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+} +.xd20e140 +{ +margin:0px auto; display:table;width:80%; +} +.xd20e162 +{ +text-align:right; +} +.xd20e184width +{ +width:471px; +} +.xd20e6375 +{ +text-align:center; +} +</style> +</head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Later Life, by Louis Couperus + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Later Life + +Author: Louis Couperus + +Translator: Alexander Teixeira de Mattos + +Release Date: September 30, 2011 [EBook #37578] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LATER LIFE *** + + + + +Produced by Jeroen Hellingman and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net/ for Project +Gutenberg (This file was produced from images generously +made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) + + + + + + +</pre> + +<div class="front"> +<div class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first"></p> +<div class="figure xd20e120width"><img src="images/frontcover.jpg" alt= +"Original Front Cover." width="491" height="720"></div> +</div> +</div> +<div class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first xd20e126">The Later Life</p> +</div> +</div> +<div class="div1 xd20e129"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first xd20e130">THE BOOKS OF THE SMALL SOULS</p> +<p class="xd20e126">By</p> +<p class="xd20e130">LOUIS COUPERUS</p> +<p class="xd20e126">Translated by<br> +ALEXANDER TEIXEIRA DE MATTOS</p> +<div class="table"> +<table class="xd20e140" width="100%"> +<tr valign="top"> +<td>I.</td> +<td><a class="pglink xd20e41" title="Link to Project Gutenberg ebook" +href="https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/34021">SMALL SOULS</a>.</td> +</tr> +<tr valign="top"> +<td>II.</td> +<td>THE LATER LIFE.</td> +</tr> +<tr valign="top"> +<td>III.</td> +<td><a class="pglink xd20e41" title="Link to Project Gutenberg ebook" +href="https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/34458">THE TWILIGHT OF THE +SOULS</a>.</td> +</tr> +<tr valign="top"> +<td></td> +<td class="xd20e162">[<i>In preparation.</i></td> +</tr> +<tr valign="top"> +<td>IV.</td> +<td><a class="pglink xd20e41" title="Link to Project Gutenberg ebook" +href="https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/34761">DR. ADRIAAN</a>.</td> +</tr> +<tr valign="top"> +<td></td> +<td class="xd20e162">[<i>Later.</i></td> +</tr> +</table> +</div> +</div> +</div> +<div class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first"></p> +<div class="figure xd20e184width"><img src="images/titlepage.gif" alt= +"Original Title Page." width="471" height="720"></div> +</div> +</div> +<div class="titlePage"> +<div class="docTitle"> +<div class="mainTitle">The Later Life</div> +</div> +<div class="byline">By<br> +<span class="docAuthor">Louis Couperus</span><br> +Author of “Small Souls,” “Footsteps of Fate,” +etc.<br> +<i>Translated by</i> <span class="docAuthor"><i>Alexander Teixeira de +Mattos</i></span></div> +<div class="docImprint">New York<br> +Dodd, Mead and Company<br> +<span class="docDate">1915</span></div> +</div> +<div class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first xd20e126"><span class="sc">Copyright, 1915</span></p> +<p class="xd20e126"><span class="sc">By</span> <span class="uc">Dodd, +Mead and Company</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="note" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 class="main">Translator’s Note</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first"><i>The Later Life</i> is the second of <i>The Books of +the Small Souls</i>, following immediately upon <i>Small Souls</i>, the +novel that gives the title to the series. In the present story, +Couperus reverts, at times and in a measure, to that earlier, +“sensitivist” method which he abandoned almost wholly in +<i>Small Souls</i> and which he again abandons in <i>The Twilight of +the Souls</i> and in <i>Dr. Adriaan</i>, the third and fourth novels of +the series.</p> +<p class="signed"><span class="sc">Alexander Teixeira de +Mattos.</span></p> +<p class="signed"><span class="sc">Chelsea</span>,<br> +<i>22 March, 1914</i>.</p> +</div> +</div> +</div> +<div class="body"> +<div id="ch1" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 class="super">The Later Life</h2> +<p><span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb1" href="#pb1" name= +"pb1">1</a>]</span></p> +<h2 class="main">Chapter I</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">Van der Welcke woke that morning from a long, sound +sleep and stretched himself luxuriously in the warmth of the sheets. +But suddenly he remembered what he had been dreaming; and, as he did +so, he gazed into the wardrobe-glass, in which he could just see +himself from his pillow. A smile began to flicker about his curly +moustache; his blue eyes lit up with merriment. The sheets, which still +covered his body—he had flung his arms above his head—rose +and fell with the ripple of his silent chuckles; and suddenly, +irrepressibly, he burst into a loud guffaw:</p> +<p>“Addie!” he shouted, roaring with laughter. +“Addie, are you up?... Addie, come here for a minute!”</p> +<p>The door between the two rooms opened; Addie entered.</p> +<p>“Addie!... Just imagine ... just imagine what I’ve been +dreaming. It was at the seaside—Ostende or Scheveningen or +somewhere—and everybody, everybody was going about ... half-naked +... their legs bare... and the rest beautifully dressed. The men had +coloured shirts and light jackets and exquisite ties and straw hats, +gloves and a stick in their hands ... and the rest ... <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb2" href="#pb2" name="pb2">2</a>]</span>the rest was +stark naked. The ladies wore lovely blouses, magnificent hats, parasols +... and that was all!... And there was nothing in it, Addie, really +there was nothing in it; it was all quite natural, quite proper, quite +fashionable; and they walked about like that and sat on chairs and +listened to the music!... And the fishermen ... the fishermen, Addie, +went about like that too!... And the musicians ... in the bandstand ... +were half-naked too; and ... the tails ... of their dress-coats ... +hung down ... well ... like that!”</p> +<p>Van der Welcke, as he told his dream in broken sentences, lay +shaking with laughter; his whole bed shook, the sheets rose and fell; +he was red in the face, as if on the verge of choking; he wept as +though consumed with grief; he gasped for breath, threw the bed-clothes +off:</p> +<p>“Just imagine it ... just imagine it ... you never ... you +never saw such a stretch of sands as that!”</p> +<p>Addie had begun by listening with his usual serious face; but, when +he saw his father crying and gasping for breath, rolling about in the +bed, and when the vision of those sands became clearer to his +imagination, he also was seized with irresistible laughter. But he had +one peculiarity, that he could not laugh outright, but, shaken with +internal merriment, would laugh in his stomach without uttering a +sound; and he now sat on the edge of his <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb3" href="#pb3" name="pb3">3</a>]</span>father’s bed, rocking +with silent laughter as the bed rocked under him. He tried not to look +at his father, for, when he saw his father’s face, distorted and +purple with his paroxysms of laughter, lying on the white pillow like +the mask of some faun, he had to make agonized clutches at his stomach +and, bent double, to try to laugh outright; and he couldn’t, he +couldn’t.</p> +<p>“Doesn’t it ... doesn’t it ... strike you as +funny?” asked Van der Welcke, hearing no sound of laughter from +his son.</p> +<p>And he looked at Addie and, suddenly remembering that Addie could +never roar with laughter out loud, he became still merrier at the sight +of his poor boy’s silent throes, his noiseless stomach-laugh, +until his own laughter rang through the room, echoing back from the +walls, filling the whole room with loud Homeric mirth.</p> +<p>“Oh, Father, stop!” said Addie at last, a little +relieved by his internal paroxysms, the tears streaming in wet streaks +down his face.</p> +<p>And he heaved a sigh of despair that he could not laugh like his +father.</p> +<p>“Give me a pencil and paper,” said Van der Welcke, +“and I’ll draw you my dream.”</p> +<p>But Addie was very severe and shocked:</p> +<p>“No, Father, that won’t do! That’ll never do.... +it’d be a vulgar drawing!”</p> +<p>And his son’s chaste seriousness worked to such <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb4" href="#pb4" name="pb4">4</a>]</span>an extent +upon Van der Welcke’s easily tickled nerves that he began roaring +once more at Addie’s indignation....</p> +<p>Truitje was prowling about the passage, knocking at all the doors, +not knowing where Addie was:</p> +<p>“Are you up, Master Addie?”</p> +<p>“Yes,” cried Addie. “Wait a minute.”</p> +<p>He went to the door:</p> +<p>“What is it?”</p> +<p>“A telegram ... from the mistress, I expect....”</p> +<p>“Here.”</p> +<p>He took the telegram, shut the door again.</p> +<p>“From Mamma?” asked Van der Welcke.</p> +<p>“Sure to be. Yes, from Paris: <i lang= +"fr">‘J’arrive ce soir.’”</i></p> +<p>Van der Welcke grew serious:</p> +<p>“And high time too. What business had Mamma to go rushing +abroad like that?... One’d think we were well off.... What did +you do about those bills, Addie?”</p> +<p>“I went to the shops and said that mevrouw was out of town and +that they’d have to wait.”</p> +<p>“I see. That’s all right.... Can you meet Mamma at the +station?”</p> +<p>“Yes. The train’s due at six.... Then we’ll have +dinner afterwards, with Mamma.”</p> +<p>“I don’t know.... I think I’d better dine at the +club.” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb5" href="#pb5" name= +"pb5">5</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Come, Father, don’t be silly!”</p> +<p>“No,” said Van der Welcke, crossly, “don’t +bother me. I’ll stay on at the Witte.”</p> +<p>“But don’t you see that means starting off with a +manifestation? Whereas, if you wait in for Mamma peacefully and we all +have dinner together, then things’ll come right of themselves. +That’ll be much easier than if you go staying out at once: Mamma +would only think it rude.”</p> +<p>“Rude?... Rude?...”</p> +<p>“Well, there’s nothing to flare up about! And you just +come home to dinner. Then you’ll be on the right side.”</p> +<p>“I’ll think it over. If I don’t look out, +you’ll be bossing me altogether.”</p> +<p>“Well, then, don’t mind me, stay at the +Witte.”</p> +<p>“Oho! So you’re offended, young man?”</p> +<p>“Oh, no! I’d rather you came home, of course; but, if +you prefer to dine at the Witte, do.”</p> +<p>“Dearly-beloved son!” said Van der Welcke, throwing out +his hands with a comical gesture of resignation. “Your father +will obey your sapient wishes.”</p> +<p>“Fond Father, I thank you. But I must be off to school +now.”</p> +<p>“Good-bye, then ... and you’d better forget those +sands.”</p> +<p>They both exploded and Addie hurried away and vanished, shaking with +his painful stomach-laugh, <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb6" href= +"#pb6" name="pb6">6</a>]</span>while he heard Van der Welcke break into +a fresh guffaw:</p> +<p>“He <i>can</i> laugh!” thought the boy. <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb7" href="#pb7" name="pb7">7</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch2" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e386" class="main">Chapter II</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">Van der Welcke had dressed and breakfasted and, +because he felt bored, took his bicycle and went for a long ride by +himself. He was very often bored these days, now that Addie was working +hard at the grammar-school. Without his boy, he seemed at once to have +nothing to do, no object in life; he could see no reason for his +existence. He would smoke endless cigarettes in his den, or go +bicycling, or turn up once in a way at the Plaats, once in a way at the +Witte; but he did not go to either of his clubs as often as he used to. +He saw much less of his friends, his friends of former days, the men of +birth and position who had all won fame in their respective spheres, +though Van Vreeswijck continued his visits regularly, appreciating the +cosy little dinners. Van der Welcke generally felt lonely and stranded, +found his own company more and more boring from day to day; and it was +only when he saw his boy come back from school that he cheered up, +enjoyed life, was glad and lively as a child.</p> +<p>He loved the quick movement of it; and he cycled and cycled along +the lonely, chill, windy country-roads, aiming at no destination, just +pedalling away for the sake of speed, for the sake of covering the +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb8" href="#pb8" name= +"pb8">8</a>]</span>ground. If he were only rich: then he’d have a +motor-car! There was nothing like a motor-car! A motor-car made up for +this rotten, stodgy, boring life. To rush along the smooth roads in +your car, to let her rip: tock, tock, tock, tock, tock-tock-tock-tock! +Ha!... Ha!... That would be grand! Suppose his father were to make him +a present of a car.... Ha!... Tock-tock-tock-tock!... And, as he +spurted along, he suggested to himself the frantic orgy of speed of a +puffing, snorting motor-car, the acrid stench of its petrol-fumes, the +ready obedience of the pneumatic-tyred wheels while the car flew +through the dust like a storm-chariot over the clouds. It made him +poetic—tock-tock-tock-tock, tock-tock-tock-tock—but, as +long as his father lived, he would never have enough money to buy +himself a decent car!</p> +<p>Life was stodgy, rotten, boring.... If only Addie had finished +school! But then ... then he would have to go to the university ... and +into the diplomatic service.... No, no, the older his boy grew, the +less he would see of him.... How wretched it all was: he did not know +whether to wish that Addie was older or not!... To think, it +wasn’t a year ago since the child used to sit on his knee, with +his cheek against his father’s, his arm round his father’s +neck; and Van der Welcke would feel that slight and yet sturdy frame +against his heart; and now ... now already he was a lad, a <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb9" href="#pb9" name="pb9">9</a>]</span>chap with a +deep voice, who ruled his father with a rod of iron! Yes, Van der +Welcke was simply ruled by him: there was no getting away from it! +Suppose he wanted to stay and dine at the Witte that night: why the +blazes shouldn’t he? And he knew as sure as anything that he +wouldn’t! He would come home like a good little boy, because +Addie had rather he did, because otherwise Addie would look upon it as +a manifestation against Constance.... She too was coming back, after +Addie had written that it really wouldn’t do, financially. She +had run away like a madwoman, two months ago, after that pleasant +business at the last Sunday-evening which they had spent at Mamma van +Lowe’s, after the furious scene which she had made him, Van der +Welcke, because he wanted to hit their brother-in-law, Van Naghel, in +the face. Mind, it was for her, for his wife’s sake, that he +wanted to hit Van Naghel in the face. For her sake, because that +pompous ass had dared to say that he wasn’t keen on Constance +calling on Bertha’s at-home day ... but that in other respects +they were brothers and sisters! The disgusting snob! That old woman, +that non-entity, that rotter, that twopenny-halfpenny cabinet-minister, +who had got on simply because old Van Lowe, in his day, had kicked him +upstairs step by step!... Van der Welcke was still furious when he +thought of the fellow, with his smooth face and his namby-pamby +speeches. He hadn’t been able to <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb10" href="#pb10" name="pb10">10</a>]</span>control himself that +time: his wife, at any rate, was his wife; his wife was Baroness van +der Welcke; and he couldn’t stand it, that they should insult his +wife and before his face too; and, if Paul had not prevented him, he +would have struck the snobbish ass in the face, thrashed him, thrashed +him, thrashed him! His blood still boiled at the thought of it.... +Well, there it was! Paul had held him back ... but still, he would have +liked to challenge the fellow, to have fought a duel with him!... He +grinned—pedalling like mad, bending over like a record-breaker at +the last lap of a bicycle-race—he grinned now when he thought of +the despair of the whole family, because their revered brother-in-law +Van Naghel, “his excellency,” whom they all looked up to +with such reverence, might have to fight a duel with a brother-in-law +who was already viewed with sufficient disfavour at the Hague!... Well, +it hadn’t come off. They had all interfered; but it wasn’t +for that reason, but because dear old Mamma van Lowe had taken to her +bed—and also for Addie’s sake—that he had not +insisted on the duel. Yes, those Dutchmen: they never wanted to fight +if they could help it! He, Van der Welcke, would have liked to fight, +though Van Naghel had been a thousand times his brother-in-law, a +thousand times colonial secretary. And it wasn’t only that the +whole family had thought the very idea of a duel so dreadful; but his +wise son had interfered, <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb11" href= +"#pb11" name="pb11">11</a>]</span>had taken up a very severe attitude +to his father, had reproached him because he—still “a young +man,” as Addie put it in his amusing way—wanted to insult +and strike a man of Uncle van Naghel’s age, even though it was +for Mamma’s sake! And Addie had gone to Frans van Naghel, the +eldest son, the undergraduate, of whom he was very fond; and Frans was +furious, wanted to take his father’s place and fight in his +stead. But Addie had said that Papa was in the wrong, that Papa had +lost his self-control; and he had calmed Frans and told him, his +father, positively, that it was his, Van der Welcke’s, duty to +apologize to Uncle van Naghel! That boy, that boy, thought Van der +Welcke, thinking half-angrily of his son’s perpetual tutelage. It +was really too silly: if he didn’t look out, the brat would twist +him round his little finger entirely. A little chap like that, a +schoolboy of fourteen ... and yet the beggar had managed so that Frans +did not challenge Van der Welcke and that Van der Welcke had sent Van +Naghel a note of apology, a note the thought of which made him boil +even now, made him rant and curse at the thought that he had let +himself be persuaded by the fourteen-year-old schoolboy. And then he +had had to express his regret to Mamma van Lowe into the bargain; but +that he didn’t mind, for she was an old dear and he thought it +too bad that the wretched affair should have made her ill. And so the +fourteen-year-old schoolboy <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb12" href= +"#pb12" name="pb12">12</a>]</span>had succeeded in hushing up a Hague +scandal, just like a grown-up man.... When you came to think of it, it +was simply absurd, incredible; you would never have believed it if you +read it in a book; and it was the positive truth: the schoolboy had +prevented the cabinet-minister or his son from fighting a duel with the +schoolboy’s father!... And now Van der Welcke had to choke with +laughter at the thought of it; and, as he spurted along the roads, like +a professional, with his back bent into an arch, he roared with +laughter all by himself and thought:</p> +<p>“Lord, what an extraordinary beggar he is!”</p> +<p>But the boy’s mother, after scene upon scene with him, the +father; his mother, furious that her husband should have dared to raise +his hand against that revered brother-in-law, “his +excellency;” his mother, driven out of her senses, with every +nerve on edge after all that she had had to endure that Sunday: his +mother the boy had not been able to restrain; a woman is always more +difficult to manage than a man; a mother is not half so easy as a +father! Constance, after one of those scenes which followed one upon +the other as long as the atmosphere remained charged with electricity, +had said:</p> +<p>“I’m sick of it all; I’m going away; I’m +going abroad!”</p> +<p>And even the fact that she was leaving her son behind her did not +bring her to reason. She packed her trunks, told Truitje to keep house +for the master <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb13" href="#pb13" name= +"pb13">13</a>]</span>and Master Addie as she herself used to and went +away, almost insolently, hardly even saying good-bye to Addie.... They +thought at first that she would do something rash, goodness knows what, +and were anxious because they didn’t know where Constance had +gone; but the next day there was a telegram from Paris to reassure +them, telling them that Constance was going to Nice and meant to stay +some time. Then letters came from Nice and they had no more fears, nor +had Mamma van Lowe; they all thought the change might even do her good; +and she continued pretty sensible. She wrote to her mother, to Addie; +she wrote to Truitje, impressing upon her to look after the house well +and after the master and Master Addie and to see that everything was +going on all right when her mistress returned. And this sensible, +housewifely letter had done more than anything to reassure Mamma van +Lowe and the two of them; and now they didn’t grudge Constance, +Mamma, her trip, for once in a way. But it was an expensive amusement. +Constance, it was true, had taken some money of her own with her; but +still, since they had come to the Hague, Van der Welcke no longer made +anything out of wine- and insurance-commissions; he was no longer an +agent for the Brussels firms; and they had not much to live on and had +to be very economical. And so Van der Welcke, after seven weeks had +passed, was obliged to tell Addie that it wouldn’t <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb14" href="#pb14" name="pb14">14</a>]</span>do for +Mamma to stay on at Nice, in an expensive hotel, and that he had better +write to her. And the schoolboy had written asking his mother to come +back now, telling his mother that that would have to do and that there +was no money left. And Constance was coming home that evening.</p> +<p>Van der Welcke was in good spirits all day, perhaps through the +after-effects of his dream—he kept seeing those sands before his +eyes—and, pedalling along like mad, he sat shaking in his saddle, +thinking of that young scamp of his, who ruled over his father and +mother. It wasn’t right, it was too absurd, soon they would +neither of them be able to call their souls their own; but the boy was +so sensible and he was always the little peacemaker, who settled +everything. Yes, the scamp was the joy of his life; and really, really, +except for the boy, everything was unrelieved gloom.... If only he +could buy a motor-car, or at least a motor-cycle. He must find out one +day, just ask what a motor-cycle cost.... But, apart from that, what +was there? Especially now that they two—Constance in +particular—had wanted at all costs to “rehabilitate” +themselves, as Constance called it, in Hague society and now that they +had failed utterly through that scene with Van Naghel, things were +stodgier than ever ... with no one to come and see them but Van +Vreeswijck, with no outside interests whatever. It was <i>his</i> +fault, his fault, his wife kept reproaching <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb15" href="#pb15" name="pb15">15</a>]</span>him in +their scenes, almost with enjoyment, revelling in her revenge, because +he, not long ago, had reproached her that it was <i>her</i> fault, her +fault that they were buried away there, “cursing their luck in +the Kerkhoflaan.” And he was sorry too because of Marianne: she +used to come and dine once in a way; when Van Vreeswijck was coming, +Constance would ask either Paul or Marianne, to make four; and, now +that he had insulted her father, she wouldn’t come again, they +were on unfriendly terms not only with the parents, but also with the +daughter ... and with the sons, to the great regret of Addie, who was +very fond of Frans and Henri.... His fault! His fault! Perhaps it was +his fault, but he couldn’t always restrain himself, control +himself, master himself. Possibly, if he had stuck to his career, he +would have learnt to do it, after his training in diplomatic reserve +... or else he would always have remained an indifferent diplomatist. +That might have happened too; it was quite possible!... Yes, he was +sorry ... because of Marianne. She was a nice girl, so natural, so +unaffected, in spite of her worldly environment; and he liked her eyes, +her voice. He was sorry ... because of Marianne; but it couldn’t +be helped: although he had written to her father, she would not come to +the house again, she would never come again, he thought.</p> +<p>And he almost sighed, sadly, he did not know <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb16" href="#pb16" name="pb16">16</a>]</span>why, no +doubt because life would be still more stodgy without Marianne’s +eyes and voice. But, after all, it was only once every four or five +weeks that she used to come and dine; so what did it really matter? +What did it matter? No, really nothing mattered; really, the whole +world was a sickening, stodgy business, rottenly managed.... Oh, if he +could only have bought a motor! The longing was so intense, so violent +that he was almost tempted to ask his father for one straight out. And +now, while he spurted home after his long ride, he hummed between his +teeth, to the rhythm of the flying wheels, a song which he suddenly +made up for himself:</p> +<p>“A motor-car—and a motor-car: Ottocar in a +motor-car—Ottocar in a motor-car!”</p> +<p>And burning with his longing for the unattainable, he pedalled +away—Ottocar in a motor-car!—in a mad frenzy, delighting in +the sheer speed of his ride, which made people turn round and stare at +him, at his arched back and his piston-legs, like an +automaton’s....</p> +<p>He came home very late, just as Addie was starting to go to the +station.</p> +<p>“I really thought, Daddy, that you were staying at the Witte +after all!” said the boy. “You’re so late!”</p> +<p>“No, old chap, I wouldn’t have dared do that!” +cried Van der Welcke. “Ottocar—in a motor-car! <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb17" href="#pb17" name= +"pb17">17</a>]</span>I’ve been cycling my legs off and I’m +tired out.”</p> +<p>“You’re quite red in the face.”</p> +<p>“Yes, I’ve had great fun! Ottocar—in his +motor-car! You see, I’ve got to have my fun by myself ... when +you’re cooped up at school.”</p> +<p>“What are you saying, Father, about Ottocar?”</p> +<p>“Nothing, nothing, it’s a song: Ottocar in his +motor-car!...”</p> +<p>“Well, I’m off ... to meet Mamma. Good-bye, you mad old +Dad!”</p> +<p>“Good-bye, my boy.... Come here a moment....”</p> +<p>“What’s the matter now?...”</p> +<p>“Old chap, I feel so lonely sometimes ... so terribly alone +... so forlorn.... Tell me, Addie, you’ll always be your +father’s chum, won’t you?... You won’t leave me, like +all the rest? You’ll stay with your old father?”</p> +<p>“But, Daddy, what makes you so sentimental +suddenly?”</p> +<p>“Oh, no, I’m not sentimental ... but, my dear boy, +I’m so awfully bored sometimes!”</p> +<p>“Then why don’t you find more to do, Daddy?”</p> +<p>“Oh, my boy, what would you have me do?... Oh, if I only had a +car!”</p> +<p>“A car?...”</p> +<p>“A motor-car! Like Ottocar!”</p> +<p>And Van der Welcke burst out laughing: <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb18" href="#pb18" name="pb18">18</a>]</span></p> +<p>“He at least <i>had</i> one!” he bellowed, amidst his +laughter.</p> +<p>“Father, you’re mad!”</p> +<p>“Yes, to-day ... because of that dream, those wonderful +sands.... Oh, how I wish I were Ottocar!... My boy, my boy, I’m +so terribly bored sometimes!”</p> +<p>“And just after you’ve had a jolly +bicycle-ride!”</p> +<p>“All on my own ... with my head full of all sorts of wretched +thoughts!...”</p> +<p>“Well, to-morrow, Wednesday afternoon, we’ll go +together.”</p> +<p>“Do you mean it? A long ride? To-morrow? To-morrow?”</p> +<p>“Yes, certainly, a long ride.”</p> +<p>“You brick! My own Addie! My boy! My boy!”</p> +<p>He was as grateful as a child, caught his son in his arms:</p> +<p>“Addie, let me give you one more hug!”</p> +<p>“Well, be quick about it, Father, for I must really go, or I +shall be late.”</p> +<p>Van der Welcke put his arms round him, kissed him on both cheeks, +and flew upstairs. He undressed, flung his clothes to right and left, +washed his face in a huge basin of water, shaved quickly, dressed +himself neatly. He did all this with much fuss and rushing about, as +though his toilet was a most important affair. Then he went downstairs. +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb19" href="#pb19" name= +"pb19">19</a>]</span>The table was laid. It was nearly seven. Constance +would be there in no time. And, sitting down in the drawing-room with a +cigarette, looking round the room—Constance’ room all over, +in which he sat as a stranger—he hummed, while he waited for his +wife and his son:</p> +<p>“And Ottocar had a motor-car; but +I—have—<i>none</i>!...” <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb20" href="#pb20" name="pb20">20</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch3" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e514" class="main">Chapter III</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">Addie ran up the stairs to the platform just as the +train from Paris steamed in. He hurried along, looking into the +windows.... There was Mamma, there was Mamma! And he flung himself on +the handle, pulled open the door, helped Constance to alight.</p> +<p>“Ah!” he said. “There you are! There you are at +last!”</p> +<p>She laughed, kissed him, her handsome, sturdy boy:</p> +<p>“My boy, how could I do so long without you?”</p> +<p>“Ah, so you see! You’re surprised at it yourself! Come, +make haste, I’ve got a cab. Give me your +luggage-ticket.”</p> +<p>He swept her along; and, in the cab, while they were waiting for the +luggage:</p> +<p>“Tell me, Addie,” she said, “is there really no +money left?”</p> +<p>“Do you imagine that, when you go spending seven weeks at +Nice, in a first-class hotel, there’ll still be money?”</p> +<p>“I never thought of it like that,” she said meekly.</p> +<p>He laughed, thought her tremendously amusing. She laughed too, they +both bubbled with mirth, <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb21" href= +"#pb21" name="pb21">21</a>]</span>Constance glad at seeing him, at +finding him looking so well and in such good spirits.</p> +<p>“Mamma, you’re hopeless!” he exclaimed. “Did +you really never think that there was no money left?”</p> +<p>“No,” said Constance, humbly.</p> +<p>And they both started laughing again. He shook his head, considered +her incorrigible:</p> +<p>“And I’ve got some bills too, for the things you bought +when you went away.”</p> +<p>“Oh, yes!” she said, remembering. “But they can +wait.”</p> +<p>“I told them that you were abroad and that they’d have +to wait.”</p> +<p>“Of course,” said she.</p> +<p>And they arrived in the Kerkhoflaan in excellent spirits.</p> +<p>“Well, Truitje, have you looked after the master and Master +Addie nicely?”</p> +<p>“I did the best I could, ma’am.... But it’s just +as well you’re back again....”</p> +<p>“Well, Constance?”</p> +<p>“Well, Henri?”</p> +<p>“Did you have a good time?”</p> +<p>“Yes.”</p> +<p>“You’re looking well.”</p> +<p>“Thanks.... Oh, have you waited dinner for me?”</p> +<p>“Well, of course!” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb22" +href="#pb22" name="pb22">22</a>]</span></p> +<p>“I’ll go and wash my hands and I’ll be down +immediately.”</p> +<p>“Mamma never thought for a moment ... that there was no money +left,” said Addie.</p> +<p>“Nonsense!” said Van der Welcke.</p> +<p>But he seemed to consider it quite natural; and, when Constance came +downstairs, he said, laughing:</p> +<p>“Didn’t you think that there was no money +left?”</p> +<p>Constance glanced up, imagining that he meant to make a scene. But +he was smiling; and his question sounded good-humoured.</p> +<p>“No!” she said, as if it was only natural.</p> +<p>And now they all went into fits of laughter, Addie with his silent +convulsions, which made him shake up and down painfully.</p> +<p>“Do laugh right out, boy!” said Van der Welcke, teasing +him. “Do laugh right out, if you can.”</p> +<p>They were very gay as they sat down to dinner.</p> +<p>“And just guess,” said Constance, “whom I met in +the hotel at Nice, whom I sat next to at the <i lang="fr">table +d’hôte</i>: the d’Azignys, from Rome.... The first +people I met, the d’Azignys. It’s incredible how small the +world is, how small, how small!”</p> +<p>He also remembered the d’Azignys: the French ambassador at +Rome and his wife ... fifteen years ago now.... <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb23" href="#pb23" name="pb23">23</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Really?” he asked, greatly interested. “Were they +all right?”</p> +<p>“Oh, quite,” she said, “quite! I remembered them +at once, but didn’t bow. But d’Azigny was very polite; and, +after a minute or two, he spoke to me, asked if he wasn’t right +in thinking I was the Baronne de Staffelaer. ‘Baronne van der +Welcke,’ I replied. He flushed up and his wife nudged him, but +after that they were very charming and amiable all the time I was at +Nice. I saw a lot of them and, through their introduction, I went to a +splendid ball at the Duc de Rivoli’s. I enjoyed it thoroughly. I +wore a beautiful dress, I was in my element once more, I was a +foreigner, everybody was very pleasant and I felt light-hearted again, +quit of everything and everybody, and I thought to +myself....”</p> +<p>“Well, what did you think?”</p> +<p>“Oh, if only we had never gone back to Holland! If, when +Brussels became so dull, we had just moved to a town like Nice. +It’s delightful there. As a foreigner, you need have nothing to +trouble about, you can do just as you like, know just whom you please. +You feel so free, so free.... And why, I thought, must Addie become and +remain a Dutchman? He could just as well be a Frenchman ... or a +cosmopolitan....”</p> +<p>“Thank you, Mamma: I don’t feel like being a Frenchman, +nor yet a cosmopolitan. And you’d <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb24" href="#pb24" name="pb24">24</a>]</span>better not say that to +Uncle Gerrit, or you can look out for squalls.”</p> +<p>“Addie, I’ve met with so many squalls in my dear Holland +that I feel like blowing away myself, away from +everybody....”</p> +<p>“Including your son?”</p> +<p>“No, my boy. I missed you. I thought of you every day. I +<i>am</i> so glad to see you again. But I did think to myself that we +should have done better never to come back to Holland.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Van der Welcke, thoughtfully.</p> +<p>“We could have lived at Nice, if we liked.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” Van der Welcke admitted, a little dubiously, +“but you were longing for your family.”</p> +<p>She clenched her little hand and struck the table with it:</p> +<p>“And you!” she cried. “Didn’t you long for +your parents, for your country?”</p> +<p>“But not so much as you did.”</p> +<p>“And who thought it necessary for Addie? I +didn’t!” she exclaimed, in a shrill voice. “I +didn’t for a moment! It was you!”</p> +<p>“Oh, d——,” said Addie, almost breaking into +an oath. “My dearest parents, for Heaven’s sake don’t +begin quarrelling at once, for I assure the two of you that, if you do, +<i>I’ll</i> blow away and <i>I’ll</i> go to Nice ... money +or no money!”</p> +<p>Van der Welcke and Constance gave one roar and Addie joined in the +laugh. <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb25" href="#pb25" name= +"pb25">25</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Oh, that boy!” said Van der Welcke, choking with +merriment. “That boy!”</p> +<p>Constance uttered a deep sigh:</p> +<p>“Oh, Addie!” she said. “Mamma does and says such +strange things, sometimes ... but she doesn’t mean them a bit. +She’s really glad to be back again, in her horrid country ... and +in her own home, her dear cosy home ... and with her son, her darling +boy!”</p> +<p>And, throwing her arm round his neck, she let her head fall on his +breast and she sobbed, sobbed aloud, so that Truitje, entering the +room, started, but then, accustomed to these perpetual, inevitable +scenes, quietly went on laying the dessert-plates.</p> +<p>Van der Welcke fiddled with his knife.</p> +<p>“Why can’t those two manage to get on better +together?” thought Addie, sadly, while he comforted his mother +and gently patted her shoulder.... <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb26" +href="#pb26" name="pb26">26</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch4" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e666" class="main">Chapter IV</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">“And shall Mamma show you what she looked like +at the Duc de Rivoli’s?”</p> +<p>Dinner was over and she was sitting by her open trunk, while Truitje +helped her unpack and put the things away.</p> +<p>“I had my photograph taken at Nice. But first here’s a +work-box for Truitje, with Nice violets on it. Look, Truitje: +it’s palm-wood inlaid; a present for you. And here’s one +for cook.”</p> +<p>“Oh, thank you, ma’am!”</p> +<p>“And for my wise son I hunted all over Nice for a souvenir and +found nothing, for I was afraid of bringing you something not serious +enough for your patriarchal tastes; and so I had myself photographed +for you. There: the last frivolous portrait of your mother.”</p> +<p>She took the photograph from its envelope: it showed her at +full-length, standing, in her ball-dress; a photograph taken with a +great deal of artistry and <i>chic</i>, but too young, too much touched +up, with a little too much pose about the hair, the fan, the train.</p> +<p>He looked at her with a smile.</p> +<p>“Well, what do you think of it?” she asked.</p> +<p>“What a bundle of vanity you are, Mamma!” <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb27" href="#pb27" name="pb27">27</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Don’t you like it? Then give it back at +once.”</p> +<p>“Why, no, Mummy: I think it awfully jolly to have a photograph +of you....”</p> +<p>“Of my last mad mood. Now your mother is really going to grow +old, my boy. Upon my word, I believe Truitje admires my portrait more +than my son does!...”</p> +<p>“Oh, ma’am, I think it’s splendid!”</p> +<p>“How many did you have done, Mummy?”</p> +<p>“Six. One for Granny, one for Uncle Gerrit, one for Uncle +Paul, one for you, one for myself....”</p> +<p>“And one for Papa.”</p> +<p>“Oh, Papa owns the original!”</p> +<p>“No, give your husband one.”</p> +<p>“Henri!” she called.</p> +<p>He came in.</p> +<p>“Here’s a portrait of your wife.”</p> +<p>“Lovely!” he exclaimed. “That’s awfully +good! Thanks very much.”</p> +<p>“Glad you like it. My husband and my handmaid are satisfied, +at any rate. My son thinks me a bundle of vanity.... Oh, how glad I am +to be back!... Here’s the ball-dress. We’ll put it away +to-morrow. I shall never wear the thing again. A dress that cost six +hundred francs for one wearing. Now we’ll be old again and +economical.”</p> +<p>They all laughed, including Truitje.</p> +<p>“Oh, how glad I am to be back!... My own <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb28" href="#pb28" name="pb28">28</a>]</span>room, my +own cupboards.... Truitje, what did you give your masters to +eat?”</p> +<p>“Well, just what you used to, ma’am!...”</p> +<p>“So it was all right? I wasn’t missed?...”</p> +<p>“Oh, but you mustn’t go away for so long again, +ma’am!” said Truitje, in alarm.</p> +<p>Constance laughed and stretched herself out on her sofa, glad to be +home. Van der Welcke left the room with his photograph, Truitje with +her work-box.</p> +<p>“Come here, Addie. Papa has had you for seven weeks. Now you +belong to me ... for an indefinite period.”</p> +<p>She drew him down beside her, took his hands. It struck him that she +looked tired, more like her years, not like her photograph; and, his +mind travelling swiftly to his father, he thought his father so young, +outwardly a young man and inwardly sometimes a child: Ottocar in a +motor-car....</p> +<p>“It’s strange, Addie,” she said, softly, +“that you are only fourteen: you always seem to me at least +twenty. And I think it strange also that I should have such a big son. +So everything is strange. And your mother herself, my boy, is the +strangest of all. If you ask me honestly if I like being +‘vain,’ I mean, taking part in social frivolities, I +shouldn’t know what to answer. I certainly used to enjoy it in +the old days; and, a fortnight ago, I admit I looked upon it as a sort +of youth that comes over <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb29" href= +"#pb29" name="pb29">29</a>]</span>one again; but really it all means +nothing: just a little brilliancy; and then you feel so tired and empty +... and so discontented....”</p> +<p>She stopped suddenly, not caring to say more, and looked at the +photograph, now lying on a table beside her. It made her laugh again; +and at the same time a tear trembled on her lashes. And she did not +know if it gave her a peaceful feeling to be growing old ... or if she +regretted it. It was as though the sun of Nice had imbued her with a +strange, dull melancholy which she herself did not understand.</p> +<p>“To live!” she thought. “I have never lived. I +would so gladly live once ... just once. To live! But not like this ... +in a dress that cost six hundred francs. I know that, I know all about +it: it is just a momentary brilliancy and then nothing.... To live! I +should like to live ... really ... truly. There must be +<i>something</i>. But it is a mad wish. I am too old. I am growing old, +I am becoming an old woman.... To live! I have never lived ... I have +been in the world, as a woman of the world; I spoilt <i>that</i> life; +then I hid myself.... I was so anxious to come back to my country and +my family; and it all meant nothing but a little show and illusion ... +and a great deal of disappointment. And so the days were wasted, one +after the other, and I ... have ... never ... lived.... Just as I throw +away my <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb30" href="#pb30" name= +"pb30">30</a>]</span>money, so I have thrown away my days. Perhaps I +have squandered all my days ... for nothing. Oh, I oughtn’t to +feel like this! What does it mean when I do? What am I regretting? What +is there left for me? At Nice, I thought for a moment of joining in +that feminine revolt against approaching age; and I did join in it; and +I succeeded. But what does it all mean and what is the use of it? It +only means shining a little longer, for nothing; but it does not mean +living.... But to long for it doesn’t mean anything either, for +there is nothing for me now but to grow old, in my home; and, even if I +am not exactly among my people, my brothers and sisters, at any rate I +have my mother ... and, perhaps for quite a long time still, my son +too....”</p> +<p>“Mummy ... what are you thinking about so deeply?”</p> +<p>But she smiled, said nothing, looked earnestly at him:</p> +<p>“He’s much fonder of his father,” she thought. +“I know it, but it can’t be helped. I must put up with it +and accept what he gives me.”</p> +<p>“Come, Mummy, what are you thinking about?”</p> +<p>“Lots of things, my boy ... and perhaps nothing.... Mamma +feels so lonely ... with no one about her ... except you....”</p> +<p>He started, struck by what she had said: it was almost the same +words that his father had used that afternoon. <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb31" href="#pb31" name="pb31">31</a>]</span></p> +<p>“My boy, will you always stay with me? You won’t go +away, like everybody?...”</p> +<p>“Come, Mummy, you’ve got Granny and Uncle Gerrit and +Uncle Paul.”</p> +<p>“Yes, they are nice,” she said, softly.</p> +<p>And she thought:</p> +<p>“I shall lose him, later, when he’s grown up.... I know +that I shall lose him....”</p> +<p>It made her feel very weak and helpless; and she began to +cry....</p> +<p>He knelt down beside her and, in a stern voice, forbade her to be so +excitable, forbade her to cry about nothing....</p> +<p>It was heavenly to have him laying down the law like that. And she +thought:</p> +<p>“I shall lose him, when he’s grown up.... Oh, let me be +thankful that I have him still!...”</p> +<p>Then, tired out, she went to sleep; and he left her, thinking to +himself:</p> +<p>“They both feel the same thing!” <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb32" href="#pb32" name="pb32">32</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch5" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e793" class="main">Chapter V</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">She tried tyrannically to monopolize her son, so that +Van der Welcke became very jealous. It was the next day, Wednesday +afternoon.</p> +<p>“Are you coming with me to Granny’s?”</p> +<p>“I promised Papa to go cycling.”</p> +<p>“You’ve had seven weeks for cycling with +Papa.”</p> +<p>“I promised him yesterday that I would go for a long ride +to-day.”</p> +<p>She was angry, offended:</p> +<p>“The first day that I’m home!...” she began.</p> +<p>He kissed her, with a shower of tiny little kisses, tried to appease +her wrath:</p> +<p>“I promised!” he said. “We don’t go cycling +together often. You will have me to yourself all the evening. Be +sensible now and nice; and don’t be so cross.”</p> +<p>She tried to be reasonable, but it cost her an effort. She went +alone to Mrs. van Lowe’s. She saw two umbrellas in the hall:</p> +<p>“Who is with mevrouw?” she asked the maid.</p> +<p>“Mrs. van Naghel and Mrs. van Saetzema.”</p> +<p>She hesitated. She had not seen her sisters since that awful +Sunday-evening. She had gone abroad five days after. But she wanted to +show them....</p> +<p>She went upstairs. Her step was no longer as <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb33" href="#pb33" name="pb33">33</a>]</span>timid as +when she climbed those stairs ten months ago, when she first came back +among them all. She did not wish to seem arrogant, but also she did not +wish to be too humble. She entered with a smile:</p> +<p>“Mamma!” she cried, gaily, kissing her mother.</p> +<p>Mrs. van Lowe was surprised:</p> +<p>“My child!” she exclaimed, trembling. “My child! +Are you back? Are you back again? What a long time you’ve been +abroad!”</p> +<p>“I’ve enjoyed myself immensely. How d’ye do, +Bertha? How d’ye do, Adolphine?”</p> +<p>She did not shake hands, but just nodded to them, almost cordially, +because of her mother, who looked anxiously at her three daughters. +Bertha and Adolphine nodded back. Carelessly and easily, she took the +lead in the conversation and talked about Nice. She tried to talk +naturally, without bragging; but in spite of herself there was a note +of triumph in her voice:</p> +<p>“Yes, I felt I wanted to go abroad a bit.... Not nice of me to +run away without saying good-bye, was it, Mamma dear? Well, you see, +Constance sometimes behaves differently from other people.... I had a +very pleasant time at Nice: full season, lovely weather.”</p> +<p>“Weren’t you lonely?”</p> +<p>“No, for on the very first day I met some of our Rome friends +at the hotel....”</p> +<p>She felt that Bertha started, blinked her eyes, <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb34" href="#pb34" name= +"pb34">34</a>]</span>disapproved of her for daring to speak of Rome. +And she revelled in doing so, casually and airily, thought it delicious +to dazzle Adolphine with a list of her social triumphs, very naturally +described:</p> +<p>“People we used to know in Rome: Comte and Comtesse +d’Azigny. He was French ambassador in those days. They recognized +me at once and were very kind; and through the introduction I went to a +glorious ball at the Duchesse de Rivoli’s. And, Mummy, +here’s a portrait of your daughter in her ball-dress.”</p> +<p>She showed the photograph, enjoyed giving the almost +too-well-executed portrait to Mamma, not to her sisters, while letting +them see it. She described her dress, described the ball, bragging a +little this time, saying that, after all, parties abroad were always +much grander than that “seeing a few friends” in Holland, +addressing all her remarks to Mamma and, in words just tinged with +ostentation, displaying no small scorn for Bertha’s dinners and +Adolphine’s “little evenings:”</p> +<p>“Everything here is on such a small scale,” she +continued. “There, the first thing you see is a suite of twelve +rooms, all with electric light ... or, better still, all lit up with +wax-candles.... Yes, our little social efforts at the Hague cut a very +poor figure beside it.”</p> +<p>She gave a contemptuous little laugh to annoy <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb35" href="#pb35" name="pb35">35</a>]</span>her +sisters, while Mamma, always interested in the doings of the great, did +not notice the contempt and was glad enough to see that the sisters +behaved as usual to one another. And now Constance went on to say that +everything had gone on so well at home, that Truitje had looked after +everything, even though Constance had gone away indefinitely, an +unprecedented thing, so unlike a Dutch housewife! Then she turned to +her sisters with an indifferent phrase or two; and they answered her +almost cordially, out of respect for Mamma....</p> +<p>Adolphine was the first to leave, exasperated by Constance’ +insufferable tone, by all that talk about Nice, all those counts and +dukes whom Constance had mentioned; and, when Constance said good-bye, +Bertha also left and they went down the stairs together.</p> +<p>“Constance,” said Bertha, “can I speak to you a +minute in the cloak-room?”</p> +<p>Constance looked up haughtily, surprised; but she did not like to +refuse. They went into the little cloak-room.</p> +<p>“Constance,” said Bertha, “I do so want to say +that I am sorry for what happened between us. Really, it pained me very +much. And I want to tell you also that Van Naghel greatly appreciated +Van der Welcke’s writing to him to apologize. He has written to +Van der Welcke to say so. But we should both like to call on you one +day, to show <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb36" href="#pb36" name= +"pb36">36</a>]</span>you how glad we should be to come back to the old +terms once more.”</p> +<p>“Bertha,” said Constance, a little impatiently and +wearily, “I am prepared to receive your visit, but I should +really like to know what is the good of it and why you suggest it. Do +let us have some sincerity ... when there is no occasion for hypocrisy. +Sometimes one has to be insincere ... but there is no need for that +between us now. We both know that our mutual sympathy, if it ever +existed, is dead. We never meet except at Mamma’s and we +don’t let her see our estrangement. Apart from that, it seems to +me that things are over between us.”</p> +<p>“So you would rather that Van Naghel and I did not +come?”</p> +<p>“It’s not for me to decide, Bertha: I shall speak about +it to Van der Welcke and write you a line.”</p> +<p>“Is that cold answer all you have to say to me, +Constance?”</p> +<p>“Bertha, a little time ago, I was not backward in showing my +affection for you all. Perhaps I asked too much in return; but, in any +case, I was repulsed. And now I retire. That is all.”</p> +<p>“Constance, you don’t know how sorry we all are that the +old aunts ... spoke as they did. They are foolish old women, Constance; +they are in their second childhood. Mamma had to take to <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb37" href="#pb37" name="pb37">37</a>]</span>her bed, +her nerves are still quite upset; she can’t bear to see her +sisters now; and it sometimes sends her almost out of her mind. I have +never seen her like it before. And we are all of us, all of us, +Constance, very, very sorry.”</p> +<p>“Bertha, those two old women only yelled out at the top of +their voices, as deaf people do, what the rest of you thought in your +hearts.”</p> +<p>“Come, Constance, don’t be so bitter. You are hard and +unjust. I swear that you are mistaken. It is not as you think. Let me +show it to you in the future, let me prove it to you ... and please +speak to Van der Welcke and write and tell me a day when we shall find +you at home, so that Van Naghel can shake hands with Van der Welcke. He +is not a young man, Constance, and your husband is under forty. +It’s true, Van der Welcke has apologized and Van Naghel +appreciates it, but that doesn’t prevent him from wishing to +shake hands with Van der Welcke.”</p> +<p>“I’ll tell my husband, Bertha. But I don’t know +that he will think it so necessary to shake hands, any more than I do. +We live very quietly now, Bertha, and people, Hague people, no longer +concern us. And Van Naghel only wants to shake hands because of +people.”</p> +<p>“And because of the old friendship.”</p> +<p>“Very well, Bertha,” said Constance, coldly, +“because of the old friendship: a vague term that says +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb38" href="#pb38" name= +"pb38">38</a>]</span>very little to me. What I wished for was brotherly +and sisterly affection, cordial companionship. That is no longer +possible: it was a foolish fancy of mine, which has gone forever. But, +as I said, I shall speak to Van der Welcke.”</p> +<p>They came out into the hall; the maid was waiting at the door. It +was raining. Bertha’s carriage was outside, had been sent to +fetch her.</p> +<p>“Shall I drop you on my way, Constance?”</p> +<p>“No, thank you, Bertha; the fresh air will do me good; +I’d rather walk.”</p> +<p>And, as she walked, she thought:</p> +<p>“Oh, why did I go on like that to annoy them? And why +didn’t I welcome Bertha’s visit at once?... It’s all +so small, so petty....”</p> +<p>And she shrugged her shoulders under her umbrella, laughed at +herself a little, because she had shown herself so petty. <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb39" href="#pb39" name="pb39">39</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch6" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e909" class="main">Chapter VI</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">At Addie’s wish, at the little schoolboy’s +wish, the Van der Welckes responded to Van Naghel’s advances and +Constance sent a note. The visit was paid and the brothers-in-law shook +hands. Van der Welcke himself shrugged his shoulders over the whole +business; but Addie was pleased, started going for walks again with +Frans and spoke to Karel again at the grammar-school, though he did not +much care for him. Two days later, Marianne called in the afternoon, +when the rain was coming down in torrents. Constance was at home. The +girl stood in the door-way of the drawing-room:</p> +<p>“May I come in, Auntie?...”</p> +<p>“Of course, Marianne, do.”</p> +<p>“I don’t like to: I’m rather wet.”</p> +<p>“Nonsense, come in!”</p> +<p>And the girl suddenly ran in and threw herself on her knees beside +Constance, almost with a scream:</p> +<p>“I am so glad, I am so glad!” she cried.</p> +<p>“Why?”</p> +<p>“That Uncle wrote to Papa ... that Papa and Mamma have been +here ... that everything is all right again.... It was so dreadful; it +kept me from sleeping. I kept on thinking about it. It <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb40" href="#pb40" name="pb40">40</a>]</span>was a +sort of nightmare, an obsession. Auntie, dear Auntie, is everything all +right now?”</p> +<p>“Yes, certainly, child.”</p> +<p>“Really all right?... Are you coming to us again ... and may I +come and see you ... and will you ask me to dinner again soon? Is +everything all right, really all right?”</p> +<p>She snuggled up to her aunt like a child, putting her head against +Constance’ knees, stroking her hands:</p> +<p>“You will ask me again soon, Auntie, won’t you? I love +coming to you, I simply love it. I should have missed it so, I +can’t tell you how much....”</p> +<p>Her voice broke, as she knelt by Constance’ side, and she +suddenly burst into tears, sobbing out her words so excitedly that +Constance was startled, thinking it almost unnatural, absurd:</p> +<p>“I was nearly coming to you before Papa and Mamma had been.... +But I didn’t dare.... I was afraid Papa would be angry.... But I +can come now, it’s all right now....”</p> +<p>“Yes, it’s all right now....”</p> +<p>She kissed Marianne. But the door opened and Van der Welcke +entered.</p> +<p>“How do you do, Uncle?”</p> +<p>He always thought it odd when Marianne called him uncle, just like +that:</p> +<p>“Is it you, Marianne?... Constance, did I leave my +<i>Figaro</i> down here?” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb41" +href="#pb41" name="pb41">41</a>]</span></p> +<p>“The <i>Figaro</i>? No....”</p> +<p>He hunted for his paper and then sat down.</p> +<p>“Uncle,” said Marianne, “I’ve just been +telling Auntie, I’m so glad, I’m so glad that +everything’s settled.”</p> +<p>“So am I, Marianne.”</p> +<p>Outside, the rain came pelting down, lashed by the howling wind. +Inside, all was cosiness, with Constance pouring out the tea and +telling them about Nice, while Marianne talked about Emilie and Van +Raven and how they were not getting on very well together and how Otto +and Frances were also beginning to squabble and how Mamma took it all +to heart and allowed it to depress her:</p> +<p>“I sha’n’t get married,” she said. “I +see nothing but unhappy marriages around me. I sha’n’t get +married.”</p> +<p>Then she started. She had a knack of behaving awkwardly and +tactlessly, of saying things which she ought not to say. Van der Welcke +looked at her, smiling. To make up for her indiscretion, she was more +demonstrative than ever, profuse in exclamations of delight:</p> +<p>“Oh, Auntie, how glad I am to be with you once more!... I must +be off presently in the rain.... I wish I could stay....”