I was soon to learn what being “sent into the yard” meant. Within a week that destiny was mine. Being so sent was the phrase for being charged to count the staves as they arrived in wagon-loads from Hungary,—oaken staves being the chief “industry” of Fiume, and the principal source of Herr Oppovich's fortune.
My companion, and, indeed, my instructor in this intellectual employment, was a strange-looking, dwarfish creature, who, whatever the season, wore a suit of dark yellow leather, the jerkin being fastened round the waist by a broad belt with a heavy brass buckle. He had been in the yard three-and-forty years, and though his assistants had been uniformly promoted to the office, he had met no advancement in life, but was still in the same walk and the same grade in which he had started.
Hans Sponer was, however, a philosopher, and went on his road uncomplainingly. He said that the open air and the freedom were better than the closeness and confinement within-doors, and if his pay was smaller, his healthier appetite made him able to relish plainer food; and this mode of reconciling things—striking the balance between good and ill—went through all he said or did, and his favorite phrase, “Es ist fast einerley,” or “It comes to about the same,” comprised his whole system of worldly knowledge.
If at first I felt the occupation assigned to me as an insult and a degradation, Hanserl's companionship soon reconciled me to submit to it with patience. It was not merely that he displayed an invariable good-humor and pleasantry, but there was a forbearance about him, and a delicacy in his dealing with me, actually gentlemanlike. Thus, he never questioned me as to my former condition, nor asked by what accident I had fallen to my present lot; and, while showing in many ways that he saw I was unused to hardship, he rather treated my inexperience as a mere fortuitous circumstance than as a thing to comment or dwell on. Han-serl, besides this, taught me how to live on my humble pay of a florin and ten kreutzers—about two shillings—daily. I had a small room that led out into the yard, and could consequently devote my modest salary to my maintenance. The straitened economy of Hans himself had enabled him to lay by about eight hundred florins, and he strongly advised me to arrange my mode of life on a plan that would admit of such a prudent saving.
Less for this purpose than to give my friend a strong proof of the full confidence I reposed in his judgment and his honor, I confided to his care all my earnings, and only begged he would provide for me as for himself; and thus Hans and I became inseparable. We took our coffee together at daybreak, our little soup and boiled beef at noon, and our potato-salad, with perhaps a sardine or such like, at night for supper; the “Viertelwein”—the fourth of a bottle—being equitably divided between us to cheer our hearts and cement good-fellowship on certainly as acrid a liquor as ever served two such excellent ends.
None of the clerks would condescend to know us. Herr Fripper, the cashier, would nod to us in the street, but the younger men never recognized us at all, save in some expansive moment of freedom by a wink or a jerk of the head. We were in a most subordinate condition, and they made us feel it.
From Hans I learned that Herr Oppovich was a widower with two children, a son and a daughter. The former was an irreclaimable scamp and vagabond, whose debts had been paid over and over again, and who had been turned out of the army with disgrace, and was now wandering about Europe, living on his father's friends, and trading for small loans on his family name. This was Adolph Oppovich. The girl—Sara she was called—was, in Hanserl's judgment, not much more to be liked than her brother. She was proud and insolent to a degree that would have been remarkable in a princess of a reigning house. From the clerks she exacted a homage that was positively absurd. It was not alone that they should always stand uncovered as she passed, but that if any had occasion to address her he should prelude what he had to say by kissing her hand, an act of vassalage that in Austria is limited to persons of the humblest kind.
“She regards me as a wild beast, and I am therefore spared this piece of servitude,” said Hans; and he laughed his noiseless uncouth laugh as he thought of his immunity.
“Is she handsome?” asked I.
“How can she be handsome when she is so overbearing?” said he. “Is not beauty gentleness, mildness, softness? How can it agree with eyes that flash disdain, and a mouth that seems to curl with insolence? The old proverb says, 'Schönheit ist Sanftheit;' and that's why Our Lady is always so lovely.”
Hanserl was a devout Catholic; and not impossibly this sentiment made his judgment of the young Jewess all the more severe. Of Herr Oppovich himself he would say little. Perhaps he deemed it was not loyal to discuss him whose bread he ate; perhaps he had not sufficient experience of me to trust me with his opinion; at all events, he went no further than an admission that he was wise and keen in business,—one who made few mistakes himself, nor forgave them easily in another.
“Never do more than he tells you to do, younker,” said Hans to me one day; “and he 'll trust you, if you do that well.” And this was not the least valuable hint he gave me.
Hans had a great deal of small worldly wisdom, the fruit rather of a long experience than of any remarkable gift of observation. As he said himself, it took him four years to learn the business of the yard; and as I acquired the knowledge in about a week, he regarded me as a perfect genius.
We soon became fast and firm friends. The way in which I had surrendered myself to his guidance—giving him up the management of my money, and actually submitting to his authority as though I were his son—had won upon the old man immensely; while I, on my side,—friendless and companionless, save with himself,—drew close to the only one who seemed to take an interest in me. At first,—I must own it,—as we wended our way at noon towards the little eating-house where we dined, and I saw the friends with whom Hans exchanged greetings, and felt the class and condition he belonged to reflected in the coarse looks and coarser ways of his associates, I was ashamed to think to what I had fallen. I had, indeed, no respect nor any liking for the young fellows of the counting-house. They were intensely, offensively vulgar; but they had the outward semblance, the dress, and the gait of their betters, and they were privileged by appearance to stroll into a café and sit down, from which I and my companion would speedily have been ejected. I confess I envied them that mere right of admission into the well-dressed world, and sorrowed over my own exclusion as though it had been inflicted on me as a punishment.
