Chapter 9

May 29th. On June 10th or 12th, Mother and Dora are going to Frazensbad, because they both have to take mud baths. Besides, Father says that a change will give Dora new thoughts, so that she won’t go about hanging her head like a sick chicken. To-day Dora told me something very interesting. Unmarried men have little books and with these they can go to visit women “of a certain kind” in Graben and in the Karntnerstrasse. There, Dora says, they have to pay 10 florins or 10 crowns. In Dora’s class there is a girl whose father is police surgeon, and they have all to be examined every month to see if they are healthy, and if not they can’t visit these “ladies,” and that’s why the Preusses can never keep a servant. In my bath yesterday I noticed that I had a certain line, so I must be fr--. But I shan’t have more than 1 or 2 children at most for the line is very faint. When I’m studying I often think of such things, and then I read a whole page and turn over and have not the remotest idea what I’ve been reading. It’s very tiresome, for soon the other school insp. for maths. and the other subjects is coming, and I should not like to make a fool of myself; especially not because perhaps the inspectors talk us over with one another about who is clever and who stupid.

May 30th. The concert was glorious. When I hear such grand music I always have to keep myself well in hand for I fear I should cry. It’s very stupid, of course, but at such times I can only think of sad things, even if it’s just a small piece. Dora can play Brahms’ Hungarian Dances, too, but that never makes me want to cry. I only get annoyed because I can’t play them myself. I could all right, but I have not got patience to practice long enough. I never tell anyone that I want to cry when I am listening to music, not even Hella, though I tell her everything, except of course about Mad. Yesterday I made a fool of myself; at least so Dora says. I don’t know how it happened, we were talking about books at supper, and I said: “What’s the use of books, one can’t learn anything out of them; everything is quite different from what they say in books.” Then Father got in a wax and said: “You little duffer, you can thank your stars there are books from which you can learn something. Anyone who can’t understand a book always says it is no good.” Dora gave me a look, but I didn’t know what she meant, and I went on: “Yes, but there’s an awful lot that the encyclopedia puts all wrong.” “What have you been ferreting in the encyclopedia for; we shall have to keep the key of the bookcase in a safer place.” Thank goodness Dora came to my help and said: “Gretel wanted to look up something about the age of elephants and mammoths, but it’s quite different in the encyclopedia from what Prof. Rigl told her last year.” I was saved. Dora can act splendidly; I’ve noticed it before. In the evening she rowed me, and said: “You little goose, will you never learn caution; first that stupidity about Viktor and to-day this new blunder! I’ve helped you out of a hole once but I shan’t do it again.” And then she spent all the time writing a letter, to him of course--! Hella and I have just been reading a lot of things in the encycl., about _Birth_ and _Pregnancy_, and I on my own about abor--; we came across the words Embyro and Foetus, and I said nothing at the time but tied 2 knots in my handkerchief to remind me, and yesterday I looked them up. Mad. need not be anxious even if she _really_ did get like that. But every doctor knows about it and one often dies of it. I wonder if Mad. knows anything about it. We were talking about the _differences_ between men and women, and it came out that when Hella has her bath she is still washed by Anna who has been with them for 12 years. Nothing would induce me to allow that, I would not let anyone wash me, except Mother; certainly not Dora, for I don’t want her to know what _I_ look like. The nurse in the hosp. told Hella that she is developed just like a little nymph, so lovely and symetrical. Hella says that is nothing unusual, that every girl looks like that, that the female body is _Nature’s Work of Art_. Of course she’s read that somewhere, for it does not really mean anything. _Nature’s_ work of art; it ought to be: a work of art made by husband and wife!!!

May 30th. Dora and Mother are going to Franzensbad on June 6th, directly after Whitsuntide. Dora has got another new coat and skirt, grey with blue stripes; yesterday our white straw hats came, it suits me very well says Hella and everyone, with white ribbons and wild roses. There might have been a fearful row about what’s just happened. When I went to telephone I had my Christmas umbrella with the rose-quartz handle and I left it in the telephone box; the girl in the tobacco shop found it there, and as she knows me she brought it here and gave it to the porter who brought it upstairs. Thank goodness it occurred to me at once to say that I went into the tobacco shop to buy stamps and I must have left it in the _shop_. No one noticed anything.

May 31st. They wanted me to go and stay with Hella for the month when Mother and Dora are away. It would be awfully nice, but I’m not going to, for I want to stay with Father. What would he do all alone at meal times, and whom would he have to talk to in the evenings? Father was really quite touched when I said this and he stroked my hair as he can and no one else, not even Mother. So I’m going to stay at home whatever happens. Flowers are very cheap now, so I shall put _different_ flowers on the table every day, I shall go to the Market every day to buy a little posy, so that they can always be fresh. It would be stupid for me to go to the Brs., why should I, Resi has been with us for such a long time, she knows how to do everything even if Mother is not there and everything else I can arrange. Father won’t want for anything.

