Hon. Marie Hay

A room with rudely bulging plaster walls, once painted a harsh blue, now toned by time and damp to a hundred parti-coloured patches. A rough, uneven floor; for furniture a narrow, oaken bedstead, a heavy chair lamed by four legs of various heights, a rickety table steadied by a pad of rags beneath one foot, a long chest of painted wood: such was the sleeping-room of Wilhelmine von GrÄvenitz, in her mother's house at GÜstrow in Mecklemburg. And here on a December morning of the year 1705 Wilhelmine sat disconsolately on the edge of the narrow bed. A feeble ray of winter sunshine crept through the small lattice window and made the dust twirl in a straight shaft of haze. The sunbeam kissed a cheerfulness into the dreary chamber, but the girl evidently felt no answering thrill of gladness, for she remained in her dejected attitude gloomily contemplating the dust dancing in the sunray. It was bitterly cold, and the feeble sun seemed only a teasing trick of nature, emphasising the general unfriendliness of the morning. Wilhelmine shivered in her thin bedgown, but she made no movement towards clothing herself; she was a prey to a mood of profound melancholy, and her expression was mournful, almost sinister. Though hers was a strangely haunting face, giving the impression of loveliness, yet, had one called this girl beautiful, it would have conveyed a totally erroneous picture of her, and but ill defined her subtle fascination. Her features were irregular, a trifle heavy perchance, with high cheek bones and massive square chin, with a cleft in the centre as though the Master Sculptor had said: 'This were too strong a face for a woman; I will give her a hint of tenderness to make her utterly irresistible,' and so He had planted a child's dimple in her chin and another near her lips when she smiled. Wilhelmine was over-tall, lithe of limb, and spare as a Greek runner; then suddenly, unexpectedly, full breasted—surprising, when one considered the rest of her proportions. Her hair was deep brown, nearly black, save where the light showed a tinge of red, a glint of gold. It was almost too abundant; like a rich, virulent weed it grew triumphant. Her lips were thin yet perfectly modelled, a long gracious curve; the upper lip a trifle thicker and short below the sensitive, wide-open nostrils. The brow serene and white, heavy over the deep-set blue eyes. And the eyes! No one could ever describe Wilhelmine von GrÄvenitz's eyes, or no two persons could agree concerning them, which comes to the same thing. They were blue and deeply set, the lids heavy, the lashes short and thick, the eyebrows strongly marked, arched and almost joining over the nose. But these are mere outward presentments, and tell nothing of the spirit living in those marvellous eyes. This was a thing of vital force, for ever changeful. Even the colour of her eyes was varying, and yet there was a curious persistency of gaze, a power of fixing. The GÜstrow citizens called Wilhelmine von GrÄvenitz witch and sorceress because of these strange eyes; they said she could freeze men with a look, that she had a serpent's gaze that grew cold and petrifying, when she chose, and yet those who loved her (they were not many) knew that her eyes could dance with laughter like a child's, that they could soften to tenderness, could glow with enthusiasm over a song or poem. But these softer moods were rare; in Wilhelmine's life there was little to call forth a gentle feeling. She lived alone with her mother in the small dark house, her brother Friedrich was away at the wars, her elder sister had married a middle-class personage of the name of Sittmann, a struggling Berlin merchant; and thus Wilhelmine led a dull life enough, for she despised the homely GÜstrow citizens, who in return disliked and feared her and called her witch. Frau von GrÄvenitz was a talkative dame, who passed her days in gossip and in waiting for news of her son Friedrich—'my soldier son at the wars with our brave Mecklemburgians, who follow the allied army under the great Englishman Malbruck!' as she informed her neighbours a hundred times a day. Upon Wilhelmine she lavished little affection, grudging her the scanty fare, and continually reminding her that she must marry. 'And who is more fitting a husband than Herr Pastor MÜller?' she would add. 'Though,' she grumbled, 'he is not of noble birth, still he is a solid man; and really in these days, when all the country is upset and one never knows when the French King and his wickedness may come upon us; what with one thing and another, indeed, a maiden may be pleased to find even a plebeian protector.' Thus she rambled on in her sharp voice, yet there was cause for her anxiety, and truth lay beneath her cackle, but the wisdom of age is often obscured by its presentment.