This jealous feeling met no encouragement from Hans. The old man had no rancour of any kind in his nature. He had no sense of discontent with his condition, nor any desire to change it. Counting staves seemed to him a very fitting way to occupy existence; and he knew of many occupations that were less pleasant and less wholesome. Rags, for instance, for the paper-mill, or hides, in both of which Herr Ignaz dealt, Hans would have seriously disliked; but staves were cleanly, and smelt fresh and sweetly of the oak-wood they came from; and there was something noble in their destiny—to form casks and hogsheads for the rich wines of France and Spain—which he was fond of recalling; and so would he say, “Without you and me, boy, or those like us, they 'd have no vats nor barrels for the red grape-juice.”
While he thus talked to me, trying to invest our humble calling with what might elevate it in my eyes, I struggled often with myself whether I should not tell him the story of my life,—in what rank I had lived, to what hopes of fortune I had been reared. Would this knowledge have raised me in the old man's esteem, or would it have estranged him from me? that was the question. How should I come through the ordeal of his judgment,—higher or lower? A mere chance decided for me what all my pondering could not resolve. Hans came home one night with a little book in his hand, a present for me. It was a French grammar, and, as he told me, the key to all knowledge.
“The French are the great people of the world,” said he, “and till you know their tongue, you can have no real insight into learning.” There was a “younker,” once under him in the yard, who, just because he could read and write French, was now a cashier, with six hundred florins' salary. “When you have worked hard for three months, we 'll look out for a master, Owen.”
“But I know it already, Hanserl,” said I, proudly. “I speak it even better than I speak German, and Italian too! Ay, stare at me, but it's true. I had masters for these, and for Greek and Latin; and I was taught to draw, and to sing, and to play the piano, and I learned how to ride and to dance.”
“Just like a born gentleman,” broke in Hans.
“I was, and I am, a born gentleman; don't shake your head, or wring your hands, Hanserl. I 'm not going mad! These are not ravings! I 'll soon convince you what I say is true.” And I hurried to my room, and, opening my trunk, took out my watch and some trinkets, some studs of value, and a costly chain my father gave me. “These are all mine! I used to wear them once, as commonly as I now wear these bone buttons. There were more servants in my father's house than there are clerks in Herr Oppovich's counting-house. Let me tell you who I was, and how I came to be what I am.”
I told him my whole story, the old man listening with an eagerness quite intense, but never more deeply interested than when I told of the splendors and magnificence of my father's house. He never wearied hearing of costly entertainments and great banqueta, where troops of servants waited, and every wish of the guests was at once ministered to.
“And all this,” cried he, at last, “all this, day after day, night after night, and not once a year only, as we see it here, on the Fraulein Sara's birthday!” And now the poor old man, as if to compensate himself for listening so long, broke out into a description of the festivities by which Herr Oppovich celebrated his daughter's birthday; an occasion on which he invited all in his employment to pass the day at his villa, on the side of the bay, and when, by Hanserl's account, a most unbounded hospitality held sway. “There are no portions, no measured quantities, but each is free to eat and drink as he likes,” cried Hans, who, with this praise, described a banquet of millennial magnificence. “But you will see for yourself,” added he; “for even the 'yard' is invited.”
I cautioned him strictly not to divulge what I had told him of myself; nor was it necessary, after all, for he well knew how Herr Ignaz resented the thought of any one in his service having other pretensions than such as grew out of his own favor towards them.
The Jews cannot abide the great folk, with their indebtedness; and to deem these inseparable is a creed.
“On the 31st of August falls the Fraulein's birthday, lad, and you shall tell me the next morning if your father gave a grander fête than that!”
The 31st of August dawned at last, and with the promise of a lovely autumnal day. It was the one holiday of the year at Herr Oppovich's: for Sunday was only externally observed in deference to the feelings of the Christian world, and clerks sat at their desks inside, and within the barred shutters the whole work of life went on as though a week-day. As for us in the yard, it was our day of most rigorous discipline; for Iguaz himself was wont to come down on a tour of inspection, and his quick glances were sure to detect at once the slightest irregularity or neglect. He seldom noticed me on these occasions. A word addressed to Hanserl as to how the “younker” was doing, would be all the recognition vouchsafed me, or, at most, a short nod of the head would convey that he had seen me. Hanserl's reports were, however, always favorable; and I had so far good reason to believe that my master was content with me.
From Hans, who had talked of nothing but this fête for three or four weeks, I had learned that a beautiful villa which Herr Ignaz owned on the west side of the bay was always opened. It was considered much too grand a place to live in, being of princely proportions and splendidly furnished; indeed, it had come into Herr Oppovich's possession on a mortgage, and the thought of using it as a residence never occurred to him. To have kept the grounds alone in order would have cost a moderate fortune; and as there was no natural supply of water on the spot, a steam-pump was kept in constant use to direct streams in different directions. This, which its former owner freely paid for, was an outlay that Herr Oppovich regarded as most wasteful, and reduced at once to the very narrowest limits consistent with the life of the plants and shrubs around. The ornamental fountains were, of course, left unfed; jets-d'eau ceased to play; and the various tanks in which water-nymphs of white marble disported, were dried up; ivy and the wild vine draping the statues, and hiding the sculptured urns in leafy embrace.
