When he had seen Madeleine home, Maurice returned to his room, and not feeling inclined to sleep, sat down to read. But his thoughts strayed; he forgot to turn the page; and sat staring over the book at the pattern of the tablecloth. Incidents of the evening flashed before him: Miss Jensen, in James's hat, with her skirts pinned up; Madeleine earnest and decisive on the bank of snow; the maze and laughter of the FRANCAISE; Miss Martin's slim, straight figure as he pushed her before him. He did not try to control these details, nor was he conscious of a mental effort; they stood out for an instant, as vivid sensations, then glided by, to make room for others. But, as he let them pass, he became aware that below them, in depths of his mind he had believed undisturbed, there was present a feeling of strange unhappiness, which he did not know the cause of: these sharp pictures resembled an attempt on the part of his mind, to deceive him as to what was really going on in him. But he did not want to know, and he allowed his thoughts to take wider flights: recalling the scheme Madeleine had proposed, he considered it with a clearness of view, which, at the time, had been impossible. From this, he turned to America itself, and reflected on the opportunities the country offered. He saw the two of them sweeping through vast tracts of uncultivated land, in a train that outdid all real trains in swiftness; saw unknown tropical places, where the yellow fruit hung low and heavy, and people walked shadeless, sandy roads, in white hats, under white umbrellas. He saw Madeleine and himself on the awning-spanned deck of an ocean steamer, anchoring in a harbour where the sea was the colour of turquoise, touched to sapphire where the mountains came down to the shore.
"Moping herself to death": the phrase crystallised in his brain with such suddenness that he said it aloud. Now he knew what it was that was troubling him. He had not consciously recalled the words, nor had they even made a very incisive impression on him at the time; but they had evidently lain dormant, now to return and to strike him, as if no others had been said. He explained to himself what they meant. It was this: outside, in the crisp, stinging air, people lived and moved, busy with many matters, or sported, as he and his companions had done that evening: inside, she sat alone, mournful, forsaken. He saw her in the dark sofacorner, with her head on her hands. Day passed and night passed, but she was always in the same place; and her head was bowed so low that her white fingers were lost in the waves of her hair. He saw her thus with the distinctness of a vision, and except in this way could not see her at all.
He felt it little short of shameful that he should have carelessly amused himself; and, as always where she was concerned, a deep, unreasoning sense of his own unworthiness, filled him. He demanded of himself, with a new energy, what he could do to help her. Fantastic plans rose as usual in his mind, and as usual were dismissed. For the one thing he was determined not to do, was to thrust himself on her uncalled. Her solitude was of her own choosing, and no one had the right to break in upon it. It was perhaps her way of doing penance; and, at this thought, he felt a thrill of satisfaction.
At night, he consoled himself that things would seem different in the morning; but when he wakened from a restless sleep, crowded with dreams one more grotesque than another, he was still prone to be gloomy. He could think more clearly by daylight—that was all: his pitying sympathy for her had only increased. It interfered with everything he did; just as it had formerly done—just in the old way. And he had been on the brink of believing himself grown indifferent, and stronger in common sense. Fool that he was! Only a word was needed to bring his card-house down. The placidity of the past weeks had been a mere coating of thin ice, which had given way beneath the first test. A distrust of himself took him, a distrust so deep that it amounted to aversion; for in his present state of mind he discerned only a despicable weakness. But though he was thus bewildered at his own inconsistency, he was still assured that he would not approach Louise—not, that is, unless she sent for him. So much control he still had over his actions: and he went so far as to make his staying away a touchstone of his stability. This, too, although reason told him the end of it all would be, that Louise would actually leave Leipzig, without sending for him, or even remembering his existence.
He worked steadily enough. A skilled observer might have remarked a slight contraction of the corners of his mouth; none of his friends, however, noticed anything, with the exception of Madeleine, and all she said was: "You look so cross sometimes. Is anything the matter?"
Late one afternoon, they were on the ice as usual. While Madeleine talked to Dickensey, Maurice practised beside them. In making a particularly complicated gyration, he all but overbalanced himself, and his cap fell on the ice. As he was brushing the snow off it, he chanced to raise his eyes. A number of people were standing on the wooden bridge, watching the skaters; to the front, some children climbed and pushed on the wooden railing. His eye was ranging carelessly over them, when he started so violently that he again let his cap drop. He picked it up, threw another hasty look at the bridge, then turned and skated some distance away, where he could see without being seen. Yes, he had not been mistaken; it was Louise; he recognised her although a fur hat almost covered her hair. She was gazing down, with an intentness he knew in her; one hand rested on the parapet. And then, as he looked, his blood seemed to congeal: she was not alone; he saw her turn and speak to some one behind her. For a moment things swam before him. Then, a blind curiosity drove him forward to find out whom she spoke to. People moved on the bridge, obstructing his view, then several went away, and there was no further hindrance to his seeing: her companion was the shabby little Englishman, of doubtful reputation, with whom he had met her once or twice that summer. He felt himself grow cold. But now that he had certainty, his chief idea was to prevent the others from knowing, too; he grew sick at the thought of Madeleine's sharp comments, and Dickensey's cynicism. Rejoining them, he insisted—so imperiously that Madeleine showed surprise—on their skating with him on the further pond; and he kept them going round and round without a pause.