</p> +<p>“But stay and dine,” said Van der Welcke.</p> +<p>Constance hesitated: she saw that Marianne would like to stop on and +she did not know what to <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb42" href= +"#pb42" name="pb42">42</a>]</span>do, did not wish to seem ungracious; +and yet....</p> +<p>“Will you stay to dinner?” she asked.</p> +<p>Marianne beamed with joy:</p> +<p>“Oh, I should love to, Auntie! Mamma knows I’m here; +she’ll understand....”</p> +<p>Constance was sorry that she had asked her; her nerves were feeling +the strain of it all; but she was determined to control herself, to +behave naturally and ordinarily. She could see it plainly: they were +too fond of each other!</p> +<p>They were in love! Long before, she had seemed to guess it, when she +saw them together, at her little dinners. The veriest trifle—an +intonation of voice, a laughing phrase, the passing of a dish of +fruit—had made her seem to guess it. Then the vague thought that +went through her mind, like a little cloud, would vanish at once, +leaving not even a shadow behind it. But the cloud had come drifting +again and again, brought by a gesture, a glance, a how-do-you-do or +good-bye, an appointment for a bicycle ride. On such occasions, the +brothers had always gone too—so had Addie—and there had +never been anything that was in the least incorrect; and at the little +dinners there was never a joke that went too far, nor an attempt at +flirtation, nor the very least resemblance to love-making. And +therefore those vague thoughts had always drifted away again, like +clouds; and Constance would think: <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb43" +href="#pb43" name="pb43">43</a>]</span></p> +<p>“There is nothing, there is nothing. I am mistaken. I am +imagining something that doesn’t exist.”</p> +<p>She had not seen them together for two months; and she knew, had +understood from a word dropped here and there, that Van der Welcke had +not seen Marianne during those two months which had passed since that +Sunday evening. And now, suddenly, she was struck by it: the shy, +almost glad hesitation while the girl was standing at the door of +Constance’ drawing-room; her unconcealed delight at being able to +come back to this house; the almost unnatural joy with which she had +sobbed at Constance’ knee ... until Van der Welcke came in, after +doubtless recognizing the sound of her voice in his little +smoking-room, as transparent as a child, with his clumsy excuse of +searching for a newspaper. And now at once she was struck by it: the +almost insuppressible affection with which they had greeted each other, +with a certain smiling radiance that beamed from them, involuntarily, +irresistibly, unconsciously.... But still Constance thought:</p> +<p>“I am mistaken, there is nothing; and I am imagining something +that doesn’t exist.”</p> +<p>And the thought passed away, that they were really in love with each +other; only this time there remained a faint wonder, a doubt, which had +never been there before. And, while she talked about <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb44" href="#pb44" name="pb44">44</a>]</span>Nice, it +struck her that Van der Welcke was still there ... that he was staying +on in her drawing-room, a thing which he never did except when Paul was +there, or Gerrit.... He sat on, without saying much; but that happy +smile never left his lips.... Yet she still thought:</p> +<p>“I am mistaken; it is only imagination; there is nothing, or +at most a little mutual attraction; and what harm is there in +that?”</p> +<p>But, be this as it might, she, who was so jealous where her son was +concerned, now felt not the least shade of jealousy amid her wondering +doubts. Yes, it was all gone, any love, passion, sentiment that she had +ever entertained for Henri. It was quite dead.... And, now that he +smiled like that, she noticed, with a sort of surprise, how young he +was:</p> +<p>“He is thirty-eight,” she thought, “and looks even +younger.”</p> +<p>As he sat there, calmly, always with the light of a smile on his +face, it struck her that he was very young, with a healthy, youthful +freshness, and that he had not a wrinkle, not a grey hair in his +head.... His blue eyes were almost the eyes of a child. Even +Addie’s eyes, though they were like his father’s, were more +serious, had an older look.... And, at the sight of that youthfulness, +she thought herself old, even though she was now showing Marianne the +pretty photograph from Nice.... Yes, she felt old; and she was hardly +surprised—<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb45" href="#pb45" name= +"pb45">45</a>]</span>if it was so, if she was not mistaken—at +that youthfulness in her husband and at his possible love for that +young girl.... Marianne’s youth seemed to be nearer to his own +youth.... And sometimes it was so evident that she almost ceased +doubting and promised herself to be careful, not to encourage Marianne, +not to invite her any more....</p> +<p>Unconscious: was it unconscious, thought Constance, on their part? +Had they ever exchanged a more affectionate word, a pressure of the +hand, a glance? Had they already confessed it to each other ... and to +themselves? And a delicate intuition told her:</p> +<p>“No, they have confessed nothing to each other; no, they have +not even confessed anything to themselves.”</p> +<p>Perhaps neither of them knew it yet; and, if so, Constance was the +only one who knew. She looked at Marianne: the girl was very young, +even though she had been out a year or two. She had something of +Emilie’s fragility, but she was more natural, franker; and that +natural frankness showed in her whole attitude: she seemed not to +think, but to allow herself to be dragged along by impulse, by +sentiment.... She looked out with her smile at the pelting rain, +nestled deeper in her chair, luxuriously, like a kitten, then suddenly +jumped up, poured out a cup of tea for Constance and herself; and, when +Van der Welcke begged his wife’s leave to smoke a <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb46" href="#pb46" name= +"pb46">46</a>]</span>cigarette, she sprang up again, struck a match, +held the light to him, with a fragile grace of gesture like a little +statue. Her pale-brown eyes, with a touch of gold-dust over them, were +like chrysolite; and they gazed up enthusiastically and then cast their +glance downwards timidly, under the shade of their lids. She was pale, +with the anæmic pallor of alabaster, the pallor of our jaded +society-girls; and her hands moved feverishly and restlessly, as though +the fingers were constantly seeking an object for their butterfly +sensitiveness....</p> +<p>Was it so? Or was it all Constance’ imagination? And, amidst +her wondering doubts, there came suddenly—if it really was +so—a spasm of jealousy; but not jealousy of her husband’s +love: jealousy of his youth. She suddenly looked back fifteen years and +felt herself grown old, felt him remaining young. Life, real life, for +which she sometimes had a vague yearning, while she felt herself too +old for it, after frittering away her days: that life he would perhaps +still be able to live, if he met with it. He at least was not too old +for it!</p> +<p>It all filled her with a passion of misery and anger; and then again +she thought:</p> +<p>“No, there is nothing; and I am imagining all manner of things +that do not exist.”</p> +<p>Addie came home; and, with the rain pelting outside, there was a +gentle cosiness indoors, at table. Constance was silent, but the others +were cheerful. <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb47" href="#pb47" name= +"pb47">47</a>]</span>And, when, after tea had been served, the fury out +of doors seemed to have subsided, Marianne stood up, almost too +unwilling to go away:</p> +<p>“It’s time for me to go, Auntie....”</p> +<p>“Shall Addie see you home?”</p> +<p>“No, Addie’s working,” said Van der Welcke. +“I’ll see Marianne home.”</p> +<p>Constance said nothing.</p> +<p>“Oh, Auntie,” said Marianne, “I am so glad that +everything’s settled!”</p> +<p>She kissed Constance passionately.</p> +<p>“Uncle, isn’t it a nuisance for you to go all that way +with me?”</p> +<p>“I wish I had a bicycle for you!...”</p> +<p>“Yes, if only we had our tandem here!”</p> +<p>“It’s stopped raining; we shall be able to +walk.”</p> +<p>They went, leaving Constance alone. Her eyes were eager to follow +them along the street. She could not help herself, softly opened a +window, looked out into the damp winter night. She saw them go towards +the Bankastraat. They were walking side by side, quite ordinarily. She +watched them for a minute or two, until they turned the corner:</p> +<p>“No,” she said, “there is nothing. Oh, it would be +too dreadful!” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb48" href="#pb48" +name="pb48">48</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch7" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e1062" class="main">Chapter VII</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">Van der Welcke and Marianne went side by side.</p> +<p>“How deliciously fresh it is now,” she almost carolled. +“The wind has gone down and the air is lovely; and look, how +beautiful the sky is with those last black clouds.... Oh, I think it so +ripping, that everything’s all right again between you and Papa! +I did feel it so. You know how fond I am of both of you, Aunt Constance +and you, and of Addie; and it was all so sad.... Tell me, does Auntie +still feel bitter about it? I expect she does.... Ah, I understand +quite well now ... that she would have liked to come to our house ... +officially, let me say! But why not first have spoken to Mamma ... or +to me, who am so fond of you? Then we could have seen: we might have +thought of something. As it was, Mamma was so startled by that +unexpected visit.... Poor Aunt Constance, she isn’t happy! How +sad that you and she aren’t happier together! Oh, I could cry +about it at times: it seems such a shame!... A man and woman married +... and then ... and then what I so often see!... I oughtn’t to +have said what I did before dinner, it was stupid of me; but I may +speak now, mayn’t I?... Oh, I sha’n’t marry, I +won’t marry!... To be married like Otto and Frances, <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb49" href="#pb49" name="pb49">49</a>]</span>like +Emilie and Van Raven: I think it dreadful. Or like you and Auntie: I +should think it dreadful. Can’t you be happier together? Not even +for Addie’s sake? I wish you could; it would make me so happy. I +can’t bear it, when you and Auntie quarrel.... She was sweet and +gentle to-night, but so very quiet. She is so nice.... That was a mad +fit of hers, to go abroad so suddenly; but then she had had so much to +vex her. Oh, those two old aunts: I could have murdered them! I can +hear them now!... Poor Auntie! Do try and be a little nice to her.... +Has this been going on between you for years? Don’t you love each +other any longer?... No, I sha’n’t marry, I +sha’n’t marry, I shall never marry.”</p> +<p>“Come, Marianne: if some one comes along whom you get to +love....”</p> +<p>“No, I shall never marry.... I might expect too much of my +husband. I should really want to find something beautiful, some great +joy, in my love ... and to marry for the sake of marrying, like Frances +or Emilie, is a thing I couldn’t, couldn’t do.... Otto is +fonder of Louise than of his wife; and lately Emilie and Henri are +inseparable.... In our family there has always been that affection +between brother and sister. But it is too strong, far too strong. It +doesn’t make them happy. I’ve never felt it in that way, +fond as I am of my brothers.... No, I should place the <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb50" href="#pb50" name="pb50">50</a>]</span>man I +love above everybody, above everybody.... But I suppose you’re +laughing ... at my bread-and-butter notions....”</p> +<p>“No, I’m not laughing, Marianne; and, just as you would +like to see Aunt Constance and me happy, so I should like to see you +happy ... with a man whom you loved.”</p> +<p>“That will never be, Uncle; no, that will never be.”</p> +<p>“How can you tell?”</p> +<p>“Oh, I feel it, I feel it!...”</p> +<p>“Come, I’ll have a bet on it,” he said, +laughingly.</p> +<p>“No, Uncle,” she said, with a pained smile, “I +won’t bet on a thing like that....”</p> +<p>“I didn’t mean to hurt you, Marianne....”</p> +<p>“I know that....”</p> +<p>“But you mustn’t be so melancholy, at your age. +You’re so young....”</p> +<p>“Twenty-one. That’s quite old.”</p> +<p>“Old! Old! What about me?”</p> +<p>She laughed:</p> +<p>“Oh, you’re young! A man....”</p> +<p>“Is always young?”</p> +<p>“Not always. But you are.”</p> +<p>“A young uncle?”</p> +<p>“Yes, a young uncle.... A woman gets old quicker....” +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb51" href="#pb51" name= +"pb51">51</a>]</span></p> +<p>“So, when you’re old and I am still young, we shall be +about the same age.”</p> +<p>She laughed:</p> +<p>“What a calculation! No, you’re older. But age +doesn’t go by years.”</p> +<p>“No. I sometimes have very young wishes. Do you know what I +have been longing for since yesterday, like a baby, like a +boy?”</p> +<p>“No.”</p> +<p>“A motor-car.”</p> +<p>She laughed, with a laugh like little tinkling bells:</p> +<p>“A motor-car?”</p> +<p>“Wouldn’t it be delightful? To go tearing and tearing +over fields and roads, through clouds of dust....”</p> +<p>“You’re becoming poetic!”</p> +<p>“Yes, it’s making me poetic....”</p> +<p>“And the smell of the petrol?... The mask and goggles against +the dust?... The hideous dress?...”</p> +<p>“Oh, that’s nothing!... To tear and fly along, faster +and faster, at a mad pace....”</p> +<p>“I have never been in a motor-car....”<a class="noteref" +id="xd20e1142src" href="#xd20e1142" name="xd20e1142src">1</a></p> +<p>“I have, in Brussels, in a friend’s car. There’s +nothing to come up to it.”</p> +<p>Her laugh tinkled out again:</p> +<p>“Yes, now you’re most certainly like a boy!” +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb52" href="#pb52" name= +"pb52">52</a>]</span></p> +<p>“I’m so young?”</p> +<p>“O young Uncle!”</p> +<p>“You oughtn’t to call me uncle, Marianne: I’m too +young for it.”</p> +<p>The tinkling bells:</p> +<p>“What am I to call you then?”</p> +<p>“Anything you like. Not uncle.”</p> +<p>“Nunkie?”</p> +<p>“No, no....”</p> +<p>“But I can’t call you Henri ... or Van der +Welcke?”</p> +<p>“No, that’s too difficult. Better say +nothing.”</p> +<p>The tinkling bells:</p> +<p>“Nothing. Very well.... But am I to say <i lang="nl">U</i> or +<i lang="nl">je</i>?”<a class="noteref" id="xd20e1183src" href= +"#xd20e1183" name="xd20e1183src">2</a></p> +<p>“Say <i lang="nl">je</i>.”</p> +<p>“But it seems so funny ... before people!”</p> +<p>“People, people! You can’t always bother about +people.”</p> +<p>“But I have to: I’m a girl!”</p> +<p>“Oh, Marianne, people are always a nuisance!”</p> +<p>“A desert island would be the thing.”</p> +<p>“Yes, a desert island....”</p> +<p>“With a motor-car....”</p> +<p>“And just you and me.”</p> +<p>They both laughed; and her little bells tinkled through his boyish +laugh.</p> +<p>“What a perfect night!” <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb53" href="#pb53" name="pb53">53</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Perfect: the air is so crisp....”</p> +<p>“Marianne....”</p> +<p>“Yes, Uncle....”</p> +<p>“No, not uncle.... You must be my little friend.... Not a +niece.... I’ve never had a girl-friend.”</p> +<p>“Your little friend?... But I am!”</p> +<p>“Well, that’s all right.”</p> +<p>“Look, how dark it is in the Wood.... People say it’s +dangerous. Is it, Uncle? No, I didn’t mean to say +uncle....”</p> +<p>“Sometimes. Are you frightened? Take my arm.”</p> +<p>“No, I’m not frightened.”</p> +<p>“Come, take my arm.”</p> +<p>“I don’t mind....”</p> +<p>“We shall be home in a minute.”</p> +<p>“If only Mamma isn’t angry with me, for staying out.... +Are you coming in?”</p> +<p>“No ... no....”</p> +<p>“Not because you’re still angry with us?”</p> +<p>“No, I’m not angry.”</p> +<p>“That’s all right. Oh, I am glad! I should like to give +you a motor for making me so happy!”</p> +<p>“Those old tin kettles cost a lot of money....”</p> +<p>“Poor Uncle! No, I don’t mean uncle....”</p> +<p>“Here we are.”</p> +<p>He rang the bell.</p> +<p>“Thank you for seeing me home.” <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb54" href="#pb54" name="pb54">54</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Good-night, Marianne.”</p> +<p>The butler opened the door; she went in. He trotted back, whistling +like a boy.</p> +<p>“Wherever have you been, Marianne?” asked Bertha.</p> +<p>“I stayed to dinner at Aunt Constance’.”</p> +<p>“I was anxious about you,” said Bertha.</p> +<p>But she was glad that Constance had been so gracious.</p> +<p>“Who brought you home?”</p> +<p>“Uncle.”</p> +<p>She ran up to her room. She looked in the glass, as though to read +her own eyes. There she read her secret:</p> +<p>“God help me!” she thought. “I oughtn’t to +have gone. I oughtn’t to have gone. I was too weak, too weak.... +Oh, if only they had never made it up, Papa and ... he!... Oh dear! I +shall never go there again. It’s the last time, the last time.... +O God, help me, help me!...”</p> +<p>She sank into a chair and sat with her face hidden in her hands, not +weeping, her happiness still shedding its dying rays around her, but +with a rising agony; and she remained like that for a long time, with +her eyes closed, as though she were dreaming and suffering, both. +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb55" href="#pb55" name= +"pb55">55</a>]</span></p> +</div> +<div class="footnotes"> +<hr class="fnsep"> +<p class="footnote"><span class="label"><a class="noteref" id= +"xd20e1142" href="#xd20e1142src" name="xd20e1142">1</a></span> The +period of the novel is about 1901.</p> +<p class="footnote"><span class="label"><a class="noteref" id= +"xd20e1183" href="#xd20e1183src" name="xd20e1183">2</a></span> +Equivalent to <i lang="fr">vous</i> or <i lang="fr">tu</i>.</p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch8" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e1291" class="main">Chapter VIII</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">“And who do you think’s in town?” +Van Vreeswijck asked Van der Welcke, as they were walking together.</p> +<p>“I don’t know.”</p> +<p>“Brauws.”</p> +<p>“Brauws?”</p> +<p>“Max Brauws.”</p> +<p>“Max? Never! What, Leiden Max?”</p> +<p>“Yes, Leiden Max. I hadn’t seen him for +years.”</p> +<p>“Nor I, of course. And what is he doing?”</p> +<p>“Well, that’s a difficult question to answer. Shall I +say, being eccentric?”</p> +<p>“Eccentric? In what way?”</p> +<p>“Oh, in the things he does. First one thing and then another. +He’s giving lectures now. In fact, he’s a +Bohemian.”</p> +<p>“Have you spoken to him?”</p> +<p>“Yes, he asked after you.”</p> +<p>“I should like to see him. Does he belong to the +Witte?”</p> +<p>“No, I don’t think so.”</p> +<p>“He’s a mad fellow. Always was mad. An interesting chap, +though. And a good sort. Has he money?” <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb56" href="#pb56" name="pb56">56</a>]</span></p> +<p>“I don’t know.”</p> +<p>“Where is he staying?”</p> +<p>“In rooms, in the Buitenhof.”</p> +<p>“We’re close by. Let’s go and see if he’s +in.”</p> +<p>Brauws was not in. And Van der Welcke left a card for his old +college-chum, with a pencilled word.</p> +<p>A fortnight passed; and Van der Welcke began to feel annoyed:</p> +<p>“I’ve heard nothing from Brauws,” he said to Van +Vreeswijck.</p> +<p>“I haven’t seen him either.”</p> +<p>“Perhaps he’s offended about something.”</p> +<p>“Nonsense, Brauws isn’t that sort.”</p> +<p>Van der Welcke was silent. Since the scene with the family, he was +unduly sensitive, thinking that people were unfriendly, that they +avoided him.</p> +<p>“Well, if he wants to ignore my card, let him!” he said, +angrily. “He can go to the devil, for all I care!”</p> +<p>But, a couple of days later, when Van der Welcke was smoking in his +little room, Truitje brought in a card.</p> +<p>“Brauws!” exclaimed Van der Welcke.</p> +<p>And he rushed outside:</p> +<p>“Come upstairs, old chap!” he shouted, from the +landing.</p> +<p>In the hall stood a big, quiet man, looking up with a smile round +his thick moustache.</p> +<p>“May I come up?” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb57" +href="#pb57" name="pb57">57</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Yes, yes, come up. Upon my word, Max, I am +glad....”</p> +<p>Brauws came upstairs; the two men gripped each other’s +hands.</p> +<p>“Welckje!” said Brauws. “Mad Hans!”</p> +<p>Van der Welcke laughed:</p> +<p>“Yes, those were my nicknames. My dear chap, what an age since +we....”</p> +<p>He took him to his den, made him sit down, produced cigars.</p> +<p>“No, thanks, I don’t smoke. I’m glad to see you. +Why, Hans, you haven’t changed a bit. You’re a little +stouter; and that’s all. Just look at the fellow! You could pass +for your own son. How old are you? You’re thirty-eight ... +getting on for thirty-nine. And now just look at me. I’m three +years your senior; but I look old enough to be your father.”</p> +<p>Van der Welcke laughed, pleased and flattered by the compliment paid +to his youth. Their Leiden memories came up; they reminded each other +of a score of incidents, speaking and laughing together in unfinished, +breathless sentences which they understood at once.</p> +<p>“And what have you been doing all this time?”</p> +<p>“Oh, a lot! Too much to tell you all at once. And +you?”</p> +<p>“I? Nothing, nothing. You know I’m married?” +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb58" href="#pb58" name= +"pb58">58</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Yes, I know,” said Brauws. “But what do you do? +You’re in a government-office, I suppose?”</p> +<p>“No, Lord no, old fellow! Nothing, I just do nothing. I +cycle.”</p> +<p>They both laughed. Brauws looked at his old college-friend, almost +paternally, with a quiet smile.</p> +<p>“The beggar hasn’t changed an atom,” he said. +“Yes, now that I look at you again, I see something here and +there. But you’ve remained Welckje, for all that....”</p> +<p>“But not Mad Hans,” sighed Van der Welcke.</p> +<p>“Vreeswijck has become a great swell,” said Brauws. +“And the others?”</p> +<p>“Greater swells still.”</p> +<p>“Not you?”</p> +<p>“No, not I. Do you cycle?”</p> +<p>“Sometimes.”</p> +<p>“Have you a motor-car?”</p> +<p>“No.”</p> +<p>“That’s a pity. I should like to have a motor. But I +can’t afford one of those sewing-machines.”</p> +<p>Brauws roared with laughter:</p> +<p>“Why don’t you start saving up for one?”</p> +<p>“No, old chap, no....”</p> +<p>“I say, do you know what’s a funny thing? While you were +living in Brussels, I too was living just outside Brussels.”</p> +<p>“Impossible!”</p> +<p>“Yes, I was.” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb59" href= +"#pb59" name="pb59">59</a>]</span></p> +<p>“And we never met?”</p> +<p>“I so seldom went into town. If I had known....”</p> +<p>“But what a pity!”</p> +<p>“Yes. And what’s still funnier is that, when you were on +the Riviera, I was there too.”</p> +<p>“Look here, old fellow, you’re kidding me!”</p> +<p>“I never knew till later that you were there also that year. +But you were at Monte Carlo and I at Antibes. Just compare the +dates.”</p> +<p>They compared dates: Brauws was right.</p> +<p>“But that was horribly unlucky.”</p> +<p>“It couldn’t be helped. However, we’ve found each +other now.”</p> +<p>“Yes. We must see something of each other now, eh? Let’s +go cycling together ... or buy a motor-car between us.”</p> +<p>Brauws roared with laughter again:</p> +<p>“Happy devil!” he shouted.</p> +<p>“I?” cried Van der Welcke, a little huffed. +“What’s there happy about me? I sometimes feel very +miserable, very miserable indeed.”</p> +<p>Brauws understood that he was referring to his marriage.</p> +<p>“Here’s my boy,” said Van der Welcke, showing +Addie’s photograph.</p> +<p>“A good face. What’s he going to be?”</p> +<p>“He’s going into the diplomatic service. I say, shall we +take a stroll?” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb60" href="#pb60" +name="pb60">60</a>]</span></p> +<p>“No, I’d rather sit here and talk.”</p> +<p>“You’re just as placid as ever....”</p> +<p>Brauws laughed:</p> +<p>“Outwardly, perhaps,” he said. “Inwardly, +I’m anything but placid.”</p> +<p>“Have you been abroad much?”</p> +<p>“Yes.”</p> +<p>“What do you do?”</p> +<p>“Much ... and perhaps nothing. I am seeking....”</p> +<p>“What?”</p> +<p>“I can’t explain it in a few words. Perhaps later, when +we’ve seen more of each other.”</p> +<p>“You’re the same queer chap that you always were. +<i>What</i> are you seeking?”</p> +<p>“Something.”</p> +<p>“There’s our old oracle. ‘Something!’ You +were always fond of those short words.”</p> +<p>“The universe lies in a word.”</p> +<p>“Max, I can’t follow you, if you go on like that. I +never could, you know.”</p> +<p>“Tell me about yourself now, about Rome, about +Brussels.”</p> +<p>Van der Welcke, smoking, described his life, more or less briefly, +through the blue clouds of his cigarette. Brauws listened:</p> +<p>“Yes,” he said. “Women....”</p> +<p>He had a habit of not finishing his sentences, or of saying only a +single word. <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb61" href="#pb61" name= +"pb61">61</a>]</span></p> +<p>“And what have women done to you?” asked Van der Welcke, +gaily.</p> +<p>Brauws laughed:</p> +<p>“Nothing much,” he said, jestingly. “Not worth +talking about. There have been many women in my life ... and yet they +were not there.”</p> +<p>Van der Welcke reflected.</p> +<p>“Women,” he said, pensively. “Sometimes, you +know....”</p> +<p>“Hans, are you in love?”</p> +<p>“No, no!” said Van der Welcke, starting. “No, +I’ve been fairly good.”</p> +<p>“Fairly good?”</p> +<p>“Yes, only fairly...”</p> +<p>“You’re in love,” said Brauws, decisively.</p> +<p>“You’re mad!” said Van der Welcke. “I +wasn’t thinking of myself.... And, now, what are you doing in the +Hague?”</p> +<p>Brauws laughed:</p> +<p>“I’m going to give lectures, not only here, but all over +Holland.”</p> +<p>“Lectures?” cried Van der Welcke, in astonishment. +“What made you think of that? Do you do it to make money? +Don’t you find it a bore to stand jawing in front of a lot of +people for an hour at a time?”</p> +<p>“Not a bit,” said Brauws. “I’m lecturing on +Peace.”</p> +<p>“Peace?” cried Van der Welcke, his blue orbs +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb62" href="#pb62" name= +"pb62">62</a>]</span>shining in wide-eyed young amazement through the +blue haze of his cigarette-smoke. “What Peace?”</p> +<p>“<i>Peace</i>, simply.”</p> +<p>“You’re getting at me,” cried Van der Welcke.</p> +<p>Brauws roared; and Van der Welcke too. They laughed for quite a +minute or two.</p> +<p>“Hans,” said Brauws, “how is it possible for any +one to change as little as you have done? In all these years! You are +just as incapable as in the old days of believing in anything +serious.”</p> +<p>“If you imagine that there’s been nothing serious in my +life,” said Van der Welcke, vexed.</p> +<p>And, with great solemnity, he once more told his friend about +Constance, about his marriage, his shattered career.</p> +<p>Brauws smiled.</p> +<p>“You laugh, as if it all didn’t matter!” cried Van +der Welcke, angrily.</p> +<p>“What does anything matter?” said Brauws.</p> +<p>“And your old Peace?”</p> +<p>“Very little as yet, at any rate.... Perhaps later.... +Luckily, there’s the future.”</p> +<p>But Van der Welcke shrugged his shoulders and demolished Peace in a +few ready-made sentences: there would always be war; it was one of +those Utopian ideas....</p> +<p>Brauws only smiled. <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb63" href="#pb63" +name="pb63">63</a>]</span></p> +<p>“You must come and dine one day, to meet Vreeswijck,” +said Van der Welcke.</p> +<p>Brauws’ smile disappeared suddenly:</p> +<p>“No, my dear fellow, honestly....”</p> +<p>“Why not?”</p> +<p>“I’m not the man for dinners.”</p> +<p>“It won’t be a dinner. Only Vreeswijck. My wife will be +very pleased.”</p> +<p>“Yes, but I shall be putting your wife out....”</p> +<p>“Not a bit. I’ll see if she’s at home and +introduce you to her.”</p> +<p>“No, my dear fellow, no, honestly.... I’m no +ladies’ man. I’m nothing of a drawing-room person. I never +know what to say.”</p> +<p>“You surely haven’t grown shy!”</p> +<p>“Yes, almost. With ladies ... I really don’t know what +to say. No, old chap, honestly.....”</p> +<p>His voice was full of anxious dismay.</p> +<p>“I think it’s mean of you, to refuse to come and dine +with us, quite quietly.”</p> +<p>“Yes ... and then it’ll be a dinner of twenty people. I +know.”</p> +<p>“I shouldn’t know where to get them from. We see nobody. +Nobody.”</p> +<p>“No, no.... Well, yes, perhaps later.”</p> +<p>He raised his hand deprecatingly, almost impatiently:</p> +<p>“Come,” he said, “let’s go for a +walk.” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb64" href="#pb64" name= +"pb64">64</a>]</span></p> +<p>And, as though fearing lest Van der Welcke should still find a +moment to introduce him to his wife, Brauws hurried him down the +stairs. Once outside, he breathed again, recovered his usual placidity. +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb65" href="#pb65" name= +"pb65">65</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch9" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e1620" class="main">Chapter IX</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">“I went last night with Van Vreeswijck to hear +Brauws speak at Diligentia,” said Van der Welcke, one morning. +“The fellow’s inspired. He speaks extempore and +magnificently; he’s an orator. A splendid fellow, the way he +spoke: it was astounding.... I knew him years ago at Leiden. He was a +queer chap even then. He did not belong to any particular club, not to +ours either: his family is nothing out of the way. His father has a +factory, I believe, somewhere in Overijssel. He himself has nothing of +the tradesman about him. He used to coach us dull beggars and help us +get up our examinations. I should never have passed without him. He +knows about everything, he’s not only good at law. He’s +read everything; he has a tremendous memory. He’s travelled a lot +and done all sorts of things, but I can’t find out exactly what. +Now he’s lecturing. This evening, he’s lecturing in +Amsterdam. I asked him to dinner, but he refuses to come, says +he’s shy with ladies. Silly fellow!”</p> +<p>The newspapers printed lengthy reports of Brauws’ speeches on +Peace. He spoke in all the large Dutch towns and in many of the smaller +ones. When he was to speak at the Hague for the second time, Van der +Welcke said, excitedly: <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb66" href= +"#pb66" name="pb66">66</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Constance, you must absolutely go and hear Brauws this +evening. He’s grand. You know, I can never listen to any one for +more than a quarter of an hour....”</p> +<p>“Nor I for more than three minutes,” said Paul, who was +there. “But I love to talk for an hour on end myself.”</p> +<p>“But Brauws: the fellow electrifies you. Though I think that +Peace idea of his all rot. But that makes no difference: the chap +speaks magnificently.... I’m dining with Van Vreeswijck and +we’re going on together.”</p> +<p>Paul asked Constance to go with him. That evening, the little hall +of Diligentia—the proceeds were to go to the fund for the Boer +wounded—was full: Constance and Paul had difficulty in finding +seats.</p> +<p>“All sorts of people,” Paul observed. “A curious +audience. An olla podrida of every set in the Hague. Here and there, +the very select people have turned up, no doubt brought by Van +Vreeswijck: look, there are the Van der Heuvel Steijns; and +there’s the French minister; and there, as I live, is Van Naghel, +with his colleague from the Treasury.... And look, there’s +Isidore the hairdresser.... A bit of everything, a bit of +everything.... How brotherly and sisterly the Hague has become this +evening: it makes me feel quite sentimental!” <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb67" href="#pb67" name="pb67">67</a>]</span></p> +<p>Brauws made his entrance, to faint applause.</p> +<p>“The fellow’s not in evening-dress; he’s wearing a +frock-coat. I suppose he’s playing the demagogue or the +preacher.”</p> +<p>But he had to stop, for Brauws at once began to speak from the +rostrum. He had nothing with him, not a note; and his voice was firm +but very gentle. He began with a masterly exposition of the present +political situation, sketching it in broad outlines, like an enormous +picture, for all those people in front of him. His voice became +clearer; his eyes looked through the hall, steady and bright, like two +shining stars. Constance, who seldom read any political news, listened, +was at once interested, wondered vaguely for a moment that she lived +like that, from day to day, without knowing the times in which she +lived. The present took shape before her in those few sentences of +Brauws’. Then he spoke of Peace, which would be essential sooner +or later, which was already making its joyous way into the mind of the +nations, even though they were actually still waging war upon one +another. It was as though wide and radiant vistas opened under his +words; and his voice, at first so gentle, now rang through the hall, +triumphantly confirming the glad tidings. He spoke without pausing, for +two hours on end; and, when he stopped, the hall was breathless for a +moment, the audience forgot to cheer. Then indeed applause <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb68" href="#pb68" name="pb68">68</a>]</span>burst +forth, jubilant; but by that time Brauws was gone. They called him +back, but he did not return; and the audience streamed out.</p> +<p>Constance and Paul were in the crush, when they saw Van Vreeswijck +and Van der Welcke behind them.</p> +<p>“Mevrouw,” said Van Vreeswijck, bowing. “What do +you think of our friend?”</p> +<p>“Wonderful,” said Constance, excitedly.</p> +<p>“The fellow speaks well,” said Paul, “but he is +too earnest. He means all he says. People don’t like that in the +long run.”</p> +<p>Van der Welcke protested vehemently, as he pushed through the +close-packed crowd, and declared that he was converted, that he +believed in Peace.</p> +<p>They reached the street: the hum of the crowd floated through the +wintry air.</p> +<p>“How excited our stolid Haguers are!” said Paul.</p> +<p>“There’s our man,” said Van Vreeswijck.</p> +<p>“Yes, there he is!” exclaimed Van der Welcke.</p> +<p>And he darted forwards, stopped Brauws, who was walking fast and saw +nobody, and seized his hand. The others drew near. Van Vreeswijck, out +of politeness, stayed by Constance, waved his hand to Brauws. Van der +Welcke was in a great state of excitement:</p> +<p>“Where are you going?” they heard him ask Brauws. +“To the Witte?” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb69" href= +"#pb69" name="pb69">69</a>]</span></p> +<p>“No, my dear fellow, home.”</p> +<p>“Home? <i>Can</i> you go home now? Won’t you come to the +Witte? I say, do let me introduce you to my wife, to my +brother-in-law....”</p> +<p>Brauws started:</p> +<p>“No, Hans, honestly.... No, no.... What’s the +good?...”</p> +<p>Constance heard and could not help smiling. She walked on with Van +Vreeswijck and Paul.</p> +<p>“Yes, yes,” Van der Welcke insisted.</p> +<p>Brauws no doubt realized that Constance had heard, for he said, in a +voice of despair:</p> +<p>“Very well then, Hans....”</p> +<p>“Constance! Paul!” cried Van der Welcke, proud of his +friend, and caught them up.</p> +<p>He would have liked to introduce Brauws to the whole world, to the +whole audience streaming out of Diligentia.</p> +<p>“Let me introduce you: my friend, Max Brauws; my wife; my +brother-in-law, Van Lowe.”</p> +<p>They shook hands. Brauws remained standing in front of Constance, +shyly and awkwardly. She tried to pay him a compliment that would not +sound too obvious; and, like the tactful woman that she was, she +succeeded. Paul also said something; they walked on, Van Vreeswijck +silently amused at Van der Welcke’s excitement and Brauws’ +awkwardness.</p> +<p>“And are you really going home? Won’t you <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb70" href="#pb70" name="pb70">70</a>]</span>come to +the Witte?” Van der Welcke urged, in imploring tones.</p> +<p>“My dear Hans, what would you have me do at the +Witte?”</p> +<p>“So you’re going home.”</p> +<p>“Yes, I’m going home, but I’ll walk a bit of the +way with you.”</p> +<p>And, wishing to appear polite, he bowed vaguely to Constance, but +said nothing more.</p> +<p>It was a delightful winter evening, with a sharp frost and a sky +full of twinkling stars.</p> +<p>“I love walking,” said Constance. “When I’ve +heard anything fine—music, a play, or a speech like +to-night’s—I would much rather walk than rattle home in a +cab.”</p> +<p>“My dear fellow!” cried Van der Welcke, still bubbling +over with enthusiasm. “You’ve converted me! I believe in +it, I believe in that Peace of yours!”</p> +<p>Brauws gave a sudden bellow.</p> +<p>“There, now the chap’s laughing at me again!” said +Van der Welcke, in an injured tone.</p> +<p>“Well,” said Brauws, “shall I come and fetch you +in a motor to-morrow, to reward you?”</p> +<p>They all laughed this time.</p> +<p>“Have you got one?” cried Van der Welcke, +delightedly.</p> +<p>“No, but I can hire one,” said Brauws. “And then +you can drive.” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb71" href="#pb71" +name="pb71">71</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Can you hire one? Can you hire one?” cried Van der +Welcke, in delighted amazement. “And may I really +drive?”</p> +<p>And forgetting all about Peace, he was soon eagerly discussing +motor-cars and motor-cycles....</p> +<p>When they reached the Kerkhoflaan, Constance asked:</p> +<p>“Won’t you all come in?”</p> +<p>Van Vreeswijck and Paul said that they would be glad to come and +have a glass of wine; but Brauws said:</p> +<p>“Mevrouw, it’s so late....”</p> +<p>“Not for us.”</p> +<p>“Come along, Max,” said Van der Welcke.</p> +<p>But Brauws laughed his queer, soft laugh and said:</p> +<p>“What’s the good of my coming in?...”</p> +<p>And he went off, with a shy bow. They all laughed.</p> +<p>“Really, Brauws is impossible,” said Van Vreeswijck, +indignantly.</p> +<p>“And he’s forgotten to tell me at what time he’s +coming for me with his old sewing-machine....”</p> +<p>But next day, very early, in the misty winter morning, the +“machine” came puffing and snorting and exploding down the +Kerkhoflaan and stopped at Van der Welcke’s door with a +succession of deep-drawn sighs and spasmodic gasps, as if to take +breath after its exertions; and this monster as it were of living +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb72" href="#pb72" name= +"pb72">72</a>]</span>and breathing iron, odorous of petrol—the +acrid smell of its sweat—was soon surrounded by a little group of +butchers’-boys and orange-hawkers. Brauws stepped out; and, as +Constance happened to be coming downstairs, she received him.</p> +<p>“I’m not fit to be seen, mevrouw. In these +‘sewing-machines,’ as Hans calls them, one becomes +unpresentable at once.”</p> +<p>He was shy, looked out at the gasping motor-car and smiled at the +crowd that had gathered round:</p> +<p>“I’m causing quite a tumult outside your +door.”</p> +<p>“They ought to be used to ‘sewing-machines’ at the +Hague by now.”</p> +<p>“That’s a very graphic word of Hans’.”</p> +<p>They both laughed. She thought his laugh attractive and his voice +soft and restful to listen to.</p> +<p>“Mevrouw,” he said, suddenly, overcoming his +bashfulness, “I hope you were not angry that I was so ungracious +yesterday?...”</p> +<p>“But you weren’t at all ungracious.”</p> +<p>“Yes, I was, very. But what excuse can I make? I have lost the +habit ... of just talking....”</p> +<p>She smiled:</p> +<p>“To ladies,” she said, jokingly.</p> +<p>“Yes, about nothing ... you know ... small talk....”</p> +<p>“You really needn’t apologize, Mr. Brauws. You had +already said so many delightful things last night that I can quite +understand....” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb73" href="#pb73" +name="pb73">73</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Yes, but I have said nothing this morning and....”</p> +<p>“You wouldn’t know what to say ... about nothing. But +please don’t trouble ... and make yourself at home. Henri will be +down in a minute; he is very worried at not being ready.”</p> +<p>In fact, they heard Van der Welcke upstairs, dressing excitedly; he +was rushing madly round his room and shouting:</p> +<p>“Addie! Addie! Pick me out a tie! Do be quick, boy!”</p> +<p>And Constance rose to go. Brauws stopped her:</p> +<p>“Mevrouw,” he said, hurriedly, “Hans asked me to +dinner.”</p> +<p>“And you refused....”</p> +<p>“Well, you see, I’m such a bear. Don’t be angry +and don’t let Hans be angry either and let me come and dine with +you one day.”</p> +<p>“So you’re inviting yourself?”</p> +<p>“Yes.”</p> +<p>“Very well; we shall be delighted to see you. When will you +come?”</p> +<p>“Whenever you like.”</p> +<p>“To-morrow?”</p> +<p>“With great pleasure.”</p> +<p>“Would you rather come alone, or shall I ask Van Vreeswijck to +meet you?”</p> +<p>“Yes, certainly, Van Vreeswijck....”</p> +<p>“And nobody else.” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb74" +href="#pb74" name="pb74">74</a>]</span></p> +<p>“No, nobody. But I <span class="corr" id="xd20e1829" title= +"Source: musn’t">mustn’t</span> dictate to you.”</p> +<p>“Why shouldn’t you, in this case?”</p> +<p>Van der Welcke came rushing down the stairs, followed by Addie:</p> +<p>“This is jolly of you, Max! Let’s have a look at the old +machine. She’s a first-rater! And here’s my boy.... Addie, +eat a bit of bread and butter, quick; then we’ll drop you at your +school.”</p> +<p>Addie laughed, quietly ate his bread and butter without sitting +down:</p> +<p>“I’ve lots of time,” he said.</p> +<p>“So much the better ... we’ll drive you round a bit +first. Quick, quick! Take your bread and butter with you in your +hand!”</p> +<p>He rushed like a madman through the dining-room and hall, hunted for +his hat, couldn’t find it, shouted up the stairs, made Truitje +look all over the place for his gloves, created a breezy draught all +through the house. At last, he was ready:</p> +<p>“If only I can manage the old sewing-machine! ... +Tock-tock-tock-tock, tock-tock-tock-tock!... Good-bye, +Constance....”</p> +<p>He shoved Addie in front of him, made him get into the car, settled +himself:</p> +<p>“We’re off, Brauws!”</p> +<p>“Good-bye, mevrouw. Till to-morrow then!”</p> +<p>He ran out. Constance looked out of the window: they drove off, with +Addie between them, waving <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb75" href= +"#pb75" name="pb75">75</a>]</span>his hand to her, while Brauws was +showing Van der Welcke—much too quick, too wild, too +impatient—how to work the “sewing-machine” and +obviously asking him to be careful.... <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb76" href="#pb76" name="pb76">76</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch10" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e1861" class="main">Chapter X</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">Constance had invited Van Vreeswijck at the last +moment and he was engaged, so that Brauws was the only guest. Though +Constance usually gave a deal of thought to her little dinners, she +received Brauws quite simply, treating him as one of themselves; and +Addie dined with them.</p> +<p>“And now tell me what you have been doing all these +years?” asked Van der Welcke.</p> +<p>Brauws tried to tell him, but kept on hesitating, as though under a +strange compulsion. His father was a manufacturer, owning big +iron-works in Overijssel, and still carried on that huge business with +Brauws’ two elder brothers, who were married to two sisters, the +daughters of another manufacturer, owning a cotton-mill in the same +district. But Max, who had been a queer boy from a child, had from a +child felt repelled by all that factory-life of masters and men, as he +saw it around him; and his father, recognizing his exceptional +intelligence, had sent him to college, hoping that in this way he would +carve out an honourable career for himself among his fellow-men. Max +was fond of study and studied long and hard, for the sake of study. At +Leiden, he became acquainted with Van Vreeswijck, Van der Welcke and +other young sprigs of the aristocracy, who would <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb77" href="#pb77" name="pb77">77</a>]</span>gladly +have admitted him to their club, putting up with him because he had +plenty of money to spend and because he was clever and it amused him to +help them in their examinations. Van der Welcke and Van Vreeswijck had +learnt to value his friendship, but nevertheless lost sight of him +afterwards, thinking that he had joined his brothers after all and was +managing the factory with them. And, even as they, as youths, had +hardly known their friend more than superficially, so they did not +know, on leaving Leiden, that Max had not gone to +Overijssel—where his father would have liked to marry him to the +third daughter of the father-in-law of his two other sons—but to +America, to “seek.”</p> +<p>“Well, but to seek what?” Van der Welcke asked, failing +to understand what a rich youth could want to seek in America, if he +did not see some idea, some plan, some object plainly outlined before +him.</p> +<p>Brauws now confessed that at the time he scarcely knew what he had +gone to seek, in America. He admitted that his father, the iron-master, +had hoped that Max would form industrial connections in America which +would have benefited the factory. But Max had formed no connections at +all.</p> +<p>“Then what <i>did</i> you do?” asked Van der Welcke.</p> +<p>And Brauws smiled his strange, gentle smile, in which there gleamed +a touch of irony and compassion—with <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb78" href="#pb78" name="pb78">78</a>]</span>himself, +or the world, or both—a smile which sometimes broke into his big, +resonant laugh. He smiled and at last said, very slowly:</p> +<p>“But I hardly dare confess to you, my dear Hans, what I did in +America. I don’t talk about that time as a rule, because it all +sounds so strange, now that I am sitting at table with you and your +wife and your son. Perhaps, if I tell you what I did do in America, +Mrs. van der Welcke, after the first shock of surprise, will shudder at +having invited such a queer person to her table and probably think me a +very bad example for Addie. So don’t let’s talk about +myself or what I did in America.”</p> +<p>But Van der Welcke had grown inquisitive:</p> +<p>“No, my dear fellow, you sha’n’t get out of it +like that. I can’t imagine that you did anything in America that +Addie mustn’t hear about; and in any case he needn’t take +you for his model. But I’m burning with curiosity and I insist on +knowing what you were up to in America. Not lecturing on Peace all the +time?...”</p> +<p>“No, not even once.”</p> +<p>“Well, what then?”</p> +<p>“But, Hans, what’s the good of talking about myself to +this extent?”</p> +<p>“We’re all interested, Mr. Brauws,” said +Constance. “We certainly are. But, if you would rather not talk +about those days, we will not be indiscreet.” <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb79" href="#pb79" name="pb79">79</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Yes, yes, yes,” said Van der Welcke, impatiently. +“By Jingo, I <i>will</i> be indiscreet. Max, I must +know....”</p> +<p>“Well, then,” said Max Brauws, very simply and shyly, as +though he were making an apology. “At the risk of your +wife’s never asking me to her house again: I was a +porter.”</p> +<p>They all three looked at him and did not understand.</p> +<p>“A porter?” asked Van der Welcke.</p> +<p>“A porter?” asked Constance.</p> +<p>“Yes, mevrouw: just a porter and dock-labourer.”</p> +<p>“A dock-labourer?” asked Van der Welcke, thinking, from +Max Brauws’ quiet voice, that he had suddenly gone mad.</p> +<p>“Yes, Hans; and, later on, I worked as a stoker in an +iron-works, like my father’s.”</p> +<p>“As a stoker?” asked Constance.</p> +<p>“Yes, mevrouw, as a stoker in a factory. And then, afterwards, +as an engine-driver. And then—but that was very hard work—I +was a miner for a short time; but then I fell ill.”</p> +<p>“A miner?” asked Van der Welcke, in a blank voice, dazed +with astonishment.</p> +<p>And at last, recovering from the astonishment, he burst out:</p> +<p>“Look here, Max, if you want to talk seriously, do; but +don’t go pulling my leg and making a fool of me to my face. I +don’t understand a word of <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb80" +href="#pb80" name="pb80">80</a>]</span>what you’re saying, unless +I’m to suppose that your father was angry with you and gave you +no money and that you had to work for your bread, perhaps. But that you +were a porter....”</p> +<p>“And dock-labourer,” said Constance.</p> +<p>“And engine-driver and miner, that I refuse to believe, unless +your father....”</p> +<p>“My dear Hans, my father used to send me the same allowance +that he made me at the university: three hundred guilders a +month.”</p> +<p>“And...?”</p> +<p>“And I used the money ... for other things; but I lived on my +wages, like a labourer, as I really was. You see, you can’t +understand that; and, as I feared, your wife thinks it horrible to be +sitting at table with a man who has been a porter, a dock-labourer and +a stoker....”</p> +<p>“And a miner,” added Van der Welcke.</p> +<p>And he shut his eyes, as though he had received a blow on the +head.</p> +<p>“But, mevrouw,” said Brauws, with his quiet smile, +“my hands, although they are not delicate, have become fit to +show again, as you see.”</p> +<p>And he showed his hands, big, powerful hands, probably developed by +manual labour, but now neither coarse nor hard.</p> +<p>“But can you explain to me,” asked Constance, with a +little laugh, “why you worked in those various humble +capacities?” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb81" href="#pb81" +name="pb81">81</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Shall we say, mevrouw, for the sake of being +eccentric?” replied Brauws, almost coldly. “And then we +will talk no more about myself. Tell me instead about Addie. Hans was +saying the other day that his ambition was to enter the diplomatic +service....”</p> +<p>But a certain constraint seemed involuntarily to make the +conversation flag, as though both host and hostess were unable to +understand their guest at all, as though some one of another class had +actually strayed by accident into their dining-room, into the home of +these born aristocrats; and Constance, perceiving this, not only wanted +to avoid that constraint, but also a deeper feeling of invincible +sympathy made her regret almost unconsciously any misunderstanding or +unpleasantness that might arise between that strange man and Henri or +herself. This deeper feeling was so faint and unconscious that, at the +moment, she saw in it only her wish, as hostess, to make the passing +hour as agreeable as possible for her guest; and she did not hear the +deeper note in her voice when she said, with that candour and sincerity +which at times gave her an exquisitely feminine charm:</p> +<p>“I should be very sorry indeed, Mr. Brauws, if you refused to +go on speaking of yourself. You are an old and intimate friend of +Henri’s; and, now that you two have met again, it would be a pity +if you refused to talk about the years when you did not see +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb82" href="#pb82" name= +"pb82">82</a>]</span>each other. But I am not speaking only for my +husband, who will speak for himself: I am speaking especially for my +own sake. When I heard you lecturing on Peace the other day—on +something which I had really never thought about, though I had heard +the word vaguely mentioned by people now and then—your speech +really roused ... a sort of interest in me; and I listened with keen +sympathy; and afterwards I thought about that word. And, now that you +tell us that you have been a common workman in America, I am very much +interested to know how you came to adopt a life so very different from +that of the men in my set; and, if it is not too indiscreet, I should +like to ask you, as a favour, to speak about yourself and explain what +at present seems so perplexing to me....”</p> +<p>The simple, homely meal was finished; and they went into the +drawing-room.</p> +<p>“May I stay, Mamma?” asked Addie, who never accompanied +them to the drawing-room when there was a stranger present.</p> +<p>She laughed; and Van der Welcke said:</p> +<p>“You see, even my boy is curious.”</p> +<p>“Our future diplomatist!” said Brauws, with his quiet +smile. “Well, mevrouw, may he stay or not?”</p> +<p>“Of course he may stay!”</p> +<p>“Aren’t you afraid that the ideas of ... a labouring-man +will spoil him?” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb83" href="#pb83" +name="pb83">83</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Oh, there’s no spoiling my boy!” said she, +lifting her head high and putting her arm round Addie’s shoulder +with motherly pride.</p> +<p>“And you don’t make him vain, by saying that?”</p> +<p>“There’s no making him vain,” she continued, +boasting a little, like a proud mother.</p> +<p>“So he can stay?” asked Brauws.</p> +<p>“He can stay.”</p> +<p>“Well, in that case I shall tell you more about +myself.”</p> +<p>“Only in that case?”</p> +<p>“You are giving me a proof of confidence and, I might almost +say, of sympathy.”</p> +<p>Van der Welcke took his friend by the shoulders:</p> +<p>“My dear Max, you pretend that you don’t know how to +talk to ‘ladies’ and there you stand, like a typical +courtier, paying compliments to my wife. That’s all superfluous, +you know: here’s a cup of coffee; sit down, make yourself at +home, choose your own chair; and now, Mr. Miner, tell your Mad Hans +how, when you were in America, you went even madder than he.”</p> +<p>But Brauws was obviously still seeking subterfuges, as though it +were impossible for him to interpret the riddle of his former existence +to these people who were entertaining him so kindly; and at last he +half managed to escape their pressing curiosity by saying:</p> +<p>“But I can’t possibly tell you all that straight +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb84" href="#pb84" name= +"pb84">84</a>]</span>away.... Perhaps later, mevrouw, when I have known +you a little longer, I may be able to tell you about that time, so that +you may understand it after a fashion.”</p> +<p>Constance was disappointed, but she said, with a smile:</p> +<p>“Then I must exercise patience.”</p> +<p>“But I exercise no patience,” said Van der Welcke. +“Tell us now, Max: when you left Leiden, after taking your degree +in law, a year before I did—but you were much older than I, an +older student who really studied, a <i>rara avis</i>!—what did +you do then?”</p> +<p>“I first went back to my father and my brothers, to the +factory. And then I took such an aversion to the whole thing, to all +that we represented, my father, my brothers and I, that I determined to +go and lead an entirely different life. I saw that, though my father +and brothers were comparatively good to their workmen, those workmen +remained slaves; and we....”</p> +<p>He passed his hand over his forehead:</p> +<p>“How can I and why should I talk about all this, my dear +Hans?” he said, gently interrupting himself. “You +wouldn’t understand me; nor you either, mevrouw....”</p> +<p>“Why shouldn’t we understand you?” asked +Constance. <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb85" href="#pb85" name= +"pb85">85</a>]</span></p> +<p>His voice assumed a rough tone that almost frightened her:</p> +<p>“Because both of you, you and Hans, are capitalists—and +titled capitalists at that—and because I.... But I don’t +want to be rude to my host and hostess.”</p> +<p>“Capitalists without capital,” said Van der Welcke, +laughing.</p> +<p>Brauws shrugged his shoulders:</p> +<p>“There are more of them than you think,” he said.</p> +<p>“So really you’re among enemies here,” said +Constance, in her drawing-room voice.</p> +<p>“No,” said Van der Welcke, “for he in his turn has +deserted to the capitalists, even the titled ones.”</p> +<p>“Not quite,” said Brauws, quietly, “though I admit +that I have been weak.”</p> +<p>“I won’t press you any more, Mr. Brauws,” said +Constance; but her voice urged him to continue.</p> +<p>“Don’t look upon yourself and Henri as my enemies, +mevrouw,” said Brauws, earnestly. “Above all things, I +should like to see nothing but friendship in this world of ours. But +you were asking me about America: well, when I had lived for a short +time with my father and my brothers in our big house near the factory, +it became too much for me; and I went away, to lead my life just as if +I had been born among workmen ... so as to study them more <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb86" href="#pb86" name="pb86">86</a>]</span>closely, +do you understand?... No, you don’t understand; and how can I go +on?...”</p> +<p>“Max, you’re being dull. And you’re absurd +too.”</p> +<p>“I’m sorry, Hans, I simply can’t talk about +myself: you see, I’ve tried to, two or three times +over.”</p> +<p>“Then we won’t worry you any more,” said +Constance.