At the University (eBook)

Theodor Storm (Autor)

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2023 | 1. Auflage
91 Seiten
neobooks Self-Publishing (Verlag)
978-3-7549-8829-9 (ISBN)

Infos

I didn't have a sister who could have introduced me to girls my own age, but I went to dance school. It was held twice a week in the hall of the town hall, which was also the mayor's flat. Together with the mayor's son, my most loyal comrade, there were eight of us dancers, all of whom were secondary students at the Latin School in our home town. Only with regard to the dancers did a seemingly insurmountable difficulty initially arise; the eighth professional lady could not be procured.

Hans Theodor Woldsen Storm (* 14 September 1817 in Husum, Duchy of Schleswig; ? 4 July 1888 in Hanerau-Hademarschen) was a German writer. His poetry and prose make him one of the most important representatives of poetic realism. Storm is best known for his novellas, but he saw himself first and foremost as a lyricist and regarded poems as the origin of his stories. Thomas Westphal (* 1980) lives and works as a translator in Rostock, Germany.

Textauszug

Chapter 2

The next day, as Fritz confided to me, Mrs Beauregard had been to his mother's house, rummaged around in the wardrobe with her for some time and then left the house with a well-filled parcel.

Wednesday evening was the dance lesson. I had only got the varnished shoes with steel buckles and the new jacket from the cobbler and tailor at the last moment and found everything already assembled when I stepped into the hall. My comrades were standing at the window around the old dance master, who was strumming his fingers on his violin while accepting the wishes of his young scholars. Our dancers walked up and down the hall in groups, their arms intertwined.

Leonore was not among them; she stood alone not far from the door and glared at the lively chattering girls, who seemed to feel so free and unhindered in the strange noble house and did not care about her at all.

Nothing is more selfish and merciless than youth. But immediately after me the mayoress had entered. After greeting the young company and, as Fritz put it, casting one of her general glances around the hall, she strode up to Lore and took her by the hand. "To make the couples fit together!" she said to the dancing master. "Shunt the cavaliers once!" - Then, while the latter obeyed her order, she turned to the girls and began the same procedure with them. The blonde postmaster's daughter was the longest, almost a head taller than all the others. She was lined up against the wall opposite us; not then was the matter in doubt. "I don't know, Charlott'," said the mayoress, "you or Lore! I don't seem to care much about you!"

The person addressed, the daughter of the chamberlain and bailiff, retirred a step. "Mamsell Lore will probably be the taller one," she said lightly.

"Well, little madam," cried my friend's mother, "come out of your corner and have a little chat with Mamsell Lore!"

And the little lady had to come out and compete dos-à-dos with the tailor's daughter; but - I kept a sharp eye on it - she still knew how to do it in such a way that she barely touched the dark head of the craftsman's daughter with hers.

The young lady was dressed in light colours; Lenore wore a black and red striped woollen dress, with a white pile scarf around her neck. The clothes were almost too dark; she looked strange; but it suited her well.

The mayor eyed the two girls. "Charlott," she said, "you've always been the champion; be careful she doesn't outshine you; she looks like it to me."

I felt as if I saw the girl's black eyes flash at these words.

After a while, the pairs were formed. I was second in the line of boys, and Lore became my lady. She smiled as she placed her hand in mine. "We want to dance them around and around!" I said - and we kept our word. First of all, a mazurka was to be practised, and already at the end of this first lesson, because one tour wouldn't go, our old maestro tapped the violin lid with his bow: "Little Beauregard! Mr. Philipp! Go ahead once!" And while he played and sang the melody at the same time, we danced - it was no art to dance with her, I don't think anyone could have failed; but the old gentleman shouted one enthusiastic "Bravo!" after another, and the brave Frau Bürgermeisterin leaned far back in her sofa, smiling with pleasure, where she had sat as an attentive spectator since the beginning of the lesson.

Miss Charlotte had fallen to my friend Fritz as a partner, and her lively nature, as I was pleased to notice, soon seemed to make him forget his initial enthusiasm for the tailor's daughter. But as I now regarded the latter as my property, so to speak, I was jealous of my lady's beauty and elegance, and a lingering glance from her impeccably dressed rival, which my eyes had followed, had taught me that the protector of the beautiful girl had nevertheless not considered one thing sufficiently. The gloves were too big for those slender hands; they had obviously already been washed.

