jenny walked listlessly about in her studio next morning and could not settle down to anything. the pouring rain was beating against the big window. she stopped to look at the wet tiles of the roofs, the black chimneys, and the telephone wires, along which the small raindrops were rolling down like pearls until they gathered into one large one and fell off, to be replaced immediately by others.
she might go to her mother and the children in the country for a few days. she must go away from all this. or she might go to an hotel in some other town and write for helge to come and talk things over with her quietly. if they could only be together again—they two alone! she tried to think of their spring in rome, of the silvery haze over the mountains, and of her own happiness in it all. but she could not reconstruct the picture of helge from that time—as he had appeared to her enamoured eyes.
those days seemed already so far away; they were an isolated[162] episode in her life, and although she knew they were a reality she could not connect them with her present existence.
helge—her helge was lost to her in the home at welhavensgaten, and she herself could not fit in there. it seemed unthinkable that she should have anything to do with those people now and in all the time to come. yes—gram was right—they must go away.
and she would go at once—before helge came, asking for an explanation of her behaviour yesterday. she packed a bag, and as she was putting on her mackintosh somebody knocked at the door—again and again—she knew it was helge. she stood absolutely still and waited till he had gone. after a while she took her bag, locked the studio, and went. half-way down the stairs she saw a man sitting in one of the windows. it was helge. he had seen her too, so she went down to him. they looked at each other in silence.
“why did you not open just now?” he asked.
jenny did not answer.
“did you not hear me knocking?” he looked at her bag: “are you going to your mother?”
she hesitated a little, then said: “no; i thought of going to holmestrand for a few days and writing to you from there to come down, so that we could be together for a time without undue interference and scenes. i should like to talk matters over with you in peace and quiet.”
“i am anxious to speak to you too. can we not go up to your place?”
she did not answer directly.
“is there anybody there?” he asked.
jenny looked at him: “anybody in my studio when i have left?”
“there might be somebody you do not wish to be seen with.”
[163]
she turned purple in the face: “why? how could i know that you were sitting there spying on me?”
“my dear jenny, i don’t mean to say that there was any harm in it, not on your part at least.”
jenny said nothing, but went up the stairs again. in the studio she placed her bag on the floor, and without taking off her things stood looking at helge while he hung up his coat and put his umbrella in the corner.
“father told me this morning that you had been to the office and that mother had been below in the street.”
“yes. it is a peculiar manner you people have—of spying, i mean. i must say, i find it hard to get accustomed to it.”
helge turned very red.
“forgive me, jenny—i had to speak to you, and the porter said he was sure you were in. you know very well that i don’t suspect you.”
“really, i hardly know anything,” she said, overcome with it all. “i cannot bear it any longer. all this suspicion and secrecy and discord. good heavens, helge!—can’t you protect me from all this?”
“my poor jenny.” he rose and went to the window, where he remained standing with his back to her. “i have suffered more than you know. it is all so hopeless. can you not see for yourself that mother’s jealousy is not without foundation?”
jenny began to shiver. he turned round and saw it.
“i don’t believe father is aware of it himself. if he were, he would not give in like that to his desire to be with you. but he told me himself that we ought to go away from here, both of us. i am not so sure that your going away now is not his idea too.”
“no; i decided myself to go to holmestrand, but he spoke[164] to me yesterday about leaving town, when—when we got married.”
she went to him and put her hands on his shoulders.
“dearest—if it is as you say, i will have to go away. helge, helge! what shall we do?”
“i am going,” he said abruptly, lifting her hands from his shoulders and pressing them against his face.
they stood a moment in silence.
“but i must go too. can you not understand? as long as i thought your mother absurd, even common, i could keep my countenance, but now it is different. you should not have said it, helge—even if you are mistaken. i cannot go there any more with that on my mind. whether she is justified or not, i cannot meet her eyes. i shall not be myself, and i shall look guilty.”
“come,” said helge, leading her to the sofa and sitting down beside her.
“i am going to ask you a question. do you love me, jenny?”
