Meier greeted himself in the mirror, waved a friendly hand at his reflection—“Good luck go with you, child of Fortune”—and marched off to Violet von Prackwitz.
Frau Hartig was tidying up in the office. The coachman’s wife, still comely, would probably also like to have her fling; but women over twenty-five were as old as the hills, and Hartig was about twenty-seven, the mother of no less than eight children. Today her lips were compressed, her eyes sparkled, and she frowned. That didn’t bother Meier; but, just as he was about to pass by, the iron reading lamp fell from the desk with a thundering crash and the green shade broke into a thousand fragments.
So Meier had to stop and say his piece.
“Well,” he grinned, “broken glass brings us good luck-does this apply to you or to me?” She gave him an angry glance. “What’s the matter with you? Is it the weather? It’s close enough for a storm.” And he looked mechanically at the barometer, which had been dropping slowly but steadily since midday.
“I don’t want any of your dirtiness,” cried the woman shrilly. “Do you think I’m going to tidy up any longer after you two?” And she slipped her hand into the pocket of her apron and showed him three hairpins. (In 1923 bobbed hair had not yet conquered the great plains.) In your bed they were,” she almost shrieked. “You filthy beast! But I won’t tidy up that, I’ll show it to the mistress.”
“Which one, Frau Hartig?” laughed Meier. “The old one knows about it already—and she’s praying for me at this moment; the young one has guessed and’ll laugh all the more.” He looked at her with a superior and mocking air.
“Such a common bitch, too,” shrieked Frau Hartig. “Can’t she have a look in the bed before she clears out? But no, I’m to tidy up after a poultry maid! Creatures like that have no shame.”
“Oh, yes, they have, Frau Hartig,” said Black Meier seriously. Then he grinned again. “What handsome red hair your youngest son has, exactly like the head stableman’s. Is he to become a coachman like his father, or stableman like his stepfather?” And with that Meier marched off, giggling to himself, pleased as Punch, while Frau Hartig, still angry but already partly mollified, stared at the three hairpins in her hand. He was a rotter, but he knew his way about, small as he was.
She looked at the hairpins once more, then stuck them resolutely in her own hair. I’ll get hold of you yet, she thought. Amanda won’t rule forever.
Cheerfully she cleared away the fragments of the lamp shade, of a sudden firmly convinced that they would bring her the good luck.
Meier, too, was thinking of the broken glass and the good luck it would almost immediately bring him. In the best of moods he arrived at the Rittmeister’s villa. First he peeped into the garden, for he would much prefer to meet Vi out of earshot of her mother; she was not there, however. This was not difficult to establish since, although the garden was not small, one could see all over it at a glance. Already partly dried up, it had been recently created by Frau von Prackwitz and conjured up at a moment’s notice from a bare field.
Nothing, by the way, could better symbolize the position in Neulohe or the gulf between owner and tenant than a comparison of Teschow’s park with Prackwitz’s garden: in the former were sumptuous trees a hundred years old, abounding with foliage and sap; in the latter a few bare sticks with scanty and fading leaves. In the one were wide green lawns; in the other a thin dry grass struggling hopelessly against advancing mare’s-tail, couch-grass, and meadow heartsease. There a fair-sized lake with rowboat and swan; here an artificial stone basin filled with green ditchwater. In one place a growth inherited and full of promise for the future; in the other, growth hardly born, yet already withering. (Still, the Rittmeister’s a great man!)
Bailiff Meier was just about to ring the bell when he heard a call from the side. A ladder led up to the flat roof of the kitchen annex where stood a deck chair and a big garden sunshade. It was from there that the voice had called, “Herr Meier!”
Meier stood to attention. “At your service.”
An ungracious voice from above: “What’s the matter? Mamma is quite done up by the heat and wants to sleep. Don’t you dare disturb her.”
“I only wanted to ask, Fräulein … Herr von Teschow told me that the Rittmeister had telephoned.” Rather angrily: “It is about the conveyances … Am I to send them to the station or not?”
“Don’t shout like that,” shouted the voice from above. “I’m not one of your farm girls. Mamma wants to rest, I tell you.”
Meier looked despairingly at the flat roof. But it was too high to see anything of the girl he had eloped with in his dreams and married; only a corner of the deck chair and part of the sunshade. He decided to whisper as loudly as he could. “Am I to send conveyances—this evening—to the railway?”
Silence. Meier waited.
Then from above: “Did you say anything? I could only hear “Run away.”
“Haw-haw-haw.” Meier guffawed dutifully before repeating his inquiry somewhat louder.
“You’re not to shout,” came her command.
He knew quite well that she only wanted to torment him. He was merely Papa’s bailiff. Had to do what he was told. Had to stand and wait till it graciously pleased Fräulein. You wait, my dear, one day you’ll have to stand and wait—for me.
However, he now seemed to have been kept waiting long enough, for she called to him (surprisingly loud, too, for such a considerate daughter): “Herr Meier, aren’t you going to speak? Are you still there?”
“Certainly, Fräulein.”
“I thought you’d melted in the sun. You’re hot enough for that.”
There, she knew all about it, of course. But no harm done, it only whetted the appetite.
“Herr Meier!”
“Yes, Fräulein?”
“If you’ve stood there long enough perhaps you will notice a stepladder, and come up here and tell me what you really want.”
“Yes, Fräulein.” And up the ladder. “Yes, Fräulein” was always good, flattered her and cost nothing, stressed the social gulf between them and permitted everything. One could peep into her low-necked dress while saying, very humbly: “Yes, Fräulein.” One could even say it and kiss her. “Yes, Fräulein” was smart and gallant, like the officers at Ostade.
He was now standing at the foot of her deck chair, blinking obediently, yet with insolence, at the young mistress who reclined before him clad in nothing but a very short bathing suit. At fifteen, Violet von Prackwitz was already fully developed—over-developed if one considered her age, her heavy bosom, fleshy hips and vigorous bottom. She had the soft flesh, the too-white skin of the lymphatic, and, in addition, somewhat protruding eyes like her mother’s, of a pale blue, a sleepy blue. The dear innocent child had raised her naked arms, stretched herself; it didn’t look at all bad, the bitch was handsome and, hang it all, what a body to cuddle.
Sleepily, sensually, through half-closed eyes, she searched the bailiff’s face. “Well, why are you looking like that?” she demanded. “At mixed bathing I wear nothing else. Don’t be stupid.” She studied his face.
“Mamma ought to see us both here.…”
He struggled with himself. The sun burned madly, vibrated, dazzled. Now she stretched herself again and he made a step toward her. “Vi, oh, Vi.”
“Why, oh why?” she laughed. “No, no, Herr Meier, you’d better stand nearer the ladder.” And now she was the daughter of the house again. “You’re funny. You seem to imagine things. I have only to call out and Mamma’s at her window.” Then, when she saw that he obeyed her: “You needn’t send carriages to the station today. Probably tomorrow morning to meet the first train. But Papa will telephone again.”