Villa Elsa Part 13

"Affection True"--good things with which to court a musical girl.

Her cordiality suddenly took on a frank warmness, as if she had come back to an old friend. He saw that she felt more at home with him.

Wasn't she at last becoming like a "pal"? Yet sometimes the doubtful impression a.s.sailed him that she was merely acting in a sort of gratefulness for his having brought the stylish and princely James Alexander Deming of Erie, Pay, to Villa Elsa.

Gard was quite happy when his invitation to the ball was accepted.

Both mother and daughter were most glad to go. He procured the box and Frau Bucher, steeped in the practices of economy and judging that his means were modest, pooh-pooed with material kindness at his idea of an expensive motor car. He insisted on compromising by ordering one at five in the morning for the return. It would be an event and he wished to carry it off quite grandly for Elsa's sake.

She had never attended the Court Ball, it turned out, and, like all maidens of Saxony, had always longed to go.

Accordingly due preparations were started by her mother and by her in what had served, since Deming's arrival, as a kind of boudoir.

The gala affair was talked over with the usual noisiness in the family. Anything that had to do with the King's household was wonderful. The neighbors were exultantly apprised. Certainly the Buchers were nowadays cutting a high figure--they to whom such costly festivities had been unknown. No one had ever a.s.sociated Villa Elsa with the wand of prodigality, and its vulgar Americans were dumfounding.

But, four days before the ball, Frau Bucher, in a constant condition of agitation in her social upheaval, announced to Gard that she and Fraulein could not accompany him because a telegram had been received from Friedrich. His sister at Meissen was coming for the occasion and he took it for granted that the Buchers would complete his company. Of course Friedrich and his sister could not be disappointed. They were old friends--really a part of the family.

Gard, greatly disappointed, reclaimed his money for the box and countermanded the order for the motor. It was provoking, yet such things very reasonably happened.

The next morning another telegram from the always excited Von Tielitz. Plans were changed. Sister did not think she would be able to leave. Frau Bucher would much like to go with Gard. Elsa was so anxious to dance at Court. It would be too bad to dash her antic.i.p.ations to the ground. Gard spent the day renewing the arrangements. It was a pleasure to do so.

That evening a note couched in the s.p.a.cious terms of formality was handed in at his door by Tekla. Frau Bucher was extremely sorry, but Friedrich and his sister had found they could come and were making all preparations. Herr Kirtley's invitation must be declined again.

Beginning to be put out, he found that his box could not now be returned. And he had no one to go with. It would be stupid to be there without even an acquaintance. At last he thought of Anderson.

The latter announced his satisfaction at the prospect of "seeing the Germans jump around." Gard's dancing was cut off, which was disappointing enough, yet he could at least see the spectacle.

The following morning, the day before the event, another wire, and another cramped, stiff note through the diplomatic channels of the kitchen reached the attic. More regrets, but the Von Tielitzes were unable to carry out their plan. Would not Herr Kirtley kindly renew his invitation? This stately despatching of communications, as with a foreign power, went on side by side of and unseparated from the usual daily informal intercourse of the family.

Gard's good nature wrestled with his balanced equilibrium and overcame it along the lines of gallant generosity. It would be a pity to deprive the ladies of what they had looked forward to, although his own expectations were already marred. He would bemean himself sufficiently to overlook Frau's caddishness. He went in town to see if the change would suit his invited friend. Anderson bravely rose to the occasion and accepted silently the duty of having to tour the ball room now and then with his arm despairingly clasping the rotundity of mother Bucher.

When Gard got back to Villa Elsa, another stilted letter with a new programme was awaiting him. It had developed that the Von Tielitzes could come, though the sister was slightly indisposed. It would be nice for all to form a party, and Frau Bucher would be so pleased if Herr Kirtley would have them joined in. But transportation to and fro must be provided because of the sister. He had so kindly, at first, spoken of a motor.

