Chapter V: Part ONE: A Poet in the Making (4)

“At least you think _my_ poetry is drivel,” he soon added.

There was the faintest smile playing around her lips. Her silence and smile seemed to him a challenge. His dormant pride, his sublime confidence in his powers, suddenly made him boastful. There was fire in his eyes.

“You just wait and I’ll show you all that my poems are no drivel. I’ll make my songs ring throughout the land. Every man, woman, and child shall read them. You may all laugh at me now—and Rudolph may jest about me—but I’ll make them all listen to me some day—”

He looked at her face but could read nothing in it. The next moment he became conscious of his boasting and felt ashamed of his utterances.

“Oh, I am a fool,” he burst out as if talking to himself. “You think me a braggart, don’t you?” He touched her hand and looked beseechingly at her.

She looked at him intently for a bare second.

“I am very unhappy,—I’ve always been unhappy. I am a little child crying for the moon, and the moon is so far, far away and doesn’t even know that a poor child is crying for it.”

There were unshed tears in his eyes.

“Why do you make yourself so unhappy?” she asked and stirred, with a frown on her pretty face.

But he did not answer. He noticed the approach of Uncle Leopold and Aunt Betty.

“Why so serious?” Aunt Betty asked, smiling and at the same time studying Hilda’s face.

“We were discussing poetry,” she answered, rising.

III.

Albert appeared at dinner and vanished immediately after that. He scarcely spoke a word during the meal. But this was not unusual. Dinner in this household was served with such elaborate ceremony—waiters and butlers and many courses—that the stiffness of it all robbed him of speech. Aunt Betty noticed his glance in Hilda’s direction once or twice but her daughter ignored her cousin entirely. The mother heaved a sigh of relief. She had been unduly alarmed.

What the watchful mother failed to observe was that as they rose from the table and were passing to the adjoining room Albert dashed across to Hilda and mumbled something in a panting voice and left abruptly. She paled but did not turn to see whither he had gone.

She joined her family but after a while chose a secluded place, apparently reading. She turned the pages of her book as if she were perusing them without seeing a word before her. She seemed vexed and perplexed and now and then jerked her head as if shaking off an intruding thought. Finally she walked up to her room and closed the door resolutely as if she had made a decision and given emphatic expression to it. She then threw herself on her bed and lay for a time, staring at the ceiling.

“Seven o’clock near Klopstock’s grave,” she murmured to herself.

Shortly after that she walked down stairs and remained standing in the doorway over the veranda and walked slowly, deliberately, down the broad stone steps, pausing and lingering a while on every step, like a playful child, and looking at her feet as she moved them. When she reached the pebbled path of the winding walk she played with the little stones with the tip of her dainty slipper as if there were not a single thought passing through her mind. Presently she was standing before the marble-walled well in the centre of the garden and looked curiously at the carved figures on the outside as if she had never seen them before. Dimly she remembered that Albert had spoken of them the other day—they were mythological figures and he had explained them to her. She recalled his face and the manner in which he looked at her as he spoke of the beautiful goddesses of Greece.

She was soon out of sight of the beautiful mansion on the hill, sauntering down the slope that led to the seashore. Along the Elbe was a cliff-walk that led to a promontory on which was the grave of him who sang of The Messiah.

The sun was going down but it was still long before sunset in this northern clime. There was a golden haze in the air, with hoards of mosquitoes and tiny insects in column formation flitting about like a dancing procession. Klopstock’s grave was west of the Zorn villa, where the sun was sliding down the curving horizon and making the many-branched linden tree over the tomb look like a burnished bush. There was tumult in her brain and her heart was beating irregularly. A number of limes she halted and half-turned, as if she were attempting to twist herself loose from the embrace of some invisible being, but soon again she proceeded on her way.

“I was afraid you wouldn’t come,” he said as he came running toward her. His teeth were almost chattering, his voice was strained.

“I shouldn’t have come—I know I shouldn’t,” she was saying, scarcely glancing at him.

“Why do you despise me so?—”

He touched her hand which she withdrew quickly and put it back of her like an angered child.

“You don’t know how miserable I feel—Hilda—.” His voice was plaintive, pleading. “I know you detest me—You don’t even care for my poems, the echoes of my heart. Oh, Hilda—just a word—”

“You make me so unhappy,” she interrupted him. He thought he saw anger in her eyes.

“I am so sorry if my love makes you unhappy.” His voice was now penitent, humble, beseeching. “But I can’t help it, Hilda. We don’t will love—love wills us. I understand. I am not blaming you—you can’t help hating me as I can’t help loving you. I am not as dull as you think. I understand—Some girl might love me and I mightn’t care for her—”

Her eyes dilated; a pallor crept over her cheeks.

“Is that girl in Hamburg?” There was naiveté in her tone.

“There is no other girl. No one is in love with me. I was only explaining how nature works. One loves and the beloved loves another—”

“I am sure you have a girl in mind. Who is she?”

“I swear to you there is no one—”

“I am sure from the way you said it there is someone—anyhow, you wouldn’t tell me even if there were—”

“I would tell you the truth—I wouldn’t be ashamed to tell you if someone were in love with me. Oh, a long time ago—I was a youngster then.”

“Is she still in love with you?”

He waved his arms in despair.

“Oh, no, she is dead—But I am not thinking of anyone but you—”

“What did the other girl look like? Was she light or dark?”