Of the rare plants and flowers, hundreds, of course, died; indeed, none but those of hardy nature could survive this stinted aliment. Greenhouses and conservatories, too, fell into disrepair and neglect; but such was the marvellous wealth of vegetation that, fast as walls would crumble and architraves give way, foliage and blossom would spread over the rain, and the rare plants within, mingling with the stronger vegetation without, would form a tangled mass of leafy beauty of surpassing loveliness; and thus the rarest orchids were seen stretching their delicate tendrils over forest-trees, and the cactus and the mimosa mingled with common field-flowers. If I linger amongst these things, it is because they contrasted so strikingly to me with the trim propriety and fastidious neatness of the Malibran Villa, where no leaf littered a walk, nor a single tarnished blossom was suffered to remain on its stalk. Yet was the Abazzia Villa a thousand times more beautiful. In the one, the uppermost thought was the endless care and skill of the gardeners, and the wealth that had provided them. The clink of gold seemed to rise from the crushed gravel as you walked; the fountains glittered with gold; the conservatories exhaled it. Here, however, it seemed as though Nature, rich in her own unbounded resources, was showing how little she needed of man or his appliances. It was the very exuberance of growth on every side; and all this backed by a bold mountain lofty as an Alp, and washed by a sea in front, and that sea the blue Adriatic.
I had often heard of the thrift and parsimony of Herr Oppovich's household. Even in the humble eating-house I frequented, sneers at its economies were frequent. No trace of such a saving spirit displayed itself on this occasion. Not merely were guests largely and freely invited, but carriages were stationed at appointed spots to convey them to the villa, and a number of boats awaited at the mole for those who preferred to go by water. This latter mode of conveyance was adopted by the clerks and officials of the house, as savoring less of pretension; and so was it that just as the morning was ripening into warmth, I found myself one of a large company in a wide eight-oared boat, calmly skimming along towards Abazzia. By some accident I got separated from Hanserl; and when I waved my hand to him to join me, he delayed to return my salutation, for, as he said afterwards, I was gar schon,—quite fine,—and he did not recognize me.
It was true I had dressed myself in the velvet jacket and vest I had worn on the night of our own fête, and wore my velvet cap, without, however, the heron feather, any more than I put on any of my trinkets, or even my watch.
This studied simplicity on my part was not rewarded as I hoped for; since, scarcely were we under way, than my dress and “get-up” became the subject of an animated debate among my companions, who discussed me with a freedom and a candor that showed they regarded me simply as a sort of lay figure for the display of so much drapery.
“That's how they dress in the yard,” cried one; “and we who have three times the pay, can scarcely afford broadcloth. Will any one explain that to me?”
“There must be rare perquisites down there,” chimed in another; “for they say that the old dwarf Hanserl has laid by two thousand gulden.”
“They tell me five thousand,” said another.
“Two or twenty-two would make no difference. No fellow on his pay could honestly do more than keep life in his body, not to speak of wearing velvet like the younker there.”
A short digression now intervened, one of the party having suggested that in England velvet was the cheapest wear known, that all the laborers on canals and railroads wore it from economy, and that, in fact, it was the badge of a very humble condition. The assertion encountered some disbelief, and it was ultimately suggested to refer the matter to me for decision, this being the first evidence they had given of their recognition of me as a sentient being.
“What would he know?” broke in an elderly clerk; “he must have come away from England a mere child, seeing how he speaks German now.”
“Or if he did know, is it likely he'd tell?” observed another.
“At all events, let us ask him what it costs. I say, Knabe, come here and let us see your fine clothes; we are all proud of having so grand a colleague.”
“You might show your pride, then, more suitably than by insulting him,” said I, with perfect calm.
Had I discharged a loaded pistol in the midst of them, the dismay and astonishment could not have been greater.
That any one “aus dem Hof”—“out of the yard”—should presume to think he had feelings that could be outraged, seemed a degree of arrogance beyond belief, and my word “insult” was repeated from mouth to mouth with amazement.
“Come here, Knabe,” said the cashier, in a voice of blended gentleness and command,— “come here, and let us talk to you.”
I arose and made my way from the bow to the stern of the boat. Short as the distance was, it gave me time to bethink me that I must repress all anger or irritation if I desired to keep my secret; so that when I reached my place, my mind was made up.
“Silk-velvet as I live!” said one who passed his hand along my sleeve as I went.
“No one wishes to offend you, youngster,” said the cashier to me, as he placed me beside him; “nor when we talk freely to each other, as is our wont, are any of us offended.”
“But you forget, sir,” said I, “that I have no share in these freedoms, and that were I to attempt them, you'd resent the liberty pretty soon.”
“The Knabe is right,” “He says what's true,” “He speaks sensibly,” were muttered all around.
“You have been well educated, I suspect?” said the cashier, in a gentle voice; and now the thought that by a word—a mere word—I might compromise myself beyond recall flashed across me, and I answered, “I have learned some things.”
“One of which was caution,” broke in another; and a roar of laughter welcomed his joke.
Many a severer sarcasm would not have cut so deeply into me. The imputation of a reserve based on cunning was too much for my temper, and in a moment I forgot all prudence, And hotly said, “If I am such an object of interest to you, gentlemen, that you must know even the details of my education, the only way I see to satisfy this curiosity of yours is to say that, if you will question me as to what I know And what I do not, I will do my best to answer you.”
“That's a challenge,” cried one; “he thinks we are too illiterate to examine him.”
“We see that you speak German fluently,” said the cashier; “do you know French?”
I nodded assent
“And Italian and English?”
“Yes; English is my native language.”
