The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries Volume Xix Part 7

The first suitors who presented themselves were the two boarders of the pretty little widow with the heart-shaped face, Herr Oehmchen and Herr Leinhose. They paid a visit to the Sperbers, but not together; neither knew of the other's intention. They did not venture to go directly to the Rauchfuss farm; the thing was to be conducted with utmost propriety.

"Hallo!" thought Herr Sperber. "The thing must be getting serious when such settled gentlemen put themselves in motion." Herr Sperber did not fly too high in his ambitions for his protegee. "A plain fellow like that is the best for a woman of her sort," he thought to himself; "then there won't be any such business as there was with Herr Rauchfuss. Such a chap hasn't anything particular to show off before the world, no red beard, no giant's stature, no whimsies in the brain, no big heart, no wit--just an average fellow that'll settle down and keep quiet."

Herr Sperber received both the gentlemen in a very friendly fashion.

The nephew, of course, would cut them out--but that was his affair.

Beate, who was invited one evening to meet the nephew and the other two at her old friends', enjoyed the astonished admiration of the three like a delicious confection--or rather like a sweet perfume that she breathed in. "Men are drunk with me," she thought again, and was proud and happy.

Although the two boarders and the nephew were quite sufficiently wearisome in their enamored state, she was not bored; she was only conscious of herself and of the incense of sacrifice which arose under her nostrils and seemed to invigorate her. The three men were alike indifferent to her; they were only the vessels in which the incense was burnt.

After such an evening she was gay and strong as a young G.o.ddess. The next day she was indefatigably at work, imposed even more respect than usual on her people, and felt exceedingly well.

On Sat.u.r.day evenings the Kirsten girls had a way of strolling up with their friends; but it was not long before first one and then another came with them, whom they had met on the way and did not know how to shake off. This annoyed Rose and Marie very much. "These people are in the way," they said--"we like to be by ourselves." But Beate Rauchfuss said, "Oh, let them come--it doesn't make any difference."

"Of course they all run after you, because they think there's something to get," said Rose. "You'd better tell them you don't mean to have anything to say to them. What do you want of _them_? You've got _us_!"

The old Sperbers began to be overburdened by the mult.i.tude of young people who developed a desire to visit them; and the nephew in particular grew tired of it. So they decided to give Beate Frau k.u.mmerfelden's old friend, the Raven-mother, as a chaperon. She was quite capable of keeping ten suitors in their proper place, and was useful for anything; she could watch the dead and the sick--then why not for once the beauty of a young girl?

She was the widow of the tinsmith Lange; she had married all her children, and so was ready to come to the service of her friends and acquaintances. She was even to be called upon for poetical effusions for special occasions; under the great Saint Christopher's cloak that she wore winter and summer alike beat a feeling heart, and a n.o.ble soul dwelt in the big strong body.

She was only too glad to go up to the Ettersberg as Beate's chaperon.

It was the beginning of winter when they sent for her. For some time she had been wishing for something of the sort. Up there on the fine farm she would be very comfortable. When the snow lay on the ground, she would not have far to go to find her little pensioners, the ravens, whom she was accustomed to provide with food when the fields were snow-covered.

She came up to the Rauchfuss farm at the beginning of November. "By spring we'll be having a wedding," old Sperber had said to her. "I don't know why this girl, who ought for all reasons to choose a husband nicely and quietly, should be such a burning hay-rick! And the rascal likes it; just as a drinker enjoys his wine, so she enjoys the lovesighs of all these a.s.ses. Ah, there you are--the sins of the fathers upon the children, unto the third and fourth generation!" Old Sperber looked very black; he was displeased with Herr Rauchfuss's Tubby.

"What foolishness is this?" he said to her. "Down in the town a girl takes what she can get and is thankful--but you make everything that's got legs trudge all this long way up the hill. You know, you ought to be ashamed of yourself. A girl ought to have more discretion."

At this the girl laughed rather haughtily. Her heart was still free, and simply running over with the happiness of earth. No matter what was said to her, she heard only half of it. She seemed to have wrapped herself up in a sort of chrysalis. Her soul was round as a ball, without any angles on which cares could be hung, or cracks into which they could insinuate themselves--a fair ball of crystal, with light shining all about and through it.

