"The wedding, well, that"s all up now anyhow," said Lina, bustling back and forth between her chests and Billy. "There, this dress here, it"s a bit tight for me, for the young lady it"ll be all right. Nope, it"s too big after all, we"ll have to pin it together," and the two girls began to laugh at the loose dress, quite loudly, quite helplessly. Lina sat down, slapped her knees, and held her sides. The canaries tried to outsing the laughter of the girls. Now Billy was ready. She asked for a mirror, surveyed herself attentively, then put away the mirror satisfied and said, "Very good, your clothes are as soothing as smelling-salts."
Lina went out to prepare something to eat, and Billy leaned back on the sofa and closed her eyes. Yes, she really felt as if she had put away with her clothes the cares and unrest of the former Billy. With the dotted blue and white linen dress, with the big collar and the coa.r.s.e shirt that scratched her skin, it seemed as if she had imbibed something of the carefree, almost shameless peacefulness with which Lina had lazily and indolently moved her body, distorted by motherhood, along the vegetable beds of the garden.
Now Lina brought milk, a shiny, brown loaf, and a great deal of honey.
Billy began to eat; at first with ravenous hunger, then slowly with enjoyment, almost with devotion: she could not remember ever having had anything taste so good to her.
When she was satisfied, she rested her arms heavily on the table. In these unwonted clothes she had an impulse to go through motions which were otherwise never characteristic of her, which perhaps were Lina"s.
Her cheeks were flushed again, her eyes shining, and impatience for life warmed her blood. Lina sat facing her, her hands laid flat on her knees, and looked at her steadily and patiently out of her small blue eyes.
"I think," remarked Billy, "we will go and see the cow, the chickens, and the bees now."
That was it: in this comical blue dress she felt like going about the farm outside; yes, she was convinced that she would be able to walk along between the vegetable beds quite as lazily and cheerfully as Lina. But when she stood up she felt that her legs were stiff and pained her.
"Oh, no, let us stay here," she said, "and let us talk instead."
But the calm of the big, heated girl facing her made her impatient.
Could one not poke up this calm, as the child Billy had poked up the small, quiet ant-hills, so that they immediately teemed with excited life. "Are you not afraid?" asked Billy suddenly.
"Afraid?" answered Lina, "why? Oh, I see, you mean about that; naw, what is there to be afraid of?"
"But some die of it," Billy went on probing.
Lina drew the back of her hand across her eyes and smiled faintly.
"Yes, some die." The two girls were silent for a time, listening to the clamor of the canaries. Then Lina began to ask in her deep, somewhat singing voice, "And yours is gone too?"
Billy blushed. "Yes, gone," she murmured uncertainly.
Lina sighed. "Yes," she said, "men are a cross, they always go away.
That"s what happens to all of us."
Billy was silent, but it was like security and peace to her, this "us"
which placed her in the ranks of the girls who with calmness and strength take the burden of life upon them.
The rumble of a wagon was heard outside. Immediately thereafter the old man appeared in the door with a whip in his hand, saying, "We can start now, young lady." Billy had to put on a very large yellow straw hat, and then they drove away.
The little wagon rattled violently, the heavy white horse trotted along imperturbably, patiently shaking off the gadflies that circled about him. The little bells fastened to his harness tinkled a sleepily monotonous tune. For a time the wagon continued to roll through the fir nursery as between quiet blue walls, then the forest came to an end, and the high road was before them and broad fields. Over all of it lay a hot, pale yellow dust-film. The countryside seemed to Billy so awesomely bare. "We see no people," she said.
The old man began to laugh softly and long. ""Cause it"s Sunday. Ah yes, when we go walking by night we don"t know what day it is any more, but that"s the way with girls; Lina"s got that far too."
"Can"t he marry her?" asked Billy timidly.
The old man struck angrily at his white horse. "Marry? Marry who? Where is the man to marry? Where is our handsome machinist at the saw-mill? "Cause he"s got yellow cat"s-eyes, they all run after him.
Anna at the watermill has come to it too now. Ye-ep, you can"t stop it; soon as spring comes, the young hussies are out o" nights, as restless as the bees before a thunderstorm, and you can beat "em, you can tie "em, but in a jiffy--off they put. Now at this time o" year it don"t happen so often," added the old man with a sidelong glance at Billy.
She smiled. "Yes," she thought, "in a spring night, when we grow as restless as the bees before a thunderstorm, then maybe there is this Being-happy and this Dying, that Boris was talking about, but there"--she shrank and shuddered: she did not even wish to think of it, she still had a long ride before her, and later she would think it all over. Good, good, but no thinking now, just listen to the sleepy tinkle of the little bells.
Gradually however the region became more familiar, here and there stood a farmer in Sunday coat among his fields, whose face Billy recalled, and finally Kadullen rose in the distance between the great trees of the park; a cool green spot in the sun-yellow land.
Billy drew herself up; she suddenly became quite wakeful; it was almost torturing, how abruptly all her dream world fell away from her and the former Billy was present once more with the responsibility for what she had done, with the fear and shame before all those people yonder. She saw distinctly Marion"s eyes, Aunt Betty"s helpless little face, and her father"s severe white nose. They had probably found the slip of paper she had left behind. She tried to think what was on it.