</p> +<p>A constraint seemed to have come upon them, a barrier which rose +between their words at every moment. Addie, disappointed, left the room +quietly. In a little while, Brauws took his leave, awkwardly, almost +rudely. Constance and Van der Welcke exchanged a glance when they were +alone. Van der Welcke shook his head:</p> +<p>“The fellow’s mad,” he said. “Always was; +but, since he’s joined the proletariats in America, he’s +stark, staring mad. He was so jolly yesterday, coming with that old +sewing-machine. He is a good sort, there’s something nice about +him. But he’s quite mad. Vreeswijck is much better company. We +won’t ask him again: what do you say, Constance? The +fellow’s really mad; and, besides, he doesn’t know how to +talk and, when all is said, he was impertinent, with his ‘titled +capitalists.’ Indeed, I ought really to apologize to you for +asking such a queer fish to your house.”</p> +<p>“He is different from other people,” she said, +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb87" href="#pb87" name= +"pb87">87</a>]</span>“but I think that, however much he may +differ from you, he likes you.”</p> +<p>Her husband burst out irritably:</p> +<p>“You women,” he exclaimed, “are simply impossible! +Who would ever have thought that you could have found a word of excuse +for Brauws! Why, I was afraid that you would cover me with reproaches +and point out to me that, even though we see nobody, you wouldn’t +want to receive a socialist friend of mine. But there’s no +understanding women!”</p> +<p>He was dissatisfied, out of temper, because of Brauws and that +spasmodic conversation; and his tone seemed to invite a scene. But +Constance raised her eyes to his very calmly and said, so gently and +quietly that the voice did not sound like hers to his ears:</p> +<p>“Henri, your friend Brauws is a man and an exceptional man; +and that is enough to captivate a woman for a moment.”</p> +<p>“Well, you can ask him every day, for all I care.”</p> +<p>“I didn’t ask him.”</p> +<p>“No, I did, of course!”</p> +<p>“Don’t let us quarrel, Henri. Mr. Brauws asked himself. +But, if you would rather not see any more of him, we won’t +encourage him again; and then he’ll stay away of his own +accord....” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb88" href="#pb88" +name="pb88">88</a>]</span></p> +<p>Her gentle words, which he did not understand, disturbed him +greatly; and he went upstairs in a temper, undressed angrily and flung +himself on his bed:</p> +<p>“And, upon my word, he’d be upsetting Addie’s head +next, with those queer notions,” he muttered, as he dug his ear +viciously into his pillow. <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb89" href= +"#pb89" name="pb89">89</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch11" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e2085" class="main">Chapter XI</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">A few days had passed, when Brauws rang at the door, +late one afternoon. Constance was sitting in the drawing-room and saw +him through the corner window; and, as she heard the bell, she felt a +shock of alarm. She was afraid, she did not know why, and listened +anxiously to his deep voice in the passage.</p> +<p>“Is meneer at home?”</p> +<p>“No, sir.”</p> +<p>“Perhaps mevrouw is at home?”</p> +<p>“Yes, sir, mevrouw is in. I’ll just ask....”</p> +<p>Truitje entered:</p> +<p>“Mr. Brauws, ma’am....”</p> +<p>“Show meneer in.”</p> +<p>She still felt her heart beating with that strange, inexplicable +shock of alarm. And she thought that it was because she was alone with +that strange man, who had been a workman in America and who could say +such rude things sometimes, suddenly.</p> +<p>They shook hands:</p> +<p>“Henri is out,” she said. “But sit down. I see in +the paper that you are speaking at Arnhem to-morrow.”</p> +<p>“Yes, mevrouw, but I haven’t come to talk about +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb90" href="#pb90" name= +"pb90">90</a>]</span>my lectures. I’ve come to make you my very +humble apologies.”</p> +<p>“What for?”</p> +<p>“Mevrouw, I’m a bear. I don’t know how to talk to +people. Forgive me ... for what I said the other day.”</p> +<p>“But what did you say?”</p> +<p>“Nothing—after your friendly encouragement—but +what was rude.”</p> +<p>“I have no great reverence for titles,” she said, +quickly.</p> +<p>She said it so suddenly and spontaneously that it surprised even +herself; and she asked herself, the next second:</p> +<p>“Why do I say that? And is it true, now? Or is it not +true?”</p> +<p>She herself did not know.</p> +<p>“You haven’t, perhaps, but Hans has.... But I was rude +especially because, after you had asked me so kindly and graciously, I +still would not talk about my life.”</p> +<p>“But you were to do that when we knew each other +better....”</p> +<p>“People never know each other well. Still....”</p> +<p>“What?”</p> +<p>“I don’t know.... May I tell you something about myself +from time to time? Perhaps it won’t interest you as much as, from +politeness, you wish me to think; but ... when I’ve done it ... I +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb91" href="#pb91" name= +"pb91">91</a>]</span>shall feel relieved.... Heavens, how difficult +words are!”</p> +<p>“And yet you are accustomed to speak for hours!...”</p> +<p>“That’s a different thing. Then some one else is +speaking inside me. When I myself am speaking, in everyday life, I find +words difficult.”</p> +<p>“Then don’t make the least effort, but tell me ... +gradually.”</p> +<p>“What did Addie think? I should like to know.”</p> +<p>“He was disappointed, but he did not say much.”</p> +<p>“He’s a serious boy, isn’t he? Tell me about +him.”</p> +<p>She felt no more fear and talked about Addie. Brauws laughed, gently +and kindly, at the pride that kept shining from her:</p> +<p>“I was a serious child too,” he said.</p> +<p>And she understood that he was making an effort, in order to talk +about himself.</p> +<p>“I was a strange child. Behind our house was a pine-forest, +with hills in it; and behind that a little stream. I used to wander all +day long in those woods, over the hills and beside the stream. They +would miss me at home and look for me and find me there. But gradually +they stopped being frightened, because they understood that I was only +playing. I used to play by myself: a lonely, serious child. It’s +true I played at highwaymen and pirates; and yet my games were very +serious, not like a child’s <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb92" +href="#pb92" name="pb92">92</a>]</span>... I still feel a thrill when I +think of that strange childhood of mine.... I used to play there in +those woods and beside that stream, in Holland; but sometimes I +imagined that I was playing at pirates and highwaymen in America, or in +the tropics. And in my childish imagination the whole Dutch landscape +changed. It became a roaring river, with great boulders, from which the +water fell foaming, and very dense, tropical foliage, such as I had +seen in pictures; and great flowers, red and white, grew in the +enormous trees. Then my fancy changed and I was no longer a pirate or +robber, but became ... an oriental prince. I don’t know why I, a +pure-bred Dutch boy, should have had that strange vision of the east, +of something tropical, there, on those pine-covered hills and beside +that little stream.... It was always like that afterwards: the tropical +landscape, the spreading cocoa-trees, the broad plantain-leaves and the +huge flowers, white and red ... and then I often thought, ‘Now I +will find her.’ Whom I wanted to find I didn’t know; but I +would run down the hills and roam beside the little river and seek and +seek ... and my seeking for ‘her’ became strange and +fantastic: I, an oriental, was seeking for a fairy, or a princess, I +forget which. It seemed to me as if she were running there ahead of me, +very white and fragile: a little child, as I was a child; a girl, as I +was a boy; in white and decked with the flowers, white and red +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb93" href="#pb93" name= +"pb93">93</a>]</span>... And my seeking for the princess, for the +fairy, for the little white, fragile girl became so intense that I +sometimes thought I had found her, found her in my imagination; and +then I would speak to her, as in a dream.... Until ... until I woke +from my waking dream and remembered that I had been wandering away from +home for hours, that my mother would be anxious, that I was not fit to +be seen, that I looked like a dirty street-boy, that I had only been +dreaming, that there were no white or red flowers around me ... and +then I would cry, boy of thirteen though I was, passionately, as if I +should go mad.... And I have never told all this to any one, but I am +telling it to you, because I want to ask you: Addie is not like that, +is he? When you come to think of it, how children differ, at that +age!”</p> +<p>She sat on her chair, very pale, and could not speak.</p> +<p>“My parents did not know that I was like that; and I told +nobody about my fancies. I went to school, in the meantime, and was +just the usual sort of schoolboy. I was cruel to animals, a vulgar +little rascal, in the meantime; and it was only in those free hours +that I wandered and dreamt. And, when I now look at your boy, who is +like a little man, I sometimes think, how is it possible that he is +like this and that I was like that, at the same age?”</p> +<p>She made an effort to smile. <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb94" +href="#pb94" name="pb94">94</a>]</span></p> +<p>“So you see,” he said, “<i>gradually</i> perhaps I +shall be able to tell you something about my life ... at least, if it +interests you....”</p> +<p>It seemed as if his first confession had in fact given him a greater +facility, for of his own accord he now went on talking: how, when he +grew a year or two older, he had shaken those fancies from him as so +much child’s-play and devoted himself seriously to every kind of +study, until he went to the university, where he not only read law, but +really took up all the other faculties in between, while at the same +time he felt attracted by every branch of knowledge:</p> +<p>“I was a ready learner and a quick reader; I remembered +everything; and I had a sort of fever to know everything in the world, +to know all there was to know and learn. That I afterwards went and +travelled goes almost without saying. And then....”</p> +<p>It was at this moment that Van der Welcke entered. He was at first +surprised, almost annoyed to see Brauws; but his warm friendship gained +the upper hand:</p> +<p>“Hullo, anarchist!” he said. “Is that +you?”</p> +<p>But it was very late; Addie came in; it was close upon dinner-time. +Brauws said good-bye and promised to come again and fetch Van der +Welcke in a “machine;” and that made up for everything to +Van der Welcke. <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb95" href="#pb95" name= +"pb95">95</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch12" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e2194" class="main">Chapter XII</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">It was a howling winter night of storm and rain. Addie +was doing his lessons after dinner; and Van der Welcke had gone to sit +by him with a book “because there was such a draught in his +room.” Constance was all alone. And she loved the loneliness of +it just then. She had taken up a book, a piece of needlework; but first +one and then the other had slipped from her hands. And, in the soft +light of the lace-shaded lamps, she lay back in her chair and listened +to the melancholy storm outside, which seemed to be rushing past the +house like some monstrous animal. She was in a mood of vague +excitement, of mingled nervousness and depression; and, in her +loneliness, she let this strange feeling take possession of her and +gave herself up to the quite new luxury of thinking about herself, +wondering dimly:</p> +<p>“Does that sort of thing really exist?”</p> +<p>She found no answer to her question; she heard only the storm raging +outside, the hiss of its lash round the groaning trees; and those +mournful voices of the night did not include the mystic voice which +alone could have supplied the answer.</p> +<p>“Does that sort of thing really exist?” she asked +herself again.</p> +<p>And, in that vague emotion, she was conscious of <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb96" href="#pb96" name="pb96">96</a>]</span>a sense +of fear, of a rising anxiety, an increasing terror. When, after a lull, +the storm burst into sudden fury again, she started violently, as she +had started when Brauws’ hand rang the bell....</p> +<p>With each shriller howl of the raging storm she started; and each +fresh alarm left her so nervous and so strangely despondent that she +could not understand herself....</p> +<p>“Does that sort of thing really exist then?” she asked +herself for the third time.</p> +<p>And the question seemed each time to echo through her soul like a +refrain. She could never have thought, suspected or imagined that such +things really existed. She did not remember ever reading about them or +ever talking to anybody about them. It had never been her nature to +attach much importance to the strange coincidences of life, because +they had never harmonized in her life with those of other lives; at +least, she did not know about them, did not remember them.... For a +moment, it flashed through her mind that she had walked as the blind +walk, all her life, in a pitch-dark night ... and that to-day suddenly +a light had shone out before her and a ruddy glow had filtered through +her closed eyelids.</p> +<p>“No,” she thought, “in those things I have always +been very much of a woman; and I have never thought about them. If by +chance I ever heard about them, they did not attract me. Then why do +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb97" href="#pb97" name= +"pb97">97</a>]</span>they strike me so forcibly now? And why do I feel +so strange?...”</p> +<p>The wind suddenly cried aloud, like the martyred soul of some +monster; and she started, but forced herself to concentrate her +thoughts:</p> +<p>“He can’t know,” she thought. “What can he +know, to make him speak deliberately ... of those childish years? No, +he can’t know; and I felt that he did not know, that he was only +speaking in order to compare himself with Addie to Addie’s +mother, in a burst of confidence. He is a man of impulses, I think.... +No, there was nothing at the back of his words ... and he knows +nothing, nothing of my own early years.... We are almost the same age: +he is four years older than Henri. When he was a child, I was a child. +When he was dreaming, I was dreaming. Does that sort of thing really +exist? Or is it my fancy, some unconscious vein of poetry inside me, +that is making me imagine all this?... Hush, hush ... it is becoming +absurd! It is all very pretty and charming in children: they can have +their day-dreams; and a young man and a young girl might perhaps give a +thought to them afterwards, in a romantic moment; but, at my age, it +all becomes absurd, utterly absurd.... And of course it’s +<i>not</i> there: it’s nothing but a chance coincidence. I +won’t think about it any more.... And yet ... I have never felt +before as I do now. Oh, that feeling as if I had always been straying, +blindly, <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb98" href="#pb98" name= +"pb98">98</a>]</span>with my eyes shut, in a dark night! Have I never +had that feeling before, that feeling as if nothing had really existed, +as if I had never lived yet, as if I wanted to live once, just once, in +my life?... But no, it can never be like that, it can’t happen +like that. No, that sort of thing does not exist. It is just our +imagination when we are feeling restless and dissatisfied ... or when +we are tired and feel that we have no energy ... or whatever it is that +makes us more easily affected by all those strange things which we +never suspected.... Why did I not at once laugh and say that, as a +child, as a little girl, I myself...? No, no, I simply couldn’t +say it; and it is better that I didn’t say it.... Now I am +getting frightened at my own silliness. It is all very well for young +people, for a boy and a girl, to have these fancies and even talk of +them, in a romantic moment, but at my age it is simply ridiculous.... +It is so long ago, so long ago; and, with all those years in between, +it would be ridiculous to refer to poetic dreams and fancies which can +only be spoken of when one is very young.... I sha’n’t +speak of them ... and I shall never tell him. Wouldn’t it be ... +utterly ridiculous?... Yet it does seem ... it does seem to me that, +after those years—when, as Gerrit said, I was a dear little +child, playing in the river at Buitenzorg, making up stories about +fairies and <i>poetries</i>,<a class="noteref" id="xd20e2231src" href= +"#xd20e2231" name="xd20e2231src">1</a> decked with <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb99" href="#pb99" name="pb99">99</a>]</span>flowers, +red and white—that, after those years, I lost something of +myself, something romantic that was <i>in</i> me then, something living +that was <i>in</i> me then, and that, since then, I have <i>never</i> +lived, never lived a single moment, as if all sorts of vain and worldly +things had blinded me.... Oh, what thoughts are these and why do I have +them? I won’t think them; and yet ... and yet, after those +wonderful, fairy years, it was all over ... all over.... What do I +remember of the years after? Dances, balls, society, vanity and +artificiality.... Yes, it was all over by then.... And now surely that +childish spark hasn’t revived, surely my soul isn’t trying, +isn’t wanting to live again? No, no, it can’t do that: the +years are lying all around it, the silent, dead years of vanity, of +blundering, of longing, of death in life.... And besides, if my soul +did want to live again, it would be too late now, for everything; and +it doesn’t want to either.... It’s only because of those +strange coincidences, it’s only because he spoke like that ... +and because his voice it attractive ... and because I am sitting here +alone ... and because the storm is blowing so terribly, as though it +wanted to open the windows and come inside.... No, hush, hush ... I +won’t give way to those thoughts again, never again ... and, even +if that sort of thing does really exist, it is only for those who are +young and who see life with the glamour of youth ... and not for me, +not for me. <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb100" href="#pb100" name= +"pb100">100</a>]</span>... Oh, I couldn’t have told him about +myself when I was a child, for it would have appeared to me as if, by +telling him, I was behaving like ... a woman offering herself!... But +hush, hush: all this is absurd ... for me ... now; and I will stop +thinking of it.... But how lonely I am, sitting here ... and how the +wind howls, how the wind howls!... The lamps are flickering; and +it’s just as if hands were rattling the shutters, trying hard to +open them.... Oh, I wish those lamps wouldn’t flicker so!... And +I feel as if the windows were going to burst open and the curtains fly +up in the air.... I’m frightened.... Hark to the trees cracking +and the branches falling.... Hear me, O God, hear me! I’m +frightened, I’m frightened.... Is this then the first night that +I see something of myself, as if I were suddenly looking back, on a +dark path that lies behind me, a dark path on which all the pageant of +vanity has grown dim? For it does seem as if, right at the end of the +road, I saw, as in a vision, the sun; trees with great leaves and +blossoms red and white; and a little fairy child, in white, with +flowers in her hair, standing on a boulder, in a river, beckoning +mysteriously to her brothers, who do not understand. O my God, does +that sort of thing really, really exist ... or is it only because I +never, never heard the wind blow like this before?...”</p> +<p>These thoughts, these doubts, these wonderings <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb101" href="#pb101" name= +"pb101">101</a>]</span>flashed through her; and, because she had never +heard herself thinking and doubting and wondering so swiftly, she grew +still more frightened in her loneliness, while the storm howled more +furiously outside. And the silent lamps flickered so violently in her +drawing-room—in a sort of passionate draught—that she +suddenly rushed staggering to the door. She went up the stairs; and it +was as though the storm would break the little villa to pieces with one +blow of its angry wing....</p> +<p>She went to Addie’s room; her hand was on the door-handle; she +turned it. She saw her boy working at his table and Van der Welcke +smoking in the easy-chair. She gave a start, because he was there, and +she looked deathly pale, with terrified, quivering eyes.</p> +<p>“Mamma!”</p> +<p>“My boy, I’m frightened; listen to the +storm!...”</p> +<p>“Yes, did you ever see such weather?” asked Van der +Welcke, through the clouds of his cigarette.</p> +<p>“Are you frightened, Mamma?”</p> +<p>“Yes, my boy, my Addie ... I’m frightened ... I’m +frightened....”</p> +<p>“And shall your boy keep you safe, safe from the +wind?”</p> +<p>“Yes, my darling, keep me safe!” she said, with a wan +little laugh. “For I’m really, really frightened ... +I’ve been sitting alone downstairs ... <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb102" href="#pb102" name="pb102">102</a>]</span>and +it blew so, it blew so: the lamps blew and the shutters banged and +I’m so frightened now!...”</p> +<p>The boy drew her on his knees and held her very tight:</p> +<p>“Silly Mummy! Are you really frightened?”</p> +<p>She made herself very small in his arms, between his knees, nestled +up against him and repeated, as in a dream:</p> +<p>“Yes, I’m so frightened, I’m so +frightened!...”</p> +<p>And, without a further glance at her husband sitting there clouded +in the blue smoke of his cigarette, she as it were crept into the heart +of her child, whispering, all pale and wan, with a wan smile and her +eyes full of anxious wonder:</p> +<p>“I’m frightened, Addie! Save me! Protect me!...” +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb103" href="#pb103" name= +"pb103">103</a>]</span></p> +</div> +<div class="footnotes"> +<hr class="fnsep"> +<p class="footnote"><span class="label"><a class="noteref" id= +"xd20e2231" href="#xd20e2231src" name="xd20e2231">1</a></span> Malay +fairies.</p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch13" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e2285" class="main">Chapter XIII</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">“I’m mad!” he thought, as, after a +hasty meal at a restaurant in the town, he walked along the Hooge Weg +to Scheveningen through the shrieking winter night.</p> +<p>The leafless branches lashed tragically to and fro, as though +sweeping the scudding clouds; and the street-lamps seemed like ghostly +eyes blinking here and there in the fitful darkness....</p> +<p>“I’m mad! Why did I tell her all that, I ... I who can +never talk to women?”</p> +<p>He was walking against the wind, angry with himself and angry with +the wind when it barred his way with its widespread hindering arms. The +wind whistled very high in the air, along the topmost leafless boughs; +and the boughs broke off, as though at the touch of angry fingers, and +scattered all around him; and sometimes a heavier branch fell, black, +right at his feet. He walked on—his legs were stronger than the +wind barring his way, tugging at his flapping coat—walked with +his hands in his pockets, his collar turned up, his hat pulled over his +eyes; and he walked on and on without an object, only with an eager +craving for the sea, for sea and air and wind, to blow and wash +everything out of his brain, which otherwise would be sick with +dreaming.... <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb104" href="#pb104" name= +"pb104">104</a>]</span>Was he still such a dreamer, even though all the +rest of his life belied his dreams? What did he mean by suddenly going +to that woman, apologizing to her that afternoon because he +didn’t know how to talk and then suddenly talking, talking like a +boy, telling her things—shadowy things of the past—which he +had never told to anybody, because they were not things to be told, +because, once told, they ceased to exist?... What interest did she take +in his childish games and his childish dreams?... He had probably bored +her: perhaps she had laughed at him—the cynical little laugh of +the society-woman—and at his really too-ridiculous simplicity, +the simplicity of a man who had thought and worked and lived and who +had yet always remained a child ... in certain little corners of his +soul.... He was so much ashamed at the recollection of all that he had +dared to say to her, so much ashamed of the irresistible impulse which +had driven him to speak to her, at such length, of his childhood and +his childish imaginings, that he was now—as though to regain +mastery of himself after the strange spell of her presence—that +he was now fighting with the wind, to make himself feel strong again +and a man.... The wind clung howling to his body, dragged itself by his +legs, struck him blinding blows in the face, but he walked on: his +strong legs walked on, with a sharp, regular step, ever mightier than +the wind, which he trod under foot and kicked out of his path.... +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb105" href="#pb105" name= +"pb105">105</a>]</span></p> +<p>“I don’t know what it was,” he thought, +“but, once I was alone with her, I had ... I <i>had</i> to say +it.... How can I be of <i>any</i> use in the world, when I am such a +dreamer?... Women! Have women ever woven into my life anything beyond +the most commonplace threads? Have I ever confided in a woman before, +or felt that irresistible impulse to open my heart, as I did this +afternoon, in that weak moment of enchantment? Why to her, why to her? +Why not to others, before her, and why first to her?... Must my life +always be this clumsy groping with dreams on one side and facts on the +other? But why, why should I have spoken like that: what was the +overpowering impulse that made me tell her those strange things, that +made it impossible for me to do anything else? Are our actions then so +independent of ourselves that we just behave according to the laws of +the most secret forces in and above us?... Do <i>I</i> know what it was +in me that made me speak like that, that compelled me to speak like +that? It was like an irresistible temptation, it was like a path that +sloped down to delectable valleys and it was as if angels or +demons—I don’t know which—pushed and pushed me and +whispered, ‘Tell it all ... and go down the path.... You’ll +see how beautiful it is, you’ll see how beautiful it +becomes!’ She ... just listened, without speaking, without +moving. What did she think? Nothing, most likely. She heard nothing, +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb106" href="#pb106" name= +"pb106">106</a>]</span>she felt nothing. If she’s thinking of me +now, she thinks of me as a madman, or at least a crank.... What is she? +She has been a woman of the world, of just that world which I hate.... +What has her life been? She married a man much older than herself, out +of vanity. Then a moment of passion, between her and Hans.... What else +has there been, what else is there in her? Nothing! How utterly small +they all are, these people who don’t think, who don’t live: +who exist like dolls, with dolls’ brains and dolls’ souls, +in a dolls’ world! What am I doing among them? Oh, not that +I’m big; not that I am worth more than they, but, if I am to do +anything—for the world—I must live among real people, +different people from them ... or I must live alone, wrapped in +myself!... That has always been the everlasting seesaw: doing, +dreaming, doing, dreaming.... But there has never been that temptation, +that beckoning towards delectable valleys of oblivion and that luxury +of allowing myself to be drawn along as though by soul-magnetism, by +the strange sympathy of a woman’s soul!... Is it then so, in +reality! Is it merely a mirage of love? Love has never come into my +life: have I ever known what it was? Is there <i>one</i> woman then, +only one? Can we find, even late, like this?... Oh, I wish that this +wind would blow all this uncertainty, all these vapourings out of my +head and my heart ... and leave me strong and simple ... to act alone, +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb107" href="#pb107" name= +"pb107">107</a>]</span>to act alone!... And now I will <i>not</i> think +about it any more....”</p> +<p>And he quickened his pace and fought more vigorously against the +wind, with a wrestler’s vigour, and, when at last he saw the sea, +foaming pale under the black pall of cloud and roaring with a thousand +voices, he thought:</p> +<p>“It all came from one moment of foolishness. It had no real +existence. I spoke as I should not have spoken, but what I said was +nothing and is being blown out of my heart and out of my head at this +very moment....”</p> +<p>But, the next day, waking from a calm sleep, he asked himself:</p> +<p>“Is it not just the unutterable things in us that matter more +than anything else to us ... and to those who made us divine +them?...” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb108" href="#pb108" +name="pb108">108</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch14" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e2330" class="main">Chapter XIV</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">A day or two later, Marianne called:</p> +<p>“Auntie,” she said, “I haven’t seen you for +days. What’s the matter? Are you vexed with me?”</p> +<p>“Why, no, Marianne.”</p> +<p>“Yes, there’s something. You’re cross with me. +Tell me that you’re not cross with me. I haven’t dined with +you for an age. You are vexed with me because I invited myself. Tell me +that I’m mistaken, that you’re not vexed with me. And do +ask me to dinner again, one day.... It’s such a busy time just +now: parties, dinners, the Court ball the other night. It was very +boring.... We never see you. You never call on us. Nor Uncle either. +It’s all through that Brauws man.”</p> +<p>Constance started, with that strange nervous catch in her +throat:</p> +<p>“What do you mean?” she asked.</p> +<p>“That old friend of Uncle’s, who speaks on Peace. +I’ve heard him: it was splendid, splendid. His speech was +topping, I’m mad on Peace. But he takes possession of Uncle; the +boys have seen them together twice, in a motor-car. It’s all +through Brauws that I never see anything of either of you.... I suppose +he’s been to dinner, too?”</p> +<p>“Once.” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb109" href= +"#pb109" name="pb109">109</a>]</span></p> +<p>“I’m jealous, Auntie. Why should he come when you +don’t ask me? Doesn’t Mr. Van Vreeswijck ever come now +either? If you’re angry with me, I’ll be an angel in the +future, I’ll never invite myself again. But do invite me again, +yourself!”</p> +<p>“But, you silly child, I’m not angry.”</p> +<p>“Yes, you are; you’re cross with me. You’re not +the same. You’re different towards me. I feel it. I see +it.”</p> +<p>“But, Marianne....”</p> +<p>“Aren’t you? Am I wrong?.... Tell me that you’re +not cross with me.”</p> +<p>She knelt down by Constance, caressingly.</p> +<p>“Marianne, what a baby you are!... I am not cross: +there!”</p> +<p>“Say it once more, like a darling.”</p> +<p>“I—am—not—cross. There: are you +satisfied?”</p> +<p>“Yes, I believe you now. And when am I coming to +dinner?”</p> +<p>“You little tyrant!”</p> +<p>“I daren’t ask myself again.”</p> +<p>“What do you like so much in our dinners?”</p> +<p>“They’re just what I do like. The other night, when I +was so bored at the Court ball, I thought, ‘So long as Auntie +asks me again soon, I don’t mind anything!’”</p> +<p>“Rubbish! I don’t believe a word of it!”</p> +<p>“It’s quite true.” <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb110" href="#pb110" name="pb110">110</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Well, will you come one evening ... with Brauws and Van +Vreeswijck? Then I’ll ask Uncle Gerrit and Aunt Adeline +too.”</p> +<p>“Rather! That will be lovely. When?”</p> +<p>“I’ll write and let you know; don’t be so +impatient.”</p> +<p>“Now you <i>are</i> a darling!”</p> +<p>She hugged her aunt:</p> +<p>“You’re looking so nice to-day, Auntie. So pretty. You +are really. I say, how old are you?”</p> +<p>“You silly child, what does it matter?”</p> +<p>“I want to know. Wait, I can work it out. Mamma said there was +eight years between you. Mamma is fifty. So you must be +forty-two.”</p> +<p>“Very nearly forty-three. That’s old, isn’t +it?”</p> +<p>“Old? I don’t know. For some women. Not for you. +You’re young. And how young Uncle looks, doesn’t he? Why, +Addie is more sedate than Uncle!... You don’t look forty-two, you +look ten years less than that. Auntie, isn’t it strange how the +years go by? I ... I feel old. One year comes after another; and it all +makes me miserable.... Auntie, tell me, what makes me so fond of +you?... Sometimes ... sometimes I feel as if I could cry when I am +here....”</p> +<p>“Do I make you so sad?”</p> +<p>“No, not that. But, when I’m with you, I don’t +know why, I’m always thinking ... even when I’m chattering +... I feel happy in your house, Auntie. <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb111" href="#pb111" name="pb111">111</a>]</span>Look, here are the +tears!... But you ... you have tears in your eyes also. Yes, you have, +you can’t deny it. Tell me, Auntie, what is it?”</p> +<p>“Why, Marianne, it’s nothing ... but you talk such +nonsense sometimes ... and that upsets me; and, when I see other people +crying, it makes the tears come into my eyes too.”</p> +<p>“Uncle isn’t always nice to you, is he, +Auntie?”</p> +<p>“My dear Marianne!...”</p> +<p>“No, I know he isn’t. Do let me talk about it. +It’s so horrid, when you’re very fond of some one, always +to be silent about the things you’re thinking of. Let me talk +about it. I know that Uncle is not always nice. I told him the other +day....”</p> +<p>“What?”</p> +<p>“You’ll be angry when you hear. I told him the other day +that he must be nicer to you. Are you angry?”</p> +<p>“No, dear, but....”</p> +<p>“No, you mustn’t be angry: I meant to say the right +thing. I can’t bear to think of your not being happy together. Do +try and be happy together.”</p> +<p>“But, Marianne dear, it’s years now....”</p> +<p>“Yes, but it must be altered. Auntie, it <i>must</i> be +altered. It would make me so awfully happy.”</p> +<p>“Oh, Marianne, Marianne, how excitable you are!...”</p> +<p>“Because I feel for people when I’m fond of them. There +are people who never feel and others <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb112" href="#pb112" name="pb112">112</a>]</span>who never speak out. +I feel ... and I say what I think. I’m like that. Mamma’s +different: she never speaks out. I must speak out; I should choke if I +didn’t. I should like to say everything, always. When I’m +miserable, I want to say so; when I feel happy, I want to say so. But +it’s not always possible, Auntie.... Auntie, do try and be happy +with Uncle. He is so nice, he is so kind; and you <i>were</i> very fond +of him once. It’s a very long time ago, I know; but you must +begin and grow fond of each other again. Tell me, can’t you love +him any more?”</p> +<p>“Dear....”</p> +<p>“Oh, I see it all: you can’t! No, you can’t love +him any more. And Uncle <i>is</i> so nice, so kind ... even though he +is so quick-tempered and excitable. He’s so young still: +he’s just like a hot-headed undergraduate sometimes, Henri said. +In that scene with Papa, he was just like a game-cock.... You know, in +the family, the uncles are afraid of Uncle Henri, because he always +wants to be fighting duels. But that’s his quick temper; in +reality, he’s nice, he’s kind. I know it, Auntie, because, +when Uncle sees me home, we talk about all sorts of things, tell each +other everything. You don’t mind, Auntie, do you? You’re +not jealous?”</p> +<p>“No, dear.”</p> +<p>“No, you’re not jealous. And Uncle Henri is my uncle +too, isn’t he, and there’s no harm in talking <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb113" href="#pb113" name="pb113">113</a>]</span>to +him? He talks so nicely: time seems to fly when Uncle’s +talking.... Tell me, Auntie, Brauws: is Brauws really a gentleman? He +has been a workman.”</p> +<p>“Yes, but that was because he wanted to.”</p> +<p>“I don’t understand those queer men, do you? No, you +don’t either, you can’t understand such a queer man any +more than I can. Just imagine ... Uncle Henri as a labouring man! Can +you imagine it? No, no, not possibly! He speaks well, Brauws; and I +raved about Peace for a whole evening....”</p> +<p>“And since?”</p> +<p>“No. I don’t rave over things long. Raving isn’t +the same as feeling. When I really feel....”</p> +<p>“Well?”</p> +<p>“Then—I think—it is for always. For +always.”</p> +<p>“But, Marianne, darling, you mustn’t be so +sentimental!...”</p> +<p>“Well, what about you? You’re crying +again....”</p> +<p>“No, Marianne.”</p> +<p>“Yes, you’re crying. Let’s cry together, Auntie. I +feel as if I want to cry with you; I’m in that sort of mood, I +don’t know why. There, see, I <i>am</i> crying!...”</p> +<p>She knelt down by Constance; and her tears really came. <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb114" href="#pb114" name="pb114">114</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Dear, you mustn’t excite yourself like that. Some one +is coming; I hear Uncle....”</p> +<p>The girl recovered herself quickly as Van der Welcke entered the +room. He stood for a moment in the doorway, smiling his gay, boyish +smile, his blue eyes glowing with happiness. She looked at him for a +second.</p> +<p>“Well, Marianne ... I haven’t seen you for ever so +long....”</p> +<p>“Yes, you’re always in that old car with Brauws.... And +I’ve been an absolute butterfly. Only think, at the Court ball, +the other night, just as the Queen entered the ball-room....”</p> +<p>She sat down and told her little budget of news in a voice that +seemed to come from far away. The dusk crept in and shadowed the room, +obliterating their outlines and the expression of their faces. +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb115" href="#pb115" name= +"pb115">115</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch15" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e2500" class="main">Chapter XV</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">“Isn’t she coming?” asked Adolphine, +with a sidelong glance at the door.</p> +<p>It was Sunday evening, at Mamma van Lowe’s, and it was after +half-past nine. It had been like that every Sunday evening since +Constance returned from Nice: the sidelong, almost anxious look towards +the door; the almost anxious question:</p> +<p>“Is she coming?”</p> +<p>“I shouldn’t be surprised if she did to-night,” +said Floortje. “If so, she’s coming late, so as not to stay +long.”</p> +<p>Mother and daughter were sitting at the bridge-table with Uncle +Ruyvenaer and Jaap; and the cards fell slackly one upon the other, +uninterestingly, with a dull flop; and Floortje gathered in the tricks +mechanically, silently and greedily.</p> +<p>“What a frump Cateau looks to-night!” said Adolphine, +with a furtive glance at the second card-table.</p> +<p>“Like a washerwoman in satin,” said Floortje.</p> +<p>“I say,” said Uncle Ruyvenaer, burning to say something +spiteful: he was losing, couldn’t get a hand, kept throwing his +low cards, furiously, one after the other, on Floortje’s fat +trumps. “I say, it’s high time Bertha interfered!” +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb116" href="#pb116" name= +"pb116">116</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Why, what are you talking about?”</p> +<p>“What am I talking about? What everybody’s talking +about: that Marianne is running after Van der Welcke in the most +barefaced fashion.”</p> +<p>“Aunt Bertha had better be very careful, with such a rotten +cad as Uncle van der Welcke,” Floortje opined.</p> +<p>“I passed them the other evening on the +Koninginnegracht,” said Jaap.</p> +<p>“And what were they doing?”</p> +<p>“How were they walking?”</p> +<p>“They had hold of each other.”</p> +<p>“How?”</p> +<p>“Well, he had his arm around her waist.”</p> +<p>“Did you see it?”</p> +<p>“<i>Did</i> I see it? And he kept on spooning her all the +time.”</p> +<p>“And Bertha,” said Adolphine, “who just acts as if +she saw nothing.... Good heavens, what a frump Cateau looks +to-night!... She doesn’t seem to be coming, does she?”</p> +<p>“No, she doesn’t seem to be coming now.”</p> +<p>“How does Mamma take it, her staying away?”</p> +<p>“Mamma seems to get on without her,” answered Uncle +Ruyvenaer.</p> +<p>“Mamma can’t really be fond of her.”</p> +<p>“Or else Granny would insist on her coming,” said +Floortje.</p> +<p>“It’s much quieter, now that she’s staying +away.” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb117" href="#pb117" name= +"pb117">117</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Well, I don’t mind a bit of a kick-up,” said +Jaap.</p> +<p>“Have you had to-day’s <i>Dwarskijker</i>, +Jaap?”</p> +<p>“Yes, but they’ve stopped putting in anything about +us.”</p> +<p>“It’s really a piece of cheek on her part, not to come +any more on Sundays....”</p> +<p>“And to go rushing off to Nice....”</p> +<p>“And not even arrange to be back on New Year’s +Eve.”</p> +<p>“Yes; and then we hear about ‘longing for the +family.’”</p> +<p>“And even on New Year’s Eve....”</p> +<p>“She takes good care to keep away.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Adolphine sentimentally, “on New +Year’s Eve we ought all to be here.”</p> +<p>“Just so,” said Uncle Ruyvenaer. “I +agree.”</p> +<p>“Then, if you’ve had a quarrel....”</p> +<p>“You make it up again....”</p> +<p>“And start quarrelling again, with renewed courage, on the +first of January,” grinned Jaap.</p> +<p>“But—I’ve always said so—what Constance has +not got is ... a heart,” Adolphine continued, pathetically.</p> +<p>“Do you know what I think?” said Floortje, sinking her +voice.</p> +<p>“What?”</p> +<p>“That she encourages Marianne.”</p> +<p>“What for?”</p> +<p>“Well, deliberately.” <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb118" href="#pb118" name="pb118">118</a>]</span></p> +<p>“But what for?”</p> +<p>“Why, to be free of her husband.”</p> +<p>“Of Van der Welcke?”</p> +<p>“Yes.”</p> +<p>“To get ... rid of him?”</p> +<p>“Of course. He’s young ... and she’s old,” +said Floortje, not sparing her mother, who was only four years younger +than Constance.</p> +<p>“But do you believe...?” said Uncle, nodding his +head.</p> +<p>“Oh, no, I don’t say that!”</p> +<p>“But still....”</p> +<p>“I expect it’s only just spooning ... as Jaap +says.”</p> +<p>“I <i>don’t</i> think!” said Jaap, with a knowing +grin.</p> +<p>“Behave yourself, Jaap!” said Adolphine, angry because +Floortje had used the word “old.”</p> +<p>“Rats!” said Jaap, rudely, shrugging his shoulders, as +much as to say that Mamma was an idiot. “I’ll eat my hat if +it’s only spooning.”</p> +<p>They looked at one another: Uncle, Adolphine and Floortje.</p> +<p>“You mustn’t speak like that,” said Adolphine, in +a tone of reprimand, “when you don’t know....”</p> +<p>“And what does Floortje know and what do you know? And you are +both just as bad as I am, with your insinuations.... Only, I <i>say</i> +what you and Floortje <i>think</i>....” <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb119" href="#pb119" name="pb119">119</a>]</span></p> +<p>He flung down his cards and left his seat, because he couldn’t +stand being treated like a little boy who didn’t know things.</p> +<p>The three others went on talking about Marianne and Van der Welcke +... because they saw. But they saw nothing of Brauws and Constance ... +and did not talk about them....</p> +<p>“Oh, <i>dear</i>!” whined Cateau. “What a +<i>frump</i> Aunt Adolph-ine looks to-night!”</p> +<p>She was sitting at the bridge-table with Aunt Ruyvenaer, Toetie and +Eduard van Raven and looked over her ample bust at each card as she +played it, very carefully, putting it down with her fat, stumpy +fingers, the incarnation of unctuous caution.</p> +<p>“To-night?” asked Eduard.</p> +<p>“Oh, so oft-en: such a frump!” declared Cateau, +emphatically. “So dowd-y!”</p> +<p>“She’s your husband’s sister, after all,” +said Aunt Ruyvenaer, quietly.</p> +<p>“Yes, Aunt-ie, I <i>know</i>.... But Ka-rel is al-ways a +gen-tleman!”</p> +<p>“And Aunt Adolphine never,” replied Van Raven, to +provoke her.</p> +<p>There was no love lost between aunt and nephew; and Cateau said, +meekly:</p> +<p>“Well, I’m not say-ing it to say any-thing +un-<i>kind</i> about Adolph-ine.... But, Van Ra-ven, how <i>ill</i> +Emilie-tje’s looking: so tired! Are you two all right +to-gether?” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb120" href="#pb120" +name="pb120">120</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Say, <i>half</i> right,” said Van Raven, echoing her +emphasis.</p> +<p>Toetie tittered behind her cards; and Auntie said:</p> +<p>“<i>Ajo</i>,<a class="noteref" id="xd20e2701src" href= +"#xd20e2701" name="xd20e2701src">1</a> Edua-r-r-rd, you!... Attend to +the game.... Your lead!”</p> +<p>Cateau was no match for Van Raven at laconic repartee and so she +preferred to go on talking about Constance and said:</p> +<p>“Is she nev-er com-ing to Mo-ther’s Sun-days again? Ah, +I ex-pect she’s been fright-ened away!”</p> +<p>“By you?” asked Eduard, gleefully capturing +Cateau’s knave of trumps.</p> +<p>“No, by the old <i>aunts</i>. It was re-ally ve-ry tactless +... of the two old <i>aunts</i>.... Isn’t it aw-ful: about +Mari-anne and Van der Wel-cke?”</p> +<p>Karel, Van Saetzema and Dijkerhof were playing three-handed bridge +at the third table. They had begun in grim silence, each of them eager +to play the dummy, and inwardly Karel thought his sister Adolphine +dowdy, Van Saetzema thought his sister-in-law Cateau dowdy, while +Dijkerhof thought both his aunts very dowdy, hardly presentable. All +three, however, kept their thoughts locked up in the innermost recesses +of their souls, so that outwardly they were playing very seriously, +their eyes fixed greedily and attentively on the dummy’s exposed +cards. Suddenly, however, Karel said: <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb121" href="#pb121" name="pb121">121</a>]</span></p> +<p>“I say....”</p> +<p>“Well?” asked Van Saetzema.</p> +<p>“Isn’t it caddish of Van der Welcke?”</p> +<p>“What? Compromising Marianne?”</p> +<p>“Ah, those girls of Aunt Bertha’s!” said +Dijkerhof, with a grin.</p> +<p>“What do you mean?” asked his father-in-law.</p> +<p>“Well, Louise is in love with her brother Otto, Emilie with +her brother Henri and now Marianne, by way of variety, goes falling in +love with her uncle.”</p> +<p>“They’re crazy, all that Van Naghel lot,” said +Karel, who felt particularly fit and well that evening, puffing +luxuriously after a substantial dinner. “I say, what about +Constance? Isn’t she coming any more?”</p> +<p>“It doesn’t look like it.”</p> +<p>“Isn’t Aunt Constance coming any more?”</p> +<p>“No, it doesn’t look like it.”</p> +<p>“Father, it’s my turn to take dummy.”</p> +<p>“Yes, Saetzema, it’s Dijkerhof’s turn.”</p> +<p>Father-in-law and son-in-law exchanged seats.</p> +<p>The old aunts were sitting in a corner near the door of the +conservatory:</p> +<p>“Rine.”</p> +<p>“Yes, Tine.”</p> +<p>“She doesn’t seem to be coming any more on +Sundays.”</p> +<p>“No, Tine, she doesn’t come on Sundays now.” +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb122" href="#pb122" name= +"pb122">122</a>]</span></p> +<p>“A good thing too!” Tine yelled into Rine’s +ear.</p> +<p>Mamma van Lowe, smiling sadly, moved from table to table, with +Dorine, asking the children if they wouldn’t like something to +drink. <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb123" href="#pb123" name= +"pb123">123</a>]</span></p> +</div> +<div class="footnotes"> +<hr class="fnsep"> +<p class="footnote"><span class="label"><a class="noteref" id= +"xd20e2701" href="#xd20e2701src" name="xd20e2701">1</a></span> Malay: +“Come on, now then.”</p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch16" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e2769" class="main">Chapter XVI</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">“You’re absolutely humanizing +Brauws,” said Van der Welcke to Constance, when Brauws had +accepted a second invitation to dinner. “And with other people +coming, too!... It’s incredible!”</p> +<p>She was fond of seeing people whom she liked at her table; and she +took a pleasure in making her house comfortable for others as well as +for herself. Addie was to come down to dinner. Adeline was going out +for the first time after her recent confinement; and Gerrit was glad to +come, appreciated a good dinner. Her only fear had been that Van +Vreeswijck would think it too much of a family dinner this time.</p> +<p>“Tell me frankly, would you rather not come?” she asked +Van Vreeswijck.</p> +<p>But he almost flushed as he said:</p> +<p>“But I’m delighted to come, mevrouw.”</p> +<p>She had noticed lately that he was paying great attention to +Marianne; and she was almost glad of it.</p> +<p>They were very gay at dinner; and Brauws, feeling quite at home, +talked about America: how he had stood on the platform of an electric +tram, in wind and rain, as driver.</p> +<p>“Constance,” said Paul, “all the social elements +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb124" href="#pb124" name= +"pb124">124</a>]</span>are assembled at your dinner-table to-night! Did +you choose them on purpose? Van Vreeswijck represents the Court +aristocracy; your husband, let us say, the country aristocracy: +it’s the only word I can find for him; Gerrit the army; Brauws +labour; I the middle-classes, the pure unadulterated capitalists; and +your boy the future, the mysterious future! The ladies are not so +mixed: next time, you must mix your ladies....”</p> +<p>“Mr. Brauws,” Marianne asked, suddenly, “why +aren’t you driving a tram now?”</p> +<p>“Freule,<a class="noteref" id="xd20e2793src" href="#xd20e2793" +name="xd20e2793src">1</a> to explain that, I should have to talk to you +for two hours about myself; and you wouldn’t be interested in the +explanation....”</p> +<p>“Oh, yes!” said Marianne, flippantly. “If you had +remained a tram-driver, your life would not have interested me. Now +that you have resigned your rank as a workman and are eating <i lang= +"fr">pâté</i> and drinking champagne with us, it does +interest me. For it’s just that evolution which attracts +me....”</p> +<p>“Marianne!” said Paul, admonishing her. “Not so +fast, child: you’re only a little girl and you mustn’t +discuss such questions. You’ll be making Mr. Brauws afraid to +take another mouthful!...”</p> +<p>Brauws was obviously a little annoyed; and Constance whispered:</p> +<p>“Marianne ... don’t talk like that....”</p> +<p>“But, Auntie....” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb125" +href="#pb125" name="pb125">125</a>]</span></p> +<p>“No, dear, don’t do it: don’t talk like +that....”</p> +<p>“Am I always saying tactless things?”</p> +<p>“No, no, but ... if you keep on, you’ll really make +Brauws refuse to come to the houses of people like +ourselves....”</p> +<p>“Who eat <i lang="fr">pâté</i>!”</p> +<p>“Hush, Marianne!”</p> +<p>“Uncle!” said Marianne to Van der Welcke.</p> +<p>“Yes?”</p> +<p>“Don’t you think it silly? To become a workman and then +leave off? Why? That’s what I want to know. If you want to become +one, you should remain one! Are you in sympathy with those ideas which +lead to nothing?”</p> +<p>“I’m very fond of Brauws, Marianne.”</p> +<p>“But not of his ideas?”</p> +<p>“No, he’s a monomaniac. He’s mad on that point, or +was.”</p> +<p>“Just so: was.”</p> +<p>“Marianne, are you always so implacable?”</p> +<p>The bells:</p> +<p>“No, I’m not implacable. Paul is really right: I +mustn’t talk like that. I blurt out the first thing that comes +into my head. Is Brauws angry, do you think?”</p> +<p>“With you? No.”</p> +<p>“I say, Uncle, do you think it’s the least use, always +thinking about that improvement of social conditions? Why not, all of +us, do good where we can <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb126" href= +"#pb126" name="pb126">126</a>]</span>and, for the rest, try and be +happy ourselves? That’s the great thing.”</p> +<p>Van der Welcke laughed:</p> +<p>“What an easy solution, Marianne!”</p> +<p>“Tell me, Uncle: do you do a lot of good?”</p> +<p>“No.”</p> +<p>“Are you happy?”</p> +<p>“Sometimes....”</p> +<p>“Not always.... I don’t do any good either, or not much. +I am happy ... sometimes. You see, I don’t go very far, even +according to my own superficial creed. Uncle, are we very +insignificant, should you say?”</p> +<p>“Who, baby?”</p> +<p>“You and I! Much more insignificant than Brauws?”</p> +<p>“I think so.”</p> +<p>“Are we small?”</p> +<p>“Small?”</p> +<p>“Yes, are we small souls ... and is he ... is he a big +one?”</p> +<p>“Perhaps, Marianne.”</p> +<p>“Yes, I’m a small one. And you too ... I think. +He’s not. No, he’s one of the big ones ... though he is +eating <i lang="fr">pâté</i> just now. But I, a small +soul, shall always like small souls best. I like you much better than +him.”</p> +<p>“And yet he is more interesting than I; and one doesn’t +come across many big souls.” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb127" +href="#pb127" name="pb127">127</a>]</span></p> +<p>“No, but I like you best. I daren’t talk to him again. I +should start quarrelling with him at once. Straight away. I could never +quarrel with you. That’s the sympathy between small soul ... and +small soul. Tell me, is your insignificance attracted to mine +also?”</p> +<p>“Perhaps, Marianne.”</p> +<p>“You say perhaps to everything. Say yes.”</p> +<p>“Well, then, yes.”</p> +<p>“Are we both small?”</p> +<p>“Yes.”</p> +<p>“Both of us?”</p> +<p>“Yes.”</p> +<p>“In sympathy?”</p> +<p>“Yes.”</p> +<p>The bells:</p> +<p>“Yes—yes—yes!” she laughed; and the little +bells tinkled merrily, the shrill little silver bells. “Uncle, I +drink to it.”</p> +<p>“To what?”</p> +<p>“To our small ... sympathy.”</p> +<p>“Here goes!”</p> +<p>Their champagne-glasses touched, with a crystal note. They +drank.</p> +<p>“What are you drinking to?” asked Paul.</p> +<p>She put her finger to her tiny mouth. She was radiant and, in her +excitement, she became very pretty, with her shining eyes. She felt +that Brauws was looking at her; and she felt that Brauws was still +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb128" href="#pb128" name= +"pb128">128</a>]</span>angry. And, feeling mischievous and happy, with +a desire to tease them all, Brauws, Paul and Van der Welcke, she +murmured, with an airy grace:</p> +<p>“That’s our <i>secret</i>; Uncle’s and +mine....”</p> +<p>“A secret?” asked Van Vreeswijck.</p> +<p>She laughed. The bells rang out merrily:</p> +<p>“And you,” she said to Van Vreeswijck, maliciously, +“you sha’n’t know the secret ever!...” +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb129" href="#pb129" name= +"pb129">129</a>]</span></p> +</div> +<div class="footnotes"> +<hr class="fnsep"> +<p class="footnote"><span class="label"><a class="noteref" id= +"xd20e2793" href="#xd20e2793src" name="xd20e2793">1</a></span> The +title borne by the unmarried daughters of Dutch noblemen.</p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch17" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e2942" class="main">Chapter XVII</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">The men remained behind to smoke; Constance went to +the drawing-room with Adeline and Marianne.</p> +<p>“You’re looking so happy to-night, Aunt +Constance,” said Marianne. “Don’t you think so, Aunt +Adeline? Tell me why.”</p> +<p>The girl herself looked happy, radiant as though with visible rays, +a great light flashing from her sparkling eyes.</p> +<p>“Yes, Auntie’s looking very well,” said the simple +little fair-haired woman.</p> +<p>“That’s because I think it so nice to have all of you +with me.”</p> +<p>Marianne knelt down beside her, in her caressing way:</p> +<p>“She is so nice, isn’t she, Aunt Adeline? I say, Aunt +Adeline, isn’t she a darling? So nice, so jolly, so homy. I adore +Aunt Constance these days.”</p> +<p>And she embraced Constance impetuously.</p> +<p>“Yes, Constance,” said Adeline, “I’m very +fond of you too.”</p> +<p>And she took her sister-in-law’s hand. She was a very gentle, +simple, fair-haired little woman, the quiet, obedient little wife of +her big, noisy Gerrit; and the family thought her insignificant and +boring. Because Constance had at once sought her affection <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb130" href="#pb130" name="pb130">130</a>]</span>and +valued her affection, she had, after her first surprise, grown very +fond of Constance. She never went out in the evening, because of the +children, except when Constance invited her. And she sat there, happy +to be with Constance, with her gentle smile on her round, fair, +motherly little face, pleasant and comfortable with her matronly little +figure, now too plump for prettiness.