Rosshalde Page 8

  It disturbed him that she should ask. It had become customary between them that he did not speak of his work, there were many of his more recent paintings that she had never seen.

  She felt that the bright moment was slipping away and did nothing to hold it. And he, who was already reaching for his cigarette case and about to ask leave to smoke, lost his desire and let his hand drop.

  But he drank his coffee without haste, asked a question about Pierre, thanked his wife politely, and stayed on another few minutes, contemplating a small painting he had given her some years before.

  "It holds up rather well," he said, half to himself. "It still looks pretty good. Except for the yellow flowers, they shouldn't really be there, they draw too much light."

  Frau Veraguth made no reply; it so happened that the delicate, finely painted yellow flowers were what she liked best in the picture.

  He turned around with a shadow of a smile. "Goodbye; don't let the time hang too heavy on your hands until the boys get back."

  Then he left the room and descended the stairs. Outside, the dog jumped up on him. He took his paws in his left hand, stroked him with his right hand, and looked into his eager eyes. Then he called through the kitchen window for a piece of sugar, gave it to the dog, cast a glance at the sunny lawn, and went slowly back to the studio. It was a fine day to be out of doors, the air was marvelous; but he had no time, his work was waiting for him.

  There stood his painting in the quiet diffused light of the high studio. On a green surface dotted with a few wildflowers sat the three figures: the man bent over, deep in hopeless brooding, the woman waiting in resigned and joyless disillusionment, the child bright and guileless, playing in the flowers; and over them all an intense, vibrant, triumphantly flowing light glittered with the same carefree warmth in every flower as in the boy's luminous hair and in the little gold ornament on the disconsolate woman's throat.

  Chapter Nine

  THE PAINTER HAD WORKED ON TOWARD EVENING. Now, deadened with fatigue, he sat for a while in his armchair, his hands in his lap, utterly drained, with slack cheeks and slightly inflamed eyelids, old and almost inert, like a peasant or woodcutter after heavy toil.

  He would have liked best to remain in his chair and surrender to his fatigue and craving for sleep. But habit and stern discipline would not let him; after ten or fifteen minutes he jolted himself awake. He stood up and without so much as a glance at the painting went down to the landing, undressed, and swam slowly around the lake.

  It was a milky-pale evening; muffled by the woods, the sound of creaking hay wagons and the weary cries and laughter of farm hands returning from the day's work could be heard from the nearby road. Veraguth stepped shivering out of the water, carefully rubbed himself warm and dry, went into his little living room, and lighted a cigar.

  He had planned to write letters this evening, now he opened his desk drawer without conviction, but irritably closed it again and rang for Robert.

  The servant appeared.

  "Tell me, when did the boys get back with the carriage?"

  "They didn't, Herr Veraguth."

  "What, they're not back yet?"

  "No, Herr Veraguth. I only hope Herr Albert hasn't tired the bay too much. He tends to be a little hard on the horses."

  His master did not answer. He would have liked to spend half an hour with Pierre, who, he supposed, had returned long ago. Now he was angry and rather frightened at the news.

  He ran across to the manor house and knocked at his wife's door. There was astonishment in her answer, he never came to see her at this hour.

  "Excuse me," he said, repressing his agitation, "but where is Pierre?"

  Frau Adele looked at her husband with surprise. "The boys have gone for a drive, don't you remember?"

  Sensing his irritation, she added: "You're not worried?"

  He shrugged his shoulders impatiently. "No. But it's thoughtless of Albert. A few hours, he said. He might have phoned at least."

  "But it's still early. They'll surely be back before dinner."

  "The little fellow is always gone when I want to spend a little time with him."

  "There's no point in getting excited. These things happen. Pierre spends plenty of time with you."

  He bit his lips and left without a word. She was right, there was no point in getting excited, there was no point in being intense and demanding anything of the moment. It was better to sit there patient and indifferent as she did.

