The Torrents Of Spring

you… .’ And Frau Lenore half rose from her seat as though about to fall
at Sanin’s feet… . He restrained her.
‘Frau Lenore! For mercy’s sake! What are you doing?’
She clutched his hand impulsively. ‘You promise … ’
‘Frau Lenore, think a moment; what right have I … ’
‘You promise? You don’t want me to die here at once before your
eyes?’
Sanin was utterly nonplussed. It was the first time in his life he had
had to deal with any one of ardent Italian blood.
‘I will do whatever you like,’ he cried. ‘I will talk to Fräulein Gemma…
.’
Frau Lenore uttered a cry of delight.
‘Only I really can’t say what result will come of it … ’
‘Ah, don’t go back, don’t go back from your words!’ cried Frau Lenore
in an imploring voice; ‘you have already consented! The result is certain
to be excellent. Any way, I can do nothing more! She won’t listen to me!’
‘Has she so positively stated her disinclination to marry Herr Klüber?’
Sanin inquired after a short silence.
‘As if she’d cut the knot with a knife! She’s her father all over, Giovanni
Battista! Wilful girl!’
‘Wilful? Is she!’ … Sanin said slowly. ‘Yes … yes … but she’s an angel
too. She will mind you. Are you coming soon? Oh, my dear Russian
friend!’ Frau Lenore rose impulsively from her chair, and as impulsively
clasped the head of Sanin, who was sitting opposite her. ‘Accept a mother’s
blessing – and give me some water!’
Sanin brought Signora Roselli a glass of water, gave her his word of
honour that he would come directly, escorted her down the stairs to the
street, and when he was back in his own room, positively threw up his
arms and opened his eyes wide in his amazement.
‘Well,’ he thought, ‘well, now life is going round in a whirl! And it’s
whirling so that I’m giddy.’ He did not attempt to look within, to realise
what was going on in himself: it was all uproar and confusion, and that
was all he knew! What a day it had been! His lips murmured unconsciously:
‘Wilful … her mother says … and I have got to advise her …
her! And advise her what?’
Sanin, really, was giddy, and above all this whirl of shifting sensations
and impressions and unfinished thoughts, there floated continually the
image of Gemma, the image so ineffaceably impressed on his memory on
that hot night, quivering with electricity, in that dark window, in the
light of the swarming stars!
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