that God knows I could have killed her.
Yes, at that moment she stood in peril. I had not lied to her
about that.
"Surely you are not a coward?" suddenly she asked me.
"I do not know," I replied. "Perhaps I am, but I do not know.
I have long given up thinking about such things."
"If I said to you, 'Kill that man,' would you kill him?"
"Whom?"
"Whomsoever I wish?"
"The Frenchman?"
"Do not ask me questions; return me answers. I repeat,
whomsoever I wish? I desire to see if you were speaking
seriously just now."
She awaited my reply with such gravity and impatience that I
found the situation unpleasant.
"Do YOU, rather, tell me," I said, "what is going on here? Why
do you seem half-afraid of me? I can see for myself what is
wrong. You are the step-daughter of a ruined and insensate man
who is smitten with love for this devil of a Blanche. And there
is this Frenchman, too, with his mysterious influence over you.
Yet, you actually ask me such a question! If you do not tell me
how things stand, I shall have to put in my oar and do something.
Are you ashamed to be frank with me? Are you shy of me? "
"I am not going to talk to you on that subject. I have asked
you a question, and am waiting for an answer."
"Well, then--I will kill whomsoever you wish," I said. "But are
you REALLY going to bid me do such deeds?"
"Why should you think that I am going to let you off? I shall
bid you do it, or else renounce me. Could you ever do the
latter? No, you know that you couldn't. You would first kill
whom I had bidden you, and then kill ME for having dared to send
you away!"
Something seemed to strike upon my brain as I heard these words.
Of course, at the time I took them half in jest and half as a
challenge; yet, she had spoken them with great seriousness. I
felt thunderstruck that she should so express herself, that she
should assert such a right over me, that she should assume such
authority and say outright: "Either you kill whom I bid you, or
I will have nothing more to do with you." Indeed, in what she
had said there was something so cynical and unveiled as to pass
all bounds. For how could she ever regard me as the same after
the killing was done? This was more than slavery and abasement;
it was sufficient to bring a man back to his right senses. Yet,
despite the outrageous improbability of our conversation, my
heart shook within me.
Suddenly, she burst out laughing. We were seated on a bench near
the spot where the children were playing--just opposite the point
in the alley-way before the Casino where the carriages drew up
in order to set down their occupants.
"Do you see that fat Baroness?" she cried. "It is the Baroness
Burmergelm. She arrived three days ago. Just look at her
husband--that tall, wizened Prussian there, with the stick in his
hand. Do you remember how he stared at us the other day? Well,
go to the Baroness, take off your hat to her, and say something
in French."
"Why?"
"Because you have sworn that you would leap from the
Shlangenberg for my sake, and that you would kill any one whom I
might bid you kill. Well, instead of such murders and tragedies,
I wish only for a good laugh. Go without answering me, and let
me see the Baron give you a sound thrashing with his stick."
"Then you throw me out a challenge?--you think that I will not
do it?"
"Yes, I do challenge you. Go, for such is my will."
"Then I WILL go, however mad be your fancy. Only, look here:
shall you not be doing the General a great disservice, as well
as, through him, a great disservice to yourself? It is not about
myself I am worrying-- it is about you and the General. Why, for
a mere fancy, should I go and insult a woman?"
"Ah! Then I can see that you are only a trifler," she said
contemptuously. "Your eyes are swimming with blood--but only
because you have drunk a little too much at luncheon. Do I not
know that what I have asked you to do is foolish and wrong, and
that the General will be angry about it? But I want to have a
good laugh, all the same. I want that, and nothing else. Why
should you insult a woman, indeed? Well, you will be given a
sound thrashing for so doing."
I turned away, and went silently to do her bidding. Of course
that, as I approached the Baroness, I felt as excited as a
schoolboy. I was in a frenzy, as though I were drunk.
VI
Two days have passed since that day of lunacy. What a noise and
a fuss and a chattering and an uproar there was! And what a
welter of unseemliness and disorder and stupidity and bad
manners! And I the cause of it all! Yet part of the scene was
also ridiculous--at all events to myself it was so. I am not
quite sure what was the matter with me--whether I was merely
stupefied or whether I purposely broke loose and ran amok.
At times my mind seems all confused; while at other times
I seem almost to be back in my childhood, at the school desk,
and to have done the deed simply out of mischief.
It all came of Polina--yes, of Polina. But for her, there might
never have been a fracas. Or perhaps I did the deed in a fit of
despair (though it may be foolish of me to think so)? What there
is so attractive about her I cannot think. Yet there IS
something attractive about her--something passing fair, it would
seem. Others besides myself she has driven to distraction. She
is tall and straight, and very slim. Her body looks as though it
could be tied into a knot, or bent double, like a cord. The
imprint of her foot is long and narrow. It is, a maddening
imprint--yes, simply a maddening one! And her hair has a reddish
tint about it, and her eyes are like cat's eyes--though able also
to glance with proud, disdainful mien. On the evening of my
first arrival, four months ago, I remember that she was sitting
and holding an animated conversation with De Griers in the
salon. And the way in which she looked at him was such that
later, when I retired to my own room upstairs, I kept fancying
that she had smitten him in the face--that she had smitten him
right on the cheek, so peculiar had been her look as she stood
confronting him. Ever since that evening I have loved her.