  Angrily, he went downstairs and out through the gate to the road. No, that was something he had no desire to learn, he wanted his joy and his anger. What a damper this woman had already put on him, how temperate and old he had become, he who had formerly prolonged happy days boisterously into the night and smashed chairs in anger. All his bitterness and resentment rose up in him, and at the same time an intense longing for his boy, whose voice and glance alone could give him joy.

  With long strides, he started down the road. A sound of wheels was heard, and eagerly he hastened his step. It was nothing. A peasant with a cart full of vegetables. Veraguth called out to him. "Have you passed a coupe with two boys on the box?"

  The peasant shook his head without stopping, and his lumbering farm horse jogged on indifferently into the mild evening.

  As he walked, the painter felt his anger cool and seep away. His step became more relaxed, a soothing weariness came over him, and as he strode easily along, his eyes rested gratefully on the rich quiet countryside, which lay pale and mild in the misty evening light.

  He was hardly thinking of his sons when, after he had been walking for half an hour, their carriage came toward him. It was close to him before it caught his attention. Veraguth stopped under a large pear tree. When he recognized Albert's face, he stepped back, not wishing them to see him and call out to him.

  Albert was alone on the box. Pierre sat slumped in a corner of the carriage, his bare head had drooped and he seemed to be asleep. The carriage rolled past and the painter looked after it, standing at the side of the dusty road until it disappeared from sight. Then he turned around and started back. He would have liked to see Pierre, but it was almost the child's bedtime and Veraguth had no desire to show himself at his wife's house that day.

  And so, passing the park, the house, and the gate, he continued on into town, where he took supper at a tavern and leafed through the papers.

  By then his sons had long been home. Albert sat with his mother, telling her about the expedition. Pierre had been very tired, he had not wanted his supper, and now he was lying asleep in his pretty little bedroom. When his father passed the house on his way home, there was no light to be seen. The balmy starless night surrounded park, house, and lake with black stillness, and fine soft raindrops fell from the motionless air.

  Veraguth put on the light in his living room and sat down at his desk. His craving for sleep was gone. He took a sheet of letter paper and wrote to Otto Burkhardt. Little moths flitted in through the open windows. He wrote:

  My dear friend:

  You were probably not expecting a letter from me so soon. But since I am writing now, you surely expect more than I can give. You think that clarity has come to me and that I now see the damaged mechanism of my life as neatly in cross section as you believe you see it. Unfortunately, that is not the case. Yes, there have been flashes of summer lightning inside me since we spoke of those things, and from time to time an extremely painful revelation stares me in the face; but it is not daylight yet.

  So, you see, I can't say what I shall or shall not do later on. But we will go away together. I will go to India with you, please get me a berth as soon as you know the date. I can't leave before the end of the summer, but in the fall the sooner the better.

  I want to give you the painting you saw here, the one with the fishes, but it would please me to have it stay in Europe. Where shall I send it?

  Here everything is as usual. Albert is playing the sophisticated gentleman, you can't imagine how respectfully w
e treat each other, like the ambassadors of two hostile powers.

  Before we leave, I shall expect you again at Rosshalde. I must show you a painting that will be finished any day now. It's good work, a good thing to wind up my career with in case your crocodiles gobble me up, which, I have to admit, would displease me in spite of everything.

  I must go to bed now, though I am not sleepy. I was at my easel for nine hours today.

  Your Johann

  He addressed the letter and put it out in the hall for Robert to take to the post office next day.

  Looking out of the window before getting into bed, the painter heard the whishing of the rain that he had disregarded while writing. It descended in soft swathes from the darkness and for a long time he lay awake listening as it fell in little tinkling streams from the sodden foliage to the thirsty earth.

  Chapter Ten

  PIERRE IS SO TEDIOUS, said Albert to his mother as they went out into the rain-fresh garden to cut roses. "He hasn't paid much attention to me the whole time, but yesterday I couldn't get anything out of him. A few days ago when I suggested going for a drive together, he was full of enthusiasm. But yesterday he didn't really want to go, I almost had to plead with him. It wasn't much fun for me, not being able to take the two horses, I really went mostly for his sake."

