Bertha Garlan
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Arthur Schnitzler >> Bertha Garlan
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13 BERTHA GARLAN
BY ARTHUR SCHNITZLER
I
She was walking slowly down the hill; not by the broad high road which
wound its way towards the town, but by the narrow footpath between the
trellises of the vines. Her little boy was with her, hanging on to her
hand and walking all the time a pace in front of her, because there was
not room on the footpath for them to walk side by side.
The afternoon was well advanced, but the sun still poured down upon her
with sufficient power to cause her to pull her dark straw hat a little
further down over her forehead and to keep her eyes lowered. The slopes,
at the foot of which the little town lay nestling, glimmered as though
seen through a golden mist; the roofs of the houses below glistened, and
the river, emerging yonder amongst the meadows outside the town,
stretched, shimmering, into the distance. Not a quiver stirred the air,
and it seemed as if the cool of the evening was yet far remote.
Bertha stooped for a moment and glanced about her. Save for her boy, she
was all alone on the hillside, and around her brooded a curious
stillness. At the cemetery, too, on the hilltop, she had not met anybody
that day, not even the old woman who usually watered the flowers and kept
the graves tidy, and with whom Bertha used often to have a chat. Bertha
felt that somehow a considerable time had elapsed since she had started
on her walk, and that it was long since she had spoken to anyone.
The church clock struck--six. So, then, scarcely an hour had passed since
she had left the house, and an even shorter time since she had stopped in
the street to chat with the beautiful Frau Rupius. Yet even the few
minutes which had slipped away since she had stood by her husband's grave
now seemed to be long past.
"Mamma!"
Suddenly she heard her boy call. He had slipped his hand out of hers and
had run on ahead.
"I can walk quicker than you, mamma!"
"Wait, though! Wait, Fritz!" exclaimed Bertha. "You're not going to leave
your mother alone, are you?"
She followed him and again took him by the hand.
"Are we going home already?" asked Fritz.
"Yes; we will sit by the open window until it grows quite dark."
Before long they had reached the foot of the hill and they began to walk
towards the town in the shade of the chestnut trees which bordered the
high-road, now white with dust. Here again they met but few people. Along
the road a couple of wagons came towards them, the drivers, whip in
hand, trudging along beside the horses. Then two cyclists rode by from
the town towards the country, leaving clouds of dust behind them. Bertha
stopped mechanically and gazed after them until they had almost
disappeared from view.
In the meantime Fritz had clambered up onto the bench beside the road.
"Look, mamma! See what I can do!"
He made ready to jump, but his mother took hold of him by the arms and
lifted him carefully to the ground. Then she sat down on the bench.
"Are you tired?" asked Fritz.
"Yes," she answered, surprised to find that she was indeed feeling
fatigued.
It was only then that she realized that the sultry air had wearied her to
the point of sleepiness. She could not, moreover, remember having
experienced such warm weather in the middle of May.
From the bench on which she was sitting she could trace back the course
of the path down which she had come. In the sunlight it ran between the
vine-trellises, up and up, until it reached the brightly gleaming wall of
the cemetery. She was in the habit of taking a walk along that path two
or three times a week. She had long since ceased to regard such visits to
the cemetery as anything other than a mere walk. When she wandered about
the well-kept gravel paths amongst the crosses and the tombstones, or
stood offering up a silent prayer beside her husband's grave, or, maybe,
laying upon it a few wild flowers which she had plucked on her way up,
her heart was scarcely any longer stirred by the slightest throb of pain.
Three years had, indeed, passed since her husband had died, which was
just as long as their married life had lasted.
Her eyes closed and her mind went back to the time when she had first
come to the town, only a few days after their marriage--which had taken
place in Vienna. They had only indulged in a modest honeymoon trip, such
as a man in humble circumstances, who had married a woman without any
dowry, could treat himself to. They had taken the boat from Vienna, up
the river, to a little village in Wachau, not far from their future home,
and had spent a few days there. Bertha could still remember clearly the
little inn at which they had stayed, the riverside garden in which they
used to sit after sunset, and those quiet, rather tedious, evenings which
were so completely different from those her girlish imagination had
previously pictured to her as the evenings which a newly-married couple
would spend. Of course, she had had to be content.