“Oh, why speak of her—she is dead, I tell you—” he spoke impatiently.

“You must still be thinking of her or you wouldn’t remember her now. I am sure you are in love with her still—was she pretty?”

He was beside himself.

“I tell you she is dead—” There was exasperation in his tone.

“And you mean to tell me you never had a love affair since then?”

She was drawing an 8 on the ground with the tip of her slipper.

“Of course I have never loved anyone as I love you.”

“Then you did love her!”

“I might have had a boyish fancy—I wrote a poem about her—”

“And some day you’ll write a poem about me and all will be ended.”

“Hilda, why do you torture me so?—”

He clasped her hand and kissed it. She withdrew her hand and said he must not do this.

“I know I shouldn’t have come here—I know I shouldn’t—some one might have seen us—”

“And what if they did?”

“Oh, Albert, you don’t understand—”

He was about to seize her hand again but she ran down the path.

IV.

When Hilda had suddenly left him he remained at Klopstock’s grave until the stars appeared. He found the grave symbolic. The grave was the only place for a poet, he mused in despair—yes, a silent grave under a shady tree, the roar of the sea in the distance, the silence of fields around. Ah! the serenity and the beauty of lying still without surging blood, without agitated nerves, wrapt in a white shroud in the bosom of the cool earth, in peace, with no sound save the swaying of the branches and the chance song of a bird! The burden of youth was oppressing him, the presentiments of sorrows to come were in his heart. For the moment he wished he were dead—dead at the feet of the silent poet who had sung so gloriously of the Redeemer. He remained standing before the grave in sad contemplation of his plight. In vain had he consoled himself that Hilda loved him. She was just playing with him, he mused bitterly.

He presently fancied himself dead, stretched on the grass alongside the hillock which held the dust of the great poet, Hilda standing over his corpse and weeping. There was a touch of joy in his fantasy. Hilda weeping over his dead body!

He had no recollection of returning to his room. He was dimly conscious of trying to fall asleep when Klopstock opened the door softly and tripped in. Klopstock was wrapt in a white shroud and his face was of a deathly pallor. His face seemed so feminine, and the eyelashes drooped like Hilda’s. Klopstock then waved an arm and exclaimed—

“Seven times the thund’rous strokes had rent the veil,
When now the voice of God in gentle tone
Was heard descending: ‘God is love,’ it spoke;
‘Love, ere the worlds or their inhabitants
To life were called’——”

Klopstock wept as he recited these immortal lines and his copious tears dropped on Albert’s brow and curled into the corners of his mouth. A poet’s tears were saltier than those of ordinary mortals, Albert was saying to himself as he felt the taste of the drops. He wondered what Rudolph was doing there. For it was not Klopstock but Rudolph standing at the foot of his bed. Rudolph was pulling Hilda by the arm and she was laughing—everybody was laughing, and the orchestra was playing at the Swiss pavilion on the Jungfernstieg. Strange that instead of the musicians it was the linden tree—the linden tree over Klopstock’s grave—that stood in the middle of the musicians’ platform. To the right of the tree was an open coffin, the lid lying alongside of it. Somebody was reading a prayer—he could not tell whether it was in Latin or in Hebrew—yes, it was Aaron Hirsch reading from a prayer book, tears coursing down his bearded face.

“You are dead, Albert Zorn—you are dead—you are dead,” Hirsch was saying. Then he felt himself lifted into the coffin, the coffin was lowered, clods of earth falling upon the lid—thud! thud! thud!—he was choking—he was trying to get his breath . . .

When he awoke he remembered that he was to leave for Hamburg early that morning. Yes, somebody was knocking at his door. He dressed quickly, for he knew his uncle was an impatient man, and rushed downstairs, where he found him pacing up and down the drawingroom, a cigar between his teeth. He seemed angry, and when Albert bade him good morning he grunted. Soon Aunt Betty appeared, and told him to go to the dining-room and have his breakfast as they had already had theirs. The rest of the family had not yet risen.

Aunt Betty was kinder than visual. Before leaving she was very solicitous and kissed him affectionately.

Soon the carriage rolled away along the road lined with poplars, the rising sun shining cheerily, birds carolling merrily, the horses whipping their tails in high spirits . . .

V.

At present Hamburg seemed to Albert even more prosaic than ever. He felt more lonesome, everybody bored him. As the master hums so do the hirelings sing. Everyone in the bank treated him as if he did not belong there, and the little courtesy he received was perfunctory, and out of respect for his uncle. They had no regard for a young man who wrote poetry and talked philosophy. Aaron Hirsch was the only one who showed him proper respect, but even he looked around as if afraid to be caught talking familiarly with the young idler.

On the day of his return from his uncle’s villa, Aaron clasped his hand and held it rather affectionately for a moment or so.

“I’ll bet you had a wonderful time. Isn’t the villa wonderful! Salomon in all his glory never had a finer palace. And the grounds!” He shrugged his shoulders with an expression of the inexpressible. “It made me think of the Garden of Eden. And that stream running through the woods back of the mansion—It’s just like the river Hiddekel in the Bible! Yes, sir, a veritable Garden of Eden, with no beguiling serpent to cause trouble in the family—”

Aaron laughed a loud “Hi-hi” and “Ho-ho!” but he presently checked himself, with a serious grimace on his face.

