“I came. …” he tried to explain. “I thought you would be so kind … if it isn’t putting you out too much … as to put me up for a day—”
Braun did not let him finish.
“A day! … Twenty days, fifty, as long as you like. As long as you are in this country you shall stay in our house: and I hope you will stay for a long time. It is an honor and a great happiness for us.”
Christophe was overwhelmed by his kind words. He flung himself into Braun’s arms.
“My dear Christophe, my dear Christophe!” said Braun. … “He is weeping. … Well, well what is it? … Anna! Anna! … Quick, he has fainted. …”
Christophe had collapsed in his host’s arms. He had succumbed to the fainting fit which had been imminent for several hours.
When he opened his eyes again he was lying in a great bed. A smell of wet earth came up through the open window. Braun was bending over him.
“Forgive me,” murmured Christophe, trying to get up.
“He is dying of hunger!” cried Braun.
The woman went out and returned with a cup and gave him to drink. Braun held his head. Christophe was restored to life: but his exhaustion was stronger than his hunger: hardly was his head laid back on the pillow than he went to sleep. Braun and his wife watched over him: then, seeing that he only needed rest, they left him.
He fell into the sort of sleep that seems to last for years, a heavy crushing sleep, dropping like a piece of lead to the bottom of a lake. In such a sleep a man is a prey to his accumulated weariness and the monstrous hallucinations which are forever prowling at the gates of his will. He tried to wake up, burning, broken, lost in the impenetrable darkness: he heard the clocks striking the half hours: he could not breathe, or think, or move: he was bound and gagged like a man flung into water to drown: he tried to struggle, but only sank down again.—Dawn came at length, the tardy gray dawn of a rainy day. The intolerable heat that consumed him grew less: but his body was pinned under the weight of a mountain. He woke up. It was a terrible awakening.
“Why open my eyes? Why wake up? Rather stay, like my poor friend, who is lying under the earth. …”
He lay on his back and never moved, although he was cramped by his position in the bed: his legs and arms were heavy as stone. He was in a grave. A dim pale light. A few drops of rain dashed against the windows. A bird in the garden was uttering a little plaintive cry. Oh! the misery of life! The cruel futility of it all! …
The hours crept by. Braun came in. Christophe did not turn his head. Seeing his eyes open, Braun greeted him joyfully: and as Christophe went on grimly staring at the ceiling he tried to make him shake off his melancholy: he sat down on the bed and chattered noisily. Christophe could not bear the noise. He made an effort, superhuman it seemed to him, and said:
“Please leave me alone.”
The good little man changed his tone at once.
“You want to be alone? Why, of course. Keep quiet. Rest, don’t talk, we’ll bring you up something to eat, and no one shall say a word.”
But it was impossible for him to be brief. After endless explanations he tiptoed from the room with his huge slippers creaking on the floor. Christophe was left alone once more, and sank back into his mortal weariness. His thoughts were veiled by the mist of suffering. He wore himself out in trying to understand. … “Why had he known him? Why had he loved him? What good had Antoinette’s devotion been? What was the meaning of all the lives and generations—so much experience and hope—ending in that life, dragged down with it into the void?” … Life was meaningless. Death was meaningless. A man was blotted out, shuffled out of existence, a whole family disappeared from the face of the earth, leaving no trace. Impossible to tell whether it is more odious or more grotesque. He burst into a fit of angry laughter, laughter of hatred and despair. His impotence in the face of such sorrow, his sorrow in the face of such impotence, were dragging him down to death. His heart was broken. …
There was not a sound in the house, save the doctor’s footsteps as he went out on his rounds. Christophe had lost all idea of the time, when Anna appeared. She brought him some dinner on a tray. He watched her without stirring, without even moving his lips to thank her: but in his staring eyes, which seemed to see nothing, the image of the young woman was graven with photographic clarity. Long afterwards, when he knew her better, it was always thus that he saw her: later impressions were never able to efface that first memory of her. She had thick hair done up in a heavy knob, a bulging forehead, wide cheeks, a short, straight nose, eyes perpetually cast down, and when they met the eyes of another, they would turn away with an expression in which there was little frankness and small kindness: her lips were a trifle thick, and closely pressed together, and she had a stubborn, rather hard expression. She was tall, apparently big and well made, but her clothes were very stiff and tight, and she was cramped in her movements. She came silently and noiselessly and laid the tray on the table by the bed and went out again with her arms close to her sides and her head down. Christophe felt no surprise at her strange and rather absurd appearance: he did not touch his food and relapsed into his silent suffering.
The day passed. Evening came and once more Anna with more food. She
