Jena or Sedan? Part 16

Heppner grumbled: "The fellow must wait!" He had no more money. It had nearly all vanished yesterday, and to-day he had been obliged to give the greater part of what remained to the women for housekeeping.

With a surly face he sat down to his supper.

"Have you been made sergeant-major?" his wife asked.

He saw his sister-in-law's eyes too fixed on him questioningly. He muttered, "Yes," to her, and then turned roughly on his wife: "What business is it of yours?"

She lay back, and answered gently: "I am so glad." "Really?" he sneered. He cast a sharp glance at her and snarled between his teeth: "Don't gus.h.!.+"

Then he pushed his plate away, tossed off two gla.s.ses of beer, and lay down to rest in the bedroom.

The two sisters remained together, the invalid stretched on the sofa, the other sewing near the lamp. They heard Heppner snoring.

His wife's face was in shadow, but her eyes blazed at her sister and rested with an uncanny expression of hatred on the strong, well-developed beauty of the young girl.

There was a knock at the door. The battery tailor had brought the sergeant-major's tunic, on the sleeve of which he had st.i.tched the double stripes. Ida took it from him and hung it up silently.

The invalid watched her indifferently. A short time before she had been mildly excited with joy at her husband's promotion; he had quite spoilt this feeling for her. Now she was callous to everything.

Suddenly she pressed her lips together and clenched her hands feverishly.

Had not her sister just handled his tunic lingeringly with a kind of furtive tenderness?

Had the scandal already gone so far?

Julie Heppner believed that she would die betrayed and forsaken by all; but during her last days she gained a sympathetic friend in the newly appointed deputy sergeant-major Heimert.

Heimert had taken possession of the Schumanns' empty house. True that at the time he was still single; but as his marriage was to take place in a few weeks, the captain had at once allotted married quarters to him. Now the deputy sergeant-major was furnis.h.i.+ng the rooms and decking the bare walls and windows with touching care. He would arrange and rearrange the furniture, and would drape a curtain a thousand different ways, and yet nothing was ever beautiful enough for him.

On holidays he was seldom able to visit his sweetheart, Albina Worzuba.

At other times he devoted every spare hour to her; but she was the barmaid of a small tavern in the town, and had no time to spare for him on holidays. Besides, Heimert did not like watching how the guests would go up to the counter for gla.s.ses of beer, and joke with Albina, or even dare to pinch her cheeks. He had on several occasions made scenes about this till the landlord had almost forbidden him the place.

Albina herself, too, advised him to come as seldom as possible. She considered that as long as she was a barmaid she must be friendly, and not too sensitive to the chaff of the guests; and if it pained him to see this, it was better that he should remain away. And with an ardent glance she added that when she was his wife he would have her all to himself. Heimert had constrained himself to agree to this.

On one of these Sundays it befell that Heimert was startled from his carpentering by the sound of a groan. He went outside and listened; the moaning sounds came from Heppner's quarters. He burst the door open and entered.

The sick woman had been left alone. Her sister had gone for a walk, and the sergeant-major was doubtless at a public-house. Such neglect of her had often occurred before; but this time she had suddenly been seized by an attack of pain so severe that she thought she was dying.

To die alone! With no one even to hold her hand; without a ray of light from a living eye to brighten the dark porch of death!

Between the attacks of pain she called feverishly and breathlessly for her husband: "Otto! Otto! Otto!!"

Heimert ran to her anxiously. He gave her his hand, which she seized and held convulsively, spoke to her soothingly, and wiped the drops of sweat from her brow with his handkerchief.

He quietly gave her time to recover from her exhaustion, then said to her gently: "Frau Heppner, would you like me to send to find your own people?"

She shook her head energetically: "No, no!" and whispered wearily: "But if you would only stay just a little while, Herr Heimert!"

The sergeant nodded, and remained sitting silently beside her.

It was some time before Julie Heppner had the strength to explain to him what had happened to her. While so doing she looked at him more attentively, and was almost frightened by his ugliness. The coa.r.s.e face with the outstanding ears was made half grotesque, half repellent, by an enormous nose, which was always red. What did it matter that two beautiful, kindly child-like eyes shone from this countenance? Would any one trouble to look for them in the midst of such hideousness?

