Wolf Among Wolves (20 page)

Fräulein, colorless and mouse-gray, listened, said: “Yes,” “Oh, no,” “Really,” “Charming”; but when Her Excellency had visitors she heard nothing. Frau Major General whispered with the last remnants of her Lausanne finishing-school French:
“Attention! La Servante!”
and the ladies fell silent. When there were visitors Fräulein had no existence, as was fitting. (When the visitors were gone everything was recounted to her.)

But after the first silence Frau von Anklam did not remain silent by any means—that was not done either. She talked of the weather. (“It is close today, perhaps we shall have a storm; perhaps yes, perhaps no.”) She’d once had a Fräulein with rheumatic twinges in her big toe before a storm—very strange, was it not?

“It always came true, and once when Fräulein was on her holiday (you know we had our estate at that time) we had a tremendous hailstorm which smashed down the whole crop. Well, if Fräulein hadn’t been on holiday we should have known about it in advance-and that would have been so good, wouldn’t it, dear Mathilde? But, of course, Fräulein was on her holiday.”

“Yes, everything is all right, Fräulein, thanks. You may now press the lace frill on my black taffeta dress. It’s already pressed I know, Fräulein. It’s not necessary to tell me that. But it’s not done as I like it. I like it to be as light as a breath of air. Fräulein, as light as air! So please do that, Fräulein.”

And the door had hardly closed behind Fräulein before Frau von Anklam turned sympathetically to Frau Pagel. “I’ve considered and reconsidered the matter, dear Mathilde, and I stick to my opinion. She is simply a low, vulgar creature.”

Frau Pagel started and looked anxiously toward the door. “Fräulein?”

“Mathilde, do concentrate a little. What are we talking about? Your son’s marriage! If I were to be so absent-minded … I always told the ladies of my regiment.…” Frau Pagel still hoped to learn something definite, but what she hardly knew. She succeeded in putting in a word. “The girl is perhaps not entirely bad.…”

“Mathilde! A creature! Only a creature!”

“She loves Wolfgang—in her way.”

“I don’t wish to hear anything about it. No indelicacy in my house!”

“But Wolfgang gambles, Betty, gambles everything away.”

Frau von Anklam laughed. “To see your face, dearest Mathilde! Boys always play a little—you mustn’t say ‘gamble,’ it sounds so vulgar. All young men play a little. I remember that time we had the regiment at Stolp—there was a lot of playing among the young fellows. Excellency von Bardenwiek said to me: ‘What are we to do, Frau von Anklam? We must do something about it.’
I said: ‘Excellency,’ I said, ‘we’ll do nothing of the kind. As long as the young people play they’re not making fools of themselves in another way.’ And he agreed with me at once.… Come in.”

There had been a gentle knocking at the door. Fräulein put her head in: “Ernst is back, Excellency.”

“Ernst? What does he want? These are peculiar manners, Fräulein! You know I have a visitor, don’t you? Ernst—the idea of it!”

In spite of this outburst Fräulein still dared to say something. Like a mouse in the trap she squeaked. “He has been to the registry office, Excellency.”

Frau von Anklam brightened up. “Oh, of course. He shall come in as soon as he has washed his hands. What a long story you make of everything, Fräulein. Fräulein, one moment, don’t always run away at once, so heedlessly. Please wait for my instructions. First give him a spray or two of eau-de-Cologne; yes, the toilet eau-de-Cologne. One never knows whom he has met there.”

Alone with her cousin again, she said: “I wanted to find out how the wedding went. I considered for a long time whom I could send to such an affair, and I sent our Ernst. Well, now we shall hear.” And her eyes shone. She moved her heavy body to and fro in anticipation. She was to hear something new, something more for her lumber-room of memories. O Lord, how splendid!

Ernst, the servant, entered: an elderly man, diminutive, close on sixty, who had been in Frau von Anklam’s service for a lifetime.

“Wait at the door,” she called. “Stay at the door, Ernst.”

“I know that, Excellency.”

“Immediately afterward have a bath and change every stitch. Heaven knows what bacteria you have picked up, Ernst. Come on, do tell us about the wedding.”

“There was none, Excellency.”

“You see, Mathilde—what did I tell you? You get excited about nothing. What did I tell you only three minutes ago? She’s quite a common person. She has thrown him over.”

“Might I ask Ernst a few questions, dear Betty?” said Frau Pagel faintly.

“Certainly, dear Mathilde. Ernst, I don’t understand you. You stand there like a stick. Don’t you hear that Frau Pagel wants to know everything? Speak. She has of course thrown him over. Go on, what did he say to that?”