  "Wasn't he well behaved?" Frau Veraguth asked.

  "Oh, very well behaved, but so tedious. There's something so blase about him sometimes. No matter what I suggested or showed him or offered him, I could hardly get a smile or an 'Oh, yes' out of him. He didn't want to sit on the box, he didn't want to learn how to handle the reins, he didn't even want to eat apricots. He was like a spoiled little prince. It was annoying; I'm telling you because I really don't want to take him out with me any more."

  His mother stopped still and looked at him searchingly; his eyes flashed with indignation and she could not repress an amused smile.

  "My big baby," she said soothingly. "You must have patience with him. Perhaps he wasn't feeling very well, he hardly ate a thing for breakfast this morning. That happens now and then with all children, it was the same with you. It usually comes from an upset stomach or from bad dreams at night, and it's true that Pierre is rather frail and sensitive. And besides, he may be a little jealous. Don't forget that he usually has me all to himself, and now you're here and he has to share me with you."

  "But it's my vacation! He must realize that, he's not stupid!"

  "He's a little boy, Albert. You'll just have to be more intelligent than he is."

  Rain was still dripping from the fresh, metallically glistening leaves. They had come to pick the yellow roses that Albert was especially fond of. He bent the crowns of the bushes apart and his mother with her garden shears cut the flowers, which still drooped a little, weighed down by the rain.

  "Was I like Pierre when I was his age?" Albert asked thoughtfully.

  Frau Adele tried to remember. Lowering the hand that held the shears, she looked into her son's eyes and then closed her own, trying to evoke his image as a child.

  "You looked a good deal like him except for the eyes, but you weren't so tall and thin, you started growing a little later."

  "And the rest? My character, I mean."

  "Well, my boy, you too had your moods. But I think you were steadier, you didn't jump from one game or occupation to another as quickly as Pierre does. And he's more emotional than you were, not as well balanced."

  Albert took the shears from his mother's hand and bent over a rose bush. "There's more of Papa in Pierre," he said softly. "Isn't it strange, Mother, how the qualities of parents and grandparents, or a mixture of them, recur in children? My friends say that every child has all the elements in him that will shape his whole life, and that there's nothing to be done about it, absolutely nothing. For instance, if somebody has the makings of a thief or murderer, it just can't be helped, he'll be a criminal and that's that. It's horrible. You believe it, don't you? It's absolutely scientific."

  "That may be," Frau Adele smiled. "When a person becomes a thief or a murderer, scientists may be able to prove that he has always had it in him. But I'm sure there are lots of good straight people who have inherited plenty of evil from their parents and grandparents and go on being good all the same, but science can't very well investigate that. I should say that good will and a good upbringing are more reliable than heredity. We all know what's good and right, or we can learn, and that's what we've got to go by. Nobody knows exactly what hereditary mysteries any man has inside him, and it's best not to worry too much about them."

  Albert knew that his mother never let herself in for dialectical arguments, and instinctively he felt that her naive reaction was right. Yet he knew that this was not the last word on the frightening subject, and he would have liked to say something decisive about the theory of causality, which had seemed so convincing when some of his friends had spoken of it. He cast about in vain for clear, compelling formulations, though--unlike those friends, whom he nevertheless admired--he felt that at heart he inclined far more to an ethical or aesthetic attitude than to the objective, scientific view which he professed among his fellow students. In the end, he let the matter drop and turned back to the roses.

  Meanwhile, Pierre, who was indeed not feeling well and had awakened much later than usual and without zest, had stayed in his room with his toys until he began to feel bored. He was quite wretched, and it seemed to him that something special must happen to make this lackluster day bearable and just a little pleasant.

  Hesitating between anticipation and distrust, he left the house and went to the lime grove in search of something new, some discovery or adventure. He had a dismal feeling in his stomach; that had happened before, but never had his head felt so tired and heavy. He would have liked to run to his mother and cry. But that was impossible in the presence of his big proud brother, who always, even on normal days, made it plain that he was still a little boy.

