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Read Ebook: The Undying Past by Sudermann Hermann Marshall Beatrice Translator
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Ebook has 4155 lines and 165798 words, and 84 pages
"Yes, certainly before her second marriage. So much I will admit. But Leo Sellenthin and Ulrich have been friends from childhood, and what friends! Something quite extraordinary, like David and Jonathan. Would Ulrich have married this woman if there had been anything between her and his friend? It stands to reason that there could have been nothing, doesn't it?"
Frau von Stolt relapsed into meditation. Her husband's argument apparently had convinced her.
"But apart from that altogether," she began again, after a pause. "Leo is abroad, and not coming home. What concerns us now is Felicitas Kletzingk's present conduct, and I must say that it almost amounts to a scandal."
Herr von Stolt shrugged his shoulders.
"Here is an example," continued his wife--"just one example. The other morning I had occasion to turn out our sons' pockets."
"So you are in the habit of turning out other people's pockets!" exclaimed Herr Stolt, perceptibly disturbed by the discovery.
"Yes, why not? It is advisable to keep one's self abreast of their little peccadilloes in love as well as professional affairs. And what do you think I found? Letters from Madam Felicitas--small olive-green missives, reeking with that abominable perfume with which she always scents herself."
Herr von Stolt involuntarily sniffed the air, and smiled dreamily as he did so.
"And has that done any good?" asked Herr von Stolt, with a grin.
"To a certain extent it has. But of course I could not prevent their actual visits to Felicitas. I don't understand how Ulrich can wink at his wife's intercourse with these young men. Not only our two, but Otzen and Neuhaus, and the second Sembritzky, and a lot more of them are constantly there, all young and green."
"Hum! there are older visitors too, I'm thinking," interposed Herr von Stolt, thoughtfully.
"Yes. There is yourself, for instance."
"Really, Malwine!" he ejaculated reproachfully.
"Dear Alfred, we understand each other."
"When I do happen to ride over to Uhlenfelde, it is to see Ulrich."
"Especially when Ulrich is in the Reichstag?"
The matrimonial recriminations ended abruptly, for at this moment a tall spare masculine figure, in a white dust-coat which hung without a fold, glided past the waiting-room window. It rather resembled a walking towel, on which some one had stuck a head.
"Talk of the devil!" exclaimed Frau Malwine, and jumped up to see whither the passing form had betaken itself.
"Who was it?" asked Herr von Stolt, who was sitting with his back to the window.
"Ulrich von Kletzingk."
The door of the vestibule opened, and he who had gone by came in.
He had a pale sickly face of a reflective cast, with sharp small nose and hollow cheeks, set on narrow shoulders and a long freckled neck. It was framed in a light beard, which hung about it like a ragged fringe. The high, rather receding forehead was furrowed with three perpendicular lines denoting mental fatigue, and it ended in a shock of bristly dark-brown hair standing erect. The most remarkable feature of this intellectual head were the dark brilliant eyes, which shone forth from their blue sockets like torches of energy. After emitting luminous flashes, they seemed to slumber wearily again till a new excitement set them aflame once more.
When he was aware who occupied the room, a shadow of nervous uneasiness descended for a moment on the new-corner's face, but passed quickly away. The tone in which he greeted the husband and wife was moderately friendly, if not cold. His voice was not pleasant to hear. It was shrill and high pitched, and however rapidly he spoke, the words seemed to be forced with pain and difficulty from his narrow chest.
Frau Malwine beamed. She was no longer the mother of the Gracchi, in which part she had been just posing to her husband. She exhausted herself in expressions of affection for Frau Felicitas, and added the tender reproach that it was ages since she had seen anything of her. Twice when she had been expected, an extra supply of meringues had been baked, of the kind which was the pride of her modest m?nage, but Frau Felicitas had not come. Ulrich Kletzingk allowed this outpouring of gush to pass over him quietly. Only the nervous playing with the buttons of his riding-glove betrayed that he was not quite at ease.
"You put us to shame, madame," he answered. "Your friendship, however, has been too unobtrusive, for I think that it is some months since we saw you at Uhlenfelde."
Kletzingk bowed and smiled politely.
"At any rate," she continued, with animation, "I ought to express my thanks to you, Herr Baron, for the happy influence the atmosphere of your house has exercised on my young scapegraces. My only fear is that I may have abused your hospitality in sending them over to you nearly every day. I trust that they have always given my kind regards?"
"I believe so, probably." He gazed out of the window. At that moment he longed for nothing more earnestly than to be delivered from this woman's offensive chatter.
Herr von Stolt, who hitherto had been content to smile in his sleeve in cynical enjoyment of his wife's sallies, now joined in the conversation. He inquired after the condition of the crops at Uhlenfelde, and gave a good report of his own. The harvest had been got in satisfactorily on the whole; only the wheat was middling. He left the rest to Providence. "But do tell me, Kletzingk," he said, suddenly taking another tack, "what is up at Halewitz? The rye there is yellow as guineas and still uncut. I could scarcely believe my eyes as we drove by there to-day."
Baron Kletzingk bit his lips, bent his head, and stared silently at the ground.
"I don't mean to reproach you for it, of course," Stolt added hastily; "we all know that you are not responsible for this estate falling into a neglected hell--pardon the expression, Malwine--but our friend has been globe-trotting for four years. In my opinion it is time that he came home."
"I am expecting him now," replied Kletzingk.
The effect of this announcement was stupendous.
Herr von Stolt nearly choked in suppressing a cry of amazement, and his wife bounded up as if she had been shot from a cannon.
"Leo Sellenthin! It is impossible! Coming now by this train?"
"Yes, by this train."
"Where is he coming from?"
"That I don't know, dear madame. My last letter to him was addressed to La Plata."
"And you tell me all this as if it were the simplest thing in the world. Aren't you pleased?"
"How could I be otherwise than delighted?" Kletzingk responded. "With him I lost half myself."
"Ah, to be sure. And, do tell me, Leo and you--the old intimacy exists still?"
"Still, madame, and I hope and trust that it will continue to exist in defiance of anything the world may choose to say."
His eyes rested steadily on her face, while she turned to study a fly-paper with interest.
The two young cuirassier officers rushed in to announce that the train was in sight. When they saw the baron they appeared suddenly abashed. They waited awkwardly till he offered them his hand, and then seized it with somewhat excessive warmth. But Kletzingk was far from paying heed to their manners. It was with an effort that he roused himself sufficiently to bid the old lady and gentleman a courteous farewell.
"I hope Sellenthin will speak to us," called Frau von Stolt after him.
He did not hear. With his long stork-like steps he hurried on to the platform. His breast heaved, and the veins started out in knots on his wide arched temples. He stood there with his clenched fist pressed to his left side, and stared with frightened eyes at the incoming train.
"Uli!" cried a resonant voice in jubilation echoing along the platform, and a blond head was thrust out of one of the carriage windows. Beneath the yellow hair were cheeks tanned to copper hue, a pair of merrily twinkling eyes, and a long flowing beard which the draught from the train swept backwards like a besom.
Frau von Stolt caught hold of her husband's arm. "He has not improved in looks," said she.
"Grown rather wild," he assented.
Four eye-glasses were directed with breathless attention to the two friends as they flew into each other's embrace.
"It was wise of him, after all, to wait till the grass had grown over that affair," went on Frau Malwine.
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