"Well, Anton, you're expecting me, aren't you? It wouldn't be the thing if you weren't!" said Aunt Stefanie, in a tone of reproach.
Trippingly and imperiously, she went up to him. Her voice sounded shrill and her little witch-face shook and shivered out of the worn fur collar of her cloak, because she felt cold.
"Yes, all right," said Anton Dercksz, but without getting up. "You'll sit down first, won't you, Stefanie?"
"But the cab's waiting, Anton; it means throwing money away for nothing!"
"Well, that won't ruin you. Is it really necessary that we should go and look at those brats?"
"You must see your godchild, surely. That's only proper. And then we're going on, with Ina and Lily, to Daan and Floor, at their hotel."
"Yes, I know, they arrived yesterday.... Look here, Stefanie, I can't understand why you don't leave me here in peace. You always want to boss people. I'm comfortable here, reading...."
The warmth of the stove gave old Stefanie de Laders a blissful feeling; she held her numbed feet—Anton possessed no foot-stove—voluptuously to the glow; but the smoke of the pipe made her cough.
"Yes, yes, you're just sitting reading; I read too, but I read better books than you.... Let me see what you're reading, Anton. What is it? Latin?"
"Yes, it's Latin."
"I never knew that you read Latin."
"You don't know everything about me yet."
"No, thank God!" cried Stefanie, indignantly. "And what is that Latin book?" she asked, curiously and inquisitorially.
"It's sinful," said Anton, teasingly.
"I thought as much. What's it called?"
"It's Suetonius:The Lives of the Caesars."
"So you're absorbed in the lives of those brutes, who tortured the early Christians!"
He grinned, with a broad grin. He sat there, big and heavy; and the folds and dewlaps of his full, yellow-red cheeks thrilled with pleasure at her outburst; the ends of his grey-yellow moustache stood straight up with merriment; and his eyes with their yellow irises gazed pensively at his sister, who had never been of the flesh. What hadn't she missed, thought Anton, in scoffing contempt, as he sat bending forwards. His coarse-fisted hands lay like clods on his thick knees; and the tops of his Wellington boots showed round under the trouser-legs. His waistcoat was undone; so were the two top buttons of his trousers; and Stefanie could just see his braces.
"You know more about history than I thought," he grinned.
She thought him repulsive and looked nervously round the room, which contained a number of open book-cases, with the curtains drawn back:
"Have you read all those books?" she asked.
"And read them over again. I do nothing else."
Stefanie de Laders was coughing more and more. Her feet were warm by this time. She was proof against much, but she felt as if she would faint with the smoke.
"Sha'n't we go now, Anton?"
He was not in the least inclined to go. He was greatly interested in Suetonius at the moment; and she had disturbed him in his fantasy, which was intense in him. But she had such a way of nagging insistency; and he was really a weak man.
"I must just wash my hands."
"Yes, do, for you reek of that pipe of yours."
He grinned, got up and, without hurrying himself, went to his bedroom. Nobody knew of his solitary fantasies, which became more intense as he grew older and more impotent in his sensuality; nobody knew of the lust of his imagination nor how, as he read Suetonius, he pictured how he had once, in a century long past, been Tiberius, how he had held the most furious orgies in gloomy solitude at Capri and committed murder in voluptuousness and sent the victims of his passions dashing into the sea from the rocks and surrounded himself with a bevy of children beautiful as Cupids. The hidden forces of his intellect and imagination, which he had always enjoyed secretly, with a certain shyness towards the outside world, had caused him to read and study deeply in his younger years; and he knew more than any one talking to him would ever have suspected. On his shelves, behind novels and statute-books, he concealed works on the Kabbala and Satanism, being especially attracted in his morbid fancies by the strange mysteries of antiquity and the middle ages and endowed with a powerful gift of thinking himself back into former times, into a former life, into historic souls to which he felt himself related, in which he incarnated himself. No one suspected it: people merely knew that he had been a mediocre official, that he read, that he smoked and that he had occasionally done shameful things. For the rest, his secret was his own; and that he often guessed at another's secret was a thing which not his mother nor Takma nor anybody would ever have suspected....
The moment he had gone to his bedroom, Aunt Stefanie rose, tripped to the bookshelves and let her eyes move swiftly along the titles. What a lot of books Anton had! Look at that whole shelf of Latin books: was Anton as learned as that? And behind them: what did he keep behind those Latin books? Great albums and portfolios: what was in them? Would she have time to look? She drew one from behind the Latin books and, with quick, bird-like glances at the bedroom, opened the album, which hadPompeiion it.... What were those strange prints and photographs? Taken from statues, quite naked, from mural and ceiling frescoes; and such queer subjects, thought Aunt Stefanie. What was it all, what were those things and people and bodies and attitudes? Were they merely jokes which she did not understand?... Nevertheless they were enough to make her turn pale; and her wrinkled little witch-face grew longer and longer in dismay, while her mouth opened wide. She turned the pages of the album more and more swiftly, so as to be sure and miss nothing, and then went back to certain plates which struck her particularly. The world, so new to her, of classical perversion sped past her awe-struck eyes in undivined sinfulness, represented by man and beast and man-beast in contortions which her imagination, untutored in sensuality, could never have suspected. A devil's sabbath hypnotized her from out of those pages; and the book, weighing so heavy in her trembling old fingers, burnt her; but she simply could not slip it back into its hidden nook ... just because she had never known ... and because she was very inquisitive ... and because she had never suspected superlative sin.... Those were the portals of Hell; the people who had acted so and thought so would burn in Hell-fire for ever: she not, fortunately!
"What are you doing?"
Anton's voice startled her; she gave a little scream; the book slipped from her hands.
"Mustyou go prying about?" asked Anton, roughly.
"Well, can't I look at a book?" stammered Aunt Stefanie. "I wasn't doing anything improper!" she said, defending herself.
He picked up the album and shoved it back violently behind the Latin volumes. Then, becoming indifferent, he grinned, with eyes like slits:
"And what have you seen?"
"Nothing, nothing," stammered Stefanie. "You just came in ... and startled me so. I saw nothing, nothing.... Are you ready? Shall we go?"
