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Countess Erika's Apprenticeship

<h2>CHAPTER V.</h2> The Countess Lenzdorff had gone to meet her granddaughter as far as the vestibule, which was hung with Japanese crape and lighted by red Venetian lanterns in wrought-iron frames. She had been convinced from the first that the brilliant description which Doctor Herbegg had given of her grand-daughter was not to be trusted, and she had consequently moderated her expectations, but yet she was startled at what she encountered in the vestibule, the door of which the ever-ready Lüdecke had left open. At first she thought that the tall spare girl in that gown was her grand-daughter's attendant; but since behind the awkward creature whose clothes were all awry stalked a broad-shouldered female grenadier with a woollen kerchief on her head and a pasteboard bandbox in her hand, she doubted no longer which was her grand-daughter: it was not necessary for Doctor Herbegg to present the girl to her with, "Here is the young Countess, your Excellency." She advanced a step and touched the girl's forehead with her lips. "Welcome to Berlin, dear child," she said, coldly. This, then, was her grand-daughter,--this angular creature with red wrists and a servant who wore a woollen kerchief on her head and carried in her hand an archaic pasteboard bandbox. The Countess shuddered. "Will you have a cup of tea, my dear Doctor?" she said, turning to her lawyer with the hope of putting a little life into the situation. Then, seeing him look at her with something of the dismay in his expression which Goswyn von Sydow's features had shown when she had complained that this was to be her last comfortable evening, she added, hastily, "You will not? Well, you are right; it is late; another time, my dear Herbegg, you will do me the pleasure; and I--I could hardly remain with you; I am too--too desirous of making acquaintance with my grand-daughter." The last words came with something of a stumble, as if the Countess had been obliged to give them a push before they would leave her lips. The Doctor took a ceremonious leave. Minna, with her bandbox, which she refused to allow any one to take from her, was conducted by a footman to the servants' hall, the Countess Lenzdorff having informed her that her own maid would attend for this evening to her young mistress's wants. Erika followed her grandmother through several brilliantly-lighted apartments, the arrangement of which produced upon her the impression of a fairy-tale, to an airy little room adjoining the old Countess's sleeping-apartment. "This is your room," said Countess Lenzdorff. "I had your bed put for the present in my dressing-room; it is the best arrangement, and--and I--I think I would rather have you close at hand. Of course it is all provisionary: I do not even know yet what is to be done with you, whether--whether you will stay with me, or go for a while to some school. At any rate, for the present you must try to feel comfortable with me." Comfortable! It was asking much of the girl that she should feel comfortable under the circumstances! She wanted to say something: it annoyed her to have to play the part of a dunce,--her poor, youthful pride rebelled against it,--but she said not a word; she had to summon up all her resolution to keep back the tears that would well up to her eyes. With the slow stony gaze of one who is determined not to cry, she looked about her upon her new surroundings. How airy and fragrant, how bright and fresh and inviting, it all was! But in the midst of this Paradise she stood, trembling with fatigue, sore in soul and body, timid and sad, with but one wish,--that she might creep away somewhere into the dark. â?¢ Her grandmother perceived something of the girl's suffering, but still could not overcome her own distaste. "Will you dress first, or have some supper immediately?" she asked, with an evident effort to be kind. As she spoke, her bright eyes scanned the girl from head to foot. Poor Erika! She understood only too clearly that her grandmother was disappointed in her, that personally she was in no respect what the old lady had hoped for. "I should like to brush off some of this dust," she stammered, meekly. Her voice was remarkably soft and sweet, and her accent brought a reminiscence of the Austrian intonation, so much admired in Berlin. For the first time the Countess's heart was moved in favour of the young creature; some chord within her vibrated agreeably. "Well, my child, do just as you like," she said, rather more warmly, as she made an attempt to unfasten the top button of the ugly black garment that so disfigured her grand-daughter. With a shy gesture Erika raised her hands and held her poor gown together over her breast. There was something in the gesture that touched the old lady. "You may go," she said to the maid, who had meanwhile been unpacking Erika's travelling-bag. "I will ring for you when we want you." Then, turning to Erika, she added, "I will help you myself to undress." Erika's