Bernstein lowered the flaming cup that, in his eagerness, he had raised toward his lips and looked at Natzi. Malice gleamed in his eyes.
“Yes. Let it cool. Then we will drink a toast.”
“With all my heart,” said Natzi. “It shall be a toast to her. A toast to the sweetest woman in the world.”
There was a long pause. Once or twice Natzi glanced hesitatingly at his companion, who sat with bowed head, his eyes intent upon the flames that leaped so brightly from his cup. Then Natzi spoke, slowly at first, but gradually more rapidly, and more animatedly as the intensity of his emotion mastered him.
“Do you know, dear friend,” he began, “there was a time when I thought she loved you? We were together so much, the three of us, and she had so many opportunities to know you—to know you as I knew you—to know your great, strong mind, your tender heart, your steadfastness, your generous nature, that could harbour no unworthy thought. You pose as a cynic, as a man who looks down upon the petty things that make up life for most of us, but I—I, who have lived with you, struggled with you, known so many of the trials and heart-breakings of everyday life with you—I know you better. True, you have no love for women, and I often wondered how you could be so blind to her sweetness, and to the charm that seemed to fill the room whenever we three were together. But I never took my eyes from her face, and when I saw with what breathless interest she listened whenever you spoke, whenever you told us of your plans for uplifting the down-trodden, of your innermost thoughts and hopes and feelings, I read in her eyes a fondness for you that filled me with despair.”
Bernstein was breathing heavily. His lips quivered; his face twitched; the blood had mounted to his cheeks. His eyes were downcast, fastened upon the blue flames of the chai, dancing and leaping in fantastic shapes.
“That time you were sick—do you remember? When the doctor said there was no hope on earth, when everyone felt that the end had come, when you lay for days white and still, hardly breathing, with the pallor of death upon your face—do you remember? And I nursed you—sat at your bedside through four days and four nights without a minute’s rest. And then, when the doctor said the crisis had passed and you would get well, I fainted away from sheer weakness—do you remember?”
Perspiration in huge drops was trickling slowly down Bernstein’s forehead. His lips were dry. His teeth were tightly clenched.
“And you thought I had done it all for friendship’s sake, and I listened to your outpouring of gratitude, taking it all for myself, without a word—without a word! Ah, my dear friend, it was hateful to deceive you; but how could I tell the truth? But now I have no shame in telling it. I did it for her. All for her. To save you for her. That was the only thought in my poor, whirling brain during those long, weary days and nights. I felt that if you died she would die. I knew the intensity of her nature, and I knew that if aught happened to the man she loved she would die of grief. And now to think you never cared for her, and that it was I whom she always loved!”
Natzi looked at the bowed head before him with tender smile. Bernstein was trembling.