Chapter XII: Part THREE: A Cynic in the Making (2)

Albert was in the living-room. It was a small room, with a white marble mantle over the fireplace and a large mirror above it. The open windows opposite were reflected in the mirror. He was seated, an elbow on the arm of his chair, his cheek against the palm of his left hand, his legs outstretched, wistfully thinking, a strange melancholy in his half-closed eyes. His usual impatience was lacking.

Presently Marguerite appeared. She seemed unusually pretty. Her plump figure had never looked so comely and her eyes never sparkled with more vivacity. She paused for a moment coquettishly, inviting inspection. Should she make a light? No, he did not care for a light. He could see how beautiful she was even in the dim light of the setting sun.

He languidly stretched out his right hand and she came closer to him and placed her hand in his. Ah! she knew how to humor her Albert when he was in a melancholy mood, and her Albert was never more amiable and kind than when in this mood. Though jocular he could not hide his melancholy the past few days, and though he might think her a fool, and without much brains, she understood every passing mood of his. No, indeed, all his friends were telling her what a great man Albert was, and how subtle and profound he was, but she knew better than any of them. She knew he was as simple minded as a child. Albert often called her his child—a lot he knew! It was he who needed mothering from his Marguerite.

The next moment she was on his knees, her lips against his forehead, a hand through his soft hair. He responded quickly to tenderness and pressed his lips against her fingers. There was mist in his eyes. He had been thinking very much of her the past few days; in fact, all his thoughts were of her. He had just come from a notary and made his will, leaving everything he possessed to her.

They were seated in silence for a short space, the clock on the mantle ticking strange melodies. Albert often heard this French clock tick German folk songs. He often wondered why Marguerite could not hear these songs—the only one she could make out was _La Parisienne_, and even this one only when Albert hummed it and used his hand as a baton.

“We are going to get married, Marguerite,” he suddenly announced.

Her hand gripped his involuntarily and for a few seconds she made no sound. Her brain could not quite comprehend his statement. She had never asked him to marry her legally and he had never spoken of it.

“Are you ill—What is troubling you?” she was almost breathless with anxiety.

“No, my kitten,” he made an effort to talk in a light tone and encircled her waist with his arm. “It has just occurred to me that in case anything should happen to me—in case I die—you understand——”

“But what put dying into your head all of a sudden?” There was terror in her voice.

“Nothing—nothing particularly—” he was forcing an indifferent tone—“the thought occurred to me today as I was passing the Boulevard. A horse slipped and fell and hurt a pedestrian. One thought brought another—don’t you see, I was thinking an accident might happen to me—what would become of you?”

Her eyes quickly filled with tears and there were tears in her voice. She did not want her Albert to die and if he died she might as well die, too. Marriage or no marriage, it made no difference to her. Many men had flirted with her and tried to win her away from him—yes, even a few of his friends—yes, all men were alike. Whenever they saw a pretty young woman, they wanted to appropriate her, be she a friend’s wife or mistress. No, indeed, it made no difference to her. She had gone to live with him because she loved him and would never leave him, marriage or no marriage.

“_Apprends donc_,” she was saying, “_que jamais je ne te quitterai, que tu m’aimes on non, que tu m’epouses ou non, que tu me maltraites ou non, jamais je ne te quitterai. Entends-tu bien? Jamais! jamais!_”

No, indeed, it made no difference to her, marriage or no marriage, whether or not he loved her, whether or not he’d ever ill-treat her, she’d never leave him—never! never! never! If he was proposing marriage to her because perchance he was jealous for a moment and thought some one might wean her away from him he need have no fear on that score.

He kissed her fingers in silence; there was ecstasy in his soul. He remembered the speech of Ruth when Naomi counselled her return to her people.

Presently Marguerite was sobbing on his breast. Her Albert was speaking and acting strangely. Had he been to see a physician, who had told him he could not live long? What did physicians know—indeed, what did they know? Her Albert would outlive them all. And she would take care of her Albert better than all the nurses in Paris and she would always be faithful to him. Oh, her poor Albert! What had put such foolish thoughts into his brain?

He cleared his throat, wiped the tears out of the corners of his eyes, and spoke light-heartedly. No, he had seen no physician and his health was good and he did not expect to die. He wanted to marry her for her own sake; he wanted no one ever to cast reflections upon her relationship with him. How would she be married—would she like to have a religious marriage? Yes, indeed, he would marry her in any manner it pleased her.

Since Albert insisted upon a legal bond, she wondered if he would mind going with her to the priest at the church of St. Sulpice. She had been “confessing” to him since she came to Paris.

“No, indeed, my kitten!” Albert’s voice was almost jubilant. “By all means let us be married by a Catholic priest. When the Church of Rome binds no one can tear asunder,” he added with a mysterious twinkle in his eyes.

* * * * *

Eight days later Albert was brought home slightly wounded. The duel had taken place in the Valley of St. Germain.

During his convalescence a friend dropped in.

“You have made thousands and thousands of friends,” the visitor was saying enthusiastically.