It is a wonderful thing, the perfect egoism of early youth, the way it has no ears for the words of reason and wisdom, and only half an ear for anything else. Like a distant noise and bustle sound the world's doings amid the undisturbed content of self-centred youth and beauty.

But quite respectable personages came wandering all the long way up the hill. Herr Oehmchen and Herr Leinhose were indefatigable. With them came not seldom the young widow with the heart-shaped face, in the wise conviction that the dangerous maiden could at worst take only one of her well-nourished boarders from her, and that it would pay her to keep on good terms with both.

Besides these a courtier often came up, a man who had in the neighborhood of Weimar a rather heavily mortgaged estate. But he had also faultless manners, an extraordinarily small head and aristocratic hands. He could look back upon a long line of ancestors, who had all nibbled away something of his property and his personality; there was little of either left, and it was extremely sensible of him to think of supplementing them. He was superior to all the others when it came to a question of form, and so made a great impression on them. They considered him a dangerous rival, and rejoiced when he was obliged to stay in his town house--for he went to court--when they had anything on like a sleigh-ride or a dance; in fact, they arranged such things if possible on days when they knew he would have to be absent.

Dances, musical evenings, masked b.a.l.l.s, sewing-circles were abundant that winter in Weimar, and the pretty Rauchfuss girl was asked to everything--now it was one paying attention to her, now another. She had plenty of cavaliers: all the marriageable merchants' sons of the town, young lawyers--in brief, the wooers recruited themselves from the entire circle of the townspeople, and even beyond it. The hunt was on, and every one joined it who could.

She loved dancing. It seemed to her the most glorious thing in the world to forget herself, to let herself dissolve in music and motion.

She distinguished her suitors only by their ability as dancers; as to their intellectual capacity, which indeed was not specially noticeable in any of them, she easily confused them. She herself was without any instinct of the chase or desire for conquest, simply contented and happy in herself.

So the time pa.s.sed on. The impatience of the aspirants might well have seemed to her like a flood rising to her very lips, threatening and terrifying her, or like a row of insistent creditors, with herself sitting in her little room in peace and letting them knock and call as loud as they would. She did not realize the impatience of the hunters; they seemed all so foreign, so far off to her.

To take one of these strangers into her house, to have him always about, to be obliged to see him every day, seemed a thing so distasteful and impossible that the thought did not even trouble her.

But she dreamed of wonders--of one whom she would long to love. She felt something strong, great and good in herself, and realized at the same time her ignorance and her limitations. Her longing for freedom was also a longing for breadth, a desire to escape from all that was narrow, a will to grow.

Hitherto no one had offered her the bread of life; and she was hungry.

Her beauty had in it something sleeping, something strong, that yearned to be active in this world and beyond; but no one offered to nourish this wonderful thing. What they offered her was no royal, soul-strengthening food; it was but ordinary, every-day diet, on which she would pine away and starve.

Yes ... she dreamed long, amidst all her suitors, of an awakening compared with which the life which these others called into being in her was but a deep, dull sleep.

The Raven-mother took delight in observing that the fortress she was set to guard showed no signs of surrendering; for so the comfortable existence up at the Rauchfuss farm might prolong itself a while longer.

On Sunday afternoons and evenings they had the most of their visitors.

Then came the suitors, the Kirsten girls with their friends, the pretty young widow, and often the good k.u.mmerfelden, who took great delight in listening to the irrational chatter of the amorous youths.

"These men-creatures are enough to drive one mad when they're in love,"

she said once to the Raven-mother. "The bird sings his prettiest songs to his mate and finds the nicest things to tell her; but men, with the exception of a few, who immediately print their pretty phrases, talk miserable rubbish. It positively makes my hair stand on end when I think that they used to do exactly the same in my day, and I didn't take it in ill part. They are only really clever when they're driven into a corner and can't help themselves; it must be a fearful strain on them."

"Yes," said the Raven-mother, "it's as if they thought that a fresh girl like that could only be caught by extraordinary nonsense--to be sure, she laughs at their foolishness; but I tell you she's a cool head all the same."

