The General was working in his study; Aunt Sidonie was probably writing her "Court Etiquette;" Ottomar had not yet returned from parade; Elsa had fulfilled her household duties, had dressed herself, and had now time, before breakfast, to read Meta's letters.
This morning two had again arrived together. Elsa had put them unread into her pocket when they were given to her, knowing that Meta's letters were not of pressing importance. She had now gone into the garden, and was strolling under the tall trees near the wall of the Schmidts' garden, her favourite walk, and with a smile on her face was deciphering one of the letters, the first she had put her hand upon; it did not generally signify in what order they were read. It was no easy task; Meta wrote a characteristic but not a particularly legible hand. Each letter stood by itself without reference to its neighbours on the right or left, and all had a decided objection to the horizontal, and either ran gaily up to the height above or drooped sadly towards the lower regions which belonged properly to the next line. Interspersed amongst them were strange hieroglyphics resembling swords or lances, which were probably meant for stops, but as they were never to be found where they were expected, and, indeed, in their superabundant zeal frequently appeared in the middle of a word, they rather increased than lessened the confusion.
Elsa at length made out the following:
"Cruel one! I understand all now, I may say for the first time in my life; and you--you yourself, your last letter--oh! that last letter! When men are silent stones will talk; if after five long anxious days the unhoped-for, unexpected meeting with the man she appeared to love, only gives the proud Elsa matter for a humorous description of that very meeting, poor Meta may dare to hope, does hope, and--loves! Yes, she loves--loves him whom you scorn, whom you coldly turn your back upon because the skirts of a princess have touched yours! You will say that this is pity--not love! But are not pity and love twin sisters! Yes, I have suffered with him, I still suffer with him; I see his honest blue eyes swimming with tears, I see those tears falling persistently and slowly down the sunburnt cheeks into the curly beard; but the last tear--the very last--before it vanishes in the clouds of tender melancholy, I will myself wipe away--yes, I! I have made up my mind. To-morrow morning papa shall have the horses put to--to-morrow evening you will see the face of one who pities you but is determined not to spare you the indignant countenance of his avenger and of your too happy
"Meta."
The second letter was as follows:
"You will not see it! Beloved, adored Elsa, forgive me! now in the depth of night, when all is still, so still that I can hear the blood coursing through my temples, and I start if our Castor barks in the courtyard; if an apple, which I had forgotten, or which I could not reach, rustles through the dry leaves of the tree in front of my window and falls to the ground--they still look wonderful, but are all rotten--now, only when I read your letter for the second time, do I understand it, and perceive the earnest, sorrowful tone that pierces through the hollow ring of your mirth. One word has made all clear to me; one single, deep, heartfelt word, so deep and so heartfelt as can come only from the heart and the pen of my Elsa. You write: 'He walked up the gallery, the Princess spoke to me very graciously, as was apparent from her smiles and the kind tone of her soft voice; but I confess, to my shame, that her first words were Hebrew to me.' To your shame?--Elsa--Elsa! to mine, to my deepest, most heart-rending shame! Oh, heavens! what does not lie under that one word 'Hebrew!" Your grief, your sorrow, your penitence, your love! Well, then, love him! I resign him; I must do so! and my visit to you also. Papa cannot, as it happens, let me have the horses to-morrow, because he must send his fat sheep to Prora, and mamma wants to make plum-jam. Let me weep and sob out my sorrow in solitude and plum-jam, and keep a little love for your too unhappy
"Meta."
"What absurd nonsense!" said Elsa.
But she did not laugh, but said it, on the contrary, very gravely; read the scrawl again very carefully, and only dropped the letters into her pocket when Aunt Sidonie appeared through the door of the room which opened into the garden and came down the steps towards her.
"I must rest a little," said Sidonie.
"How far have you got?" asked Elsa.
"To an extremely difficult chapter--to the marriage festivities. Malortie leaves me altogether in the dark upon this point. The examples which he gives on page 181 of the second volume, give an immense amount of information, but only of use for the chamberlains at great courts: 'Marriage of their late Majesties'--à la bonne heure! 'Programme of the marriage by proxy of his Majesty the King Don Pedro of Portugal and Algarve'----"
"Who did he marry?" asked Elsa.
Sidonie, who was walking by her side with her hands behind her back, stood still in astonishment.
