Читать книгу: «Married», страница 5

“Is that really you, Mr. Blom? How are you?”

But Gustav, the waiter, who was so pleased to find himself for a few moments the equal of his master, held a piece of wood in his warm hand and met a pair of eyes which pierced his soul like gimlets. And yet this same hand had given him ten crowns only yesterday, and the owner of it had thanked him for six months’ service and attention in the way one thanks a friend. The waiter went back to his companions and sat down amongst them, embarrassed and snubbed. But Mr. Blom left the verandah with bitter thoughts and pushed his way through the crowd; he fancied that he could hear a mocking: “He hasn’t been able to get dinner, after all!”

He came to a large open space. There was a puppet-show, and Jasper was being beaten by his wife. A little further off a sailor was showing servant girls, soldiers and apprentices their future husband or wife in a wheel of fortune. They all had had dinner and were enjoying themselves; for a moment he believed himself their inferior, but only for a moment; then he remembered that they had not the vaguest idea of how an Egyptian camp was fortified. The thought gave him back his self-respect, and he wondered how it was possible that people could be so degraded as to find pleasure in such childishness.

In the meantime he had lost all inclination to try the other restaurants; he passed the Tivoli and went further into the heart of the park. Young men and women were dancing on the grass to the strains of a violin: a little further off a whole family was camping under an old oak; the head of the family was kneeling down, in his shirt sleeves, with bare head, a glass of beer in one hand, a sandwich in the other; his fat, jolly, clean-shaven face beamed with pleasure and good-nature as he invited his guests, who were evidently his wife, parents-in-law, brothers, shop-assistants and servants, to eat, drink and be merry, for to-day was Midsummer day, all day long. And the jovial fellow made such droll remarks that the whole party writhed on the grass with amusement. After the pancake had been produced and eaten with the fingers, and the port bottle been round, the senior shop-assistant made a speech which was at once so moving and so witty that the ladies at one moment pressed their handkerchiefs to their eyes, while the head of the family bit his lips, and at the next interrupted the speaker with loud laughter and cheers.

The schoolmaster’s mood became more and more morose, but instead of going away he sat down on a stone under a pinetree and watched “the animals.”

When the speech was finished and father and mother had been toasted with cheers and a flourish of trumpets, executed on a concertina, accompanied by the rattling of all cups and saucers that happened to be empty, the party rose to play “Third Man,” while mother and mother-in-law attended to the babies.

“Just like the beasts in the field,” thought the schoolmaster, turning away, for all that was natural was ugly in his eyes, and only that which was unnatural could lay any claim to beauty in his opinion, except, of course, the paintings of “well-known” masters in the National Museum.

He watched the young men taking off their coats, the young girls slipping off their cuffs and hanging them on the blackthorn bushes; then they took up their positions and the game began.

The girls picked up their skirts and threw up their legs so that their garters, made of blue and red braid such as the grocers sell for tying up pots, were plainly visible, and whenever the cavalier caught his lady, he took her in his arms and swung her round so that her skirts flew; and young and old shrieked so with laughter that the park re-echoed.

“Is this innocence or corruption?” wondered the schoolmaster.

But evidently the party did not know what the learned word “corruption” meant, and that was the reason why they were so merry.

By the time they were tired of playing “Third Man” tea was ready. The schoolmaster was puzzled to know where the cavaliers had learnt their fine manners, for they moved about on all fours to offer the girls sugar and cake; and the straps of their waistcoats stood out like handles.

“The males showing off before the females!” thought the schoolmaster. “They don’t know what they are in for.”

He noticed how the head of the family, the jolly fellow, waited on father and mother-in-law, wife, shop-assistants and servant girls: and whenever one of them begged him to help himself first, he invariably answered that there was plenty of time for that.

He watched the father-in-law peeling a willow branch to make a flute for the little boy; he watched the mother-in-law wash up as if she had been one of the servants. And he thought that there was something strange about selfishness, since it could be so cleverly disguised that it looked as if no one gave more than he received; for it must be selfishness, it couldn’t be anything else.