sensations can hardly be described. Apart from the fact that in consequence of her intense shyness, the shyness of a very strong, pure nature bred in solitude, it was terrible to her even to take off her gown in the presence of a stranger, it suddenly seemed very hard to her (she had not thought of it at first) to expose to her grandmother's penetrating gaze the poverty of her wardrobe. She trembled from head to foot as her grandmother drew down her gown from her shoulders. But, strange to say, it almost seemed as if with the ugly dress some sort of barrier of separation between herself and her grandmother were removed. The old lady's bright eyes were dimmed by a certain emotion as she noticed the coarse, ill-made, but daintily white linen shift that left bare a small portion of the young, half-developed shoulders. "Poor thing!" she murmured, the words coming for the first time warm from her heart. Then, stroking the girl's long, slender, nobly-modelled arm, she said, "How fair you are! I only begin now to see what you look like." She lifted the heavy knot of shining hair from the back of Erika's neck, and, in an access of that absence of mind for which she was noted in the Berlin world of society, exclaimed, "Mais elle est magnifique!--In three years she will be a beauty!--Turn your head a little to the left." Her grand-daughter's stare of dismay recalled her. "What would Goswyn say if he heard me?" she thought, and smiled. Erika had only bathed her face and hands, and slipped on a long white dressing-gown of her grandmother's, when the maid brought in a waiter with her supper. In spite of her continued sense of discomfort, youth demanded its rights. She was decidedly hungry, and it was long since she had seen anything so inviting as this dainty repast. She sat down and began to eat. The old Countess observed her narrowly, but saw nothing to displease her. Her grandchild's manner of eating and drinking, of holding her fork, her glass of water,--all was just as it should be. The whole thing seemed odd to the Countess Lenzdorff: she delighted in everything odd. Not to disturb the girl at her repast, she looked away from her, glancing at the contents of the shabby old travelling-bag which the maid had unpacked. How poverty-stricken it all looked, in almost ridiculous--no, in positively pathetic--contrast with the young creature who in spite of her awkwardness had a regal air. "Mais elle est superbe! Where were my eyes?" the Countess thought, as she casually picked up a book from among Erika's belongings. It was a volume of Plutarch. "'Tis comical enough," she thought, "if I am to have a little blue-stocking in the house." As she turned over the leaves rather absently, she noticed that passages here and there were encircled by thick pencil-marks: sometimes an entire page would be thus marked, sometimes only a few lines. "What does that mean?" she asked. "My mother always used to mark so in my books the parts that I must not read," Erika said, simply. The Countess's eyes flashed. How sure a way to lead a child to taste the forbidden fruit!--or was it possible that girls growing up in the country under the exclusive influence of a mother might be differently constituted from girls in cities and boarding-schools? "And you really did not read those portions?" she asked, half smiling. The girl's face grew dark. "How could I?" she exclaimed, almost angrily. "Brava!" cried her grandmother, patting her grandchild's shoulder. "You are an honourable little lady,--a very great rarity. We shall get along very well together." But, far from the girl's expressing any pleasure at this frank recognition of her excellence, her face did not relax one whit. Erika had gone to bed. Countess Lenzdorff was still up and pacing her chamber to and fro. She thoroughly understood the full significance of her granddaughter's being with her; she was neither heartless nor complaining, but, where emotion was concerned, a sensitive old woman who studiously avoided everything that could agitate her nerves. But at present she could not control her emotion; feeling awoke within her as from a long sleep. At first she was conscious only of a vague discomfort,--a strange sensation which she ascribed to nervousness that must be controlled; but, far from being controlled, it increased, growing stronger until it became a positive hunger of the heart. The self-dissatisfaction which had begun to torment her when she learned that Erika after her mother's death had been entirely uncared for, left alone with her step-father, now increased tenfold. It was the fault of the Pole, who had not notified her of his wife's death. But this excuse did not content her. How could she blame him? What had he done save follow her example in caring only for his own personal ease? The unkindness with which she had treated her daughter-in-law now troubled her more than her loveless neglect of her grandchild. Had she any right to despise and cast her off because of her weakness? Good heavens! she was a rare creature