“You don’t seem very happy—” He eyed him scrutinizingly. “Perhaps there was a beguiling serpent after all.” He emitted a forced little laugh.

“There is a beguiling serpent in every Garden of Eden,” replied Albert in a jesting tone.

Hirsch then began to talk of other things.

“I should like to take you to the Reform Temple,” he was saying, “where all the aristocrats go. I? No, I don’t belong there. I am an old-fashioned Jew, and orthodoxy is good enough for the likes of me. And to tell the truth—” he moved closer to Albert and lowered his voice as if he were about to confide a secret—“I don’t care much for this hocus-pocus reform. If I want to pray to the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, I need no groaning organ or chanting choir to carry my prayers to heaven. No, not me. Whenever I visit the Reform synagogue I am reminded of the time the Prussian King was here last winter. There was so much parading and drumming and shooting of cannon in his honor that when he addressed the people no one could hear a word he said. Yes, my child, I am an old-fashioned Jew. I love my Hebrew prayers with all their trimmings as I love my _Chalet_ cooked in the old way—I prefer it to the best _Rost-Braten_ prepared by your uncle’s chef. When I want to pray I wrap myself in my _talis_ and pray. I don’t care for the Protestant hymns Judaised. I prefer a heart-to-heart talk with my God in the language we both understand—God and I—and no elocutionary nonsense. I mean no offense, God forbid—no, no, I know my place and mean no criticism of my betters. Your esteemed uncle belongs to the Reformers, and I get my bread and butter from him. Indeed, I do not mean to criticize my superiors, but when I get to the Temple I get the shivers, so help me God! There is no warmth in it. Doctor Kley, the preacher, is afraid to make a gesture with his arms for fear he might be mistaken for a Jew—” Hirsch bleated long and juicily—“and the congregation sit as if they are afraid to stir and awaken God from His slumber. A hearty prayer for me! The God of Israel never cared for Hamburg manners.”

“Why don’t you try and convert my uncle?” Albert goaded him on.

“I convert your uncle? There are too many conversions already; and far be it from me—a common, everyday man—to proselyte. Aaron Hirsch knows when to talk and when to hold his tongue.”

“Why not turn Christian and be done with it?” asked Albert, hiding an inner chuckle.

Aaron placed the index finger at his elongated nose and, glancing at the young man sideways, his head slightly inclined to one side, said, “Christianity, my child, is no better than Judaism. There is Catholicism for instance—I went into a Catholic church the other day and the sadness of it all and the flickering of candles and the smell of incense made me feel that God had just died and had not been embalmed soon enough. No, no, my child, a living, cheerful God for Aaron Hirsch!”

“How about the Protestant religion?”

“That’s a little better, I own. I visited the Old Protestant Church only last year. No crosses, no effigies, no incense, no smell of the dead—honestly, if they left Jesus out of their ritual I might be tempted to let the Protestants join our synagogue.”

Albert found Hirsch stimulating. As in the case of books Albert did not find Hirsch valuable for his own sake but for his jabber that aroused new thoughts in his brain.

After business hours he could not remain in his room and yet would accept no invitations to call upon those who desired to show him hospitality. He often left his room in self-defense against Frau Rodbertus’ monologues. She was tall and flat, her hair parted in the middle, a gown sweeping to the floor and only betraying the tips of her slippers. Her face was always in repose, her lips pouting, as if she were ready to be painted at any moment. She habitually had her hands clasped in front of her, even when standing, and when in action (she never stopped talking) she slightly moved her head from side to side with the coquetry of a young girl on her first introduction to a presentable young man. Albert had no difficulties in finding out that the pretty girl he saw at her house on the day of his arrival was the daughter of a French emigré, a relation of hers.

Although, as directed by his uncle, Aaron volunteered to show him the city, Albert preferred to make his own discoveries. He tramped the streets, dropped into cafés, studied the people about him and when bed-time came was exhausted and irritated. There was no variety of types here to arouse his lively imagination. Big, rotund men with red faces, and insipid flaxen haired youths with expressionless eyes and duel scars; stout, dull women, and flighty girls who flaunted their sex in the face of every passerby on the Jungfernstieg.

He would return to his room overwhelmed by a feeling of sordidness. No new thoughts, no fresh sentiments, nothing but stagnation. He was in despair. He feared the poet in him had suddenly died. An alarming thought raced through his brain one evening. Was the ambition of his youth a vain dream? He picked up a volume of Goethe, of Lessing, of Klopstock, but they received no response from his soul; they did not thrill him; their beauty was meaningless to him; their imageries evoked no visions in his mind. A terrible fear possessed him. Was he becoming sterile? Was his imagination barren? He tried to express his present despair but even that failed him. His mind was a blank. He felt like a singer who suddenly finds his voice failing. He had not yet learned that beauty often springs from sorrow, that despair often begets ecstasy.

VI.

As time went on he felt more lonesome, more isolated, more bored. He was invited to places but he found the people uninteresting. He was only enlarging his gallery of faces. They were all discussing the same subjects, repeating the same gossip, rehashing the same anecdotes. He was young, imaginative, and craved novelty; and he was too young to know that in his day, no different from the day of the King Solomon, there was nothing new under the sun. He had yet to learn that whatever new there is in life is in one’s own mind and that there are but few people in any generation who have mind enough to see it.

