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

you blackguard!” he said.

“What dreadful company to be mixed up with! Let me tell you, gentlemen, I’m too old to be treated like a schoolboy,” said Struve, tremulously, forgetting his usual bonhomie.

Borg, who had had enough to eat, rose from the table.

“Ugh!” he said, “what a beastly crowd you are! Pay, Isaac, I’ll pay you back later on; I’m going.”

He put on his overcoat, put his hat on his head, filled a tumbler with punch, added brandy to it, emptied it at one gulp, blew out some of the candles in passing, smashed a few of the glasses, pocketed a handful of cigars and a box of matches, and staggered out of the room.

“What a pity that such a genius should drink like that,” said Levi solemnly.

A moment later Borg re-entered the room, went to the dining-table, took the candelabrum, lighted his cigar, blew the smoke into Struve’s face, put out his tongue, showed his back teeth, extinguished the lights, and departed again. Levi rolled on the floor screaming with laughter.

“To what scum have you introduced me?” asked Falk gravely.

“Oh, my dear fellow, he’s intoxicated tonight, but he’s the son of Professor Dr.⁠ ⁠…”

“I didn’t ask who his father was, I asked who he was,” said Falk, cutting him short, “I understand now why you allow such a dog to bully you; but can you tell me why he associates with you?”

“I reserve my reply to all these futilities,” answered Struve stiffly.

“Do reserve it, but reserve it for yourself!”

“What’s the matter with you, brother Levi?” asked Struve officiously; “you look so grave.”

“It’s a great pity that a genius like Borg should drink so much,” replied Levi.

“How and when does he show his genius?” asked Falk.

“A man can be a genius without writing verse,” said Struve pointedly.

“I dare say; writing verse does not presuppose genius, nor is a man a genius if he behaves like a brute,” said Falk.

“Hadn’t we better pay and go?” remarked Struve, hurrying towards the door.

Falk and Levi paid. When they stepped into the street it rained and the sky was black; only the reflection of the gas-lit town faintly illuminated the sky. The coach had driven away; there was nothing left for them but to turn up their collars and walk.

They had gone as far as the skittle-alley, when they were startled by terrible yells above their heads.

“Curse you!” screamed a voice, and looking up they saw Borg rocking himself on one of the highest branches of a lime tree. The branch nearly touched the ground, but at the next moment it described a tremendous curve upwards.

“Oh! Isn’t it colossal!” screamed Levi. “Colossal!”

“What a madman,” smiled Struve, proud of his protégé.

“Come along, Isaac!” bellowed Borg, high up in the air, “come along, Jew, let’s borrow money from each other!”

“How much do you want?” asked Levi, waving his pocket book.

“I never borrow less than fifty!”

At the next moment Borg had slid to the ground and pocketed the note.

Then he took off his overcoat.

“Put it on again immediately!” commanded Struve.

“What do you say? I’m to put it on again? Who are you to order me about? What? Do you want a fight?”

He smashed his hat against the tree, took off coat and waistcoat, and let the rain beat on his shirt.

“Come here, you rascal! Let’s have a fight!”

He seized Struve round the waist, and, staggering backwards, both of them fell into the ditch.

Falk hurried away as fast as he could. And for a long time he could hear behind him outbursts of laughter and shouts of bravo. He could distinguish Levi’s voice yelling: “It’s divine, it’s colossal⁠—it’s colossal!” And Borg’s: “Traitor! Traitor!”

XX On the Altar

The clock in the Town-Hall Vaults of X-köping thundered the seventh hour of an October evening as the manager of the Municipal Theatre came in. He beamed as a toad may beam after a good meal; he looked happy, but his facial muscles, not accustomed to express such emotions, drew the skin into worried folds and disfigured him still more than usual. He nodded patronizingly to the little shrivelled headwaiter who was standing behind the bar counting the guests.

“Well, and how’s the world treating you?” screamed the manager in German⁠—he had dropped the habit of speaking long ago.

“Thank you!” replied the headwaiter in the same language, and as this was all the German the two gentlemen knew, the conversation was continued in Swedish.

“Well, what do you think of the lad Gustav? Wasn’t his Don Diego excellent? Don’t you admit that I can make actors? What?”

“There’s no denying that! Fancy, that boy! It’s quite true what you said, sir. It’s easier to do something with a man who hasn’t been ruined by book-learning.”

“Books are the ruin of a good many people. Nobody knows that better than I do. However, do you know anything about books? I do! You will see queer things when young Rehnhjelm plays Horatio! I’ve promised him the part, because he gave me no peace; but I’ve also warned him not to look to me for any assistance. I don’t want to be held responsible for his failure; I also told him that I was allowing him to play the part to show him how difficult it is to act when one has no talent. Oh! He shall have such a snub that he’ll never look at a part again. See if he won’t! But that isn’t what I want to say to you! Have you got two vacant rooms?”

“The two small ones?”

“Just so!”

“They’re at your disposal, sir!”

“Supper for two, the best you can do! You’d better do the waiting yourself.”

He did not shout the last few words; the headwaiter bowed; he had understood.

At this moment Falander entered the room. He took his accustomed seat without as much as a look at the manager. The latter rose immediately. “At eight then,” he whispered, as he passed the bar and went out.

The headwaiter brought Falander a bottle of absinthe, and all the usual trimmings. As the actor seemed