The clock on the mantel indicated eight, and Frau Kahle had not yet returned. They began to fear anxiety on the score of their guest. What could have happened to her?
The maid was just setting the table for the evening meal in the adjoining room when the couple were giving expression to their surmises, explaining in one way or another this prolonged absence.
“Minna,”—Frau Weil turned to the girl,—“I think you had better go to the house of Frau Pastor Klein and ask whether Frau Major Kahleis still there. I shall have no rest until I know what has become of her.”
“I don’t think I shall find her at the Frau Pastor’s, gracious lady,” replied the girl, “for I saw the Frau Major up on the avenue, about half-past four, as I was fetching the milk, and the Frau Pastor lives right behind the church.”
“In that case there is no use in sending there,” and Frau Weil shrugged her shoulders.
“I think my idea will prove the right one,” said the first lieutenant,—“it was a mere pretext on her part. She did not want to tell us where she was really going. I have my own thoughts about the matter.”
“And what do you think, Max,” his wife asked, with some show of curiosity. “Where else could she be?”
“With Kolberg, of course.”
“But how can you say so, Max? I don’t suppose she....”
“Certainly she will! That is just what she is doing.”
Both became silent when the servant girl stepped in. She placed the teapot on the table, and then took a folded piece of paper from herpocket, and handed it to Weil with a peculiar smile.
“Has this perhaps been dropped by either the Herr First Lieutenant or the gracious lady?”
And as Minna had again retired, the officer first gazed at the paper with eyes wide open, then he gave a scornful laugh and held it open to his wife.
“Here, my dear, will you not convince yourself? There it is in black and white.”
Frau Weil hesitatingly took the slip of paper from his hands and read:
“Am expecting you to-day at 4.30, since I shall be engaged to-morrow in the service.”
“Am expecting you to-day at 4.30, since I shall be engaged to-morrow in the service.”
Signature and address were wanting, but the writing was unmistakably Kolberg’s.
“Here it is,” said Weil. “That is her way of thanking us for offering her our hospitality,—just lying to us, and trying to befool us for no other purpose than to permit her to continue her disgraceful conduct. Didn’t I at once say it would be better not to have her come? But you, of course, insisted on inviting her. If you had listened to me, we should now be spared thedisagreeable necessity of throwing that woman out.”
“But for heaven’s sake, Max, that you can’t do. Throw the note into the fire!”
“I’ll do nothing of the kind,” her husband flared up. “I shall certainly throw her out of the house! Or do you suppose I’m going to make our home a convenient shelter for depraved women? Let her see where she will find another refuge. As for me, I respectfully decline the honor of harboring her any longer as our guest; and this note will not go into the fire, but, instead, where it belongs,—before a Council of Honor!”
The young officer was in a great state of excitement. With rapid strides he measured the room, burying his hands in his pockets. His dark look betrayed indignation and resolve.
“If you will take my advice,” his soft-hearted spouse said, with some trepidation, “you will put that bit of paper into the stove and keep quiet about the whole matter. She is to join her husband in another two days, anyway, and then there would be an end to her intrigues in any case. Do me the favor, my dear Max, and leaveyour fingers out of that pie, for there will be nothing but disagreeable consequences awaiting you if you don’t. And then, another thing, think of the poor major!” And the little woman had actually tears in her eyes.
But that stubborn husband of hers proved inexorable.
“I shall do what I said I was going to do, and that’s all there is about it. These are matters you don’t understand. I won’t quietly look on while this person continues her miserable intrigue with that scoundrel, Kolberg,—at least not while she is in my house. She ought to have had enough decency remaining to have left off meeting him while being the guest of honest people. That is beastly; it’s worse than beastly,—hoggish, I may say!”
Frau Weil did not insist any longer. She knew her husband, knew his strictness in such matters, and also knew that the more she would plead with him the more fixed his purpose would become; but her forehead became rumpled with unpleasant thoughts, and she sat down before the glowing coal in the grate, in a brown study.
Her husband meanwhile continued to pace the carpet, reflecting on what steps he had best decide.
At last the maid came into the room once more, and said, with a mien of ill-concealed curiosity:
“Madam is served!”
“Tell us, Minna, where did you find that letter?” said the officer to her.
“I found it lying in the hall under the hat-rack; I presume it must have dropped out of somebody’s pocket.”
“Very well; you may go.”
Silently the couple sat down to table. Weil’s face was clouded, and his wife scarcely looked up from her plate. She lifted her glance to him, however, with considerable anxiety when the hall door was heard to open, and Frau Kahle’s voice became audible.
“She is coming, Max! Now, for pity’s sake, don’t make a scene! Think of the servants who will be sure to listen and to spread everything that’s said.”
But Weil did not answer, neither did he look at the door when it now opened and gave admissionto the Frau Major. Her face was rosy with excitement, and her eyes were gleaming in humid tenderness.
“Good evening, both of you!” she cried gayly, her voice trembling with suppressed agitation. “I hope you will pardon the delay; but Frau Pastor Klein pressed me so much to drive with her over to the city that I could not resist, and that is how it became so late. But it was delightful,—my afternoon with her. We were at a café, and made a number of purchases.”
Weil arose stiffly and faced his guest.