</p> +<p>The men joined them; and, when Constance saw Brauws come in with the +others, she thought that he looked strange, pale under the rough bronze +of his cheeks. His deep, grey eyes seemed to lose themselves in their +own sombre depths; and for the first time she examined his features in +detail: they were somewhat irregular in outline, with the short-cropped +hair; his nose was large and straight and the heavy eyebrows arched +sombrely over the sombre eyes; his temples were broad and level; his +cheekbones wide; and all that part of his face was energetic, +intelligent, rough and sombre, a little Gothic and barbarian, but yet +curiously ascetic, with the asceticism of the thinker. But the mouth +might have belonged to quite another face: almost weak, more finely and +purely drawn than any of his other features; the lips fresh, without +any heavy sensuality; the white teeth seemed to hold a laughing threat +as though they would bite: a threat that gave him the look of a beast +of prey. And yet that mouth, the moustache and the chin had something +more delicate about them, <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb131" href= +"#pb131" name="pb131">131</a>]</span>as though they belonged to another +face; his voice was gentle; and his laugh, which every now and then +burst out naturally and clearly, was charming, had a note of +kindliness, which softened all that was rough and threatening into +something surprisingly lovable. In his vigorous, broad, powerful +movements he had retained an almost unceremonious freedom, which most +certainly remained to him from his workman years: an indifference to +the chair in which he sat, to the mantelpiece against which he leant; +an indifference which seemed a strong and virile, easy and natural +grace in the man of culture whose hands had laboured: something +original and almost impulsive, which, when it did not charm, was bound +to appear antipathetic, rude and rough to any one who was expecting the +manners prescribed by social convention for a gentleman in a +drawing-room. Constance was sometimes surprised that she, of all women, +was not offended by this unceremonious freedom, that she was even +attracted by it; but a nervous girl like Marianne—herself a +delicate, fragile little doll of boudoir culture—would tingle to +her finger-tips with irritation at that impulsive naturalness, which +was too spacious for her among the furniture of Aunt Constance’ +drawing-room. And a sort of uncontrollable resentment surged through +her when Brauws came to where she sat and said:</p> +<p>“Do you always ... take such an interest in evolution, +freule?” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb132" href="#pb132" name= +"pb132">132</a>]</span></p> +<p>She looked up at him quickly. He was bending forward a little, in a +protecting and almost mocking attitude; and she saw only the barbaric, +Teutonic part of his head and the beast-of-prey threat of his handsome +teeth. She hated it all, because it was very strong and as it were +hostile to her caste. She answered, with cool irony:</p> +<p>“No, Mr. Brauws, only in your case.”</p> +<p>“And to what do I owe the honour?” asked Brauws.</p> +<p>“It’s only natural. You were not like everybody ... +once. Now that I am meeting you just as I meet everybody, it interests +me to know how it came about.”</p> +<p>“From weakness, you think? Is that your secret +idea?”</p> +<p>“Perhaps.”</p> +<p>“Perhaps you are right. And, if it were so, would you despise +me?”</p> +<p>The conversation was getting on her nerves. She tried to evade +it:</p> +<p>“You may be weak, you may be strong,” she said, +irritably. “I don’t know ... and ... it doesn’t +interest me so very much.”</p> +<p>“It did just now.”</p> +<p>Again she looked up quickly, with the quick, nervous grace of all +her movements, and it flashed upon her that he was very angry with her, +very hostile towards her. <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb133" href= +"#pb133" name="pb133">133</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Aunt Constance!” she called. “Do come and help +me. Mr. Brauws isn’t at all nice.”</p> +<p>Constance came up.</p> +<p>“He’s not nice, your friend,” Marianne went on, +like a spoilt child, a little frightened. “He wants ... he +absolutely insists on quarrelling with me. Do take my part!”</p> +<p>And she suddenly flitted away to another chair and, bending behind +her fan to Van der Welcke:</p> +<p>“That Brauws man is a most disagreeable person. Why +can’t he let me alone?”</p> +<p>She felt safe with him, this man of her own class, who joined hands +with her own selfish, happiness-craving youth—for he was +young—a small soul, like hers. Her small soul hung on his eyes; +and she felt that she loved him. As long as she did not think about it +and abandoned herself to her overflowing happiness, she remained happy, +full of radiance; it was only at home that it cost her tears and bitter +agony.</p> +<p>“You’re surely not angry with my little niece?” +asked Constance.</p> +<p>He was still pale, under the rough bronze of his cheeks.</p> +<p>“Yes,” he said, sombrely.</p> +<p>“Why?” she asked, almost beseechingly. “She is a +child!”</p> +<p>“No, she is not merely a child. She represents to +me....” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb134" href="#pb134" name= +"pb134">134</a>]</span></p> +<p>“What?...”</p> +<p>“All of you!” he said, roughly, with a wave of his +hand.</p> +<p>“Whom do you mean?”</p> +<p>“Her caste, to which you yourself belong. What am I here for? +Tell me what I am here for. A single word from that delicate, +lily-white child, who hates me, has made me ask myself, what am I here +for, among all of you? I’m out of place here.”</p> +<p>“No. You are our friend, Henri’s friend.”</p> +<p>“And yours?”</p> +<p>“And mine.”</p> +<p>“Already?”</p> +<p>“Already. So don’t think that you are out of place +here.”</p> +<p>“You also are a woman ... of your caste,” he said, +gloomily.</p> +<p>“Can I help that?” she asked, half laughing.</p> +<p>“No. But why friendship? Our ideas remain poles +apart.”</p> +<p>“Ideas? I have none. I have never thought.”</p> +<p>“Never thought?”</p> +<p>“No.”</p> +<p>“You are a woman: you have only felt.”</p> +<p>“Not that either.”</p> +<p>“Not felt? But then what have you done?”</p> +<p>“I do not believe that I have lived.”</p> +<p>“Not ever?”</p> +<p>“No, not ever.” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb135" +href="#pb135" name="pb135">135</a>]</span></p> +<p>“How do you know that now?”</p> +<p>“I am beginning to feel it now, by degrees. No doubt because I +am getting old now.”</p> +<p>“You are not old.”</p> +<p>“I am old.”</p> +<p>“And thinking: are you also beginning to think?”</p> +<p>“No, not yet.”</p> +<p>“But, by the way you speak of yourself, you are quite +young!”</p> +<p>“Don’t be angry with that child!” she entreated, +turning the conversation. “She is a nice girl, I am very fond of +her ... but she sometimes says things....”</p> +<p>“Do you like her?”</p> +<p>“Yes.”</p> +<p>“I don’t. I could almost say, I hate her as she hates +me.”</p> +<p>“Why?” she asked, in a frightened voice. “You +don’t know her. You can’t hate her.”</p> +<p>“I am different from other people, am I not, mevrouw? I say +different things and I say them differently. You know it, you knew it +before I entered your house!” he said, almost fiercely.</p> +<p>“What do you mean?”</p> +<p>“I want to say something to you.”</p> +<p>“What is it?”</p> +<p>“That child ... that delicate, that lily-white child ... +is....”</p> +<p>“What?” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb136" href= +"#pb136" name="pb136">136</a>]</span></p> +<p>“The danger to your domestic happiness.”</p> +<p>She gave a violent start:</p> +<p>“What do you mean?”</p> +<p>“She’s in love with Hans.”</p> +<p>“Hush!” she whispered, trembling, and laid her hand on +his hand. “Hush!”</p> +<p>“She is in love with Hans.”</p> +<p>“How do you know?”</p> +<p>“I see it.... It radiates from their whole +being....”</p> +<p>They both of them looked at Van der Welcke and Marianne. The two +were whispering together with a glance and a smile, half-hidden behind +a fan, while Paul, Gerrit and Van Vreeswijck were in the midst of an +eager discussion and Addie gallantly entertaining Aunt Adeline, who was +smiling gently.</p> +<p>“Please hush!” Constance entreated again, very pale. +“I <i>know</i> she’s in love with him.”</p> +<p>“You know it?”</p> +<p>“Yes.”</p> +<p>“Has she told you?”</p> +<p>“No. But I see it radiating out of her, as you see it. But she +is no danger ... to my domestic happiness. That happiness lies in my +son, not in my husband.”</p> +<p>“I like Hans,” he said, almost reproachfully. “I +have always liked him, perhaps just because he was always a +child—and I already a man—when we were boys. He is still a +child. He also ... loves <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb137" href= +"#pb137" name="pb137">137</a>]</span>her. You see, I say different +things from other people, because I don’t know how to +talk....”</p> +<p>“I know,” she whispered, “that he loves +her.”</p> +<p>“You know?”</p> +<p>“Yes.”</p> +<p>“Has he told you?”</p> +<p>“No. But I see it radiating out of him as I do out of +her.”</p> +<p>“So do I.”</p> +<p>“Hush, please hush!”</p> +<p>“What’s the use of hushing? <i>Everybody</i> sees +it.”</p> +<p>“No, not everybody.”</p> +<p>“If we see it, everybody sees it.”</p> +<p>“No.”</p> +<p>“I say yes. I know that your brothers see it.”</p> +<p>“No.... Please, please ... don’t speak of it, +don’t speak of it, don’t speak of it!”</p> +<p>“She is happy!”</p> +<p>“She must be suffering as well.”</p> +<p>“But she gives herself up to her happiness. She is young, she +does not reflect ... any more than Hans does. I am sorry ... for your +sake, mevrouw.”</p> +<p>“It is no sorrow to me for my own sake.... I am sorry ... for +hers. Don’t be angry with the child! Who knows what she suffers! +Don’t be angry because she ... annoyed you at dinner, with her +questions.” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb138" href="#pb138" +name="pb138">138</a>]</span></p> +<p>“One can’t control one’s likes ... or one’s +dislikes.”</p> +<p>“No. But I do like the girl ... and I want you to try, as our +friend, not to hate her.... How seriously we’re talking! I +can’t talk like that: I’m not used to it. I confess to you +honestly, I’m getting frightened....”</p> +<p>“Of me?...”</p> +<p>“You’re too big ... to hate a child like +that.”</p> +<p>“I’m not big at all.... I am very human. I sometimes +feel very small. But you are right: to hate that child, for a single +word which she said, for a touch of hostility which I felt in her, is +<i>very</i> small. Thanks for the rebuke. I won’t hate her, I +promise you.”</p> +<p>At first, the sombre austerity of his frown and his expression had +almost terrified her. She now saw his lips laugh and his face light +up.</p> +<p>“I’m going to apologize.”</p> +<p>“No, don’t do that.”</p> +<p>“Yes, I will.”</p> +<p>He went to Marianne; and Constance heard him say:</p> +<p>“Freule, I want to make friends.”</p> +<p>She did not catch what Marianne answered, but she heard the little +bells of Marianne’s laughter and saw her put out her hand to +Brauws. It was a reconciliation; and yet she felt that the hostility +continued to exist, irreconcilably, like a hostility that was +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb139" href="#pb139" name= +"pb139">139</a>]</span>too deep-seated, going down to the fundamental +antagonism of caste, even though this was innate in her and cultivated +in him....</p> +<p>“And why,” she thought, “do not <i>I</i> feel that +hostility?...” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb140" href="#pb140" +name="pb140">140</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch18" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e3218" class="main">Chapter XVIII</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">There was a big official dinner at Van Naghel’s; +and the guests were expected in three-quarters of an hour.</p> +<p>“Mamma,” whined Huigje to Frances, as she was dressing, +“what’s happening?”</p> +<p>“There are people coming,” said Frances, without looking +up.</p> +<p>“What sort of people, Mamma?”</p> +<p>“Oh, there’s a dinner-party, dear!” said Frances, +irritably.</p> +<p>Huigje did not know what a dinner-party was:</p> +<p>“What’s dinner-party?” he asked his little sister +Ottelientje.</p> +<p>“Things to eat,” said Ottelientje, importantly.</p> +<p>“Things to eat?”</p> +<p>“Yes, nice things ... ices.”</p> +<p>“Shall we have dinner-party, Mamma, and ices?” whined +Huigje.</p> +<p>“<i>Allah</i>,<a class="noteref" id="xd20e3248src" href= +"#xd20e3248" name="xd20e3248src">1</a> <i>baboe</i>,<a class="noteref" +id="xd20e3254src" href="#xd20e3254" name="xd20e3254src">2</a> keep the +<i>sinjo</i><a class="noteref" id="xd20e3262src" href="#xd20e3262" +name="xd20e3262src">3</a> with you!... But, <i>baboe</i>, do me up +first.”</p> +<p>Otto, who now had a billet at the Foreign Office, came in, followed +by Louise.</p> +<p>“Oh, aren’t you dressing, Louise?” said +Frances.</p> +<p>“No, I’m not going down,” she answered. “I +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb141" href="#pb141" name= +"pb141">141</a>]</span>shall have my meal with the children and with +Marietje and Karel, in the nursery.”</p> +<p>“I don’t want you to have your dinner with the +children,” said Frances, fastening her bracelet.</p> +<p>“No,” said Louise, gently, “but I’m having +dinner with Karel and Marie in any case.”</p> +<p>“One would think you were mad,” said Frances. “Why +aren’t you at the dinner?”</p> +<p>“I arranged it with Mamma. There’s a place +short.”</p> +<p>“But you’re not a child!”</p> +<p>“Frances, what do I care about these dinners?” said +Louise, with a gentle little laugh.</p> +<p>“If there’s a place short,” said Frances, working +herself up about nothing, “<i>I’ll</i> have my dinner with +the children.”</p> +<p>“Frances, please....”</p> +<p>“I will!”</p> +<p>“But, Frances, why make difficulties when there are +none?” Louise replied, very gently. “Really, it has all +been arranged ... with Mamma.”</p> +<p>“I’m only a step-daughter!” cried Frances.</p> +<p>“You mean, a daughter-in-law!” Otto put in, with a +laugh.</p> +<p>“A step-daughter!” Frances repeated, trembling with +nervous irritation. “You’re a daughter. Your place is at +the dinner.”</p> +<p>“Frances, I assure you, I’m not going in to +dinner,” said Louise, quietly but decidedly. <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb142" href="#pb142" name="pb142">142</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Oh, shut up, Frances!” said Otto.</p> +<p>But Frances wanted to get angry, about nothing, merely for the sake +of working herself up. She scolded the <i>baboe</i>, pushed the +children out of her way, broke a fan:</p> +<p>“There, I’ve smashed the rotten thing!”</p> +<p>“Is that your new fan?” asked Otto, furiously.</p> +<p>“Yes. R-r-rootsh!... There, it’s in shreds!”</p> +<p>He flew into a rage:</p> +<p>“You needn’t think I’ll ever give you anything +again!... You’re not worth it!”</p> +<p>“That’s right, then you can give everything to your +sister: you’re fonder of Louise as it is ... you’re in love +with Louise. R-r-rootsh!... R-r-rootsh!”</p> +<p>And she sent the fan flying across the room, in pieces.</p> +<p>“Eh, <i>njonja</i>!”<a class="noteref" id="xd20e3337src" +href="#xd20e3337" name="xd20e3337src">4</a> said the <i>baboe</i> in +mild astonishment.</p> +<p>“You’re a regular <i>nonna</i>,<a class="noteref" id= +"xd20e3348src" href="#xd20e3348" name="xd20e3348src">5</a> that’s +what you are!” said Otto, flushing angrily.</p> +<p>But his wife laughed. The broken fan had relieved her, made her feel +livelier:</p> +<p>“Give me that other fan, <i>baboe</i>.”</p> +<p>She was ready. She looked at her face in the glass, added a touch of +powder and smiled. She thought that she looked nice, though she was a +little <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb143" href="#pb143" name= +"pb143">143</a>]</span>pale and thin. Suddenly, she sat down, straight +up in a chair:</p> +<p>“I feel so faint!” she murmured.</p> +<p>Louise went to her:</p> +<p>“What’s the matter, Frances?”</p> +<p>“I feel so faint!” she said, almost inaudibly.</p> +<p>She was as white as a sheet.</p> +<p>“Give me some eau-de-Cologne....”</p> +<p>“What’s the matter with you now?” cried Otto, in +despair.</p> +<p>“<i>Baboe</i>,” said Louise, “get some vinegar; +mevrouw’s fainting.”</p> +<p>“No,” moaned Frances, “vinegar ... stains ... +one’s ... things.... Mind ... my ... dress. Eau ... de ... +Cologne.”</p> +<p>Louise dabbed her forehead.</p> +<p>“Don’t ruffle my hair!” screamed Frances.</p> +<p><span class="corr" id="xd20e3390" title= +"Not in source">“</span>Oh dear, oh dear!” she moaned, the +next second.</p> +<p>She rested her head against Louise:</p> +<p>“Louise!”</p> +<p>“What is it, Frances?”</p> +<p>“I haven’t been nice to you.... I’m going to +die.”</p> +<p>“No, no, you’re not.”</p> +<p>“Yes, I am.... Huigje! Ottelientje! Mamma’s going to +die.”</p> +<p>Otto took the children out of the room.</p> +<p>“Leave them with me!” she moaned. “I’m +dying!...” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb144" href="#pb144" +name="pb144">144</a>]</span></p> +<p>“No, Frances. But won’t you lie down a little? Take off +your things? Lie down on your bed?”</p> +<p>“No ... no ... I’m a little better.... I must go +down....”</p> +<p>“Are you feeling better?”</p> +<p>“Yes.... Give me some ... eau-de-Cologne.... Oh, Louise, +everything suddenly went black!...”</p> +<p>“You felt giddy, I expect. Did you take your drops +to-day?”</p> +<p>“Yes, but they’re no good, those drops. I’m much +better now, Louise. Are you angry with me?...”</p> +<p>“No.”</p> +<p>“For saying Otto was in love with you?”</p> +<p>“Oh, nonsense, Frances!”</p> +<p>“Yes, he is in love with you. You’re mad, you two: +brother and sister; I never heard of such a thing.... I’m better, +Louise. Will you help me downstairs? And will you ... <i>will</i> you +have your dinner with the children? That’s sweet of you.... You +see, the foreign secretary’s coming and that’s why Papa +wants Otto and me to be at the dinner. Otherwise I don’t care +about that sort of thing.... I’m much better now, Louise.... +Come, take me downstairs.”</p> +<p>She stood up and Louise helped her down the stairs, tenderly.</p> +<p>The maids were running upstairs, downstairs and along the passages; +footmen were waiting in the <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb145" href= +"#pb145" name="pb145">145</a>]</span>hall; the house was one blaze of +light. In the drawing-room, Bertha, already dressed, was speaking to +Willem, the butler; the doors were open, showing the long table +glittering through its flowers.</p> +<p>“What’s the matter with Frances?” asked Bertha, +seeing Frances come in slowly, looking very pale, leaning on +Louise’s arm.</p> +<p>“I’m better now, Mamma.... I thought I was +dying....”</p> +<p>At that moment, there was a loud peal at the front-door bell.</p> +<p>“Who can that be?”</p> +<p>One of the footmen opened the door.</p> +<p>“Who is it?” asked Bertha, softly, from the stairs.</p> +<p>“It’s I, Mamma!”</p> +<p>“Emilie!”</p> +<p>“Yes ... I....”</p> +<p>Emilie came up. She had flung down a wet waterproof in the hall and +was very pale; her hair hung in disorder over her face.</p> +<p>“But, Emilie ... what’s the matter?”</p> +<p>She had flown upstairs precipitately, seeing nothing; now she +suddenly perceived the rooms, all open and lit up, with the long table +and the flowers; and she remembered that there was a +dinner-party....</p> +<p>“I’ve run away!” she said. “I’m not +going back!”</p> +<p>“Run away!” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb146" href= +"#pb146" name="pb146">146</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Yes. Eduard struck me ... and insulted me ... insulted me.... +I won’t go back home.... I shall stay here!”</p> +<p>“Emilie! Good heavens!”</p> +<p>“Unless you turn me away.... Then I’ll go into the +streets, I don’t know where ... to Leiden ... to Henri.... +I’ll go to Henri. Understand what I say, Mamma: I’ll +<i>never</i> go back to Eduard.”</p> +<p>Van Naghel appeared at the door:</p> +<p>“What’s happened, Emilie?”</p> +<p>“Papa, Papa, I’ve run away....”</p> +<p>“Run away....”</p> +<p>“From Eduard. It’s a dog’s life. He’s a +miser. He’s always bullying me, reproaching me, saying that I +spend too much money ... that my parents, yes, that you ... that +<i>you</i> spend too much money! He’s mad with meanness. He locks +up my linen-cupboard ... because I wear too many chemises and send too +many things to the wash and employ too expensive a laundress! He +grudges me more than one chemise a week! He’s mad ... he’s +gone mad! For a whole week, I put on three fresh chemises a day, to +annoy him, and I threw all those chemises into <i>his</i> +dirty-clothes-basket, to annoy him! He found them this morning! I told +him that I was the mistress of my own chemises and that I should wear +just as many as I pleased. Then he flew into a passion and he struck +me....”</p> +<p>She burst out laughing: <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb147" href= +"#pb147" name="pb147">147</a>]</span></p> +<p>“I flung all my chemises at his head!” she screamed, +hysterically. “And he flung them all back. The room was one vast +chemise!... Oh, it’s terrible.... It’s a dog’s life. +I won’t go back to him.... Papa, I needn’t go back to him, +need I?”</p> +<p>“Emilie, you ought to be ashamed of yourself!”</p> +<p>She threw herself upon her father, crushed herself against the +orders on his breast:</p> +<p>“Oh, Papa, I am so unhappy! I can’t stand any more of +it: I am so unhappy!”</p> +<p>Marianne came in. She was looking very pretty: a delicate, fair +little society-girl, in her low-necked white frock. She heard +Emilie’s last words, saw her pale, thin, dishevelled:</p> +<p>“Emilietje!... Sissy!... What is it?” she exclaimed. +“Oh, that horrid man! It’s that horrid man!”</p> +<p>Bertha shut her eyes:</p> +<p>“Emilie,” she said, wearily.</p> +<p>“Mamma, don’t be angry ... but <i>I’m +staying</i>!”</p> +<p>The bell rang.</p> +<p>“There’s the bell, Emilie!” said Van Naghel, +sternly.</p> +<p>“I’m going, Papa....”</p> +<p>She looked around her in perplexity, not knowing which door to go +out by.</p> +<p>“Come with me,” said Louise, quickly. <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb148" href="#pb148" name="pb148">148</a>]</span></p> +<p>And, taking Emilie almost in her arms, she hurried her away.</p> +<p>The first arrivals were coming up the stairs. Louise and Emilie just +managed to escape into a little boudoir. But the doors were open.</p> +<p>“We can run across the passage presently,” whispered +Louise.</p> +<p>“Just think,” whispered Emilie, “he’s +absolutely mad! He interferes with the cook’s housekeeping-book. +He checks what she spends each day.... He’s mad, he’s mad! +He won’t eat at meals, so as to save a bit of meat for next day. +And, when we give a little dinner, nothing’s good enough. +It’s all for people, all for show: he’d starve, in order to +give his friends champagne!”</p> +<p>“Hush, Emilie!”</p> +<p>They heard the exchange of greetings in the drawing-room; their +parents’ well-bred, expressionless voices; Marianne’s +nervous, tinkling laugh; Otto and Frances making up to the foreign +secretary. It all sounded false. The bell kept on ringing. More guests +came upstairs, with a rustle of skirts, a creaking of shoes....</p> +<p>“We can’t get away!” said Emilie, plaintively, +almost collapsing in Louise’s arms.</p> +<p>They succeeded in running upstairs between two rings at the bell. +The table was laid in the nursery: Karel and Marietje were there, +playing with Ottelientje and Huig; the <i>baboe</i> sat huddled in a +corner. <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb149" href="#pb149" name= +"pb149">149</a>]</span></p> +<p>“I’ll have something with you!” said Emilie. +“I’m faint with hunger.... What a day, good God, what a +day!”</p> +<p>“We’ll get something to eat in between,” said +Louise. “Come, Emilie, come to my room.”</p> +<p>And, as if they were fleeing again, this time from the children, she +dragged Emilie up to her own room.</p> +<p>“Emilie, do be sensible!” she implored.</p> +<p>“Louise, I mean what I said, give me a glass of wine, a +biscuit, anything: I’m sinking....”</p> +<p>Louise went out and Emilie was left alone. She looked around the +bright, cosy sitting-room, stamped with the gentle personality of its +owner: there were many books about; the doors of a book-case were +open.</p> +<p>“The dear girl!” thought Emilie, lying back wearily in a +chair. “She lives her own life peacefully ... and, when +there’s anything wrong, she’s the one who helps. Her life +just goes on, the same thing day after day! She was a girl while we +were still children; and, properly speaking, we never knew her as we +know one another. She’s fond of Otto, just as I’m very fond +of Otto ... but, apart from that, her life just goes on in the same +way.... She’s always silent.... She just lives and reads up here +... and, if there’s anything wrong, she’s the one who +helps.... What have I done, my God, what have I done!... But I +won’t go back!...” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb150" +href="#pb150" name="pb150">150</a>]</span></p> +<p>Louise returned, with a glass of wine and a few biscuits.</p> +<p>“We’re dining presently,” she said. “There, +drink that and be sensible, Emilie. Does Eduard know you’re +here?”</p> +<p>“No. He was out when I left. I waited till he was out.... +Louise, I won’t go back! I’ve telegraphed to Henri to help +me. I’m expecting him here.”</p> +<p>They heard voices below.</p> +<p>“Listen!” said Louise.</p> +<p>“Who is it?”</p> +<p>“Perhaps it’s some one who has come late.... But +that’s impossible.... I hear a noise on the stairs....”</p> +<p>“My God!” cried Emilie. “It’s Eduard! Hide +me! Say you don’t know where I am!”</p> +<p>“I can’t do that, Emilie. Keep calm, Emilie, be +sensible. Go to my bedroom, if you like....”</p> +<p>Emilie fled. It was a renewed flight, the fluttering of a young +bird, a frail butterfly, hither and thither. Her eyes seemed to be +seeking, vaguely and anxiously.... She and Louise had to go down to the +next landing and Emilie managed to escape to Marianne’s room, +once the boudoir which they had shared between them:</p> +<p>“My own little room!” she sobbed, throwing herself into +a chair. <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb151" href="#pb151" name= +"pb151">151</a>]</span></p> +<p>The gas was half-lowered. Everywhere lay things of Marianne’s; +the dressing-table was in disorder, as though Marianne had had to dress +quickly and hurriedly for the dinner-party.</p> +<p>“How nice she looked!” sobbed Emilie. “My little +sister, my dear little sister! O God, they say she’s in love with +Uncle Henri!”</p> +<p>She sprang up again in nervous restlessness, turned the gas on, +looked round, anxiously, feeling lost, even in this room:</p> +<p>“His portrait!” she cried. “Uncle Henri’s +portrait!”</p> +<p>She saw Van der Welcke’s photograph. True, it was between +Constance’ and Addie’s; but there was another on +Marianne’s writing-table.</p> +<p>“My little sister, my poor little sister!” sobbed +Emilie.</p> +<p>And she dropped limply into another chair, on the top of a corset +and petticoats of Marianne’s. She lay like that, with drooping +arms, among her sister’s things. Suddenly she sat up. She heard +voices outside, in the passage: Louise with Eduard, her husband.</p> +<p>“She’s mad, she’s mad!” he was snarling. +“She’s run away! The servant didn’t know where to. +Where is she, where is she?”</p> +<p>“She’s here,” said Louise, calmly.</p> +<p>“Where?” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb152" href= +"#pb152" name="pb152">152</a>]</span></p> +<p>“She’s resting. But keep calm, Eduard, and don’t +let them hear you downstairs. There’s a dinner-party.”</p> +<p>“I don’t care! I <i>insist</i>....”</p> +<p>“I <i>insist</i> that you keep quiet and don’t make a +scene....”</p> +<p>“Where is Emilie?”</p> +<p>“If you’re quiet, you can speak to her. If you shout +like that, so that you can be heard downstairs, I’ll send a +message to Papa.”</p> +<p>Emilie, on tenterhooks, quivering in every nerve, stood up and +opened the door:</p> +<p>“I am here,” she said.</p> +<p>She stood in front of her husband. He was no longer the dapper +nonentity; he stood there coarse, raving, like a clod-hopper:</p> +<p>“You’re coming home with me!” he shouted. +“This minute!”</p> +<p>“Eduard!” Louise entreated. “Don’t shout. +Come in.”</p> +<p>She pushed him into Marianne’s room.</p> +<p>“You’re coming home!” he shouted again. “Are +you coming? Are you coming?”</p> +<p>“No, I’m not,” said Emilie.</p> +<p>“You’re not?”</p> +<p>“No! I won’t go back to you.”</p> +<p>“You’ve got to!”</p> +<p>“I want a divorce.”</p> +<p>“I don’t; and you’re coming home.” +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb153" href="#pb153" name= +"pb153">153</a>]</span></p> +<p>“I’m not going home. You’ve struck me ... and +I’m placing myself under my father’s protection. I +don’t know the law, but I’m not going to be struck by +you.”</p> +<p>“If you don’t come ... I’ll make you, I’ll +thrash you to the door.”</p> +<p>She gave a contemptuous laugh:</p> +<p>“You’re not a man,” she said. “You’re +a cowardly brute!”</p> +<p>He raved as though beside himself. He cursed and foamed at the +mouth. Louise stared at him in dismay; hardly knew him, now that he had +lost all his veneer of manner, all his German, would-be correct +politeness.</p> +<p>“Home you go!” he roared again, pointing to the door +with his finger.</p> +<p>“I am not going.”</p> +<p>He flew at her, seized her by her frail shoulders, shook her, his +mouth distorted by passion, his eyes starting out of his head, like a +madman’s. She writhed herself free, struck him full in the face. +He hit her back.</p> +<p>“Eduard! Emilie!” screamed Louise.</p> +<p>Her anger gave her strength. She threw herself upon her +brother-in-law, strong in her indignation, pushed him away from his +wife.</p> +<p>“Go away!” she cried aloud, clasping Emilie in her arms. +“Go away! Out of the room!”</p> +<p>“I want my wife back!” <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb154" href="#pb154" name="pb154">154</a>]</span></p> +<p>Louise calmed herself:</p> +<p>“Eduard,” she said, quietly, “leave the +room.”</p> +<p>“No.”</p> +<p>“Once more, Eduard, leave the room, or I’ll send one of +the men to Papa. If you want to make a scandal, very well, do; but +you’ll be the chief sufferer.”</p> +<p>He suddenly remembered the Hague, his career....</p> +<p>“Go out of the room, Eduard.”</p> +<p>“He’s hurt me!” moaned Emilie. “I’ve +got a pain, here....”</p> +<p>She lay like a dead thing in her sister’s arms.</p> +<p>“Eduard, go out of the room.”</p> +<p>“I’ll go,” he said. “But I shall stay until +the dinner is over....”</p> +<p>He went away.</p> +<p>“The wretch! The wretch!” moaned Emilie. +“He’s bruised my breast. Lucky that he did: now I can get a +divorce, can’t I, Louise?... Louise, do you know the +law?”</p> +<p>“No, my darling, but Papa will tell you all about it. But keep +calm, keep calm....”</p> +<p>“Where has he gone?”</p> +<p>“If you don’t mind being left alone, I’ll go and +see....”</p> +<p>“No, stay with me, stay with me....”</p> +<p>There was a knock at the door.</p> +<p>“Who’s there?” <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb155" href="#pb155" name="pb155">155</a>]</span></p> +<p>An old nurse entered:</p> +<p>“Freule,” she said to Louise, “meneer asks if +you’ll please not talk so loud up here. Meneer can hear Mr. van +Raven’s voice.”</p> +<p>“Where is Mr. van Raven now?”</p> +<p>“The blackguard has gone to Mr. Frans and Mr. Henri’s +sitting-room.”</p> +<p>“Very well, Leentje, we’ll make less noise. But you +mustn’t talk like that.”</p> +<p>“It hurts!” moaned Emilie.</p> +<p>The woman looked at her compassionately:</p> +<p>“The dirty blackguard!” she said. “Did he hit you, +my poor dear?...”</p> +<p>“Leentje, I won’t have you speak like that!” said +Louise.</p> +<p>“And I’ll tell him to his face ... that he’s a +dirty blackguard,” the old nurse insisted, obstinately.</p> +<p>She knelt beside Emilie, opened the girl’s blouse and softly +rubbed her breast:</p> +<p>“The blackguard!” she repeated.</p> +<p>The sisters let her alone. They were silent, all three; the room was +all in confusion. Emilie had dropped back again limply among +Marianne’s clothes. Leentje got up and began tidying.</p> +<p>“Louise,” whispered Emilie.</p> +<p>“My poor sissy!”</p> +<p>“I see Uncle Henri’s portrait there.... And there.... +And another over there.... Marianne’s fond of Uncle +Henri....” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb156" href="#pb156" +name="pb156">156</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Yes, but hush!”</p> +<p>“She’s fond of him ... she’s in love with him, +Louise.”</p> +<p>“Yes, I know. Hush, Emilie!”</p> +<p>“Does Mamma know?”</p> +<p>“We don’t talk about it. But I think so.”</p> +<p>“Does everybody know?”</p> +<p>“No, no, not everybody!”</p> +<p>“Does Marianne never talk about it?”</p> +<p>“No, never.”</p> +<p>“Is there nothing to be done? Aunt Adolphine and Aunt Cateau +were speaking of it the other day. Everybody knows about it.”</p> +<p>“No, no, not everybody, surely?”</p> +<p>“Yes, everybody. And everybody knows too that Eduard beats +me.... Louise!”</p> +<p>“Ssh! I hear voices.”</p> +<p>“That’s ... Henri!”</p> +<p>“Yes, it’s Henri’s voice....”</p> +<p>“And Eduard....”</p> +<p>“Heavens!... Leentje!” cried Louise. “Go to Mr. +Henri and Mr. Eduard and tell them that Papa doesn’t wish them to +speak loud.”</p> +<p>“The blackguard!” said Leentje.</p> +<p>She left the room and went down the stairs. The whole house was lit +up, the doors of the reception-rooms were open; one caught the glitter +of the dinner-table amid its flowers and the sound of laughing +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb157" href="#pb157" name= +"pb157">157</a>]</span>voices: a soft, well-bred society-ripple, a ring +of silver, a faint tinkling of crystal.</p> +<p>“The blackguard!” thought the old nurse.</p> +<p>She was down in the hall now: from the kitchen came the voices of +bustling maids, of the <i>chef</i>, the footmen. The cloak-room was +lighted and open, was full of wraps and overcoats. On the other side of +the hall was the sitting-room of the two undergraduates.</p> +<p>Old Leentje opened the door. She saw Van Raven standing opposite +Henri; their voices clashed, in bitter enmity:</p> +<p>“Then why did Emilie telegraph to me?”</p> +<p>“I don’t know; but our affairs don’t concern +you.”</p> +<p>“Mr. Henri, Mr. Eduard,” said the old nurse, “your +papa asks, will you please not speak loud....”</p> +<p>“Where is Emilie?” asked Henri.</p> +<p>“The poor dear is in Marianne’s room,” said +Leentje. “Come with me, my boy....”</p> +<p>She took Henri, who was shaking all over, by the hand. And, as she +left the room with Henri, she said, out loud:</p> +<p>“The blackguard!”</p> +<p>“Who?” asked Henri.</p> +<p>“He!”</p> +<p>“What has he done?”</p> +<p>“What hasn’t he done!” <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb158" href="#pb158" name="pb158">158</a>]</span></p> +<p>She hesitated to tell him, dreading his temper, went cautiously up +the stairs, past the open doors of the lighted rooms.</p> +<p>Henri caught a glimpse of the dinner-table, through the flowers, and +of three of the guests talking and laughing, lightly and pleasantly, in +their well-bred, expressionless voices.</p> +<p>And then he found his two sisters in Marianne’s room. As soon +as Emilie saw him, she threw herself into his arms:</p> +<p>“Henri!”</p> +<p>“Sissy, what is it?”</p> +<p>She told him, briefly.</p> +<p>“The cad!” he cried. “The cad! Has he hit you? +I’ll ... I’ll ...”</p> +<p>He wanted to rush downstairs; they held him back:</p> +<p>“Henri, for goodness’ sake,” Louise entreated, +“remember there are people here!”</p> +<p>“Don’t you all want your dinner?” asked Karel, at +the door. “We’re starving.”</p> +<p>They went to the nursery, as it had been called for years, and sat +down to table.</p> +<p>“I’m not hungry now,” said Emilie.</p> +<p>“I don’t want anything either,” said Henri. +“I’m calmer now ... and I’m going +downstairs.”</p> +<p>They held him back again. And the time dragged on. Ottelientje and +Huig were put to bed; Karel went to do his home-work; Marietje hung +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb159" href="#pb159" name= +"pb159">159</a>]</span>round her elder sisters, inquisitively. And they +listened, with the doors open, to the sounds below.</p> +<p>“They’ve finished dinner....”</p> +<p>“Yes, I can hear them in the drawing-room....”</p> +<p>Marianne suddenly came running upstairs, appeared in the doorway, +looking very white and sweet:</p> +<p>“I couldn’t bear it any longer!” she exclaimed. +“The dinner’s over. I escaped for a moment. Emilie! +Sissy!”</p> +<p>“He’s here!” said Emilie. “Eduard: +he’s waiting downstairs. He wants to take me home with him. You +must all help me. He struck me!”</p> +<p>“My sissy, my sissy!” cried Marianne, excitedly, +wringing her arms and her hands, kissing Emilie. “Is he +downstairs? I’ll tell Papa. I daren’t stay any longer. Oh, +those tiresome people down there! It’s nearly nine. They’ll +be gone in an hour. Now I must go.”</p> +<p>And she started to hurry away.</p> +<p>“Marianne!” said Henri.</p> +<p>“What is it?”</p> +<p>“I want to speak to you presently.”</p> +<p>“Very well, presently.”</p> +<p>And she flitted down the stairs.</p> +<p>“How pretty she’s growing!” said Henri.</p> +<p>“And I,” said Emilie, “so ugly!”</p> +<p>She leant against Louise. They heard a rustle on the stairs. It was +Bertha herself: <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb160" href="#pb160" +name="pb160">160</a>]</span></p> +<p>“My child!”</p> +<p>“Mamma!”</p> +<p>“I managed to slip away, just for a moment. My dear +child!”</p> +<p>“Eduard is here, Mamma. He’s downstairs. He wants to +take me away with him. He is waiting till the people are gone. He was +shouting so....”</p> +<p>“I heard him.”</p> +<p>“We told him to be quiet. I won’t go with him, Mamma. +I’ll stay with you, I’ll stay with you. He struck +me!”</p> +<p>“The cad!” cried Henri, pale in the face.</p> +<p>“The dirty blackguard!” said the old nurse.</p> +<p>Bertha, very pale, shut her eyes, heaved a deep sigh:</p> +<p>“My child, my dear child ... be sensible, make it +up.”</p> +<p>“But he is brutal to me, Mamma!”</p> +<p>She flung herself, sobbing, into Bertha’s arms.</p> +<p>“My darling!” Bertha wept. “I can’t stay +away any longer.”</p> +<p>She released herself, went away; her dress rustled down the stairs. +Her guests were sitting in the drawing-room; one or two looked at her +strangely, because she had absented herself. In a moment she was once +more the tactful, charming hostess.</p> +<p>Marianne, with a smile on her face, had gone to Van Naghel’s +study, where the men were having their coffee, smoking: <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb161" href="#pb161" name="pb161">161</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Papa....”</p> +<p>“What is it, dear?”</p> +<p>“Eduard is downstairs!” she whispered. “I only +came to tell you. He wants to take Emilie with him. He has struck +her.”</p> +<p>“Tell him I’ll speak to him ... as soon as our visitors +have gone.”</p> +<p>And, as the host, he turned to his guests again.</p> +<p>Marianne went downstairs, found Eduard in the boys’ +sitting-room. He was quietly smoking.</p> +<p>“Papa will speak to you as soon as they’re all gone. The +carriages will be here in three-quarters of an hour.”</p> +<p>“Very well,” he said laconically.</p> +<p>Her blood seethed up:</p> +<p>“You’re a cowardly wretch!” she cried. +“You’ve struck Emilie!”</p> +<p>He flared up, losing all his stiff German society-manners:</p> +<p>“And I’m her husband!” he roared. “But you +... you ...”</p> +<p>“What about me?”</p> +<p>“You’ve no decency! You’re in love with your +uncle! With a married man!”</p> +<p>“O-o-oh!” screamed Marianne.</p> +<p>She hid her face with her hands, terrified. Then she recovered +herself, but her pale face flushed red with shame:</p> +<p>“You don’t know what you’re saying!” she +said, <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb162" href="#pb162" name= +"pb162">162</a>]</span>haughtily, trying to withdraw into her maidenly +reserve. “You don’t know what you’re saying. But your +manners are only put on, for strangers. And at heart you’re a +cowardly cad, a cowardly cad, who strikes and insults women.”</p> +<p>He made an angry movement at her words.</p> +<p>“You’re not going to strike me, I suppose?” she +said, drawing herself up haughtily. “You’ve insulted me: +isn’t that enough for you?”</p> +<p>She made an effort to turn away calmly, walked out of the room, up +the stairs. The sobs welled up in her throat; she could no longer keep +them back:</p> +<p>“O God!” she thought. “Everybody knows it. +Everybody sees it. I can’t keep it hidden: I love him, I love +him!... Hush! Hush! I must suppress it, deep, deep down in myself. But, +if I love him, if I love him ... if I am happy when I see him.... Oh, +hush, hush!”</p> +<p>She pressed her two hands to her breast, as though to thrust her +emotion deep down in her soul. She wiped her eyes, had the strength to +return to the drawing-room. She talked gaily and pleasantly, as the +daughter of the house, but she suddenly felt tired to death:</p> +<p>“Everybody knows it, everybody sees it,” she kept on +thinking; and she tried to read in the faces of the guests what they +saw, what they knew.</p> +<p>It was over at last. The butler was continually coming to the door, +announcing the carriages. <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb163" href= +"#pb163" name="pb163">163</a>]</span>Those people would not remain much +longer. It was ten o’clock; and they began to say good-bye. They +followed one after the other, at short intervals, as is proper at big +dinner-parties.... There was only one of the ministers left, talking +earnestly to Van Naghel, in a low voice, probably about some government +matter: he was not thinking yet of going.... But at last he also +hastened away, apologizing. And Van Naghel and Bertha, Marianne, +Frances and Otto all listened while he put on his overcoat downstairs, +said a word to the butler.... The front-door slammed. They were +alone.</p> +<p>They looked at one another....</p> +<p>And, as if driven by an irresistible impulse, Van Naghel went +downstairs, to his son-in-law, and Bertha and Marianne upstairs, to +Emilie....</p> +<p>“Mamma, have you come to me at last?” said Emilie, +plaintively. “Mamma, I shall stay here: I won’t go +back....”</p> +<p>She was clutching Henri desperately; and Marianne went up to her, +comforted her, kissed her.</p> +<p>“Marianne,” said Henri, “here, a +minute....”</p> +<p>He led her out into the passage:</p> +<p>“Marianne,” he said, “you don’t know how +fond I am of you ... almost as fond as of Emilie. Marianne, let me just +say this to you: be sensible; everybody’s talking about +it....”</p> +<p>“Everybody?” she asked, frightened; and she did not even +ask what it was, because she understood. <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb164" href="#pb164" name="pb164">164</a>]</span></p> +<p>“You even know it yourself then?” he asked, quickly, to +take her by surprise.</p> +<p>She withdrew into the mysterious recesses of her little soul, which +was too transparent, reflected its radiance too much; she wanted to +veil that radiance from him and from the others:</p> +<p>“What?” she said. “There’s nothing to +know!... Everybody? Everybody who? Everybody what?...”</p> +<p>“Everybody’s talking about it, about Uncle Henri’s +making love to you?”</p> +<p>She tried to laugh; and the little silver bells sounded shrill and +false:</p> +<p>“Making love to me?... Uncle Henri?... People are +mad!”</p> +<p>“You were out with him yesterday ... in a +motor-car.”</p> +<p>“And what is there in that?”</p> +<p>“Don’t do it again.”</p> +<p>“Why not?”</p> +<p>“Everybody’s talking about it.”</p> +<p>Again she tried to laugh; and the little silver bells sounded shrill +and false:</p> +<p>“Uncle Henri!” she said. “Why, he might be my +father!”</p> +<p>“You know you don’t mean what you say.”</p> +<p>“Uncle Henri!”</p> +<p>“He is a young man.... Marianne, tell me that it’s not +true....” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb165" href="#pb165" +name="pb165">165</a>]</span></p> +<p>“That he makes love to me? I’m fond of him ... just as +I’m fond of Aunt Constance.”</p> +<p>“That you love him. There, you can’t deny it. You love +him.”</p> +<p>“I do not love him,” she lied.</p> +<p>“Yes, you do, you love him.”</p> +<p>“I do not love him.”</p> +<p>“Yes, you do.”</p> +<p>“Very well, then, I do!” she said, curtly. “I love +him. What then?”</p> +<p>“Marianne....”</p> +<p>“I like being with him, like talking to him, cycling with him, +motoring with him: what then? There’s no harm in it; and ... I +love Aunt Constance too.”</p> +<p>“Marianne, I’ve warned you,” he said, sadly. +“Be sensible.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” she answered. “But you be sensible +also.”</p> +<p>“How do you mean?”</p> +<p>“Be sensible with Eduard! Control your temper, Henri! It can +only make things worse, if you don’t control your +temper.”</p> +<p>“I will control myself!” he promised, clenching his +fists as he spoke.</p> +<p>“Henri....”</p> +<p>“I hate the bounder ... I could murder him, wring his +neck.”</p> +<p>“Henri, be quiet, I hear Papa coming.” <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb166" href="#pb166" name="pb166">166</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Promise me, Marianne, that you will be careful.”</p> +<p>“Yes, Henri. And you promise me also, Henri, that you will be +careful.”</p> +<p>“I promise you.”</p> +<p>She went up to him, put her arms round his neck:</p> +<p>“My brother, my poor brother!”</p> +<p>“My dear little sister, my little sister!”</p> +<p>“Hush, hush!...”</p> +<p>“Hush!...”</p> +<p>“Here’s Papa....”</p> +<p>Van Naghel came up the stairs.</p> +<p>And they went with him into the nursery, where Bertha was waiting +with Emilie, Otto and Frances.</p> +<p>“Eduard has gone now,” said Van Naghel, quietly. +“I calmed him down; he is coming back to-morrow, to talk things +over. You can stay here to-night, Emilie.”</p> +<p>“Papa, I won’t go back to him!”</p> +<p>“No, Emilie,” cried Frances, excitedly, “you +can’t go back to him!”</p> +<p>“Be quiet, Frances,” said Van Naghel, severely. And he +repeated, “You ... can ... stay here, Emilie ... +to-night....”</p> +<p>He suddenly turned purple.</p> +<p>“Tell me what the law is, Papa,” Emilie insisted.</p> +<p>“The law?” asked Van Naghel. “The law?...” +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb167" href="#pb167" name= +"pb167">167</a>]</span></p> +<p>And, almost black in the face, he pulled at his collar.</p> +<p>“Bertha!” he cried, in a hoarse voice.</p> +<p>They were all terrified....</p> +<p>He tore open his collar, his tie, his shirt:</p> +<p>“Air!” he implored.</p> +<p>And his eyes started from his head, he staggered, fell into a +chair.</p> +<p>Louise rang the bell. The girls screamed for the maids, the butler. +Henri flew down the stairs to fetch a doctor.</p> +<p>It was was too late....</p> +<p>Van Naghel lay dead, struck down by apoplexy. <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb168" href="#pb168" name="pb168">168</a>]</span></p> +</div> +<div class="footnotes"> +<hr class="fnsep"> +<p class="footnote"><span class="label"><a class="noteref" id= +"xd20e3248" href="#xd20e3248src" name="xd20e3248">1</a></span> Lord! +Heavens!</p> +<p class="footnote"><span class="label"><a class="noteref" id= +"xd20e3254" href="#xd20e3254src" name="xd20e3254">2</a></span> Nurse, +<i>ayah</i>.</p> +<p class="footnote"><span class="label"><a class="noteref" id= +"xd20e3262" href="#xd20e3262src" name="xd20e3262">3</a></span> The +young master.</p> +<p class="footnote"><span class="label"><a class="noteref" id= +"xd20e3337" href="#xd20e3337src" name="xd20e3337">4</a></span> +Mem-sahib.</p> +<p class="footnote"><span class="label"><a class="noteref" id= +"xd20e3348" href="#xd20e3348src" name="xd20e3348">5</a></span> +Half-caste.</p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch19" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e4132" class="main">Chapter XIX</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">The winter months dragged sadly and monotonously past, +with their continual rains and no frost: even such snow as fell melted +at once in the raw, damp atmosphere. But the wind blew all the time, +kept on blowing from some mysterious cloud-realm, carrying the clouds +with it, violet clouds and grey clouds, a never-ending succession, +which came sailing over the trees in the Woods as though over the sea. +And Constance followed them with her eyes, vaguely and dreamily, +dreaming on and on in an endless reverie. The clouds sailed +everlastingly on the wind; and the wind blew everlastingly, like an +everlasting storm, not always raging, but always rustling, sometimes +high up above the trees, sometimes straight through the trees +themselves. Constance remained mostly at home and sat by her window +during those short afternoons, which she lengthened out in the dim +shadows of the fire-lit room, where at three o’clock dusk was +falling.... The everyday life went on, regularly and monotonously: when +the weather was tolerable, Van der Welcke went bicycling; but for the +rest he stayed upstairs a great deal, seldom going to the Witte or the +Plaats, smoking, cursing inwardly because he was not rich enough to buy +a “sewing-machine” of <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb169" +href="#pb169" name="pb169">169</a>]</span>his own. Addie went to and +fro between home and school; and it was he that enlivened the +meals....</p> +<p>And Constance, in her drawing-room, sat at the window and gazed at +the clouds, looked out at the rain. Through the silent monotony of her +short, grey days a dream began to weave itself, as with a luminous +thread, so that she was not oppressed by the sombre melancholy of the +rainy winter. When Van der Welcke went upstairs, cursing because it was +raining again and because he had nothing to do, she settled herself in +her drawing-room—in that room in which she lived and which was +tinged as it were with her own personality—and looked out at the +clouds, at the rain. She sat dreaming. She smiled, wide-eyed. She liked +the ever louring skies, the ever drifting clouds; and, though at times +the gusty squalls still made her start with that sudden catch in her +throat and breast, she loved the raging and rustling winds, listened to +them, content for them to blow and blow, high above her head, her +house, her trees—hers—till, blowing, they lost themselves +in the infinities beyond.... She had her work beside her, a book; but +she did not sew, did not read: she dreamt.... She smiled, looking out, +looking up at the endlessly rolling skies.... The clouds sailed by, +sometimes high, sometimes low, above the houses, above the +people’s heads, like passions disdaining mankind: dank, monstrous +passions riding arrogantly by upon the passion of the winds, +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb170" href="#pb170" name= +"pb170">170</a>]</span>from a far-off land of sheer passion, sullen and +tempestuous; and the threatening cohorts rolled on, great and majestic, +like Olympian deities towering above the petty human strife hidden +under the roofs over which they passed, ever opening their mighty +flood-gates.... When Constance looked up at them, the vast, phantom +monsters, coming she knew not whence and going she knew not whither, +just shadowing across her life and followed by new monsters, no less +vast and no less big with mystery, she was not afraid or sad, for she +felt safe in her dream. The sombre skies had always attracted her, even +in the old days, though they used to frighten her then, she did not +know why; but now, now for the first time she smiled, because she felt +safe. A soft radiance shone from her eyes, which gazed up at the +phantom monsters. When the wind whistled, soughed, moaned and bellowed +round the house, like a giant soul in pain, she remained as it were +looking up at the wind, let her soul swell softly in unison with its +dirges, like something that surrenders itself, small and weak but +peaceful, to a mighty force. In her little house, as she gazed out at +the dreary road, on these winter days, especially when it grew dark of +an afternoon, the wind and the rain round about her seemed almost one +element, vast and sad as life, which came from over the sea, which +drifted away over the town and which continued to hold her and her +house in its embrace.... <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb171" href= +"#pb171" name="pb171">171</a>]</span></p> +<p>She looked outside, she smiled. Sometimes she heard her +husband’s step in the passages, as he went through the house, +grumbling, muttering, cursing, because he wanted to go out.... Then she +would think for a moment:</p> +<p>“He hasn’t seen Marianne for days.”</p> +<p>But then she would think no more about either of them; and her dream +shone out before her again. The dream shone softly and unfalteringly, +like a gentle, steady ray: a path of soft light that issued as it were +from her eyes to the sombre, frowning clouds out yonder. Over the +soft-shining path something seemed to be wafted from her outwards, +upwards, far and wide and then back again, to where she sat.... It was +so strange that she smiled at it, closed her eyes; and, when she opened +them, it was once more as though she saw her dream, that path of light, +always.... Her dream took no more definite shape and remained thus, a +gentle, kindly glow, a pale, soft ray from her to the sombre skies.... +It was dusk now and she sat on, quite lost in the misty, shadowy +darkness all around her, quite invisible in the black room; and her +eyes continued to stare outside, at the last wan streaks in the +darkening heavens.... The road outside was black.... A street-lamp +shone out, throwing its harsh light upon a puddle....</p> +<p>Then she covered her face with her hands, ashamed because she had +sat musing so long, <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb172" href="#pb172" +name="pb172">172</a>]</span>ashamed especially because she had allowed +herself to wander along that luminous thread, the path of her dream.... +She rang, had the lamps lit and waited for Addie, who would soon be +home.</p> +<p>But those were the lonely afternoons.... Sometimes in those wet, +dull afternoons when it grew dark so early, she saw <i>his</i> figure +pass the window, heard him ring. It was Brauws. She did not move and +she heard him go upstairs first, when Van der Welcke was in. But, since +he had recommenced his visits to their house, he had got into the way +of saying to Van der Welcke, in half an hour or so:</p> +<p>“Now I’ll go and pay my respects to your +wife.”</p> +<p>The first few times, Van der Welcke had gone with him to the +drawing-room; but, now that Brauws had taken to calling in a more +informal fashion, Van der Welcke stayed upstairs, let him go his own +way. And, after the first shock which Brauws’ ideas had produced +in their house, his friendship became something cheering and comforting +which both Van der Welcke and Constance continued to appreciate for +their own and each other’s sakes. He and Van Vreeswijck were now +the only friends whom they both really liked, the two regular visitors +to their otherwise lonely house. And for that reason Van der Welcke let +Brauws go to Constance alone, staying away, never entering his +wife’s drawing-room unnecessarily ... except when he heard the +little bells of Marianne’s voice and laugh. <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb173" href="#pb173" name="pb173">173</a>]</span></p> +<p>Constance’ heart beat when she heard Brauws’ voice on +the stairs:</p> +<p>“Now I’ll go and pay my respects to your wife. +She’s at home, isn’t she?”</p> +<p>“Sure to be, in this beastly weather.”</p> +<p>She heard Brauws’ step, which made the stairs creak as it came +down them. Then she felt a violent emotion, of which she was secretly +ashamed, ashamed for herself. For she was severe with herself: she was +afraid of becoming ridiculous in her own eyes. When she felt her +emotion grow too violent, she at once conjured up Addie’s image: +he was fourteen now. The mother of a son of fourteen! Then a smile of +ironic indulgence would curve the dimples by her lips; and it was with +the greatest composure that she welcomed Brauws:</p> +<p>“Isn’t it dark early? But it’s only half-past +three and really too soon to light the lamp.”</p> +<p>“There are times when twilight upsets me,” he said, +“and times when it makes me feel very calm and +peaceful.”</p> +<p>He sat down near her, contentedly, and his broad figure loomed +darkly in the little room, among the other shadows. The street-lamps +were already lighted outside, glittering harshly on the wet road.</p> +<p>“It’s been awful weather lately.”</p> +<p>“Yes, so I prefer to stay indoors.”</p> +<p>“You’re too much indoors.”</p> +<p>“I go out whenever it’s fine.” <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb174" href="#pb174" name="pb174">174</a>]</span></p> +<p>“You don’t care for going out ‘in all +weathers.’”</p> +<p>“I like looking at the weather from here. It’s a +different sky every day....”</p> +<p>Then they talked on all sorts of subjects. He often spoke of Addie, +with a sort of enthusiasm which he had conceived for the lad. Her face +would glow with pride as she listened. And, almost involuntarily, she +told him how the boy had always been a comfort to them, to Van der +Welcke as well as to her. And, when she mentioned her husband’s +name, he often answered, as though with a touch of reproach:</p> +<p>“I’m very fond of Hans. He is a child; and still +I’m fond of him....”</p> +<p>Then she would feel ashamed, because she had just had a wordy +dispute with Van der Welcke—about nothing at all—and she +would veer round and say:</p> +<p>“It can’t be helped. We can <i>not</i> get on. We endure +each other as well as we can. To separate would be too silly ... and +also very sad for Addie. He is fond of both of us.”</p> +<p>And their conversation again turned on the boy. Then she had to tell +him about Brussels and even about Rome.</p> +<p>“It’s strange,” he said. “When you were in +Brussels ... I was living at Schaerbeek.”</p> +<p>“And we never met.”</p> +<p>“No, never. And, when you and Hans went to the Riviera, I was +there in the same year.” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb175" +href="#pb175" name="pb175">175</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Did you come often to Monte Carlo?”</p> +<p>“Once or twice, at any rate. Attracted by just that vivid +contrast between the atmosphere out there, where money has no value, +and my own ideas. It was a sort of self-inflicted torture. And we never +saw each other there.... And, when you were here, in the Hague, as a +girl, I used often to come to the Hague and I even remember often +passing your parents’ house, where your mother still lives, in +the Alexanderstraat, and reading your name on the door: Van +Lowe....”