In obedience to his father’s summons, Christian travelled to Würzburg.
Their greeting was most courteous. “I hope I have not interfered with
any plans of yours,” said Albrecht Wahnschaffe.
“I am at your disposal,” Christian said coolly.
They took a walk on the old ramparts but said little. The beautiful dog
Freia, who was the constant companion of Albrecht Wahnschaffe, trotted
along between them. It surprised the elder Wahnschaffe to observe on
Christian’s face the signs of inner change.
That evening, over their tea, he said with an admirably generous
gesture. “You’re to be congratulated, I understand, on a very unusual
acquisition. A wreath of legends surrounds this diamond. The incident
has caused quite a whirl of dust to fly and not a little amazement. Not
unjustly so, it seems to me, since you are neither a British Duke nor
an Indian Maharajah. Is the stone so very desirable?”
“It is marvellous,” Christian said. And suddenly the words of Voss
slipped into his mind: One must expiate the lust of the eye.
Albrecht Wahnschaffe nodded. “I don’t doubt it, and I understand such
passions, though, as a man of business, I must regret the tying up of
so much capital. It is an eccentricity; and the world is endangered
whenever the commoners grow eccentric. And so I should like to ask
you to reflect on this aspect of things: all the privileges which you
enjoy, all the easements of life, the possibility of satisfying your
whims and passions, the supremacy of your social station--all these
things rest on work. Need I add--on the work of your father?”
The dog Freia had strolled out from a corner of the room, and laid her
head caressingly on Christian’s knee. Albrecht Wahnschaffe, slightly
annoyed and jealous, gave her a smart slap on one flank.
He continued. “An exploitation of one’s capacity for work which reaches
the extent of mine involves, of course, the broadest self-denial in
all other matters. One becomes a ploughshare that tears up the earth
and rusts. Or one is like a burning substance, luminiferous but
self-consumed. Marriage, family, friendship, art, nature--these things
scarcely exist for me. I have lived like a miner in his shaft. And what
thanks do I get? Demagogues tell those whom they delude that I am a
vampire, who sucks the blood of the oppressed. These poisoners of our
public life either do not know or do not wish to know the shocks and
sufferings and renunciations that have been mine, and of which their
peaceful ‘wage-slave’ has no conception.”
Freia snuggled closer up to Christian, licked his hand, and her eyes
begged humbly for a look. The beast’s dumb tenderness soothed him. He
frowned, and said laconically: “If it is so, and you feel it so keenly,
why do you go on working?”
“There is such a thing as duty, my dear spoiled boy, such a thing as
loyalty to a cause,” Albrecht Wahnschaffe answered, and a gleam of
anger showed in his pale-blue eyes. “Every peasant clings to the bit of
earth into which he has put his toil. When I began to work, our country
was still a poor country; to-day it is rich. I shall not say that what
I have accomplished is considerable, when compared to the sum of our
national accomplishment, but it has counted. It is a symptom of our
rise, of our young might, of our economic welfare. We are one of the
very great nations now, and have a body as well as a countenance.”
“What you say is doubtless most true,” Christian answered. “Unhappily
I have no instinct for such matters; my personality is defective in
things of that kind.”
“A quarter of a century ago your fate would have been that of a
bread earner,” Albrecht Wahnschaffe continued, without reacting to
Christian’s words. “To-day you are a descendant and an heir. Your
generation looks upon a changed world and age. We older men have
fastened wings upon your shoulders, and you have forgotten how painful
it is to creep.”
Christian, in a sombre longing for the warmth of some body, took the
dog’s head between his hands, and with a grunt of gratitude she raised
herself up and laid her paws on his shoulders. With a smile, that
included his petting of the dog, he said: “No one refuses the good
things that fall into his lap. It is true I have never asked whence
everything comes and whither it tends. To be sure, there are other ways
of living; and I may yet embrace one of them some day. Then it will
be apparent whether one becomes another man, and what kind, when the
supports or the wings, as you put it, are gone.” His face had grown
serious.