"Child! child! is it possible? You read me that chapter yourself only yesterday evening. I have been lying awake and racking my brains over it all night, and you have forgotten that his Highness's illustrious bride was the Princess Stephanie of Hohenzollem-Sigmaringen? But the fact is, that you take no interest in my work; you do not, or will not, understand what an immense benefit a really comprehensive complete book on ceremonial, suited to small courts, would be! Well, well, child, I am not angry with you. You have never had much to do with such matters; how should you be expected to understand their importance, though you do now and then suggest very useful ideas on some of the most difficult points! Now imagine this: at the wedding of his late Majesty two Lieutenant-Generals, Herr von Brauchitsch and Herr von Kessel, who stood at the two ends of the table, carved the dishes, gave them to the footmen standing behind them, these to the pages, and from the latter they were received by the lords and gentlemen in waiting. That is all very well, but how are two Lieutenant-Generals to be found at a small court such as ours was?"
"Then take two Lieutenants," said Elsa.
"Capital!" said Sidonie. "That--no, that will not not do! What would become of precedence if I began with Lieutenants? But you are not listening."
"Indeed I am, aunt. I was only thinking that this very evening we shall have two Lieutenant-Generals here, and that I should much prefer a few Lieutenants. We really have too few dancing men."
"Ottomar can bring some of his brother officers; besides, there are not so very few. There is Count Golm, who told me he was passionately fond of dancing; there is Tettritz, there is Schönau--he says he has given up dancing, but that cannot be allowed in a Second Captain. There is----"
Her aunt named half a dozen names, but not the only one which Elsa wished to hear.
Elsa was stooping over the trellis which ran along the wall between the two great elm-trees.
"And Captain Schmidt, has he refused?"
"I did not send him the invitation, my dear child."
"You did not send it!"
Elsa started up quickly; her expressive face showed surprise and annoyance.
"How can you excite yourself so over such a trifle, my dear child? It occurred to me, just as I was giving the letters to August, that we are going to give another party in a few weeks, to which we must invite Major Müller and some of that set; the Captain can be asked with them."
"But why should he be!" exclaimed Elsa; "I remember that evening at Golmberg, when, without intending it, he was almost the only speaker at the table, and gave Count Golm besides a lesson which it is to be hoped he has not forgotten."
"That is exactly what decided me," said Sidonie; "just that warm discussion which you and your papa told me of between the two gentlemen--the two gentlemen, you hear, Elsa, I make no distinction of rank. We are giving a party in honour of the Count, and as a return for the civilities he showed you. Would it be courteous, would it be becoming, to invite at the same time a gentleman--mark that, Elsa--a gentleman with whom he has had at his own table--tranchons le mot!--an altercation!"
"But he deserved the lesson."
"And I suppose is to have a repetition of it here."
"That he certainly will not. Captain Schmidt is courtesy itself."
Sidonie stopped in her walk, her good-natured eyes looked almost sharply into Elsa's face, which was flushed with the warmth of the dispute.
"If I could not see into your heart, Elsa, as clearly as in a looking-glass, I really should not know how to explain the perverseness which leads you to praise the courtesy of a simple merchant-captain at the expense of your aunt's. Child, child, do not you bring sorrow on your dear papa, who already takes such a gloomy view of life; and on your aunt, who lives only for her 'Court Etiquette' and for you."
"I do not understand what you mean, aunt," answered Elsa, blushing up to the roots of her hair.
"Nor I either, thank God," answered Sidonie, wiping her eyes; "only I get so anxious when I see your papa so out of spirits, as he was this morning when he gave me Aunt Valerie's letter; he never answers her letters himself, although this last one is really so touchingly humble, that I shall find it very difficult to be severe with her again."
"How can one be severe with a person who is so unhappy as you say Aunt Valerie is?"
"Child, you cannot understand," answered Sidonie; "you must trust to your papa and me. There are things which can never be forgiven."
"Not even if one is sorry for them, as Aunt Valerie evidently is? Is it only a brother who is to be forgiven until seventy times seven, and not a sister also?"
This was another of Elsa's terrible ideas which Sidonie did not know how to meet. Her kind eyes looked around as if seeking for help, and rested at last on the trellis, where they wandered up and down.
"At last I have got it into order," she exclaimed: "see, Elsa, for the last three days the bed has not been trodden down nor the leaves torn off the trellis. It is only a wild vine, but it was beginning to look so pretty; August swore he did not do it; but how can one believe people? Well, I have gained my object."
"It is wonderfully quiet over there to-day," said Elsa.
"I wish to heaven it were always so," answered the aunt.
"Even the manufactory chimney is not smoking," continued Elsa. "Good heavens! I have only just remarked it. I hope no misfortune has happened! Have you heard anything, August!"
