A stout man in a dark suit occupies the most comfortable chair in the middle of the terrace. He is about forty years old, slightly bald, and has a round, red, cheerful face. He unfolds a newspaper and starts to read. Something, it is not easy to say what, distinguishes him from the people who have lately passed by. Perhaps it is merely that he is exempt from the domination of the grey-haired woman. He is the Professor.
After a minute or two, the door on the left opens and three new figures emerge with a somewhat stealthy appearance: they have an obvious air of having evaded authority. At the sight of the Professor, whom they had not expected to find there, they hesitate uncertainly, but he smiles at them over his paper and waves them forward with an indulgent gesture. Relieved, they advance past the card players, who glance up at them with faint curiosity, and then seat themselves on the top step of the terrace just in front of the Professor.
Here they remain for a while without speaking, staring through their dark glasses into the glare. The central person of the trio is a young woman with yellow hair. She is smartly dressed in pale pink. On her right is a young man with the pointed ears and the half wistful, half malicious look of a faun. The man on her other side is older with a sad Jewish face. Between all three a curious resemblance is noticeable, and this is not only due to the fact that each one is slender and elegant and wearing a pair of dark spectacles.
The card players, having once displayed their dim inquiry, without further interest in what is passing lethargically continue the game which they have been ordered to play, dealing and receiving the cards with gestures as automatic as those of the hands of so many clocks. The Professor rustles the page of his newspaper. The three on the steps sit motionless, deriving some incommunicable solace from each other’s proximity and from the fugitive sense of escape.
Suddenly a flock of pigeons flies up from the direction of the lake and circles low in front of the terrace with bright flashing wings. And immediately, as if stricken into life at the sight of those beating wings, the three rise from the steps with one simultaneous lamentable cry.
Now it can be seen only too clearly where their mutual and horrid resemblance lies. What appeared as slender elegance now reveals itself as emaciation, hip bones protrude shockingly through the covering clothes, cheek bones have almost pushed their way through the reluctant flesh.
The long, lank, match-thin limbs with their enlarged joint mechanisms jerk into forlorn obedience to the Professor’s wires as, like a smiling puppet-master, he hurriedly takes control. And from behind the three pairs of dark spectacles large tears roll over the painted marionette cheeks and slowly drip on to the stone terrace.
II
I had a friend, a lover. Or did I dream it? So many dreams are crowding upon me now that I can scarcely tell true from false: dreams like light imprisoned in bright mineral caves; hot, heavy dreams; ice-age dreams; dreams like machines in the head. I lie between the bare wall and the medicine bitter with sediment in its dwarfish glass, and try to recall my dream.
I see myself walking hand-in-hand with another, a human being whose heart and mind had grown into mine. We walked together on many roads, in sunshine beside ancient olive trees, on hillsides sprayed as by fountains with the larks’ singing, in lanes where the raindrops dripped from the chilly leaves. Between us there was understanding without reservations and indestructible peace. I, who had been lonely and incomplete, was now fulfilled. Our thoughts ran together like greyhounds of equal swiftness. Perfection like music was in our united thoughts.
I remember an inn in some southern country. A crisis, long since forgotten, had arisen in our lives. I remember only the cypresses’ black flames blowing, the sky hard as a blue plate, and my own confidence, serene, unshakable, utterly secure. ‘Whatever happens is trivial so long as we are together. Under no circumstances could we fail one another, wound one another, do one another wrong.’
Who shall describe the slow and lamentable cooling of the heart? On what day does one first observe the infinitesimal crack which finally becomes a chasm deeper than hell?
The years passed like the steps of a staircase leading lower and lower. I did not walk any more in the sun or hear the songs of larks like crystal fountains playing against the sky. No hand enfolded mine in the warm clasp of love. My thoughts were again solitary, disintegrate, disharmonious — the music gone. I lived alone in a few pleasant rooms, feeling my life run out aimlessly with the tedious hours: the life of an old maid ran out of my fingertips. I arranged the flowers in their vases.
Yet still, intermittently, I saw him, the companion whose heart and brain once seemed to have grown to mine. I saw him without seeing him, the same and yet not the same. Still I could not believe that everything was lost beyond hope of salvage. Still I believed that one day the world would change colour, a curtain would be ripped away, and all would be as it once was.
But now I am lying in a lonely bed. I am weak and confused. My muscles do not obey me, my thoughts run erratically, as small animals do when they are cornered. I am forgotten and lost.
It was he who brought me to this place. He took my hand. I almost heard the tearing of the curtain. For the first time in many months we rested together in peace.
Then they told me that he had gone. For a long while I did not believe it. But time passes by, and no word comes. I cannot deceive myself any longer. He has gone, he has left me, and he will not return. I am alone for ever in this room where the light burns all night long and the professional faces of strangers, without warmth or pity, glance at me through the half open door. I wait, I wait, between the wall and the bitter medicine in the glass. What am I waiting for? A screen of wrought iron covers the window; the house door is locked though the door of my room is open. All night long the light watches me with its unbiased eye. There are strange sounds in the night. I wait, I wait, perhaps for the dreams that come so close to me now.
I had a friend, a lover. It was a dream.
III
Hans comes out of the lift and crosses the hall of the clinic. Just beside a large vase of salmon-pink gladioli which stands on a table, he remembers that he has left the door of the lift open. He turns back and closes it very carefully, then slowly crosses the wide hall again. He is a small, slim man, quite young, with pointed ears and black hair that grows in a point on his forehead. His brown eyes, which nature intended to be gentle and mischievous, are now gentle and sad. His whole expression is one of barely concealed anxiety which shows also in the undecided steps of his shiny black shoes. He is smartly, if rather unsuitably, dressed in a dark town suit.
A woman in a white uniform wishes him good morning from her desk near the main door. He answers mechanically, without seeing her. At the door he hesitates for several moments: it is difficult for him to pass through it although it is standing open. Finally he manages to overcome his inhibition and goes outside. On the steps he again hesitates, not being able to decide which direction to take.