Читать книгу The Song of Songs - Hermann Sudermann - Страница 8

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"Well, young lady," said Mr. Pieper, the prominent lawyer, "I have been appointed your guardian. I accepted the office because I thought it my duty—the papers in Lemke vs. Militzky," he interrupted himself to call to his managing clerk, who had just then entered. "What was I going to say? Oh, yes. Because I thought it my duty, despite my being an extremely busy man—to assist widows and orphans to the best of my feeble ability."

He passed his exquisitely cherished left hand over his shining bald pate and straw-coloured beard, beneath which a worldly mouth half concealed an epicurean smile.

"My wards all make their way in the world," he continued. "It's my pride to have them succeed. The way they do it—well, that's my affair, a business secret, so to say. I am convinced, my child, that you, too, will get along. If I didn't think so, I should not be so interested in you probably. The first thing is to get the young ladies the right positions. The homely ones give most trouble, unless they happen to possess a certain measure of self-abnegation. It pays them to assume the so-called Christian virtues. But of course you don't belong in that category—you probably know it yourself—I tell you merely that you may learn with time to make demands. I must explain—the main art in life is to determine the boundary line between demands justifiable and demands unjustifiable. That is, you must have a feeling for exactly how far your powers will reach in each circumstance as it arises. A girl like you—"

The managing clerk, a tall, bony fellow, suddenly appeared at the lawyer's side shoving a bundle of documents at him.

"At four o'clock the Labischin divorce case. At quarter past five Reimann—Reimann vs. Fassbender—get everything ready, and have someone here to accompany this young lady—the papers will tell you where. That will do."

The managing clerk vanished.

"Well," Lilly's guardian resumed, "the time I have to spare for you is nearly gone. You cannot continue with your schooling, that's plain. There's no money for it. But even if you had the means, I'm not certain whether in view of your future—however, a governess may make a brilliant match—it sometimes occurs, chiefly, to be sure, in English novels—but there's the danger, too, that you might—excuse me for the word—on the spur of the moment I can't think of another—besides, it's the right one—that you might be seduced. What I'd rather see you than anything else is the lady in a large photographic establishment who receives customers. But it seems to me you haven't enough self-confidence as yet for that. One must make a deep impression at first sight, because people who leave an order have to have some inducement for coming back to call for their pictures. I've selected something else for you, for the purpose more of giving you a short period of trial than of providing you with a permanent position. It's in a circulating library. It will give you plenty of opportunity—discreetly, you know—not to hide your light under a bushel. The remuneration, I need scarcely say, will be moderate—free board and lodging and twenty marks a month. You will have a chance to let your fancy—I suppose you're not yet blasé—let your fancy roam at will in the fields of general literature. There you are, young lady! Mercy on us! Why are you crying?"

Lilly quickly dried the tears from her eyes and cheeks.

"I've just come from the hospital," was the only excuse she could find. "I'm still a little—I beg your pardon."

The prominent lawyer shook his head. His bald spot looked as petted and pampered as a lovely woman's cheeks.

"You must get out of the habit of crying, too, if you want to make your way in the world. Tears are not in place until you are 'settled.' Oh, yes, something else—the things your poor mother owned must be sold. The proceeds will serve as a small capital. I lay stress on having such a sum, no matter how insignificant. Now you will go back to your home with my man—the key was deposited at my office—and select what you think you absolutely need or"—he smiled a little—"what filial devotion leads you to prize. Good-by, my dear. In six months come to me again."

Lilly felt a cool, soft hand, which seemed incapable of bestowing a pressure, lie in her own for an instant; then she found herself staggering down the dark steps behind a clerk who had been waiting for her outside the door with the key to her home.

She wanted to speak to him, ask him questions, beg him for something. But for what? She herself knew not.

When the clerk opened up the musty room, where the twilight was broken by shafts of light, as in a tomb, the tomb of her life, the tomb of her youth, Lilly felt that now everything was over and all left her was to fall asleep here and die.

The clerk threw the shutters back and raised the windows.

The clothes were still lying on the bed, the underwear and bed-linen on the floor, and close by were two brown stains, the blood that had flowed from her wound. The knife, too, was still there.

Lilly restrained her desire to cry, shamed by the presence of the clerk, who stood there stupidly, whistling, with his lower lip thrust out.

Lilly threw her clothes into the basket-trunk which her mother had intended to use in moving to the nine-room apartment, added a few pieces of underwear and some books chosen at random, and then looked around for mementos. Her brain was befogged. She saw everything and recognised nothing. But there on the table, there, bound with rubber bands, soaked in her blood, untouched because no one knew its value, lay the Song of Songs.

Lilly snatched it up, shut down the trunk lid, and with the score under her arm, stepped out into the new life, hungry for experience.