They played at forfeits and redeemed every forfeit with kisses, true, genuine, resounding kisses on the lips; and when the jolly book-keeper was made to kiss the old oak-tree, his conduct was too absurd for anything; he embraced and caressed the gnarled trunk as if it had been a girl whom he had met secretly; everybody shouted with laughter, for all knew how to do it, although none of them would have liked to be caught doing it.

The schoolmaster who had begun by watching the spectacle with critical eyes, fell more and more under the spell of it; he almost believed himself to be one of the party. He smiled at the sallies of the shop-assistants, and before an hour was gone the head of the family had won his whole sympathy. No one could deny that the man was a comedian of the first rank. He could play “Skin-the-cat”; he could “walk backwards,” “lie” on the tree-trunks, swallow coins, eat fire, and imitate all sorts of birds. And when he extracted a saffron cake from the dress of one of the girls and made it disappear in his right ear, the schoolmaster laughed until his empty inside ached.

Then the dancing began. The schoolmaster had read in Rabe’s grammar: Nemo saltat sobrius, nisi forte insanit, and had always looked upon dancing as a species of insanity. True, he had watched puppies and calves dancing when they felt frisky, but he did not believe that Cicero’s maxim applied to the animal world, and he was in the habit of drawing a sharp line between men and animals. Now, as he sat watching these young people who were quite sober, and neither hungry nor thirsty, moving round and round to the slow measures of the concertina, he felt as if his soul were in a swing which was being kept going by his eyes and ears, and his right foot beat time gently on the springy turf.

He spent three hours musing and watching, then he rose. He found it almost difficult to tear himself away; it was just as if he were leaving a merry party to which he had been invited; but his mood had changed; he felt more reconciled. He was at peace with the world and pleasantly tired, as if he had been enjoying himself.

It was evening. Smart carriages passed him, the lady-occupants lolling on the back seats and looking in their long, white theatre wraps like corpses in their shrouds; it was fashionable then to look as if one had been exhumed. The schoolmaster, whose thoughts were running in another direction, was sure that the ladies must be bored to death and felt no trace of envy. Below the dusty highroad, far out on the sea, the steamers with their flags and brass bands were returning from their pleasure trips; cheers, strains of music and snatches of song were wafted by the sea breezes to the mountains and the Deer Park.

The schoolmaster had never felt so lonely in his life as he did this evening in the moving throng. He fancied that everybody was looking at him compassionately as he made his solitary way through the crowd, and almost gave way to self-pity. He would have liked to talk to the first comer, for the mere pleasure of hearing his voice, for in his loneliness he felt as if he were walking by the side of a stranger. And now his conscience smote him. He remembered the waiter Gustav, who had been unable to hide his pleasure at meeting him. Now he had arrived at a point when he would have given worlds if anybody had met him and shown any pleasure at the fact. But nobody came.

Yes, somebody did, after all. As he was sitting by himself on the steamer, a setter, who had lost his master, came to him and put its head on his knee. The schoolmaster was not particularly fond of dogs, but he allowed it to stay; he felt it pressing its soft warm body against his leg, he saw the eyes of the forsaken brute looking at him in dumb appeal, as if it were asking him to find its master.

But as soon as they landed, the setter ran away. “It needed me no longer,” thought the schoolmaster, and he walked home and went to bed.

These trifling incidents of Midsummer day had robbed the schoolmaster of his assurance. They taught him that all foresight, all precautions, all the clever calculations in the world availed nothing. He felt a certain instability in his surroundings. Even the public house, his home, was not to be counted on. It might be closed any day. Moreover, a certain reserve on the part of Gustav troubled him. The waiter was as civil as before, more attentive even, but his friendship was gone; he had lost confidence. It afforded the schoolmaster food for thought, and whenever a tough piece of meat, or too small a dish of potatoes was set before him he thought:

“Haha! He’s paying me out!”

It was a bad summer for the schoolmaster: the second violin was out of town and the book-seller frequented “Mosesheight,” a garden restaurant in his own district, situated on a hill.

On an evening in autumn the bookseller and the second violin were sitting at their favourite table, drinking a glass of punch, when the schoolmaster entered, carrying under his arm a parcel which he carefully hid in an empty hamper in a cupboard used for all sorts of lumber. He was ill-tempered and unusually irritable.

