Wolf Among Wolves (83 page)

“Yes, Mamma, I’ll pay more attention to it. You are right,” said Frau von Prackwitz obediently. She was a heroine—Studmann admitted it frankly. She
neither flinched nor hesitated. She certainly did not find the victor’s yoke light, yet she did not betray the fact. And for whom was she suffering these bitter humiliations? For a man who would never appreciate it, who, when everything had been happily straightened out, would triumphantly claim: “Well, didn’t I tell you so? A lot of fuss about nothing! I knew it, but you always have to lose your head; you will never listen to me!”

It was dreadful how quickly a comradeship dating from before the war broke down in times like these, under such conditions. Herr von Prackwitz had certainly never been a brilliant or even very capable officer; but he had been a reliable comrade, a brave man and a pleasant companion. And what was left of it? He was not reliable—he sent his officials out against field thieves, and when the thieves were caught he went and hid behind a bush. He was no longer a comrade—he was only a superior, and an unjustly critical superior at that. He was no longer brave—he preferred to let his wife go alone to a distressing interview. He was no longer pleasant society—he spoke only of himself, of the insults he suffered, of the troubles he had, of the money he lacked. One had to admit, though, that these defects had always been present, and that it was the badness of the times which had made them blossom so luxuriantly.

But there sat the Rittmeister’s wife, and whereas her husband was cowardly, she was brave. Whereas he only thought of himself, she remained a comrade. Above sat the old woman, a lean, dry little bird with a pointed beak, good for pecking, and below sat the beautiful woman. She looked radiant, the country did her good, she was mature as gold-tinted wheat, there was a charm about her. When the old woman had spoken of the low-necked blouses, Studmann had not been able to prevent himself from glancing at the gently heaving silken bosom, and had lowered his eyes like a schoolboy caught in mischief.

He saw only virtues in this woman. The more distorted, the more imperfect he found the Rittmeister’s once friendly figure, all the more perfect did his wife appear to him. To be sure she was a woman, a human being, and therefore in theory imperfect—yes, she probably had her bad side. But he might have racked his brains to the utmost without finding a fault in her. She was perfect, a gift from heaven—but for whom? For a fool! For a scatter-brain!

The way she not only bore everything silently, but even smiled, trying to turn her mother’s sermon into a dialogue which would cheer up that old heap of poison! She isn’t doing it for her husband at all, suddenly thought Studmann. She is doing it for her child. She can only think as I do about him; she just saw in the hall what sort of a man he is. There’s nothing to bind them together any longer. It’s only her daughter, Violet.… And naturally she wants to keep the farm on which she has grown up.…

From condemnation to betrayal of his friend was only a step. But it must be said in Herr von Studmann’s favor that he did not think clearly about these things. The teacher was frightened at the chasm in his own heart. Herr von Studmann didn’t think. He just saw. He saw this handsome woman sitting a little lower than himself; he saw how her hair was rolled up on her neck, the beautiful white shoulders which disappeared beneath her blouse. She moved her foot, and the ankle covered by the silk stocking was beautiful. She raised her hand, her bracelets tinkled softly, and her arm was round and spotlessly white—it was Eve, the ancient, ever-young Eve.

She’d paralyzed his ability to think, to analyze, and to explain himself. Herr von Studmann was over thirty-five and hadn’t believed that he would experience this any more, with such spontaneity, such power. In fact, he didn’t really know he was experiencing it. He sat there innocently, his eyes betraying nothing. His words remained thoughtful and moderate. Yet it had happened!

If only the cursed geese had not been there! Again and again their ghosts drifted into a conversation, now gradually growing calmer, and made the old woman’s tears flow afresh. Elias came knocking, then the maid, then Amanda Backs—to say that the servant from the Villa was there with the dead geese—what should they do with them? Again and again Hubert Räder stormed the Manor, to be turned away each time. The inscrutable intriguer from the servants’ quarters was always making further attempts to hand over the corpses—thereby adding fuel to the fire.

An imploring glance from Frau Eva decided Studmann. Leaving the room out of her sight, he was again the cool businessman, familiar, as the result of years of hotel work, with every kind of servant’s trick.

He found the basement of the Manor in a state of siege. After Räder had vainly attempted to hand over the geese to each of the employees there, he had apparently undertaken to get rid of them by stealth, laying them on window sills and outside cellar doors—attempts which were, however, frustrated by the general watchfulness. But, obstinate as a mule, Hubert Räder still circled the Manor, followed by a laborer pushing the barrow with the victims. Gray, fishy, cold, the servant peered at an open window, weighed the possibilities of the hen coop.

