The Tales of Hoffmann, page 23
The steward had closed the door again. He now turned to the Baron and said, toying with the great key and smiling strangely: ‘Down there lie thousands upon thousands, the lovely instruments of my late Master – telescopes, quadrants, globes, reflectors – everything lies in ruins among the stones and rubble!’
‘But money, actual money!’ the Baron interrupted. ‘You spoke of gold pieces, did you not?’
‘I meant only objects,’ the steward replied. ‘Things which cost thousands of gold pieces.’ And he would say no more.
The Baron was delighted that he had suddenly acquired the means of executing his favourite plan of raising a splendid new house. The lawyer V. pointed out that the will of the departed provided only for the repair and renovation of the existing castle and that it would be difficult to equal the simple grandeur of the old building in any new one, but the Baron stuck to his intention and asserted that in any matter not covered by the entail the wishes of the dead would have to yield to those of the living. He would improve the ancient castle to the extent the climate, ground and surroundings permitted; and he added that he would shortly be bringing home as his wife a creature for whom no sacrifice could be too great.
The way in which the Baron spoke of this union led the lawyer to suppose it had probably already been sealed and cut short any further questions on his part; but he was consoled by the feeling that the Baron’s desire for riches was fuelled by a wish to provide for his beloved rather than by simple greed – though the sight of the Baron gloating over the Friedrichsdor made it rather hard to sustain this feeling. ‘The old scoundrel is certainly not telling the truth,’ the Baron said. ‘But next spring I will have that rubble cleared away under my own eyes.’
Builders came and the Baron discussed with them at length how best to proceed with the new building. He discarded plan after plan; no design was sufficiently grand for him. He began to draft plans himself: this occupation, which kept the sunniest images constantly before his mind, put him into a mood that often touched on exuberance and expressed itself in generous, even opulent hospitality. Even Daniel appeared mollified, though it was clear the Baron still mistrusted him. What appeared wonderful to everyone was that the steward seemed to grow younger every day: perhaps the grief for his late master was wearing off, perhaps it was because he was no longer obliged to spend cold, sleepless nights in the tower; but whatever the cause, he had changed from a tottery old man to a robust, red-cheeked fellow who walked vigorously and laughed loudly.
The gaiety of life at Castle R. was now disrupted by the arrival of the noteworthy figure of Baron Wolfgang’s younger brother, Hubert. When the Baron saw him he went deathly white and exclaimed: ‘Wretch! What do you want here?’
Hubert threw himself into his brother’s arms, but the latter led him away into another room and shut the door. The two were together for several hours; then Hubert reappeared with a wild demeanour and called for his horses. The lawyer tried to detain him, for he feared a fatal outcome to this quarrel; then the Baron also appeared and called loudly: ‘Stay here, Hubert! You will come to your senses.’
Hubert mastered himself, and as he threw his coat to a servant he took V.’s hand and said with a mocking smile: ‘The Lord of the Manor is, it seems, willing to have me.’
They went into a side room. V. said that whatever had arisen would only have been intensified if Hubert had left. Hubert took the tongs which stood by the hearth and poked the fire: ‘You will note that I am a good-natured fellow and quite skilled in homely tasks,’ he said. ‘But Wolfgang is full of the most marvellous prejudices and inclined to be a skinflint.’
V. did not feel it advisable to pursue the subject further, as Wolfgang’s behaviour indicated a man torn by emotions of every kind.
Late that evening he went to the Baron’s apartment and found him pacing the room, his hands clenched behind his back. When he noticed the lawyer, he stopped and, looking him gloomily in the eyes, said in a broken voice: ‘My brother is here. I know what you are going to say. But you know nothing about it. My wretched brother – I am right to call him so – crosses my path everywhere like an evil spirit and disturbs my peace. He has done everything possible to wreck my life. Since the promulgation of the entail he has pursued me with a deadly hatred. He begrudges me these possessions – though in his hands they would be dissipated like chaff. He is the maddest spendthrift there is. His debts more than exceed his share of his property in Courland, and now, pursued by creditors, he has come here for money.’
‘And you, his brother, refuse him–’ V. interrupted. The Baron took a step backwards. ‘Yes!’ he cried. ‘I refuse him! I cannot and will not give away one thaler of the estate’s income. But listen to the proposal I put to the madman a few hours ago and then judge me. Our possessions in Courland are, as you know, considerable; I agreed that he should have the half which falls to me. Hubert has a wife and children, and they are starving. I proposed that the property be administered, the money needed for his keep given to him from the revenues, creditors satisfied. But what does an ordered life matter to him, what do wife and child matter to him? Money, cash in large sums, is what he wants, so that he can recklessly squander it. Some devil has told him the secret of the hundred and fifty thousand thalers, of which he is demanding half. I must and I shall refuse him. And I now feel he is plotting my destruction.’
