Essential Novelists - Paul Heyse. Paul Heyse

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      "You want to transform this stage princess, who has already passed through so many hands, into a saint? You're jesting."

      Christiane laughed, a short, hollow laugh, utterly destitute of mirth.

      "What do you take me for?" she asked. "To make a person something which I myself neither am nor desire to be! And what has her mode of life to do with me? I'm willing to allow everybody to be happy in their own way. What I call saving her soul, is giving her an idea of true music. The girl has the most enviable talents, voice, ear, passion, the genuine, the natural musical sympathy, which in all such compositions instantly opens to her the real meaning of the author or the part, so that she not only repeats the notes, but reproduces the whole meaning to the life. This is rare, even among those who consider themselves great artists, and are paid as such. And that's why this stage princess as you choose to call her, is too high for Offenbach, and, indeed, perfectly capable of interpreting Mozart and the other great masters."

      "And if you succeed, do you really believe that this rescued soul will be made any happier?"

      "Who can tell? I merely do what lies in my power. Happy! If music alone could give happiness, few would possess such joy as mine. But it's only a substitute, perhaps the most powerful and noble, but not the real thing, not happiness itself. Of that I'm perfectly sure; I've had time to experience it."

      "And what do you consider real happiness?"

      She was silent a moment, not as if it were difficult to answer, but as if considering whether she owed the questioner any reply.

      Then in a tone of cold resignation she said suddenly:

      "Real happiness? I only know because I have never tasted it. Real happiness can be nothing but to sacrifice ourselves without losing ourselves, because we find ourselves again in something better than we are; to forget self in another, without fear of being ashamed of it, because that other at the same moment is thinking only of what we ourselves forget. You'll not understand me, and no matter if you don't. I'll light the lamp."

      "You speak of love," he said quietly. "I understand you, because the same happiness you hope to find in earthly love, opens before us children of God in the bliss of eternity. Did I not tell you just now, that you must forget yourself to find yourself again in God, that there was no other redemption? Now you come to meet me half way."

      "But I shall never be able to traverse the other half," she said bitterly. "Pray don't let us recur to that conversation. Once more—it's late. I've work to do."

      Still he did not move from his crouching position on the sofa.

      "Don't be narrow-minded," he said quietly. "It doesn't suit you. You have a larger nature than ordinary women; what's the use of these half allusions, this shame-faced, prudish reserve, where the point in question is the happiness of your life? If I could only really help you?"

      "You? No one can help me."

      "Except God, and he who leads you to Him."

      "I do not understand you. Have I not told you plainly enough, that I feel no longing for your God and his pardoning grace? All I can do for him, is not to hate him; though he has placed me in this world as I am."

      "As you are? And how are you?"

      "You've just said it yourself: I'm no ordinary woman. I don't know what could be more sad for a girl. And really: ever since the tale of a dear God became improbable, ever since it dawned upon me that we poor human animals only move about in the great throng of creation and have no more claim to any special tenderness, than the thistles in the field, which the donkey gnaws, or the donkey that the miller's boy cudgels, I've become somewhat calmer. No one is to blame because I'm a joyless, ugly, lonely woman, with a man's face, except perhaps my parents, who died long ago and couldn't atone for it; the good people certainly did not know what they were doing, when they gave me life."

      She poured forth these words in harsh, scornful tones, as one relates something that has long angered one, busying herself, while so doing, in lighting the little lamp with the green shade which she now placed on the table.

      "I think you've heard enough," she added dryly. "You're now convinced, Herr Candidat, that such a mangy sheep would make a poor figure among the gentle flock you lead to pasture, so I beg you in the future not to trouble yourself about my temporal and eternal welfare."

      "Certainly I have heard enough," answered Lorinser opening his eyes so suddenly upon her, that the metallic lustre of the whites, subdued by the green lamp light, seemed ghostly, "though you have really told me nothing more, than I knew at the first glance. You're mistaken if you think such confessions are new to me or repel me. They always proceed from an exceptionally powerful nature, and grace can work only where there is strength. Gentle, unselfish souls have nothing to oppose and so nothing to gain. But since I have fully understood your nature, it would be of great value if you would trust me sufficiently to disclose the external circumstances among which you have become—no, have remained, what you were from the beginning; I mean, your history, the events of your life."

      "My history?"—she laughed. "I have none, or what I have has already been told you. My face is my history, my heavy eye-brows and the shadow on my upper lip are my destiny. My father happened to look as I do, and was considered a stately, interesting man. But I should have been wiser to choose the face of my mother, who was by no means filmed for her beauty, but must have been exactly what I am not, a thorough woman. At least she made all sorts of innocent conquests. I, on the contrary, though I was neither stupid nor had unwomanly manners—I mean when I was a young girl; for I now go about boldly, like an old student—although my talents early attracted attention among my father's colleagues—he was one of the court musicians,—never made a conquest in all my life. That is, I might have married two or three times; but it was for very different reasons than love. One wanted to give concerts with me, another, who was an elderly man and tired of his bachelor life, needed a housekeeper, and that she should be ill-favored he rather preferred than otherwise. He thought he would be all the more sure of her faithfulness and self-sacrificing gratitude, in return for his making her a married woman. The third—but why should I tell you these disgusting tales, which at first deeply humiliated me. And though I might have learned from them what my mirror had not then taught me, I was mad enough always to select as the objects of my secret adoration, the handsomest, most agreeable, and most admired men, who never cast a glance at me. I had artist's blood in my veins, I could not help being filled with enthusiasm about everything that was lovable, charming, and distinguished, even if my heart should burst in consequence. But now I have reached my thirty-fourth year; youth with its foolish desires for love-sorrows, yearnings, anxieties, and honey that turns to gall, may well have raved itself calm. Do you wish to know more of my story? I am very sorry; but unfortunately I have nothing to tell of love adventures, broken vows, wanderings from the path of virtue. Unfortunately, I say. They would have made a change in the dreary grey of my days and years, a few blood red spots, a stain effaced with thousands of tears. Instead of that, I'm an old maid in the fullest sense of the word, and your 'magic of sin' has no power over my beggarly pride. Can you even imagine a bright, interesting, exciting romance with such a frontispiece?"—She suddenly removed the green shade and raised the little lamp to her face, which she turned full upon him in the bright glare.

      "That's a matter of taste," he replied without the slightest change of countenance. "For instance, I for my part have always preferred faces full of character to smooth, meaningless ones, which might nevertheless be considered very charming, pretty, and attractive. Superficial sweetness nauseates me. To feel strength, bitterness, even icy scorn and hatred melt in the glow of passion, always seemed to me more desirable than the sentimental fusion of two harmonious souls. The woman СКАЧАТЬ