When the bridge was empty, and he had made sure that Louise was not standing anywhere about the edge of the ice, he left his companions, and, without explanation, crossed to the benches and took off his skates. He did not, however, go home; he went into the SCHEIBENHOLZ, and from there along outlying roads till he reached the river; and then, screwing on his skates again, he struck out with his face to the wind. Dusk was falling; at first he met some skaters making for home; but these were few, and he soon left them behind. When the state of the ice did not allow of his skating further, he plunged into the woods again, beyond Connewitz, tumbling in his haste, tripping over snow-bound roots, sinking kneedeep in the soft snow. His endeavour was to exhaust himself. If he sat at home now, before this fever was out of him, he might be tempted to knock his head against the wall of his room. Movement, space, air—plenty of air!—that was what he needed.
Hitherto, he had been surprised at his own conduct; now he was aghast: the hot rush of jealousy that had swept through him at the sight of the couple on the bridge, was a revelation even to himself. His previous feelings had been those of a child compared with this—a mere weak revolt against the inevitable. But what had now happened was not inevitable; that was the sting of it: it was a violent chance-effect. And his distress was so keen that, for the first time, she, too, had to bear her share of blame. He said jeeringly to himself, that, quixotic as ever, he had held aloof from her, leaving her in solitude to an atonement of his own imagining; and meanwhile, some one who was not troubled by foolish ideals stepped in and took his place. For it WAS his place; he could not rid himself of that belief. If anyone had a right to be at her side it was he, unless, indeed, all that he had undergone on her behalf during the past months counted for nothing.
Of course this Eggis was an unscrupulous fellow; but it was just such men as this—he might note that for future use—who won where others lost. At the same time, he shrank from the idea of imitating him; and even had he been bold enough, not a single errand could he devise to serve him as an excuse. He could not go to her and say: I come because I have seen you with some one else. And yet that would be the truth; and it would lurk beneath all he said.
The days of anxiety that followed were hard to bear. He dreaded every street-corner, for fear Louise and the other should turn it; dreaded raising his eyes to the bridges over the ice; and was so irritable in temper that Madeleine suggested he should go to Dresden in the Christmas holidays, for change of air.
For, over all this, Christmas had come down—the season of gift-making, and glittering Christmas trees, of BOWLE, STOLLEN, and HONIGKUCHEN. For a fortnight beforehand, the open squares and places were set out with fir-trees of all sizes—their pungent fragrance met one at every turn: the shops were ablaze till late evening, crowded with eagerly seeking purchasers; the streets were impassible for the masses of country people that thronged them. Every one carried brown paper parcels, and was in a hurry. As the time drew near, subordinates and officials grew noticeably polite; the very houseporter touched his cap at your approach. Bakers' shops were piled high with WEIHNACHTSSTOLLEN, which were a special mark of the festival: cakes shaped like torpedoes, whose sugared, almonded coats brisked brown and tempting. But the spicy scent of the firs was the motive that recurred most persistently: it clung even to the stairways of the houses.
Maurice had assisted Madeleine with her circumstantial shopping; and, at dusk on Christmas Eve, he helped her to carry her parcels to the house of some German friends. He himself was invited to Miss Jensen's, where a party of English and Americans would celebrate the evening in their own fashion; but not till eight o'clock. When he had picked out at a confectioner's, a TORTE for the Fursts, he did not know how to kill time. He was in an unsettled mood, and the atmosphere of excitement, which had penetrated the familiar details of life, jarred on him. It seemed absurdly childish, the way in which even the grown-up part of the population surrendered itself to the sentimental pleasures of the season. But foreigners were only big children; or, at least, they could lay aside age and dignity at will. He felt misanthropic, and went for a long walk; and when he had passed the last tree-market, where poor buyers were bargaining for the poor trees that were left, he met only isolated stragglers. In some houses, the trees were already lighted.
On his return, he went to a flower-shop in the KONIGSPLATZ, and chose an azalea to take to Miss Jensen. While he was waiting for the pot to be swathed in crimped paper, his eye was caught by a large bunch of red and yellow roses, which stood in a vase at the back of the counter. He regarded them for a moment, without conscious thought; then, suddenly colouring, he stretched out his hand.
"I'll take those roses, too. What do they cost?"
The girl who served him—a very pretty girl, with plaits of straw-coloured hair, wound Madonna-like round her head—named a sum that seemed exorbitant to his inexperience, and told a wordy story of how they had been ordered, and then countermanded at the last moment.
"A pity. Such fine flowers!"
Her interest was awakened in the rather shabby young man who paid the price without flinching; and she threw inquisitive looks at him as she wrapped the roses in tissue-paper.
A moment later, Maurice was in the street with the flowers in his hand. He had acted so spontaneously that he now believed his mind to have been made up before he entered the shop; no, more, as if all that had happened during the past week had led straight up to his impulsive action. Or was it only that, at the sight of the flowers, a kind of refrain had begun to run through his head: she loves roses, loves roses?
But he did not give himself time for reflection; he hurried through the cold night air, sheltering the flowers under his coat. Soon he was once more in the BRUDERSTRASSE, on the stair, every step of which, though he had only climbed it some three or four times, he seemed to know by heart. As, however, he waited for the door to be opened, his heart misgave him; he was not sure how she would regard his gift, and, in a burst of cowardice, he resolved just to hand in the roses, without even leaving his name. But his first ring remained unanswered, and before he rang again, he had time to be afraid she would not be at home—a simple, but disappointing solution.