Wilhelmine paid little heed to her mother's eloquence; though this morning, as she sat on the edge of her bed, it was of those daily tirades that she thought.

Frau von GrÄvenitz was a sore trial. The food in her house was poor and scanty. The house itself dirty and untidy, with one peasant girl to do all the work. Wilhelmine hated this misery. She dreamed of ease and plenty, of soft linen, of bright garments, of balls and masques, of gaiety and splendour.

Pastor MÜller had none of these things to offer, she reflected; and she saw in prospect long years of dull sermons to be yawned through, stockings—thick, ugly stockings—to darn, stuffy respectability!—A timid knock came at the door, and Wilhelmine called the permission to enter, in a voice still clouded and harsh from her dreary reflections. The door opened, disclosing a curious and pathetic figure wrapped in a tattered homespun cloak.

It seemed to be a child, for it had but childhood's growth; yet the body had the clumsy decrepitude of old age. The shoulders were high and pointed; the long, emaciated arms reached almost to the ground. Enormous hands hung on these poor limbs—hands for a very big woman, beautiful hands; for in spite of their huge size they were wonderfully modelled and imposingly strong, with the long, nervous fingers of the artist or the enthusiast. The head was grotesquely oversized, though essentially beautiful; but it seemed like some sculptor's masterpiece placed upon a ridiculous figure, or some fine boulder rock balanced absurdly on a narrow, crooked flower-stem. The face arrested attention immediately; it was beautiful, finely chiselled and of classic line, without a hint of deformity or disease on its glowing health. The eyes were large, liquid, appealing, yet painfully watchful, as are the eyes of all the deformed. A yearning soul looked out of them, longing for sympathy, suspicious of pity—pity which is of all things most hateful to the cripple and the hunchback. As she stood in the doorway, there was a look of almost stern disapproval on her face, though the eyes softened with the tenderness of a woman watching the gracious naughtiness of a child.

'Wilhelmine,' she said, her grave glance meeting the other's angry frown, 'Wilhelmine, what is it now? Has the mother been singing her usual song of poverty and marriage? Come, beloved one, never frown at me so; you know it hurts me when you frown, more than the sneers and laughter which I always hear around me.—My friend! Nothing is worth a frown, though many things are worth tears.'

Wilhelmine turned away abruptly. Anna Reinhard was her friend, one of the few people in the world for whom she felt affection; but the pedantic words of the deformed girl often irritated her, and she found that spoken wisdom of Anna's infinitely wearisome, yet she was seldom querulous to her, partly because of the real affection she bore her, partly from a certain fear of the hunchback's quick wit and vehemence.

'No,' said Wilhelmine, 'it is not really the recollection of mother's lectures which disturbs me; but oh, Anna, this existence is becoming unbearable! It is all very well for you; you have your beloved books, and your religion to occupy you, but I have got nothing, and I want so much! Believe me, all those things you call amusement and luxury are necessities to me. I want to lie soft in sweet linen, to wear rich clothes, to dance, and—yes, Anna, don't look wise and solemn! I want admiration, applause, power. Anna, Anna, I wish I had been born like you' (the hunchback shuddered), 'yes, yes! You know what I mean! To like those things you like, all of which you can get——'

'What foolishness!' broke in Anna; 'content with what one can have is the only happiness. Wilhelmine, some day perhaps you will have the things you pine for, far more perhaps, and then you will want others, always more!'

'Give me these things, and I will not ask for more!' burst out Wilhelmine.

'So you always say, Wilhelmine, and always will—even when——'

'Anna, you do not understand! how could you? I want life and all that life holds——' She opened her strange, grasping hands, and they closed over the other's wrists in a compelling grip.

At this moment a clatter arose in the narrow, ill-paved street, in which stood Frau von GrÄvenitz's house.

A man on a mud-bespattered horse cantered to the door of the Rathaus and pulled up with a flourish, blowing a shrill blast on a horn. He was accoutred in the blue and silver uniform which the Princes of Thurn and Taxis decreed to be worn by the Imperial Post.

