Elective Affinities (10 page)

One evening, which had been partly ruined for the little group by the presence of tedious visitors, Eduard suggested staying together for a little longer than usual. He felt inclined to take out his flute, which instrument had not been on the agenda for a long time. Charlotte looked for the sonatas they usually played together, and when she could not find them Ottilie admitted with some hesitation that she had taken them up to her room.

‘And you can and you want to accompany me at the piano?’ Eduard exclaimed. His eyes shone with pleasure. ‘I think I might manage it,’ Ottilie replied. She fetched the scores and sat down at the keyboard. Their audience heard with surprise how completely she had mastered the music by herself, but with greater surprise how she had learned to adapt it to Eduard’s mode of performance. ‘Learned to adapt’ is not the right expression: if Charlotte held back at one point
and hurried along at another in response to her husband’s hesitations and precipitancies it was because she was skilled enough and willing to do so, but Ottilie, who had heard them play the sonata once or twice, seemed to have taken it in only in the manner in which Eduard played it. She had made his shortcomings so much her own that a new living whole had evolved which, if it did not keep to the original measure, at any rate managed to sound very pleasant and agreeable. The composer himself would have enjoyed hearing his work distorted in so charming a manner.

The Captain and Charlotte looked silently upon this strange unexpected event with the feeling with which you often regard the behaviour of children which, because of its consequences, you cannot exactly approve of but cannot reprove either but must perhaps even envy. For the fact was that an affection was growing up between Charlotte and the Captain just as much as between Ottilie and Eduard and perhaps, since Charlotte and the Captain were more serious-minded, more sure of themselves, more capable of self-control, it was an even more dangerous affection.

The Captain was already beginning to feel that, because she was always near him, he was becoming attached to her irresistibly. He made himself avoid appearing during the hours Charlotte was usually in the park. He got up early in the morning, took care of everything, and then retired to work in his wing of the mansion. The first days on which this happened Charlotte thought his absence was accidental and looked for him everywhere. Then she believed she understood him, and on that account esteemed him all the more highly.

If the Captain avoided being alone with Charlotte he was all the more diligent in hastening the brilliant celebration of her approaching birthday. While he drove the easy ascending path up from behind the village he at the same time started on a descending path from the top, ostensibly so as to acquire the stone thus broken out, and had so organized things that
the two sections would meet on the last night. The cellar for the new pavilion on the hill had been dug out rather than properly excavated and a handsome foundation-stone, with panels and covering slabs, had been hewn out.

This activity, these little secret designs, combined with feelings more or less repressed, placed a constraint on the liveliness of the company when they were together, so that Eduard, who sensed that something was missing, one evening called on the Captain to bring out his violin and play something with Charlotte at the piano. The Captain could not resist the general desire that he should comply with this suggestion and the two performed together a very difficult piece of music with sensitivity, ease and lack of constraint, so that they and the couple who formed their audience were overcome with pleasure. They promised themselves they would play more often and practise more together.

‘They can do it better than we can, Ottilie!’ said Eduard. ‘Let us admire them, but let us go on enjoying our own playing too.’

CHAPTER NINE

T
HE
birthday had arrived and everything was ready. The wall which raised the village street and protected it from the water was finished and so was the pathway, which now ran past the church, following for a stretch the path already laid out by Charlotte, then wound up the cliff and passed the moss-hut, where it turned and so gradually made its way to the top of the hill.

A crowd of visitors had come on this day. They all went along to the church, where they found the local community assembled in festive dress. As had been arranged, the boys and youths and men left first after the service was over, then the ladies and gentlemen with their visitors and retinue left, and the girls and women left last of all.

A raised rock-platform had been set up where the path turned; here the Captain conducted Charlotte and the guests. From this place they overlooked the entire pathway, the troop of men walking further along up and the women following them who were now passing by. It made a glorious sight in the sunshine. Charlotte was surprised and moved by the spectacle and she warmly pressed the Captain’s hand.

They followed the slowly advancing crowd which had by now formed a circle round the site of the new building. Its owner and his party and the most prominent of his guests were invited to step down to where the foundation-stone stood supported on one side ready to be laid. A mason dressed in his best suit and carrying a trowel in one hand and a hammer in the other now delivered a well-turned address in verse which we are able to reproduce only imperfectly in prose.

‘Three things,’ he began, ‘have to be taken into account
when erecting a building: that it is standing on the right spot, that the foundations are sound, that it is well constructed. The first is properly a matter for the owner: for as in a town only the prince and the municipality can decide where a building is to be erected, so in the country it is the privilege of the landowner to say: Here and nowhere else shall my house stand.’

Eduard and Ottilie avoided looking at one another during these words although they were standing quite close together.

‘The third, the completion of the building, is in the care of very many crafts; there are few indeed which have no part in it. But the second, the foundation, is the mason’s business and, if we may make so bold as to say so, it is the chief business in the entire undertaking. It is an earnest labour, and our summons to you is earnest: for this ceremony is dedicated to the depths. Here within this narrow excavated space you do us the honour of appearing as witnesses of our secret labour. Soon we shall lay this well-hewn stone, soon these earthen walls, now adorned with so many fair and worthy persons, will be inaccessible, they will be buried.

‘This foundation-stone, whose firm corner denotes the firm corner of the building, whose square-cut form denotes the regularity of the building, whose perpendicular and horizontal position denotes the trueness of the walls without and within – this stone we might now lay without further ado: for by its own weight it would rest firm. Yet here too there must be lime and cement: for, as men who are naturally inclined to one another hold together better when they are cemented by the law, so too bricks whose shapes are already well matched are better united by this binding force; and since it is not fitting to be idle while others are working, you will not disdain to become one of us on this occasion.’

