May 15th. Father said: I don’t care much about these visits to the Richters as long as that young jackanapes is still there, but Mother can’t very well refuse. We shall wear our green coats and skirts with the white blouses with the little green silk leaves for Dora does not like to wear all white except in summer. And because the leaves on the blouses are clover leaves, that is because of their meaning. We are looking forward to it tremendously. I do hope Mother will be all right, for she is in bed to-day. It’s horrid being ill anyhow, but when being ill interferes with other people’s pleasure it’s simply frightful.
May 16th. The day before yesterday was Mother’s birthday; but it was not so jolly as usual because Mother is so often ill; for a birthday present I painted her a box with a spray of clematis, which looks awfully chic. Dora gave her a book cover embroidered with a spray of Japanese cherries, I don’t know what Father gave her, money I think, because on her birthday and name day he always hands her an envelope. But since Mother is not well we were not very cheerful, and when we drank her health at dinner she wiped her eyes when she thought we were not looking. Still, it’s not so dangerous as all that; she is able to go out and doesn’t look bad. I think Mother’s awfully smart, she looks just as well in her dressing gown as when she’s dressed up to go out. Dora says that if she had been made ill by her husband she would hate him and would never let her daughters marry. That’s all very well, but one ought to be quite sure that that is why one has become ill. They say that is why Aunt Dora doesn’t like Father. Certainly Father is not so nice to her as to other relations or to the ladies who some to see Mother. But after all, Aunt Dora has no right to make scenes about it to Father, as Dora says she does. Mother’s the only person with any right to do that. Dora says she is afraid that it will come to Mother’s having to have an operation. Nothing would ever induce me to undergo an operation, it must be horrible, I know because of Hella and the appendicitis. But Dora says: “Anyone who’s had five children must be used to that sort of thing.” I shall pray every night that Mother may get well without an operation. I expect we shan’t all go away together at Whitsuntide this year, for Mother and Dora are to go to a health resort, most likely to Franzensbad.
May 18th. It was lovely at the Richters; Walter was there from Modling, he was awfully nice, and said I was so like my sister that it was difficult to tell us apart. That’s a frightful cram, but I know what he really meant. He plays the flute splendidly, and the three played a trio, so that I was frightfully annoyed with myself for not having worked harder at my music. From to-morrow on I shall practice 2 hours every day, if I can possibly find time. Next winter Viktor is going to found a private dramatic club, so he must be going to stay more than six months in Vienna. Walter thinks Dora awfully charming, and when I said: “The great pity is that she’s got such frightful anemia,” he said: In a man’s eyes that is no drawback whatever, as you can see in my brother. Moreover, that illness is not a real illness, but often makes a girl more charming than ever, as you can see in your sister.
Day before yesterday Miss Maggie Lundy came for the first time; anybody can have her for me. She wears false hair, flaxen. She says she is engaged, but Dora says, has been. I simply don’t believe it. V. says Mad. is awfully pretty. When I asked Dora if she was not jealous, she said she didn’t care, she was quite sure of his love. He means to leave the army and go into the civil service, and then he will be able to marry. But Dora said, there’s plenty of time for that, a secret engagement is much nicer. Then she noticed she’d given herself away, and she blushed like anything and said: You naturally must be engaged before you are married, mustn’t you?—of course she is secretly engaged, but she won’t tell me about it. What’s the good of my being the “Guardian Angel of their Love?” If he only knew.
May 19th. I really ought to practice to-day, but I simply have no time, first of all I had my lesson anyhow, and secondly something awful happened to Dora. She left her diary lying about in the school; and because we have our religion lesson in the Fifth I saw a green bound book lying under the third bench. Great Scott, I thought, that looks like Dora’s diary. I went up as quickly as I could and put my satchel over it. Later in the lesson I picked it up. When I got home at 1 o’clock I did not say anything at first. After dinner she began rummaging all over the place, but without saying anything to me, and then I said quite quietly: “Do you hap—pen to be look—ing for your di—ar—y? Here it is; you—left—it in—the—fifth—class—un—der—the—third—bench.” (I kept her on tenter hooks that way.) She got as white as a sheet and said: “You are an angel. If any one else had found it, I should have been expelled and Mad. would have had to drown herself.” “Oh, it can’t be as bad as all that,” I said, for what she said about Mad. was frightfully exciting. In class I had looked chiefly at what she had written about V. But I could not read it there, because it was written very small and close together and was several pages, but I had not looked much at what she had written about Mad. “Did you read it?” “No, only where it happened to come open because there’s a page torn out.” “About V. or about Mad?” “A little about Mad; but tell me all about it; I shan’t tell anyone. For if I’d wanted to betray you, you know quite well. . . .” And then she told me all about Mad. But first I had to promise that I would not even tell Hella. Mad. is secretly engaged to a man to whom she has given “the utmost gifts of love,” that is to say she has . . . . She is madly in love with him, and they would marry directly but he is a lieutenant too, and they have not enough money for the security. She says that when one really loves a man one can bear everything for his sake. She has often been to his rooms, but she has to be frightfully careful for her father would kill her if he found out. Dora has seen the lieutenant and says he is very handsome, but that V. is much handsomer. Mad. says that you can’t trust men as a rule, but that her lover is quite different, that he is true as steel. I am sure V. is too.