The Taxis were Hereditary Grand Masters of the Imperial Post, which office they had found to be a valuable source of income, for the entire return of the exorbitant postal rates went into their pockets; still the people had cause for gratitude to the Taxis, as, at least, their care assured a tolerably safe carrying of letters, and, to a certain extent, a systematised postal service.

In those days the arrival of the mail was an important event. It awoke the small German town from its habitual slumberous dullness, and a letter caused its recipient to be regarded as a person of consequence.

A crowd of town cronies and gossips immediately formed round the horseman. They did not ask if he brought a letter; indeed, that was unlikely, but news! news of the war! What were the Frenchmen doing? had they gone back to their godless country?

The man answered these questions as best he might. He knew little, he said, for he only carried despatches from Schwerin. News of the war in the South? Well,—they said in Schwerin that Marshal Villars had left Wirtemberg with his army, but there was a letter in his bag from Wirtemberg for the FrÄulein von GrÄvenitz, and perchance she would be able to tell them. At mention of this a busybody ran up the narrow street, calling loudly: 'FrÄulein Wilhelmine! FrÄulein Wilhelmine! there is a letter from your brother! Come and tell us the news of the army. He may tell when to expect our soldiers' return.'

Wilhelmine, who had dressed hurriedly on hearing the post arrive, came slowly down the street. She looked angrily at the woman, for she hated the familiarity of the townsfolk and resented their open curiosity. Did they expect her to read her brother's letter aloud to a gaping group, as though it were a public gazette? But she wanted the letter, and wished to get it before her mother, hearing the tumult, could come and snatch it from her. The people eyed the proud girl with no good will. She was reserved and haughty, and some said she had the evil eye.

The messenger handed her the letter and she walked quickly away, followed by many a disapproving grunt and sarcastic comment from the crowd. She gained the door of her mother's house and, springing up the creaking stair, went quickly into her room, shutting and bolting the door behind her.

---

'Dear Sister,'—she read—'Since last I wrote to thee, I have left my Lord of Marlborough's army, being invited to visit the court of my honoured brother in arms, Monseigneur le Duc de Wirtemberg. This happened six months since; meanwhile I have married Mademoiselle Marie von Stuben, a lady of Rottenburg (a small town on the borders of my Lord Duke's territory). I have been appointed Kammerjunker at court, and shall not be returning to GÜstrow for some time. I write this news so that thou mayst break it gently to our mother, who, I fear, may be disappointed in that I do not return immediately to visit her. But assure her that I will ride North to see her whenever I can, and that shortly I hope to be in a position to offer her hospitality in Stuttgart.

'I am convinced that it would be to thine advantage, dear sister, if thou camest immediately to visit us. Tell our mother that I know many rich noblemen here, and that I will endeavour to arrange a marriage for thee, more fitting than the alliance of our sister Sittmann. The great thing is that thou shouldst set forth soon, for there will be court festivities in the spring. After which, there is usually little gaiety until the late autumn.

'A good friend of mine, Madame de Ruth of Oberhausen, is willing to receive thee, and will arrange that thou shouldst take part in these court gaieties. A thousand greetings to our mother, and beg her, for my sake, to permit thee to travel southward without too much delay.—Thy brother,

Wilhelmine sat motionless for a few moments after she had perused this effusion. In her mind she saw a succession of pictures of courtly splendour and graceful adventure—and in each she herself was the central figure. She looked around her bare room; the bulging walls, the rude furniture. Her eyes narrowed into that strange look of hers which the people of GÜstrow declared was like a serpent's gaze, and could hold animals powerless as long as it was directed upon them. She was thinking deeply—swiftly—and perhaps it was at this moment that Wilhelmine von GrÄvenitz vowed her soul to worldly success; her indomitable will directed to the goal of worldly power at all costs and at all hazards. She rose shivering. It was cheerless and cold in her room; the momentary gleam of the winter sun had died away, and the sky was grey and heavy with coming snow. She unhooked her cloak from the peg, fastened it round her, and with her letter hidden away in the folds she stepped softly out and down the stair, throwing a quick backward glance to see if her mother followed or observed her. Noiselessly she lifted the latch of the house door and took her way up the narrow street.

She passed the old Rathaus with the quaint fourteenth-century belfry, and the clock whence sprang out the brightly painted leaden figure of a knight, to smite the chime with his sword at each hour. In the market-place beneath, the weekly market was being held.