“Pardon me, Excellency. I believe the young gentleman didn’t turn up either.”

“You see, Mathilde, what did I tell you? The boy is all right, the bit of playing does him no harm; on the contrary, he is absolutely sensible. One doesn’t marry such a person.”

At last Frau Pagel got in a word. “Ernst, is it certain? Was there definitely no wedding? Perhaps you arrived a little too late.”

“No, madam, certainly not. I was there in time and waited till the end, and also asked the clerk. Neither of them turned up.”

“You see, Mathilde.”

“But why should you think, Ernst, that it was my son?”

“I wanted to be sure, madam. Something might have happened. I ascertained their address from the registry office. So I went there, madam.…”

“Ernst, be sure to have a bath immediately and put on fresh linen.”

“Yes, Excellency. The young gentleman has not been seen since this morning. And the girl has been turned out of doors because the rent hadn’t been paid. She was still standing in the doorway.”

Frau Pagel stood up suddenly. Once more she was full of decision, energetic and unyielding.

“Thank you, Ernst. You have reassured me. Excuse me, dear Betty, for leaving without ceremony, but I must go home at once. I have the feeling that Wolfgang is sitting there waiting for me, full of despair. Something must have happened. O God, and Minna is also out! Well, he still has the key of the flat. Excuse me, I’m quite confused, dear Betty.”

“Manners and deportment, dear Mathilde! Deportment in every situation of life! Naturally you should have stayed at home on such an afternoon; of course he’s waiting for you. I, myself, wouldn’t have gone out on such a day. And above all—please, Mathilde, one moment, you simply can’t run off like that—be firm. No false kindness. Above all give him no money, not a penny. Board and lodging and clothes—that’s all right. But no money; he’ll only lose it at play. Mathilde—Mathilde! Go. Don’t stand on ceremony. Listen, Ernst.…”

The Thumann woman of the upper classes talks on and on.…

VIII

The dog slept, the cat slept, Georgenkirchstrasse slept.

Petra Ledig stood in the shadow of the doorway leading to the courtyard. The street vibrated in the merciless white heat; the hard light hurt her eyes; what she looked at seemed to lose its outlines and dissolve. She shut her eyes, and her head was filled with darkness shot through with aching flashes. She heard clocks strike the hour—it was good that the time passed. At first she had thought she must go somewhere or do something, but as she felt the moments slip away in a daze, she knew that she need only stand and wait. He must come, he might come any moment, he was bringing money. Then they would set out. Round the corner was a baker’s, next to a butcher’s. She imagined she was
biting into a roll; it crackled, its crisp amber shell breaking, splinters of crust round the edge, and the inside white and spongy.

Now intruded red objects; she tried to recognize them, which she could do with shut eyes, for they were within her brain, not without: small round circles with reddish spots. What could they be? And suddenly she knew—they were strawberries. Of course, they had moved on; she was at a greengrocer’s. The strawberries lay in a basket. They smelled fresh—oh, how fresh they smelled. The strawberries lay on green leaves which were cool, too.… Everything was very cool and very fresh, with the sound of water also clear and cool.…

She tore herself away from her fantasy with an effort, but the water ran so insistently, and splashed down in such a way that it seemed to have something to say to her. Slowly she opened her eyes, slowly she recognized the doorway in which she was still standing, the vibrating street—and at last saw the bowler-hatted man who was saying something to her, an elderly man with sallow face and yellow-gray mutton-chop whiskers.

“What do you say?” she asked with a great effort, which she had to repeat because at first only a tiny unintelligible sound came from her parched mouth.

Many had passed her while she stood there. If they did notice the figure in the shadow of the open door they only hurried on all the quicker. It was a poor district in a starving age, and everywhere, at any hour of the day, stood women, girls, widows, miserable bodies rigged up in the most ridiculous rags, hunger and misery in their faces. To find a buyer for that miserable body was the last hope of the war widows done out of their pensions; working-class women whose husbands, even the soberest and most industrious, were tricked out of their wages by every devaluation of the mark; girls, some almost children, who could no longer witness the misery of their younger brothers and sisters. Every day, every hour, every minute, they slammed the doors of wretched hovels in which hunger was their mate and worry their bedfellow; they slammed doors behind them in finality and said: “Now I will do it. Why preserve myself for a greater misery, the next influenza epidemic, the medical officer and the bone house? Everything flows, hurries on, makes haste, changes—and am I supposed to keep myself?”