“Ah, yes, I understand,” jested Albert, “Drawing blood—especially an enemy’s blood—always relieves one’s pain. If I had been killed the kind Jesuits would have named the day of the duel a Saint’s Day.”

Marguerite, who sat by his bedside, begged him to stop laughing, as the physician had told her his constant laughing and joking irritated his wound.

“The doctor is mistaken,” Albert retorted. “My joking and laughing irritates the wounds of my enemies.”

THE JEST OF THE GODS.

I.

Youth lives in the future, middle age in the present, old age in the past, but Albert Zorn, though still in his early middle life, and in the greatest vigor of his mentality, found himself nursing memories of the past. Instead of dwelling upon the present or the future he was now constantly brooding over the blunders in the days gone by, living over again the moments of ecstasy, and of passion, long vanished, musing upon experiences that could never enter his life again. Never a man of action—his battles were only strifes of ideas—he reached the stage when no one would take up his challenges. For it was in the middle of the nineteenth century when there came a lull in the struggle of ideas. After every sharp world conflict there comes a momentary pause, a lethargical rest, while man gathers strength for the next combat. Recently there had been so many clashes of ideas, irreconcilable ideas, that for the moment no one cared what the other thought.

In spite of his growing fame Albert was living in a modest quarter in Paris, just he and his Marguerite, as simply as the humblest of workmen, and worked indefatigably. He wrote poems, the finest fruits of his pen, he discussed on philosophical themes, with keener insight than the obtuse pedants who passed for philosophers; he made political observations, with clearer vision than those whom the world called statesmen. But his enemies—and all his antagonists were his enemies—clamored loud enough to drown his voice. Being a radical among the conservatives and a conservative among radicals his enemies had no difficulty in confusing the masses as to the meaning of his words. The enemies of clear thinking and right living have always seen to it that the masses should fail to understand those that come to their aid. Ah, the masses, he murmured under his breath, the masses have always unwittingly stoned those who came to redeem them!

Spring came again, spring in Paris. The sky was clear and blue; blossoms dazzled in the morning sunshine; delicious fragrance wafted from the distant fields. Spring always brought melancholy thoughts to Albert’s mind, and his thoughts this spring were even more melancholy. For paralysis had spread from his left hand to the whole left side and he could hardly move without acute pain. However, the more he suffered the harder he worked because the intensity of creative word deadened his pain, but when the effort was spent the reaction was all the greater.

One late afternoon he settled at an open window, with his eyes almost closed, dreams of old songs in his brain. He was tired and, leaning in an arm-chair, he rested, feeling as if an iron hoop was around his head and through its tight embrace all his thoughts and ideas had been put to sleep. Gradually all the sweet memories of the past—and even his past great sorrows were now sweet memories to him—came back to him. He let his mind wander . . .

A bird twittered under his window; a sparrow came hopping on his little feet. He sighed and drew his breath painfully. He could not even hop like the sparrow. It was years since he had walked the Boulevards, since he had heard Paris laugh. Oh, Paris! he sighed and nodded his head woefully. France was to him like a garden where all the beautiful flowers of the world had been plucked to make one fine nosegay—Paris was the nosegay. It seemed to him ages since the perfume of this nosegay had reached his nostrils . . .

His thoughts drifted. He began to feel the ennui of his isolation. His visitors had grown fewer and fewer and fewer. He realized that no one cared to see one in misery. Presently his mind dwelt upon his last glimpse of Parisian life. It seemed to him ages ago. Leaning back in his cab he had watched the smiling grisettes in the doorways of the shops, the coquettes on the pavement . . .

He again heaved a sigh and abruptly dismissed that pleasant memory. There was rancor in his heart. People had called him a libertine, a Don Juan . . . A bitter smile appeared on his bloodless lips. He a Don Juan! He who had sung of romance and love! He frowned upon the injustice of the world’s opinion. He could count on the fingers of one hand the number of women he had ever loved . . .

He tossed his head, contempt on his face. He did not care what the people were saying about him.

The next moment his wife’s laughter reached his ears. In the adjoining room she was munching bonbons and reading a novel by Paul de Kock. He shuddered. Ah, he should have married a woman who could understand him . . .

He suddenly raised himself from his arm-chair, picked up his cane, limped across the room, and was soon in the street. An overwhelming desire to see the Boulevards again came upon him. He hailed a cab and leaning back in the conveyance feasted his eyes upon the surging crowds in the thoroughfares. Reaching the Madeleine he ordered the driver to turn into Rue Royal, and then along the Tuillerie Gardens up to the Louvre, when he ordered the coachman to halt and alighted. Half paralyzed, half blind, leaning heavily upon his cane and dragging his withered limbs, he proceeded to the palace of art.

It was late in the afternoon, the galleries were deserted, the glow of the setting sun cast melancholy shadows over the plastic statues of stone and granite wrought by the hands of the ancient Egyptians and long forgotten Greeks. There was even vaster melancholy in his heart. The gods and goddesses he worshipped in his youth seemed to be mocking him—Bacchus and Apollo, Orpheus and the bearded, horny Pan—they all seemed to jeer at him. He could not withhold a groan. He fathomed the despair of Moses, the son of Amram, as he stood on the top of the Pisgah and yearningly gazed at the land of Canaan—the land for which he had fought that others might enter but he could not enter. That was the irony of life, the jest of the gods. He, too, like Moses of old, had dragged himself to the top of Pisgah to have his last glance at his promised land!