At this he handed his trowel to Charlotte, who threw a trowelful of lime under the stone. Others were asked to do so
too and the stone was then lowered. Then Charlotte and the others were handed the hammer and with a threefold blow blessed the union of the stone and the ground.

‘Although the mason’s work continues above ground,’ the speaker went on, ‘it is still hidden, or where not hidden is done for the sake of what is hidden. The square-cut foundation is choked with earth, and even the walls we build in the light of day in the end almost disappear from mind. The work of the stone-cutter and the sculptor are most visible to view, and we are even compelled to approve when the decorator obliterates the traces of our labour altogether and appropriates our work to himself by overlaying, smoothing and painting it.

‘Who then must be more concerned than the mason to make well so that he may appear well in his own eyes? Who has more cause than he to nourish his assurance of his own worth? When the house is built, the floor flattened and plastered, the exterior decorated, he can still always see through this covering and recognize still those well-proportioned painstaking joints which the whole has to thank for its existence and stability.

‘But as he who has done evil must fear that, in spite of all precaution, his deed will come to light, so he who has done good in secret must expect that, counter to his will, his deed too will be revealed. That is why this foundation-stone is to be a memorial-stone also. Here in these hollow spaces we shall place various objects as witnesses to a distant posterity. These sealed metal containers hold written messages; on these metal plates have been engraven all sorts of inscriptions; in these handsome glass bottles we bury the best of our wine with a designation of its vintage; likewise coins of various kinds minted this year: all this we have received through the munificence of the owner. And there is still plenty of room left if any guest or spectator would also like to bequeath something to posterity.’

The workman paused and looked around. But, as usual on such occasions, no one was prepared, everyone was taken by surprise, until at length a young officer took the lead and said: ‘If I am to contribute anything to this storehouse that has not been put in there already I will have to cut a couple of buttons off my uniform. I think they too deserve to go down to posterity.’ No sooner said than done. And then many others had similar ideas. The ladies offered their hair-combs, and smelling-bottles and other trinkets went in. Ottilie alone, sunk in contemplation of the offerings, failed to give anything, until a word from Eduard brought her back and then she unfastened from around her neck the gold chain from which her father’s picture had hung and laid it gently on top of the other treasures, and after she had done that Eduard hastily had the covering slab put on and fixed at once.

The young workman, who had been busier than anyone during all this, now took up his oratorical posture again and continued: ‘We found this stone for eternity, to ensure the enjoyment of this house to its present and future possessors for the longest possible time. But while we here as it were bury a treasure and are occupied with the most fundamental of all tasks, we think at the same time of the transitoriness of human things: we think of the possibility that this firm-sealed lid may one day be opened again, which could not happen unless that which has not yet even been built were all to be destroyed again.

‘But let us bring our thoughts back from the future, let us return to the present, so that this building may be accomplished. As soon as this ceremony is done let us straightway get on with our task, so that none of the guilds at work on our site need stand idle, that this structure may rapidly rise upward and be completed, and that, through those windows which do not yet exist, the master of the house, his family and his guests, may happily enjoy the view of the region round; to
whom, and to all here present, let us herewith drink a health!’

And with that he emptied at a single draught a shining crystal cup and threw it into the air: for to destroy the vessel you have used on a happy occasion is a sign of overflowing joy. But on this occasion something else happened: the glass did not come back to earth and yet there was no miracle involved.

So as to get ahead with the building the foundations at the opposite corner had already been dug out, and a start had even been made on the walls, and for the purpose of building the walls a scaffold had been put up.

For the benefit of the work-people the scaffold had been fitted with planks and a crowd of spectators allowed up on it. The glass sailed up as high as these planks and one of the spectators caught it. He took it for a sign of luck and without letting it go he showed it around and everyone could see that there had been cut into it the letters E and O entwined. It was a glass of Eduard’s made for him as a boy.

When the spectators had got down from the scaffold the nimblest among the guests climbed up on it and were loud in praise of the beautiful view on every side: for you can see much more if you stand higher, even if it is only one storey higher. Towards the country they could see several new villages that had not been visible before, the silver streak of the river was clearly visible, one of them even said he could see the towers of the capital. Rearwards behind the wood-covered hill rose the blue peaks of a distant mountain range and the immediate neighbourhood could be viewed overall. ‘What wants doing now,’ one of them said, ‘is to join the three lakes together into one great lake, then the view would have everything you could ask for.’

‘That could be done,’ said the Captain. ‘They were at one time a single mountain lake.’

‘Only let my group of plane-trees and poplars alone,’ said
Eduard. ‘They look very fine beside the middle lake. Look’ – turning to Ottilie and leading her a few steps forward and pointing down – ‘I planted those trees myself.’

‘How long have they stood there?’ she asked. ‘About as long as you have been on earth,’ Eduard replied. ‘Yes, dear child, I was already planting trees while you were still in the cradle.’

The company went back to the mansion. When they had eaten they were invited to take a walk through the village so as to see the new arrangements there too. At the Captain’s instigation the villagers had assembled in front of their houses. They were not standing in line but grouped naturally in families, some busy with evening tasks, some relaxing on benches newly provided. It had become a pleasant duty for them to keep the village clean and tidy at any rate on Sundays and holidays.

An intimate affectionate companionship such as had grown up between our friends can only be unpleasantly disturbed by the presence of a larger company. All four were glad when they were back alone in the big drawing-room, but this cosy feeling was somewhat broken into by the arrival of a letter announcing that other guests would be coming next day.