The poor man resolved on revenge. He knew who Hilde’s father was and, with his simple brain, which did not appreciate the philosophy of an emancipated young woman, assumed that the goings-on on the sofa which he had overheard must be the result of a seduction in the good old style. With persons of consequence, he thought in his innocence, there is an honour which one forfeits, protects, avenges in a duel or with pistol-shots. He already saw the Director General lying dead in the office with a bullet in the temple, old Herr von Maerker beside him, broken but proud and silent, and — most important of all — he himself again indispensable and preserved. And he went to Herr von Maerker and related to him what he had detected and overheard. Basically, Herr von Maerker’s views did not differ from those of Wawrka. The precepts of social honour required a ministerial adviser and cavalry officer to call his daughter’s seducer to account. And with the matter-of-course attitude of a man who has no misgivings about his daughter but the traditions of an old chivalry in his blood, Herr von Maerker betook himself, horsewhip in hand, to the Director General.
Herr von Derschatta was determined not to die at any price, either at the front or behind the lines. To save his life he played the confessed sinner, but also the anguished lover, and begged Herr von Maerker for his daughter’s hand. Hilde would have preferred to pursue her sexual freedom but realized that she must avert a catastrophe. She made a sacrifice to prejudice, got married, and consoled herself with the prospect of a free modern marriage in which both parties could do as they wished.
But she was wrong. For her husband, who had formerly shared her views of sexual freedom for women, suddenly regarded marriage as a sacred institution and was determined, as he said, to preserve ‘the honour of his home’. Yes, he even became jealous. He kept his wife under surveillance. He engaged a new secretary and pursued his normal practices with her. Wawrka went to the front and had probably fallen in the meantime. Hilde, however, got a child. It was simply a precautionary measure on her husband’s part. She took it as a sign of her humiliation. Thus, with Nature’s help, he had demonstrated to her that it was a wife’s lot to be unfree and a vessel for posterity. She hated the child, a boy, who resembled his father with malice aforethought. Now she was surrounded by two Derschattas. When the one went to the office, the other screamed in the cradle. Often they both slept in her bed. She had nobody in the world. She could not talk to her father, he did not understand what she said. Her only friend, Frau G., gave her cheap advice. She should betray her husband. That was the sole revenge. But Herr von Derschatta was mistrustful and prudent and a domestic tyrant of the old style. And far and wide there was no man with whom it would have been worthwhile breaking the marriage. For Hilde had become more critical. Misfortune makes one choosy.
Then came the Revolution. Herr von Derschatta lost his connections, his rank and his nobility. He had never had a vocation. It was necessary to cut down. The children’s nurse was dismissed and a cheap cook engaged. One gave no social evenings and went to no parties. Herr von Derschatta lost his secretaries and concentrated his entire manliness on his wife. He became even more jealous. A second child arrived, a son, just as much like his father as the first and just as much hated by Hilde. Herr von Derschatta plunged into commerce. He developed connections with members of the odious but clever race of Jewish financiers. At the instance of one of these he removed to Berlin, in order to act for his principal on the money markets of German cities. No one had any confidence in his expertise. But, in the opinion of rich but ill-favoured men, he had a distinguished appearance and ‘cut a good figure’ in Germany. No drop of Jewish blood could be detected in him. And he was a nobleman.
He made his living by tenuous deals, which he barely grasped. He consorted with stout individuals whom he despised and whom he simultaneously respected and feared. He attempted to learn their ‘dodges’. For he believed they were dodges. He did not realize that generations of ancestors subjected to pogroms and martyrdom, confined in the ghetto and compelled to banking transactions, were requisite to making deals. He became one of those furtive antisemites who begin to hate out of respect and who say to themselves a thousand times a day, whenever a deal goes against them and whenever they believe themselves outwitted: ‘If I were to have my life over again, I would be a Jew.’ A great part of his bad humour arose from the fact that it was so difficult to be born again. And because he could not discuss his private worries with business friends and acquaintances, he poured out his heart to Hilde. She let him talk, she did not comfort him, she actually rejoiced in his bad luck. She was haughty and spiteful. The Director General who, with the adroitness of a weakling, approved the principles of the new world and despised those of the old one, which was what he called a ‘reorientation’, indicated that his marriage had been an over-hasty affair and the result of a reactionary outlook. He thought of his marriage as he did of his patriotism and his war decoration and his monarchistic opinions. From the whole of that world, which had so rapidly collapsed, he had salvaged nothing but this stupid marriage, whose basis had been a stupid principle of honour. Today? Today no reasonable man would enter into a discussion with an old blockhead of a ministerial adviser over the honour of his daughter. Pistols, horsewhips, duels, formalities! What a performance! ‘If I had not married Hilde,’ he thought bitterly, ‘I might now have got hold of the daughter of a rich Jew. Blond Aryans are highly sought after.’ Often he worked himself into a rage. He no longer had a uniform or a title or any position of standing. No precepts anywhere could force him to practise restraint. He let himself go. A door slammed, a chair fell over, his fist pounded on the table, the hanging-lamp began to shake gently. Hilde opened her eyes wide. Already grief choked her, the tears began to smart at the corners of her eyes. ‘Anything rather than cry,’ she thought, ‘anything rather than cry in front of him! I shall try instead to be surprised, just surprised. What an animal. A butcher.’ First the nape of his neck reddened, then the blood mounted from behind into his face. Small hairs sprouted on the backs of his broad hands. She must think of someone quickly, thought was a comfort in itself. And she thought of her father, who restrained himself a hundred times a day, who was doubly polite when he fell into a silent rage, who left the house when he had something unpleasant to say. Father! But he was old and foolish and had never understood her. Even if he were here now, he would at most shoot it out with her husband.
She remembered Friedrich. She no longer saw him distinctly. She remembered him, but not as a living human being, rather as a kind of ‘interesting phenomenon’. A young idealist, a revolutionary. And not even consistent. In the end he was like the others. ‘He must have enlisted and has probably been killed,’ she thought.
She had not ceased thinking of Friedrich when the Director General succeeded, the inflation overcome, in obtaining an impressive and prominent position as manager of the office of a steel combine in Berlin, and in acquiring the improved mood that befitted the circumstances.