The Vienna Melody (42 page)

“You're only imagining things,” she said, deeply struck by his words.

“Perhaps,” he answered. “Perhaps we only imagined everything. That we were being educated for something great. That we were fighting for something great. That we were brave. All imagination.” He had finished cleaning his tunic, and he thrust one the newspapers on the floor aside with his foot. “Let's forget it, Mother. I'm going out to look for a place to live. You've never wanted me to live at home.”

She could not restrain him. He packed his few belongings and left.

Martha Monica and her cousin Fritz took their places, in the orchestra seats of the Burgtheater. Each member of the opera had the right to two passes for the Burgtheater once a week, and Fritz's wife, Liesl Schoenwieser, had given hers to her husband to see their new cousin-in-law in Grillparzer's
Des Meeres und der Liebe Wellen
. To tell the truth, the ballet dancer did not care much for the classics. But she promised to be backstage after the performance to tell Hans's wife how good she was. For Number 10 was to attend the performance for that purpose tonight.

Obviously Fritz was somewhat smitten with Martha Monica—as much or as little as it lay in his nature to be. He still patterned himself on Gustav Mahler, but the effect he produced with his enormous glasses, his ascetic face, his sloppy dress, and his wild, nervous movements was anything but enticing. It was not just Martha Monica's beauty which appealed to Fritz; it was rather the warmth she radiated, the cheerful readiness to take part in everything, to enjoy or to lighten it. “Uncomplicated” was what he called her; as his own wife proved, that was what he liked in women. That was also the reason why he was not particularly drawn to his new cousin-in-law, Selma. “Women,” he said dogmatically, “should be one thing, but completely that: womanly. That is the purpose of their existence.” And he did not intend to be taken in by Selma's acting ability either. The critics had indeed raved about her. But every one knows what those people are! Always in a discovering mood whenever a new face turned up; so immensely proud of their infallibility in seeing through things at the first glance. Fritz was determined to form his own opinion. He didn't care a damn about reviews.

Martha Monica's pleasure at being taken to the theater by her much older and cleverer artist cousin knew no bounds. She was prepared to like Selma's acting even before the curtain rose. She knew it would be great. And how thrilling to sit here and be related to the girl playing the leading part! The building itself filled her with enthusiasm. As soon as she came into the high oval auditorium with its four tiers of boxes, ivory pillars and balconies, deep-red silk walls and seats, she was seized with a festive mood. There also was that suggestive aroma as in the Opera House, sweet, cool, and exciting; it enveloped you as soon as you came in. Fritz, the destroyer of illusions, had told her that it was a mixture of smells from glue, scenery, rank perfume, and the chocolate tarts hawked up in the gallery buffet by Gerstner, the court confectioner. She believed this, as she believed everything that was told her. Nevertheless, she sensed that it was an aroma which defied definition. To her it was almost the aroma of fairyland.

The performance would begin any moment now, and there was barely time to glance around the auditorium. Martha Monica waved excitedly to box 12, where her mother was sitting. She did not at first remember the lady next to Mama and to whom she was talking. She looked somewhat pale and weary. But Mama looked wonderful. No one dressed as beautifully as she did. She wore a hat of purple velvet to match her purple dress, because in the boxes of the former Imperial Theaters ladies had to wear hats. Almost no one else did it, though, for Vienna of the revolution no longer ‘dressed' for the theater. This did not diminish Martha Monica's delight. Fritz, however, spoke of it caustically. “You don't prove you have a better sense of freedom by indulging in worse manners,” he said. Yet he himself never wore evening dress, and his suit had certainly not been pressed for months. “Yes, Fritz,” the girl said.

It was always a fresh sensation to her, and her heart beat faster when they began to tune the instruments for the brief musical prelude that preceded all performances at the Burgtheater. The conductor raised his baton, the lights faded, and the music began; the real world vanished. Martha Monica closed her eyes for a second and was completely happy.

