Princess Heinrich held a reception of all sorts and conditions of those in Forstadt who were receivable. So comprehensive was the party that to be included conveyed no compliment, to be left out meant a slap in the face. But the scene was gorgeous, and the Princess presided over it with fitting dignity. Elsa and I stood by her for a while, all in our buckram, living monuments of bliss and exaltedness. It was like a prolonged interview with the photographer. Then I slipped away and paid marked and honorific courtesy to Bederhof's wife and Bederhof's daughters, tall girls, not over-quick to be married, somehow quite inevitable if one considered Bederhof himself. Rising from my plunge, I looked round for Elsa. She had left my mother and taken a seat in a recess by the window. There she sat, looking, poor soul, rather weary, speaking now and then to those who, in passing by, paused to make their respects and compliments to her. She wore my diamonds; all eyes were for her; the streets were splendidly decorated. Was she content? With all my heart I hoped that she was.
People came and buzzed about me, and I buzzed back to them. I had learned to buzz, I believe, with some grace and facility, certainly with an almost entire detachment of my inner mind; it would be intolerable for the real man to be engrossed in such performances. Looking over the head of the President of the Court of Appeal (he was much shorter than his speeches), I saw Elsa suddenly lean forward and sign with her fan to a lady who passed by. The lady stopped; she sat down by Elsa; they entered into conversation. For a while I went on buzzing and being buzzed to, but presently curiosity conquered me.
"In the pleasure of your conversation I mustn't forget what is my first duty just now, gentlemen," I said with a smile.
They dissolved from in front of me with discreet smiles. I sauntered toward the recess where Elsa sat. Glancing at Princess Heinrich, I saw her watching all that went forward, but she was hemmed in by eminent persons. And why should she interpose, if Elsa desired to talk to the Countess von Sempach?
I leaned over the arm of my betrothed's chair. They were talking of common affairs. From where I was I could not see Elsa's face, so I moved and stood leaning on a third chair between them. The Countess was gay and brilliant; kind also, with a tenderness that seemed to throw out feelers for friendship. To me she spoke only when I addressed her directly; her attention was all for Elsa. In Elsa's eyes, not skilled to conceal her heart, there was, overpowering all other expression, a curiosity, a study of something that interested and puzzled her, a desire to understand the woman who talked to her. For Elsa had heard something; not all, but something. She was not hostile or disturbed; she was gracious and eager to please; but she was inquiring and searching. At her heart's bidding her wits wereon the move. I knew the maze that they explored. She was asking for the Countess' secret. But which secret? For to her it might well seem that there were two. Rumour said that I had loved the Countess. It would be in the way of the natural woman for Elsa to desire to find out why, the trick of the charm that a predecessor (let the word pass) had wielded. But rumour said also that the Countess had loved me. Was this the deeper harder secret that Elsa sought to probe, this the puzzle to which she asked an answer? Perhaps, could she find an answer that satisfied, there would be new heaven and new earth for her. Here seemed to me the truth, the reason of the longing question in her eyes. Jealousy could not inspire that; certainly not a jealousy of what was long gone by, of a woman who to Elsa's fresh girlhood must be faded and almost sunk to middle age. "How did you contrive to love him?" That was Elsa's question, asked beneath my understanding gaze.
There was a little stir by the door, and a man came through the group that loitered round it, hastily shaking hands here, nodding there, as he steered his course toward Princess Heinrich. I knew that Varvilliers would come to the wedding, but had not been aware that he was already in Forstadt. My companions did not notice him, but I watched his interview with my mother. Even she unbent to him, disarmed by a courtesy that overcame the protest of her judgment; she detained him in conversation nearly ten minutes, and then pointed to where we were, directing him to join us.
"Ah, here comes Varvilliers," said I. "I'm delighted to have him back. You've met him, Countess?"
"Oh, yes, sire, in Paris," she answered.
For a few moments I kept my eyes from Elsa's face and looked toward Varvilliers, smiling and beckoning. When I turned toward her she was bright and composed. He joined us, and she welcomed him with cordiality. He launched on an account of his doings; then came to our affairs, commiserating us on the trial of our ceremonies. For a while we talked all to all; then I began to tell the Countess a little story. Varvilliers and Elsa fell into a conversation apart. She had made him sit by her. I bent down over my chair back, to converse more easily with my Countess. All this was right enough, unless the talk were to continue general.
I do not know how long we went on thus; some time I know it was. At last it chanced that the Countess made no answer to what I said, and leaned back in her chair with a thoughtful smile. I sighed, raised my head, and looked across the room. I heard the other two in animated talk and their gay laughter; for the moment my mind was not on them. Suddenly Wetter passed in front of me; he had once been President of the Chamber, and Princess Heinrich knew her duty. He was with William Adolphus, who seemed in extremely good spirits. Wetter paused opposite to me and bowed. I returned his salutation, but did not invite him to join us; I hoped to speak to him later. Thus it was for a bare instant that he halted. But what matters time? Its only true measure lies in what a man does in it. Wetter's momentary halt was long enough for one of those glances of his to play over the group we made. From face to face it ran, a change of expression marking every stage. It rested at last on me. I turned my head sharply toward Elsa; hercheek was flushed; her eyes glistened; her body was bent forward in an eagerness of attention, as though she would not lose a word. Varvilliers was given over to the spirit of his talk, but he watched the sparks that he struck from her eyes. I glanced again at Wetter; William Adolphus had seized his arm and urged him forward. For a second still he stood; he tossed his hair back, laughed, and turned away. Why should he stay? He had said all that the situation suggested to him, and said it with his own merciless lucidity.
