Fräulein Schmidt and Mr. AnstrutherVon Arnim, Elizabeth
General
Fräulein Schmidt and Mr. Anstruther
Von Arnim, Elizabeth
British -- Germany -- Fiction; Epistolary fiction; Germany -- Fiction; Love stories; Young women -- Fiction
fibrous bulk, most convenient in this form, should be applied; and, like
the roasted Sunday goose of our fleshlier days in Rauchgasse, the
vegetarian goes about stuffed with apples. Meanwhile there are no
apples, and I know not whither I must turn in search of bulk. Do you
think that in another week I shall be strong enough to write to you?
Yours sincerely,
ROSE-MARIE SCHMIDT.
XXXVII
Galgenberg, July 28th.
Dear Mr. Anstruther,--This is a most sweet evening, dripping, quiet,
after a rainy day, with a strip of clear yellow sky behind the pine
trees on the crest of the hill. I gathered up my skirts and went down
through the soaked grass to where against the fence there is a divine
straggly bush of pink China roses. I wanted to see how they were getting
on after their drenching; and as I stood looking at them in the calm
light, the fence at the back of them sodden into dark greens and blacks
that showed up every leaf and lovely loose wet flower, a robin came and
sat on the fence near me and began to sing. You will say: Well, what
next? And there isn't any next; at least, not a next that I am likely to
make understandable. It was only that I felt extraordinarily happy. You
will say: But why? And if I were to explain, at the end you would still
be saying Why? Well, you cannot see my face while I am writing to you,
so that I have been able often to keep what I was really thinking safely
covered up, but you mustn't suppose that my letters have always exactly
represented my state of mind, and that my soul has made no pilgrimages
during this half year. I think it has wandered thousands of miles. And
often while I wrote scolding you, or was being wise and complacent, or
sprightly and offensive, often just then the tired feet of it were
bleeding most as they stumbled among the bitter stones. And this evening
I felt that the stones were at an end, that my soul has come home to me
again, securely into my keeping, glad to be back, and that there will be
no more effort needed when I look life serenely in the face. Till now
there was always effort. That I talk to you about it is the surest sign
that it is over. The robin's singing, the clear light behind the pines,
the dripping trees and bushes, the fragrance of the wet roses, the
little white house, so modest and hidden, where Papa and I are going to
be happy, the perfect quiet after a stormy day, the perfect peace after
discordant months,--oh, I wanted to say thank you for each of these
beautiful things. Do you remember you gave me a book of Ernest Dowson's
poems on the birthday I had while you were with us? And do you remember
his
Now I will take me to a place of peace,
Forget my heart's desire--
In solitude and prayer work out my soul's release?
It is what I feel I have done.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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