</p> +<p>“We were destined never to meet,” she said, trying to +laugh softly; and in spite of herself her voice broke, as though +sadly.</p> +<p>“No,” he said, quietly, “we were destined not to +meet.”</p> +<p>“The fatality of meeting is sometimes very strange,” she +said.</p> +<p>“There are thousands and millions, in our lives....”</p> +<p>“Don’t you think that we often, day after day, for +months on end, pass quite close to somebody....”</p> +<p>“Somebody who, if we met him or her, would influence our +lives?...”</p> +<p>“Yes, that’s what I mean.”</p> +<p>“I’m certain of it.”</p> +<p>“It’s curious to think of.... In the street, sometimes, +one’s always meeting the same people, without knowing +them.” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb176" href="#pb176" name= +"pb176">176</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Yes, I know what you mean. In New York, when I was a +tram-driver, there was a woman who always got into my car; and, without +being in love with her, I used to think I should like to speak to her, +to know her, to meet her....”</p> +<p>“And how often it is the other way round! I have met thousands +of people and forgotten their names and what they said to me. They were +like ghosts. That is how we meet people in society.”</p> +<p>“Yes, it’s all so futile....”</p> +<p>“You exchange names, exchange a few sentences ... and nothing +remains, not the slightest recollection....”</p> +<p>“Yes, it all vanishes.”</p> +<p>“I was so often tired ... of so many people, so many +ghosts.... I couldn’t live like that now.”</p> +<p>“Yet you have remained a society-woman.”</p> +<p>“Oh, no, I am no longer that!”</p> +<p>And she told him how she had once thought of making her reappearance +in Hague society; she told him about Van Naghel and Bertha.</p> +<p>“Are you on bad terms with your sister now?”</p> +<p>“Not on bad terms....”</p> +<p>“He died suddenly...?”</p> +<p>“Yes, quite suddenly. They had just had a dinner-party.... It +was a terrible blow for my sister. And I hear there are serious +financial difficulties. It is all very sad.... But this doesn’t +interest you. Tell me about yourself.” <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb177" href="#pb177" name="pb177">177</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Again?”</p> +<p>“It interests me.”</p> +<p>“Tell me about your own life.”</p> +<p>“I’ve just been telling you.”</p> +<p>“Yes, about Rome and Brussels. Now tell me about +Buitenzorg.”</p> +<p>“Why about that?”</p> +<p>“The childhood of my friends—I hope I may number you +among my friends?—always interests me.”</p> +<p>“About Buitenzorg? I don’t remember anything.... I was a +little girl.... There was nothing in particular....”</p> +<p>“Your brother Gerrit....”</p> +<p>She turned pale, but he did not see it, in the dim room.</p> +<p>“What has he been saying?”</p> +<p>“Your brother Gerrit remembers it all. The other night, after +your dinner here, he told me about it while we were smoking.”</p> +<p>“Gerrit?” she said, anxiously.</p> +<p>“Yes: how prettily you used to play on the great boulders in +the river....”</p> +<p>She flushed scarlet, in the friendly dusk:</p> +<p>“He’s mad!” she said, harshly. “What does he +want to talk about that for?”</p> +<p>He laughed:</p> +<p>“Mayn’t he? He idolizes you ... and he idolized you at +that time....” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb178" href="#pb178" +name="pb178">178</a>]</span></p> +<p>“He’s always teasing me with those reminiscences.... +They’re ridiculous now.”</p> +<p>“Why?”</p> +<p>“Because I’m old. Those memories are pretty enough when +you are young.... When you grow older, you let them sleep ... in the +dead, silent years. For, when you’re old, they become +ridiculous.”</p> +<p>Her voice sounded hard. He was silent.</p> +<p>“Don’t you think I’m right?” she asked.</p> +<p>“Perhaps,” he said, very gently. “Perhaps you are +right. But it is a pity.”</p> +<p>“Why?” she forced herself to ask.</p> +<p>He gave a very deep sigh:</p> +<p>“Because it reminds us of all that we lose as we grow older +... even the right to our memories.”</p> +<p>“The right to our memories,” she echoed almost under her +breath. And, in a firmer voice, she repeated, severely, +“Certainly. When we grow older, we lose our right.... There are +memories to which we lose our right as we grow old....”</p> +<p>“Tell me,” he said, “is it hard for a woman to +grow old?”</p> +<p>“I don’t know,” she answered, softly. “I +believe that I shall grow old, that I am growing old as it is, without +finding it hard.”</p> +<p>“But you’re not old,” he said.</p> +<p>“I am forty-three,” she replied, “and my son is +fourteen.” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb179" href="#pb179" +name="pb179">179</a>]</span></p> +<p>She was determined to show herself no mercy.</p> +<p>“And now tell me about yourself,” she went on.</p> +<p>“Why should I?” he asked, almost dejectedly. “You +would never understand me, however long I spoke. No, I can’t +speak about myself to-day.”</p> +<p>“It’s not only to-day: it’s very often.”</p> +<p>“Yes, very often. The idea suddenly comes to me ... that +everything has been of no use. That I have done nothing that was worth +while. That my life ought to have been quite different ... to be worth +while.”</p> +<p>“What do you mean by worth while?”</p> +<p>“Worth while for people, for humanity. It always obsessed me, +after my games in the woods. You remember my telling you how I used to +play in the woods?”</p> +<p>“Yes,” she said, very softly.</p> +<p>“Tell me,” he suddenly broke in. “Are those +memories to which I have no right?”</p> +<p>“You are a man,” said she.</p> +<p>“Have I more right to memories, as a man?”</p> +<p>“Why not ... to these?” she said, softly. “They do +not make your years ridiculous ... as mine do mine.”</p> +<p>“Are you so much afraid ... of ridicule?”</p> +<p>“Yes,” she said, frankly. “I am as unwilling to be +ashamed in my own eyes ... as in those of the world.”</p> +<p>“So you abdicate....” <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb180" href="#pb180" name="pb180">180</a>]</span></p> +<p>“My youth,” she said, gently.</p> +<p>He was silent. Then he said:</p> +<p>“I interrupted myself just now. I meant to tell you that, +after my games as a child, it was always my obsession ... to be +something. To be somebody. To be a man. To be a man among men. That was +when I was a boy of sixteen or seventeen. Afterwards, at the +university, I was amazed at the childishness of Hans and Van Vreeswijck +and the others. They never thought; I was always thinking.... I worked +hard, I wanted to know everything. When I knew a good deal, I said to +myself, ‘Why go on learning all this that others have thought +out? Think things out for yourself!’ ... Then I had a feeling of +utter helplessness.... But I’m boring you.”</p> +<p>“No,” she said, impatiently.</p> +<p>“I felt utterly helpless.... Then I said to myself, ‘If +you can’t think things out, <i>do</i> something. Be somebody. Be +a man. Work!’ ... Then I read Marx, Fourier, Saint-Simon: do you +know them?”</p> +<p>“I’ve never read them,” said she, “but +I’ve heard their names often enough to follow you. Go +on.”</p> +<p>“When I had read them, I started thinking, I thought a great +deal ... and then I wanted to work. As a labourer. So as to understand +all those who were destitute.... God, how difficult words are! I simply +can’t speak to you about myself.” <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb181" href="#pb181" name="pb181">181</a>]</span></p> +<p>“And about Peace you speak ... as if you were +inspired!”</p> +<p>“About Peace ... perhaps, but not about myself. I went to +America, I became a workman. But the terrible thing was that I felt I +was <i>not</i> a workman. I had money. I gave it all to the poor ... +nearly. But I kept just enough never to be hungry, to live a little +more comfortably than my mates, to take a day’s rest when I was +tired, to buy meat and wine and medicines when I wanted them ... to go +to the theatre dressed as a gentleman. Do you understand? I was a +Sunday workman. I was an amateur labourer. I remained a gentleman, a +‘toff.’ I come of a good middle-class family: well, over +there, in America, while I was a workman, I remained—I became +even more than I had been—an aristocrat. I felt that I was far +above my fellow-workmen. I knew more than they, I knew a great deal: +they could tell it by listening to me. I was finer-grained, more +delicately constituted than they: they could tell it by looking at me. +They regarded me as a wastrel who had been kicked out of doors, who had +‘seen better days;’ but they continued to think me a +gentleman and I myself felt a gentleman, a ‘toff.’ I never +became a proper workman. I should have liked to, so as to understand +the workman thoroughly and afterwards, in the light of my knowledge, to +work for his welfare, back in my own country, in my own station of +life. But, <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb182" href="#pb182" name= +"pb182">182</a>]</span>though I was living among working people, I did +not understand them. I shuddered involuntarily at their jokes, their +oaths, their drinking, their friendship even. I remained a gentleman, a +‘toff.’ I remained of a different blood and a different +culture. My ideas and my theories would have had me resemble my mates; +but all my former life—my birth, my upbringing, my +education—all my own and my parents’ past, all my inherited +instincts were against it. I simply could not fraternize with them. I +kept on trying something different, thinking it was that that was +amiss: a different sort of work, a different occupation. Nothing made +any difference. I remained a harmless, inquisitive amateur; and just +that settled conviction, that I could leave off at any time if I +wished, was the reason why my life never became the profoundly serious +thing which I would have had it. It remained amateurish. It became +almost a mockery of the life of my mates. I was free and they were +slaves. I was vigorous and they were worked to death. To me, after my +brain-work, that manual and muscular labour came as a tonic. If I was +overtired, I rested, left my job, looked for something else after a few +weeks. The others would be sweated, right up to their old age, till +they had yielded the last ounce of their working-power. I should work +just as long as I took pleasure in it. I looked healthy and well, even +though my face and hands became rough. I ate in proportion <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb183" href="#pb183" name="pb183">183</a>]</span>to +the hardness of my work. And I thought: if they could all eat as I do, +it would be all right. Then I felt ashamed of myself, distributed all +my money, secretly, among the poor and lived solely on my wages ... +until I fell ill ... and cured myself with my money. It became absurd. +And never more so than when I, habitually well-fed, looked down upon my +mates because their unalterable ideal appeared to be ... to eat beef +every day! Do they long for nothing better and higher and nobler, I +thought, than to eat beef? It was easy for me to think like that and +look down on them, I who ate beef whenever I wanted to! Well-fed, even +though tired with my work, I could think of nobler things than beef. +And yet ... and yet, though I felt all this at the time, I still +continued to despise them for their base ideal. That was because of my +blood and my birth, but especially because of my superior training and +education. And then I became very despondent and thought, ‘I +shall never feel myself their brother; I shall remain a gentleman, a +“toff;” it is not my fault: it is the fault of everything, +of all my past life.’ ... Then, suddenly, without any transition, +I went back to Europe. I have lectured here ... on Peace. In a +year’s time, perhaps, I shall be lecturing on War. I am still +seeking. I no longer know anything. Properly speaking, I never did know +anything. I seek and seek.... But why have I talked to you at such +length about myself? I <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb184" href= +"#pb184" name="pb184">184</a>]</span>am ashamed of myself, I am +ashamed. Perhaps I have no right to go on seeking. A man seeks when he +is young, does he not? When he has come to my age, which is the same as +yours, he ought to have found and he has no right to go on seeking. +And, if he hasn’t found, then he looks back upon his life as one +colossal failure, as one huge mistake—mistake upon +mistake—and then things become hopeless, hopeless, +hopeless....”</p> +<p>She was silent....</p> +<p>She thought of her own life, her small feminine life—the life +of a small soul that had not thought and had not felt, that was only +just beginning to feel and only just beginning at rare intervals to +think—and she saw her own small life also wasting the years in +mistake upon mistake.</p> +<p>“Oh,” he said, in a voice filled with longing, “to +have found what one might have gone on seeking for years! To have +found, when young, happiness ... for one’s self ... and for +others! Oh, to be young, to be once more young!... And then to seek ... +and then to find when young ... and to <i>meet</i> when young ... and +to be happy when young and to make +others—everybody!—happy!... To be young, oh, to be +young!”</p> +<p>“But you are not old,” she said. “You are in the +prime of life.”</p> +<p>“I hate that phrase,” he said, gloomily. “The +prime of life occurs at my age in people who do not <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb185" href="#pb185" name= +"pb185">185</a>]</span>seek, but who have quietly travelled a definite, +known path. Those are the people who, when they are my age, are in the +prime of life. I am not: I have sought; I have never found. I now feel +all the sadness of my wasted efforts; I now feel ... old. I feel old. +What more can I do now? Think a little more; try to keep abreast of +modern thought and modern conditions; seek a little, like a blind man. +And,” with a bitter laugh, “I have even lost that right: +the right to seek. You seek only when you are very young, or else it +becomes absurd.”</p> +<p>“You are echoing me,” she said, in gentle reproach.</p> +<p>“But you were right, you were right. It is so. There is +nothing left, at our age; not even our memories....”</p> +<p>“Our memories,” she murmured, very softly.</p> +<p>“The memories of our childhood....”</p> +<p>“Of our childhood,” she repeated.</p> +<p>“Not even that.”</p> +<p>“Not even that,” she repeated, as though hypnotized.</p> +<p>“No, there is nothing left ... for us....”</p> +<p>The door opened suddenly: they started.</p> +<p>“Mamma, are you there?”</p> +<p>It was Addie.</p> +<p>“Yes, my boy....”</p> +<p>“I can’t see you. It is quite dark.”</p> +<p>“And here is Mr. Brauws.” <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb186" href="#pb186" name="pb186">186</a>]</span></p> +<p>“I can see nothing and nobody. May I light one of the +lamps?”</p> +<p>“Yes, do.”</p> +<p>He bustled through the room, hunted for matches, lit a lamp in the +corner:</p> +<p>“That’s it. Now at least I can see you.”</p> +<p>He came nearer: a young, handsome, bright boy, with his +good-looking, healthy face and his serious, blue eyes; broad and +strong, shedding a note of joy in the melancholy room, which lit up +softly with the glow of its one lamp, behind Constance. She smiled at +him, drew him down beside her, put her arms round him while he kissed +her:</p> +<p>“<i>He</i> is left!” she said, softly, with a glance at +Brauws, referring to the last words which he had spoken.</p> +<p>He understood:</p> +<p>“Yes,” he answered—and his gloom seemed suddenly +to brighten into a sort of rueful gladness, a yearning hope that all +was not yet lost, that his dreams might be realized not by myself, but +by another, by Addie—and he repeated her own, radiant words, +“Yes, yes, <i>he</i> is left!”</p> +<p>The boy did not understand, looked at them both by turns and smiled +enquiringly, receiving only their smiles in answer.... <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb187" href="#pb187" name="pb187">187</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch20" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e4473" class="main">Chapter XX</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">For a long time, Constance had not been to Mamma van +Lowe’s Sunday-evenings; and at first Mamma had not insisted. Now, +however, one afternoon, she said, gently:</p> +<p>“Are you never coming again on a Sunday, Constance?”</p> +<p>She saw that her mother had suddenly become very nervous and she was +sorry that she had not made an effort and overcome her reluctance to +attend the family-gatherings after that terrible evening.</p> +<p>“Yes, Mamma,” she said, without hesitation, “I +will come. This is Saturday: I will come to-morrow.”</p> +<p>The old woman leant back wearily in her chair, nodded her head up +and down, as though she knew all sorts of sad things:</p> +<p>“It is so sad ... about Van Naghel,” she said. +“Bertha is going through a lot of trouble.”</p> +<p>It seemed as if Mamma wished to talk about it; but Constance, with +an affected indifference to her relations’ affairs, asked no +questions.</p> +<p>The next evening, Constance and Addie were ready to start for the +Alexanderstraat.</p> +<p>“Aren’t you coming?” she asked Van der Welcke. +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb188" href="#pb188" name= +"pb188">188</a>]</span></p> +<p>He hesitated. He would rather not go, feeling unfriendly towards the +whole family, but he would have liked to see Marianne. Still he +said:</p> +<p>“No, I think not.”</p> +<p>He was afraid that his refusal would cause a scene; but latterly, +even though anger welled up inside her, she had shown a forbearance +which surprised him; and she merely said:</p> +<p>“Mamma would like us all to come again.”</p> +<p>He was really fond of the old lady: she had always been kind to +him.</p> +<p>“Who will be there?” he asked.</p> +<p>“Why, all of them!” she said. “As +usual.”</p> +<p>“Surely not Bertha ... and her children...?”</p> +<p>“I think so,” she said, gently, feeling that he was +sounding her to see if Marianne would be there. “Why +shouldn’t they go, though they are in mourning? It’s not a +party: there will be no one but the family.”</p> +<p>“Perhaps I’ll come on later,” he said, still +hesitating.</p> +<p>She did not insist, went off on foot with Addie. It was curious, but +now, whenever she went to her mother’s house, nice though her +mother always was to her, she felt as if she were going there as a +stranger, not as a daughter. It was because of the others that she felt +like a stranger, because of Bertha, Adolphine, Karel, Cateau and +Dorine. Gerrit and Paul were the only ones whom she still looked upon +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb189" href="#pb189" name= +"pb189">189</a>]</span>as brothers; and she was very fond of +Adeline.</p> +<p>This evening again, as she entered the room, she felt like that, +like a stranger. The old aunts were sitting in their usual places, +doing their crochet-work mechanically. Mamma, as Constance knew, had +had an angry scene with the two old things, to explain to them that +they mustn’t talk scandal and, above all, that they mustn’t +do so out loud, a scene which had thoroughly upset Mamma herself and +which the old aunts had not even seemed to understand, for they merely +nodded a vague consent, nodded yes, yes, no doubt Marie was right. Yet +Constance suspected that Auntie Rine had understood at least something +of it, for she was now looking at Constance askance, with a frightened +look. Constance could not bring herself to speak to the old aunts: she +walked past them; and Auntie Tine whispered to Auntie Rine:</p> +<p>“There she is again!”</p> +<p>“Who?” screamed Auntie Rine, aloud.</p> +<p>But Auntie Tine dared not whisper anything more, because of their +sister Marie, who had flown into such a passion; and she pinched Auntie +Rine’s withered hand, whereupon Auntie Rine glared at her +angrily. Then they cackled together for a moment, bad-temperedly. The +three young Saetzemas, playing their cards in a corner of the +conservatory, sat bursting with laughter at the bickering of the two +old aunts.</p> +<p>Constance sat down quietly by Mamma. And she <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb190" href="#pb190" name= +"pb190">190</a>]</span>felt, now that Addie spoke to +Marietje—Adolphine’s Marietje—but did not go to the +boys in the conservatory, that there was no harmony among them all and +that they only met for the sake of Mamma, of Grandmamma. Poor Mamma! +And yet she did not seem to notice it, was glad that the children and +grandchildren came to her Sundays, to her +“family-group.”</p> +<p>Adolphine and Cateau sat talking in a corner; and Constance caught +what they said:</p> +<p>“So Ber-tha is <i>not</i> ... keep-ing on the +house?”</p> +<p>“I should think not, indeed! They have nothing but +debts.”</p> +<p>“Is it their bro-ther-in-law who is see-ing to things and +ad-min-istering the es-tate?”</p> +<p>“Yes, the commissary in Overijssel.”<a class="noteref" +id="xd20e4545src" href="#xd20e4545" name="xd20e4545src">1</a></p> +<p>“So they are <i>not</i> well <i>off</i>?”</p> +<p>“No, they haven’t a farthing.”</p> +<p>“Yes, as I al-ways used to say to Ka-rel, they al-ways lived +on much too <i>large</i> a <i>scale</i>.”</p> +<p>“They squandered all they had.”</p> +<p>“Well, that’s not very pleas-ant for the +children!”</p> +<p>“No. And there’s Emilie, who wants a divorce. But +don’t mention that to Mamma: she doesn’t know about +it.” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb191" href="#pb191" name= +"pb191">191</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Ve-ry well.... Yes, that’s most unfor-tunate. Your +Floor-tje, Phine, is bet-ter off than that with Dij-kerhof.”</p> +<p>“At least, they’re not thinking of getting divorced. I +always look upon a divorce as a scandal. We’ve one divorce in the +family as it is; and I consider that one too many.”</p> +<p>Constance turned pale and felt that Adolphine was speaking loud on +purpose, though it was behind her back.... Dear Mamma noticed +nothing!... She had been much upset on that one Sunday, that terrible +evening, but had not really understood the truth: the terrible thing to +her was merely that the old sisters had talked so loud and so +spitefully about her poor Constance, like the cross-grained, spiteful +old women that they were; but what happened besides she had really +never quite known.... And this, now that Constance was gradually +drawing farther away from her brothers and sisters, suddenly struck her +as rather fine. Whatever happened, they kept Mamma out of it as far as +they could, in a general filial affection for Mamma, in a filial +conspiracy to leave Mamma her happiness and her illusion about the +family; and it seemed as if the brothers and sisters also impressed +this on their children; it appeared that Adolphine even taught it to +her loutish boys, for, to her sudden surprise, she saw Chris and Piet +go up to Addie and ask him to join in their game. Addie refused, +coldly; and now <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb192" href="#pb192" +name="pb192">192</a>]</span>Constance was almost ashamed that she +herself had not pointed out to Addie that Grandmamma must always be +spared and left in her fond illusion that all was harmony. But +fortunately Addie of his own accord always knew what was the right +thing to do; for, when Adolphine’s Marietje also came up with a +smile and asked him to come and play cards in the conservatory, he went +with her at once. She smiled because of it all: no, there was no mutual +sympathy, but there was a general affection for Mamma. A general +affection, for Mamma, was something rather touching after all; and +really she had never before seen it in that light, as something fine, +that strong and really unanimous feeling among all those different +members of a family whose interests and inclinations in the natural +course of things were divided. Yes, now that she was standing farther +away from her brothers and sisters, she saw for the first time this one +feature which was good in them. Yes, it was really something very good, +something lovable; and even Adolphine had it.... It was as though a +softer mood came over Constance, no longer one of criticism and +resentment, but rather of sympathy and understanding, in which +bitterness had given place to kindliness; and in that softer mood there +was still indeed sadness, but no anger, as if everything could not well +be other than it was, in their circle of small people, of very small +people, whose eyes saw only a little way beyond themselves, whose +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb193" href="#pb193" name= +"pb193">193</a>]</span>hearts were sensitive only a little way beyond +themselves, not farther than the narrow circle of their children and +perhaps their children’s children.... She did not know why, but, +in the vague sadness of this new, softer mood, she thought of Brauws. +And, though not able at once to explain why, she connected her thought +of him with this kindlier feeling of hers, this deeper, truer vision of +things around her. And, as though new, far-stretching vistas opened up +before her, she suddenly seemed to be contemplating life, that life +which she had never yet contemplated. A new, distant horizon lay open +before her, a distant circle, a wide circle round the narrow little +circle past which the eyes of her soul had never yet been able to +gaze.... It was strange to her, this feeling, here in this room, in +this family-circle. It was as though she suddenly saw all her +relations—the Ruyvenaers had now arrived as well—sitting +and talking in that room, all her relations and herself also, as very +small people, who sat and talked, who moved and lived and thought in a +very narrow little circle of self-interest, while outside that circle +the horizon extended ever wider and wider, like a vision of great +cloudy skies, under which towns rose sharply, seas billowed, bright +lightning glanced. It all shot through her and in front of her very +swiftly: two or three little revealing flashes, no more; swift +revelations, which flashed out and then darkened again. But, swiftly +though those revelations <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb194" href= +"#pb194" name="pb194">194</a>]</span>had flashed, after that brightness +the room remained small, those people remained small, she herself +remained small....</p> +<p>She herself had never lived: oh, she had so often suspected it! But +those other people: had they also never, never lived? Mamma, in the +narrow circle of her children’s and grandchildren’s +affection; Uncle and Aunt, in their interests as sugar-planters; Karel +and Cateau, in their narrow, respectable, complacent comfort; +Adolphine, in her miserable struggle for social importance; and the +others, Gerrit, Dorine, Ernst, Paul: had they ever, ever lived? Her +husband: had he ever lived? Or was it all just a mere existence, as she +herself had existed; a vegetation rooted in little thoughts and habits, +in little opinions and prejudices, in little religions or philosophies; +and feeling pleasant and comfortable therein and looking down upon and +condemning others and considering one’s self fairly good and +fairly high-minded, not so bad as others and at least far more sensible +in one’s opinions and beliefs than most of one’s +neighbours?... Oh, people like themselves; people in their +“set,” in other sets, with their several variations of +birth, religion, position, money; decent people, whom Brauws sometimes +called “the <i>bourgeois</i>:” had they ever lived, ever +looked out beyond the very narrow circle which their dogmas drew around +them? What a small and insignificant merry-go-round it was! And what +was the object <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb195" href="#pb195" name= +"pb195">195</a>]</span>of whirling among one another and round one +another like that?... It suddenly appeared to her that, of all these +people who belonged to her and of all the others, the acquaintances, +whom with a swift mental effort she grouped around them, there was not +one who could send a single thought shining out far and wide, towards +the wide horizons yonder, without thinking of himself, his wife and his +children and clinging to his prejudices about money, position, religion +and birth.... As regards money, it was almost a distinction among all +of them not to have any and then to live as if they had. Position was +what they strove for; and those who did not strive for it, such as Paul +and Ernst, were criticized for their weakness. Religion was, with those +other people, the mere acquaintances, not belonging to their circle, +sometimes a matter of decency or of political interest; but, in their +set, with its East-Indian leaven, it was ignored, quietly and calmly, +never thought about or talked about, save that the children were just +confirmed, quickly, as they might be given a dancing- or music-lesson. +Birth, birth, that was everything; and even then there was that +superior contempt for new titles of nobility, that respect only for old +titles and a tendency to think themselves very grand, even though they +were not titled, as members of a patrician Dutch-Indian family which, +in addition to its original importance, had also absorbed the +importance attaching to the highest <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb196" href="#pb196" name="pb196">196</a>]</span>official positions in +Java.... And over it all lay the soft smile of indulgent pity and +contempt for any who thought differently from themselves. It formed the +basis of all their opinions, however greatly those opinions might vary +according to their personal interests and views: compassion and +contempt for people who had no money and lived economically; for those +who did not aim at an exalted position; for those, whether Catholics or +anti-revolutionaries—they themselves were all moderate liberals, +with special emphasis on the “moderate”—who cherished +an enthusiasm for religion; for those who were not of such patrician +birth as themselves. And so on, with certain variations in these +opinions.... It was as though Constance noticed the merry-go-round for +the first time, whirling in that little circle. It was as though she +saw it in the past, saw it whirling in their drawing-rooms, when her +father was still alive, then especially. She saw it suddenly, as a +child, after it is grown up, sees its parents and their house, their +former life, in which it was a child, in which it grew up. She saw it +now like that at her mother’s, only less vividly, because of the +informality of that family-gathering. She saw it like that, dimly, in +all, in every one of them, more or less. But she also saw the respect, +the love for Mamma, the wish to leave her in the illusion which that +love gave her.</p> +<p>She had never seen it like that before. She herself <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb197" href="#pb197" name="pb197">197</a>]</span>was +just the same as the others. And she thought herself and all of them +small, so small that she said to herself:</p> +<p>“Do we all of us live for so very little, when there is so +very much beyond, stretching far and wide, under the cloudy skies of +that immense horizon? Do we never stop outside this little circle in +which we all, with our superior smile—because we are so +distinguished and enlightened—spin round one another and +ourselves, like humming-tops, like everlasting humming-tops?”</p> +<p>And again Brauws’ figure rose before her eyes. Oh, she now for +the first time understood what he had said, on that first evening when +she saw and heard him, about Peace!... Peace! The pure, immaculate +ideal suddenly streamed before her like a silver banner, fluttered in +the wide cloudy skies! Oh, she now for the first time understood ... +why he sought. He had wanted to seek ... life! He had sought ... and he +had not found. But, while seeking, he had lived: he still lived! His +breath came and went, his pulses throbbed, his chest heaved ... even +though his sadness, because he had never “found,” bedimmed +his energies. But she and all of them did not live! They did not live, +they had never lived. They were born, people of distinction, with all +their little cynicisms about money and religion, with all their +fondness for birth and position; and they continued to spin round like +that, to <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb198" href="#pb198" name= +"pb198">198</a>]</span>spin like humming-tops: moderate liberals. That +they all tolerated her again, in the little circle, was that not all +part of their moderate liberal attitude? Oh, to live, to live really, +to live as he had lived, to live ... to live with him!</p> +<p>She was now startled at herself. She was in a room full of people +and she sat in silence next to her mother. Dear Mamma!... And she was +weary of her own thinking, for swift as lightning it all flashed +through her, that revelation of her thoughts, without sentences, +without images, without words. It just flashed; and that was all. But +that flashing made her feel weary, enervated, almost breathless in the +room, which she found close.... And the very last of her thoughts, +which had just for a moment appeared before her—sentence, image +and word—had startled her. She had to confess it to herself: she +loved, she loved him. But she inwardly pronounced that +love—perhaps with the little cynical laugh which she had observed +in her own people—she pronounced that love to be absurd, because +so many silent, dead years lay heaped up there, because she was old, +quite old. To wish to live at this time of day was absurd. To wish to +dream at this stage was absurd. No, after so many years had been wasted +on that meaningless existence, then she, an old woman now, must not +hope to live again when it dawned too late, that life of thinking and +feeling, that life from which might have sprung <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb199" href="#pb199" name="pb199">199</a>]</span>a +life of doing and loving, of boundless love, of love for everybody and +everything.... No, after so many years had been spent in living the +life of a plant, until the plant became yellow and sere, then +inevitably, inexorably extinction, slow extinction, was the only hope +that remained....</p> +<p>The absurdity, of being so old—forty-three—and feeling +like that!... Never, she swore, would she allow anybody to perceive +that absurdity. She knew quite well that it was not really absurd, that +its absurdity existed only in the narrow little circle of little +prejudices and little dogmas. But she also knew that she, like all of +them, was small, that she herself was full of prejudice; she knew that +she could not rise, could never rise above what she considered absurd, +what she had been taught, from a child, in her little circle, to look +upon as absurd!</p> +<p>No, now that she was old, there was nothing for her but to turn her +eyes from the radiant vision and, calmly, to grow still older ... to go +towards that slow extinction which perhaps would still drag on for many +long and empty years: the years of a woman of her age ... in their +set.... <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb200" href="#pb200" name= +"pb200">200</a>]</span></p> +</div> +<div class="footnotes"> +<hr class="fnsep"> +<p class="footnote"><span class="label"><a class="noteref" id= +"xd20e4545" href="#xd20e4545src" name="xd20e4545">1</a></span> The +“Queen’s Commissary” of a Dutch province has no +counterpart in England except, perhaps, the lord lieutenant of a +county. His functions, however, correspond more nearly with those of a +French prefect.</p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch21" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e4616" class="main">Chapter XXI</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">The door opened and Bertha, Louise and Marianne +entered. And they stepped so suddenly right across Constance’ +thoughts that she was startled at their appearance: mother and +daughters in deep mourning. She had not seen Bertha except on that +first hurried visit immediately after Van Naghel’s death and on +the day of the funeral, six weeks ago; and she knew very little of what +was happening; she had seen Marianne only once. And now that they both +stepped right across her thoughts, into that narrow circle—which +she condemned, though she herself was unable to move out of it—a +great compassion suddenly surged through her, like a torrent. Bertha +looked very pale, tired, wasted, grown all at once into an old woman, +hopeless and resigned, as though broken under much silent sorrow. +Louise’s face wore a rather more tranquil expression; but +Marianne beside her, delicate and white, still more delicate and white +in her black dress, also diffused an almost tearful melancholy. Mamma +rose and went towards them. It was the first time since her +husband’s death that Bertha had come to Mamma’s +Sunday-evening; and the gesture with which the old woman rose, +approached her daughter, embraced her and led her to the sofa where she +had been sitting <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb201" href="#pb201" +name="pb201">201</a>]</span>showed the same open-armed and open-hearted +motherly affection with which, as Constance remembered, Mamma had +received her, Constance, at the door, on the landing, on the first +evening of her own return. Dear Mamma!</p> +<p>It touched her so much that she herself rose, went to Bertha, kissed +her tenderly, kissed Louise and Marianne. Her voice, for the first time +for many a day, had a sisterly note in it that took Bertha by surprise. +She pressed Constance’ hand and, after the others had spoken to +her, sat down quietly near Mamma, Aunt Lot and Constance. How pale, +dejected and resigned she was! She seemed to be looking helplessly +around her, to be looking for some one to assist her, to be wishing to +say something, to somebody, that would have relieved her. She +sighed:</p> +<p>“I have come, Mamma ... but I cannot stay long,” she +said. “I am very tired. There are all those business matters; +and, though Adolph is very kind and sympathetic and is a great help, it +is terribly complicated and I sometimes feel half-dead with it all.... +It’s lucky that I have Otto and Frances; I don’t know what +I should do without them.... You know we are going to live in the +country?...”</p> +<p>“You were thinking about it the other day, dear,” said +Mamma, anxiously, “but it wasn’t decided yet ... Bertha, +<i>must</i> I lose you?” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb202" +href="#pb202" name="pb202">202</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Dear Mamma, it’s better in the country. Adolph wanted +us to look round in Overijssel, but I would rather be at Baarn, for +instance: it’s nearer to the Hague and you....”</p> +<p>“Why, Baarn, my child? There’s nobody there but +Amsterdam people, business-people: such a very different set from +ours!...”</p> +<p>“We sha’n’t expect to make friends, Mamma, at +first. I shall be alone with the girls. Otto and Frances have found a +little house at the Hague: it’s lucky that Otto is provided for +at the Foreign Office. The minister spoke very nicely about him the +other day.... Frans and Henri must finish their university-course +quickly now,” she said, in a hesitating tone. “Karel is +going to a boarding-school, for I can’t manage him. And Marietje +too: she was going soon, in any case. So there will be just the three +of us: Louise, Marianne and I.... Things have changed very much, all at +once, Aunt Lot. We want to live quietly. In the first place, we shall +just have to live quietly; and the girls are quite content to do +so....”</p> +<p>It again seemed to Constance as if Bertha were looking for somebody +in the room, were hushing something up. Constance had Emilie’s +name on her lips, but she did not like to ask. Mamma knew nothing more +than that Emilie and Van Raven sometimes had differences.</p> +<p>“I shall have a lot of trouble and worry before <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb203" href="#pb203" name= +"pb203">203</a>]</span>me,” said Bertha. “But, when it is +all settled and we have our little villa....”</p> +<p>She sank back in her chair and stared before her with dim eyes.</p> +<p>Constance took her hand compassionately, held it tight. It looked as +though Bertha, after that busy life which had suddenly snapped with Van +Naghel’s death, an hour after their last dinner-party, no longer +knew what to do or say, felt derelict and helpless....</p> +<p>Though there was so much business to attend to, she seemed stunned +all at once, in the grip of a strange lethargy, as though everything +was now finished, as though there was nothing left now that there would +soon be no more visits to pay, no receptions to hold, no dinners to +give; now that Van Naghel no longer came home from the Chamber, tired +and irritable from an afternoon’s heckling; now that there would +be no more calculating how they could manage to spend a thousand +guilders less a month; now that she would simply have to live quietly +on what she and the girls possessed. And it seemed as if she no longer +knew how or why she should go on living, now that she would no longer +have to give her dinners and pay her visits ... for her children, +particularly her girls. Louise and Marianne had said to her so calmly +that they wanted very soon to begin living quietly that Bertha now +began to wonder: <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb204" href="#pb204" +name="pb204">204</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Why did I always make so much fuss, if the girls cared for it +so little? Why did I go on till I was old and worn out?”</p> +<p>It was true, that had been Van Naghel’s ambition: he had +wanted to see his house a political <i>salon</i>. What he wished had +happened. Now it was all over. Now there was nothing to be done but to +live quietly, in the little villa at Baarn; to make no debts; to let +the boys finish their college-course as quickly as possible; and then +to educate Karel and Marietje and let theirs be a different life from +the others’: how she did not know....</p> +<p>Bertha remained sitting wearily, staring vaguely before her, +half-listening to the sympathetic words, uttered with an emphatic +Indian accent, of Aunt Lot, who kept saying:</p> +<p>“<i>Kassian!...</i>”<a class="noteref" id="xd20e4666src" +href="#xd20e4666" name="xd20e4666src">1</a></p> +<p>But suddenly an access of nervousness seemed to startle her out of +her depression. She looked round again, as though seeking for somebody +... somebody to say something to. Her glance fastened for a moment on +Aunt Lot and then on Constance. Suddenly she rose, with a little laugh, +as though she wanted to speak to Louise, farther away. But the nervous +pressure of her hand seemed to be urging Constance also to get up, to +go with her, somewhere, anywhere.... They went through the other +drawing-room, past the card-table at which <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb205" href="#pb205" name= +"pb205">205</a>]</span>Uncle, Adolphine, Karel and Dotje were sitting, +past the other with Cateau, Van Saetzema, Dijkerhof and Pop; and the +conversation at both tables at once flagged; the cards fell hurriedly +one after the other.... They were talking about Bertha, thought +Constance, as Bertha drew her gently to the little boudoir, the room +where the wine and cakes were set out, where Papa van Lowe’s +portrait hung, stern and inexorable; the little room where they all of +them went when they had anything confidential to say to one another, +when there was a scene, or a difference, or a private discussion. And +Constance at once remembered how, five months ago, she had appealed to +Van Naghel and Bertha in this very room; how they had refused to +receive her “officially” at their house; how Van der Welcke +had lost his temper, flown into a rage, made a rush for Van Naghel.... +She was now here with Bertha once more; and Papa’s portrait +stared down coldly and severely upon the two sisters.</p> +<p>They looked at each other in silence. Bertha glanced round timidly: +she felt that, in the big drawing-room, at the card-tables, the +brothers and sisters had at once begun to talk again, criticizing her, +because she had retired for a moment with Constance ... with Constance. +And, lowering her voice to a hardly audible whisper, she murmured:</p> +<p>“Constance ... Constance ...”</p> +<p>“What is it, Bertha?” <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb206" href="#pb206" name="pb206">206</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Help me ... help me ... be kind to me.”</p> +<p>“But what’s the matter?”</p> +<p>“Oh dear, nobody knows about it yet, but I can’t keep it +all ... here ... to myself!”</p> +<p>“Tell me what it is and what I can do.”</p> +<p>“I don’t know what you can do. But, Constance, I felt I +had to ... had to ... tell you....”</p> +<p>“Tell me then.”</p> +<p>“Nobody, nobody knows yet ... except Louise and +Marianne.”</p> +<p>“What is it?”</p> +<p>“Emilie ... Emilie has....”</p> +<p>“Has what?”</p> +<p>“She has gone away ... with Henri....”</p> +<p>“Gone away?”</p> +<p>“Run away perhaps ... with Henri.... I don’t know where. +Van Raven doesn’t know where. Nobody knows. Adolph van Naghel, my +brother-in-law the commissary, has made enquiries ... and has found out +nothing.... We dissuaded her from seeking a divorce; so did Adolph. +Then, no doubt because of that, she ran away with Henri, with her +brother. She absolutely refuses to live with Eduard. She has run +away.... Constance, where has she gone to? I don’t know! +Constance, it’s a terrible thing! But keep it to yourself, +don’t tell anybody. Mamma doesn’t know. I want to pretend, +if there’s nothing else for it, if they don’t come back, +that she has gone on a little journey, a trip somewhere, <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb207" href="#pb207" name= +"pb207">207</a>]</span>alone with her brother. We must pretend that, +Constance. I don’t think they intend to come back. Henri has been +very excited lately: he fought Eduard, came to blows with him, for +ill-treating his sister. You know how fond they are of each other, +Emilie and Henri. It’s almost unnatural, in a brother and sister. +Now they’ve run away.... Oh dear, Constance, I am so terribly +unhappy!”</p> +<p>She threw herself into Constance’ arms, sobbed, with her arms +round Constance’ neck:</p> +<p>“Constance, Constance, help me!... I have no one to turn to, +no one I can talk to. Adolph is helping me with the business-matters; +Otto too. Louise is very kind; but she and Otto think that Emilie ought +to divorce her husband, on the ground of cruelty. But, Constance, in +our class, men don’t beat their wives! It never happens. +It’s an awful thing. It only happens with the lower orders!... Oh +dear, Constance, I am so unhappy!... The business-matters will be +settled.... But there are debts. I thought that we were living within +our income, but I don’t know: there appear to be debts. Bills +mount up so.... I did so hope that the boys would finish their course. +Frans will; but now Henri ... that mad idea ... going away with Emilie +... running away ... nobody knows where.... Oh dear, Constance, I +<i>am</i> so unhappy: help me, do help me!”</p> +<p>She lay back limply in Constance’ arms and the <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb208" href="#pb208" name= +"pb208">208</a>]</span>tears flowed incessantly down her pale face, +which in those few weeks had fallen away till it was the face of an old +woman. She lay there feeble and ill; and it seemed as if Van +Naghel’s death, coming suddenly as an additional catastrophe on +that evening of misfortunes—her guests in the drawing-room, +Emilie hiding upstairs, Van Raven waiting below—had so terribly +shaken her composure, the composure of a prudent, resourceful woman of +the world, that she was simply compelled to speak of private matters +which she would never have mentioned before.... An instinct drove her +into Constance’ arms, drove her to unbosom herself to Constance +as the only one who could understand her. Her near-sighted, blinking +eyes sought anxiously, through her tears, to read the expression on +Constance’ face. And she was so broken, so shattered that +Constance had to make an effort to realize that it was really Bertha +whom she held in her arms.</p> +<p>The ill-feeling which she had cherished for months past was gone. +None of it remained in her soul, in her heart, as though she had passed +out of the depths of that atmosphere to purer heights of understanding +and feeling. Only for a moment did she still remember that evening when +she herself, in this same room, had implored Bertha and Van Naghel to +help her “rehabilitate” herself in the eyes of their +friends and of the Hague. It seemed long ago, years ago. She could +hardly understand herself: <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb209" href= +"#pb209" name="pb209">209</a>]</span>that she could have begged so +earnestly for something that was so small, of such little importance to +her soul, to the world. She could not have done it now.... She did not +understand how she could so long have cherished a grudge against Van +Naghel, against Bertha ... because they did not ask her to their +official dinners, when the invitation would have given her the +rehabilitation which she sought. At the present moment, she did not +even desire that rehabilitation, did not care about it, treated it as +something that had become of no value: an idea which had withered and +shrivelled within her and which blew away like a dead leaf to far-off +spacious skies.... Addie? He did not need his mother’s +rehabilitation in the eyes of the Hague. The boy would make his own way +in life.... Oh, how small she had been, to beg for it; to go on bearing +a grudge, months on end, for something so little, so infinitesimal ... +so absolutely non-existent!... She felt that something had grown up +inside her and was looking down upon all that earlier business.... No, +there was no bitterness left. She felt a deep pity and a sisterly +affection for this poor, old woman, Bertha, who now lay feebly and +impotently in her arms, begging ... for what? She collected her +thoughts: what could she do, how could she help Bertha? Her thoughts +crowded upon one another rapidly; she thought vaguely of Van der +Welcke, of Addie: what could they do, how could <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb210" href="#pb210" name="pb210">210</a>]</span>they +help Bertha, how get upon the track of Emilie and Henri? And in the end +she could think of nothing to say but:</p> +<p>“Yes, Bertha, the best thing will be to pretend that Emilie +has gone for a trip with her brother. We will put it like that, if +necessary. What does Van Raven want to do?”</p> +<p>“He won’t consent to a divorce.... And it would be an +awful thing, you know.... Oh, Constance, they have not been married ten +months!”</p> +<p>A weariness suddenly came over her, like the abrupt extinction of +all the little mundane interests that had always meant so much to +her.</p> +<p>“But,” she murmured, “if he beats her ... perhaps +it is better that they should be divorced.... I don’t know.... We +are going to Baarn: there is a small villa to let there. I should +prefer to take it at once and go down there with Louise and +Marianne.... Karel gives me a lot of trouble: he doesn’t behave +well, no, he doesn’t behave well. And he is still so young. +Perhaps he will go to live with Adolph, his guardian, who will be very +strict with him. I don’t know what to do, I can do nothing.... I +used to do everything with Van Naghel, he and I together. He was really +good and kind. We were always thinking of the children, both of us. He +was tired ... of being in the Cabinet; but he went on, for the +children’s sake....”</p> +<p>Her unconscious simplicity, in implying that Van <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb211" href="#pb211" name= +"pb211">211</a>]</span>Naghel was in the Cabinet for the sake of his +children and not of his country, seemed to strike Constance for the +first time: she almost smiled, held Bertha closer to her.</p> +<p>“He couldn’t very well resign ... and he didn’t +want to,” Bertha continued, feebly. “And now I don’t +know what to do. I feel so very much alone; and yet I was once a +capable woman, wasn’t I, Constance? Now I no longer feel capable. +Perhaps that life was too crowded. And, Constance, what was the use of +it all? My children, our children, for whom we lived, are none of them +happy. I have grown weary and old ... for nothing. I wish that we were +at Baarn now. I want to live there quietly, with the two girls. Louise +is nice, so is Marianne. They neither of them want to go about any +more. They’re not happy, no, they are not happy. Oh, my poor, +poor children!... You must never tell Mamma, Constance. Mamma +doesn’t know: dear Mamma! There is no need for her to know, poor +dear! Better leave her under the impression that all is well with us, +even though Van Naghel is gone....”</p> +<p>And she sobbed at the thought that she was alone. Then, suddenly, +she drew herself up a little, made Constance take a chair, sat down +beside her and asked, peering anxiously through her tears into +Constance’ face:</p> +<p>“Constance, tell me ... Marianne?” <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb212" href="#pb212" name="pb212">212</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Yes, Bertha?”</p> +<p>“Are you fond of Marianne?”</p> +<p>“Yes, very.”</p> +<p>“Still?”</p> +<p>“Yes, still.”</p> +<p>“Constance....”</p> +<p>“Yes, Bertha?”</p> +<p>“It is just as well ... that we are going to Baarn.... Tell +me, Constance: Van der Welcke....”</p> +<p>“Well?”</p> +<p>“What sort of a man is he?”</p> +<p>“What do you mean, Bertha?” asked Constance, gently.</p> +<p>“Is ... is it his fault?... Is he a gentleman?”</p> +<p>Constance defended her husband calmly, but not without astonishment +that Bertha could speak so frankly about <i>that</i> ... as if they +both knew all about it:</p> +<p>“No, Bertha, I don’t think that Henri ... that it is +Henri’s fault. I don’t think it’s Marianne’s +fault either. Bertha, I don’t believe they can help it. They have +an attraction for each other, a very great attraction....”</p> +<p>A tenderness came over her soul, like a glow, like a glowing +compassion.</p> +<p>“Constance, they must not let themselves go. They must +struggle against it.” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb213" href= +"#pb213" name="pb213">213</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Who can tell what they are doing, Bertha? Who can tell what +goes on inside them?”</p> +<p>“No, they are not struggling.”</p> +<p>“Who can tell?”</p> +<p>“No, no.... Constance, it is just as well that we are going to +Baarn.”</p> +<p>They heard voices in the drawing-room, loud voices, with an Indian +accent. The Ruyvenaers were going:</p> +<p>“Good-bye, Ber-r-rtha,” said Aunt Lot, looking through +the door. “We’re going, Ber-r-rtha.”</p> +<p>Constance and Bertha went back to the drawing-room. Bertha forgot to +wipe the tears from her eyes, kissed Aunt Lot. Adolphine and Cateau +came up to Bertha:</p> +<p>“Ber-tha,” whined Cateau; and this time she whined with +a vengeance. “We just want-ed to say a <i>word</i> to you. +Emilie-tje must <i>not</i> get a di-vorce.”</p> +<p>“No,” said Adolphine, “if she goes and gets a +divorce, the family will become impossible. It’ll create a +scandal, if they are divorced.”</p> +<p>“Ye-es,” Cateau droned aloud, “it would be a +scan-dal, Ber-tha. Don’t you think so <i>too</i>, +Constance?”</p> +<p>“There’s no question of it ... for the moment,” +said Constance. “Emilie has gone abroad for a bit with Henri; and +the change is sure to do her good and make her a little +calmer.”</p> +<p>“Oh?... Has she gone a-broad?” <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb214" href="#pb214" name="pb214">214</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Where to?” asked Adolphine, all agog.</p> +<p>“They were to go to Paris,” said Constance, without +hesitating.</p> +<p>“O-oh?... Has Emilie-tje gone to ... Pa-ris?”</p> +<p>“Yes, with her brother,” Constance repeated.</p> +<p>A minute later, she found an opportunity of saying quietly to +Bertha:</p> +<p>“It’s better like that, Bertha; better to say it as if +it was quite natural... If you don’t say it yourself ... and they +come to hear....”</p> +<p>“Thank you, Constance ... thank you.”</p> +<p>“Oh, Bertha.... I wish I could do something for +you!”</p> +<p>“You have helped me as it is.... Thank you.... That’s +all that I can say....”</p> +<p>She lay back helplessly in her chair, staring dimly before her. +Constance followed her glance. She saw that Van der Welcke had come, +very late. He was sitting in the conservatory—where the boys had +cleared away the cards after their game, as Grandmamma always expected +them to do—sitting a little in the shadow, but still visible. He +was bending over towards Marianne, who sat beside him, her face a white +patch in the darkness: a frail little black figure making a faint blur +in the dim conservatory, where the gas was now turned out. She seemed +to be weeping silently, sat crushing her handkerchief. He appeared to +be saying something, <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb215" href="#pb215" +name="pb215">215</a>]</span>anxiously and tenderly, while he bent still +nearer to her. Then, suddenly, he took her hand, pressed it +impulsively. Marianne looked up in alarm. Her eyes met, at the far end +of the long drawing-room, the eyes of Aunt Constance, the dull, staring +eyes of her mother. She drew away her hand ... and her pale face +flushed with a glow of shame....