Hanns Heinz Ewers Alraune (36 page)

Frieda Gontram straightened up, opened her
lips with great difficulty.

“And why not?” she asked.

“I have no reason at all,” answered Alraune.
“Really none at all!–I simply don’t want to–that is all.”

She turned to the Countess, “Do you believe
your Mama will suffer very much because of that?”

She stressed the “very”–and in doing so, her
voice twittered sweet and cruel at the same time like a swallow on
the hunt. The countess trembled under her gaze.

“Oh, no!” she said. “Not that much.

And she repeated Frieda’s words–

“She will still have her villa in Bonn and
the little castle on the Rhine. Then there were the proceeds from
the Hungarian vineyards. I also have my Russian pension and–”

She stopped, didn’t know any more. She had no
concept of her financial standing, scarcely knew what money was,
only that you could go into beautiful shops and buy things with it,
hats and other pretty things. There would be more than enough to do
that.

She excused herself primly; it had only been
a thought of her mother’s. There was no need for the Fräulein to
trouble herself over it. She only hoped that the unpleasant
incident hadn’t brought any stormy clouds into their friendship–She
chatted on without stopping to think, senseless and pointless. She
didn’t catch the severe glance of her friend and crouched warmly
under the green glowing eyes of Fräulein ten Brinken, like a wild
forest rabbit in a cabbage patch.

Frieda Gontram became restless. At first she
was angered at the immense stupidity of her friend, then found her
manner tasteless and laughable.

“No fly,” she thought, “ever flew so clumsily
to the poisoned sugar.”

But finally, the more Olga chatted under
Alraune’s gaze, the more quickly her own sulking feelings awoke
under their normal covering of snow and she tried very hard to
repress them. Her gaze wandered across, fastened itself
passionately on the slender body of Prince Orlowski.

Alraune noticed it.

“I thank you, dear Countess,” she said. “What
you’ve told me relieves me very much.”

She turned toward Frieda Gontram, “The Legal
Councilor has told me such horror stories about the certain ruin of
the princess!”

Frieda searched for a last reserve and gave
herself a violent shake.

“My father is right,” she declared bluntly.
“Naturally the collapse is unavoidable–The princess will have to
sell her little castle–”

“Oh, that doesn’t matter,” declared the
countess. “We are never there anyway!”

“Be quiet,” cried Frieda. Her eyes clouded,
she felt that she was entirely, without a doubt, fighting for a
lost cause.

“The princess will have to rent out rooms in
her household, will have difficulty adjusting to her new life
style. It is doubtful if she will be able to keep her car, most
likely not.”

“What a shame!” piped the black prince.

“She will also have to sell her horses and
carriages,” Frieda continued. “Most of the servants will have to be
let go–”

Alraune interrupted her, “What will you do
Fräulein Gontram? Will you stay with the princess?”

She hesitated at the question, it was totally
unexpected.

“I,” she stammered, “I–but most
certainly–”

At that Fräulein ten Brinken piped up, “Of
course it would make me very happy if I were permitted to invite
you to my house. I am so alone. I need company–come to me.”

Frieda fought, wavered a moment.

“To you–Fräulein–?”

But Olga stepped between them, “No, no! She
must stay with us!–She is not allowed to leave my mother now.”

“I was never at your mother’s,” declared
Frieda Gontram. “I was with you.”

“That doesn’t matter!” cried the countess.
“With me or with her–I don’t want you to stay here!”

“Oh, pardon me,” mocked Alraune. “I believed
the Fräulein had a will of her own!”

Countess Olga stood up, all of the blood
drained from her face.

“No,” she screamed. “No, no!”

“I take no one that doesn’t come of their own
free will,” laughed the prince. “That is my mark. I will not even
urge–Stay with the princess if you really want to Fräulein
Gontram.”

She stepped up closer to her, grasped both of
her hands.

“Your brother was my good friend,” she said
slowly, “and my playmate–I often kissed him–”

She saw how this woman, almost twice her age,
dropped her eyes under her gaze, felt how her hands became moist
under the lightest touch of her fingers. She drank in this victory.
It was priceless.