She was twenty-six years old and quite alone in the world when Victor
Mathias Garlan had proposed to her. Her parents had recently died. A long
time before, one of her brothers had gone to America to seek his fortune
as a merchant. Her younger brother was on the stage; he had married an
actress, and was playing comedy parts in third-rate German theatres. She
was almost out of touch with her relations and the only one whom she
visited occasionally was a cousin who had married a lawyer. But even that
friendship had grown cool as years had passed, because the cousin had
become wrapped up in her husband and children exclusively, and had almost
ceased to take any interest in the doings of her unmarried friend.
Herr Garlan was a distant relation of Bertha's mother. When Bertha was
quite a young girl he had often visited the house and made love to her in
a rather awkward way. In those days she had no reasons to encourage him,
because it was in another guise that her fancy pictured life and
happiness to her. She was young and pretty; her parents, though not
actually wealthy people, were comfortably off, and her hope was rather to
wander about the world as a great pianiste, perhaps, as the wife of an
artist, than to lead a modest existence in the placid routine of the home
circle. But that hope soon faded. One day her father, in a transport of
domestic fervour, forbade her further attendance at the conservatoire of
music, which put an end to her prospects of an artistic career and at the
same time to her friendship with the young violinist who had since made
such a name for himself.
The next few years were singularly dull. At first, it is true, she felt
some slight disappointment, or even pain, but these emotions were
certainly of short duration. Later on she had received offers of
marriage from a young doctor and a merchant. She refused both of them;
the doctor because he was too ugly, and the merchant because he lived in
a country town. Her parents, too, were by no means enthusiastic about
either suitor.
When, however, Bertha's twenty-sixth birthday passed and her father lost
his modest competency through a bankruptcy, it had been her lot to put up
with belated reproaches on the score of all sorts of things which she
herself had begun to forget--her youthful artistic ambitions, her love
affair of long ago with the violinist, which had seemed likely to lead to
nothing, and the lack of encouragement which the ugly doctor and the
merchant from the country received at her hands.
At that time Victor Mathias Garlan was no longer resident in Vienna. Two
years before, the insurance company, in which he had been employed since
he had reached the age of twenty, had, at his own request, transferred
him, in the capacity of manager, to the recently-established branch in
the little town on the Danube where his married brother carried on
business as a wine merchant. In the course of a somewhat lengthy
conversation which took place on the occasion of his farewell visit to
Bertha's parents, and which created a certain impression upon her, he had
mentioned that the principal reasons for his asking to be transferred to
the little town were that he felt himself to be getting on in years, that
he had no longer any idea of seeking a wife, and that he desired to have
some sort of a home amongst people who were closely connected with him.
At that time Bertha's parents had made fun of his notion, which seemed to
them somewhat hypochondriacal, for Garlan was then scarcely forty years
old. Bertha herself, however, had found a good deal of common sense in
Garlan's reason, inasmuch as he had never appeared to her as, properly
speaking, a young man.
In the course of the following years Garlan used often to come to Vienna
on business, and never omitted to visit Bertha's family on such
occasions. After supper it was Bertha's custom to play the piano for
Garlan's entertainment, and he used to listen to her with an almost
reverent attention, and would, perhaps, go on to talk of his little
nephew and niece--who were both very musical--and to whom he would often
speak of Fraulein Bertha as the finest pianiste he had ever heard.
It seemed strange, and Bertha's mother could not refrain from commenting
now and again upon it, that, since his diffident wooing in the old days,
Herr Garlan had not once ventured so much as to make the slightest
further allusion to the past, or even to a possible future. And thus
Bertha, in addition to the other reproaches to which she had to listen,
incurred the blame for treating Herr Garlan with too great indifference,
if not, indeed, with actual coldness. Bertha, however, only shook her
head, for at that time she had not so much as contemplated the
possibility of marrying this somewhat awkward man, who had grown old
before his time.