Buttoned up in his great-coat, he followed her tripping little steps; he grinned at her scornfully: how much she had missed! And, if shehadseen anything, how she must have been shocked!
"He is the devil!" she thought, in her fright. "He is the devil! If it wasn't for that sinful money, which it would be such a pity for him not to leave to Ina, I should drop him altogether, I should never wish to see him again. For he is not all the thing...."
Ina d'Herbourg was waiting for them in the little house of her son-in-law and daughter, Frits and Lily van Wely: Frits, a callow little officer; Lily, a laughing, fair-haired little mother, up again pluckily after her confinement. There were the two children, Stefanus a year and Antoinetje a fortnight old; the monthly nurse, fat and pompous; the maid-of-all-work busy with the little boy; the twelve-o'clock lunch not cleaned away yet; a bustle of youth and young life: one child crowing, the other screaming, the nurse hushing it and filling the whole house with her swelling figure. The maid let the milk catch, opened a window; there was a draught; and Ina cried:
"Jansje, what a draught you're making! Shut the window, shut the window, here are Uncle and Aunt!..."
And Jansje, who knew that Uncle Anton and Aunt Stefanie were godfather and godmother, flew to the door, leaving the milk to boil over, forgetting to close the window, with the result that the old people were received amidst a cold hurricane which made Aunt Stefanie, whose throat was already irritated by Anton's smoke, cough still more and mumble:
"It's not the thing, a draught like this;sucha draught!"
The fire which Jansje had lighted in the little drawing-room had gone out again; and Lily and Frits, wishing above all to make things pleasant for the old people, now brought them back again to the dining-room, where Jansje, in her eagerness to clear the table, dropped and broke a plate, whereupon exclamations from Jansje and reproaches from Lily and despairing glances of Ina at her son-in-law Frits. No, Lily did not get that slovenliness from her, forshetook after the IJsselmondes and they were correct; Lily got it from the Derckszes. But Frits now understood that he must be very civil to Uncle Anton, whom he detested, while Lily, whom Uncle Anton always kissed at very great length, loathed him, felt sick at the sight of him, for Lily also had to make up to Uncle Anton, that being Mamma's orders. She had married Frits without any money; but the young couple had very soon perceived that money was not to be despised; and the only two from whom there was a trifle to be expected were Aunt Stefanie and Uncle Anton.
The old man, after being dragged there by his sister against his will, had recovered his good temper thanks to the lingering kiss which he had given Lily and, with his fists like clods upon his knees, sat chuckling and nodding in admiration when Nurse held up the yelling brat to him. And, though he was jealous of young, vigorous people, he found an emotion in his jealousy, found young, vigorous people pleasant to look at and considered that that virile little Frits, that callow, stiff little officer, might well make a good husband to his wife. He nodded at Lily and then at Frits, to convey that he understood them, and Lily and Frits smiled back vacuously. They did not understand him, but that didn't matter: he guessed that they were still very much in love, even though they had two brats; and he also guessed that they were keen on his bit of money. Well, they were quite right from their point of view; only he couldn't stand Ina, because, ever since D'Herbourg had helped him in his trouble with the little laundry-girl, she treated him with a kindly condescension, as the influential niece who had saved her imprudent uncle from thatsoesah.[1]He grinned, seeing through all that coaxing pretence and chuckling to himself that it was all wasted, because he had no intention of leaving them his bit of money. But he knew better than to let this out to Stefanie or any of them; on the contrary, amid all the pretty things that were said to him, he gloated over the gin-and-bitters which Frits so attentively set before him, after helping him off—he wasn't feeling cold now, was he?—with his great-coat. He thought the whole farce most diverting and laughed pleasantly and benevolently, with the air of a good, kind uncle who was so fond of the children, while he thought to himself:
"They sha'n't get one cent!"
And he chuckled so deliciously at the thought that he was quite pleased to give the fat monthly nurse a couple of guilders. They were all taken in—Aunt Stefanie, Ina and the young couple—when they saw Uncle behaving so good-naturedly and so generously; they looked upon him as hooked; and he left them in the illusion, which he so cleverly saw through. What the devil, he thought, in a dull, gathering rage, did he care about those young people? Hadn't they enough with their youth and their two vigorous bodies, that they must go coveting his few thousand guilders? And what did he care about that brat which they had christened Antoinette after him? He had a horror of new-born children, though he had sometimes thought children very nice when they were just a few years older. Things misted before his eyes, but he mastered himself in his dull rage and in his slimy thoughts and behaved benevolently and genially as the well-off uncle and godfather who was going to leave all his money to the brat.
"And Uncle Daan and Aunt Floor arrived yesterday," said Ina d'Herbourg, with a suppressed sigh, for she looked upon the Indian relations as unpresentable. "We said we'd call on them together to-day, didn't we, Aunt Stefanie?"
"That'll save her a cab-fare," thought Anton Dercksz.
"Yes," said Lily, "we might as well be going on, don't you think so, Uncle?"
"Certainly, dear."
"Frits'll come on presently, won't you, after barracks? I'll just go and get on my things. I do think it so nice of you, Uncle Anton, to come and have a look at the baby. I had begun to despair of your ever coming, for you had promised me so long...."
"You see Uncle always keeps his promises, dear...."
He said it with the appearance of kindliness, put out his hand as she passed, drew her to him and, as though under the softening influence of the visit, gave her another long, lingering kiss. She shuddered and hurried away. In the passage she met her husband, buckling on his sword.
"Don't let that filthy old scoundrel kiss you like that!" hissed Frits, furiously.
"How can I help it? The brute makes me sick!..."
He went out, slamming the front-door, thinking that his young happiness was already being defiled because they were hard up and had to besmirch themselves in consequence. Ina, Uncle and Aunt waited in the dining-room until Lily was ready.
"Uncle Daan must be very comfortably off," said Ina, with glittering eyes. "Papa, who is bound to know, always refuses to talk about money and wouldn't say how much he thought Uncle Daan had...."
"And how much would you say it was?" asked Aunt Stefanie.