Studmann put an end to this disorder; he sent the Manor servants about their work and gave Räder a dressing-down. But Räder was strangely cool and refractory. He seemed not to regard Herr von Studmann as having authority. He had been strictly ordered by the Rittmeister to deliver the geese—on pain of losing his job. And madam also had assented to this order.

In vain did Studmann assure him that he had just come from madam with the order that he was to take the geese away at once. Räder showed no
inclination to accept this as an annulment of the Rittmeister’s command. Where was he to go with the geese, anyway? To the Villa? The Rittmeister would fire him on the spot.

Studmann should have seen in Räder a very faithful servant, but he merely found him sickeningly recalcitrant. He wanted to go back, to know what was being arranged in the large greenish-golden room—and he had been standing here for five minutes talking to this ass. At last he ordered them to follow him to the staff-house; the laborer obeyed with squeaking barrow while from the Manor basement every face stared after the procession. Räder followed, protesting—Studmann felt that he was a rather ridiculous figure.

In the office he seized the telephone. “I shall speak to the Rittmeister,” he said more mildly. “You needn’t be afraid about your job.”

Räder stood there as cool as ever. There was no reply from the Villa, and Studmann could not help casting angry glances at the servant. But they were lost on him; Räder was watching the antics of the flies round the flycatcher. When finally someone did answer, it was the cook Armgard, who announced that the Rittmeister had gone out with the young Fräulein. Räder looked as if he had been expecting this.

“Then take the geese to the Villa, Herr Räder,” said Studmann mildly. “You can put them somewhere in the cellar. I’ll arrange the matter with the Rittmeister—you need not worry.”

“I have to deliver the geese at the Manor, otherwise I’ll be sacked,” explained Hubert Räder inexorably.

“Then leave the geese here in the office, for all I care!” cried Studmann angrily. “The things have to be got out of the way, even if I have to do it myself!”

“I’m sorry,” contradicted the servant politely, “but I have to deliver them at the Manor.”

“I’ll be damned!” shouted Studmann at this pig-headedness.

“I’ll be damned!” bellowed from the doorway a stronger voice, more practised in swearing. “What are my geese doing here? What are my geese doing on this barrow? Who has killed my geese?”

Studmann left the servant standing where he was and dashed from the office. Outside stood old Geheimrat von Teschow, scarlet with rage. He roared like a wounded lion, brandishing his stick. He threatened the estate’s builder Tiede, who dodged out of the way with almost silent curses.

“If you please, Herr Geheimrat,” said Studmann with all that painfully acquired calmness which had never deserted him, even when faced with hysterical women in the hotel, not to speak of the man with the geese, “I shall—”

“Did you kill my geese? My Attila? I’ll teach you, my lad! Clear out of my farm at once! Leave my stick alone!” The stick had been dangerously near Studmann’s face. With a quick movement Studmann had hold of it.

“If you please, Herr Geheimrat,” he requested, while the other, turning blue with rage, tugged at the stick, “not here before the men!”

“The men can go to blazes!” panted the old man. “Did you worry about the men when you shot my geese? But I’m telling you I won’t tolerate you a moment longer on this farm! Comes from Berlin, thinks he’s so clever, babbles like a shyster lawyer …” The Geheimrat was delighted to be able to retaliate on Studmann for the several set-backs he had suffered, to be able to curse him in the passion of a semi-simulated rage. He was too clever actually to believe that Studmann had killed his geese, but he wanted to have full freedom to curse.

Studmann, who did not know all the implications of the goose massacre, thought the old gentleman had some reason to be enraged, but felt at the same time that this fit of passion was not quite genuine. Suddenly he let go the stick and revealed what the old man would find out anyhow. “You’re mistaken, Herr Geheimrat. Your son-in-law shot the geese. He intended only to frighten them, but unfortunately—”

“You’re lying!” shouted the old man still more angrily. “You’re lying in your throat!”

“ ‘I assume, anyway, that he intended to frighten them,” said Studmann, turning white.

“My son-in-law? You’re lying! I’ve just spent half an hour with him in the forest, and he didn’t mention a word to me about the geese! Are you suggesting that he’s a liar—a coward? No, you are lying! You are a coward!”

