XVII
In obedience to his father’s summons, Christian travelled to Würzburg.
Their greeting was most courteous. “I hope I have not interfered with any plans of yours,” said Albrecht Wahnschaffe.
“I am at your disposal,” Christian said coolly.
They took a walk on the old ramparts but said little. The beautiful dog Freia, who was the constant companion of Albrecht Wahnschaffe, trotted along between them. It surprised the elder Wahnschaffe to observe on Christian’s face the signs of inner change.
That evening, over their tea, he said with an admirably generous gesture. “You’re to be congratulated, I understand, on a very unusual acquisition. A wreath of legends surrounds this diamond. The incident has caused quite a whirl of dust to fly and not a little amazement. Not unjustly so, it seems to me, since you are neither a British Duke nor an Indian Maharajah. Is the stone so very desirable?”
“It is marvellous,” Christian said. And suddenly the words of Voss slipped into his mind: One must expiate the lust of the eye.
Albrecht Wahnschaffe nodded. “I don’t doubt it, and I understand such passions, though, as a man of business, I must regret the tying up of so much capital. It is an eccentricity; and the world is endangered whenever the commoners grow eccentric. And so I should like to ask you to reflect on this aspect of things: all the privileges which you enjoy, all the easements of life, the possibility of satisfying your whims and passions, the supremacy of your social station—all these things rest on work. Need I add—on the work of your father?”
The dog Freia had strolled out from a corner of the room, and laid her head caressingly on Christian’s knee. Albrecht Wahnschaffe, slightly annoyed and jealous, gave her a smart slap on one flank.
He continued. “An exploitation of one’s capacity for work which reaches the extent of mine involves, of course, the broadest self-denial in all other matters. One becomes a ploughshare that tears up the earth and rusts. Or one is like a burning substance, luminiferous but self-consumed. Marriage, family, friendship, art, nature—these things scarcely exist for me. I have lived like a miner in his shaft. And what thanks do I get? Demagogues tell those whom they delude that I am a vampire, who sucks the blood of the oppressed. These poisoners of our public life either do not know or do not wish to know the shocks and sufferings and renunciations that have been mine, and of which their peaceful ‘wage-slave’ has no conception.”
Freia snuggled closer up to Christian, licked his hand, and her eyes begged humbly for a look. The beast’s dumb tenderness soothed him. He frowned, and said laconically: “If it is so, and you feel it so keenly, why do you go on working?”
“There is such a thing as duty, my dear spoiled boy, such a thing as loyalty to a cause,” Albrecht Wahnschaffe answered, and a gleam of anger showed in his pale-blue eyes. “Every peasant clings to the bit of earth into which he has put his toil. When I began to work, our country was still a poor country; to-day it is rich. I shall not say that what I have accomplished is considerable, when compared to the sum of our national accomplishment, but it has counted. It is a symptom of our rise, of our young might, of our economic welfare. We are one of the very great nations now, and have a body as well as a countenance.”
“What you say is doubtless most true,” Christian answered. “Unhappily I have no instinct for such matters; my personality is defective in things of that kind.”
“A quarter of a century ago your fate would have been that of a bread earner,” Albrecht Wahnschaffe continued, without reacting to Christian’s words. “To-day you are a descendant and an heir. Your generation looks upon a changed world and age. We older men have fastened wings upon your shoulders, and you have forgotten how painful it is to creep.”
Christian, in a sombre longing for the warmth of some body, took the dog’s head between his hands, and with a grunt of gratitude she raised herself up and laid her paws on his shoulders. With a smile, that included his petting of the dog, he said: “No one refuses the good things that fall into his lap. It is true I have never asked whence everything comes and whither it tends. To be sure, there are other ways of living; and I may yet embrace one of them some day. Then it will be apparent whether one becomes another man, and what kind, when the supports or the wings, as you put it, are gone.” His face had grown serious.
Albrecht Wahnschaffe suddenly felt himself rather helpless before this handsome, proud stranger who was his son. To hide his embarrassment, he answered hastily: “A different way of living—that is just what I mean. It was the conviction that a life which is nothing but a chain of trifles must in the end become a burden, that made me suggest a career to you that is worthier of your powers and gifts. How would you like the profession of diplomacy? Wolfgang seems thoroughly satisfied with the possibilities that he sees opening up before him. It is not too late for you either. It will not be difficult to make up the time lost. Your name outweighs any title of nobility. You would stay in a suitable atmosphere; you have large means, the necessary personal qualities and relations. Everything will adjust itself automatically.”
Christian shook his head. “You are mistaken, father,” he said, softly but firmly. “I have no capacity for anything like that, and no taste for it at all.”
“I suspected as much,” Albert Wahnschaffe said, in his liveliest manner. “Let us not speak of it any more. My second proposal is far more congenial to myself. I would encourage you to co-operate in the activities of our firm. My plan is to create a representative position for you in either our home or our foreign service. If you choose the latter you may select your own field of activity—Japan, let us say, or the United States. We would furnish you with credentials that would make your position very independent. You would assume responsibilities that are in no wise burdensome, and enjoy all the privileges of an ambassador. All that is needed is your consent. I shall arrange all details.”
Christian arose from his chair. “I beg you very earnestly, father, to drop that subject,” he said. His expression was cold and his eyes cast down.
Albrecht Wahnschaffe arose too. “Do not be rash, Christian,” he admonished his son. “I shall not conceal the fact that a definitive refusal on your part would wound me deeply. I have counted on you.” He looked at Christian with a firm glance. But Christian was silent.
After a while he asked: “How long ago is it since you were at the works?”
“It must be three or four years ago,” Christian answered.
“It was three years ago on Whitsuntide, if I remember rightly,” Albrecht Wahnschaffe said, with his habitual touch of pride in his memory, which was rarely at fault. “You had agreed on a pleasure trip in the Harz mountains with your cousin, Theo Friesen, and Theo was anxious to pay a flying visit to the factories. He had heard of our new welfare movement for workingmen, and was interested in it. But you scarcely stopped after all.”
“No, I persuaded Theo to go on. We had a long way ahead of us, and I was anxious to get to our quarters.”
Christian remembered the whole incident now. Evening had come before the car drove through the streets of the factory village. He had yielded to his cousin’s wish, but suddenly his aversion for this world of smoke and dust and sweat and iron had awakened. He had not wanted to leave the car, and had ordered the driver to speed up.
Nevertheless he recalled the hellish music made up of beaten steel and whirring wheels. He could still hear the thundering, whistling, wheezing, screeching, hissing; he could still see the swift procession of forges, cylinders, pumps, steam-hammers, furnaces, of all kinds; the thousands of blackened faces, a race that seemed made of coal in the breath of the fierce glow of white and crimson fires; misty electric moons that quivered in space; vehicles like death barrows swallowed up in the violet darkness; the workingmen’s homes, with their appearance of comfort, and their reality of a bottomless dreariness; the baths, libraries, club-houses, crêches, hospitals, infants’ homes, ware-houses, churches, and cinemas. The stamp of force and servitude, of all that is ugliest on earth, was bedizened and tinted in fair colours here, and all menaces were throttled and fettered.
Young Friesen had exhausted himself with admiration, but Christian had not breathed freely again until their car was out on the open road and had left the flaring horror in its panic flight.
“And you have not been there since?” Albrecht Wahnschaffe asked.
“No, not since that day.”
For a while they stood opposite each other in silence. Albrecht Wahnschaffe took Freia by her collar, and said with notable self-control: “Take counsel with yourself. There is time. I shall not urge you unduly, but rather wait. When you come to weigh the circumstances, and test your own mind, you will realize that I have your welfare at heart. Do not answer me now. When you have made a clear decision—let me know what it is.”
“Have I your permission to retire?” Christian asked. His father nodded, and he bowed and left the room.
Next morning he returned to Christian’s Rest.