"Oh, Aunt," said Ina, with a well-bred glance of her weary eyes, "Ineverspeak or think about money and I really don't know how rich Uncle Daan is ... but still I believe he is worth seven hundred thousand guilders. What makes them come to Holland so suddenly, in the winter? Business, Papa said; and he ought to know. But, as you know, Papa never says much and never talks about business or money. ButI'vebeen wondering to myself, could Uncle Daan have lost all his money? And mark my words: if so, Papa will have him on his hands."
For Uncle Daan and Aunt Floor, who were unpresentably Indian, had children of their own; there were no expectations therefore from that quarter; and Ina hated them with a profound hatred and, jealous of their wealth, spoke as much ill of them as she dared.
"Should you say so?" asked Aunt Stefanie.
"They've always been in business together," said Ina, "so,ifUncle Daan has lost his money, Papa is sure to have him on his hands."
"But, if he's worth seven hundred thousand guilders?" asked Anton Dercksz.
"Yes, in that case," said Ina, covetously. "But perhaps he hasn't seven hundred thousand. I don't know. I never talk about money; and what other people have isle moindre de mes soucis."
Lily came down, looking the sweetest of little fair-haired women in her fur boa; and the four of them went to the cab, while Jansje created a fresh draught by opening the door too wide.
And Ina insisted that Uncle Anton should sit in the front seat, beside Aunt Stefanie, and she and Lily with their backs to the horse, while Uncle Anton, with pretended gallantry, tried to resign the place of honour to her, though he was glad that she did not accept it. All that family was only a tie, which bound you without doing you the least good. There was that old bird of a Stefanie, who had dragged him from his reading, his warm room, his pipe, his Suetonius and his pleasant reverie, first to look at a brat to whom he wasn't going to leave a cent and next to call at an hotel on a brother who chose to come from India to Holland in December. All such unnecessary things; and what thousands of them you did in your life! There were times when you simply couldn't be your own master.... He indemnified himself by pressing his knees against Lily's and feeling the warmth of her fresh young body. His eyes grew misty.
The cab stopped at the bigpensionwhere Uncle Daan was accustomed to stay when he came home from India. They were at once shown in to Aunt Floor, who had seen them through the window; ababoewas standing at the door of the room.
"Come inn! Come insside!" cried Aunt Floor, in a bass voice and accentuating her consonants. "How d'ye do, Stefanie? How d'ye do, Anton? And how d'ye do, Ina ... and you, little Lily:allah,[2]two childr-r-ren alr-r-ready, that little thing!"
Aunt Floor had not got up to receive them; she was lying on a sofa and a secondbaboewas massaging her huge, fat legs. The girl's hands glided to and fro beneath her mistress' dressing-gown.
"Caughtt cold!" said Aunt Floor, angrily, as though the others could help it, after renewed words of welcome on their part and enquiries after the voyage. "Caughtt cold in the train from Paris. I assur-r-re you, I'm as stiff as a boar-r-rd. What came over Dhaan, to want to come to Gholland at thiss time of year, I cannott make out...."
"Why didn't you stay behind in India, Aunt?" asked Ina, well-bred and weary-eyed.
"Not likely! I ssee myself letting Dhaan gho alone! No, dear, we're man and wife and where Uncle Dhaan ghoesIgho. Old people like us belong to one another.... Dhaan is with Gharold now, in the other room: your Papa arrived a moment agho, Ina. Those two are talking bissiness of course. I asked Dhaan, 'Dhaan, what on ear-r-rth do you want to gho to Gholland for?' 'Bissiness!' says Dhaan. Nothing but bissiness, bissiness. I don't understand it: you can always wr-r-rite about bissiness. Year after year that confounded bissiness; and nothing ghoes r-r-right: we're as poor as r-r-rats.... There, Saripa,soeda,[3]that's enough: I'm as stiff as a boar-r-rd all the same."
The twobaboesleft the room; the anthracite-stove glowed like an oven, red behind its little mica doors. Aunt Floor had drawn herself up with a deep sigh and was now sitting: her fat, yellow face, with the Chinese slanting eyes, loomed like a full moon from out of the hair, still black, which went back, smooth and flat, to a largekondé;[4]and there was something of a mandarin about her as she sat, with her legs wide apart in the flannel dressing-gown and her fat, swollen little hands on her round knees, just as Anton Dercksz often used to sit. Her sunken breast hung like the bosom of atepèkong[5]in two billows on her stomach's formidable curve; and those rounded lines gave her an idol-like dignity, as she now sat erect, with her stiff, angry mandarin-face. From the long lobes of her ears hung a pair of enormous brilliants, which gleamed round her with startling brightness and did not seem to belong to her attire—the loose flannel bag—so much as to her own being, like a jewel set in an idol. She was not more than sixty; she was the same age as Ottilie Steyn de Weert.
"And is old Mamma well?... It's nice of you to have come," she said, remembering that she had not yet said anything amiable to her relations.
Her gelatinous mass now shook more genially on the sofa, while around her sat Stefanie, with her wrinkled witch-face; Anton, who recollected Floor forty years ago, when she was still a strapping youngnonna, anonnawith Chinese blood in her veins, which gave her an exotic attraction for the men; Ina d'Herbourg, very Dutch and correct, blinking her eyes with a well-bred air; and the fair-haired little wife, Lily.
"Why dhoesn't Dhaan come?" exclaimed Aunt Floor. "Lily, gho and see what's become of your gr-r-randpapa and your uncle."
"I'll go, Aunt," said Ina d'Herbourg. "You stay here, dear. She mustn't walk about much yet, Aunt."
And Ina, who was curious to see the rooms which Uncle Daan and Aunt Floor occupied, rose and went through Aunt's bedroom, with a quick glance at the trunks. One of thebaboeswas busy hanging up dresses in a wardrobe.
"Where are the gentlemen,baboe?"
"In the study,njonja."
