Irretrievable

by Theodor Fontane

  Yes, that was what he must do, and at ten o’clock he was once more at the palace where, to his great joy, he learned that the Princess had passed a fair night. Through the same chambermaid as he had spoken with before, he inquired whether it might please Her Royal Highness to grant him an audience, and immediately afterwards, he was shown into her presence, for she had stated that she wished to speak with him urgently.

  The room was the one in which he had had his first audience with the Princess on the day after his arrival. The large portrait of King Christian was still there and, on the opposite wall, that of the deceased landgrave with its frame and crêpe greyer and dustier than ever. Hunched on the sofa under the portrait of the king, sat a decrepit old lady, looking very little like a princess and nothing of an esprit fort. It was plain that even if she was practically recovered from her illness, she had by no means recovered from the shock and excitement of those last hours at Fredericksborg. She seemed exhausted and her eyes were tired and lustreless.

  “That was a bad night, my dear Holk. You can see that I am still suffering from the effects of it. And yet it was nothing compared with what you went through. And Ebba as well. A miracle that you were saved, as I have been told, by your own presence of mind. I wanted to see you so that I could have the opportunity of expressing my gratitude to you. Such things are unforgettable. Particularly by Ebba herself. She will never be able to forget what you did for her and I am sure that she will be obliged to you for the rest of her life.”

  These words could hardly have been better chosen to encourage Holk to say what was already trembling on his lips and, for a moment, he was about to unburden his heart to her and reveal all his plans. But however encouraging the words, her attitude and the tone in which she uttered them were not so in the least. Everything about her was listless and, however anxious Holk was for certainty, he saw quite clearly that this was not the best but the worst possible time to make his confession. In this completely senile old lady sitting underneath the solemn portrait, there was no longer the slightest trace of the free-thinking princess who normally delighted, or at least was interested, in amorous escapades and mésalliances, divorces, and marital squabbles. The only lesson that could now be read in her haggard face seemed to be that boldness and excess had little to offer as a rule of life; that keeping a promise and obeying the law were the only things really to be recommended and, above all, that a genuine, not a reluctant, marriage, was the only safe haven. Holk would have liked to find something else in the Princess’s expression but it was so plainly impossible to do so that, instead of making his confession, he merely asked for several days’ leave of absence. In doing this, he had no clear plan in mind and if asked why he wanted it, he would not have known the answer. But the Princess who, from the beginning of the interview, had had only the one desire, to withdraw as soon as possible into her private study, was only too glad not to ask any indiscreet questions and graciously granted his request. And then, with a kindly nod of her head, she ended the audience, if audience it could be called.

  29

  When holk had asked for leave, one thing only was clear in his mind: something must be done; and now that leave had been granted, the question at once arose: what was to be done now? A meeting with Ebba—although he was sure of her agreement; arrangements for the future—that would have been the most obvious course; but Ebba was ill and when he called again, Karin gave the same reply: she could see no one. And so he faced a true testing-period, days during which there would be nothing to do but wait. And in his present state of mind, that was the most difficult thing of all. Finally, he accepted the situation and decided to shut himself up and see nobody, read newspapers, write letters. But to whom? He saw at once that there was no one to write to …. Petersen, Arne, the children—all impossible. Fräulein Dobschütz—even more so. There remained only Christine herself. “Christine. Yes, that would be the best thing. She must know eventually and the sooner the better …. But why write to her? Must I really write, as if I haven’t the courage to go and see her? But I do have the courage, because it’s my right to have what I want. People don’t live together just in order to be perpetually squabbling and always going in different directions. Christine has driven me away by her coldness. Yes, that’s the right word and it was her ever-increasing coldness that was worse than quarrels and violence. A woman must have some warmth, some temperament, life, sensuality. What can one do with an iceberg? And even if it’s the most transparent kind of iceberg, that sort of ice is the coldest and I won’t be frozen. Yes, that’s right, that’s a good gambit but it must be face to face. I shan’t write, I shall say it to her face. Her own letter has offered me a golden opportunity. And once I’m free and back here again …. Ah, how I long for life, warmth, joy. I’ve been spending my days surrounded by shadows from the underworld—the worthy Dobschütz for example; but I’m still young enough to want flesh and blood.”

  He rang. The widow came.

  “Dear Frau Hansen, I want to go over to Holkenäs for the day …”

  “Ah yes, for the Christmas presents. That will please the Countess, now that she is so much alone and with the children away, too, as you told me.”

  “Yes, to Holkenäs,” said Holk. “Do you know how the steamers are running? I mean those between Glücksburg and Flensburg. I should prefer to leave this morning, or perhaps this evening. Then I could be there early tomorrow. Perhaps you could send someone down to the harbour to inquire, my dear Frau Hansen? But it must be someone reliable, because I don’t want any mistake.”

