“So you have decided to come after all,” he said to young Pagel. “It’s very nice of you.”
VIII
Left alone, the Rittmeister gnawed his lip and looked at the ticket in his hand, undecided. The enthusiastic mood which had made all his confessions easy vanished with his two companions. Now he was overwhelmed by the situation, which was simply sickening. Angrily wrinkling his brow, he peered into the station hall. The men had become uneasy with the approach of the time due for departure; those sitting on the steps had got up; groups formed and were carrying on excited discussions; on the landing stood the bony agent attempting to reassure those crowding round him. His eyes searched the hall.
The Rittmeister retreated further behind his pillar. He saw no possibility of getting through this gang of hooligans unseen. Why hadn’t the damned platform more entrances?
I’m not going to take the men, I won’t take them under any circumstances. I’m not going to make myself the laughing-stock of the whole district. Farming in silk dresses and high-heeled shoes! Not a spare shirt, not a spare pair of trousers. If the rascals should ever get wet they’d all sit stark naked on their bunks till their things were dry again. What a fine state of affairs! No, the convicts for me.
The Rittmeister peered round the pillar, drew back quickly. The agent had left his elevated point of vantage; with the girl in the shabby blouse on one side of him, the old boy with the botanist-box and frock coat on the other, he was struggling toward the platform entrance, talking excitedly. The Rittmeister would have liked to creep into the pillar, turn to stone, dissolve—so terrified was he of this trio.
And just at that moment, at that most critical of critical moments, a girl’s voice, somewhat harsh but by no means unpleasant, sounded in his ear. “Oh, the Rittmeister!”
He swung round and stared.
Yes, it was true; before him stood, as if she had fallen from heaven, the daughter of his overseer Kowalewski, a girl whom he had always liked to see on account of her fresh appearance and dainty beauty, so different from the rest of the silly, clumsy girls working on the farm. He had often favored her with a fatherly word.
“Sophie!” he said. “What are you doing here, Sophie?”
“I’m going to spend a holiday with my parents,” she laughed, looking at him in quite a daughterly way.
“Ah, Sophie,” he said eagerly. “You come as if you were really sent from heaven. See that man on the other side of the pillar, with a bald head, yes, the tall one—don’t stare like that, Sophie!—he mustn’t see me under any circumstances. I’ve got to get to the train and there’s only three minutes more. Can’t you get him away somehow, just long enough for me to flit through the entrance hall? I have my ticket. Thanks, thanks, Sophie, I’ll explain it all in the train. You’re still the same splendid girl. Hurry!”
He heard her voice, loud, very quarrelsome. “I say, don’t stand in the way! I’ve got to get to my train. Here, you’d better take my bags.”
Fine girl! But she’d changed a lot. A bit flashy …
He raced off as fast as he could, not at all like a Rittmeister, not at all like an employer. The barrier. There in front was the barrier.
But perhaps the fellow had platform tickets. Queer shadows under her eyes. And her face had got fat, all its fineness gone. Bloated, yes, as if from drink … “I know, thanks; yes, I know, the train on the left—not the first time I’m traveling here. Thanks!”
Thank God he’d made it! But he would only be safe when the train was moving.… Yes, he was afraid little Sophie had already in the past got a little mixed up with the young fellows in the village, so he had heard—and Berlin was a very slippery place. He knew that to his own cost.… Thank God, there was Pagel waving! “Well, gentlemen, I’ve made it. Please, Studmann, please, Pagel—stand at the window so that no one can look in; the fellow’s quite capable of inspecting the carriages. I must first mop myself; I’m simply dripping. What a run, early in the morning.”
“So you got through without being molested?” asked Studmann.
“It wasn’t easy! And do you know who helped me? My overseer’s daughter! She happened to turn up, traveling home on holiday; she’s maid to some countess here in Berlin.… As a matter of fact, you might keep an eye open to see whether she still makes the train; it’s due to start at any moment now. You might ask her to get in here. I should like to find out how she’s getting on. A fine girl—she understood straight away, without a word!”
“Yes, but what does she look like? Old, young? Fat, thin? Fair, dark?”
