‘I’m not talking about that. That’s not quite what I meant to say, although, to be candid, I do have misgivings about that too, or I should say I had. For it’s all in the past now. But there are more discreet places. Do you know about country outings?’
‘Of course. And I wish Innstetten showed more interest…’
‘Do you realize what you’re saying, my dear friend? Zwicker was always going out to Saatwinkel. I can tell you, I still only have to hear the name to feel a pang again. That goes for all those places people go to on the outskirts of our dear old Berlin! For I love Berlin in spite of everything. But the very names of all those places conjure up a world of worry and anxiety. You’re smiling. But tell me my dear friend, what can you expect the state of morality to be in a city where just outside the gates (for there’s hardly any difference between Berlin and Charlottenburg any more), huddled within half a mile of each other you have Pichelsberg, Pichelsdorf and Pichelswerder? Three places to get pickled in is just too much. Search the whole world, you won’t find anything like it elsewhere.’
Effi nodded.
‘And this,’ Frau Zwicker continued, ‘is all going on in the greenwood on the banks of the Havel. And that’s only the west where at least you find culture and civilized behaviour. But go to the other side of the city my dear, up the Spree. I’m not talking about Treptow or Stralau, they’re bagatelles, quite innocuous, but look at a local map, and alongside names that are to say the least strange-sounding like Kiekebusch or Wuhlheide… you should have heard Zwicker pronouncing that one… you’ll find names with an unmistakably vulgar ring, names I won’t offend your ears with. But, naturally, these are the preferred places. I hate these country outings, which in the popular imagination are patriotic charabanc parties with rousing choruses of “I am Prussian”, whereas in fact they contain the seeds of social revolution. When I say “social revolution” I mean of course moral revolution, everything else is passé, and even Zwicker in his last days said to me, “Believe me Sophie, Saturn devours his children.” And Zwicker, for all his faults and deficiencies, I have to give him his due here, was a thinking man and had a natural feeling for history… But I can see that my dear Frau von Innstetten, polite as she usually is, is only listening with half an ear. Of course! There’s the postman over there, and so the heart flies out to anticipate the loving words in the letter… Well Böselager, what have you brought us?’
While she spoke, the postman had reached the table and was emptying his bag: several newspapers, two hairdresser’s advertisements and lastly a large registered letter addressed: ‘To Baroness von Innstetten, née von Briest.’
The recipient signed and the postman left again. Frau Zwicker ran her eye over the advertisements and laughed at the reduced price for a shampoo.
Effi was not listening; she turned the letter she had received over and over in her hands with an inexplicable reluctance to open it. Registered, sealed with two large seals in a stout envelope. What did that mean? Postmarked Hohen-Cremmen and addressed in her mother’s handwriting. From Innstetten, it was five days now, not a word.
She took a pair of mother-of-pearl-handled embroidery scissors and slowly cut open the long side of the envelope. And now a fresh surprise awaited her. The sheet of notepaper was indeed covered with closely written lines from her mother, but folded up in it were banknotes with a broad paper band round them on which, in red in her father’s hand, the amount of the enclosed sum was marked. She thrust the bundle of notes back into the envelope and began to read, leaning back in the rocking-chair. But she did not get far, the notepaper fell from her grasp and all the blood drained from her face. Then she bent down and picked up the letter again.
‘What’s wrong, my dear friend? Bad news?’
Effi nodded, but did not elaborate and merely asked for a glass of water. When she had taken a drink she said, ‘It will pass, dear Geheimrätin, but I should like to go to my room for a moment… Could you send Afra to me?’
And with that she rose and went back into the drawing-room where she was visibly relieved at having something to hold on to, and to be able to feel her way along the jacarandawood piano. In this way she reached her room on the right, and when, fumbling and groping for the handle, she had opened the door and reached the bed against the wall opposite, she fainted.
