The Red Room - August Strindberg (best summer reads TXT) 📗

But Olle smiled a kindly smile, and his shirt front swelled with pleasure, so that the red braces could be plainly seen; he drank to Lundell and implored him to take an example from Sellén, and not forget the Land of Promise in lingering over the fleshpots of Egypt. He assured him that his friend, Olle, believed in his talent, that was to say, when he was himself and painted according to his own light; but whenever he humbugged and painted to please others he was worse than the rest; therefore he should look upon the altarpiece as a pot boiler which would put him into a position to follow his own inspiration in art.

Falk tried to seize the opportunity of finding out what Olle thought of himself and his own art, a puzzle which he had long vainly attempted to solve, when Ygberg walked into the Red Room. Everybody eagerly invited him to be his guest, for he had been forgotten during the last hot days, and everyone was anxious to show him that it had not been out of selfishness. But Olle searched in his right waistcoat pocket, and with a movement which he was anxious to hide from all eyes he slipped a rolled-up banknote into Ygberg’s coat pocket; the latter understood and acknowledged it by a grateful look.

Ygberg drank to Sellén; he said that one might consider, in one way, that Sellén’s fortune was made; but, on the other hand, one might consider, with equal justification, that it was not so. Sellén was not sufficiently developed; he still wanted many years’ study, for art was long, as he, Ygberg, had himself experienced. He had had nothing but ill-luck, therefore nobody could suspect him of envying a man of Sellén’s reputation.

The envy which peered through Ygberg’s words slightly clouded the sunny sky; but it was only for a moment, for everybody realized that the bitterness of a long, wasted life, must be held responsible for it.

All the more gladly Ygberg handed Falk a small newly printed essay, on the cover of which he beheld with consternation the black portrait of Ulrica Eleonora. Ygberg stated that he had delivered the manuscript on the day stipulated. Smith had taken Falk’s refusal with the greatest calm, and was now printing Falk’s poems.

To Falk’s eyes the gas-jets lost their brilliancy; he sat plunged in deep thought; his heart was too full to find vent in words. His poems were to be printed at Smith’s expense. This was proof that they were not without merit! The thought was sufficient food for the whole evening.

The evening passed quickly for the happy circle; the band ceased playing and the light was turned out; they were obliged to leave, but, finding the night far too young for breaking up, they strolled along the quays, amid endless conversation and philosophical discussions, until they were tired and thirsty. Lundell offered to take his friends to see Marie, where they could have some beer.

They turned towards the north and came to a street which gave on a fence; the fence enclosed a tobacco field, bordering on the open country. They stopped before a two-storied brick-house with a gable facing the street. From above the door grinned two sandstone faces whose ears and shins were lost in fantastic scrolls. Between the heads hung a sword and an axe. It was formerly the house of the executioner.

Lundell, apparently quite familiar with the neighbourhood, gave a signal before one of the windows on the ground floor; the blind was drawn up; the window opened, and a woman’s head looked out; a voice asked whether the caller was Albert? No sooner had Lundell owned to this, his nom de guerre, than a girl opened the door and, on the promise of silence, admitted the party. As the promise was readily given, the Red Room was soon in her apartment, and introduced to her under fictitious names.

The room was not a large one; it had once been the kitchen, and the range was still standing in its place. The furniture consisted of a chest of drawers, of a pattern usually found in servants’ rooms; on the drawers stood a looking-glass, swathed in a piece of white muslin; above the glass hung a coloured lithograph, representing the Saviour on the Cross. The chest was littered with small china figures, scent bottles, a prayer book, and an ash tray, and with its looking-glass and two lighted tallow candles seemed to form a little house altar. Charles XV, surrounded by newspaper cuttings, mostly representing police constables, those enemies of the Magdalenes, was riding on horseback on the wall above the folding sofa, which had not yet been converted into a bed. On the windowsill stood a stunted fuchsia, a geranium and a myrtle⁠—the proud tree of Aphrodite in the poor dwelling. A photograph album lay on the worktable. On the first leaf was a picture of the King, on the second and third papa and mamma⁠—poor country folk; on the fourth a student, the seducer; on the fifth, a baby; and on the sixth the fiancé, a journeyman. This was her history, so like the history of most of them. On a nail, close to the range, hung an elegant dress, a velvet cloak, and a hat with feathers⁠—the fairy disguise in which she went out to catch young men. The fairy herself was a tall, ordinary looking young woman of twenty-four. Recklessness and vigils had given her face that white transparency which as a rule distinguishes the untoiling rich, but her hands still showed traces of hard work. In her pretty dressing-gown, with her flowing hair down her back, she was the picture of a Magdalene; her manner was comparatively shy, but she was merry and courteous and on her best behaviour.

The party split up into groups, continued the interrupted discussions and started fresh ones. Falk, who now looked upon himself as a poet and was determined to be interested