The Goose Man
words we owe each other nothing. We have had enough of talk; there has
been no lack of sorrow and enough of error. We can no longer act
differently, and therefore we dare not act differently any longer."
"Be still," whispered Eleanore, "I don't like your wrangling; what you
say is so unpeaceful and fiendish. Yesterday I dreamed that you were
lying on your knees and had your folded hands uplifted. Then I loved
you--very much."
"Do you need dreams in order to love me, girl? I don't; I need you just
as you are. I will soon be thirty years old, Eleanore. A man never
really wakes up until he is thirty; it is then that he conquers the
world. You know what rests within me; you suspect it. You know too how I
need you; you feel it. You are my soul; you are created out of my music;
without you I am an empty hull, a patchwork, a violin without strings."
"Oh, Daniel, I believe you, and yet it is not all true," replied
Eleanore. He thought he could see in the darkness her mockingly ironical
smile: "Somewhere, I am almost tempted to say in God, it is not true. If
we were better, if we were beings in the image of God and acting in
God's ways, we would have to desist from our own ways. Then it would be
wonderful to live: it would be like living above the clouds, happy, at
peace, pure."
"Does that come from your heart, Eleanore?"
"My dear, dear man! My heart, like yours, has been beclouded and
bewitched. I cannot give you up. I have settled my accounts. In my soul
I am entirely conscious of my guilt. I know what I am doing and assume
full responsibility for my action. There is no use to struggle any
longer; the water is already swirling over our heads. I simply want to
say that you should not delude yourself into believing that we have
risen up above other people by what we have done, that we have deserved
the gratitude of fate. No, Daniel, what we are doing is precisely what
all those do who fall. Let me stay with you, dearest; kiss me, kiss me
to death."
V
Philippina had promised Eleanore to look after Jordan and Gertrude on
Sunday.
As she was crossing Five Points, she went into a shop, and asked for
three pfennigs' worth of court plaster. While doing some housework she
had scratched herself on a nail. The clerk gave her the plaster, and
asked her what was the news.
"Ah, you poor bloke, you want to know the very latest, don't you?" she
snarled, and then grinned with blatant self-complacency.
"The later the better," said the fellow with a lustful smirk.
Philippina bent over the counter, and whispered: "They're taking their
wedding trip to-day." She laughed in a lewd, imbecile way. The clerk
stared at her with wide-opened eyes and mouth. Two hours later the news
was in the mouth of every hussy in that section of the city.
Gertrude was in bed. The day woman who did the cooking gave Philippina a
plate with Jordan's dinner on it: Meat, vegetables, and a few sour
plums. Philippina ate two of the plums on the way up to his room, and
licked her fingers.
The whole forenoon she spent rummaging around in Eleanore's room; she
looked through the cabinets, the presses, and the pockets of Eleanore's
dresses. As it began to grow dark, Jordan suddenly entered, in hat and
great coat, and looked on in speechless and enraged amazement at the
girl's inexplicable curiosity.
Philippina took the broom from the corner, and began to sweep with all
her might. While sweeping she sang, out of tune, impudently, and
savagely:
"No fire, no coal, so warmly glows
As secret love that no one knows."
Jordan went away without saying anything. He had forgotten to lock his
room. Hardly had Philippina noticed that he had left the key in the
door, when she opened it and went in.
She spied around with cowardly, superstitious eyes. She was afraid of
the old inspector, as she would have been afraid of an invincible
magician. For such cases she had a number of formulas at her tongue's
end. She murmured: "Put earth in, close the lid, hold your thumbs, spit
on your shoe." She spat on her shoe.
She then began to examine the cabinet, for she believed that it
contained all of Jordan's secrets. But she could not open the lock, try
as she might. She then went at the writing desk; she was angry. There
she found, in plain wooden frames, the pictures of Gertrude and
Eleanore. She ran out, got a large needle, came back, and stuck it in
the picture of Eleanore right between the eyes. Then she took Gertrude's
picture, and after she had held it for a while, looking at it with her
gloomy eyes, she noticed that it was spotted with blood. The plaster had
come off her finger, and the finger had started to bleed.
"Come now, Philippina," she said to herself, "go and see how Gertrude is
making out." Entering Gertrude's room, she found her asleep. Creeping up
to her bed on her tiptoes, she took a chair, straddled it, leaned her
chin on the back, and stared fixedly at the face of the young woman, now
just barely visible in the darkness of the room.
Gertrude dreamed that a black bird was hovering over her and picking at
her breast with its pointed beak. She screamed and woke up.
Shortly after this Gertrude had to send for the midwife.
During the night, Gertrude gave birth to a girl; she had suffered
terrible pains. Philippina had seen and heard it all. She had run back
and forth, from the kitchen to the bedroom and from the bedroom to the
kitchen, for hours; she was like an insane person; she kept mumbling
something to herself. What she mumbled no one knew.
Gertrude had called in vain for Daniel; in vain had she waited for him
the whole day.
"Where in the world can Daniel be?" cried Philippina, "where can Daniel
be with his damned Eleanore?" She sat in the corner with her hands
folded, her hair tangled and knotted, her face distorted with the
grimaces of madness. The midwife was still busy with Gertrude; the
new-born child was crying pitifully.