I echoed his laugh. Mine was an interruption to their talk. Elsa started and looked up; Varvilliers' face turned to me. He looked at me for a moment, then a strange and most unusual air of embarrassment spread over him. The Countess did not speak, and her eyes were downcast. Varvilliers was himself again directly; he began to speak of indifferent matters; he was not so awkward as to let this incident be the occasion of his leave-taking. A minute or two passed. I looked at him and held out my hand. At the same instant the Countess asked a signal from Elsa, and it was given. We all stood together for a moment, then they left us, she accepting his arm to cross the room. Elsa sat down again and did not speak. I found no words either, but leaned again over my chair, regarding the scene in absent moodiness. I was thinking how odd a thing it was, and how perfect, that absolute contentment of the one with the other, that mutual sufficiency, that fitting in of each to each, that ultimate oneness of soul which is the block from which is hewn love's image. And the block is there, though by fate's caprice it lie unshaped. The thing had been between the Countess and myself; its virtue had availed to abolish difference of years, to rout absurdity, to threaten the strongest resolution of my mind. It was between Elsa and Varvilliers. In none other had I found it for myself; in none other would Elsa find it. It was not for her in me. Then in vain had been the questioning of her eyes, in vain the eager longing of her parted lips. She had not ears to hear the secret of the Countess. At this moment I forgot again that my, or even her, happiness was not a relevant consideration in forming a judgment of the universe. It is, in fact, a difficult thing to remember. My pride was ablaze with hatred of being taken because I could not be refused. I was carried away by a sudden impulse. I threw myself into the chair by Elsa, saying:
"How it would surprise and scatter all these good people if you suddenly announced that you'd changed your mind, Elsa! What a rout! what a scurry! What a putting out of lights, and a pulling down of poles, and a furling up of flags, and a countermanding of orders to the butcher and the baker! Good heavens! Think of my mother's face, or, indeed, of your mother's face! Think of Bederhof's face, of everybody's face!" And I fell to laughing.
Elsa also laughed, but with a nervous discomfort. Her glance at me was short; her eyes dropped again.
"What made you think of such a thing?" she asked in a hesitating tone.
"I don't know," said I. Then I turned and asked, "Have you never thought of it?"
"Never," she said. "Indeed, never. How could I?"
It was impossible to doubt the sincerity of her disclaimer. She seemed really shocked and amazed at the notion.
"And now! To do it now! When everything is ready!" She gave a pretty little gasp. "And go back with mother to Bartenstein!" she went on, shaking her head in horror. "How could you imagine it? Fancy Bartenstein again!"
Evidently I was preferable to Bartenstein again, to the narrow humdrum life there. No poles, no flags, no illuminations, no cheers, no dignity! Diamonds even scarce and rare! I tried to take heart. It was something to be better than Bartenstein again.
"And what would they think of me? Oh, it's too absurd! But of course you were joking?"
"Oh, not more than usual, Elsa. You might have found me even more tiresome than Bartenstein."
"Nonsense! It would always be better here than at Bartenstein."
Clearly there was no question in her mind on this point. Forstadt and I—let me share, since I may not engross the credit—were much better than going back to Bartenstein.
She was looking at me with an uneasy, almost suspicious air.
"What made you ask that question?" she said abruptly.
I looked round the room. Among the many groups in talk there were faces turned toward us, regarding us with a discreet good-humoured amusement. The King forgot his duties and talked with his lady-love. Every moment buttressed the reputation of our love match. Let it be so; it was best. Yet the sham was curiously unpleasant to me.
"Why did you ask me that question, Augustin? You had a reason?"
"No, none; except that in forty-eight hours it will be too late to ask it."
She leaned toward me in agitated pleading.
"I do love you, Augustin. I love nobody so much as you—you and father."
I and father! Poor girl, how she admitted while she thought to deny! But I was full of a pity and a tenderness for her, and forgot my own pride.
"You're so good to me; and there's no reason why you should like me."
"Like?" said I. "A gentleman must pretend sometimes, or so it's thought."
"Yes. What do you mean?" Pleased coquetry gleamed for a moment in her eyes. "Do you mean—love me?"
"It is impossible, is it?" I asked, and I looked into her eyes as though I desired her love. Well, I did, that she might have peace.
She blushed, and suddenly, as it were by an uncontrollable immediate impulse, glanced round. Whose face did she seek? Was it not his who last had looked at her in that fashion? He was not in sight. Her gaze fell downward. Ah, that you had been a better diplomatist, Elsa. For though a man may know the truth, he loves sometimes one who will deny it to him pleasantly. He gains thereby a respite and an intermission, the convict's repose between his turns on the treadmill or the hour's flouting of hard life that good wine brings. But it was impossible to rear on stable foundations a Pleasure House of Pretence. With every honest revelation of her heart Elsa shattered it. I can not blame her. I myself was at my analytic undermining.
"You'll go on then?" I asked, with a laugh.
She laughed for answer. The question seemed toher to need no answer. What, would she go back to Bartenstein—to insignificance, to dulness, and to tutelage? Surely not!
"But I'm not very like the grenadier," I said.
She understood me and flushed, relapsing into uneasiness. I saw that I had touched some chord in her, and I would willingly have had my words unsaid. Presently she turned to me, and forgetting the gazers round held out her hands to mine. Her eyes seemed dim.
"I'll try—I'll try to make you happy," she said.
"I'll try—I'll try to make you happy."
"I'll try—I'll try to make you happy."