in spite of everything; she had shown herself so in her child's education. What an influence she must have exercised over the girl to preserve her from deterioration through those terrible three years. Poor Emma! The old Countess's heart grew heavy as she recalled her. Her injustice to the poor woman dated from years back. She could not deny it. She had never been fond of her daughter-in-law: each differed too fundamentally from the other. On the one hand was Anna Lenzdorff, with her keenly observant mind, self-interested even in her strict morality which in her arrogance she regarded as the necessity of her nature for moral purity and independence, something for which she claimed no merit, since she practised it solely for her private satisfaction; good-natured, but without enthusiasm, endlessly but lovelessly indulgent to humanity, and rather of opinion that life is nothing but a farce with a tragic conclusion, something out of which the most advantage may be gained by observing it from a safe, comfortable corner, without ever making an attempt to mingle in its activities, firmly convinced that the best conduct of life consists in acknowledging its glaring contradictions, its lack of harmony, in making use of palliatives where they are of use, and in postponing for as long as possible the facing of the huge deficit sure to appear at the close of every human existence. And on the other hand was Emma,--Emma, who had a positive horror of the philosophy of life, which her mother-in-law with easy indifference denominated "my laughing despair,"--Emma, who believed in everything, in God and in humanity,--yes, even, as her mother-in-law maintained, in the cure of leprosy and the disinterestedness of English politics,--Emma, for whom an existence in which she could take no active part was devoid of interest, and who looked upon a loveless life as worse than death,--Emma, whose unselfishness bordered upon fanaticism, blinding her conscience for a moment now and then, when she would have given to one person what she had no right to take from others,--Emma, utterly unable to appreciate proportion and moderation, and who, scorning all the palliatives and make shifts with which one eases existence, demanded from life absolute happiness, and consequently, dazzled by an illusion, plunged blindly into an abyss. Ah, if it had been only an abyss! but no, it was a slough, and Anna Lenzdorff could not traverse it. It certainly was strange that she, who found an excuse for every criminal of whom she read in the papers, had never been able to forgive her daughter-in-law when, thanks to her inborn thirst for the romantic, she forgot herself so far as to adore that Polish nonentity. What in the world could a woman of sense find in romance? When Anna von Rhödern, at twenty-two, had married Count Ernst Lenzdorff, her views of life were in great measure the same that she had since elaborated so perfectly. She was of Courland descent, and the daughter of a prominent diplomat in the Russian service. Unlike her daughter-in-law, she had been a courted beauty, but at two-and-twenty she had turned her back upon all the sentimental possibilities to which in virtue of her great charm she had a right, and had married Count Lenzdorff, whose entire part in her existence she afterwards summed up in declaring that he really had bored her very little. And that, she maintained, was a great deal in a husband. She had become acquainted with him in Paris, where he was secretary to the Prussian legation, and she married him there; afterwards he took up his abode in Berlin, where he held a distinguished position in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. In moments of insolent frankness she was wont to describe him as an automaton whose key was in the possession of whoever might be Minister of Foreign Affairs. Once wound up, he could perform all the duties of his office during the few hours in which they were required of him; when they were over he was a lifeless wooden figure-head--nothing more. A wooden figure-head whom one is obliged to drag after one in life conduces but little to one's comfort, especially when the wooden figure-head is of the dimensions of Count Ernst Lenzdorff, and of this his wife shortly became aware. With great courtesy and skill she removed him from her life as soon as possible, placing him somewhere in the background upon a suitable pedestal,--the best place for wooden figureheads, and one where they can be made to look very effective. The Countess's only son was the very image of his father, and quite as imposingly wooden. If Emma, following her mother-in-law's example, could have courteously and respectfully put him upon a pedestal in some corner where he would not have been in her way, she might have led a very tolerable life with him. The mistake was that she attempted to make him happy. Poor Emma! As if one possibly could make a wooden figure-head happy! Young Count Lenzdorff was extremely uncomfortable in view of his wife's exertions to make him