Gertrude (19 page)

“Are you serious?” she asked quietly.

“Oh, yes,” I said, and laughed. “And I think this piece of music suits you very well, Miss Brigitte.”

Her gaze, which was still veiled with tears, astonished me, it was so serious and ungirlish—but I did not pay further attention to the matter. Teiser now put his violin away, and my mother, who already knew what he liked, filled the glasses with wine. The conversation became lively. We argued about a new operetta which had been produced a few weeks earlier, and I only remembered the little incident with Brigitte later in the evening, when they both departed and she again looked at me strangely.

In the meantime, rehearsals of my opera had commenced in Munich. As one of the principal parts was in Muoth's good hands and Gertrude had praised the soprano, the orchestra and the chorus became my chief concern. I left my mother in the care of my friends and traveled to Munich.

The morning after my arrival I walked along the attractive broad streets to Schwabing and to the quietly situated house where Muoth lived. I had almost completely forgotten about the opera. I only thought about him and Gertrude and how I would find them. The cab stopped at an almost rural byroad in front of a small house that stood among autumnal-looking trees. Yellow maple leaves lay on both sides of the road, swept into heaps.

With some trepidation I went in. The house gave me the impression of being comfortable and prosperous. A servant took my coat.

In the large room into which I was led I recognized two large old paintings that had been brought from the Imthors' house. On one wall there was a new portrait of Muoth that had been painted in Munich, and while I was looking at it Gertrude came in.

My heart beat quickly at seeing her again after such a long time. She had changed into a more serious, mature woman, but she smiled at me in the old friendly way and held out her hand to me.

“How are you?” she asked in a friendly manner. “You have grown older but you look well. We have expected you for a long time.”

She inquired about all her friends, about her father and my mother, and as she became interested and overcame her first shyness, I regarded her in the same light as I had in the past. Suddenly my embarrassment disappeared and I talked to her as to a good friend, told her how I had spent the summer by the sea, about my work, the Teisers, and finally even about poor Miss Schniebel.

“And now,” she exclaimed, “your opera is going to be performed! You will be very pleased about it.”

“Yes,” I said, “but I am even more pleased at the thought of hearing you sing again.”

She smiled. “I shall be pleased, too. I sing quite often, but almost always for myself alone. I shall sing all your songs. I have them here and I do not let the dust settle on them. Stay for a meal with us. My husband will be coming soon and he can go along with you to see the conductor in the afternoon.”

We went into the music room and she sang my songs. I became quiet and found it difficult to remain calm. Her voice had become more mature and sounded more confident, but it soared as easily as ever and transported me in my memory to the best days of my life, so that I looked at the piano keys as if bewitched, quietly played the well-known notes and, listening with closed eyes, could not for moments distinguish between the present and the past. Did she not belong to me and my life? Were we not as near to each other as brother and sister, and very close friends? To be sure, she would have sung differently with Muoth!

We sat chatting for a while, feeling happy and not having much to say to each other, for we knew that no explanations were necessary between us. How things were with her and what relations were like between her and her husband, I did not think about then. I would be able to observe that later. In any event, she had not swerved from her path and become untrue to her nature, and if she had a load to bear, she certainly bore it with dignity and without bitterness.

An hour later Heinrich, who had heard that I had arrived, came in. He immediately began to talk about the opera, which seemed more important to everyone else than it did to me. I asked him how he was and how he liked being in Munich.

“Like everywhere else,” he said seriously. “The public does not like me because it feels that I do not care about it. I am hardly ever favorably received at my first entrance. I always have to hold people first and then carry them away with me. I thus succeed without being popular. Sometimes I also sing badly, I must admit that myself. Well, your opera will be a success—you can count on that—for you and for me. Today we shall go and see the conductor; tomorrow we shall invite the soprano to come and see us and whoever else you wish to meet. Tomorrow morning there is an orchestral rehearsal. I think you will be satisfied.”

During lunch I observed that he was exceptionally polite toward Gertrude, which made me suspicious. It was like that the whole time I was in Munich, and I saw them both every day. They were an extremely handsome couple and made an impression wherever they went. Yet they were cool toward each other, and I thought that only Gertrude's strength of character and superior nature made it possible for her to mask this coolness with a polite and dignified veneer. It appeared as if she had not long before awakened from her passion for this handsome man and still hoped to recover her inward stillness. In any event, she acted in accordance with good form. She was too well bred and fine a person to play the part of the disillusioned and misunderstood woman before friends or to show her secret sorrow to anyone, even if she could not hide it from me. But she could also not have endured any look or gesture of understanding or sympathy from me. We spoke and acted all the time as if there were no cloud over her marriage.

How long this state of affairs would be maintained was uncertain and depended on Muoth, whose incalculable nature I saw kept under restraint by a woman for the first time. I was sorry for both of them but I was not very surprised to find this situation. They had both enjoyed their passion; now they had to learn resignation and preserve this happy time in their memory or they must learn to find their way to a new kind of happiness and love. Perhaps a child would bring them together again, not back to the abandoned Paradise garden of love's ardor, but to a new will to live together and to draw closer to each other. Gertrude had the strength and serenity of character for it, I knew. I did not dare to think whether Heinrich had the same capacity. However sorry I was that the fierce storm of their first passion and pleasure in each other had already passed, I was pleased at the way both of them behaved, preserving their dignity and respect not only in front of people but also in each other's company.

Meanwhile, I did not accept the invitation to stay at Muoth's house, and he did not press me. I went there every day and it gladdened me to see that Gertrude liked me to come and enjoyed chatting and making music with me, so that the pleasure was not only mine.