“Well, old boy,” the bookseller began for the hundredth time, “and when are you going to be married?”

“Confound your ‘when are you going to be married!’ As if a man hadn’t enough trouble without it! Why don’t you get married yourself?” growled the schoolmaster.

“Oh! because I have my old Stafva,” answered the bookseller, who always had a number of stereotyped answers in readiness.

“I was married very happily,” said the Pole, “but my wife is dead, now, ugh!”

“Is she?” mimicked the schoolmaster; “and the gentleman is a widower? How am I to reconcile these facts?”

The Pole nodded, for he did not in the least understand what the schoolmaster was driving at.

The latter felt bored by his friends; their topic of conversation was always the same; he knew their replies by heart.

Presently he went into the corridor for a few moments to fetch his cigar-case which he had left in the pocket of his overcoat. The bookseller instantly raided the cupboard and returned with the mysterious parcel. As it was not sealed, he opened it quickly; it contained a beautiful American sleeping-suit; he hung it carefully over the back of the schoolmaster’s chair.

“Ugh!” said the Pole, grinning, as if he were looking at something unsightly.

The proprietor of the restaurant who loved a practical joke, bent over the counter, laughing loudly; the waiter stood rooted to the spot, and one of the cooks peeped through the door which communicated with the kitchen.

When the schoolmaster came back and realised the trick played on him, he grew pale with anger; he immediately suspected the bookseller; but when his eyes fell on Gustav who was standing in a corner of the room, laughing, his old obsession returned to him: “He’s paying me out!” Without a word he seized his property, threw a few coins on the counter and left the restaurant.

Henceforth the schoolmaster avoided Rejner’s. The bookseller had heard that he dined at a restaurant in his own district. This was true. But he was very discontented! The food was not actually bad, but it was not cooked to his liking. The waiters were not attentive. He often thought of returning to Rejner’s, but his pride would not let him. He had been turned out of his home; in five minutes a bond of many years’ standing had been severed.

A short time after fate struck him a fresh blow. Miss Augusta had inherited a little fortune in the provinces and had decided to leave Stockholm on the first of October. The schoolmaster had to look out for new lodgings.

But he had been spoilt, and there was no pleasing him. He changed his room every month. There was nothing wrong with the rooms, but they were not like his old room. It had become such a habit with him to walk through certain streets, that he often found himself before his old front door before he realised his mistake. He was like a lost child.

Eventually he went to live in a boarding house, a solution which he had always loathed and dreaded. And then his friends lost sight of him altogether.

One evening, as the Pole was sitting alone over his grog, smoking, drinking, and nodding with the capacity of the oriental to lapse into complete stupor, the bookseller burst in on him like a thunderstorm, flung his hat on the table, and shouted:

“Confound him! Has anybody ever heard anything like it?”

The Pole roused himself from his brandy-and-tobacco Nirvana, and rolled his eyes.

“I say, confound it! Has anybody ever heard anything like it? He’s going to be married!”

“Who’s going to be married?” asked the Pole, startled by the bookseller’s violence and emphatic language.

“Schoolmaster Blom!”

The bookseller expected a glass of grog in exchange for his news. The proprietor left the counter and came to their table to listen.

“Has she any money?” he asked acutely.

“I don’t think so,” replied the bookseller, conscious of his temporary importance and selling his wares one by one.

“Is she beautiful?” asked the Pole. “My wife was very beautiful. Ugh!”

“No, she’s not beautiful either,” answered the bookseller, “but nice-looking.”

“Have you seen her?” enquired the proprietor. “Is she old?” His eyes wandered towards the kitchen door.

“No, she’s young!”

“And her parents?” continued the proprietor.

“I heard that her father was a brass founder in Orebro.”

“The rascal! Well, I never!” said the proprietor.

“Haven’t I always said so? The man is a born husband,” said the bookseller.

“We all of us are,” said the proprietor, “and take my word for it, no one escapes his fate!”

With this philosophical remark he closed the subject and returned to the counter.

When they had settled that the schoolmaster was not marrying for money, they discussed the problem of “what the young people were going to live on.” The bookseller made a guess at the schoolmaster’s salary and “what he might earn besides by giving private lessons.” When that question, too, had been settled, the proprietor, who had returned to the table, asked for details.