August, who came to call the ladies to breakfast, was astonished that the ladies had not heard of it. Herr Schmidt had dismissed twenty or thirty men last Thursday, because they--with respect be it said--were Socialists and Communists; and the rest, who are not much better, seized the opportunity and demanded from Herr Schmidt enormous wages. Well, Herr Schmidt of course turned off the ringleaders, and they came back with the others in great crowds to murder Herr Schmidt, when the Captain, who was at Golmberg with the General and Fräulein Elsa, stood in the doorway and--did you not see?--pulled out a pair of pistols; and they all took to their heels and went on strike, as they call it, when they do not work, and drink schnaps. Since yesterday evening there has not been so much as a cat in the entire building, and the workmen at the other marbleworks have also struck, to keep them company. And they say it will cost Herr Schmidt several thousand thalers a day, and that he will soon have to give in; but I don't believe that, for Herr Schmidt, as the ladies know, is A 1."
"Shocking!" said Sidonie, shaking her head; "such near neighbours! I warned your papa when he bought the house. It really is not safe. And people like that are to be invited!"
Elsa did not answer. When the servant mentioned Reinhold, her tell-tale heart beat rapidly, and she had involuntarily felt for the compass which, since their last meeting at the Exhibition, she had always carried in her pocket, that she might return it to him at the first opportunity. Her aunt's observation had filled her with speechless indignation. But when, a few minutes later, she sat opposite to her father at the breakfast-table, she asked him, to Sidonie's great dismay, without further preparation, if he had heard what had happened to the Schmidts; and that Herr Schmidt and the Captain had been apparently in danger of their lives; and should not Ottomar go to-day and return the Captain's visit, the rather that her aunt had postponed to the following week the invitation she had already written him?
"Certainly!" answered the General; "Ottomar shall take the invitation himself. I want to speak to the Captain, and quite reckoned upon seeing him this evening."
Elsa cast down her eyes to avoid seeing the flush of embarrassment which she felt sure must cover her aunt's cheeks at that moment.
"Has my son returned?" asked the General of the servant.
"The Lieutenant has just returned from parade, and has gone to his room to dress." The General commissioned the ladies to inform Ottomar of his wishes with regard to the visit and the invitation, and to tell him that there was a letter for him on his writing-table; he had to attend a board, and was already a few minutes late: he begged them not to disturb themselves on his account.
The General rose, made a stately bow to the ladies, and left the room. He had, contrary to his custom, eaten scarcely anything, and appeared absent and gloomy. This had not escaped Elsa; but she did not venture to ask any questions, any more than she ventured now to ask her aunt what she was thinking of, as she silently and with unwonted energy picked the last remnant of meat from an unlucky wing of chicken. She knew too well that it was not "the difficult chapter" in the "Court Etiquette." Fortunately Ottomar soon appeared; but neither did he bring cheerfulness: the Major had again been unbearable--the same evolution over and over again; he had blown up the officers after the parade as if they had been school-boys; it was unbearable, he was sick of the whole business; he had rather throw it all up at once.
Elsa thought the opportunity a bad one for troubling her brother, while he was so put out, with the commission which lay so near her heart, and was glad that her aunt did not start the subject, as she had feared. But the letter which was awaiting him on his father's table could not be delayed.
"Why was not the letter brought to my room?" said Ottomar to the servant, raising his eyebrows.
"I know nothing about it, sir," answered August.
Ottomar had already laid aside his napkin, and was rising, but now said: "I dare say it is not very important; will you hand me that dish, Elsa? I am as hungry as a wolf."
All the same he hardly touched the food, but poured out successively several glasses of wine, which he drank down quickly.
"I am too thirsty to eat," he said; "perhaps I shall have a better appetite an hour hence. Shall we leave the table?"
He pushed back his chair, and went to the door leading to his father's study, but stopped a moment on the way and passed his hand over his forehead and eyes. "That confounded parade," he said; "it would make the strongest man nervous."
He was gone; his behaviour had struck Elsa painfully. She could not believe that the parade was the sole cause of his bad spirits: he had borne the same wearisome duties easily enough before. But for some time past he had seemed changed: his cheerful spirits and good humour had vanished; in the last few days especially she had been struck by his gloomy, disturbed manner. She thought she knew what was the cause, and had determined more than once to speak to him about it. It was wrong not to have done so, and now it was perhaps too late.
Elsa thought over all this while again walking in her favourite haunt in the garden; she was too much excited to undertake any of her usual occupations. Perhaps Ottomar would come into the garden too; or she might call him when he left his father's room, the door of which she could see through the open door of the dining-room.
He stayed long, as it seemed to her impatience. Perhaps he was answering the letter at his father's table; but at last he emerged, buttoning his uniform, and came into the garden; he had no doubt seen her in the walk under the trees.
He had not observed her. With head bare and eyes cast down, still fingering the buttons of his coat, he came slowly towards her. His handsome face was dark as night, in spite of the bright sunlight which shone upon it; Elsa saw how his lips trembled and quivered.
