Chapter 9

"No, no--something better. I rushed over to a marble wash-basin and seized a ewer of water, and, going back to the crib, despite the frantic remonstrances of the old sorceress, I baptized the Antichrist in the name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Before my eyes I saw the inverted cross vanish. Then I soundly spanked the presumptuous youngster and, running down the staircase, I sought the prince and said to him:--

"'Your boy is now a Roman, not a Greek Catholic. We are quits!'"

The idea of a spanked Antichrist disconsolately roaming the earth, unwilling to return to his fiery home for fear of a scolding, his guns of evil spiked, his virus innocuous, his mission of spiritual destruction a failure--for what could a baptized devil's child do but pray and repent?--all this dawned upon me, and I burst into laughter, the worthy Monsignor discreetly participating. His bizarre recital proved to me that, despite his Gallic first name, Monsignor Anatole O'Bourke hailed from the County Tipperary.

VIII

THE ETERNAL DUEL

What is the sorriest thing that enters Hell?

--D.G. ROSSETTI, _Vain Virtues_.

The face set him to a strange wondering; he sat at the coffin and watched it. His wife's face it was, and above the sorrow of irrevocable parting floated the thought that she did not look happy as she lay in her bed of death. Monross had seen but two dead faces before, those of his father and mother. Both had worn upon the mask which death models an expression of relief. But this face, the face of his wife, of the woman with whom he had lived--how many years! He asked himself why he shuddered when he looked down at it, shuddered and also flushed with indignation. Had she ever been happy? How many times had she not voiced her feelings in the unequivocal language of love! Yet she seemed so hideously unhappy as she stretched before him in her white robes of death. Why? What secret was this disclosed at the twelfth hour of life, on the very brink of the grave? Did death, then, hold the solution to the enigma of the conquering Sphinx!

Monross, master of psychology, tormented by visions of perfection, a victim to the devouring illusion of the artist,--Monross asked himself with chagrin if he had missed the key in which had sounded the symphony of this woman's life. This woman! His wife! A female creature, long-haired, smiling, loquacious--though reticent enough when her real self should have flashed out signals of recognition at him--this wife, the Rhoda he had called day and night--what had she been?

She had understood him, had realized his nobility of ideal, his gifts, his occasional grandeur of soul,--like all artistic men he was desultory in the manifestation of his talent,--and had read aloud to him those poems written for another woman in the pitch-hot passion of his youth--before he had met her. To her he had been always, so he told himself, a cavalier in his devotion. Without wealth, he had kept the soles of her little feet from touching the sidewalks of life. Upon her dainty person he had draped lovely garments. Why then, he wondered, the vindictive expression etched, as if in aqua fortis, upon her carved features?

Some Old World superstition held him captive as he gazed. Death is the grand revealer, he thought; death alone stamps upon the crumbling canvas of mortality the truth. Rhoda was dead. Yet her face was alive for the first time. He saw its truth; and he shuddered, for he also discerned the hate that had lurked a life long in its devious and smiling expressions--expressions like a set of scenery pushed on and off as the order of the play demanded. Oh, the misery of it all! He, Monross, poet, lover, egoist, husband, to be confronted by this damnable defiance, this early-born hate! What had he done! And in the brain cells of the man there awakened a processional fleet of pictures: Rhoda wooed; Rhoda dazzled; Rhoda won; Rhoda smiling before the altar; Rhoda resigned upon that other altar; Rhoda, wife, mother; and Rhoda--dead!

But Rhoda loved--again he looked at the face. The brow was virginally placid, the drooping, bitter mouth alone telling the unhappy husband a story he had never before suspected. Rhoda! Was it possible this tiny exquisite creature had harboured rancour in her soul for the man who had adored her because she had adored him? Rhoda! The shell of his egoism fell away from him. He saw the implacable resentment of this tender girl who, her married life long, had loathed the captain that had invaded the citadel of her soul, and conqueror-like had filched her virgin zone. The woman seemingly stared at the man through lids closed in death--the woman, the sex that ages ago had feared the barbarian who dragged her to his cave, where he subdued her, making her bake his bread and bear his children.