"I am with him." Lord, how stupid that sounded! And now they were coming closer and closer to the house. If only she could get to her room unnoticed by way of the little staircase: no one would recognize her in Lina"s clothes, and once upstairs in her room she would lock the door and let n.o.body in and sleep--sleep. Perhaps that would take some burden from her; perhaps when she then awoke everything would be different, everything better.
"Oh please," she said, "we"ll stop at the little gate in the park wall over there."
The old man nodded indifferently, turned into the side road, and stopped before the small gate in the park wall. When Billy had got out, she stood still a moment and said hesitantly: "I suppose I must pay."
""s all right," answered the old man with a bad grace, "I"m going to deliver some honey in the courtyard anyway."
"But not right away," pleaded Billy.
"I know, I know the game," murmured the old man, "needn"t tell me."
Billy disappeared behind the gate. Cautiously she hurried up the little paths: everything was silent and unpeopled, and the house stood there as if asleep, with lowered blinds. Cautiously Billy approached the back stairs. From the windows of the servants" quarters resounded the long-drawn notes of a hymn: the servants were having their Sunday worship. Before the washhouse stood the washwoman, putting her hand to her eyes and looking out into the sunshine. Where had Billy just seen that? Oh yes, over yonder in her dream. Now she softly ran up the stairs, now she was in her room. Here too everything had waited for her unchanged, and the familiar scent of the room, the familiar light, all moved her so deeply that tears streamed down her face without effort or pain. She locked the door, hastily pulled off her clothes, and crept into her bed. Tears and sleep she craved, nothing else. Then when she awoke, simply to belong again to all this that had waited here for her so unchanged, so quietly and proudly.
Strange enough was the Sunday that had broken upon Kadullen. The news of Billy"s return home spread quickly. The washwoman had told the butler, the butler reported it to Countess Betty, and then the old beekeeper came into the servants" room and told his story. He was taken to the Count and there cross-examined; but to no avail, for the affair remained as incomprehensible as before. Why had she gone away? What had happened? Marion was sent up to Billy"s room, but reported that Billy would admit no one and wished to sleep. Full of trouble Countess Betty and Madame Bonnechose sat on the garden-steps beside Lisa, who had stretched herself out on a reclining chair, for she felt very weak from all these excitements. The two old ladies were silent: what should they say?--they no longer understood _la chere jeunesse_. Only Madame Bonnechose murmured from time to time, "_C"est incomprehensible._"
Countess Betty nodded, but Lisa would smile dreamily and say, "Understand?--Oh, I can understand it all."
"_Mais chere_ little Lisa, _dites-nous donc, ce que vous savez_," urged Madame Bonnechose.
Lisa shook her head. "There are things which we understand and yet for which there are no words. When I stood on the plain of Marathon with Katakasianopulos that time, it seemed to me as if I distinctly understood all the pain that was to come upon us, but express it--that I could not have done."
"Ah, dear child," said Countess Betty dejectedly, "that will not help us now."
Marion came and reported once more that in Billy"s room everything was quite still.
"Oh dear, oh dear," sighed Countess Betty; she could not calmly sit still, so she rose and went over to see her brother.
Count Hamilcar lay in his room on the sofa; he was keeping his eyes shut, his face was strangely sallow, and the features seemed sharper and more pointed than usual. When his sister came to a stop before him, he opened his eyes and looked at her with a glance which had the indifference of a man who to be sure surveys us, but whose thoughts and dreams are very far from us.
"Still no certainty," said Countess Betty whimperingly. "She admits n.o.body, saying she wants to sleep."
"Let her sleep," answered the count.
"Yes, but she might let us in," wailed the old lady further, "what is all this? all these affairs? the whole house is whispering. The Professor"s family will leave today and carry the story all over the country, and you, Hamilcar, you don"t say anything either."
The count raised himself slightly. "No, Betty," he said, "I say nothing, because I know nothing. We cannot prevent others from talking, but we ought not to speak until there is need for it. Let the child sleep, then she shall tell you everything, and then, Betty, I shall say my say too. Will it soon be time for breakfast?"
"Oh, Hamilcar," replied Countess Betty intimidated, "you surely won"t come to breakfast, you are so unstrung."
The count laid his finger along his nose and said sharply, "I shall come, and I hope it will be on time as usual. Also I did not hear you sing a hymn: did you not have the accustomed worship?"
"No, we were so excited, you see," the old lady excused herself, but the count was dissatisfied.
"You are wrong, Betty, have your worship as you do every Sunday; but if I may request it, no reference to these happenings in the Bible reading or in the prayer, just ordinary devotions. It is not our fault that something has come in here which does not belong to us, but there is no reason why we should surrender to it: we insist on our way, and that ends it."
Wearily the count leaned back and shut his eyes; his sister looked at him with alarm. "What ails you, Hamilcar?" she asked, "you are so pale."
The count motioned impatiently with his hand. "I shall manage," he said, "circulation and heart-beat simply won"t listen to us, and the only trouble is that they are forever meddling with our affairs. There is an error here in the contract that we call our life. But for the rest, it is old age, Betty, just that, and that is after all comprehensible."