May 21st. When Mad. came to-day I simply could not look at her while Mother was there and Dora says I made an awful fool of myself. For I went out walking with them to-day, and when we met a smart-looking officer I hemmed and looked at Dora. But she didn’t know why. Mad. is the daughter of a high official in the French military service and she only took her teacher’s degree in order to get free from her Mother’s “tyranny;” she nagged at her frightfully and until she began to give lessons she was never allowed to go out alone. Dora says she is very refined in her speech, especially when she is talking about these things. Of course about them she always speaks German, for it’s much more difficult to say it in French, and probably Dora would not understand it and then Mad. would only have to translate it. She is called Sylvia and he calls her Sylvette. Mad. says that if one is madly in love with a man one does whatever he asks. But I don’t see that one need do that, for he might ask the most idiotic things; he might ask you to get the moon out of the skies, or to pull out a tooth for his sake. Dora says she can understand it quite well; that I still lack the true inwardness of thought and feeling. It looks like utter nonsense. But since it sounds fine I’ve written it down, and perhaps I shall find a use for it some day when I’m talking to Walter. Mad. is always frightfully anxious lest she should get a baby. If she did she’s sure her father would kill her. The lieutenant is in the flying corps. He hopes he’s going to invent a new aeroplane, and that he will make a lot of money out of it. Then he will be able to marry Mad. But it would be awful if something happened and she got a baby already.
May 22nd. Dora asked me to-day how it was I knew all about these things, whether Hella had told me. I did not want to give Hella away, so I said quite casually: “Oh, one can read all about that in the encyclopedia.” But Dora laughed and said: “You are quite on the wrong scent; you can’t find a tenth of all those things in the encyclopedia, and what you do find is no good. In these matters it is absolutely no good depending on books.” First of all she would not tell me any more, but after a time she told me a good deal, especially the names of certain parts, and about fertilisation, and about the microscopic baby which really comes from the husband, and not as Hella and I had thought, from the wife. And how one knows whether a woman is fruitful. That is really an awful word. In fact almost every word has a second meaning of that sort, and what Dora says is quite true, one must be fearfully careful when one is talking. Dora thinks it would be best to make a list of all such words, but there are such a frightful lot of them that one never could. The only thing one can do is to be awfully careful; but one soon gets used to it. Still it happened to Dora the other day that she said to V.: I don’t want any intercourse. And that really means “the utmost gifts of love,” so Mad. told her. But V. was so well-mannered that he did not show that he noticed anything; and it did not occur to Dora until afterwards what she had said. It’s really awfully stupid that every ordinary word should have such a meaning. I shall be so frightfully careful what I say now, so that I shan’t use any word with two meanings. Mad. says it’s just the same in French. We don’t know whether it is the same in English and we could never dream of asking that awful fright, Miss Lundy. Very likely she does not know the first thing about it anyhow. I know a great deal more than Hella now, but I can’t tell her because of betraying Dora and Mad. Perhaps I can give her a hint to be more careful in what she says, so as not to use any word with two meanings. That is really my duty as a friend.
