Part 22

Now Axel Martini had taken part in the "May-combat" this year, and had come off victorious. The poem which he had sent in, an inspired hymn of praise to the joy of life, or rather a highly tempestuous outbreak of the joy of life itself, a ravishing hymn to the beauty and awfulness of life, was conceived in the style of both his books and had given rise to discord in the Board of Judges. The Privy Councillor himself and the Professor of Philology had been for dismissing it with a notice of commendation; for they considered it exaggerated in expression, coarse in its passion, and in places frankly repulsive. But the Professor of Literary History together with the editors had out-voted them, not only in view of the fact that Martini's contribution represented the best poem to the joy of life, but also in consideration of its undeniable pre-eminence, and in the end their two opponents too had not been able to resist the appeal of its foaming and stunning flow of words.

So Axel Martini had been awarded fifteen pounds, a gold breast-pin in the form of a lyre, and the Grand Duke's silver cup as well, and his poem had been printed first in the annual, surrounded with an artistic frame from the hand of Professor von Lindemann. What was more, the custom was for the victor (or victrix) in the "May-combat" to be received in audience by the Grand Duke; and as Albrecht was unwell, this task fell to his brother.

Klaus Heinrich was a little afraid of Herr Martini.

"Oh dear, Doctor Ueberbein," he said when he met his tutor one day, "what subject am I to tackle him on? He's sure to be a wild, brazen-faced fellow."

But Doctor Ueberbein answered: "Anything; but, Klaus Heinrich, you need not worry! He's a very decent fellow. I know him, I'm rather in with his set. You'll get on splendidly with him."

So Klaus Heinrich received the poet of the "Joy of Life," received him at the "Hermitage," so as to give the business as private a character as possible. "In the yellow room, Braunbart if you please," he said, "that's the most presentable one for occasions like this." There were three handsome chairs in this room, which indeed were the only valuable pieces of furniture in the Schloss, heavy Empire arm-chairs of mahogany, with spiral arms and yellow upholstery on which blue-green lyres were embroidered. Klaus Heinrich on this occasion did not dispose himself ready for an audience, but waited in some anxiety near by, until Axel Martini on his side had waited for seven or eight minutes in the yellow room. Then he walked in hastily, almost hurriedly, and advanced towards the poet, who made a low bow.

"I am very much pleased to make your acquaintance," he said, "dear sir ... dear Doctor, I believe?"

"No, Royal Highness," answered Axel Martini in an asthmatic voice, "not doctor, I've no title."

"Oh, forgive me ... I assumed ... Let's sit down, dear Herr Martini. I am, as I have said, delighted to be able to congratulate you on your great success...."

Herr Martini drew down the corners of his mouth. He sat down on the edge of one of the mahogany arm-chairs, at the uncovered table, round whose edge ran a gold border, and crossed his feet, which were cased in cracked patent-leather boots. He was in frock-coat and wore yellow gloves. His collar was frayed at the edges. He had rather staring eyes, thin cheeks and a dark yellow moustache, which was clipped like a hedge. His hair was already quite grey on the temples, although according to the "May-combat" Annual he was not more than thirty years old, and under his eyes glowed patches of red which did not suggest robust health. He answered to Klaus Heinrich's congratulations: "Your Royal Highness is very kind. It was not a difficult victory. Perhaps it was hardly tactful of me to compete."

Klaus Heinrich did not understand this; but he said: "I have read your poem repeatedly with great pleasure. It seems to me a complete success, as regards both metre and rhyme. And it entirely expresses the 'Joy of Life.'"

Herr Martini bowed in his chair.

"Your skill," continued Klaus Heinrich, "must be a source of great pleasure to you--an ideal recreation. What is your calling, Herr Martini?"

Herr Martini showed that he did not understand, by describing a note of interrogation with the upper half of his body.

"I mean your main calling. Are you in the Civil Service?"

"No, Royal Highness, I have no calling; I occupy myself exclusively with poetry...."

"None at all.... Oh, I understand. So unusual a gift deserves that a man's whole powers be devoted to it."

"I don't know about that, Royal Highness. Whether it deserves it or not, I don't know. I must own that I had no choice. I have always felt myself entirely unsuited to every other branch of human activity. It seems to me that this undoubted and unconditional unsuitability for everything else is the sole proof and touchstone of the poetical calling--indeed, that a man must not see in poetry any calling, but only the expression and refuge of that unsuitability."

It was a peculiarity with Herr Martini that when he talked tears came into his eyes just like a man who comes out of the cold into a warm room and lets the heat stream through and melt his limbs.

"That's a singular idea," said Klaus Heinrich.

"Not at all, Royal Highness. I beg your pardon, no, not singular at all. It's an idea which is very generally accepted. What I say is nothing new."

"And for how long have you been living only for poetry? I suppose you were once a student?"

"Not exactly, Royal Highness; no, the unsuitability to which I alluded before began to show itself in me at an early age. I couldn't get on at school. I left it without passing my 'final.' I went up to the university with the full intention of taking it later, but I never did. And when my first volume of poems attracted a good deal of attention, it no longer suited my dignity to do so, if I may say so."

"Of course not.... But did your parents then agree to your choice of a career?"

"Oh no, Royal Highness! I must say to my parents' credit that they by no means agreed to it. I come of a good stock: my father was Solicitor to the Treasury. He's dead now, but he was Solicitor to the Treasury. He naturally disliked my choice of a career so much that till his death he would never give me a farthing. I lived at daggers drawn with him, although I had the greatest respect for him because of his strictness."

"Oh, so you've had a hard time of it, Herr Martini, you've had to struggle through. I can well believe that you must have knocked about a good deal!"

"Not so, Royal Highness! No, that would have been horrid, I couldn't have stood it. My health is delicate--I dare not say 'unfortunately,' for I am convinced that my talent is inseparably connected with my bodily infirmity. Neither my body nor my talent could have survived hunger and harsh winds, and they have not had to survive them. My mother was weak enough to provide me behind my father's back with the means of life, modest but adequate means. I owe it to her that my talent has been able to develop under fairly favourable conditions."

"The result has shown, Herr Martini, that they were the right conditions.... Although it is difficult to say now what actually are good conditions. Permit me to suppose that if your mother had shown herself as strict as your father, and you had been alone in the world, and left entirely to your own resources ... don't you think that it might have been to a certain extent a good thing for you? That you might have got a peep at things, so to speak, which have escaped you as it is?"