"In heaven's name! what is the matter, Ottomar?"
"How you startled me!"
"And you me still more! What has happened, Ottomar? I implore you to tell me! Is it the letter?--a challenge?"
"Or a sentence of death, perhaps? Nothing of importance--a registered letter which my father received for me."
"An unimportant letter--registered! But if it is not the letter, it is what has for so long worried and absorbed you. How do matters stand between you and Carla, Ottomar!"
"Between me and Carla? What an extraordinary question! How should matters stand between oneself and a lady to whom one will shortly be betrothed?"
"Ottomar, look me in the face. You do not love Carla!"
Ottomar tried to meet her glance, but was not quite successful. "You are silly," he said, with an embarrassed smile; "those are girlish fancies."
"And is not Carla a girl? And do you not think that she has fancies too?--that she has pictured to herself the happiness that she hopes for at your side?--that for her, as for every other girl, this happiness can only exist with love, and that she, that you both will be unhappy if this love is absent on one side or the other, or on both? Do you not believe this?"
"I do not believe a word of it," said Ottomar.
He looked at his sister now and smiled; but his eyes were fixed and hard, and his sad yet ironical smile cut Elsa to the heart.
"And yet?" she said sadly.
"And yet! Look here, my dear child; the matter is very simple. I require for my own expenses, and to pay off the debts that I was obliged to incur before I came into the enjoyment of my fortune this spring, ten thousand thalers a year. My income is, as you know, in consequence of the absurdly small rents on the property, five thousand. Carla has five thousand a year; the two together make ten thousand. Therefore I mean to marry her, and the sooner the better."
"In order to pay your debts?"
"Simply in order to live; for this--this everlasting dependence, this everlasting concealment about nothing at all--because everything is known, after all--this--this----"
The words would not come; he trembled all over. Elsa had never seen him so. Her limbs trembled also; but she was determined to do what she thought her duty--what she had never so clearly recognised as her duty till that moment.
"Dear Ottomar," said she, "I do not ask if you really require such a frightful amount of money. Papa has often told us----"
"That when he was a lieutenant, he managed upon eighteen thalers a month. For heaven's sake, no more of that! Times were different then. My father was in the Line; I am in the Guards; and he and I--are like the Antipodes."
"Very well. I take it for granted that you require as much as you say. In three years I shall also be of age, and shall then have five thousand thalers; I will gladly give them to you, if----"
"'I am not married by that time.' Is that what you meant to say?"
"I will not marry then. I--I will never marry."
She could not any longer keep back her tears, which now streamed from her eyes. Ottomar put his arm round her.
"You dear, good Elsa," said he. "I really do believe that you are capable of it; but do you not see that it would be a thousand times more hateful to save oneself at the cost of a sister whom one dearly loves, than at the cost of a woman whom one does not love certainly, but who very probably does not wish to be loved?"
"But, Ottomar, that--that is just it," exclaimed Elsa, drying her tears. "Why marry Carla, of whom I cannot say that she is incapable of loving; who, indeed, I am persuaded, does love you at this moment, in her way? But her way is not your way; and that you would soon find out, even if you yourself loved her, which you avowedly do not. You are not suited to one another. With the one exception that, in spite of her short sight, she rides well and is passionately fond of it, I do not know a single interest that you have in common. Her music--that is to say, her Wagner music--about which she is so enthusiastic, is hateful to you; her books, which I am convinced she very often does not understand herself, you will never look at; and it is the same on every subject. And the worst of all is, that what she understands by love is not what you understand by it. You have--say what you will, and brilliant man of society as you are, and I hope always will be--a tender, kind heart, which longs to beat against a heart of the same nature. Carla's love is, I fear, too much mixed with vanity, lies too much on the glittering, sparkling surface of life; and if you longed some day to hear a deeper note, and struck that note yourself, you would find no echo in her heart."
"Why, Elsa, you are wonderfully learned in matters of the heart!" said Ottomar. "Whom did you learn it all from--from Count Golm?"
Elsa blushed up to the roots of her hair; she drew her arm out of her brother's. "I have not deserved that," she said.
Ottomar seized her hand and pressed it to his lips. "Forgive me," he said. "I feel myself that my jokes are always unlucky now. I don't know why. But Golm himself is the cause of this one. He is mad about you, as you probably know already, and he talked of nothing but you when we met in the park just now as we were riding home. He was riding one of his own horses, which he has had sent after him; so it looks as if he meant to stay here. However, I may tell you for your comfort that I am not so very fond of Golm. I do not think we should ever be very great friends, unless he happened to present himself in the capacity of--but I will not make my little Elsa angry again. How many have accepted for to-night? Does Clemda come? He was not on parade to-day."
