Gertrude

by Hesse, Hermann

  “I must leave early in the morning for Cologne,” I said, during the dinner. “But should you need me at any time, Mother, I can quickly return.”

  At that I looked not at my mother but at her cousin and she knew what it meant. My farewell to her was short and, on my side, almost hearty.

  “Child,” said my mother, afterwards, “you did that very well and I must thank you for it. Will you not play me something from your opera?”

  Of course there was no time for this, but we had broken through the armor, and between my old mother and me it began to be daylight. That was the best part of the affair. She now had faith in me. And I was happy to think of the little household I could open with her, and to think I was soon to issue from my long homelessness. I departed well satisfied, left best wishes for the old cousin, and immediately after my return began to call here and there where pretty, small houses were for rent.

  Teifer helped me with this, and his sister often went with us. Both were glad for me, and looked forward to a happy life together with the two families.

  In the meantime my opera had gone to Munich. After two months, shortened by the arrival of my mother, Muoth wrote me that it had been accepted, but could not be produced anymore that season. But it would be presented at the beginning of the next winter. So I had good news for the mother, and Teifer prepared a feast with festal dances when he heard it.

  My mother wept when she entered our pretty little place with its garden, and thought it was not wise to be replanted when one is old. But I found it very good, and so did the Teifers. Brigitte helped my mother as if it were a pleasure. Brigitte had few friends in the city, and was often left alone in the house while her brother was at the theater. Now she came to us often, and helped, not only by suggestions and practices, but also helped my mother and me to find our way up the steep path to a friendly quiet life together. She knew how to explain to my mother when I was in need of rest and must be alone. She was then at hand and took my place. And she explained to me many requirements and desires of my mother, of which I had never dreamed, and which my mother had not confided to me. So very soon there was a peaceful home for us, not as luxurious as our former home, but quite good enough for one who had not progressed any farther than I.

  Now, also, my mother learned to know my music. She did not like all of it, and for the most part, was silent about it. But she saw and believed that it was not a pastime and play, but was earnest work. And upon the whole she found, to her astonishment, that the life of a musician, which she had considered pure rope-dancing and vaudeville, was really no less bourgeois than that life which my father had led.

  We could speak more freely of him, and by degrees I heard a thousand anecdotes of him and of her, and of my childhood, and of the grandparents. The past, and my family were dear to me and interesting, and I felt I was no more outside the circle. And in return my mother learned to leave me alone, to have faith in me, when I shut myself up in my work or was irritable. She had been so content with my father, and the trials of the Schniebel had been hard for her, so now she put her confidence in me, and gradually ceased to talk of her age and her loneliness.

  In all this comfort and modest happiness the feeling of sorrow and of insufficiency, in which I had so long lived, was sunk. But it did not sink into the bottomless deep; rather it reposed, unlost, in my innermost soul. Many a night it looked out at me questioningly, and maintained its right. The farther the past seemed to fade, the clearer appeared the picture of my love and of my sorrow. That remained with me and was my quiet admonisher.

  Many times before had I thought to know what love is. In my youth in which I foolishly wandered with the pretty, superficial Liddy, I thought to know love. Then again when I first saw Gertrude, and felt that she was the answer to my questionings and the solace for my obscure desires. Then again when pain began, and out of the friendship and light grew suffering and darkness. And, finally, when she was lost to me. But the love remained and was always with me, and I knew that never again would I follow a woman with desire, nor long for the kiss of a woman’s lips, since I had Gertrude enshrined in my heart.

  Her father, whom I sometimes visited, seemed to know of my feeling for her. He asked me for a copy of the prelude which I had written for her wedding, and showed a silent regard for me. He must have felt how I wanted to hear about her and how I hesitated to ask, and he shared many of her letters with me. In them there was, frequently, mention of me, and especially of my opera. She wrote that a good singer had been found for the soprano rôle, and that she was so pleased that at last she was to hear the whole work, parts of which she knew so intimately. She was also glad that I had my mother with me. What she wrote about Muoth, I did not know.

  My life ran along smoothly; the currents of the deeps no longer drew me in nor carried me out. I was working on a mass and had an oratorio in my mind, although for that I had no words. When I necessarily had to think of my opera, it seemed to me like a foreign world. My music was following a new course. It was becoming simple, and less fiery; it desired to comfort and not to arouse.

  During this time the sister of Teifer meant much to me. We saw each other almost daily. We read, played, and walked together; we had picnics and trips together. Only in summer, when I could not burden people on their vacation trips, we were separated a few weeks. The Teifers walked through the Tyrol again, crossed the Arlburg, and sent little boxes filled with edelweiss. I had taken my mother to some of her relatives in North Germany, where she had been invited for years, and I had gone to the North Sea. There, day and night, I heard the old song of the sea, and in the fresh, salt air pursued my thoughts and melodies. There for the first time, I found heart to write to Gertrude in Munich—not to the wife of Muoth, but rather to my friend Gertrude, to whom I confided my music and my dreams. Perhaps she would be pleased; perhaps some comfort and friendly words would do her good, I thought. For in my very heart I could but distrust my friend, Muoth, and I always felt a certain uneasiness for Gertrude. I knew him too well, that self-willed melancholy temperament, accustomed to live in his moods, and never to make any sacrifice; suffering and driven by an overpowering force, and looking at his own life, in its critical hours, as a tragedy. If this was truly an illness, this state of loneliness and misunderstanding—as the good Lohe had asserted—then Muoth suffered from this illness more than anyone else.