</p> +<p>Grandmamma stood in the middle of the drawing-room, a little sad at +the gloom which the recent mourning had cast over her rooms. The +children took their leave. <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb216" href= +"#pb216" name="pb216">216</a>]</span></p> +</div> +<div class="footnotes"> +<hr class="fnsep"> +<p class="footnote"><span class="label"><a class="noteref" id= +"xd20e4666" href="#xd20e4666src" name="xd20e4666">1</a></span> Poor +thing!</p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch22" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e4846" class="main">Chapter XXII</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">Constance began to love her loneliness more and +more.</p> +<p>Her daily life was very uneventful: she could count the people with +whom she came into contact. First her husband and her son: there was +something gentler in her attitude towards Van der Welcke, something +almost motherly, which prevented her from getting angry with him, even +though the inclination welled up within her. Addie was as usual, +perhaps even a little more serious: this disquieted her. Then there was +Brauws, who came regularly. He dined with them regularly, on a fixed +day in the week, quite informally; and moreover he had become the +friend of both Van der Welcke and Constance and even of Addie. Then +there were Mamma, Gerrit and his little tribe and, now and again, Paul. +And then there was Van Vreeswijck; and Marianne, of course; and +latterly she had seen more of Bertha. For the rest she seemed to drift +away from all the others, even from warm-hearted Aunt Lot. She kept in +touch only with those with whom she was really in sympathy.</p> +<p>Still, though she had these few friends, she often <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb217" href="#pb217" name="pb217">217</a>]</span>had +quite lonely afternoons. But they did not depress her; she gazed out at +the rain, at the cloud-phantoms. And she dreamed ... along the path of +light. She smiled at her dream. Even though she very much feared the +absurdity of it for herself, she could not help it: a new youthfulness +filled her with a gentle glow, a new tenderness, like the delicate +bloom of a young girl’s soul dreaming of the wonderful future.... +And then she would come back to herself suddenly and smile at her +sentimentality and summon up all her matronly common-sense; and she +would think:</p> +<p>“Come, I oughtn’t to be sitting like this!... Come, I +oughtn’t to be acting like this and thinking of everything and +nothing!... Certainly, I like him very much; but why cannot I do that +without these strange thoughts, without dreaming and picturing all +manner of things and filling my head with romantic fancies ... as if I +were a girl of eighteen or twenty?... Oh, those are the things which we +do not speak about, the deep secret things which we never tell to +anybody!... I should never have suspected them in myself ... or that +they could be so exquisitely sweet to me. How strangely sweet, to dream +myself back to youth in visions which, though they never really take +shape, yet make a shining path to those cloudy skies, to imagine myself +young again in those dreams!... If I never had these thoughts and +dreams before, why do I <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb218" href= +"#pb218" name="pb218">218</a>]</span>have them now? Come, I +oughtn’t to be sitting like this and thinking like this!... I +make up a host of pretty stories, sentimental little stories, and see +myself, see us both, years ago, as quite young children, both of us. He +played and I played ... almost the same game: he a boy, I a girl. It +was as though he were seeking me. It was as though I, in my childish +dreams, divined something of him, far, far away, as though there were a +part of me that wanted to go to him, a part of him that wanted to come +to me.... Stop, I am giving way again to those secret enthusiasms which +lie deep down in my soul like strange, hidden streams, those vague, +romantic ferments such as I imagined that young girls might have, but +not I, a woman of my years, a woman with my past, the mother of a big +son.... I will <i>not</i> do it any more, I will <i>not</i>.... It is +morbid to be like this.... And yet ... and yet ... when the wind blows +and the rain comes down, it <i>is</i>, it still is the dear secret that +brings the tears to my eyes.... If I love him, quite silently, deep +down within myself, why may I not just dream like that? The absurdity +of it exists only for me: nobody, <i>nobody</i> knows of it. I have +some one else hidden within me: a younger woman, a sister, a young +sister-soul, a girl’s soul almost. It is absurd, I know; but +sometimes, sometimes it is so strong in me and I love him so well and +feel, just like a girl, that <i>he</i> is the first man I have ever +loved.... Oh, Henri! I can <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb219" href= +"#pb219" name="pb219">219</a>]</span>see now what <i>that</i> was: he +was young; it was at first mere play-acting, just like a comedy; then +it became passion, very quickly, a mad impulse, an almost feverish +impulse to hold him in my arms. That is all dead. Passion is dead.... +This is a dream, a young girl’s dream. It is the beginning. It +<i>is</i> absurd; and I am often ashamed of it, for my own sake. But I +cannot resist it: it envelops me, just as the spring sunshine and the +scent of the may and the cherry-blossom in the Woods envelop one with +languorous sweetness. I cannot resist it, I can <i>not</i> resist it. +My eyes go towards those clouds, my soul goes towards those clouds, my +dreams go towards them ... and I love him, I love him.... I feel +ashamed: sometimes I dare not look my son in the face.... I love him, I +love him; and I feel ashamed: sometimes I dare not go across the +street, as though people would notice it, by the light on my face.... +But ah, no, that light does not shine from me, because I am old! It +does from Marianne, poor child, but not from me ... oh, thank God for +that!... I want to struggle against it, but it is stronger than I; and, +when I think of him, I feel as if I were numbed here in my chair. When +he comes into the room, I tremble, powerless to make a movement. Let me +be ashamed of myself, argue with myself, struggle as I may, it is so, +it is something real, as though I had never felt anything real in my +life: it is a dream and it is also reality....” <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb220" href="#pb220" name="pb220">220</a>]</span></p> +<p>She often strove against it, but the dream was always too strong for +her, enveloping her as with a multitude of languorous spring scents. It +imparted a strange tenderness to her, to her fresh, round face, the +face of a woman in her prime, with the strange, soft, curly hair, which +the years were changing without turning grey. If he came, she awoke +from that dream, but felt herself blissfully languid and faint.</p> +<p>“I am not a girl,” she thought, now that she heard +herself speak; but her fixed idea, that she was old, quite old, +retreated a little way into the background.</p> +<p>But, though she now no longer felt so old in her dream, after her +dream she thought herself ignorant. Oh, how ignorant she was! And why +had she never acquired an atom of knowledge in her wasted days, in her +squandered, empty years. When she was talking to Brauws—and now +that he came regularly, they often talked together, long and earnestly, +in the friendly twilight—she thought:</p> +<p>“How ignorant I am!”</p> +<p>She had to make an effort sometimes to follow him in the simplest +things that he said. She was obliged to confess to him that she had +never learnt very much. But he said that that was a good thing, that it +had kept her mind fresh. She shook her head in disclaimer; she +confessed that she was ignorant and stupid. He protested; but she told +him <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb221" href="#pb221" name= +"pb221">221</a>]</span>frankly that it sometimes tired her to follow +him. And she was so honest with him that she herself was sometimes +surprised at it. If ever their conversation became too hopelessly deep, +she preferred to be silent rather than lie or even seek an evasion in +words.... Ignorant, yes; and it distressed her to such an extent that, +one afternoon, when Henri was out and Addie at school, she went to her +son’s room and opened his book-case. In addition to the ordinary +school-manuals, it contained a few boys’-books; and she laughed +at herself, her little tender, mocking laugh of gentle irony. But she +found a couple of volumes on Universal History, a present from Van der +Welcke to Addie, who was very fond of history; and she opened them +where she stood. She turned the pages. She was afraid that some one +might come in: the maid, perhaps, by accident. She sat down in the only +easy-chair, impregnated with the smoke of the cigarettes which Van der +Welcke smoked one after the other, silently, while Addie was preparing +his lessons; and she turned the pages and read. She continued to suffer +from that sense of her own absurdity. She felt like a schoolgirl +dreaming ... and learning her lessons. She went on reading; and, when +Truitje was looking for her all over the house and she heard her ask +the cook where on earth mevrouw could be, she blushed violently, +quickly put the books back on the shelves and <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb222" href="#pb222" name="pb222">222</a>]</span>left +the room. She would have liked to take the books with her, but dared +not; however, that evening at dinner she plucked up courage and +said:</p> +<p>“Addie, Mr. Brauws was saying something about the French +Revolution the other day; and I felt so stupid at being so ignorant on +the subject. Have you any books about it?”</p> +<p>Yes, he had this book and that book, in fact he had always been +attracted by that period and had collected as many books upon it as his +scanty pocket-money permitted. He would bring them to her after dinner. +And she acquired a sort of passion for reading and learning. She +indulged it almost hastily, feverishly, without any method, as though +nervously anxious to make up for the deficiencies of her own education. +And at the same time she was frightened lest other people—even +Van der Welcke and Addie—should notice that fevered haste; and +she devoured book after book with studied cunning, sometimes turning +the pages over hurriedly, feverishly, then again reading more +attentively, but never leaving the books about, always replacing them +on her boy’s shelves, or returning them to Brauws and Paul when +they had been borrowed from them, or carefully putting away those which +she had bought herself, so that her room apparently remained the same, +without the confusion and untidiness of a lot of books. Her reading was +a strange medley: a volume of Quack’s <i>Socialists</i>, which +Brauws lent her; <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb223" href="#pb223" +name="pb223">223</a>]</span>Zola’s novel, +<i>L’Œuvre</i>; a pamphlet by Bakunin and an odd number of +the <i>Gids</i>; a copy of <i>The Imitation</i> which had strayed among +Van der Welcke’s books; Gonse on Japanese Art; Tolstoi’s +novels and pamphlets. But it was a strange bold power of discrimination +that at once taught her to pick and choose amid the chaos of all this +literature, made her accept this and reject that: a psychological +analysis; a new work on modern social evolution; an æsthetic +rhapsody about a Japanese vase. She learnt quickly to look into them +boldly and to take from them what was able as it were to develop her; +and out of many of those books there flashed forth such entirely new +revelations of hitherto unperceived truths that often, tired, dazed, +astounded, she asked herself:</p> +<p>“Is there so much then? Is so much thought about, dreamt +about, so much sought for, lived for? Do people have those visions +then, those dreams? And does it all exist? And can it all be taken in +by me, by my intelligence?”</p> +<p>And, as she thought, it seemed as if crape veils were being raised +everywhere from before her and as if she, whose gaze had never wandered +from her family and friends, now saw, suddenly, through the distant +clouds, right into those cities, right into those civilizations, into +the future, into the past, into so much of the present as still hovered +closely around her own existence. She experienced shock after shock: +she felt dimly that even the terrible French <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb224" href="#pb224" name= +"pb224">224</a>]</span>Revolution, though it did cost Marie-Antoinette +her life, had its good side. Zola seemed to her so magnificent that she +was almost frightened at her own enthusiasm and dared not put her +feeling into words. And the noble dreams of those apostles of humanity, +even though they anathematized the power of the State and +money—all that she had unconsciously looked upon, all her life, +as indispensable to civilized society—made her quiver first with +alarm, then with compassion, then with terror, with despair, with +exultation.... She did not utter her thoughts; only, in her +conversations with Brauws, she felt that she was gradually better able +to follow him, that she was more responsive, less vague in her +replies.... If in all this, this new self-education, there was +something hurried and superficial, the tremulous haste of an eager, +nervous woman who fears that she is devoting herself too late to what +is vitally necessary, there was at the same time something fresh and +ingenuous, something youthful and unspoilt, like the enthusiasm of a +woman still young who, after her girlish dreams, wants to grasp some +part of the vivid, many-coloured, radiant life around her, who grasps +with joyous open hands at the colours and the sunbeams and who, though +she grasps wildly, nevertheless gathers fresh life in her illusion.... +She gathered fresh life. The wind that blew outside seemed to blow +through her soul; the rain that pelted seemed actually to wash her +face; <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb225" href="#pb225" name= +"pb225">225</a>]</span>the continual gusts on every hand blew the mist +from before her eyes, drew it aside like a curtain.... Her eyes +sparkled; and, when the winter had done blowing and raining, when +suddenly, without any transition, a breath of spring—the limpid +blue of the sky, the tender green of the stirring earth—floated +over and through the Woods, it was as though she yearned for movement. +She managed, every afternoon that Addie was free, to take him away from +Van der Welcke and to lure him out for a long walk, out of the town, +over the dunes, ever so far. Addie, with his eyes bright with laughing +surprise, thought it very jolly of her and would go with her, though he +was no walker and preferred bicycling, athirst for speed. But, in his +young, gallant boy’s soul, he laughed softly, thought Mamma +charming: grown years younger, grown into a young woman, suddenly, in +her short skirt, her little cloth cape, with the sailor-hat on her +curly hair and the colour in her cheeks, slim-waisted, quick-footed, +her voice clear, her laugh sometimes ringing out suddenly. He thought +of Papa and that she was now becoming as young as he; and Addie felt +himself old beside her. He saw nothing of what was happening in his +mother, even as nobody saw it, for she kept it to herself, was no +different to the others, spoke no differently to the others, perhaps +only just with a brighter laugh. What she read, what she learnt, what +she felt, what she thought: all this was not perceptible <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb226" href="#pb226" name="pb226">226</a>]</span>to +the others. It did not shine out from her; and her foot merely moved a +shade quicker, her speech became a shade more spontaneous. But +everything that blossomed and flamed up in her she kept to herself, in +the vast silence of her broad but unshared vistas. To her husband she +was gentler, to her son she was younger. Only now, in those walks, +perhaps Addie was the one person in her life who noticed that, when +Mamma happened to mention Mr. Brauws’ name, an unusual note +sounded in her brighter, younger voice. A boy of his age does not +analyse a subtle perception of this kind; only, without reasoning, +without analysing, just instinctively, this boy of fourteen thought of +his father, whom he worshipped with a strange, protecting adoration +such as one gives to a brother or a friend—a younger brother, a +younger friend—and felt a pang of jealousy on his behalf, +jealousy of this man who did what Papa never did, talked with Mamma for +hours three or four times a week, so often in fact that she was growing +younger, that she had taken to reading, so as no longer to be ignorant, +that she had developed a need for walking great distances. But the lad +kept this jealousy locked up within himself, allowed none to perceive +it. Perhaps he was just a trifle colder to him, to this man, the friend +of the family, though Brauws was so fond of him, Addie, almost +passionately fond of him indeed: Addie knew that. This jealousy for his +father, jealousy of that <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb227" href= +"#pb227" name="pb227">227</a>]</span>friend of the family, was very +strong in him; and he felt himself to be the child of both his parents, +felt within himself their double heritage of jealousy. The image of his +father appeared constantly before him, appeared between the images of +Brauws and of his mother. But he let her see nothing of it.</p> +<p>She gathered fresh life in those walks. When Addie was at school, +she walked alone, no longer fearing the loneliness out of doors, she +who had come to love her indoor loneliness and the still deeper +loneliness of her soul. It was as though, after dreaming and educating +herself—quickly, nervously, superficially and with youthful +simplicity—in what great men had thought and written, she felt +herself breathe again in the midst of nature. No longer from her +arm-chair, through the windows, along the bend of the curtains did she +see the great clouds, but she now saw them out of doors and overhead, +blue, white, immense, irradiated by the sun in the vault of the +boundless spring skies all vocal with birds, saw them as she stood on +the dunes, with the wind all round her head, all round her hair and +blowing through her skirts....</p> +<p>“I love him, I love him,” a voice inside her sang softly +and yet insistently, while the wind’s strong passion seemed to +lift her up and waft her along.</p> +<p>But in the movement of her hands there was something as though she +were resisting the wind, with a smile of gentle irony, of tender +mockery. <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb228" href="#pb228" name= +"pb228">228</a>]</span>The wind blew past, as if grumbling, and she +walked on, saw the sea. She seemed to look upon the sea for the first +time. It was as though, in the strong wind, under the blue-white +clouds, the sea streamed to her for the first time from the ethereal +fount of the horizon and were now rushing towards her, roaring and +frothing, like a triumph of multitudinous, white-crested horses. And +the sky and the sea were as one great triumph of mighty, omnipotent +nature. A nameless but overwhelming triumph seemed from out of those +clouds to hold reins in thousands of fists, the reins of the +multitudinous white-crested horses; and all that triumph of nature +advanced towards her like a riot of youth. It was as though every atom +of her former life, every memory flew away around her like sand, like +dust, like straw. It all flew away; and the waves broke, the sea +uplifted itself like an exulting menace, as though to carry her with it +in the riotous rush of its triumphant crested steeds, over all that +small life, over everything ... if she did not take care.</p> +<p>It was all big, wide, far-reaching, like a world. When she reached +home, she was tired out, sobered by the tram-ride and the last bit of +walking, past casual, shadowy people. Worn out, she fell asleep, woke +shortly before dinner, welcomed Addie in a dream. Until sometimes she +read her son’s eyes, made an effort, plunged her face in a basin +of water, tried to be, to appear as she had always been. And +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb229" href="#pb229" name= +"pb229">229</a>]</span>then, in the glass, she saw herself like that, +to all appearance the same woman, with just something livelier in her +eyes, her gait, her movements. But inside her everything was +changed.</p> +<p>At home sometimes the past would still rise up before her, but +different, quite different. She seemed to withdraw from her former +personality and it was as though, far removed from the woman that she +had once been, she was now for the first time able to judge her past +from another point of view than her own. She saw suddenly what her +father must have suffered, Mamma, the brothers even, the sisters. She +realized for the first time the sacrifice which those old, pious +people, Henri’s parents, had made. She thought in dismay of the +injury which she had done her first husband, De Staffelaer. She thought +of them all, in dismay at herself, in compassion for them. And she felt +sorry even for her husband and for what he had always querulously +resented, his shattered career, which had constituted his grudge, his +obsession, the excuse for his inertia: for Van der Welcke and even for +that grudge she felt compassion. How young he was when she met him, +when they had acted their comedy, their comedy which had become deadly +earnest! And she had at once fettered him to herself, in +ever-increasing antagonism! Then her eyes would rest on him with a more +understanding glance, sometimes almost with a certain pity, as she +looked into his eyes, his young <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb230" +href="#pb230" name="pb230">230</a>]</span>blue boyish eyes, which Addie +had inherited from him, but which in the father looked younger, more +boyish than in the son. If, at the sound of his voice, the inclination +to speak to him irritably welled up in her from the eternal antagonism +between them, as from a gloomy spring deep down in her, she would +restrain herself, control herself with that new sympathy and pity, +answer gently, almost jokingly, and would let him have the last word. +And, now that she herself was in love and felt herself live again, she +had a sympathy that was almost motherly for his love, even though she +herself was beginning to feel young again, and with it a strange +tenderness for the two of them, Marianne and Henri. She did not think +of the danger for him; she still had only, in her new world of romance, +a sympathy for romance. He was her husband, but she felt none of a +wife’s jealousy. And for Marianne she felt the same strange +compassion, as for a younger sister-in-love....</p> +<p>There came to her scarcely a fleeting thought of the immorality +which the world, people, small people—the whirlers in the little +circle, with their little prejudices and dogmas, their little creeds +and philosophies—would see in such strange views from a married +woman concerning herself and a friend, concerning her husband and the +little niece with whom her husband was evidently in love. She was a +small creature like all of them, she was a small soul, like +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb231" href="#pb231" name= +"pb231">231</a>]</span>all of them; but her soul at least was growing, +growing upwards and outwards; she no longer felt depressed; and it +seemed as if she were being borne on wings to the greater cloud-worlds +yonder, to the far cities, where flashed the lightnings of the new +revelations, the new realities....</p> +<p>Everything in her was changed.... <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb232" href="#pb232" name="pb232">232</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch23" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e4958" class="main">Chapter XXIII</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">Max Brauws was a thinker as well as a man of action; +and each of these two personalities insisted on having its period of +domination. After his college days, he had wandered over Europe for +years, vaguely seeking an object in life. Deep down in himself, +notwithstanding all his restless activity, he remained a dreamer, as he +had been in his childhood and boyhood. It seemed as if that which he +had sought in his dreams when playing as a boy on the fir-clad hills +and over the moors went on beckoning him, darkly and elusively, a +mystic, nebulous veil on the dim horizons of the past; and, when he ran +towards them, those far horizons, they receded more and more into the +distance, fading little by little; and the veil was like a little +cloud, melting into thin air.... He had wandered about for years, his +soul oppressed by a load of knowledge, by the load of knowing all that +men had thought, planned, believed, dreamed, worshipped, achieved. An +almost mechanically accurate memory had arranged those loads in his +brain in absolute order; and, if he had not been above all things +driven by the unrest of his imagination, with its eternal dreaming and +its eternal yearning to find what it sought, he would have become a +quiet scholar, living in the country, <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb233" href="#pb233" name="pb233">233</a>]</span>far from cities, with +a great library around him; for very often, when spent with weariness, +he had a vision of an ideal repose. But the unrest and the yearning had +always driven him on, driven him through the world; and they had both +made him seek, for himself as well as for others, because, if he had +found for others, he would also have found for himself. They, the +unrest and the yearning, had driven him on towards the great centres of +life, towards the black gloom of the English and German +manufacturing-towns, towards the unhappy moujiks in Russia, towards the +famine-stricken villages of Sicily, all in a heart-rending passion to +know, to have seen, penetrated and experienced all the misery of the +world. And the capitals had risen up around him like gigantic Babels of +fevered pride, accumulations of egotisms; the smoke of the +manufacturing-towns had smeared along the horizon of his life the +soot-black clouds through which he could not see and in which the days +remained eternally defiled; the Russian snow-landscapes had spread out +as eternal, untraversable steppes—steppes and steppes and +steppes—of absolutely colourless despair; in Italy he had beheld +an appalling contrast between the magnificence of the country—the +glory of its scenery, the melancholy of its art—and the sorrows +of the afflicted nation, which, as in a haze of gold, against a +background of sublime ruins and shimmering blue, along rows of palaces +full of noble treasures, uttered <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb234" +href="#pb234" name="pb234">234</a>]</span>its cry of hunger, shook its +threatening fist, because the old ground brought forth not another +olive, not one, after the excesses of the past, exhausted by the +birth-pangs of the untold glories of old....</p> +<p>His mind, schooled in book-lore, also read life itself, learnt to +know it, fathomed it with a glance. He saw the world, saw its +wickedness, its selfishness, saw especially its awful, monstrous +hypocrisy. Like so many leering, grinning masks, with treacherous +honeyed smiles, contradicting the furtive glances of the diabolical +eyes, he saw the powers of the world above the world itself: a huge +nightmare of compact distress, the greedy, covetous, grasping fingers +hidden as though ready to clutch at the folds of the majestic purple, +ready to strike like vultures’ claws. And he saw—O terrible +vision!—the world as a helpless, quivering mass lying for +centuries under that eternal menace. He saw it everywhere. Then he +wanted to free himself with a gigantic effort from the sphinx-like +domination of his impotence, with its eternally unseeing eyes, its +eternally silent lips, its undivining mind; and his movement was as +that of one who lies crushed under granite, the granite of that +omnipotent sphinx of impotence, who, with her eternal immovability, +seemed to be saying nothing but this:</p> +<p>“I am unchangeable, eternally; against me everything is +eternally dashing itself to pieces; against me your dreams scatter into +mist. I alone am, but I am <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb235" href= +"#pb235" name="pb235">235</a>]</span>that which is unchangeable: human +impotence, your own impotence. Lie still at my feet, do not move: I +alone am.”</p> +<p>That was the vision of his hopeless eyes. But desperation drove him +on, wandering ever on and on to other lands, to other capitals, to +other towns black with smoke: the smoke through which nothing shone, +not a single gleam of hope. And for years it was the same: wandering, +seeking, not finding; only seeing, knowing, realizing. But the more he +saw, knew and realized, the more terrible it was to him that he could +not find the very first word of the solution, the more terrible it +became to him that only the sphinx remained, the immovable granite +impotence; and her blank gaze seemed to utter her solitary +revelation:</p> +<p>“I alone am. I am impotence; but I am immovable, I am +omnipotent.”</p> +<p>Then he had felt in himself the need to do still more, to be really +a doer, a common workman, as they all were, everywhere, the poor and +wretched. And he went to America, in order no longer to think, read, +ponder, dream, see or know, but to do what they were all doing, the +poor and wretched. And it was as he had succeeded in telling Constance +at last, after so many hesitations: everything that was atavistic in +him had prevented him from becoming a brother, a fellow-worker. But he +was scarcely back in Europe before he felt the air around him +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb236" href="#pb236" name= +"pb236">236</a>]</span>full of noble aims, passionate hopes; and Peace +had shone before his eyes. He spoke; and his words were as the words of +one inspired; and everybody went to hear him. He had spoken in Holland; +he now went to Germany and spoke there. He wrote his book there: +<i>Peace</i>. He went on doing and moving, until he was laid low not +only with the fatigue of thinking and meditating, but also with the +strain of constantly travelling hither and thither, of constantly +appearing in overcrowded halls, of speaking in a clear, resonant voice +to thousands of people. For a moment he said to himself that he was +doing something, something even greater and better than his manual +labour in America had been. For a moment he said to himself that he had +found, if not everything, at least something, an atom of absolute good, +and that he was imparting that atom to the world. But dull +discouragement came and smote him, as well as physical strain, and left +him saying to himself:</p> +<p>“They cheer and applaud, but nothing is changed. Everything +remains as it is, as if I had never spoken.”</p> +<p>His impatience demanded an immediate realization and the sight of +the ideal flashing across the horizon. And then he lost all hope even +for the future, for the brighter ages that were dawning. A mocking +laugh, a sarcastic word in a report on his lectures was enough to +shatter him for weeks. <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb237" href= +"#pb237" name="pb237">237</a>]</span>He hid himself like a leper, or +allowed himself to be luxuriously lapped in the leafy melancholy of the +German mountain-forests, or went, farther and higher, into the Alps, +made reckless ascents, just himself and a guide, as though, along the +pure world of the slippery glaciers, he hoped to find what he had +sought in vain in the Old World and the New, in the world of all and of +himself.</p> +<p>Then he remained for weeks lingering on in a lonely little village +in Switzerland, high up among the eternal snows, as though he wished to +purify himself of all the dust of his humanity. Merely through +breathing the exquisite rareness of the air, especially at night, when +in the higher heavens the stars shone nearer to him, twinkling out +their living rays, it seemed as if the pure cold were cleansing him to +his marrow, to his soul. He gazed back almost peacefully upon his life +as a man of thought and action, thought and action being two things in +which a man is able to indulge only if he be willing to live, for +others and for himself. If anything of his thought, of his action +remained drifting in those lower atmospheres of the suffering world, he +was certain that this would be so little, so infinitesimally small, +that he himself did not perceive it, like an atom of dust floating in +the immensity of the future. Perhaps then the atom would prove to be a +little grain and, as such, be built into the substance of the ideal. +But, even if this were so, his thought and <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb238" href="#pb238" name="pb238">238</a>]</span>his +action and their possible results seemed to him so small, so slight +that he was filled with humility. And in this humility there was a +pride in being humble; for did he not remember all the complacency, the +dogmatism, the conviction, the assurance, the self-consciousness, all +the pedantry that battened down there?</p> +<p>Amid the serenity of the mountains, as he sent his gaze roaming over +the frost-bound horizons, all within him became pure and crystal-clear, +his soul a very prism. He saw its colours lying there plainly, shining, +glittering, with none of the foulness of that lower world. And these +weeks were weeks of the deepest and most health-giving rest that he had +ever known.</p> +<p>He now felt very lonely. He was not the man to give himself up to +the simple enjoyment of this healing rest. He loved best to feel the +multitude around him, to fling out his strong arms wide towards +humanity, feeling his most ardent and happiest glow when embracing +humanity. But, after his discouragements, he seemed to have thrust it +gently, though kindly, a little farther from him, had abandoned it, had +sequestered himself, in order to recover from himself and from humanity +in the ample, restful silence of utter solitude. He now felt very +lonely. And a longing awoke in him, stirring but feebly as yet, for +love to come towards him now, because hitherto love had always gone out +from him, eager <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb239" href="#pb239" +name="pb239">239</a>]</span>and passionate; a longing to be sought +himself, for once in his life; to see arms opened to him this time, +waiting to embrace him, to press him to a loving heart.... A feeling of +melancholy softened him, made him small and human, while the +mountain-wind swept past on giant wings....</p> +<p>He looked back upon his life. That was one thing which it had never +known: that concentration of all feeling on an individual. With him, +any whole-hearted feeling had always been for the many. When he looked +back, he saw spectres wandering through the past: the individual, the +unit, just a faint blur here and there; he had never felt that +all-devouring passion for them, the individuals. And yet, as a child, +as a boy, playing his dream-game amid woods, fields, heather and +stream, for whom had his longing been? To find all of them, humanity, +or the one individual soul? He did not know; but a dreamer he had +always remained, for all his thinking and doing. And now, after the +many had brought him sorrow, he began to dream, for the first time, of +the one....</p> +<p>Of the one ... the one individual soul that would open wide arms to +him and approach him with a loving embrace ... one individual soul.... +Had his quest always been the self-deception of impotence and was it +possible that now that quest had become a search for the one individual +soul? Suddenly, through his longing, he remembered an evening: +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb240" href="#pb240" name= +"pb240">240</a>]</span>a table with flowers and candles; men talking +amid the smoke of their cigars; the burly figure of a fair-haired +officer; and some strange words which that officer had just uttered as +though unconsciously, in the course of ordinary conversation: a vision +calling up early years of childhood, childish play, a little girl, +fair, with red flowers at her temples, dressed in white, running +barefoot over great boulders in a river full of rocks, under the heavy +foliage of the tropical trees, and beckoning, beckoning with her little +hand to the two elder brothers who were playing with her, fascinated by +their little sister....</p> +<p>There, in that room, through the smoke of the cigars, amid the hum +of indifferent talk, in three or four sentences, no more, that big, +fair-haired man had said it, said it just casually, with a softening of +his rough, noisy voice:</p> +<p>“It was wonderful, the way she had of playing. She would run +over the rocks and pluck the flowers. Lord, how adorable she looked, +the little witch! And we boys used to run with her, run after her, as +far as ever she pleased. She only had to beckon to us ... the damned, +adorable little witch!”</p> +<p>And the oath sounded like a caress; and the whole thing was only a +picture lasting two or three seconds, no more; and then they returned +to the smell of coffee and liqueurs, the cigar-smoke, the noisy voice +growing rough again, becoming coarse and jovial as the burly, +fair-haired soldier told some mess-room tale <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb241" href="#pb241" name= +"pb241">241</a>]</span>immediately afterwards, after that reminiscence. +But in him, Brauws, the reminiscence had lingered, as though always +visible: the picture shining in the tenderness with which the brother +had spoken of his sister; and it seemed to him as though he himself had +seen, but more vaguely and dimly, once in his life, on those Dutch +horizons of his childhood, a blur like that of the little figure, the +bright, fair-faced child, even the little red note of her flowers.... +Oh, how vague it was, how visionary! You thought of it ... and it had +gone, all of it, leaving hardly the memory of a perfume, nay, hardly +the reflection of a memory! Really, it was nothing, nothing, too airy +for thought and impossible to describe in words, however tenderly +chosen. It was nothing: if he thought about it for more than the one +second that the reflection flashed across him, it was gone, quite +lost....</p> +<p>He was feeling very lonely now.... Oh, to think of the passing years +with their millions of meetings, so many men and women just brushing +against one another, in that casual passing, just looking into one +another’s eyes, with the indifferent look of non-recognition, and +then passing one another again, never seeing one another after!... And +perhaps among them the one had passed, her eyes looking indifferently +into his eyes, a bit of her body or dress brushing against his body or +dress ... and she was gone, gone, lost altogether forever. Was that how +it had happened in his life? Or not? Was <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb242" href="#pb242" name="pb242">242</a>]</span>life sometimes +merciful at the eleventh hour, giving the one, the individual soul, as +a consolation, as a reward for that love for the many?</p> +<p>Now he felt quite lonely, he who was a dreamer as well as a thinker +and a man of action. And an irresistible wish to be no longer lonely +made him come down suddenly from that ring of glittering peaks. There +was nothing waiting for him in Holland, nothing to draw him towards +those low lands of his birth, into the swarm of utterly indifferent +people, full of petty insignificance, save alone, perhaps, that it was +there—in the same house where the vision had been conjured +up—there that the soul was waiting, there that the one individual +soul would bide his coming.</p> +<p>“It is only a fancy,” he now thought. “A fancy ... +at my age! No, if any such thing had to happen, it would have happened +in the years of youth in which we have the right to feel, to dream, to +seek ... to seek for the one. Now that so many years, silent, dead +years, lie heaped up around her and around me ... and between us, now +it becomes absurd to feel, to dream, to seek those sweet solaces which +we feel, dream and seek only when we are very young, but not when we +have lost even our right to the remembrance of our youth, the +reflection of our childish memories....”</p> +<p>Still he came down from the mountains.... <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb243" href="#pb243" name="pb243">243</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch24" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e5026" class="main">Chapter XXIV</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">It was not until he was standing in front of her, at +the Hague, that he knew, in his innermost soul, that he had come back +to Holland because of her and of her alone. It struck him at once that +her eyes were brighter, her movements younger, that her voice sounded +clearer.</p> +<p>“I have read your book!” was the first thing that she +said to him, radiantly.</p> +<p>“Well?” he asked, while his deep, almost sombre eyes +laughed in his rough, bronzed face.</p> +<p>She would not tell him that the book, <i>Peace</i>, written in his +clear, luminous style, prophesying in ringing tones the great watchword +of the future, had consoled her for his three months’ absence. +She managed to speak of it in terms of quiet appreciation, betraying no +sign of her enthusiasm except by an added brightness in her eyes and a +curious lilt in her voice, with its echo of summer and of carolling +birds. The book was a great success, written as it were in one breath, +as though he had uttered it in a single sentence of quiet knowledge, +warning them of the coming changes in the world; in a single sentence +of quiet consolation, foretelling its future destinies. There was in +his words, in that one long sentence of prophetic consolation, an +irresistible <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb244" href="#pb244" name= +"pb244">244</a>]</span>sweetness, a magic charm which affected for a +moment even the most sceptical of his readers, even though they scoffed +at it immediately afterwards; something wonderful, inspired ... and so +simple that the word was spoken almost without art, only with a note +that sounded strangely clear, as though echoing from some higher plane. +He had thought out the book during his lecturing-period in Holland and +Germany; he had written it up there, high up in the Alps, with his eyes +roaming over the ice-bound horizons; and it had often seemed to him as +if Peace were waving her argent banners in the pure air, her joyous +processions descending from the eternal snows of the upper air to the +pollution of the lower, to trumpet forth with blithe clarions the holy +tidings, the fair, unfaltering prophecy.... The book had comforted her; +she had read it in the Woods, on the dunes, by the sea; and, in the +warm summer air, with its tang of salt, she had sat with the book in +her hands and felt him with her, though absent.... She knew the +sentences by heart; but she tempered her enthusiasm, lest she should +betray herself. And, when she had spoken of the book and was silent for +a moment, he said:</p> +<p>“And now tell me about yourself! What have you been doing all +these months?”</p> +<p>“What have I been doing?...”</p> +<p>“Yes. You must have done something besides reading my +<i>Peace</i>!” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb245" href="#pb245" +name="pb245">245</a>]</span></p> +<p>She almost blushed; and a thrill went through her, that catch at her +throat and grip at her heart which his step, his voice, his glance +could still always give her; and she was not able to answer at once. +Yes, really she had done nothing that summer except read his +<i>Peace</i>! So it seemed to her for a moment. But, when she recovered +from that sudden wave of emotion, she reflected that it was not so; +that she had read other things; that she had dreamt, had thought; that +she had lived! It was very strange, but she reflected ... that she had +lived!</p> +<p>It was as though both of them had much to say to each other and yet +did not know how to say it. Van der Welcke was not at home; and they +talked together for a long time of indifferent things. He felt all the +while that a vague question was rising to his lips, a question hardly +formulated even in his mind. He longed to ask her something, such a +question as a brother’s tenderness might have prompted, to which +she would answer with a sister’s ready sympathy. But he did not +know how to speak; and so he buried within himself that strange bright +tenderness which longed to give itself expression, to ask its +questions; and he locked himself up in his deep, mournful seriousness, +the sombreness of a middle-aged man. She also, opposite him, was the +same, sat and spoke like a middle-aged woman; he remarked the soft grey +of her curling hair; and both of them, serious, almost indifferent, +talked <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb246" href="#pb246" name= +"pb246">246</a>]</span>quietly, if sympathetically, of casual +things.... And yet he felt that, deep down in herself, she was changed. +She had never looked like that before, never spoken so clearly, with +such young and lively gestures. He noticed that she had been reading, +that she had read other books than his <i>Peace</i>; and, when he told +her of the world of misery which he had seen quite lately in Germany, +she replied in a tone of compassion which struck him, because it was no +more the shuddering pity of a woman of the world for the misery that +swarms far beneath her like vermin, but true compassion, the welling up +of a new and generous youth in her soul, an enthusiasm now experienced +for the very first time. How sincerely her answer rang, how fervent +were the words in which she uttered it! He was astonished and told her +so, told her that he would never have suspected such sincerity, such +fervour, such capacity for pity in a woman of her caste. But she +defended her caste, especially because she did not wish to be too +exuberant in her new youth and new life and was perpetually suppressing +herself. And so now, to hide her feelings, she defended her caste: did +he not think that there were others who had the power of feeling as she +did for the misery of the world, women like herself, women of her +caste, not merely those who perform their perfunctory little works of +charity, but other women who welcome the new ideas and above all the +new sentiments of universal <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb247" href= +"#pb247" name="pb247">247</a>]</span>brotherhood, women who will +perhaps stamp them on their coming children, are already implanting +them, germ by germ, so that later, soon indeed, they will bear a new +generation whose lives will be based on those sentiments of +brotherhood? He was surprised at what she said, but he brushed it aside +with a rough gesture, while a glance of hatred flashed from his sombre, +brooding eyes, deep-set in his rough face—a glance that was +sometimes anguished as though with pain—and he said to her that +this was not true, that it could not be, that her whole caste was +nothing but egoism, nothing but hypocrisy, vast and monstrous, its +hypocrisy perhaps even more colossal than its egoism, and that he was +surprised at himself for having any friendly feeling towards her, a +woman of her caste. A rough candour made his voice sound harsh. But she +was not offended by it; she listened to him although out of his rough +words there came a gust which seemed likely to overthrow all that she +had long looked upon as cultured, correct, respectable, irreproachable, +moral and aristocratic. It was as though her reading, like a breeze +from the sea or the dunes, had suddenly removed and blown away from her +all the pettiness, the miserable distortion of the dwarf plant with its +aping of greatness; all the everlasting strife of opinions, interests +and prejudices waged in and around all those creatures of the world, +the women of her set. He noticed it, with a thrill of <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb248" href="#pb248" name= +"pb248">248</a>]</span>happiness; and he knew that they understood each +other. There had sprung up between them the common understanding, the +common discussion of things that are never discussed in current +conversation.</p> +<p>And, because of his happiness, he knew that he loved her, even +though it was late in the day, even though it was too late. He had +never known a love like that; he felt it now for the first, the very +first time, that wave of exultant, smiling happiness, but at the same +time he felt it like a shadow, a grief, a regret for what might have +been. She had not yet felt it like that, a regret for what might have +been, because she was living again, because she was living for the +first time, late but not too late, since she was living at last in a +real, intense, pulsating life; but to him, the man who had lived but +only never loved, it came at once, came as regret for what might have +been....</p> +<p>And his love seemed never likely to become anything else than just +that: regret.... <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb249" href="#pb249" +name="pb249">249</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch25" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e5074" class="main">Chapter XXV</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">In these days, when Constance felt herself becoming so +strangely young and alive—she who for so long believed that she +had never, never lived—she was compelled to step outside that +life dominated purely by feeling. Van Vreeswijck came to her one +evening and sat talking for hours. She liked him; she valued him as a +good friend who, notwithstanding that he really belonged to the most +insufferable section of the Court set, had shown that he was not too +much afraid of degrading himself by associating with Van der Welcke, +with her or even with Brauws, though he loudly and sweepingly condemned +Brauws’ views. She, in her new pride of life, looked down upon +him, with a kindly contempt, as one of the little people in the narrow +little circle, a humming-top spinning around itself and around other +humming-tops, just another figure in the merry-go-round which they +represented to her, all of them; but she valued his unaffected +friendship and, though she thought him anything but a great soul, she +did not think him a base or evil soul. And so she spoke to him +sympathetically that evening and promised to help him.</p> +<p>She promised; and yet it was exceedingly difficult. A new honesty +had sprung up in her, making her hesitate to whom to turn first. She +had meant to <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb250" href="#pb250" name= +"pb250">250</a>]</span>speak to Van der Welcke the next morning, in +quite an ordinary way. But, when she saw him for a moment before he +went out, he seemed to her to be suppressing some secret grief deep +down in himself: his blue boyish eyes were overcast, his mouth +half-sulking, as on rainy days when he was not able to go cycling; and +yet it was fine now, a fine autumn day, and he came down in his +cycling-suit, fetched his bicycle, said that he was going a long way, +that he would perhaps not be back for lunch. She suspected in him a +craving to get away, as fast as possible and as far as possible, and to +deaden with that wild speed the pain of his gnawing grief. But, in the +soft glow of her new youth, which illuminated everything within her and +around her, she had not the heart to tell him what she was going to do, +what she had promised to do, though in her secret self she thought it +dishonest not to tell him straight out. So she said nothing, let him +go. She looked after him for a moment, watched the angry curve of his +shoulders, as he pedalled desperately, in his mad craving to get away, +far away.</p> +<p>She sighed, felt sorry for him, she no longer knew why or wherefore +... But she had promised Van Vreeswijck; and perhaps, she thought, it +would be best so. She went out therefore, took the tram to the +Bezuidenhout, rang at Bertha’s door, found her at home. In the +hall, the removers’ men were busy packing china and glass in big +cases. Louise and <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb251" href="#pb251" +name="pb251">251</a>]</span>Frans were going from room to room with a +list in their hands, making notes of the furniture which Mamma would +want at Baarn. The little villa had been taken.</p> +<p>Constance found Bertha upstairs in Van Naghel’s study. She was +sitting at an open window in the large room with its dark, heavy +furniture, gazing into the garden, with her hands in her lap. She +seemed calmer than she had been the other evening, at Mamma’s. +She sat there in her black dress, her face old and drawn, but calmer +now; and her eyes never left the garden, a town garden full of +rose-trees and fragrant in the late summer air. But all around her the +room was gloomy and deadly and desolate. The book-cases were empty: the +books had been taken out and divided among the boys. Only the large +bronze inkstand remained on the writing-table. The furniture stood +stiff, formal, stripped, unused, lifeless, as though awaiting the day +of the sale. The bare walls showed the marks of the etchings and +family-portraits that had been taken down.</p> +<p>Bertha rose when Constance entered; she kissed her and sat down +again at once, sinking into her chair and folding her hands in her lap. +And Constance asked if she could have a moment’s serious +conversation with her. A shade of weariness passed over Bertha’s +face, as if to convey that she had had so many serious conversations +lately and would rather <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb252" href= +"#pb252" name="pb252">252</a>]</span>go on gazing into the garden. She +lifted her eyes almost sorrowfully from the riot of roses, turned them +on Constance, asked what it was about. And Constance began to tell her: +Van Vreeswijck had been with her for a long time the evening before and +had told her that he had loved Marianne for so long, so long....</p> +<p>Bertha was interested for a moment, seemed to wake from a dream:</p> +<p>“Van Vreeswijck?” she asked.</p> +<p>Constance went on. He had never said a word to Marianne, because he +feared, was almost certain, indeed, that she did not care for him. Had +it not been mentioned that they were moving to Baarn, he would perhaps +not have ventured to speak even now. But this threatened change had +suddenly compelled him to open his heart ... to her, to Constance. And +he had begged Constance to ask Bertha, to ask Marianne herself if he +might hope ... perhaps later....</p> +<p>“Van Vreeswijck?” Bertha repeated.</p> +<p>Two months ago, though she had never been a match-making mother, she +would have welcomed this proposal, would have rejoiced at it: Van +Vreeswijck was a man of good family, belonged to their own circle and +to the Court set, had a little money; not very young, perhaps, but a +good-looking, pleasant, well-bred fellow. But now she did not know, +showed little or no interest after that momentary <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb253" href="#pb253" name= +"pb253">253</a>]</span>flicker and went on dully, with her hands lying +motionless on her black dress:</p> +<p>“Well, I have nothing against it, Constance. If Marianne likes +the idea, I do too.”</p> +<p>Her voice sounded as if she were withdrawing herself from +everything, including her children’s interests. She sat there, +just blankly staring, leaving everything to them. Louise and Frans went +through the house looking out the furniture for which there would be +room at Baarn. Constance heard their voices on the stairs:</p> +<p>“So,” Louise was saying, “we have, in addition to +the furniture in Mamma’s bedroom, in Marianne’s and mine, +enough for one spare-room; then there’s the piano, from the +drawing-room, and the china-cabinet....”</p> +<p>“Isn’t the china-cabinet ever so much too big ... for +those small rooms down there?”</p> +<p>“Yes, perhaps.... Perhaps we had better leave the +china-cabinet....”</p> +<p>Bertha heard as well as Constance: perhaps Louise and Frans were +speaking loudly in the passage on purpose. Bertha, however, did not +stir: her eyes remained vague, her hands lifeless. It was obviously a +matter of supreme indifference to her whether they took the +china-cabinet with them or not....</p> +<p>And, as she did not speak at all, Constance was obliged to ask: +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb254" href="#pb254" name= +"pb254">254</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Would you mind, Bertha, if I just spoke to +Marianne?”</p> +<p>“Very well,” said Bertha, “do.”</p> +<p>“Now? Here?”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Bertha.</p> +<p>Constance rose, opened the door.</p> +<p>“So that’s two more tables ... two sofas,” Frans +counted, making notes on his list.</p> +<p>“Louise,” said Constance, at the door, “would you +ask Marianne to come here a moment?”</p> +<p>She sat down again by her sister, affectionately, took her hand, +brimming over with pity for the tired woman whom she had always looked +upon as an ever capable, busy woman of the world, now exhausted with +all the thousand cares of her life and smitten by the sudden blow that +had befallen her. And Constance’ heart beat anxiously in dread of +what was coming: she trembled, felt her eyes become wet....