"And she's right," said Frau k.u.mmerfelden.

But the talk of two old women is a dry affair. In the spring twilight they were sitting by the window in the great living-room; the young people were playing forfeits. In the next room the table was laid for supper.

They had pa.s.sed a good many merry Sunday afternoons and evenings with the object of all this devotion, harmless, amusing hours, in which the suitors forgot what had brought them there and enjoyed themselves just like other people. But tonight there seemed to be a sort of spring fever in the air. Outside a cold, persistent rain could be heard falling, in spite of the new leaves on the trees. In the chicken-house the fowls were clucking in a Sunday afternoon ennui. The wretched rain had interfered with the usual Sunday occupations of the men and maids.

Footsteps dragged across the yard in whose very sound discontent and boredom could be detected. The raindrops beat against the window-panes, or when the wind dropped, came down like a soft gray curtain.

The little town of Weimar, with all its distinguished men, lay hidden in mist and equally bored at the foot of the long slope of the Ettersberg, looking like any other little country town in the rain--comfortless and desolate'. In the midst of the loneliness and the spring rain, sounded now and then the note of a thrush, crying for the sun.

The Kirsten girls and their comrades had slipped up in spite of rain and mud, because they hoped that on such a day the amorous youths, the donkeys, as they called them, would stay at home. But the same thought had struck others. Each had hoped not to find the rest and to be able to show off his own personality; and all had been disappointed.

The object of their devotion was in anything but a good mood. A sort of disgust had seized her as all the dripping, commonplace figures divested themselves of their outer garments at the door with much noise and snorting. The stable-girl had to clean off their muddy boots, or, in case they had brought another pair to change, take the wet ones away to dry them at the stove.

Each one that came in seemed to make a great deal more noise than there was any need of. To the young girl they all seemed like bl.u.s.tering husbands; she too would rather have been alone with the Kirsten girls and their friends. Today all these strange men oppressed her, each of them coming with the hope of remaining at home there, master of all.

They seemed positively shameless to her. A heavy sadness came upon her.

She thought of her mother's marriage, of the quiet woman's hard-working life, of her loneliness, of the indifference she had to bear, of the warm, sorrowful embraces she had for her child.

"A pretty situation!" The young girl grew full of anger and disgust.

"Has one of these men who come here given me anything that I didn't know all about? They are tiresome! If I were to take one of them, he'd soon forget to notice that I was beautiful. What is there left, then?"

They played at forfeits, the restless, discontented thoughts of them all making the very air of the room heavy. At supper, too, it was not so lively as at other times. The hostess was silent, not beaming as usual with the consciousness of her youth and beauty.

For the first time since she awoke to the carefree joy of budding youth, the ball of crystal that was her soul seemed stained and darkened; it no longer swam in the sunlight, shot through and through by the rays.

About nine o'clock, when the rain was coming down in torrents, and it had been proposed that the Kirsten girls should spend the night with Beate, their three comrades and Frau k.u.mmerfelden at the Sperbers', while the suitors would have to accustom themselves gradually to the idea of going out into the wind and wet, there came a loud ring at the gate of the courtyard.

"For heaven's sake!" cried the Raven-mother. The rest sat in silent wonder; their number was complete--who could it be?

"Perhaps it's another one coming over from the Sperbers'," said Rose.

"Heaven forbid!" said Beate. She was thinking, "It will be no life at all if I marry one of these--it would be a hopeless business." And she felt again the strength of her longing, hungry young soul, which yearned to grow and yet no one would give it its food.

She was lost in these thoughts, in her new strange pain, when the stable-girl came in out of breath and said, "I've just let in a strange gentleman, who asks leave to wait a little while till the weather's not so bad. He's come across country, he says."

"Well," said the Raven-mother, "is he a proper sort of a person?"

"Oh yes!" The stable-girl brought her hand down on her thigh in emphatic a.s.surance. "He's certainly a gentleman, even if he is wet through." All laughed loudly. The sudden burst of laughter rose up as unexpectedly as a covey of birds startled by a pedestrian in a quiet stubble-field.