June 1st. We’ve had such an experience to-day! It’s awful; it’s quite true then that one takes off _every stitch_ when one is madly fond of anyone. I never really believed it, and I’m sure Dora did not, although Mad. hinted it to her; but _it’s true_. We’ve seen it _with our own eyes_. I was just sitting and reading Storm’s The Rider of the Grey Horse and Dora was arranging some writing paper to take to Franzensbad when Resi came and said: Fraulein Dora, please come here a moment, I want you to look at something! From the tone of her voice I saw there was something up so I went too. At first Resi would not say what it was but Dora was generous and said: “It’s all right, you can say _everything_ before her.” Then we went into Resi’s room and from behind the curtain peeped into the mezzanin. A young _married couple_ live there!!! At least Resi says people say they are _not_ really married, but simply live together!!!! And what we saw was awful. She was absolutely naked lying in bed without any of the clothes on, and he was kneeling by the bedside quite n-- too, and he kissed her all over, _everywhere!!!_ Dora said afterwards it made her feel quite sick. And then he stood up--no, I can’t write it, it’s too awful, I shall never forget it. So _that’s_ the way of it, it’s simply frightful. I could never have believed it. Dora went as white as a sheet and trembled so that Resi was terribly frightened. I nearly cried with horror, and yet I could not help laughing too. I was really afraid he would stifle her because he’s so big and she’s so small. And Resi says he is certainly much too big for her, and that he nearly tears her. I don’t know why he should tear her but certainly he might have crushed her. Dora was so terrified she had to sit down and Resi hurried to get her a glass of water, because she believed she was going to faint. I had not imagined it was anything like _that_, and Dora certainly had not either. Or she would never have trembled so. Still I really don’t see why she should tremble like that. There is no reason to be frightened, one simply need not marry, and then one need never strip off every stitch, and oh dear, poor Mademoiselle who is so small and the lieutenant is very tall. But just think if anyone is as fat as Herr Richter or our landlord. Of course Herr Richter is at least 50, but last January the landlord had another little girl, so something _must have happened_. No, I’m sure it’s best not to marry, for _it_ is really too awful. We did not look any more for then came the worst, suddenly Dora began to be actually sick, so that she could hardly get back to our room. If she had not been able to, everything would have come out. Mother sent for the doctor directly and he said that Dora was very much overworked; that it was a good thing she was going away from Vienna in a few days. No girl ought to study, it does not pay. Then he said to me: “You don’t look up to much either. What are you so hollow-eyed for?” “I’m so frightened about Dora,” I said. “Fiddlededee,” said the doctor, “that does not give anyone black rings round the eyes.” So it must be true that one gets to look ill when one always has to think about _such_ things. But how can one help it, and Hella says: It’s awfully interesting to have black rings under the eyes and men _like_ it.

We were going to make an excursion to-morrow to Kahlenberg and Hermannskogel, but probably it won’t come off. Its 11 already and I’m fearfully tired from writing so much; I must go to bed. I do hope I Shall be able to sleep, but -- -- -- --

June 3rd. Father took Hella and me to Kahlenberg; we enjoyed ourselves tremendously. After dinner, when Father was reading the paper in the hotel, we went to pick flowers, and I told Hella all about what we’d seen on Friday. She was simply speechless, all the more since she had never heard what Mad. told us about taking off everything. She won’t marry either, for it’s too disagreeable, indeed too horrid.--The doctor said too: This perpetual learning is poisonous for young girls _in the years of development_. If he only knew _what_ we had seen. Hella is frightfully annoyed that she was not there. She can be jolly glad, I don’t want to see it a second time, and I shall never forget it all my life long; what I saw at the front door was nothing to this. Then Hella went on making jokes and said: “I say, just think if it had been Viktor.” “Oh, do shut up,” I screamed, and Father thought we were quarrelling and called out: “You two seem to be having a dispute in the grand style.” If he’d only known what we were talking about!!! Oswald has been home since Friday evening; he did not arrive till half past 10. But he did not come on the excursion with us yesterday, although Father would have liked him to; he said he would find it much too dull to spend the day with two “flappers;” that means that we’re not grown up enough for him and is a piece of infernal cheek especially as regards Hella. She says she will simply ignore him in future. Since I am his sister I can’t very well do that, but I shan’t fetch and carry for him as he would like me to. He’s no right to insult even his sister.

Dora has just said to me: It’s horrible that one has to endure that (you know what!!! -- -- -- --) when one is married. Resi had told her about those two before, and that only the Jews do it just like _that_. She said that other people did not strip quite naked and that perhaps it’s different in some other ways!! -- -- -- But Mad. implied that it was just _that_ way, only she did not say anything about the crushing; but I suppose that’s because of the cruelty of the Jews -- -- --. I’m afraid every night that I’m going to dream about it, and Dora has dreamed about it already. She says that whenever she closes her eyes she sees it all as if it were actually before her.

