Night Games: And Other Stories and Novellas (26 page)

"When am I going to see you again?" I asked. I didn't say: Eduard is dead. I didn't say: forgive me. I didn't say: I was too much of a coward
to tell you right away. No, I asked, "When am I going to see you again?"
as though there were no other questions to be answered, as though there
were nothing else to say.

"You'll never see me again," she said. "If you care for me, you'll be
grateful for this hour just as I am. If you don't want this hour to turn from
a wonderful, unforgettable dream into a sad reality, a lie, a hundred lies, a
chain of deception and ugliness, then go, go immediately, leave, and
never try to see me again."

Inside my head I murmured: Eduard is dead-your husband is dead.
Everything you're saying is nonsense, and you haven't the slightest idea.
There is no lie, no deception, no ugliness anymore-you're free. But I
didn't say any of that. Everything suddenly became clearer to me than I
could have thought possible a minute ago. And I said, "It's no deception,
no lie. It would be a lie and a deception if after this hour you were to stay
in this house any longer and once more belong to another." It seemed to
me that the travel dream from before had gained control of me, or as if I
were getting control of it.

Agatha turned pale. She looked at me, and I felt that my face had
become totally rigid. She touched my arm as if to calm me. "Let's be reasonable," she said, "Or let's at least try to be reasonable again. I do love
you, yes, but I don't belong to you, any more than you belong to me. We
both know that. It was only a dream, a miracle, a joy; unforgettable, yes,
but over."

I shook my head violently. "Everything that happened before this
hour is over, this hour has changed everything. You can never belong to
him again, you belong to me alone."

She was still holding my arm, and now she grasped it and held it
firmly. Yes, she moved it back and forth gently, as though she hoped to
awaken me out of an incomprehensible disturbance, out of insanity. But
my eyes remained fixed. I knew that there was hardly any love in them,
only determination, almost a threat. And I noticed that her anxiety grew,
and so she attempted a jocular tone: "Child," she said, "wasn't I right?
I've always known why I called you Child. Do I now have to be reason able for both of us? It isn't easy. Not even for me. But we must, we must
be sensible."

"Why must we?" I asked stubbornly, and hated myself at the same
time.

"We must," she said, and in her growing anxiety she immediately
brought up the strongest, the most irrefutable argument: "We have to be
sensible and can't betray ourselves, because you would be lost if he suspected...."

I smiled. I couldn't do anything else. But her opposition, her warning, her attempt to instill fear of a dead man in me, affected me not only
as gruesome but as unaccountably comic. At this moment I was not very
far from saying something devilish, to put an end to the intolerability and
the horror of the conversation with a destructive and yet a saving word.
But I didn't do it. I felt my powerlessness precisely at this moment. I felt
that the dead man was stronger than me, and I was unable to formulate
any other reply than the silly phrase, "And what if in the end fate should
decide for me?"

She grasped me by the shoulder. There was fear in her eyes. "What
are you saying? What kind of foolishness is this? What are you getting
at?"

And at this moment I felt that she was afraid for him-for him, and
not in the least for me-that he was everything, and that I was nothing to
her.... And at this moment we heard footsteps on the garden gravel. I
had only a few seconds left. It was impossible, in these few seconds, to
tell her what had happened and at the same time to justify why I had been
silent up to now. A few minutes ago she would still have understood,
might perhaps have been forgiving. Yes, perhaps I could have claimed an
actual, permanent victory over the dead man. But now it was I who was
the soldier fallen in action, the dead man; yes, at this moment I felt like a
ghost, and the footsteps outside in the garden-though I knew that anyone but he could enter at any moment-announced Loiberger's arrival to
me in an unfathomable way. Just as he had done in my dream, he walked
through the garden and up the steps to the terrace. But whoever it might
be, in the few seconds that remained to me it was impossible for me to tell Agatha what had happened and at the same time to justify my silence
up to now. It was still more impossible to let what was coming come
without preparing her at all. But only one phrase forced its way to my
lips: "Don't be afraid." And when I spoke these words I truly felt that her
dead husband would arrive the next moment. At first she looked at me
with an uncertain smile, as if she wanted to let me know that I needn't
worry, that no one would be able to tell from looking at her what had
happened in the last hour. But she evidently immediately read in the despairing seriousness of my look that my warning must have some other
meaning than the petty concern that she might somehow betray herself.
She just had enough time to ask: "What's happened?" But I no longer
had the chance to answer.

Footsteps were already echoing in the adjoining room. Agatha
walked into the salon without again turning toward me, and I followed
her. Aline was standing in the doorway between the salon and the terrace.
She glanced at me with a puzzled and astonished look, took the hands of
her now pallid friend, and, breaking down in tears, embraced her.
Agatha's eyes, however, stared past Aline's into mine with such a relentlessly questioning look that it seemed she wanted to read the answer on
my forehead. I put my finger to my lips and realized that this pitiable
gesture was meant to beg Agatha to betray me rather than herself. But in
her look there was more than I have ever seen in a person's look: presentiment, even knowledge, as well as indignation, understanding, and forgiveness, yes, perhaps even something like gratitude.

