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Jean Christophe, Vol. I

R >> Romain Rolland >> Jean Christophe, Vol. I




As it was, sentimental Minna was, in spite of all, calm and cold. In spite
of her aristocratic name, and the pride with which the ennobling particle
filled her, she had the soul of a little German housewife in the exquisite
days of adolescence.

* * * * *

Naturally Jean-Christophe did not in the least understand the complicated
mechanism--more complicated in appearance than in reality--of the feminine
heart. He was often baffled by the ways of his friends, but he was so happy
in loving them that he credited them with all that disturbed and made him
sad with them, so as to persuade himself that he was as much loved by them
as he loved them himself. A word or an affectionate look plunged him in
delight. Sometimes he was so bowled over by it that he would burst into
tears.

Sitting by the table in the quiet little room, with Frau von Kerich a few
yards away sewing by the light of the lamp--Minna reading on the other
side of the table, and no one talking, he looking through the half-open
garden-door at the gravel of the avenue glistening under the moon, a soft
murmur coming from the tops of the trees--his heart would be so full of
happiness that suddenly, for no reason, he would leap from his chair, throw
himself at Frau von Kerich's feet, seize her hand, needle or no needle,
cover it with kisses, press it to his lips, his cheeks, his eyes, and sob.
Minna would raise her eyes, lightly shrug her shoulders, and make a face.
Frau von Kerich would smile down at the big boy groveling at her feet, and
pat his head with her free hand, and say to him in her pretty voice,
affectionately and ironically:

"Well, well, old fellow! What is it?"

Oh, the sweetness of that voice, that peace, that silence, that soft air
in which were no shouts, no roughness, no violence, that oasis in the
harsh desert of life, and--heroic light gilding with its rays people and
things--the light of the enchanted world conjured up by the reading of the
divine poets! Goethe, Schiller, Shakespeare, springs of strength, of
sorrow, and of love!...

Minna, with her head down over the book, and her face faintly colored by
her animated delivery, would read in her fresh voice, with its slight lisp,
and try to sound important when she spoke in the characters of warriors
and kings. Sometimes Frau von Kerich herself would take the book; then she
would lend to tragic histories the spiritual and tender graciousness of her
own nature, but most often she would listen, lying back in her chair, her
never-ending needlework in her lap; she would smile at her own thoughts,
for always she would come back to them through every book.

Jean-Christophe also had tried to read, but he had had to give it up; he
stammered, stumbled over the words, skipped the punctuation, seemed to
understand nothing, and would be so moved that he would have to stop in the
middle of the pathetic passages, feeling tears coming. Then in a tantrum he
would throw the book down on the table, and his two friends would burst out
laughing.... How he loved them! He carried the image of them everywhere
with him, and they were mingled with the persons in Shakespeare and Goethe.
He could hardly distinguish between them. Some fragrant word of the poets
which called up from the depths of his being passionate emotions could not
in him be severed from the beloved lips that had made him hear it for the
first time. Even twenty years later he could never read Egmont or Romeo, or
see them played, without there leaping up in him at certain lines the
memory of those quiet evenings, those dreams of happiness, and the beloved
faces of Frau von Kerich and Minna.

He would spend hours looking at them in the evening when they were reading;
in the night when he was dreaming in his bed, awake, with his eyes closed;
during the day, when he was dreaming at his place in the orchestra, playing
mechanically with his eyes half closed. He had the most innocent tenderness
for them, and, knowing nothing of love, he thought he was in love. But he
did not quite know whether it was with the mother or the daughter. He went
into the matter gravely, and did not know which to choose. And yet, as it
seemed to him he must at all costs make his choice, he inclined towards
Frau von Kerich. And he did in fact discover, as soon as he had made up
his mind to it, that it was she that he loved. He loved her quick eyes,
the absent smile upon her half-open lips, her pretty forehead, so young in
seeming, and the parting to one side in her fine, soft hair, her rather
husky voice, with its little cough, her motherly hands, the elegance of her
movements, and her mysterious soul. He would thrill with happiness when,
sitting by his side, she would kindly explain to him the meaning of some
passage in a book which he did not understand; she would lay her hand on
Jean-Christophe's shoulder; he would feel the warmth of her fingers, her
breath on his cheek, the sweet perfume of her body; he would listen in
ecstasy, lose all thought of the book, and understand nothing at all. She
would see that and ask him to repeat what she had said; then he would say
nothing, and she would laughingly be angry, and tap his nose with her book,
telling him that he would always be a little donkey. To that he would reply
that he did not care so long as he was _her_ little donkey, and she did not
drive him out of her house. She would pretend to make objections; then she
would say that although he was an ugly little donkey, and very stupid, she
would agree to keep him--and perhaps even to love him--although he was good
for nothing, if at the least he would be just _good_. Then they would both
laugh, and he would go swimming in his joy.