  Frau Hansen said that she would go herself and in less than an hour she returned from her errand with the news that there was no further ship that day, but tomorrow evening the Holger Danske was going and would be off Holkenäs at ten o’clock in the morning.

  “That’s the day after tomorrow. What’s the date today?”

  “The 21st, the shortest day of the year …”

  Holk thanked her for her trouble and was glad in his heart that it would not be Christmas Eve when the ship would be tying up at the Holkenäs jetty.

  On the 23rd, the coast of Angeln came into sight and as ten o’clock approached, the castle of Holkenäs could be seen from the deck, perched on its dune. A vague mist was shrouding its outlines and, for a moment, it started to snow. But the flurry of snowflakes soon ceased and the mist, too, had almost lifted when the ship’s bell began to ring and the smart steamer came alongside the pier. Holk walked down the gangway on to the jetty, the steward brought his luggage down after him and in less than five minutes the Holger Danske was steaming on towards Glücksburg. For a few moments, Holk followed the ship with his eyes and then, flinging his coat between his two bags, since it would have impeded his climb up to the terrace, he set off along the jetty. Now and again, he stopped and looked up at Holkenäs. Now that the fog had momentarily lifted, the castle stood out clearly in front of him but it seemed deserted and lonely and the thin spiral of smoke which rose from it suggested that it was only half alive. The many shrubs in front of the veranda were bare and leafless, save for a few cypresses and the veranda itself was enclosed by boards and hung with matting to protect the rooms behind from the north-east as far as possible. Everything was silent and sad but, like the afterglow of earlier happiness, a certain peace seemed still to surround it—a peace that he was coming to disturb. Suddenly he was appalled at what he intended to do; assailed by doubts, the voice of conscience that he was endeavouring to still refused to be completely stifled. But for good or evil, it was now in any case too late to retreat: it had to be. How Ebba would have laughed at him and spurned him if, on his return to Copenhagen, he had said to her: “I wanted to do it and couldn’t.” And so he walked on again and eventually climbed slowly up to the terrace. On reaching the top, he called to one of his old servants who happened to be there, one who had lived for years as a pensioner in a nearby cottage, and asked: “Is the Countess in the castle?” “Certainly, master,” replied the old man, almost scared. “I shall
go and inform her ladyship of your arrival.” “No, leave it,” said Holk. “I shall go myself.” And then he turned and walked towards the back of the castle which looked out over the park and gardens sloping away from the sea.

  When he reached there, everything seemed warmer and more comfortable and Holk, stopping only for a moment to look around him, mounted the three marble steps which led between two pillars to the door of the summer drawing-room …. And now he went into the room itself where, although the children were not there, everything seemed to have been made ready for Christmas. On the corner table, where previously Christine used to sit and sew with Fräulein Dobschütz and Asta, there stood the Christmas crib with all its figures, one which had often been used over the years but was still in good condition; and in the opposite corner stood a large Christmas tree, as yet undecorated but so tall that its top nearly reached the ceiling. From all this, it seemed that someone must have been busy here quite recently but no one was to be seen. Had she run away to avoid him? Before he could answer his own question, he saw that he had been mistaken, at least as far as running away from him was concerned, for from the dark corner behind the Christmas tree stepped a woman in black. It was Fräulein Dobschütz, carrying a bowl of gold- and silver-coloured nuts in her hand, with which she had probably just been beginning to decorate the tree. She gave a sudden start as she recognized the Count. “What has happened? Shall I call Christine?”

  “No, my dear Julie,” said Holk. “Let us leave Christine for a while. What she has to hear will be soon enough. I have come here sooner than I expected and I should have preferred to choose another day than this. But I am not staying long.”

  Fräulein Dobschütz knew how things stood and how, over the last few weeks, Holk had increasingly humiliated and offended his wife; but what she had just heard was much more than this and went much further. What could be the meaning of these words that seemed to say so much and yet said nothing? And as he spoke them, Holk stood with a half defiant, half embarrassed, expression on his face, as if he had come to accuse someone and himself as well.

  “I should prefer to go and inform Christine that you are here.”

  He nodded, as if to say, very well, if you wish, it makes no difference whether it is now or later. Then he walked over to the crib, picked up one or two of the figures and looked round to see if Dobschütz had meanwhile left the room or not.

  Yes, she had gone and now, for the first time, he let his gaze wander slowly round the room, looking at everything, large and small, almost with indifference and, as he did so, he could also see out over the park drive on which hens were walking because there was no one to stop them. Then he walked back again to the open grand piano, at which Elizabeth and Asta had so often sat and played duets or sung their songs, one of them on the last day—or was it the last but one?—before his departure. And all at once it seemed to him that he heard it again, but far, far away.

  He stood thus, dreaming, half forgetful of what he had come to accomplish, when he thought he heard the door open. Turning, he saw that Christine had come in. She was standing, holding Fräulein Dobschütz’s hand, as if for support. Holk went towards her. “Good morning, Christine. You see that I have returned earlier than I had expected.”

