For reasons that may perhaps become clear later, Madame Benzon wished most fervently for the union of Princess Hedwiga and Prince Hector. She must now believe this union at risk, and any intervention in the matter by a third party would appear to her threatening. Moreover, she found herself for the first time surrounded by inexplicable mysteries, and for the first time Prince Irenaeus preserved his silence. Accustomed as she was to presiding over all the games of the fantastical court, how could she be more deeply wounded?
Master Abraham knew that there is no better weapon to use against an agitated woman than imperturbable calm. Consequently he said not a word, but walked along in silence beside Madame Benzon, who turned, deep in thought, towards that bridge which the gentle reader knows already. Leaning on the balustrade, Madame Benzon gazed into the distant bushes, upon which the setting sun was still casting bright golden glances as if in farewell.
‘A lovely evening,’ said Madame Benzon, without turning round.
‘Indeed it is,’ replied Master Abraham. ‘Indeed it is: quiet, peaceful, cheerful as an easy, open mind.’
‘My dear sir, you cannot hold it against me,’ continued Madame Benzon, addressing the Master with more formality than usual,6 ‘you cannot hold it against me that I am bound to feel painfully affected when the Prince suddenly makes you alone his confidant, asks you alone for advice in a matter where an experienced woman can really give better counsel, make better decisions. But I have now wholly overcome the petty sensitivity I was unable to hide! My mind is quite at ease, since nothing but the form of the thing has been injured. The Prince ought to have told me himself all that I have now learnt from other sources, and indeed I can only approve entirely of everything you have told him, my dear sir. I will even admit to something not exactly praiseworthy. Perhaps it may be excused by both feminine curiosity and my profound sympathy for all that happens to this princely family. You must know, Master, I was listening to you in secret; I eavesdropped on your whole conversation with the Prince and heard every word –’
At these words from Madame Benzon, a strange emotion compounded of scornful irony and deep bitterness seized upon Master Abraham. Like the Prince’s personal valet, he had observed that anyone hiding in the recess in the bushes close to a window in the fisherman’s cottage could hear every word spoken inside. However, he had contrived a clever acoustic device which made conversation inside the cottage sound like nothing but distorted, incomprehensible noise to a person standing outside, so that it was quite impossible to distinguish so much as a syllable. Inevitably, then, it struck the Master as pitiful to hear Madame Benzon resort to a lie in order to discover secrets which she might guess at, but the Prince could not, and which the Prince therefore could not confide to Master Abraham. As for what he was discussing with the Master in the fisherman’s cottage, that will be disclosed later.
‘Oh,’ said the Master, ‘oh, dear madam, it was the lively mind of an active woman of the world that led you to the cottage. How can I, a poor old man without experience, manage all these matters without your aid? I was just about to broadcast what the Prince told me in confidence to all and sundry – but there’s no need for further explanations, since you know everything already. Perhaps, dear madam, you would credit me with speaking from the heart about things that may possibly appear worse than they really are.’
Master Abraham hit the tone of sober confidentiality so well that for all her perspicacity, Madame Benzon could not immediately decide if he were chaffing her or not, and her confusion caused her to lose the thread she might otherwise have grasped and knotted into insidious snares for him. As it was, however, she stood there on the bridge like one spellbound, struggling in vain for words as she looked down into the lake.
The Master relished the sight of her embarrassment for a few moments, but then his thoughts turned to the day’s events. He well knew how Kreisler had been at the centre of those events; deep pain at the loss of his dearest friend overcame him, and the exclamation ‘Poor Johannes!’ involuntarily escaped his lips.
At this Madame Benzon turned quickly to the Master, and said, with sudden vehemence: ‘What, Master Abraham? Surely you aren’t so foolish as to believe that Kreisler has perished? What can a blood-stained hat prove? And what could make him take the terrible decision to do away with himself so suddenly? In any case, he would have been found.’