There was another pause. Then he heard sounds, steps came along the passage, and the door was opened by Louise herself.
He was so unprepared for this that he could not collect his wits; he thrust the flowers into her hand, with a few stammered words, and his foot was on the stair before she could make a movement to stop him.
Louise had peered out from the darkness of the passage to the dusk of the landing, with the air of one roused from sleep. She looked from him to the roses in her hand, and back at him. He tried to say something else, raised his hat, and was about to go. But, when she saw this, she impulsively stepped towards him.
"Are they for me?" she asked. And added: "Will you not come in? Please, come in."
At the sound of her voice, Maurice came back from the stair-head. But it was not possible for him to stay: friends—engaged—a promise of long standing.
"Ah then ... of course." She retreated into the shadow of the doorway. "But I am quite alone. There is no one in but me."
"Why, however does that happen?" Maurice asked quickly, and was ready at once to be wrath with all the world. He paused irresolute, with his hand on the banisters.
"I said I didn't mind. But it is lonely."
"I should think it was.—On this night of all others, too."
He followed her down the passage. In the room there was no light except what played on the walls from the streetlamps, the blinds being still undrawn. She had been sitting in the dark. Now, she took the globe off the lamp, and would have lighted it, but she could not find matches.
"Let me do it," said Maurice, taking out his own; and, over the head of this trifling service, he had a feeling of intense satisfaction. By the light that was cast on the table, he watched her free the roses from their paper, and raise them to her face. She did not mention them again, but it was ample thanks to see her touch several of them singly, as she put them in a jug of water.
But this done, they sat on opposite sides of the table, and had nothing to say to each other. After each banal observation he made came a heart-rending pause; she let a subject drop as soon as it was broached. It was over two months now since Maurice had seen her, and he was startled by the change that had taken place in her. Her face seemed to have grown longer; and there were hollows in the fine oval of the cheeks, in consequence of which the nose looked larger, and more pinched. The chin-lines were sharpened, the eyes more sunken, while the shadows beneath them were as dark as though they were plastered on with bistre. But it was chiefly the expression of the face that had altered: the lifelessness of the eyes was new to it, and the firm compression of the mouth: now, when she smiled, no thin line of white appeared, such as he had been used to watch for.
Even more marked than this, though, was the change that had taken place in her manner. He had known her as passionately self-assertive; and he could not now accustom himself to the condition of apathy in which he found her. "Moping to death" had been no exaggeration; help was needed here, and at once, if she were not to be irretrievably injured.
As he thought these things, he talked at random. There were not many topics, however, that could be touched on with impunity, and he returned more than once to the ice and the skating, as offering a kind of neutral ground, on which he was safe. And Louise listened, and sometimes assented; but her look was that of one who listens to the affairs of another world. Could she not be persuaded to join them on the JOHANNATEICH, he was asking her. What matter though she did not skate! It was easily learned. Madeleine had been a beginner that winter, and now seldom missed an afternoon.
"Oh, if Madeleine is there, I should not go," she said with a touch of the old arrogance.
Then he told her of the frozen river, with its long, lonely, grey-white reaches. Her eyes kindled at this, he fancied, and in her answer was more of herself. "I have never trodden on ice in my life. Oh, I should be afraid—horribly afraid!"
For those who did not skate there were chairs, he urged—big, green-painted, sledge-like chairs, which ran smoothly. The ice was many inches thick; there was not the least need to be afraid.
But she only smiled, and did not answer.
"Then I can't persuade you?" he asked, and was annoyed at his own powerlessness. She can go with Eggis, he told himself, and simultaneously spoke out the thought. "I saw you on the bridge the other day."
But if he had imagined this would rouse her, he was wrong.
"Yes?" she said indifferently, and with that laming want of curiosity which prevents a subject from being followed up.
They sat in silence for some seconds. With her fingers, she pulled at the fringe of the tablecloth. Then, all of a sudden rising from her chair, she went over to the jug of roses, which she had placed on the writing-table, bent over the flowers with a kind of perceptible hesitation, and as suddenly came back to her seat.
"Suppose we went to-night." she said, and for the first time looked hard at Maurice.
"To-night?" he had echoed, before he could check himself.
"Ah yes—I forgot. You are going out."
"That's the least of it," he answered, and stood up, fearful lest she should sink back into her former listlessness. "But it's Christmas Eve. There wouldn't be a soul on the river but ourselves. Are you sure you would like it?"
"Just for that reason," she replied, and wound her handkerchief in and out of her hands, so afraid was she now that he would refuse. "I could be ready in five minutes."
With his brain in a whirl, Maurice went back to the flowershop, and, having written a few words of apology on a card, ordered this to be sent with his purchase to Miss Jensen. When he returned, Louise was ready. But he was not satisfied: she did not know how cold it would be: and he made her put on a heavy jacket under her fur cape, and take a silk shawl, in which, if necessary, she could muffle up her head. He himself carried a travelling-rug for her knees.
"As if we were going on a journey!" she said, as she obeyed him. Her eyes shone with a spark of their old light, in approval of the adventurous nature of their undertaking.