It was evident that Ottomar wished to change the subject, and Elsa knew that she had spoken in vain. Her heart was heavy; misfortune was approaching her, invisible but unavoidable, just as it did when he had told her that the vessel would run aground in ten minutes or a quarter of an hour. And then he had been at her side, had remained by her; she had looked in the brave blue eyes and felt no fear, for she had known that this man was inured to dangers. And as she walked silently at her brother's side--who, silent and gloomy also, had evidently fallen back into his melancholy musings--her faithful sister's heart told her that the amiable, careless, light-hearted young man would and must succumb to a serious danger, unless some stronger hand than hers interfered to save him. Perhaps--no, certainly--his hand could do it; only that there was scarcely a possibility of bringing the two young men into such close relations. But, after all, what was not possible if one only had true courage?
"Before I forget it, Ottomar, papa wishes you to go over and invite Captain Schmidt for this evening. Aunt----"
And she told him what had passed.
"August or my servant can do that quite as well," said Ottomar.
"Not quite so well," said Elsa. "The Captain paid us a visit--or, at least, left his card, as nobody was at home, which comes to the same thing. It is only civil, therefore, that you should return his visit, and take the opportunity to give him the invitation."
"I am so tired and knocked up; I must go and have a nap."
"Then go later; there will be plenty of time."
"It seems to me, Elsa, that you have rather a weakness for the Captain," said Ottomar, standing still and looking his sister in the face.
"Yes, I have; and he deserves it," said Elsa, bravely meeting his glance. "He is a good, noble man; I know few like him, and should be very glad if you knew him better. I am sure you would like him; and perhaps--there are so few people, Ottomar, that one can trust, that one can count upon in every difficulty and danger."
"As I can on you!" said Ottomar.
His eyes rested thoughtfully on his sister's brave honest face, and then turned as if accidentally from her towards two windows of Herr Schmidt's house, which could be seen from the place where they were standing. The blue silk curtains of one of the two windows were drawn; they had been for the last three days; it meant, "I do not expect you this evening." Should he confide to the prudent, brave, faithful girl, the secret that weighed on his heart? Should he unburden his heavy heart by an open honest confession, here where he was sure to find, if not approval, at least comprehension, interest, and pity?
Pity? and if only scorn awaited him from behind those curtains, if he were finally dismissed, and must say to-morrow, "Do not trouble yourself further, Elsa; it is all over and at an end: she has dismissed me--me!" he should have humbled himself to no purpose, exposed himself uselessly. No, no! there would be time enough for that. He would hear first from her own lips.
"I will go over, Elsa," he said, "and I will go at once; I can sleep later."
"You dear, good Ottomar!" exclaimed Elsa, throwing her arms round her brother and kissing him; "I knew you would."
"Elsa, come here a minute, please!" called Sidonie from the dining-room door.
"I am coming, aunt."
Elsa hurried away; Ottomar looked gloomily after her, as the two ladies disappeared into the house.
He walked a few paces farther till he was quite shut in by the thick shrubs and concealed from all eyes. He still looked cautiously round him, tore open his coat, and pulled out the letter which he had found on his father's table.
In the envelope were several papers, he took out a small sheet in his father's handwriting. On the sheet was written:
"Received this morning the two enclosed bills, which I have settled and receipted for you--1200 thalers; the last debts that I pay for you, for the reason that my own property, as you will see by the accompanying accounts, has been spent, with the exception of a small portion, in the same manner, and I cannot pay another penny without depriving my family of the means of living as our position demands, or running into debt myself, and must beg you to act accordingly.
"V. Werben."
A beautiful gay butterfly fluttered across the blue sky. A sparrow darted down from a tree, seized the butterfly, flew with it to the top of the garden wall, and there devoured his prize.
A bitter smile played on Ottomar's lips.
"You have soon frittered your life away, poor butterfly! Everything must have an end, one way or another!"
Reinhold had vainly attempted the day before to persuade his uncle to agree, for this once at least, to the increase of pay demanded by the work-people; he would so evidently be the greater sufferer if he were prevented, by the threatened strike of the work-people, from completing his contracts within the stipulated time. Uncle Ernst was not to be moved. The work-people, on the other hand, who were quite alive to their favourable position and perhaps over-rated it, had adhered no less obstinately to their demands, so that after hours of discussion backwards and forwards, during which everybody got more and more excited, matters had come to extremities, and Reinhold, who had expected this result and had silently prepared for it, had been obliged, pistol in hand, to drive the furious and drunken mob back from his uncle's threshold. At the same moment the police had appeared, had with some difficulty seized the ring-leaders and put down the riot. But the agitation had spread like lightning through the other marble-works; everywhere there had been more or less disturbance; the men in the brick and stone yards joined the rising; since this morning all these works were at a standstill, and the yards were empty. The masters had speedily arranged a meeting, which was to take place in an hour. Uncle Ernst was just ready to start, Reinhold was with him in his room, attempting once more to persuade the obstinate man to greater mildness, or at least to take a calmer view of the state of affairs.