And she said well. Letting all think what they would, I rose to my feet and bowed low over the hand that I kissed. Then I gave her my arm, and walked with her through the lane that they made for us. Surely we pretended well, for somehow, from somewhere, a cheer arose, and they cheered us as we walked through. Elsa's face was in an instant bright again. She pressed my arm in a spasm of pleasure. We proceeded in triumph to where Princess Heinrich sat; away behind her in the foremost row of a group of men stood Wetter—Wetter leading the cheers, waving his handkerchief, grinning in charmingly diabolical fashion. The suitability of Princess Heinrich's reception of us I must leave to be imagined; it was among her triumphs.
I fell at once into the clutches of Cousin Elizabeth, my regard for whom was tempered by a preference for more restraint in the display of emotion.
"My dearest boy," she said, pulling me into a seat by her, "I saw you. It makes me so happy."
A thing, without being exactly good in itself, may of course have incidental advantages.
"It was sure to happen. You were made for one another. Dear Elsa is young and shy, and—and shedidn't quite understand." Cousin Elizabeth looked almost sly. "But now the weight is quite off my mind. Because Elsa doesn't change."
"Doesn't she?" I asked.
"No, she's constancy itself. Once she takes up a point of view, you know, or an impression of a person, nothing alters it. Dear me, we used to think her obstinate. Only everybody gave way to her. That was her father's fault. He never would have her thwarted. But she's turned out very well, hasn't she? So I can't blame him. I know your mother thought us rather lax."
"Ah, my mother was not lax."
"It only shows there's room for both ways, doesn't it? What was I saying?"
I knew what she had been saying, but not which part of it she desired to repeat. However she found it for herself in a moment.
"Oh, yes! No, she never changes. Just what she is to you now she'll be all her life. I never knew her to change. She just loves you or she doesn't, and there it rests. You may feel quite safe."
"How very satisfactory all this is, Cousin Elizabeth!"
"Satisfactory?" she exclaimed, with a momentary surprise at my epithet. But her theory came to the rescue. "Oh, I know you always talk like that. Well, I don't expect you to talk like a lover to me. It's quite enough if you do it to Elsa. Yes, it is—satisfactory, isn't it?" The good creature laughed heartily and squeezed my hand. "She'll never change," she repeated once again in an ample, comfortable contentment. "And you don't mind showing what you feel, do you?"
Cousin Elizabeth was chaffing me.
"On my word, I forgot how public we were," said I. "My feelings ran away with me."
"Oh, why should you be ashamed? They might laugh, but I'm sure they envied you."
It was strange enough, but it is very likely that they did. For my own part, I have learned not to envy people without knowing a good deal about them and their affairs.
"Because," pursued Cousin Elizabeth, "I have always in my heart hated merely arranged marriages. They're not right, you know, Augustin. They may be necessary, but they're not right."
"Very necessary, but quite wrong," I agreed.
"And at one time I was the least bit afraid—However I was a silly old woman. Do look at her talking to your mother. Oh, of course, you were looking at her already. You weren't listening to my chatter."
But I had listened to Cousin Elizabeth's chatter. She had told me something of interest. Elsa would never change; she took a view and a relation toward a person and maintained them. What she was to me now she would be always.
"My dear cousin, I have listened with keen interest to every word that you've said," I protested truthfully.
"That's your politeness. I know what lovers are," said Cousin Elizabeth.
I looked across to the Duke's passive tired face. The thought crossed my mind that Cousin Elizabeth must have depended on observation rather than on experience for the impressions to which she referred. However she afforded me an opportunity for escape, which I embraced with alacrity.
As I passed my mother, she beckoned to me. Elsa had left her, and she was alone for the moment. It seemed that she had a word to say to me, and on the subject concerning which I thought it likely enough that she would have something to say—the engagement of Coralie to sing at the gala performance.
"Was there not some unpleasant talk about this Madame Mansoni?" she asked.
"Well, there was talk," said I, smiling and allowing my eyes to rest on the figure of William Adolphus, visible in the distance. "It would have been better not to have her, perhaps. It can be altered, I suppose."
"Bederhof sanctioned it without referring to you or to me. It has become public now."
"Oh, I didn't know that."
"Yes; it's in the evening papers."
"Any—any remarks?"
"No, except that the Vorwärts calls it an extraordinarily suitable selection."
"The Vorwärts? Yes," said I thoughtfully. Wetter wrote for the Vorwärts. "Perhaps then to cancel it would make more talk than to let it stand. The whole story is very old."
Princess Heinrich permitted a smile to appear on her face as with a wave of her fan she relegated Coralie to a proper insignificance. She was smiling still as she added:
"There's another old acquaintance coming to assist at the wedding, Augustin. I telegraphed to ask her, and she has answered accepting the invitation in the warmest terms."
"Indeed! Who is that, pray?"
"The Baroness," said my mother.
I stared at her; then I cried with a laugh, "Krak? Not Krak?"
"Yes, Krak, as you naughty children used to call her."
"Good Heavens, does the world still hold Krak?"
"Of course. She's rather an old woman, though. You'll be kind to her, Augustin? She was always very fond of you."
"I will treat Krak," said I, "with all affection."
Surely I would, for Krak's coming put the crown of completeness on the occasion. But I was amazed; Krak was utterly stuff of the past.
My mother did not appear to desire my presence longer; I had to take up my own position and receive farewells.
A dreary half hour passed in this occupation; at last the throng grew thin. I broke away and sauntered off to a buffet for a sandwich and a glass of champagne. There I saw Wetter and Varvilliers standing together and refreshing their jaded bodies. I joined them at once, full of the news about Krak. It fell rather flat, I regret to say; Krak had not significance for them, and Wetter was full of wild brilliant talk. Varvilliers' manner, on the other hand, although displaying now no awkwardness or restraint, showed unusual gentleness and gravity with an added friendliness very welcome to me. I stood between my friends, sipping my wine and detaining them, although the room was nearly empty. I felt a reluctance to part and an invincible repugnance to my bed.
