Page:Buddenbrooks vol 2 - Mann (IA buddenbrooks0002mann).pdf/35

RV 25 (BUDDENBROOKS) looking to right or left, with gaze directed toward the ground. They take, according to instructions, the route marked out by the election. And it is not in the direction of Sand Street! They have turned to the right—they are going down Broad Street!

The lady in the veil cannot believe her eyes. However, all about her, people are seeing just what she sees; they are pushing on after the beadles, and saying to each other: “It isn’t Hagenström, it’s Buddenbrook!” And a group of gentlemen emerge from the portal, in excited conversation, and hurry with rapid steps down Broad Street, to be the first to offer congratulations.

Then the lady holds her cloak together and runs for it. She runs, indeed, as seldom lady runs. Her veil blows up, revealing her flushed face—no matter for that; and one of her furred goloshes keeps flapping open in the sloppy snow and hindering her frightfully: yet she outruns them all! She gains the house at the corner of Bakers’ Street, she rings the alarm-bell at the vestibule-door—fire, murder, thieves!—she shouts at the maid who opens: “They're coming, Kathrin, they’re coming,” takes the stairs, and storms into the living-room, Her brother himself sits there, certainly a little pale. He puts down his paper and makes a gesture, almost as if to ward her off. But she puts her arms about him, and repeats: “They’re coming, Tom, they're coming! You are the man—and Hermann Hagenström is out!”

That was Friday. On the following day, Senator Buddenbrook stood in the Council Hall, in the seat of the deceased James Möllendorpf, and in the presence of the City Fathers there assembled, and the Delegation of Burgesses, he took the oath: “I will conscientiously perform the duties of my office, strive with all my power for the good of the State, faithfully obey the Constitution, honourably pursue the public weal, and in the discharge of my office, regard neither my own advantage nor that of my relatives and friends. I will

RV 25 (25)