</p> +<p>Marianne entered, pale, almost diaphanous; and her black blouse made +her look a frail little figure of mourning, slender and drooping. For +the thing which she could not conceal in her innermost self was no +longer a light shining from her, visible to all: it was now a cloud +around her, still visible, but as a shadow of grief, whereas but lately +it had been a glow of happiness. Constance at once drew her to her, +kissed her, held her to her. And she could not find words. Bertha did +not speak. <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb255" href="#pb255" name= +"pb255">255</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Marianne ...” Constance began.</p> +<p>“Are you angry, Aunt Constance?”</p> +<p>“No, darling, why....”</p> +<p>“Yes, you are angry with me.”</p> +<p>“Why, Marianne!”</p> +<p>“Yes, you are different. I have seen it for some time; +there’s something, I know....”</p> +<p>It was no longer the joyous, playful, almost mischievous voice in +which she had said this before. It now sounded rather like a cry of +fear, because it, “that,” seemed so obvious that every one +was bound to see it, that Aunt Constance herself must needs see it ... +and be angry.</p> +<p>“Really, Marianne, I am not angry. But I wanted to speak to +you alone....”</p> +<p>“Oh, then you <i>are</i> angry!” she said, passionately, +almost hiding herself in Constance’ arms. “Don’t be +angry!” she said, almost entreatingly. “Do tell me that you +will try ... not to be angry with me!”</p> +<p>She betrayed herself almost entirely, incapable of keeping back that +which had once shone from her and which now nearly threatened to sob +itself from her. Constance could find no words.</p> +<p>“We shall soon be going away, Auntie!” said Marianne, +her features wrung with grief. “And then you will not see me any +more ... and then ... then perhaps you will never have any reason to be +angry with me again....”</p> +<p>And then, all at once, she gave a sob, an irresistible <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb256" href="#pb256" name="pb256">256</a>]</span>sob, +jarring every nerve with a shock that seemed to leave her rigid. She +shut her eyes, buried her face in Constance’ shoulder and +remained lying like this, after that one convulsive sob, motionless, +pale, as though she were dying, as though devastated with sorrow. +Bertha, opposite her, stared at her vaguely, with her hands lying +helplessly on her black dress.</p> +<p>And Constance could find no words. Time after time she thought of +mentioning Van Vreeswijck’s name, time after time the name died +away on her lips. She gently urged Marianne to control herself, +assuring her that she was not angry, had never been angry. And for a +moment, thinking of herself, she felt afraid.</p> +<p>If love could be now gladness and now mourning, as it had been and +was in this suffering, love-stricken child, should it not be the same +with her—that gladness and oh, perhaps later, O God, that +mourning!—with her, the middle-aged woman, who felt herself +growing younger and a new life coursing through her: at first, in the +soft spring flush of a girl’s dreams; now in the summer glory of +a woman’s—a young woman’s—love? But there was a +mirror opposite her; and she saw Marianne grief-smitten, shaken with +sobs ... and in herself she saw nothing! She seemed to have the power +to hide her happiness in her secret self: her agony—O +God!—she would also hide later in her secret <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb257" href="#pb257" name= +"pb257">257</a>]</span>self. She saw nothing in herself. And she knew +that nobody saw it in her. It remained secretly, mysteriously hidden. +Adolphine, Cateau, the Ruyvenaers, all of them talked about her husband +and Marianne: she knew it; but she also knew that they never talked +about herself and Brauws ... though she had now known him for months, +though he was the friend of the house and came to their house almost +daily. He was a friend of Van der Welcke’s, he was a friend of +the house and a very well-known man; and that was all. It was not +visible to anybody, to anybody....</p> +<p>Oh, was it not strange? That this same feeling, which she bore in +her innermost self, unseen by any, should shine within her as a sun, +while with Marianne it had shone out, for all the world to see, as an +illicit joy ... and was now streaming forth from her, in a convulsive +sob, as an illicit sorrow. What she, the woman, hid within her the +child could not hide within her, as though her soul were too slight for +it, so slight that it had glowed through her soul as through alabaster +and now flowed from it as from alabaster.... Oh, was it not strange, +was it not strange? After all, she did not hide it intentionally, for +she, the middle-aged woman had never, in her new young life, thought of +the people outside ... in connection with her reviving youth! But it +was so, it was so, beyond a doubt.... And it made her feel strong: it +seemed to her a grace <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb258" href= +"#pb258" name="pb258">258</a>]</span>that had been accorded her, this +power to live and go on living a new life deep in her secret self, +invisible to the people outside, this power to live and love....</p> +<p>She felt grateful: something sang in her like a hymn of +thanksgiving; but she was filled with compassion for Marianne. The +girl, despite Constance’ cheering words, still lay motionless +against her shoulder, with closed eyes, as though dead. Constance now +gently forced her to rise, led her away without a word ... while Bertha +remained sitting, just followed them both with her dull, indifferent +eyes, then looked out at the roses in the garden, her hands lying +helplessly in her black lap.</p> +<p>Constance opened the door, led the girl into the drawing-room. The +carpet had been taken up, the curtains taken down; the furniture stood +cold and lifeless on the bare boards.</p> +<p>“Marianne, darling, do listen to me now!” Constance +forced herself to say, in a firmer voice. “I am not angry and I +wanted to speak to you ... and I have something to ask you.... But +first tell me: do you believe that I care for you and that anything I +say and ask comes from nothing but my love for you?”</p> +<p>Marianne opened her eyes:</p> +<p>“Yes, Auntie.”</p> +<p>“Well, then,” said Constance, “Van +Vreeswijck....” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb259" href= +"#pb259" name="pb259">259</a>]</span></p> +<p>But Marianne suddenly drew herself up where they were +sitting—she with Constance’ arms around her—nervous, +terrified, at once knowing, understanding:</p> +<p>“No, Auntie, no!” she almost screamed.</p> +<p>“Marianne!...”</p> +<p>“No, Auntie, oh, no, no, no! I can’t do it, I +can’t do it!”</p> +<p>And she threw herself back, sobbed out her words, as though she no +longer dared fling herself into Constance’ arms.</p> +<p>“Marianne, he is very fond of you ... and he is such a good +fellow....”</p> +<p>“Oh, Auntie, no, no, no!... No, no, Auntie, no!... I +can’t do it!”</p> +<p>Constance was silent. Then she said:</p> +<p>“So, it’s no, darling?”</p> +<p>“No, Auntie, no, no!... I don’t care for him, I can +never, never care for him! Oh, no, no, it is cruel of you, if you ask +that of me, if you want to force me into it!... I don’t care for +him.... There is ... there is some one else....”</p> +<p>She was silent, stared before her like a madwoman, with the same +fixed stare as her mother. And suddenly she became very still, +accepting her anguish, and said, gently, with a heart-rending +smile:</p> +<p>“No, Auntie ... no. I would rather go ... with Mamma and +Louise ... to Baarn. We shall live very pleasantly there ... cosily, +the three of <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb260" href="#pb260" name= +"pb260">260</a>]</span>us together.... Marietje will join us later, +from her boarding-school.... Karel....”</p> +<p>She tried to utter just a word of interest in her mother, sisters +and brothers, but her indifferent, dead voice belied her. There was +nothing in her but what had once shone from her, what was now trying to +sob from her....</p> +<p>Constance clasped her in her arms:</p> +<p>“My child!”</p> +<p>“No, Auntie, you will tell him, won’t you?... Tell him +that I am sorry ... but ... but that I don’t care for him.... I +care ... I care for some one else....”</p> +<p>And now, without speaking a word, raising her beseeching, +tear-filled eyes to her aunt’s, she said to Constance, without +speaking a word, told her only with her beseeching glance, told her +that she loved ... that she loved Uncle Henri ... and that she +couldn’t help it; that she knew it was very wrong of her; that +she begged her aunt to forgive her and implored her please not to be +angry; that she entreated only to be allowed to suffer and sob about +it; but that for the rest she hoped for nothing more from life, +nothing, nothing; that she would go quietly to Baarn, with her mother +and sisters, and try to manage to live there and pine away silently in +her grief....</p> +<p>And Constance, as she held her in her arms, thought: <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb261" href="#pb261" name="pb261">261</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Living ... Living.... This child ... this poor child ... is +living early; and, if I have begun to live late ... O God, O God, must +I also suffer as she is doing ... must I also suffer some day ... soon, +perhaps ... if one cannot have life without suffering?...” +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb262" href="#pb262" name= +"pb262">262</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch26" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e5239" class="main">Chapter XXVI</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">When Constance returned home, she was even more +troubled than she had been in the morning by what she called her +dishonesty towards Van der Welcke. She lunched alone with Addie; Van +der Welcke did not come in, was evidently trying to lose himself on his +bicycle in the roads outside the Hague and lunching off a sandwich and +a glass of beer at a country inn. He did not come home till very late, +tired and dusty, and he was in an unbearable mood, as though his +surfeit of movement and speed and space had produced nothing but an +evil intoxication and not the beneficent anæsthesia which he had +expected of it. Roughly, as though dispirited and disgusted, he put +away his machine, without bestowing on it the care which he usually +gave to it after a long ride, angry with the lifeless steel which had +not consoled him, which had not shown itself a friend this time. It was +three o’clock; and he went straight to his room to change his +clothes.</p> +<p>Constance, in her drawing-room, remained uneasy. In her heart there +was a deep pity for Marianne; and for him too an almost motherly pity, +which made her eyes fill with tears. Oh, when she had found so very +much for herself, so much that was broad and lofty, radiant and lovely, +of which she <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb263" href="#pb263" name= +"pb263">263</a>]</span>asked no more than that it should exist, exist +in soft radiance within herself, a mystic sun, a glowing mystery, +invisible to all but her, it pained her that those two, Henri and +Marianne, could find nothing for themselves and for each other!... She +listened anxiously to the sounds upstairs. She heard his footsteps +tramping overhead, heard him even throwing his clothes about, splashing +the water noisily, almost breaking the jug and basin in his savage +recklessness, his violent resentment against everything. It all +reechoed in her; she kept on starting: there he was flinging his boots +across the room; bang went the door of his wardrobe; and, when he had +finished, she heard him go to his den. Everything became still; the +warmth of the summer afternoon floated in through the open windows; a +heat mist hung over the garden of the little villa; in the kitchen, the +maid was droning out a sentimental song, in a dreary monotone....</p> +<p>Constance’ uneasiness increased. Yes, she must, she must tell +him something: she almost became frightened at the idea of telling him +nothing, of concealing from him entirely that Van Vreeswijck had asked +her to go to Marianne. And yet nothing compelled her to say anything to +Henri; and it would perhaps not even, she thought, be fair to Van +Vreeswijck. She did not know; her thoughts rambled on uneasily. But +persistently, as though from out of the new, fresh youth that was hers, +one idea <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb264" href="#pb264" name= +"pb264">264</a>]</span>obtruded itself: it would not be honest to tell +Henri nothing, not even a casual word, so that at any rate he should +not imagine, if he came to hear later, that she had been plotting +behind his back....</p> +<p>All of a sudden, the anxiety, the uneasiness became so great in her +that she rose, impulsively, and went upstairs. The servant was droning +sentimentally. Constance quietly opened the door of Henri’s +little den. He was sitting in a chair, with his arms hanging down +beside him; he was not even smoking.</p> +<p>“Am I disturbing you?” she asked. “I should like +to speak to you for a moment....”</p> +<p>He gave her a sharp look. Usually, when she came in like that, it +meant that she had something to reproach him with, that she was +spoiling for a scene ... about a trifle, sometimes about nothing. She +would come in then with the same words; and her voice at once sounded +aggressive. This time, though she tried to speak gently, her voice, +because of her uneasiness and anxiety, sounded harsh and discordant; +and he, with his irritated nerves, seemed to hear the aggressive note, +the prelude to a scene. It was as though his nerves at once became set, +as though he were pulling himself together in self-defence:</p> +<p>“What is it now?” he asked, roughly.</p> +<p>She sat down, outwardly calm, inwardly trembling, anxious, uneasy. +And she made an effort to <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb265" href= +"#pb265" name="pb265">265</a>]</span>clear her hoarse voice and to +speak calmly ... so that he might know:</p> +<p>“Oh,” she began, reflectively, wishing to show him at +once that she had not come to make reproaches, that she did not wish to +make a scene, “I wanted to speak to you ... to ask your +advice....”</p> +<p>Her voice, now under control, sounded soft, as she wished it; and he +was astonished for a second, just remembered, almost unconsciously, +that she had not been so quick-tempered lately, that in fact they had +not had a scene for weeks. Still he continued suspicious: she, who +never asked his advice! And he echoed:</p> +<p>“To ask my advice?”</p> +<p>“Yes,” she went on, in that same calm, reflective tone, +with a certain constraint, “I wanted to tell you—what do +you think?—Vreeswijck stayed talking to me for a long time +yesterday evening ... and he wanted absolutely....”</p> +<p>“Wanted what?”</p> +<p>She saw him turn pale; his eyes blazed angrily, as though sparks +were flashing from that vivid blue, generally so young and boyish.</p> +<p>“He would so much like ... he asked me....”</p> +<p>She could not get the words out, looked at him, afraid of his eyes, +now that she was in no mood for a scene of mutual recrimination. But +she could not keep silent either: <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb266" +href="#pb266" name="pb266">266</a>]</span></p> +<p>“He asked me ... if I thought ... that Marianne....”</p> +<p>She saw him give a shiver. He understood it all. Nevertheless, she +went on:</p> +<p>“That Marianne could get to care for him.... He asked me to go +to Bertha ... and ask her....”</p> +<p>“Van Vreeswijck? Marianne?” he repeated; and his eyes +were almost black. “Asked you ... to go to Bertha?... Well, +you’re not mixing yourself up in it, are you? You’re not +going, surely?”</p> +<p>“I went this morning,” she said; and her voice once more +sounded discordant.</p> +<p>He seemed to hear a hostile note in it. And, unable to contain +himself, he flew into a passion:</p> +<p>“You went? You went this morning?” he raved; and even in +his raving she saw the suffering. “Why need you mix yourself up +in it? What business has Van Vreeswijck to come asking you?... Van +Vreeswijck....”</p> +<p>He could not find the words. All that he could get out was a rough +word, cruel, hard and insulting:</p> +<p>“Plotting and scheming ... if you want to go +plotting....”</p> +<p>Her eyes flamed; she felt his intention to insult her. But his +suffering was so obvious, she saw him so plainly writhing under his +pain, that the angry <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb267" href="#pb267" +name="pb267">267</a>]</span>tempest died down at once and she merely +said, very gently:</p> +<p>“She has refused him.”</p> +<p>He looked at her. The black cloud lifted from his eyes, which turned +blue again, and his gloomy frown gave way to his usual boyish +expression, full of wide-eyed astonishment now. His features relaxed, +his whole body relaxed; he gave a shiver and sat down, as though all +his temper and rage were subsiding like a sudden storm that had arisen +for no reason at all. And he asked, slowly:</p> +<p>“She ... has refused him?”</p> +<p>“Yes. Of course, Bertha had nothing against it. But Marianne, +when I spoke to her, declined at once. I did not insist. Poor +Vreeswijck!”</p> +<p>“Yes, poor fellow!” he said, mechanically.</p> +<p>“I wanted to tell you, because ...”</p> +<p>“Because what?”</p> +<p>“Because Vreeswijck is a friend and I thought it better that +you should know. I meant to tell you this morning, before I started. +But you went out....”</p> +<p>He looked at her again, with a keen glance, wondering if she was +sincere or if there was anything behind her words; wondering what she +thought, knew or guessed about him and Marianne; what she would really +have liked; if it was a disappointment to her that Marianne had +declined so promptly: so promptly that Constance had not insisted for a +moment. <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb268" href="#pb268" name= +"pb268">268</a>]</span>But she was so calm and gentle, as she stood +leaning against his table, that he found her incomprehensible and was +only conscious of breathing again after that first moment when it had +seemed to him that his throat, lungs, chest and heart were all gripped +in one hideous constriction.</p> +<p>They were silent, she standing there and he looking at her, with his +keen glance. A heat haze hung over the garden; the heavy summer scent +floated up to them; from the kitchen came the monotonous voice of the +housemaid droning out her love-song. And suddenly a sort of remorse +loomed as a spectre before Constance, because she had fettered him to +her life, for all his life, years ago; because she had fettered him to +her then by accepting his sacrifice and that of his parents in her +despair and helplessness, reviled outcast as she then was. It flashed +before her: the recollection of that day when he came to her in +Florence, when he made his gift of himself to her, made it +despairingly, feeling even then perhaps, despite the forced +love-illusion of passion, the life-long mistake which they were +mutually making. She had accepted his gift, taken his youth; she had +rendered him aimless, him and his life, his career and his happiness: +all that he might perhaps yet have found. It flashed before her again: +the recollection of that good-looking boy, the way he had come to her +in Florence and the way she had taken everything, without having +anything to give <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb269" href="#pb269" +name="pb269">269</a>]</span>him in exchange. Oh, how the past oppressed +her now, how it hung round her shoulders, crushing her like a nightmare +that was not to be shaken off, like the embrace of some leering +monster! Oh, the remorse, the remorse that was beginning to torture +her!</p> +<p>She stared before her as she stood leaning against the table; and +beads of perspiration began to come out on her forehead in the small, +warm room, full of summer haze. He continued to look at her, +penetratingly. And suddenly he heard her voice speak his name:</p> +<p>“Henri....”</p> +<p>He did not answer, thought her strange, did not recognize her; and +again he wondered what she thought, guessed or knew ... and what else +she wanted to say. But she, while a sweat of fear broke from her, made +a great inward effort to release herself from the oppression of her +past and her remorse, to be once more the woman that she had become: +the woman young again; the woman whose life was beginning for the first +time; the woman who thought, dreamed and loved; the woman in whom +nowadays the thoughts and dreams sometimes darted and darted like +multitudes of laughing butterfly fancies, swiftly, swiftly in front of +them; the woman who loved so deeply that she floated in ecstasy as in +the mystic sun of herself. Did she not now see farther than the usual +little circle which <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb270" href="#pb270" +name="pb270">270</a>]</span>had bounded her vision for years: the +little circle of the little prejudices, the little moralities, the +little follies; the little circle in which all the others—her own +people, people like herself, the small people—felt happy and +comfortable with their little philosophies, their little religions, +their little dogmas? Had she not, for weeks and months past, been +contemplating more distant prospects, all the distant cities of light +on the horizons above which sailed the spacious cloud-worlds and across +which shot the revealing lightning-flashes? In the love which she had +already confessed to herself so honestly that it etherealized into +sheer ecstasy, had she not risen above all that was still left in her +and about her of prejudice and insincerity, that sneering at herself +and others, with all the rest of that feeble cynicism? If she wanted to +live, must she not be honest, honest in all things? Oh, she +felt—in these thoughts which rushed through her mind in those few +seconds while she leant against the table, her forehead bedewed with +heat and excitement—that she was shaking off the nightmare of the +past and that, if she felt remorse, she must also try to give back what +she had taken ... and what had never belonged to her, because it had +never been her right, because it had never been her happiness, any more +than his, nor her life, any more than his life! No, she had grown out +of that prejudice, the horror of making herself ridiculous; and what +she had stolen she <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb271" href="#pb271" +name="pb271">271</a>]</span>would like to give back now ... in so far +as was possible to her!</p> +<p>“Henri,” she repeated, for her whole thought had rushed +through her in those two or three seconds, “there is something +more I want to say to you. I should like to talk frankly to you. +Promise me to keep calm; and do not let us lose our tempers. It is not +necessary to lose our tempers, Henri, in order to understand each other +at last....”</p> +<p>“What do you mean?” he asked.</p> +<p>“I have been thinking a great deal lately,” she +continued, turning her steady eyes towards him. “I have been +thinking a very great deal, about our life, about both our lives ... +and about the mistake we made....”</p> +<p>He became impatient:</p> +<p>“What on earth are you driving at and what is it all +about?” he asked, with an irritable shake of his shoulders.</p> +<p>“Come, Henri,” she said, gently, “let us talk for +once, for once in our lives, and be quite frank and serious. Our life +has been a mistake. And the fault....”</p> +<p>“Is mine, I suppose?” he broke in, angrily, +aggressively, working himself up for the scene which he foresaw.</p> +<p>She looked at him long and deeply and then said, firmly:</p> +<p>“The fault is mine.” <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb272" href="#pb272" name="pb272">272</a>]</span></p> +<p>He remained silent, again shook his shoulders, restlessly, not +understanding her, not recognizing her at all. This woman was now a +stranger to him; and, above all, her calm seriousness confused him: he +would almost have preferred that she should fly out at him and have +done with it and tell him that he had no business to go bicycling alone +with Marianne.</p> +<p>But she did not do this, she merely repeated, calmly:</p> +<p>“The fault is mine. The fault, the blame is mine alone, Henri. +I ought not, in Florence, to have accepted the sacrifice which you made +for me, which your father and mother made for me. It was my fault that +your life did not become ... what it might have been.”</p> +<p>Yes, she was frank and calm: he had to admit that; and it was not a +crafty prelude leading up to one of her angry scenes. She was speaking +so quietly and gently; her voice had a note of sorrowful humility that +almost touched him.</p> +<p>“But what are you driving at?” he said, nevertheless, in +a voice that was still nervous and jerky. “You are very frank and +honest in looking at things like that; but what is the use of it all +now? It is so long ago. It is the past. And it was my duty then to make +up for the wrong which I had done you.”</p> +<p>“I had done you quite as great a wrong, Henri. <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb273" href="#pb273" name="pb273">273</a>]</span>I +should not have accepted your sacrifice. I ought not to have become +your wife.”</p> +<p>“But what would you have done then?”</p> +<p>“I should have gone away, somewhere or other. If I had been +then the woman that I am now, I should have gone away, somewhere or +other. And I should have left you to your life ... and to the happiness +that was perhaps awaiting you elsewhere....”</p> +<p>“I should have had to give up the service just the +same....”</p> +<p>“But you would have been freer without me. You were still so +young: you had your whole life before you; and you would perhaps have +found your happiness. As it is, you have never found it ... or ... +perhaps too late.”</p> +<p>He stood up, very restless and nervous, and his boyish eyes pleaded +anxiously:</p> +<p>“Constance, I can’t talk in this way. I’m not used +to it....”</p> +<p>“Can’t you face things seriously for a +moment?...”</p> +<p>“No, I can’t. It upsets me. I don’t know: you mean +to be nice, I believe, but please don’t let us talk like this. +We’re not accustomed to it. And I ... I can’t do it. You +can see for yourself, it upsets me.”</p> +<p>“Come,” she said, in a motherly tone, “you are not +so much upset as all that. You can have a <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb274" href="#pb274" name="pb274">274</a>]</span>bicycle-ride +afterwards and you will feel better. But first let us talk seriously +for a moment....”</p> +<p>He sighed, sank into his chair, submitted to her stronger will. If +only she had flown out at him, he would have stormed back at her; but +she was saying such strange things, the sort of things that people +never said, and she was so calm and frank about it, calmer and franker +than people ever were.</p> +<p>“You will listen seriously for a moment? Well, what I want to +ask you is this: have you never thought that it would be better ... if +we just quietly separated, Henri?”</p> +<p>He said nothing, looked at her with his great wondering eyes.</p> +<p>“It is certainly very late,” she said, “very late +for me to propose it. But it is perhaps not too late.... Let us be +honest, Henri: we have never been happy together. You might perhaps +still be happy without me, released from me, free....”</p> +<p>He continued to look at her, his eyes still full of amazement; and +it seemed as though he was afraid to turn his gaze towards a life of +such transcendent peace and quietness and sincerity. It seemed to him +that she was urging him to take a road which grew fainter and fainter +as it took its mystic, winding way towards clouds ... towards things +that did not exist.</p> +<p>“I?... Happy?” he stammered, not knowing what to say. +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb275" href="#pb275" name= +"pb275">275</a>]</span></p> +<p>But a more concrete thought now came into his mind:</p> +<p>“And Addie?” he asked.</p> +<p>“I am not forgetting him,” she said, gently. “He +is the child of both of us, whom we both love. If we quietly ... +quietly separate, if you become happy later, he will be able to +understand that his parents, however passionately they both loved him, +separated because it was better that they should. He need not suffer +through it. He will not suffer through it. At least, I like to think +that he will not. If we are only honest, Henri, he cannot suffer +through it.”</p> +<p>“And you ... what would you do?”</p> +<p>She blushed, but did not lose her composure; he did not see her +blush. She had not yet thought of herself for a moment: she was +thinking, had been thinking, after that wave of remorse and after +holding Marianne that morning in her arms, only of him and Marianne, of +their happiness, his and Marianne’s, even though she did not +mention the girl’s name again, once she had told him that +Marianne had refused Van Vreeswijck. She was thinking only of the two +of them.... What would she do? She did not know. Her love, it is true, +rose radiantly before her: her love, her new life; but she was not +thinking of outward change. Life, the real life, was an inward thing; +outwardly she was the mother of her son and would remain so.... +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb276" href="#pb276" name= +"pb276">276</a>]</span></p> +<p>“I?” she asked. “Nothing. I should simply stay as +I am. Addie could be with us in turns.”</p> +<p>“It would distress him, Constance....”</p> +<p>“Perhaps, at first.... But he would soon +understand.”</p> +<p>“Constance, tell me, why are you speaking like +this?”</p> +<p>“In what way?”</p> +<p>“What do you really mean, Constance? What do you mean by my +happiness?”</p> +<p>“Only what I say, Henri: that you may still be able to find +your happiness.”</p> +<p>“You are frank,” he said, forcing himself to adopt her +tone, though it was difficult for him to speak like that. “You +are frank. I will also try to be frank. My happiness? You speak of my +happiness?... I am too old to find that now.”</p> +<p>“No, you are not old. You are young.”</p> +<p>“And you?”</p> +<p>“I ... am old. But there is no question about me. I am +thinking ... of you.”</p> +<p>She looked at him and he suddenly understood her. He understood her, +but he writhed under so much frankness and at seeing life so +honestly:</p> +<p>“No, no, Constance,” he mumbled.</p> +<p>“Think it over,” she said, gently. “If you like +... I will agree. Only ... let us do it quietly, Henri, ... let us do +it, if possible, with something of affection for each other.” +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb277" href="#pb277" name= +"pb277">277</a>]</span></p> +<p>Her eyes filled with tears. He was very much moved:</p> +<p>“No, Constance, no,” he mumbled.</p> +<p>“Henri, have the courage to be honest. Have the courage and do +not be weak. Be a man. I am only a woman and I have the +courage.”</p> +<p>“Constance, people ...”</p> +<p>“No, Henri, you must not hesitate because of people. If we +cannot do it, it would be because of Addie. But I like to think that, +if he understands, he will not suffer through it. He <i>must</i> not +suffer through it: that would be selfish of him; and he is not +selfish.”</p> +<p>“No, Constance, no!” he protested again.</p> +<p>“Think it over, Henri,” she repeated. “Think it +all out. I shall think of Addie also. You know how passionately devoted +I am to him. But ...”</p> +<p>“Constance, it is all too late.”</p> +<p>“But think it over, Henri.”</p> +<p>“Yes, yes, Constance, I shall ... I shall think it +over.”</p> +<p>“And, if we decide upon it ... let us do it ... let us decide +to do it with something of affection for each other ...”</p> +<p>“Yes, Constance ... yes, with affection ... You are nice ... +you are kind ...”</p> +<p>He looked at her, his chest heaving with emotion; a haze dimmed the +boyish glance of his eyes. She had meant to go, quietly, to leave him +alone. She <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb278" href="#pb278" name= +"pb278">278</a>]</span>went to the door, without another word, another +look, wishing to leave him alone with his thoughts.</p> +<p>“Constance!” he cried, hoarsely.</p> +<p>She looked round. He was standing before her; and she saw him +quivering, trembling with the emotion, the shock which the reality of +life had sent shuddering through him. For a moment they stood in front +of each other; and, because they saw into each other’s eyes, they +told each other once more—silently, without words—that they +understood each other! A great gratitude, an emotion that to him was +almost superhuman shot through his small soul and flowed over her. And, +impotently, he cried once more, like a man in a fever:</p> +<p>“Constance!”</p> +<p>He flung himself, distractedly, desperately, with a wild impulse, +into her arms; bursting into sobs, he buried his head in her breast. +She started violently; she felt his convulsive tremors against her +heart. Then she threw her arm around him, stroked his hair. It was as +though she were comforting her son.</p> +<p>“I am mad, I am mad!” he muttered.</p> +<p>He released himself, hurriedly pressed a quivering kiss on her +forehead and tore down the stairs. And, when she went down to her +drawing-room, she suddenly heard the front-door slam and saw him +bicycling away like a madman, his back arched like a +professional’s. He pedalled, pedalled furiously: <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb279" href="#pb279" name="pb279">279</a>]</span>she +watched him lose himself ... in movement, speed and space ...</p> +<p>“Poor boy!” she thought.</p> +<p>Then she sank into a chair, while the room swam round her. She +closed her eyes and her hands fell limply at her side. So she sat for +half an hour, unconscious, alone ... as if the new life had been too +keen, too intense, with its pure air, its honesty ... too rare and keen +in its cold-blue ether ... and as if she were swooning away in it.... +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb280" href="#pb280" name= +"pb280">280</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch27" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e5502" class="main">Chapter XXVII</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">She came to herself with a start and did not know +whether she had been unconscious or asleep. At the same moment, she +heard the bell and through the curtain she saw Brauws, standing outside +the door.</p> +<p>“It is he, it is he!” an exultant voice cried inside +her.</p> +<p>But at the same time she felt too nervous and overwrought to receive +him, just ordinarily and naturally. She stopped Truitje in the hall, +said that she had a headache and the girl must say not at home; and she +fled to her bedroom and locked herself in.</p> +<p>“It was he, it was he!” the voice still sang, almost +sorrowfully.</p> +<p>But she could not have talked ordinarily and naturally.... Suddenly +she did what she had not yet done that day: she thought of herself. If +they were to separate, Henri and she, then she herself would be +free!... Free! A violent longing surged up in her to see Brauws, to +speak to him, to say just one word to him, to ask his advice, to +abandon herself, as it were, to that advice!... At this moment, for the +first time, the thought occurred to her that he must love her too. +Would he come so often, if not? Would he speak as he did, reveal +himself <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb281" href="#pb281" name= +"pb281">281</a>]</span>so completely, otherwise? Would he otherwise ... +she did not know what; but, as she recalled him since he returned from +Switzerland, she felt, indeed she was certain that his whole being was +permeated with love for her ... a love that was strangely akin to +regret, but still love ... Was her love regret? No.... Was her love +hope? No, not hope either.... Her love, hers, was only life, had +hitherto been only life: the lives which another woman lives from her +eighteenth year onwards she had as it were hastened to live now, late +as it was. Oh, to live right on from those first young girlish dreams +which had danced along radiant paths towards the high clouds above her +... while all the time her incredulous little laugh had tempered their +eager joy!... But now, since she had spoken to Van der Welcke, now, +suddenly, since she had awakened from her sleep or her swoon after that +breath of pure ether, that perfect sincerity, now she felt that her +love was not only just existence, just life—the real existence, +the real life—but that the most human emotions were suddenly +passing through her soul; that she herself regretted what might have +been; that she herself hoped—O Heaven!—for what might yet +be. It was suddenly as though all her past had fallen from her and as +though she saw a number of new paths winding towards new years, towards +the wide fields of the future, nothing but the future. It was as though +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb282" href="#pb282" name= +"pb282">282</a>]</span>this new inner life of thinking and feeling, +this new life of her soul, were also about to begin a new actual life, +a life of fresh seasons, which lay spread before her broad and generous +as summer and towards which she would fly in joyous haste, because it +was already so late ... but not yet too late, not yet too late....</p> +<p>She thought of herself, for the first time that day; and a violent +emotion throbbed within her, almost taking away her breath. Henri would +be back presently: would he tell her that that was best, that they +would separate, with still something of affection and gratitude for +each other, heedless of people and of everything that made up their +world, because they were at last entitled to their own happiness, to +the happiness of their own souls and to the happiness of those who +loved them really? They would shake from them all that had been +falsehood during all those long, long years; and they would now be +true, honest with themselves and with every one; and they would be +happy.... It was as if these dreams were already lifting her up out of +the ring of falsehood, the ring of small people, small souls. Sitting +there in her chair, she hid her face in her hands, compressed her +closed eyes until, in their blindness, they saw all the colours of the +rainbow flashing before them ... so as not to see her room, so as to +see nothing but her dreams....</p> +<p>“Mamma!...” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb283" href= +"#pb283" name="pb283">283</a>]</span></p> +<p>She started: it was Addie come home. And the start which she gave +was a violent one, for she had forgotten him; and a quick compunction +shot through those last flashes. She had forgotten him; and yet time +after time she had said to herself that she must speak to him as if he +were a man.</p> +<p>She now called to him to come in, for he always looked in on her +when he returned from school in the afternoon. And, when she saw him, +she felt as if she were waking from a dream. Still the violent emotion +continued to throb in her; and she felt that she could not be silent. +She began, at once:</p> +<p>“Addie, I have been talking to Papa.”</p> +<p>It was impossible for her to go on. Not until he sat down beside +her, took her hand in his, did she continue, with difficulty:</p> +<p>“Addie, would it make you very unhappy ... if ...”</p> +<p>“If what, Mamma?”</p> +<p>“If we, Papa and I ... quite quietly, Addie ... without any +bitterness ... were to separate?”</p> +<p>He started inwardly, but remained outwardly calm. He knew the +struggle that was going on in both of them. Had he not constantly heard +his father’s name mixed up with Marianne’s? Did he not know +and had not he—he alone, within himself, without even letting his +mother notice it—had he not guessed the real reason why Mamma had +had a different <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb284" href="#pb284" +name="pb284">284</a>]</span>expression, a different voice, a different +step during the last few months? Did he not feel what prompted her to +go for long, long walks—sometimes with him, sometimes +alone—over the dunes, towards the sea?... Though he did not know +her new life, he had guessed her love....</p> +<p>There was a buzzing in his ears as she talked, as she explained to +him how it would be better like that, for Papa, and how they both loved +him, their child. She mentioned no names, neither Marianne’s nor +Brauws’. He remained quiet; and she did not see what was passing +within him, not even when he said:</p> +<p>“If you think ... if Papa is of opinion ... that it will be +better so, Mamma....”</p> +<p>She went on speaking, while her heart throbbed violently with the +force of her emotion. She spoke of honesty and sincerity ... of +happiness for Papa ... perhaps. A curious shyness made her shrink from +speaking of herself. He hardly heard her words. But he understood her: +he understood what she actually wanted, the future which she wished to +bring about and compel. But a passion of melancholy overwhelmed him and +his heart was weighed down with grief. He heard her speak of her +life—his father’s and hers—as a chain, a yoke, a lie. +He felt dimly that she perhaps was right; and the light of those +glowing dreams of hers made something shine vaguely before his childish +eyes. But he found in it only sadness; and his <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb285" href="#pb285" name= +"pb285">285</a>]</span>heart was still heavy with grief. He was their +child; and it seemed as though something in his soul would be rent +asunder if they separated, even though their life together was a lie, a +chain, a yoke. He tried to weigh those words, to sound their depths, to +feel them. But it was only his sadness that he measured, only the depth +of his own sorrow. If they were to separate, his parents whom he loved +so well, both of them, each of them, whom he had learnt to love so well +just perhaps because they did not love each other, then his love, so it +suddenly appeared to him, was something which they could both do +without, something of no value, to either of them. That was how he felt +it, though he could not have put it into words; and he felt it even +more profoundly than any words could have expressed.... But she noticed +nothing in him. It was not the first time that he had felt the cruelty +of life, even towards a child, a boy; and it was not his nature to show +weakness. That other time, after his childish soul had suffered so +grievously, when he had doubted whether he was his father’s son, +he had resolved to triumph over life’s cruelties and not to show +anything and to be strong. Now the moment seemed to have come. He +remembered his first great trouble, he remembered his resolve: the +resolve to be always strong after that first childish weakness; and he +was able to repeat, calmly:</p> +<p>“If you think ... that it will be better for both <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb286" href="#pb286" name="pb286">286</a>]</span>of +you, Mamma ... then it is not for me to object....”</p> +<p>She thought him almost cold; but he kissed her, said that he, +whatever happened, would remain the child and the son of both of them, +that he would love them both, equally....</p> +<p>But, because of that coldness, the shadow of a doubt suddenly +crossed her mind; and it seemed as though her dreams grew dark and +cloudy....</p> +<p>“Addie,” she asked again, “tell me frankly, tell +me honestly that I am right, that it will be a good thing ... for +Papa....”</p> +<p>“And for you?...”</p> +<p>“And for me,” she echoed; and he saw her blush. +“Or ... or, Addie, my boy, my darling, is ... is it all too late? +Is it too late ... for Papa’s happiness?”</p> +<p>“And for yours too, you mean.... Too late? Why should it be +too late?”</p> +<p>She looked at him, thought him hard, but guessed that he was +suffering more than he was willing to admit....</p> +<p>“I thought first ... of Papa’s happiness, Addie,” +she said, softly. “Because Papa has never been happy with me ... +with me who took everything from him and gave him nothing in return, I +thought first of all ... of Papa’s happiness and afterwards ... +afterwards....”</p> +<p>“Afterwards...?” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb287" +href="#pb287" name="pb287">287</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Yes, Addie, then I thought ... of my own! But perhaps it is +not all as I picture it, Addie ... and perhaps it is all too +late....”</p> +<p>Then he took her in his arms; and she felt his young, sturdy, boyish +body against hers, felt it all at once, as a pillar of strength.</p> +<p>“Too late? Why should it be, Mamma? Let us first hear what +Papa thinks. Too late? No, Mamma. If you see it in this light for the +first time now, why ... why should it be too late?”</p> +<p>She threw her arms round his neck and laid her head on his +shoulder:</p> +<p>“I don’t know, dear. I thought ... I thought that it +would be a good thing ... for everybody ... for all of us ... Perhaps I +am wrong. I can’t tell.... I am tired, dear. Leave me here by +myself. Have your dinner with Papa: I don’t want any dinner, I am +tired, I sha’n’t come down.... Hark, there’s Papa +coming in. Go and tell him that I am tired. Go now, go at once.... I +can’t say: perhaps it is not as I thought, Addie, and perhaps ... +perhaps it is all ... too late!”</p> +<p>She saw his eyes grow softer, full of pity; he pressed her to +him.</p> +<p>“Addie!” she suddenly implored. “Whatever I may +lose, never, never let me lose you! For all the rest is perhaps +illusion ... and all too late, too late.... But you ... you are real, +you exist!” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb288" href="#pb288" +name="pb288">288</a>]</span></p> +<p>She held him, clung to his strong shoulders; and he saw her very +pale, anxious-eyed:</p> +<p>“Mamma....”</p> +<p>“No, leave me now, my boy ... leave me alone ... and go to +Papa....”</p> +<p>He kissed her once more and went away.</p> +<p>She stayed behind, looked at herself in the glass. She saw herself, +after all this emotion, saw her pale face, her grey hair:</p> +<p>“I don’t know,” she murmured. “Oh, to live +really, I must not ... I must not think of myself!... For me ... it is +all too late! If it has to be so, if we separate, it must be only ... +only for him, for Henri ... and for ... and for Marianne!”</p> +<p>She sank into her chair, covered her face, kept her eyes tightly +closed; but their blindness no longer saw the rainbow-colours flashing +before them.... <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb289" href="#pb289" +name="pb289">289</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch28" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e5606" class="main">Chapter XXVIII</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">Addie, downstairs, helped his father with the bicycle, +took it for him to the little room by the kitchen, promised Papa to see +to it for him in the morning.</p> +<p>“Am I late for dinner?” asked Van der Welcke.</p> +<p>He was tired and hot; his clothes were sticking to him.</p> +<p>“Mamma has a head-ache,” said Addie. “Go and +change your things first: dinner can wait.”</p> +<p>Van der Welcke dragged himself upstairs. He had bicycled so hard +that day—both morning and afternoon—with his eyes fixed in +front of him, his thoughts fixed in front of him, that his body was +tingling with weariness, his eyes blind with that fixed staring, as if +they had been full of dust and sand.</p> +<p>“Come and help me,” he said to Addie.</p> +<p>And, going to the bathroom, he flung off all his clothes and took a +shower-bath, while Addie brought him fresh things.</p> +<p>He was ready in ten minutes, doing everything in a feverish, tired +hurry:</p> +<p>“Now we can have dinner. Isn’t Mamma coming +down?”</p> +<p>“No.”</p> +<p>They sat down opposite each other, but Van der <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb290" href="#pb290" name= +"pb290">290</a>]</span>Welcke was not hungry, did not eat. The servant +took something up to Constance. Dinner was over in a quarter of an +hour.</p> +<p>“I <i>am</i> tired!” Van der Welcke confessed.</p> +<p>The maid had soon cleared the table. And they remained in the +dining-room, which was now growing dark.</p> +<p>The French windows were open and the sultry evening filled the room. +Van der Welcke, who had thrown himself into a chair, got up restlessly, +strode into the garden, came back again. When he saw Addie sitting +quietly on the sofa, he flung himself beside him, laid his head on the +boy’s knees. Then, with a deep sigh, he fell asleep, almost +immediately.</p> +<p>Addie sat without moving, let his father sleep there, with his head +on his son’s knees.</p> +<p>From another villa, a stream of yellow light flowed across the +garden and cast dim shadows in the dark dining-room. And in the kitchen +the maid went on drearily humming the same tune as in the afternoon, as +though she were humming unconsciously.</p> +<p>The boy sat still, with set lips, looking down at his father, whose +chest rose and fell peacefully, with the deep breathing which Addie +felt against his hand....</p> +<p>That afternoon, those two, his father and mother, had spoken to each +other, for the first time, seriously, in truth and sincerity, as his +mother had told him. <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb291" href="#pb291" +name="pb291">291</a>]</span>And now the thought was whirling in both +their minds that, after years and years of wretchedness and disunion, +they were going to separate after all! For Papa’s happiness, +Mamma had said; and Addie believed that that was how she meant it.</p> +<p>Apart from this, there had been no names mentioned; but Addie knew +that both Mamma and Papa, that afternoon, had thought—as he was +thinking now—had thought, behind their spoken words, of Marianne. +And now jealousy—that heritage from both his parents—sprang +up in the boy’s breast, jealousy no longer vague and formless. He +felt it with a keener pang because Papa, at this moment, cared more for +Marianne than for him. He felt too, for the first time, that, though he +did not mean to, he loved his father better than his mother: his father +who was like a child, who was himself a boy, a brother, a friend to +him, something more than a father almost. In their brotherly +comradeship, they had seemed gradually to lose sight of the difference +in age, of filial respect; and in Addie’s love for his father +there was an element—not yet fully developed, but slowly +gathering strength—of protection almost, a feeling that he was +perhaps not yet the stronger, but that he would become so when he was a +little older. It was a strange feeling, but it had always come natural +to him, that way of looking upon his father as a younger brother to be +loved and protected. <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb292" href="#pb292" +name="pb292">292</a>]</span></p> +<p>It was perhaps all for nothing, useless, he thought, and worthless. +It was Marianne that Papa cared for now. And he remembered how he had +sometimes thought that Papa was so young that one could imagine him +with a very young wife, a young girl like Addie’s cousins, a girl +like ... Marianne.</p> +<p>So it was to happen ... Papa and Mamma ... would separate ... +and....</p> +<p>He felt the sadness of it all ... and his heart was very heavy ... +and his lips became still more compressed because he did not want to +cry. He wanted to stand firm against the cruelties of life; and, if +Papa could do without him, if Mamma also thought it better so, if +perhaps it was also better for Mamma and would make her happier, why, +then it was all right and he could bear it with strength and fortitude. +He was a child, a boy; but he felt vaguely that soon the world would +open before him. He must forget everything therefore: everything about +his parents, their ill-assorted lives, in which he had been the only +comfort and consolation. No, it would all be different in future; and, +if nothing else could be done, well then, it must be like that. When +Papa, later on, was tired or in the blues or anything, he would not lay +his head on Addie’s knees, just like a little brother, and go to +sleep: Marianne would comfort him instead.</p> +<p>Addie tried to suppress that feeling of jealousy, but it kept on +shooting through him, like a painful, <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb293" href="#pb293" name="pb293">293</a>]</span>smarting sting.... +But suddenly, in the dark room, in the silent house—the servant +was no longer singing—Van der Welcke woke, drew himself up, +rubbed his neck, which was stiff with lying down.</p> +<p>“Well, you’ve had a good long nap!” said Addie, +making his voice sound rough.</p> +<p>There was nothing in that voice and in the boyish phrase to suggest +the jealousy, the melancholy and the great sorrow that was weighing +down his childish soul.</p> +<p>Van der Welcke seemed to be waking up to life and reality after his +vain attempt to lose himself in that mad devouring of distance. He +remembered his conversation with his wife, in which she had been so +unusually gentle, so indulgent, showing such self-effacement and +self-sacrifice ... so much indeed that he had had to kiss her in spite +of himself.</p> +<p>“I have been speaking to Mamma,” said he.</p> +<p>But he was silent again, could get no further.</p> +<p>“So have I,” said Addie, to make it easier for him.</p> +<p>But he also did not know what to say; and they remained sitting side +by side in the dark dining-room, both staring at the shaft of yellow +light that streamed across the garden from the villa at the back. Each +now knew, however, that the other knew; and Addie threw his arm over +his father’s shoulder, almost protectingly. <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb294" href="#pb294" name="pb294">294</a>]</span></p> +<p>“It is an idea of Mamma’s, Addie ... that it would be +better....”</p> +<p>“For both of you.”</p> +<p>“For me, Mamma thought.”</p> +<p>“And for her too.”</p> +<p>“And you, my boy, what would you think ... if it did come to +that ... at last?...”</p> +<p>“If you both consider ... calmly and dispassionately ... that +it would be a good thing....”</p> +<p>“And you, you would spend a part of the year with Mamma and a +part with me....”</p> +<p>“Yes, of course.”</p> +<p>“You’re taking it very coolly, Addie.”</p> +<p>“Dad, what else is there to do? If it’s better like that +... for the two of you ... I’m bound to think it all +right.”</p> +<p>“If you can talk like that, it’s because you’re +not so fond of us....”</p> +<p>“No, I’m just as fond of you: of Mamma, Dad, and of you. +But, if it’s got to be, it’s got to be....”</p> +<p>“It’s strange, Addie, how everything suddenly, one fine +day, seems likely to become different....”</p> +<p>“Mamma saw it like that....”</p> +<p>“Yes. Mamma has changed lately, don’t you +think?”</p> +<p>“Mamma has become rather gentler, not so +quick-tempered.” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb295" href= +"#pb295" name="pb295">295</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Yes, not so quick-tempered.”</p> +<p>“That’s all....”</p> +<p>“Yes, that’s all. Tell me, Addie, tell me honestly: do +people, as far as you know, still ... talk about us ... as much as they +did?”</p> +<p>“I don’t know, Dad. I don’t bother about +‘people.’ I just go to school, you see. But I +think....”</p> +<p>“Do they talk about Mamma?”</p> +<p>“No.”</p> +<p>“Not at all?”</p> +<p>“I never hear anything.”</p> +<p>“About me?”</p> +<p>“Yes.”</p> +<p>“They talk about me?”</p> +<p>“Yes, they talk about you, Dad.”</p> +<p>“What do they say?”</p> +<p>“They talk of you, Dad, and....”</p> +<p>“Well?”</p> +<p>“Marianne.”</p> +<p>“She is going to Baarn ... and then we sha’n’t see +each other any more. People are always ready to jabber ... because +I’ve gone cycling and motoring ... with Marianne.”</p> +<p>It was as though he were confessing and denying in the same +breath.</p> +<p>“Addie,” he continued, “I cycled a great way +to-day.” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb296" href="#pb296" name= +"pb296">296</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Yes, Dad.”</p> +<p>“I can always think best when I’m cycling like +mad.”</p> +<p>“Yes, Dad, I know.”</p> +<p>“When I’m scorching along the roads, like a lunatic, I +can think. At any other time, I can’t.”</p> +<p>“Yes.”</p> +<p>“And I thought a great deal to-day, Addie. As a rule, I never +think about anything. It tired me to-day even more than the cycling +itself. I’m tremendously tired.”</p> +<p>“Well, Dad, go to bed.”</p> +<p>“No, I want to talk to you. I want to sit with you like this. +You’re my friend, aren’t you, your father’s friend? +Or aren’t you that any longer?”</p> +<p>“Of course I am.”</p> +<p>“You’re so cold, Addie, you don’t care a +bit.”</p> +<p>“Yes, Dad, I do care.”</p> +<p>And he pulled Van der Welcke to him and pressed his father’s +head against his chest:</p> +<p>“Lie like that now and talk away. I do care.”</p> +<p>“I thought a great deal, Addie, cycling. This morning, I was +angry, furious, desperate. I could have done something violent, broken +something, murdered somebody.”</p> +<p>“Come, come!...”</p> +<p>“Yes, murdered ... I don’t know whom ... I felt, Addie, +that I could have become very happy if....” <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb297" href="#pb297" name="pb297">297</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Yes, Dad, I know....”</p> +<p>“You know?”</p> +<p>“Yes.”</p> +<p>“You understand?”</p> +<p>“Yes, I understand.”</p> +<p>“When I came home, I was tired and mad with misery. Mamma came +upstairs and talked to me. She told me that Van Vreeswijck ... had +asked her to go to the Bezuidenhout and speak to Aunt Bertha ... and to +Marianne, because Van Vreeswijck ... do you understand?”</p> +<p>“Yes, Dad.”</p> +<p>“Mamma went. I was furious when I heard that she had been. But +she said that Marianne refused....”