Dream Story (5 page)

The road wound slowly up-hill between modest villas. Fridolin thought that he now had his bearings. He had sometimes come this way on walks, years ago. It must be the Galitzinberg that he was going up. Down to his left he could see the city indistinct in the mist, but glimmering with a thousand lights. He heard the rumbling of wheels behind him and looked out of the window back of him. There were two carriages following his. He was glad of that, for now the driver of the mourning-coach would certainly not be suspicious of him.

With a violent jolt, the cab turned into a side street and went down into something like a ravine, between iron fences, stone walls and terraces. Fridolin realized that it was high time to put on his costume. He took off his fur coat and slipped into the cassock, just as he slipped into the sleeves of his white linen coat every morning in his ward at the hospital. He was relieved to think that, if everything went well, it would be only a few hours before he would be back again by the beds of his patients, ready to give aid.

His cab stopped. What if I don't get out at all, Fridolin thought, and go back at once? But go where? To little Pierrette? To the girl in Buchfeld Strasse? Or to Marianne, the daughter of the deceased? Or perhaps home? He shuddered slightly and decided he'd rather go anywhere than home. Was it because it was farthest to go? No, I can't turn back, he thought. I must go through with this, even if it means death. And he laughed at himself, using such a big word but without feeling very cheerful about it.

A garden gate stood wide open. The mourning-coach drove on deeper into the ravine, or into the darkness that seemed like one. Nachtigall must, therefore, have got out. Fridolin quickly sprang out of the cab and told the driver to wait for him up at the turn, no matter how late he might be. To make sure of him, he paid him well in advance and promised him a large sum for the return trip. The other carriages drove up and Fridolin saw the veiled figure of a woman step out of the first. Then he turned into the garden and put on his mask. A narrow path, lighted up by a lamp from the house, led to the entrance. Doors opened before him, and he found himself in a narrow, white vestibule. He could hear an organ playing, and two servants in dark livery, their faces covered by gray masks, stood on each side of him.

Two voices whispered in unison: "Password?" He replied: "Denmark." One of them took his fur coat and disappeared with it into an adjoining room, while the other opened a door. Fridolin entered a dimly lighted room with high ceilings, hung on all sides with black silk. Sixteen to twenty people masked and dressed as monks and nuns were walking up and down. The gently swelling strains of Italian church music came from above. A small group, composed of three nuns and two monks, stood in a corner of the room. They watched him for a second, but turned away again at once, almost deliberately. Fridolin, noticing that he was the only one who wore a hat, took his off and walked up and down as nonchalantly as possible. A monk brushed against him and nodded a greeting, but from behind the mask Fridolin encountered a searching and penetrating glance. A strange, heavy perfume, as of Southern gardens, scented the room. Again an arm brushed against him, but this time it was that of a nun. Like all the others she had a black veil over her face, head and neck, a blood-red mouth glowed under the black laces of the mask. Where am I? thought Fridolin. Among lunatics? Or conspirators? Is this a meeting of some religious sect? Can it be that Nachtigall was ordered or paid to bring along some stranger to be the target of their jokes? But everything seemed too serious, too intense, too uncanny for a masquerade prank. A woman's voice joined the strains of the organ and an Old. Italian sacred aria resounded through the room. They all stood still and listened and Fridolin surrendered himself for a moment to the wondrously swelling melody. A soft voice suddenly whispered from behind: "Don't turn around. There's still a chance for you to get away. You don't belong here. If it's discovered it will go hard with you."

Fridolin gave a frightened start. For a second he thought of leaving, but his curiosity, the allurement and, above all, his pride, were stronger than any of his misgivings. Now that I've gone this far, he thought, I don't care what happens. And he shook his head negatively without turning around.