"It seems to me, uncle," he said, "that this is just like a mutiny at sea. If a man is not strong enough to overpower the scoundrels and does not care to lose his ship and its cargo, to say nothing of his own life, he must try to come to terms with them. It is not easy for a proud man, as I know from experience, but in the end it is the wisest course. The men know that the masters have undertaken large contracts, that you will lose thousands upon thousands if you stop the works and are thereby prevented from fulfilling your engagements; they know all that, and they know also that you must give in at last. I should have done so yesterday in your place, before matters had gone so far that you were forced to uphold your authority by force on your own ground. To-day matters have changed; to-day the question is not of one solitary case, but of a general calamity, which must be decided upon general principles. And if you do not agree with this view of affairs, well, give way for once; let yourself be ruled if it must be so; do not throw the weight of your name and credit into the balance of the disputants."
Uncle Ernst laughed bitterly.
"The weight of my name, of my credit! My dear Reinhold, you forget who you are talking to! Am I Bismarck? Am I the Chancellor and President of the Council? Do all sit in breathless silence when I rise to speak? Do all tremble when I frown? Do all shrink when I raise my voice? Do all give way when I threaten to desert them? Is there an army at my back if I stamp my foot? Bah! my name is Schmidt, and there is an end of it."
"No, no, uncle!" exclaimed Reinhold, "there is not an end of it; you have only shown that we must do in small matters what he does in great ones. Even the great Bismarck knows how to trim his sails and tack when it is necessary, and does it very skilfully so far as I can understand. We must take example even from our enemies. It sounds hard, I know, and is a bitter pill; but when you come home, as you probably will do, angry and wrathful, we will sit down to dinner, and I will help you manfully to wash down your anger and wrath in an extra bottle or two."
Uncle Ernst did not answer at once; he walked up and down the room with his head down, sunk in deep thought, his hands behind his back, occasionally stroking his grey beard, or passing a hand through his bushy hair. At length he shook his head several times, stood still and said:
"I cannot do it; I cannot give in without giving myself up, without ceasing to be what I am. But why not? I no longer suit this world any more than it suits me. Neither of us loses anything in the other--on the contrary, he who succeeds to my place will know better what should be done or left undone, in order to live in peace with the world. Will you be that other, Reinhold?"
"I?" exclaimed Reinhold, astonished,
"You! You are a true Schmidt, and have been so shaken and tossed about by the waves, that it must be a hard blow that you cannot stand up against. You learnt something in your youth, and since then have been out in the world, and you probably see things from a clearer point of view than we who have always remained at home and have by degrees lost our clearsightedness. You are tied to no past, to no scheme of life by which you must stand or fall, but may, on the contrary, start on an entirely fresh one, according to your own judgment and the light in which matters appear to you; and then the reason why I would choose you before all others for my successor is----"
Uncle Ernst broke off, like a man who has still got the most difficult thing to say, and can only gather strength for it by a deep breath.
"Is that you are dear to me, Reinhold, and--and--I believe that you have a little love for me, and that is more than I can say of any one else in the world."
He had walked to the window and stood there. Reinhold followed him and laid his hand on his shoulder.
"Dear uncle----"
Uncle Ernst did not move.
"Dear uncle! I thank you from my heart for your love, which you give me so freely, for how could I have deserved it? What I did yesterday I would have done for any captain under whom I had served for four and twenty hours. If indeed love deserves love, then I deserve yours, for I love and honour you as I would love and honour a father. But that I am the only one who loves you, you only say because you are out of spirits, and I hope you do not think it; and if you do think it, I know better than you."
"Indeed!" said Uncle Ernst. "You know better? You know nothing about the matter. Have you ever waited in helpless anguish and despair, tearing your hair because nature seemed to do her work too slowly? Have you ever sunk on your knees in gratitude when your child's first cry smote on your ear? Have you ever nursed children on your knees, and secretly found all your happiness in their laughing eyes, and then seen how those eyes ceased to laugh at you, how they looked shyly past you and turned away, eyes and hearts both? To know such things a man must have experienced them."
