“How awkward,” she exclaimed, and was scarcely in it before she struck
me in the face again. I felt myself growing pale.
“Did I hurt you?” she asked, softly touching me with her hand.
“No, no,” I exclaimed.
“At any rate you have no reason to complain, you want it thus; now kiss
me again.”
I threw my arms about her, and her lips clung closely to mine. As she
lay against my breast in her large heavy furs, I had a curiously
oppressive sensation. It was as if a wild beast, a she-bear, were
embracing me. It seemed as if I were about to feel her claws in my
flesh. But this time the she-bear let me off easily.
With my heart filled with smiling hopes, I went up to my miserable
servant’s room, and threw myself down on my hard couch.
“Life is really amazingly droll,” I thought. “A short time ago the most
beautiful woman, Venus herself, rested against your breast, and now you
have an opportunity for studying the Chinese hell. Unlike us, they
don’t hurl the damned into flames, but they have devils chasing them
out into fields of ice.
“Very likely the founders of their religion also slept in unheated
rooms.”
* * * * *
During the night I startled out of my sleep with a scream. I had been
dreaming of an icefield in which I had lost my way; I had been looking
in vain for a way out. Suddenly an eskimo drove up in a sleigh
harnessed with reindeer; he had the face of the waiter who had shown me
to the unheated room.
“What are you looking for here, my dear sir?” he exclaimed. “This is
the North Pole.”
A moment later he had disappeared, and Wanda flew over the smooth ice
on tiny skates. Her white satin skirt fluttered and crackled; the
ermine of her jacket and cap, but especially her face, gleamed whiter
than the snow. She shot toward me, inclosed me in her arms, and began
to kiss me. Suddenly I felt my blood running warm down my side.
“What are you doing?” I asked horror-stricken.
She laughed, and as I looked at her now, it was no longer Wanda, but a
huge, white she-bear, who was digging her paws into my body.
I cried out in despair, and still heard her diabolical laughter when I
awoke, and looked about the room in surprise.
Early in the morning I stood at Wanda’s door, and the waiter brought
the coffee. I took it from him, and served it to my beautiful mistress.
She had already dressed, and looked magnificent, all fresh and roseate.
She smiled graciously at me and called me back, when I was about to
withdraw respectfully.
“Come, Gregor, have your breakfast quickly too,” she said, “then we
will go house-hunting. I don’t want to stay in the hotel any longer
than I have to. It is very embarassing here. If I chat with you for
more than a minute, people will immediately say: ‘The fair Russian is
having an affair with her servant, you see, the race of Catherines
isn’t extinct yet.’”
Half an hour later we went out; Wanda was in her cloth-gown with the
Russian cap, and I in my Cracovian costume. We created quite a stir. I
walked about ten paces behind, looking very solemn, but expected
momentarily to have to break out into loud laughter. There was scarcely
a street in which one or the other of the attractive houses did not
bear the sign _camere ammobiliate_. Wanda always sent me upstairs, and
only when the apartment seemed to answer her requirements did she
herself ascend. By noon I was as tired as a stag-hound after the hunt.
We entered a new house and left it again without having found a
suitable habitation. Wanda was already somewhat out of humor. Suddenly
she said to me: “Severin, the seriousness with which you play your part
is charming, and the restrictions, which we have placed upon each other
are really annoying me. I can’t stand it any longer, I do love you, I
must kiss you. Let’s go into one of the houses.”
“But, my lady—” I interposed.
“Gregor?” She entered the next open corridor and ascended a few steps
of the dark stair-way; then she threw her arms about me with passionate
tenderness and kissed me.
“Oh, Severin, you were very wise. You are much more dangerous as slave
than I would have imagined; you are positively irrestible, and I am
afraid I shall have to fall in love with you again.”
“Don’t you love me any longer then,” I asked seized by a sudden fright.
She solemnly shook her head, but kissed me again with her swelling,
adorable lips.
We returned to the hotel. Wanda had luncheon, and ordered me also
quickly to get something to eat.
Of course, I wasn’t served as quickly as she, and so it happened that
just as I was carrying the second bite of my steak to my mouth, the
waiter entered and called out with his theatrical gesture: “Madame
wants you, at once.”
I took a rapid and painful leave of my food, and, tired and hungry,
hurried toward Wanda, who was already on the street.
“I wouldn’t have imagined you could be so cruel,” I said reproachfully.
“With all these, fatiguing duties you don’t even leave me time to eat
in peace.”
Wanda laughed gaily. “I thought you had finished,” she said, “but never
mind. Man was born to suffer, and you in particular. The martyrs didn’t
have any beefsteaks either.”