Thebaboepointed the way to Ina through the conservatory. Well, they were handsome and no doubt expensive rooms. Ina knew that thepensionwas not a cheap one; and Uncle Daan and Aunt Floor would hardly be poor as "r-r-rats." So Uncle had his own bedroom and a study besides. Papa was with him now and they were doubtless talking business, for they were jointly interested in various undertakings. At home Papa never talked about business, vouchsafed no information, to Ina's great despair.... She heard their voices. And she was thinking of creeping up quietly through the conservatory—who knew but that she might overhear some detail which would tell her of the state of Uncle Daan's fortune?—from sheer innocent curiosity, when she suddenly stopped with a start. For she had heard Uncle Daan's voice, which had not changed during the five years since she had seen Uncle, exclaim:
"Harold, have you known it all this time?"
"Ssh!" she heard, in her father's voice.
And Uncle Daan repeated, in a whisper:
"Have you known it all this time?"
"Don't speak so loud," said Harold Dercksz, in a hushed tone. "I thought I heard somebody...."
"No, it's thebaboeclearing up ... and she doesn't understand Dutch...."
"Speak low for all that, Daan," said Harold Dercksz. "Yes, I've known it all this time!"
"All the time?"
"Yes, sixty years."
"I never ... I never knew it."
"Speak low, speak low! And isshedead now?"
"Yes, she's dead"
"What did you say her name was?"
"Ma-Boeten."
"That's it: Ma-Boeten. I was a child of thirteen. She was Mamma's maid and used to look after me too."
"It was her children who began to molest me. She told her son about it: he is amantri[6]in the rent-office."
"Yes."
"He's a damned villain. I gave him money."
"That was right.... But, you see, Daan, it's so long ago now."
"Yes, it's a very long time ago."
"Don't speak about it to Floor."
"No, never, never. That's why it's just as well she came with me. If she had stayed at Tegal, that damned villain might have.... Yes, it's certainly a very long time ago."
"And it's passing.... It's passing.... A little longer and ..."
"Yes, then it will all be past.... But to think that you, Harold, should have known it all this time!"
"Not so loud, not so loud! I hear something in the conservatory...."
It was Ina's dress rustling. She had heard with a beating heart, tortured with curiosity. And she had not understood a word, but she remembered the name of the deadbaboe, Ma-Boeten.
She now deliberately rustled the silk of her skirt, pretended to have just come through the conservatory, threw open the doors, stood on the threshold:
"Uncle Daan! Uncle Daan!"
She saw the two old men sitting, her father and his brother. They were seventy-three and seventy. They had not yet been able to recover their ordinary expression and relax the tense dismay of their old faces, which had gazed with blinded eyes into the distant past. Ina thought them both looking ghastly. What had they been talking about?Whatwas it that they were hiding?Whathad Papa known for sixty years?Whathad Uncle Daan only known for such a short time?... And she felt a shiver going along her, as of something clammy that went trailing by.
"I've come to look for you, Uncle Daan!" she exclaimed, with an affectation of cordiality. "Welcome to Holland, Uncle, welcome! You're not lucky with the weather: it's bleak and cold. You must have been very cold in the train. Poor Aunt Floor is as stiff as a board.... Uncle Anton is there too and Aunt Stefanie; and my Lily came along with us. I'm not interrupting you ... in your business?"
Uncle Daan kissed her, answered her in bluff, genial words. He was short, lean, bent, tanned, Indian in his clothes; a thin grey tuft of hair and the cut of his profile gave him a look of a parrot; and, thanks to this bird-like aspect, he resembled his sister Stefanie. Like her, he had quick, beady eyes, which still trembled with consternation, because of what he had been discussing with his brother Harold. He clawed a few papers together, crammed them into a portfolio, to give the impression that he and Harold had been talking business, and said that they were coming. They went back with Ina to the sitting-room and greetings were exchanged between Uncle Daan and those who had come to welcome him.
"Aunt Floor knows nothing," thought Ina, remembering how Aunt had just spoken about her coming to Holland.
Why had they come? What was the matter?Whatwas it that Papa had known for sixty years and Uncle Daan for only such a short time? Wasthatwhy he had come to Holland? Had it anything to do with money: a legacy to which they were entitled?... Yes, that was it, a legacy: perhaps they would still become very rich. Did Aunt Stefanie know about it? Uncle Anton? Aunt Ottilie? Grandmamma? Mr. Takma?...Whatwas it? And, if it was a legacy, how much?... She was burning with curiosity, while she remained correct, even more correct than she was by nature, in contrast with the Indian unconstraint of Uncle Daan—in his slippers—and the Chinesetepèkongthat was Aunt Floor, with her bosom billowing down upon her round stomach. She was burning with curiosity, while her eyes glanced wearily, while she made well-bred efforts to conceal her eager longing to find out. And stories were told that did not interest her. Uncle Daan and Aunt Floor talked about their children: Marinus, who was manager of a big sugar-factory and lived near Tegal, with a large family of his own; Jeanne—"Shaan," as Aunt called her—the wife of the resident of Cheribon; Dolf unmarried, a magistrate. She, Ina d'Herbourg, did not care a jot about the cousins, male or female, would rather never see them: they were such an Indian crew; and she just made herself pleasant, condescendingly, but not too much so, pretending to be interested in the stories of Clara, Marinus' daughter, who was lately married, and Emile, "Shaan's" son, who was so troublesome.
"Yes," said Aunt Floor, "and here we are, in Gholland, in this r-r-rottenpension... for bissiness, nothing but bissiness ... and yes,kassian,[7]we're still as poor as r-r-rats! What am I to do here for five months? I shall never stand it, if this weather keeps on. Luckily, I've got Tien Deysselman and Door Perelkamp"—these were two old Indian ladies—"and they'll soon look me up. They wr-r-rote to me to bring them some Chinese cards and I've brought twenty packs with me: that'll help me get through the five months...."
And Aunt Floor glared out of her angry old mandarin-face at her husband, "Dhaan."
No, thought Ina, Aunt Floor did not know about the legacy. Perhaps it wasn't a legacy. But then what was it?...
She and Lily went back in the cab that came for Harold; Stefanie drove Anton home in hers. Ina at once went in search of her husband: she must consult somebody and she knew of no one better. She found him in his office:
"Leopold, can I speak to you?" she asked.
"I have a consultation presently," he said, consequentially.