Many small booths had been erected, and the venders were expostulating with the citizens, who drove hard bargains with them. It was a picturesque scene enough, had Wilhelmine paused to watch—much colour in the peasants' dress, much variety in the women's headgear, and over all the wonderful old building, which would have delighted a painter's soul. That morning Wilhelmine noted nothing of all this, though on another occasion she would have taken pleasure in it, for like most sensuous natures she had a keen feeling for colour, and the grouping of a peasant crowd appealed to her artistic eye; but that day she was so absorbed in her own dreams that she did not even observe her mother walking towards her, an expression of annoyance on her sharp features. Wilhelmine started when Frau von GrÄvenitz, laying an ungentle hand on her shoulder, said close to her ear: 'And where may my fine daughter be going at so early an hour? Generally Miss Lie-abed is still reposing at nine of the clock!'

'O mother!' she answered, 'I am going to Monsieur Gabriel for my singing lesson. God knows, you cannot grudge me that, for he teaches me without payment.' Her quick wit told her that to draw her mother's attention to this fruitful source of complaint, her poverty, would ensure an escape unquestioned. She reflected that she could tell of Friedrich's letter, pretending she had received it on her way home. Or, if her mother discovered the earlier delivery of the post, she would say the angry attack in the market-place had made her forget to mention it. This plan met with success, and Frau von GrÄvenitz remained in the pleasurable throes of a talkative woman with a grievance, holding forth to an appreciative audience composed of several of her gossips, who had gathered round as soon as they heard her shrill excited tones. A market-woman or two joined the group and stood with hands on hips, listening with open amusement, for the garrulous dame was a well-known character in the country town.

As Wilhelmine gained the shelter of the dark street which ran from the Marktplatz to the cathedral, she saw Pastor MÜller's fat form added to her mother's assemblage. How she hated that stout person, his pompous condescension to her, and his greasy face!

The Klosterstrasse seemed deliciously quiet after the noise of the Marktplatz, and before her, at the end of the street, she could see one tall buttress of the cathedral, and a corner of the graveyard. She walked up the pathway between the tombs and pushed open the heavy church door. The cathedral nave was dark. Wilhelmine peered about and, thinking there was no one in the church, turned to go, when from the organ, far away near the high altar (or where the high altar had been before Protestant fury had torn it down), came a whisper like the awakening of the cathedral's soul; a long-drawn note which grew stronger and fuller, filling the whole building with a pulse of sound.

Wilhelmine paused, then, turning silently to one of the oaken pews, sat down. A wondrous melody crept through the air, strong, noble, uncomplicated; then followed chords growing each moment more the expression of a soul on fire. They rose stronger, they swelled and strove and implored, they wailed with the passion of finite hearts that yearn infinitely; then suddenly sank back into the solemn major key whence they started. And it was as the renunciation of some terrible striving, as though the organ chanted the litany of some perfect calm reached through an agony of endeavour and suffering. Wilhelmine's eyes were wet, while she leaned her head against the back of the oaken pew. To her music was the only form of prayer, and it never failed to move her to a vague aspiration, she herself knew hardly what. Her dreams of the world faded, and she was only cognisant of the dim church and the inspired improvisation of her beloved Monsieur Gabriel. This was his answer to her as yet unasked question. She had come to him for guidance, to beg his counsel concerning her brother's letter, and he had told her in his music all that he knew of the world. He had shown her the cruel agony of the worldly life, the unrest, the bootless seeking, the satiety of realised ambition, and the calmness, the peace of the renunciation of these things.