The Master was not a little surprised to hear Madame Benzon speak of suicide when there seemed to be quite a different sort of suspicion abroad, but before he could answer she continued: ‘It’s as well for us, indeed it is, that he is gone – that unlucky man who brings nothing but distress and mischief wherever he goes. His passionate nature, his bitterness – for I can’t call the humour some praise so highly anything else – will infect every sensitive creature with whom he plays his cruel game. If disdain for all conventional circumstances, indeed defiance of every usual formality, be evidence of a superior understanding, then we must all bow the knee to this Kapellmeister, but pray let him leave us in peace instead of rebelling against all that proceeds from a proper view of real life and is acknowledged to be the foundation of our contentment. So I say thank Heaven he is gone, and I hope never to set eyes on him again!’
‘And yet,’ said the Master gently, ‘yet you were a friend to my Johannes in the past, dear madam, and took his part at a difficult, critical time, and did you yourself not guide him into the path from which he had been lured only by those same conventional circumstances which you support so zealously? Why reproach my good Johannes so suddenly now? What evil has emerged from his heart? Is he to be hated because life faced him with hostility so soon after chance had brought him to a new place, because evil-doing threatened him, because – because an Italian bandit was in pursuit of him?’
Madame Benzon visibly started at these words. ‘What thoughts,’ she said then, in a trembling voice, ‘what dreadful thoughts do you nurture in your breast, Master Abraham? But should it be so, should Johannes really have been killed, then at that moment the bride he had ruined was avenged. Some inner voice tells me that Kreisler alone is to blame for Princess Hedwiga’s dreadful condition. He stretched the tender strings of the sick girl’s mind without pity, until they snapped.’
‘In that case,’ said Master Abraham, sharply, ‘in that case our Italian friend was a man of swift decision who took revenge even before the deed was done. After all, my dear madam, you have heard all I discussed with the Prince in the fisherman’s cottage, so you know that Princess Hedwiga fell into a lifeless trance at exactly the same moment as the shot rang out in the forest.’
‘Indeed,’ said Madame Benzon, ‘it almost makes one believe in all the chimerical stuff served up to us these days, psychic correspondences and such things! Yet I repeat, it is as well for us that he has gone; the Princess’s condition can and will change. Disaster has driven the destroyer of our peace away – and tell me yourself, Master Abraham, isn’t our friend’s mind so lacerated that life can give him no solace now? So supposing he has really –’
Madame Benzon did not finish her sentence, but Master Abraham felt the anger he had been suppressing with difficulty flare up.
‘What,’ he cried, raising his voice, ‘what do you all have against Johannes, what harm has he done you that you will grant him no place of refuge on this earth? You don’t know? Then I’ll tell you. You see, Kreisler doesn’t wear your colours, doesn’t understand your manner of speech; the chair you offer for him to sit in among you is too small for him, too narrow; you cannot take him for one of your own kind, and that vexes you. He will not recognize the perpetuity of the contracts which you have concluded about the form life should take, indeed he thinks that you are suffering from a severe delusion which prevents you from seeing reality, and that the solemn way you think you rule a realm you cannot understand looks quite ludicrous – and you call all that bitterness. More than anything he loves the kind of jesting which is engendered by the deeper intuition of the human mind, and which may be called Nature’s finest
gift, drawn from the purest spring of her being. But you are grave folk of high rank, and won’t jest. The spirit of true love dwells in him, yet how can it warm a heart forever frozen to death, which never held the spark that spirit breathes into flame? You don’t care for Kreisler because you are uncomfortable with your sense of the superiority you cannot but allow him, because he has dealings with higher things than fit into your narrow circle, and you fear him.’