There they stood, in every corner, at all hours, insolent or cowed, talkative or silent, begging: “Only a cup of coffee and a roll.”

Georgenkirchstrasse was in a poor district. Gas company collector, middleman tailor, postman—they hurried all the quicker when they saw the girl. They didn’t pull a face or make an insolent remark or joke: they had no thought of scoffing. But they hurried past lest a word of supplication should reach their hearts and move them to make a gift which should not be given. For the same
trouble awaited all of them at home: black care rode on everybody’s shoulder. Who knows when my wife, my daughter, my girl will be standing there, at first in the shadow of the door and next time in broad daylight? If you hurry by and see nothing, no whisper reaches your ears. You are alone, I am alone, we die alone—so each for himself.

But now somebody had stopped before Petra, an elderly man in a bowler hat, a yellow owl’s face and yellow owl’s eyes.

“What?” she asked, this time quite distinctly.

“Well, Fräulein!” He shook his head somewhat disapprovingly. “Do the Pagels live here?”

“Pagels?” So he didn’t want anything of that sort, he was inquiring after the Pagels. The Pagels, several Pagels, at least two of them. She would have liked to know who he was, what he wanted; perhaps something important for Wolfgang.… And she tried to pull herself together. This gentleman wanted something. He mustn’t discover that she belonged to Pagel, she who stood in the doorway thus. “The Pagels?” She sought to gain time.

“Yes, the Pagels. Well, you don’t seem to know. Been having a drop or two, what?” He winked. He seemed to be a good-hearted man. “You oughtn’t, Fräulein, not during the daytime. It’s all right in the evening. But it’s bad for you during the day.”

“Yes, the Pagels live here,” she said. “But they’re not at home. They’re both out.” (For he mustn’t go up to the Thumann woman; what he would hear there might be detrimental to Wolfgang.)

“So? Both out? Probably to the wedding, eh? But then they must have arrived late. The registry office is closed now.”

So he knew that, too. Who could he be? Wolfgang had always said he had no acquaintances.

“When did they go?” the gentleman continued.

“About half an hour ago, no, an hour ago,” she said hastily. “And they told me they weren’t coming back today.” (He mustn’t go up to the Thumann woman. No!)

“So they told you that, Fräulein?” the gentleman asked, suddenly suspicious. “You’re probably on friendly terms with the Pagels?”

“No, no,” she protested hastily. “They only know me by sight. They only told me because I’m always standing here.”

“So …” said the gentleman thoughtfully. “Well, thank you very much.” And he went slowly through the doorway toward the first courtyard.

“Oh, please,” she called in a weak voice and even took a few steps after him.

“Anything else?” he asked, turning round; but he didn’t come back. (He intended to go up in any case.)

“Please,” she implored. “The people up there are bad. Don’t believe what they tell you of Herr Pagel. Herr Pagel is an excellent and very respectable man I’ve never had anything to do with him, I only know him by sight.”

The visitor stood in the sunlit courtyard. He looked at Petra keenly, but he did not recognize her in the shadowy doorway; a slight, weak figure, the head bent forward, the lips half open, hands laid imploringly on her breast, anxiously awaiting the effect of her words.

He fingered his yellow-gray beard thoughtfully. After a long silence’ he said: “Don’t worry, Fräulein. I don’t believe everything I’m told.”

It did not sound ironical, perhaps it was not intended for her at all. It sounded almost friendly.

“I know the young gentleman quite well. I knew him when he was so high.” And he indicated an impossibly short distance from the ground. Then, without another word, he nodded at her and vanished in the passage to the second courtyard.

Petra, however, slipped back to her sheltered corner behind the open door. She knew now that she had made a mistake; she should not have given any information at all to this old gentleman who had known Wolfgang as a child. No, she ought to have said: “I don’t know whether the Pagels live here.”

But she was too tired, too shattered, too ill to think about it any more. She only wanted to stand there and wait till he came back; then she would read in his face the information he had gleaned. She would tell him what a wonderful man Wolfgang was, that he had never done anything wicked, never done anybody any harm.… She rested her head on the cool wall, shutting her eyes, and this time almost unwillingly felt descend upon her the darkness which meant relief from her ego, her troubles, while in her mind she endeavored to accompany the old gentleman across the courtyard. And then upstairs to Frau Thumann’s door. She thought she could hear him ring, and now she wanted to concentrate on his conversation with the landlady.… She would talk, that woman! Oh, she would talk, reveal everything, fling mud at them both, lament over the lost money.…