The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries Volume Xii Part 68

Effi laughed more heartily than she had for a long time. But the mood was of short duration and when Innstetten went away and left her alone she sat down by the baby's cradle, and tears fell on the pillows. The old feeling came over her again that she was a prisoner without hope of escape.

She suffered intensely from the feeling and longed more than ever for liberty. But while she was capable of strong emotions she had not a strong character. She lacked steadfastness and her good desires soon pa.s.sed away. Thus she drifted on, one day, because she could not help it, the next, because she did not care to try to help it. She seemed to be in the power of the forbidden and the mysterious.

So it came about that she, who by nature was frank and open, accustomed herself more and more to play an underhand part. At times she was startled at the ease with which she could do it. Only in one respect she remained unchanged--she saw everything clearly and glossed nothing. Late one evening she stepped before the mirror in her bedroom. The lights and shadows flitted to and fro and Rollo began to bark outside. That moment it seemed to her as though somebody were looking over her shoulder. But she quickly bethought herself. "I know well enough what it is. It was not _he_," and she pointed her finger toward the haunted room upstairs. "It was something else--my conscience--Effi, you are lost."

Yet things continued on this course; the ball was rolling, and what happened one day made the actions of the next a necessity.

About the middle of the month there came invitations from the four families with which the Innstettens a.s.sociated most. They had agreed upon the order in which they would entertain. The Borckes were to begin, the Flemmings and Grasenabbs followed, the Guldenklees came last. Each time a week intervened. All four invitations came on the same day. They were evidently intended to leave an impression of orderliness and careful planning, and probably also of special friendliness and congeniality.

"I shall not go, Geert, and you must excuse me in advance on the ground of the treatment which I have been undergoing for weeks past."

Innstetten laughed. "Treatment. I am to blame it on the treatment.

That is the pretext. The real reason is you don't care to."

"No, I am more honest than you are willing to admit. It was your own suggestion that I consult the doctor. I did so and now I must follow his advice. The good doctor thinks I am anaemic, strangely enough, and you know that I drink chalybeate water every day. If you combine this in imagination with a dinner at the Borckes', with, say, brawn and eel aspic, you can't help feeling that it would be the death of me. And certainly you would not think of asking such a thing of your Effi. To be sure, I feel at times--"

"I beg you, Effi."

"However, the one good thing about it is that I can look forward with pleasure to accompanying you each time a part of the way in the carriage, as far as the mill, certainly, or the churchyard, or even to the corner of the forest, where the crossroad to Morgnitz comes in.

Then I can alight and saunter back. It is always very beautiful among the dunes."

Innstetten was agreed, and when the carriage drove up three days later Effi got in with her husband and accompanied him to the corner of the forest. "Stop here, Geert. You drive on to the left now, but I am going to the right, down to the beach and back through the 'Plantation.' It is rather far, but not too far. Dr. Hannemann tells me every day that exercise is everything, exercise and fresh air. And I almost believe he is right. Give my regards to all the company, only you needn't say anything to Sidonie."

The drives on which Effi accompanied her husband as far as the corner of the forest were repeated every week, but even on the intervening days she insisted that she should strictly observe the doctor's orders. Not a day pa.s.sed that she did not take her prescribed walk, usually in the afternoon, when Innstetten began to become absorbed in his newspapers. The weather was beautiful, the air soft and fresh, the sky cloudy. As a rule she went out alone, after saying to Roswitha: "Roswitha, I am going down the turnpike now and then to the right to the place with the merrygo-round. There I shall wait for you, meet me there. Then we can walk back by the avenue of birches or through the ropewalk. But do not come unless Annie is asleep. If she is not asleep send Johanna. Or, rather, just let it go. It is not necessary; I can easily find the way."

The first day they met as planned. Effi sat on a bench by a long shed, looking over at a low yellow plaster house with exposed timbers painted black, an inn at which the lower middle cla.s.ses drank their gla.s.s of beer or played at ombre. It was hardly dusk, but the windows were already bright, and their gleams of light fell upon the piles of snow and the few trees standing at one side. "See, Roswitha, how beautiful that looks."

