Minna opened the door for me. She gave me a firm shake of the hand and whispered, "Thank you for coming."
I stepped at once into the sitting-room, hat in hand. The lamp was lit. Stephensen sat talking to Mrs. Jagemann, who was wearing her linsey dress and best cap. It was evident that the piratical suitor sailed under the neutral flag of a visit to the family. She entertained him about the lodgers: "Bad people, Mr. Stephensen! Indeed, we have often wished you back. But, oh my, there is nothing to say against the present one; he is also a painter, that is to say in another way,… he is in the decorative line, you know."
Stephensen had risen. We greeted one another very politely, and I even compelled myself to give him my hand; for, after all, Minna was fond of him, and her feelings should protect him against my dislike. His thin and delicate hand was very cold—the heart perhaps, according to the old saying, was in consequence so much the warmer.
I pressed Mrs. Jagemann's soft and flabby hand, and after a wandering glance round the room I spoke to Minna—
"I thought I had forgotten my pocket-book; it was for that reason"
"But we have just sent it," the mother shouted. "We thought you were sure to miss it."
"Indeed! Then my landlady will keep it for me."
Stephensen smiled a little ironically, as much as to say: "Is it for my sake you take all this trouble?"
"But you will now remain here for the evening?" Minna said, and bent her head over some music through which she was looking.
"Yes, of course Mr. Fenger will stay. We shall have a jolly time," the mother said.
I expressed my thanks, and sat down near the window.
The long box with the ferns had been put out on the window-sill. In the midst of all her troubles Minna had still been tenderly careful that they should have the benefit of the rain. The single-leaved ferns, which we had found together, stood in the middle and noddingly moved their slim stalks. Some acacia leaves and a bit of bent cherry branch glittered in the light from within. The thick, fine rain sounded like a low whispering, and with it a water-pipe mingled its babble. From the sombre background irregular dotted panes stood out, between which a few staircases mounted up like interrupted columns of light. I stared out, and was suddenly overcome by the strange depressing feeling of the sadness and monotony of human life. It was to me a very extraordinary idea that all these lights were signs of just as many existences, in which possibly there was not to be found any similarity except modest conditions, disappointments, and emptiness, a miserable and joyless fate, like the monotonous darkness, which at the same time isolated and collected the lights. "But," thought I, "could there in any of those rooms be so queer a party as was collected in this?"
"Jolly" was not exactly the correct expression for our mood. Minna, absent-mindedly, struck some chords, as if she had not much wish to play, but still would do her best to break the silence. The mother, who had nothing more to say, gave a deep sigh—that was her contribution. I felt the pressing necessity of making some remark, but Stephensen anticipated me.
"Is it pretty in the neighbourhood of Meissen?" he asked, evidently to let me know that he was aware of the plan.
"Oh no, I cannot say that it is. It is the contrary to that of the south, where Saxonia increases in beauty the farther one descends. Don't you know our beautiful rhyme—
"'Denn gleich hinter Meissen—
Pfui Spinne!—kommt Breissen.'"[1]
She said this, in spite of a certain nervousness, so funnily, that we all burst out laughing, her mother as heartily as any of us.
"Oh yes," she whimpered, while she dried the tears from her large cheek, "Why should you now get this sudden idea to visit Wilhelmina … when you have been away all the summer? Surely you must have had enough country air! Honestly I believe there is too much fuss made about this fresh air."
The naïve explanation of Minna's trip came as a relief, though I had an idea that it was not quite genuine. If all of us had understood the situation, it would have been too trying, and we should have felt that we might as well speak openly of what we all knew. The good woman's presence placed us on those more conventional terms which are so well fitted to hide the real emotions.
"And such cosy evenings we might have had," Mrs. Jagemann continued.… "We might, for instance, have arranged for whist. Can you remember, Mr. Stephensen, how often we amused ourselves in that way when you lodged here, and my good husband still lived?… Oh dear me, yes, those were happy times, such a family party, h'm, so to speak,… true, I was always being sat upon by my partner."
"Not by me, I hope," Stephensen said with his most amiable smile.
"Oh dear no, Mr. Stephensen! You, who always are so considerate and tactful! But my good husband was often nasty; he also got angry when he had no luck. Indeed, upon my word, he did … oh dear! Poor Jagemann could not endure misfortune."
"He was a good player, I remember."
"Good indeed, I should think so; he really was good at everything he undertook, was poor Jagemann.… But it's just the same in cards as in other things, what can one do with bad cards?"
Or with a bad partner, I thought.
"Oh dear me, yes, my good husband surely might have been something more than a poor teacher in a public school, but what are we to do? Bad people, Mr. Stephensen! Oh yes, and then fate, as you know—misfortune."
