Toils and Trouble

The water supposedly was too cold for bathing in the morning, and I used the chance to lie in. While I was abed, Clem got up and went out for a walk, as far as I learn later. By the time when I had been in hands of Old Ilmar, who shaved my face, Clem returned and his return was so impressive if not shocking that it made a sensation of the day.

The razor had removed the soap-suds only from one of my cheeks, when some loud tramp was heard outdoor. My barber paused and we exchanged glances. Then my room door flew open, and Clem appeared in the doorway. Thanks goodness, the old manservant was experienced enough and his hand with the razor didn't wavered; he simply left my face and stared at the comer.

It was something worth seeing and getting shocked, since Clem's face was either blood-stained or bleeding and his jacket was blood-stained too, or his breast was wounded. Coming in, Clem paused in the middle of the room, straddling his legs. He lifted his hand and touched his forehead. His fingers got blood-stained too. Behind him, in the opened doorway, wry faces of our servants goggled at his rear. However shocked, Old Ilmar carefully placed the razor aside, not dropping it, and only then he dashed to his master.

I was faster, saying, on the move, "Are you all right Clem?!"

However silly it sounded, the question was quite sane, for really, the young man obviously could stand, walk and move his hands; he had come without anybody's help; he panted but he was not about to swoon before our eyes, therefore, he well might be all right.

"All right," he said in a hoarse voice, and looked at my half-soaped face, "I'm all right. Just I need washing and... I'm thirsty." He made a step towards my chair, the manservant and I took his arms, propping him on sides and helped him to be seated in my chair.

My shaving was impossible till Clem got treated. I told Old Ilmar to bring all necessities for washing, to make a cup of black coffee with brandy and to send a boy with a glass of cold water, but the old servant knew of all this without my order.

"Who it was?" I asked when helping Clem to take his shirt away.

"I just fell," he said.

"All right," I said, "Your wound first, and then you'll tell about all."

Bathed, the wound looked like a big bruise badly cut. "It was a stone there on the ground?" I said.

He winced and said, "No. My own staff. When I came to myself, able to lift my head, I saw my forehead had been above the handle of my staff, which I dropped when falling down."

"Poor boy."

No more wounds over his body. Applying iodine to the wound and putting the bandage on Clem's head proved to be a painful procedure, with cognac being the only anaesthetic we had at home. As usual. Eventually, Clem was clad in a fresh shirt, and a cup of coffee with brandy was brought. While sipping the coffee, Clem began his narration, and we at long last learned that he was after a chase.

The sun was shining when Clem went out this morning. The Lake looked wonderful in the sunshine, and Clem went to the glittering lapping waters.

On the Lake side, he paused at a small mound of stones and looked round, thinking to himself who could make the mound and when. The narrow pathway went towards a big flat stone; a broom-tree and a bench were by the stone. Through the thinning foliage of the broom-tree, on the pathway, a motionless figure of a human was seen. Clem looked narrowly. The human was a gentleman. Here, a sunray fell on the stranger's bare head, and the hair flashed red. Clem was dawned that the stranger might be the red-haired man who he happened to see one day, in the morning, on the way home, after his good long round, when he saw a carriage taking away a lady who looked like Clem's mother. Clem shouted, "Hey!" and ran towards the man.

Seeing Clem approaching, the red-haired stranger hastened to put some head-dress on his head.

"I wanted to ask why he's there," Clem narrated, while lolling languorously in the chair, "I wanted to be heard, that's why I shouted out my question, and I'm afraid I lifted my staff. He dashed behind the bench, and from there he went by a bicycle. Seeing him going away, I shouted again, demanding to stop. But he went on the pathway, away from me. I put on speed, being about to chase him. But my leg failed. I tripped over something and tumbled. It left me dazed."

"Then you came to senses, got up and went home?" I said.

"Yes."

"Nothing more serious?"

"Nothing."

I nodded Old Ilmar to begin shaving me again, and said, "I bet you looked wild to the stranger."

Clem sighed, "Oh yes, I'm afraid, I did."

While soaping my jawbones afresh, Old Ilmar said, "Never mind. It serves those blasphemers right!"

"But why blasphemers?" Clem said.

The manservant replied, "You gentlemen are too young to understand who is a good man and who is devil's servant."

I said, "Old Ilmar doesn't relish those foreigners of the Factory."

Clem said, "Who did ever like foreigners… No, Old Ilmar is untiring when he talks about evil spirits. They are always on his mind. Tell me, old man, what is the red-haired man? Go to find out, later on."

"Why to find out?" the manservant said, without stopping his work, "I know what he is."

"Do you?!" Clem nearly jumped up, in the chair, "Why you never told me about him?"

"I never told because I never was asked."

Clem said, "Look, Old Ilmar, what do you mean? Tell about all you know!"

The manservant, with his hairstyle a la Benjamin Franklin, grayish, initially gingery, squinted at Clem and asked in a whisper, "Will you, sirs, promise not to say to Madame?"

"We promise," I said.

"We promise," Clem said.

"Remember, gentlemen, you promised, or else... I'll get a scolding. So, it was the time when one red-haired man hung around Madame. Why? God knows why, but he hung around."

"But it's impossible!!" Clem said, "Old Ilmar! You old chatterer!"

"Well I never. I just told about the red-haired. As for our Landlady… She was always beyond suspicion."

"Ah stop talking! All the confusion and your chattering too!.. Don't you dare spread the gossip! Go now!.. As soon as you finish the work."

"As you please, sir…" the old man showed his absorption in shaving my chin.

Silence. The shaving came to an end. Clem was the first to break the silence, saying to the manservant, "When it took place?"