A thousand sad thoughts flitted through his brain. He limped along the vast halls and paused before Venus de Milo. A hectic flush came into his face. He looked up at the armless goddess with the covetousness of a virgin youth beholding a maiden of rare beauty. Settling down on the cold stone bench in front of the statue, both of his hands resting on the head of his cane, his half-blind eyes blurred with tears, he gazed yearningly at the parted lips of her exquisite mouth. Was she just smiling, or was she, too, smiling at him? His eyes closed for a moment, with unbearable pain in his heart. Ah, if he could only die at this very moment! he reflected. That would be a poetical, pagan, fitting death for him. His whole life passed before him like a vision. All his life he had worshipped beauty—the divine figure before him was the symbol of beauty—her seductive, tantalizing, heavenly smile, her sweet sensuous lips set his blood boiling. Tears rolled down his wan cheeks, his enfeebled frame shook with grief and mortification. He must live perforce and look on as the great, avenging, mocking God was finishing his diabolic jest . . . .

He struggled to his feet and staggered through the vast corridors, without turning his eyes in the direction of the artistic masterpieces of all ages . . .

After that visit at the Louvre Albert was unable to leave his room. His forebodings were prophetic. That palace of art—the Salle de la Venus de Milo—was his Mount of Nebo, from which he had caught the last glimpse of his promised land.

II.

One day Marguerite entered his room with the announcement that some one wished to see him.

At first he made no reply. He lay stretched on a low couch with the immobility of a corpse and his upper eyelids met the lower in two fine pencilled lines like the eyes of the dead. His hair and beard, framing skin of deathly pallor, were also lifeless. His beautifully shaped right hand, thin almost to the point of transparency, rested limply on his coverlet.

Marguerite repeated: “Albert, there is some one who wants to see you.”

His figure suddenly stirred as if convulsed.

“I suppose another countryman to view my remains and then go back to Germany and lie about me!” A bitter smile appeared on his bloodless lips as he uttered these words with an irritable sneer. “I am sick of all visitors. They come here out of curiosity. The swine! What stories they have fabricated about me. I want friends, not visitors. And friends come only when one has something to give them!” He emitted a sigh. “Why should they come?” he soon added more bitterly. “Who wants to see misery!”

“This is a woman, Albert. She says she comes from Vienna——”

“From Vienna—she is perhaps bringing me word that the director of the Royal theatre is to present one of my tragedies—he has promised me. Send her in.”

The next instant the corner of his mouth twitched, the crease between his eyes flattened, and digging his right elbow into the downy pillow underneath him, he raised his right side to a half-sitting posture and leaned against the prop of pillows at his head. A panting sigh betrayed the great effort of raising himself.

Presently a girl of about twenty-two stepped in, and as she caught sight of the half-blind, half-paralyzed figure her breathing almost stopped. For a bare second she halted as if she meant to retreat, but her blue eyes filled with tears and she whispered. “_Bon jour._”

“_Guten Morgen_,” he replied in German and extended his withered right hand. “So you have come from Vienna,” he added without releasing her hand. “Do you know my friend Loeb?”

The young woman stood speechless, leaning over the couch, realizing for the first time that unless he lifted the paralyzed lid of his right eye he saw nothing. Tears overflowed her eyes.

“I have not come direct from Vienna,” she faltered—“I haven’t been there for some time, but—but I wanted some excuse to cross your threshold—I lisped your songs before I could lisp my prayers—they were my breviary—you have taught me the meaning of the beauty of life——”

Albert nodded his head as she uttered the last flattering words, a smile of great satisfaction appeared on his face. The speaker’s girlish voice attracted him; it was like a voice from his young life, the days of love-making in Gunsdorf, Bonn and Goettingen. And the voice was such a relief to him! He was tired of all the voices around him—of the jabbering speech of his nurses, and of his wife—good souls all, but God! what voices! It was years since he had heard a pleasing voice.

“Never mind why you came here,” he struck in, smiling, “I am happy that you are here. Sit down and tell me who you are.”

She moved a chair nearer the couch and sat down.

“I can hardly tell you who I am—” she was nervously plucking at the edges of the roll of music in her hands, her eyes filled with tears, rested pitifully on the face that spoke of a thousand sufferings. To her it was the face of the Christ—the suffering face of the Man of Sorrows; the beard and the superfine, bloodless lips and the nose and the closed eyes and the strange smile—there was something of the expression of _Eli, Eli, lamah Zabachtani_ in that face.

“Come nearer, let me see what you look like.”

She moved her chair closer to the couch, and raising the right eyelid with the tips of his fingers, he held it for a moment and looked at the visitor, who hesitated to tell her name. He scented romance. The sweet tantalization of youth was again in his blood. He was eager, pursuing, impatient. The glimpse of her made him still more eager. He took in at a glance her roguish blue eyes, so appealing yet so shrewd, her light-brown hair, her slender figure—the slenderness, without the suggestion of meagerness that always attracted him.