“Madam,” said he, with quiet dignity, “it is useless for you to try to deceive us as to the purpose of your absence this afternoon. The letter which reached you while at table with us, and which has come into our hands by accident, proves in the most unmistakable manner that you have abused our hospitality most grossly. May I request you to leave this house as soon as ever you can, but certainly no later than to-morrow morning? I must beg that you will leave us undisturbed for the remainder of the evening.”
He ceremoniously bowed, and then took his seat once more at table.
Frau Kahle remained for a moment as if petrified in the semi-obscurity of the room. Then she hastily seized her châtelaine bag. Her hand tremblingly fingered its contents, and then she turned to the door and went out, slamming it behind her. The footfall of her retreating steps could be heard in the direction of her own room.
After supper the first lieutenant stepped up to his writing-desk, lit the green shaded lamp, and sat down on a stool before it. Next he selected a large sheet of official note-paper, dipped his pen, and leaned back and reflected.
For some time he thus concentrated his thoughts, and at last began to write.
His spouse, meanwhile, with anxious aspect, sat on the sofa near a small table, busy with some embroidery, her fingers mechanically travelling to and fro; but every little while she cast a troubled glance towards her husband, whose pen went scratch, scratch, over the paper.
At last he had finished the letter. Weil reclined pensively in his chair, and slowly readover and over what he had written. He made no alterations, but folded Frau Kahle’s note up with his own, and then enclosed both in a large yellow envelope, sealing it in the proper way.
Then he locked up the document in a drawer of his desk, blew out the lamp, and took a seat on the sofa next to his wife, perusing attentively a newspaper.
Frau Kahle departed the following morning by an early train. Nobody, not even the orderly, knew her destination. He had taken her trunk to the station, but she had not told him a word as to her future intentions. And neither by letter nor by word of mouth had she left a word of thanks or apology for her late hosts.
At noon of the same day Lieutenant Kolberg, whose mind not even the faintest suspicion of these latest developments of his intrigue had crossed, was ordered to appear forthwith before the commander. The latter, dryly and without comment, informed him that proceedings had been begun against him before the Council of Honor, and that until further notice he would be excused from service.
There was much excitement within the bodyof officers. In their secret hearts every one of them was glad that in the deadening monotony of their garrison life this affair, painful as it was, was now assuming tangible proportions. For not a single one of them had any kindly feeling for Kolberg, whose secretive disposition and whose absence from nearly all joint festivities at the Casino had rendered him unpopular, and Frau Kahle herself was scarcely better liked, desperate flirt as she was.
It was because of this that none of the officers, least of all Borgert, refrained from criticising in a most uncompromising spirit both Kolberg and his paramour. And Weil’s proceedings were unanimously adjudged perfectly correct. The remarks made in regard to this whole matter were by no means couched in such terms as might have been expected from his Majesty’s officers of the army when applied to comrades. In fact, hard names were used, and everybody proclaimed aloud his intention severely to cut “the vulgar beast” and “that coarse woman.”
Colonel von Kronau had had a great fright when Captain Stark, as president of the Council of Honor, had handed him in the morning thatdocument which had given Weil so much anxious thought. He ruminated and lugubriously pondered what had best be done in this unfortunate affair in order to end it with the least amount of scandal; but his cogitations were in vain. The matter had been brought formally to the attention of the Council of Honor, and, according to the strict wording of the instructions provided, there was no squelching or modification of the proceedings possible. He had to be satisfied, therefore, to curse most heartily the author of the fatal document,—First Lieutenant Weil,—and to give him in his thoughts a big black mark in the next conduct list.
A most unwelcome business, indeed. Already he saw himself superintending the unloading of hay-carts on that estate of his, far off in the eastern, semi-civilized districts of the realm.
But it was poor Major Kahle who would suffer most of all. After attaining at last the goal of his desires, all his aspirations were to be nipped in the bud by the misdemeanor of his wife. He had no idea where she was now; she had preferred not to venture near him in leaving the garrison, since she did not feel sureof a cordial reception on his part. Hence she had sent her little son to her parents, while she herself had taken up quarters in Berlin. Her chief amusement just now consisted in the inditing of innumerable letters to Kolberg, full of reproaches for “having succeeded by his diabolical arts in alienating her affections from her husband,” while the leisure she could spare from these epistolary efforts was devoted to roaming that broad international thoroughfare, Unter den Linden, which presented to her, after her long “exile” close to the frontier, a striking and highly appreciated contrast.
Kahle was firmly resolved to show the door to his faithless wife if she should dare present herself before him; meanwhile he took preliminary steps to obtain a legal separation from her.
But there was another thought heavy on his mind. It was the unavoidable duel. Because his wife had deceived him, the army code forced him to next expose himself to the bullet of her seducer, instead of simply expelling the latter from the army and giving him a much-needed period of reflection in jail.
He was expected to “save the honor of his wife” by mortal combat.
What an absurdity! he thought to himself. Is there any honor left in a wife who deceives her husband? A coquette she was, heartless and honorless, nothing more, and yet he must risk his life in defence of a thing which did not exist any longer, and which, he now strongly suspected, had from the first been nothing but a delusion on his part—her honor! What a ludicrous farce!
And he began to reflect whether there was not some way in which he could escape this impending duel. Not because he was a coward or afraid of death; no, he was brave enough, but he could not see why he should expose to blind chance not only the fruits of his own arduous life, but also the future of his son, merely because another man had acted in a despicable manner. It was quite possible that his adversary might kill him in this duel. In that case he, the innocent party, would suffer the supreme penalty which man can suffer,—death,—and the criminal himself would go off scot-free.