Now Muelling was also standing in the door between the salon and
the terrace, between shadow and light. He glanced at me questioningly.
My presence here declared to him without further notice that I had not
been able to bring myself to leave the unfortunate woman after bringing
her the awful news. He walked up to her and squeezed her hand without
a word. Again she sought my eyes past Muelling's. No one spoke, not
she, not Aline, and not Muelling, but it seemed to me that my silence was
deeper than that of the others. The summer stillness of the garden echoed
into the room. Finally Agatha said-and my heart stood still as she
moved her lips-"Now I want," she said, "to hear the whole truth"-and
since she noticed the look of estrangement in the expression of the oth ers, and in mine a look of shock, she turned to me and added, in admirable calm: "You didn't want to hide anything from me, but perhaps
subconsciously you were trying to protect me. I thank you. But believe
me, I'm now composed enough to hear it all. Tell me everything, Dr.
Muelling, from beginning to end. I won't ask any questions, I won't interrupt you," and with her voice dying, she added, "Tell me!"

She leaned on the piano and her fingers played with the fringes of
the shawl. She didn't betray either herself or me with the slightest quiver
of her lips while Muelling spoke. Aline had let herself sink onto the
piano stool, and propped her head in her hands. Despite his inner turmoil,
Muelling was able to muster the professional habit of speaking fluently
in public. He reported the course of events, from the moment that he and
I had waited for Eduard at the train station of the small town to the
minute that Eduard had fallen dead at the edge of the forest, and it was
clear to me that he had already told the story once or twice since
we had separated at the gate of his inn. He spoke on the whole as if he
were pleading a case for someone atoning all too much for a longforgotten, trivial offense, whose memory was to be acquitted of every
guilt. Agatha actually managed not to interrupt him with a single word.
And only when Muelling had finished did she turn to him with a question, to ask whether any arrangements had been made on the spot. And
when Muelling replied that the body was to be released by the authorities
by the next morning at the very latest, she said, "I'll go to him this
evening." Muelling advised her against it, saying that today's night train
would not arrive in the small garrison town until after midnight, but she
said only, "I want to see him tonight." It was clear to all of us that she
meant to get into the morgue tonight. Muelling offered to accompany
her, for there were all sorts of things to care for and arrange, which
Agatha could not possibly do by herself. But she declined with a decisiveness that allowed for no contradiction. "All this is my affair," she
said. "We'll speak again only when everything is over, Dr. Muelling." I
was filled with admiration and horror at the same time. She didn't direct
a single word to me. She now wanted to be alone; only Aline should
come back again later to help her with her travel preparations and to receive instructions as to what to do during her absence.

She shook hands with all of us. With me no differently than with
Aline and Muelling. She didn't even avoid looking me in the eye as we
parted.

She did actually leave that same night-alone-and brought her
husband's body to Vienna the next morning. The next day was the funeral; naturally I took part. Agatha saw no one that day. She never again
returned to the lake.

Many years later we met again at a party. She had remarried in the
meantime. No one who saw us speaking together could have suspected
that a strange, profound, and secret experience joined us together. Did it
really join us? I myself could have remembered that uncanny and yet so
blissful summer hour as a dream I had dreamed alone, so clearly, so emptily, so innocently did her eyes meet mine.

IT WAS A MILD EVENING in May when Clara Hell once again performed as the "Queen of the Night" after a long absence. The reason that
had kept the singer away from the opera for almost two months was well
known. On March 15, Prince Richard Bedenbruck had had an accident in
which he had been thrown from his horse and had died in Clara's arms
only a few hours afterward, during which time Clara did not leave his
side. Clara's despair had been so great that at first there had been concern
for her life, then for her mind, and most recently for her voice. This last
fear had proved just as unfounded as the former ones. When she again
appeared before the public, she was greeted warmly and expectantly; and
as early as the end of the very first great aria, her intimate friends were
able to accept the congratulations of her more distant ones. In the fourth
gallery the rubicund face of Miss Fanny Ringeiser beamed with happiness, and the regulars in the upper galleries smiled at their comrade.
They all knew that Fanny, even though she was nothing more than the
daughter of a Mariahilferstrasse shopkeeper, belonged to the intimate circle of the beloved singer; that she was sometimes invited to her house for
tea; and that she had also secretly loved the late prince. During the intermission Fanny told her friends that it was Baron von Leisenbohg who
had given Clara the idea of choosing the "Queen of the Night" for her
first performance, suggesting that the dark costume would most nearly
match her mood.

The baron himself took his orchestra seat in the middle section, first
row, corner, as usual, and thanked those who greeted him with a gracious
but almost pained smile. Many memories flooded his mind today. He had
met Clara ten years ago. At that time he was sponsoring the artistic education of a young, slender, red-haired woman and had gone to a performance at the Eisenstein singing academy where his protege was
appearing in public as Mignon for the very first time. On that same
evening he saw and heard Clara, who was singing the role of Philine in
the same scene. He was then twenty-five years old, independent and inconsiderate. He abandoned Mignon on the spot. Mrs. Natalie Eisenstein
introduced him to Philine, and he declared to her that his heart, his fortune, and his connections to theatre managers were at her disposal. At
that time Clara was living with her mother, the widow of a higherranking post office official, and was in love with a young medical student
to whose room in the suburb of Alser she sometimes went for tea and
conversation. She rejected the baron's passionate courtship, but, warmed
by Leisenbohg's wooing, became the mistress of the medical student.
The baron, from whom she did not conceal this relationship, returned to
his red-haired protege but maintained a friendship with Clara. He sent
her flowers and chocolates on any holiday that could serve as an excuse,
and once in a while appeared for a polite visit in the house of the post office official's widow.