I
With her companion, Fräulein Stöhr, the Countess Brainitz travelled
about the world.
She had been the guest of an incredibly aged Princess Neukirch at
Berchtesgaden. But she grew to be immensely bored, and fled to
Venice, Ravenna, and Florence. Armed with a Baedeker, and accompanied
by a guide, she “did” the galleries, churches, basilicas, palaces,
sarcophagi, and monuments, and her tirelessness reduced Fräulein Stöhr
to despair.
She quarrelled with the gondoliers over their fare, with waiters over a
tip, with shopkeepers over the price of their wares. She thought every
coin a counterfeit, and in her terror of dirt and infection she touched
no door-knob or chair, no newspaper and no one’s hand. She washed
herself repeatedly, screeched uninterruptedly, and by her appetite
struck her companions at the table d’hôte with awe.
With rancour in her heart she left the land of miracles and of petty
fraud. She visited her nephews, the brothers Stojenthin, in Berlin.
They were charmed at her coming, and borrowed a thousand marks of her
over the oysters and champagne. Then she proceeded to Stargard, to be
with her sisters Hilde Stojenthin and Else von Febronius.
She was vastly amused at the middle-class ladies in Stargard, who
curtsied to her as to a queen. At their teas she lorded it over them
from the heights of a sofa covered with dotted calico. She entertained
her devoutly attentive audience with stories of the great world. At
times these anecdotes were of such a character that the judge’s widow
had to administer a warning pinch to the arm of her noble sister.
Frau von Febronius had been ailing since the beginning of winter.
Careless exposure on a sleigh drive had brought on an attack of
pneumonia. The consequences threatened to be grave. The countess,
who not only feared illness for herself but hated it in others, grew
restive and talked of leaving.
“When my dear husband saw his end approaching, he sent me to Mentone,”
she told Fräulein Stöhr. “Stupid and devoid of understanding as he
was--though not more so than most men--in this respect he showed a
praiseworthy delicacy of feeling. I was simply not made to bear the
sight of suffering. Charity is not among my gifts.”
Fräulein Stöhr assumed a pastoral expression and cast her eyes to
heaven. She knew her mistress sufficiently to realize that the anecdote
of the dying count and the expedition to Mentone was a product of the
imagination. She said: “Man should prepare himself in time for his
latter end, Madame.”
The countess was indignant. “My dear Stöhr, spare me your spiritual
wisdom! It suits only times of trouble. Pastoral consolations are not
to my taste. It is not your proper task to preach truths to me, but to
offer me agreeable illusions.”
One evening Frau von Febronius asked to see the countess. The latter
went. But terror made her pale. She put on a hat, swathed her face in a
veil and her hands in gloves. Sighing she sat down beside her sister’s
bed, and carefully measured the distance, so as to be out of reach of
the patient’s breath.
Frau von Febronius smiled indulgently. Her illness had smoothed the
lines of petty care and sorrow from her face, and, among her white
pillows, she looked strikingly like her daughter Letitia. “I’m sorry
to trouble you, Marion,” she began, “but I must talk to you. There’s
something that weighs on my mind, and I must confide in some one. The
fact in question should be told to one who knows me, and should not be
buried with me.”
“I beseech you, Elsie, my poor darling, don’t talk of graves and such
things,” the countess exclaimed in a whining voice. “My appetite will
be gone for a week. If you’ll only fling the medicine bottles out of
the window, and tell all quacks to go to the devil, you’ll be well by
day after to-morrow. And, for heaven’s sake, don’t make a confession.
It reminds one of quite dreadful things.”
But Frau von Febronius went on: “It’s no use, Marion. I must tell you
this. The reason I turn to you is because you’ve really been so very
good and kind to Letitia, and because Hilde, sensible and faithful as
she is, wouldn’t quite understand. Her notions are too conventional.”
In whispers she now related the story of Letitia’s birth. An illness of
his earlier years had deprived her husband of the hope of posterity;
but he had yearned for a son, a child. This yearning had finally
silenced all scruples and all contradictory emotions to such an extent
that he had chosen a congenial stranger to continue his race. He had
persuaded her, his wife, whom he loved above all things, after a long
struggle. Finally she had yielded to his unheard-of demand. But when
the child was born, a progressive melancholy had seized upon her
husband. It had become incurable, and under its control he had ruined
his estate and in the end himself. He had felt nothing of the happiness
he had expected. He had, on the contrary, always shown a contemptuous
dislike of Letitia, and had avoided her as far as possible.
“It doesn’t surprise me a bit,” the countess remarked. “You were
uncommonly naïve to be astonished. A strange child is a strange child,
no matter how it got into the nest. But it’s really like a fairy tale.
I confess I underestimated you. Such delightful sophistication! And who
is the child’s father? Who is responsible for the life of that darling
angel? He deserves great credit for his achievement.”
Frau von Febronius mentioned the name. The countess screamed, and
leaped up as though she had been stung. “Crammon? Bernard von Crammon?”
She clasped her hands in agony. “Is that true? Aren’t you dreaming?
Consider, my dear! It must be the fever. Oh, certainly, it’s sheer
delirium. Take a little water, I beg of you, and then think carefully,
and stop talking nonsense.”
Frau von Febronius gazed at her sister in utter amazement. “Do you know
him?” she asked.
The countess’ voice was bitter. “Do I know him? I do. And tell me one
more thing: Does this--this--creature know? Has he always known?”
“He knows. Two years ago he saw Letitia at our old home. Since that
time he has known. But you act as if he were the fiend incarnate,
Marion. Did you have a quarrel with him or what? You always exaggerate
so!”
Excitedly the countess walked up and down. “He knows it, the wretch!
He has always known it, the rogue! And such dissembling as he has
practised! Such hypocrisy! The wretched rogue, I’ll bring it home to
him! I’ll seek him out!” She turned to her sister. “Forgive me, Elsie,
for letting my temperament run away with me. You are right. His name
awakened an anger of some years’ standing. My blood boils, I confess.
He may have been a man of honour and a gentleman in his youth. He must
have been, or you would never have consented to such an adventure. But
I hesitate to say what he is to-day. He is still perfectly discreet;
you need have no anxiety on that score. But I assert that even
discretion has its limits. Where these are passed, decent people shake
their heads, and virtue looks like mere baseness. _Voilà._”
“All that you say is quite dark to me,” Frau von Febronius replied
wearily, “and I really haven’t any desire to fathom it. I wanted to
tell you this oppressive secret. Keep it to yourself. Never reveal it,
except to prevent some misfortune, or to render Letitia a service. I
don’t quite see how either purpose will ever be served by a revelation.
But it consoles me that one other human being, beside myself and that
man, knows the truth.”
The countess gazed thoughtfully at her sister. “Your life wasn’t
exactly a gay one, was it, Elsie?”
The sick woman answered: “No, hardly gay.”
During the following days she rallied a little. Then came a relapse
that left no room for hope. In the middle of March she died.
By this time the countess was already far away. Her goings and comings
were as purposeless as ever. But she nursed a favourite vision now.
Some day she would meet Crammon, confront him with her knowledge,
avenge herself upon him, challenge him and annihilate him, in a word,
enjoy a rich triumph. At times when she was alone, or even in the
presence of Miss Stöhr, whom it astonished, she would suddenly wrinkle
her childlike forehead, clench her little fists, and her shiny face
would turn red as a lobster, and her violet-blue eyes blaze as for
battle.