The Torrents of Spring
quarter of an hour later Sanin, Klüber, and Emil, in this same
carriage, drew up triumphantly at the steps of the confectioner’s shop.
Madame Roselli resolutely refused to join the party; Gemma wanted to
stay with her mother; but she simply turned her out.
“I don’t want any one,” she declared; “I shall go to sleep. I would
send Pantaleone with you too, only there would be no one to mind the
shop.”
“May we take Tartaglia?” asked Emil.
“Of course you may.”
Tartaglia immediately scrambled, with delighted struggles, on to the
box and sat there, licking himself; it was obviously a thing he was
accustomed to. Gemma put on a large straw hat with brown ribbons; the
hat was bent down in front, so as to shade almost the whole of her face
from the sun. The line of shadow stopped just at her lips; they wore a
tender maiden flush, like the petals of a centifoil rose, and her teeth
gleamed stealthily—innocently too, as when children smile. Gemma sat
facing the horses, with Sanin; Klüber and Emil sat opposite. The pale
face of Frau Lenore appeared at the window; Gemma waved her
handkerchief to her, and the horses started.
XV
Soden is a little town half an hour’s distance from Frankfort. It lies
in a beautiful country among the spurs of the Taunus Mountains, and is
known among us in Russia for its waters, which are supposed to be
beneficial to people with weak lungs. The Frankforters visit it more
for purposes of recreation, as Soden possesses a fine park and various
“wirthschaften,” where one may drink beer and coffee in the shade of
the tall limes and maples. The road from Frankfort to Soden runs along
the right bank of the Maine, and is planted all along with fruit trees.
While the carriage was rolling slowly along an excellent road, Sanin
stealthily watched how Gemma behaved to her betrothed; it was the first
time he had seen them together. _She_ was quiet and simple in her
manner, but rather more reserved and serious than usual; _he_ had the
air of a condescending schoolmaster, permitting himself and those under
his authority a discreet and decorous pleasure. Sanin saw no signs in
him of any marked attentiveness, of what the French call
“_empressement_,” in his demeanour to Gemma. It was clear that Herr
Klüber considered that it was a matter settled once for all, and that
therefore he saw no reason to trouble or excite himself. But his
condescension never left him for an instant! Even during a long ramble
before dinner about the wooded hills and valleys behind Soden, even
when enjoying the beauties of nature, he treated nature itself with the
same condescension, through which his habitual magisterial severity
peeped out from time to time. So, for example, he observed in regard to
one stream that it ran too straight through the glade, instead of
making a few picturesque curves; he disapproved, too, of the conduct of
a bird—a chaffinch—for singing so monotonously. Gemma was not bored,
and even, apparently, was enjoying herself; but Sanin did not recognise
her as the Gemma of the preceding days; it was not that she seemed
under a cloud—her beauty had never been more dazzling—but her soul
seemed to have withdrawn into herself. With her parasol open and her
gloves still buttoned up, she walked sedately, deliberately, as
well-bred young girls walk, and spoke little. Emil, too, felt stiff,
and Sanin more so than all. He was somewhat embarrassed too by the fact
that the conversation was all the time in German. Only Tartaglia was in
high spirits! He darted, barking frantically, after blackbirds, leaped
over ravines, stumps and roots, rushed headlong into the water, lapped
at it in desperate haste, shook himself, whining, and was off like an
arrow, his red tongue trailing after him almost to his shoulder. Herr
Klüber, for his part, did everything he supposed conducive to the
mirthfulness of the company; he begged them to sit down in the shade of
a spreading oak-tree, and taking out of a side pocket a small booklet
entitled, “_Knallerbsen; oder du sollst und wirst lachen!_” (Squibs; or
you must and shall laugh!) began reading the funny anecdotes of which
the little book was full. He read them twelve specimens; he aroused
very little mirth, however; only Sanin smiled, from politeness, and he
himself, Herr Klüber, after each anecdote, gave vent to a brief,
business-like, but still condescending laugh. At twelve o’clock the
whole party returned to Soden to the best tavern there.
They had to make arrangements about dinner. Herr Klüber proposed that
the dinner should be served in a summer-house closed in on all
sides—“_im Gartensalon_”; but at this point Gemma rebelled and declared
that she would have dinner in the open air, in the garden, at one of
the little tables set before the tavern; that she was tired of being
all the while with the same faces, and she wanted to see fresh ones. At
some of the little tables, groups of visitors were already sitting.
While Herr Klüber, yielding condescendingly to “the caprice of his
betrothed,” went off to interview the head waiter, Gemma stood
immovable, biting her lips and looking on the ground; she was conscious
that Sanin was persistently and, as it were, inquiringly looking at
her—it seemed to enrage her. At last Herr Klüber returned, announced
that dinner would be ready in half an hour, and proposed their
employing the interval in a game of skittles, adding that this was very
good for the appetite, he, he, he! Skittles he played in masterly
fashion; as he threw the ball, he put himself into amazingly heroic
postures, with artistic play of the muscles, with artistic flourish and
shake of the leg. In his own way he was an athlete—and was superbly
built! His hands, too, were so white and handsome, and he wiped them on
such a sumptuous, gold-striped, Indian bandana!
The moment of dinner arrived, and the whole party seated themselves at
the table.
