Irretrievable (12 page)

“Ah, Count,” said Frau Hansen, “nobody could confuse us. Me, an old woman who has had such a long and difficult life …”

“Come, come …”

“And Brigitte who will not be thirty until tomorrow! But you mustn't give me away, Count, and tell her that I told you that it is her birthday tomorrow.”

“I, give you away? Please, Frau Hansen …. But you keep on running round all the time, you're making me feel giddy. Do you know what you must do? You must sit down and talk to me, always assuming that I am not holding up your house-work or something more important.”

Frau Hansen pretended to be uncertain whether to stay or to go.

“Really, you must make this the first of your kind visits and I hope that you will be making them regularly from now onwards. In any case, I have so many questions on my mind. Please sit down here, here in this chair where I can see you best, and if you can
see
well, you can
hear
well. I used to hear very well but in recent years my hearing has let me down now and again. It's the first sign of old age.”

“You'll have difficulty in finding anyone to believe that, Count Holk. I believe that you hear everything you want to hear and see everything you want to see.”

“I hear nothing and see nothing, Frau Hansen, and when I do see something I forget it again. Not quite everything, of course. Yesterday I saw your daughter, Brigitte I think you said her name was; a lovely name into the bargain. Now, nobody could forget her again. You must be proud to have such a beautiful daughter, and what I cannot understand is her husband calmly leaving her here while he sails to and fro between Singapore and Shanghai. At least, I assume that's what he does because most of them sail between those two ports. Well, I think that a beautiful wife like that ought to be taken everywhere, from the North Pole to the South Pole, don't you, Frau Hansen? And if not for love, then just because you're afraid or jealous. And this much I do know, if it were I, I would always say to myself, you mustn't expect too much from a young woman and you certainly shouldn't expect miracles. I think we agree on this, don't we, Frau Hansen? Why does he expose her to such a risk? And, of course, expose himself as well …”

“Ah, that's a long story, Count Holk …”

“All the better. A love-story can never be too long and I imagine that it must be a love-story.”

“I don't rightly know if I can call it that; it's something of a love-story but it is not a proper love-story … only it might easily have become one.”

“You're making me more and more curious. Incidentally, this is most excellent tea and I can recognize once again the result of all those trips to China. If you want to give me a real pleasure, let me pour you a cup of your own tea.”

He stood up and from a cabinet standing near the window took out a cup on which was written in gold letters: “To the happy couple.” “To the happy couple,” repeated Holk. “Who were they? Perhaps you were one of them, Frau Hansen? You're laughing …. But one's never too old to be wise and the wisest thing for a widow …”

“Is to stay a widow.”

“Well, if you like; you may be right. But how about this story …. Captain Hansen, your son-in-law, must certainly be a fine-looking man, all captains are fine-looking men, and Frau Brigitte must certainly have married him for love.”

“That she did, at least she never said the contrary, except on one occasion. But that was later and I'm talking now of the early days when they had only just married. She was very affectionate and loving then, and wherever he went she went with him on board, even where there was yellow fever, and when she came back to Copenhagen … in those days she had her own place, because my husband, whom the count will remember from Glücksburg, was still alive then … now what was I saying, whenever she came back from a long trip, she was always wanting to be off again straightaway because she used to say that she didn't like the people here, and it was much nicer in the big outside world.”

“But that's amazing. Was she really as modest and bashful as all that? Didn't she enjoy being flattered and courted as she certainly must have been here in Copenhagen? They showed her what they thought of her here by the time of her confirmation, I'll be bound!”

“Indeed they did, but Brigitte paid no attention and she remained the same, even after she was married. Only now and again she seemed a little wild. Everything stayed like that until 1854; I remember exactly, because it was the year the English fleet came here on its way to Russia. And that same summer we had a very young Guards officer here in Copenhagen, who spent all his time in and out of the Rasmussen's house—I mean Countess Danner but we still always call her Rasmussen—and he got so heavily in debt that he couldn't be kept on any more and had to leave. But since he was very clever and knew everybody—because he went into all the wealthiest houses and especially those where there were ladies—Baron Scheele, who was Minister in those days, said he would take the lieutenant on with him. And so he took him into the Ministry for Home Affairs, where he still is, and has become very important, too. But in those days, he was still just a young cub, nothing but a very good-looking young man, and when Brigitte saw him, it was the very same day we had news of the bombardment up there, I can't remember the name, I'm afraid, anyway, she confessed that she was fond of him. And she showed it at once, too. And when Hansen had to go off to China that same autumn, she told him bluntly that she didn't want to go and she told him the reason, too, or perhaps other people did. The long and the short of it was that when the time came for the ship to leave, Hansen became very serious and refused to take no for an answer and said to her, Brigitte, you must come with me. And though up till then he had been taking her with him for love, now he wanted to take her as you said, Count Holk, as a precaution or because he was jealous.”

“And was it any help? Did the trip cure her of her love? I mean, of her love for the man in the Ministry?”

“Yes, she was cured, although with Brigitte you can never be quite sure, because although she talks a lot, she still keeps a lot to herself. And anyway it doesn't matter very much because it turned out all right by and large.”

“And how did it turn out by and large?”

“My son-in-law got back his trust in his wife completely. Hansen is really a very good man and he's quite calm and sensible again now and goes off quite happily to China.”

“I'm delighted to hear that. But in these matters we must be careful not to leave anything out or forget anything. I think, my dear Frau Hansen, that you were going to tell me exactly how it came about that your son-in-law recovered from his jealousy.”

“Yes, I was going to do that and I always say that man decides and God provides and the greater the need, the nearer the help. I must say that I was very worried; a mother is always worried about her child and it makes no difference whether she is married or not; yes, I was worried about Brigitte because I thought there would be a divorce, for she is very strong-willed, you could almost call her obstinate, and very excitable, although she seems so quiet and dreamy at times …”

“Ah yes,” laughed Holk, “that's often the case, still waters run deep.”