She knew that he was lying, that he had nothing to do. She sat down quietly, without removing her cloak or hat.
"Leopold ..."
She frightened him.
"What's the matter?" he asked.
"Wemustfind out why Uncle Daan and Aunt Floor have come to Holland."
"Goodness gracious!" he exclaimed. "Papa's affairs haven't gone wrong, have they?"
"I don't know, I don't think so; but there's something that's brought Uncle Daan over."
"Something? What?"
"I don't know, but there's something: something that Papa has known for sixty years, ever since he was a child of thirteen. Uncle Daan has only known it a little while and apparently has come to Holland to consult Papa."
"How do you know?"
"I know: take it from me that I know. And I know more besides."
"What is that?"
"That Aunt Floor doesnotknow and that Uncle Daan does not mean to tell her. That Grandmamma's oldbaboewas called Ma-Boeten and that she's dead. That her son is amantriat Tegal and that Uncle Daan has given him money. That's all I know."
They looked at each other. Both of them were very pale.
"What an incoherent story!" said Leopold d'Herbourg, barrister and solicitor, with a consequential shrug of the shoulders.
Ina, well-bred as usual, cast up her eyes wearily:
"It's very important. I don't know what it is, but it's important and I want to know. Could it have to do with a legacy?"
"A legacy?" echoed D'Herbourg, failing to see.
"Something that's due to us? Could thatmantriknow things which, if Uncle Daan gave him money ..."
"Perhaps," said D'Herbourg, "it has to do with money which Papa and Uncle Daan owe ..."
This time, Ina turned very pale:
"No," she exclaimed, "that would be ..."
"You can never tell. The best thing is not to talk about it. Besides, Papa won't let anything out, in any case."
But Ina's curiosity was too much for her. She nodded her head in her well-bred way, under the white bird of paradise in her hat:
"Imustknow," she said.
"How will you find out?"
"You might speak to Papa, ask him what's depressing him...."
"What's depressing him? But I've never known him to be anything but depressed, during all the twenty-three years that we've been married. Papa never talks to me; he even employs another solicitor for his business, as you know."
"ThenIwill ask Papa."
"That won't be any good."
"Imustknow," said Ina, rising. "I don't see a legacy in it, after what you've said. Oh dear, oh dear, who knows what it can be? Money perhaps which ..."
"It's certainly money."
"Which Papa and Uncle Daan ..."
"May have to repay, if ..."
"Do you think so?"
"They do so much business in common. That leads to all sorts of complications. And it won't be the first time that men who do a great deal of business ..."
"Yes, I understand."
"Perhaps it's better not to mix yourself up in it at all. You would do wiser to be careful. You never know what hornets' nest you're bringing about your ears."
"It happened sixty years ago. It dates sixty years back. What an immense time!" said Ina, hypnotized by the thought.
"That's certainly very long ago. The whole thing is out of date!" said D'Herbourg, pretending to be indifferent, though inwardly alarmed.
"No," said Ina, shaking the white bird of paradise, "it's something that is not yet past. Itcan'tbe. But Papa hoped that, before very long ..."
"What?"
"Itwouldbe past."
They both looked very pale:
"Ina, Ina, do be careful!" said D'Herbourg. "You don't know what you're meddling with!"
"No!" she said, like a woman in a trance.
She must know, she was determined to know. She resolved to speak to her father that evening.
[1]Malay: bother, scrape, fuss.
[1]Malay: bother, scrape, fuss.
[2]The Lord.
[2]The Lord.
[3]That will do.
[3]That will do.
[4]The chignon or knot of hair at the back of the head.
[4]The chignon or knot of hair at the back of the head.
[5]A Javanese dancer or nautch-girl, often old and ugly.
[5]A Javanese dancer or nautch-girl, often old and ugly.
[6]Native clerk.
[6]Native clerk.
[7]Oh dear! Poor things!
[7]Oh dear! Poor things!
She wandered round the house, greatly agitated and uncertain what to do. She heard her son Pol, the undergraduate, in his room downstairs, next to the front-door. He was sitting there smoking with some friends; and as she passed she listened to the lads' noisy voices. There was a ring at the door: it was her younger boy, Gus, her favourite; and, glad to hear his merry and youthful chatter, she forgot for a moment the feverish curiosity that consumed her so fiercely.
She now thought of going to her father in his study, but it was too near dinner-time, she feared, and Papa did not like being disturbed at this hour. She was restless, could not sit down, kept wandering about. Just imagine, if Papa was ruined, what should they do? Aunt Stefanie would perhaps leave something to Gus, she was fonder of him than of the others; but there were so many nephews and nieces. If only Aunt didn't fritter her little fortune away in legacies!... Her maternal feelings, always centring on the question of money, made her think of the future of her three children. Well, for Lily she was doing everything in her power, working on the feelings of both Aunt Stefanie and Uncle Anton. As for Pol, he must manage as best he could: if he had a million, he would still be hard up.
The dinner-hour approached; and she waited, with D'Herbourg and the two boys, in the dining-room, for Papa to come down. When Harold Dercksz entered, it seemed to her that Father's long, lean figure, which was always bent, was now more bent than ever; a bilious yellow gave his hollow cheeks a deep metallic colour. Ina loved a formal but cheerful table; the simple meal was tastefully served; she kept up a certain style in her home, was a verygrande dameof a housekeeper. She had brought up her children with the utmost correctness and could not understand that Lily had so soon kicked over the traces, immediately after her marriage: what a scene of slovenliness you always found at Frits and Lily's! She was pleased with her boys as she thought of it, pleased with their manners at table: Pol talked gaily and pleasantly, though not too noisily, because of Grandpapa; Gus made a little joke from time to time; then Ina would laugh and stroke his head. Harold Dercksz hardly spoke at all, listened to the boys with a smile of pain on his lips. D'Herbourg carved. There was usually a separate dish for Grandpapa: he had to be very careful because of his digestion and his liver. As a matter of fact, he was always in pain. Sometimes his forehead puckered with physical agony. He never spoke of what he suffered, did what the doctor told him, was always taciturn and gentle, quietly dignified, broken in body through illness, broken in soul through the melancholy that shone in the gentle glance of his old eyes with their discoloured irises. Ina looked after her father, began by seeing to his special dish; she was attentive and liked to have everything quite right in her house and at her table.
