Since I was more inclined to comply with Dr. Köhler's instructions, Mother liked me to stand right next to her, quite close, I might say in the heat of her body's warmth, so close that the shoulder ruffles of her puffed-sleeve dress almost touched my face, but this certainly did not mean that in her frustration she sought solace in me or began to have impermissible and troubling feelings of tenderness for me — I don't think she harbored such feelings for anybody — no, there was a purely logical reason we ended up next to each other: this way she could hear and then follow the rhythm of my breathing, and by the same token, if she faltered or was out of breath or, letting her mind wander, got confused, I could wait for her and help her get back on track; I was able to hold my breath for a long time, wait for and enjoy the slight dizziness that would displace my feelings while things I could only see before but not feel grew sharper and pervaded my senses; I could lose myself at last and be anything I wanted — a distant sound, the crest of a wave, a seagull, a falling leaf landing atop the stone wall, or just vacant air — until in the redness of the blood rushing to my brain everything would slowly turn dark, yet the instinct to breathe would still force me to hear distinctly and sense how Mother, with a few interpolated exhalations and inhalations, was reverting to our previous rhythm and how, her own breath balancing at a precarious standstill, she'd wait for me to take the lead again; we did not look at and could not see each other, our bodies did not touch, yet only incaution and inexperience could explain and excuse the blindness with which she allowed us to stray into such emotionally dangerous territory; she should have known that we were doing something we shouldn't have, and that in this instance she was the seducer, because mutual sensation, when deprived of tactile and visual contact, will resort to more receptive, more primitive, one might even say more animal-like means, and then the other body's heat, odor, mysterious emanations and rhythms can convey much more than a glance, a kiss, or an embrace ever could; this is true in lovemaking as welclass="underline" the various positions and techniques are never an end but merely the means of descent into the depths, while the end keeps concealing itself in deeper and deeper regions, beyond ever heavier curtains, and if it allows itself to be caught and exposed at all, it will do so only in the experience of unfulfillable pleasure and unattainable hope.
And now, twenty years later, and only a few days before my thirtieth birthday, which, on the strength of an intuition, a persistent though inexplicable premonition, I had come to consider — as it happened, correctly — to be a highly significant turning point in my life, I decided to forgo the pleasure of spending yet another pleasant afternoon with my fiancée and of being the guest of honor at my own birthday party, which her parents had arranged for me, and instead, seeking a refuge worthy of the supposed significance of the day, I turned to solitude, again to solitude, or rather to a more intimate tête-à-tête with my betrothed; delayed by some business engagement, my future father-in-law had not yet come home, and when the lovely Frau Itzenpiltz, using the excuse of having to see about supper, considerately withdrew, leaving the two of us alone in the room, I told Helene about my intention to travel; she had no objections at all — on the contrary, I felt she agreed and understood that it was imperative that the first chapters of the narrative I had been planning for years be committed to paper before our wedding day, to make certain that the expected change in our lifestyle would not divert me from my original ambitions or, worse, cause me to abandon them—"I feel, Helene, I really do, that you do not require a detailed explanation," I said to her in a whisper, and the sincerity of my words was no doubt enhanced by the fact that I clasped her hand gently, and our cheeks were so close I could feel whiffs of my own breath mingled with hers on my face; the red of dusk was playing with the patterns of the silk hangings on this warm autumn day, the windows were open; "Still, I find it necessary, Helene, to speak of something I can broach only with the utmost reluctance, for it is so dark and morally dubious.. what I intend to tell you increases the perils of your undertaking as much as it does my own responsibility, please realize that; you can still change your mind," I said, and knowing full well she wouldn't, I laughed, teasingly; "What I intend to say, then, is that happiness, though it ought to be at the very center of my heart's desires, is not, for no amount of explaining and quibbling will make it conducive to artistic creation, so if I leave now, I am deliberately exchanging the happiness I know can be mine when I am with you for the unhappiness I always feel when not in your company, the unhappiness I knew before we met" — needless to say I was lying to her, while pleased to be affecting an air of sincerity, or, I should say, my confession was sincere inasmuch as it was a pretext only; and being able to deceive her, seeing her fall under my spell so easily, made her even more attractive to me, but at the same time, precisely because in her gullibility she laid herself so open, precisely because she couldn't be anything but what she was — tears of anguish were brightening her blue eyes — the real sentiment I wanted to express grew ever heavier within me; "Away from here, I don't ever want to see you again" is what I should have said to her, because I could not resist the deep-seated urge to escape and, in a sense, to disappear for good, as in fact once, while leaving their house, I did catch myself mumbling, completely unawares and spitefully, "It's finished, done with, I'm free" — and if now, having the luxury to fantasize, I try to imagine what would have happened if that afternoon before my departure I had not merely looked for a pretext but spoken candidly to her, what I see before me is the face of a young woman whose translucent white skin and soft round features give her an uncertain, almost ethereal look, though the pale freckles scattered around the delicate nose and the thick bronze-red hair imbue it with a curious vitality, and this face shows no surprise, on hearing my news, indeed breaks into a smile, as if it had been waiting for these words; when Helene smiles like this, with full-mouthed enjoyment, she looks older and more experienced, because in her moistly gleaming teeth there is a touch of wanton willfulness; she quickly wipes away the teardrop brought to her eyes by the moral superiority of knowing she has acquiesced obligingly to my plan, and yet she makes a gesture that, in the heat of the moment, excited by each other's breath, we both long for: it would have to have been a very common gesture, but this is the point where my imagination comes to a respectful halt, given Helene's then still untouched sensuality; leaving, then, after a supper spent in a convivial family atmosphere and a farewell which in the circumstances seemed almost too lighthearted, I may have carried away with me Helene's earnestly given consent, yet I could not but feel our future to be ominous and threatening, since all signs indicated we would have to build it on insincerity, insincerity in the guise of mutual attentiveness and consideration, because, on the one hand, it seemed that my unavoidable physical attraction to her would be nourished not by the kind of raw and inexplicable force that, as far as I knew, one felt in real love, but only by an exquisite sense of beauty, a titillating vulnerability, and on the other hand, I didn't think she would ever admit that to endure living with her own fragile emotional sensibilities, she herself needed those coarser gestures, a secret lewdness which she could not possibly expect me to provide and the presumed lack of which would not be compensated either by the mysteriousness of my obscure silences or by the lies of my playful fits of sincerity.