And what seemed to others complicated was so simple to him. People blabbed about religion, fought over theology, hated each other because of sect, as if these were vital principles of life while to him they were mere playthings, playthings for children. He could not grasp what the struggle was about. Though considered irreligious he loved the Bible and loved God as Spinoza had loved Him, as all people of real intellect loved Him. No other book was as precious to him as the Bible—he had read it over and over and was still reading it with refreshing joy, and its poetry, its allegories, its legends, its fables and parables, and its inundating beauty captivated his soul—but he found nothing mysterious in it except the mystery there was in all things beautiful. To him who sees clearly all things are simple. What were the Jesuits and the Lutherans and the Mendelsohnians and the Talmudists and the Kantians and the Fichteans—what were they all fighting over? Did any one really believe that God created the universe in six days? he asked himself time and again. Did any sane person earnestly claim the serpent myth to have been a real fact? Did any one earnestly believe the hundreds of allegories scattered throughout the Great Book to be actual happenings? Did any one believe in the historical parts in the Bible any more than in Persian or Grecian myths? Did any one entertain faith in the immaculate conception? Of course, he knew the ignorant and superstitious believed in fetishes, but he could not fully comprehend that the so-called enlightened sincerely believed in all these. He looked into his own mind and believed he understood all minds. He judged all minds by his own. At times, in his wanderings through the streets, brandishing his cane and smiling cynically, he said to himself that either he was an imbecile and did not possess the ordinary faculties of a human being or the world was peopled with idiots. There could be no compromise between the two; either he saw clearly or the millions of struggling bigots saw the truth. With the sublime self-assurance of youth he knew he was right and laughed pitifully at the erring souls around him. Yes, he understood Voltaire. Who would not laugh at the sight of an army of children dressed up in clothes of grown men and women? Who would not scoff at the prattling babes imitating the language of their elders? The children must have some things to play with or to fight over, he mused. Religion or War? Since the sound of cannon had ceased, the children of men now engaged with other playthings. When everything else fails religion supplies the demand for a universal plaything. War and Religion—he almost preferred the former. The ugly spectacle of Hamburg’s factionalism disgusted him. And whenever strife is ripe—he beheld all history at a glance—after every great war, after every economic upheaval, after every revolution, people turned against his race. He now understood why his people were called chosen.

His thoughts soon turned to Greece as one tired of a long winter in the north turns to the sunny south. Greece of old was the sunshine in his dreary existence. He could not understand the petty strife of the theology of his day but he grasped the meaning of Old Greece. The one was sordid prose, the other idyllic poetry. Prose must speak in exact terms, poetry may be fantastic. He yearned for deities rising from ocean waves, for a god on Olympus, for goddesses with harps and rainbows and vessels of nectar. The gods of Hamburg savoured of incense and garlic.

Hilda was to him what the deities were to the Old Greeks, an object of adoration. She was his Venus, a composite of all things beautiful, his illusion. In his present state she was the only drop of sweetness in his bitter cup. All his innate beauty-worship, and all his vision, was centered upon her. What attributes were not hers his fancy supplied. And the more hopeless his romantic fancy had become the more he craved her love—he loved to run after the retreating horizon. At times he would become vexed and swear that he would love her no more. Twice he had sent her poems and she had not even acknowledged them, yet he would send her another poem. It was a sweet lyric, the offspring of pure ecstasy. It had leaped into being like a bud bursting into bloom. For days he had hummed it to himself—stroked the petals—and finally dispatched it to her. He wanted her to know his great sorrow. He was sure she would understand him now. But like its predecessors, it remained unacknowledged and unanswered.

A few days later on his return from the midday meal, Aaron Hirsch came up to him, his perspiring face basking in a sunny smile. “I suppose you have dined with the family today.”

His voice was ingratiating. Albert looked puzzled.

“Were you not invited? Your esteemed aunt was here and your lovely cousin, Fräulein Hilda, and, I heard your esteemed uncle say they were going to have a little family dinner.”

Aaron clasped his little beard as if he were shaking hands with a dear friend as he proceeded, “Perhaps I should not have told you this, but you know it hurts me—yes, it hurts me to see you unappreciated. Of course, I did not dare say all there was on my mind but one day I said to your esteemed uncle—‘Herr Banquier’, says I, ‘that nephew of yours will yet do you great honor’, says I—these are the very words I said. I hate to flatter you but I told him a thing or two about you that did you no harm, for I know there are others—I’ll mention no names—there are others who whisper other things in your esteemed uncle’s ear.” And with a hushing movement of his hand he added, “You know the saying, ‘An ox has a long tongue but cannot speak.’ One must guard his bread and butter—I have a wife and seven children!” With a finger at his lips he made a helpless grimace.

Albert’s face clouded. He did not discuss his personal affairs with Aaron, though he often encouraged the little man’s monologues. Aaron appealed to his sense of humor. His expressions, his gestures, his comments, were mirth-provoking. Today he made no rejoinder. He wanted Hirsch to leave him alone. His aunt and Hilda visited the bank and had not taken the trouble to see him—Hilda, to whom he had sent his finest lyrics only a few days ago!

He rose from his work and, without saying a word to anyone, left the bank. He overheard Mr. Elfenbein mumble something about his idleness but he did not care. A thousand needles were pricking at the base of his brain. He could not stand still. With cane in hand he sauntered along the Jungfernstieg, listlessly watched the swans in the Alster basin, and finally landed in the Swiss Pavilion, Hamburg’s most festive café.