"Come to my quarters," I said, "and we'll have cigars."
Varvilliers bowed ready assent. Wetter's face twisted into a smile.
"I must plead excuse to the command," he said.
"Then you're a rascal, Wetter; I want you, man, and you ought not to be expected anywhere this time of night."
"Not at home, sire?"
"Home least of all," said Varvilliers, smiling.
"But I have guests at home," cried Wetter. "I've left them too long. But Her Royal Highness didn't invite them; besides it was necessary to practise the song."
"What? Are they with you?"
"Should I send them to a hotel, sire? My friends the Struboffs! No, no!"
Sipping my wine, I looked doubtfully from one to the other.
"The King," observed Wetter to Varvilliers, "would be interested in hearing a rehearsal of the song."
"But," said I, "Krak comes to-night, and I daren't look as if I'd sat up beyond my hour."
Wetter laid his finger on my arm.
"One more night," he said. Varvilliers laughed. "I have the same old servant. He's very discreet!"
"But you'll put it in the Vorwärts!"
"No, no, not if the meeting-place is my own house."
"I'll do it!" I cried. "Come, let's have a carriage."
"Mine waits," said Varvilliers, "at your disposal. I'll see about it," and off he ran. Wetter turned to me.
"An interesting quartette there in the recess," said he.
"And an insolent fellow looking on at it," said I.
"I'll write an article on your impulsive love-making before all the world."
"Do; I can conceive nothing more politic."
"It shall teem with sincerity."
"Never a jest anywhere in it? Not one for me?"
"No. Jests are in place only when one tells the truth. A lie must be solemn, sire."
"True. Write it to your mood."
And to his mood he wrote it, eloquently, beautifully, charged with the passion of that joy which he realized in imagination, but could not find in his stormy life. I read it two or three days later at Artenberg.
"Hey for the wedding-song and one night more!" he cried.
We rolled off, we three, in Varvilliers' carriage.
There was no doubt that they practised the marriage-song. Coralie's voice echoed through the house as we entered. For a moment we paused in the hall to listen. Then Wetter dashed up the stairs, crying, "Good God! Wooden, wooden, wooden!" We followed him at a run; he flung the door open and rushed in. Coralie broke off her singing and came to greet me with a little cry of pleased surprise. Struboff sat at the piano, looking rather bewildered. Supper was spread on a table at the other end of the room. When Struboff tried to rise, Wetter thrust him back into his seat. "No, no, the King doesn't want to talk to you," he said. "He wants to hear madame sing, to hear you play. Coralie, come and sing again, and, for God's sake sing it as if it meant something, dear Coralie."
"It's such nonsense," said Coralie, with a pouting smile.
"Nonsense? Then it needs all your efforts. As if—as if, I say—it meant something."
Varvilliers, laughing, flung himself on a sofa. I stood at the end of the piano, Wetter was gesticulating and muttering on the hearthrug. Struboff put his fingers on the keys again and began to play; after a sigh of weariness Coralie uplifted hervoice. It came fresh and full; the weariness was of the spirit only. The piece was good, nay, very good; there were feeling and passion in the music. I looked at Struboff. His fingers moved tenderly, tears stood in his little eyes. Coralie shouted perfect notes in perfect heartlessness.
"My God!" muttered Wetter from the hearthrug, and bounded across to her. He caught her by the arm.
"Feel, feel, feel!" he cried angrily.
"Don't be so stupid," said Coralie.
"She can't feel it," said Struboff, taking his handkerchief and wiping brow and eyes.
"She's a fortunate woman," remarked Varvilliers from his sofa.
"You'd think she could," said Wetter, taking both her hands and surveying her from top to toe. "You'd think she could understand. Look at her eyes, her brows, her lips. You'd think she could understand. Look at her hands, her waist, her neck. It's a little strange, isn't it? See, she smiles at me. She has an adorably good temper. She doesn't mind me in the least. It's just that she happens not to be able to feel."
During all this outburst Struboff played softly and tenderly; a large tear formed now in each of his eyes, and presently trickled over the swelling hillocks underneath his cheek bones. Coralie was smiling placidly at Wetter, thinking him mad enough, but in no way put out by his criticism.
"I can feel it," said Wetter, in a whimsically puzzled tone. "Why should I feel it? I'm not young or beautiful, and my voice is the worse for wear, because I've had to denounce the King so much. Nevertheless I can feel it."
"You can make a big fool of yourself," observed Coralie, breaking into a laugh and snatching her hands away from him.
"Yes, yes, yes, I should hope so," he cried. "She catches the point! Is there hope? No, she won't make a fool of herself. There's no hope." He sank into a chair with every appearance of dejection.
"I think it's supper-time," she said, moving toward the table. "What are you still playing for?" she called to Struboff.
"Let him play," said I. "Perhaps he would rather play than sup."
"It's very likely," Coralie admitted with a shrug. Struboff looked at me for a moment, and nodded solemnly. He was playing low now, giving a plaintive turn to the music that had been joyful.
"No, you shall try it once again," cried Wetter, leaping up. "Once again! A verse of it! I'll stand opposite to you. See, like this; and I'll look at you. Now try!"
She was very good-natured with him, and did as he bade her. He took his stand just by her, behind Struboff, and gazed into her face. I could see him; his lips twitched, and his eyes were set on her in an ardour of passion.
"Look in my eyes and sing!" he commanded.
"Ah, you're silly," she murmured in her pleasant lazy drawl. She threw out her chest, and filled the room with healthy tuneful sound.
"Stop!" he cried. "Stop! I can endure no more of it. Can you eat? Yes, you can eat. In God's name, come and eat, dear Coralie."