Stephensen tried to look sympathetic. I had not taken my eyes away from Minna. She still sat at the piano, but was half-turned towards us. It was evident that this talk irritated her; the smile round her lips grew more and more mocking, and every now and then she shrugged her shoulders.
"I think it is a good likeness you have caught in your picture there of Jagemann," I remarked to Stephensen.
"Oh yes, something of the old 'Tartar' has got into it, though he could look more amiable."
"It reminds me very speakingly of father," Minna said.
"Oh dear me, yes, indeed!"
"At times I have good luck with such light pencil drawings, but the pastel of Minna, which cost me so much trouble, is really a smudge. I ought not to allow it to hang on the wall."
"Please don't, Mr. Stephensen. How can you say so? That beautiful painting! At that time we had not one other one in colours; at least there was another one with children in a boat, and I honestly thought it was very pretty, but Minna wouldn't allow it to be here, so I had to put it into the bedroom.… Well, later on you were so kind as to send that lovely picture over the sofa.… But Minna's picture, no, you mustn't say that, one can clearly see who it is meant for"
"But only very dimly who it is," Minna said.
"Oh, you really are a naughty child!"
Stephensen laughed.
"There you are, Madam! It's no use for you to be so kind, the picture can't be saved. But one might make a new one, and, for instance, just such a pencil sketch."
"Have you painted at all to-day, Mr. Stephensen?" I asked.
"No, the light was too bad.… I could only soil the canvas over, so that to-morrow, anyhow, I may not look at the white stuff."
"Do all painters use such disparaging expressions about their art?" Minna asked. "It seems that one never hears anything from you all but 'soiling,' 'daubing,' or, at most, 'smearing.'"
"Quite right," Stephensen answered, smiling; "it is a rather ordinary artistic façon de parler; there is a bit of self-criticism in it, and still more affectation and perhaps perverted vanity. I will try to get rid of that habit. By the way, you ladies have a similar habit when speaking of your 'strumming,' what you were doing a minute ago."
"Oh, really you can't compare that!" Minna exclaimed, insulted on behalf of his art. "You are trying to make me appear foolish."
We now both asked her to play seriously. She at once turned towards the piano, opened some music, and started a Prelude by Chopin. Stephensen went into the hall and came back with a sketch-book in his hand. I thought he was going to draw Minna at the piano, though in reality his position was not suitable, but I soon felt that his attention was fixed upon me. I was annoyed that he should sketch me without my permission, but he smiled—one could not deny there was something attractive in his smile—and pointed with the pencil to Minna. "Is it really for her he is going to draw me?" I thought. "It is a queer idea, but in a way rather a nice one." And I sat as still as a mouse, listening to the music.
One Prelude followed the other. She played absent-mindedly and with not nearly her usual amount of expression. One could hardly expect anything else, but I regretted it; I was very proud on her behalf, and should have liked to see her showing off—even to Stephensen. He, for his part, was hardly a very attentive listener, as he was busy drawing, sometimes bending forward in order to see better, or measuring with the pencil in the air.
When Minna had played about half an hour, she turned towards us: "Have you had enough now?" Without waiting for an answer she jumped up and exclaimed, "What is it you are doing there?"
"Oh, it's not bad at all," she said, looking over Stephensen's shoulder. "It's a good likeness."
"Well, it might be worse."
"Oh, I say! Sweetly pretty!" the mother exclaimed.
"If only, I think"
"What?" Stephensen asked and looked up.
"No, perhaps I'm wrong, and it is impertinent of me to make suggestions."
"Not at all! A fresh eye easily discovers something, and you know the face better than I do."
"I think the chin ought to be larger."
"Really?" Stephensen measured, rubbed out and corrected, bent forward in order to see, and altered again. "Yes, indeed, it improves it; I even think it might stand a little more. You have a good eye, Minna!"
"Perhaps you ought also to let the Adam's apple be a little more prominent, it is so characteristic in him. Just see how it has helped!"
I got up, curious to see my own likeness. The drawing was only lightly sketched, but firm and true in the lines. As one does not know oneself in profile, I could not have much opinion as to the likeness. But Minna was satisfied, and it secretly pleased me that she had taken a small part in the finishing touches. Stephensen's smile betrayed the childish pleasure that an artist always feels when he has succeeded in something. He signed and dated it, loosened the leaf with his penknife and gave it to Minna.
"Thanks!" she said heartily, but without showing any surprise. "It pleases me immensely! There is something much more satisfactory in such a drawing than in a photograph—more charm. I don't know quite how it is, but I believe it makes me think of olden days, when everybody did not have dozens of photographs of themselves to distribute among their friends and acquaintances, and when people must have been so happy to get such a portrait of a person dear to them."
