The Song Of Songs Part 117

Three letters and two telegrams lay on the card tray.

The letters were in Richard's writing. The telegrams were directed to Adele and urgently inquired for Lilly's address.

But after sending these missives, Mr. Dehnicke, Adele informed her, had given up his affairs in Harzburg and returned to Berlin. He had inserted advertis.e.m.e.nts for her in the papers, and came every day at the usual hour to find out if they had met with success. Then he sat on his customary seat, very quiet, drinking tea and smoking cigarettes until the time for returning to his office.

"Did you tell him about Dr. Rennschmidt?"

"What do you think of me, Mrs. Czepanek? Do you suppose I don't know how to look out for my mistress's honour? But the best thing would be if you were to come back and behave as if nothing had happened. That's what all my ladies used to do."

Lilly asked her to fetch from the bas.e.m.e.nt the smaller of the two leather trunks, explaining that she wished to take a few of her old possessions with her.

After Adele had swung herself out of the room sulking, Lilly gathered up Konrad's letters from the secret drawer in which she had hidden them, and then ran hastily to her large wardrobe, from which she pulled out all her dresses and threw them on the bed in order to select whatever might be of use to her.

At last the Song of Songs occurred to her.

She opened the secretaire.

The score, which had dreamed away its aimless existence for years in the back part of the lowest drawer, had acquired a strange aspect.

The rubber band about it was sticky, and fell to bits when Lilly wanted to undo the roll.

The sheets glided from her hand and flew over the carpet one by one.

There they all lay--the arias and recitatives, the duos and orchestral interludes--mingled and confused, and on top the turtle dove solo for the clarionet, which she had sung with her mother while still a lisping babe.

She looked at the scattered leaves in dismay.

They had turned yellow and mouldy. Many of them were plastered with blood, her own blood, which had squirted from the knife wound her mother had inflicted, and covered large spots with black and reddish brown stains. Some of the stains had been eaten into holes, the work of the mice at Lischnitz.

So there it was--her Song of Songs.

Nevermore any hope. No rock of salvation for the future--no faithful Eckhardt in life's stress, and no guide to golden heights! A mere weather-beaten remnant, worn, though unused, honourable ballast which one drags along for unknown reasons--a light extinguished, a piece of wisdom without sense.

Shrugging her shoulders, she kneeled on the floor, and gathered up the thin rolls hastily, without regard for their order.

"I can arrange them some other time," she thought, though a faint doubt arose within her whether she ever would.

Adele came with the trunk. It had taken her an extraordinary length of time. She replied to Lilly's questions in a confused way, and glanced at the clock furtively.

She opened the trunk lid, and Lilly threw the score on the bottom.

The empty open trunk was like a mouth gaping for fodder. The clothes lay spread on the bed. Her shoes stood next to the washstand. Hats, veils, blouses, lace mantillas, silk petticoats--all waited and seemed to cry:

"Take me along."

For an instant Lilly closed her eyes and groaned, remembering the sacrifice, the only one, he demanded of her.

But it had to be.

Both his and her future depended on it.

"Mrs. Laue will hide them for me, and she can keep them afterwards," she thought.

She made her decision. Blindly she gathered up whatever her hands fell upon--in addition to her dresses the ivory toilet articles with the seven pointed coronet, the triple hand mirror, the powder box, the receipt for her furs in the storage house, and numberless little _objets de luxe_.

She did not forget her jewellery either.

"In case _he_ needs some money," she thought.

She sent Adele to order a cab. This time again it was an eternity before she returned.

The porter helped carry the trunk down, and two hat boxes dangled in Adele's free hand.

One more caress of the canary's greyish green wings, one more kiss on the monkey's velvety snout, then the door closed behind her forever.

"Won't you leave an address?"

What a secretive air Adele wore!

"I will write to you, Adele, and sometime, I hope, you will come to me again."

Adele did not respond, but looked down the street expectantly.

A minute later Lilly, glancing from the hansom window as she was being driven along the ca.n.a.l, saw a taxicab whizz past from the opposite direction. In that second she recognised Richard seated inside.

Red as a lobster, his head inclined to one side, he stared ahead of him with wild, searching eyes at the house she had just left.

She hastily told the coachman to turn down a side street. She must not meet Richard until her fate had been decided before the world.

But in a few moments, her heart throbbing, she heard behind her the rattle and clatter that had just died down in the distance. It grew louder and louder.

The yellow wall of the taxicab shot by, turned about suddenly, and stopped. A man's voice called to Lilly's driver, and her cab was also brought to a stop.

Richard was standing close to her, holding the open door in his trembling hand.

"Where are you going?"

His voice shrilled in a feminine falsetto. His Adam's apple rose and fell convulsively over his high collar.

Lilly felt quite calm, quite equal to the situation.

He who had so long been her lord and master now seemed like a poor, helpless shadow.

"If you please, Richard, let me ride on," she said. "I took leave of you in my letter. I just came to fetch a few of my things, and now all's over between us. Why should we go on tormenting each other?"

"Come back!" he hissed.

"Why should I?"