I
Despite the rain, Daniel and Benda strolled around the city moat until
midnight.
The very thing that lay heaviest on Daniel's heart, as was obvious from
the expression on his face, he never mentioned. He told of his work, his
travels in connection with the old manuscripts, his position as organist
and in the conservatory, but all in such a general, detached, and
distraught way, so tired and bewildered, that Benda was filled with an
embarrassed anguish that made courteous attention difficult if not
impossible.
In order to get him to talk more freely, Benda remarked that he had not
heard of the death of Gertrude and Eleanore until his return. He said he
was terribly pained to hear of it, and, try as he might, he could not
help but brood over it. But he had no thought of persuading Daniel to
give him the mournful details. He merely wished to convince himself that
Daniel had become master of the anguish he had gone through,--master of
it at least inwardly.
Instead of making a direct and logical reply, Daniel said with a
twitching of his lips: "Yes, I know, you have been here for quite a
while already. Inwardly I was surprised at your silence. But it is not
easy to start up a renewed friendship with such a problematic creature
as I am."
"You know you are wrong when you say that," responded Benda calmly, "and
therefore I refuse to explain my long waiting. You never were
problematic to me, nor are you now. I find you at this moment just as
true and whole as you always were, despite the fact that you avoid me,
crouch before me, barricade yourself against me."
Daniel's breast heaved as if in the throes of a convulsion. He said
falteringly: "First let that old confidence return and grow. I must
first become accustomed to the thought that there is a man near me who
feels with me, sympathises with me, understands me. To be sure, you want
me to talk. But I cannot talk, at least not of those things about which
you would like to hear. I am afraid: I shudder at the thought; I have
forgotten how; words mock me, make me feel ashamed. Even when I have
good dreams, I personally am as happily and blessedly silent in them as
the beast of the field. I shudder at the thought of reaching down into
my soul and pulling out old, rusty things and showing them to
you--mouldy fruit, slag, junk--showing them to you, you who knew me when
all within me was crystal."
He fixed his eyes on the clouds and then continued: "But there is
probably another means, Friedrich. Look, friend, look! It was always
your affair to look, to behold. Look, but see to it that you do not make
me writhe before you like a worm in the dust! And when you have
looked--wisdom needs only one spoken word for ten that are unspoken.
This one word you will surely draw from me."
Benda, deeply moved, remained silent: "Is it the fault of a woman?" he
asked gently, as they crossed the drawbridge and entered the desolate
old door leading to the castle.
"The fault of a woman? No! Not really the fault of a woman. It is rather
the fault of a man--my fault. Many a fate reaches the decisive point in
happiness, many not until coloured with guilt. And guilt is bitter. The
fault of a woman!" he repeated, in a voice that threw off a gruesome
echo in the vaulted arch of the gateway to the castle. "There is to be
sure a woman there; and when one has anything to do with her, he finds
himself with nothing left but his eyes for weeping."
They left the gateway. Benda laid one hand on Daniel's shoulder, and
pointed in silence at the sky with the other. There were no stars to be
seen; nothing but clouds. Benda however had the stars in mind. Daniel
understood his gesture. His eyelids closed; around his mouth there was
an expression of vehement grief.