In a wide heaven of surmise Monross read the confirmation of his suspicions--of the eternal duel between the man and the woman; knew that Rhoda hated him most when most she trembled at his master bidding. And now Rhoda lay dead in her lyre-shaped coffin, saying these ironic things to her husband, when it was too late for repentance, too early for eternity.

IX

THE ENCHANTED YODLER

A MARIENBAD ELEGY

I

The remorseless rain had washed anew the face of the dark blue sky that domed Marienbad and its curved chain of hills. Hugh Krayne threw open his window and, leaning out, exclaimed, as he eagerly inhaled the soft air of an early May morning:--

"At last! And high time!" For nine days he had waded through the wet streets, heavily leaping the raging gutters and stopping before the door of every optician to scrutinize the barometer. And there are many in this pretty Bohemian health resort, where bad weather means bad temper, with enforced confinement in dismal lodgings or stuffy _restaurations_, or--last resort of the bored--the promenade under the colonnade, while the band plays as human beings shuffle ponderously over the cold stones and stare at each other in sullen desperation.

But this day was a glorious one; in high spirits the Englishman left the house on the Oberkreuzbrunnenstrasse and moved slowly toward the springs. He was not thirty, but looked much older, for his weight was excessive. An easy-going temperament, a good appetite, a well-filled purse, and a conscience that never disturbed his night's slumber contributed to this making of flesh. He waddled, despite his great height, and was sufficiently sensitive to enjoy Marienbad as much for its fat visitors as for its curative virtues. Here at least he was not remarkable, while in London or Paris people looked at him sourly when he occupied a stall at the theatre or a seat in a café. Not only had he elbow room in Marienbad, but he felt small, positively meagre, in comparison with the prize specimens he saw painfully progressing about the shaded walks or puffing like obese engines up the sloping roads to the Rübezahl, the Egerländer, the Panorama, or the distant Podhorn.

The park of the Kreuzbrunnen was crowded, though the hour of six had just been signalled from a dozen clocks in the vicinity. The crowd, gathered from the four quarters of the globe, was in holiday humour, as, glass in hand, it fell into line, until each received the water doled out by uniformed officials. Occasionally a dispute as to precedence would take place when the serpentine procession filed up the steps of the old-fashioned belvedere; but quarrels were as rare as a lean man. A fat crowd is always good-tempered, irritable as may be its individual members. Hugh Krayne kept in position, while two women shoved him about as if he were a bale of hay. He heard them abusing him in Bohemian, a language of which he did not know more than a few words; their intonations told him that they heartily disliked his presence. Yet he could not give way; it would not have been Marienbad etiquette. At last he reached the spring and received his usual low bow from the man who turned the polished wheel--the fellow had an eye tuned for gratuities. With the water in his glass three-fourths cold and one-fourth warm, a small napkin in his left hand, the Englishman moved with the jaunty grace of a young elephant down the smooth terraced esplanade that has made Marienbad so celebrated. The sun was riding high, and the tender green of the trees, the flashing of the fountains, and the music of the band all caused Hugh to feel happy. He had lost nearly a pound since his arrival the week before, and he had three more weeks to stay. What might not happen!