VII.

When he next visited his uncle’s summer home and met Hilda he sought in vain for a trace of self-consciousness in her countenance. She received him as cordially and as calmly as Aunt Betty. She inquired about his progress at the bank, whether he had made friends at Hamburg, quite indifferently. She smilingly “hoped” that his impressions of “the vulgar Hamburgers”—a phrase he had used—had changed. He scented a challenge in this remark and rushed to prove the assertion.

The conversation was soon interrupted. Aunt Betty joined them. And she usually managed to be around whenever Albert talked to Hilda.

One afternoon he spied Hilda alone.

He had been wandering around from ennui. He was almost sorry that he had come here. He found life here as monotonous as in Hamburg; at times even more so. There was here too much enforced etiquette and formality to suit his independent spirit. Here he was not himself. His uncle, his aunt, the guests—this time there were a few dignitaries, officials and such—everyone was so proper, the talk was so stereotyped, that he found himself in a state of boredom. Hilda was the only person to relieve the monotony, but she seemed hedged about on all sides. Boldly he made for where she was seated.

He felt that she knew of his approach, but she gave no sign, except that she appeared more absent minded than usual.

“Why do you avoid me, Hilda?” he begged. He did not realize that unto the lover that begs nothing shall be given.

“It’s best that I should.”

She was looking away from him. She was seated as if posing, her left elbow on her knee.

“Hilda, don’t my verses mean anything to you?”

“I like your rhymes very much—I have often wondered how you could think of all those rhymes—”

He was beside himself. So that was all his verses meant to her. They were well rhymed! They were mere beads strung on a string—not even a rosary!

“Why did you not write to me?—why didn’t you at least acknowledge the receipt of my poems?” There was a cry of humiliation in his voice.

She was silent for a moment. She knitted her brows as if studying how to put her thoughts into words. Then her face darkened; animation suddenly leaped into her sea-green eyes.

“And I have thought of you every moment,” he continued in a plaintive, reproachful tone, “and dreamed of you—and day-dreamed of you—” There was a spiteful smile around his lips as he added, “In my day-dreaming you could not shun me—you couldn’t push me away. You see, there is some advantage in being an imaginative poet even though you despise him—”

The color was rising in her face, her breast heaved. His words were like the suggestive passages in the novels she was forbidden to read but which she had read clandestinely.

“You must not say these things to me,” she presently said, catching her breath, her cheeks burning.

“Why shouldn’t I? I love you. I do not care who knows it. I lie awake in the darkness of my room visualizing your presence close to me. You can’t forbid my loving you—”

There were unshed tears in his half-closed eyes. There were tears in his voice. It was his vision, his words of despair, that brought the tears.

“How can you talk this way, Albert.”

Her voice was soft, caressing; there was tenderness—a soothing tenderness—in the manner she pronounced his name. “You know, it is—” she paused as if she could not utter what was in her mind—“You know it’s impossible—”

“Why impossible?” His voice changed quickly and he spoke rapidly, impulsively. “Impossible because I am a poor poet, because I have no gold to offer you, because—” He checked himself.

She was pensively silent, which gave him hope. On their way to the house she seemed more solicitous about the things that interested him.

That evening Aunt Betty was more demonstrative in her hospitality to him. She prevailed upon him to stay a few days longer, and he saw in this, too, a hopeful sign, He saw connection between her attitude and his talk with Hilda.

He spent a hilarious evening. He was his old self again, the loveable, witty boy whom the family had met in Gunsdorf a few years ago. Before he went to bed he wrote letters home. One to his mother, telling her of the wonderful time he was having at Uncle Leopold’s villa, and begging her to thank Aunt Betty for her many kindnesses to him; another to his sister, in which he guardedly told her of Hilda’s beauty and loveliness; and still another to his devoted friend, Christian Lutz. To him he poured out his whole heart. He told him of his great passion for Hilda, of the unmistakable signs of reciprocity, of his great happiness.

“Tell it not in Gath,” he wound up his letter in Biblical phraseology, “I am in love—madly in love. As the lily is among the thorns, so is my beloved among the daughters of Hamburg. Her lips are like a thread of scarlet and her neck—no, it is not like the tower David builded for an armory; it is white and firm; neither long nor short, a slender pedestal for the prettiest Grecian head. I charge you, ye son of Gunsdorf, by the roses of Sharon, by the lilies of the valley, that ye stir not my love till she pleases. Christian, dear, I feel like a drunken god intoxicated with the elixir of love, bidding all the angels of the heavenly choir to join me in singing ‘Hallelujah’. Hamburg does not seem as sordid as it did at first. If my present spirit continues I may even learn to love the sons of Hammonia. But don’t grow jealous. I shall never stop loving my Christian. You were my first love.”

“Yes, my good Christian, I feel like a good natured, maudlin sot, bursting with song. I should like to fling my arms around everybody’s neck and shower kisses upon every one in sight. I should like to hug the whole universe and bedew it with my tears of joy. For I have good reason to believe Hilda loves me.”

VIII.

He left more than elated. Unlike on the occasion of his first visit Hilda now treated him with manifest kindness. On the morning of his departure she let him kiss her hand without protest and he gazed into her calm clear eyes without embarrassment.

On his way back to the city he recalled every little incident, raked up every triviality—symptoms of her love, he called them—and with all the inductions and deductions of logic adduced conclusively that Hilda was as much in love with him as he was with her.