Without casting his eyes up, the manservant said, "About ten years ago, sir."

Frowning, Clem asked, "Did my father say anything about the red-haired man?"

"No, sir, your late father said nothing about him."

"Well... where did you get the gossip? Invented, maybe?"

"Just so, sir. Invented."

"That's it, you invented it or retold some gossip. All right. You may go. But first, tell me the red-haired man's name."

"As God is in being… Taylor, sir."

"Taylor. His trade?"

"Negotiator, sir."

"Go now."

Putting on our coats, Clem and I went out to see the scene of his fall, with Clem limping and holding his evil-fated staff in hand.

The fag ends of cigars and a bicycle tire tread on the ground around the bench confirmed the red-haired stranger was not but a vision. Ladies of the Balzac age were prone to infatuations for persons of no reputation like that Taylor, I thought to myself, but I was not about to voice this "profound" thought for Clem and I had no time to say anything, because the chambermaid came to say that the doctor was here. We had sent for Doctor Talvik, for checking up Clem's wound. In addition, the visit was an opportunity to have a talk with the doctor about much beside the wound. But it was not Doctor Talvik.

The young doctor Raymundus Fridland was our parish doctor from now on. Oops...

"Do you know Doctor Talvik's current whereabouts?" I asked Doctor Fridland while he was busy checking up Clem.

"In Padrik, as I think," the Doctor said, without looking at me and without stopping his work.

"In Padrik? Indeed… I heard he has a house there."

"Yes, he has, as I was told... You, young man required several stitches for your wound to prevent it from scarring over. It'll be an ugly scar, anyway, two centimetres at least."

"Ohh..." I said, "Never mind. A scar on a forehead could be covered up with a fringe over the forehead."

"Indeed... Scars adorn men," the Doctor proceeded with the bandaging.

I said, "I wander how his bride is."

"Whose?"

"Doctor Talvik's."

"Most interesting..."

"Really?"

"Not your question. The wound. But your question, Mr Graf, is interesting too, because it reminds of something most interesting."

"Lovely, Mr Fridland. Tell about."

"You asked about Doctor Talvik's fiancée..."

"Actually, I'd like to know how's he. Soon his wedding?"

"The wedding is postponed, twice... or three times. I don't know why. Doctor Talvik has a restless mind of the sort that doesn't let understand him completely. As for his fiancée... I was introduced to her, and I was amazed."

"She's good-looking as I heard."

"She is, of course, but... Do you know how old she is?"

Looking at Clem, who listened to the dialogue attentively, I replied, "As I think, she's a mature damsel, to put it mildly. Unlike me, Clem happened to see the woman."

Clem said, "Yes, I did, and I'd say she's twenty-five."

"Is she!" I said.

"Twenty-seven," Clem said and added, "She doesn't look more than twenty-seven years old."

The Doctor said, "I agree with Mr Lisnyak. She does not look more than 27 years old."

I smiled ironically, "All right. Really, it's perfectly natural if an old man wants to get married to a younger woman, much younger than he."

Doctor Fridland said, "Nothing of the kind, gentlemen!" We stared at him. He straightened the fresh bondage on Clem's head for the final time, and said, "Neither of you is right. I myself was stunned when I learnt of her true age. Are you ready?.."

I nodded, and Clem said, "What do you mean, Doctor? Why the tone of a fakir? Why should we be ready?"

The Doctor looked at Clem and said, "You'll take my meaning, Mr Lisnyak, after I say that Mlle Delamarche is going on 53."

"No!!!" It was Clem. And I simply stared at the Doctor.

Doctor Fridland said, "Quite so. I felt like this when I learnt of that."

I said, "Interesting. Can you explain this phenomenon in terms of science?"

The Doctor said, "No, I can't. All I know is her passport, which Doctor Talvik showed to me."

Poor little thing Clem. Shock by shock. In addition to his limp, he experienced the shock when he learned that his objet was to belong to the other man; then he was shocked learning that his pompous and noble-looking objet was a mere teacher; then he badly hurt his head, and finally he learned that his objet was older than his mother... and this was not the whole list of his misfortunes. Poor little thing, in other words, you don't know whether to laugh or cry.

His wound as well as his mind needed a rest. Leaving him alone and abed, I left his room and went out to take the air.

The thought about the everlasting young age of the woman haunted me. True, some humans look young for their age, for example, that foreigner, Mr Aboleo, who looked as young as his 20-year-old son, adoptive, most likely. I always bore my age well, looking today younger than I am, 10 years at least, but... 25! Against nature.

Salon Almodis. Salon Semiramis. Salon Almodis. No, I believed not. Neither Doctor Talvik nor another doctor could find an elixir of everlasting youth. Rather Doctor Talvik found Mlle Delamarche as the best face ever for his new business. And yet, what's her secret, in this case?

Poor little thing Clem. But... Poor little thing was me too, at the moments of the shocking vision of the damaged topi. The vision was real. Whether it was faked or it was my topi in fact, it was palpable, real and agonizingly unforgettable. Sent by an unknown hand, the thing suggested that someone wanted me like someone wanted Clem, his brothers and his mother, fooling them, teasing or doing something worse. Well then, in that event, I had no choice but to wait. No need to be in fidget and hurry about something obscure to me and to everyone around. To be waiting till the day and hour when the topi's sender appeared to voice his pretensions... The water of the Lake was too cold for bathing in the morning, but the sunshine could warm it by lunchtime. I looked at my wristwatch. Soon after noon. Time to swim.

My swimming in the cold water on the fine September day was a good physical conditioning. Nobody disturbed my solitude, which was nice and which suggested that nobody spied on me for the purpose of taking me by surprise.