  “Yes,” she said, “earlier.” And she gave him her hand and waited to see what he would do, some sign to show her how things stood, because she knew that in spite of all his weaknesses, he was honest and could not dissemble.

  Holk held her hand in his and tried to look her in the face but he could not bear the gaze from the calm eyes that met his and in order not to lower his own, turned them away again, while she continued to remain silent. “Shall we not sit down, Christine?”

  They both walked to the corner table. Julie followed but remained standing while the Countess sat down opposite Holk, who drew up a chair. The Christmas crib stood between them and across the crib their eyes questioned each other.

  “Please leave us, Julie,” said the Countess after a pause. “We had better be alone. I think my husband has something to tell me.”

  Julie hesitated, not because she wanted to witness the painful scene that was obviously about to follow but because of her love for Christine who, she feared, might need her help and support. But finally she left.

  Holk seemed at first to be contradicting his wife’s statement that he had something to say, for he remained silent, playing with the figure of the Christ child which, without thinking, he had taken from the lap of the Virgin Mary.

  Christine looked at him and almost felt sympathy for him. “I shall make it easy for you, Helmut,” she said. “What you cannot bring yourself to say, I shall say for you. We were expecting you on New Year’s Eve or New Year’s Day and you have come for Christmas. I don’t imagine that you have come to see the crib or for the sake of the Christ child that you are playing with. You have something else on your mind than Him and it can only be whether your hope of happiness is called Brigitte or Ebba. It is really one and the same thing. You have come to do what I suggested to you as a last resort, to tell me that it was I who wanted it to be so. Yes, I did want it to be so because I can’t bear half-heartedness in any relationship. Among my many special kinds of selfishness, I possess that of not wishing to share with anyone. I want the whole of a man, the whole of his heart, and I don’t wish to be a man’s wife for the summer while others take it in turn to be his wife during the winter. So tell me openly that you have come to talk of separation.”

  It was unfortunate that the Countess could not control her feelings. Had she spoken more mildly, she might have been able to turn Holk, indecisive as he was, away from his plan and made him recognize his mistake, for in spite of everything, he had not yet stifled the voices of conscience and justice, and all that he needed was the strength to listen to them. Had Christine succeeded in giving him this extra strength, he might even now have changed his mind. But her tone betrayed her and awakened in Holk all those feelings that had irritated him for so long and which, since he had known Ebba, had made him so ready to consider himself the wronged party.

  And so, as soon as Christine had stopped speaking, he threw the Christ back into the crib, not caring where it fell, and said: “I think you said that you wanted to make it easy for me. Well, I’m indebted to you for being willing to keep faith with what you had promised—in your usual supercilious way. Let me confess to you that I was deeply moved when I saw you appear a moment ago and come towards me leaning on Julie. But I’m not moved any more. You don’t have the power to heal or console or lighten anyone’s burden or even to spread flowers in anyone’s path. You have no light or sun. You lack anything feminine, you’re bitter and morose …”

  “And self-righteous …”

  “And self-righteous. And above all, so stubborn in all your beliefs, in everything that you say and do that, for a while, one begins to be convinced oneself and goes on being convinced until one day the scales fall from one’s eyes and one is angry with oneself, above all at the thought that anyone can see God’s lovely world as a narrow, fenced-in enclosure covered by a shroud. Yes, Christine, such a world does exist, and it is lovely and bright and spacious and that is the world that I am going to live in, a world that may not be paradise but at least is a reflection of it, and in this bright and cheerful world, I want to hear the nightingales singing and not see golden eagles, or condors if you like, soaring solemnly heavenwards all the time.”

  “All right, Helmut, let us say no more about it. I don’t want to exclude you from your paradise any longer, because what you have just said about its being a mere reflection means nothing: you want a real paradise on earth and, as you expressed it rather peculiarly, you want to hear the nightingales singing in it. But sooner or later, they will stop singing and then you will hear the sound of only one bird, softly and more and more bitterly. It will not be bringing you joy and when it comes, you will find yourself looking back on an unhappy life. I’m not going to mention the children to you, I cannot bear to bring th
em into a conversation such as this; a man who will not listen to his wife, a wife who has claims on his love because her love was only for him, such a man will be just as indifferent to the feelings that the mere names of his children ought to arouse in him. I shall go now. My brother will look after my affairs from Arnewieck, not in any way to resist, or even protest against your plans, Heaven forbid, but merely to settle what has to be settled and, above all, whether the children are to be yours or mine. If I know you well enough”—she gave a bitter smile—“you will not raise any difficulties on that score; there were times, I think, when the children meant something to you but those times are past. Times change and what used to give you joy has now become a burden. I shall do my best to spare your new ménage any special strains, including the strain of being a stepmother. And now good-bye and I hope that you will not be too heavily punished for all that you are doing.”