Coralie appealed to me.
"Don't you think I sing it very well?" sheasked. "I can fill the Grand Opera House quite easily."
"You sing it to perfection," said I. "There's nothing wrong, nothing at all. Wetter here is mad."
"Wetter is certainly mad," echoed Varvilliers, rising from the sofa.
"Wetter is damned mad," said Wetter.
"Wetter is right—ah, so right," came in a despairing grumble from poor Struboff, who still played away.
"To supper, to supper!" cried Wetter. "You're right, all of you. And I'm right. And I'm mad. To supper! No, let Struboff play. Struboff, you want to play. Play on."
Struboff nodded again and played on. His notes, now plaintive, now triumphant, were the accompaniment to our meal, filling the pauses, enriching, as it seemed, the talk. But Coralie was deep infoie gras, and paid no heed to them. Wetter engaged in some vehement discussion with Varvilliers, who met him with good-humoured pertinacity. I had dropped out of the talk, and sat listening dreamily to Struboff's music. Suddenly Coralie laid down her knife and turned to me.
"Wouldn't it be nice if I were going to be married to you?" she asked.
"Charming," said I. "But what of our dear M. Struboff? And what of my Cousin Elsa?"
"We wouldn't trouble about them." She was looking at me with a shrewd gaze. "No," she said, "you wouldn't like it. Shall we try another arrangement?" She leaned toward me and laid her pretty hand on my arm. "Wetter and I—I am not very well placed, but let it pass—Wetter and I, Varvilliers and the Princess, you and the Countess."
I made no sign of appreciating this rather penetrating suggestion.
"You're more capricious than fortune, more arbitrary than fate, madame," said I. "Moreover, you have again forgotten to provide for M. Struboff."
She shrugged her shoulders and smiled.
"No," she said meditatively. "I don't like that after all. It might do for M. de Varvilliers, but the Countess is too old, and Wetter there would cut my throat. We can't sacrifice everything to give Varvilliers a Princess." She appeared to reflect for a few seconds. "I don't know how to arrange it."
"Positively I should be at a loss myself if I were called upon to govern the world at short notice."
"I think I must let it alone. I don't see how to make it better."
"Thank you. For my own part I have the good luck to be in love with my cousin."
Coralie lifted her eyes to mine. "Oh, no!" she drawled quietly. Then she added with a laugh, "Do you remember when you fought Wetter?"
"Heavens! yes; fools that we were! Not a word of it! Nobody knows."
"Well, at that time you were in love with me."
"Madame, I will have the honour of mentioning a much more remarkable thing to you."
"If you please, sire," she said, taking a bunch of grapes and beginning to eat them.
"You were all but in love with me."
"That's not remarkable. You're too humble. I was; ah, yes, I was. I was very afraid for you.Mon ami, don't you wish that, instead of being King here, you were the Sultan?"
I laughed at this abrupt and somewhat unceremonious question.
"In fact, Coralie," said I, "there are only two really satisfactory things to be in this life; all else is miserable compromise."
"Tell them to me."
"A Sultan or a monk. And—pardon me—give me the latter."
"Well, I once knew a monk very well, and——" began Coralie in a tone of meditative reminiscence. But, rather to my vexation, Wetter spoiled the story by asking what we were talking about with our heads so close together.
"We were correcting Fate and re-arranging Destiny," I explained.
"Pooh, pooh!" he cried. "You'd not get rid of the tragedy, and only spoil the comedy. Let it alone, my children."
We let it alone, and began to chatter honest nonsense. This had been going on for a few minutes, when I became aware suddenly that Struboff had ceased playing my wedding-song. I looked round; he sat on the piano-stool, his broad back like a tree-trunk bent to a bow, and his head settled on his shoulders till a red bulge over his collar was all that survived of his neck. I rose softly, signing to the others not to interrupt their conversation, and stole up to him. He did not move; his hands were clasped on his stomach. I peered round into his face; its lines were set in a grotesque heavy melancholy. At first I felt very sorry for him; but as I went on looking at him something of Coralie's feeling came over me, and I grew angry. That he was doubtless very miserable ceased to plead for him, nay, it aggravated his offence. What the deuce right had this fellow to make misery repulsive? And it was over my wedding song that he had tortured himself into thisludicrous condition! Yet again it was a pleasant paradox of Nature's to dower this carcass with the sensibility which might have given a crowning charm to the beauty of Coralie. In him it could attract no love, to him it could bring no happiness. Probably it caused him to play the piano better; if this justifies Nature, she is welcome to the plea. For my part, I felt that it was monstrously bad taste in him to come and be miserable here and now in Forstadt. But he overshot his mark.
"Good God, my dear Struboff!" I cried in extreme annoyance, "think how little it matters, how little any of us care, even, if you like, how little you ought to care yourself! You've tumbled down on the gravel; very well! Stop crying, and don't, for Heaven's sake, keep showing me the graze on your knee. We all, I suppose, have grazes on our knees. Get your mother to put you into stockings, and nobody will see it. I've been in stockings for years." I burst into a laugh.
He did not understand what I would be at; that, perhaps, was hardly wonderful.
"The music has affected me," he mumbled.
"Then come and let some champagne affect you," I advised him irritably. "What, are you to spoil a pleasant evening?"
He looked at me with ponderous sorrowful reproach.
"A pleasant evening!" he groaned, as he blew his nose.
"Yes," I cried loudly. "A damnably pleasant evening, M. Struboff," and I caught him by the arm, dragged him from his stool, and carried him off to the table with me. Here I set him down between Varvilliers and myself; Wetter and Coralie,deep in low-voiced conversation, paid no heed to him. He began to eat and drink eagerly and with appetite.