The hard-frozen streets, over which a cutting wind drove, were deserted. In many windows, the golden glory of the CHRISTBAUM was visible; the steep blackness of the houses was splashed with patches of light. At intervals, a belated holidaymaker was still to be met with hurrying townwards: only they two were leaving the town, and its innocent revels, behind them. Maurice had a somewhat guilty feeling about the whole affair: they also belonged by rights to the town to-night. He was aware, too, of a vague anxiety, which he could not repress; and these feelings successfully prevented him taking an undue pleasure in what was happening to him. He had swung his skates, fetched in passing, over his shoulder; and they walked as quickly as the slippery snow permitted. Louise had not spoken since leaving the house; she also stood mutely by, while the astonished boatman, knocked out in the middle of his festivities, unlocked the boat-shed where the ice-chairs were kept. The Christmas punch had made him merry; he multiplied words, and was even a little facetious at their expense. According to him, a snow-storm was imminent, and he warned them not to be late in returning.
Maurice helped Louise into the chair, and wrapped the rug round her. If she were really afraid, as she had asserted, she did not show it. Even after they had started, she remained as silent as before; indeed, on looking back, Maurice thought they had not exchanged a word all the way to Connewitz. He pushed in a kind of dream; the wind was with them, and it was comparatively easy work; but the ice was rough, and too hard, and there were seamy cracks to be avoided. The snow had drifted into huge piles at the sides; and, as they advanced, it lay unswept on their track. It was a hazily bright night, but rapid clouds were passing. Not a creature was to be seen: had a rift opened in the ice, and had they two gone through it, the mystery of their disappearance would never have been solved.
Slight, upright, unfathomable as the night, Louise sat before him. What her thoughts were on this fantastic journey, he never knew, nor just what secret nerve in her was satisfied by it. By leaning sideways, he could see that her eyes were fixed on the grey-white stretch to be travelled: her warm breath came back to him; and the coil of her hair, with its piquant odour, was so close that, by bending, he could have touched it with his lips. But he was still in too detached a mood to be happy; he felt, throughout, as if all this were happening to some one else, not to him.
At their journey's end, he helped her, cold and stiff, along the snowy path to the WALDCAFE. In a corner of the big room, which was empty, they sat beside the stove, before cups of steaming coffee. The landlady served them herself, and looked with the same curious interest as the boatman at the forlorn pair.
Louise had laid her fur cap aside with her other wraps, and had drawn off her gloves; and now she sat with her hand propping her chin. She was still disinclined to speak; from the expression of her eyes, Maurice judged that her thought were very far away. Sitting opposite her, he shaded his own eyes with his hand, and scrutinised her closely. In the stronger light of this room, he could see more plainly than before the havoc trouble had made of her face. And yet, in spite of the shadows that had descended on it, it was still to him the most adorable face in the world. He could not analyse his feelings any better now than in the beginning; but this face had exactly the same effect upon him now as then. It seemed to be a matter of the nerves. Nor was it the face alone: it was also the lines of throat and chin, when she turned her head; it was the gesture with which she fingered the knot of hair on her neck; above all, her hands, whose every movement was full of meaning: yes, these things sent answering ripples through him, as sound does through air.
He had stared too openly: she felt his eyes, and raised her own. For a few seconds, they looked at each other. Then she held out her hand.
"You are my friend."
He pressed it, without replying; he could not think of anything suitable to say; what rose to his lips was too emotional, too tell-tale. But he made a vow that, from this day on, she should never doubt the truth of what she said.
"You are my friend."
He would take care of her as no one had ever yet tried to do. She might safely give herself into his charge. The unobtrusive aid that was mingled tenderness and respect, should always be hers.
"Are you warmer now?"
He could not altogether suppress the new note that had got into his voice. All strangeness seemed to have been swept away between them; he was wide-awake to the fact that he was sitting alone with her, apart from the rest of the world.
He looked at his watch: it was time to go; but she begged for a little longer, and so they sat on for another half-hour, in the warm and drowsy stillness.
Outside, they found a leaden sky; and they had not gone far before snow began to fall: great flakes came flying to them, smiting their faces, stinging their eyes, melting on their lips. The wind was against them; they were exposed to the full force of the blizzard. Maurice pushed till he panted; but their progress was slow. At intervals, he stopped, to shake the snow off the rug, and to enwrap Louise afresh; and each violent gust that met him when he turned a corner, smote him doubly; for he pictured to himself the fury with which it must hurl itself against her, sitting motionless before it.
It took them twice as long to return; and when Louise tried to get out of the chair, she found herself so paralysed with cold that she could hardly stand. Blinded by the snow, she clung to Maurice's arm; he heard her teeth chatter, as they toiled their way along the ARNDTSTRASSE, through the thick, new snow-layer. Not a droschke was to be seen; and they were half-way home before they met one. The driver was drunk or asleep, and had first to be roused. Louise sank limply into a corner.
The cab slithered and slipped over the dangerous roads, jolting them from side to side. Maurice had laid the rug across her knees, and she had ceased to shiver. But, by the light of a street-lamp which they passed, he was dismayed to see that tears were running down her cheeks.
"What is it? Are you so cold?—Just a little patience. We shall soon be there."