Just where the promenade twists under the shaded alleys that lead to the Ferdinandsbrunnen, he saw four women holding hands. They were dressed in Tyrolean fashion--pleated skirts, short enough to show white, plump stockings, feet in slippers, upon the head huge caps, starched and balloony; their massive white necks, well exposed, were encircled by collars that came low on bodices elaborately embroidered. Behind them marched several burly chaps, in all the bravery of the Austrian Tyrol--the green alpine hat, with the feather at the back, the short gray jacket, the bare knees, and the homespun stockings. Krayne regarded curiously this strolling band of singers. Their faces seemed familiar to him, and he rapidly recalled souvenirs of Salzburg and an open-air concert. But this morning there was something that arrested his attention in the group. It was a girl of eighteen or twenty, with a brilliant complexion, large blue eyes, and a robust, shapely figure. As she passed she gave him such an imploring look, such an appealing look, that all his chivalric instincts rushed into the field of his consciousness. He awkwardly dropped his tumbler. He turned around, half expecting to see the big child still looking at him. Instead he gazed upon the athletic backs of her male companions and to the unpleasant accompaniment of hearty feminine laughter. Were these women laughing at him? No fool like a fat one, he merrily thought, as he bought a new glass at a bazaar, which a grinning, monkey-faced creature sold him at the regular price redoubled.

Before his meagre breakfast of one egg and a dry rusk, Krayne endeavoured to evoke the features of the pretty creature who had so strongly attracted him. He saw a tangle of black hair, a glance that touched his heart with its pathos, a pair of soft, parted red lips, and dazzling teeth. It was an impression sufficiently powerful to keep him company all the forenoon. Fat men, he reasoned on the steep pass that conducts to the Café Forstwarte, are always sentimental, by no means always amiable, and, as a rule, subject to sudden fancies. Ten years of his sentimental education had been sown with adventures that had begun well, caprices that had no satisfactory endings. He had fallen in love with the girl who played Chopin on the piano, the girl who played Mendelssohn on the violin, the girl who played Goltermann on the violoncello. Then followed girls who painted, poetized, botanized, and hammered metal. Once--an exception--he had succumbed to the charms of an actress who essayed characters in the dumps--Ibsen soubrettes, Strindberg servants, and Máxim Górky tramps. Yet he had, somehow or other, emerged heart whole from his adventures among those masterpieces of the cosmos--women.

Certainly this might be another romance added to the long list of his sentimental fractures. He ate his dinner, the one satisfactory meal of the day allowed him by a cruel doctor, with the utmost deliberation. He had walked three hours during the morning, and now, under the spacious balconies of the Forstwarte, he knew that his beef and spinach would be none the worse for a small bottle of very dry, light Vöslauer. Besides, his physician had not actually forbidden him a little liquid at the midday meal. Just before bedtime he was entitled--so his dietetic schedule told him--to one glass of Pilsner beer. Not so bad, after all, this banting at Marienbad, he reflected. Anyhow, it was better than the existence of those fellows at sea-shore and mountain, who gorged and guzzled their summer away. Then he tried to remember among his London club friends any who were as heavy as he, but he could not. Idly smoking, he regarded the piazzas, with their tables and groups of obese humanity, eating, drinking, and buzzing--little fat flies, he thought, as he drew his waistcoat in, feeling quite haughty and slender.

He read on a placard that the "Präger Bavarian Sextet" would give a "grand" concert at the Hotel Bellevue this very afternoon. "Ah ha!" said Krayne aloud, "that's the girl I saw!" Then he wasted several hours more loitering about the beautiful park on the Kaiserstrasse and looking in the shop windows at views of Marienbad on postal cards, at yellow-covered French, German, and Russian novels, at pictures of kings, queens, and actresses. He also visited the houses wherein Goethe, Chopin, and Wagner had dwelt. It was four o'clock when he entered the garden of the Bellevue establishment and secured a table. The waiter at his request removed the other chairs, so he had a nook to himself. Not a very large crowd was scattered around; visitors at Marienbad do not care to pay for their diversions. In a few minutes, after a march had been banged from a wretched piano--were pianos ever tuned on the Continent, he wondered?--the sextet appeared, looking as it did in the morning, and sang an Austrian melody, a capella. It was not very interesting.