But reflection showed him clearly that therewas no way to avoid mortal combat, for, if he refused or neglected to send a challenge to the other, the Council of Honor was bound under the code to dismiss him from the army, because, forsooth, he did not know how to “protect the honor of the profession.” On the other hand, if he did this prescribed duty of “honor,” and fought this duel and escaped being wounded or killed, a term of confinement in a fortress awaited him. The latter seemed to him the lesser of two evils, but he now made up his mind to show no consideration to the man who had destroyed the peace of his home, and who was likely to destroy his existence. He would demand the most severe conditions for this duel, and he would not scruple to send a bullet crashing into his antagonist’s brain if his arm were steady enough, or else let the scoundrel deprive him of his life as well,—a life which would hereafter be a burden to him.
The proceedings and investigations of the Council of Honor required several months. Things were unearthed which to the younger officers of the garrison seemed very interesting, but which threw a dubious light upon LieutenantKolberg and his conceptions of honor and comradeship.
The behavior, too, of the corps of officers underwent a change during this time.
At first all the officers had shunned Kolberg, and he was only occasionally seen in the environs of the garrison when exercising his horses.
But one day Borgert was in severe financial straits, and then, all his other sources failing, he had repaired to Kolberg for the money as a last resort. And Kolberg on his part had been shrewd enough to use the opportunity to place Borgert under obligations, for he knew the latter’s influence on his younger comrades. Therefore, Kolberg managed to raise the thousand marks needed, and put himself at Borgert’s disposal for future occasions of the kind.
The result of this manœuvre could have been foreseen. Within a few days Borgert had changed his tune in regard to Kolberg’s character and failings. At the Casino table he now sang his praises, lauded the fine qualities of comradeship possessed by Kolberg, and condemned the view taken by the superior officers of the lieutenant’s guilt, doing all this in his effectivemanner, half banter, half bonhomie; so that the disgraced one, although not doing actual duty, became suddenly a well-received guest at the social functions in the Casino; and not alone that, he also assumed successfully the part of host himself, in the much-talked-of little garden-house under the chestnut trees.
Kolberg could even go so far as to brag at his own table, while champagne from his cellars was flowing and his guests smoked his fragrant Havanas, of the prowess to be shown by him at the prospective duel. He applied names like “Dämelsack”[18]to Kahle, of whom he vowed to “make short work.” In that way he not only silenced all his former detractors, but actually became the lion of the garrison—a dashing fellow, who had made the conquest of a lady’s heart, while others had to be satisfied with lesser game.
He began to sing small, however, when he one day received Kahle’s challenge:
“Fifteen paces distance, visored duelling pistols, and an exchange of bullets to the point of incapacitating one or both parties.”
That he had not expected. Why, this was murder, he said, and the issue of the forthcoming duel now became suddenly rather doubtful to him; all the more as the major was known to be a good shot, and his reputation as an excellent Nimrod was known beyond the confines of the garrison.
So, then, Kolberg earnestly began to train for the meeting. Day after day he could be seen issuing forth for a walk into the woods nearby, for pistol practice. Scores of trees soon bore the traces of his bullets. When the day of battle would come he meant to be prepared to face his adversary well equipped.
Sometimes, when he sent leaden pellets, one after the other, into his targets, the thought would occur to him that really he ought not to hit the major, since he had sinned against him and betrayed his trust. It was something like the last flickerings of a feeling of duty which had dwindled for years in the slow process of moral decadence: the last flutterings of a guilt-laden conscience and of a sense of justice. These dim emotions, however, were drowned by a more powerful sentiment:his newly awakened love of life, the primal feeling of self-preservation, which seized him all the harder the more he began to muse about the possibility of having to lose a life which offered so much that was worth living for. An inner voice called to him: “Thou shalt not die! Life is sweet!”
And there was only one way of carrying out his purpose,—to kill his man.
In this way, with delays and supplementary investigation, four months elapsed. Then at last the Council of Honor pronounced its sentence. Kolberg was dismissed from the service; but, along with the formal request to his Majesty to confirm the sentence, went a unanimously signed petition for his reinstatement.
The proposed duel was likewise sanctioned, but not under the conditions proposed by Kahle. Perhaps it was feared that a fatal ending to the duel, such as the very stringent conditions seemed to make almost unavoidable, would raise too much dust. For quite recently there had been several cases of a similar nature, and the death of one of theduellists had had the most disagreeable consequences for those high-commanding officers who had neither attempted to modify the conditions of combat nor endeavored to bring about reconciliation.
Thus it was that the new terms of the challenge were: thirty-five paces distance and one exchange of bullets; ordinary pistols.
Kahle, then, was to be given no opportunity to punish as he deserved the disturber of his domestic peace, because superior officers did not wish to bring unpleasant consequences upon themselves; for the duel, as now arranged for under these altered terms, he regarded as a mere farce, and a possible fatal issue could be nothing but the work of blind accident.
Borgert had been requested by Kolberg to serve as his second, and the former readily agreed to this; for on the one hand he liked to play the rôle of an onlooker in such an affair, and on the other he deemed it prudent to put Kolberg under a new obligation; all the more as the repaying of his loans seemed as far off as ever.