He took her hand, and chafed it. At this, she began to cry. He did not know how to comfort her, and looked out of the window, scanning each house they passed, to see if it were not the last. She was still crying when the cab drew up. The house-key had been forgotten; there was nothing for it but to ring for the landlady, and to stand in the wind till she came down. The old woman was not so astonished as Maurice had expected; but she was very wroth at the folly of the proceeding, and did not scruple to say so.
"SO 'NE DUMMHEIT, SO 'NE DUMMHEIT!" she mumbled, as, between them, they got Louise up the stairs; and she treated Maurice's advice concerning cordials and hot drinks with scant courtesy.
"JA, JA—JAWOHL!" she sniffed. And, on the landing, the door was shut in his face.
What she needed, what she had always needed, was a friend, he said to himself. She had never had anyone to stand by her and advise her to wisdom, in the matter of impulsive acts and wishes. He would be that friend. He had not, it was true, made a very happy beginning, with the expedition that had ended so unfortunately; but he promised himself not to be led into an indiscretion of the kind again. It was a friend's part to warn in due time, and to point out the possible consequences of a rash act. He only excused his behaviour because he had not seen her for over two months, and had felt too sorry for her to refuse the first thing she asked of him. But from now on, he would be firm. He would win her back to life—reawaken her interest in what was going on around her. He would devote himself to serving her: not selfishly, as others had done, with their own ends in view; the gentle, steady aid should be hers, which he had always longed to give her. He felt strong enough to face any contingency: it seemed, indeed, as if his love for her had all along been aiming at this issue; as if each of the unhappy hours he had spent, since first meeting her, was made up for by the words: "You are my friend."
A deep sense of responsibility filled him. In obedience, however, to a puritanic streak in his nature, he hedged himself round with restrictions, lest he should believe he was setting out on all too primrose a path. He erected limiting boundaries, which were not to be overstepped. For example, on the two days that followed the memorable Christmas Eve, he only made inquiries at the door after Louise, and when he learned that the cold she had caught was better, did not return. For, on one point, his mind was made up: idle tongues should have no fresh cause for gossip.
At the expiry of a fortnight, however, he began to fear that if he remained away any longer, she would think him indifferent to her offer of friendship. So, late one afternoon, he called to see her. But when he was face to face with her, he doubted whether she had given him a thought in the interval: she seemed mildly surprised at his coming. It was even possible that she had forgotten, by now, what she had said to him; and he sought anew for a means of impressing himself on her consciousness.
She was crouched in the rocking-chair, close beside the stove, and was wrapped in a thick woollen shawl; but the hand she gave him was as cold as stone. She was trying to keep warm, she said; she had not been properly warm since the night on the ice.
"But there's an easy remedy for that," said Maurice, who came in ruddy from the sharp air. "You must go out and walk. Then you will soon get warm."
But she shuddered at the suggestion, and also made an expressive gesture to indicate the general laxity of her dress—the soiled dressing-gown, her untidy hair. Then she leaned forward again, holding both hands, palms out, to the mica pane in the door of the stove, through which the red coals glowed.
"If only winter were over!"
He gazed at the expressive lines of hand and wrist, and was reminded of an adoring Madonna he had somewhere seen engraved: her hands were held back in the same way; the thumbs slightly thrown out, the three long fingers together, the little one apart: here as there, was the same supple, passionate indolence. But he could find no more to say than on the occasion of his former visit; she did not help him; and more and more did it seem to the young man as if the words he had gone about hugging to him, had never been spoken. After a desperate quarter of an hour, he rose to take leave. But simultaneously, she, too, got up from the rocking-chair, and, standing pale and uncertain before him, asked him if she might trouble him to do something for her. A box had been sent to her from England, she told him, while she tumbled over the dusty letters and papers accumulated on the writing-table, and had been lying unclaimed at the custom-house for several weeks now—how many she did not know, and she spread out her fingers, with a funny little movement, to show her ignorance. She had only remembered it a day or two ago; the dues would no doubt be considerable. If it were not too much trouble ... she would be so grateful; she would rather ask him than Mr. Eggis.
"I should be delighted," said Maurice.
He went the next morning, at nine o'clock, spent a trying hour with uncivil officials, and, in the afternoon, called to report to Louise. As he was saying good-bye to her, he inquired if there were nothing else of a similar nature he could do for her; he was glad to be of use. Smiling, Louise admitted that there were other things, many of them, more than he would have patience for. She should try him and see, said Maurice, and laid his hat down again, to hear what they were.
As a consequence of this, the following days saw him on various commissions in different quarters of the town, scanning the names of shops, searching for streets he did not know. But matters did not always run smoothly; complications arose, for instance, over a paid bill that had been sent in a second time, and over an earlier one that had not been paid at all; and Maurice was forced to confess his ignorance of the circumstances. When this had happened more than once, he sat down, with her consent, at the writing-table, to work through the mass of papers, and the contents of a couple of drawers.
In doing this, he became acquainted with some of the more intimate details of her life—minute and troublesome details, for which she had no aptitude. From her scat at the stove, Louise watched him sorting and reckoning, and she was as grateful to him as it was possible for her to be, in her present mood. No one had ever done a thing of the kind for her before; and she was callous to the fact of its being a stranger, who had his hands thus in her private life. When, horrified beyond measure at the confusion that reigned in all belonging to her, Maurice asked her how she had ever succeeded in keeping order, she told him that, before her illness, there had, now and again, come a day of strength and purpose, on which she had had the "courage" to face these distasteful trifles and to end them. But she did not believe such a day would ever come again.
