CHAPTER III.
In order to explain this, we must disclose a secret that our artist had heretofore guarded carefully from every one--even from herself, as far as such a thing was possible.
The fate of the one man with whom this peaceable soul always stood on a war-footing, and who, as it seemed, possessed none of all the qualities by which one could generally win her love and admiration, had become of such importance to her in the course of time, that her own weal and woe, and even such a happiness as had just been offered her, became but a secondary matter when compared with it.
That violent hate can turn into burning love is a fact that is no longer considered strange. But the transformation of a thoroughly honest and obvious contempt into the exact opposite, without the object of these conflicting feelings having changed especially himself, must ever remain a difficult riddle to solve. This was especially the case because this contempt for her neighbor was not directed against his character as an artist and a man, of whose good qualities she might in time have become more clearly convinced, but rested solely on the contradiction in their characters, which appeared to her to have been completely reversed in their cases from what Nature had intended.
Little of the Amazon as there was about her, she nevertheless felt herself, as compared with Rosenbusch, the stronger, more resolute and more manly of the two; and, since devotion to something higher and stronger was a chief necessity of her nature, nothing would have struck her as more absurd than that this flute-playing, verse-scribbling art-colleague of hers, who decked himself out in silk and satin like a bearded girl, could ever become dangerous to her peace of mind.
Consequently, when she found that ever since that stolen kiss on Christmas night, innocent though it was, the picture of the robber rose up before her oftener than before, each time causing a certain ashamed surprise to creep over her virgin heart, she fought against this weakness with all her power, and took pains to exaggerate, in her own mind, the faults and absurdities of this gay deceiver. But, in doing so, she was obliged to occupy her thoughts with him to an uncommon extent, and she often caught herself studying his praiseworthy qualities with far greater fondness than his laughable ones. Unfortunately, she had plenty of spare time for these studies; for, as Schnetz expressed it, she was enjoying a vacation from idolatry since Jansen's and Julie's departure. And, finally, what contributed as much as anything else to make her heart more tender, was the just fear that things were going badly with her neighbor, and might end seriously for him some fine day, unless some one came to his aid.
She positively breathed easier when she discovered that he was hungry and cold, and began quite cheerfully to revolve in her mind how she could best assist him.
She took good care to say nothing about it to his friends. To her alone he should owe his rescue, and that without having the slightest suspicion of it. She herself could hardly be said to be swimming in luxury; that which she earned was just sufficient to carry her through the world respectably; for she had the greatest horror of anything in her art that had a taint of fraud about it, and was exceedingly conscientious with regard to such matters. More than once she had taken back a picture, with which the person who had ordered it expressed himself as quite content, merely because it did not satisfy herself.
But the suspiciously jolly air with which Rosenbusch met her on the stairs, the ominous stillness next door, where the stove no longer sang its morning song, nor the flute summoned the mice to the dance, so cut her to the heart, that she would not have hesitated even to have got into debt, if by so doing she could have saved her friend from bankruptcy.
It was a sunny morning in April; she had accompanied little Frances and her foster-mother to the station, and had thus given up the last thing she had to exercise her sentimental devotion upon; and now she walked slowly to her studio, firmly determined to seek consolation in her art. But on arriving up stairs, where a fresh canvas was already awaiting her, she made a mistake in the door, and, instead of going into her own workshop, knocked at the battle-painter's, of whom she had not caught a glimpse for several days.
Rosenbusch knew her knock well. He always declared it was a pity she did not play on the piano, she had such an excellent touch. However, he did not seem inclined to let her in; at all events she had to knock three times, and to call out that it was no use, he needn't pretend any longer, she had seen him through the keyhole sitting there, and must come in for ten minutes as she had an order for him; then, at last, he slowly got up, crept to the door, sighing, and drew back the bolt.
As she entered she cast a stolen look at the bare walls of the room, that was as damp and chilly as a cellar, and at its miserable occupant, who had folded his shawl tight about his body just as a beetle does his wings in a rainstorm, and, with his pinched, half-starved looking little nose, was making a wretched attempt to look chipper and pleased.
"What are you making such an ecce homo face for?" she said, in her brusquest tone, which now stood her in good stead in concealing her emotion. "You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Herr von Rosenbusch, to sit here in a corner and mope, this heavenly weather. Besides, it's so cold here that the oil would freeze on one's brush. But I forget, you are not doing any painting now. You have another acute attack of your chronic laziness--or are you sick?"