  But I heard nothing from him. He never wrote letters. Gertrude, too, answered me with only a short thank you, and inviting me to come to Munich early in the autumn, when, directly with the beginning of the season, my opera would be rehearsed.

  The first of September, when we had all returned to the city, and were leading our habitual lives, we came together one evening in my house, to look through my work of the summer. The chief thing was a little lyrical composition for two violins and the piano. We played that. Brigitte Teifer was at the piano. From over my manuscript I could see her head with its heavy crown of blond braids, whose ends gleamed like gold in the candlelight. Her brother stood next to her and played the first violin. It was simple music, gently lamenting and fading away like a summer night, neither happy nor sad, but floating in the air in lost tunes, like a cloud consumed by fire after the sun has set. That composition pleased the Teifers, especially Brigitte. She was seldom given to saying anything about my music, but repressed herself in a kind of maidenly respect, and only looked at me wonderingly, for she considered me a great master. Today she took courage and made known her distinct pleasure. She glanced at me ardently out of her bright, blue eyes and nodded, until the light danced upon her blond braids. She was so pretty, almost a beauty!

  To give her pleasure, I took the piano score and wrote over the notes a dedication—“To my friend, Brigitte Teifer,”—and gave it back to her. “That shall always remain above the little song,” I said to her gallantly and paid her some compliments. She read the dedication, slowly flushed, held out her little,
forceful hand, and immediately her eyes were full of tears.

  “Is it really true?” she said, softly.

  “It is, indeed,” I laughed. “And I think the little song really belongs to you.”

  The glance from her eyes filled with tears, astonished me. It was so serious and womanly. Then I paid no more attention to it. Teifer put his violin away, and my mother, knowing well his requirements, poured some wine into the glasses. The conversation became gay. We wrangled about a new opera that had been produced a few weeks before, and the little incident with Brigitte first occurred to me later in the evening as they took their departure, and she looked again in my eyes with a strange unrest.

  In Munich, in the meanwhile, the rehearsals of my opera began. As the principal rôle was in the hands of Muoth, and as Gertrude had praised the soprano, the orchestra and the chorus were my main concern. I left my mother to the care of the friends and started for Munich.

  The morning after my arrival I went through the beautiful, broad streets to Schwabing, to the quiet house where Muoth lived. I had forgotten the opera completely. I thought only of him and of Gertrude and of how I would find them. The carriage stopped before a house that stood among green trees, in a shady street. Golden maple leaves were rustling on both sides of the path to the house. I went in with a feeling of oppression. The house gave a comfortable, rich effect. A servant helped me off with my coat.

  In the large drawingroom, into which I was shown, I recognized two of the old paintings which had been brought from the Imthor house. On another wall hung a new portrait of Muoth, painted in Munich. And while I was looking at it, Gertrude came in. My heart almost stopped beating when, after so long a time, I looked into her eyes. In the old friendly way, she cordially gave me her hand, but smiled out of a changed face—the sterner, matured face of a woman.

  “Is everything all right?” she asked me. “You have become older, but you look well. We have waited for you a long time.”

  She inquired about all the friends, about her father, about my mother, and as she grew interested and forgot the first embarrassment she looked as she had formerly. All of a sudden my surroundings vanished, and I talked to her as to my one good friend. I told her of my summer at the sea, of my work, of the Teifers, and even of poor Miss Schniebel.

  Then she exclaimed, “Now your opera is to be played! How happy you must be! ”

  “Yes,” I said, “but I am more happy to think I will hear you sing again.”

  She nodded to me. “I, too, am happy. I sing a good deal but only for myself. We will sing all your songs. They are always by me, and never have a chance to get dusty. Stay for lunch. My husband must come soon, and afterwards he can go with you to the Director.”

  We went into the music room. I sat at the piano. And she sang my songs of other times so that I became quiet and had great difficulty to remain cheerful. Her voice had grown richer and fuller, but was as delicate and spontaneous as ever, and filled my heart with the remembrance of the best days of my life. I sat over the keys as one bewildered and played softly the old notes, and for an instant, listening with eyes closed, I could not distinguish between present and past. Did she not belong to me and to my life? Were we not as brother and sister to each other—as friends? Truly with Muoth, she would not have sung so!

  After a while we sat happily talking, without saying much to each other, for we perceived that between us no explanation was required. How it was with her, and how it was between her and her husband, I did not think anymore. I would see that later for myself. At all events she had not swerved from her path, and had not become untrue to herself. And if it was not well with her, and if she had a burden to bear, she bore it nobly and without bitterness.

