The Song Of Songs Part 5

As the time drew near for the great event, the mother became more taciturn. A crafty smile lay on her face, which, but for an admixture of scorn, was like the smile parents wear before Christmas. She painted her cheeks more carefully than ever, and the jar of rouge, which previously she had kept locked away from Lilly, reposed unabashed on the top of the chest.

But money grew rapidly scarcer. Lilly had to give up every minute she could spare from school work to make up for her mother's remissness, while Mrs. Czepanek went about calculating and speculating. She put her foot to the treadle only on rare occasions, when Lilly pled with her urgently. The delivery of finished articles became more and more irregular, and the two women were in danger of losing their entire means of subsistence.

Lilly's vast h.o.a.rd of youthful strength threatened to give out. Yet this did not cause her overmuch concern.

"Something'll turn up," she thought.

If only she could have gotten one good night's rest, instead of lying dressed on the edge of the bed from two to six in the morning, she would not have grudged her mother her youthful intoxication born of young hopes.

Lilly sat in school with tired, reddened eyes, a filmy veil between her and the world, between her and the thoughts she was expected to think.

Her teachers began to find fault with her.

It was high time for the new life to begin.

It began on a hot, drab July day.

On returning from school Lilly saw two waggons standing outside the door loaded with furniture smelling of fresh varnish. Even before she set foot on the lowest step she could hear her mother's shrill voice apparently raised in altercation with strangers.

Lilly ran upstairs, her heart beating fast. Two drivers wearing black leather ap.r.o.ns were standing there, one with a bill in his hand demanding money. A look of amus.e.m.e.nt was on their red faces. Mrs.

Czepanek was tripping to and fro, running her fingers through her freshly-curled hair and screaming all sorts of things about rascality and broken promises and grinding down the poor. Whereupon the men laughed, and said they'd like to get back home that day.

This set Mrs. Czepanek off completely. She tried to s.n.a.t.c.h the bill from the man's hand. He refused to give it up, and she set to pummelling him with her fists.

Lilly sprang between them, caught hold of her mother, who fought desperately, and called to the men to leave, telling them everything would be arranged. So the men took themselves off.

Her mother's wrath now descended upon Lilly.

"If you hadn't come," she screamed, "I would have gotten hold of the receipt, and everything would have been all right. Now I have to go there to-morrow again, while if you hadn't mixed in, the furniture could have been unpacked in the new apartment this very day."

"What new apartment?"

Mrs. Czepanek laughed. How could Lilly be so stupid? Did she think her mother had been going about idle all that time?

Then everything was revealed. The nine-room apartment had already been rented, and all they needed to do was move in. Even the plate had already been made. When hung it would act like magic. So much for the outside. But hadn't she self-sacrificingly strained every nerve on the inside equipment, too? She wasn't going to describe the furniture, for it might make her angry again, but--

She had bought curtains for twelve windows--the pattern a Chinese lady and a palm leaf. And six rugs, good ones, because students usually have a pretty heavy tramp, and cheap stuff would wear out like chiffon. Big English wash basins with gold flowers, the pattern exactly matching the pattern of the ten stands. Unfortunately the dishes were not ready for delivery because it always took three or four weeks to have the monogram burnt in. But they would have to have something to eat from, so for the meantime she had bought a cheaper set--for eighteen people--everything thoroughly refined and respectable. She had been very clever and very careful in the entire matter.

While engaged in this description, Mrs. Czepanek walked about the centre-table with long shambling steps. Her small eyes, with the traces of many sleepless hours upon them, glistened and gleamed, and beneath the false glowed the genuine red on her haggard cheeks.

Lilly, who was beginning to be a bit uneasy, ventured to inquire concerning the payments. Her mother simply laughed at her.

"You are either a lady and impress the tradespeople, or you are not a lady. I think that I, the wife of Kilian Czepanek, conductor of the singing society, am thoroughly ent.i.tled to be treated with respect."

"Are the things at the apartment?"

Mrs. Czepanek laughed again.

"What should I do with them before the apartment is in order? Apartments have to be freshly painted and papered." Then with the graceful gesture which only the ability to pay bestows upon a person, she added: "I was especially careful in selecting the wall-paper to get artistic patterns."

Lilly had a sickish feeling. It was like being in doubt as to whether or not your schoolmates were teasing you.

Added to all the other annoyances nothing had been gotten for dinner.

Lilly set the coffee on to boil and put the afternoon rolls on the table. Well, then, they would simply skip a meal again. The two Czepaneks had grown nimble in that sort of skipping.

The mother hastily gulped down the hot drink. No time must be lost, she said, they would have to get at the packing.

At this point she was seized by another attack of fury.

"Hadn't you held my hands, you good-for-nothing, you," she screamed, "we should have had that lovely furniture in its place by to-morrow morning.

As it is, we shall have to move in with all this trash. What _will_ the people say when they see it?"

She tore at her artificial curls and despairingly brandished the bread-knife, with which she was slicing her roll.

Then she turned up the sleeves of her blouse, and said the packing should begin.

She emptied the wardrobe and piled the clothes over the bottom of the bed. The underwear and linen, the contents of their linen chest, she sent flying over the floor.

The sinews of her withered arms jerked, the sweat trickled down her forehead.

Lilly, watching the aimless pother with an oppressed feeling at her heart, noticed the score of the Song of Songs, the home's greatest treasure, lying on the floor, heedlessly thrown there by her mother along with nightgowns and bed-clothes.

She stooped to pick it up.

"What are you after with the Song of Songs?" screamed the mother. She had been kneeling, and now jumped to her feet.

"Nothing," said Lilly in surprise. "I was just going to put it on the table."

"You lie," the mother screeched, "you low-down thing. You want to steal it, the way you stole the receipt. I'll spoil your little game for you."

Lilly suddenly saw a gleaming something pa.s.s before her eyes, and felt a pain at her throat, felt something warm spread soothingly down to her left breast.

Not until her mother prepared for a second thrust did Lilly realise it was the bread-knife she was holding in her hand. She uttered a piercing scream, and grasped her mother's wrist.

But the mother had developed giant strength, and Lilly would probably have succ.u.mbed in the struggle that ensued, had not the noise they made drawn the neighbours to the spot.

Mrs. Czepanek was caught from behind, and bound with handkerchiefs. She held the bread-knife in a tight clutch, which the strongest man could not relax, and did not drop it until an opiate had been administered by the physician who had hurried to the scene.

Lilly's wound was dressed, and she was taken to the hospital, where she remained temporarily, because they did not know what else to do with her. While at the hospital she learned that her mother had been placed in the district insane asylum, and in all likelihood would never come out of it again.

Lilly was left alone in the world.

CHAPTER V

"Well, young lady," said Mr. Pieper, the prominent lawyer, "I have been appointed your guardian. I accepted the office because I thought it my duty--the papers in Lemke _vs._ Militzky," he interrupted himself to call to his managing clerk, who had just then entered. "What was I going to say? Oh, yes. Because I thought it my duty, despite my being an extremely busy man--to a.s.sist widows and orphans to the best of my feeble ability."