Little Burgei now sleeps with me. My friends will listen to nothing else, and will not suffer me to be alone at night.
I am filled with dread. A corpse lies on the floor above. Beside it, is a solitary lamp that is left to burn until the dead man is buried. And yet I feel that I must conquer this feeling of dread! Yes, I shall.
It still moves me deeply to think of how the old man remembered me. He sent for me yesterday; and, when I went up to his bedside, he said: "Irmgard, you were a stranger and yet were kind to me--I'd like to leave you something. I've been thinking the matter over and find that I still have something to give you. It's the best of all that I own. It would do me no good to have it buried with me, and it will be of great benefit to you, for there's a charm in it. Here it is--take it--it's the bullet that struck me on the third rib. Take good care of it. He who bears with him a bullet that has once hit a man, is in no danger of sudden, unexpected death. You can rely on that! And now I've something to ask you: Tell me, what was your father's name? You've told me that he's dead. When I get to heaven, I'll hunt him up and tell him that you're quite a good girl; a little bit queer, perhaps, but right good for all. I'll tell your father that, and it'll be good news for him."
I could not tell him the name--how could I? All I could do was to thank him for giving me what had been so precious in his own eyes. And, strange to say, when I take the bullet in my hand and look at it, it agitates me greatly.
I will now prepare myself to follow the old man to his grave.
I was at the churchyard while the old man was buried. I shall lie there, too, some day.
I feel as if death might be conquered by the will. I am determined to live; I will not die. Is force of will the hidden thing within me, that I am ever seeking? And yet, I have no will. No one has. All our life, all our thoughts, are simply the necessary result of events and experiences, of waking perception and nocturnal dreams. Like the beasts, we may change the scene; but, the greater one, the prison that confines us, we cannot change. We cannot quit the earth. The laws of gravitation and attraction hold our souls fast as well as our bodies. Far above me, move the stars, and I am nothing more than a flower or a blade of grass clinging to the earth. The stars look down at me and I look up to them, and yet we cannot join each other.