‘Master,’ said Madame Benzon in a low voice, ‘Master Abraham, the zeal with which you defend your friend takes you too far. Did you want to wound me? Well, you have succeeded, for you have awoken thoughts within me that have slumbered for a long, long time! You call my heart frozen? How do you know whether the spirit of love has ever addressed it in a kindly manner, whether I have not found peace and comfort only in those conventional circumstances the eccentric Kreisler may find contemptible? Don’t you think, old man, having known so much grief yourself, that it’s a dangerous game to raise oneself above those conventions and try to approach the world spirit more closely in puzzling over one’s own nature? I know Kreisler has called me the coldest, most motionless piece of prose alive, and it is his judgement now speaking through yours when you call me frozen, but has either of you ever been able to see through the ice that has protected my breast like armour for so long? If love does not mean life itself to men, who merely enthrone it on a peak from which there are safe ways down, our highest, brightest point, creating and shaping our whole being, is the moment of first love.7 If hostile fate ordains that moment to be missed, then all of life is missed for the weak woman submerged in desolate insignificance, while she who has more strength of mind will raise herself up by force and give those same ordinary circumstances of life a form which offers her peace and repose. Let me tell you, old man – here in the darkness of night that casts a veil over confidences, let me tell you, when that moment came in my own life, when I saw him, saw the man who kindled in me all the fire of the most fervent love the female breast can feel – I was standing at the altar with Councillor Benzon, who turned out the best husband in the world. His total insignificance allowed me all I could desire in order to lead a quiet life, and no complaint or reproach ever passed my lips. I put my mind wholly to the sphere of ordinary life, and if much happened even within that sphere to lead me, unobserved, off the straight and narrow path, if I can excuse much that might seem blameworthy only by the pressure of circumstances at the time, then let the first stone be cast by the woman who, like me, has fought the hard battle leading to the entire renunciation of all higher happiness, even if that happiness be nothing but a sweet, dream-like delusion. Prince Irenaeus became acquainted with me – but I will say nothing of what is long past; I will speak only of the present. I have allowed you a glimpse of my heart, Master Abraham; now you know why, with things here turning out as they are, I must fear every intrusion of a strange, exotic principle as a threat. My own fate in that disastrous hour grins at me like a ghost uttering dreadful warnings. I must save those who are dear to me; I have made my plans. Do not oppose me, Master Abraham, or if you wish to enter the lists against me, then be careful I don’t frustrate your conjuring tricks!’
‘Unhappy woman,’ cried Master Abraham.
‘Unhappy, do you call me?’ replied Madame Benzon. ‘I, who have known how to combat a hostile fate, winning peace and contentment where all seemed lost?’
‘Unhappy woman,’ repeated Master Abraham, in a tone which bore witness to his inner emotion, ‘poor, unhappy woman! You think you have won peace and contentment, never suspecting that it was desperation which made all the burning flames flow out of you, like a volcano, and now, in your intractable delusion, you take those dead ashes from which no blossom or flower will spring again for the rich field of life that will yet give you fruits. You mean to erect an artificial structure on foundations shattered by a lightning bolt, and you don’t fear it will fall just when bright ribbons wave merrily from the flowery garland announcing the triumph of the architect? Julia – Hedwiga – I know, I know, those plans were artfully made for them! Unhappy woman, take care that ominous emotion, that real bitterness for which you most unjustly took my friend Johannes to task, does not rise from the depths of your own heart, making your wise designs nothing but a hostile rebellion against a happiness you never enjoyed, and which you now grudge even your dear ones. I know more than you may think of your designs, of those circumstances you boast of which were supposed to bring you peace – yet which lured you into criminal dishonour!’
Madame Benzon uttered a low, inarticulate cry at these last words of the Master, betraying her deep distress. Master Abraham stopped, but then, as Madame Benzon too had fallen silent and did not move from the spot, he continued quietly, ‘I want nothing less than to enter into any combat with you, dear lady! But as for what you call my conjuring tricks, you know very well, madam, that ever since my Invisible Girl left me –’ At that moment the idea of his lost Chiara struck the Master with a force he had not felt for a long time; he thought he saw her form in the dark distance, he thought he heard her sweet voice.
‘Oh, Chiara – my Chiara!’ he cried out in the most painful grief.
‘What’s the matter?’ asked Madame Benzon, turning quickly towards him. ‘What’s the matter with you, Master Abraham? What name is that you speak? But I repeat, let the past alone, don’t judge me by those curious opinions of life you share with Kreisler, promise me not to abuse the confidence Prince Irenaeus has given you, promise not to oppose me in my plans.’
Master Abraham was plunged so deep in the painful memory of his Chiara that he scarcely heard what Madame Benzon was saying, and could reply only with incoherent words.