At dessert, however, her uncontrollable curiosity arose in her once more. Questions burnt upon her lips, but of course she would ask nothing during dinner ... and she again laughed at something that Gus said, stroked his curly head. She looked more motherly in her indoor dress; when she was with Gus, her weary eyes had not the same ultra-well-bred glance as under the waving white bird of paradise, when she sat cheek by jowl with fat Aunt Floor, who was so Indian. Papa got up at dessert and said, courteously:
"Do you mind, Ina? My pain's rather bad this evening...."
"Poor Father!" she said, kindly.
The old man left the room: Pol had jumped up at once to open the door for him. The parents and the two boys sat on a little longer. Ina told the others about Uncle Daan and Aunt Floor; they were amused at the twenty packs of Chinese playing-cards. Gus, who was a good mimic, imitated the Indian accent of Aunt Floor, whom he remembered from her last visit, a couple of years ago; and Ina laughed merrily at her boy's wit. Thus encouraged, Gus mimicked Aunt Stefanie, made his face look like an elderly bird's, with a quivering, flexible neck, and D'Herbourg roared with delight; but Pol, the undergraduate, cried:
"Don't forget, Gus, that you've got expectations from Aunt. You must never let her know you mimic her!"
"It's not nice of you to say that," said Ina, in a mildly reproachful tone. "No, Pol, it's not nice of you. You know Mamma doesn't like allusions to expectations and so forth. No, Pol, it's not very good taste.... I can't understand how Papa can laugh at it."
But the merriment continued because of Gus; and, when he imitated Uncle Anton, with his fists clenched on his knees, Ina allowed herself to be led on and they all three laughed, leagued against the Derckszes as in a family alliance of aristocratic Jonkheer d'Herbourgs against Indian uncles, aunts, granduncles and grandaunts.
"Yes, Grandpapa is certainly the best of them," said Pol. "Grandpapa is always distinguished."
"Well, Greatgranny"—as the children called the old lady—"Greatgranny, old as she is, is a very distinguished woman!" said Ina.
"What tons of old people we have in the family!" said Gus, irreverently.
Ina repressed him: no jokes about the old lady; for that matter, they all of them stood in awe of her, because she was so very old and remained so majestic.
"Aunt Ottilie has turned sixty, hasn't she?" Ina asked, suddenly, hypnotized by the number sixty, which loomed fatefully large before her eyes.
And the D'Herbourgs now ceased talking of money, but discussed the family instead. With the exception of Grandmamma and Papa—Greatgranny and Grandpapa to the boys—they pulled all the others to pieces and Gus mimicked them all: in addition to Uncle Anton, Aunt Stefanie and Aunt Floor, he mimicked Uncle Daan, mimicked the son who held a legal office out there, mimicked "Shaan," the resident's wife at Cheribon. He had seen them all in Holland, when they came home for anything from two to twelve months on leave; and they always provided food for discussion and jest in the D'Herbourg mansion. But Ina did not laugh any more and stood up, while her curiosity burnt her to the point of causing her physical pain.
Harold Dercksz was sitting upstairs at his big writing-table. A lamp with a green shade made him appear still yellower; and the wrinkles were sharply furrowed in the old man's worn face. He sat huddled in his chair, screening his eyes with his hand. In front of him lay great sheets of figures, which he had to examine, as Daan had asked him to. He stared before him. Sixty years ago he had seen the Thing. It was slowly passing, but in passing it came back again to him so closely, so very closely. The sight of it had given his child-brain and child-nerves a shock for all his life; and that he had grown old quietly, very old, older than he need have, was due to his self-restraint.... The thing of the past, the terrible Thing, was a ghost and looked at him with eyes while it came nearer, dragging its veil of mist over rustling leaves, over a path lined with sombre trees from which the leaves fell everlastingly.... The Thing was a ghost and came nearer and nearer in passing, before it would vanish entirely in the past; but never had a single creature appeared from behind the trees to stretch out a forbidding hand and hold back the ghastly Thing that went trailing by.... Was a shadow loitering behind the trees, was some one really appearing, did he really see a hand motioning the thing, the ghastly Thing, to stop in its passage through the rustling leaves?... Oh, if it would only pass!... How slowly, how slowly it passed!... For sixty long years it had been passing, passing.... And the old man and the old woman, both in their respective houses or sitting together at the windows, were waiting until it should have passed.... But it would not pass, so long as they were still alive.... Harold Dercksz felt pity for the old man, for the old woman.... Oh, if it would but pass!... How long the years lasted!... How oldtheyhad grown!... Why must they grow so old?... Was that their punishment,theirpunishment, the punishment of both of them? For he now knew what part his mother had played in the crime, the terrible crime. Daan had told him; Ma-Boeten had told her son; themantrihad told Daan. There were so many who knew it! And the old people believed that nobody ... that nobody knew it except ... except old Dr. Roelofsz!... Oh, so many knew it, knew the Thing that was buried and kept on raising its spectral form, the secret that was always rising up again in its clammy mist.... Oh, that he must needs grow so old,soold that Daan now knew it too! If only Daan held his tongue and did not tell Floor! Would he hold his tongue? Would themantrigo on holding his tongue? Money must be paid, at least until the old, the poor old people were dead ... and until the Thing was past for them and with them....
A gentle tap; and the door opened: he saw his daughter on the threshold.
"Father dearest," she said, winningly.
"What is it, dear?"
Ina came nearer.
"I'm not disturbing you, I hope? I came to see how you were. I thought you looked so bad at dinner...."
She tended him, like a good daughter; and he appreciated it. His heart was sensitive and soft and he appreciated the companionship of the home: Ina's care, the boys' youth imparted a genial warmth to his poor chilled heart; and he put out his hand to her. She sat down beside his chair, giving a quick glance at the papers before him, interested in the sight of all those figures, which no doubt represented the state of Papa's fortune and Uncle Daan's. Then she asked:
"Are you ill, Father dear?"