As Friedrich had admittedly no money, Gard saw that this was a project--likely on the part of both--to saddle him with the whole expense. The clumsy maneuvering had got down to bargaining. He was mad. He sent the scullery courier back definitely withdrawing all arrangements. The pleasure of his invited guest could not be complicated. Result, the Von Tielitzes did not appear, mother and daughter Bucher remained at home, and Kirtley went with Anderson.

CHAPTER XXIV

THE COURT BALL

The two sat the night out in the box. The reader is familiar with Thackeray's amusing references to the stuffy German Court b.a.l.l.s.

After his day and under the sway of the Empire, they had broadened and aired out somewhat in their automaton grandeurs.

Precisely at nine o'clock the Saxon Court entered, so far as possible in battle array, and unlimbered to a slight extent before their revering subjects. No one knew of anything this Royal family had ever said, commented Anderson. None of them had done anything original or brilliant except Louise, who had run off with the tutor.

She could not stand the dullness here any longer. And the members of this Court represented civilization raised to the famous _n_th power!

How commonplace, uninspiring, they _did_ look to Kirtley! As Germans can illy take on polish he thought he only beheld Rudolphs and Teklas jammed into court dress. The disenchantment of a medieval dynasty at near view!

After the midnight supper Anderson, refreshed, told of an illuminating book he might write on Germany with journalistic brevity and conciseness. It would run something like this:

Chapter on Gentlemen and Ladies.

There are few gentlemen and ladies in Germany.

Chapter on Manners.

There are no manners in Germany. Only orders and servility.

Chapter on Charm and Delicacy.

No specimens to be found.

Chapter on the Milk of Human Kindness.

There is no milk of human kindness in Germany.

Chapter on the Absence of Arrogance.

There is no absence of arrogance in Germany.

And so forth. What did Kirtley think of it?

The journalist jestingly identified the dignitaries, the men about town, the t.i.tled ladies about whose bulbous red shoulders often hung scandal, and retailed other gossip from his newspaper files. The scene indeed scintillated with lights and diamonds and crystal. Two orchestras answered each other in a continuous strain of conquering music. Swords and spurs clanked and clattered through the riotous German dances, adding their martial clangor to the regal sounds.

Trains were stepped on, dresses torn. The retiring rooms were often sought for repairs. Now and again commotion was caused by some heavy person tripping on her skirts and cras.h.i.+ng to the floor. It was Triumphant Germany celebrating her undisputed position and pride--celebrating her mastery of the universe.

Gard really longed at moments to be actively throbbing with it all, circling in the throng, and holding Elsa with her blond florescence in his arms. Then a certain contentment would possess him as he pictured her mother forced to stay home with blighted hankerings.

What a ridiculous appearance he would have presented towing her around here in a waltz before all these florid and grandiose figures of state!

Kirtley's disposition was somewhat slow-going, sure-footed. He had a gentle or quiet conservative tenacity that so often comes with the inheritance of a moderate income. It at least gave him time to look things deliberately in the face.

He had at first discounted heavily his old friend's pyrotechnic, cynical bill of complaints against the Teutons and Teutonism. It was diverting, salient, but therefore discouraging to credence. Such judgments were apt to be flashes in the pan. They startled but lacked rootage. Gard had not sufficiently taken into consideration that the journalist was speaking at the end of seven years in Germany instead of at the beginning. When one arrives in a country, extreme snap-shot impressions readily flare forth in the mind.

Yet the more Kirtley saw, the more did he turn toward the same divorced mental att.i.tude. He realized how truly the typical Villa Elsa, though in quite a different key, justified Anderson's conclusions. The performance Frau Bucher had gone through verified another variant in racial traits--a variant which Anderson had stressed.

