At that moment a shock gripped my whole body with a jolt of terror: a cart towing tree-trunks in front of us! Two cars approaching from either direction and we racing towards them at a hundred miles an hour! No time to brake! The road too narrow! A steep drop on either side!
The driver! He’s still sitting at the wheel, totally unmoved. Has he gone mad? He’s accelerating up to a hundred and ten! Overtake on the left? Impossible! The road is blocked by the three vehicles. So he’s going to edge out to the – right! My mind screams: He’s mad! He’ll have us over the side! Another second and we’ll be spiked on the tree-trunks over-hanging the back of the cart, better to crash down the precipice! There! The right-hand side of the car is hovering over the yawning abyss with the foaming torrent raging between the rocks below! –
There was scarcely a yard of road left outside the forestry truck as we overtook with only the left-hand wheels on the road: our furious speed kept the car up and saved us from falling.
A quick glance back: the tangle of cars is far behind us, hardly visible any more in the cloud of white dust. “John Roger” is still sitting at the wheel, unmoved, as if it were all child’s play. “Only the devil could drive like that,” I think, “or a living corpse.” And once more we are purring along past swishing three-foot thick sycamore trees.
Lipotin laughed:
“A pretty brisk drive, what? If good old gravity hadn’t been taking forty winks, then ...”
Slowly, with the stinging of pins and needles, the blood returned to my numbed limbs. I must have been grimacing as I replied:
“A little too brisk for ordinary flesh and blood like mine.”
Once more I fell prey to deep suspicion of my companions, even though it was clear to the eye that this trip through familiar countryside was all too real. In spite of all that I told myself, this suspicion included Jane as well. Were these really living human beings that I was sharing the car with? Could they be dead? Spectres from a world that has long since ceased to exist? – –
The Princess turned to me with a mocking expression:
“You are afraid?”
I chose my words carefully. It had not escaped me that since the beginning of the journey Assja Shotokalungin had shot a number of concerned glances in the direction of Jane, who was sitting next to her. That was something new in her. I was tempted to probe a little, so I answered with a similar smile:
“Not that I am aware of. Unless it is catching amongst friends. I couldn’t help noticing that you seem uneasy about something yourself.”
The Princess twitched perceptibly. We thundered underneath a bridge, making any answer impossible. Instead of the Princess, Lipotin shouted into the wind:
“I wouldn’t have thought the lady and gentleman would be arguing about who is more afraid instead of enjoying the healthy, refreshing air! Anyway: no need for fear when you travel with me. In our family an excessively undramatic manner of coming into the world and leaving it is hereditary.”
After a short while Jane said quietly:
“How can anyone be afraid who is following his own way? Only someone who resists his fate will feel fear.”
The Princess remained silent. Her face was smiling, but I, and I alone, could see it darken for a split second with the flickering shadow of some inner storm. Then she tapped the chauffeur on the shoulder:
“Why are we going so sluggishly, Roger?”
I felt a slight shock: the chauffeur was called Roger!? An eerie coincidence!
The man at the wheel nodded and the whole car started to sing. The speedometer leapt up to a hundred and twenty and swung wildly to and fro before sticking at some outrageous speed. I looked at Jane: if I die, let it be in her arms.
How we managed to reach the top of the steep and incredibly bumpy track to the ruin of Elsbethstein will always remain a mystery to me. The only explanation I can think of is that we flew up. The tremendous power and solid construction of the limousine made the miracle possible. It was certainly the first car that had ever been seen up there.
We were quickly surrounded by workmen – dripping figures emerging like beings of the underworld from the drifting clouds of hot steam; they leant on their spades and mattocks, marvelling at our arrival, before a fizzing backcloth of spurting geysers. We wandered silently round the pleasantly wooded ruins and I was struck by the sense of design in the arrangement of the bushes, as if some gardener had created the delightful vistas through the trees down into the depths of the valley. The half overgrown flowerbeds beside the massive, crumbling walls formed a strange, romantic contrast. It was like walking through an enchanted garden where moss-covered statues without arms or heads suddenly popped up, as if placed there by some fairy to frighten or tease the visitors. Then there was a fissure in the rock, and, glistening in the depths, the foaming current.
Someone asked:
“Who can it be who keeps this ravishing disorder in such beautiful order?”
No-one