“you know i do,” she said quickly, as if frightened.
he took her cold hand between both of his: “i know you did once—though, god knows, i never understood why. but i knew it was true when you said so. you were loving and kind to me, and i was happy, but i was always afraid of a time coming when you would not love me any longer.”
she looked up in his face, saying: “i am very, very fond of you, helge.”
“i know,” he answered, with a shadow of a smile. “i don’t think you turn cold all at once to somebody you have loved—you are not that kind. i know that you don’t wish to make me suffer, and that you will suffer yourself the moment you understand that you don’t love me any longer. i love you above everything.”
he bent his head in tears. she put her arms round him.
[165]
“helge—my own darling boy.”
he raised his head and pushed her gently away from him: “jenny, that time in rome i could have made you mine—you wanted it yourself, for you believed that we could only find happiness in a life together. i was not so sure, i suppose, as i did not risk it. but here at home i have been wanting you more than ever. i wanted you to be mine entirely, for i was afraid of losing you, but i saw you were frightened every time you understood that i was longing for you.”
she looked at him in awe. yes, he was right—she had not wished to admit it, but it was so.
“if i asked you now—this moment—would you consent?”
jenny moved her lips; then came a quick and firm “yes.”
helge smiled sadly, kissing her hand: “gladly, because you wish to be mine? because you cannot conceive of any happiness unless you are mine and i am yours? not only because you want to be kind to me or don’t want to break your word—tell me the truth.”
she threw herself down on his knee and sobbed: “let me go away for a time. i want to go up in the mountains. i must recover myself. i want to be your jenny, as i was in rome. i do want it, helge, but i am so confused now. when i am myself again i will write you to come, and i will be your own jenny again—yours only.”
“i am my mother’s son,” said helge quietly. “we have got estranged from one another. will you not convince me that i am everything in the world to you, the only man, more than anything else?—more than your work and your friends, to whom i felt you belonged more than to me—just as you feel a stranger among the people i belong to.”
“i did not feel a stranger towards your father.”
“no, but my father and i are strangers to one another. there is one interest—your work—which i cannot share with you completely, and i know now that i should be jealous[166] of it. you see, i am her son. if i am not convinced that i am everything in the world to you, i cannot help being jealous—anxiously fearing that some day there might come another whom you could love more, who could understand you better. i am jealous by nature.”
“you must not be jealous, or everything will go to pieces. i cannot bear to be distrusted. i would rather you deceived me than doubted me—i could better forgive you that.”
“i could not”—with a bitter smile.
jenny stroked the hair from his forehead and dried his eyes.
“we love one another, don’t we, helge? when we get away from all this and we both wish everything to be well and right, don’t you think we can make one another happy?”
“i have seen too much. i dare not trust my good intentions or yours. others have built their hopes on this and failed—i have seen what a hell two people can make life for each other. you will have to give me an answer to what i asked you. do you love me? do you wish to be mine—as you did in rome? do you wish it more than anything else in the world?”
“i love you very dearly, helge,” she said, crying piteously.
“thank you,” he said, kissing her hand. “i know you cannot help it, poor darling, that you don’t love me.”
“helge,” she said imploringly.
“you cannot say that you wish me to stay because you would not be able to live without me. dare you take the responsibility for everything that may happen if you say you love me—only so as not to send me away in sadness?”
jenny sat looking down.
helge put on his overcoat.
“good-bye, jenny.” he clasped her hand.
“are you going away from me, helge?”
“yes. i am going.”
“and you will not come back?”
“not unless you can say what i asked you to say.”
[167]
“i cannot say it now,” she whispered in agony.
helge touched her hair lightly, and left.
jenny remained on the sofa crying long and bitterly—her mind a perfect blank. tired with crying, and worn out after all these months of petty, racking humiliation and quarrels, she felt her heart empty and cold. helge was probably right.
after a while she began to feel hungry, and, looking at her watch, saw it was six. she had been sitting like this for four hours. when she rose to put on her coat she noticed that she had had it on all the time.
by the door she perceived a small pool of water running on to some of her pictures standing against the wall. she went for a duster to wipe it up, and, realizing suddenly that the pool was left from helge’s umbrella, she leaned her forehead against the door and cried again.