happy. What ensued was of a very unedifying character: from being simply a state of contented indifference, the marriage became a decidedly irksome bond. Nevertheless it was most unfortunate for Emma when Edmund Lenzdorff, two years after their marriage, lost his life in a railway accident. Had he lived, her existence might at least have been a quiet one; in time she would have relinquished her ill-judged attempts to make him happy, and have found an object in life in the education of her child; while, as it was, he was no sooner dead than her existence began to totter uncertainly, like a ship from which the ballast has been removed. At first she sickened, as her mother-in-law expressed it, with an attack of acute philanthropy. She haunted the most disreputable corners of Berlin in search of cases of misery to be relieved, never allowing a servant to accompany her, because, as she explained, it might humiliate the poor. Upon one of her excursions her watch was snatched from her, and another time she caught spotted fever. This was very annoying to the Countess Anna, but she forgave her, with--as she was wont to declare--praiseworthy courage, in view of the terrible disease. Six months afterwards Emma married Strachinsky; and this her mother-in-law did not forgive her. Since then fourteen years had passed, fourteen years during which she had had nothing whatever to do with poor Emma. And now she was sorry. Again and again did the Countess Anna revert to the education given to the young girl asleep in the next room. A woman who could so educate her child, and who could continue so to influence her after her death, was no ordinary character. Of course she had had fine material to work upon. And the old Countess was conscious of an emotion never awakened within her by her son, yet now aroused by her grand-daughter,--pride in her own flesh and blood. "A splendid creature!" she murmured to herself once or twice, then adding, with a sneer at her own lack of perception, "and I was fool enough to think her ugly at first. Whom does she resemble? she is not in the least like her mother,--nor like my son!" Still pondering, she paused in her monotonous pacing to and fro, strangely thrilled. Going to an antique buhl cabinet with a multitude of drawers, she opened one of them,--a secret drawer, which had long been undisturbed,--and began to look through its contents. At last she found what she sought, a lithograph representing a young girl, décolletée, and with the huge sleeves in fashion in 1830. A very charming young girl the picture portrayed,--Countess Lenzdorff when she was still Anna von Rhödern. The little faded picture trembled in the old lady's hand: it worked upon her like a spell, carrying her back to a time long forgotten,--a time when life had been to her something different from a farce with a tragic ending, by which one might be vastly entertained, but in which one should scorn to play a part. She was suddenly deeply pained at sight of the beautiful, grave, proud young face: it suggested to her something that had begun very finely and ended in unutterable bitterness, something through which the best and most genial part of her had been destroyed, or at least paralyzed. Hark! What was that? A low, suppressed sob! another! They came from the adjoining room. The old Countess dropped the little picture, and, with a candle in her hand, went to her grand-daughter's bedside. When she heard her grandmother coming, Erika closed her eyes, feigning sleep, but she had not time to wipe away the tears from her cheeks. Her grandmother set the candle upon the table, and then, bending over the girl, whispered, softly, "Erika!" Erika did not stir. How pathetic she looked!--pale and thin, and yet so noble and charming in spite of the traces of tears. The Countess sat down upon the edge of the bed and stroked the girl's wet cheeks. "Erika, my darling, what is the matter? Are you homesick?" Then Erika opened her large eyes and looked gloomily at her grandmother. She answered not a word, but compressed her lips. How could her grandmother ask her if she was homesick, when all that she had of home was a grave? For one moment the old Countess hesitated; then, lifting the reluctant girl from the pillows, she clasped her to her breast, pressing her lips upon the golden head, and murmuring softly, "Forgive me, my child, forgive me!" For one moment Erika's obstinate resistance was maintained; then she began to sob convulsively; and then--then her grandmother felt the slender form nestle close within her arms, while the weary young head fell upon her shoulder and a sensation of sweet, young warmth penetrated to the Countess's very heart, which suddenly grew quite heavy with tenderness. Erika was soon sound asleep, but her grandmother still felt no desire to retire to rest. "I will write to Goswyn," she said to herself. "I must tell him she is charming, and that I will make her happy." <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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