“Will you stay here?” she whispered.

Frieda Gontram breathed heavily. Without
looking up she stepped over to the countess.

“Forgive me Olga,” she said. “I must
stay.”

At that her friend threw herself onto the
sofa, buried her face in the pillows. Her body was wracked with
hysterical sobbing.

“No,” she lamented. “No, no!”

She stood up, raised her hand as if to strike
her friend, then burst out into shrill laughter. She ran down the
stairs into the garden, without a hat, without a parasol, across
the courtyard and out into the street.

“Olga,” her friend cried after her.
“Olga!–Listen to me! Olga!”

But Fräulein ten Brinken said, “Let her be.
She will calm down soon enough.”

Her haughty voice rang–

Frank Braun breakfasted outside in the garden
under the elder tree. Frieda Gontram gave him his tea.

“It is certainly good for this house,” he
said, “that you are here. One never sees you doing anything, but
everything runs like clockwork. The servants have a strange dislike
of my cousin and have fallen into a passive resistance. The people
have no idea of class warfare, but they have already reached a
point of sabotage. An open revolution would have broken out long
ago if they didn’t have a bit of love for me. Now you are in the
house–and suddenly everything runs by itself–I give you my
compliments Frieda!”

“Thank you,” she replied. “I am happy that I
can do something for Alraune.”

“Only,” he continued, “you are missed all the
more over there. Everything has gone topsy-turvy since the bank has
stopped payments. Here, read my mail!”

He pushed a few letters over to her. But
Frieda Gontram shook her head.

“No– excuse me–I don’t want to read, don’t
want to know anything about it.”

He insisted, “You must know, Frieda. If you
don’t want to read the letters, I will give you the short version.
Your friend has been found–”

“Is she alive,” whispered Frieda.

“Yes, she’s alive!” he declared. “When she
ran away from here she got lost and wandered around through the
entire night and the next day. At first she must have gone inland
toward the mountains, then curved back to the Rhine.

People on a ferryboat saw her not far from
Remagen. They watched her and stayed nearby. Her behavior seemed
suspicious and when she jumped from the cliff they steered over to
her and fished her out of the river after a few minutes. That was
about noon, four days ago. They brought her struggling and fighting
to the local jail.”

Frieda Gontram held her head in both
arms.

“To jail?” she asked softly.

“Certainly,” he answered. “Where else could
they have taken her? It was obvious that she would immediately try
to commit suicide again if they let her go free–So she was taken
into custody.

She refused to give any information and
remained stubbornly silent. She had long since thrown away her
watch, purse and even her handkerchief–No one could make any sense
out of the crown and the initials in her linen undergarments. It
was only when your father reported her missing to the authorities
that they were able to figure it out and establish her identity for
certain.”

“Where is she?” asked Frieda.

“In the city,” he replied. “The Legal
Councilor picked her up from Remagen and brought her to Professor
Dalberg’s private insane asylum. Here is his report–I fear that
Countess Olga will need to stay there for a very long time. The
princess arrived yesterday evening–Frieda, you should visit your
poor friend soon. The professor says that she is quiet and
calm.”

Frieda Gontram stood up.

“No, no.” she cried. “I can’t.”

She went slowly down the gravel path under
the fragrant lilacs. Frank Braun watched her go. Her face was like
a marble mask, like fate had chiseled it out of hard stone. Then
suddenly a smile fell on that cold mask, like a ray of sunshine
reaching deep into the shadows. Her eyelids raised, her eyes
searched through the red beech lined avenue that led up to the
mansion–Then he heard Alraune’s clear laughter.

“Her power is strange,” he thought. “Uncle
Jakob really had it right in his leather bound volume of
musings.”

He thought about it. Oh yes, it was difficult
for Frieda to be away from her. No one knew what is was, and yet
they all still flew into her hot burning flame–What about him? Him
as well?