The women stood in front and yelled with a hearty will; the men roared in the background. Krayne saw his young lady, holding her apron by the sides, her head thrown back, her mouth well opened; but he could not distinguish her individual voice. How pretty she was! He sipped his coffee. Then came a zither solo--that abominable instrument of plucked wires, with its quiver of a love-sick clock about to run down; this parody of an æolian harp always annoyed Krayne, and he was glad when the man finished. A stout soprano in a velvet bodice, her arms bare and brawny, the arms of a lass accustomed to ploughing and digging potatoes, sang something about turtle doves. She was odious. Odious, too, was her companion, in a duo through which they screamed and rumbled--"Verlassen bin i." At last she came out and he saw by the programme that her name was Röselein Gich. What an odd name, what an attractive girl! He finished his coffee and frantically signalled his waitress. It was against the doctor's orders to take more than one cup, and then the sugar! Hang the doctor, he cried, and drank a second cup.

She sang. Her voice was an unusually heavy, rich contralto. That she was not an accomplished artiste he knew. He did not haunt opera houses for naught, and, like all fat men who wear red ties in the forenoon, he was a trifle dogmatic in his criticism. The young woman had the making of an opera singer. What a Fricka, Brangaene, Ortrud, Sieglinde, Erda, this clever girl might become! She was musical, she was dramatic in temperament--he let his imagination run away with him. She only sang an Oberbayerische yodel, and, while her voice was not very high, she contrived a falsetto that made her English listener shiver. This yodel seemed to him as thrilling as the "_Ho yo to ho!_" of Brunnhilde as she rushes over the rocky road to Valhall. _La la liriti! La la lirita! Hallali!_ chirped Röselein, with a final flourish that positively enthralled Hugh Krayne. He applauded, beating with his stick upon the table, his face flushed by emotion. Decidedly this girl was worth the visit to Marienbad.

And he noted with delight that Fräulein Gich had left the stage. Basket in hand, she went from table to table, selling pictures and programmes and collecting admission fees. At last he would be able to speak with the enchantress, for he prided himself on the purity of his German. Smiling until she reached his table, she suddenly became serious when she saw this big Englishman in the plaid suit and red necktie. Again he felt the imploring glance, the soft lips parted in childish supplication. It was too much for his nerves. He tossed into her basket a gold piece, grabbed at random some pictures, and as her beseeching expression deepened, her eyes moist with wonder and gratitude, he tugged at a ring on his corpulent finger, and, wrenching it free, presented it to her with a well-turned phrase, adding:--

"Thou hast the making of a great singer in thee, Fräulein Röselein. I wish I could help thee to fame!"

The girl gave him an incredulous stare, then reddening, the muscles on her full neck standing out, she ran like a hare back to her companions. Evidently he had made an impression. The honest folk about him who witnessed the little encounter fairly brimmed over with gossip. The stout basso moved slowly to Krayne, who braced himself for trouble. Now for it! he whispered to himself, and grasped his walking-stick firmly. But, hat in hand, his visitor, a handsome blond man, approached and thanked Hugh for his generosity. He was a lover of music, the yodler assured him, and his wife and himself felt grateful for the interest he displayed in Fräulein Röselein, his wife's sister. Yes, she had a remarkable voice. What a pity--but wouldn't the gentleman attend the concert to be given that evening up at the Café Alm? It was, to be sure, rather far, the café, but the moon would be up and if he could find his way there he might do the company the honour of coming back with them.

The Fräulein would sing a lot for him--Bohemian, Tyrolean, French, and German songs. Ah, she was versatile! The man did not speak like a peasant, and seemed a shrewd, pleasant fellow. Hugh Krayne, in excellent though formal German, assured the other of his pleasure and accepted the invitation. Then he looked over at Röselein, who stood on the stage, and as he did so she waved a crimson handkerchief at him as a friendly sign. He took off his hat, touched significantly his own tie to indicate a reciprocity of sentiment, and all aglow he ordered a third cup of coffee.