31
Minutes went by. When Effi had recovered she sat on a chair standing by the window and looked out at the quiet street. If only there had been some noise, some altercation; but all that was on the paved roadway was sunshine, interspersed with the shadows cast by the railings and the trees. The feeling of being alone in the world descended on her with all its weight. An hour ago a happy woman, the darling of all who knew her, now an outcast. She had read only the beginning of the letter, but it was enough to bring her situation home to her quite clearly. Where to go? She had no answer to that, yet she was filled with a deep longing to get away from all that surrounded her here, away from the Geheimrätin, to whom it was all just an ‘intriguing case’, and whose sympathy, if she had any, would certainly be no match for her curiosity.
‘Where to go?’
On the table in front of her lay the letter; but she did not have the courage to read any more of it. In the end she said, ‘What is there to be afraid of now? What can they say that I haven’t already told myself? The man for whose sake this all happened is dead, there’s no going back home for me, in a few weeks the divorce will be granted and the child will be awarded to the father. Naturally. I’m the guilty party and a guilty woman can’t bring up her child. And anyway, what with? For myself, I’ll manage. Let’s see what Mamma has to say about this, how she envisages my life.’
And with these words she took up the letter again to read it through to the end:
…And now to your future, my dear Effi. You are going to have to fend for yourself, and in that you can rely, as far as material things are concerned, on our support. You had best stay in Berlin (a big city is best for living down this kind of thing) and there you will be one of the many who have forfeited the open air and the light of the sun. You will live a lonely life, or if you don’t want that you will probably have to move out of your own sphere. The world you have lived in will be closed to you. And the saddest thing of all for us and for you (yes, for you too, we think we know you well enough to say) is that your parental home will be closed to you. We cannot offer you a quiet corner at Hohen-Cremmen, there can be no refuge in our home, for that would mean closing this house to all the world, and that we are definitely not inclined to do. Not because we are so very attached to the world, or because saying goodbye to ‘society’, as it is called, seems absolutely unbearable, no, not for that reason. It’s simply that we have to show what we stand for and show before the world, I’m afraid I have to say this, our condemnation of what you have done, of what our only child, whom we loved so dearly, has done…
Effi could read no further; her eyes filled with tears, and after struggling in vain with them, she finally succumbed to paroxysms of sobbing and weeping which relieved her heart.
Half an hour later there was a knock, and in response to Effi’s ‘Come in,’ the Geheimrätin appeared.
‘May I come in?’
‘Of course my dear Geheimrätin,’ said Effi, who was now lying on the sofa, covered with a light rug, her hands clasped. ‘I’m exhausted. I’ve just made myself as comfortable as I could here, after a fashion. May I invite you to take a seat?’
The Geheimrätin sat down so that the table with its bowl of flowers stood between her and Effi. Effi showed no trace of embarrassment and made no adjustment to her posture, not even her clasped hands. All at once it was a matter of complete indifference to her what the woman thought; all she wanted was to get away.
‘You have had sad news my dear, dear lady…’
‘More than sad,’ said Effi. ‘At any rate sad enough to put a swift end to our being together here. I must leave here today.’
‘I don’t wish to pry, but is it
something to do with Annie?’
‘No, not with Annie. The news didn’t come from Berlin, it was a few lines from my Mamma. She’s worried about me, so I really feel I must dispel her worries somehow, or if I can’t do that, at least be at home with her.’
‘I understand only too well, much as I regret the prospect of spending these last few days here in Ems without you. May I put my services at your disposal?’
Before Effi could answer, Afra came in and announced that they were going in to lunch. All the guests were very excited, she said: the Kaiser was probably coming for three weeks, and at the end of his stay there were to be grand manoeuvres. The Bonn Hussars were supposed to be coming too.
Would it be worth staying on until then, Frau Zwicker instantly reflected, arriving at a definite ‘yes’ before leaving to offer Effi’s apologies for her absence at lunch.
When Afra too made to leave, Effi said. ‘Oh Afra, if you’re free, come and help me with my packing for a quarter of an hour. I want to catch the seven o’clock train today.’
‘Today, so soon? Oh my lady, that’s a great pity, it really is. The fun’s just beginning.’
Effi smiled.
