Page:The Masses, Volume 1, Number 3.pdf/7

IOIANTHE'S WDDING by HERMANN SUDERMANN

(Second A

S

Instalment)

I O L A N T H E walked beside me in the twilight of the hall, she said very softly, with a sort of timid grief : "I know you don't want to come again." " N o , I don't," I said frankly, and was about to give her my reasons, when she suddenly snatched up my hand, pressed it between her slender white palms, and said, half crying: " O h , come again ! Please, please come again." That's the way you're taken in. O l d nincompoop that I was, she made me daft on the instant. In my excitement I chewed up the whole of my cigar on the ride home. I made right for a mirror—lit all the lights, locked the door—back to the mirror. Looked at myself front and back, and, with the help of my shaving mirror, my profile, too. Result—crushing. A heavy bald pate, bull's neck, puffs under my eyes, double chin, my skin a fiery russet, like a glowing copper kettle. A n d what was worse than all that—when I looked at myself in all my six feet of bulk, a chandelier went up. I knew why everybody immediately called me a "good fellow." Even in the regiment they used to call me a good fellow. Once you are branded with a Cain's mark like that, the rest of your life turns into nothing but a series of events to prove the truth of it. People come to you with hard-luck stories, you're a butt for their jokes, they pump you and blarney you. If once you make a timid attempt to defend yourself, then they say : " W h y , I thought you were a good fellow !" So you can't get out of it. Y o u are and you remain a good fellow. You've been stamped and sealed. A n d then you, good fellow, want to take up with women ! W i t h women who languish for the diabolic, who, to love properly, themselves want to be duped, deserted, and generally maltreated. "Hanckel, don't be an ass," I said to myself. " G o away from the mirror, put out the lights, knock those silly dreams out of your head, and get into bed." Gentlemen, I had a bed—and still have it— an absolutely ordinary bed, as narrow as a coffin. It's of pine, stained red—no springs, no mattress—a deerskin instead. Once a year it is filled with fresh straw. That was the extent of my luxury. Gentlemen, there are many stories about the poor camp couches of persons in very high life. Y o u see them on exhibit in castles and historical museums. A n d when the visitors look at them they invariably clasp their hands and dutifully exclaim: " W h a t power of renunciation ! What Spartan simplicity !" A base deception, gentlemen ! Y o u can't sleep more comfortably anywhere than on a bed like that—provided, of course, that you have a good day's work behind you, a good conscience within you, and no woman beside you—all of which things are about the same. Y o u stretch yourself deliciously until your feet just touch the bottom of the bed, you bite the

Illustrated

by Frank Van Sloun

comfortable a few times, burrow in the pillows, reach out for a good book lying on the table next to the bed, and groan from sheer bliss, That's what I did that night, after the tempter had left me, and as I slowly dozed off I thought : " W e l l , well. N o woman will make you traitor to your dear, hard, narrow bachelor's sack of straw, even if her name is Iolanthe, and even if she is the finest thoroughbred that ever galloped about on God's lovely pastures. "Perhaps all the less so. "Because;—who knows?" CHAPTER

II.

The next day I turned in my report to the boy leaving out my asininities, of course. H e glowered at me with his dark eyes, and said : "Let's say no more about it—I thought so." But a week later he returned to the subject as if casually. " Y o u ought to drive over again after all, uncle." " A r e you crazy, boy?" I said, though I felt as good as if a woman's soft warm hand were tickling the nape of my neck. " Y o u needn't speak about me," he said, examining the tips of his boots, "but if you go there several times, perhaps gradually things will right themselves." Gentlemen, you couldn't have broken a reed more easily than my resolution. So I drove over again. A n d again and again. I would listen to old Krakow's vaporings would drink the coffee his wife made for me, and would listen devoutly while Iolanthe sang her loveliest songs, even though music—in general— well, the offener I visited Krakowitz the uncannier the business seemed to me, but it drew me with a thousand arms. I couldn't help myself. The old A d a m in me wanted, before he went to sleep forever, to enjoy one feast again, even if it was nothing more than the pleasant sensation of a woman's nearness—for something more real than that I had no hopes at bottom. T o be sure, Iolanthe continued to cast furtive glances at me, but what was in them—a reproach, a cry for help, or merely the wish to be admired—I never could make out. Then—on my third or fourth visit—the following happened. It was early in the afternoon—blazing hot—· and from boredom or impatience I drove to Krakowitz. "The Baron and Baroness are asleep," said the lackey, "but the young lady is on the veranda." I began to suspect all sorts of things, and my heart started to thump. I wanted to turn back. But when I saw her standing there tall and snowy white in her mull dress, as if chiseled in marble, my old asininity came upon me again, stronger than ever. " H o w nice of you to come, Baron," she said. "I've been frightfully bored—let's take a walk in the garden—there's a cool arbor there—we can 7

have a pleasant chat in it without being disturbed." W h e n she put her arm in mine, I began to tremble. I tell you, I thought I'd rather climb a hill under fire than go down those steps. She said nothing—I said nothing. The atmosphere grew heavier. The gravel crunched under our tread—the bees buzzed about the spiraea bushes—nothing else to be heard far or near. She hung on my arm quite confidentially, and forced me every now and then to stop when she tore up a clump of grass or plucked a stalk of reseda to tickle her nose with it for an instant and then throw it away. "I wish I loved flowers," she said. "There are so many people who love flowers, or say they love them—in love affairs you can never get at the truth." " W h y not?" I asked. " W h y shouldn't it happen that two human beings like each other and say so—quite simply—without tricks or arrières pensées?" " L i k e each other—like each other," she said tauntingly. " A r e you such an icicle that you translate love into like?" "Unfortunately, whether I am an icicle or not has nothing to do with the case," I answered. "You're a noble-hearted man," she said, and looked at me sidewise, a bit coquettishly. "Everything you think comes from you as if shot from a pistol." "But I know how to keep quiet, too," I said. " O h , I feel that," she answered hastily. "I could confide everything, everything to you." It seemed to me she pressed my arm very gently. "What does she want of you?" I asked myself, and I felt my heart beating in my throat. A t last we reached the arbor, an arbor of aristolochia, you know, with those broad, heartshaped leaves which keep the sun out entirely. It's always night in aristolochia arbors, you know. She let go my arm, kneeled on the ground, and crept through a little hole on all fours. The entrance was completely overgrown, and this was the only way to get inside. A n d I, Baron von Hanckel of Ilgenstein, I, a paragon of dignity and staidness, I got down on all fours, and crept through a hole no larger than an oven door. Yes, gentlemen, that is what the women do with us. Inside in the cool twilight she sat half reclining on a bench, wiping her bared throat with her handkerchief. Beautiful—she looked perfectly beautiful. W h e n I stood before her breathless, panting like a bear—at forty-eight years of age, gentlemen, you don't go jumping about on all fours with impunity-—she burst out laughing—a short, sharp, nervous laugh. "Just laugh at me," I said. " I f you knew how little I felt like laughing," she said, and drew her mouth bitterly. Then there was silence. She stared into space with her eyebrows lifted high. H e r bosom rose and fell. "What are you thinking o f ? " I asked. She shrugged her shoulders.