On the eve of his leaving for that city in South Germany where the meeting was to take place, Kolberg once more assembled his faithful admirers in his quiet little garden-house. His invitations had been for a banquet, washed down with some of his choicest wines. The drinking on that occasion was so hard that Kolberg himself became completely intoxicated, and when his guests left he was snoring in a drunken stupor on his lounge. The train left early, and Kolberg’s man had a hard task in rousing his master sufficiently at the proper time to hastily prepare him for his long journey.
Borgert had been in a similar plight. As he stood on the station platform a few minutes before the train rolled in, he felt as if he had only just now risen from his chair at the festive board.
As he confided this impression to his principal, Kolberg, he did not forget to mention incidentally that, “of course,” he had forgotten to take his purse along. With a show of assumed indifference he stuffed the two “blue rags” into his watchpocket, Kolberghaving fished the bills with trembling fingers out of his own wallet, and a silent pressure of the hand was the only thing Kolberg was ever to receive in lieu thereof.
They arrived at Kahle’s garrison in due time, still in a somewhat dazed condition. Kahle’s second had attended to all the preliminaries of the duel. It was a cold morning when two cabs rolled out of the town on their way to the garrison shooting stands, where the bloody meeting was to take place.
The sun was just peeping over the backs of the mountains to the east, and sent his first oblique rays down upon the hoar-frosted stubble fields.
Peacefully Nature spread her autumnal robe, and in the forest deep silence reigned. The only sound, now and then, was the fluttering of a dead leaf seeking its bed of repose on the bare earth.
In the first cab sat Kolberg, Borgert, and two surgeons, while the second was occupied by Kahle, his second, and the two members of the Council of Honor, who were to witness the duel as impartial judges. Beneath therear seat lay the case of pistols. From the highroad the vehicles turned into a side path, so narrow that the branches of the trees standing to right and left frequently beat against the cab panes.
They reached their destination,—an opening in the woods. It was here, secluded from all curious and observant eyes, that the officers of the nearby garrison went to settle their “affairs of honor.” The occupants of both vehicles descended and ordered the drivers to ride back to the edge of the woods, and there await their return.
The case containing the pistols was placed on a slight eminence, and the seconds took out the weapons; then these were loaded, and both pistols underwent an examination by the seconds.
The surgeons took off their coats, spread out their instruments, and made ready strips of bandage. Meanwhile the judges had measured the proper distance and had firmly planted their swords at either end, to mark the terminal points. This was accomplished with some difficulty, as the ground was frozen hard.
The customary formal attempt to effect a reconciliation was ineffectual, of course, and so the two principals took their stands at the indicated points.
Kahle looked pale; he trembled with the cold, and his nervously-twitching features betrayed intense agitation.
Kolberg, on the contrary, was almost smiling, and threw away with a careless gesture the stub of the cigarette he had been smoking until the last.
One of the judges explained briefly the order of combat, saying that the shots must be fired between the words “one” and “three.” A moment later he commanded:
“Ready!”
Both men held their pistols pointed towards the ground, in order to raise them immediately on the word “one.”
Simultaneously with “two” Kahle fired, and the ball struck with a slight noise the bark of a beech tree, a step or two to the left of and above his adversary, while a small twig fell rattling from overhead. Kahle’s unsteady hand had given his pistol a slightupward turn, so that he had missed his prey.
Kolberg, however, stood throughout firm and motionless, and took steady aim, so that with “three” the trigger of his pistol fell.
Kahle looked unflinchingly at the small black mouth of the pistol pointing at him, but at the shot he opened his eyes wide, lurched heavily, and fell headlong.
A cold tremor ran down Kolberg’s spine as he saw the tall, powerful man pitch forward, and for a moment he remained, his smoking pistol lifted, rooted to the spot. Then the weapon slipped from his hand.
The others, however, immediately ran towards the major, and the surgeons tore open his coat.
There was a small hole in his chest, and the blood began to ooze from it.
Kahle had lost consciousness for a second only. Now he lay there, pale, and gazing steadily at the men busily engaged about him.
Kolberg also approached, holding out his hand in token of amity; but he quickly withdrew his hand and retreated out of sight, fora cold, repellent look from Kahle’s eyes had met his. From some short distance in the rear, out of the reach of those severe eyes, he attentively viewed his prostrate foe; then he turned on his heels and made off through the woods, towards the cabs.
The major’s wound, however, was found to be not fatal, although the bullet had grazed the lungs, and a long time would have to elapse before he would be up and about once more.
One of the cabs was driven up and the major carefully lifted into it. The two surgeons accompanied him inside, while his second occupied the place next the driver. Thereupon they drove back at a slow gait to the city, where the injured man was to be at once taken to the hospital.
After he had taken farewell from the two judges as the vehicle reached the outskirts of the town, Borgert, who remained with Kolberg, slapped the latter encouragingly on the shoulder and said:
“Don’t make such a wry face, man alive! Be satisfied that you got off with a whole skin. Of course, it was rough on the poordevil that you happened to hit him in the chest; but that’s something you are not responsible for; after all, the challenge came from him. And now let’s have a good breakfast, for my stomach rebels against this raw air. I am not accustomed to knock about the woods so early in the morning.”
“I feel sincerely sorry that I hit the major so unluckily,” replied Kolberg; “but I didn’t mean to, and the devil take the women! It’s always their doing. I don’t know anyway what made me take up with that silly Kahle woman!”