"You perceive, Struboff," said I persuasively, "that while we have stomachs—and none, my friend, can deny that you have one—the world is not empty of delight. You and I may have our grazes—Varvilliers, have you a graze on the knee by chance?—but consider, I pray you, the case of the man who has no dinner."
"It would be very bad to have no dinner," said Struboff, in full-mouthed meditation.
"Besides that," said I lightly—I grew better tempered every moment—"what are these fine-spun miseries with which we afflict ourselves? To be empty, to be thirsty, to be cold—these are evils. Was ever any man, well-fed, well-drunk, and well-warmed, really miserable? Reflect before you answer, Struboff."
He drained a glass of champagne, and, I suppose, reflected.
"If he had his piano also——" he began.
"Great Heavens!" I interrupted with a laugh.
Coralie turned from Wetter and fixed her eyes on her husband. He perceived her glance directly; his appetite appeared to become enfeebled, and he drank his wine with apologetic slowness. She went on looking at him with a merciless amusement; his whole manner became expressive of a wish to be elsewhere. I saw Varvilliers smothering a smile; he sacrificed much to good manners. I myself laughed gently. Suddenly, to my surprise, Wetter caught Coralie by the wrist.
"You see that man?" he asked, smiling and fixing his eyes on her.
"Oh, yes, I see my husband," said she.
"Your husband, yes. Shall I tell you something? You remember what I've been saying to you?"
"Very well; you've repeated it often. Are you going to repeat it now out loud?"
"Where's the use? Everybody here knows. I'll tell you another thing." He leaned forward, still holding her wrist tightly. "Look at Struboff," he said. "Look well at him."
"I am giving myself the pleasure of looking at M. Struboff," said Coralie.
"Very well. When you die—because you'll grow old, and you'll grow ugly, and at last, after you have become very ugly, you'll die."
Coralie looked rather vexed, a little perturbed and protesting. Wetter had touched the one point on which she had troubled herself to criticise the order of the universe.
"When, I say, you die," pursued Wetter, "when, after growing extremely ugly, you die, you will be sent to hell because you have not appreciated the virtues or repaid the devotion of my good friend M. Struboff. And, sire" (he turned to me), "when one considers that, it appears unreasonable to imagine that eternity will be in any degree less peculiar than this present life of ours."
"That's all very well," said Coralie, "but after having grown ugly I don't think I should mind anything else."
I clapped my hands.
"I think," said I, "if M. Struboff will pardon the supposition, that madame will be allowed to escape perdition. For, see, she will stand up and she will say quite calmly, with that adorable smile of hers——"
"They don't mind smiles there, sire," put in Varvilliers.
"She'll smile not to please them, but because she's amused," said I. "She'll say with her adorable smile, 'This and that I have done, this and that I have not done. Perhaps I did wrong, I have not studied your rules. But you can't send me to hell.'"
They all appeared to be listening with attentive ears.
"Here's a good advocate," said Wetter. "Let us hear the plea."
"'You can't send me to hell because I have not pretended. I have been myself, and I didn't make myself. I can't go to hell with the pretenders.'"
"But to heaven with the kings?" asked Varvilliers.
"With the kings who have not also been pretenders," said I.
"Nom de Dieu," said she, "I believe that I shall escape, after all. So you and I will be separated, Wetter."
"No, no," he protested. "Unless you're there the place won't be itself to me."
We all laughed—Struboff not in appreciation, but with a nervous desire to make himself agreeable—and I rose from my seat. It was three o'clock in the morning. Struboff yawned mightily as he drank a final glass and patted his stomach. I think that we were all happier than when we sat down.
"And after the occasion, whither?" I asked them.
"I back to France," answered Varvilliers.
"We to Munich," said Coralie, with a shrug.
"I the deuce knows where," laughed Wetter.
"I also the deuce knows where. Come, then, toour next merry supper!" I poured out a glass of wine. They all followed my example, and we drank.
"But we shall have no more," said Wetter.
A moment's silence fell on us all. Then Wetter spoke again. He turned to them and indicated me with a gesture.
"He's a good fellow, our Augustin."
"Yes, a good fellow," said Varvilliers.
"A very good fellow," muttered Struboff, who was more than a little gone in liquor.
"A good fellow," said Coralie. Then she stepped up to me, put her hands on my shoulders, and kissed me on both cheeks. "A good fellow, our little Augustin," said she.
There was nothing much in this; casual phrases of goodwill, spoken at a moment of conviviality, the outcome of genuine but perhaps not very deep feeling, except for that trifle of the kisses almost an ordinary accompaniment or conclusion of an evening's entertainment. I was a good fellow; the light praise had been lightly won. Yet even now as I write, looking back over the years, I can not, when I accuse myself of mawkishness, be altogether convinced by the self-denunciation. For what it was worth, the thing came home to me; for a moment it overleaped the barriers that were round me, the differences that made a hedge between me and them; for a moment they had forgotten that I was not merely their good comrade. I would not have people forget often what I am; but now and then it is pleasant to be no more than what I myself am. And the two there, Wetter and Varvilliers, were the nearest to friends that I have known. One went back to his country, the other the deuce knew where. I should be alone.
Alone I made my way back from Wetter's house, alone and on foot. I had a fancy to walk thus through the decorated streets; alone to pause an instant before the Countess' door, recollecting many things; alone to tell myself that the stocking must be kept over the graze, and that the asking of sympathy was the betrayal of my soul's confidence to me; alone to be weak, alone to be strong; alone to determine to do my work with my own life, alone to hope that I must not render too wretched the life of another. I had good from that walk of mine. For you see, when a man is alone, above all, I think, when he is alone in the truce of night, one day's fight done and the new morning's battle not yet joined, he can pause and stand and think. He can be still; then his worst and his best steal out, like mice from their holes (the cat of convention is asleep), and play their gambols and antics before his eyes: he knows them and himself, and reaches forth to know the world and his work in it, his life and the end of it, the difference, if any, that he has made by spending so much pains on living.