This was repeated for a few days. But usually, when Roswitha reached the merry-go-round and the shed, n.o.body was there, and when she came back home and entered the hall Effi came to meet her, saying: "Where in the world have you been, Roswitha? I have been back a long time."

Thus it went on for weeks. The matter of the hussars was about given up, on account of objections made by the citizens. But as the negotiations were not yet definitely closed and had recently been referred to the office of the commander in chief, Crampas was called to Stettin to give his opinion to the authorities.

From there he wrote the second day to Innstetten: "Pardon me, Innstetten, for taking French leave. It all came so quickly. Here, however, I shall seek to draw the matter out long, for it is a pleasure to be out in the world again. My regards to your gracious wife, my amiable patroness."

He read it to Effi, who remained silent. Finally she said:

"It is very well thus."

"What do you mean by that?"

"That he is gone. To tell the truth, he always says the same things.

When he is back he will at least for a time have something new to say."

[Ill.u.s.tration: HIGH ALTAR AT SALZBURG _From the Painting by Adolph von Menzel_]

Innstetten gave her a sharp scrutinizing glance, but he saw nothing, and his suspicion was allayed. "I am going away, too," he said after a while, "and to Berlin at that. Perhaps I, too, can bring back something new, as well as Crampas. My dear Effi always wants to hear something new. She is bored to death in our good Kessin. I shall be away about a week, perhaps a day or two longer. But don't be alarmed--I don't think it will come back--You know, that thing upstairs--But even if it should, you have Rollo and Roswitha."

Effi smiled to herself and felt at the same time a mingling of sadness. She could not help recalling the day when Crampas had told her for the first time that her husband was acting out a play with the ghost and her fear. The great pedagogue! But was he not right? Was not the play in place? All kinds of contradicting thoughts, good and bad, shot through her head.

The third day Innstetten went away. He had not said anything about his business in Berlin.

CHAPTER XXI

Innstetten had been gone but four days when Crampas returned from Stettin with the news that the higher authorities had definitely dropped the plan of detailing two squadrons to Kessin. There were so many small cities that were applying for a garrison of cavalry, particularly for Blucher hussars, that as a rule, he said, an offer of such troops met with a hearty reception, and not a halting one. When Crampas made this report the magistracy looked quite badly embarra.s.sed. Only Gieshubler was triumphant, because he thought the discomfiture served his narrow-minded colleagues exactly right. When the news reached the common people a certain amount of depression spread among them, indeed even some of the consuls with eligible daughters were for the time being dissatisfied. But on the whole they soon forgot about it, perhaps because the question of the day, "What was Innstetten's business in Berlin?" was more interesting to the people of Kessin, or at least to the dignitaries of the city. They did not care to lose their unusually popular district councillor, and yet very exaggerated rumors about him were in circulation, rumors which, if not started by Gieshubler, were at least supported and further spread by him. Among other things it was said that Innstetten would go to Morocco as an amba.s.sador with a suite, bearing gifts, including not only the traditional vase with a picture of Sans Souci and the New Palace, but above all a large refrigerator. The latter seemed so probable in view of the temperature in Morocco, that the whole story was believed.

In time Effi heard about it. The days when the news would have cheered her were not yet so very far distant. But in the frame of mind in which she had been since the end of the year she was no longer capable of laughing artlessly and merrily. Her face had taken on an entirely new expression, and her half-pathetic, half-roguish childishness, which she had preserved as a woman, was gone. The walks to the beach and the "Plantation," which she had given up while Crampas was in Stettin, she resumed after his return and would not allow them to be interfered with by unfavorable weather. It was arranged as formerly that Roswitha should come to meet her at the end of the ropewalk, or near the churchyard, but they missed each other oftener than before.

"I could scold you, Roswitha, for never finding me. But it doesn't matter; I am no longer afraid, not even by the churchyard, and in the forest I have never yet met a human soul."