  After an hour Heinrich came. He had already heard of my arrival. He began immediately to speak of the opera, which seemed to be more important to every one than to me. I asked him how he liked Munich and how things were going.

  “As usual,” he said. “The Public does not like me, because it feels that its opinion matters little to me. I am seldom liked at my first appearance. First, I must take hold of the people by carrying them along with me. So I have succeeded without being liked. Many times, too, of course, I sing badly. I must confess that myself. But this opera will be a success. You can count upon that—both for you and for me. Today we will go to the Director. Tomorrow, we will invite the soprano and whomever else you desire, for lunch. Tomorrow, early, is a rehearsal of the orchestra. You will be pleased with it.”

  At the table I observed that he was extremely polite to Gertrude. That did not please me. And so it continued the whole time, as long as I was in Munich, and saw them both daily. They were a very handsome couple and made an impression wherever they went. But they were formal to each other, and I thought to myself that only the pride and spiritual superiority of Gertrude had the power to change his indifference into a form of courtesy and dignity. She seemed to have but awakened from her passion for this handsome creature, and still to hope for a return of the lost, departed ardor. At all events it was she who demanded from him this civility. She was too refined and good to play, even before friends, the rôle of a disappointed, disillusioned woman, and to show her secret sorrows to anyone, even if she could not conceal them from me. But I gave her no glance, no sign of comprehension or pity. Throughout, we spoke and acted as if her marriage were without shadow. How long this situation would last was rather doubtful, and depended wholly upon Muoth whose incalculability I saw, for the first time, restrained by a woman. I was grieved for both, although I was not surprised to find things so. They both had had their love and lived their passion. Now they must either learn to renounce and to think of the happy time in sorrow or find the way to a new happiness and to a new love. Perhaps a child would draw them together, not back into the garden of their glowing love, but rather to a new, fine purpose—mutually to do and to live for each other. Gertrude had the strength and the spirituality to do that, I knew. But whether Heinrich would find it—that I could not know. It grieved me that the big, lofty storm of their first ardor and joy in each other was over. But I was glad that their good mien, not only before other people, but also before each other, had proved their fineness and dignity.

  I could not accept the invitation of Muoth to stay at his home, and he did not urge me. I was there daily, and it did me good to see that Gertrude liked to have me come and liked to sing to my accompaniment. So I not only took, but gave.

  The production of the opera was set for December. I remained there two weeks, took part in all the orchestra rehearsals, found that I must cut here and adapt there, but saw that the work was in good hands. It was wonderful to me to see the singers, the violinists, the flutes, the Kapellmeister and chorus busy on my work, which had become strange to me, and was a breathing being that no longer belonged to me.

  “Only wait,” said Heinrich Muoth, now and then, “you’ll have to breathe the cursed air of publicity. Sometimes, I almost wish for you that it will bring you no success. For then you will have the pack of hounds after you. Then you will have to trade in locks of your hair, and in autographs, and you will see how tasteful and desirable is the adoration of the herd. Already every one is speaking of your lameness. Something like that makes one popular! ”

  After the necessary experiments and tests, I departed, having first agreed to return before the production. Teifer had no end of questions to ask about the performances, and thought of a hundred separate things in the orchestra, that I had hardly taken into consideration. And he awaited the event with greater excitement and uneasiness than I myself. When I invited him and his sister to be my guests at the first performance, he jumped for joy. On the contrary my mother did not wish to take the journey and to have the excitement. I was rather glad of this. Gradually I felt the strain, and in the evenings I had to take a glass of red wine to make me sleep.

  Winter came early. And the garden
of our little house lay deeply buried under the snow, the morning Teifer and his sister came for me in the carriage. My mother waved to us from the window, the carriage started, and Teifer, out of his voluminous muffler, burst into a song. On the whole long trip he was like a child who takes a journey to celebrate Christmas. Brigitte showed her excitement in a quieter satisfaction. I was glad to have their company, for my calm was gone and I went to meet the event of the next few days like a condemned person.

  Muoth, who met us at the station, noticed this immediately.

  “You have stage fright, boy,” he laughed, amused. “Thank God for that. You are, after all, just a musician, not a philosopher.”

  He seemed to be right, for my excitement lasted until the performance, and I did not sleep a single night.

  Of us all only Muoth was calm. Teifer burned with impatience. He came to each rehearsal, and there was no end to his criticisms. Bent over, and keenly watching, he sat next to me in the rehearsals. In the difficult places he beat time loudly with his fist, and praised or disapproved with his head.

  “There’s a flute missing,” he cried so loudly at the first rehearsal of the orchestra that the Director looked around at him, angrily.

  “We have had to strike that out,” I said, smiling.

  “The flutes? Struck out? Why that? Such an idiocy! Be careful or they’ll spoil the whole overture for you.”

  I had to laugh and hold him back by strength. He threw himself into the matter with such wildness. But at his favorite place in the overture, where the violas and ‘cellos enter, he leaned back with his eyes closed, and clasped my hand convulsively, and whispered, almost ashamed, “Yes, that almost makes me cry. It is great! ”