The invalid remembered she had heard that Heimert was going to be married. In the light of her own unhappiness she thought to herself that this marriage could only turn out well if the man had chosen a woman as ugly as himself, so that in their common misfortune the pair could comfort each other.

As she gradually became able to talk to him she inquired about his bride, and the enamoured swain raved to her unceasingly of Albina's beauty and charm.

Heimert now appeared to her as a fellow-sufferer; only she was about to lay down the heavy burden, and he was but just going to take the load upon his back.

The two talked together as if they had known each other for years; they were nearly always of the same opinion. Finally, the invalid invited the deputy sergeant-major to come over often when she was alone; she would always give him a sign, and he could bring his carpenter's bench with him, the hammering would not disturb her in the least.

After this, Heimert always appeared directly Julie Heppner called him.

He gained distraction from his jealous fits in this way, and he thought the sergeant-major's wife a really good woman, who had been unfortunate enough to marry the wrong man, when with another she would perhaps have been happy. The brutality with which Heppner treated the dying woman was revolting to him, and his sympathy with the injured wife gradually inspired him with a positive hatred for the sergeant-major.

The sergeant-major laughed at Heimert. "The Prince with the Nose" he called him, and sneered at his wife about this "lover."

"You two would have suited each other well!" he jeered. "You would have nothing to reproach each other with in the way of beauty!"

One day in pa.s.sing he looked into the neighbouring quarters, and found the deputy sergeant-major gazing at a cabinet photograph of his betrothed. Heimert, startled, tried quickly to hide the portrait; but Heppner begged to see it.

He had expected to see a girl,--well, something like his wife, or perhaps uglier, for surely it would be impossible for any one else to fall in love with Heimert; but as he took the picture in his hand an involuntary expression of surprise escaped him: "By Jove! Isn't she beautiful!"

From that moment he was always asking Heimert to take him with him to see his sweetheart.

"Why?" Heimert asked suspiciously. "Do you want to cut me out with her?"

Heppner laughed at him. "The devil!" he said. "I have two women in the house myself, and that's more than enough. Surely one may make the acquaintance of a comrade's sweetheart?"

"And," he added craftily, "have you so little confidence in her, then?"

Heimert burst out: "Oh, that's not the reason!"

"Well then," said the other, "you know you won't be able to lock her up and hide her when she is your wife. Where's the harm in my just saying good-day to her?"

The deputy sergeant-major was forced to agree that there was really nothing against it. Moreover he was rather proud of having won such a beautiful girl; he enjoyed seeing the sergeant-major's envious eyes; and finally he said he would take him to Grundmann's the following Monday. Grundmann was the name of the landlord of the tavern in which Albina was barmaid; and as on Monday business there was at its slackest, they might hope to exchange a few quiet words with the girl.

On the Monday evening appointed he met Heppner on the parade-ground.

Heimert had made himself as smart as possible. He had put on his new extra uniform, which he had meant to keep for his wedding, and had forced his big hands into s.h.i.+ny white kid gloves. The collar of his tunic was very high, and so tight that he could hardly turn his head.

Heppner, on the other hand, had only put on his best undress uniform.

He was in a very good temper and very talkative, whereas Heimert walked beside him depressed and silent.

They arrived at Grundmann's very opportunely. They were the only guests, and the landlord had no objection to Albina's sitting at their table with them.

Heppner chose a place from which he could gaze undisturbed at the girl's profile. She pleased him. She was just to his taste, this full-bosomed girl with salient hips and rounded arms. In his opinion her face was more than pretty; her eager, pa.s.sionate eyes, and her mouth with the full, rather pouting lips, on which one longed to plant a big kiss, seemed to him quite beautiful. She wore her dark hair, which was as coa.r.s.e as a horse's tail, dressed in a new-fas.h.i.+oned way which gave her a certain "individuality"; and, above all, she had some scent about her of a kind that was only used by the most distinguished ladies.

Heppner was annoyed that she noticed him so little. She was quite taken up with her betrothed, who was telling her of the progress made in the preparation of the house, and she only gave Heppner a glance at rare intervals.

At first she did not talk much; but when, in order to say something, he asked her where her home was, she immediately began to relate her whole history.