Albrecht Wahnschaffe suddenly felt himself rather helpless before this
handsome, proud stranger who was his son. To hide his embarrassment,
he answered hastily: “A different way of living--that is just what I
mean. It was the conviction that a life which is nothing but a chain of
trifles must in the end become a burden, that made me suggest a career
to you that is worthier of your powers and gifts. How would you like
the profession of diplomacy? Wolfgang seems thoroughly satisfied with
the possibilities that he sees opening up before him. It is not too
late for you either. It will not be difficult to make up the time lost.
Your name outweighs any title of nobility. You would stay in a suitable
atmosphere; you have large means, the necessary personal qualities and
relations. Everything will adjust itself automatically.”
Christian shook his head. “You are mistaken, father,” he said, softly
but firmly. “I have no capacity for anything like that, and no taste
for it at all.”
“I suspected as much,” Albert Wahnschaffe said, in his liveliest
manner. “Let us not speak of it any more. My second proposal is far
more congenial to myself. I would encourage you to co-operate in the
activities of our firm. My plan is to create a representative position
for you in either our home or our foreign service. If you choose the
latter you may select your own field of activity--Japan, let us say,
or the United States. We would furnish you with credentials that would
make your position very independent. You would assume responsibilities
that are in no wise burdensome, and enjoy all the privileges of an
ambassador. All that is needed is your consent. I shall arrange all
details.”
Christian arose from his chair. “I beg you very earnestly, father, to
drop that subject,” he said. His expression was cold and his eyes cast
down.
Albrecht Wahnschaffe arose too. “Do not be rash, Christian,” he
admonished his son. “I shall not conceal the fact that a definitive
refusal on your part would wound me deeply. I have counted on you.” He
looked at Christian with a firm glance. But Christian was silent.
After a while he asked: “How long ago is it since you were at the
works?”
“It must be three or four years ago,” Christian answered.
“It was three years ago on Whitsuntide, if I remember rightly,”
Albrecht Wahnschaffe said, with his habitual touch of pride in his
memory, which was rarely at fault. “You had agreed on a pleasure trip
in the Harz mountains with your cousin, Theo Friesen, and Theo was
anxious to pay a flying visit to the factories. He had heard of our
new welfare movement for workingmen, and was interested in it. But you
scarcely stopped after all.”
“No, I persuaded Theo to go on. We had a long way ahead of us, and I
was anxious to get to our quarters.”
Christian remembered the whole incident now. Evening had come before
the car drove through the streets of the factory village. He had
yielded to his cousin’s wish, but suddenly his aversion for this world
of smoke and dust and sweat and iron had awakened. He had not wanted to
leave the car, and had ordered the driver to speed up.
Nevertheless he recalled the hellish music made up of beaten steel
and whirring wheels. He could still hear the thundering, whistling,
wheezing, screeching, hissing; he could still see the swift procession
of forges, cylinders, pumps, steam-hammers, furnaces, of all kinds;
the thousands of blackened faces, a race that seemed made of coal
in the breath of the fierce glow of white and crimson fires; misty
electric moons that quivered in space; vehicles like death barrows
swallowed up in the violet darkness; the workingmen’s homes, with their
appearance of comfort, and their reality of a bottomless dreariness;
the baths, libraries, club-houses, crêches, hospitals, infants’ homes,
ware-houses, churches, and cinemas. The stamp of force and servitude,
of all that is ugliest on earth, was bedizened and tinted in fair
colours here, and all menaces were throttled and fettered.
Young Friesen had exhausted himself with admiration, but Christian had
not breathed freely again until their car was out on the open road and
had left the flaring horror in its panic flight.
“And you have not been there since?” Albrecht Wahnschaffe asked.
“No, not since that day.”
For a while they stood opposite each other in silence. Albrecht
Wahnschaffe took Freia by her collar, and said with notable
self-control: “Take counsel with yourself. There is time. I shall
not urge you unduly, but rather wait. When you come to weigh the
circumstances, and test your own mind, you will realize that I have
your welfare at heart. Do not answer me now. When you have made a clear
decision--let me know what it is.”
“Have I your permission to retire?” Christian asked. His father nodded,
and he bowed and left the room.
Next morning he returned to Christian’s Rest.