May 23rd. I quite forgot. Last week Oswald had his written matriculation exam, he wrote a postcard every day and Mother was frightfully annoyed because he made such silly jokes all the time that we could not really tell how he got on. Dora and I are awfully excited because next Monday we are going to the aerodome with Frau Richter and her niece who is at the conservatoire. Lieutenant Streinz is going to fly too. Of course we’ll motor out because the railway is not convenient. Of course Viktor will be there, but he is motoring over with some other officers. It’s a great pity, for it would have been lovely if he’d been in our car. By the way, I saved the class to-day, the school inspector has been this week and examined our class first in History and then in German, and I was the only one who knew all that Frau Doktor M. had told us about the Origin of Fable. The insp. was very complimentary and afterwards Frau Doktor M. said: its quite true one can always depend upon Lainer; she’s got a trustworthy memory. When we were walking home she was awfully nice: “Do you know, Lainer, I feel that I really must ask your pardon.” I was quite puzzled and Hella asked: But why? She said: “It seemed to me this year that you were not taking quite so much interest in your German lessons as you did last year; but now you’ve reinstated yourself in my good opinion.” Afterwards Hella said: I say you know, Frau Doktor M. is not so far wrong when I think of all that we used to read last year so that we might know everything when the lesson came, and when I think of what we do this year!!! You know very well — — — —. Hella is quite right, but still one can learn in spite of those things, one can’t be always talking about them. And then it’s quite easy to learn for such an angel as Frau Doktor M. Hella says that I got as red as a turkey cock from pride because I could say it all in the very words of Frau Doktor M., but it was not so, for first of all I was not a bit puffed up about it, and secondly I really don’t know myself how I managed to say it all. I only felt that Frau Doktor M. is so annoyed when no one offers to answer a question, and so I took it on.
May 25th. Confound it, I could slap myself a hundred times. How could I be so stupid! Now we’re not allowed to go to the aerodome. Father only let us go because Viktor is in Linz and Father believed he was going to stay there another fortnight. And at dinner to-day I made a slip and said: “It is a pity there’s no room for five in our car. If Fraulein Else were not coming Lieutenant Richter could come with us.” Dora kicked me under the table and I tried to brazen it out, but Father was so angry and said. “Hullo, is the flying man coming? No, no, children, nothing doing. I shall make your excuses to Frau Richter directly. I’m not having any, did not I tell you you weren’t to see the fellow any more?” Of course this last was to Dora. Dora did not say anything but she did not eat any pudding or fruit, and as soon as we were back in our room she gave it me hot, saying: You did that on purpose, you little beast, but really you are only a child whom I never ought to have trusted, and so on. It’s really too bad to say I did it on purpose, as if I envied her. Besides it’s bad for me as well as for her, for I like him very much too, for he makes no difference between us and treats me exactly like Dora. Of course we are not on speaking terms now, and what infuriated me more than anything was that she said she grudged every word she had said to me in this connection: “Pearls before Swine.” What a rude thing to say. So I am an S. But I should like to know who told most. I forsooth? Anyhow I’m quite sure that I shall never talk to her again about anything of that sort. Thank goodness I have a friend in Hella. She would never say or think anything of the kind of me.
May 26th. Neither of us could sleep a wink all night; Dora cried frightfully, I heard her though she tried to stifle it, and I cried too, for I was thinking all the time what I could do to prevent Viktor from thinking unkindly of me. That would be awful. Then I thought of something, and chance or I ought to say luck helped me. Viktor does not walk to school with us any longer, because the girls of the Fifth have seen us several times, but he comes to meet Dora when she comes away at 1 o’clock. So quite early I telephoned to him at a public telephone call office, for I did not dare to do it at home. Dora was so bad that she could not go to school so I was going alone with Hella. I telephoned saying a friend was ringing him up, that was when the maid answered the telephone, and then she called him. I told him: that whatever happened he was not to think unkindly of me and I must see him at 1 o’clock because Dora was ill. He must wait at the corner of —— Street. All through lessons I was so upset that I don’t in the least know what we did. And at 1 o’clock he was there all right, and I told him all about it and he was so awfully kind and he consoled me; he consoled me. That’s quite different from the way Dora behaved. I was so much upset that I nearly cried, and then he drew me into a doorway and put his arm round me and with his own handkerchief wiped away my tears. I shall never tell Dora about that. Then he asked me to be awfully kind to Dora because she had such a lot to bear. I don’t really know what she has to bear, but still, for his sake, because it’s really worth doing it for that, after dinner I put a note upon her desk, saying: V. sends oceans of love to you and hopes you will be all right again by Monday. At the same time his best thanks for the book. I put the note in Heidepeter’s Gabriel, which she had lent to me to read and put it down very significantly. When she read it she flushed up, swallowed a few times and said: “Have you seen him? Where was it and when?” Then I told her all about it and she was frightfully touched and said: “You really are a good girl, only frightfully undependable.” What do you mean, undependable? She said: Yes undependable, for one simply must not blurt out things in that way; never mind, I will try to forget. Have you finished Heidepeter’s Gabriel yet? “No,” I said, “I’m not going to read anyone’s book with whom I’m angry.” In the end we made it up, but of course we did not talk any more about it and I did not say a word about that business with the handkerchief.