"Yes," he said, moaning, "I'm in pain." And, moved by her affection, he added, "Better if it were over with me soon."
"Don't say that: we could never do without you."
He smiled, with a gesture of denial:
"You would have a trouble the less."
"Why, you know you're no trouble to me."
It was true and she said it sincerely; the note of sincerity rang true in his child's motherly voice.
"But you oughtn't to be always working like this," she went on.
"I don't do much work."
"What are all those figures?"
She smiled invitingly. He knew her curiosity, had known it ever since her childhood, when he had caught her ferreting in his writing-desk. Since that time, he had locked everything up.
"Business," he replied, "Indian business. I have to look into these figures for Uncle Daan, but it doesn't mean much work."
"Is Uncle Daan satisfied with the business?"
"Yes, he is. We shall be rich yet, dear."
"Do you think so?"
Her voice sounded greedy.
"Yes. Have no fear. I'll leave you something yet."
His voice sounded bitter.
"Oh, Father, I really wasn't thinking of that. I do worry about money sometimes, because of Lily, who married on nothing: what have Frits and Lily to live on? And because of my boys. I don't care about money myself."
It was almost true; it had become true as the years went on. Since she had grown older, she thought of money more for her children's sake; motherliness had developed in her soul, even though that soul remained material and small.
"Yes," said Harold Dercksz, "I know."
"You are so depressed, Father."
"I am just the same as usual."
"No, Uncle Daan has made you depressed. I can see it."
He was silent and on his guard.
"You never speak out, Father. Is there nothing I can do for you? What's depressing you?"
"Nothing, dear."
"Yes, there is; yes, there is. Tell me what's depressing you."
He shook his head.
"Won't you tell me?"
"There's nothing."
"Yes, there's something. Perhaps it's something terrible."
He looked her in the eyes.
"Father, is it a secret?"
"No, dear."
"Yes, it is; it's a secret. It's a secret, a secret that's depressing you ... since I don't know how long."
He turned cold in his limbs and all his soul armed itself, as in a cuirass, and he remained like that, on his guard.
"Child, you're fancying things," he said.
"No, I'm not, but you won't speak. It hurts me to see you so sad."
"I am unwell."
"But you are depressed ... by that terrible thing ... that secret...."
"There's nothing."
"No, there must be something. Is it about money?"
"No."
"Is it about money which Uncle Daan ..."
He looked at her.
"Ina," he said, "Uncle Daan sometimes has different ideas about absolute honesty in business ... from those which I have. But he always ends by accepting my view. I am not depressed by any secret about money."
"About what then?"
"Nothing. There is no secret, dear. You're fancying things."
"No, I'm not. I ... I ..."
"You know?" he asked, loudly, with his eyes looking into hers.
She started.
"N-no," she stammered. "I ... I don't know anything ... but ... Ifeel..."
"What?"
"That there's a secret that's depressing you."
"What about?"
"About ... about something that's happened ..."
"You know," he said.
"No, I don't."
"Nothing has happened, Ina," he said, coldly. "I am an old, sick man. You tire me. Leave me in peace. Leave me in peace."
He rose from his chair, nervous, agitated. She drew up her weary eyes with her well-bred expression, with her mother's expression, the expression of the IJsselmondes, who were her source of pride.
"I will not tire you, Papa," she said—and her voice, sharp but tuned to the correct social enunciation, sounded affected—"I will not tire you. I will leave you in peace. I came to you, I wanted to speak to you ... because I thought ... that you had some worry ... some sorrow. I wanted to share it. But I will not insist."
She went on, slowly, with the offended haughtiness of agrande dame, as Harold Dercksz remembered seeing his mother leave the room after a conversation. A reproachful tenderness welled up in him; he had almost kept her back. But he restrained his emotion and let her go. She was a good daughter to him, but her soul, the soul of a small-minded woman, was all consumed with money needs, with foolish conceit about small, vain things—because her mother was a Freule IJsselmonde—and with a passionate curiosity. He let her go, he let her go; and his loneliness remained around him. He sank into his chair again, screened his eyes with his hand; and the lamplight under the green shade furrowed the wrinkles sharply in his worn face of anguish. He stared out before him. What did she know? What did she guess? What had she overheard perhaps ... in the conservatory, as she came to them?... He tried to remember the last words which he had exchanged with Daan. He could not remember. He decided that Ina knew nothing, but that she guessed, because of his increased depression.... Oh, if the Thing would only pass!... Oh, if the old people would onlydie!... Oh, that no one might be left to know!... It was enough, it was enough, there had been enough years of self-reproach and silent, inward punishment for people who were so old, so very old....
And he stared, as though he were looking the Thing in the eyes.
He stared all the evening long; sitting in his chair, his face twisted with illness and pain, he fell asleep with the light sleep of old people, quick to come and quick to go, and he saw himself again, a child of thirteen, in the night in thepasangrahanand heard his mother's voice:
"O my God, O my God, no, no,notin the river!"
And he saw those three—but young still—his mother, Takma, Ma-Boeten; and between them his father's lifeless body, in the pelting rain of that fatal night....
Ina lay awake all night. Yes, curiosity was her passion, had been since her childhood. If she could only know now, now, now! Her husband would give her no assistance, was afraid of complications which might threaten, if they meddled with matters that did not concern them. She herself was curious to the point of imprudence. She now wanted to talk to Uncle Daan, whom she was sure to meet next day at Grandmamma's....
She went that afternoon to the Nassaulaan. Old Anna opened the door, glad that the old lady was not neglected:
"Good-afternoon, ma'am.... Mr. Takma, Dr. Roelofsz and Mrs. Floor are upstairs.... Yes, you can go up presently.... Thank you, the old lady is very well indeed.... Yes, yes, she'll outlive us all yet.... Would you mind waiting a minute, in the morning-room? We're keeping up a nice fire here now, in the cold weather; for, though the mistress never comes downstairs, as you know, there's usually somebody of the family waiting...."
Old Anna gave Ina a chair. The servant had turned the morning-room into a comfortable waiting-room. This secured that there was never too much fuss around the old lady, which would not have done at all. The closed stove burnt well. The chairs were arranged in a circle. And the old servant, from politeness, to keep Ina company, stood by her for a moment, talking, till Ina said:
"Sit down, Anna."