“Ah, Berlin hasn’t done her much good. No, you’d better leave it. There would only be talk afterwards, and it would be awkward in Neulohe when we meet again. After all, she’s only the daughter of my overseer! Always keep to that rule, Pagel. Keep your distance from the men—no familiarity, no mixing with them. Understand?”
“Yes, Herr Rittmeister.”
“Thank God, we’re off. There, spread yourselves out comfortably. Let’s have a smoke. It’s fine, though, to travel out of this city into the summer, eh, Studmann? Eh, Pagel?”
“Marvelous!” said Studmann. “Something has just occurred to me, Prackwitz—doesn’t the man know your name?”
“Which man?”
“Why, the agent!”
“Yes, of course—why?”
“Well then, he’ll write to you and ask for compensation.”
“Damn it! I didn’t think of that. All that farce for nothing! But I won’t accept the letter; I’ll refuse to take it—no one can compel me to accept it.” The Rittmeister ground his teeth with rage.
“I’m very sorry, Prackwitz, but that will scarcely help.”
“Yes, you are sorry, Studmann. But you should either have told me that downstairs in the station or not at all. Now it’s too late! My whole journey’s spoiled! And it’s such nice weather!”
The Rittmeister stared angrily out of the window at his nice weather. Before Studmann could make any reply, however (and it was doubtful whether he had any great desire to do so), the door to the corridor opened and, instead of the guard, there appeared a very smart young girl. Smilingly she raised her hand to her little hat. “Orders executed, Herr Rittmeister!”
The Rittmeister jumped up, beaming. “This is fine, Sophie; so you caught the train, after all! I was already beginning to reproach myself. Gentlemen, this is Sophie Kowalewski, I’ve already told you … Herr von Studmann, Herr Pagel. The gentlemen are—ahem!—my guests. Well, that’s that. And now sit down here, Sophie, and tell me all the news. Cigarette? No, of course not. Very sensible. Young girls shouldn’t smoke at all, I always say that to my daughter. Fräulein Kuckhoff is right: women womanly—men manly. And you think so too, eh, Sophie?”
“Of course, Herr Rittmeister. Smoking is so unhealthy as well.” And with a glance at the two men listening: “Are the gentlemen coming only for the week-end or are they staying longer in Neulohe?”
Part Two
The Land Afire
Chapter Ten
The Peace of the Fields
I
It was no longer the same office. The bookshelves of ugly yellowish-gray pinewood, the desk with its green ink-stained felt, the over-large safe, were still there—but it was no longer the same office.
The windows sparkled; clean bright curtains had been put up; a dull gleam had been given to the furniture by an application of oil; the worn splintery floor had been planed smooth, waxed and polished; and the wheelwright had painted the safe a silver gray. No, it was no longer the same office.
Rittmeister von Prackwitz had at first worried about putting his friend into such a squalid office to scan wages lists and corn accounts. He need not have worried. Herr von Studmann was not the man to sit in squalor—he drove out slovenliness, gently but inexorably.
On one of those early days Studmann had had to fetch a key from the office—and Frau Hartig was standing on a window seat cleaning the windows. Studmann stopped and watched her. “Do you tidy up here?” h
e asked.
“I see to that all right!” Hartig said pugnaciously, for firstly she was deceived by this man’s gentleness and secondly she was angry with him because little Meier had gone. Even if she had solemnly renounced all right to the former bailiff, she couldn’t forgive the gentleman there—people said he was a detective—for the fact that Meier was gone.
The supposed detective did not reply, but for no earthly reason smelled the water with which she was cleaning the windows. Then he took the chamois in his hand, which was, of course, no chamois, but a mere rag, for Armgard at the Villa was not parting with good chamois for a bad office. Next he swung the cleaned window to and fro in the sunshine—Hartig’s whole body trembled with fury at a spy who now even sniffed round her work! His inspection finished, he raised his glance to the woman, seeming not to see that she was angry. “Your name is?”
“I am the coachman’s wife,” cried Hartig angrily and polished her window noisily.