"You are mistaken, honored patroness," said Rosenbusch, in his silver tenor, which now, however, sounded a little cracked. "I am quite well, with the exception of a certain nervousness that is often to be found among artists; atrophy of the nervus rerum, the men of science call it. Besides, I am not sitting here so idle as you perhaps imagine; I am working away at my great picture, having accustomed myself of late to first complete the picture in my head, down to the last light effect on the nostrils of a pack-horse. In this way you save an incredible deal of color that you would otherwise have wasted in constant scratching out. You ought to try it, Angelica."
"Thank you. Every one has his manner, and my ideas never come to me until I see them first upon the canvas. But listen, Rosenbusch, does this dry mental painting take up all your time? Couldn't you steal a few hours in the day for outside work? A young officer's widow has given me an order for a portrait of her husband, who fell at Kissingen, to be inclosed in a wreath of laurels, cypresses, and passion-flowers--between ourselves, a regular sampler idea. Only think of it: the departed one on horseback, in the background the city; and around it all a wreath, like onions about a dish of sauerkraut and sausages. I let fall a few hints, as to whether it would not look better, perhaps, if we should leave out the wreath, or at most paint in the bust of the deceased? But no, it would not do to leave out the horse, he might almost have been said to have been one of the family, the widow declared--a beautiful bay stallion with a white star; and he had also died in consequence of a wound. As the times are bad and the lady did not find the price I asked any too high, I accepted the commission. I immediately said to myself, it is nonsense; the horses that you paint look a good deal like hippopotamuses, so you can't get it done without Rosenbusch's help; and as he is now at work on his great picture--but still, as you are only painting it in your head--"
She turned away, so that he should not see the sly look that flashed over her round face. But, in his wretched state of body and mind, all his sharpness had left him.
"You know, Angelica," said he, "that if I were painting the battles of Alexander, I would always have time enough left for you. Besides, one nag won't be anything of a job. I shall paint him with wide-spread nostrils snuffing at the wreath, as though the laurels that beckoned to his master had excited his own appetite. Symbolical allusions like that can give an interesting air even to the most foolish picture."
"Will you have the goodness to dispense with all your jokes? The matter is serious, the picture is to be placed on a sort of household altar in the widow's sleeping-chamber, and a night-lamp is to be kept constantly burning before it. So, if you will undertake to do the figures, including, of course, the portrait of the officer--a photograph of the horse is also to be sent to me to-day--I will paint a wreath around them, and we will go shares in the fame and money."
She named twice the sum she had asked. For she was determined to let him have the whole, which would be no inconsiderable sum for him in his present state. But to her alarm he did not show the slightest joy at this unhoped-for income.
"My dear friend," he said, "the two departed ones shall be painted, and I promise you they shall bear as close a resemblance to a fallen hero and a defunct war-horse as any sorrowing widow could possibly wish. I will also, if you insist upon it, paint my monogram on the nag's saddle-cloth, so that we may figure together in art-history, like Rubens and Blumenbreughel. But you alone must have the money. I will never consent to be paid in vile lucre for acts of friendship, especially toward a lady, and above all toward an honored patroness and neighbor. And, by the way, we can commence at once; I have come to a halt in my composition--particularly as I have a cold in my head--and as one finally gets quite confused merely from the number of good thoughts that come to him--therefore, if you please--"
He approached with arm gracefully bent, in order to escort her over to her studio.
Angelica knew him well enough to feel sure that nothing in the world would shake him in the resolution he had taken; and, since everything that was chivalrous in his character flattered her hidden liking, she made no attempt to dissuade him. She would find some way of recompensing him for his trouble without offending his sense of courtesy, and a great deal had already been won in inducing him to go to work again and to come into a heated room.
There, to be sure, he was obliged to take off his shawl and appear in the unlucky dress-coat which, having been intended for Rossel's rounded proportions, hung very loosely about his shrunken limbs. However, he was not in the least embarrassed by this, but proceeded to explain to his friend, with the greatest seriousness, the advantage of having one's clothes too large. In the summer they were airy, for they caught the wind; in the winter they retained a larger supply of warm air--a movable wadding, as it were, between the body and the cloth--while they were much warmer in an unheated room, especially when covered by a shawl, on account of their having so much more material. He delivered this lecture over a cup of tea which Angelica had prepared for him, and which evidently restored to his inner man the warmth he had so long been without. As he was never more active than when he was working for others, the rough sketch of the equestrian portrait was completed in a few hours, and so skillfully set in Angelica's border of flowers that, as she expressed it, the whole picture looked "quite crazy enough," and they were able to proceed at once to the shading.
Over this common labor, that afforded them both great pleasure and gave occasion for innumerable jests, the forenoon had slipped away unheeded. Angelica proposed to take her dinner in her studio to-day, against which proposition Rosenbusch had nothing to object. She dispatched the janitor with a few secret commissions, and in a short time had improvised such an excellent meal that Rosenbusch burst out in great enthusiasm.