Like a mere line of blackness, thin of limb and waist, attired with nun-like austerity in garments that hung as if withering upon her, she stood against the background of autumnal splendour.
Now she recognised him, too. A sudden redness that at once gave way to lifeless pallor flashed across her delicate, stern face.
They looked straight into each other"s eyes.
He bowed deeply. She smiled with an effort at indifference.
"And so she is faded, too," he thought. To be sure, her face still bore the stamp of a simple and severe beauty, but time and grief had dealt ungently with it. The lips were pale and anaemic, two or three folds, sharp as if made with a knife, surrounded them. About the eyes, whose soft and lambent light of other days had turned into a hard and troubled sharpness, spread concentric rings, united by a net-work of veins and wrinkles.
He stood still, lost in thought, and looked after her.
She still trod the earth like a queen, but her outline was detestable.
Only hopelessness bears and attires itself thus.
He calculated. She must be thirty-six. Thirteen years ago he had known her and--loved her? Perhaps....
At least he had left her the evening before their formal betrothal was to take place because her father had dared to remark upon his way of life.
He loved his personal liberty more than his beautiful and wealthy betrothed who clung to him with every fibre of her delicate and n.o.ble soul. One word from her, had it been but a word of farewell, would have recalled him. That word remained unspoken.
Thus her life"s happiness had been wrecked. Perhaps his, too. What did it matter?
Since then he had nothing but contempt for the daughters of good families. Other women were less exacting; they did not attempt to circ.u.mscribe his freedom.
He gazed after her long. Now groups of other pedestrians intervened; now her form reappeared sharp and narrow against the trees. From time to time she stooped lovingly toward the old lady, who, as is the wont of aged people, trod eagerly and fearfully.
This fragile heap of bones, with the dull eyes and the sharp voice--he remembered the voice well: it had had part in his decision. This strange, unsympathetic, suspicious old woman, he would have had to call "Mother."
What madness! What hypocrisy!
And yet his hunger for happiness, which had not yet died, reminded him of all that might have been.
A sea of warm, tender and unselfish love would have flooded him and fructified and vivified the desert of his soul. And instead of becoming withered and embittered, she would have blossomed at his side more richly from day to day.
Now it was too late. A long, thin, wretched little creature--she went her way and was soon lost in the distance.
But there clung to his soul the yearning for a woman--one who had more of womanliness than its name and its body, more than the harlot whom he kept because he was too slothful to drive her from him.
He sought the depths of his memory. His life had been rich in gallant adventures. Many a full-blooded young woman had thrown herself at him, and had again vanished from his life under the compulsion of his growing coldness.
He loved his liberty. Even an unlawful relation felt like a fetter so soon as it demanded any sacrifice of time or interests. Also, he did not like to give less than he received. For, since the pa.s.sing of his unscrupulous youth, he had not cared to receive the gift of a human destiny only to throw it aside as his whim demanded.
And therefore his life had grown quiet during the last few years.
He thought of one of his last loves ... the very last ... and smiled.
The image of a delicately plump brunette little woman, with dreamy eyes and delicious little curls around her ears, rose up before him.
She dwelt in his memory as she had seemed to him: modest, soulful, all ecstatic yielding and charming simple-heartedness.
She did not belong to society. He had met her at a dinner given by a financial magnate. She was the wife of an upper clerk who was well respected in the business world. With adoring curiosity, she peeped into the great strange world, whose doors opened to her for the first time.
He took her to the table, was vastly entertained by the lack of sophistication with which she received all these new impressions, and smilingly accepted the undisguised adoration with which she regarded him in his character of a famous horseman and rake.
He flirted with her a bit and that turned her head completely. In lonely dreams her yearning for elegant and phantastic sin had grown to enormity. She was now so wholly and irresistibly intoxicated that he received next morning a deliciously scribbled note in which she begged him for a secret meeting--somewhere in the neighbourhood of the _Arkona Place_ or _Weinmeisterstra.s.se_, regions as unknown to him as the North Cape or Yokohama.
Two or three meetings followed. She appeared, modest, anxious and in love, a bunch of violets for his b.u.t.ton-hole in her hand, and some surprise for her husband in her pocket.
Then the affair began to bore him and he refused an appointment.
One evening, during the last days of November, she appeared, thickly veiled, in his dwelling, and sank sobbing upon his breast. She could not live without seeing him; she was half crazed with longing; he was to do with her what he would. He consoled her, warmed her, and kissed the melting snow from her hair. But when in his joy at what he considered the full possession of a jewel his tenderness went beyond hers, her conscience smote her. She was an honest woman. Horror and shame would drive her into her grave if she went hence an adulteress.
He must have pity on her and be content with her pure adoration.
He had the requisite pity, dismissed her with a paternal kiss upon her forehead, but at the same time ordered his servant to admit her no more.
Then came two or three letters. In her agony over the thought of losing him, she was willing to break down the last reserve. But he did not answer the letters.
At the same time the thought came to him of going up the Nile in a dahabiyeh. He was bored and had a cold.
On the evening of his departure he found her waiting in his rooms.
"What do you want?"
"Take me along."
"How do you know?"
"Take me along."
She said nothing else.
The necessity of comforting her was clear. A thoroughgoing farewell was celebrated, with the understanding that it was a farewell forever.
The pact had been kept. After his return and for two years more she had given no sign of life. He now thought of this woman. He felt a poignant longing for the ripe sweetness of her oval face, the veiled depth of her voice. He desired once more to be embraced by her firm arms, to be kissed by her mad, hesitating lips.
Why had he dropped her? How could he have abandoned her so rudely?
The thought came into his head of looking her up now, in this very hour.
He had a dim recollection of the whereabouts of her dwelling. He could soon ascertain its exact situation.
Then again the problems of his racing stable came into his head. The thought of "Maidenhood," the newly purchased horse, worried him. He had staked much upon one throw. If he lost, it would take time to repair the damage.
Suddenly he found himself in a tobacconist"s shop, looking for her name in the directory. _Friedrich-Wilhelm Stra.s.se_ was the address.
Quite near, as he had surmised.
He was not at loss for an excuse. Her husband must still be in his office at this hour. He would not be asked for any very strict accounting for his action. At worst there was an approaching riding festival, for which he could request her cooperation.
Perhaps she had forgotten him and would revenge herself for her humiliation. Perhaps she would be insulted and not even receive him.