‘Don’t repudiate me,’ she continued, ‘don’t repudiate me, Master Abraham. It seems you are in fact better informed about many matters than I could suppose, but perhaps I too have secrets which would be worth a great deal to you if I were to impart them; indeed, I might be able to do you a favour you cannot divine. Let us rule this little court together; it certainly needs to be kept in leading-strings! “Chiara” you cry, with an expression of pain that –’
But Madame Benzon was interrupted by a loud noise from the castle. Master Abraham was roused from his dreams. The sound –
M. cont. – list them as follows. A Philistine cat, however thirsty he may be, begins by lapping all round the sides of his saucer of milk, so as to keep clean and not get his nose and whiskers milky, for he minds decorum more than thirst. If you visit a Philistine cat he’ll promise you all manner of good things, but when you leave will assure you of nothing but his friendship, and then he’ll gobble up the delicacies he offered you on his own, in secret. A Philistine cat has a sure and unerring ability to find the best place everywhere, in the attic, the cellar, etc., and will settle down there and make himself as comfortable as possible. He talks a lot about his own good qualities and how, thank Heaven, he can’t complain that Fate has overlooked them. He’ll tell you at length how he came by the good position he now occupies, and what more he will do to rise in the world. However, if in the end you want to say something about yourself and your less fortunate lot in life, the Philistine cat will immediately close his eyes, put back his ears, and pretend to be sleeping or purring. A Philistine cat industriously licks his fur clean and glossy, and even when he goes hunting mice he won’t pass a puddle without shaking water off his paws at every step, so that should his prey escape he would still cut a fine, tidy, well-dressed figure in every eventuality of life. A Philistine cat shuns and avoids the slightest danger; should you find yourself in such danger, and approach him for aid, he will say, with the most solemn assurances of his friendly sympathy, how sorry he is that his situation and various considerations he must take into account don’t allow him to help you just now. In fact everything the Philistine cat does on all occasions depends on thousands and thousands of considerations. For instance, he’ll even remain polite and friendly to the little pug who bit his tail in a very sensitive
spot, so as not to offend the yard dogs whose protection he has wisely secured; he just lies in wait for that pug by night to scratch one of its eyes out. Next day he’ll express heartfelt sympathy for his dear friend the pug, indignantly condemning the malice of its cunning enemies. These considerations, incidentally, resemble a well-designed fox’s earth, always giving the Philistine cat a chance to escape just when you think you’ve caught him. What a Philistine cat likes best is staying under the stove at home, where he feels safe. Open air on the roof-top gives him vertigo. You see, friend Murr, that’s your own case precisely. Now, if I tell you that the cat who’s a member of one of our feline fraternities8 is open, honourable, disinterested, good-hearted, ever ready to help a friend, taking account of no considerations but those incumbent upon honour and good sense, in short, that the feline fraternity member is the very opposite of the Philistine cat, then you won’t hesitate to shake off Philistinism and join a fraternity like a good, honest fellow.’
I keenly felt the truth of what Muzius said. I realized it was only the word Philistine I hadn’t known, while I did indeed know what it meant, having already met many feline Philistines, a bad class of cats whom I had heartily despised. All the more painfully, then, did I feel the error whereby I might have been counted among such contemptible folk, and I determined to follow Muzius’s advice in every point, so that perhaps I might yet be a good member of a feline fraternity. A young man once spoke to my master of a friend who had proved false, and described him by a very strange term which I didn’t understand: he called him a sluggard. It now seemed to me that the word sluggard would describe a Philistine very well, and I asked friend Muzius about it. I had scarcely uttered the word ‘sluggard’ before Muzius leaped up with a cry of delight, and embracing me vigorously shouted, ‘That’s my boy! Now I see that you’ve truly understood me – yes, a sluggard of a Philistine! Such is the despicable creature that sets itself up against our noble fraternities, and we’d like to do away with it wherever we find it. Yes, friend Murr, you have now shown your true, inner feeling for all that is great and noble! Let me press you once more to this breast, in which there beats a true German heart.’
The Life and Opinions of the Tomcat Murr Page 28