Bills, bills, bills: dozens of bills, of varying dates, sent in once, twice, three times, and invariably tossed aside and forgotten—a mode of proceeding incomprehensible to Maurice, who had never bought anything on credit in his life. And not because she was in want of money: there were plenty of gold pieces jingling loose in a drawer; but from an aversion, which was almost an inability, to take in what the figures meant. And the amounts added up to alarming totals; Maurice had no idea what a woman's dress cost, and could only stand amazed; but the sum spent on fruit and flowers alone, in two months, represented to his eyes a small fortune. Then there was the Bluthner, the unused piano; the hire of it had not been paid since the previous summer. Three terms were owed at Klemm's musical library, from which no music was now borrowed; fees were still being charged against her at the Conservatorium, where she had given no formal notice of leaving. It really did not matter, she said, with that carelessness concerning money, which was characteristic of her; but it went against the grain in Maurice to let several pounds be lost for want of an effort; and he spent a diplomatic half-hour with the secretaries in the BUREAU, getting her released from paying the whole of the term that had now begun. As, however, she would not appear personally, she was under the necessity of writing a letter, stating that she had left the Conservatorium; and when she had promised twice to do, it, and it was still unwritten, Maurice stood over her, and dictated the words into her pen. A day or two afterwards, he prevailed upon her to do the same for Schwarz, to inform him of her illness, and to say that, at Easter, if she were better, she would come to him for a course of private lessons. This was an idea of Maurice's own, and Louise looked up at him before putting down the words.
"It's not true. But if you think I should say so—it doesn't matter."
This was the burden of all she said: nothing mattered, nothing would ever matter again. There was not the least need for the half-jesting tone in which Maurice clothed his air of authority. She obeyed him blindly, doing what he bade her without question, glad to be subordinate to his will. As long as he did not ask her to think, or to feel, or to stir from her chair beside the stove.
But it was only with regard to small practical things; in matters of more importance she was not to be moved. And the day came, only too soon, when the positive help Maurice could give her was at an end; she did not owe a pfennig to anyone; her letters and accounts were filed and in order. Then she seemed to elude him again. He did what lay in his power: brought her books that she did not read, brought news and scraps of chit-chat, which he thought might interest her and which did not, and an endless store of sympathy. But to all he said and did, she made the same response: it did not matter.
Since the night on the river, she had not set foot across the threshold of her room; nervous fears beset her. Maurice was bent on her going out into the open air; he also wished her to mix with people again, and thus rid herself of the morbid fancies that were creeping on her. But she shrank as he spoke of it, and pressed both hands to her face: it was too cold, she murmured, and too cheerless; and then the streets! ... the publicity of the streets, the noise, the people! This was what she said to him; to herself she added: and all the old familiar places, to each of which a memory was attached! He spent hours in urging her to take up some regular occupation; it would be her salvation, he believed, and, not allowing himself to be discouraged, he returned to the attack, day after day. But she only smiled the thin smile with which she defeated most of his proposals for her good. Work?—what had she to do with work? It had never been anything to her but a narcotic, enabling her to get through those hours of the day in which she was alone.
She let Maurice talk on, and hardly heard what he said. He meant well, but he did not understand. No one understood. No one but herself knew the weight of the burden she had borne since the day when her happiness was mercilessly destroyed. Now she could not raise a finger to help herself. On waking, in the morning, she turned with loathing from the new day. In the semi-darkness of the room, she lay motionless, half sleeping, or dreaming with open eyes. The clock ticked benumbingly the long hours away; the wind howled, or the wind was still; snow fell, or it was frostily clear; but nothing happened—nothing at all. The day was well advanced before she left her bed for the seat by the stove; there she brooded until she dragged herself back to bed. One day was the exact counterpart of another.
The only break in the deathlike monotony was Maurice's visit. He came in, fresh, and eager to see her; he held her hand and said kind things to her; he talked persuasively, and she listened or not, as she felt disposed. But little though he was able to touch her, she unconsciously began to look to his visits; and one day, when he was detained and could not come, she was aware of a feeling of injury at his absence.
As time went by, however, Maurice felt more and more clearly that he was making no headway. His uneasiness increased; for her want of spirit had something about it that he could not understand. It began to look to him like a somewhat morbid indulgence in grief.
"This can't go on," he said sternly.
She was in one of her most pitiable moods; for there were gradations in her unhappiness, as he had learned to know.
"This can't go on. You are killing yourself by inches—and I'm a party to it."
For the first time, there was a hint of impatience in his manner. To his surprise, Louise raised her head, raised it quickly, as he had not seen her make a movement for weeks.
"By inches? Inches only? Oh, I am so strong ... Nothing hurts me. Nothing is of any use."
"If you look in the glass, you will see that you're hurting yourself considerably."
"You mean that I'm getting old?—and ugly?" she caught him up. "Do you think I care?—Oh, if I had only had the courage, that day! A few grains of something, and it would have been all over, long ago. But I wasn't brave enough. And now I have no more courage in me than strength in my little finger."
Maurice looked meditatively at her, without replying: this was the single occasion on which she had been roused to a retort of any kind; and, bitter though her words were, he could not prevent the spark of hope which, by their means, was lit in him.