The organ was silent for a moment, and then through the stillness of the shadowy aisle floated the first notes of an 'Ave Maria,' which Wilhelmine knew well and had often sung when no disturbing element of disapproving Protestant burgherdom was near. Instinctively she came in at the appointed bar for the voice's commencement. 'Ave Maria gratia plena,' she sang, and her powerful notes echoed through the cathedral with all the sombre glory which lay in her great contralto voice. The player at the organ immediately softened his music to a mere accompanying whisper, which yet supported the voice, greeting it with the newly awakened soul of the organ. 'Ora pro nobis, peccatoribus,' she sang, and surely the Mother of God must have listened to so wonderful a tone prayer? 'Nunc et in hora mortis nostrae, Amen.' And the organ wandered on repeating the 'Amen' again and again in a solemn, dreamy deepening of chords, which the beautiful voice followed and answered with that certainty and ease which belong to a few of the world's singers when they sing to the accompaniment of one with whom they are in perfect musical and sympathetic understanding. The music came to an end and the church seemed doubly silent, with the painful stillness one sometimes feels when a song is ended; it is almost the same sudden forlorn feeling as when a beloved friend goes away, that sense of the departure of a beautiful presence, or it may be that our souls have returned to earth after soaring towards some beauteous mystic region. Wilhelmine passed up the nave, through a small door in the side of the carven wooden screen, and up a dark and narrow winding stair which led to the organ-loft. It was unusual to find an organ even in a cathedral in those days, but a pious Duke of Mecklemburg-GÜstrow had given this one to the church as a thankoffering, and had caused it to be built by the famous organ-makers of Venice.

The organist's face and figure commanded attention. Tall and spare, with the scholar's stoop, a long narrow head broadening at the brow, a mass of iron-grey hair,—a thin, eager face lit by almost colourless eyes, which looked as though the blue of youth had been washed away by tears, or faded by vigils and patient suffering. This was the individual whom the townsfolk called the 'mad French schoolmaster, Monsieur Gabriel,' and whose youth they whispered had been spent at the court of France, till Madame de Maintenon had set his enemies upon him, and he, being proved a heretic, had fled for his life across the frontier and wandered northwards. The course of his wanderings brought him to Mecklemburg where, hearing that the schoolmaster at GÜstrow had died, he had sought the post and it had been granted him, because of his proved learning and his skill as a musician. This uneventful calling he had followed for many years, and the people had ceased to wonder at his eccentricities, his silence, and his friendlessness. The children loved him, and his school became famous through the countryside, and on Sundays and feast days the citizens flocked to hear his organ playing, and the performance of the choir of youths and maidens he had trained to sing so well.

Pastor MÜller, according to his coarse nature, was jealous of him and insolent to him, yet he feared the mild gaze of those faded eyes and the imperturbable courtesy of the old Frenchman's manner. The pastor would often question the schoolmaster sharply concerning the music he played. 'Chorales are all very fine,' he said, 'but surely oftentimes you play music from the abominable Mass, not fitting indeed in a holy place set apart for the worship of the Lord according to our pure faith?' 'Ah! Pastor, but the notes cannot contaminate,' Monsieur Gabriel would answer; 'Luther himself made use of the monk's melodies in his canticles.' And Pastor MÜller retired to his dirty, airless house, feeling rebuked himself where he had wished to chide.

When Wilhelmine von GrÄvenitz appeared at the GÜstrow school, a curly-haired child, Monsieur Gabriel had immediately fallen victim to her wayward charm, and had lavished much care on her studies. He taught her French thoroughly. 'I am told,' he was wont to say, 'that even in Germany no lady speaks aught save French, and you, my child, must be a great lady some day. Believe me, there is no more magnificent being than a true grande dame, and for this destiny the good God fashioned you.' He trained Wilhelmine in music, till thorough-bass, counterpoint, and the rest became to her an easy exercise. He read her of the history of France; taught her to know and love the Roman de la Rose, and the poems of the singers of La PleÏade. Often he would quote Malherbes, saying with a smile and a sigh as he looked at her radiant youth: 'Et rose, elle a vÉcu ce que vivent les roses, l'espace d'un matin; for,' he said, 'the flowers of the world fade quickly, and thou art surely a flower, my little one.' He read her the works of Racine, Corneille, MoliÈre, all of which learning she assimilated rapidly, and with an accuracy which delighted the old scholar. Sometimes, of an evening, he would keep her with him long after school hours, and one winter he took it into his head that she must learn to dance. He tied an inky tablecloth to her shoulders to serve as a sweeping garment. It was infinitely droll to see the two, mincing, bowing, and pirouetting in front of the mirror. 'You must see yourself curtsey,' he said, 'if you would learn the real movement.' He taught her the gavotte, the pavane, and many other dances, playing the measures on an old violin the while. The school desks served for dummy dancers, and were arranged to give her a notion of the ordering of the figures. The aged recluse, in his musty coat, seemed transformed into a very courtly gentleman, but Wilhelmine always fancied that his eyes were more melancholy than usual after these mimic courts. One day she asked him if it saddened him to revoke the past. 'Ah! mon enfant!' he replied, 'que voulez-vous? un coeur profondÉment blessÉ ne guÉrit jamais; and the melodies of these dances remind me of my wound, which I thought had healed in your peaceful northern land. Ah! little one, there is no sadder music to the old than the dance-music of a vanished youth.'