V. tried to talk the Baron out of his suspicions against his brother, but to no avail. He was authorized to deal with Hubert and his monetary needs, and he performed this task with all discretion; at last Hubert agreed: ‘Let it be so, then. I will accept the Lord of the Manor’s proposals, but on the condition that, since I am on the point of losing my good name and honour for ever through the harshness of my creditors, he give me a cash advance of a thousand Friedrichsdor and allow me to make my home with him, for a time at least, in his beautiful castle.’
‘Never!’ the Baron exploded when V. transmitted these proposals to him. ‘Never will I agree to Hubert’s spending even a minute in my house once I have brought my wife here. Go, dear friend, and tell that disturber of my peace that he shall have two thousand Friedrichsdor, but not as an advance; no, it is a gift, and then he must be gone – gone from here.’
V. now suddenly realized that the Baron had married without his father’s knowledge, and he guessed that the dispute between the brothers must have its origin here. Hubert listened composedly to what he had to say and then replied gloomily: ‘I will think about it. For the moment I will stay a few more days.’
V. tried to prove to him that the Baron was in fact doing all he could to recompense him for the injustice inherent in an entail, which so greatly favours the first-born; there was, indeed, something hateful in the whole conception. As if suffocating, Hubert tore open his jacket, placed a hand on his hip and spun round like a dancer. ‘Bah!’ he exclaimed. ‘Hatefulness is born of hatred.’ Then he laughed loudly and said: ‘How graciously the Lord of the Manor throws his gold pieces to the beggar!’
V. now realized there was no question of a reconciliation between the brothers.
Hubert installed himself in the side wing and, to the Baron’s annoyance, seemed ready for a long stay. He often had long conversations with the steward, and they even went hunting together; but apart from this he was seldom seen and he avoided meeting his brother. Altogether, V. felt he understood the dread the Baron had evidenced on beholding Hubert’s arrival.
One day, when V. was alone in his study, Hubert entered and said, in an almost melancholy tone: ‘I will accept the most recent proposals of my brother. Can you manage it so that I receive the two thousand Friedrichsdor today? I will then leave tonight – by horse – entirely alone.’
‘With the money?’ V. asked.
‘Correct,’ replied Hubert. ‘I know what you are going to say. The weight! Make it out in notes to Isaac Lazarus in K. I will go straight to K. tonight. I am being driven from here: the old man has cursed this place with his evil spirits.’
‘Are you speaking of your father, Herr Baron?’ asked V., very seriously.
Hubert’s lips trembled; he held firmly on to a chair so as not to fall, then cried: ‘Today then, Herr Justitiarius!’ and staggered from the room.
‘He realizes he can do nothing once my mind is made up,’ said the Baron, as he made out the notes to Lazarus. He felt a load had been lifted from his shoulders and as he sat at supper that evening was happier than he had been for a long time. Hubert had sent his apologies, and all were glad he was not there.
V. resided in a somewhat distant room whose windows looked out on to the courtyard. During the night he was awoken by what seemed to him a distant, plaintive wailing. He listened, but there was no repetition, and he had to dismiss it as a trick of some dream. Nonetheless, so strong a feeling of horror and anxiety had overcome him that he could no longer stay in bed. He rose and went to the window. Before long the castle door opened and a figure holding a burning candle stepped out and crossed the yard. V. recognized the steward, Daniel, and watched as he opened the stable door, went into the stable and emerged again, leading a saddled horse. Now a second figure appeared out of the darkness: it was wrapped in a fur coat and wore a fox-fur cap; V. recognized Hubert. He spoke earnestly with Daniel for a few minutes, then again disappeared. Daniel led the horse back into the stable, locked it and returned across the yard the way he had come. It was evident that Hubert had intended to ride off but had for some reason changed his mind; it was also evident he was involved with the steward in some kind of conspiracy. V. could scarcely wait for morning to come to inform the Baron of what had occurred.