"That hasn't occurred to me before," Stephensen said. "It's more natural to me to think of the art value, but there is much in what you have just said."
"Quite true," I remarked. "It is the way of getting a likeness which always has existed, and it has not only the aristocracy of many ancestors, but is also free from the tiresome democratic point, that Jack and Tom have the same picture which is precious to us."
"Oh dear me, yes!" Mrs. Jagemann exclaimed. "The world has been progressing since I was young! Photography is indeed a wonderful invention, and it produces better likenesses than anything else."
Minna smiled at her mother, who had no notion that her remark was so little in harmony with the reflection to which it was supposed to give support.
"Yes, you are quite right in that," Stephensen admitted with his flexible readiness to smooth over a difficulty, "only there is something in the art of photography which is called re-touching and which indeed can produce strange results."
"Have you never tried to draw yourself?" Minna asked him.
"Not yet. Strangely enough I have not so far received any summons from the Uffizi Gallery in Florence to contribute to its unique collection of self-portraits."
"Suppose I ask you to do so now?"
"Then I will try during these lonely evenings, if the hotel mirror does not make me too crooked.… But I must now make use of the time and draw you."
"Am I really to pose? I don't know anything worse."
"At all events it's a long time since I troubled you," Stephensen answered gently, and with a strange sorrowful tone in his voice that was quite new to me, and that clearly enough said: "And who knows whether I shall ever do it again!"
Minna sat down without any further objection, and altered her position once or twice according to his directions. He began eagerly to sketch. But soon he stopped, discontented with the light; I placed the lamp in a better position for him. In so doing I noticed that the old globe with the break had been changed for a new one, in honour of Stephensen, as it seemed; but whether Minna or her mother had been so tender over his artistic susceptibilities I did not know. Most probably Minna would have had more important things to think of than the broken globe, and Mrs. Jagemann had evidently not only a deep reverence for "Mr. Stephensen, artist," but also a certain motherly feeling from the time he had been there as a lodger. She gave him now and then an affectionate side-glance, while she rocked her big head over her knitting, as if she said to herself: "Oh dear me, yes, there he sits again! Yes, my word! Why didn't you come before?"
I did not doubt that, if the choice had been left to her, I might as well have retired at once. And though I was quite sure that Minna was far from wanting to take her advice, and that on the morrow she would be quite free from her influence, I had all the time a painful sensation that I was out of favour.
Minna, on the contrary, shared her kindness equally between us both in a natural and unhesitating manner, which astonished me, as if it did not give her the least difficulty to steer between her two suitors, each of whom seemed to have the same claim to her future. As she had hardly expressed her pleasure over possessing the drawing of me, before she asked Stephensen to draw one of himself for her, so she did not once allow either one of us to get anything at the cost of the other; even if she employed a little art and calculation in this impartiality, she used still more natural feeling and instinctive tact. She talked to both of us—the subject of conversation was the German Theatre and Dramatic Art—but as she was being drawn half-profile, she could seldom look towards Stephensen, and even when she answered him her eyes and attention seemed to be fixed upon me. He was very much occupied by his work, but liked her to talk so that her face might retain its liveliness.
Only when he drew the important part round the mouth she was to sit silent, and she then made her mother praise the old days at the theatre. Truly enough it did not appear that Mrs. Jagemann had often visited the theatre, but she had been captivated by Devrient, whom she had, however, seen more in her father's restaurant than on the stage; and what she had heard from others, who had more idea of art, was so mingled in her rather muddled brain with the little she remembered herself that she grew just as sentimental as if she had lived and breathed in the temple of Thalia and Melpomene.
"Oh dear me, yes, in those days we had artists! You ought to have seen our theatres then, Mr. Stephensen! Davison! surely you have heard of him? You know the beautiful villa which he built, just opposite the Bohemian railway station; in those days it was something new, we have so many others now. Yes, he made a lot out of it, but it was also worth the money to see him. As Mephistopheles, terrifying! Now I would not dare to see it for anything. But at last he also went off his head, you know. And Emil Devrient, that was in quite a different way, elevated, ideal, Max in Wallenstein, one was transported; the present generation cannot realise this at all. Poor Jagemann said the same—he would not go to the theatre any more. Surely you remember, when you praised anything which you had seen here, he always said: 'No, you ought to have seen so-and-so.' His favourite, however, was Madame Schröder-Devrient; indeed, I myself remember her too, grandly tragic, plastic, 'classic plastic,' poor Jagemann said; he never missed an evening when she played. It was before we were married, she left the theatre before she was fifty. Oh dear me, yes,… such artists … indeed it was a glorious period."
"But it is everywhere the same, Mrs. Jagemann; also in Denmark the old generation say they can't stand the theatre any longer, and that we poor things never have seen proper comedy."