“Where had he met her? Was she fair or dark? Was she in love with him?”

The last question was by no means out of the way; the bookseller “thought she was,” for he had seen them together, arm in arm, looking into shop windows.

“But that he, who was such a stick, could fall in love! It was incredible!”

“And what a husband he would make!” The proprietor knew that he was devilish particular about his food, and that, he said, was a mistake when one was married.

“And he likes a glass of punch in the evening, and surely a married man can’t drink punch every evening of his life. And he doesn’t like children! It won’t turn out well,” he whispered. “Take my word for it, it won’t turn out well. And, gentlemen, there’s another thing,” (he rose from his seat, looked round and continued in a whisper), “I believe, I’m hanged if I don’t, that the old hypocrite has had a love affair of some sort. Do you remember that incident, gentlemen, with the—hihihi—sleeping suit? He’s one of those whom you don’t find where you leave them! Take care, Mrs. Blom! Mind what you are about! I’ll say no more!”

It was certainly a fact that the schoolmaster was engaged to be married and that the wedding was to take place within two months.

What happened after, does not belong to this story, and, moreover, it is difficult to know what goes on behind the convent walls of domesticity when the vow of silence is being kept.

It was also a fact that the schoolmaster, after his marriage, was never again seen at a public house.

The bookseller, who met him by himself in the street one evening, had to listen to a long exhortation on getting married. The schoolmaster had inveighed against all bachelors; he had called them egotists, who refused to do their duty by the State; in his opinion they ought to be heavily taxed, for all indirect taxes weighed most cruelly on the father of a family. He went so far as to say that he wished to see bachelorhood punished by the law of the land as a “crime against nature.”

The bookseller had a good memory. He said that he doubted the advisability of taking a fool into one’s house, permanently. But the schoolmaster replied that his wife was the most intelligent woman he had ever met.

Two years after the wedding the Pole saw the schoolmaster and his wife in the theatre; he thought that they looked happy; “ugh!”

Another three years went by. On a Midsummer day the proprietor of the restaurant made a pleasure trip on the Lake of Mälar to Mariafred. There, before Castle Cripsholm, he saw the schoolmaster, pushing a perambulator over a green field, and carrying in his disengaged hand a basket containing food, while a whole crowd of young men and women, “who looked like country folk,” followed in the rear. After dinner the schoolmaster sang songs and turned somersaults with the youngsters. He looked ten years younger and had all the ways of a ladies’ man.

The proprietor, who was quite close to the party while they were having dinner, overheard a little conversation between Mr. and Mrs. Blom. When the young wife took a dish of crabs from the basket, she apologised to Albert, because she had not been able to buy a single female crab in the whole market. Thereupon the schoolmaster put his arm round her, kissed her and said that it didn’t matter in the least, because male or female crabs, it was all the same to him. And when one of the babies in the perambulator began to cry, the schoolmaster lifted it out and hushed it to sleep again.

Well, all these things are mere details, but how people can get married and bring up a family when they have not enough for themselves while they are bachelors, is a riddle to me. It almost looks as if babies brought their food with them when they come into this world; it really almost does look as if they did.

COMPENSATION

He was considered a genius at College, and no one doubted that he would one day distinguish himself. But after passing his examinations, he was obliged to go to Stockholm and look out for a berth. His dissertation, which was to win him the doctor’s degree, had to be postponed. As he was very ambitious, but had no private means, he resolved to marry money, and with this object in view, he visited only the very best families, both at Upsala where he studied for the bar, and later on at Stockholm. At Upsala he always fraternised with the new arrivals, that is to say, when they were members of aristocratic families, and the freshers felt flattered by the advances made by the older man. In this way he formed many useful ties, which meant invitations to his friends’ country houses during the summer.

The country houses were his happy hunting ground. He possessed social talents, he could sing and play and amuse the ladies, and consequently he was a great favourite. He dressed beyond his means; but he never borrowed money from any of his friends or aristocratic acquaintances. He even went to the length of buying two worthless shares and mentioning on every possible occasion that he had to attend a General Meeting of the shareholders.

