CHAPTER IV
When Trampy received the visit of the Gerichtsdiener, with the bill of costs to pay—for the Kolossal sued the Kaiserin for damages and the Kaiserin came down upon Trampy—when Trampy learned that, he became a limp rag. Already he saw himself dragged before the courts, his whole past laid bare: two wives on his hands, for all he knew; Lily crushing him with her scorn; Jimmy triumphant.
Trampy had a moment of real despair. Lily preferred him like that, humbled at her feet. She seemed to understand her husband, a man spoiled by easy conquests, a boozer, a rake, who had taken too much upon himself when he wedded a wife. Trampy was certainly not made for marriage: having a wife was a different thing from having thirty-six girls. His heart, weakened with premature enjoyment, was no longer made for real love. All this he too now perceived; and, in spite of himself, realizing his unworthiness, he felt overcome by an ever-increasing jealousy.
Those were melancholy weeks in the small room. He sat for hours brooding over his disgrace. Lily silently turned this time of rest to account and mended her costumes, sewed spangles on her bodices, beside the earthenware stove, on which the stew was bubbling; and then came the meal, on the table hastily cleared of the mass of ribbons, thread and needles, to make room for the plates. Trampy choked as he swallowed that dinner which he had not earned, sighed sadly for the good cheer of his dreams, the champagne suppers with girls. He gulped down his meagre fare in silence, he who had known the gay junketings, the noisy laughter and the “Roman nights!” To go from there and drown his sorrows in the bar next door was but a step. And Trampy had sorrows outside his recent defeat: sorrows which were even more bitter. He felt that, this time, he was losing Lily.
Lily was surrounded with sympathy. When she went the round of the agencies, the pros courted her. They looked upon Lily in the light of a wife tired of her husband. They prowled round that possible prey. A Lily was worth the having, meant an assured income for whoever succeeded in winning her affections and managing her properly: not with brutality, no, rather not; home joys, like Mr. Fuchs! Who was destined one day to own those full-blown seventeen years, those twinkling legs, that lissom body, trained to spin round and round, unerring and exact? What lucky dog would have her for himself, would succeed in making her love him? They pitied Lily openly, to disgust her with her husband and hasten on the catastrophe. Trampy? He was no husband for her! They, ah, yes, now that was a different matter! And they talked of the dangers attendant upon Trampy’s mode of life; the impersonator told her of the terrible diseases brought on by constant tippling; they exaggerated it all on purpose, amused themselves by frightening her; until Lily, sometimes, would look upon herself as a pretty little gazelle chained to a mangy bear.
Trampy suspected all this, having himself, in the old days, in the time of his glory, been one of those who hovered round wives ready for divorce, helping them, if need be. He could have smashed the face of that green-eyed impersonator. There was also that architect, that theater-builder, Harrasford’s friend: he was passing through Berlin and Lily had taken his fancy the other evening, at the café; he had patted her cheek gaily:
“I knew you when you were ‘that high.’ You used to sit on my knee. How beautiful you’ve grown!”
There appeared to be an infinity of people who had known Lily when she was “that high.” They paid her more and more attention ... and then they believed her to be looked after by Jimmy. That again was a friendship dating back to her childhood, they said: Jimmy, the bill-topper. He, too, had known her when she was “that high.”