The voice behind him whispered: "I should feel very sorry for you." He turned and looked at her. He saw the blood-red mouth glimmering under the lace. Dark eyes were fixed on him. "I shall stay," he said in a heroic voice which he hardly recognized as his own, and he looked away again. The song was now ringing through the room; the organ had a new sound which was anything but sacred. It was worldly, voluptuous, and pealing. Looking around Fridolin saw that all the nuns had disappeared and that only the monks were left. The voice had meanwhile also changed. It rose by way of an artistically executed trill from its low and serious pitch to a high and jubilant tone. In place of the organ a piano had suddenly chimed in with its worldly and brazen tunes. Fridolin at once recognized Nachtigall's wild and inflammatory touch. The woman's voice which had been so reverent a moment before had vanished with a last wild, voluptuous outburst through the ceiling, as it were, into infinity. Doors opened to the right and left On one side Fridolin recognized the indistinct outlines of Nachtigall's figure; the room opposite was radiant with a blaze of light. All the women were standing there motionless. They wore dark veils over their heads, faces and necks and black masks over their eyes, but otherwise they were completely naked. Fridolin's eyes wandered eagerly from voluptuous to slender bodies, from delicate figures to those luxuriously developed. He realized that each of these women would forever be a mystery, and that the enigma of their large eyes peering at him from beneath the black masks would remain unsolved. The delight of beholding was changed to an almost unbearable agony of desire. And the others seemed to experience a similar sensation. The first gasps of rapture had changed to sighs that held a note very near anguish. A cry broke out somewhere. Suddenly all of them, as though pursued, rushed from the darkened room to the women, who received them with wild and wicked laughter. The men were no longer in cassocks, but dressed as cavaliers, in white, yellow, blue and red. Fridolin was the only one in monk's dress. Somewhat nervously he slunk into the farthest corner, where he was near Nachtigall whose back was turned to him. Nachtigall had a bandage over his eyes, but Fridolin thought he could see him peering underneath the bandage into the tall mirror opposite. In it the cavaliers with their gay-colored costumes were reflected, dancing with their naked partners.

A woman came up suddenly behind Fridolin and whispered—for no one spoke aloud, as if the voices, too, were to remain a secret—: "What is the matter? Why don't you dance?"

Fridolin, seeing two noblemen watch fixedly from another corner, suspected that this woman with the boyish and slender figure, was sent to put him to the test. In spite of it he meant to dance with her, but at that moment another woman left her partner and walked quickly up to him. He knew at once that it was the same one who had already warned him. She pretended that she had just seen him and whispered, in a voice loud enough to be heard in the other corner: "Returned at last!" Laughingly, she continued: "All your efforts are useless. I know you." Then turning to the woman with the boyish figure, she said: "Let me have him for just two minutes, then he shall be yours again until morning, if you wish." In a softer voice she added: "It is really he." The other replied in astonishment: "Really?" and with a light step went to join the cavaliers in the corner.

Alone with Fridolin, the woman cautioned him, "Don't ask questions, and don't be surprised at anything. I tried to lead them astray, but you can't continue to deceive them for long. Go, before it is too late—and it may be too late at almost any moment—and be careful that no one follows you. No one must know who you are. There would be no more peace and quiet for you. Go!"

"Will I see you again?"

"It's impossible."

"Then I shall stay."

"My life, at most, is at stake," he said, "and I'm ready at this moment to give it for you." He took her hands and tried to draw her to him.

She whispered again, almost despairingly: "Go!"

He laughed, and he heard himself laughing as in a dream. "But I know what I'm doing. You are not all here just to make us mad by looking at you. You are doing this to unnerve me still more."

"It will soon be too late. You must go!"

But he wouldn't listen to her. "Do you mean to say that there are no rooms here for the convenience of congenial couples? Will all these people leave with just a courteous 'good-bye'? They don't look like it."

He pointed to the dancers, glowing white bodies closely pressed against the blue, red and yellow silk of their partners, circling, in the brilliant, mirrored room adjoining, to the wild tunes of the piano. It seemed to him that no longer was any attention paid to him and the woman beside him. They stood alone in the semi-dark middle room.

"You are hoping in vain," she whispered. "There are no such rooms here. This is your last opportunity to leave."

"Come with me!"

She shook her head violently, despairingly.