After the sudden death of her mother, which happened at a time when her
father had been lying ill for many months, Garlan reappeared upon the
scene with the announcement that he had obtained a month's holiday--the
only one for which he had ever applied. It was clearly evident to Bertha
that his sole purpose in coming to Vienna was to be of help to her in
that time of trouble and distress. And when Bertha's father died a week
after the funeral of her mother, Garlan proved himself to be a true
friend, and one, moreover, blessed with an amount of energy for which she
had never given him credit. He prevailed on his sister-in-law to come to
Vienna, so that she could help Bertha to tide over the first few weeks of
her bereavement, besides, in some slight degree, distracting her
thoughts. He settled the business affairs capably and quickly. His
kindness of heart did much to cheer Bertha during those sad days, and
when, on the expiration of his leave, he asked her whether she would be
his wife she acquiesced with a feeling of the most profound gratitude.
She was, of course, aware of the fact that if she did not marry him she
would in a few months' time have to earn her own living, probably as a
teacher, and, besides, she had come to appreciate Garlan and had become
so used to his company that she was able, in all sincerity, to answer
"Yes," both when he led her to the altar and subsequently when, as they
set off for their honeymoon, he asked her, for the first time, if she
loved him.
It was true that at the very outset of their married life she
discovered that she felt no love for him. She just let him love her and
put up with the fact, at first with a certain surprise at her own
disillusionment and afterwards with indifference. It was not until she
found that she was about to become a mother that she could bring
herself to reciprocate his affection. She very soon grew accustomed to
the quiet life of the little town, all the more easily because even in
Vienna she had led a somewhat secluded existence. With her husband's
family she felt quite happy and comfortable; her brother-in-law
appeared to be a most genial and amiable person, if not altogether
innocent of an occasional display of coarseness; his wife was
good-natured, and inclined at times to be melancholy. Garlan's nephew,
who was thirteen years old at the time of Bertha's arrival at the
little town, was a pert, good-looking boy; and his niece, a very sedate
child of nine, with large, astonished eyes, conceived a strong
attachment for Bertha from the very first moment that they met.
When Bertha's child was born, he was hailed by the children as a welcome
plaything, and, for the next two years, Bertha felt completely happy. She
even believed at times that it was impossible that her fate could have
taken a more favourable shape. The noise and bustle of the great city
came back to her memory as something unpleasant, almost hazardous; and
on one occasion when she had accompanied her husband to Vienna, in order
to make a few purchases and it so chanced, to her annoyance, that the
streets were wet and muddy with the rain, she vowed never again to
undertake that tedious and wholly unnecessary journey of three hours'
duration. Her husband died suddenly one spring morning three years after
their marriage. Bertha's consternation was extreme. She felt that she had
never taken into consideration the mere possibility of such an event. She
was left in very straitened circumstances. Soon, however, her
sister-in-law, with thoughtful kindness, devised a means by which the
widow could support herself without appearing to accept anything in the
nature of charity. She asked Bertha to take over the musical education of
her children, and also procured for her an engagement as music teacher to
other families in the town. It was tacitly understood amongst the ladies
who engaged her that they should always make it appear as if Bertha had
undertaken these lessons only for the sake of a little distraction, and
that they paid her for them only because they could not possibly allow
her to devote so much time and trouble in that way without some return.
What she earned from this source was quite sufficient to supplement her
income to an amount adequate to meet the demands of her mode of living,
and so, when time had deadened the first keen pangs and the subsequent
sorrow occasioned by her husband's death, she was again quite contented
and cheerful. Her life up to then had not been spent in such a way as to
cause her now to feel the lack of anything. Such thoughts as she gave to
the future were occupied by scarcely any other theme than her son in the
successive stages of his growth, and it was only on rare occasions that
the likelihood of marrying a second time crossed her mind, and then the
idea was always a mere fleeting fancy, for as yet she had met no one whom
she was able seriously to regard in the light of a possible second
husband. The stirrings of youthful desires, which she sometimes felt
within her in her waking morning hours, always vanished as the day
pursued its even course. It was only since the advent of the spring that
she had felt a certain disturbance of her previous sensation of
well-being; no longer were her nights passed in the tranquil and
dreamless sleep of heretofore, and at times she was oppressed by a
sensation of tedium, such as she had never experienced before. Strangest
of all, however, was the sudden access of lassitude which would often
come over her even in the daytime, under the influence of which she
fancied that she could trace the course of her blood as it circled
through her body. She remembered that she had experienced a similar
sensation in the days when she was emerging from childhood. At first this
feeling, in spite of its familiarity, was yet so strange to her that it
seemed as though one of her friends must have told her about it. It was
only when it recurred with ever-increasing frequency that she realized
that she herself had experienced it before.
