The Benefactress. Elizabeth von Arnim
of the blast, and shrank still farther into her corner—an interesting and tantalising object to the school-children, a dark, mysterious combination of fur, cocks' feathers, and black eyebrows.
Then the clergyman, hat in hand, made a speech. He spoke distinctly, as one accustomed to speaking often and long, and Anna understood every word. She was wholly taken aback by these ceremonies, and had no idea of what she should say in reply, but sat smiling vaguely at him, looking very pretty and very shy. She soon found that her smiles were inappropriate, and they died away; for, warming as he proceeded, the parson, it appeared, was taking it for granted that she intended to live on her property, and was eloquently descanting on the comfort she was going to be to the poor, assuring those present that she would be a mother to the sick, nursing them with her tender woman's hands, an angel of mercy to the hungry, feeding them in the hour of their distress, a friend and sister to the little children, succouring them, caring for them, pitiful of their weakness and their sins. His face lit up with enthusiasm as he went on, and Anna was thankful that Susie could not understand. This crowd of children, the women, the young parson, her coachman, were all hearing promises made on her behalf that she had no thought of fulfilling. She looked down, and twisted her fingers about nervously, and felt uncomfortable.
At the end of his speech, the parson, his eyes full of the tears drawn forth by his own eloquence, held up his hand and solemnly blessed her, rounding off his blessing with a loud Amen, after which there was an awkward pause. Susie heard the Amen, and guessed that something in the nature of a blessing was being invoked, and made a movement of impatience. The parson was odious in her eyes, first because he looked like the ministers of the Baptist chapels of her unmarried youth, but principally because he was keeping her there in the gale and prolonging the tortures she was enduring from the smell of fish. Anna did not know what to say after the Amen, and looked up more shyly than ever, and stammered in her confusion Danke sehr, hoping that it was a proper remark to make; whereupon the parson bowed again, as one who should say Pray don't mention it. Then another man, evidently the schoolmaster, took out a tuning-fork, gave out a note, and the children sang a chorale, following it up with other more cheerful songs, in which the words Frühling and Willkommen were repeated a great many times, while the wind howled flattest contradiction.
When this was over, the parson begged leave to introduce the other clerical-looking person, a tall narrow youth, also in white kid gloves, buttoned up tightly in a long coat of broadcloth, with a pallid face and thick, upright flaxen hair.
"Herr Vicar Klutz," said the elder parson, with a wave of the hand; and the Herr Vicar, making his bow, and having his limp hand heartily grasped by that other little hand, and his furtive eyes smiled into by those other friendly eyes, became on the spot desperately enamoured; which was very natural, seeing that he had not spoken to a woman under forty for six months, and was himself twenty and a poet. He spent the rest of the afternoon shut up in his bedroom, where, refusing all nourishment, he composed a poem in which berauschten Sinn was made to rhyme with Engländerin, while the elder parson, in whose house he lived, thought he was writing his Good Friday sermon.
Then the schoolmaster was introduced, and then came the two women—the schoolmaster's wife and the parson's wife; and when Anna had smiled and murmured polite and incoherent little speeches to each in turn, and had nodded and bowed at least a dozen times to each of these ladies, who could by no means have done with their curtseys, and had introduced them to the dumb figure in the corner, during which ceremonies Letty stared round-eyed and open-mouthed at the school-children, and the school-children stared round-eyed and open-mouthed at Letty, and Miss Leech looked demure, and Susie's brows were contracted by suffering, she wondered whether she might not now with propriety continue her journey, and if so whether it were expected that she should give the signal.
Everybody was smiling at everybody else by way of filling up this pause of hesitation, except Susie, who shut her eyes with great dignity, and shivered in so marked a manner that the parson himself came to the rescue, and bade the coachman help him put up the hood again, explaining to Anna as he did so that her Frau Schwester was not used to the climate.
Evidently the moment had come for going on, and the bows that had but just left off began again with renewed vigour. Anna was anxious to say something pleasant at the finish, so she asked the parson's wife, as she bade her good-bye, whether she and her husband would come to Kleinwalde the next day to dinner.
This invitation produced a very deep curtsey and a flush of gratification, but the recipient turned to her lord before accepting it, to inquire his pleasure.
"I fear not to-morrow, gracious Miss," said the parson, "for it is Good Friday."
"Ach ja," stammered Anna, ashamed of herself for having forgotten.
"Ach ja," exclaimed the parson's wife, still more ashamed of herself for having forgotten.
"Perhaps Saturday, then?" suggested Anna.
The parson murmured something about quiet hours preparatory to the Sabbath; but his wife, a person who struck Anna as being quite extraordinarily stout, was burning with curiosity to examine those foreign ladies more conveniently, and especially to see what manner of being would emerge from the pile of fur and feathers in the corner; and she urged him, in a rapid aside, to do for once without quiet hours. Whereupon he patted her on the cheek, smiled indulgently, and said he would make an exception and do himself the honour of appearing.
This being settled, Anna said Gehen Sie to her coachman, who again showed his intelligence by understanding her; and in a cloud of smiles and bows they drove away, the school-girls making curtseys, the schoolboys taking off their caps, and the parson standing hat in hand with his arm round his wife's waist as serenely as though it had been a summer's day and no one looking.
Anna became used to these displays of conjugal regard in public later on; but this first time she turned to Susie with a laugh, when the hood had hidden the group from view, and asked her if she had seen it. But Susie had seen nothing, for her eyes were shut, and she refused to answer any questions otherwise than by a feeble shake of the head.
On the other side of the village the chaussée came to an end, and two deep, sandy roads took its place. There was a sign-post at their junction, one arm of which, pointing to the right-hand road that ran down close to the sea, had Kleinwalde scrawled on it; and beside this sign-post a man on a horse was waiting for them.
"Good gracious! More rot?" ejaculated Susie as the carriage stopped again, shaken out of the dignity of sulks by these repeated shocks.
"Oberinspector Dellwig," said the man, introducing himself, and sweeping off his hat and bowing lower and more obsequiously than anyone had yet done.
"This must be the inspector Uncle Joachim hoped I'd keep," said Anna in an undertone.
"I don't care who he is, but for heaven's sake don't let him make a speech. I can't stand this sort of thing any longer. You'll have me ill on your hands if you're not careful, and you won't like that, so you had better stop him."
"I can't stop him," said Anna, perplexed. She also had had enough of speeches.
"Gestatten gnädiges Fräulein dass ich meine gehorsamste Ehrerbietung ausspreche," began the glib inspector, bowing at every second word over his horse's ears.
There was no escape, and they had to hear him out. The man had prepared his speech, and say it he would. It was not so long as the parson's, but was quite as flowery in another way, overflowing with respectful allusions to the deceased master, and with expressions of unbounded loyalty, obedience, and devotion to the new mistress.
Susie shut her eyes again when she found he was not to be stopped, and gave herself up for lost. What could Hilton, who must be close behind waiting in the cold, uncomforted by any food since leaving Berlin, think of all this? Susie dreaded the moment when she would have to face her.
The inspector finished all he had intended saying, and then, assuming a more colloquial tone, informed Anna that from the sign-post onward she would be driving through her own property, and asked permission to ride by her side the rest of the way. So they had his company for the last two miles and his conversation, of which there was much; for he had a ready tongue, and explained things to Anna in a very