And from this day on, things went forward of themselves. Again and again, some harmless observation on his part drew forth a caustic reply from her; it was as if, having once experienced it, she found an outcry of this kind a relief to her surcharged nerves. At first, what she said was directed chiefly against herself—this self for which she now nursed a fanatic hatred, since it had failed her in her need. But, little by little, he, too, was drawn within the circle of her bitterness; indeed, it sometimes seemed as if his very kindness incited her, by laying her under an obligation to him, which it was in her nature to resent: at others, again, as if she merely wished to try him, to see how far she might go.
"Do I really deserve that thrust?" he once could not help asking. He smiled, as he spoke, to take the edge off his words.
Louise threw a penitent glance at him, and, for all answer, held out her hand.
But, the very next day, after a similar incident, she crossed the room to him, with the swiftness of movement that was always disturbing in her, contrasting as it did with her customary indolence. "Forgive me. I ought not to. And you are the only friend I have. But there's so much I must say to some one. If I don't say it, I shall go mad."
"Why, of course. That's what I'm here for," said Maurice.
And so it went on—a strange state of things, in which he never called her by her name, and seldom touched her hand. He had himself well under control—except for the moment immediately before he saw her, and the moment after. He could not yet meet her, after the briefest absence, unmoved.
For a week on end that penetrating rawness had been abroad, which precedes and accompanies a thaw; and one day, early in February, when, after the unequalled severity of the winter, the air seemed of an incredible mildness, the thaw was there in earnest; on the ice of more than three months' standing, pools of water had formed overnight. By the JOHANNATEICH, Maurice and Madeleine stood looking dubiously across the bank of snow, which, here and there, had already collapsed, leaving miniature crater-rings, flecked with moisture. Several people who could not tear themselves away, were still flying about the ice, dexterously avoiding the watery places; and Dove and pretty Susie Fay called out to them that it was better than it looked. But Maurice was fastidious and Madeleine indifferent; she was really rather tired of skating, she admitted, as they walked home, and was ashamed to think of the time she had wasted on it. As, however, this particular afternoon was already broken into, she would have been glad to go for a walk; but Maurice did not take up her suggestion, and parted from her at her house-door.
"Spring is in the air," he sought to tempt Louise, when, a few minutes later, he entered her room.
She, too, had been aware of the change; for it had aggravated her dejection. She raised her eyes to his like a tired child, and had not strength enough to make her usual stand against him. Oh, if he really wished it so much, she would go out, she said at last. And so he left her to dress, and ran to the Conservatorium, arriving just in time for a class.
Later on, a curious uneasiness drew him back to see how she had fared. It was almost dark, but she had not returned; and he waited for half an hour before he heard her step in the hall. Directly she came in, he knew that something was the matter.
In each of her movements was a concentrated, but noiseless energy: she shut the door after her as if it were never to open again; tore off rather than unpinned the thick black veil in which she had shrouded herself; threw her hat on the sofa, furs and jacket to the hat; then stood motionless, pressing her handkerchief to her lips. Her face had emerged from its wrappings with renewed pallor; her eyes shone as if with belladonna. She took no notice of the silent figure in the corner, did not even look in his direction.
"You've got back," said Maurice, for the sake of saying something. "It's too late."
At his words, she dropped on a chair, put her arms on the table, and hid her face in them.
"What's the matter? Has anything happened?" he asked, in quick alarm, as she burst into violent sobs. He should have been accustomed to her way of crying by this time—it sounded worse than it was, as he knew—but it invariably racked him anew. He stood over her; but the only comfort he ventured on was to lay his hand on her hair—this wild black hair, which met his fingers springily, with a will of its own.
"What is the matter?" he besought her. "Tell me, Louise—tell me what it is."
He had to ask several times before he received an answer. Finally, she sobbed in a muffled voice, without raising her head: "How could you make me go out! Oh, how COULD you!"
"What do you mean? I don't understand. What is it?" He had visions of her being annoyed or insulted.
But she only repeated: "How could you! Oh, it was cruel of you!" and wept afresh.
Word by word, Maurice drew her story from her. There was not very much to tell.
She had gone out, and had walked hurriedly along quiet by-streets to the ROSENTAL. But before she had advanced a hundred yards, her courage began to fail, and the further she went, the more her spirits sank. Her surroundings were indescribably depressing: the smirched, steadily retreating snow was leaving bare all the drab brownness it had concealed—all the dismal little gardens, and dirty corners. Houses, streets and people wore their most bedraggled air. Particularly the people: they were as ugly as the areas of roof and stone, off which the soft white coating had slid; their contours were as painful to see. And the mud—oh, God, the mud! It spread itself over every inch of the way; the roads were rivers of filth, which spattered and splashed; at the sides of the streets, the slush was being swept into beds. Before she had gone any distance, her boots and skirts were heavy with it; and she hated mud, she sobbed—hated it, loathed it, it affected her with a physical disgust—and this lie might have known when he sent her out. In the ROSENTAL, it was no better; the paths were so soaked that they squashed under her feet; on both sides, lay layers of rotten leaves from the autumn; the trees were only a net-work of blackened twigs, their trunks surrounded by an undergrowth that was as ragged as unkempt hair. And everything was mouldering: the smell of moist, earthy decay reminded her of open graves. Not a soul was visible but herself. She sat on a seat, the only living creature in the scene, and the past rose before her with resistless force: the intensity of her happiness; the base cruelty of his conduct; her misery, her unspeakable misery; her forlorn desolation, which was of a piece with the desolation around her, and which would never again be otherwise, though she lived to be an old woman.—How long she sat thinking things of this kind, she did not know. But all of a sudden she started up, frightened both by her wretched thoughts and by the loneliness of the wood; and she fled, not looking behind her, or pausing to take breath, till she reached the streets. Into the first empty droschke she met, she had sunk exhausted, and been driven home.