She shuddered, with a feeling as though she were waking from sleep. She
opened her eyes.
It seemed to her that the air was all a-whirl; the shadows had crept
halfway across the road; away up on the hilltop the cemetery wall no
longer gleamed in the sunlight. Bertha rapidly shook her head to and fro
a few times as though to waken herself thoroughly. It seemed to her as if
a whole day and a whole night had elapsed since she had sat down on the
bench. How was it, then, that in her consciousness time passed in so
disjointed a fashion? She looked around her. Where could Fritz have gone
to? Oh, there he was behind her, playing with Doctor Friedrich's
children. The nursemaid was on her knees beside them, helping them to
build a castle with the sand.
The avenue was now less deserted than it had been earlier in the evening.
Bertha knew almost all the people who passed; she saw them every day. As,
however, most of them were not people to whom she was in the habit of
talking, they flitted by like shadows. Yonder came the saddler, Peter
Nowak, and his wife; Doctor Rellinger drove by in his little country trap
and bowed to her as he passed; he was followed by the two daughters of
Herr Wendelein, the landowner; presently Lieutenant Baier and his
_fiancee_ cycled slowly down the road on their way to the country. Then,
again, there seemed to be a short lull in the movement before her and
Bertha heard nothing but the laughter of the children as they played.
Then, again, she saw that some one was slowly approaching from the town,
and she recognized who it was while he was still a long way off. It was
Herr Klingemann, to whom of late she had been in the habit of talking
more frequently than had previously been her custom. Some twelve years
ago or more he had moved from Vienna to the little town. Gossip had it
that he had at one time been a doctor, and had been obliged to give up
his practice on account of some professional error, or even of some more
serious lapse. Some, however, asserted that he had never qualified as a
doctor at all, but, failing to pass his examinations, had finally given
up the study of medicine. Herr Klingemann, for his own part, gave
himself out to be a philosopher, who had grown weary of life in the
great city after having enjoyed it to satiety, and for that reason had
moved to the little town, where he could live comfortably on what
remained of his fortune.
He was now but little more than five-and-forty. There were still times
when he was of a genial enough aspect, but, for the most part, he had an
extremely dilapidated and disagreeable appearance.
While yet some distance away he smiled at the young widow, but did not
hasten his steps. Finally he stopped before her and gave her an ironical
nod, which was his habitual manner of greeting people.
"Good evening, my pretty lady!" he said.
Bertha returned his salutation. It was one of those days on which Herr
Klingemann appeared to make some claim to elegance and youthfulness. He
was attired in a dark grey frock coat, so tightly fitting that he might
almost have been wearing stays. On his head was a narrow brimmed brown
straw hat with a black band. About his throat, moreover, there was a very
tiny red cravat, set rather askew.
For a time he remained silent, tugging his slightly grizzled fair
moustache upwards and downwards.
"I presume you have come from up there, my dear lady?" he said.
Without turning his head or even his eyes, he pointed his finger over his
shoulder, in a somewhat contemptuous manner, in the direction of the
cemetery behind him.
Throughout the town Herr Klingemann was known as a man to whom nothing
was sacred, and as he stood before her, Bertha could not help thinking of
the various bits of gossip that she had heard about him. It was well
known that his relations with his cook, whom he always referred to as his
housekeeper, were of a somewhat more intimate nature than that merely of
master and servant, and his name was also mentioned in connexion with the
wife of a tobacconist, who, as he had himself told Bertha with proud
regret, deceived him with a captain of the regiment stationed in the
town. Moreover, there were several eligible girls in the neighbourhood
who cherished a certain tender interest in him.
Whenever these things were hinted at Herr Klingemann always made some
sneering remark on the subject of marriage in general, which shocked the
susceptibilities of many, but, on the whole, actually increased the
amount of respect in which he was held.
"I have been out for a short walk," said Bertha.
"Alone?"
"Oh, no; with my boy."
"Yes--yes--of course, there he is! Good evening, my little mortal!"--he
gazed away over Fritz's head as he said this--"may I sit down for a
moment beside you, Frau Bertha?"
