Rosshalde (3 page)

The servant looked at the child searchingly. He ought really to have given this spoiled child a good lecture long ago, there was much to find fault with. But when Pierre was there in front of him and he looked into his face, it was impossible. His face was so fresh and pretty and grave; everything about him seemed to be just right, and just this streak of the blasé, this arrogance or precocity, was strangely becoming to him.

“What would you actually like to be, my boy?” Robert asked with some severity.

Pierre looked down and reflected. “Oh, I really don't want to be anything special, you know. I only wish I were through with school. In the summer I'd just like to wear all white clothes, white shoes too, and never have the tiniest spot on them.”

“I see, I see,” said Robert reproachfully. “That's what you say now. But when you were out with us the other day, all of a sudden your white clothes were full of cherry stains and grass stains, and you'd lost your hat altogether. Do you remember?”

Pierre froze. He closed his eyes except for a small slit and glared through his long lashes.

“Mama gave me a big scolding for that,” he said slowly, “and I don't believe she gave you orders to bring it up again and torture me with it.”

Robert took a conciliatory attitude. “So you would always like to wear white clothes and never get them dirty?”

“No, sometimes I would. You just don't understand! Of course I'd want to lie around in the grass sometimes, or in the hay, or jump over puddles or climb a tree. That's as plain as day. But when I've finished running wild, I don't want to be scolded. I just want to go quietly to my room and put on clean fresh clothes, and then everything will be all right again. —Do you know, Robert, I really don't see any point in scolding.”

“That
is
convenient. How so?”

“Well, look: if you've done something that isn't right, you know it and you're ashamed. If somebody scolds me, I'm much less ashamed. And sometimes they scold you when you haven't done anything at all, just because you weren't there when they called, or because Mama is in a bad humor.”

Robert laughed. “You've just got to average it up. Think of all the wicked things you must do that nobody sees and nobody scolds you for.”

Pierre gave no reply. It was always the same. Whenever he let himself be drawn into a discussion with a grownup about something that was really important to him, it ended in disappointment or even humiliation.

“I'd like to see the picture again,” he said in a tone which suddenly put him at a distance from the servant. Robert might equally have taken his words as a command or a request. “Come on, let me in for a second.”

Robert obeyed. He opened the studio door, admitted Pierre, and followed him, for he had strict orders not to leave anyone alone in the studio.

Veraguth's new painting, in a temporary gilt frame, had been placed on the easel in the middle of the large room, turned toward the light. Pierre planted himself in front of it. Robert stood behind him.

“Do you like it, Robert?”

“Of course I like it. I'd be a fool not to.”

Pierre blinked at the picture.

“I believe,” he said thoughtfully, “you could show me a whole pile of pictures and I'd know right off if one of them was by Papa. That's why I like his pictures, because I feel that Papa made them. But, to tell you the truth, I only half like them.”

“Don't talk nonsense,” said Robert, horrified, with a reproachful look at the boy, who, quite unruffled, stood blinking at the picture.

“You see,” he said. “There are some old paintings over there in the house that I like a lot better. When I grow up, I want to have pictures like that. Mountains, for instance, when the sun is setting and everything is all red and gold, or nice-looking children and ladies and flowers. Such things are really a lot nicer than an old fisherman like this who hasn't even got a real face, and a nasty black boat. Don't you agree?”

At heart Robert agreed perfectly; he was surprised and indeed delighted at the boy's frankness. But he would not admit it.

“You're too young to understand such things,” he said curtly. “Come now, I have to lock up.”

At that moment a chugging and grinding was heard from the direction of the manor house.

“Oh, a car!” cried Pierre joyfully, and ran out under the chestnut trees, taking forbidden shortcuts across the lawns and jumping over the flower borders. Breathless, he reached the gravel driveway in front of the house just in time to see his father and an unknown gentleman alighting from the car.

“Pierre!” cried his father, and caught him in his arms. “Here is a friend you don't know any more. Give him your hand and ask him where he's come from.”

