"Dream?"
"Yes, I am just beginning to wake up. It is rather like the morning air streaming into a bedroom."
"And then I suppose the other dream will begin?"
"What do you mean, the other dream?"
"This is what I take to be the case with you. When you are in the public eye again, making speeches, sacrificing yourself for some cause or other, then at some moment or other the whole thing strikes you like a dream, doesn't it? And you think real life is somewhere else."
"There is really something in what you say."
At this moment Demeter and Anna, who were standing by the garden gate, turned round towards them both and immediately took the broad avenue towards the entrance of the hotel. George and Therese also went on further, unseen outside the railing, into the darkest depths of the shade.
George suddenly seized hold of his companion's hand. As though astonished she turned towards him and both now stood opposite each other, enveloped by the darkness and closer than they could understand. They did not know how ... they scarcely meant to, but their lips rested on each other for a short moment that was more charged with the doleful joy of deception than with any other emotion. They then went on, silent, unsatisfied, desirous, and stepped through the garden door.
The two others, who were in front of the hotel, now turned round and came to meet them.
Therese quickly said to George: "Of course you don't come with us?"