Читать книгу The Sublime Jester - Ezra S. Brudno - Страница 6

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Weeks of tantalizing suspense followed. The letters that arrived from his father stirred Albert’s imagination. They seemed to come from distant lands, far, far away. And the letters were full of adventurous episodes: of nights spent in forests because of a broken axle, of weary tramps because of the horse’s bleeding leg, of halts at the frontier, and of numerous other perilous mishaps. “But,” as the optimistic David Zorn put it, “the road to success is always paved with rough stones.” His letter from Amsterdam was encouraging. No, he could not tell the extent of the estate, but it was huge. The tone of his succeeding letters, however, soon grew less and less reassuring, hinting at intervening difficulties, and he finally announced that he would return home without the millions as the matter was necessarily complicated and he could carry on the rest of the negotiations through correspondence.

His father’s return without riches was a stunning blow to the youth. It meant renewed drudgery and further contact with Father Scher and Kunz and Fritz. True, his father had not yet abandoned hope—he never did abandon hope—but Albert realized there were no prospects for a castle—at least not for the present and no immediate relief from the Franciscan school! Everything was the same as of old; no change, no excitement, nothing but the same monotonous business of irregular verbs, meaningless characters that stood for figures, the same blackboard and alongside of it another yellow stick in place of the broken one with whose every projecting knot and gnarl Albert was so familiar. It was a disheartening scene to see his father alight from the post chaise without a single bag of gold!

A few moments later came the great disappointment, the final blow. Like the glad tidings, it came in the form of a letter from Holland one rainy day in August. The humble shop in Schmallgasse was deserted save for David who, as usual, was thoughtfully turning the leaves of his ledger and jotting down some figures on the margin of a page. Zorn was everlastingly balancing the book, and the more he balanced them the less they balanced in his favor.

One of the saddest scenes of Albert’s early life took place on the afternoon following his father’s departure for Hamburg, to get financial assistance from his brother, Leopold Zorn, a banker.

The mother was alone in the little shop, alone with her thoughts. She was not thinking of her husband’s reverses nor was she brooding over her own deprivations. She was wondering what would become of Albert, what would become of his promising gifts. For while she frequently complained of his idleness and of his perverseness she was confident that talent lay slumbering in the boy’s being. True, she had other children but her heart and hopes were centered upon her first-born. No matter what might become of the others, nothing must stand in Albert’s way.

A new idea struck her and the thought of it sent a gleam of sunshine to her dark eyes. She had a pearl necklace of great value and diamond earrings that might fetch a handsome price; at least sufficient to see her son through Gymnasium and the University. If she could not make a banker of him, which was her cherished ambition, let him be a scholar.

But the next moment she remembered her husband. Adornment was his life. He had often remonstrated against her aversion for wearing jewels.

After a space she saw a way out. Ludwig Grimm, the money-lender at the Marktplatz, would advance her a considerable amount on her necklace. In order to spare her husband’s feelings she would not tell him of this until business had improved when she could redeem her valuables. No one need know of this—not a soul—and she was sure Grimm would tell no one.

Albert came into the shop as his mother was about to leave on her secret errand. The boy’s eyes were downcast, there was pallor in his cheeks. For he, too, had done his share of brooding since the last ray of hope of the heritage was gone.

“Mother,” he said abruptly, “I’ll take no more private lessons. I—”

“Albert!”

She had hired a music teacher to teach him the violin, and her present ejaculation was the sudden outlet of her accumulated grief.

For a brief moment Albert weakened, his mother’s evident unhappiness checked his flow of words, but he soon gained courage.

“Mother, dear, I’ll be no burden to you,” he burst out. “I know—I understand—I won’t let you spend your last groschen on me—”

“Albert!” she cried, reproach and grief mingled in her tone. “You won’t break your mother’s heart. Since when have my children become a burden to me?”

“But, mother dearest,” the boy begged, tears in his eyes, “I am old enough to be apprenticed—”

“And give up all hope?—Albert!”

The mere intimation of surrender—giving up the chance of becoming a great man, a scholar if not a banker—cut her to the very heart.

The boy trembled perceptibly. His mother had touched a vibrating chord in his being. For every thought of his, every dream and fancy, was of the future. And he was confident of the future; even more confident than his mother; for every prophetic little Samuel hears the voice of God before it reaches the ears of the blind Eli, though he may not at first recognize the voice that calls him.

“Don’t worry, Albert dearest,” the mother sobbed, sunshine through her tears, “the war will soon be over, business will improve, and you will not be handicapped for want of money.”

Late that afternoon, in the dimmest twilight, she locked the shop on Schmallgasse, walked down the narrow street, and turned into the Marktplatz, an air of stealth in her movements. Frequently she glanced this way and that, like a hunted criminal, and hugged a little packet to her breast. When she reached Ludwig Grimm’s pawnshop she halted, hesitated a moment, took a step backwards, halted again, and then, with a sudden lurch forward, darted up the three stone steps that led to Grimm’s and opened the door with a resolute jerk.....