"Boc.o.c.k," Madame von Marwitz mused, holding out an indulgent hand for the pen that Karen gave her and allowing the blotter with the photographs upon it to be placed upon her knee. "And they care for music, _parbleu_! How many of such appreciators are there, do you think, among my adorers? I do this to please you, Karen. It is against my principles to encourage the _schwarmerei_ of schoolgirls. There," she signed quickly across each picture in a large, graceful and illegible hand, adding, with a smile up at Karen,--"To my kind little admirers."
Karen, satisfied, examined the signatures, held them to the fire for a moment to preserve their vivid black in bold relief, and then put them into their envelope, dropping in a small slip of paper upon which she had written: "Her eyes are grey, flecked with black, and are not velvety."
They had now reached the end of the letters.
"A very good, helpful child it is," said Madame von Marwitz. "You are methodical, Karen. You will make a good housewife. That has never been my talent."
"And it is my only one," said Karen.
"Ah, well, no; it is a good, solid little head in other directions, too.
And it is no mean musician that the child has become. Yes; there are many well-known artists to whom I would listen less willingly than to my Karen. It is only in the direction of _la toilette_," Madame von Marwitz smiled with a touch of roguishness, "only in the direction of _la toilette_ that the taste is rather rudimentary as yet. I was very cross last night, _hein_?"
"It was disappointing not to have pleased you," said Karen, smiling.
"And I was cross. Louise has her _souffre-douleur_ expression this morning to an exasperating degree."
"We thought we were going to make the dress quite right," said Karen.
"It seemed very simple to arrange the lace around the shoulders; I stood and Louise draped me; and Louise is clever, you know."
"Not clever enough for that. It was all because with your solicitude about Louise you wanted her to escape a scolding. She took the lace to Mrs. Rolley too late and did not explain as I told her to do. And you did not save her, you see. Put those two letters of Mr. Drew"s in the portfolio; so. And now come and sit, there. I want to have a serious talk with you, Karen."
Karen obeyed. Madame von Marwitz sat in her deep chair, the window behind her. The fog had lifted and the pale morning sunlight struck softly on the coils of her hair and fell on the face of the young girl sitting before her. With her grey dress and folded hands and serene gaze Karen looked very like the little convent _pensionnaire_. Madame von Marwitz scrutinized her thoughtfully for some moments.
"You are--how old is it, Karen?" she said at last.
"I shall be twenty-four in March," said Karen.
"_Bon Dieu!_ I had not realised that it was so much; you are singularly young for your years."
"Am I, Tante? I don"t know," Karen reflected, genially. "I often feel, oh far older than the people I talk with."
"Do you, _mon enfant_. Some children, it is true, are far wiser than their elders. You are a wise child; but you are young, Karen, very young for your years, in appearance, in demeanour, in candour of outlook. Tell me; have you ever contemplated your future? asked yourself about it?"
Karen, looking gravely at her, shook her head. "Hardly at all, Tante. Is that very stupid?"
"Not stupid, perhaps; but, again, very child-like. You live in the present."
"The past was so sad, Tante, and since I have been with you I have been so happy. There has seemed no reason for thinking of anything but the present."
"Well, that is right. It is my wish to have you happy. As far as material things go, too, your future shall be a.s.sured; I see to that.
But, you are twenty-three years old, Karen; you are a woman, and a child no longer. Do you never dream dreams of _un prince charmant_; of a home of your own, and children, and a life to build with one who loves you?
If I were to die--and one can count on nothing in life--you would be very desolate."
Karen, for some silent moments, looked at her guardian, intently and with a touch of alarm. "No; I don"t dream," she said then. "And perhaps that is because you fill my life so, Tante. If someone came who loved me very much and whom I loved, I should of course be glad to marry;--only not if it would take me from you; I mean that I should want to be often with you. And when I look forward at all I always take it for granted that that will come in time--a husband and children, and a home of my own. But there seems no reason to think of it now. I am quite contented as I am."
The kindly melancholy of Madame von Marwitz"s gaze continued to fix her.
"But I am not contented for you," she observed. "I wish to see you established. Youth pa.s.ses, all too quickly, and its opportunities pa.s.s, too. I should blame myself if our tie were to cut you off from a wider life. Good husbands are by no means picked up on every bush. One cannot take these things for granted. It is of a possible marriage I wish to speak to you this morning, my Karen. We will talk of it quietly." Madame von Marwitz raised herself in her chair to stretch her hand and take from the mantelpiece a letter lying there. "This came this morning, my Karen," she said. "From our good Lise Lippheim."
Frau Lippheim was a warm-hearted, talented, exuberant Jewess who had been a fellow student of Madame von Marwitz"s in girlhood. The eagle-flights of genius had always been beyond her, yet her pinions were wide and, unburdened by domestic solicitudes, she might have gone far.