For two summers he had paid a great deal of attention to a titled lady who owned some property, and his prospects were the general topic, when he suddenly disappeared from high life and became engaged to a poor girl, the daughter of a cooper, who owned no property whatever.

His friends were puzzled and could not understand how he could thus stand in his own light. He had laid his plans so well, he “had but to stretch out his hand and success was in his grasp”; he had the morsel firmly stuck on his fork, it was only necessary for him to open his mouth and swallow it. He himself was at a loss to understand how it was that the face of a little girl whom he had met but once on a steamer could have upset all his plans of many years’ standing. He was bewitched, obsessed.

He asked his friends whether they didn’t think her beautiful?

Frankly speaking they didn’t.

“But she is so clever! Just look into her eyes! What expressive eyes she has!”

His friends could see nothing and hear less, for the girl never opened her lips.

But he spent evening after evening with the cooper’s family; to be sure, the cooper was a very intelligent man! On his knees before her (a trick often practised at the country houses) he held her skeins of wool; he played and sang to her, talked about religion and the drama, and he always read acquiescence in her eyes. He wrote poetry about her, and sacrificed at her shrine his laurels, his ambitious dreams, even his dissertation.

And then he married her.

The cooper drank too much at the wedding and made an improper speech about girls in general. But the son-in-law found the old man so unsophisticated, so amiable, that he egged him on instead of shutting him up. He felt at his ease among these simple folk; in their midst he could be quite himself.

“That’s being in love,” said his friends. “Love is a wonderful thing.”

And now they were married. One month—two months. He was unspeakably happy. Every evening they spent together and he sang a song to her about the Rose in the Wood, her favourite song. And he talked about religion and the drama, and she sat and listened eagerly. But she never expressed an opinion; she listened in silence and went on with her crochet work.

In the third month he relapsed into his old habit of taking an afternoon nap. His wife, who hated being by herself, insisted on sitting by him. It irritated him, for he felt an overwhelming need to be alone with his thoughts.

Sometimes she met him on his way home from his office, and her heart swelled with pride when he left his colleagues and crossed the street to join her. She took him home in triumph: he was her husband!

In the fourth month he grew tired of her favourite song. It was stale now! He took up a book and read, and neither of them spoke.

One evening he had to attend a meeting which was followed by a banquet. It was his first night away from home. He had persuaded his wife to invite a friend to spend the evening with her, and to go to bed early, for he did not expect to be home until late.

The friend came and stayed until nine o’clock. The young wife sat in the drawing-room, waiting, for she was determined not to go to bed until her husband had returned. She felt too restless to go to sleep.

She sat alone in the drawing-room. What could she do to make the time pass more quickly? The maid had gone to bed; the grandfather’s clock ticked and ticked. But it was only ten o’clock when she put away her crochet work. She fidgeted, moved the furniture about and felt a little unstrung.

So that was what being married meant! One was torn from one’s early surroundings, and shut up in three solitary rooms to wait until one’s husband came home, half intoxicated.—Nonsense! he loved her, and he was out on business. She was a fool to forget that. But did he love her still? Hadn’t he refused a day or two ago to hold a skein of wool for her?—a thing he loved to do before they were married. Didn’t he look rather annoyed yesterday when she met him before lunch? And—after all—if he had to attend a business meeting to-night, there was no necessity for him to be present at the banquet.

It was half-past ten when her musing had reached this point. She was surprised that she hadn’t thought of these things before. She relapsed into her dark mood and the dismal thoughts again passed through her mind, one by one. But now reinforcements had arrived. He never talked to her now! He never sang to her, never opened the piano! He had told her a lie when he had said that he couldn’t do without his afternoon nap, for he was reading French novels all the time.

He had told her a lie!

It was only half-past eleven. The silence was oppressive. She opened the window and looked out into the street. Two men were standing down below, bargaining with two women. That was men’s way! If he should ever do anything like that! She should drown herself if he did.