It was four o'clock when a sleepy night-porter let me in. My servants had orders never to wait beyond two, and in my rooms all was dark and quiet. But when I lit a candle from the little lamp by the door, I saw somebody lying on the sofa in my dressing-room, a woman's figure stretched in the luxury of quiet sleep. Victoria this must be and none else. I was glad to see her there and to catch her drowsy smile as her eyes opened under the glare of my candle.
"What in the world are you doing here, my dear?" said I, setting down the candle and putting my hands in my pockets.
She sat up, whisking her skirts round with one hand and rubbing her eyes with the other.
"I came to tell you about Krak—Krak's come. But you weren't here. So I lay down, and I suppose I went to sleep."
"I suppose you did. And how's Krak?"
"Just the same as ever!"
"Brought a birch with her, in case I should rebel at the last?"
Victoria laughed.
"Oh, well, you'll see her to-morrow," she remarked. "She's just the same. I'm rather glad, you know, that Krak hasn't been softened by age. It would have been commonplace."
"Besides, one doesn't want to exaggerate the power of advancing years. You didn't come for anything except to tell me about Krak?"
Victoria got up, came to me, and kissed me.
"No, nothing else," she said. She stopped a moment, and then remarked abruptly, "You're not a bit like William Adolphus."
"No?" said I, divining in a flash her thought and her purpose. "Still—have you been with Elsa to-night?"
"Yes; after Cousin Elizabeth and mother left her. You—you'll be kind to her? I told her that she was very silly, and that I wished I was going to marry you."
"Oh, you did? But she wishes to marry me?"
"She means to, of course."
"Exactly. My dear, you've waited a long while to tell me something I knew very well."
"I thought perhaps you'd be glad to see me," she said, with a little laugh. "Where have you been? Not to the Countess'?"
"Indeed, no. To Wetter's."
"Ah! The singer?"
"The singer of my marriage-song, Victoria."
Victoria looked at me in a rather despairing fashion.
"Her singing of it," I added, "will be the most perfect and appropriate thing in the world. You'll be delighted when you hear it. For the rest, my dear sister, Hammerfeldt looks down from heaven and is well pleased."
Victoria sat on the sofa again. I went to the window, unfastened the shutters, and pulled up the blinds. A single star shone yet in the gray sky. I stood looking at it for a few minutes, then lit a cigarette, and turned round. Victoria was on the sofa still; she was crying in a quiet matter-of-fact way, not passionately, but with a rather methodical air. She glanced at me for a moment, but said nothing. Neither did I speak. I leaned against the wall and smoked my cigarette. For five minutes, I should suppose, this state of things went on. Then I flung away the cigarette, Victoria stopped crying, wiped her eyes, and got up.
"I rather wish we'd been born in the gutter," said she. "Good-night, dear."
She kissed me, and I bade her good-night.
"I must get some sleep, or I shall look frightful. I hope William Adolphus won't be snoring very loud, I hear him so plainly through the wall," she said as she started for the door.
Of the next day I have three visions.
I see myself with Krak and Princess Heinrich. Pride illuminated their faces with a cold radiance, and their utterances were conceived in the spirit of aNunc Dimittis. They congratulated the world on its Ruler, the kingdom on its King, themselves on my account, me on theirs. To Krak I was her achievement; to my mother the vindication of the support she had given to Krak, and the refutation of my own grumblings and rebellion. How could I not be reminded of my coronation day? How not smile when the Princess, after observing regretfully that the Baroness would not be able to educate my children, bade me inculcate her principles in the mind of their tutor or governess. She was afraid, she said, that dear Elsa might be a little lacking in firmness, a little prone to that indulgence which is no true kindness in the end. "The very reverse of it, madame," added Krak.
"It's quite time enough for them to begin to do as they like when they grow up," said the Princess Heinrich.
"By then, though," said Krak, "they will have learned, I hope, to do what they ought."
"I hope so with all my heart, Baroness," said I.
"Victoria is absurdly weak with her child," Princess Heinrich complained.
Krak smiled significantly. She had never expected much of Victoria; the repression of exuberant wickedness had been the bounds of her hope.
Krak left us. There must have been some noticeable expression on my face as I watched her go, for my mother said with a smile:
"I know you think she was severe. I used to think so too, now and then. But see how well you've turned out, Augustin!"
"Madame," said I, "my present excellence and my impending happiness reconcile me to everything."
"You had a very happy childhood," my mother observed. I bowed. "And now you are going to marry the girl I should choose for you above all others." Again I bowed. "And public affairs are quiet and satisfactory." A third time I bowed. "Kiss me, Augustin," said my mother.
This summary of my highly successful life and reign was delivered in Princess Heinrich's most conclusive manner. I had no thought of disputing it; I was almost surprised that the facts themselves did not suffer an immediate transformation to match the views she expressed. What matter that things were not so? They were to be deemed so and called so, so held and so proclaimed. My mother's courage touched my heart, and I kissed her with much affection. It is no inconsiderable achievement to be consistently superior to reality. I who fought desperate doubtful battles, crippled by a secret traitorous love of the enemy, could not but pay homage to Princess Heinrich's victorious front.