But to my tale.
I stepped from the path into the carriage-way, and took my stand
in the middle of it. There I awaited the Baron and the Baroness.
When they were but a few paces distant from me I took off my
hat, and bowed.
I remember that the Baroness was clad in a voluminous silk
dress, pale grey in colour, and adorned with flounces and a
crinoline and train. Also, she was short and inordinately stout,
while her gross, flabby chin completely concealed her neck. Her
face was purple, and the little eyes in it had an impudent,
malicious expression.
Yet she walked as though she were
conferring a favour upon everybody by so doing. As for the
Baron, he was tall, wizened, bony-faced after the German
fashion, spectacled, and, apparently, about forty-five years of
age. Also, he had legs which seemed to begin almost at his
chest--or, rather, at his chin! Yet, for all his air of
peacock-like conceit, his clothes sagged a little, and his face
wore a sheepish air which might have passed for profundity.
These details I noted within a space of a few seconds.
At first my bow and the fact that I had my hat in my hand barely
caught their attention. The Baron only scowled a little, and the
Baroness swept straight on.
"Madame la Baronne," said I, loudly and distinctly--embroidering
each word, as it were--"j'ai l'honneur d'etre votre esclave."
Then I bowed again, put on my hat, and walked past the Baron
with a rude smile on my face.
Polina had ordered me merely to take off my hat: the bow and the
general effrontery were of my own invention. God knows what
instigated me to perpetrate the outrage! In my frenzy I felt as
though I were walking on air,
"Hein!" ejaculated--or, rather, growled--the Baron as he turned
towards me in angry surprise.
I too turned round, and stood waiting in pseudo-courteous
expectation. Yet still I wore on my face an impudent smile as I
gazed at him. He seemed to hesitate, and his brows contracted to
their utmost limits. Every moment his visage was growing darker.
The Baroness also turned in my direction, and gazed at me in
wrathful perplexity, while some of the passers-by also began to
stare at us, and others of them halted outright.
"Hein!" the Baron vociferated again, with a redoubled growl
and a note of growing wrath in his voice.
"Ja wohl!" I replied, still looking him in the eyes.
"Sind sie rasend?" he exclaimed, brandishing his stick, and,
apparently, beginning to feel nervous. Perhaps it was my costume
after the manner of a man who belongs to indisputably good
society.
"Ja wo-o-ohl!" cried I again with all my might with a
longdrawn rolling of the " ohl " sound after the fashion of the
Berliners (who constantly use the phrase "Ja wohl!" in
conversation, and more or less prolong the syllable "ohl"
according as they desire to express different shades of meaning
or of mood).
At this the Baron and the Baroness faced sharply about, and
almost fled in their alarm. Some of the bystanders gave vent to
excited exclamations, and others remained staring at me in
astonishment. But I do not remember the details very well.
Wheeling quietly about, I returned in the direction of Polina
Alexandrovna. But, when I had got within a hundred paces of her
seat, I saw her rise and set out with the children towards the
hotel.
At the portico I caught up to her.
"I have perpetrated the--the piece of idiocy," I said as I came
level with her.
"Have you? Then you can take the consequences," she replied
without so much as looking at me. Then she moved towards the
staircase.
I spent the rest of the evening walking in the park. Thence I
passed into the forest, and walked on until I found myself in a
neighbouring principality. At a wayside restaurant I partook of
an omelette and some wine, and was charged for the idyllic
repast a thaler and a half.
Not until eleven o'clock did I return home--to find a summons
awaiting me from the General.
Our party occupied two suites in the hotel; each of which
contained two rooms. The first (the larger suite) comprised a
salon and a smoking-room, with, adjoining the latter, the
General's study. It was here that he was awaiting me as he stood
posed in a majestic attitude beside his writing-table. Lolling
on a divan close by was De Griers.
"My good sir," the General began, "may I ask you what this is
that you have gone and done?"
"I should be glad," I replied, "if we could come straight to
the point. Probably you are referring to my encounter of today
with a German?"
"With a German? Why, the German was the Baron Burmergelm--a most
important personage! I hear that you have been rude both to him
and to the Baroness?"
"No, I have not."
"But I understand that you simply terrified them, my good sir?"
shouted the General.
"Not in the least," I replied. "You must know that when I was
in Berlin I frequently used to hear the Berliners repeat, and
repellently prolong, a certain phrase--namely, 'Ja wohl!'; and,
happening to meet this couple in the carriage-drive, I found,
for some reason or another, that this phrase suddenly recurred
to my memory, and exercised a rousing effect upon my spirits.