“I see, the coachman’s wife,” said Studmann calmly. “And what is the coachman’s name?”
Then Hartig very excitedly and quickly said many things one after another; for example, that she understood her work, that it wasn’t necessary for anyone to come from Berlin to “learn” her how to work, that she had worked for four years in the Manor for the old lady before marrying Hartig, and that the old lady had always been satisfied with her, though she was actually hard to please …
“So your name is Frau Hartig,” said Herr von Studmann, patient because he had worked a long time in the hotel business. “Listen, Frau Hartig, this window cleaning is useless. One doesn’t clean windows in the sunshine—look, they are quite streaky.”
And he swung the window to and fro. But the annoyed Frau Hartig didn’t look. She knew quite well that the windows were streaky, but hitherto her work had been good enough for everyone. She said so, too.
Studmann was unmoved. “And it’s better to put a drop of spirit in the water; that makes the panes bright. But even then all your work will be in vain if you haven’t got a proper chamois. Look, the cloth is fluffy. There’s lots of fluff sticking to the windows!”
At first Frau Hartig was speechless with indignation. Then she asked Herr von Studmann very scornfully where was she to get spirit from, eh? She couldn’t sweat any through her ribs, and Armgard wouldn’t give her a chamois.…
“You shall get spirit and also a chamois,” said Studmann. “And if you haven’t got a chamois, you take an old newspaper—look, like this.” He seized an old newspaper and polished away. “See, like that! Isn’t it clean now?”
“That was the District Gazette!” exclaimed Frau Hartig contemptuously. “They’re collected and bound! No number must be missing.”
“Oh!” said Studmann, embarrassed—in the early days both he and Pagel frequently made such mistakes out of sheer ignorance. He unfolded the damp paper ball. “The date is still readable—I’ll order another.” He made a note of the date.
This little blunder, however, had exhausted his patience. He spoke more curtly. “And now go home. This half-cleaning is useless. Come this evening at six. Then I’ll show you how I want the office and the room cleaned.”
And he went off with his key in his hand. Frau Hartig, though, was quite undisturbed by the talk of this ass from Berlin who would be hopping it in the next few days, anyway. She went on cleaning in her own way, and did not dream of appearing at six, as ordered.
When, however, curiosity impelled her to go to the staff-house towards seven, she saw to her indignation that Black Minna, that sanctimonious bitch, was pottering around, and when she entered quietly, seizing a pail and flannel as if nothing had happened, the detective merely turned round and said in his beastly gentle way: “You are dismissed, Frau Hartig. You don’t clean here anymore.” And before she was able to make any reply, he turned away. The wheelwright and his boy set their planes going with a shrap! shrap! shrip! Frau Hartig had stood there like Hagar driven into the wilderness. Tears had had no effect on the old lady, nor sobs on Frau Eva, nor pleadings on the Rittmeister; all had suddenly become different, a new wind was blowing.… “Yes, if Herr von Studmann doesn’t want to have you, then you can’t have done your work properly, Frieda. So we can’t say anything, and we can’t help you.” Not even the information about the spoiled newspaper, not even the news that Herr von Studmann had had Amanda for over an hour in the office after midnight—nothing which was usually listened to so willingly—had effect. “No, go home now, Frieda! You mustn’t gossip like that—gossiping is a very ugly habit. You must get out of it, Frieda.”
And so she had had to go, to a grumbling husband who was very displeased with her, and she hadn’t even been right in her prophecy that on Saturday evening, after the paying of all the many employees, the office would again look like a pigsty. No, it still looked spotless, for that ass from Berlin had placed a table and two chairs on the grass outside the door, and had paid out the wages there. The men, who were always ready to be impressed by anything new, had thought it wonderful.
“But what will he do when it rains? And in the winter?” Frau Hartig had screamed.
“Be quiet, Frieda,” said the men. “You’re just jealous. He’s ten times cleverer than you. He’s already kicked out Black Meier, and if you scream too much he’ll kick you out as well!”
“He ordered the poultry maid to come to him in the office at midnight!” she cried angrily.