The boy looked the stranger straight in the eye. He gave the man his hand and looked into a ruddy-brown face and bright laughing gray eyes.

“Where have you come from?” he asked obediently.

The stranger picked him up in his arms. “You're getting too heavy for me, son,” he said with a cheery sigh, and put him down again. “Where do I come from? From Genoa and before that from Suez, and before that from Aden, and before that, from…”

“Oh, from India, I know, I know! And you're Uncle Otto Burkhardt. Have you brought me a tiger, or coconuts?”

“The tiger ran away, but you can have coconuts and shells and Chinese picture albums.”

They entered the house and Veraguth led his friend, who was a good bit taller than himself, up the stairs, putting his arm affectionately round his shoulder. Upstairs in the hallway they were met by the lady of the house. With restrained but sincere cordiality she welcomed the guest, whose hale cheerful face reminded her of happy times in years gone by. He held her hand in his for a moment and looked into her face.

“You haven't aged any, Frau Veraguth,” he complimented her. “You've held up better than Johann.”

“And you haven't changed at all,” she said amiably.

He laughed. “Oh, the façade is still in good shape, but I've given up dancing. Besides, it wasn't getting me anywhere, I'm still a bachelor.”

“This time, I hope, you've come to Europe to look for a wife.”

“No, Frau Veraguth, it's too late for that. And I wouldn't want to spoil my stay in Europe. I have relatives, you know, and I'm gradually developing into an inheritance uncle. I wouldn't dare turn up at home with a wife.”

Coffee had been served in Frau Veraguth's room. They drank coffee and liqueurs and chatted for an hour about ocean voyages, rubber plantations, and Chinese porcelain. At first the painter was quiet and slightly depressed. He had not set foot in this room for months. But it all went off smoothly and with Otto's presence a lighter, more cheerful, more childlike atmosphere seemed to have come into the house.

“I believe my wife would like to rest awhile,” said the painter at length. “Come, Otto, I'll show you your rooms.”

They took their leave and went to the guest rooms. Veraguth had prepared the two rooms for his friend, attending to everything himself. He had arranged the furniture and thought of everything from the pictures on the wall to the books in the bookcase. Over the bed hung a faded old photograph, a touchingly comical class picture dating back to the seventies. It struck the guest's eye, and he went closer to look at it.

“Good Lord!” he cried in amazement. “There we are, all sixteen of us! What a touching thought! I hadn't seen that in twenty years!”

Veraguth smiled. “Yes, I thought it would amuse you. I hope you find everything you need. Do you want to unpack now?”

Burkhardt sat down squarely on a large steamer trunk with copper corners and looked about him with satisfaction. “This is perfect. And where are your quarters? Next door? Or upstairs?”

The painter played with the handle of a leather bag.

“No,” he said offhandedly. “I live over in the studio now. I've added to it.”

“You must show me that later. But … do you sleep over there too?”

Veraguth dropped the bag and turned around. “Yes, I sleep over there too.”

His friend fell into a thoughtful silence. Then he reached into the bag and took out a bundle of keys which he began to jangle. “Should we do a little unpacking? You could go and get the boy, he'll enjoy it.”

Veraguth went out and soon returned with Pierre.

“You have beautiful luggage, Uncle Otto, I've been looking at it. And so many tags. I've read a few. One of them says Penang. What's Penang?”

“It's a city in Malaya where I go sometimes. Come, you can open this.”

He gave the child a flat, intricate key and bade him unlock a suitcase. It sprang open, and the very first thing to meet the eye was an inverted flat basket of bright-colored Malay wickerwork. They turned it over and removed the wrapping; inside, padded with paper and rags, there were lovely, strangely shaped shells such as are offered for sale in exotic seaports.

The shells were a present for Pierre, who was too happy to speak, and after the shells came an ebony elephant and a Chinese toy with grotesque movable wooden figures, and finally a roll of garish-colored Chinese prints, full of gods, devils, kings, warriors, and dragons.