“What about Greek and Latin, boy?”
“Very little Greek; some half-dozen Latin authors.”
“Any Hebrew?” chimed in one, with a smile of half mockery.
“Not a syllable.”
“That's a pity, for you could have chatted with Herr Ignaz in it.”
“Or the Fraulein,” muttered another. “She knows no Hebrew,” “She does; she reads it well,” “Nothing of the kind,” were quickly spoken from many quarters; and a very hot discussion ensued, in which the Fraulein Sara's accomplishments and acquirements took the place of mine in public interest.
While the debate went on with no small warmth on either side,—for it involved a personal question that stimulated each of the combatants; namely, the amount of intimacy they enjoyed in the family and household of their master: a point on which they seemed to feel the most acute sensibility,—while this, therefore, continued, the cashier patted me good-humoredly on the arm, and asked me how I liked Fiume; if I had made any pleasant acquaintances; and how I usually passed my evenings? And while thus chatting pleasantly, we glided into the little bay of the villa, and landed.
As boat after boat came alongside the jetty, numbers rushed down to meet and welcome their friends. All seemed half wild with delight; and the adventures they had had on the road, the loveliness of the villa, and the courtesy they had been met with, resounded on every side. All had friends, eager to talk or to listen,—all but myself. I alone had no companionship; for in the crowd and confusion I could not find Hanserl, and to ask after him was but to risk the danger of an impertinence.
I sat myself down on a rustic bench at last, thinking that if I remained fixed in one spot I might have the best chance to discover him. And now I could mark the strange company, which, of every age, and almost of every condition, appeared to be present. If the marked features of the Hebrew abounded, there were types of the race that I had never seen before: fair-haired and olive-eyed, with a certain softness of expression, united with great decision about the mouth and chin. The red Jew, too, was there: the fierce-eyed, dark-browed, hollow-cheeked fellow, of piercing acute-ness in expression, and an almost reckless look of purpose about him. There was greed, craft, determination, at times even violence, to be read in the faces; but never weakness, never imbecility; and so striking was this that the Christian physiognomy seemed actually vulgar when contrasted with those faces so full of vigorous meaning and concentration.
Nothing could be less like my father's guests than these people. It was not in dress and demeanor and general carriage that they differed,—in their gestures as they met, in their briefest greetings,—but the whole character of their habite, as expressed by their faces, seemed so unlike that I could not imagine any clew to their several ranks, and how this one was higher or greater than that. All the nationalities of Eastern Europe were there,—Hungarian, Styrian, Dalmatian, and Albanian. Traders all: this one bond of traffic and gain blending into a sort of family races and creeds the most discordant, and types whose forefathers had been warring with each other for centuries. Plenty of coarseness there was, unculture and roughness everywhere; but, strangely enough, little vulgarity and no weakness, no deficient energy anywhere. They were the warriors of commerce; and they brought to the battle of trade resolution and boldness and persistence and daring not a whit inferior to what their ancestors had carried into personal conflict.
If, seated on my rustic bench under a spreading ilex, I was not joining in the pleasures and amusements of those around me, I was tasting an amount of enjoyment to the full as great It was my first holiday after many months of monotonous labor. It was the first moment in which I felt myself free to look about me without the irksome thought of a teasing duty,—that everlasting song of score and tally, which Hans and I sang duet fashion, and which at last seemed to enter into my very veins and circulate with my blood.
The scene itself was of rare beauty. Seated as I was, the bay appeared a vast lake, for the outlet that led seaward was backed by an island, and thus the coast-line seemed unbroken throughout. Over this wide expanse now hundreds of fishing-boats were moving in every direction, for the wind was blowing fresh from the land, and permitted them to tack and beat as they pleased. If thus in the crisply curling waves, the flitting boats, and the fast-flying clouds above, there was motion and life, there was, in the high peaked-mountain that frowned above me, and in the dark rocks that lined the shore, a stern, impassive grandeur that became all the more striking from contrast. The plashing water, the fishermen's cries, the merry laughter of the revellers as they strayed through brake and copse, seemed all but whispering sounds in that vast amphitheatre of mountain, so solemn was the influence of those towering crags that rose towards heaven.
“Have you been sitting there ever since?” asked the cashier, as he passed me with a string of friends.
“Ever since.”
“Not had any breakfast?”
“None.”
“Nor paid your compliments to Herr Ignaz and the Fraulein?”
I shook my bead in dissent.
“Worst of all,” said he, half rebukingly, and passed on. I now bethought me how remiss I had been. It is true it was through a sense of my own insignificant station that I had not presented myself to my host; but I ought to have remembered that this excuse could have no force outside the limits of my own heart; and so, as I despaired of finding Hanserl, whose advice might have aided me, I set out at once to make my respects.
A long, straight avenue, flanked by tall lime-trees, led from the sea to the house; and as I passed up this, crowded now like the chief promenade of a city, I heard many comments as I went on my dress and appearance. “What have we here?” said one. “Is this a prince or a mountebank?” “What boy, with a much-braid-bedizened velvet coat is this?” muttered an old German, as he pointed at me with his pipe-stick..