He pressed her for information about herself. She fenced cleverly. She did not mean to tell him her history—she had never told her history to any one.

“I’ll tell you the truth,” she was saying, trying to divert his mind from her person. “I learned that your secretary had gone and since French and German are almost equally my mother tongue, I thought I might be of service to you.”

“No, no,” he shook his head, laughing, “one can no more have two mother tongues than one can have two mothers. You are a Swabian—you can’t hide it from me. I can tell a Swabian accent—I can never forget Hegel’s accent and manner of pronouncing certain words—and a sweet Swabian woman’s face.—Now, since I have paid you a compliment we are friends, so you must tell me who you are.”

There was a moment’s silence. The visitor’s blue eyes shifted from side to side, her inner indecision was betrayed in her mobile features.

“I once spent a whole day talking about you with a perfect stranger, a man who happened to be a friend and admirer of yours—he thought I had fallen in love with him.” She gave a roguish little laugh.

“Who was he?” There was boyish inquisitiveness in his voice.

“Heinrich Metzger.”

“So you are the Butterfly!” Albert exclaimed.

“Yes, I am the Butterfly,” she returned, laughing. “What did Herr Metzger tell you about me?” She halted and a blush spread over her cheeks. “I know; he told you he had met me on a train going from Paris to Havre, and that I had fallen in love with him at first sight. Herr Metzger thinks he is quite irresistible.”

Albert laughed cheerfully. No man is displeased at hearing a pretty woman ridicule another man, even when the other happens to be a friend. However, he protested.

“Metzger is a handsome fellow—a very fine chap—quite a lady-killer.”

“What else did he tell you?”

“Let me see. He was quite impressed with the mystery of your flitting existence. You wouldn’t give him your name but you gave him your ring on which there was a seal with the emblem of a butterfly—and you did fly away. The next time he met you on the Strand in London, but you wouldn’t recognize him. And then he found you in Paris. He thought you were a mysterious person. He wished he were a novelist instead of a poet. He could have written an interesting story about you.”

The girl laughed.

“In order to write the novel he would have to know the mystery,” she said, her smiling face quickly changing to that of sadness, “and he still knows nothing about me. He doesn’t even know my first name. O, yes, he thinks my name is Margot.” Again she emitted a light-hearted laugh. “He evidently doesn’t know the meaning of _Margot_ in French. I had talked so much and so recklessly that day that I thought _Margot_ a fitting name for myself. I was a regular _margot_—a real chatterbox—that day—and all because we talked about you and he said he had just visited you——”

Albert extended his hand. She let her hand rest in his and gazed intensely at his face, which was now flushed and full of animation.

“I never hoped, I never dreamed, I’d come so close to you, the poet of my dreams,” she murmured without withdrawing her hand from his.

“Do tell me who you are,” he begged.

“For the present call me Butterfly,” she said, rising. “I’ll call again—if you’ll let me.”

He was clinging to her hand.

“You must come again!” he addressed her _du_ (thou) familiarly. “You must!” he pressed her hand affectionately. “You shall be the last ray of sunshine in my dark life. Ah, why didn’t you come before? My life of late has been so dreary!”

There were tears in his voice. Tears gathered in her eyes, too. Then a moment of silence. From the next room came the jarring laughter of his wife. The parrot was repeating _au revoir_ again and again. From outside, through the open door over the balcony, came the noise of the street, the rattle of carriages, the jangling of a hurdy-gurdy——

“_Au revoir_,” she whispered.

He was still clinging to her hand, speechlessly. Bending over him she kissed his forehead and rushed out of the house.

III.

He dropped on his pillows, a hectic flush on his bloodless cheeks. His eyelids sealed, his right arm limply on the coverlet, he lay musing, half dreaming. In this somnolent manner he often spent hours, conjuring up sweet recollections, pleasing fantasies, and more often composed lyrics.

Presently Marguerite stood before him. Her approaching steps irritated him. Only the other day he had jested about the blessing of his growing blindness—it spared him the sight of Marguerite getting fat! Fat women had always offended his sense of beauty and even now he could not bear the thought that his Marguerite—the slim pretty girl he had first known—was tipping the scale at two hundred pounds. No wonder, that spendthrift had of late thought of nothing but rich food and gaudy clothes. And now while her Albert, nothwithstanding his paralysis, was laboring all day with his pen to provide her wants, she was only thinking of many course dinners and pretty dresses. He had pretended not to notice this. He wished to banish unhappy broodings—his life was unhappy enough without tormenting thoughts.

“Who was that girl?” she asked.

“Oh, some friend sent her here,” he replied perfunctorily. “In the absence of my secretary she might be of some service to me. She is quite proficient in both French and German.”

“She is quite chic—that girl——”

For a bare second he made no rejoinder. He seemed to hold his breath. Then he said, with evident constraint, “Rather amiable—and bright.”

The next moment he heard her making her toilette preparatory to going out. She was always going out, he was saying to himself with increased irritability. In the past few years this thought frequently crossed his mind, only to be brushed away by a counterthought of sympathy for his poor wife, chained to a corpse. He pitied her, his martyr.