She opened them, and her joy was enhanced. On the enormous stage there was a Greek temple, built in the characteristic style of Alfred Roller, the scene designer. At first glance it gave the illusion which people like Martha Monica craved for their life, because they took it to be life. The clear and convincing outlines of this stage temple did not deceive. They did not pretend to be Corinthian columns or made of marble. Yet they produced the effect of both and more. In the instant when the curtain went up this structure of cloth and laths made one believe in an ancient Greece which, as in all the Greek plays of Grillparzer, Vienna's classic writer, possessed Greek greatness and Viennese charm.

That was also what the young actress playing the part of Hero was able to produce in amazing degree. Who had taught her, where she had learned how to do it, remained a puzzle. At all events it was not the former court actors who stood beside her on the stage. With every step she took she brushed aside conventions and robbed the classic style of its stilts. She spoke iambics in a casual way. She did not make the verses resound; she made them vibrate like a tautly drawn string of an instrument. When she loosed it one believed one heard her soul. Yet her revolutionary naturalness was not free of inhibitions, and tonight she was probably more inhibited than usual, for she knew that Number 10 was watching her. In any ease, it added a touching quality to her appearance, already so fragile under the spotlight and in her costume.

She had not finished her first monologue and started to adorn the pillars of the Greek temple with wreaths when Fritz changed his position. He leaned forward, his right elbow on his knee and his chin propped in his hand. Martha Monica recognized this position from the times when they had gone to the opera together. When he sat like that he was entranced.

Martha Monica knew a hundred times less about art than her artist cousin. But to her there was no doubt that Selma was magnificent. How proud she was of her! She would have loved to tell every one that she was her sister-in-law. Slim, with an almost austere grace, the actress came forward, like a being from some higher sphere moving among earthly mortals, and spoke her first words of love to Leander. That was how love should be spoken, Martha Monica felt. That was how love should come to you, in a tidal wave. Oh, what a joyous feeling it was to be lifted out of the here and now of times that were growing grimmer with every day! She squeezed Fritz's hand, and whispered, “It's divine!”

In the orchestra box 12, on the right, Henriette was wrestling with her emotions. She was no longer able to use the excuse of not leaving Franz alone and therefore of not being able to go to the theater. Since Hermann had come home and his irritable mood had worn off—it had been possible to arrange for him to have the ground-floor apartment because Hans's return, despite all intervention on his behalf, was mysteriously delayed—Franz now had com any in the evening. And Franz himself had written on one of his conversation slips that the girl had a right to be judged impartially also as an actress by the family. “Her impossible political views” so he had written, “belong in a different category and will be taken up if, after his return, Hans should still feel himself bound to her.”

Should he still feel himself bound to her Henriette knew Hans better. It would never have entered her head to think that he would give up this wife, as apparently Franz did and as Hermann was convinced that he would. Her yearning for her favorite son did not confuse her estimate of him. Hans was slow to reach decisions, but, once made, he stuck to them. He would never give up this Selma. If only she had something to offer him! A wife without glamour. A wife with a critical faculty—Henriette knew exactly how harmful that was as a dowry. A wife without family background, whose dead father evidently had had an obscure past. Her mother ran a tobacco shop, and since their war marriage had never put in an appearance although she had repeatedly been invited to the house.

It was this mother who now sat beside Henriette in the box. For when Selma learned of the family's intention to appear in force in order to see her act, she had put a box at Henriette's disposal. Originally it was planned that Martha Monica and Hermann should use it too, but Martha Monica had accepted Fritz's invitation and Hermann refused to leave his father. So Selma had asked whether Henriette would object if her mother sat in the box with her, as no other seats were available. Henriette had said it would be a particular pleasure to have her. Rarely had she gone to the theater so reluctantly.

Widowed Frau Rosner, however, did not displease Henriette. She was an excited mother, proud of her daughter, and anxious to break down the resistance to her which existed in the Alt family. Henriette even suspected that Frau Rosner had wanted to sit next to her in order to put her daughter in the right light. Perhaps she would have done the same for Hans, she thought, as she studied this woman's intelligent face marked with illness. She had heart disease, Henriette learned, and excitement was not the best thing for her. But Frau Rosner loved excitement. Was there anything more beautiful than to sit here, in Europe's most beautiful playhouse, waiting for the curtain to go up and then to see your daughter standing on the stage, acting simply magnificently? But Frau Alt must excuse her; she really had no intention of influencing her opinion.