But next morning, at the hour when the Baron was accustomed to rise, V. heard a running hither and thither, the sound of doors opening and shutting, confused talking and shouting. He stepped out into the corridor, and everywhere there were servants running. At length he learned that the Baron was missing: they had sought for him for hours in vain. He was known to have gone to bed; he must therefore have got up again and have wandered off with the candelabra in his hand, for that also was missing. Driven by a dark foreboding, V. rushed to the fateful hall where, like his father, Wolfgang had made his bedroom. The door to the tower stood open; horror–struck, V. cried: ‘There he lies, dashed to pieces!’
It was so. Snow had fallen, so that from above only one arm of the unfortunate man could be seen protruding from the stones. It was hours before workmen succeeded in climbing down and retrieving the body. In the convulsion of death, the Baron had clung to the silver candelabra, and the hand with which he still held it was the only part of his body uninjured: the rest had been shattered by the impact on the stones and rocks.
With a fury of despair in his countenance, Hubert rushed up to the body, which lay in the hall on a wide table just where the old Baron had lain a few weeks earlier. Crushed by the sight, he wailed: ‘Brother! O my poor brother! No, this is not what I desired from the devils who were driving me!’
V. shuddered at this insidious language, for he believed he would have to proceed against Hubert as his brother’s murderer. Hubert lay unconscious on the floor; he was put to bed, but recovered fairly quickly with a strengthening tonic. Pale and with grief in his eyes, he then went to V. in his room and said as he slowly lowered himself into a chair: ‘I have wished my brother dead, because my father bestowed on him the best part of his estate through that evil entail. Now he has met his death in a dreadful way. I am Lord of the Manor. But my heart is crushed. I shall never be happy again. I confirm you in your office. You shall have the widest powers to administer the estate, on which I shall not be living.’
In a few hours Hubert was on his way back to K. It appeared that the unhappy Wolfgang had risen during the night, had probably made for the library, but, bemused by sleep, had mistaken the door. This explanation did not satisfy V. If the Baron could not sleep, he could not have been bemused by sleep and thus could not have mistaken the door. The tower doorway was, moreover, firmly locked and must have been difficult to open. He expressed his doubts to the assembled servants.
‘Ah,’ said Franz, the Baron’s huntsman, ‘my dear sir, indeed it never happened like that.’
‘How else, then?’ V. asked him.
Franz declined to speak in front of the others; he desired to say what he had to say in confidence. V. now learnt that the Baron had often spoken to Franz about the treasure which lay buried under the rubble and that, as if driven by an evil spirit, he often went at night to the doorway, to which Daniel must have given him the key, and looked down longingly into the depths for these supposed riches. What was probable was that, on that fateful night, the Baron had again made his way to the tower and had there been seized by a sudden dizziness and had thus fallen. Daniel, who also appeared very shaken by the Baron’s death, proposed that the dangerous doorway be walled up, and this was done.
Baron Hubert von R., now Lord of the Manor, returned to Courland. V. received unrestricted authority for the administration of the estate: the building of the new house was discontinued and the old building put in as good condition as possible.
Many years passed. Late one autumn, Hubert again appeared at Castle R. and spent several days closeted with V. Then he returned to Courland; on his journey through K. he deposited there his last will and testament. During his visit he had spoken much of forebodings of an early death, and these forebodings were fulfilled, for he died a year later. His son, also named Hubert, came quickly from Courland to take possession of his inheritance. His mother and sister followed him. The youth seemed from the first moment to combine all the evil qualities of his forebears: he wanted many changes on the spot, he threw the cook out of the house, he tried to thrash the coachman (but did not succeed, for the fellow was as strong as a tree) – in short, he was well on the way to making himself thoroughly unpopular when V. stepped in firmly to assure him that not so much as a chair should be moved before the reading of the will.
‘You are subordinate here to the Lord of the Manor,’ the Baron began. V. did not allow him to continue. ‘No hastiness, Baron!’ he said. ‘You may not hold sway here before the will is read. For the moment I, and I alone, am master here and well know how to meet force with force. I have the power of my authority as executor of your father’s will and am authorized by the power of the court to prohibit your stay in Castle R. I advise you to take yourself back to K.’
The decisive tone in which he spoke gave his words suitable weight, and the young Baron retreated with derisive laughter.