The cure could take care of itself. _Man lebt nur einmal!_

II

On his way to the Alm he met the fattest man in Marienbad, a former chef of the German emperor, and gave him a friendly salute. He liked to see this monster, who made the scales groan at six hundred pounds, more than double his own weight, for it put him at ease with himself. But this evening he felt uncomfortable. What if he were to reach such a climax in adiposity What if in the years to come he should be compelled, as was the unfortunate man from Berlin, to sit on a chair every five minutes, a chair carried by an impudent boy! What--here his heart sank--if the Fräulein should mock his size! He walked so rapidly at this idea that other victims of rotundity stopped to look at his tall figure and nodded approval. Ach! Marienbad was wonderful!

After he had found a seat at the Alm next to the low wall, across which he could see a vast stretch of undulating country, lighted by a moon that seemed to swing like a silver hoop in the sky, Krayne ordered Pilsner. He was fatigued by the hilly scramble and he was thirsty. Oh, the lovely thirst of Marienbad--who that hath not been within thy hospitable gates he knoweth it not! The magic of the night was making of him a poet. He could see his Tyrolean friends behind the glass partition of the little hall. There would they sing, not in the open. It was nearly the same, for presently the windows were raised and their voices came floating out to him, the bourdon of Röselein's organ easily distinguishable. Love had sharpened his ears. He drained his glass and sent for another. He felt that he was tumbling down an abyss of passion and that nothing in the world could save him.

The intermission! He stood up to attract the attention of Herr Johan Präger. Röselein saw him and at once neared him, but without the basket. This delicacy pleased Krayne very much. It showed him that he was not on the same footing as the public. He made the girl take a seat, and though he felt the eyes of the crowd upon him, he was not in the least concerned. London was far away and the season was too young for the annual rush of his compatriots. Would the Fräulein take something? She accepted coffee, which she drank from a long glass with plenty of milk and sugar. She again gazed at him with such a resigned expression that he felt his starched cuffs grow warm from their contiguity to his leaping pulses.

"Yes, Fräulein," he said, employing the familiar _du_, "thou hast overcome me. Why not accept my offer?" Was this the prudent Hugh Krayne talking? She smiled sweetly and shook her head. Her voice was delicious in colour and intonation, nor did it betray humble origin.

"I fear, dear sir, that what you offer is impossible. My sister, the soprano, would never hear of such a thing. My brother, her husband, would not allow it. And I owe them my living, my education. How could I repay them if I left them now?" she hesitated.

"Simply enough. You would be a singer at the opera some day, and take them all to live with you. Is there no other reason?" He recollected with a vivid sense of the disagreeable the lively antics of a lithe youth in the company, who, at the close of the concert, executed with diabolic dexterity what they called a _Schuhplattltanz_. This dance had glued Krayne's attention, for Röselein was the young tenor singer's partner. With their wooden sabots they clattered and sang, waving wildly their arms or else making frantic passages of pretended love and coquetry. It upset the Englishman to see the impudence of this common peasant fellow grasping Röselein by the waist, as he whirled her about in the boorish dance. Hence the clause to his question. She endured his inquiring gaze, as she simply answered:--

"No, there is no other reason." She put her hand on the arm of her companion and the lights suddenly became misty, for he was of an apoplectic tendency. They talked of music, of the opera in Vienna and Prague. She was born in Bavaria, not more than a day's ride from Marienbad. You could almost see her country from the top of the Podhornberg, in the direction of the Franconian Mountains, not far from Bayreuth. The place was called Schnabelwaid, and it was very high, very windy. Since her tenth year she had been singing--yes, even in the chorus at the Vienna opera, with her sister and brother. They were no common yodlers. They could sing all the music of the day. The yodling was part of their business, as was the costume. Later, when she had enough saved, she would study in Vienna for grand opera!

He was enraptured. How romantic it all was! A free-born maiden--he was certain she was reared in some old castle--wandering about earning money for her musical education. What a picture for a painter! What a story for a novelist! They were interrupted. The dancer, a young man with a heavy shock of hair growing low on his forehead, under which twinkled beady black eyes, had been sent to tell Fräulein Röselein that her colleagues were waiting for her. With a courtesy she went away. Krayne now thoroughly hated the dancer.