Benda's absence lasted for hardly a year. His mother had not accompanied
him this time. She was not feeling well, and there was some danger that
she was losing her eyesight.
After his return he took to silent brooding. Though he never said a word
to his mother about the disappointment he had experienced, she knew
precisely what he had gone through, and spared him the humiliation that
would have followed any questions she might have asked.
He was oppressed by the memories the house awakened in him. Forgotten
pictures became living ones. The figure of the murdered woman appeared
in the nighttime on the balcony. Her shadow fell upon him, nestled up to
him in fact, as he sat at his writing-desk.
There were a great many things that still bound him to her whose spirit
had vanished from the earth, though her body remained.
It was impossible for him to forget her gentle look or the coyness of
her hands. He knew her fate; he knew her soul. But he was condemned to
silence. To withdraw from contact with the world and into the deepest of
loneliness had been her lot; it had also been his. At present it was
possible to get only one picture of her, the one her brother had given:
she sat in her cell and combed her yellow hair.
He held no one responsible; he blamed no one. He merely regretted that
men are as they are.
A former university friend of his came in, and tried to get him
interested in collaborating on a great scientific work. He declined. As
soon as his colleague of other days had gone, he visualised to himself
the entire conversation: The man was affable and insistent; and yet
there was in his very being an underground, enigmatic hostility. It was
the hostility he invariably felt whenever he had anything to do, either
of a purely external, business nature or in a social way, with men of
other faith. The least he had to fear was a prejudiced inimicality, as
if the individual in question were on the point of calling out to him:
You stay on that side, I'll stay on this. Keep off the bridge.
He was fully aware of this, but his pride forbade his fighting against
it. He renounced his natural right to life and a living. He declined the
university conceded privilege of co-existence. To go out and actually
win for himself the right to participate in the inevitable contest of
forces, or to secure even this poor privilege by supplication, or to
defend it by argument, or to cajole it into his possession by political
wiles, seemed to him contrary to reason and at odds with common sense.
He would not do it.
He refused to knock at the door which he himself had bolted and
barricaded.
From this self-imposed embarrassment he suffered to an almost
intolerable degree. It was the irrational and fraudulent phase of
matters that made him suffer. Did men act as they did because they were
so strong in their faith? Not at all. Did he believe in those racial
differences which made them believe? Not at all. He felt at home on the
soil that nourished him; he felt under obligations to the weal and woe
of his people; he was bound heart and soul to the best of them, and
realised that he had been spiritually developed by their language,
ideas, and ideals.
Everything else was a lie. They knew that it was a lie too, but out of
his pride they forged a weapon and turned it against him. To deny his
relationship to them, a relationship that had been proved by his
achievements and enthusiasm, was a part of their plan; it was also a
part of their evil designs.
To strike up acquaintances, seek out congenial companions, or take an
active part in social organisations was repulsive to him. He did not
care to be dragged into fruitless and empty community of effort or
social co-operation. Defiant and alone, he explained his case to
himself. Since it merely intensified his agony to compare his lot with
that of others who seemed to be similarly situated, he did not do it. He
avoided in truth all reflections that might have made the world appear
to him as having at least a semblance of justice.
He was consequently filled with a longing which took more definite
shape day by day, and finally developed into a positive and irrevocable
decision.
About this time he made the acquaintance of Daniel, and through him he
came to know other people. He saw at once that there was something
unusual about Daniel; that there was something in him which he had never
before noticed in any one. Even his outer distress was a challenge to
greater activity, while his inner agitation never permitted his
associates to rest in idle peace.
It was not easy to be of assistance to him; he rejected all gifts which
he could not repay. He had to be convinced first of his duty and
indebtedness to the friend whom fate had made cross his path. And even
then he stood out for the privilege of being theoretically ungrateful.
Benda and his mother succeeded in getting him a position as a tutor in
some private families. He had to give piano lessons to young boys and
girls. The compensation was not great, but it at least helped him out
for the time being.
After the day's work was done, the evenings and nights bound the two
more and more firmly together.