Part 100

He looked at the dead stems and withered chalices: Eleanore’s fingers had once touched all of these. Her fingers were even then hovering over the dead buds like figures from the realm of spirits. In the dusty spider webs hung caught at present unused moments, kind words that were never spoken, consolation that was never expressed, encouragement, consideration, and happiness that were allowed to pass unclaimed and unapplied. Oh, this living and not knowing what the present contains! Oh, this being with a living life, and remaining unaware of it! This failure to avail one’s self of a wonderful day, a breathing, pulsing hour! This dragging, falling, plunging into the night of desire and delusion, this proud, vain, criminal discontent! O winged creature, winged creature, where art thou! Where can one call out to thee!

There was nothing left but two graves, a broken harp, withered flowers, and a mask! And a fair child here, a foul one there, and a third that had come into life only to die! And up above all this, up above even the tip of the mountain top, the gigantic, the inexpressible, the sea of dreams and dreamed melodies, the breath of God, the annunciation of infernal darkness, the message of eternity, the wonders of temporal existence, dance and dancing pipes, peals of thunder, and sweet weavings of sound—Music!

It was evening. The Baron closed the door. Daniel reached him his hand in silence, and then went home.

THE PROMETHEAN SYMPHONY

During the following autumn and winter, Daniel lived a quiet, lonely life. In the spring, Sylvia von Auffenberg wrote him a letter, asking him to come over to Siegmundshof and spend a few weeks with her and Eberhard. He declined, though he promised to come later.

Old Herold visited him occasionally. He told all about the friction in the conservatory since Döderlein had been in charge, and contended that the world was on the point of turning into a pig-stye.

Herr Seelenfromm also came in from time to time, while among other visitors were the architect who had a defect in his speech and Martha Rübsam. Toward the close of the winter Herr Carovius also called. Socially he had become more nearly possible than he had been in former years. He still held, however, some very remarkable views about music.

Whatever any of the visitors said went in one of Daniel’s ears and out of the other. It would often happen that there would be a number of people in his presence, and he would seem to be listening to them; and yet if you watched his face, you could see that he was completely absent-minded. If some one turned to him with a question, he would not infrequently smile like a child, and make no effort whatsoever to respond. No one had ever noticed him smile this way before.

He returned the money Philippina had loaned him at the time the piano was pawned. Philippina said: “Oi, oi, Daniel, you seem to be swimming in money!” She brought him the receipt, and then took the money to her room, where she did a lot of figuring to see whether the interest had been accurately calculated.

Little Agnes was sitting on the floor, sucking a stick of candy. She was always happy when Philippina was around; she was afraid of her father.

Friends had told him that his apartment was too large now; he was advised to give it up and take a smaller one. He became enraged; he said he would never do this voluntarily, for the house meant a great deal more to him than merely so many rented rooms; and he insisted that everything be left just as it was.

One day at the beginning of spring he said to Philippina: “I am going away for a long time. Watch the child, and don’t let the old man upstairs suffer for anything. I will send you the money to keep up the house on the first day of each month, and you will be held responsible for everything that takes place. Moreover; I want to pay you a set wage: I will give you five talers a month. There is no reason why you should work for me for nothing.”

The shaking and shuddering that Daniel had often had occasion to notice in Philippina returned. She shrugged her shoulders, looked as mean as only she could, and said: “Save your coppers; you’ll need ’em; you mustn’t try to act so rich all of a sudden; it ain’t good for your health. If you have any money to spend, go out and git Agnes a pair of shoes and a decent dress.” Daniel made no reply.

Her greediness in money matters had certainly not diminished since the day she began to pilfer from her parents. She loved money; she adored the shining metal; she liked to see it and feel it; she liked to take bank notes in her hands and caress them. It gave her intense pleasure to think that people looked upon her as being poor when she was actually carrying more than a thousand marks around in an old stocking stuffed down in her corset between her breasts. She loved to hear people complain of hard times. When a beggar reached out his hand to her on the street, she felt that he was doing it as an act of homage to her; she would cause her bosom to heave so that she might feel the presence of the stocking more keenly. She was pleased to think that one so young had made herself so secure against future eventualities of any kind.

She felt, despite all this, like scratching Daniel’s eyes out when he spoke of paying her regular monthly wages. This she regarded as base ingratitude. If it were at all possible for grief to find ineradicable lodgment in her envious, unenlightened, malicious soul, Daniel’s offer of so much per month made it so.

She ran into the kitchen, and hurled knives and forks in the sink. She went to old Jordan’s room, knocked on his door, and made him open it; then she told him with all the anger at her resourceful command that Daniel was going away. “There is hardly a cent in the house, and he’s going on a jamboree!” she exclaimed. “There is some damned wench back of this. Go tell him, Herr Inspector, go tell him what a dirty thing it is he’s doing—going away and leaving his child and his old father in the lurch. Do it, Herr Inspector, and you’ll get potato dumplings, ginger-bread, and sauce for dinner next Sunday.”

Jordan looked at Philippina timidly. His mouth watered for the food she had promised him; for she was holding him down to a near-starvation diet. He was often so hungry that he would sneak into the delicatessen shop, and buy himself ten pfennigs’ worth of real food.

“I will make inquiry as to the reason for his going,” murmured Jordan, “but I hardly believe that I will be able to move him one way or the other.”

“Well, you go out and take a little walk; git a bit of fresh air,” commanded Philippina; “I’ve got to straighten up your room. Your windows need washing; you can’t see through ’em for dirt.”

Late that evening Daniel came up to say good-bye to Jordan.

“Where are you going?” asked the old man.

“I want to see a little of the German Empire,” replied Daniel. “I have some business to attend to up in the North, in the cities and also out in the country.”

“Good luck to you,” said Jordan, much oppressed, “good luck to you, my dear son. How long are you going to be gone?”

“Oh, I don’t know yet; possibly for years.”

“For years?” asked Jordan. He looked at the floor; he tried to keep his eyes on the floor under his feet: “Then I suppose we might as well say good-bye forever.”

Daniel shook his head. “It makes no difference when I return, I will find you here,” he said with a note of strange assurance in his voice. “When fate has treated a man too harshly, there seems to come a time when it no longer bothers him; it evades him, in fact. It seems to me that this is the case with you: you are quite fateless.”

Jordan made no reply. He opened his eyes as if in fear, and sighed.

The next morning Daniel left home. He wore a brown hunting jacket buttoned close up to his neck with hartshorn buttons. Over this hung a top-coat and a cape. His broad-brimmed hat overshadowed his face, which looked young, although so serious and distracted that voices, glances, and sounds of any kind seemed to rebound from it like swift-running water from a smooth stone wall.