She cast a swift glance at him and instantly looked away. Something of the fear of him she had once felt again arose in her. She strove against it, she tried to laugh, she said provokingly: “I suppose it isn’t a kiss you want from me, Hubert?”
He looked at her unmoved. Her laugh had already died away, it sounded so ugly and false. I don’t feel like laughing, she thought.
“No, not a kiss,” he said almost contemptuously. “I don’t believe in cuddling.”
“What then, Hubert? Go on, tell me.” She was burning with impatience. He had achieved what he wanted: she preferred the most fantastic request to this painful uncertainty.
“It is nothing unfitting that I ask of the young Fräulein,” he said in his cold, didactic tone. “Nor is it anything indecent.… I should just like to be allowed to place my left hand for a while on the young Fräulein’s heart.”
She said nothing. She moved her lips, she wanted to say something.
He made no movement to approach closer. He stood at the door in an attitude appropriate to a servant; he was wearing a kind of livery-jacket with gray armorial buttons; on his glistening oily head every hair was in its proper place.
“Now I have told the young Fräulein,” he said in his lifeless tone, “may I say that I intend nothing unchaste? It isn’t that I want to touch her breast.…”
She was still struck dumb. They were separated almost by the width of the room.
Hubert Räder made something like a very slight bow. She hadn’t moved and was quite still. He walked slowly across the room toward her; rigid, she saw him coming closer; no differently does the horrified victim await the murderer’s death blow.
He placed the letter on the table, turned round and walked toward the door.
She waited, waited an eternity. He had already grasped the doorknob when she moved. She cleared her throat—and Hubert Räder looked round at her.… She wanted to say something, but a spell lay over her. With a vague, unsteady movement she pointed at the letter—no longer thinking at all of letter or recipient.…
The man raised his hand to the switch near the door, and the room was in darkness.
It was so dark she could have screamed. She stood behind the table, she saw nothing of him; only the two windows on the left stood out grayly. She heard nothing of him, he always walked so quietly. If only he would come!
Not a sound, not a breath.
If only she could scream, but she couldn’t even breathe!
And then she felt his hand on her breast. No butterfly could have settled more gently on a blossom, yet with a shudder that passed through her whole body she shrank back.… The hand followed her shrinking body, laid itself in coolness over her breast.… She could shrink back no farther.… Coolness penetrated her thin summer dress, her skin, penetrated to her heart.…
Her fear was gone, she no longer felt the hand, only an ever more penetrating coolness.…
And the coolness was peace.
She wanted to think of something, she wanted to say to herself: It is only Hubert, a disgusting ridiculous fellow.… But nothing came of it. The pictures in the book on marriage drifted through her head; for a moment she saw its pages as if in bright lamplight.
Then she heard a melody from downstairs and knew it was her father. Bored with waiting, he had turned on the phonograph.
But the melody seemed to grow fainter and fainter, as if she were losing her strength in the ever-pervasive coolness. Her senses were becoming dulled, she only felt the hand … And now she felt the other … Its fingers fumbled lightly on her neck, they pushed her hair back.
Then the hand glided right round her throat; the thumb rested with a light pressure on her larynx, while the pressure on her heart increased …
She made a quick movement with her head, to free her neck from the hand—in vain, the thumb pressed on it more firmly …
But it was only the servant Hubert—he couldn’t want to choke her … She breathed with difficulty. The blood buzzed in her ears. Her head grew dizzy …
“Hubert!” she wanted to scream.
Then she was free. Struggling for breath, she stared into the darkness, which became light. At the switch stood the servant Räder, irreproachable, not a hair on his head out of place.
Downstairs could be heard the phonograph.
“Thank you very much, Fräulein,” said Räder, as unemotionally as if she had given him a tip. “The letter will be seen to.” It was in his hand again; he must have taken it from the table in the dark.
In the drive outside sounded her mother’s voice, then that of Herr von Studmann.
“Supper will be ready at once, Fräulein,” said Räder, gliding out of the room.
She looked around. It’s her room, unaltered. It was also the old, unchanged, funny servant, Räder—and she hadn’t changed either. A little painfully, as if her limbs had not yet regained their full life, she went to the mirror and looked at her throat. But nothing could be seen of the fiery red marks she had imagined. Not even the slightest reddening of the skin. He had only gripped her very gently, if indeed he had gripped her at all. Perhaps she had only imagined most of it. He was merely a crazy, disgusting fellow; when a little time had passed, so that he wouldn’t think it came from her, she must persuade Papa and Mamma to get another servant.…
Suddenly—she had already washed her face—a feeling of absolute despair came over her, as if everything were lost, as if she had gambled with her life and had lost it.… She saw her Lieutenant Fritz, first passionate and then quite cold, almost nasty to her.… She heard Armgard whispering to her mother that Hubert was a fiend, and the thought darted through her head that perhaps Hubert had also laid his hand on the fat cook’s breast, had encircled her throat—and that that was why she hated him.
Violet regarded herself in the mirror with an almost indifferent curiosity. She looked at her white flesh, she pushed down the neck of her dress. She felt so degraded that she thought the flesh must look sullied. (The same hands that had touched Armgard!) But it was white and healthy.…
“Supper, Vi!” cried her mother from downstairs.
She shook off the tormenting thoughts as a dog shakes off water from its coat. Perhaps all men were like that. All a little disgusting. She just mustn’t think of them.
She ran down the stairs, humming the tune she had heard on the phonograph. Up you go, my girl, raise your leg high!
XI
It turned out that Frau Eva and Herr von Studmann had already had supper with the old Teschows. Deeply hurt, the Rittmeister sat at table with his daughter, while the two for whom he had so heroically waited talked quietly in the adjoining room. The door stood open; the Rittmeister, muttering and growling, let slip disjointed sentences about punctuality and consideration for others, and from time to time barked at his daughter, who pleaded she had no appetite. Räder, a napkin under his arm, was the only one who had his approval. With unerring instinct he guessed which dish was wanted; he refilled the beer glass to the second.
“My dear Studmann,” shouted the Rittmeister, having at last distinctly sniffed tobacco smoke, “do me just one favor and don’t smoke, at least while I’m eating!”
“Sorry, Achim, I am smoking!” called his wife.
“So much the worse,” growled the Rittmeister.
At last he jumped up and went in to the others.
“Enjoy your supper?” asked his wife.
“Nice question when I’ve been waiting two hours for you for nothing!” Full of irritation, he poured himself out another vodka. “Listen, Eva,” he said aggressively, “Studmann has to get up at four in the morning. You should have let him go to bed rather than drag him over here. Or are you perhaps going to start on those ridiculous geese again?”