One pronounced me a fencing-master; but public reprobation found its limit at last by calling me a Frenchman. Shall I own that I heard all these with something much more akin to pride than to shame? The mere fact that they recognized me as unlike one of themselves—that they saw in me what was not “Fiumano “—was in itself a flattery; and as to the depreciation, it was pure ignorance! I am afraid that I even showed how defiantly I took this criticism,—showed it in my look, and showed it in my gait; for as I ascended the steps to the terrace of the villa, I heard more than one comment on my pretentious demeanor. Perhaps some rumor of the approach of a distinguished guest had reached Herr Oppovich where he sat, at a table with some of the magnates of Fiume, for be hastily arose and came forward to meet me. Just as I gained the last terrace, the old man stood bareheaded and bowing before me, a semicircle of wondering guests at either side of him.
“Whom have I the distinguished honor to receive?” said Herr Ignaz, with a profound show of deference.
“Don't you know me, sir? Owen,—Digby Owen.”
“What!—how?—Eh—in heaven's name—sure it can't be! Why, I protest it is,” cried he, laying his hand on my shoulder, as if to test my reality. “This passes all belief. Who ever saw the like! Come here, Knabe, come here.” And slipping his hand within my arm, he led me towards the table he had just quitted. “Sara,” cried he, “here is a guest you have not noticed; a high and wellborn stranger, who claims all your attention. Let him have the place of honor at your side. This, ladies and gentlemen, is Herr Digby Owen, the stave-counter of my timber-yard!” And he burst, with this, into a roar of laughter, that, long pent up by an effort, now seemed to threaten him with a fit Nor was the company slow in chorusing him; round after round shook the table, and it seemed as if the joke could never be exhausted.
All this time I stood with my eyes fixed on the Fraulein, whose glance was directed as steadfastly on me. It was a haughty look she bent on me, but it became her well, and I forgave all the scorn it conveyed in the pleasure her beauty gave me. My face, which at first was in a flame, became suddenly cold, and a faintish sickness was creeping over me, so that, to steady myself, I had to lay my hand on a chair. “Won't you sit down?” said she, in a voice fully as much command as invitation. She pointed to a chair a little distance from her own, and I obeyed.
The company appeared now somewhat ashamed of its rude display of merriment, and seeing how quietly and calmly I bore myself,—unresentingly too,—there seemed something like a reaction in my favor. Foreigners, it must be said, are generally sorry when betrayed into any exhibition of ill-breeding, and hastily seek to make amends for it Perhaps Herr Oppovich himself was the least ready in this movement, for he continued to look on me with a strange blending of displeasure and amusement.
The business of breakfast was now resumed, and the servants passed round with the dishes, helping me amongst the rest. While I was eating, I heard—what, of course, was not meant for my ears—an explanation given by one of the company of my singular appearance. He had lived in England, and said that the English of every condition had a passion for appearing to belong to some rank above their own; that to accomplish this there was no sacrifice they would not make, for these assumptions imposed upon those who made them fully as much as on the public they were made for. “You 'll see,” added he, “that the youth there, so long as he figures in that fine dress, will act up to it, so far as he knows how. He talked with a degree of assurance and fluency that gained conviction, and I saw that his hearers went along with him, and there soon began—very cautiously and very guardedly, indeed—a sort of examination of me and my pretensions, for which, fortunately for me, I was so far prepared.
“And do all English boys of your rank in life speak and read four languages?” asked Herr Ignaz, after listening some time to my answers.
“You are assuming to know his rank, papa,” whispered Sara, who watched me closely during the whole interrogatory.
“Let him answer my question,” rejoined the old man, roughly.
“Perhaps not all,” said I, half amused at the puzzle I was becoming to them.
“Then how came it your fortune to know them,—that is, if you do know them?”
Slipping out of his question, I replied, “Nothing can be easier than to test that point. There are gentlemen here whose acquirements go far beyond mine.”
“Your German is very good,” said Sara. “Let me hear you speak French.”
“It is too much honor for me,” said I, bowing, “to address you at all.”
“Is your Italian as neat in accent as that?” asked a lady near.
“I believe I am best in Italian,—of course, after English,—for I always talked it with my music-master, as well as with my teacher.”
“Music-master!” cried Herr Ignaz; “what phoenix have we here?”
“I don't think we are quite fair to this boy,” said a stern-featured, middle-aged man. “He has shown us that there is no imposition in his pretensions, and we have no right to question him further. If Herr Ignaz thinks you too highly gifted for his service, young man, come over to Carl Bettmeyer's counting-house to-morrow at noon.”
“I thank you, sir,” said I, “and am very grateful; but if Herr Oppovich will bear with me, I will not leave him.”
Sara's eyes met mine as I spoke, and I cannot tell what a flood of rapture her look sent into my heart.
“The boy will do well enough,” muttered Herr Ignaz. “Let us have a ramble through the grounds, and see how the skittle-players go on.”
And thus passed off the little incident of my appearance: an incident of no moment to any but myself, as I was soon to feel; for the company, descending the steps, strayed away in broken twos or threes through the grounds, as caprice or will inclined them.
If I were going to chronicle the fête itself, I might, perhaps, say there was a striking contrast between the picturesque beauty of the spot, and the pastime of those who occupied it The scene recalled nothing so much as a village fair. All the simple out-of-door amusements of popular taste were there. There were conjurors and saltimbanques and fortune-tellers, lottery-booths and ninepin alleys and restaurants, only differing from their prototypes in that there was nothing to pay. If a considerable number of the guests were well pleased with the pleasures provided for them, there were others no less amused as spectators of these enjoyments, and the result was an amount of mirth and good humor almost unbounded. There were representatives of almost every class and condition, from the prosperous merchant or rich banker down to the humblest clerk, or even the porter of the warehouse; and yet a certain tone of equality pervaded all, and I observed that they mixed with each other on terms of friendliness and familiarity that never recalled any difference of condition; and this feature alone was an ample counterpoise to any vulgarity observable in their manners. If there was any “snobbery,” it was of a species quite unlike what we have at home, and I could not detect it.