The old servant sat down respectfully on the edge of a chair. That was a habit which visitors had adopted with her, because she was so old. She asked politely after Mrs. Lily's little ones.
"The first really fine day, Mrs. van Wely will bring the babies to see their great-great-grandmamma."
"Yes, the mistress will love that," said the old servant; but she jumped up at the same time and exclaimed, "Well, I never! There's Miss Stefanie too! Well, they're certainly not neglecting the old lady!"
She showed Aunt Stefanie de Laders in to Ina and withdrew to the kitchen.
"Mr. Takma, the doctor and Aunt Floor are upstairs," said Ina. "We will wait a little, Aunt.... Tell me, Aunt, do you know why Uncle Daan has really come to Holland?"
"Business?" said Stefanie, interrogatively.
"I don't think so. I believe there's something the matter."
"Something the matter?" said Stefanie, with rising interest. "What sort of thing? Something that's not quite proper?"
"I can't tell what it is exactly. As you know, Papa never lets anything out."
"Is Uncle Daan ruined?"
"I thought he might be, but Papa says positively that there is no question of money. As towhatit is ..."
"But what could it be?"
"There'ssomething."
They looked into each other's eyes, both of them burning with curiosity.
"How do you know it, Ina?"
"Papa is very much depressed since he's seen Uncle Daan."
"Yes, buthowdo you know that there's something the matter?"
The need to talk overcame Ina's prudence:
"Aunt Stefanie," she whispered, "I really couldn't help it ... but yesterday, when I went to fetch Uncle Daan and Papa in Uncle's study, I heard ... in the conservatory ..."
Aunt Stefanie, eager to learn, tremulously nodded her restless little bird's-head.
"I heard ... Papa and Uncle Daan talking for a moment. Of course I didn't listen; and they stopped speaking when I went in. But still I heard Uncle Daan say to Papa, 'Have you known it all this time?' And then Papa said, 'Yes, sixty years.'"
"Sixty years?" said Aunt Stefanie, in suspense. "That's ever since Ottilie was born. Perhaps it had to do with Ottilie. You know, Ina, Aunt Ottilie is ..."
"Takma's daughter?"
Aunt Stefanie nodded:
"People used to talk a lot about it at one time. They've forgotten it now. It all happened so long ago. Mamma did not behave at all properly. Yes, she has been very sinful."
"Could that be what they were talking about?"
"No, I don't think so. Uncle Daan knew all about it. And Papa would not have said, 'I've known it for sixty years.'"
"No," said Ina, lost in conjecture.
And her usually weary eyes were bright and clear, in their effort to penetrate the vagueness of the Thing which she saw.
"No," said Stefanie, "it can't be that."
"What then?"
"Something ... about Mamma."
"About Grandmamma?"
"Yes, it's sure to have been about Grandmamma.... Sixty years ago...."
"What a long time!" said Ina.
"I was a girl of ... seventeen," said Aunt Stefanie. "Yes, it was a long time ago."
"And you were seventeen."
"Yes.... That's when Papa Dercksz died."
"Grandpapa?"
"Yes. He was drowned, you know."
"Yes, it dates back to that time."
"Yes.... Whatcanit be?"
"Do you remember Grandmamma'sbaboe?"
"I do. She was called Ma-Boeten."
"She's dead."
"How do you know?"
"I heard it."
"In the conservatory?"
"Yes, I heard it in the conservatory."
"What else did you hear?"
"Ma-Boeten's son is amantriin the Tegal rent-office."
"Well...?"
"Uncle Daan gives him money."
"Money?"
"Either to speak ... or to hold his tongue. I believe it's to hold his tongue."
"Then can anything have happened?"
"Sixty years ago? Auntie,can'tyou remember?"
"But, my dear, I was so young, I didn't notice things. I was a girl of seventeen. Yes, yes, Auntie herself was young once. I was seventeen.... I and the other children had remained in the town: a sister of Grandmamma's was taking charge of us. Papa had gone to the hills for his health. He and Mamma were staying at apasangrahanand—I rememberthisnow—they had taken Harold with them. Yes, I remember, Harold was not with us. They had taken him: Harold was Papa's favourite.... It was there that Papa was drowned. One night, in thekali.[1]He was restless, could not sleep, walked into the jungle, missed his way and slipped into the river. I remember all that."
"And Papa was in thepasangrahanwith them?"
"Yes, your father was with them. He was a little fellow of thirteen then."
"And he hasknown, since then?"
"Is that what he says?"
"Then he must know something ... about the hills, about thepasangrahan...."
"Ina, whatcanit be?"
"I have no idea, Aunt, but it must be something ... about Grandmamma...."
"Yes," said Aunt Stefanie, with sudden caution; "but, whatever it is, dear ... it happened so long ago. If it's anything, it's probably something ... improper. Don't let's rake it up. It is so long ago now, sixty years ago. And Grandmamma is so old...."
She stopped; and her beady bird's-eyes stared and blinked. It was as if she suddenly saw something looming, something that was coming nearer; and she did not want to talk any more. She did not even want to know. A shuddering anxiety, mingled with a mist of vaguest memories, swam in front of her blinking eyes. She would enjoin silence upon it. It was not wise to penetrate too deeply into the things of the past. Years passed, things passed: it was best to let them pass quietly, to let sin pass by.... The powers of Hell lurked in sinfulness. Hell lurked in curiosity. Hell lurked as a devil's sabbath in Anton's books and albums. It lurked in her mother's past. It lurked in Ina's devouring curiosity. She, Aunt Stefanie, was afraid of Hell: she wanted to go to Heaven. She no longer wanted to know what might have happened. And she shut her blinking eyes before the mist of remembrance and kept them closed:
"No, dear," she repeated, "don'tlet us rake it up."
She would not say any more; and Ina was certain that Aunt knew, that Aunt at any rate remembered something. But she knew Aunt Stefanie: she would not speak now, any more than Papa would. Was she on her guard? Oh, what was it, what could it be?