* * * * *

When he discovered that he loved Frau von Kerich, Jean-Christophe broke
away from Minna. He was beginning to be irritated by her coldness and
disdain, and as, by dint of seeing her often, he had been emboldened little
by little to resume his freedom of manner with her, he did not conceal his
exasperation from her. She loved to sting him, and he would reply sharply.
They were always saying unkind things to each other, and Frau von Kerich
only laughed at them. Jean-Christophe, who never got the better in such
passages of words, used sometimes to issue from them so infuriated that he
thought he detested Minna; and he persuaded himself that he only went to
her house again because of Frau von Kerich.

He went on giving her music lessons. Twice a week, from nine to ten in the
morning, he superintended the girl's scales and exercises. The room in
which they did this was Minna's studio--an odd workroom, which, with an
amusing fidelity, reflected the singular disorder of her little feminine
mind.

On the table were little figures of musical cats--a whole orchestra--one
playing a violin, another the violoncello--a little pocket-mirror, toilet
things and writing things, tidily arranged. On the shelves were tiny busts
of musicians--Beethoven frowning, Wagner with his velvet cap, and the
Apollo Belvedere. On the mantelpiece, by a frog smoking a red pipe, a paper
fan on which was painted the Bayreuth Theater. On the two bookshelves
were a few books--Lübke, Mommsen, Schiller, "Sans Famille," Jules Verne,
Montaigne. On the walls large photographs of the Sistine Madonna, and
pictures by Herkomer, edged with blue and green ribbons. There was also
a view of a Swiss hotel in a frame of silver thistles; and above all,
everywhere in profusion, in every corner of the room, photographs of
officers, tenors, conductors, girl-friends, all with inscriptions, almost
all with verse--or at least what is accepted as verse in Germany. In the
center of the room, on a marble pillar, was enthroned a bust of Brahms,
with a beard; and, above the piano, little plush monkeys and cotillion
trophies hung by threads.

Minna would arrive late, her eyes still puffy with sleep, sulky; she would
hardly reach out her hand to Jean-Christophe, coldly bid him good-day, and,
without a word, gravely and with dignity sit down at the piano. When she
was alone, it pleased her to play interminable scales, for that allowed her
agreeably to prolong her half-somnolent condition and the dreams which she
was spinning for herself. But Jean-Christophe would compel her to fix her
attention on difficult exercises, and so sometimes she would avenge herself
by playing them as badly as she could. She was a fair musician, but she did
not like music--like many German women. But, like them, she thought she
ought to like it, and she took her lessons conscientiously enough, except
for certain moments of diabolical malice indulged in to enrage her master.
She could enrage him much more by the icy indifference with which she set
herself to her task. But the worst was when she took it into her head that
it was her duty to throw her soul into an expressive passage: then she
would become sentimental and feel nothing.

Young Jean-Christophe, sitting by her side, was not very polite. He never
paid her compliments--far from it. She resented that, and never let any
remark pass without answering it. She would argue about everything that he
said, and when she made a mistake she would insist that she was playing
what was written. He would get cross, and they would go on exchanging
ungracious words and impertinences. With her eyes on the keys, she never
ceased to watch Jean-Christophe and enjoy his fury. As a relief from
boredom she would invent stupid little tricks, with no other object than
to interrupt the lesson and to annoy Jean-Christophe. She would pretend
to choke, so as to make herself interesting; she would have a fit of
coughing, or she would have something very important to say to the maid.
Jean-Christophe knew that she was play-acting; and Minna knew that
Jean-Christophe knew that she was play-acting; and it amused her, for
Jean-Christophe could not tell her what he was thinking.