"Well, there you are, bad times, Mr. Stephensen!… No, it was different in those days, it was nice to be in Dresden then. One did not see all that stiff Prussian Military, and we were not burdened with all these taxes. Oh, what couldn't one get for one's money! Meat has now gone up one-third in price … oh dear, oh dear!"
And, shaking her head, she got up and went towards the door.
Minna laughed and recited—
"How love and truth and religion
From out of the world had fled,
How very dear was the coffee,
How scarce was the gold, we said."
"Well, you have not forgotten your Heine," Stephensen remarked.
"Oh no," she exclaimed eagerly.
I thought of the way in which Stephensen had shown his knowledge of Heine, and I suppose that I did not look very cheerful. Minna, who seemed to read my thoughts, sighed deeply. Stephensen placed the sketch-book on the table, and leaned back with his hands behind his back.
I think we were all surprised by being so suddenly brought back to ourselves and our conditions, and that we felt how impossible it was to get away from them.
Mrs. Jagemann came in with the table-cloth, and Minna got up and offered to help her to lay the table. But at supper our silence was much greater than our appetites.
Still the picture was unfinished, and Stephensen started again directly after we had risen from the table.
"Well, now it will have to be finished, it is also getting late, and I suppose Minna will have to rise early on account of the journey," he said, after having worked for about a quarter of an hour.
I went up to him and could not restrain an outburst of admiration. The drawing was not so firm and boldly worked as the one of me, but even this apparent anxiety gave it a certain pleasing grace, and the expression was none the less successful from being given very sketchily; one anticipated something more than was seen.
"It might be better, but even if I had the time I should be afraid to try and improve it."
He also loosened this leaf with his penknife.
"And who is to have that one?" Minna asked.
Stephensen handed it to her: "You, Minna, in order to give it to the one of us whom you think will need it most."
There was a deep and sad earnestness in his voice, which trembled just a little with an exceedingly sympathetic sound. It was the only hint that had been given in the course of the evening of the decision on hand, and nobody had so far been more considerate in keeping the conversation in safe channels than Stephensen. The unexpected plainness almost frightened us—perhaps not the least himself, but I, for one, was pleased that we had not during the whole evening deceived ourselves as to the solemnity of the situation, but for a single moment had looked it straight in the face. It was like a solace for the conscience. I even felt a certain gratitude to Stephensen for the moral courage that he had shown. But, to tell the truth, a bitter feeling soon mingled with it: the recognition of his superiority. I was certain, that had I tried to say something like this I should have failed—it would have come out in a clumsy, upsetting manner, and would only have left a painful discord, instead of being followed by a sigh of relief. Just in the same way as on the previous day upon the terrace, and also during this evening, he had succeeded in keeping everything on neutral ground, so was he followed by the same success, when now, stepping outside this ground, with bold hand he touched what we had considered "tabooed." This success only depends upon assertiveness, and it was this very assertiveness that extorted the silent confession from me, the most painful of all towards a rival suitor—that he was more of a man than I. I tried, to be sure, to console myself with the reflection that this "manliness" was but the outward appearance of manliness, which, after all, only proves greater experience in social life; but all the same it was both mortifying and alarming.
Minna accepted the leaf without a word and with downcast eyes. She placed it in her blotter next to my portrait, and this proximity I considered to be of good omen.
I also remember looking for that boot-shaped spot on the wall-paper, which was not so easily found in the lamplight, so that I might prevent the bad omen which might have been in that fancy, when I took leave of Minna: "Perhaps you never will see this spot again." If I had neglected to look at it, that omen might still be in power! I was in these days as superstitious as an old witch, because only my sphere existed, and everything was bound to have a meaning for it.
Mrs. Jagemann sat in her chair, dozing with open eyes; she understood nothing of the feelings which stirred us, but murmured mechanically—
"Sweetly pretty—oh dear me, yes, that's talent and no mistake."
We still kept on talking for a quarter of an hour about indifferent things—in order to postpone the moment of parting. At last we tore ourselves away.
Minna lighted us out to the stairs. The front door was still open.
I let him step out first. He turned, and lifting his hat, held his right hand towards me.
"You said yesterday evening, Mr. Fenger, that we parted as enemies. Just look, now we have spent quite a friendly evening together. In reality, we cannot hate one another; for whichever of us is going to be the favoured one the other is bound to wish him happiness—for her sake."
"You are right, Mr. Stephensen. But our paths lie in different directions. Farewell!"
We parted.
It had stopped raining. Between the ragged clouds a star sparkled here and there over the shiny roofs. The wet stones and the pavements shone for a long distance with a deserted and sad light.
- ↑ "Then just after Meissen—
Damn it—lies Breissen" (Saxonian for Prussia).