Next I see myself with Elsa, alone for a little while with Elsa exultant in her pomp, observed ofall, the envy of all, the centre of the spectacle, frocked and jewelled beyond heart's desire, narcotized by fuss and finery, laughing and trembling. I had found her alone with difficulty, for she kept some woman by her almost all the day. She did not desire to be alone with me. That was to come to-morrow at Artenberg. Now was her moment, and she strove to think it eternal. It was not in her to face and conquer the great enemy after Princess Heinrich's heroic fashion; she could only turn and fly, hiding from herself how soon she must be overtaken. She chattered to me with nervous fluency, making haste always to choose the topic, leaving no gap for the entrance of what she feared. I saw in her eyes the apprehension that filled her. Once it had bred in me the most odious humiliation, an intense longing to go from her, a passionate loathing for the necessity of forcing myself on her. I was chastened now; I should not be in so bad a case as Struboff; there would be no question of a fresh slice of bread. But I tried to harden myself against her, declaring that, desiring the prize, she must pay the price, and deserved no pity on the score of a bargain that she herself had ratified. Alas, poor dear, she knew neither how small the prize was nor how great the price, and her eyes prayed me not to turn her fears to certainty. She would know soon enough.
Last comes the vision of the theatre, of the gala performance, where Elsa and I sat side by side, ringed about with great folk, enveloped in splendour, making a spectacle for all the city, a sight that men now remember and recall. There through the piece we sat, and my mind was at work. It seemed to me that all my life was pictured there; I had but to look this way or that, and dead things rose from the graveand were for me alive again. There was Krak's hard face, there my mother's unconquerable smile; a glance at them brought back childhood with its rigours, its pleasures snatched in fearfulness, its strange ignorance and stranger passing gleams of insight. Victoria's hand, ringed, and gloved, and braceleted, held her fan; I remembered the little girl's bare, red, rapped knuckles. Away in a box to the right, close by the stage, was the Countess with her husband; my eyes turned often toward her and always found hers on mine. Again as a child I ran to her, asking to be loved; again as a boy I loved her and wrung from her reluctant love; again in the first vigour and unsparing pride of my manhood I sacrificed her heart and my delight. Below her, standing near the orchestra, was Wetter; through my glass I could see the smile that never left his face as he scanned the bedizened row in which I sat. There with him, looking on, jesting, scoffing at the parade, there was Nature's place for me, not here playing chief part in, the comedy. What talks and what nights had we had together; how together had we fallen from heaven and ruefully prayed for that trick of falling soft! See, he smiles more broadly! What is it? Struboff has stolen in and dropped heavily into a seat. Wetter waved a hand to him and laughed. Laugh, laugh, Wetter! It is your only gospel and therefore must be pardoned its inevitable defects. Laugh even at poor Struboff whose stomach is so gross, whose feelings so fine, who may not give his wife a piece of bread, and would ask no greater joy than to kiss her feet. And laugh at Varvilliers too, who, although he sits where he has a good view of us, never turns his eyes toward the lady by my side, but is most courteously unobservant of her aloneamong all the throng. Did she look at him? Yes, for he will not look toward her. Why, we are all here, all except Hammerfeldt, who looks down from heaven, and Coralie who is coming presently to sing us the wedding-song. Even Victoria's Baron is here, and Victoria's sobs of terror are in my ears again. Bederhof and his fellows are behind me. The real and the unreal, the dummies and the men, they are all here, each in his place in the tableau. When Coralie comes, we shall be complete.
The opera ended and the curtain fell. There was a buzz of talk.
"Our anthem comes now, Elsa," said I.
"Yes," she whispered, crushing the bizarre satin rag of a programme that they had given her. "I have never heard Madame Mansoni," she added. I glanced at her; there was a blush on her cheek. She had heard of Madame Mansoni, although she had not heard her sing.
I put up my glass again and looked at Wetter. He nodded slightly but unmistakably, then flung his head back and laughed again. Now we waited only for Coralie. With her coming we should be complete.
The music began. By arrangement or impulse, I knew not which, everybody rose to their feet. Only Elsa and I sat still. The curtain rose and Coralie was revealed in her rare beauty and her matchless calm. A moment later the great full feelingless voice filled the theatre; she had had no doubt that she could fill the theatre. I saw Struboff leaning back in his chair, his shoulders eloquent of despair; I saw Wetter with straining eyes and curling lips, Varvilliers smiling in mischievous remembrance of our rehearsal. By my side Elsa was breathing quick and fast. I turned to her; her eyes were sparkling intriumph and excitement. It was a grand moment. She felt my glance; her cheek reddened, her eyes dropped, her lip quivered; the swiftest covert glance flew toward where Varvilliers was. I turned away with a sort of sickness on me.
Coralie's voice rose and fell, chanting out her words. The deadness of her singing seemed subtle mockery, as though she would not degrade true passion to the service of this sham, as though the words were enough for such a marriage, and the spirit scorned to sanction it. Elsa's eyes were on her now, and the Countess leaned forward, gazing at her. The last verse came, and Coralie, with a low bow and a smile, sang it direct to me—to me across all the theatre, so plainly that now all heads were turned from her, the people facing round and looking all at me and at Elsa by my side. Every eye was on us. The song ended. A storm of cheers burst out. A short gasp or sob came from Elsa. The cheers swelled and swelled, handkerchiefs waved in the air. I rose to my feet, gave Elsa my hand, and helped her to rise. Then together we took a step forward and bowed to all. Silence fell. Coralie's voice rose again, repeating the last verse. Now all the chorus joined in. We stood till the song ended again, and through the tempest of cheers. There had been no such enthusiasm in Forstadt within the memory of man. The heart of the people went forth to us; it was a triumph, a triumph, a triumph!
The next day we were married, and in the evening my wife and I set out together for Artenberg. This was what Bederhof had arranged.
THE END.
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