While I strolled about, amusing myself with the strange sights and scenes around me, I suddenly came upon a sort of merry-go-round, where the performers, seated on small hobby-horses, tilted with a lance at a ring as they spun round, their successes or failures being hailed with cheers or with laughter from the spectators. To my intense astonishment, I might almost say shame, Hanserl was there! Mounted on a fiery little gray, with bloodshot eyes and a flowing tail, the old fellow seemed to have caught the spirit of his steed, for he stood up in his stirrups, and leaned forward with an eagerness that showed how he enjoyed the sport. Why was it that the spectacle so shocked me? Why was it that I shrunk back into the crowd, fearful that he might recognize me? Was it not well if the poor fellow could throw off, even for a passing moment, the weary drudgery of his daily life, and play the fool just for distraction' sake? All this I could have believed and accepted a short time before, and yet now a strange revulsion of feeling had come over me and I went away, well pleased that Hans had not seen nor claimed me. “These vulgar games don't amuse you,” said a voice at my side; and I turned and saw the merchant who, at the breakfast-table, invited me to his counting-house.
“Not that,” said I; “but they seem strange and odd at a private entertainment I was scarce prepared to see them here.”
“I suspect that is not exactly the reason,” said he, laughing. “I know something of your English tone of exclusiveness, and how each class of your people has its appropriate pleasures. You scorn to be amused in low company.”
“You seem to forget my own condition, sir.”
“Come, come,” said he, with a knowing look, “I am not so easily imposed upon, as I told you awhile back. I know England. Your ways and notions are all known to me. It is not in the place you occupy here young lads are found who speak three or four languages, and have hands that show as few signs of labor as yours. Mind,” said he, quickly, “I don't want to know your secret.”
“If I had a secret, it is scarcely likely I 'd tell it to a stranger,” said I, haughtily.
“Just so; you 'd know your man before you trusted him. Well, I 'm more generous, and I 'm going to trust you, whom I never saw till half an hour ago.”
“Trust me!”
“Trust you,” repeated he, slowly. “And first of all, what age would you give that young lady whose birthday we are celebrating?”
“Seventeen—eighteen—perhaps nineteen.”
“I thought you'd say so; she looks nineteen. Well, I can tell you her age to an hour. She is fifteen to-day.”
“Fifteen!”
“Not a day older, and yet she is the most finished coquette in Europe. Having given Fiume to understand that there is not a man here whose pretensions she would listen to, her whole aim and object is to surround herself with admirers,—I might say worshippers. Young fellows are fools enough to believe they have a chance of winning her favor, while each sees how contemptuously she treats the other. They do not perceive it is the number of adorers she cares for.”
“But what is all this to me?”
“Simply that you 'll be enlisted in that corps to-morrow,” said he, with a malicious laugh; “and I thought I 'd do you a good turn to warn you as to what is in store for you.”
“Me? I enlisted! Why, just bethink you, sir, who and what I am: the very lowest creature in her father's employment.”
“What does that signify? There's a mystery about you. You are not—at least you were not—what you seem now. You have as good looks and better manners than the people usually about her. She can amuse herself with you, and so far harmlessly that she can dismiss you when she's tired of you, and if she can only persuade you to believe yourself in love with her, and can store up a reasonable share of misery for you in consequence, you 'll make her nearer being happy than she has felt this many a day.”
“I don't understand all this,” said I, doubtingly.
“Well, you will one of these days; that is, unless you have the good sense to take my warning in good part, and avoid her altogether.”
“It will be quite enough for me to bear in mind who she is, and what I am!” said I, calmly.
“You think so? Well, I don't agree with you. At all events, keep what I have said to yourself, even if you don't mean to profit by it” And with this he left me.
That strange education of mine, in which M. de Balzac figured as a chief instructor, made me reflect on what I had heard in a spirit little like that of an ordinary lad of sixteen years of age. Those wonderful stories, in which passion and emotion represent action, and where the great game of life is played out at a fireside or in a window recess, and where feeling and sentiment war and fight and win or lose,—these same tales supplied me with wherewithal to understand this man's warnings, and at the same time to suspect his motives; and from that moment my life became invested with new interests and new anxieties, and to my own heart I felt myself a hero of romance.
As I sauntered on, revolving very pleasant thoughts to myself, I came upon a party who were picnicking under a tree. Some of them graciously made a place for me, and I sat down and ate my dinner with them. They were very humble people, all of them, but courteous and civil to my quality of stranger in a remarkable degree. Nor was I less struck by the delicate forbearance they showed towards the host; for, while the servant pressed them to drink Bordeaux and champagne, they merely took the little wines of the country, perfectly content with simple fare and the courtesy that offered them better.
When one of them asked me if I had ever seen a fête of such magnificence in my own country, my mind went back to that costly entertainment of our villa, and Pauline came up before me, with her long dark eyelashes, and those lustrous eyes beaming with expression, and flashing with a light that dazzled while it charmed. Coquetry has no such votaries as the young. Its artifices, its studied graces, its thousand rogueries, to them seem all that is most natural and most “naïve;” and thus every toss of her dark curls, every little mock resentment of her beautiful mouth, every bend and motion of her supple figure, rose to my mind, till I pictured her image before me, and thought I saw her.