Presently as he heard her splashing in the next room, talking loudly to the nurse, and laughing lustily, his irritation grew. He was vexed and angry. He wondered whom she was going to meet. She usually stayed away hours—sometimes almost the whole day—and when he pressed her for an explanation she would burst in tears and say that after she had walked blocks and blocks in order to save cabfare he ill-treated her; and then he would call himself a brute and would reprimand her for her niggardliness. No, he did not want his devoted wife to wear her legs off for the sake of a couple of francs; for even though he was paralyzed he was working and earning as much as many an able-bodied man, he added boastfully.

This moment he was sure that she had always lied to him. She was having secret rendezvous. No, no, he was not jealous. A paralyzed man, with a wasted body, could hardly compete with half a million able-bodied men in Paris! he would say to himself cynically. Ah! he did not care whom she was going to meet if she only did not laugh so boisterously. He could not bear that booming, loud laughter of hers coming now from the adjoining room.

He was annoyed beyond words. No wonder the young visitor who had just left had mistaken Marguerite for a servant.

The young Swabian girl had made a _faux pas_. She had referred to Marguerite as his servant and when he had enlightened her she blundered still worse. The woman who had opened the door for her looked so ordinary, she had said, that she could not imagine her idol would have chosen such a fat woman for his mate. No, he did not blame this young girl for her blundering speech. Marguerite was an ordinary fat woman, not the fit companion of a poet, who had always worshipped feminine beauty.

He was glad Marguerite was going out, and would leave him in peace. Between the parrot’s screeching and Marguerite’s laughter he did not know which to choose, but when both were exercising their lungs life was unbearable. He felt quite relieved when his wife, in swishing silk, presently bade him _au revoir_ and slammed the door, leaving an odor of cosmetics behind her.

He was again calm, frolicsome thoughts playing in the attic of his brain. He was thinking of his mysterious visitor, the Butterfly. She was charming. Her voice came back to him like a sweet chime. A delectable sensation was rising within him. The voice of the sweetest romance was calling to him. His chest heaved. She had been kind to Metzger and had given him her ring as a souvenir because he was the friend of her poet, and the deluded soul thought she was in love with him! A happy smile was on his face. He was very fond of Metzger. Had he not said in print he, Albert Zorn, aside from being the greatest living poet in the world, had the kindest heart, the noblest soul? And Metzger was handsome. Even in his days of bloom, Albert could not boast of such manly beauty as his friend, Albert owned to himself. And this mysterious Swabian damsel had always been in love, with him ever since she was a child, she had said! All his pains disappeared. The romanticism of his youth was returning. Indeed, his body was wasted but his spirit, his heart, was as young as of yore! Real poets die young! Youth remains in their hearts even if they reach the age of Methuselah! Yes, he was young again. The lure of love was in his blood once more. The dying candle sent forth a leaping flame.

He was soon feverish with anxiety, as feverish as when he waited for Miriam under the willows near Gnesen. His fancy lent color to his vision of this mysterious stranger. He had only a glimpse of her but the impression of her face was indelible. With his eyes closed the picture of her was most vivid.

He stirred and reached for the portfolio that contained his paper and pencil—which always lay by his side. He rose higher on his pillows and, gripping his long pencil, began to scrawl. He had always had a beautiful handwriting but now he could only scratch long irregular letters. He was glad that she had left him her address. Why had she left him her address? Honey flowed in his veins. Did she hope he would write to her? She was but womanly; wanted to be wooed by her lover . . .

“Lovable and charming Person:—” he scribbled hastily,

“I regret most keenly having seen so little of you on your first visit. You left a most agreeable impression upon me, and I have the greatest desire to see you again. Don’t stand on ceremony but come as soon as possible—tomorrow if you can. I am ready to receive you at any time. I should prefer that you come at four and stay until—as late as you please. I am writing to you with my own hand, in spite of my poor eyesight, because, as you know, I have no secretary whom I can trust. The deafening noises around me cause me incessant pain, and your sympathy has meant so much to me. Superstitious as I am, I imagine that a good fairy has visited me in my hour of affliction. My hours of affliction? No, if you are a good fairy this is an hour of bliss. Or will you be a bad fairy? I must know this at once.

Your Albert Zorn.”

IV.

He forwarded the letter as soon as he had finished it and indulged in speculations, sweet speculations. Would she come tomorrow at four? No, she might not. Women were never as impulsive as men but more subtle. Women possessed greater self-control; at least, they were not as demonstrative as men; they knew how to hide their feelings. Indeed, he had known the whims and caprices of women since he was sixteen! Women loved to make men beg on their knees for that which they would eagerly give without asking. Is it possible that this pretty young Swabian was in love with him?—with him who was no longer a man but a spirit? He was not even an aged Faust rejuvenated by love. What comedy life was playing with him!