June 4th. We understand now _what_ Father meant the other day when he was speaking about Dr. Diller and his wife and said: “But they don’t suit one another at all.” I thought at the time he only meant that it looks so absurd for so tiny a woman to go about with a big strong man. But that’s only a minor thing; the main point is something quite different!!!! Hella and I look at all couples now who go by arm in arm, thinking about them from _that_ point of view, and it amuses us so much as we are going home that we can hardly keep from laughing. But really it’s no laughing matter, especially for the woman.

June 5th. This morning Mother took Dora with her to pay a farewell call at the Richter’s. But there was no one at home, that is Frau R. was certainly at home, but said she was not because they are very much offended with Father. In the afternoon Dora and I had a lot of things to get, and we met Viktor, by arrangement of course. Dora cried a lot; they went into the Minorite church while I went for a walk in Kohlmarkt and Herrengasse. He is going to America in the beginning of July, before Dora comes home. He has given her some exquisite notepaper stamped with his regimental arms, specially for her to write to him on, and a locket with his portrait. To-morrow she is going to send him her photo, through me, I shall be awfully glad to take it. Dora has been much nicer to me lately.

June 6th. Mother and Dora left early this morning. Mother has never gone away from us before for long at a time, so I cried a lot and so did she. Dora cried too, but I know on whose account. Father and I are alone now. At dinner he said to me: “My little housewife.” It was so lovely. But it’s frightfully quiet in the house, for 2 people don’t talk so much as 4. It made me feel quite uncomfortable. To-day I talked several things over with Resi. What I think worst of all is that one saw the whole of his behind, it was really disgusting. Dora said the other day she thought it was positively infamous. Resi said they might at least have pulled down the blind so that nobody could see in, that’s what respectable people would do. But _respectable_ people simply would not strip, or at least they’d cover themselves respectably with the bedclothes. Then Resi told me some more about the bank clerk and his wife, that is _not_-wife. She does not know if her parents know about it, and what excuse she makes for not living at home. She is not a Jewess, though he is a Jew. Resi absolutely curled up with laughing because I said: “Ah, that is why he insists that they shall _both_ strip though ordinarily only the wife has to strip.” But she herself said a little while ago that only Jews do it _that way_, and to-day she laughed as if I were talking utter nonsense. Really she does not know exactly herself, and she cloaks it with laughter because she’s annoyed, first because _she_ does not know, and then also I’m sure because she really began to talk about the matter. One thing that puzzles me is that I never dream about _it_. I should like to know whether perhaps Dora never really dreamed of it, though she pretended she did. As for Hella saying she dreamed of it the day before yesterday, I’m sure that was pure invention, for she was not there at all. She says it’s a good thing she was not for if she had been she would have burst out laughing. But I fancy if she’d seen what we saw she would have found there was nothing to laugh at.

June 7th. It’s frightfully dull after dinner and in the evening before bed time, especially because this year, since the affair at the front door, Dora and I have always had plenty to talk about. I miss it. I wish Hella would come and stay with us for the 4 weeks. But she does not want to. Father had work to do to-day, so I’m quite alone and feel as if I’d like to cry.

June 9th. Yesterday, when I was feeling so melancholy, Resi came to make my bed, and we talked about the married couple opposite, and then she told me awful things about a young married couple where she was once. She left because they always went into the bath together; she says she’s certain that _something happened_ there. And then she told me about an old gentleman who made _advances_ to her; but of course she would not have anything to do with him; besides he was married, and anyhow he would never have married a servant for he was a privy councillor. Yesterday Father said: Poor little witch, it’s very lonely for you now; but look here, Resi is no fit company for you; when your little tongue wants to wag, come to my room. And I was awfully stupid, I began to cry like anything and said. “Father, please don’t be angry, I’ll never think and never talk of such things any more.” Father did not know at first what I meant, but afterwards it must have struck him, for he was so kind and gentle, and said: “No, no, Gretel, don’t corrupt your youth with such matters, and when there’s anything that bothers you, ask Mother, but not the servants. A girl of good family must not be too familiar with servants. Promise me.” And then, though I’m so big he took me on his knee like a child and petted me because I was crying so. “It’s all right, little Mouse, don’t worry, you must not get so nervous as Dora. Give me a nice kiss, and then I’ll come with you to your room and stay with you till you go to sleep.” Of course I stayed awake on purpose as long as I could, till a quarter to 11.

And then I dreamed that Father was lying in Dora’s bed so that when I woke up early in the morning I really looked across to see if he had not gone to bed there. But of course I’d only dreamed it.