There was a mishap on the way. An axle broke and delayed the homeward journey several hours. The accident did not disturb him. He rather welcomed it. He was alone and while the driver went to the nearest village to get the axle repaired Albert stretched himself at the edge of a field of ripening grain and watched the colorful patches in the sky. In spots the clouds seemed piled upon one another, a heap of them, with protruding ends trimmed with saffron and jade, and some were like huge rugged castles, with many turrets. Soon his eyes were fixed upon one to the left. It was a long stretch of watery green with a number of peaks and lower down there appeared to be a row of windows. Yes, it looked like his uncle’s villa. In the foreground was the broad terrace, back of it the long doors and French windows, and farther back, higher up, was the roof. The last window to the right belonged to Hilda’s room. He gazed upon it intently and was conscious of a peculiar pleasurable feeling. And there, farther down, near the horizon was a cloud in the shape of the marble well, with sphinxes engraved on the side, and those streaks of light were like the poplars along the path leading to the beach. For a moment he was superstitious. That was a sign from heaven. He saw good omens in everything about him. A lark was rising, trilling short, sweet notes in his flight toward the clouds. The lark was himself.

Two young peasant women were walking past him with scythes and sickles slung over their shoulders. They were barefooted, bareheaded, with short skirts of unbleached linen and loose shirts that looked like, blouses. They glanced at him lying on his back, then looked at each other, and burst out laughing. The older one said something to the younger of the two who answered with a resounding slap on the older one’s back, and they both roared with laughter once more. He was conjuring up the image of Hilda when the last peal of laughter broke the spell. He looked around. The peasant girls halted in the adjoining field for work.

Soon they began to sing a peasant love song. Albert sat up and could see their movements through the ripe grain stalks in front of him—their coarse sunburnt faces, their naked feet with their splaying toes—their sickles making rhythmical music as they swished against the falling grain. He was vexed with himself for watching them—for permitting his thoughts to dwell upon them. He felt it a sacrilege to think of them and Hilda at the same time. Presently Hilda’s image faded, the clouds in the sky were nothing but meaningless vapor, and the blood in his heart was surging rapidly. He shuddered. He could not take his eyes off the stooped peasant girl, the younger one, who was only a hundred yards away from him. Ugly thoughts raced through his brain. Strange appetites stirred within him. He would dismiss them but he could not. She was singing a love song; and presently the other joined in. They were singing a peasant harvest song, laughing at the same time—

_“Bäuerlein, Bauerlein, tick! tick! tack!_
_Ei, wie ist denn der Geschmack_
_Von dem Korn und von dem Kern,_
_Dass ich’s unterscheiden lern’?_
_Bäuerlein, Bauerlein, spricht und lacht,_
_Finklein nimm dich nur in acht,_
_Dass ich, wenn ich dresch’ und klopf’_
_Dich nicht treff, auf deinen Kopf!”_

It was the younger of the two that was singing in a mimicking voice, the older one humming after her. The younger one was a girl of about seventeen—the same age as Hilda—but was sturdier, her neck was like “the tower of David builded for an armory,” her squinting eyes full of mischief.

He would not lie to himself; a power more overwhelming was drawing him to that peasant girl with the sickle, every movement of hers was another tug at his passions . . .

He rose to his feet and stretched himself. The sun was hot and the air was dry and the peasant girl—she had just straightened a bit, with the sickle in hand, brushing a few strands of hair from her face, and was about to bend down again when she caught his eye. She glanced at him slyly with her squinting eyes. Her companion was now at the other end of the field working industriously. Albert looked at her boldly, the blood in his heart pumping furiously . . .

The driver with the axle appeared in the distance. Albert shrank a step, trembling in every limb. He again threw himself on the ground. He would not be caught by the driver looking at the reaper. An undefinable shyness seized him. Lying on his belly, his head slightly raised, he was awaiting the approaching driver. He soon heard his footsteps in the distance—slow, deliberate steps coming nearer. The footsteps suddenly halted. Albert saw the driver near the reaper. He heard voices, low voices, of the driver and the girl.

“I’ll cut you—look out. I’ll cut you.”

It was the girl’s voice he heard. Albert peered through the stalks of grain, he saw without being seen, his blood rushing to his head. He heard a chuckle, the sickle dropped from her hand. She feigned to cry for help but in a voice he could scarcely hear; the other reaper worked steadily on at the other end of the field. The driver and the peasant girl were now hidden in the tall grain . . .

The driver soon returned to his horses, grazing by the wayside. He was a stocky man in the early thirties, with a red face and a forehead bloodlessly white from the pressure of his cap. His face was now of a deeper red, his eyes seemed bloodshot, and he was panting.

He busied himself with the cart.

“Oh, but she is strong,” he said, half to himself. Albert was watching the driver adjust the axle.

“Who is she?” asked Albert.

“Do I know? From the neighborhood!”

He emitted a little laugh and proceeded with his work.

Presently he and the driver were in the cart, the wheels creaking, the horses plodding along the road.

The peasant girl waved her sickle, the driver waved his whip, the horse started off at a livelier trot in a cloud of dust.

Albert leaned back in his seat, lost in thought. He was puzzled. He knew the driver had a wife and five children, yet passing a girl he had never seen before and desiring her he made her his without courting, without brooding, without dreaming and musing, without being troubled about the scheme of things. They loved, they hated, they killed (if their king told them to) and begot others like themselves.