"At the worst you can only be speaking of Philip," said Reinhold, "and even there you take too gloomy a view; but Ferdinanda! And even if all is not as it should be, is it not partly your own fault, my dear uncle? A girl's heart needs sunshine, constant sunshine! During these last few days I have never once heard you speak so kindly to her as you have just done to me."
"Because you understand me," exclaimed Uncle Ernst. "Ferdinanda does not understand me. I do not expect that she or any other woman should. They are not sent into the world for that; they are here to cook and to knit, like Rike, or if they cannot all cook and knit, to spend their time in playing the piano, playing at sculpture, and so on. I consider it one of the principal causes of the feebleness and worthlessness of the present day that women are allowed so much liberty, and can interfere in so many things that are quite beyond their province. Besides, if you think so much of the girl--and I allow she is worth rather more than most of the chatterboxes--marry her! You would then at once have a right to take the business off my hands."
Was this one of his uncle's grim jokes, or was it earnest? Reinhold could not tell. Happily he was spared the necessity of answering by a knock at the door.
It was Cilli's father, old Kreisel, who at Herr Schmidt's "Come in!" stepped into the room.
"What is it, Kreisel?" asked Uncle Ernst "But, my good man, what an extraordinary get up! Are you going to a funeral?"
The old man's attire seemed to justify Uncle Ernst's question. His little bald head only just appeared above the stiff collar of his old-fashioned, long-tailed coat, while his boots, on the contrary, at the end of the short shabby black trousers, had full liberty. He carried in his hands a tall chimney-pot hat, with a very narrow brim, of the most antiquated fashion, and a pair of gloves whose past lustre had faded with time as the colour had faded out of his shrunken face, the careworn, wasted look of which was only too well suited to his attire.
"In truth I am going to a funeral," he answered with his low, tremulous voice.
"Well then, be off!" said Uncle Ernst.
"Whose is it?"
"My own."
Uncle Ernst stared. "Are you mad, old friend?"
"I think not," answered Kreisel; "but I will speak to you at a more convenient time."
"To your own funeral?" repeated Uncle Ernst. "I am not in the humour for jokes. Wait a bit, Reinhold! And now out with it, Kreisel! What is the matter? What do you want?"
"My discharge!" said the old man, taking a white handkerchief from his coat pocket, and wiping his bald head, on which great drops of perspiration were standing. "And I may well call that my funeral."
"Well, go and be buried then!" thundered Uncle Ernst.
The old man shrank together, as if he had really received his death-blow. Reinhold stood embarrassed and troubled. Uncle Ernst paced the room with hasty steps, then stopped and turned sharply towards the little man and growled down upon him from his superior height:
"And this is the way you treat me! Fourteen years have we worked together in joy and in sorrow; you have never heard a hasty word from my lips that I have not afterwards asked your pardon for, because you with your weak nerves cannot stand anything of the kind, and I would as soon do anything to hurt you as to your poor Cilli. And if I have not done enough for you, it is not my fault--I have of my own accord doubled your salary, and would have tripled it if you had asked me: but you never said a word, and I have always had to press it on you; and now, when--the devil may understand it! I cannot!"
"And you are not likely to understand, Herr Schmidt, if you will not allow me to tell you my reasons," answered the clerk, turning his hat round and round despairingly.
"Well then, tell me in--in my nephew's presence; I have no secrets from him."
"It is not exactly a business secret," said the clerk; "it is my secret, which has long been burning into my soul, and it will be comparatively easy to tell it in the presence of the Captain, who has always been so kind to me and my daughter. I must leave you, Herr Schmidt, before you send me away, as you sent away those thirty men on Thursday; I also----"
He held his hat steady now, and his voice no longer trembled; and he fixed his small, twinkling eyes firmly on Uncle Ernst.
"I also am a Socialist!"
The determination was doubtless an heroic one for the old man, and the situation in which he found himself was tragical; and yet Reinhold almost laughed out loud, when Uncle Ernst, instead of storming and thundering, as was his wont, only opened his eyes wide and said in an unusually quiet, almost gentle voice: "Are you not also a Communist?"
"I consider Communism to be, under certain circumstances, allowable," answered the old gentleman, dropping his eyes again, and in a scarcely audible voice.
"Then go home," said Uncle Ernst, "and take an hour's sleep to calm your excitement, and when you awake again, think that it is all a dream; and now not a word more, or I shall be really angry."
The old man did not venture to answer; he bowed himself out of the door, with a glance at Reinhold that seemed to say: "You are witness: I have done my duty."
Reinhold seized his uncle's hand. "Thank you!"
"What for? for not taking the poor old fool at his word? Pooh! he understands as much about such matters as a new-born baby, and has picked it all up out of his books, over which he spends half the night because he cannot sleep, and his Cilli, good little thing, keeps him company. That sort of Socialism will not do much harm.--Well!"
