But the city was far away, and the air was dank. He wanted to take off his jacket and wrap it around Toni. But he was afraid she might refuse; and he did not want to do anything that would evoke her refusal.
Perhaps, Michael thought, there would be a bed for her at the inn where they had eaten. Taking her arm, he said: “Let’s go back to the inn.” Toni dragged after him, bereft of strength.
7
They took the same road by which they had come and found their way back to the garden. Hartmann shoved the gate open, and they went up the stone steps. The house was silent. The waiter was not to be seen, neither was the girl. Obviously the household was asleep, and no guests were expected. Every step they took cried out at the intrusion.
Hartmann opened the door to the house and stepped inside. He spoke a greeting into the room, but there was no reply. He found an old man sitting bent over a table, pipe in mouth, an expression of annoyance on his face.
“Is there any room to sleep here?” Hartmann asked. The old man looked at him and at the woman by his side. It was clear from the old man’s expression that he was not pleased to see a couple who had turned up after midnight to seek a haven of love. He took his pipe from his mouth, laid it on the table, and, giving them a look of annoyance, said severely: “We have one room vacant.” Toni blushed. Hartmann crumpled his hat and said nothing. The landlord took his pipe, turned it upside down, knocked it against the table, and removed the ash. Putting aside the ash and the burnt shreds, he gathered the remnants of tobacco and put them back in the pipe. Pressing them down with his thumb, he said: “We’ll prepare the room for the lady.” Finally, raising his eyes, he said: “We’ll find a place for the gentleman as well. When we’re full we usually make up a bed on the billiard table.”
Toni inclined her head toward the landlord and said: “Thank you very much indeed.” Said Hartmann: “Would you show us the room?”
The landlord got up and lit a candle. Opening a door for them, he followed them into a spacious room in which there were three beds, one of them made up. There was a washstand with two basins and two jugs filled with water, and a large decanter half-full of water covered with an inverted tumbler. Above the made-up bed hung a broken horn with a bridal wreath on it, and a ram’s head and the head of a wild boar with eyes of red glass hung upon the walls. The innkeeper took the tumbler, examined it, stood it upside down, and waited for Hartmann to leave.
Hartmann put out his hand to test the mattress. Seeing him do so, the innkeeper said: “No one has yet complained of not getting a good nights sleep in this house.” Hartmann paled, and his hand remained dangling. The innkeeper placed the candle next to the made-up bed and said: “Now sir, if you’ll come with me, I’ll make your bed for you.” And he waited for his guest to accompany him.
Finally Hartmann grasped the innkeeper’s intention. Taking Toni’s hand, he wished her goodnight. Her hand clung to his, and her eyes enfolded his heart.
A few moments later the innkeeper was making up Hartmann’s bed on the billiard table and chatting to him as he did so. His annoyance gave way to affability. Now that the guest was without the woman, he considered him respectable. He asked his guest how many pillows he liked to sleep on, and whether he preferred a heavy blanket or a light one, and did he wish to take anything to drink before he retired for the night. Finally he gave him a lighted candle and a box of matches and left the room. A few moments later, Hartmann went out into the garden.
The lanterns had gone out, but a light from heaven illuminated the darkness. The grass and the mandrakes gave off a damp, refreshing scent. A chestnut dropped from a tree and burst. Another chestnut fell sharply and burst.
Hartmann stood reviewing the night’s events. After a brief pause he went across to the table at which he had dined with Toni. The chairs had been leaned against it, and the dew glistened on the bare tabletop. Underneath the table lay a thick cigar. It was the cigar that he had put down on the table when he began telling Toni his dream.
“Now we’ll have a smoke,” he said. But before he could take out a cigar he had forgotten what it was he had meant to do.
8
“What was I going to do?” he asked himself. “To get up on this little mound in front of me.” He had not really intended to do so, but once he had told himself, he went and did it.
The mound was dome-shaped, wide at the base and narrow at the top and not far across, and it was surrounded by bushes. He drew in his breath and considered: I expect each thorn and thistle has a different name. How many names of thorns do I know? More than I thought. I wonder if the gardener doesn’t lavish more care on the thorns than on the flowers. Those gardeners destroy the thorns where they normally grow and plant them in the wrong places. Perhaps the names I know are the names of the thorns growing here…Suddenly he smiled: That innkeeper doesn’t know what Toni and I are to one another. How annoyed he was when we asked for somewhere to sleep. Now let me see what’s here.
He looked down on the mound and recalled an incident of his childhood. He had gone for a walk with some friends, and, seeing a mound, he had climbed it, then slipped and slid down to the bottom. He imagined himself back in the same situation, and began to be afraid he would fall; no, it was rather a wonder he had not already slipped to the bottom. And if he had not already slipped and fallen, he was bound to do so; although there was no real danger of his falling, his fear itself would make him fall; though he was still on his feet, his legs were beginning to give way and to slip, he would roll down, his bones would get broken.
He took heart and climbed down. When he reached the bottom he was amazed. How high was the mound, a foot or eighteen inches? Yet how it had frightened him! He closed his eyes and said, “I’m tired,” and returned to the inn.
An air of calm pervaded the entire house. The innkeeper sat by himself in a little room, rubbing his ankles together and drinking a beverage to help him sleep. Hartmann slipped in quietly, undressed, stretched out on the billiard table, covered himself, and looked at the wall.
Strange, he thought, all the while I stood on the mound, I was thinking only about myself, as if I were alone in the world, as if I did not have two daughters; as if I did not have — a wife.
Hartmann loved his daughters the way a father does. But, like any other father, he did not forego his own interests for the sake of his children. The incident of the mound had opened his heart. He was both ashamed and surprised. And he proceeded once more to occupy his thoughts with himself.
What had happened to him on the mound? Actually, nothing. He had got onto the top of the mound and imagined he was slipping down. And what if he had fallen? He would have lain on the ground and picked himself up again. He stretched out on the bed and thought, smiling: How ridiculous Tenzer looked when I took Toni away from that albino! There are still things left in the world to make one laugh. But let me get back: What happened on the mound? Not the one I was standing on just now, but the one I fell from. One day I went for a walk with my friends. I climbed onto the top of the mound, and suddenly I found myself lying in the ditch. He did not remember himself actually falling, only that he was lying in the ditch. Something sweet was trickling into his mouth, his lips were cut, his tongue swollen, and his entire body bruised. But his limbs felt relaxed, like those of a man who stretches himself after throwing off a heavy burden. He had often fallen since then, but he had never experienced such a feeling of tranquility in any other fall. It seems that one does not have to taste such an experience more than once in a lifetime.