“So I was worried. But it all turned out quite differently and it was just at the same time that Brigitte had, so to speak, been compelled to go away with her husband. This is how it happened. In the course of the trip, Hansen had to take a cargo back to Bangkok, a big town in Siam that I had visited myself many years ago with my husband. When Hansen arrived and had been lying moored in front of the Imperial Palace for a couple of days—the Siamese have an Emperor, you know—a Minister came on board and invited Hansen and his wife to a big official banquet. The Emperor must have seen her. Brigitte sat next to him and talked English and the Emperor kept on looking at her. And after the banquet, he was most gracious and respectful and never took his eyes off her, and when they were leaving, he said to Hansen that he was most anxious for the captain's wife to come to the palace next day, so that all his friends and intimates and particularly all his wives—he had a great number of wives—could meet the beautiful German lady again face to face. For a moment Hansen was afraid that this flood of honours might mean treachery, for all around the palace there were heads stuck up on sticks just like pineapples; but Brigitte, who had heard them talking, just bowed to the Emperor and said with a proper air of deference, because she has always been very dignified and self-possessed, my Brigitte, she said that she would come at the time he had mentioned.”

“That was very bold.”

“And she really did go and she was placed on a high seat that had been especially erected in front of the palace gates, so that she would be in the shade, and she sat on this throne with a peacock fan and the Emperor put a pearl necklace round her neck. She said that the necklace was a marvellous one. And all the important people of Bangkok filed past and then the ordinary folk and they all kotowed to her and finally there were all the wives, and when the last one had gone Brigitte stood up and walked over to the Emperor to return the peacock-fan and the necklace which she thought had only been lent to her for the ceremony; and the Emperor took them both but gave her back the pearl necklace, so that she could wear it in memory of him always. And then with the Ministers leading the way and the bodyguard lined up on each side, she was taken back to the landing-stage where Hansen had been watching the whole scene.”

“And then?”

“From that day onwards there was a great change in Brigitte and when she came back here the following winter and the man who had nearly caused her to make a fool of herself tried to see her again, she refused to have anything to do with him, as far as I could see. And when Hansen set off again six months later, Brigitte said that if he had no objection she would rather stay at home because after having received such an honour from an Emperor, it seemed rather strange to her to be with sailors and perhaps have to sleep in a dock-side hotel, where you would hear nothing but native music and smell nothing but gin; and Hansen not only agreed but was highly delighted that she was not going on that trip with him or on any other. There was absolutely no trace of jealousy now and he realized what had happened to Brigitte and was only afraid that it might have been too much for her and that the Emperor of Siam might have gone to her head.”

Holk was doubtful whether to believe the story or to look on it merely as a flight of fancy and perhaps a test of his credulity as well. If Pentz's hints of yesterday were to be believed, the last supposition was the most probable. Yet, after all, it might be true. What is impossible? And so, in order at least to protect his self-esteem, he asked half ironically: “And where were the white elephants?”

“They must have been in their stalls,” replied Frau Hansen with a mischievous laugh.

“And the pearl necklace, my dear Frau Hansen, you must let me see it.”

“Yes, I would if it were possible …”

“If it were possible? Why not?”

“Because after Brigitte had gone on board, all of a sudden, the necklace disappeared. She must have lost it or left it behind in the palace in her excitement.”

“In that case, I should have inquired about it at once.”

“So should I. But Brigitte is a strange girl and I heard later that when Hansen was trying to insist on asking about it, she only said: ‘That would be common and contrary to court etiquette.'”

“Yes,” said Holk, who was now beginning to see certain things rather more clearly. “That's quite true. And such scruples need to be respected.”

At the
end of her story which, when it came to the lost necklace, seemed a trifle far-fetched even to the gullible Holk, Frau Hansen stood up, “in order not to disturb the Count any more,” and was allowed to leave. Not that Holk was impatient, quite the contrary, for he loved listening to that sort of gossip, and the suspicious penumbra in which everything seemed bathed served only to increase his interest. However, a glance at the bracket-clock warned him against further willing indulgence in Frau Hansen's gifts of story-telling: at eleven o'clock, barely one hour hence, he was expected at the Princess's, and beforehand he would have to write a short letter to his wife announcing his safe arrival. He had therefore to hurry—something which, on occasion, he was capable of doing—and at five minutes to eleven he climbed into the carriage which took him to the Princesses' Palace, only two minutes away.

The Princess's apartments were on the first floor. Holk, in his court-dress, which he himself found not unbecoming, went upstairs into an ante-room; and then, immediately afterwards, he was shown into a comfortable reception room, richly panelled and carpeted but, apart from the desk, sparsely furnished; it was here that the Princess received visitors or granted audiences. The flunkey said that he would announce him straightaway. Holk walked over to one of the windows that faced the door through which the Princess would enter and looked out on to the square and the street: everything looked dead—elegant and boring—and there was nothing to be seen except fallen leaves which the lively breeze was whirling about over the paving-stones. Feeling himself suddenly deserted and lonely, Holk turned back into the room and directed his gaze at the only two portraits that decorated the smooth stucco walls. One of them, over the upholstered sofa, was a likeness of the Princess's uncle, King Christian VII of ever-blessed memory, the other, over the desk, was a portrait of another close relative, also deceased, a landgrave from Thuringia. Its gilt frame was draped with dusty crepe and the dust made it look not like crepe but a spider's web. The landgrave's face was kind, courageous, and commonplace, and Holk could not help asking himself what ideas on government the deceased could possibly have contributed to further the happiness of a grateful country, since the only thing that could be deduced with some certainty from the portrait was a lively interest in that country's daughters.