One day, when she was indulging in this amusement and was coughing
languidly, hiding her mouth in her handkerchief, as if she were on the
point of choking, but in reality watching Jean-Christophe's exasperation
out of the corner of her eye, she conceived the ingenious idea of letting
the handkerchief fall, so as to make Jean-Christophe pick it up, which he
did with the worst grace in the world. She rewarded him with a "Thank you!"
in her grand manner, which nearly made him explode.

She thought the game too good not to be repeated. Next day she did it
again. Jean-Christophe did not budge; he was boiling with rage. She waited
a moment, and then said in an injured tone:

"Will you please pick up my handkerchief?"

Jean-Christophe could not contain himself.

"I am not your servant!" he cried roughly. "Pick it up yourself!"

Minna choked with rage. She got up suddenly from her stool, which fell
over.

"Oh, this is too much!" she said, and angrily thumped the piano; and she
left the room in a fury.

Jean-Christophe waited. She did not come back. He was ashamed of what he
had done; he felt that he had behaved like a little cad. And he was at the
end of his tether; she made fun of him too impudently! He was afraid lest
Minna should complain to her mother, and he should be forever banished from
Frau von Kerich's thoughts. He knew not what to do; for if he was sorry for
his brutality, no power on earth would have made him ask pardon.

He came again on the chance the next day, although he thought that
Minna would refuse to take her lesson. But Minna, who was too proud to
complain to anybody--Minna, whose conscience was not shielded against
reproach--appeared again, after making him wait five minutes more than
usual; and she sat down at the piano, stiff, upright, without turning her
head or saying a word, as though Jean-Christophe no longer existed for her.
But she did not fail to take her lesson, and all the subsequent lessons,
because she knew very well that Jean-Christophe was a fine musician, and
that she ought to learn to play the piano properly if she wished to
be--what she wished to be--a well-bred young lady of finished education.

But how bored she was! How they bored each other!

* * * * *

One misty morning in March, when little flakes of snow were flying, like
feathers, in the gray air, they were in the studio. It was hardly daylight.
Minna was arguing, as usual, about a false note that she had struck, and
pretending that it "was written so." Although he knew perfectly well that
she was lying, Jean-Christophe bent over the book to look at the passage in
question closely. Her hand was on the rack, and she did not move it. His
lips were near her hand. He tried to read and could not; he was looking at
something else--a thing soft, transparent, like the petals of a flower.
Suddenly--he did not know what he was thinking of--he pressed his lips as
hard as he could on the little hand.

They were both dumfounded by it. He flung backwards; she withdrew her
hand--both blushing. They said no word; they did not look at each other.
After a moment of confused silence she began to play again; she was very
uneasy: her bosom rose and fell as though she were under some weight; she
struck wrong note after wrong note. He did not notice it; he was more
uneasy than she. His temples throbbed; he heard nothing; he knew not what
she was playing; and, to break the silence, he made a few random remarks in
a choking voice. He thought that he was forever lost in Minna's opinion.
He was confounded by what he had done, thought it stupid and rude. The
lesson-hour over, he left Minna without looking at her, and even forgot
to say good-bye. She did not mind. She had no thought now of deeming
Jean-Christophe ill-mannered; and if she made so many mistakes in playing,
it was because all the time she was watching him out of the corner of her
eye with astonishment and curiosity, and--for the first time--sympathy.

When she was left alone, instead of going to look for her mother as usual,
she shut herself up in her room and examined this extraordinary event. She
sat with her face in her hands in front of the mirror. Her eyes seemed to
her soft and gleaming. She bit gently at her lip in the effort of thinking.
And as she looked complacently at her pretty face, she visualized the
scene, and blushed and smiled. At dinner she was animated and merry. She
refused to go out at once, and stayed in the drawing-room for part of the
afternoon; she had some work in her hand, and did not make ten stitches
without a mistake, but what did that matter! In a corner of the room, with
her back turned to her mother, she smiled; or, under a sudden impulse to
let herself go, she pranced about the room and sang at the top of her
voice. Frau von Kerich started and called her mad. Minna flung her arms
round her neck, shaking with laughter, and hugged and kissed her.