He looked at the driver as if he had beheld him for the first time. The peasant’s face was now calm, its natural red, his bluish eyes had cleared; they were no longer bloodshot; he was looking blankly in front of him, with whip in hand, was looking over the horse’s head. He had evidently forgotten about the reaper. She was no more to him than the field of rye in which she worked, no more than the bread he had eaten that morning, the glass of beer he had drunk the day before.

Albert’s heart was filled with envy, envy of the peasant. He envied him because he was so unlike himself, always thinking, always speculating on what was right and what was wrong. Albert wondered if he could make a peasant of himself and stop thinking and brooding. His thoughts drifted, he thought of Elfenbein, of Rudolph, of the chattering Hirsch and of scores of other men and women he knew. None of them were like the driver, and he could not be like any of them either. He thought of his uncle—a shrewd banker, a charitable man, a noble soul—no, he could not be like him either. He thought of his own father—kind and weak and listless—no, he was different. A flock of migrating birds were over his head—a path of black dots against the blue sky; a cow by the wayside stretched her broad neck, parted her jaws, and emitted a hoarse “moo—oo!” The woods in the distance answered “Moo—oo!”; the horse clinked his hoofs against a chance stone in the sandy road . . .

Without knowing why, Albert’s heart was filled with sadness. He sighed audibly. He was depressed because he was unlike anybody and because he knew he could not be like anybody else. God had made him different, had made him a misfit, a round peg in a square hole. His thoughts wandered. No, he did not wish to be like anybody else. Yet he was vexed. He felt dreadfully alone. Had he not been afraid of the driver’s ridicule he would have wept aloud—because—because he was unlike anyone and did not want to be like anyone else. If only Hilda had loved him! It suddenly flashed upon his mind that she did not love him.

IX.

But the next week he was again hopeful, even confident, of Hilda’s love. He had written to her and she had answered him. Rejoicing!

His hopes were rising quickly. If only he could make her appreciate his poems! He felt that she disliked his verses. She did not seem to understand that the poems he had shown her were inspired by her and were meant for her eyes alone.

One day he felt the fateful moment had come. He was again at his uncle’s villa. It was early October, the family was preparing to leave for their city home. It was a gloomy day, gray clouds in the sky, winds chasing withered leaves against tree trunks and fences. Yet there was joy in his heart. Hilda had praised one of his poems. He hung upon her words as if they had emanated from the lips of the greatest critic.

“If you only knew how many more beautiful poems you could inspire me to write,” he was saying enthusiastically, with plaintive begging in his voice.

“How?”

She said this absently, between two numbers of embroidery stitches she was counting.

“By promising that you’ll marry me some day.”

She seemed caught unawares. She dropped a few stitches and seemed annoyed.

Her head moved from side to side without looking up. She seemed very busy with her needle.

“Can’t you even give me hope—in the distant future?”

The color in her cheek was rising.

“You mustn’t think of me, Albert,” she said, without raising her eyes. “It’s impossible.” The last few words were spoken under her breath, scarcely audible.

Silence. He did not plead, he made no attempt at persuasion. There was the finality of death in her tone.

He returned to the city in a state of utter hopelessness. Conquest was denied everywhere.

He imputed to her a thousand motives for rejecting him; he blamed his uncle; he saw his aunt at the bottom of it. His sorrow deepened as the days passed. He sat in his room and brooded and then wandered through the streets like a restless vagrant. He was telling himself he would never survive this blow, and out of his poignant pain and the anguish of his soul sprang verses of despair.

His agony had become unendurable. Nothing mattered now. He did not care whether he pleased his uncle; he did not care whether he stayed at the bank or was dismissed. His sorrow was unbearable. He had to talk, to some one about it. He finally unbosomed himself to his friend, Christian. It was nearly midnight, his tallow candle sputtering.

X.

Having finished the letter he left his room. He meant to take a stroll, as he often did late at night when despair seized him.

On his way out, Frau Rodbertus greeted him cheerily, “_Guten Abend_.”

“_Guten Abend_,” he returned sulkily, and was about to pass her.

“_Bon soir_,” another voice called.

He paused. He recognized the voice of Eugenie Chauraux, the girl of whom he had caught a glimpse on the first day of his arrival here. He had since met her a number of times. She was a frequent visitor at Frau Rodbertus’. He had often admired her luminous brown eyes and black hair and her beautiful hands. Her hands particularly attracted him. They were not small but owing to her long fingers they seemed like small palm leaves, and they appeared peculiarly soothing when shaking hands with her; in spite of her warm clasp her hand was cooling.

Eugenie always talked French to him. She had told him she was glad to find one who spoke her native tongue so well and that she detested the French spoken by most Germans. Albert was not averse to flattery. He had often remained chatting with her while the sly widow would steal out of the room and leave “the children” alone. Frau Rodbertus was childless and was very fond of Eugenie. She was also fond of her lodger. She mothered him, and he liked to be mothered. She would frequently scold him for his peevishness in a gentle, motherly tone and would cater to hi whims. At times he would act towards her as if she were his mother. If his handkerchiefs were not easily found in the proper place, or when he forgot to send his linen to the washerwoman, or if an expected letter had not come, he would storm like a spoiled child as if Frau Rodbertus were to blame, and she would laugh or scold him with maternal good nature.