June 12th. To-morrow there’s a great school excursion; I am so glad, a whole day with Frau Doktor M. and without any lessons. We are going up Eisernes Tor. Last year there was no outing, because the Fourth did not want to go to the Anninger, but to the Hochschneeberg, and the Head did not want to go there.

June 13th. We had a lovely outing. Hella and I spent the whole day with Frau Doktor M.; in the afternoon Franke said: “I say, why do you stick to Frau Doktor like that? One can’t get a word with you.” So then we went for a good walk through the forest with Franke and she told us about a student who is in the Eighth now and who is madly in love with her. For all students are in love with her, _so she says_. We were not much interested in that, but then she told us that Frau Doktor M. is secretly engaged to a professor in Leipzig or some other town in Germany. Her cousin is Frau Doktor’s dressmaker, and she is quite certain of it. Her parents are opposed to it because he is a _Jew_ but they are frantically in love with one another and they intend to marry. And then we asked Franke, since she is a Jewess too whether it was all true what Mali, who was here when Resi was in hospital, had told us about the Jews. And Franke said: “Oh yes, it is true I can confirm it in every point. But it’s not so bad about the cruelty, every man is cruel, especially in this matter.” No doubt she’s right, but it’s horrible to think that our lovely and refined Frau Doktor M is going to have a cruel husband. Hella says that if _she_ is satisfied, I don’t need to get excited about it. But perhaps she does not know that -- -- --. When we came out of the wood the Herr Religionsprofessor who is awfully fond of Frau Doktor M. called out: “Frau Doktor, you have lost your two satellites!” And everybody laughed because we’d come back. Father came to fetch Hella and me, and since it was nearly 11 o’clock Hella stayed the night with us. It was awfully nice, but at the same time I was sorry because I could not have any more talk with Father. When we were getting up in the morning we splashed one another and played the fool generally, so that we were nearly late for school. The staff was still in high spirits, including Professor Wilke, about whom we had not bothered ourselves all day; that is he did not come until the afternoon when he came to meet us on our way. We believe he is in love with Frau Doktor M. too, for he went about with her all the time, and it was probably on her account that he came. None of the other professors were there, for they were all taking their classes in the different Gymnasiums.

June 14th. I am so excited. We were going to school to-day at 9 and suddenly we heard a tremendous rattling with a sword; that is Hella heard it, for she always notices that sort of thing before I do, and she said: “Hullo, that’s an o-- in a frightful hurry,” and looked round; “I say, there’s Viktor behind us” and he really was, he was saluting us and he said: Fraulein Rita, can you give me a moment; you’ll excuse me won’t you, Fraulein Hella? He always calls me Rita, and it shows what a nice refined kind of a man he is that he should know my friend’s name. Hella said directly: “Don’t mention it, Herr Oberleutenant, don’t let me be in your way if it’s anything important,” and she went over to the other side of the street. He looked after her and said: “What a lovely, well-mannered young lady your friend is.” Then he came back to the main point He has already had 2 letters from Dora, but not an answer to his letter, because she can’t fetch it from the post office, _poste restante_. Then he implored me to enclose a letter from him in mine to Dora. But since Mother naturally reads my letters, I told him it was not so simple as all that; but I knew of a splendid way out of the difficulty; I would write to Mother and Dora _at the same time_, so that Dora could get hold of _his letter_ while Mother was not noticing. Viktor was awfully pleased and said: “You’re a genius and a first-class little schemer,” and kissed my hand. Still, he might have left out the “little.” If one’s is so _little_, one can’t very well be a schemer. From the other side of the street Hella saw him kiss my hand. She says I did not try to draw it away, but held it out to him like a grand lady and even dropped it at the wrist. She says we girls of good family do that sort of thing by instinct. It may be so, for I certainly did not do it intentionally. In the afternoon I wrote the two letters, just the ordinary one to Mother and a short one to Dora with the enclosure, and took it to the post _myself_.

June 16th. I’ve already got so used to being alone with Father that I take it as a matter of course. We often drive in the Prater, or go in the evening to have supper in one of the parks, and of course Hella comes with us. I am frightfully excited to know what Dora will write. I forgot to write in my diary the other day that I asked Viktor if he was really going to New York. He said he had no idea of doing anything of the kind, that had only been a false alarm on the part of the Old Man. That’s what he calls his father. I don’t think it’s very nice of him, a little vulgar, and perhaps that is why Father can’t stand him. In fact Father does not like any officers very much, except Hella’s father, but then he’s fairly old already. I say, Hella mustn’t read that, it would put her in an awful wax; but her father really is at least 4 or 5 years older than Father.

June 17th. Frau Doktor M. is ill, but we don’t know what’s the matter with her. We were all frightfuly dull at school. The head took her classes and we were left to ourselves in the interval. I do hope she has not got appendicitis, that would be awful.

June 18th. _She_ isn’t back yet. Frau Doktor Steiner says she has very bad tonsillitis and won’t be able to come for at least a week.