Greifenstein | Page 3

mother there existed a great and wholly insurmountable
antipathy. She could not understand how Greifenstein could have
married such a woman. There was a mystery about it which she had
never fathomed. Greifenstein himself was a stern, silent man of military
appearance, a mighty hunter in the depths of the forest, a sort of
grizzled monument of aristocratic strength, tough as leather, courteous
in his manner, with that stiff courtesy that never changes under any
circumstances, rigid in his views, religious, loyal, full of the prejudices
that make the best subjects in a kingdom and the bitterest opponents of
all change.
In appearance and manner Frau von Greifenstein presented the most
complete contrast to her husband. She had been pretty, fair and

sprightly in her youth, she was now a faded blonde, full of strange
affectations and stilted sentiments. Possessing but indifferent taste, she
nevertheless devoted much time to the adornment of her person. She
was small of stature, but delicately made, and if her nervous desire to
please had granted to her outward personality a moment's repose during
the day, she might still have passed muster as a fairly good-looking
woman. Unfortunately she was animated by an unceasing activity in
trivial matters, and was rarely silent. Some women make one think of a
printed page in which there are too many italics, and too many useless
marks of exclamation. At first, their constant cries of admiration and
outbursts of enthusiasm produce a vague sense of uneasiness in the
listener, which soon develops to a feeling of positive distress and
generally ends in a real and deep-rooted dislike. At the beginning one
looks about anxiously for the object which could produce so grotesque
a smile. There is nothing, for the conversation has been as lead, but the
smile does not subside; it only passes through the endless variations
that succeed each other from the inane grin to the affected simper
which is meant to be tender. The whole face moves perpetually, as the
facial muscles of a corpse, excited by an electric current, seem to
parody all the expression of living human sentiment.
But Frau von Greifenstein was not in reality so foolish as might have
been thought. Her silliness was superficial. One part of her life had
been full of strange circumstances, and if the whole truth were told it
would appear that she had known how to extract a large amount of
personal advantage from situations which to many persons would have
seemed hopeless. She and her husband rarely left their castle in the
Black Forest, and it might naturally be supposed that their life there
was exceedingly dull and monotonous. In her own heart Clara von
Greifenstein recognised that her present luxurious retirement was a
paradise compared with the existence she must have led if she had not
known how to help herself at the right moment. During the earlier years
of her marriage, the recollection of her antecedents had been so painful
as to cause her constant anxiety, and at one time she had even gone so
far as to keep a sum of money about her, as though expecting to make a
sudden and unexpected journey. But five and twenty years and more
had passed, without bringing any untoward incident, and she felt

herself very secure in her position. Moreover a son had been born to
her and was growing up to be very like his father. Without Greif there
is no knowing what turn affairs might have taken, for although Clara's
husband maintained towards her the same stiffly considerate behaviour
which had always characterised him in their relations to each other, he
certainly admitted to himself that she was not growing old gracefully;
and it is even possible that, in some remote glen of the forest, his grave
features may have occasionally allowed themselves a look of sorrowful
regret, or even of actual repugnance, when he thought of his wife's
spasmodic smiles and foolish talk. Possibly, too, he may have
sometimes speculated upon her probable condition before she had
married her first husband, for he himself had found her a widow of
apparently little more than five and twenty years of age. But if any
suggestion at all derogatory to Greifenstein had presented itself to his
mind, his pride would assuredly have lost no time in smothering the
thought. Was she not the mother of Greif? And besides, if all were to
be told, was there not an unpleasantly dark spot in his own family, in
the shape of his half-brother, Kuno von Rieseneck? Indeed the
existence of Kuno von Rieseneck, concerning whom Clara knew
nothing, was the reason why Greifenstein had lived for so many years
in the country, only travelling outside of Germany when he travelled at
all. He wondered that his wife, being