He pronounced her name with an ironic inflection and, without waiting for
her to reply, he sat down on the bench.
"I heard you playing the piano this morning," he continued. "Do you know
what kind of an impression it made upon me? This: that with you music
must take the place of everything."
He repeated the word "everything" and, at the same time, looked at Bertha
in a manner which caused her to blush.
"What a pity I so seldom have the opportunity of hearing you play!" he
went on. "If I don't happen to be passing your open window when you are
at the piano--"
Bertha noticed that he kept on edging nearer to her, and that his arm was
touching hers. Involuntarily she moved away. Suddenly she felt herself
seized from behind, her head pulled back over the bench and a hand
clasped over her eyes.
For a moment she thought that it was Klingemann's hand, which she felt
upon her lids.
"Why, you must be mad, sir," she cried.
"How funny it is to hear you call me 'Sir,' Aunt Bertha!" replied the
laughing voice of a boy at her back.
"Well, do let me at least open my eyes, Richard," said Bertha, trying to
remove the boy's hands from her face. "Have you come from home!" she
added, turning round towards him.
"Yes, Aunt, and here's the newspaper which I have brought you."
Bertha took the paper which he handed to her and began to read it.
Klingemann, meanwhile, rose to his feet and turned to Richard.
"Have you done your exercises already?" he asked.
"We have no exercises at all now, Herr Klingemann, because our final
examination is to take place in July."
"So you will actually be a student by this time next year?"
"This time next year! It'll be in the autumn!"
As he said this Richard drummed his fingers along the newspaper.
"What do you want, then, you ill-mannered fellow?" asked Bertha.
"I say, Aunt, will you come and visit me when I am in Vienna?"
"Yes, I should like to catch myself! I shall be glad to be rid of you!"
"Here comes Herr Rupius!" said Richard.
Bertha lowered the paper and looked in the direction indicated by her
nephew's glance. Along the avenue leading from the town a maidservant
came, pushing an invalid's chair, in which a man was sitting. His head
was uncovered and his soft felt hat was lying upon his knees, from which
a plaid rug reached down to his feet. His forehead was lofty; his hair
smooth and fair and slightly grizzled at the temples; his feet were
peculiarly large. As he passed the bench on which Bertha was seated he
only inclined his head slightly, without smiling. Bertha knew that, had
she been alone, he would certainly have stopped; moreover, he looked only
at her as he passed by, and his greeting seemed to apply to her alone. It
seemed to Bertha that she had never before seen such a grave look in his
eyes as on this occasion, and she was exceedingly sorry, for she felt a
profound compassion for the paralysed man.
When Herr Rupius had passed by, Klingemann said:
"Poor devil! And wifie is away as usual on one of her visits to
Vienna, eh?"
"No," answered Bertha, almost angrily. "I was speaking to her only an
hour ago."
Klingemann was silent, for he felt that further remarks on the subject of
the mysterious visits of Frau Rupius to Vienna might not have been in
keeping with his own reputation as a freethinker.
"Won't he really ever be able to walk again?" asked Richard.
"No," said Bertha.
She knew this for a fact because Herr Rupius had told her so himself on
one occasion when she had called on him and his wife was in Vienna.
At that moment Herr Rupius seemed to her to be a particularly pitiful
figure, for, as he was being wheeled past her in his invalid's chair, she
had, in reading the paper, lighted upon the name of one whom she regarded
as a happy man.
Mechanically she read the paragraph again.
"Our celebrated compatriot Emil Lindbach returned to Vienna a few days
ago after his professional tour through France and Spain, in the course
of which he met with many a triumphant reception. In Madrid this
distinguished artist had the honour of playing before the Queen of Spain.
On the 24th of this month Herr Lindbach will take part in the charity
concert which has been organized for the relief of the inhabitants of
Vorarlberg, who have suffered such severe losses as a result of the
recent floods. A keen interest in the concert is being shown by the
public in spite of the fact that the season is so far advanced."
Emil Lindbach! It required a certain effort on Bertha's part to realize
that this was the same man whom she had loved--how many?--twelve years
ago. Twelve years! She could feel the hot blood mount up into her brow.
It seemed to her as though she ought to be ashamed of having gradually
grown older.
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