Three months passed, and the day arrived on which, according to the wishes of the late Baron, the will was to be opened at K., where it had been deposited. In addition to the court officials, the Baron and V., there was also in the courtroom a younger man, of noble appearance, whom V. had brought with him and whom everyone assumed to be V.’s clerk, as a sealed document was sticking out of his pocket. The Baron looked askance at him, as he did at almost everybody, and demanded that the tedious ceremony be disposed of quickly. He recognized the hand and seal of his late father, and as the clerk prepared to read the will aloud he gazed indifferently out of the window, an arm thrown carelessly over the back of his chair. After a brief preamble, the deceased Baron Hubert von R. declared that he had never possessed the entail as true Lord of the Manor, but had only administered it on behalf of the only son of the deceased Baron Wolfgang von R., named Roderich after his grandfather: it was to him, accordingly, that the inheritance fell. Detailed accounts of income and expenditure would be found at his estate. Wolfgang von R. – so Hubert recounted – had in Geneva made the acquaintanceship of Miss Julie von St Val and taken so passionate a liking to her that he had resolved never to be parted from her. She was very poor, and her family was of the people: he could, therefore, never hope for the consent of old Roderich, whose whole endeavour had been to enhance the status of his house in every way; and when he had, in fact, disclosed to his father what his intention was, the old man had specifically declared that he had already chosen a bride for the Lord of the Manor of R. and that there could never be any question of another. Wolfgang had then, in the name of Born, married Julie; after a year she had borne him a son, and it was he who was now to become Lord of the Manor.
The Baron stared at the clerk as if thunderstruck. As the clerk finished reading the catastrophic document, V. arose, took the young man by the hand and said, as he bowed to those present: ‘Here, my Lords, I have the honour to present to you Baron Roderich von R., Lord of the Manor of R.’
Hubert stared at the youth who, as if fallen from Heaven, had robbed him of everything. With rage in his burning eyes and clenched fists, he ran from the court without a word. Baron Roderich now handed over to the court the documents which proved he was who he claimed to be. V. perused them and said, as he put them back in order: ‘Now God will help.’
At once on the following morning, Baron Hubert submitted a complaint to the authorities at K., in which he applied for immediate possession of the entail. Neither by testament, nor in any other way, his lawyer asserted, could the deceased Baron Hubert von R. dispose of it. On the death of the father, ownership passed automatically to the son: there was no need for any declaration of accession; the terms of the entail could not be waived. What reasons the deceased may have had for appointing a different Lord of the Manor were quite immaterial. It should also be noted that the former Baron had himself had a love affair in Switzerland, and his alleged brother’s son was perhaps his own.
Though the probability that the facts asserted in the testament were accurate was very strong, and though the judges were particularly incensed that the son did not shrink from accusing his father of a crime, yet the son’s view of the case was correct, and it was only the tireless efforts of V. which succeeded in having the transfer of the entail postponed to give him time to establish the legitimacy of the youthful Roderich.
He realized only too well how difficult it would be. He had been through all old Roderich’s correspondence without finding any trace of a letter, or even a paragraph, connecting Wolfgang with Mlle de St Val. He was sitting in old Roderich’s bedroom in Castle R. and working on a letter to a notary in Geneva, who had been recommended to him as sharp-witted and who was to produce notices for him which might clarify the case of the young Baron. It was midnight and the moon shone brightly into the adjoining hall, the door of which stood open. It seemed as if someone was slowly climbing the stairs, rattling and jingling keys. V. rose and went into the hall; now he heard someone approaching the door of the hall from the passageway. It was opened, and there entered a man with a deathly white face, dressed in night attire and holding a candelabra in one hand and a large bunch of keys in the other. V. at once recognized the steward and was on the point of calling out to him when he was gripped by an icy chill: in the whole attitude of the old man there was something sinister and ghostly. He realized he had a sleepwalker before him. The steward went with measured tread through the hall and up to the walled-up door which had formerly led to the tower; in front of it he stopped and emitted a howling sound which echoed so dreadfully throughout the hall that V. trembled in horror. Then, placing the candelabra on the floor and hanging the bundle of keys on his belt, Daniel began to scratch at the wall with his hands, so that blood was soon spurting out from under his nails, while groaning as if tormented by the pangs of death. Now he put his ear to the wall as if listening to something; then he motioned with his hand as if silencing someone, bent down, picked up the candelabra and paced quietly back to the door. V. followed him warily, lamp in hand. The steward went down the stairs, opened the main doors, proceeded to the stable and, to V.’s amazement, fetched saddle and harness and with great care saddled a horse. After brushing back a lock of hair from its forehead and patting it on the neck, he took it by the bridle and led it out. In the courtyard he stood still for a few seconds as if receiving orders, to which he responded with a nod of the head. Then he led the horse back into the stable, unsaddled it and tied it up. Now he took the candelabra, closed the stable door, returned to the castle and disappeared into his room, which he carefully bolted.