  If only it occurred to his mother to do something, to call him and suggest a game and be nice to him. But of course she had gone off with Albert again. Pierre felt that this was an unlucky day, that there was little to hope for.

  Listless and dejected, he sauntered along the gravel paths, his hands in his pockets, chewing on the withered stem of a lime blossom. It was damp and morning cool in the garden and the stem had a bitter taste. He spat it out and stopped still, thoroughly out of sorts. He couldn't think of anything, today he felt like being neither prince nor bandit, neither ferryman nor builder.

  Frowning, he looked about on the ground, poked at the gravel with the tips of his shoes, kicked a gray slimy slug off the walk and into the wet grass. Nothing would speak to him, no bird or butterfly, nothing would smile at him and beguile him into gaiety. Everything was silent, everything looked drab and hopeless. He tried a little shiny-red currant from the first bush he passed; it tasted cold and sour. It would be good to lie down and sleep, he thought, and not wake up until everything looked new and beautiful and happy again. There was no point in wandering around like this, making himself miserable and waiting for things that were not going to happen. How lovely it would be, for instance, if a war had broken out and a lot of soldiers came up the road on horseback, or if a house was on fire somewhere or there was a big flood. Ah, such things only happened in picture books, in real life you never got to see them, maybe they didn't even exist.

  Sighing and woebegone, the child sauntered on; the light had gone out of his fine, handsome face. When he heard the voices of Albert and his mother behind the trellis, he was so overcome with jealousy and rancor that the tears rose to his eyes. He turned around and went away very quietly for fear they would hear him and call out to him. He didn't want to answer, he didn't want anybody to make him speak and pay attention and be good. He was feeling so wretched and nobody cared; well, then he wanted at least to savor his loneliness and sadness and feel really miserable.

  He remembered God-in-His-heaven, whom at times he thought very highl
y of; the thought brought a remote glimmer of comfort and warmth, but it soon vanished. Probably God-in-His-heaven was a fake too. And yet, now more than ever, he would have been so glad to have someone he could rely on, someone with something pleasant and comforting to offer.

  Then he thought of his father. Perhaps, he felt hopefully, perhaps his father would understand him, because he himself usually looked still and tense and unhappy. His father would surely be standing in his big quiet studio, painting his pictures, he always was. It wasn't really a good idea to disturb him. But he had said only very recently that Pierre should always come to see him when he felt like it. Perhaps he had forgotten, grownups always forgot their promises so quickly. But there was no harm in trying. Heavens, no, since he could think of no other consolation and needed one so badly.

  Slowly at first--then, as his hopes rose, more briskly--he went down the shaded walk to the studio. He put his hand on the latch and stood still, listening. Yes, his father was inside, he could hear him breathing and clearing his throat, and he heard the delicate wooden click of the brush handles he was holding in his left hand.

  Cautiously he pressed the latch, opened the door without a sound, and looked in. He recoiled at the strong smell of turpentine and varnish, but his father's broad powerful frame aroused hope. Pierre went in, closing the door behind him.

  At the click of the latch, the painter's broad shoulders, closely observed by Pierre, quivered, and he turned his head. There was an injured, questioning look in his sharp eyes, and his mouth hung open unpleasantly.

  Pierre stood motionless. He looked into his father's eyes and waited. Instantly the eyes became friendlier and the irritation went out of the painter's face. "Well, if it isn't Pierre! We haven't seen each other in a whole day. Did Mama send you?"

  The child shook his head and let his father kiss him.

  "Would you like to stay here a while and watch?" his father asked in a friendly tone. He turned back to his painting and aimed a little pointed brush at a certain spot. Pierre watched. He saw the painter study his canvas, saw his eyes staring intensely and almost angrily and his strong nervous hand aiming the brush, saw him frown and bite his lower lip. And he smelled the pungent studio air, which he had always hated and which was especially repugnant to him that day.