“What a hunt I have had after you, Herr Englander!” said a servant, who came up to me all flushed and heated. “I have been over the whole park in search of you.”
“In search of me? Surely you mistake.”
“No; it is no mistake. I see no one here in a velvet jacket but yourself; and Herr Ignaz told me to find you and tell you that there is a place kept for you at his table, and they are at dinner now in the large tent before the terrace.”
I took leave of my friends, who rose respectfully to make their adieux to the honored guest of the host, and I followed the servant to the house. I was not without my misgivings that the scene of the morning, with its unpleasant cross-examination of me, might be repeated, and I even canvassed myself how far I ought to submit to such liberties; but the event was not to put my dignity to the test I was received on terms of perfect equality with those about me; and though the dinner had made some progress before I arrived, it was with much difficulty I could avoid being served with soup and all the earlier delicacies of the entertainment.
I will not dwell on the day that to recall seems more to me like a page out of a fairy tale than a little incident of daily life. I was, indeed, to all intents, the enchanted prince of a story, who went about with the lovely princess on his arm, for I danced the mazurka with the Fraulein Sara, and was her partner several times during the evening, and finished the fête with her in the cotillon; she declaring, in that calm quiet voice that did not seek to be unheard around, that I alone could dance the waltz à deux temps, and that I slid gently, and did not spring like a Fiumano, or bound like a French bagman,—a praise that brought on me some very menacing looks from certain commis-voyageurs near me, and which I, confident in my “skill of fence,” as insolently returned.
“You are not to return to the Hof, Herr von Owen, tomorrow,” said she, as we parted. “You are to wait on papa at his office at eleven o'clock.” And there was a staid dignity in her words that spoke command; but in styling me “von” there was a whole world of recognition, and I kissed her hand as I said good-night with all the deference of her slave, and all the devotion of one who already felt her power and delighted in it.
Let me open this chapter with an apology, and I mean it not only to extend to errors of the past, but to whatever similar blunders I may commit hereafter. What I desire to ask pardon for is this: I find in this attempt of mine to jot down a portion of my life, that I have laid a most disproportionate stress on some passages the most insignificant and unimportant. Thus, in my last chapter I have dwelt unreasonably on the narrative of one day's pleasure, while it may be that a month, or several months, shall pass over with scarcely mention. For this fault—and I do not attempt to deny it is a fault—I have but one excuse. It is this: my desire has been to place before my reader the events, small as they might be, that influenced my life and decided my destiny. Had I not gone to this fêtey for instance,—had I taken my holiday in some quiet ramble into the hills alone, or had I passed it, as I have passed scores of happy hours, in the solitude of my own room,—how different might have been my fate!
We all of us know how small and apparently insignificant are the events by which the course of our lives is shapen. A look we catch at parting, a word spoken that might have passed unheard, a pressure of the hand that might or might not have been felt, and straightway all our sailing orders are revoked, and instead of north we go south. Bearing this in mind, my reader will perhaps forgive me, and at least bethink him that these things are not done by me through inadvertence, but of intention and with forethought.
“So we are about to part,” said Hanserl to me, as I awoke and found my old companion at my bedside. “You 're the twenty-fifth that has left me,” said he, mournfully. “But look to it, Knabe, change is not always betterment.”
“It was none of my doing, Hanserl; none of my seeking.”
“If you had worn the gray jacket you wear on Sundays, there would have been none of this, lad! I have seen double as many years in the yard as you have been in the world, and none have ever seen me at the master's table or waltzing with the master's daughter.”
I could not help smiling, in spite of myself, at the thought of such a spectacle.
“Nor is there need to laugh because I speak of dancing,” said he, quickly. “They could tell you up in Kleptowitz there are worse performers than Hans Spouer; and if he is not an Englishman, he is an honest Austrian!”
This he said with a sort of defiance, and as if he expected a reply.
“I have told you already, Hans,” said I, soothingly, “that it was none of my seeking if I am to be transferred from the yard. I was very happy there,—very happy to be with you. We were good comrades in the past, as I hope we may be good friends in the future.”
“That can scarcely be,” said he, sorrowfully. “I can have no friend in the man I must say 'sir' to. It's Herr Ignaz's order,” went he on, “he sent for me this morning, and said, 'Hanserl, when you address Herr von Owen,'—aye, he said Herr von Owen,—'never forget he is your superior; and though he once worked with you here in the yard, that was his caprice, and he will do so no more.”
“But, Hans, my dear old friend.”
“Ja, ja,” said he, waving his hand. “Jetzt ist aus! It is all over now. Here's your reckoning,” and he laid a slip of paper on the bed: “Twelve gulden for the dinners, three-fifty for wine and beer, two gulden for the wash. There were four kreutzers for the girl with the guitar; you bade me give her ten, but four was plenty,—that makes seventeen-six-and-sixty: and you've twenty-three gulden and thirty-four kreutzers in that packet, and so Lebwohl.”
And, with a short wave of his hand, he turned away; and as he left the room, I saw that the other hand had been drawn over his eyes, for Hanserl was crying; but I buried my face in the clothes, and sobbed bitterly.
My orders were to present myself at Herr Ignaz's private office by noon. Careful not to presume on what seemed at least a happy turn in my destiny, I dressed in my everyday clothes, studious only that they should be clean and well-brushed.
“I had forgotten you altogether, boy,” said Herr Ignaz, as I entered the office, and he went on closing his desk and his iron safe before leaving for dinner. “What was it I had to say to you? Can you help me to it, lad?”