“You’d like to cut her out again, as you did with little Meier, wouldn’t you?” the men had laughed. “Ah, Hartig, you’re silly. He’s really a fine gentleman, like the Rittmeister, and he doesn’t think of you or Amanda. Just be quiet!”
II
And now it was Sunday, a Sunday afternoon after a really busy week, and Herr von Studmann and Pagel were sitting in the spick-and-span office. Studmann was smoking a fine smooth Havana from the Rittmeister’s special box, for they had both been invited “over there” to lunch; young Pagel was smoking one of his own cigarettes.
Yes, both men, to the great awe of the Neulohe employees, had been invited to lunch in the Villa, having already been there twice for supper. This had never yet happened with farm officials, and it added to the rumors about their unusual mission. The elder of the two gentlemen, the one with the somewhat egg-shaped head and brown eyes, had even lived in the Villa until the nocturnal disappearance of little Meier. Then, of course, he had at once moved over to the staff-house—to be sure, against the Rittmeister’s will, who had actually asked him, as was learned from Armgard the cook, to stay. But no, the gentleman had said: “I’m sorry, Prackwitz, but I want to live where my work is. You can see me as often as you like!” And now the younger gentleman, Herr Pagel, lived in the bailiff’s room and the older in the gable room. What work they had in Neulohe would also be discovered in time—for they understood nothing about farming, that much was certain!
Von Studmann, then, was smoking at his desk, going through the lists of specifications. This he did but superficially, for in the first place it was warm, and then the lunch had been excellent. One ate much too much here now that one was so often in the fresh air. Violently Studmann shut his corn account and said to Pagel, who was sitting at the window, blinking with half-closed eyes at the Geheimrat’s sunlit park: “Well, what shall we do? Shall we hit the hay for a bit? God, I’m tired!”
Pagel must have been just as tired, for he did not even open his mouth. But he pointed to the ceiling from which hung a fly-catcher with flies buzzing and humming around it. Studmann looked thoughtfully at the joyful summer dances of these tormenters and then said: “You are right, they wouldn’t let us sleep for a moment. Well, what then?”
“I haven’t seen the forest properly yet,” said Pagel. “Shall we go along and look it over? They say there are ponds there, crayfish ponds, icy cold. We could take our bathing suits with us.”
“Fine!” agreed Studmann, and five minutes later the two left the staff-house.
The first person they met was the old
gentleman, Geheimrat Horst-Heinz von Teschow. The cunning old man was plodding along in his shaggy green suit, oak stick in hand; and when the two, who hardly knew him, were passing on with a short greeting, he called to them: “But this is fine, gentlemen, meeting you! I was wondering, thinking, brooding: Have the gentlemen already departed again? Have they had enough of the country and farming?—Why, I haven’t seen you for days!”
As was proper the two smiled at this joke of the Geheimrat’s, Herr von Studmann very coldly, but Pagel with honest pleasure.
“And now the gentlemen want to take a little Sunday afternoon stroll, for recreation, eh? The village beauties walk along over there, young man—I don’t dare bring that to Herr von Tutmann’s notice.”
“Studmann,” corrected the one-time first lieutenant.
“Yes, of course, please excuse me, of course, dear sir. Of course I know. It just slipped out, because people around here call you that. ‘Tut Du Man,’ one of the drivers said yesterday, someone you must have ticked off for his driving. Many around here call you that.”
“Yesterday,” said Studmann.
“Why say yesterday? Or wasn’t it yesterday? Of course it was yesterday. My head’s still screwed on, Herr von Studmann.”
Pagel burst out laughing.
The old man was still for a moment, puzzled. Then he laughed, too. Still laughing, he gave Pagel a very hefty pat on the shoulder. Pagel was tempted to reciprocate, but he didn’t know the jolly old fellow very well yet, so he let it go.
“Magnificent,” cried the Geheimrat. “He got me there. Cunning fellow, Herr von Studmann. No slouch he!” And suddenly the Geheimrat was serious, which convinced Studmann that the whole thing was an act put on for Pagel and himself for some temporarily inexplicable reason. Ready for battle, Studmann thought, “I’ll catch you again.”