“Don’t bother your head about that, my dear fellow,” said Borgert. “The major alone is to blame, for he ought to have looked out better for that handsome wife of his. And as for her, she is not worth a thought, as we all know. One must treat a woman as she deserves.”
Borgert’s specious eloquence succeeded in a short while in dispelling the clouds from Kolberg’s face, for to his callous perceptions all that the other had said was true. That there were heartless and vulgar sentiments containedin Borgert’s words he neither understood nor cared about.
So these worthy twain proceeded to their hotel, donned citizens’ clothes, and then repaired to a fashionable restaurant. The waiters received them with sleepy eyes, being just engaged in putting the place to rights; for it was still very early in the day, and they looked at their guests with something of amazement.
The two officers started in on their round of dissipation with several glassfuls of neat brandy, and wound up, late at night, in a resort of doubtful repute. Whoever might have observed them throughout the day, joking and jesting, could not have helped the conclusion that these two had clearly forgotten the events of the morning, and that they had recovered, together with their peace of mind, that superficial good humor which so often distinguishes the conscienceless rascal from the man of finer mould.
Next day, at noon, our two heroes arrived at their garrison. They were received with open arms by a number of their comrades, forthe rumor of what had occurred had preceded them.
A group of officers, in fact, stood on the platform of the little station as they left their train, and after much handshaking and congratulations, all of them accompanied Kolberg to his dwelling, there to celebrate his triumph in a “drop” of choice wine.
But there were some of the officers, especially the elder ones, who censured Kolberg for his heartless behavior. Several of them even went so far as to say that it would have been more fitting for him to have remained alone just at this time, and to make amends for his past follies by a term of undisturbed self-inspection; this new orgy they thought, above all, indecent and coarse.
Two days afterward the confirmation of the sentence pronounced in his case by the Council of Honor arrived from Berlin. With it came likewise the permission for Kolberg to enter the army anew as a junior lieutenant. That, however, meant his transference to another garrison, for in this one there was no room for him. Before he could start his career afresh in abeautiful city by the Rhine, Kolberg had to comply with one other little formality, and that took him to a fortress where he had to undergo confinement of an easy description, and lasting only for a couple of months, because he had been guilty of “participation in a duel with deadly weapons,” as his Majesty’s decree read.
The major recovered very slowly. The difficult operation undertaken by two regimental surgeons of removing the bullet imbedded near the spinal column had not entirely succeeded. The bullet had indeed been removed, but inflammation of the affected parts had set in, and this had been accompanied with great pain and a high fever.
It was only towards the close of winter that the major was dismissed from the hospital as a convalescent. His health and his energy were both gone, and he was compelled to resign his commission in the army, his strength being insufficient to discharge the duties of his post.
He also had been sentenced to a three months’ term in a fortress in consonance with the invariable custom followed in such cases by theKaiser, which makes no distinction between offender and offended, between victim and aggressor. But in this instance a confinement of a few days was considered ample, and at the expiration of this brief term the imperial pardon reached the broken-down man, and he was permitted to depart to wherever his inclination might take him.
Kahle thus saw his life’s labor destroyed. As a man who had scarcely reached forty, yet with his physical strength nearly spent, he had to face the question how and where he was to carve out a new field of activity for himself. His small pension was wholly insufficient to enable him to even eke out an existence on it, and he had, besides, by the decree of the court, been intrusted with the sole custody of his child. This, while it gave him at least an object in life, was for a man in his circumstances an additional grave burden; for his little son was still of that tender age to require a woman’s constant ministrations.
The small fortune which his divorced wife had brought into their marriage had, of course, been handed back to her by the law.
And why had all this misfortune overtaken him?
Because the army code and social conventions had bidden him to save as much of the “honor” of his wife as he could. To this mistaken idea he had been sacrificed.
And Kolberg was domiciled by the vine-clad borders of the Rhine, and in his new garrison led a life as dissipated and as free of care as he had in his former one.
FOOTNOTES:[15]“Kater,” a slang term for the demoralized condition consequent upon alcoholic overindulgence.—Tr.[16]“Corona,” meaning all the drinkers present; a student’s expression.—Tr.[17]“Liebesmahl,” a fraternal banquet arranged, on special occasions, by the officers of a garrison or of a regiment for the purpose of celebrating joyous events.—Tr.[18]“Dämelsack”—a low term of opprobrium.—Tr.
[15]“Kater,” a slang term for the demoralized condition consequent upon alcoholic overindulgence.—Tr.
[15]“Kater,” a slang term for the demoralized condition consequent upon alcoholic overindulgence.—Tr.
[16]“Corona,” meaning all the drinkers present; a student’s expression.—Tr.
[16]“Corona,” meaning all the drinkers present; a student’s expression.—Tr.
[17]“Liebesmahl,” a fraternal banquet arranged, on special occasions, by the officers of a garrison or of a regiment for the purpose of celebrating joyous events.—Tr.
[17]“Liebesmahl,” a fraternal banquet arranged, on special occasions, by the officers of a garrison or of a regiment for the purpose of celebrating joyous events.—Tr.
[18]“Dämelsack”—a low term of opprobrium.—Tr.
[18]“Dämelsack”—a low term of opprobrium.—Tr.
Seatedat his desk in his elegantly furnished apartments, we see First Lieutenant Borgert.