She was sentimental, and when she learned that Albert wrote poetry she became even more solicitous and obliging. She had the tenderness and delicacy of a French woman. Her voice was soft, almost soothing, and when she would pucker her lips and turn upon him her large dark eyes he would at once become docile. And while he had determined to keep his poetic aspirations to himself—he had been warned by his uncle that publicity of this fact might hurt him in his standing as a young business man—he frequently forgot his resolution and spoke of his _Lieder_ to her. He even recited some of them to her. He had found in her an enthusiastic audience, almost as enthusiastic as Christian. And though he had abjured her not to divulge his secret he knew that she had spoken of his verses to Eugenie. The girl never made mention of it but he felt that she knew.

“_Bon soir, Mademoiselle_,” he said to Eugenie and was about to proceed.

Eugenie’s face was turned upwards, the candle light through the open door catching the light of her eyes. Albert hesitated in his step.

“It’s too hot to walk, Herr Zorn” said Frau Rodbertus.

“Just for a stroll and then to bed.”

“It’s too early for bed,” Frau Rodbertus said laughingly.

Eugenie’s eyes were upon him.

Albert sat down on the threshold next to Eugenie.

After a space Frau Rodbertus asked Eugenie to play something.

“It’s terribly hot, and too late,” pleaded Eugenie.

“It is never too hot nor too late for music,” coaxed Frau Rodbertus.

When Albert joined in the request, Eugenie rose promptly and in rising supported her palm against Albert’s knee. He was pleasantly conscious of the contact of her hand. As he rose to follow her into the house his erstwhile loneliness was robbed of its sadness. Without analyzing himself he felt the genial warmth of these two as contrasted to the frigid kindness of his relatives. The former were human, stripped of all artifice, the latter formal, studied, cultivated.

Albert had no trained ear for music but his knowledge of melody, like all knowledge that came to him, was intuitive. And although his preference for music was limited to vocal and the violin—the staccato-like notes of the piano never appealed to him—he had a keen appreciation of all music.

Eugenie played with feeling, her slender body swaying with the rhythm of the music, casting a shadow in the room which was brightened by only one candle. Albert found himself making mental notes of everything about her. Her body swayed with the pliancy of a sapling. The irregular features of her face blended into a harmony of their own. Her fine eyebrows sloped at the ends abruptly like Japanese eyes, her nose rather narrow which made it seem longer than it was, and the middle of her upper lip protruded like a half opened bud. When she opened her mouth it was the upper lip that rose with a sudden jerk upward, disclosing longish white teeth. Her laughter—for her faintest smile was a musical laugh—was confined to her eyes; sparks of sunshine danced in the iris.

He soon forgot all about his vexing thoughts. He had no thoughts. Seated indolently, with eyes almost closed, he yielded to the pleasure of the moment. He was half-dreaming, the music but vague, distant echoes in his ears. And Eugenie played selection after selection, without being urged, without even being asked. She seemed eager to play, to go on with the galloping of her emotions, like a frightened horse that goes tearing wildly through the streets. She never turned her eyes either way but sat bent over the keys, breathing fast as she played.

Frau Rodbertus, her arms folded, watched the girl’s glowing cheeks. She understood Eugenie. She had not yet forgotten her own youth, and those heavenly moments when one’s blood courses like sparkling Burgundy. She sat in the shadow, sat and sighed softly as she remembered those blissful moments of her own life, never, never to come back. No, she was not envious. The profligate liberality of the drunkard was in her heart. She soon tiptoed out of the room and into the courtyard, unnoticed by either Eugenie or Albert, and when the last note had died away, she breathed softly, her very being in suspense.

Eugenie at last rose from the piano and stretched her arms as if she were alone in the room: She barely looked in Albert’s direction.

“You play beautifully,” he murmured.

She remained standing in the darkened part of the room, beyond the circle of the dim candle-light, her fingers clasped in front of her, without moving.

He made another remark but that, too, remained unanswered. A few more silent moments. Neither moved. Albert was watching her silhouette, astir with semi-conscious feelings.

She soon passed him silently, her dress barely brushing his clothes. He rose and followed her in silence. Frau Rodbertus was not outside. The little courtyard was deserted—nothing but the lonely pine-tree in the centre casting an almost invisible shadow in the darkness. Not a sound anywhere. A voice from the street accentuated the stillness of the enclosed courtyard.

Eugenie re-seated herself on the door-step and Albert followed her example as if he were mimicking her. They heard footsteps inside the house, through the open door,—the soft, pattering, slippered footsteps of Frau Rodbertus—and soon the glimmer of the candle-light was gone.

Albert became more conscious of Eugenie’s nearness, of the torpid heat, of the intense darkness. Presently his eyes penetrated the darkness and he saw the outline of Eugenie’s face, loose strands of her hair breaking the curved lines. They sat for a few moments like bashful children brought together for the first time and left alone.

“It’s getting late—I must go home,” she soon said and rose abruptly.

He became conscious of his heart-beats. He did not rise. Something checked his voice.

She went into the house and he heard her calling “Good night” to Frau Rodbertus, who answered that she was coming down to accompany her home.

Albert jumped up and said he would see her home. Eugenie rushed up the stairs and some words were exchanged between her and Frau Rodbertus and she soon came down and accepted his proffered escort.