“Those were the other priests,” I say. “Two thousand years ago. Not these.”
She leans against me. “They are always the same, Rudolf,” she whispers, close to my face, “don’t you know that? He would like to get out, but they hold Him prisoner. He bleeds and bleeds and wants to come down from the cross. But they won’t let Him. They keep Him in their prisons with the high towers, and they give Him incense and prayers and do not let Him out. Do you know why?”
“No.”
Now the pale moon is hanging above the woods in the ash-colored blue. “Because He is very rich,” Isabelle whispers. “He is very, very rich. But they want to keep His fortune. If He should come out, they would have to give it back, and then they would all suddenly be poor. It’s like someone who has been confined up here; then the others have control of his fortune and do what they like with it and live like rich people. Just as in my case.”
I stare at her. Her face is intense but betrays nothing. “What do you mean?” I ask.
She laughs. “Everything, Rudolf. But you know about it too! They brought me here because I was in their way. They want to keep my fortune. If I were to come out they would have to give it back to me. It doesn’t matter; I don’t want it.”
I keep staring at her. “If you don’t want it you can explain that to them; then there would be no reason for keeping you here any more,” I say cautiously.
“Here or someplace else—after all, it’s just the same. So why not here? At least they aren’t here. They are like gnats. Who wants to live with gnats?” She bends forward. “That’s why I disguise myself,” she whispers.
“You disguise yourself?”
“Of course! Didn’t you know that? You have to disguise yourself, otherwise they will nail you to the cross. But they are stupid. You can fool them.”
“Do you fool Wernicke too?”
“Who is he?”
“The doctor.”
“Oh, him! He just wants to marry me. He is like the others. There are so many prisoners, Rudolf. And those outside are afraid of them. But the One up there on the cross—He’s the one they’re most afraid of.”
“Who are?”
“All those who make use of Him and live on Him. They are innumerable. They say they are good. But they bring about a great deal of evil. Anyone who is bad can do very little. You recognize him and are on your guard against him. But the good—what don’t they accomplish! Oh, they’re bloody!”
“Yes, they are,” I say, strangely excited myself by the voice whispering in the darkness. “They have done many dreadful things. The self-righteous are merciless.”
“Don’t go there any more, Rudolf!” she whispers. “They must let Him go! Him on the cross. He would like to laugh again and sleep and dance.”
“Do you think so?”
“Everyone would like to, Rudolf. They must let Him go. But He is too dangerous for them. He is not like them. He is the most dangerous of all—He is the kindest.”
“Is that why they keep Him prisoner?”
Isabelle nods. Her breath touches me. “Otherwise they would have to crucify Him again.”
“Yes,” I say, looking at her. “I think so too. They would have to kill Him again; the same people who now pray to Him. They would kill Him, just as countless people have been killed in His name. In the name of justice and love of one’s neighbor.”
Isabelle shivers. “I don’t go there any more,” she says, pointing to the chapel. “They always say one must suffer. The black sisters. Why, Rudolf?”
I make no reply.
“Who makes us suffer?” she asks, pressing hard against me.
“God,” I say bitterly. “If there is a God. He who created us.”
“And who will punish God for that?”
“What?”
“Who will punish God for making us suffer?” Isabelle whispers. “Here, among human beings, you are put in jail or hanged if you do that. Who will hang God?”
“I never thought about that,” I say. “I’ll ask Vicar Bodendiek sometime.”
We walk back along the allée. A few fireflies dart through the darkness. Suddenly Isabelle stops. “Did you hear that?” she asks.
“What?”
“The earth. It made a leap like a horse. When I was a child I used to be afraid I would fall off when I went to sleep. I wanted to be tied tight to my bed. Can you trust gravitation?”
“Yes, just as much as death.”
“I don’t know. Haven’t you ever flown?”
“In an airplane?”
“Airplane,” Isabelle says with a light contempt. “Anyone can do that. In dreams.”
“Yes. But can’t anyone do that too?”
“No.”
“I think everyone has dreamed at some time that he was flying. It’s one of the commonest dreams.”
“You see!” Isabelle says. “And you trust gravitation! Suppose it stops some day? What then? Then we should fly around like soap bubbles! And then who would be Kaiser? The one with the most lead tied to his feet or the one with the longest arms? And how would you get down from a tree?”
“I don’t know. But even lead wouldn’t help. Then it would be light as air.”
Suddenly she is all playfulness. The moon shines in her eyes as though pale fires were burning behind them. She throws back her hair, which looks colorless in the cold light. “You look like a witch,” I say. “A young and dangerous witch!”
She laughs. “A witch,” she whispers then. “Have you finally recognized me? How long it took!”
With a jerk she pulls open the full skirt fluttering around her hips, lets it fall, and steps out of it. She is wearing nothing but shoes and a short white blouse which she pulls open. Slender and white she stands in the darkness, more boy than woman, with pale hair and pale eyes. “Come,” she whispers.
I look around. Damn it, I think, suppose Bodendiek were to come now! Or Wernicke or one of the nuns, and I am angry at myself for thinking it. Isabelle never would. She stands before me like a spirit of air that has taken on a body, ready to fly away. “You must put on your clothes,” I say. She laughs. “Must I, Rudolf?” she asks mockingly. Slowly she comes closer. She seizes my tie and pulls it loose. Her lips are a colorless gray-blue in the moon, her teeth are chalk-white, and even her voice has lost its color. “Take that off!” she whispers, pulling open my collar and shirt. I feel her cool hands on my naked breast. They are not soft; they are narrow and hard and they hold me fast. A shudder runs over my skin. Something I had never suspected in Isabelle suddenly bursts out of her. I feel it like a strong wind and a blow; it has come from far off and has compressed itself in her as the soft winds of the open plains are suddenly compressed into a storm in a narrow pass. I try to keep hold of her hands and I glance around. She pushes my hands aside. She is no longer laughing; suddenly in her there is the deadly seriousness of the creature for whom love is superfluous byplay, who knows only one goal and for whom death is not too great a price to attain it.
I cannot hold her off. From somewhere she has gained a strength against which only brute force will avail. To avoid this I draw her to me. She is more helpless thus, but she is also closer to me, her breast pressed against mine. I feel her body in my arms and I feel her crushing herself closer to me. It won’t do, I think; she is sick; it is rape, but isn’t it always rape? Her eyes are close to mine, empty and without recognition, fixed and transparent. “Afraid,” she whispers. “You are always afraid!”
“I’m not afraid.”
“Of what? Of what are you afraid?”
I do not reply. Suddenly there is no fear any more. Isabelle’s gray-blue lips are pressed against my face, cool, nothing in her is hot, but I am shivering from a cold heat, my skin contracts, only my head is glowing. I feel Isabelle’s teeth; she is a small, rearing animal, a phantom, a spirit of moonlight and desire, a dead woman, one of the living, risen dead; her skin and her lips are cold. Horror and a forbidden desire whirl through me. I wrench myself away in silence and thrust her back so that she falls—