“I'm afraid not, sir; I only know that you told me to be here at this hour.”
“Let me see,” said he, thoughtfully. “There was no complaint against you?”
“None, sir, that I know of.”
“Nor have you any to make against old Hanserl?”
“Far from it, sir. I have met only kindness from him.”
“Wait, wait, wait,” said he. “I believe I am coming to it. It was Sara's doing. Yes, I have it now. Sara said you should not be in the yard; that you had been well brought up and cared for. A young girl's fancy, perhaps. Your hands were white. But there is more bad than good in this. Men should be in the station they 're fit for; neither above nor below it. And you did well in the yard; ay, and you liked it?”
“I certainly was very happy there, sir.”
“And that's all one strives for,” said he, with a faint sigh; “to be at rest,—to be at rest: and why would you change, boy?”
“I am not seeking a change, sir. I am here because you bade me.”
“That's true. Come in and eat your soup with us, and we 'll see what the girl says, for I have forgotten all about it.”
He opened a small door which led by a narrow stair into a back street, and, shuffling along, with his hat drawn over his eyes, made for the little garden over the wooden bridge, and to his door. This he unlocked, and then bidding me follow, he ascended the stairs.
The room into which we entered was furnished in the most plain and simple fashion. A small table, with a coarse cloth and some common ware, stood ready for dinner, and a large loaf on a wooden platter, occupied the middle. There were but two places prepared; but the old man speedily arranged a third place, muttering to himself the while, but what I could not catch.
As he was thus engaged, the Fraulein entered. She was dressed in a sort of brown serge, which, though of the humblest tissue, showed her figure to great advantage, for it fitted to perfection, and designed the graceful lines' of her shoulders, and her taper waist to great advantage. She saluted me with the faintest possible smile, and said: “You are come to dine with us?”
“If there be enough to give him to eat,” said the old man, gruffly. “I have brought him here, however, with other thoughts. There was something said last night,—what was it, girl?—something about this lad,—do you remember it?”
“Here is the soup, father,” said she, calmly. “We'll bethink us of these things by and by.” There was a strange air of half-command in what she said, the tone of one who asserted a certain supremacy, as I was soon to see she did in the household. “Sit here, Herr von Owen,” said she, pointing to my place, and her words were uttered like an order.
In perfect silence the meal went on; a woman-servant entering to replace the soup by a dish of boiled meat, but not otherwise waiting on us, for Sara rose and removed our plates and served us with fresh ones,—an office I would gladly have taken from her, and indeed essayed to do, but at a gesture, and a look that there was no mistaking, I sat down again, and, unmindful of my presence, they soon began to talk of business matters, in which, to my astonishment, the young girl seemed thoroughly versed. Cargoes of grain for Athens consigned to one house, were now to be transferred to some other. There were large orders from France for staves, to meet which some one should be promptly despatched into Hungary. Hemp, too, was wanted for England. There was a troublesome litigation with an Insurance Company at Marseilles, which was evidently going against the House of Oppovich. So unlike was all this the tone of dinner conversation I was used to that I listened in wonderment how they could devote the hour of social enjoyment and relaxation to details so perplexing and so vulgar.
“There is that affair of the leakage, too,” cried Herr Ignaz, setting down his glass before drinking; “I had nigh forgotten it.”
“I answered the letter this morning,” said the girl, gravely. “It is better it should be settled at once, while the exchanges are in our favor.”
“And pay—pay the whole amount,” cried he, angrily.
“Pay it all,” replied she, calmly. “We must not let them call us litigious, father. You have friends here,” and she laid emphasis on the word, “that would not be grieved to see you get the name.”
“Twenty-seven thousand gulden!” exclaimed he, with a quivering lip. “And how am I to save money for your dowry, girl, with losses like these?”
“You forget, sir, we are not alone,” said she, proudly. “This young Englishman can scarcely feel interested in these details.” She arose as she spoke, and placed a few dishes of fruit on the table, and then served us with coffee; the whole done so unobtrusively and in such quiet fashion as to make her services appear a routine that could not call for remark.
“The 'Dalmat' will not take our freight,” said he, suddenly. “There is some combination against us there.”
“I will look to it,” said she, coldly. “Will you try these figs, Herr von Owen? Fiume, they say, rivals Smyrna in purple figs.”
“I will have no more to do with figs or olives either,” cried out Herr Ignaz. “The English beat you down to the lowest price, and then refuse your cargo for one damaged crate. I have had no luck with England.”
Unconsciously, I know it was, his eyes turned fully on me as he spoke, and there was a defiance in his look that seemed like a personal challenge.
“He does not mean it for you,” said the Fräulein, gently in my ear, and her voice gained a softness I did not know it possessed.
Perhaps the old man's thoughts had taken a very gloomy turn, for he leaned his head on his hand, and seemed sunk in revery. The Fräulein rose quietly, and, beckoning me to follow her, moved noiselessly into an adjoining room. This chamber, furnished a little more tastefully, had a piano, and some books and prints lay about on the tables.
“My father likes to be left alone at times,” said she, gravely; “and when you know us better, you will learn to see what these times are.” She took up some needlework she had been engaged on, and sat down on a sofa. I did not well know whether to take my leave or keep her company; and while I hesitated she appeared to read my difficulty, and said, “You are free, Herr von Owen, if you have any engagement.”
“I have none,” said I; then remembering that the speech might mean to dismiss me, I added hastily, “but it is time to go.”
“Good-bye, then,” said she, making me a slight bow; and I went.