His dual vision—of experiencing sensations and contemplating them at the same time—had never left him, since his impressionable youth. Feverish youth was in his blood again. He recalled the touch of her hand—how clinging her hand was, when he clasped it in his!—he had experienced the same feeling as when he first touched the hand of—of Hedwiga, of Hilda, or Eugenie, of Miriam, of—no, he could not think of Marguerite now.

The next moment he grew self-analytical and serious. He was always analyzing himself. Love did not change, he said to himself. The fire that burned in his veins when he first met Marguerite was out. Yes, that fire was now dead. As far as Marguerite was concerned there was winter in his heart; white flakes had fallen on the sweet blossoms of yesterday and blighted them. In their place new flowers had sprung, new perfumes, the beginning of a new spring. Ah, he must seize his lyre and serenade his awakened joys and sorrows! Indeed, joys and sorrows always went together, like the rose and the thorn, like the sun and the clouds. His harpstrings quivered with sweet, sad tones. The moonbeams again played with the flower petals of verdant spring; the departed nightingales had come floating from afar and were singing as sweetly as ever. Love was dead, long live love!

Ah, he was young again! Songs flowed from his heart. He must not philosophize. Love was eternal.

He would not think of his shrunken body, he would not dwell on his wasted strength, new blood flowed in his veins.

V.

His good fairy came punctually at four. She tripped in like a fairy, indeed, and leaned over him and kissed him on his forehead, while her little hand rested in his. She, too seemed unconscious of the presence of Marguerite in the adjoining room. She removed her wrap with a gesture of determination—as if warding off an intruder—and settled down by his couch, as if she meant to stay with him forever.

“Let me look at your sweet Swabian face,” he whispered and raised the lifeless eyelid of his right eye. “You have a face of a Swabian _Gelb-Vögelein_,” he breathed in her ear.

He was glad Marguerite had never learned German. He could now speak freely with his Butterfly. And this was only the second time she had been near him! He felt that he had always known her; everything about her seemed strangely familiar to him; he felt as if he had met her in a previous existence and now met her again after a lapse of many years; and while his memory failed him as to her name and the place he had met her, his feelings toward her were those of an old friend.

“You haven’t told me yet your right name,” he murmured, seeking her hand, which she readily placed in his. “You elusive Butterfly!” He emitted a soft laugh, “I never stopped thinking of you for a moment since you left. I wondered if you were but a fairy of dreamland and feared that I might wake at any moment and find you had vanished. What is your name, fairy mine?”

“Call me Butterfly——”

“My Butterfly you shall always be, but what is your real name—who are you? It seems to me I have known you for ages—I am beginning to believe in the transmigration of souls—I feel that I met you before in a different sphere——”

Her hand still resting in his she looked at his bloodless face wistfully; she seemed absent minded, as if she had not heard his words, and yet knew what he said.

“You are right, I know I met you before.” She was speaking in a hushed voice, an expression on her pensive face as if she were under a hypnotic influence; there was a strange glitter in her blue eyes. “When I was a little girl—when I first read your poems—your words seemed familiar to me as if I had heard them before. When I read your verses, I heard you recite them to me—the voice I now hear was the voice I always heard. When I told my mother about this she only laughed and patted me and said I was an imaginative child. The older I grew the more convinced I was that souls did migrate—that your soul and mine had loved each other before and had been parted and that we were destined to meet again. I always knew I’d meet you. When my mother brought me to Paris—I was little then—I heard some one speak of you. I can recall the trembling of my heart at the mention of your presence in Paris. But I was only a child then. I felt like a young girl, as yet unfamiliar with her own passions, suddenly awakened to the consciousness of male attraction. I trembled every time I heard your name mentioned and yet never dared learn of your whereabouts in this great Babel and see you in the flesh. Sometimes I heard people speak of you in uncomplimentary terms—they said you were immoral—and I felt mortified but I did not believe anything evil of you. I could not believe it. I have always known you—always! When I met Herr Metzger on the train he made some remark to me in French, but I could see that he was German so I addressed him in his language. He was piqued at first. People speaking a foreign language are always piqued when you make them feel their adopted tongue is not quite their own. We are all vain about it—even the great Albert Zorn!”

She gave a roguish little laugh and he pressed her hand tenderly without venturing a retort. He had listened to her so attentively that he did not wish to interrupt her speech.

“He thought I was flirting with him,” she continued with a gentle toss of her well-poised head. “Herr Metzger is very vain about his physique. Of course, he is good looking but he knows nothing about women—nothing! I was alone in the compartment—just he and I—and the train was speeding. During travel intimacies are quickly formed. Before long he told me the history of his life—he told me everything about himself, even of his love affairs, his conquests.” She chuckled. “He thought he made me jealous when I teased him about his frankness. Mind you, I was then only seventeen and he was a man already—years and years older than I—and within half an hour he revealed himself to me completely while I had told him nothing about myself—literally nothing! When he began to probe he found all avenues closed. Then he began to boast—all men begin to boast when they fear they have not made sufficient impression upon a woman; they don’t realize that their boasting, like a frost in late spring, nips the first buds. He was telling me what a great poet he was and what the critics said of him, incidentally mentioning what you had said of him. He must have noticed my sudden interest in him. He misunderstood the reason. He boasted of friendship with you and I showed still greater interest in him. He felt flattered. I wished to meet him again when he returned here—I wanted to renew my acquaintance with such a close friend of yours. I hoped to meet you through him. Was that mean of me?”