.. He laughed again, not recognizing his laughter. "You're making game of me. Did all these men and women come here merely to fan the flames of their desire and then depart? Who can forbid you to come away with me if you choose?"

She took a deep breath and drooped her head.

"Oh, now I understand," he said. "That's the punishment you impose on those who come here uninvited. You couldn't have invented a more cruel one. Please let me off and forgive me. Impose some other penalty, anything but that I must leave you."

"You are mad. I can't go with you, let alone anyone else. Whomever I went with would forfeit his life and mine."

Fridolin felt intoxicated, not only with her, her fragrant body and her red-glowing mouth—not only with the atmosphere of this room and the voluptuous mysteries that surrounded him—he was intoxicated, his thirst unsatisfied, with all the experiences of the night, none of which had come to a satisfactory conclusion. He was intoxicated with himself, with his boldness, the change he felt in himself, and he touched the veil which was wound about her head, as though he intended to remove it.

She seized his hands. "One night during the dance here one of the men took it into his head to tear the veil from one of us. They ripped the mask from his face and drove him out with whips."

"And—she?"

"Did you read of a beautiful young girl, only a few weeks ago, who took poison the day before her wedding?"

He remembered the incident, even the name, and mentioned it. "Wasn't it a girl of the nobility who was engaged to marry an Italian Prince?"

She nodded.

One of the cavaliers, the most distinguished looking of them all and the only one dressed in white, suddenly stopped before them. With a slight bow, courteous but imperative, he asked the woman with whom Fridolin was talking to dance with him. She seemed to hesitate a moment, but he put his arm around her waist and they drifted away to join the other couples in the adjoining room.

A sudden feeling of solitude made Fridolin shiver as if with cold. He looked about him. Nobody seemed to be paying any attention to him. This was perhaps his last chance to leave with impunity. He didn't know, however, why it was that he remained spell-bound in his corner where he now felt sure that he was not observed. It might be his aversion to an inglorious and perhaps ridiculous retreat, or the excruciating ungratified desire for the beautiful woman whose fragrance was still in his nostrils. Or he may have stayed because he vaguely hoped that all that had happened so far was intended as a test of his courage and that this magnificent woman would be his reward. It was clear at any rate that the strain was too great to be endured, and that, no matter what the danger, he would have to end it. It could hardly cost him his life, no matter what he decided. He might be among fools, or libertines, but certainly not among rascals or criminals. The thought occurred to him to acknowledge himself as an intruder and to place himself at their disposal in chivalrous fashion. This night could only conclude in such a manner,—with a harmonious finale, as it were—if it were to mean more than a wild, shadow-like succession of gloomy and lascivious adventures, all without an end. So, taking a deep breath, he prepared to carry out his plan.

At this moment, however, a voice whispered beside him: "Password!" A cavalier in black had stepped up to him unseen. As Fridolin didn't reply, he repeated his question. "Denmark," said Fridolin.

"That's right, sir, that's the password for admittance, but what's the password of the house, may I ask?" Fridolin was silent.

"Won't you be kind enough to tell me the password of the house?" It sounded like a sharp threat.

Fridolin shrugged his shoulders. The other walked to the middle of the room and raised his hand. The piano ceased playing and the dance stopped. Two other cavaliers, one in yellow, the other in red, stepped up. "The password, sir," they said simultaneously.

"I have forgotten it," replied Fridolin with a vacant smile but feeling quite calm.

"That's unfortunate," said the gentleman in yellow, "for here it doesn't matter whether you have forgotten it or if you never knew it."

The other men flocked in and the doors on both sides were closed. Fridolin stood alone in the garb of a monk in the midst of the gay-colored cavaliers.

"Take off your mask!" several of them demanded. Fridolin held out his arm to protect himself. It seemed a thousand times worse to be the only one unmasked amongst so many that were, than to stand suddenly naked amongst people who were dressed. He replied firmly: "If my appearance here has offended any of the gentlemen present, I am ready to give satisfaction in the usual manner, but I shall take off my mask only if all of you will do the same."

"It's not a question of satisfaction," said the cavalier in red, who until now had not spoken, "but one of expiation."