Christian, Amadeus, Bradshaw, Tavera, and Wiguniewski went by motor.
Eva used the train.
But this way of travelling agreed with her as ill as any other. All
night she lay sleepless in her crumpled silks, her head buried among
pillows. Susan crouched by her, giving her perfume or a book or a
glass of cold lemonade. There was a prickling in her limbs that would
not let her rest, a weight on her bosom, an alternation of thought and
fancy, of willing and the weariness of willing in her mind. The hum of
the wheels on the rails cut into her nerves; the sable landscape, as
it glided by, irritated her like a delusion that forever changed and
melted. Malignity seemed to lurk in the fields; treacherous forests
seemed to block the way; she saw haunted houses and terror-stricken men.
“What a torturer time is!” she whispered. “Oh, that it stood before me,
and I could have it whipped.”
Susan bent nearer, and gazed at her attentively.
Suddenly she whispered tenderly: “What do you expect of him? What is
the purpose of this new game? He’s the most banal of them all. I never
heard him make a polished or a witty remark. Does he realize what you
are? Not in his wildest dreams. His head is empty. Your art means about
as much to him as the acrobatics of a circus dancer to some dreary
shop-keeper. Nations are at your feet, and he grants you a supercilious
smile. You have given the world a new kind of delight, and this German
know-it-all is untouched and unchanged by it.”
Eva said: “If the North Sea is too sinister, we must seek a coast in
the South.”
Susan grew excited: “One would like to yell into his ears: ‘Get on
your knees! Pray!’ But he wouldn’t be shaken any more than the pillar
of Vendôme. Is he ever shaken by anything? I described to him how we
were adored in Russia, the ecstasy, the festivities, the outbursts of
enthusiasm. He acted as if he were hearing a moderately interesting
bit of daily news. I told him about the Grand Duke. No, don’t frown.
I had to, or I would have choked. I described that chained barbarian,
that iron soul dissolved! It’s certainly uncommon; it would make any
heart beat faster. I tried to make him visualize the situation: fifty
millions of trembling slaves and all, through his power, at your
bidding. No poet could have been more impressive than I was. If you had
heard me trying to penetrate his mind, you would have been astonished
at my talent for sewing golden threads on sack cloth. It was all in
vain. His breath came as regularly as the ticking of a clock. Once
or twice he seemed to be startled. But it was due to a breeze or a
mosquito.”
“I wonder whether the gowns from Paris have arrived at Heyst,” Eva
said. The long oval of her face seemed to grow a trifle longer; her
lips curled a little, and her teeth showed like pallid, freshly peeled
almonds.
“Why did you refuse yourself to him?” Susan went on. “What we possess
is part of our past, but a joy put off is a burden. Men are to be the
rungs of your ladder--no more. Let them give you magical nights, but
send them packing when the cock crows. How has he deserved a higher
office? You’ve yielded to a whim, and made a grinning idol of him. Why
did you summon him? I’m afraid you’re going to commit a folly.”
Eva did not answer. The tip of her tongue appeared between her lips,
and she closed her eyes cunningly. Susan thought she understood those
gestures, and said: “It’s true, he has the marvellous diamond for which
you cried. But you have but to command, and they’ll trim your very
shoes with such baubles.”
“When did you ever see me cry for a diamond?” Eva, asked indifferently.
She raised herself up, and in her transparent, wavering, blossomy
wrappings seemed like a spirit emerging from the dimness. “When did you
ever see me cry for a diamond?” she asked again, and touched Susan’s
shoulder.
“You told me so yourself.”
“Have you no better proof?” Eva laughed, and her laughter was her most
sensuous form of expression, as her smile was her most spiritual.
Susan folded her hands and said resignedly: “Volvedme del otro lado,
que de esto ya estoy tostado!” It is a Spanish ejaculation, and means:
Lay me on the other side, for I have been toasted enough on this.