Albert sighed and only pressed her small hand with his thin fingers.

Marguerite passed through the room, and the girl quickly withdrew her hand. Marguerite paused to ask him if he minded her going to the theatre that evening. She had not yet seen Scribe’s latest play. Albert said he did not mind it at all. In fact, he wished she would go and get a little fresh air. Would he mind if she took the nurse along and got dinner at one of the restaurants? No, he did not mind this either. He had not felt as well in years as at the present. Marguerite wabbled away, humming a bar of the latest popular song.

“Go on. And then?” he turned to the girl by his couch.

“Then something dreadful happened to me.” She crossed her legs and gripped her knee between her clasped hands. “My mother urged me to get married. She was at the end of her string, she confided to me, with tears in her eyes. She did not want me to repeat her blunder. She thought I was too impetuous—she said she herself had been too impetuous and ruined her whole life. I, too, might prove indiscreet if I fell in love. She believed in the orthodox fashion of French marriages, a husband chosen by the parents. She wished she had listened to her mother when she was seventeen. Instead—instead she had a daughter on her hands without a father to look after her. Men were all alike, she preached to me, unless they were tied by legal fetters they flew away to warmer climates when the air at home grew cold. This was a shocking revelation to me. I had never known my father but my mother had never mentioned his name so I thought he had died, I asked no further questions. I now understood my mother’s tragedy—and mine. A few days later she introduced me to a middle-aged Frenchman and told me he wished to marry me. He was rich, she added, and would provide well for me. I made no protests. I married him.”

She paused. There were tears in her eyes, there were tears in her voice. The poet lay still, his bloodless lips compressed, his paralyzed eyelids sealed. The clock on the mantel seemed to tick louder than ever. Through the open glass door over the balcony came noises from the street; rolling vehicles, snapping whips, floating laughter. The parrot was calling “_Bon jour_” and then joined in the laughter outside.

“I thought I was quite worldly then,” she soon preceded; “at least, quite sophisticated for a girl of seventeen. I had always mingled with people older than myself and assimilated their maturity. I had traveled considerably and my close association with my mother—who is a very intellectual and cultured woman and was governess in her younger days in one of the most influential aristocratic families in Germany—should have given me an understanding of life. Yes, I thought I did understand life much more than most girls of my age but I had soon learned that seventeen is but seventeen; my knowledge of the world was too superficial—it was like most conversations between pseudo-cultured people—meaningless phrases that sound well and vapid platitudes that pass for cleverness but contain not a grain of real sense. Stranger still, while I was a precocious child, impetuous, passionate, with a strong sex sense, I did not have the least intimation of the relationship between the sexes. It doesn’t found credible, but it was so. My inquisitiveness had never led me to probe the relationship of the sexes. I found myself married to a native of Paris, a man twenty-six years older than myself, a man to whom sex was an open book, one to whom sex had only one meaning. No, I can’t quite make clear to you my feelings when he first kissed me, when he ravished my body. Oh, it was revolting!” She shuddered visibly. “I had had visions of sweetness, of tenderness, of transporting passion, of ecstasy, and found—oh, I can’t describe it—it is too horrible to dwell upon it.”

She paused, a sob in her throat. Albert’s hand was caressing hers sympathetically, silently.

“I wonder if any man understands the difference between the passion of a woman and that of a man!” She heaved a sigh, and there was agony in her voice. She felt the tender grip of his hand and added smilingly, “Poets sometimes do understand the difference, but then poets are feminine in their instincts. A man may prefer one woman to another—just as he may prefer champagne to claret—but when he can’t have his preference the inferior is quite as agreeable. A woman is a woman. I am told even a man as wise as Benjamin Franklin felt this about women. Of course, Franklin was no poet. To a woman only her preference exists—the other are _abscheulich_! The fact that many women submit to men they don’t love proves nothing. In a society in which more than half of life is artificial, forced, and the woman the weaker, she can’t help but submit. But, oh! if man could but read the innermost secrets of woman’s heart! Thousands of years of self-suppression have made women incapable of even revealing themselves to themselves.

“Well, I found myself legally tied to a man whom I abhorred. His mere presence was loathsome to me. When he touched me I was filled with revulsion. Instead of a vivacious, highly sensitive girl that I had been I had become a depressed, morbid woman. I could not even read your songs—all beauty had become ugliness to me. I thought seriously of ending my life. Many a time I carried carbolic acid to my lips and put it away from me by sheer force. At times I raved like a maniac. My husband showered gifts upon me—he gave me jewels and fine clothes—men are always so stupid and imagine trinkets win affection—but that made me hate him the more. He told me I ought to consult a physician but I knew opiates could not cure me. How could a sordid business man, to whom the acquisition of wealth was all that life offered, understand what ailed me? One day he suggested travel. I welcomed it. I hoped new scenes might take me away from myself. But it proved the reverse. It only made me realize that there were fragrant woods and that I was confined in a narrow little cage in a dingy attic. My husband was beside himself. When we got to London he decided that I was insane. Perhaps I was. At least, I acted like a lunatic. The excitement of the English metropolis had a strange effect upon me. I had suddenly grown hilarious, pulled my husband from music hall to music hall, from one jewelry shop to another—and made him squander his hard-earned money as if I were his mistress. It was then—on the Strand—that Metzger met me and spoke to me but, to his amazement, I denied his acquaintance. I could not think of the time when I read you poetry and was in love with the beauty of life. But a few days later the reaction set in. I flung my jewels away, I tore up my finery, I shrank from my distracted husband and wept.