Grollmann, the old servant, had entered with an embarrassed look and a visiting card, which he passed from one hand to the other as if it were a bit of red-hot iron. And Uncle Ernst, as soon as he had glanced at the card, threw it on to the table as if it had burnt him. "Are you mad?"
"The young gentleman was so urgent," said Grollmann.
"I am not at home to him--once for all."
"It would only be for a few minutes; the Captain had spoken about him already."
"What does this mean, Reinhold?"
Reinhold had read the name on the card: "Philip did beg me," he answered, "the first time I met him, and yesterday again when I called upon him----"
"You called upon him?"
"I thought it my duty--and he begged me to ask your consent to an interview; I----"
He did not like to continue before the servant, well as the old factotum must know all the family affairs; Uncle Ernst also seemed embarrassed:
"I must go to the meeting," he said.
"You have still a quarter of an hour, uncle," said Reinhold.
"It will only be for a few minutes," repeated Grollmann.
Uncle Ernst turned an angry glance from one to the other, as if he wished to make them responsible beforehand for the consequences. "He may come in!"
"Do you wish me to stay, uncle?"
"You had better leave us alone."
Reinhold was not of the same opinion; he knew too well Uncle Ernst's expression not to feel sure that a storm was brewing. But his wish must be obeyed.
He met Philip in the doorway. Philip was quite distressed to disturb Reinhold; doubtless he and his father had important business together; he could come another time.
"I do not know that I shall be at home to you another time," growled Uncle Ernst.
Reinhold pretended not to hear these unkind words, and excusing himself, hurried away.
The door had closed behind him; father and son were face to face.
"What do you want of me here!" asked Uncle Ernst, as if he were speaking to a third person crouching on the floor a few paces to the right of Philip.
"I come on business," answered Philip, as if the person he addressed were floating in the air a few feet to the right of his father.
"I decline to transact any business with you."
"But perhaps not with the directors of the Berlin and Sundin Railway Company?"
"I decline all business with the Berlin and Sundin Railway Company."
"You are standing in your own light. The business would be highly advantageous to you. We have got in our pockets a concession for the island railroad which is the continuation of our own railroad. Our station must be added to. When I had the pleasure of working with you, we bought together the land on which the station stands----"
"Upon your share," allow me to remark.
"Upon my share because you would not part with yours----"
"I had advanced you the money for the purchase of yours; so far as I know you had none then."
"I am the more indebted to you; you laid thereby the foundation of my present prosperity; for, recognising and profiting by the opportunity, I sold a portion to the company----"
"Which you had no right to sell."
"I had already repaid you your money, to the last farthing, with the proper interest."
"And had only forgotten the small circumstance that I gave you the money for the sole purpose of erecting--in partnership with me--cheap dwellings for workmen on that ground. It is true there was no written agreement."
"Fortunately for me, and I should say for you too! After what happened yesterday, you have probably lost all desire to improve the condition of these heroes of strikes and riots, as you have hitherto done to your own cost. But you can now repay yourself what you have spent. Your colony of work-people has, one way or another, never thriven, and is now at its last gasp. Put an end to it once for all. Quarter-day is at hand; we do not want the land before the new year; some of the houses will be empty now, particularly if you put some pressure on the people, and we will pay as if your cottages were so many four-storied houses."
"Where will you get the money from, if I may venture to ask?"
"Where from? Where we have always got it."
"Where you have always got it?" returned Uncle Ernst. He turned for the first time a stern, fixed look upon his son. "That is to say, out of the pockets of the public, whose credulity you have, in the most shameless manner, deceived and betrayed with false and lying prospectuses; whose anxious hopes you feed with sham dividends, which they must pay themselves; whose loud complaints you boldly stifle in your so-called general meetings, till at length it occurs to the legal authorities that might is not always right. I do not care to have anything to do with the legal authorities--and my carriage is at the door."
"So is mine," said Philip, turning on his heel and leaving the room.
Uncle Ernst went to a side-table and poured out a large glass of wine--the bottle knocked against the glass; he had some difficulty in pouring out the wine--and drank it down at one gulp.
He stood there with an angry cloud on his brow, one hand leaning on the table, in a kind of stupor.
"I did not wish it," he murmured; "I wished to keep calm. When he came in he reminded me of his mother--a vacant face too; she never understood me; but he is only a caricature of her--the vacancy supplemented by vice! And then his voice--her voice also--her thin voice when she inflicted upon me her commonplace wisdom--only it is enlivened by insolence--wretched, insolent boy!"
He drank down a second glass. The cloud on his brow had only grown darker.