Frau Zwicker, who still had hopes of hearing much more, had only been persuaded with difficulty not to see the ‘dear Baroness’ off. At the station, Effi had insisted, one was always so preoccupied, and only concerned about one’s luggage and one’s seat; and especially in the case of those one cared for it was best to take one’s leave beforehand. Frau Zwicker concurred, though she sensed well enough that this was just a pretext; she had seen enough in her time to know at once what was genuine and what wasn’t.
Afra accompanied Effi to the station and insisted on the Baroness promising faithfully to come back next summer; people who had been to Ems always kept coming back. There was nowhere to beat Ems, apart from Bonn.
Frau Zwicker had in the meantime sat down to write some letters, not at the rather shaky rococo secretaire in the drawing-room, but outside on the veranda, at the same table where she had taken breakfast with Effi not ten hours previously.
She was looking forward to writing the letter, which a Berlin lady of her acquaintance who was currently staying in Reichenhall was to have the benefit of. They had long been soul-mates and were united above all in viewing the entire male sex with deep-seated scepticism; they found that men consistently fell far short of anything that one might reasonably require, the so-called ‘dashing’ ones further than most. ‘The ones who are so embarrassed they don’t know where to look are the best for all that, after a short course of instruction, but the Don Juans are invariably a disappointment. And what else could you expect?’ Such were the words of wisdom that passed between the two friends.
Frau Zwicker was already on her second sheet, expatiating on her highly rewarding topic – Effi – as follows:
All in all she was easy to get on with, she was well-mannered, seemed to be frank and open, without any trace of aristocratic snobbery (or else greatly skilled in concealing it) and she always listened with interest when she was told something interesting, which, as I don’t have to tell you, I exploited to the full. I repeat, a charming young woman, twenty-five, or not much more. And yet I didn’t trust that calm of hers, nor do I at this moment, indeed now less than ever. The business today with the letter – there’s a real story behind that. I’m as good as certain. It would be the first time I’ve ever been mistaken in such a matter. The way she liked to talk about fashionable Berlin preachers, establishing the measure of each one’s godliness, that and her occasional Gretchen look, as if butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth – all these things together reinforced my conviction… But here is Afra, whom I’ve mentioned to you already, a pretty young girl, bringing a newspaper to my table, which she tells me the landlady has given her for me: there’s something marked in blue. Excuse me while I read it…
P.S. The paper was most interesting and came right on cue. I shall cut out the passage marked in blue and enclose it with this letter. You’ll see from it that I was not wrong. Who can this Crampas be? It’s not to be credited – first she writes notes and letters and then she goes and keeps his letters! What are fires and stoves for? That sort of thing should never be allowed to happen, at least not as long as this idiotic practice of duelling is still with us; in coming generations the passion for writing letters may perhaps be permitted (because then it will no longer be dangerous). But we are a long way off that time yet. For my part, I’m filled with pity for the young baroness, and the only consolation in all this for me, vain as one is, is that I was not wrong about her. And the case was not all that ordinary. A less acute diagnostician could have been taken in.
As ever,
Yours,
Sophie
32
Three years had passed and Effi had been living for almost as long in a little flat in Königgrätzerstrasse between Askanischer Platz and Hallesches Tor: two rooms, one front and one back, and a kitchen behind with a cubby-hole for the maid, all as plain and ordinary as one could imagine. And yet it was a pretty flat with a touch of style which made an agreeable impression on everyone who saw it, not least perhaps, on his occasional calls, old Geheimrat Rummschüttel who had long since forgiven the poor young woman not only for the play-acting with rheumatism and neuralgia – that lay far in the past – but also for all that had occurred since, insofar as there was any need for forgiveness in his case. For Rummschüttel had seen far worse in his time. He was going on eighty, yet whenever Effi, who had latterly been given to frequent ailments, sent a letter asking him to visit her, he would be there next morning, brushing aside her apologies for living up so many stairs. ‘Not a word of apology my dear lady, first because it’s my job, secondly because I’m pleased, indeed rather proud to be able to climb three flights so easily. If I weren’t afraid of inconveniencing you – after all I’m here as a doctor and not as a nature-lover and landscape enthusiast – I would probably come more often, just to see you and sit for a while at your back window. I don’t think you quite appreciate the view.’