Before him lay a large sheet of paper covered with rows of figures, and all around him whole mountains of documents, bills, and vari-colored envelopes.
One after another he took up these bits of paper, and from them noted down amounts on the big sheet. He had already reached the third column when he suddenly ceased his labors and threw the pencil disgustedly away. Then he grasped the whole pile and threw it into the fire, where in a few moments it was consumed in the leaping flame and reduced to a tiny mass of ashes.
His laudable purpose had been to go through all the claims against him, so far as they had been presented. Usually his simple method wasto throw bills, as they reached him, into the stove; but for once he had been curious to find out how much he really owed in the world, or at least to gain an approximate idea of his indebtedness.
But we have seen that he gave it up as an impossible task. To tread the mazes of these bundles of dunning letters, plaints, simple bills, and formal orders issued to him by the colonel to discharge certain debts submitted to his authority, was more than Borgert felt himself equal to, especially as the conviction had very soon dawned on him that his was labor lost. This much had become quite clear: to pay his debts was impossible, for their total rose far and away above his surmises. When he had left off in sheer disgust, the neat little sum of eleven thousand marks had been reached, and to that had to be added the other mountain of bills which he had just consigned to the flames.
Most of all, the seven hundred marks which he owed to Captain König lay on his conscience; but there were some other items that pressed him hard, for they were “debts of honor,” contractedwith his equals in the social scale; and the first of these, amounting to two thousand three hundred marks, was due in about six weeks. How and where should he raise these large amounts?
He began to reflect. The furniture had already been saddled with a chattel mortgage, one of his horses even been mortgaged twice, and for the other, his former charger, he probably would not get more than three hundred marks, and that was nothing but a drop on a hot stone. Of his comrades there was none remaining with whom an attempt to borrow would have had the slightest prospect of success,—possibly König alone excepted. But should he go to him again with such a request? It could not be easily done,—at least not before the old item of seven hundred marks had been paid back. The only safety anchor he could think of was a formal request for a large loan from a Berlin usurer with a large clientèle in the army. In fact, he had tried it; but the fellow had not yet been heard from, although three weeks had gone since this same individual had been furnished with a surety given by First Lieutenant Leimann,and with a life insurance policy in the amount of twenty thousand marks.
For the moment nothing could be done. He would try to pacify in some way the most pressing of his creditors, and to pay in small instalments only those who either should begin legal proceedings against him, or lodge their complaints with the regiment. Perhaps—who could tell?—an undiscovered source might open somewhere; perhaps luck at the cards, so long unfaithful to him, would return, or one of his many tickets in various state lotteries would draw a big prize. And who could tell but what the biggest prize of all, a wealthy bride with a good fat dowry, might not fall to his share? He had formal applications of the kind on file with several of the most prominent and successful marriage agencies at the capital and elsewhere, and only recently one of these centres for the radiation of connubial bliss, so much in vogue with his kind throughout the empire, had been heard from to some apparent purpose.
“Quite a bundle of bright hopes,” he said to himself, and with that his plastic mind resumedits equilibrium. His good humor returned, he lit himself a cigarette, and whistled a gay tune, while pacing the thick Smyrna rugs in the centre of his study.
His alert ear heard a whispering in the corridor. He discerned the soft tread of nimble feet on the hall carpet, and then there was a knock at his door.
That must be Frau Leimann, he thought to himself, for she frequently paid him hasty visits at the afternoon tea hour, because at that time her husband used to go to the “Dämmerschoppen.”
To his “Come,” however, a poorly clad woman with a basket on her arm stepped over the threshold. Her youthful face showed already the unmistakable stamp which care and sorrow had imprinted on it, and she gazed shyly at the officer who had remained standing in the centre of the room, whence he eyed his visitor with undisguised displeasure.
“And what is it you want again, Frau Meyer?” he blurted. “I’ve told you once before that I will give you no more washing to do.”
“I beg the Herr First Lieutenant will excuseme, but I wanted to ask whether I cannot have to-day those forty marks, or at least a part of them. I badly need money, for my husband has been lying sick for three weeks past and is unable to work.”
“Oh, bother!” replied Borgert, roughly. “Come back to-morrow night; I have no small change about me, and I haven’t any time to spare.”
“But I hope you will keep faith with me this time, Herr First Lieutenant; you have promised so often to pay me.”
With that she diffidently opened the door and left, but Borgert undid one of the windows and let the pure autumn air stream in. The odor of these poverty-stricken wretches was insupportable to him. Disgusting! He took from a carved cabinet on the wall a large perfume bottle, and sprinkled a good portion of its contents upon the costly rugs and the upholstery of his furniture. Then he rang the bell for his servant.
The man stepped in briskly. It was Private Röse, whom the captain no longer wanted in the front, since he had proven unreliable, andwith his deficient conceptions of military discipline would only be an injury to the squadron.
“What did I order you to do, you swine?” the officer shouted.
“I was to let nobody in without being announced,” answered Röse with diffidence; “but the woman passed me by, and I could not hinder her from going in.”
“Then throw the carrion out, thou sloppy beast! The first time somebody is let in again without my consent, I’ll cowhide you within an inch of your life!”
In saying which, he struck Röse with both fists in the face, then thrust open the door and kicked him out.
“If the hag should come back to-morrow night, you tell her I’ve just gone out!” he called after him.
