewis?”
“Trifles! Mere nothings! It’ll be all right when I take up a big loan,
presently.”
“A loan! But that’ll be a new debt!”
“True! But there’ll be easy terms! Don’t let’s talk business now! Aren’t
these strawberries delicious? What? A glass of sherry with them would be
tip-top. Don’t you think so? Lina, run round to the stores and fetch a
bottle of sherry, the best they have.”
After his afternoon nap, his wife insisted on a serious conversation.
“You won’t be angry, dear, will you?”
“Angry? I! Good heavens, no! Is it about household expenses?”
“Yes! We owe money at the stores! The butcher is pressing for payment;
the man from the livery stables has called for his money; it’s most
unpleasant.”
“Is that all? I shall pay them to the last farthing to-morrow. How
dare they worry you about such trifles? They shall be paid to-morrow,
but they shall lose a customer. Now, don’t let’s talk about it any
more. Come out for a walk. No carriage! Well, we’ll take the car to
the Deer Park, it will cheer us up.”
They went to the Deer Park. They asked for a private room at the
restaurant, and people stared at them and whispered.
“They think we are out on a spree,” he laughed. “What fun! What madness!”
But his wife did not like it.
They had a big bill to pay.
“If only we had stayed at home! We might have bought such a lot of things
for the money.”
Months elapsed. The great event was coming nearer and nearer. A cradle
had to be bought and baby-clothes. A number of things were wanted. The
young husband was out on business all day long. The price of wheat had
risen. Hard times were at hand. He could get no translations, no
proof-correcting. Men had become materialists. They didn’t spend money
on books, they bought food. What a prosaic period we were living in!
Ideals were melting away, one after the other, and ptarmigans were not
to be had under two crowns the brace. The livery stables would not
provide carriages for nothing for the cab-proprietors had wives and
families to support, just as everybody else; at the stores cash had to
be paid for goods, Oh! what realists they all were!
The great day had come at last. It was evening. He must run for the
midwife. And while his wife suffered all the pangs of childbirth, he
had to go down into the hall and pacify the creditors.
At last he held a daughter in his arms. His tears fell on the baby,
for now he realised his responsibility, a responsibility which he was
unable to shoulder. He made new resolutions. But his nerves were
unstrung. He was working at a translation which he seemed unable to
finish, for he had to be constantly out on business.
He rushed to his father-in-law, who was staying in town, to bring him
the glad news.
“We have a little daughter!”
“Well and good,” replied his father-in-law; “can you support a child?”
“Not at present; for heaven’s sake, help us, father!”
“I’ll tide you over your present difficulties. I can’t do more. My
means are only sufficient to support my own family.”
The patient required chickens which he bought himself at the market,
and wine at six crowns the bottle. It had to be the very best.
The midwife expected a hundred crowns.
“Why should we pay her less than others? Hasn’t she just received a
cheque for a hundred crowns from the captain?”
Very soon the young wife was up again. She looked like a girl, as
slender as a willow, a little pale, it was true, but the pallor suited
her.
The old man called and had a private conversation with his son-in-law.
“No more children, for the present,” he said, “or you’ll be ruined.”
“What language from a father! Aren’t we married! Don’t we love one
another? Aren’t we to have a family?”
“Yes, but not until you can provide for them. It’s all very fine to
love one another, but you musn’t forget that you have responsibilities.”
His father-in-law, too, had become a materialist. Oh! what a miserable
world it was! A world without ideals!
The home was undermined, but love survived, for love was strong, and
the hearts of the young couple were soft. The bailiff, on the contrary,
was anything but soft. Distraint was imminent, and bankruptcy threatened.
Well, let them distrain then!