In the evening, when she went to her room, it was a long time before
she went to bed. She went on looking at herself in the mirror, trying
to remember, and having thought all through the day of the same
thing--thinking of nothing. She undressed slowly; she stopped every moment,
sitting on the bed, trying to remember what Jean-Christophe was like. It
was a Jean-Christophe of fantasy who appeared, and now he did not seem
nearly so uncouth to her. She went to bed and put out the light. Ten
minutes later the scene of the morning rushed back into her mind, and she
burst out laughing. Her mother got up softly and opened the door, thinking
that, against orders, she was reading in bed. She found Minna lying quietly
in her bed, with her eyes wide open in the dim candlelight.

"What is it?" she asked. "What is amusing you?"

"Nothing," said Minna gravely. "I was thinking."

"You are very lucky to find your own company so amusing. But go to sleep."

"Yes, mamma," replied Minna meekly. Inside herself she was grumbling; "Go
away! Do go away!" until the door was closed, and she could go on enjoying
her dreams. She fell into a sweet drowsiness. When she was nearly asleep,
she leaped for joy:

"He loves me.... What happiness! How good of him to love me!... How I love
him!"

She kissed her pillow and went fast asleep.

* * * * *

When next they were together Jean-Christophe was surprised at Minna's
amiability. She gave him "Good-day," and asked him how he was in a very
soft voice; she sat at the piano, looking wise and modest; she was an angel
of docility. There were none of her naughty schoolgirl's tricks, but she
listened religiously to Jean-Christophe's remarks, acknowledged that they
were right, gave little timid cries herself when she made a mistake and set
herself to be more accurate. Jean-Christophe could not understand it. In a
very short time she made astounding progress. Not only did she play better,
but with musical feeling. Little as he was given to flattery, he had to pay
her a compliment. She blushed with pleasure, and thanked him for it with a
look tearful with gratitude. She took pains with her toilet for him; she
wore ribbons of an exquisite shade; she gave Jean-Christophe little smiles
and soft glances, which he disliked, for they irritated him, and moved him
to the depths of his soul. And now it was she who made conversation, but
there was nothing childish in what she said; she talked gravely, and quoted
the poets in a pedantic and pretentious way. He hardly ever replied; he was
ill at ease. This new Minna that he did not know astonished and disquieted
him.

Always she watched him. She was waiting.... For what?... Did she know
herself?... She was waiting for him to do it again. He took good care not
to; for he was convinced that he had behaved like a clod; he seemed never
to give a thought to it. She grew restless, and one day when he was sitting
quietly at a respectful distance from her dangerous little paws, she was
seized with impatience: with a movement so quick that she had no time to
think of it, she herself thrust her little hand against his lips. He was
staggered by it, then furious and ashamed. But none the less he kissed it
very passionately. Her naïve effrontery enraged him; he was on the point of
leaving her there and then.

But he could not. He was entrapped. Whirling thoughts rushed in his mind;
he could make nothing of them. Like mists ascending from a valley they rose
from the depths of his heart. He wandered hither and thither at random
through this mist of love, and whatever he did, he did but turn round and
round an obscure fixed idea, a Desire unknown, terrible and fascinating as
a flame to an insect. It was the sudden eruption of the blind forces of
Nature.

* * * * *

They passed through a period of waiting. They watched each other, desired
each other, were fearful of each other. They were uneasy. But they did not
for that desist from their little hostilities and sulkinesses; only there
were no more familiarities between them; they were silent. Each was busy
constructing their love in silence.

Love has curious retroactive effects. As soon as Jean-Christophe discovered
that he loved Minna, he discovered at the same time that he had always
loved her. For three months they had been seeing each other almost every
day without ever suspecting the existence of their love. But from the day
when he did actually love her, he was absolutely convinced that he had
loved her from all eternity.

It was a good thing for him to have discovered at last _whom_ he loved.
He had loved for so long without knowing whom! It was a sort of relief to
him, like a sick man, who, suffering from a general illness, vague and
enervating, sees it become definite in sharp pain in some portion of his
body. Nothing is more wearing than love without a definite object; it eats
away and saps the strength like a fever. A known passion leads the mind to
excess; that is exhausting, but at least one knows why. It is an excess; it
is not a wasting away. Anything rather than emptiness.