Borgert had just seated himself, with a newspaper, by the window when the floor bell once more sounded. It was a short, energetic tinkle. The servant came in and announced, with a face still wet with tears:
“A gentleman would like to see the Herr First Lieutenant!”
“What is his name? I told you always to get the name first.”
The man left the room, but immediately returned.
“He will not give me his name, but he says he must speak with the Herr First Lieutenant in any event.”
“Then ask him in!”
A moment later a man stepped in, carrying a large wallet under his arm, and introduced himself,—“Bailiff Krause.”
“Begging the Herr First Lieutenant’s pardon in case I should disturb him, but I have a mandate from the court. Please, here it is!”
And he took from his wallet a voluminous envelope and handed it to Borgert, who, however, did not lose his presence of mind, and answered in a pleasant tone:
“Ah, I know. Has already been settled yesterday; for I presume it is for that small amount which I owe to my tailor.”
“As far as I know, Herr First Lieutenant, it is about the matter of the firm of Froehlich & Co., the sum demanded, on bills of exchangesigned by you, being four thousand marks, for furniture sold and delivered.”
“Oh, that’s it! The firm might have spared itself that trouble; the whole amount was transmitted by my bank day before yesterday.”
“So much the better, then,” jested the official. “I have the honor.”
“Farewell, Herr Krause; I would sayau revoir, but your visit always means a doubtful pleasure.”
When the man was gone, Borgert tore open the envelope and scanned the contents of the document it contained.
That was a most disagreeable business. The furniture had not yet been paid for, but already mortgaged, although the explicit terms of the contract forbade his doing so until after payment in full to the merchant had made the whole his own property.
Four thousand marks! A heap of money! He would have to speak to Leimann; perhaps he could do something.
Then suddenly he remembered that the bailiff had not passed out into the street through thefront garden. He called his servant and asked him:
“Where did the man go to?”
“Upstairs, Herr First Lieutenant.”
“To Leimann’s?”
“Just so, Herr First Lieutenant.”
Well, now, what had he to do up there? Could it be possible that they also were in his toils? That indeed would be bad, for Leimann had, in spite of all, remained something like an aid and help to him in becoming surety for payments promised or in calming obstreperous creditors.
Meanwhile Herr Krause handed to Frau Leimann, scared almost out of her wits, the summons in an action begun by the firm of Weinstein & Co., to which she owed a matter of four hundred marks for a silk robe furnished by them.
She was in despair, and scurried to and fro in the room, vainly cudgelling her brain for an idea that would bring her succor. What could she do? Where should she get the money? She would go to Borgert and ask him for the amount. But what would he think of her? Would he not lose all respect for her?
For a moment she stood undecided in her room, and pressed both hands against her wildly beating heart. Then she went resolutely to the door and hastened down the back stairs.
She found Borgert musing in an easy-chair, and he did not even rise when she entered, but merely waved his hand in greeting to her. But she stepped up to him and kissed him tenderly on the forehead, and then she sat down close by him. He was puzzled by her demeanor, and looked up questioningly into her face.
“What kind of visitors do you receive nowadays?” he said pleasantly.
“I? Visitors?” Frau Leimann retorted with some embarrassment. “I have received nobody,—truly not, nobody.”
And while she said it her eyes wandered about the room without meeting his.
“You have received no visitor? Oh, but that is a big fib!”
“Why should you say so, George; who should have been to see me?”
“Well, I merely thought a certain Herr Krause called on you.”
“How do you know that?” she cried, startled by his knowledge.
“I know everything, my child; even that the bailiff was just in to see you.”
Frau Leimann was covered with confusion, and mechanically began to fondle the seam of her little silk apron.
“Well, if you know, it is unnecessary for me to tell you. Yes, he was to see me.”
“And what did he want?”
The pretty woman told him the details. With a tear-choked voice she exclaimed:
“I am lost if my husband hears of it!”
“But I don’t see. If he has bought it he must, of course, pay for the dress.”
“He knows of nothing. I had to have the dress, the red silk, you know. I told him at that time that my mother had sent it; for he would have refused me, and I had to have it, and so I took it on my own account.”
“That was very stupid of you. Where will you take the money from now?”
“I really don’t know. Cannot you help me?”
“I will go to those people and ask them for time.”
“There would be no use in doing that, George; I must have the cash. I need at least a thousand marks, for I have to pay for other things as well—the dressmaker, the hair-dresser, the shoemaker, etc. Get me the money, George, and show me that you really love me as much as you always say you do.”
“I?” Borgert set up an unpleasant laugh. “Good heavens, I don’t know myself what is to become of me.”
“How so? Are you in debt too?”
“If you would take the trouble to devote some attention to that big sheet of paper over there on my desk, you might be able to tell. That sort of thing I get every day.”
Frau Leimann stepped up to the desk, unfolded the big sheet, and stared with wide-open eyes at the formidable columns.
“Why, I had no idea of this, George! What is to become of all this? You were my only reliance, and now I am entirely undone.”
She sank, sobbing, down on the divan and covered her face with both hands.
“Don’t lose courage at once, you little goose; you won’t die for the lack of these few hundredmarks!” Borgert consoled her, affectionately passing his hand over her blonde hair. “I will see what can be done, and in a week’s time you’ll have your thousand marks.”
For an answer she put her arms passionately around Borgert’s neck, and thanked him.