XVI
Who does not know what a German dinner is like? Watery soup with knobby
dumplings and pieces of cinnamon, boiled beef dry as cork, with white
fat attached, slimy potatoes, soft beetroot and mashed horseradish, a
bluish eel with French capers and vinegar, a roast joint with jam, and
the inevitable “_Mehlspeise_,” something of the nature of a pudding
with sourish red sauce; but to make up, the beer and wine first-rate!
With just such a dinner the tavernkeeper at Soden regaled his
customers. The dinner, itself, however, went off satisfactorily. No
special liveliness was perceptible, certainly; not even when Herr
Klüber proposed the toast “What we like!” (Was wir lieben!) But at
least everything was decorous and seemly. After dinner, coffee was
served, thin, reddish, typically German coffee. Herr Klüber, with true
gallantry, asked Gemma’s permission to smoke a cigar…. But at this
point suddenly something occurred, unexpected, and decidedly
unpleasant, and even unseemly!
At one of the tables near were sitting several officers of the garrison
of the Maine. From their glances and whispering together it was easy to
perceive that they were struck by Gemma’s beauty; one of them, who had
probably stayed in Frankfort, stared at her persistently, as at a
figure familiar to him; he obviously knew who she was. He suddenly got
up, and glass in hand—all the officers had been drinking hard, and the
cloth before them was crowded with bottles—approached the table at
which Gemma was sitting. He was a very young flaxen-haired man, with a
rather pleasing and even attractive face, but his features were
distorted with the wine he had drunk, his cheeks were twitching, his
blood-shot eyes wandered, and wore an insolent expression. His
companions at first tried to hold him back, but afterwards let him go,
interested apparently to see what he would do, and how it would end.
Slightly unsteady on his legs, the officer stopped before Gemma, and in
an unnaturally screaming voice, in which, in spite of himself, an
inward struggle could be discerned, he articulated, “I drink to the
health of the prettiest confectioner in all Frankfort, in all the world
(he emptied his glass), and in return I take this flower, picked by her
divine little fingers!” He took from the table a rose that lay beside
Gemma’s plate. At first she was astonished, alarmed, and turned
fearfully white … then alarm was replaced by indignation; she suddenly
crimsoned all over, to her very hair—and her eyes, fastened directly on
the offender, at the same time darkened and flamed, they were filled
with black gloom, and burned with the fire of irrepressible fury. The
officer must have been confused by this look; he muttered something
unintelligible, bowed, and walked back to his friends. They greeted him
with a laugh, and faint applause.
Herr Klüber rose spasmodically from his seat, drew himself up to his
full height, and putting on his hat pronounced with dignity, but not
too loud, “Unheard of! Unheard of! Unheard of impertinence!” and at
once calling up the waiter, in a severe voice asked for the bill … more
than that, ordered the carriage to be put to, adding that it was
impossible for respectable people to frequent the establishment if they
were exposed to insult! At those words Gemma, who still sat in her
place without stirring—her bosom was heaving violently—Gemma raised her
eyes to Herr Klüber … and she gazed as intently, with the same
expression at him as at the officer. Emil was simply shaking with rage.
“Get up, _mein Fräulein_,” Klüber admonished her with the same
severity, “it is not proper for you to remain here. We will go inside,
in the tavern!”
Gemma rose in silence; he offered her his arm, she gave him hers, and
he walked into the tavern with a majestic step, which became, with his
whole bearing, more majestic and haughty the farther he got from the
place where they had dined. Poor Emil dragged himself after them.
But while Herr Klüber was settling up with the waiter, to whom, by way
of punishment, he gave not a single kreutzer for himself, Sanin with
rapid steps approached the table at which the officers were sitting,
and addressing Gemma’s assailant, who was at that instant offering her
rose to his companions in turns to smell, he uttered very distinctly in
French, “What you have just done, sir, is conduct unworthy of an honest
man, unworthy of the uniform you wear, and I have come to tell you you
are an ill-bred cur!” The young man leaped on to his feet, but another
officer, rather older, checked him with a gesture, made him sit down,
and turning to Sanin asked him also in French, “Was he a relation,
brother, or betrothed of the girl?”
“I am nothing to her at all,” cried Sanin, “I am a Russian, but I
cannot look on at such insolence with indifference; but here is my card
and my address; _monsieur l’officier_ can find me.”
As he uttered these words, Sanin threw his visiting-card on the table,
and at the same moment hastily snatched Gemma’s rose, which one of the
officers sitting at the table had dropped into his plate. The young man
was again on the point of jumping up from the table, but his companion
again checked him, saying, “Dönhof, be quiet! Dönhof, sit still.” Then
he got up himself, and putting his hand to the peak of his cap, with a
certain shade of respectfulness in his voice and manner, told Sanin
that to-morrow morning an officer of the regiment would have the honour
of calling upon him. Sanin replied with a short bow, and hurriedly
returned to his friends.
Herr Klüber pretended he had not noticed either Sanin’s absence nor his
interview with the officers; he was urging on the coachman, who was
putting in the horses, and was furiously angry at his deliberateness.
Gemma too said nothing to Sanin, she did not even look at him; from her
knitted brows, from her pale and compressed lips, from her very