The curtain went up, and it took Henriette no longer than it had Fritz to see that Selma was quite exceptional. She had seen others in the part of Hero, actresses who had more charm, more warmth.

For the first quarter of an hour she tried to resist. Then she caught the quick, inquiring glance of the woman beside her and began to be ashamed of herself.

She had come there intent on finding Selma mediocre if not actually bad. She had wanted to be able to say to the others and to Hans: “More ambition than talent. Anyone who has so much ambition that others take it for talent thinks of no one but herself. She'll make a poor wife.”

It was true about Selma's ambition. It flamed in the eyes of that slim little figure on the stage! But it was equally true as to her talent. When Frau Rosner again glanced at her inquiringly, the one mother said to the other mother, “Selma is extraordinary.”

The ill woman was as delighted as if everything had depended on that praise. She too knew her child.

 

In the intermission Fritz and Martha Monica went out into the marble foyer in search of a cigarette and lemonade. “Fantastic!” Fritz said. “That girl is unique!” The buffet was meagrely stocked with tinned food, displayed on silver platters. “Isn't she?” Martha Monica agreed enthusiastically.

“
Benissimo
!” someone beside Martha Monica exclaimed in vibrant Italian. She looked round, because it sounded so lovely and she thought it was meant for her. But it was an officer talking to a gentleman. He wore a foreign uniform that contrasted noticeably with the prevailing civilian clothing of a public from which military figures had disappeared. In addition it was bright scarlet. “
Scusi
,” he said to her, as if having taken the glass of lemonade for which she had been waiting.

“
Niente
,” she replied.

“You speak Italian?” he asked with an excruciating pronunciation.

“
Un poco
,” she laughed.

“We must be going,” Fritz told her. He had been attempting to capture one of the sandwiches sold there as containing ham, although it was really corned beef.

The Italian offered Martha Monica his plate. Three of the precious products lay on it. Fritz gesticulated to her to refuse, but she had already, with a “
Tante grazie
,”
 
bitten into one of them. Then she exclaimed, “It's real ham!”

“Not quite real,” said the Italian, mispronouncing three words out of three. Then, bowing to Fritz, he introduced himself, “Conte Gaetano Corbellini, of the Italian Military Mission.”

“Delighted,” the composer said, jerking his head back nervously.

“May I be favored with an introduction to your daughter?” the officer asked.

A memory flashed through Fritz's mind. A man like this in red trousers, and with a white instead of a red tunic, stood in a meadow full of violets, and, with an arrogance he had never forgotten, called the command, “One, two, three!” Fritz had never cared much for red trousers.

“May I introduce Conte—”

“Corbellini.”

“—to you?” he said to his cousin. He did not mention the relationship.

With a glass of lemonade in one hand and a sandwich in the other, Martha Monica indicated in pantomime that she had no hand free to offer to the gentleman thus introduced. “
Scusi
,” she added. But since she felt that that was not enough, she went on, “A magnificent performance, don't you think?”

The officer expressed himself in a torrent of superlatives, and the gentleman to whom earlier he had said “
benissimo
” moved off. The curtain-call bell now rang shrilly, and every one, including Fritz and his cousin, went back into the auditorium. The Italian was swallowed up in the crowd.

“The idiot,” Fritz remarked.

“Who?” she asked.

“That red monkey.”

“But he was so good-looking!”

“Ridiculous idiot,” Fritz insisted. They found their seats, and the enchantment was renewed.

The great love scene between Hero and Leander had hardly begun when Martha Monica became aware that someone was staring at her. She would have liked to turn round but did not dare. She distinctly felt something behind her. Someone was sitting at her back and staring at her. It was a remarkable sensation. Like a physical touch.