It was of no use trying to reason with her, or to console her.
"I can't bear my life," she sobbed. "It's too hard ... and there is no one to help me. If I had done anything to deserve it ... then it would be different ... then I shouldn't complain. But I didn't—didn't do anything—unless it was that I cared too much. At least it was a mistake—a dreadful mistake. I should never have shown him how I cared: I should have made him believe he loved me best. But I was a fool. I flung it all at his feet. And it was only natural he should get tired of me. The wonder was that I held him so long. But, oh, how can one care as I did, and yet be able to plot and plan? I couldn't. It isn't in me to do it."
She wept despairingly, with her head on her outstretched arms. When she raised it again, her tear-stained face looked out, Medusa-like, from its setting of ruffled hair. More to herself than to the young man, as if, on this day, secret springs had been touched in her, she continued with terse disconnectedness: "I couldn't believe it; I wouldn't—even when I heard it from his own lips. You thought, all of you, that I was ill; but I wasn't; I was only trying to get used to the terrible thought—just as a suddenly blinded man has to get used to being always in the dark. And while I was still struggling came Madeleine, with her cruel tongue, and told me—you know what she told me. Oh, if his leaving me had been hard to bear, this stung like scorpions. I wonder I didn't go mad. I should have, if you hadn't come to help me. For a day and night, I did not move from the corner of that sofa there. I turned her words over till there was no sense left in them. My nails cut my palms."
Her clasped hands were slightly stretched from her: her whole attitude betrayed the tension at which she was speaking. "Oh, my God, how I hated him ... hated him ... how I hate him still! If I live to be an old, old woman, I shall never forgive him. For, in time, I might have learnt to bear his leaving me, if it had only been his work that took him from me. It was always between us, as it was; but it was at least only a pale brain thing, not living flesh and blood. But that all the time he should have been deceiving me, taking pains to do it—that I cannot forgive. At first, I implored, I prayed there might be some mistake: you, too, told me there was. And I hoped against hope—till I saw her. Then, I knew it was true——-as plainly as if it had been written on that wall." She paused for breath, in this bitter pleasure of laying her heart bare. "For I wasn't the person he could always have been satisfied with—I see it now. He liked a woman to be fair, and soft, and gentle—not dark, and hot-tempered. It was only a phase, a fancy, that brought him to me, and it couldn't have lasted for ever. But all I asked of him was common honesty—to be open with me: it wasn't much to ask, was it? Not more than we expect of a stranger in the street. But it was too much for him, all the same. And so ... now ... I have nothing left to remind me that I ever knew him. That night, when I had seen her, I burned everything—every photograph, every scrap of writing I had ever had from him ... if only one could burn memories too! I had to tear my heart over it; I used to think I felt it bleeding, drop by drop. For all the suffering fell on me, who had done nothing. He went free."
"Are you sure of that? It may have been hard for him, too—harder than you think." Maurice was looking out of the window, and did not turn.
She shook her head. "The person who cares, can't scheme and contrive. He didn't care. He never really cared for me—only for himself; at heart, he was cold and selfish. No, I paid for it all—I who hate and shrink from pain, who would do anything to avoid it. I want to go through life knowing only what is bright and happy; and time and again, I am crushed and flung down. But, in all my life, I haven't suffered like this. And now perhaps you understand, why I never want to hear his name again, and why I shall never—not if I live to be a hundred years old—never forgive him. It isn't in me to do it. As a child, I ground my heel into a rose if it pricked me."
There was a silence. Then she sighed, and pushed her hair back from forehead. "I don't know why I should say all this to you," she said contritely. "But often, just with you, I seem to forget what I am saying. It must be, I think, because you're so quiet yourself."
At this, Maurice turned and came over to her. "No, it's for another reason. You need to say these things to some one. You have brooded over them to yourself till they are magnified out of all proportion. It's the best thing in the world for you to say them aloud." He drew up a chair, and sat down beside her. "Listen to me. You told me once, not very long ago, that I was your friend. Well, I want to speak to you to-night as that friend, and to play the doctor a little as well. Will you not go away from here, for a time?—go away and be with people who know nothing of ... all this—people you don't need to be afraid of? Let yourself be persuaded. You have such a healthy nature. Give it a chance."
She looked at him with a listless forbearance. "Don't go on. I know everything you are going to say.—That's always the way with you calm, quiet people, who are not easily moved yourselves. You still but faith in these trite remedies; for you've never known the ills they're supposed to cure."
"Never mind me. It's you we have to think of. And I want you to give my old-fashioned remedy a trial."
But she did not answer, and again a few minutes went by, before she stretched out her hand to him. "Forget what I've said to-night. I shall never speak of it again.—But then you, too, must promise not to make me go out alone—to think and remember—in all the dirt and ugliness of the streets."
And Maurice promised.