It was on the day before Innstetten's return from Berlin that Effi said this. Roswitha paid little attention to the remarks, as she was absorbed in hanging up garlands over the doors. Even the shark was decorated with a fir bough and looked more remarkable than usual. Effi said: "That is right, Roswitha. He will be pleased with all the green when he comes back tomorrow. I wonder whether I should go out again today? Dr. Hannemann insists upon it and is continually saying I do not take it seriously enough, otherwise I should certainly be looking better. But I have no real desire today; it is drizzling and the sky is so gray."

"I will fetch her Ladyship's raincoat."

"Do so, but don't come for me today; we should not meet anyhow," and she laughed. "Really, Roswitha, you are not a bit good at finding. And I don't want to have you catch a cold all for nothing."

So Roswitha remained at home and, as Annie was sleeping, went over to chat with Mrs. Kruse. "Dear Mrs. Kruse," she said, "you were going to tell me about the Chinaman. Yesterday Johanna interrupted you. She always puts on such airs, and such a story would not interest her. But I believe there was, after all, something in it, I mean the story of the Chinaman and Thomsen's niece, if she was not his granddaughter."

Mrs. Kruse nodded.

Roswitha continued: "Either it was an unhappy love"--Mrs. Kruse nodded again--"or it may have been a happy one, and the Chinaman was simply unable to endure the sudden termination of it. For the Chinese are human, like the rest of us, and everything is doubtless the same with them as with us."

"Everything," a.s.sured Mrs. Kruse, who was about to corroborate it by her story, when her husband entered and said: "Mother, you might give me the bottle of leather varnish. I must have the harness shining when his Lordship comes home tomorrow. He sees everything, and even if he says nothing, one can tell that he has seen it all."

"I'll bring it out to you, Kruse," said Roswitha. "Your wife is just going to tell me something more; but it will soon be finished and then I'll come and bring it."

A few minutes later Roswitha came out into the yard with the bottle of varnish in her hand and stood by the harness which Kruse had just hung over the garden fence. "By George!" he said, as he took the bottle from her hand, "it will not do much good; it keeps drizzling all the time and the shine will come off. But I am one of those who think everything must be kept in order."

"Indeed it must. Besides, Kruse, that is good varnish, as I can see at a glance, and first-cla.s.s varnish doesn't stay sticky very long, it must dry immediately. Even if it is foggy tomorrow, or dewy, it will be too late then to hurt it. But, I must say, that is a remarkable story about the Chinaman."

Kruse laughed. "It is nonsense, Roswitha. My wife, instead of paying attention to proper things, is always telling such tales, and when I go to put on a clean shirt there is a b.u.t.ton off. It has been so ever since we came here. She always had just such stories in her head and the black hen besides. And the black hen doesn't even lay eggs. After all, what can she be expected to lay eggs out of? She never goes out, and such things as eggs can't come from mere c.o.c.k-a-doodle-dooing. It is not to be expected of any hen."

"See here, Kruse, I am going to repeat that to your wife. I have always considered you a respectable man and now you say things like that about the c.o.c.k-a-doodle-dooing. Men are always worse than we think. Really I ought to take this brush right now and paint a black moustache on your face."

"Well, Roswitha, one could put up with that from you," and Kruse, who was usually on his dignity, seemed about to change to a more flirting tone, when he suddenly caught sight of her Ladyship, who today came from the other side of the "Plantation" and just at this moment was pa.s.sing along the garden fence.

"Good day, Roswitha, my, but you are merry. What is Annie doing?"

"She is asleep, your Ladyship."

As Roswitha said this she turned red and quickly breaking off the conversation, started toward the house to help her Ladyship change her clothes. For it was doubtful whether Johanna was there. She hung around a good deal over at the "office" nowadays, because there was less to do at home and Frederick and Christel were too tedious for her and never knew anything.

Annie was still asleep. Effi leaned over the cradle, then had her hat and raincoat taken off and sat down upon the little sofa in her bedroom. She slowly stroked back her moist hair, laid her feet on a stool, which Roswitha drew up to her, and said, as she evidently enjoyed the comfort of resting after a rather long walk: "Roswitha, I must remind you that Kruse is married."

"I know it, your Ladyship."

"Yes, what all doesn't one know, and yet one acts as though one did _not_ know. Nothing can ever come of this."