VI
Daniel held the child in his arms, and looked at it carefully but
without love. "You little worm, what do you want in this world?" he said
to his daughter. He still had his hat on; so had Eleanore. Both of them
were dressed just as they came from the station; they were embarrassed
and excited at what had happened. Eleanore was exceedingly pale; her
great eyes looked dreamy; her body seemed of almost boyish slenderness.
At times she smiled; then the smile died away, as if she did not have
the courage to appear so cheerful.
Inspector Jordan was also in the room, acting as he had always acted
since his bankruptcy--like a guest who feels that he is a burden to the
family. He said very humbly: "I have suggested to Gertrude that she call
the child Agnes after my deceased wife."
"Very well, let's call her Agnes," said Daniel.
Gertrude asked that the child be brought to her so that she could nurse
it. Eleanore carried it over and laid it at her breast. As the hands of
the sisters touched, Gertrude looked up quickly: there was an
indescribable expression of thoughtfulness, knowingness, and kindliness
on her face. Eleanore fell on her knees, threw her arms around
Gertrude's neck, and kissed her passionately. Gertrude reached out her
left hand to Daniel; he gave her his right hand with some hesitancy.
Jordan was radiant with joy: "It is so good, children, to see that you
all love each other, so good," he said with visible emotion.
"Daniel, you must move up into Father's quarters at once," said
Gertrude. "Your piano, bed, and all your things must be taken up, and
Eleanore will move into your room. I have already spoken to Father about
it, and he feels that it will be a good arrangement. He will be very
quiet so as not disturb you. The crying of the baby would make it
impossible for you to work."
"It is a very practical solution of the problem," said Jordan, speaking
for Daniel, and looked down at his frayed coat-sleeves, which he tried
to conceal by hiding them behind his back. "I am also glad that Eleanore
will be with you. A man, you know, has a habit of going to bed long
before a woman quits her daily work. Is that not true, my son-in-law?"
With that he clapped Daniel on the shoulder.
"During Gertrude's confinement I will sleep here in her room," said
Eleanore, avoiding Daniel's eyes as she said so. "She cannot stay alone,
and it costs too much to keep a nurse."
"Exactly," said Jordan, and went to the door. But he turned around: "I
should like to know," he asked in a tone of great grief, "who has been
at Gertrude's and Eleanore's pictures. The one is covered with spots of
blood, and the other has a hole punched in it. Isn't that very strange?
I can't understand it: I can't imagine who could have done me this
injury." He shook his head and went out.
"Do you realise that to-morrow is the first of November?" asked
Gertrude. "Have you the rent ready? Did Father make any money last
month?"
"No, he didn't," replied Eleanore, "but I have almost enough to pay the
landlord."
It was no longer possible to depend upon Jordan. He was supported by his
children, and seemed to find the arrangement neither strange nor
humiliating. At times he would allude in a mysterious way to a big
enterprise that was going to claim the whole of his attention and bring
him a great deal of money and honour. But if you asked him about it, he
would wrinkle his brow and put his finger to his lips.
"I owe the man more than the rent," said Daniel. He kissed Gertrude on
the forehead, and went out.
"Put the child in the cradle, and come over here," said Gertrude to
Eleanore, as soon as Daniel had closed the door behind him. Eleanore did
as she had been told. The baby was asleep. She took it up, looked at its
wrinkled face, and carried it to the cradle. Then she went over to
Gertrude's bed.
Gertrude seized her by her hands, and drew her down to her with more
strength than one would have imagined her to have just then. The eyes of
the two women were drawn close together. "You must make him happy,
Eleanore," she said in a hoarse voice, and with a sickly glimmer in her
eyes. "If you do not, it would be better if one of us were dead."
Despite her terror, Eleanore loosened Gertrude's hold on her with great
gentleness. "It is hard to discuss that subject, Gertrude; it is hard to
live and hard to think about it all." Eleanore breathed these words into
Gertrude's ears.
"You must make him happy; you must make him happy! Repeat it to yourself
and keep it in your mind every day, every hour, every minute. You must,
you must, you must." Gertrude was almost beside herself.
"I will learn how to do it," replied Eleanore slowly and seriously. "I
am ... I hardly know what I am or how I feel. But be patient with me,
Gertrude, I will learn how to make him happy." She looked into
Gertrude's face with anxious curiosity. Gertrude however pressed her
hands against Eleanore's cheeks, drew her down to her again, and kissed
her with unusual fervour. "I too must learn how," whispered Gertrude, "I
must learn the whole of life from the very beginning."
Some one knocked at the door. The midwife came in to look after her
patient.
VII
At that time the superstition still prevailed that the window in the
room of a woman in confinement must never be opened. The air in the room
was consequently heavy and ill-smelling. Eleanore could hardly stand it
during the day; during the night she could not sleep. Moreover natural
daylight could not enter the room, and, as if it were not already gloomy
enough, the window had been hung with green curtains which were kept
half drawn.
The most unpleasant feature of all, however, was the interminable round