“I knew that you would not leave me in the lurch, thou best one!”
When Leimann returned home about eight o’clock, he found all the rooms dark and silent.
To his question about his wife the maid answered:
“The gracious lady has gone out.”
“Where to?”
“I do not know, Herr First Lieutenant!”
He lit a lamp and then went to the letter-box to ascertain whether anything had arrived by the evening mail. He found two letters with bills inside, amounting to over six hundred marks.
He did a little grumbling to himself, and then locked up the two “rags” in his desk.
In doing so he noticed a large yellow envelope. Supposing it to be an official letter, heseized it, intending to open it. But he found that it had been already opened, and his curiosity grew as he drew from it three large sheets.
Without at first catching its purport, he gazed at the clerical handwriting in it, and then he sat down at the table and read the whole document from beginning to end.
Ah, indeed, his wife too? Why, that was quite a charming surprise! If her funds were running so low as to oblige her to contract debts it would be vain, he thought, to expect any help from his mother-in-law, and yet he had always counted on her as a last resort. In a rage he flung the summons and the legal statement into a corner and went up and down in the room, musing on the financial embarrassment of his wife.
Probably Frau Leimann had heard the steady tramp of his feet through the ceiling, for now she entered with exuberant excuses.
“My dear George,” said she, breathlessly, “I had a pressing engagement with my dressmaker, and I ran after you in the street. I saw you passing before me, but I could not catch up with you.”
“What did you have to do with your dressmaker?” Leimann confronted her furiously.
“What else should I have had to do there than business for which I pay her? She is making a riding-habit for me!”
“You had better first pay for your old rubbish before ordering any new gear!” shouted he.
“Why this tone to me? And who tells you that I do not pay my bills? You think, I suppose, that I’m squandering my money as you are squandering yours.”
“If you do not wish me to see what the bailiff brings you, you had better not leave it directly under my nose.”
His wife for an instant did not quite understand what he meant by that, but then she recollected that she had left the summons on her husband’s desk.
“I must tell you very emphatically,” she flared up indignantly, “not to put your nose into my private correspondence. If the letter was lying open on the table, you had no right to read it.Inever look atyourbills.”
“Oh, do what you please; but I must request you not to bring the bailiff to my house.”
“That is not the worst,mon cher, that may happen to you; he will know now at least the way here when he’ll call on you next.”
“Hold your tongue, you impudent woman, or I will throw you into the street.”
“Many thanks for your kind offer, but I’m going of my own accord.”
She left the room, went into her bed-chamber, and retired to rest.
Meanwhile on the floor below Borgert was reading a book; but his thoughts were far away. He had serious forebodings that all his creditors, like a pack of hungry wolfhounds, were about to engage in a joint hunt for him, or rather for the money that he didn’t have. He was afraid that the colonel would soon demand the immediate payment of his load of debts, and that, if unable to comply with the order, resignation from the army was the only possible outcome. And what should he do then, without a penny, without any useful knowledge, and with many luxurious habits? Something must be done, he made up his mind, and he was going to employ the next day, a Sunday, to consider once more the various possibilities of raisinga large sum, no matter how, to discharge all these liabilities, most of them small in themselves, but in their totality representing quite a fortune.
Solaced by the hope that after all some mild hand would open and drop into his lap a small mountain of gold, he fell asleep; the book slipped from his hands, and the lamp on the night table went out after midnight, since Borgert had forgotten to blow it out. He slept restlessly, and bad dreams pursued him. His load of debt developed into a nightmare that was pressing on his chest and threatening to crush out his life.
When he awoke in the morning it was past ten. Borgert began to rage. Almost half the day was gone now, and yet he had meant to do so much. Had this ass of a servant again forgotten to wake him? With that his head ached, and he felt nervous and out of sorts. Throwing his dressing-gown loosely about him he went into his servant’s room and found Röse laboriously penning a letter. When his master entered the poor fellow shot out of the seat and stood bolt upright.
“Why didn’t you wake me, you beast?” he thundered at him.
“I wakened the Herr First Lieutenant at seven o’clock, but the Herr First Lieutenant wanted to continue sleeping and said I need not come back any more to annoy him.”
“That’s a lie, you swine; I will teach you to do as you are told.” And he seized a leather belt lying on the fellow’s bed, and with it struck Röse violently, then kicking him, and letting the belt play around his face and neck until broad livid marks began to show.
Röse preserved his military attitude, and stood his punishment without in the least resisting. But that was a further cause of anger to Borgert, and the latter dropped the belt, and with his fist struck the man several hard blows in the chest. Then he took the man’s letter, half finished as it was, crumpled it up in his hand, and threw it into the coal-scuttle.
“Step upstairs lively and tell Herr First Lieutenant Leimann that I want to speak to him. Tell him if possible to step in here for half an hour before he goes to town.”
“At your orders, Herr First Lieutenant.”
Borgert stepped back to his chamber, finished dressing, and then went into the adjoining room.
Sure enough, there stood his coffee, but cold as ice. In that case Röse must have been before him in the room. Well, a drubbing or two would do the fellow no harm. That was good for preserving discipline and a respect for his superiors, even if now and then it should be applied not exactly at the right moment.
On his desk were lying several letters. Three of them contained bills, and the fourth was from his father. The three he threw unopened into the fire, and the fourth he read as follows: