In Paradise: A Novel. Vol. I.

by Paul Heyse

CHAPTER VIII.

Punctually at eight o'clock Rosenbusch made his appearance at Felix's lodgings. He was arrayed with a gorgeousness such as he only assumed on the most extraordinary occasions. It is true, picturesque lights played in the folds of his violet velvet jacket, indicative of the extreme age of its material; but those who knew that this garment, as was authentically proved by the records, was cut from the robe of state worn by an historical Countess of Tilly, regarded it with reverence, especially as it was exceedingly becoming to its present red-cheeked wearer. About his neck he had wound a spotlessly white cambric necktie, tied in a delicate knot. His white waistcoat was, to be sure, a little yellowed, and his black trousers were a little shiny in places; but when he entered his friend's room with an elastic step, carrying his tall, antiquated cylinder hat under his arm, and swinging a pair of tolerably white kid gloves in one hand, he cut, upon the whole, such an excellent figure that Felix felt called upon to say something flattering concerning his toilet.

"One must maintain the honor of his station, and prove to the world that the tailor ought to learn from the artist, and not the reverse," replied the painter, with great solemnity, stopping before the glass and endeavoring to give a bolder wave to his cropped hair.

"Now you," he continued, "haven't by any means got rid of the baron yet. Take my word for it, clothes really do make the man. One is a very different kind of fellow in his shirt-sleeves or in a blouse, than in one of the elegant, pinched-up monkey-jackets of the latest style. Doesn't every one of us play a rôle? Now just ask Elfinger whether the true spirit of the rôle doesn't lie in the costume of the actor. I, for example, in a coat that any Tom or Dick could wear, should feel myself so lowered to their level that I shouldn't want to take a brush in my hand. But dressed as I am, even in my company toilet, I can shout anch' io as lustily as far greater people. But you show no signs of getting ready. What do you say to making a sensation by coming late?"

Felix had had time to relapse once more into his melancholy mood. He answered that he had had disagreeable news from home, and was in no humor for going into company. Rosenbusch must excuse him; besides, it would make no difference to the countess whether an unknown beginner--

"What!" cried the battle-painter, "you are going to leave me to go alone to the enchanted garden of this Armida, while all the time I have been counting on you to save me in case of necessity! Jansen is sure to come late in any case, even if he decides to go at all. No, my dear fellow, you know I expend such unheard-of courage on canvas, that not much remains to me for the salon. So, back to back, shoulder to shoulder, with a friend and companion-in-arms, or I will crawl into the first violon-cello-case I come to, and bring disgrace upon the Paradise Club."

He forced Felix, who half laughed and half protested, to make his toilet, and then dragged him out with him, holding tightly to his arm even after they were in the street, as though he still feared that he might try to give him the slip. At heart Felix was glad to be forced. He was secretly ashamed of his fear to enter, even on a day when she was absent, the house where his old sweetheart was living; but now all the depression which had weighed upon him ever since he found out she was in the city left him in the company of his merry friend, and the latter's account of his latest adventures as rejected suitor and happy lover put him in the most cheerful humor. He rallied the artist upon his flighty heart, which, instead of dreading the fire like a burned child, wanted to singe itself in this new flame; all of which Rosenbusch received with a quiet sigh.

"The fact is," he said, "a countess like this is not so very dangerous. It goes without saying, that in all intercourse with her one must respect certain limits when one is a poor fool of a painter who has to let himself be snubbed even by a glove-maker. But if, on the other hand, a female demon like this should really take it into her head to elope with one of my sort to Italy or Siberia, let us say--well, she will know what she is about; and in the mean time we can let things go as Heaven wills."

Amid talk of this sort they had reached the hotel, in the first story of which a row of lighted windows had already shown them where the female autocrat of all the arts was holding her court. Felix pulled his hat down lower over his forehead, and sprang up the stairs so rapidly that Rosenbusch was left behind breathless.

"You are an extraordinary fellow!" he cried, laughing, after he had overtaken him at the top. "It takes a good deal of diplomacy to get you started, but once started, you can't get there soon enough."

Felix made no reply, for just then a servant opened a side-door and they entered a spacious salon, which resounded with the last notes of one of Chopin's nocturnes, with which the hostess herself had opened the soirée.

A rather mixed company was grouped about the piano, mostly young people with long hair and pale faces, of the music-of-the-future sort; mingled with these a few diplomatists, officers, journalists, and people without any other profession than that of knowing everybody and being introduced everywhere. The professor of æsthetics advanced to meet the new arrivals with a sort of host-like cordiality, and shook hands with them. He wore an old-fashioned blue dress-coat with gold buttons, a yellow piqué waistcoat, white summer trousers, and a stiff, black cravat, that compelled him to keep his chin perpetually thrown up. Stephanopulos emerged from the crowd of enthusiastic courtiers in order to welcome the guests, which he too did as if he felt himself quite at home. But now the dense circle divided, and the countess herself swept up to the new-comers.

She had made an exceedingly becoming toilet--a dark dress of light material, that left bare her shoulders, which were still youthful in appearance; and a Venetian point-lace veil, thrown with studied carelessness about her head, and fastened on one side by a fresh, dark-red rose. The dead white of her cheeks looked more blooming than usual in the warm light of the candles, and her keen, piercing eyes and white teeth vied with one another in brilliancy.

"I am so glad you have kept your word," she exclaimed to the young men, giving one of her soft little hands to each of them. "I hope, too, your talented friend and master will also find his way here; and you shall not regret having come. To be sure, I told you beforehand you must be contented with what your ears would let you enjoy. Still, your eyes sha'n't go away quite unsatisfied. Come, I will show you something beautiful."

She took Felix's arm, and, talking rapidly all the time, led him to the other end of the salon. In a corner, on a semicircular sofa, sat several mothers and duennas, and in the chairs on either side perhaps a half dozen young girls, all belonging to the stage or the music-school, engaged in earnest conversation with some young musicians about the latest opera and the last concert. A little to one side of them a group of elderly gentlemen could be seen gathered about a slight, youthful figure, who sat near a little flower-stand, and who appeared to be listening in rather an absent way to a white-haired little man, who was giving a long disquisition on Bach's Passion-Music. Her back was turned toward the side from which the countess approached with Felix. Now, upon hearing the hostess's voice, she turned with much dignity.

"Allow me, ma toute belle, to introduce to you Baron von Weiblingen and Herr Rosenbusch," said the countess. "The gentlemen are artists, dear Irene; Herr Rosenbusch is a painter and musician.--You have brought your flute, haven't you?"

The painter exhausted himself in assurances of his inability to produce his sounds of Nature, as he called them, for any ears but his own; but the countess had already turned to Felix again.

"Did I say too much?" she whispered, loud enough for the Fräulein to hear her. "Isn't she charming? But your silence says enough. Happy youth! For a woman's ears there is no sweeter music than such silence, when she herself is the cause of it. I leave you to your enchantment; bonne chance!"

She tapped his arm lightly with her black fan, nodded slyly to the beautiful girl, and disappeared once more in the crowd about the piano.

The old gentleman, a musical amateur of the old school whom the countess hoped to convert to the new movement, had withdrawn upon the approach of the young men. Rosenbusch took advantage of the moment to make his bows as gracefully as possible, and to open the conversation by asking how the gracious Fräulein liked Munich. Then, upon turning round to give Felix a chance to say something, he discovered to his great surprise that the latter had withdrawn into one of the window niches, from which he vanished a few minutes after. "What devil has got into our young baron?" thought Rosenbusch. It seemed to him out of all propriety to abruptly turn one's back on a charming young lady. However, he determined to take advantage of this opportunity to show himself in a still more favorable light, for the Fräulein pleased him.

She was very simply dressed, which fact, however, only served to contrast her advantageously with the others, with their silks and showy ornaments. The excursion that was to have lasted several days had been shortened, for the old countess had been seized with an attack of neuralgia, and Irene had scarcely reached home when she was taken possession of by her fellow-lodger for this, as the latter had assured her, entirely improvised soirée, for which there was no need to make any great toilet. Her uncle had fled to a gentlemen's club. It was impossible for her to refuse the invitation.

In truth, it was a matter of perfect indifference to her into what company she went. What did she care for any strange faces since the one which was dearest to her had become a stranger? And she had not had the faintest suspicion that she should meet him here.

And now she stood opposite him, and the only look that was exchanged between them showed her that he had come into her presence not less unexpectedly.

A violin concerto, which, to Rosenbusch's great disgust, interrupted him in an eloquent description of the pleasant summer weather in the Bavarian mountains, gave her time to collect her thoughts and to recover herself so far, at least, as not to betray by her manner the emotions that were at strife within her. But what would come next--what she ought to do--was no clearer to her now, when the last tones of the violins were dying away, than in the first few minutes.

"My friend the baron has suddenly disappeared," Rosenbusch now began again. "You must have got a curious impression of him; for, upon my word, he stood before you like a painted Turk, as they say here in Munich. I'll eat my head if I can understand why he suddenly became such a stick. He is generally a devilish jolly fellow, and not at all bashful in the presence of ladies."

"He is--your friend?" she asked, in an almost inaudible voice.

"We have known each other for several weeks, and you know, until one has eaten salt with a man--in the mean time, I imagine I think more of him than he does of your humble servant."

"Your friend--is also an artist?"

"Most certainly, Fräulein. He has devoted himself to sculpture under the instruction of his old friend, the celebrated Jansen. How he suddenly came to do it, no one knows. Don't you, too, think he looks more like a cavalier? At all events there is something so romantic, interesting, and Lord Byronish about him that I should not wonder at all if he found tremendous favor with the women. I beg pardon, if I have expressed myself too freely."

He grew red and plucked at his cuffs. She appeared to take no offense at his forcible style, but merely asked again, in the most indifferent tone:

"You think he has no talent?"

"How much talent he has, God only knows," replied his friend candidly. "But one thing is certain, a gigantic courage and a devilish deal of perseverance are required of one who ventures to take up with sculpture nowadays. You wouldn't believe, Fräulein, how difficult it is--in this profession of all others--to find the means with which to mount to the source, in this strait-laced civilization of ours, with its conventional prejudices. The days when three goddesses did not think it improper to get a certificate of their beauty from a royal goatherd--I beg a thousand pardons, I always do wax warm when I think of our wretched art-condition, and then I blurt out whatever comes into my head. This much is certain: if my friend has allowed himself to be induced merely by his love of beauty to become an artist, instead of living on his estates, he will find he has reckoned without his host even here in Munich. There are charming girls here, to be sure;--seen on the street as they sweep by in their coquettish costumes, with their little hats and chignons, one might almost be tempted to sell one's soul to the devil out of pure delight--but when one comes to examine them by a stronger light--"

The Fräulein all at once seemed to discover that her presence was imperatively required opposite, where the music pupils were sitting. She rose hastily, bowed coldly to the astonished artist, and approached one of the young ladies with the question whether she too did not find it very warm.

Rosenbusch gazed upon her with open mouth. A suspicion dawned in his innocent brain that perhaps his conversation had appeared rather too free-and-easy to this young lady. He could not understand this, and laid it to the score of her North German education. He had talked in a similar way with his countrywomen at balls, without arousing any special displeasure. Now he slunk pensively away from the flower-stand, just as a promising amateur began to perform one of Bach's preludes. Slipping quietly along, and keeping close to the wall, he succeeded in reaching the adjoining room, which was dimly lighted, without attracting attention. A lady's-maid had been making tea there. The national samovar was still singing on the little table, as though secretly accompanying the playing outside. But in the doorway stood Felix, his gaze, piercing through all the crowd and confusion, fixed upon one particular spot.

He started as the battle-painter's hand was laid softly on his shoulder, and scowled angrily. Rosenbusch thought he did not wish to be disturbed while listening to the music, and kept as still as a mouse as long as the prelude lasted. He himself did not care for Bach. He was, as he expressed it, too "cyclopean" for him. He preferred something melting or merry. So he spent the time in looking about the room, and was astonished to see on an easel near the window, in a sufficiently good light to attract attention, that cartoon of the Bride of Corinth which had brought so little honor to Stephanopulos in "Paradise." The burned corner had not yet been repaired, so that the singular picture made a still more weird impression among its elegant surroundings.

How came it here? Who could have brought it to the countess? Could it be that the young sinner himself had lent a helping hand in getting it for her? His name stood in the corner that had been spared by the fire. It was possible that the honest finder, whom Rosenbusch caught in flagranti that night in the "Paradise" garden, had returned it to the artist; that the countess had seen it in his studio, and thought that it would be piquant to exhibit a drawing in her house which had been condemned by the male critics on account of its lack of modesty. Oh, these countesses!--these Russians!

The door leading to a third room was also standing open--to no less a sanctum than the sleeping-chamber of the lady of the house. A hanging-lamp was suspended within, whose light streamed through a rose-colored shade, casting its dreamy rays upon the furniture, and upon the bed hung with embroidered muslin. Near the bed, in an arm-chair, a woman's figure reclined, motionless, so that it could only be discerned with difficulty by a person outside. But Rosenbusch, who was to-day in one of his reckless moods, had already advanced several steps into the sanctum, when he suddenly saw two piercing eyes fixed upon him. He felt as if he had encountered the glowing eyes of a cat in the dark. Confusedly stammering an apology, he bowed to the silent unknown, and hastily beat a retreat into the front room.

In the mean while the playing had come to an end, and the salon resounded once more with a confusion of voices in all tongues and dialects; but still Felix stood there, solitary and unapproachable, as if no one among all who surrounded him knew how to speak his language.

"You don't seem inclined to be particularly gallant," he now heard the cheerful voice of the battle-painter remark; "or was it merely because you didn't want to cut me out that you refrained from engaging in any further conversation with that splendid Fräulein? If you had looked closer at her, you would hardly have been capable of such rather insulting magnanimity toward my poor self. A perfectly splendid girl, I assure you; very exclusive, intellectual and amiable; and without wanting to flatter myself, I really believe I didn't give her a bad impression of the Munich artists. If I were not so wholly engaged already--But, by-the-way, have you seen what is standing over there, on the easel? That Stephanopulos!--just look at him over there, half sprawling over the piano--how he follows the countess with his eyes, all the while, with a face like an Ecce Homo of Mount Athos! A devilish queer kind of fellow!"

"Did she inquire about me?" interrupted Felix, suddenly starting out of his brooding. He passed his hand over his forehead, on which the cold perspiration had started, and drew a long breath. Just at that moment Irene's slender figure glided out of the salon in spite of the countess's earnest attempts to detain her.

"Inquire after you?" repeated the artist. "Of course she did. Such a dumb cavalier, who immediately vanishes into obscurity, couldn't help exciting a woman's curiosity."

"And what--what did you say about me?" eagerly inquired Felix.

"I excused you as well as I could, saying that you were generally much more gallant toward ladies."

"Thank you. You are really very kind, Rosenbusch. And she--what did she say to that?"

"Why, what could she say? She didn't appear to feel in the least offended. Very likely she thought her beauty had rather struck you dumb--no woman is offended at that. Don't tell me I don't understand women! And then I talked to her about sculpture--But, upon my word, here comes Jansen. I must go and say good-evening to him."