Namely, one must be forcible, even harsh, with a German. He does not respond satisfactorily to kindness, leniency, liberality. Little sunny courtesies, unselfishnesses, genial endeavors, do not characteristically illuminate the tenebrous interior of his consciousness. He misinterprets them as feeblenesses, as confessions of his dominating rights and privileges. The more one grants to him, the more one yields to him, the more advantage and aggressive advantage he a.s.sumes he is invited to take. To go out of one's way to be obliging, to attempt to ingratiate one's self, brings difficulties.

But stout decision, sternness, defiant ultimatums, win out with him.

As long as Gard had tried to make himself agreeable in the affair of the Court ball, his efforts were misunderstood and he became a handball buffeted about for the superior convenience of others. As soon as he finally stiffened up and mentally told them to go to perdition, the ingrowing troubles ceased with disciplined promptness. A satisfactory relation resulted, and a hearty respect for him in the household, he recognized, was measureably and contentedly increased.

It was a little different phase of the old pagan German tribal habit of considering the outsider as one from whom all should be got that was possible, irrespective of return in kind or a decent proportion of benefits. To hear in hard, to gouge, are toward the foreigner procedures relied on by the Teuton nature as appropriate. In it there is to be found little mutuality or respectfulness of feeling that curbs, not to speak of the social spirit that restrains or breeds a fine dignity of self. A show of weakness in any form, however ideal or beautiful, makes small appeal. So far as any other "tribe" is concerned, life to the German is at base a knock-down argument. Misfortunes in an alien land do not awaken sympathy. They are rather to be regarded as windfalls, as a result of which a profit is to be grabbed or a steely hand of control inserted where it does not belong.

CHAPTER XXV

FRITZI AND ANOTHER CONVERSATION

When Jim Deming returned he resumed sway over Villa Elsa, though with less vehemence. The Buchers fell promptly again under his spell, the duos were dropped, and Gard retired into the attic for study, varying its monotony with sojourns in town to familiarize himself with the personal peculiarities of the German mult.i.tude.

During the long break-up of winter, when the Teuton skies were leaden, and it was neither cold enough nor hot enough to stay comfortably in his room, owing to the Bucher economy of heat in this mid-season, it was pleasanter to be stirring about _en ville_, and, when weary of this, seeking the agreeable cosiness of the cafes with their warmth of cooking and beverages that thawed one out. He usually lunched in some one of these well-known resorts where he became acquainted with the _personnel_ and frequenters. It was Deming who introduced him to the inn where Fritzi served, whom Von Tielitz and Messer had urged upon Gard's attentions. Jim had learned of it through the former.

Imagine the tiniest of restaurants. It was scarcely large enough for six small tables. The miniature kitchen immediately adjoined this dining nook, so that these two rooms were in effect one. When the two young Americans first went there together, a very comely girl sat cutting colored papers into fantastic shapes with the apparent intention of having more floral decorations. For huge artificial bouquets decked the boards. The place was freshly painted and engagingly clean. The very low walls were covered with queer mottoes in grotesque Gothic script, with Meissen wares, Vienna gla.s.s, and also misshapen oddities that always interest the puerile part of mature German nature.

There was a bust of the Emperor covered with ivy and flower concoctions in cardboard. The coat of arms of Saxony embellished the ceiling which one could almost touch with the upraised hand. A cat and a dog were taking their noon-day nap. Sausages and cake in the form of the ever-popular _Lebkuchen_ were made a specialty of here, and when Fritzi--for this was Fritzi--had served the young men she took a seat companionably by them, as became her role.

She had a rustic beauty and was sound and plump as a cherry. Her peasant headdress was high and elaborate, winged with chicken feathers, and her short skirts gave way before white stockings pulpily emerging from painted wooden shoes which clicked over the dull tiled floor.

By the table she knitted, watching the eating solicitously, and was by turns candid, sociable and saucy as a spoiled child. It was her business not to be affronted by familiar remarks and actions. She was there to draw trade. She knew how to drop quick curtsies in response to compliments and tips. Although Deming acted freely toward her like an old acquaintance, he could not make much headway owing to the bar of language--her jargon of dialect.