As it was, married to a German musician much her inferior, and immersed in the care and support of a huge family, she ranked only as second or third rate. She gave music-lessons in Leipsig and from time to time, playing in a quintet made up of herself, her eldest son and three eldest girls, gave recitals in Germany, France and England. The Lippheim quintet, in its sober way, held a small but dignified position.
Karen had been deposited by her guardian more than once under the Lippheim"s overflowing roof in Leipsig, and it was a vision of Frau Lippheim that came to her as her guardian unfolded the letter--of the near-sighted, pale blue eyes, heavy, benignant features, and crinkled, red-brown hair. So very ugly, almost repulsively so; yet so kind, so valiant, so untiring. The thought of her was touching, and affectionate solicitude almost effaced Karen"s personal anxiety; for she could not connect Frau Lippheim with any matrimonial project.
Madame von Marwitz, glancing through her letter, looked up from the last sheet. "I have talked with the good Lise more than once, Karen," she said, "about a hope of hers. She first spoke of it some two years ago; but I told her then that I would say nothing to you till you were older.
Now, hearing that I am going away, to leave you for so long, she writes of it again. Did you know that Franz was very much attached to you, Karen?" Franz was Frau Lippheim"s eldest son.
The vision that now flashed, luridly, for Karen, was that of an immense Germanic face with bright, blinking eyes behind gla.s.ses; huge lips; a flattened nose, modelled thickly at the corners, and an enormous laugh that rolled back the lips and revealed suddenly the Semitic element and a boundless energy and kindliness. She had always felt fond of Franz until this moment. Now, amazed, appalled, a violent repulsion went through her. She became pale. "No. I had not guessed that," she said.
Her eyes were averted. Madame von Marwitz glanced at her and vexation clouded her countenance. She knew that flinty, unresponsive look. In moments of deep emotion Karen could almost disconcert her. Her face expressed no hostility; but a sternness, blind and resisting, like that of a rock. At such moments she did not look young.
Madame von Marwitz, after her glance, also averted her eyes, sighing impatiently. "I see that you do not care for the poor boy. He had hoped, with his mother to back him, that he might have some chance of winning you;--though it is not Franz who writes."
She paused; but Karen said nothing. "You know that Franz has talent and is beginning, now, to make money steadily. Lise tells me that. And I would give you a little _dot_; enough to a.s.sure your future, and his. I only speak of the material things because it is part of your childishness never to consider them. Of him I would not have spoken at all, had I not believed that you felt friendship and affection for him.
He is so good, so strong, so loyal that I did not think it impossible."
After another silence Karen found something to say. "I have friendship for him. That is quite different."
"Why so, Karen?" Madame von Marwitz inquired. "Since you are not a romantic school-girl, let us speak soberly. Friendship, true friendship, for a man whose tastes are yours, whose pursuits you understand, is the soundest basis upon which to build a marriage."
"No. Only as a friend, a friend not too near, do I feel affection for Franz. It is repulsive to me--the thought of anything else. It makes me hate him," said Karen.
"_Tiens!_" Madame von Marwitz opened her eyes in genuine surprise. "I could not have imagined such, decisive feeling. I could not have imagined that you despised the good Franz. I need not tell you that I do not agree with you there."
"I do not despise him."
"Ah, there is more than mere negation in your look, your voice, my child. It is pride, wounded pride, that speaks; and it is as if you told me that I had less care for your pride than you had, and thought less of your claims."
"I do not think of my claims."
"You feel them. You feel Franz your inferior."
"I did not think of such things. I thought of his face, near me, and it made me hate him."
Karen continued to look aside with a sombre gaze. And, after examining her for another moment, Madame von Marwitz held out her hand. "Come,"
she said, "come here, child. I have blundered. I see that I have blundered. Franz shall be sent about his business. Have I hurt you? Do not think of it again."
The girl got up slowly, as if her stress of feeling made her awkward.
Stumbling, she knelt down beside her guardian and, taking the hand and holding it against her eyes, she said in a voice heavy with unshed tears: "Am I a burden? Am I an anxiety? Let me go away, then. I can teach. I can teach music and languages. I can do translations, so many things. You have educated me so well. You will always be my dear friend and I shall see you from time to time. But it is as you say, I am a woman now. I would rather go away than have you troubled by me."
Madame von Marwitz"s face, as she listened to the heavy voice, that trembled a little over its careful words, darkened. "It is not well what you say, Karen," she replied. "No. You speak to me as you have no right to speak, as though you had a grievance against me. What have I ever done that you should ask me whether you are a burden to me?"
"Only--" said Karen, her voice more noticeably trembling--"only that it seemed to me that I must be in the way if you could think of Franz as a husband for me. I do not know why I feel that. But it hurt me so much that it seemed to me to be true."
"It has always been my joy to care for you," said Madame von Marwitz. "I have always loved you like my own child. I do not admit that to think of Franz as a husband for you was to do you a wrong. I would not listen to an unfitting suitor for my child. It is you who have hurt me--deeply hurt me--by so misunderstanding me." Sorrow and reproach grew in her voice.
"Forgive me," said Karen, who still held the hand before her eyes.