She shut the window and lighted the chandelier in the bedroom. “One ought to be able to see what one is about,” he had once said to her on a certain occasion.—Everything was still so bright and new! The green coverlet looked like a mown lawn, and the little pillows reminded her of two white kittens curled up on the grass. The polish of her dressing-table reflected the light: the mirror had as yet none of those ugly stains which are made by the splashing of water. The silver on the back of her hair-brush, her powder-box, her tooth-brush, all shone and sparkled. Her bedroom slippers were still so new and pretty that it was impossible to picture them down-at-heel. Everything looked new, and yet everything seemed to have lost some of its freshness. She knew all his songs, all his drawing-room pieces, all his words, all his thoughts. She knew before-hand what he would say when he sat down to lunch, what he would talk about when they were alone in the evening.

She was sick of it all. Had she been in love with him? Oh, yes! Certainly! But was this all then? Was she realising all the dreams of her girlhood? Were things to go on like this until she died? Yes! But—but—but—surely they would have children! though there was no sign of it as yet. Then she would no longer be alone! Then he might go out as often as he liked, for she would always have somebody to talk to, to play with. Perhaps it was a baby which she wanted to make her happy. Perhaps matrimony really meant something more than being a man’s legitimate mistress. That must be it! But then, he would have to love her, and he didn’t do that. And she began to cry.

When her husband came home at one o’clock, he was quite sober. But he was almost angry with her when he found her still up.

“Why didn’t you go to bed?” were the words with which he greeted her.

“How can I go to sleep when I am waiting for you?”

“A fine look out for me! Am I never to go out then? I believe you have been crying, too?”

“Yes, I have, and how can I help it if you—don’t—love—me—any—more?”

“Do you mean to say I don’t love you because I had to go out on business?”

“A banquet isn’t business!”

“Good God! Am I not to be allowed to go out? How can women be so obtrusive?”

“Obtrusive? Yes, I noticed that yesterday, when I met you. I’ll never meet you again.”

“But, darling, I was with my chief—”

“Huhuhu!”

She burst into tears, her body moved convulsively.

He had to call the maid and ask her to fetch the hot-water bottle.

He, too, was weeping. Scalding tears! He wept over himself, his hardness of heart, his wickedness, his illusions over everything.

Surely his love for her wasn’t an illusion? He did love her! Didn’t he? And she said she loved him, too, as he was kneeling before her prostrate figure, kissing her eyes. Yes, they loved one another! It was merely a dark cloud which had passed, now. Ugly thoughts, born of solitude and loneliness. She would never, never again stay alone. They fell asleep in each other’s arms, her face dimpled with smiles.

But she did not go to meet him on the following day. He asked no questions at lunch. He talked a lot, but more for the sake of talking than to amuse her; it seemed as if he were talking to himself.

In the evening he entertained her with long descriptions of the life at Castle Sjöstaholm; he mimicked the young ladies talking to the Baron, and told her the names of the Count’s horses. And on the following day he mentioned his dissertation.

One afternoon he came home very tired. She was sitting in the drawing-room, waiting for him. Her ball of cotton had fallen on the floor. In passing, his foot got entangled in the cotton; at his next step he pulled her crochet work out of her hand and dragged it along; then he lost his temper and kicked it aside.

She exclaimed at his rudeness.

He retorted that he had no time to bother about her rubbish, and advised her to spend her time more profitably. He had to think of his dissertation, if he was to have a career at all. And she ought to consider the question of how to limit their household expenses.

Things had gone far indeed!

On the next day the young wife, her eyes swollen with weeping, was knitting socks for her husband. He told her he could buy them cheaper ready-made. She burst into tears. What was she to do? The maid did all the work of the house, there was not enough work in the kitchen for two. She always dusted the rooms. Did he want her to send the maid away?

“No, no!”

“What did he want, then?”

He didn’t know himself, but he was sure that something was wrong. Their expenses were too high. That was all. They couldn’t go on living at their present rate, and then—somehow he could never find time to work at his dissertation.

Tears, kisses, and a grand reconciliation! But now he started staying away from home in the evening several times a week. Business! A man must show himself! If he stays at home, he will be overlooked and forgotten!

A year had passed; there were no signs of the arrival of a baby. “How like a little liaison I once had in the old days,” he thought; “there is only one difference: this one is duller and costs more.” There was no more conversation, now; they merely talked of household matters. “She has no brain,” he thought. “I am listening to myself when I am talking to her, and the apparent depths of her eyes is a delusion, due to the size of her pupils—the unusual size of her pupils.—”