</p> +<p>“Marianne refused him?”</p> +<p>“Yes. Then ... then Mamma said ... then she asked ... if it +wouldn’t be better that we—she and I—do you +understand?”</p> +<p>“Yes, Dad.”</p> +<p>“She said it in a very nice way. She said it gently, not at +all angrily. It was nice of her to think of it, you know, +Addie.”</p> +<p>“Yes, Dad, she <i>is</i> nice.”</p> +<p>“Well, old chap, then ... then I gave her a kiss ... because +she was so nice about it and said it so kindly. And then ... then I +went cycling again.”</p> +<p>“Yes.”</p> +<p>“I can think best when I’m cycling. I rode and +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb298" href="#pb298" name= +"pb298">298</a>]</span>rode. Meanwhile, I was thinking, would it be a +good thing?... My boy, you are more than my son, aren’t you: +you’re my friend?”</p> +<p>“Yes.”</p> +<p>“All the time, I was thinking ... of Marianne. I am fond of +her, Addie.”</p> +<p>“Yes, Father.”</p> +<p>“I tried to imagine it ... I know ... that she is fond of me, +Addie.”</p> +<p>“Yes.”</p> +<p>“I tried to picture it ... And then, Addie ... then I thought +myself old. Tell me, I am old, don’t you think?”</p> +<p>“You are not old, Father.”</p> +<p>“No, perhaps not.... Still, Addie, I don’t know, I +really don’t know.... Then, Addie, I thought....”</p> +<p>“Of what, Dad, of whom?”</p> +<p>“I went on riding, like a madman. That’s how I think +best. Then I thought of ... you.”</p> +<p>“Of me?”</p> +<p>“Yes, of you.... Tell me, my boy, if we did that ... if +everything was changed ... wouldn’t you be unhappy?”</p> +<p>“If it was for the happiness of both of you, no. Then I should +not be unhappy.”</p> +<p>“Yes, so you say. But you would have to be unhappy ... inside. +If you still love us both. I thought it all out till I was dog-tired. +For I never <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb299" href="#pb299" name= +"pb299">299</a>]</span>think as a rule. Thinking bores me. This time, I +had to ... because Mamma had spoken as she did. Yes, you are bound to +be unhappy ... if you still care ... for both of us.”</p> +<p>“I tell you again, Dad....”</p> +<p>“Yes, I know. But I, Addie, <i>I</i> should be unhappy ... +afterwards, when it had once happened ... <i>I</i> should be unhappy +... because of you.”</p> +<p>“Because of me?”</p> +<p>“Because of you. You would no longer have a home.”</p> +<p>“I should have two homes.”</p> +<p>“No, no, you would have none. You would go wandering to and +fro between your parents. True, you will soon be a man. You will soon +be leaving your parents. But I do feel now that you would have no home +and that you would have a father and a mother ... but no parents. Do +you follow me? No parents. Even though they quarrel, you have parents +now. Perhaps, in a few years, you won’t care about them ... and +about their home. But just now, Addie, just for the present, you would +be losing a great deal.... You see, old chap, your father has thought +it all out ... and I frankly confess, it’s made me dog-tired. +I’m resting now, while I tell it you like this, leaning up +against you.”</p> +<p>“Yes, Dad.”</p> +<p>“My boy, my own boy!.... Well, you see, when <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb300" href="#pb300" name="pb300">300</a>]</span>your +father had got so far ... then he felt....”</p> +<p>“What?”</p> +<p>“That he cared more for you ... than for Marianne, poor +darling. Differently, you know, but more. Much more. Poor +darling!”</p> +<p>A passion of joy swept through the lad; his chest, on which his +father’s head lay, heaved. But he felt that it was wicked to have +that joy:</p> +<p>“Dad, once more, if it means your happiness....”</p> +<p>“No, old chap ... for there would be something severed in me, +something broken: I don’t know how to put it. I should miss you +all the time that you were not with me. I couldn’t do it, Addie. +It’s an impossibility, Addie.... You know, old chap, I +oughtn’t to talk like this to a son of fifteen. Fifteen? No, +you’re only fourteen. Well, you look sixteen. But that’s +nothing to do with it. I oughtn’t to talk like this. I’m a +queer father, eh, Addie? I don’t give you a proper upbringing: I +just let you go your own way. Lord, old chap, I can’t do it, I +can’t give you a proper upbringing! I shouldn’t know how. +You’ll bring yourself up, won’t you? You’re sure to +be good and clever and honourable and all the rest of it. I don’t +know how, you see: I just let you run wild, like a colt in a meadow. +Well, you promise me to turn out all right, don’t you? To do +nothing mean and so on? You know, if Grandpapa were to hear all this, +were <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb301" href="#pb301" name= +"pb301">301</a>]</span>to hear me talking like this, he would think it +very odd. And it is odd. It’s not right. But your father, Addie, +is like that: he’s hopeless, quite hopeless. So now you know all +about it. I couldn’t do it.... Poor Marianne, poor darling! But +she’s young still; she’ll have her happiness one day, a +different happiness.... Well, Addie, tell Mamma to-morrow. Tell her I +would rather, if Mamma agrees, leave everything as it is, old chap, +even though it’s not always a paradise, that I’d rather +leave everything as it is, old chap, for your sake ... and also for my +own: I could never do without you for six months. You may be going away +quite soon: Leiden ... and then your service ... but, for the present +... for the present.... Will you tell Mamma to-morrow? Those serious +conversations make me feel so tired ... in my head. I would rather +cycle for a week on end without stopping than spend one day thinking as +I have done to-day.... And now I’m going to bed, old chap, for +I’m dead tired....”</p> +<p>He caught his son in his arms, held him closely, kissed him and went +away abruptly. The boy remained alone in the dark room. The yellow +shaft of light from the other villa died away. The house was quite +silent; the servants had gone to bed. And the boy stayed on, knowing +all the time that his parents upstairs, in their own rooms, were still +separated, in spite of so much that might have united <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb302" href="#pb302" name= +"pb302">302</a>]</span>them; he sat there, still and silent, staring +out into the hot summer night, through which the trees loomed like +ghostly giants, sombre and oppressive....</p> +<p>Yet his soul was flooded with a great joy: his father loved him +best! <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb303" href="#pb303" name= +"pb303">303</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch29" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e5906" class="main">Chapter XXIX</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">Constance remained alone the whole evening.</p> +<p>She had opened both her bedroom-windows wide; and she looked out +over the road into the sultry night. She had undressed and put on a +white wrapper; and she remained sitting, in the dark room, at the open +window.</p> +<p>For a moment, she thought that Van der Welcke would come to her, to +tell her his decision; but he did not come.... He seemed to be staying +with Addie in the dining-room.... Then she heard him go to his own +room....</p> +<p>In the silence, in the still, sultry darkness, which seemed to enter +the room almost heavily, her restlessness, the doubt which she had felt +rising in herself, during those few words with Addie, melted away. +Sitting at the open window, she let herself be borne along by the +silent, insidious magic of the late summer hour, as though something +stronger than herself were overpowering her and compelling her to +surrender herself, without further thinking or doubting, to a host of +almost disquieting raptures, which came crowding in upon her....</p> +<p>Above the darkling masses of the Woods hung the sullen menace of +heavy rain; and, just once or twice, there was a gleam of lightning +yonder, in the direction <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb304" href= +"#pb304" name="pb304">304</a>]</span>of the sea, which she divined in +the distance flashing with sudden illuminations, with noiseless +reflections, and then vanishing in the low-hanging clouds of the +night.</p> +<p>She lay back in her chair, at first oppressed by her doubt and by +the heat, but gradually, gradually—her eyes fixed on the electric +gleams far in the distance—all her doubts melted away, the +enchantment penetrated yet deeper and the storm-charged sultriness +seemed a languorous ecstasy in which her breast heaved gently, her lips +opened and her eyes closed, only to open again, wider than before, and +stare at the lightning that flashed and vanished, flashed and vanished, +with intervals full of mystery....</p> +<p>No, she doubted no longer: all would be well, all would be well.... +She could not make a mistake in this new life, this later life, this +mature life, which she had lived, so to speak, in a few months, giving +herself up entirely to sincerity and honesty and to the crowning love, +the only really true and lofty love. Her love, that late love, had been +her life, right from those girlish dreams of a few months past down to +the moment of inward avowal; and what in another woman would have +lasted years, in the slow falling of the days, which, like beads on a +long string, fell one by one through the fingers of silent fate, the +unrelenting teller of the beads, she had lived in a few months: after +her dreaming had come <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb305" href= +"#pb305" name="pb305">305</a>]</span>her thinking; after her thinking, +her wish to know; after her wish to know, her plunge into books and +nature, until dreaming, thinking, knowledge and, above all, love +supreme and triumphant had mingled to form a new existence and she had +been reborn as it were out of herself.</p> +<p>She had dreamed and thought and questioned it all hastily and +feverishly, as though afraid of being late, of feeling her senses +numbed, her soul withered by the grey years, before she had lived ... +before she had lived. Hastily, but in all sincerity; and her late +awakening had been deep and intense, a mystery to herself and an +impenetrable secret to all, for no one knew that she dreamed and +thought and questioned knowledge and nature; no one knew that nowadays +she looked on a tree, a cloud, a book, a picture with different eyes +than in the past, when she had neither eyes nor understanding for tree +or cloud, for book or picture, nor found beauty in any; no one saw that +something cosmic and eternal flashed before her in that one swift +glance of tardy recognition and knowledge; no one knew that she, the +aristocrat, felt that keen pity for her day and generation, had learnt +to feel it from him, through him. All of it, all of it, all her later +life: no one knew it save herself alone.... And gradually, too, in +those intimate conversations, they had come to know something of each +other, had learnt—guessing first and then knowing—that they +had found each other, late in <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb306" +href="#pb306" name="pb306">306</a>]</span>life—she him, he +her—as though at last, at last, after that vague instinctive +seeking and trying to find each other in their childhood days, Heaven +had been merciful! How vague it had been, that shadowy intuition, +hardly to be uttered and vanishing as soon as uttered: on his side, +that distant veil of mist, that cloud, on the horizon of the moors; on +hers, that perpetual longing to go farther, to flit from boulder to +boulder down the hurrying stream, as it rushed past under the dense +canopy of those tropical trees: a pair of children knowing nothing of +each other and all unconscious until years later that they were both +seeking ... both seeking! Oh, that strange dream-quest, that nameless +desire, which, when one breathed it, vanished, was no longer a quest! +At a touch, it became intangible; as soon as one grasped it, it slipped +away, became something different, something different.... But, +unbreathed, untouched, ungrasped, just dreamed and dimly felt in those +far-off childhood days, it was <i>that</i>: the mystic, wonderful +reality, which was the only reality.... To both of them, in those days, +it had been too gossamer-frail, too intangible and too incomprehensible +to last beyond their childhood, that seed of reality working in the +womb of time: vanity and frivolity had claimed her for their own, study +and reflection had claimed him; and each had wandered farther and +farther from that half-divined other, no longer even seeking the +other.... <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb307" href="#pb307" name= +"pb307">307</a>]</span></p> +<p>The years had heaped themselves up between them, between her at the +Hague, in Rome, in Brussels, and him in America, when she was an +elegant young society-woman, he the workmen’s friend and brother, +their comrade who yearned to know and understand them. While she had +danced and flirted in the ball-rooms of Rome, he had laboured in the +docks, gone down the black shafts of the coal-mines. And all this which +had really happened seemed unreal to her, a dream, a remote nightmare, +by the side of that childish romance, those fairy visions of yesterday! +And yet it had all happened, it had all happened. They had never been +allowed to meet each other, not even when they had been brought near +each other—on the Riviera, in Brussels—as by an unconscious +power! They had not been allowed to meet until now, late, very late, +too late.... Oh, is it ever given too late, that blessed boon, to live +at last, to find at last?</p> +<p>And they had both made mistakes. She had made her mistakes: her +brief passion for Henri, the sudden kindling of the senses of a +frivolous, bored and idle woman; then the marriage: mistake upon +mistake, nothing but waste, waste, waste of her precious life. And he +had made mistakes too: he had dreamed of being the brother of those +men, a fellow-worker and comrade, and he had not become their brother. +Oh, if they had once been allowed to know and find each other, in the +years when they <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb308" href="#pb308" +name="pb308">308</a>]</span>were both young, what a harmony their life +together might have been: no jarring note in themselves or in each +other, but perfect harmony in all things, attuned to the note of their +day and generation; he by her side to understand and love her and +support her when the sadness of it all oppressed her! Oh, to have +lived, when still young, with him, in his heart, in his arms; and then +to have loved, to have understood, to have done, with him and for his +sake, all that can still be done for one’s day and generation by +those who themselves are strong and radiant in love and happiness and +harmony!...</p> +<p>And it had not been so; the precious years, far from each other, had +been wasted ... by him: he had told her so; by her: oh, her vain, +wasted years!...</p> +<p>No, fate had not willed it. And yet, now that at last, at last, the +honest, simple, true life had kindled into flame, now that, after first +thinking of others—of Henri, of Marianne—she had also +thought of herself, also thought of him, could not an outward physical +life also be kindled after that inward, spiritual life, far from +everything and everybody around them, in another country and another +world, a life in which she would be beside him, a life of harmony which +might be tinged with the melancholy of that late awakening but would +still be perfect harmony and perfect happiness?... <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb309" href="#pb309" name="pb309">309</a>]</span></p> +<p>She lay back in her chair, her hands hanging limply beside her, as +if she lacked the energy now to grasp the tempting illusion, afraid of +losing it and afraid of seizing it and then recognizing it as an +illusion....</p> +<p>And the sultry air seemed to be pressing upon her softly and +languorously until she panted and her lips parted and her eyes closed +only to open again, wider than before; and in that atmosphere of +ecstasy it appeared to her that the distant lightning-streaks yonder, +the noiseless flashes over the wide sea which she divined yonder, +yonder, far away, were themselves the swift effulgence of her thoughts +and illusions and regrets: a gleam and gone, a gleam and gone. When it +gleamed, came the smiling hope that things could become and remain as +she thought; when the light faded, came doubt ... yet not so deep but +that the night tempted and lured her:</p> +<p>“Hope again ... think once more ... dream again.... It may be +... it is not impossible.... It is reality, pure, simple reality; it +will mean the happiness of those two poor children, Henri and Marianne; +it will be the happiness of you two, him and you, the woman whose life +blossomed late.... It is possible: hope it again, think, dream it +again; for what is impossibility, when truth once stands revealed, +however late? See, the truth stands revealed; the lightning flashes; +sometimes the whole <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb310" href="#pb310" +name="pb310">310</a>]</span>sky is illumined at once; the low clouds +drift along; behind them ... behind them lies the infinity of eternity, +of everything that may happen!”</p> +<p>The room was quite dark; she herself alone remained a white blur in +the window-frame; and the night, the air, the lights were there +outside, wide and eternal. And, in the sweet languor of the late summer +hour, of the sultry night, of her uncontrollable illusion and hopes, +she felt as though she were uplifted by a flood of radiant ecstasy, by +a winged joy that carried her with it towards the sea yonder, towards +the bright rifts of the lightning-flashes, towards the distance of +futurity, eternity and everything that might happen.... And she let +herself be borne along; and in that moment a certainty came over her, +penetrated deep down in her, like a divinely-implanted conviction, that +it would be as she had dreamed and hoped and wished, that so it would +happen, at long last, because life’s chiefest grace was at length +descending upon her....</p> +<p>Yes, it would happen like that: she knew it, she saw it in the +future. She saw herself living by his side, in his heart, in his arms; +living for herself and him; living for each other in all things; she +saw it shine out radiantly with each lightning-flash in the radiant +shining of those future years. She saw them, those children of the +past, with the dew upon them, smiling to each other as though they who, +as <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb311" href="#pb311" name= +"pb311">311</a>]</span>boy and girl, had unconsciously sought each +other had grown into a young man and a maiden who had found each other +... after the mystery of the cloud-veil and of the distant river under +the spreading leaves; and they now went on together: their paths ran up +towards the glittering cities of the future, which reared their crystal +domes under the revealing skies, while from out their riot of towers +sunbeams flashed and struck a thousand colours from the crystal +domes....</p> +<p>A wind rose, as though waking in the very bed of the slumbering +night, and leapt to the sky. A cool breath drifted straight out of the +sultry, louring clouds; a few drops pattered upon the leaves. And the +wind carried the storm farther, carried the revelation with it; the +lightning flashed twice, thrice more ... vanished ... paled away.... +Not until it had travelled far, very far, would the wind let loose the +clouds, would the night-rain fall ... so Constance thought, +vaguely....</p> +<p>And she sighed deeply, as though waking out of her languor of +ecstasy, now that the night, after that rising wind, was no longer so +sultry and oppressive. She stood up, wearily, closed the window, saw a +morning pallor already dawning through the trees....</p> +<p>And she lay down and fell asleep: yes, that was what would happen, +it would be like that; she felt <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb312" +href="#pb312" name="pb312">312</a>]</span>certain of it: that future +would come; the paths ran to the crystal-domed city; she was going to +it with him ... with him!...</p> +<p>Yes, it would come, it would come, to-morrow, yes, to-morrow....</p> +<p>And, while that hope still continued to transfigure her face, pale +on the pillow in the dawning day, her eyes, blind from long gazing at +the light, closed heavily; and she fell asleep, convinced ... +convinced.... <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb313" href="#pb313" name= +"pb313">313</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch30" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e5975" class="main">Chapter XXX</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">Conviction had conquered doubt and reigned triumphant. +When Constance awoke early that morning, she was full of proud, calm +confidence, as though she knew the future positively. She hesitated to +go to her husband in his room; and he seemed to avoid her too, for as +early as seven o’clock she saw him, from her window, riding off +on his bicycle. Since their conversation, she had not seen him, did not +know what he thought; and it struck her that he was not dashing away, +as he had done so often lately, like a madman, but that he pedalled +along quietly, with a certain melancholy resignation in his face, which +she just saw flickering past under his bicycling-cap.</p> +<p>She listened to hear if Addie was awake, but he seemed to be still +asleep; also it was holiday-time. And she began to think of Van +Vreeswijck and made up her mind to write to him, just a line, to ask +him to come, a single line which however would at once allow him to +read, between the letters, that Marianne could not love him.... And, +while thinking, with a tender pity for him amid her own calm certainty, +she bit her pen, looked out of the window....</p> +<p>The August morning was already sunny at that hour: there was a blue +sky with white, fleecy clouds, <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb314" +href="#pb314" name="pb314">314</a>]</span>which passed like flocks of +snowy sheep through a blue meadow; the wind urged the sheep before it, +like an impetuous drover. And, while she searched for those difficult +words, her mind recalled the night before and the lightning yonder, +above the sea, which she divined in the distance.... It was strange, +but now, in that morning light, with that placid sky at which she +gazed, thinking of Van Vreeswijck and how to tell him in a single, +merciful word—with that summer blue full of fleecy white, at +which she was gazing so fixedly after the ecstasy and winged bliss that +had uplifted her the night before—it was as if her calm, proud +confidence in her knowledge of the future was wavering.... She did not +know why, for after all she thought that Henri would consent to their +divorcing....</p> +<p>They would be divorced....</p> +<p>And Marianne would....</p> +<p>Suddenly, she began to write. She wrote more than she intended to +write: she now wrote the truth straight away, in an impulse of honesty, +and at the end of her letter she asked Van Vreeswijck to call on her +that evening.</p> +<p>She had just finished, when Addie came in. He kissed her and waited +until she had signed her letter.</p> +<p>“Why aren’t you bicycling with Papa?” she asked. +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb315" href="#pb315" name= +"pb315">315</a>]</span></p> +<p>He said that his father had asked him to speak to her....</p> +<p>And now, sitting beside her, with her hand in his, he told her, +without once mentioning Marianne’s name, what Papa had said. His +calm, almost cold, business-like words sobered her completely, while +she continued pensively to look at the sky, which seemed now to be +wearing a blue smile of ignorance and indifference.... Suddenly it +seemed to her as if she had been dreaming.... Not that her thoughts +took any definite form, for first the ideal vision whose realization +had seemed so certain, then the morning doubts and now the +disenchantment of the sober facts had all followed too swiftly upon one +another; and she could not take it all in; she did not know what she +thought. It only seemed to her as if she had been dreaming.</p> +<p>Automatically, she said:</p> +<p>“Perhaps it is better so.”</p> +<p>She had not expected it!</p> +<p>She had never thought that Henri’s answer would be the one +which she now heard from the mouth of their son!</p> +<p>Did one ever know another person, though one lived with that person +for years? Did she know her son, did she know herself?</p> +<p>But the boy held her hand affectionately.</p> +<p>And he read the stupefaction in her eyes: <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb316" href="#pb316" name="pb316">316</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Tell me, honestly, Mamma. Are you disappointed?”</p> +<p>She was silent, gazed at the placid sky.</p> +<p>“Would you rather have started a fresh life ... away from +Papa?”</p> +<p>She bowed her head, let it rest upon his shoulder:</p> +<p>“Addie,” she said.</p> +<p>She made an attempt to pick her words, but her honesty was once more +too strong for her:</p> +<p>“Yes,” she said, simply.</p> +<p>“Then you would rather have had it so ... for your own +sake?”</p> +<p>“I would rather have had it so, yes.”</p> +<p>They were silent.</p> +<p>“I had even pictured it ... like that,” she said, +presently.</p> +<p>“Shall I speak to Papa again then, Mamma? If I tell him that +you had already been thinking of it....”</p> +<p>“You believe...?”</p> +<p>“He will agree.”</p> +<p>“Do you think so?”</p> +<p>“If it means the “happiness of both of +you....”</p> +<p>“Tell me what Papa said.”</p> +<p>“I can’t remember exactly.... Only Papa thought ... that +not to see me for six months at a time would be more than he could +bear.”</p> +<p>“Is that all that Papa said?”</p> +<p>“Yes.” <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb317" href= +"#pb317" name="pb317">317</a>]</span></p> +<p>But he gave just a smile of melancholy resignation; and his look +told that that was not all. She understood. She understood that they +had spoken of Marianne.</p> +<p>“So Papa....” she repeated.</p> +<p>“Would rather stay with <i>us</i>, Mamma.”</p> +<p>“With us,” she repeated. “We three +together?”</p> +<p>“Yes.”</p> +<p>“It means going on living ... a lie,” she said, in a +blank voice.</p> +<p>“Then I will speak to Papa again.”</p> +<p>“No, Addie.”</p> +<p>“Why not?...”</p> +<p>“No, don’t do that. Don’t ask Papa ... to think it +over again. It is perhaps too late, after all; and besides ... Papa is +right. About you.”</p> +<p>“About me?”</p> +<p>“He could not go six months without you. And I....”</p> +<p>“And you, Mamma....”</p> +<p>“I couldn’t either.”</p> +<p>“Yes, you could.”</p> +<p>“No, I couldn’t either.”</p> +<p>She suddenly passed her hands along his face, along his shoulders, +his knees, as though she wished to feel him, to feel the reality ... +the reality of her life. He ... he was the real thing, the truth; but +all the rest between her husband and her was <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb318" href="#pb318" name= +"pb318">318</a>]</span>falsehood, remained falsehood ... because of +people. Could they not even for Addie’s sake purge that falsehood +into truth? No, no, not even for him. Would falsehood then always +cleave to them?...</p> +<p>“We are too small,” she thought and murmured her thought +aloud.</p> +<p>“What did you say?”</p> +<p>“Nothing.... Very well, Addie.... Tell Papa that it shall be +as he says, that I am quite content ... that I could not do without you +either ... for six months!”</p> +<p>She looked at him, looked into his serious blue eyes, as though she +had forgotten him and were now remembering him for the first time. Six +months ... six months without him! The new life, the new paths, the new +cities, on those far-off, new horizons ... and six months ... six +months without Addie!...</p> +<p>Had she then been dreaming? Had she just been dazzled by that +glittering vision? Was it just intoxication, ecstasy? Was it just +glamour and enchantment?...</p> +<p>He left her. She dressed and went downstairs.</p> +<p>She felt as if she were back from a long journey and seeing her +house again after an absence of months. Her movements were almost like +those of a sleep-walker; the house seemed something remote and +impersonal, though she had always loved it, <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb319" href="#pb319" name= +"pb319">319</a>]</span>looked after it, made it her beautiful home by a +thousand intimate touches. She now went through the house mechanically +performing her usual little housewifely duties, still half dreaming, in +a condition of semi-consciousness. It was as if her thoughts were +standing still, as if she no longer knew, nor for that matter thought, +remembering only the night before, that lonely evening of inward +conviction.... The morning had dawned, placid, with its cloudless sky; +Addie had come: she now knew what Henri thought. It surprised her just +a little that Henri thought like that ... and then she realized that, +after all, he did not love Marianne very much ... that he must love her +less than Addie. Poor Marianne, she thought; and she reflected that +women love more absolutely than men.... She spoke to the servant, gave +her orders, did all the actual, everyday things, in between her +thoughts. And suddenly she looked deep down into herself, once more saw +so completely into her own clear depths that she was startled at +herself and shuddered. She saw that, if Henri had made the same +proposal to her that she had made to him, she would have accepted it in +her desire for happiness, for happiness with the man whom she loved and +who—she felt it!—loved her. She saw that she would have +accepted and that she would not have hesitated because of her son!... +Her son! He was certain to be leaving them soon in any case ... +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb320" href="#pb320" name= +"pb320">320</a>]</span>to seek his own life!... Her son! To provide him +for a few years more with the paternal house, that wretched fabric of +lies, which he, the boy, alone kept together ... for his sake and for +the sake of that joint falsehood, she would have to reject the new life +of truth!... It was as if she were standing in a maze; but she was +certain that she would not have hesitated in that maze, if the decision +had been left to her ... that she would have known how to take the path +of simple honesty ... that she would have elected to separate, in spite +of Addie ... that she loved her new life—and the +stranger—more than her child!</p> +<p>She had learnt to know herself in that new atmosphere of pure truth; +and now ... now she saw so far into those translucent depths that she +was frightened and shuddered as in the presence of something monstrous; +for it seemed monstrous to her to place anything above her child, above +the dear solace of so many years....</p> +<p>Just then Van der Welcke came home; she heard him put away his +bicycle, go up the stairs ... and then turn back, as if reflecting that +he could no longer avoid his wife. He entered, abruptly. She, +trembling, had sat down, because she felt on the verge of +falling....</p> +<p>“Has Addie told you?” he asked.</p> +<p>“Yes,” she said, in a low voice.</p> +<p>“And ... you think it is the best thing?...” +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb321" href="#pb321" name= +"pb321">321</a>]</span></p> +<p>“Yes ... I do....”</p> +<p>“So everything remains....” he said, hesitatingly.</p> +<p>“As it was,” she replied, almost inaudibly; and her +voice hesitated also.</p> +<p>“He told you ... the reason?” he went on.</p> +<p>“Yes.”</p> +<p>“I could not do without him ... all the time that he would be +with you, Constance. And you couldn’t do without the boy either, +could you, while he was with me?”</p> +<p>“No,” she said, automatically; and, as her voice failed +her, she repeated, more firmly, “No, I should not be able to do +without him.”</p> +<p>At that moment, she did not know if she was speaking the truth or +not. Only she had a vague sensation ... as though that fair, unsullied +truth were retreating a little farther from her ... like a glittering +cloud....</p> +<p>“Then we might try to be more patient with each other,” +he said. “But still I should like to tell you, Constance, that I +appreciate your thought ... your intention....”</p> +<p>“Yes,” she said, vaguely.</p> +<p>“Your thought for me....”</p> +<p>“Yes.”</p> +<p>But she now found it impossible to let that retreating truth slip +still farther from her; and she said:</p> +<p>“I was thinking of myself also, Henri ... but <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb322" href="#pb322" name="pb322">322</a>]</span>it +was not clear to me what I thought.... I don’t quite know.... +Henri, it is better like this, for everything to remain ... as it +was.”</p> +<p>“And we both of us love our boy.”</p> +<p>“Yes, both of us....”</p> +<p>He saw her turn very pale as she leant back in her chair, her arms +hanging limply beside her. He had a sudden impulse to say something +kind, to give her a kiss; but at the same time he was conscious that +neither his words nor his caress would reach her. And he thought, what +was the good of it? They had no love for each other. They would remain +strangers, in spite of all that they had felt for each other during +these days: she suggesting for his happiness something dead against +convention; he thrilling with genuine gratitude....</p> +<p>“Well, that is settled then,” was all that he said in +conclusion, quietly; and he went out, gently closing the door behind +him.</p> +<p>She did not move, but sat there, gazing dully into space. Yes, she +had counted her son a lesser thing than her new life! That was the +simple truth, just as much as the new life itself.... And now ... now, +as though her mind were wandering, she saw that new life like a crystal +city around her, threatening to crack, to rend asunder, to be shattered +in one mighty spasm of despair. Her eyes began to burn from staring +into those distant, cruel thoughts. In her breast she felt a physical +pain. <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb323" href="#pb323" name= +"pb323">323</a>]</span>The house, the room stifled her. She felt +impelled to fly from that house, from the narrow circles, which whirled +giddily around her, to fly from herself. She was so much perplexed in +her own being, no longer knowing what was right, what was honest, what +true ... that she yearned for space and air. Her breast was wrung with +grief and that gasping for breath. Still, she controlled herself, took +up a hat, pinned it on and found the strength to say to the +servant:</p> +<p>“Truitje, I am going out....”</p> +<p>She was outside now, in the road. She had become afraid of the +loneliness of her room and of herself, a loneliness which in other ways +had become so dear to her. Now she was seeking something more than +spaciousness of air and forest; but the road, in which a few people +were walking, made her keep herself under control. She turned down a +side-path, went through the Woods. Here again there were people taking +their morning stroll.... Suddenly, she gave a violent start: she saw +Brauws, sitting on a bench. She felt as if she would faint; and, +without knowing what she was doing, she turned round and walked +back.... By this time, she had lost all her self-command. He had seen +her, however, and his hand had already gone up to his hat. Suddenly, +she heard his step behind her; he came up with her:</p> +<p>“Is this how you run away from your friends?” +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb324" href="#pb324" name= +"pb324">324</a>]</span>he said, making an attempt to joke, but in +obvious astonishment.</p> +<p>She looked at him; and he was struck with her confusion.</p> +<p>“Don’t be angry,” she said, frankly, “but I +was startled at seeing you.”</p> +<p>“I was not welcome,” he said, roughly. “Forgive +me, mevrouw. I ought not to have come after you. But I’m a +tactless beggar in these matters. I am not one of your +society-men.”</p> +<p>“Don’t be angry,” she repeated, almost +entreatingly. “Society indeed! I certainly showed myself no +society-woman ... to ... unexpectedly to....”</p> +<p>She did not know what she wanted to say.</p> +<p>“To turn your back on me,” he said, completing the +sentence.</p> +<p>“To turn my back on you,” she repeated.</p> +<p>“Well, now that I have said good-morning....”</p> +<p>He lifted his hat, moved as though to go back.</p> +<p>“Stay!” she entreated. “Walk a little way with me. +Now that I happen to have met you....”</p> +<p>“I came back yesterday ... I meant to call on you to-day or +to-morrow....”</p> +<p>“Walk with me,” she said, almost entreatingly. “I +want to speak to you....”</p> +<p>“What about?”</p> +<p>“I suggested to Henri....”</p> +<p>She drew a deep breath; there were people passing. <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb325" href="#pb325" name="pb325">325</a>]</span>They +were near the Ponds. She ceased speaking; and they walked on +silently....</p> +<p>“I suggested to Henri,” she repeated, at last, +“that we should....”</p> +<p>The word died away on her lips, but he understood. They were both +silent, both walked on without speaking. He led the way; and it seemed +to her that they were making for a goal, she knew not where, which he +would know....</p> +<p>At last, she said:</p> +<p>“I wanted ... as you are our friend ... to tell +you....”</p> +<p>He was determined to make her say the word:</p> +<p>“You suggested what?”</p> +<p>“That we should be divorced....”</p> +<p>They walked on for some minutes. Suddenly, round about her, she saw +the dunes, the distant sea, the sea which she had divined the night +before, over which the pale gleams, the lightning-flashes had revealed +themselves. Now, the sky overhead was revealed, a vague opal, with +white clouds curling like steam....</p> +<p>“I suggested that we should be divorced,” she +repeated.</p> +<p>He drew a breath, in the salt breath of the sea, even as he had +breathed in the Alps, when contemplating those ice-bound horizons. And +he remembered ... that vision ... and the yearning ... for the one soul +... the meeting with which would <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb326" +href="#pb326" name="pb326">326</a>]</span>have been a consolation amid +the constant disappointment encountered with the many souls, the +thousands.... And a swift, keen hope seemed to flash before him ... not +only of having found at last ... in silence ... but of venturing to +utter it ... once; and so keen, so dazzling was the hope that at first +he did not hear her say:</p> +<p>“But Henri ... thinks it is better ... not....”</p> +<p>“What?” he asked, as though deaf, as though blind.</p> +<p>She repeated:</p> +<p>“Henri thinks it is better not.... Because of our boy ... of +Addie....”</p> +<p>The keen hope had flashed for only a second, swiftly, with its +dizzying rays....</p> +<p>Uttered it would never be.... To have found in silence: alas, that +was all illusion ... a dream ... when one is very young....</p> +<p>“He is right,” he said, in a low voice.</p> +<p>“Is he right?” she asked, sadly. And, more firmly, she +repeated, “Yes, he is right....”</p> +<p>“I should have been sorry ... for Addie’s sake,” +he said.</p> +<p>“Yes,” she repeated, as though in a trance. “I +should have been sorry for Addie’s sake. But I had thought that I +should be able to live at last—my God, at last!—in absolute +truth and sincerity.... <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb327" href= +"#pb327" name="pb327">327</a>]</span>and not in a narrow ring of +convention, not in terror of people and what they may think absurd and +cannot understand ... and ... and....”</p> +<p>“And...?” he asked.</p> +<p>“And ... in that thought, in that hope ... I had forgotten my +boy. And yet he is the reality!”</p> +<p>“And yet he ... is the reality.”</p> +<p>“And now I am sacrificing ... the dream ... the illusion ... +to him.”</p> +<p>“Yes ... the dream ... the illusion,” he said, with a +smile that was full of pain.</p> +<p>“It hurts me!” she confessed, with a sob. +“Yesterday—oh, only yesterday, last night!—I thought +that the dream, the illusion ... was truth.... But what for young +people can be a dream, an illusion ... which comes true....”</p> +<p>“Is at our age....”</p> +<p>“Absurd?” she asked, still wavering.</p> +<p>“Not absurd perhaps ... but impossible. We go bent under too +heavy a burden of the past to permit ourselves youthful dreams and +illusions. We no longer have any right ... even to +memories....”</p> +<p>“I have some ... from my childhood,” she stammered, +vaguely.</p> +<p>“There are no memories left for us,” he said, gently, +with his smile that was full of pain.</p> +<p>“No, there are none left for us,” she repeated. +<span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb328" href="#pb328" name= +"pb328">328</a>]</span>And she confessed, “I have dreamed ... and +thought ... too late. I ... I have begun to live too +late....”</p> +<p>“I,” he said, “I thought ... that I had lived; but +I have done nothing ... but seek....”</p> +<p>“You never found?”</p> +<p>“Perhaps ... almost. But, when I had found ... I was not +allowed to put out my hand....”</p> +<p>“Because ... of the past?” she asked, softly.</p> +<p>“And of the present. Because of what <i>is</i> and has +younger, fresher rights than mine ... which are no rights ... but the +forbidden illusions of an old man....”</p> +<p>“Not old....”</p> +<p>“Older every day. He alone is in the prime of life ... who has +found ... or thinks that he has found....”</p> +<p>“Yes, that is so,” she said; and her voice sounded like +a wail. “I have begun to live too late. I could have lived ... +even now ... perhaps; but it is all too late. I once told you ... that +I was abdicating my youth....”</p> +<p>“Once, months ago....”</p> +<p>“Since then, I have thought, dreamt, lived too much ... not to +feel young ... for a few moments.... But it was all an illusion ... and +it is all too late....”</p> +<p>They looked at each other. He bowed his head, <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb329" href="#pb329" name="pb329">329</a>]</span>in +gentle acquiescence, with his smile that was full of pain:</p> +<p>“Yes, it is so,” he said; and it was almost as if he +were joking. “Come, let us be strong. I shall go on seeking ... +and you....”</p> +<p>“Oh, I have my boy!” she murmured. “He has +<i>always</i> comforted me.”</p> +<p>They walked back slowly and took leave of each other at the door, a +friends’ leave-taking.</p> +<p>“Will you come again soon?” she asked.</p> +<p>“I don’t know,” he said. “You know, you no +sooner see me than I am gone.... I may go to England in the autumn, to +lecture on Peace. The world is full of mighty problems; and we ... we +are pigmies ... in the tiny worlds of our own selves....”</p> +<p>“Yes ... we are nothing....”</p> +<p>He left her; she was conscious of a sort of farewell in the pressure +of his hand. She went in, with her head swimming; and her son was +there. And she embraced him, as though asking his forgiveness.</p> +<p>“Addie,” she said, softly, “Papa was right, Papa +was right.... I believe that I now know for certain, dear, that I know +for certain that Papa was right.... Oh, Addie, whatever I may lose ... +you will not let me lose you?...” <span class="pagenum">[<a id= +"pb330" href="#pb330" name="pb330">330</a>]</span></p> +</div> +</div> +<div id="ch31" class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<h2 id="xd20e6338" class="main">Chapter XXXI</h2> +</div> +<div class="divBody"> +<p class="first">Had it all been an illusion then? Was it all for +nothing?</p> +<p>The days passed slowly, one after the other. She saw Van Vreeswijck +and felt for him, their friend, in his silent grief; she bade good-bye +to Bertha and her children. She knew that Van der Welcke had seen +Marianne once more before her departure; and her heart was full of pity +for them both.</p> +<p>Had it all been an illusion then, this world of feeling, this little +world of her own self? Oh, he was going to England, to lecture on +Peace; for him there were always those mighty problems which consoled +him for the smallness of that little world of self! But she, had she +lost everything, now that the illusion no longer shone before her, now +that the magic cities had fallen to pieces, now that everything had +become very dreary in the disenchantment and self-reproach of realizing +that she had not loved her son enough, that she had not loved him as +well as his father loved him, not as well as she had loved the +stranger, the friend who had taught her to live?...</p> +<p>Had she lost everything then? Now, ah now, she was really old, +grey-haired; now her eye was no longer bright, her step no longer +brisk; now it was <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb331" href="#pb331" +name="pb331">331</a>]</span>really all over and it was over forever.... +But had she lost everything then? This was what she often asked herself +in the days that followed, those days of sadness, sadness for herself, +for him, for her son, for her husband, for the girl whom she loved too +... for all those people, for all her life.... And what of the great +questions, the mighty problems of life? Ah, they no longer stood out +before her, now that he who had called her attention to them had gone +straight towards those mighty problems as to the towers of the greater +life! To her they seemed infinitely remote, shadowy cities on a far +horizon behind her own shattered cities of fair translucent hopes.... +Had she then lost her interest in all those things? And, having lost +that interest, did she no longer care for her own development, for +books, nature, art? Was the life that she had been living all illusion, +a dream-life of love, lived under his influence, lived under his +compelling eyes?</p> +<p>Yes, that was how it had been, that was how she would have to +acknowledge it to herself!... That was how it was!... That was how it +was!... Only with his eyes upon her had she felt herself born again ... +born again from her childhood onwards ... until she had once more +conjured up the fairy-vision of the little girl with the red flowers on +her temples who ran over the boulders in the river under the spreading +tropical leaves, beckoning the wondering little brothers.... And she, a +middle-aged <span class="pagenum">[<a id="pb332" href="#pb332" name= +"pb332">332</a>]</span>woman, had grown into a girl who dreamed the +shimmering dreams that were wafted along rainbow paths towards the +distant clouds high in the heavens.... In her maturity, she had +developed herself hurriedly, as though afraid of being too late, into a +thinking, feeling, loving woman.... She had been sincere in that new, +hurried life; but it had been nothing more than illusion and illusion +alone, the illusion of a woman who felt herself growing old without +ever, ever having lived....</p> +<p>But, though it had all been illusion, was illusion nothing then?... +Or was illusion indeed something, something of no great account? And, +even though she had lived only illusion, illusion under the compelling +eyes of the man whom she loved, feeling love for the first and only +time, under the brooding, anguished eyes of that thinker and seeker, +had she not lived then, had she not lived then?</p> +<p>Yes, she had: she had lived, in the way in which a woman like +herself—a woman who had never felt simply and sincerely except as +a child in those far-off childish days, a woman whose life had been +nothing but artificiality and failure—could live again, only +later still, older still, old almost and finished; she had lived in +illusions, in a fleeting illusion, which just for one moment she had +tried to grasp, that day, now a few months ago....</p> +<p>She shook her head, her grey head; she was no <span class= +"pagenum">[<a id="pb333" href="#pb333" name= +"pb333">333</a>]</span>longer blinded; she saw: she saw that it could +never have been....</p> +<p>Yet she felt that they had—both of them—lived the +illusion—both of them—for a little while....</p> +<p>And was nothing left of it?</p> +<p>Now that the long dreary days of sadness were drawing on, she saw: +she saw that there was indeed something left, that a ray of light +remained in her small soul, which had only been able to live like that, +very late; for she saw that, in spite of all her repining, there was +still gratitude....</p> +<p>Yes, she was grateful, for she had lived, even though everything had +been illusion, the late blossoming of ephemeral dream-flowers....</p> +<p>And now—when she felt that strange question rise in her soul: +is this life, this futile, endless round, or is there ... is there +anything else? When she felt that bewildering, passionate +doubt—then she was conscious, deep down in her heart, with a +throb of gratitude, that there was something else....</p> +<p>Illusion, yes, only illusion, without which there is no life....</p> +<p class="trailer xd20e6375">The End</p> +</div> +</div> +</div> +<div class="back"> +<div class="div1"><span class="pagenum">[<a href= +"#toc">Contents</a>]</span> +<div class="divHead"> +<div class="div1" id="toc"> +<h2 class="main">Table of Contents</h2> +<ul> +<li><a href="#note">Translator’s Note</a></li> +<li><a href="#ch1">Chapter I</a></li> +<li><a href="#ch2">Chapter II</a> <span class= +"tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href="#xd20e386">7</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch3">Chapter III</a> <span class= +"tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href="#xd20e514">20</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch4">Chapter IV</a> <span class= +"tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href="#xd20e666">26</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch5">Chapter V</a> <span class= +"tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href="#xd20e793">32</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch6">Chapter VI</a> <span class= +"tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href="#xd20e909">39</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch7">Chapter VII</a> <span class= +"tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href="#xd20e1062">48</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch8">Chapter VIII</a> +<span class="tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href= +"#xd20e1291">55</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch9">Chapter IX</a> <span class= +"tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href="#xd20e1620">65</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch10">Chapter X</a> <span class= +"tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href="#xd20e1861">76</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch11">Chapter XI</a> <span class= +"tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href="#xd20e2085">89</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch12">Chapter XII</a> +<span class="tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href= +"#xd20e2194">95</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch13">Chapter XIII</a> +<span class="tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href= +"#xd20e2285">103</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch14">Chapter XIV</a> +<span class="tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href= +"#xd20e2330">108</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch15">Chapter XV</a> <span class= +"tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href="#xd20e2500">115</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch16">Chapter XVI</a> +<span class="tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href= +"#xd20e2769">123</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch17">Chapter XVII</a> +<span class="tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href= +"#xd20e2942">129</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch18">Chapter XVIII</a> +<span class="tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href= +"#xd20e3218">140</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch19">Chapter XIX</a> +<span class="tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href= +"#xd20e4132">168</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch20">Chapter XX</a> <span class= +"tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href="#xd20e4473">187</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch21">Chapter XXI</a> +<span class="tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href= +"#xd20e4616">200</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch22">Chapter XXII</a> +<span class="tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href= +"#xd20e4846">216</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch23">Chapter XXIII</a> +<span class="tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href= +"#xd20e4958">232</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch24">Chapter XXIV</a> +<span class="tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href= +"#xd20e5026">243</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch25">Chapter XXV</a> +<span class="tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href= +"#xd20e5074">249</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch26">Chapter XXVI</a> +<span class="tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href= +"#xd20e5239">262</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch27">Chapter XXVII</a> +<span class="tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href= +"#xd20e5502">280</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch28">Chapter XXVIII</a> +<span class="tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href= +"#xd20e5606">289</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch29">Chapter XXIX</a> +<span class="tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href= +"#xd20e5906">303</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch30">Chapter XXX</a> +<span class="tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href= +"#xd20e5975">313</a></span></li> +<li><a href="#ch31">Chapter XXXI</a> +<span class="tocPagenum"><a class="pageref" href= +"#xd20e6338">330</a></span></li> +</ul> +</div> +<div class="transcribernote"> +<h2 class="main">Colophon</h2> +<h3 class="main">Availability</h3> +<p class="first">This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no +cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give +it away or re-use it under the terms of the <a class="exlink xd20e41" +title="External link" href="https://www.gutenberg.org/license" rel= +"license">Project Gutenberg License</a> included with this eBook or +online at <a class="exlink xd20e41" title="External link" href= +"https://www.gutenberg.org/" rel="home">www.gutenberg.org</a>.</p> +<p>This eBook is produced by the Online Distributed Proofreading Team +at <a class="exlink xd20e41" title="External link" href= +"https://www.pgdp.net/">www.pgdp.net</a>.</p> +<p>Scans of this work can be found in the Internet Archive (<a class= +"exlink xd20e41" title="External link" href= +"http://www.archive.org/details/laterlife00coupiala">1919 US +Edition</a>; 1915 US Edition: copy <a class="exlink xd20e41" title= +"External link" href= +"http://www.archive.org/details/laterlife00couprich">1</a>, <a class= +"exlink xd20e41" title="External link" href= +"http://www.archive.org/details/laterlife00coupuoft">2</a>, <a class= +"exlink xd20e41" title="External link" href= +"http://www.archive.org/details/laterlife00mattgoog">3</a>; <a class= +"exlink xd20e41" title="External link" href= +"http://www.archive.org/details/laterlife00coup">1915 UK +Edition</a>).</p> +<p>This book is the second volume of the Books of Small Souls. The +Dutch original is titled <i lang="nl">Het late leven</i>, and was first +published in 1902.</p> +<p>Related Library of Congress catalog page: <a class="catlink" href= +"http://lccn.loc.gov/15024007">15024007</a>.</p> +<p>Related Open Library catalog page (for source): <a class="catlink" +href="http://openlibrary.org/books/OL7127724M">OL7127724M</a>.</p> +<p>Related Open Library catalog page (for work): <a class="catlink" +href="http://openlibrary.org/works/OL1456919W">OL1456919W</a>.</p> +<p>Related WorldCat catalog page: <a class="catlink" href= +"http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/7790617">7790617</a>.</p> +<h3 class="main">Encoding</h3> +<p class="first"></p> +<h3 class="main">Revision History</h3> +<ul> +<li>2011-09-26 Started.</li> +</ul> +<h3 class="main">External References</h3> +<p>This Project Gutenberg eBook contains external references. These +links may not work for you.</p> +<h3 class="main">Corrections</h3> +<p>The following corrections have been applied to the text:</p> +<table width="75%" summary= +"Overview of corrections applied to the text."> +<tr> +<th>Page</th> +<th>Source</th> +<th>Correction</th> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="width20" valign="top"><a class="pageref" href= +"#xd20e1829">74</a></td> +<td class="width40" valign="bottom">musn’t</td> +<td class="width40" valign="bottom">mustn’t</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="width20" valign="top"><a class="pageref" href= +"#xd20e3390">143</a></td> +<td class="width40" valign="bottom">[<i>Not in source</i>]</td> +<td class="width40" valign="bottom">“</td> +</tr> +</table> +</div> +</div> +</div> +</div> + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Later Life, by Louis Couperus + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LATER LIFE *** + +***** This file should be named 37578-h.htm or 37578-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/7/5/7/37578/ + +Produced by Jeroen Hellingman and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net/ for Project +Gutenberg (This file was produced from images generously +made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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