“Days passed. He implored me, he beseeched me to be rational, but I was hysterical. One day on the pretext of taking a drive to get fresh air, he finally coaxed me to leave my room. The next thing I remember is that he escorted me to a luxurious villa, where I was met by a fine looking elderly gentleman, who talked to me as if I were a little child. That amused me and I couldn’t help bursting into laughter. He patted my shoulder and said I would be all right in time, and his strange actions amused me still more although his French was enough to send one into convulsions. Before I realized what was happening, I was locked in a room, alone. The next day I discovered that my husband had placed me in a private sanitorium. But, thank God, I was rid of my husband, I said to myself; I was alone and free from his loathsome attentions. After a few days’ rest I had a talk with the head physician—a very sane individual—who was very sympathetic and kind. It did not take him long to understand my case. He gave me the five hundred pounds my husband had left with him for my care for three months and bade me God-speed. ‘Yes, I understand—I understand,’ he kept murmuring sadly. ‘God help you,’ he added in a prayerful tone.

“At last I was free. Instead of going back to my mother I went to Vienna, where I had relatives. I was afraid my mother might try to bring about a reconciliation with my husband. Before long I was myself again. Besides the money left me by my husband I earned a good deal by giving French lessons, and I lived economically. One day I made the acquaintance of a musician, a composer—a dreamy sort of chap—who seemed to be falling in love with me.

“He always carried a volume of your poems in his pocket or under his arm. And how he recited your songs! The poor young man was lovelorn. He thought he was in love with me but I knew he was intoxicated with love. He was a poet. And he set some of your songs to music most charmingly. I presume I encouraged his attentions and his visits—the poor young man was so helpless, so child-like, and I was so eager to hear him hum your songs—but when he began to make violent love to me I realized I had gone too far with him. I told him I could not love him—I could not love anybody—and that, besides, I was married. But I could not get rid of him. He was the most helpless creature I have ever known and the most sentimental. It was pitiful. I pitied him from the bottom of my heart and gave him some financial assistance. He took it, but he was not a parasite. He was just helpless. I then decided to return to Paris. I had exacted a promise from my mother that she would not mention my husband’s name. And I have been living with her ever since. I have never discussed the source of her income but I know she has always received a monthly stipend from a well known noble family in Germany—it may be from my father—and her allowance is quite liberal.”

“_Armes Kind_,” Albert murmured affectionately.

She paused. Marguerite, overdressed and overperfumed—large hipped and full-breasted, with rouged fleshy cheeks—came to bid Albert goodbye. She leaned over him and kissed his forehead but he made no attempt to raise his eyelid. He only murmured _au revoir_, and as he turned his face to one side a deep sadness flitted across his cadaverous cheeks. As Marguerite turned to leave, she turned around and gave the young girl a quizzical look.

When the outside door closed the invalid stretched out his hand toward his visitor and she replaced her hand into his.

“_Du letzte Blume meines larmoyanten Herbstes_,” he murmured, caressing her hand.

A moment later he added, “You won’t leave me now, since you have at last appeared, my last ray of sunshine. All my friends have left me—all—” There was a checked sob in his breast.

“Never, never, never!—” There were tears in her voice.

“Don’t cry, _holdes Herz_, life is a comedy, and death its final scene. Last night I dreamt I was dead and hugely enjoyed the ceremony of my burial.”

He gave a soft laugh and his bloodless lips puckered like those of a pouting child.

“They laid me in a gorgeous mausoleum of costly marble, and the walls were bas reliefs of grotesque scenes, sacred and profane—all the utterances of my whole life seemed illustrated on those walls. When they lowered my coffin I began to laugh and could not stop laughing even when they screwed on the lid. Then all of a sudden, as if by magic, I noticed a dark-blue flower spring from the ground at the foot of my tomb. It looked like a passion flower from which were suspended all the instruments of torture used during the Inquisition in Spain. All at once the passion flower assumed human form; it was a living being; it had the sweet face of a charming young woman; a sweet, sad face, full of tenderness and love, was leaning over my dead body. I stared in amazement. It was your sweet countenance, _liebstes Kind_, and hot burning tears were dripping from your eyes and falling upon my dead face. Ah, these dreams! Since the earliest recollections of my childhood I have always been dreaming—my days and nights were veritably different existences. So, you see, I have really lived longer than most men. You must multiply my age by two. I have long passed the century mark. Yes, indeed, I am a centenarian.”

She leaned over him and kissed his emaciated hand in silence.