Although Minna had given Jean-Christophe good reason to believe that she
was not indifferent to him, he did not fail to torture himself with the
idea that she despised him. They had never had any very clear idea of each
other, but this idea had never been more confused and false than it was
now; it consisted of a series of strange fantasies which could never be
made to agree, for they passed from one extreme to the other, endowing each
other in turn with faults and charms which they did not possess--charms
when they were parted, faults when they were together. In either case they
were wide of the mark.

They did not know themselves what they desired. For Jean-Christophe his
love took shape as that thirst for tenderness, imperious, absolute,
demanding reciprocation, which had burned in him since childhood,
which he demanded from others, and wished to impose on them by will or
force. Sometimes this despotic desire of full sacrifice of himself and
others--especially others, perhaps--was mingled with gusts of a brutal
and obscure desire, which set him whirling, and he did not understand it.
Minna, curious above all things, and delighted to have a romance, tried
to extract as much pleasure as possible from it for her vanity and
sentimentality; she tricked herself whole-heartedly as to what she was
feeling. A great part of their love was purely literary. They fed on the
books they had read, and were forever ascribing to themselves feelings
which they did not possess.

But the moment was to come when all these little lies and small egoisms
were to vanish away before the divine light of love. A day, an hour, a few
seconds of eternity.... And it was so unexpected!...

* * * * *

One evening they were alone and talking. The room was growing dark. Their
conversation took a serious turn. They talked of the infinite, of Life, and
Death. It made a larger frame for their little passion. Minna complained of
her loneliness, which led naturally to Jean-Christophe's answer that she
was not so lonely as she thought.

"No," she said, shaking her head. "That is only words. Every one lives for
himself; no one is interested in you; nobody loves you."

Silence.

"And I?" said Jean-Christophe suddenly, pale with emotion.

Impulsive Minna jumped to her feet, and took his hands.

The door opened. They flung apart. Frau von Kerich entered. Jean-Christophe
buried himself in a book, which he held upside down. Minna bent over her
work, and pricked her finger with her needle.

They were not alone together for the rest of the evening, and they were
afraid of being left. When Frau von Kerich got up to look for something in
the next room, Minna, not usually obliging, ran to fetch it for her, and
Jean-Christophe took advantage of her absence to take his leave without
saying goodnight to her.

Next day they met again, impatient to resume their interrupted
conversation. They did not succeed. Yet circumstances were favorable to
them. They went a walk with Frau von Kerich, and had plenty of opportunity
for talking as much as they liked. But Jean-Christophe could not speak, and
he was so unhappy that he stayed as far away as possible from Minna. And
she pretended not to notice his discourtesy; but she was piqued by it, and
showed it. When Jean-Christophe did at last contrive to utter a few words,
she listened icily; he had hardly the courage to finish his sentence. They
were coming to the end of the walk. Time was flying. And he was wretched at
not having been able to make use of it.

A week passed. They thought they had mistaken their feeling for each other.
They were not sure but that they had dreamed the scene of that evening.
Minna was resentful against Jean-Christophe. Jean-Christophe was afraid of
meeting her alone. They were colder to each other than ever.

A day came when it had rained all morning and part of the afternoon. They
had stayed in the house without speaking, reading, yawning, looking out of
the window; they were bored and cross. About four o'clock the sky cleared.
They ran into the garden. They leaned their elbows on the terrace wall,
and looked down at the lawns sloping to the river. The earth was steaming;
a soft mist was ascending to the sun; little rain-drops glittered on
the grass; the smell of the damp earth and the perfume of the flowers
intermingled; around them buzzed a golden swarm of bees. They were side by
side, not looking at each other; they could not bring themselves to break
the silence. A bee came up and clung awkwardly to a clump of wistaria heavy
with rain, and sent a shower of water down on them. They both laughed, and
at once they felt that they were no longer cross with each other, and were
friends again. But still they did not look at each other. Suddenly, without
turning her head, she took his hand, and said:

"Come!"

She led him quickly to the little labyrinth with its box-bordered paths,
which was in the middle of the grove. They climbed up the slope, slipping
on the soaking ground, and the wet trees shook out their branches over
them. Near the top she stopped to breathe.

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