Moreover, on the three previous occasions that I have met the
Baroness she has walked towards me as though I were a worm which
could easily be crushed with the foot. Not unnaturally, I too
possess a measure of self-respect; wherefore, on THIS occasion I
took off my hat, and said politely (yes, I assure you it was
said politely): 'Madame, j'ai l'honneur d'etre votre esclave.'
Then the Baron turned round, and said 'Hein!'; whereupon I
felt moved to ejaculate in answer 'Ja wohl!' Twice I shouted
it at him--the first time in an ordinary tone, and the second
time with the greatest prolonging of the words of which I was
capable. That is all."
I must confess that this puerile explanation gave me great
pleasure. I felt a strong desire to overlay the incident with an
even added measure of grossness; so, the further I proceeded,
the more did the gusto of my proceeding increase.
"You are only making fun of me! " vociferated the General as,
turning to the Frenchman, he declared that my bringing about of
the incident had been gratuitous. De Griers smiled
contemptuously, and shrugged his shoulders.
"Do not think THAT," I put in. "It was not so at all. I grant
you that my behaviour was bad--I fully confess that it was so,
and make no secret of the fact. I would even go so far as to
grant you that my behaviour might well be called stupid and
indecent tomfoolery; but, MORE than that it was not. Also, let me
tell you that I am very sorry for my conduct. Yet there is one
circumstance which, in my eyes, almost absolves me from regret
in the matter. Of late--that is to say, for the last two or three
weeks--I have been feeling not at all well. That is to say, I
have been in a sick, nervous, irritable, fanciful condition, so
that I have periodically lost control over myself. For instance,
on more than one occasion I have tried to pick a quarrel even
with Monsieur le Marquise here; and, under the circumstances, he
had no choice but to answer me. In short, I have recently been
showing signs of ill-health. Whether the Baroness Burmergelm
will take this circumstance into consideration when I
come to
beg her pardon (for I do intend to make her amends) I do not
know; but I doubt if she will, and the less so since, so far as
I know, the circumstance is one which, of late, has begun to be
abused in the legal world, in that advocates in criminal cases
have taken to justifying their clients on the ground that, at
the moment of the crime, they (the clients) were unconscious of
what they were doing--that, in short, they were out of health.
'My client committed the murder--that is true; but he has no
recollection of having committed it.' And doctors actually
support these advocates by affirming that there really is such a
malady--that there really can arise temporary delusions which
make a man remember nothing of a given deed, or only a half or a
quarter of it! But the Baron and Baroness are members of an
older generation, as well as Prussian Junkers and landowners. To
them such a process in the medico-judicial world will be
unknown, and therefore, they are the more unlikely to accept any
such explanation. What is YOUR opinion about it, General?"
"Enough, sir! " he thundered with barely restrained fury.
"Enough, I say! Once and for all I must endeavour to rid myself
of you and your impertinence. To justify yourself in the eyes of
the Baron and Baroness will be impossible. Any intercourse with
you, even though it be confined to a begging of their pardons,
they would look upon as a degradation. I may tell you that, on
learning that you formed part of, my household, the Baron
approached me in the Casino, and demanded of me additional
satisfaction. Do you understand, then, what it is that you have
entailed upon me--upon ME, my good sir? You have entailed upon me
the fact of my being forced to sue humbly to the Baron, and to
give him my word of honour that this very day you shall cease to
belong to my establishment!"
"Excuse me, General," I interrupted, "but did he make an
express point of it that I should 'cease to belong to your
establishment,' as you call it?"
"No; I, of my own initiative, thought that I ought to afford him
that satisfaction; and, with it he was satisfied. So we must
part, good sir. It is my duty to hand over to you forty gulden,
three florins, as per the accompanying statement. Here is the
money, and here the account, which you are at liberty to verify.
Farewell. From henceforth we are strangers. From you I have
never had anything but trouble and unpleasantness. I am about to
call the landlord, and explain to him that from tomorrow onwards
I shall no longer be responsible for your hotel expenses. Also I
have the honour to remain your obedient servant."
I took the money and the account (which was indicted in pencil),
and, bowing low to the General, said to him very gravely:
"The matter cannot end here. I regret very much that you should
have been put to unpleasantness at the Baron's hands; but, the
fault (pardon me) is your own. How came you to answer for me to
the Baron? And what did you mean by saying that I formed part of
your household? I am merely your family tutor--not a son of
yours, nor yet your ward, nor a person of any kind for whose
acts you need be responsible. I am a judicially competent
person, a man of twenty-five years of age, a university
graduate, a gentleman, and, until I met yourself, a complete
stranger to you. Only my boundless respect for your merits
restrains me from demanding satisfaction at your hands, as well
as a further explanation as to the reasons which have led you to
take it upon yourself to answer for my conduct."
So struck was he with my words that, spreading out his hands, he
turned to the Frenchman, and interpreted to him that I had
challenged himself (the General) to a duel. The Frenchman
laughed aloud.
"Nor do I intend to let the Baron off," I continued calmly, but
with not a little discomfiture at De Griers' merriment. "And
since you, General, have today been so good as to listen to the