Studmann, very pale, had an overpowering impulse to turn round on the spot, pack his bags and depart to more peaceful fields—perhaps to Berlin. Or to stamp so hard on the old man’s toes that he would collapse at once. There stood Tiede, the estate builder, who, with open mouth and flared nostrils, was the personification of listening. Räder in the office was certainly listening to everything, and quite close, just behind the nearest bushes, was the Manor—also, without a doubt, well supplied with ears. The raging old man became ever more insulting. But Herr von Studmann had the unmistakeable feeling that this old man was only raging in order to insult him for knowing the truth.

Yes, Studmann had every inclination to turn his abilities to a more fruitful field—he had had a letter in his pocket for two days, offering him another post—and the news that the Rittmeister had not told his father-in-law of his heroic deed did nothing to diminish this inclination.

He did not doubt for a moment that the old man was speaking the truth on this point.

If, then, Studmann did not go up to his room to pack his bags—if, instead of that, he abruptly left the dead geese and the fuming old man and went toward the Manor—he was not moved to do so by the bonds of friendship nor by the memory of a beautiful helpless woman nor by a feeling of duty, but purely by the stubbornness innate in every true man. He felt that the old fellow wanted to frighten him away forever, and so he remained. He would go when it suited him and not the old man.

“Look here, sir!” shouted the Geheimrat. “What are you doing there? I forbid you to go into my park!”

Studmann went on without a word, putting Herr von Teschow at a disadvantage. If his expostulations were to reach the trespasser he had to hurry after him. A man who is normally short-winded cannot curse very well when he is running. Between jerky breaths the Geheimrat shouted: “I forbid you—to go—in my park—you are—not—to enter—my house! Elias, don’t let him in. It’s a breach of the peace. Don’t let him up!”

The door of his wife’s room slammed upstairs.

Beckoning to Elias, the old man whispered: “What does he want here?”

“Frau von Prackwitz is upstairs,” Elias whispered back.

“Breach of the peace!” bellowed the Geheimrat again. It was the cannon-shot to cover his retreat. “Been here a long time?” he whispered.

“Over two hours.”

“And Frau von Teschow?”

“Heavens, sir, both of them are crying.”

“Damn it!” whispered the old man.

“Papa,” came a gentle call from upstairs, “won’t you come up?”

“No!” he shouted. “Got to bury my Attila! Goose murderers, damn them!”

She came tripping down the stairs as quickly as if she were still seventeen, as if she were still living in his house, in that distant happy time … “Papa!” she said, taking his arm. “I need your help.”

“Don’t help murderers!” The Geheimrat flared up. “The fellow must clear out of the house, I won’t move an inch as long as he’s upstairs!”

“Now, Papa, come along.”

He had one foot on the stairs.

“You know quite well that Herr von Studmann is one of the most decent and helpful men there are. You needn’t pretend to me.” There was a strange sad note in these words.

“You shouldn’t get old, Evie,” said the old man. Angrily he called over his shoulder: “Elias! If Herr von Prackwitz, my so-called son-in-law, comes, tell him I’m not at home to him! Let him go and get another farm—today!” Quietly to his daughter: “Evie, you think you can do what you like with me. But only if my son-in-law clears out of Neulohe, understand?”

“We’ll discuss everything calmly, Papa.”

“Yes, you want to get round me, Evie,” growled the old man and squeezed her arm.

IX

Geheimrat von Teschow had spoken the truth. He had met his son-in-law in the forest, and even if the two had not chatted long, they had said “Good day” quite pleasantly. Two-fifths of the conversation that followed was devoted to deer, and three-fifths to Violet, whom her grandfather had not seen for a good while. So no time was left to speak about the goose massacre. The Geheimrat had been right on this point, too.

If, however, Herr von Studmann entertained a still lower opinion of his former friend Prackwitz because of this silence, and even cursed him for a coward, then he was scarcely in the right. Prackwitz was no coward, but moody—as moody as a young girl shedding her childhood, as moody as a young woman expecting her first baby, as moody as a prima donna who has never had one and never will. That is to say, the Rittmeister was as moody as only a woman can be. But he was no coward. He would not have hesitated a moment to tell his father-in-law about the geese and engage him in the most violent quarrel regardless of consequences—if he had felt like it. But having humored his quarrelsomeness the whole morning and a good part of the afternoon, he was now in a peaceful mood. He had spent himself; his fit of anger had vanished with the two shots.