It was now definite that my opera would be performed in December. I stayed in Munich two weeks, was present at all the orchestral rehearsals, made alterations and adjustments here and there, but saw the work in good hands. It seemed strange to see the singers, the violinists and flautists, the conductor and the chorus occupied with my work, which had now become alien to me and had life and breath that were no longer mine.

“Just wait,” said Heinrich Muoth. “You will soon have to breathe the accursed air of publicity. I almost wish for your sake that the opera will not be a success, for you will then have the mob after you. Then you will have to deal with locks of hair and autographs, and taste the approbation and kindness of the admiring public. Everyone is already talking about your crippled leg. Anything like that makes one popular!”

After the necessary rehearsals I took my departure, arranging to come back a few days before the performance. Teiser asked me endless questions about the rehearsals. He thought of numerous orchestral details that I had scarcely considered and he was more excited and anxious about the whole affair than I was. When I invited him and his sister to come with me to the performance, he jumped for joy. On the other hand, my mother did not welcome the winter journey and all the excitement, and I agreed that she should stay behind. Gradually, I began to feel more excited and had to take a glass of port at night to help me sleep.

Winter came early, and our little house and garden lay deep in snow when, one morning, the Teisers called for me in a cab. My mother waved goodbye to us from the window, the cab drove off, and Teiser, with a thick scarf round his neck, sang a traveling song. During the whole long journey he was like a boy going home for the Christmas holidays, and pretty Brigitte was glowing, expressing her pleasure more quietly. I was glad of their company, for I was no longer calm, and awaited the events of the next few days like one under sentence.

Muoth, who was waiting for me at the railway station, noticed it immediately. “You are suffering from stage fright, young man,” he said and laughed with pleasure. “Thank goodness for that! After all, you are a musician and not a philosopher.”

He seemed to be right, for my excitement lasted until the performance took place, and I did not sleep during those nights. Muoth was the only calm person among us all. Teiser burned with excitement; he came to every rehearsal and made endless criticisms. Huddled up and attentive, he sat beside me during rehearsals, beat time with his clenched hand during difficult passages, and alternately praised or shook his head.

“There's a flute missing!” he cried out at the first orchestral rehearsal he attended, so loudly that the conductor looked across at us with annoyance.

“We have had to omit it,” I said, smiling.

“Omit a flute? Why? What a crazy thing to do! Be careful, or they will ruin the whole overture.”

I had to laugh and hold him back forcibly because he was so critical. But during his favorite part, where the violas and cellos came in, he leaned back with closed eyes, pressed my hand from time to time, and afterward whispered to me, abashed: “That almost brought tears to my eyes. It is beautiful!”

I had not yet heard the soprano part sung. It now seemed strange and sad to hear it sung for the first time by another singer. She sang it well, and I thanked her as soon as she had finished, but inwardly I thought of the afternoons when Gertrude had sung those words, and I had a feeling of unadmitted discontent, as when one gives a precious possession away and sees it in strange hands for the first time.

I saw little of Gertrude during those days. She observed my excitement with a smile and let me alone. I had visited her with the Teisers. She received Brigitte very warmly, and the girl was full of admiration for the beautiful, gracious woman. From that time she was most enthusiastic about Gertrude and praised her volubly, and her brother did likewise.

I can no longer remember the details of the two days preceding the performance; everything is confused in my mind. There were additional reasons for excitement: one singer became hoarse, another was annoyed at not having a larger part and behaved very badly during the last rehearsals. The conductor became cooler and more formal as a result of my directions. Muoth came to my aid at opportune moments, smiled calmly at all the tumult, and during this time was of more value to me than Teiser, who ran here and there like a demon, making criticisms everywhere. Brigitte looked at me with reverence but also with some sympathy when, during quieter periods, we sat together in the hotel, weary and rather silent.

The days passed and the evening of the performance arrived. While the audience was entering the theater, I stood backstage without having anything more to do or to suggest. Finally, I stayed with Muoth, who was already in his costume and in a small room away from all the noise was slowly emptying half a bottle of champagne.

“Will you have a glass?” he asked sympathetically.

“No,” I said. “Doesn't it overexcite you?”

“What? All the activity outside? It is always like that.”

“I mean the champagne.”

“Oh no, it soothes me. I always have to have a glass or two before I want to do anything. But go now, it is nearly time.”

I was led by an attendant into a private box, where I found Gertrude and both the Teisers, as well as an important personage from the management of the theater, who greeted me with a smile.

Directly afterward we heard the second bell. Gertrude gave me a friendly look and nodded to me. Teiser, who sat behind me, seized my arm and pinched it with excitement. The theater became dark, and the sounds of my overture solemnly rose to me from below. I now became calmer.

Then my work appeared before me, so familiar and yet so alien, which no longer needed me and had a life of its own. The pleasures and troubles of past days, the hopes and sleepless nights, the passion and longing of that period confronted me, detached and transformed. Emotions experienced in secret were transmitted clearly and movingly to a thousand unknown people in the theater. Muoth appeared and began singing with some reserve. Then his voice grew stronger; he let himself go and sang in his deeply passionate manner; the soprano responded in a high, sweet voice. Then came a part which I could so well remember hearing Gertrude sing, which expressed my admiration for her and was a quiet confession of my love. I averted my glance and looked into her bright eyes, which acknowledged me and greeted me warmly, and for a moment the memory of my whole youth was like the sweet fragrance of a ripe fruit.

From that moment I felt more calm and listened like any other member of the audience. There was a burst of applause. The singers appeared before the curtain and bowed. Muoth was recalled a number of times and smiled calmly down into the now illuminated theater. I was also pressed to appear, but I was far too overcome by emotion and had no desire to limp out of my pleasant retreat.

Teiser, on the other hand, laughed with a face like the rising sun, put his arm through mine and also impetuously shook both hands of the important personage from the theater management.