From: Emmental, Bessarabia
21 January 1912
In Issue #23 of the paper, I noticed that one correspondent came to my defense on behalf of my article about a bad woman to prevent any injustice against my person from one or the other female reader. It could have happened easily, but the nice man hinted to them to look up Solomon’s verse and apparently they did so.
Further, I read in #24 about another correspondent, who is claiming that the bad women are hurt because of my article, although he confirms that it was well deserved. But he had to atone for it since his wife belongs also to the bad kind. I’m very sorry about that, but since it was my fault I want to tell this esteemed man and all the readers of this paper, that just the bad women are the best; you just have to know how to live with them after the marriage protocol. Probably many readers and some of the beautiful female readers want to know what kind of protocol that might be and what is the matter with it.
For them the following:
Monter was working as a bookkeeper in a big bank. There were many other employees in the bank with him. This young man stood one day at the window of his office, looking miserably out onto the garden where the cold November wind was driving the last leaves in a crazy dance.
After looking for a while on the cheerless garden, he turned suddenly and threw a gloomy glance at the calendar on the wall beside his desk and realized it showed the date of 10 November. He sighed deeply: “My wedding day. Today, one year ago, at this hour – oh, how lovely matrimony seemed to me at that time. Ziska was so gentle, like an angel and looked as if she could speak only words of love and tenderness. How could she develop such eloquence for hour-long lectures?” Again a deep sigh, even heavier than the one before, so loud that the senior bookkeeper Romandaal turned to him, remarking with a mocking smile, ”Now Mr. Monter, it seems you are not in the right mood for work today.”
“It is only because today is the anniversary of my wedding day,” was the gloomy answer.
“It is the first, right?” asked the old bookkeeper who was on good terms with the young man. “Is one year after your wedding enough to make you sigh? Well, well my dear, does a woman’s love make the house so uncomfortable?”
“Oh yes, that can happen,” slipped out of the young man, but hastening to correct himself he said apologetically: “That means, I don’t have any complaints but she talks a little too much.”
“Well, I know that it is a trait in women and then men have to endure some lectures.”
“Yes,” said Gerhard Monter, “even for hours without end, and why? For nothing but minor points. For instance when I come from the pub an hour late or do not arrive in time for our meals, or…”
“Now, my dear young friend,” the old man remarked, “is your wife always so wrong? I know that you stay too long in the pub in the evenings.”
“That is no reason to be so agitated with me,” the young man defended himself. “The eternal nagging is what is peeving me.”
The old bookkeeper smiled. “Apparently you don’t keep a marriage protocol?”
“A marriage protocol?” repeated Gerhard wondering. “What is that?”
“An innocent and simple cure. You must keep a book and write on top “Marriage Protocol” and keep it always under lock and key. If your wife finds it, she will certainly throw it into the fire. As soon as your wife starts to grumble and ticking you off, you must get the book and write down everything she says. The main and strong words you must underline, that way the eye will be caught more easily. You understand what I mean, my dear friend? So you’ll do it day after day. But at certain times, for instance on the first day of a month and when your wife is again nagging, you must take out the book and read it to her word for word. I assure you that will help in some time.” The old gentleman bent down on his books again to show that he didn’t want to be disturbed any further.
And so Monter took up his pen again and worked eagerly. After a while his gloomy face lit up. He pondered the advice of his old friend. The more he thought about it, the more his hope was growing. When the bell rung for lunch, he took his hat and walking stick and went slowly to his home, but in passing he went into a shop and bought a fat, solid book with many beautiful white pages.
Franziska Monter was a quick busy woman, but had a hint of severity around her mouth, which wouldn’t fit into her lovely face. You couldn’t see from her fresh red lips that they could pour out such a flood of angry not always well-chosen words. Even in this moment her forehead was clouded and her lips were turned down when she looked at the clock and saw it already showed a quarter past one. She was waiting very impatiently for her husband who came in eventually.
“Are you already here, you runaway,” was the biting reception from the little woman. “It seems you were sitting again with your drinking companions in the pub, you boozer. And now it is a whole quarter of an hour late. Of course, you don’t mind it when the clock is ringing one o’clock and your wife is waiting for you?”
Instead of an answer, Gerhard Monter nodded at his wife and pulled the book out of his coat pocket. He sat down at the table without a single word of explanation to his astonished and angry looking wife, and wrote on the first page of the book: “Tuesday, 10 November - Runaway, drinking companion, idler.”
But Mrs. Monter wasn’t finished yet with her lecture and carried on. “Shall the expensive food, which I have prepared with so much work and care, waste totally every noon?” It was strange, because he had put down all the nice remarks about him in the protocol; they didn’t hurt him so much as usual. Calling over her shoulder a last “Arch-Idler” Franziska hurried back into the kitchen. Gerhard looked a bit baffled, seeing the word “Arch-Idler” written in his best hand and underlined on the first page of his book – really, it looked much better.
The next days brought much material for his protocol. On the 12th of the month, there were already some pages full with his narrow script. A single lecture alone was good for four pages. Usually, Gerhard Monter on such occasions gave angry answers, but now he was too busy with writing down what his wife was saying and being careful that he didn’t forget a word. He didn’t answer his wife and after a while her lectures were becoming shorter.
When the last day of the month came closer, the protocol was 39 pages long. Gerhard Monter was looking forward to the 1st of December like a child to Christmas Eve. The knock over of the saltcellar, which was his fault at their table, was again the reason for a small outbreak.
Here is a gap, no continuity to the next page.
He didn’t know what was driving her, but she was listening silently when her husband explained: “In this book I wrote down, day for day all the names my beloved wife, Franziska Monter, nee Daivenaard, was calling me. Tuesday, 10 November: Runaway, drinking companion, idler, terrible egotist, Arch-Idler. Wednesday, 11 November: You are not worth the sun’s rays that shine on you. Boozing is more important to you. If you are sitting in the pub, you can’t stand up again. You are the least solid man under the sun, a first class idler.”
He carried on like this for more than an hour. Franziska listened to the list of words and idioms, which were less than loving and not worth that of an educated woman. Did she say all that? – Impossible, but it was written down black on white. When Gerhard finished she stood up, holding her apron to her eyes and ran crying out of the room.
“It worked,” cheered here husband. “A lucky idea.”
“Watch out, you must not stop here,” admonished him the old bookkeeper Romandaal, when Monter told him the following morning joyful about the result of the first try. “You must carry on, if not, it will not work.” Gerhard promised to do so and he kept his word.