While Wilhelmine read her brother's letter on that cold December morning, it was to Monsieur Gabriel she at once decided to confide its surprising contents. Her mother, she knew, would raise a dozen difficulties, and it were best to talk with Monsieur Gabriel and devise some means of procuring sufficient money to pay the cost of her journey to Wirtemberg. Then, if they could hit upon a scheme to propose to Frau von GrÄvenitz, there was more likelihood of gaining her consent. But the music had changed Wilhelmine's mind, and as she climbed up to the organ-loft she was almost prepared to abandon her intended journey.

'Monsieur Gabriel!' she said, 'I have great news, so strangely unexpected that I wonder if I am dreaming it! Read this letter of my brother's, and give me your advice.' The old man stretched out his left hand to take the paper, while his right hand remained on the organ keys, and as he read he played a few chords. 'HÉlas!' he murmured as he refolded the letter, 'so the time has come when you must go forth into the world. Well, well—it is right; you are wasted here, though God knows it will be very dark without you.'

'But, Monsieur Gabriel,' she said, 'you talk as though I should start to-morrow! I have not told my mother yet, and I have come to you for advice. Where could I get the money to pay my journey? It will cost many gulden.'

The old man smiled. 'Money? your brother sends you none, of course? Your mother? she also has none. Does Friedrich think you can fly southward on a swallow's wing? And the swallows have gone to the south long ago,' he added dreamily.

'O Monsieur Gabriel,' cried Wilhelmine, 'help me!—you have always helped me! tell me where to get this money.'

'My child, I must think; do you know what the cost will be? No, nor I either; but let me see—how long has this letter been on the road?—sixteen days—and you could not travel so far without rest and refreshment. Well! you must have a hundred gulden. But, child, to what am I sending you?'

Wilhelmine started; she knew by his last words that he could procure the money.

'To success!' she answered in a low voice.

'Success? Yes, probably, but that is the greatest danger! We can most of us remain pure of heart, tender, generous while we are poor or sad, but it is when the world smiles that the heart so often grows cold and hard.'

Wilhelmine clambered on to the organ bench, pushing Monsieur Gabriel gently aside. She struck a chord, but the half-witted bellows-blower, whose presence they had forgotten, had ceased to pump air into the organ, and there came only a painful droning from the empty pipes. She called to him imperiously, and with a muttered grumble he resumed his pumping.

'A bad omen,' said Wilhelmine; 'I strike a chord and I achieve dissonance and wailing.' She threw back her head and pressed her fingers on the keyboard: this time a thin flute-like chord came forth, and Wilhelmine lifted her voice and sang:

She managed the organ wonderfully, and succeeded so well in playing a light, graceful accompaniment to the old French melody, that Monsieur Gabriel, listening with a smile and nodding his head, whispered as though to some invisible confidant: 'I have made her a true artist!—no, God makes the artist, but those who love them teach them to give their genius to the world. Well, my child,' he continued, 'I will find the money for you, but leave me now. Be satisfied, your song has done its work; I will send you on your search for the flowers, and God grant you may not find the tears too soon!—I do not love that song with its refrain of fleurs et pleurs, it is so terribly true.' But Wilhelmine was not listening to his rambling talk; her strange eyes had lost the brightness which had been theirs while she sang the gay French song; they had narrowed to that hard, compelling gaze which, in truth, was curiously serpent-like in its cold fixity.

Monsieur Gabriel laid his hand on her shoulder, and together they went down into the silent nave of the church. They separated at the door; the old man going up the Klosterstrasse to the schoolhouse, while Wilhelmine walked rapidly away, through the graveyard, towards the bleak fields and the marshland which surrounded the dreary northern town.