The next morning, as soon as I came out of class, I couldn't rest. I made my way over the cupboard where my tin money box was kept and dug and shook until I had worked a hard thaler out of the crevice next to the red cloth tongue. Then I ran into a shop. - "I wanted little gloves!" I said, not without trepidation.

The shop boy cast an expert glance at my hand. "Number six!" he said as he placed the box of gloves on the table. "Give me number five!" I remarked meekly.

"Number five? - I guess it won't fit!" and he started to stretch the gloves over my hand.

It rose boiling hot to my face. "They're not meant for me!" said I, regretting more than ever the want of a sister on whom I could have brought the bargain. But I was delighted with the little gloves with the white silken ribbons that now lay spread out before me. I bought two pairs, and soon after leaving the shop I had picked up a boy from the street. "Take this to the Lore Beauregard," I said, "a greeting from the Lady Mayoress, here would be the gloves for the dancing lesson! And then bring me word; I'll wait for you here at the corner."

After ten minutes the boy was back.

"Well?"

"I gave them to the old woman."

"What did the old woman say?"

"It would be too much; after all, Madam Mayoress would have sent a couple this morning."

Good! I thought; that way she wouldn't notice.

At the next dance lesson, Lore wore the new gloves; I don't know whether they were mine or the mayor's, but they fitted her slender wrist like a glove; and now no one looked more distinguished than Lore in her dark dress.

The lessons now went their even course. After the mazurka had been practised, it was time for a counter dance, in which Fritz and Lore danced together. - Only with the long Jenni, who was the oldest and, I believe, the cleverest of them, did I see them sitting together talking a few times; even on the way home, which was common to both of them except for a short distance, Jenni probably put her arm on the tailor's daughter's arm once. Otherwise she was usually alone between dances, unless the old teacher came up to her with his violin and showed her one or two ballet dances from the days of his youth in order to initiate his darling into the extreme subtleties of the art. I often glanced furtively over at her as she listened apparently impassively to the old man, only occasionally opening her black eyes at him or silently and only suggestively imitating one of his artificial figures. But when we arrived and the maestro began to play his violin, things changed. True, she seemed to think of nothing less than the steps and turns of the dance, it was almost as if her eyes were gazing into distant horizons; but while her thoughts seemed far away, her mouth smiled, and her little feet skimmed the floor soundlessly and playfully. - "Lore, where are you?" I must have asked then, as I held out my hand to her in the tour. - "Me?" she cried, stroking back her black hair as if rising from dreams, while the turn of the dance had already snatched her away from me again. - Even now, when I hear the Spanish dance in Silcher's foreign folk melodies, I can only ever think of her.

It was somewhat of a hindrance - I won't deny it - that ever since the dance lessons, the French tailor had graced me with a conspicuous favour. Wherever he met me, in the street or on the footpaths, he tried to confront me and strike up a conversation with me that was as loud and long as possible. The very first time he told me that his grandfather had been a stove heater in the Tuileries under Louis seize.

"Yes, Monsieur Philipp," he said with a sigh, and presented me with his porcelain snuff-box, "that's how a family can come down! - But my lore - you understand me, Monsieur Philipp!" - He pulled a motley snuff cloth from his pocket and dried his little black eyes. "What do you want! I am a poor fellow, but the child - - she is my bijou, the idol of my heart!" And at this he blinked and gave me such a fatherly look, as if he intended to take me into the run-down family too.

In the meantime, the last dance lesson was approaching, which was to be extended into a small ball. The parents had been invited to see us dance; of mine, however, only my mother had accepted, my father was kept away from all socialising by his profession as a doctor and district physicist. As my impatience did not allow me any peace as soon as the evening dawned, I entered the hall before the appointed hour, in which all the candles were burning today on the sconces and in the glass crowns. As I looked around, I noticed Lore standing alone at a window with her back to me. She visibly flinched at the sound of the door closing, while she seemed to be hurriedly trying to slip a golden jewel off her hand. When I came to her, I saw that it was a bracelet, the lock of which she was trying in vain...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 19.1.2023
• Verlagsort: Berlin
• Sprache: deutsch
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Klassiker / Moderne Klassiker
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Romane / Erzählungen
• Schlagworte: Classic • German • Love
• ISBN-10: 3-7549-8829-8 / 3754988298
• ISBN-13: 978-3-7549-8829-9 / 9783754988299