There was something that attracted him, that
was certain. He didn’t understand how it worked, on his senses, on
his blood or perhaps on his brain–But it did work, he knew that
very well. It was not true that he was still here because of the
lawsuits and settlements alone. Now that the case of the Mühlheim
bank had been decided, he could easily finish everything up with
the help of the attorney–without personally being here.

And yet he was here–still here. He was
pretending, lying to himself, skillfully creating new reasons,
protracting the lengthy negotiations as much as possible, in order
to put off his departure. And it seemed that his cousin noticed it
as well. Yes, even as if her quiet influence made him act that
way.

“I will go back home tomorrow,” he
thought.

Then the thought sprang out from the nape of
his neck, “Why should he? Was he afraid of something? Did he fear
this delicate child? Was he infected by the foolishness that his
uncle had written down in his leather bound volume? What could
happen? In the worst case a little adventure! Certainly not his
first–and scarcely his last! Was he not an equal opponent, perhaps
even superior? Didn’t bodies lie along the life’s path that his
feet had trod as well? Why should he flee?

He created her once, he, Frank Braun. It had
been his idea and his uncle had only been the instrument. She was
his creation–much more than she was that of his Excellency. He had
been young at the time, foaming like new wine, full of bizarre
dreams, full of heaven storming fantasies. He had played catch with
the stars and from them had captured this strange fruit from out of
the dark, wild primeval forest of the inscrutable where his steps
had led him.

He had found a good gardener that he had
given the fruit to. The gardener had planted the seed into the
earth, watered it, looked after the seedling and tended the young
little tree. Now he was back and there shone his blossoming
tree.

Certainly, it was poisonous; whoever rested
under it encountered its toxic breath. Many died of it–many that
strolled in its sweet fragrance–the clever gardener that cared for
it as well.

But he was not the gardener that loved this
strange blossoming little tree more than anything else, not one of
the unknowing people that wandered into the garden by chance. He
was the one that had first plucked the fruit that contained the
seed from which it grew.

Since then he had ridden many days through
the savage forest of the inscrutable, waded deeply through the
sweltering, fever infested swamp of the incomprehensible. His soul
had breathed many hot poisons there, been touched by pestilence and
the smoke of many cruel burning sins.

Oh yes, it had hurt a lot, tormented him and
ripped open puss filled ulcers–But it didn’t throw him. He always
rode away healthy under heaven’s protection–Now he was safe, as if
wearing armor of blue steel.

Oh, certainly he was immune–There would be no
battle, now it appeared to him more like a game. But then–if it was
only a game–he should go–wasn’t that true? If she was only a doll
that was dangerous for all the others, but a harmless plaything in
his own strong hands–Then the adventure would be too cheap. Only–if
it really were a battle, one with equally powerful weapons–only
then would it be worth the effort.

Fraud! He thought again. Who was he really
kidding about his heroic deeds? Hadn’t his victories often enough
been easy and certain?–More like episodes? No, this was not any
different that it always was. Could you ever know the real strength
of your opponent? Wasn’t the sting of the poisonous little wasp far
more dangerous than the crocodile like jaws of the caiman that goes
up against the certainty of his Winchester rifle?

He found no way out, ran around in circles,
getting himself confused as well. But he always came back to the
same point, stay!

“Good morning, cousin,” laughed Alraune ten
Brinken.

She stood right in front of him, next to
Frieda Gontram.

“Good morning,” he answered curtly. “Read
these letters here–It won’t do you any harm to think about what you
have been the cause of–It’s time to stop this foolishness, do
something sensible, something worth the effort.”

She looked at him sharply.

“Really?” she said, drawing each word out
slowly. “And just what is it that you think would be worth my
effort?”

He didn’t respond–Didn’t have any answer at
the moment.

He stood up, shrugged his shoulders and went
into the garden. Her laughter sounded behind him.

“In a bad mood, Herr Guardian?”

That afternoon he sat in the library. Some
documents lay in front of him that Attorney Manasse had sent over
yesterday. But he didn’t read them. He stared into the air,
hurriedly smoking one cigarette after the other.

Then he opened a desk drawer and once more
took out the Privy Councilor’s leather bound volume. He read slowly
and carefully, considering every little incident.