While the painter joined the boy in admiring his presents, Burkhardt unpacked the leather bag and put slippers, underwear, brushes, and so on, in their places. Then he went back to his friends.

“Well,” he said cheerily, “that's enough work for today. Now to pleasure. Could we take a look at the studio?”

Pierre looked up, and again, just as when the car had driven in, his father's animated face, grown youthful with pleasure, filled him with surprise.

“You're so gay, Papa,” he said approvingly.

“Yes indeed,” Veraguth nodded.

But his friend asked: “Isn't he usually so gay?”

Pierre looked from one to the other with embarrassment.

“I don't know,” he said hesitantly. But then he laughed again and spoke up: “No, you've never been so cheerful.”

He ran off with his basket of shells. Otto Burkhardt took his friend's arm and they went out. Veraguth led him through the park to the studio.

“Yes,” Burkhardt observed at once, “I can see the change. I must say it looks very nice. When did you do it?”

“About three years ago. The studio has been enlarged too.”

Burkhardt looked around. “The lake is marvelous. Let's go for a little swim this evening. You have a beautiful place here, Johann. But now I want to see the studio. Have you any new paintings here?”

“Not very many. But there's one I want you to see, I only finished it the day before yesterday. I think it's good.”

Veraguth opened the doors. The high studio was festively neat, the floor freshly scrubbed, and everything in its place. The new painting stood all by itself in the middle of the room. They stood facing it in silence. The heavy damp-cold atmosphere of the dismal rainy dawn contrasted with the clear light and hot, sundrenched air that came in through the doors.

They viewed the work for a long while.

“Is this the last thing you've painted?”

“Yes. It needs a different frame, otherwise there's nothing more to be done. Do you like it?”

The friends looked searchingly into each other's eyes. The taller and stouter Burkhardt with his ruddy face and warm eyes full of the enjoyment of life stood like a large child before the painter, whose face seemed sharp and severe in its setting of prematurely gray hair.

“It's perhaps your best picture,” said the guest slowly. “I saw the ones in Brussels and the two in Paris. I'd never have expected it, but you've gone still further ahead in these few years.”

“I'm glad to hear you say that. I think so too. I've worked pretty hard. Sometimes I think I was nothing but a dilettante before. I was late in learning how to work properly, but now I've mastered it. I probably won't go any further. I can't do anything better than this.”

“I understand. Well, you've become very famous, I've even heard people talking about you on our old East Asia steamers, and I was very proud. How does it feel to be famous? Does it make you happy?”

“Happy? No, I wouldn't say that. It seems right. There are perhaps two, three, four painters who amount to more and have more to offer than I. I've never counted myself among the really great; what the journalists say is nonsense. I have a right to be taken seriously, and since I am, I'm satisfied. All the rest is newspaper glory or a question of money.”

“I suppose so. But what do you mean by the really great?”

“The kings and princes. My kind can get to be a general or minister, that's as far as he can go. The most we can do is to work hard and take nature as seriously as possible. The kings are nature's brothers and friends, they play with her, they create where we can only imitate. But of course there aren't very many kings, not one in a hundred years.”

They walked back and forth in the studio. Casting about for words, the painter stared at the floor, his friend walked beside him and tried to read his sallow lean face.

At the door to the adjoining room, Otto stopped. “How about showing me your living quarters?” he said. “And let's have a cigar.”

Veraguth opened the door. They passed through the living room and looked into the other little rooms. Burkhardt lighted a cigar. He went into his friend's bedroom, saw his bed, and carefully examined the alcoves littered with painting equipment and smoking accessories. The general effect was almost of poverty; the home of an ascetic, hard-working bachelor.

“So you've settled over here,” he said dryly. But he could see and feel everything that had happened in the last few years. He observed with satisfaction the objects suggestive of sports, gymnastics, horseback riding, and noted with concern the absence of any sign of well-being, creature comfort, or enjoyment of leisure.