‘Oh, I do, I do,’ said Effi, but Rummschüttel would not be deterred and went on, ‘Please, my dear lady, come over here just for a moment, or allow me to escort you to the window. Quite magnificent again today. Just look at all those different railway lines, three, no four of them, and look at the way trains constantly glide up and down them… and now that one over there is disappearing again behind a clump of trees. Really magnificent. And the way the sun is suffusing the white smoke! If St Matthew’s churchyard wasn’t directly behind it, it would be ideal.’
‘I rather like churchyards.’
‘Yes, you can say that. But for the likes of me! Inevitably the question for us is, couldn’t one or two fewer have been laid to rest there? Anyway my dear lady, I’m quite pleased with you and my only regret is that you won’t hear of Bad Ems; with these catarrhal infections of yours Ems would work…’
Effi said nothing.
‘Ems would work wonders. But since you don’t care for it (and I accept that) you can take the waters here. It’s three minutes to Prince Albrecht’s Gardens, and even if they don’t have the music and elegant dresses and all the diversions of a proper spa promenade, there is the spring, which is the main thing after all.’
Effi expressed agreement and Rummschüttel took his hat and stick. But he went over to the window again. ‘I hear the council is going to lay out terraces on the Kreuzberg, bless them, and once that bare patch at the back has more green… A charming flat. I almost envy you… And I’ve been meaning to say for some time dear lady, you always write me such delightful letters. Who could fail to enjoy them? But it must be such an effort each time – why don’t you just send Roswitha over?’
Effi thanked him and on this note they parted.
‘Why don’t you just send Roswitha over…’ Rummschüttel had said. So was Roswitha with Effi? Was she in Königgrätzerstrasse and not in Keithstrasse? Indeed she was, and had been for quite some time, for
as long in fact as Effi herself had been in Königgrätzerstrasse. Three days before the move Roswitha had appeared at her dearly beloved mistress’s lodgings and that had been such a great day for both of them that we must now go back and give it its due.
When her parents’ letter came from Hohen-Cremmen casting Effi off and sending her from Ems back to Berlin on the evening train, she had not immediately taken a place of her own, but had found accommodation at a boarding-house by way of experiment, and it had proved tolerably successful. The two ladies who ran the boarding-house were educated and amply considerate, and had long since given up being curious. So many paths converged there that a desire to penetrate everyone’s secrets would have caused altogether too many complications. That kind of thing could only be harmful to business. Effi, who still had Frau Zwicker’s cross-questioning eyes fresh in her memory, was most agreeably touched by the landladies’ restraint, but at the end of a fortnight had the distinct feeling that the prevailing atmosphere there, both moral and physical, was not one she could readily bear. There were mostly seven at table: besides Effi and one of the landladies (the other ran the kitchen behind the scenes), two English girls attending college, a titled lady from Saxony, a very pretty Jewish girl from Galicia – what she was there for no one knew – and a schoolmaster’s daughter from Polzin in Pomerania who wanted to be a painter. It was an unfortunate combination and the round of supercilious backbiting in which the English girls did not, oddly enough, sweep all before them, but disputed the palm with the daughter of Polzin and her exalted sense of her artistic vocation, was dispiriting, yet Effi, who kept out of it all, could have coped with the strain this moral atmosphere imposed, had there not been the physical matter of the actual air in the boarding-house to compound her problems. Its exact composition was probably impossible to determine, but the fact was all too clear that, susceptible as Effi was, it caused her breathing difficulties, and it was this physical circumstance that very quickly forced her to look out for alternative accommodation, which she then managed to find quite close by. It was the flat already described in Königgrätzerstrasse. She had gathered together the essentials to move in at the beginning of the autumn quarter, and was counting away the hours in the last days of September before her merciful release from the boarding-house.
Effi Briest Page 29