Konrad and Alexandra (pdf) - Rolf Gross

Meeting Clara Westhoff
München and Berg, 1905
A large, generous mouth, thick, dark brows, gray eyes tinged with a trace of sadness, a
pronounced chin—her features struck Alexandra as coarse. Mrs. Dahl introduced them, Clara
Westhoff, Alexandra Rost. Distracted, Alexandra thought, it can’t be, I associate fine-boned,
graceful women with that name. This Clara was, though slender, an imposing person, taller
than herself. Her large feet! Hands like a man’s!
Clara scrutinized Alexandra with her enigmatic eyes. Not unfriendly, but out of some
deeply hidden reserve.
Her warm, resonant alto-voice came as a complete surprise. "Claudia has mentioned
you to me. You are Nikos’ older sister? You just returned from two weeks in Florence, how
wonderful."
Mrs. Dahl explained. "Clara is a sculptress, she has just spent six months working with
Rodin in Paris. I have long wanted to bring you two beautiful women together. Clara has a
charming daughter, Ruth, a year younger than Otto."
Alexandra, used to being the center of attention, if only for her appearance, felt selfconscious
and defensive. Clara occupied a large emotional space, yet the sadness that
surrounded her contradicted the impression of emotional strength.
Mrs. Dahl abandoned the usual mixed seating order at the dinner table and placed them
next to each other. Alexandra tried to shake off the Clara's spell and said. "Being a sculptor,
you must know Florence well. It was my second visit to that city, and I still have not seen half of
it. We drove to Florence in Friedrich’s new automobile, which gave us a chance to also explore
Tuscany."
"I hear you learned how to drive. Claudia is consumed by envy, right Claudia?" Clara
laughed unexpectedly freely, without giving herself away.
Claudia blushed and glanced admiringly at Alexandra.
Friedrich, with an ironic smile, keenly watched the competition between Alexandra and
Clara.
Alexandra self-consciously continued her attempt at winning over austere Clara. "Our
journey to Italy was a real adventure. In Florence we stayed with a couple, dear friends of ours,
who own a secluded villa in Fiesole. Walter is an art dealer in Renaissance paintings, an
excellent cicerone for Tuscany. He has a resolutely practical American wife, Sally, without
whom he would be lost. Claudia would fit Walter better than I, I am much too brusque and
forward for the refined, old gentleman."
Clara asked where they had been.
Alexandra described their rides, the dusty roads through the intimate landscape, the
abstract checkerboard of yellow mustard fields and the bright green vineyards that looked like
they had been combed, plots of newly sprouted grain, rows of cypresses along the paths
across the rolling hills, lonely farm houses, a profusion of iris on the roadside, red-roofed
houses closely stacked into towns, always on hilltops, misty blue mountains on the horizon.
Clara’s gray eyes grew lively. "How well you picture this landscape. You must truly love
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