Chapter 5

The apartment of Daniel and Gertrude had three rooms. Two opened on the street, and one, the bed room, faced a dark, gloomy court.

With very limited means, but with diligence and pleasure, Gertrude had done all in her power to make the apartment as comfortable as possible. Though the ceilings were low and the walls almost always damp, the rooms seemed after all quite home-like and attractive.

In Daniel’s study the piano was the chief object of furniture; it dominated the space. Fuchsias in the window gave a pleasing frame to the general picture of penury. His mother had given him the oil painting of his father. From its place above the sofa the stern countenance of Gottfried Nothafft looked down upon the son. It seemed at times that the face of the father turned toward the mask of Zingarella as if to ask who and what it was. The mask hung on the other side of the room from the oil painting; its unbroken smile was lost in the shadows.

Gertrude had to do all the household work; they could not afford a servant. In the years of Daniel’s absence, however, she had learned to copy notes. Herr Seelenfromm, assistant to the apothecary Pflaum, had taught her. He was a cousin of Frau Rübsam, and she had become acquainted with him through Eleanore. In his leisure hours he composed waltzes and marches, and dedicated them to the princes and princesses of the royal family. He also dedicated one to Gertrude. It was entitled “Feenzauber,” and was a gavotte.

When Daniel learned of her accomplishment, he was so astonished that he threw his hands above his head. The rare being looked up at him intoxicated with joy. “I will help you,” she said, and copied his notes for him.

When they walked along the streets she would close her eyes at times. A melody floated by her which she had never before been able to understand. As she bought her vegetables and tried to drive a bargain with the old market woman, her soul was full of song.

Certain tones and combinations of tones took on definite shapes in her mind. The bass B of the fourth octave appeared to her as a heavily veiled woman; the middle E resembled a young man who was stretching his arms. In chords, harmonies, and harmonic transformations these figures were set in motion, the motion depending on the character of the composition: a procession of mourning figures between clouds and stars; wild animals spurred on by the huntsmen who were riding them; maidens throwing flowers from the windows of a palace; men and women plunging into an abyss in one mass of despairing humanity; weeping men and laughing women, wrestlers and ball players, dancing couples and grape pickers. The pause appealed to her as a man who climbs naked from a deep subterranean shaft, carrying a burning torch in his hand; the trill seemed like a bird that anxiously flutters about its nest.

All of Daniel’s compositions came close to her heart; all his pictures were highly coloured; his figures seemed to be full of blood. If they remained dead and distant, her sympathy vanished; her face became tired and empty. Without having spoken a word with each other, Daniel would know that he was on the wrong track. But all this bound him to the young woman with hoops of steel; he came to regard her as the creature given him of God to act as his living conscience and infallible if mute judge.

He hated her when her feelings remained unmoved. If he at last came to see, after much introspection, that she was right, then he would have liked to fall down and worship the unknown power that was so inexorable in pointing him the way.

Spindler had a beautiful harp which he had bequeathed to Daniel in his will. It had remained in Ansbach in the possession of the old lady who kept house for him. Daniel had forgotten all about the harp. After his marriage he had it sent to him.

He kept it in the living room; Gertrude was fond of looking at it. It enticed her. One day she sat down and tried to draw tones from its strings. She touched the strings very gently, and was charmed with the melody that came from them. Gradually she learned the secret; she discovered the law. An innate talent made the instrument submissive to her; she was able to express on it all the longings and emotions she had experienced in her dark and lonely hours.

She generally played very softly; she never tried intricate melodies, for the harp was adapted to the expression of simple, dream-like harmonies. The tones were wafted out into the hall and up the stairs; they greeted Daniel as he entered the old house.

When he came into the room, Gertrude was sitting in a corner by the stove, the harp between her knees. She smiled mysteriously to herself; her hands, like strange beings loosed from her body, sought chords and melodies that were his, and which she was trying to translate to her own world of dreams.