"Dear Imre, I am immeasurably happy", I replied.
He leaned forward, and lightly kissed my cheek.
What!—he Imre von N—, who so had questioned the warm-hearted greetings of his friend—Captain M—! An odd lapse indeed!
"I am in a state of regular shipwreck," he exclaimed; standing up particularly straight again, after a demonstration that so confounded me as to leave me wordless!—"I have had no breakfast, no luncheon, nothing to eat since five o'clock. I am tired as a dog, and hungry—oh, mint egy vén Kárpáti medve!" [Literally, "as an old Carpathian bear".] "I stopped to have a bath at the Officers' Baths.. you should see the dust between here and the Camp... and to change, and write a note to my father. So, if you don't mind, the sooner I have something to eat and perhaps a nap, why the better. I am done up!"
In a few moments we were at table. Imre manifestly was not too fagged to talk and laugh a great deal; with a truly Homeric exhibition of his appetite. The budget of experiences at the Camp was immediately drawn upon, with much vivacity. But as luncheon ended, my guest admitted that the fatigues of the hot morning-march with his troop, from P.... (during which several sunstrokes had occurred, those too-ordinary incidents of Hungarian army-movements in summer) were reacting on him. So I went to the Bank, as usual, for letters; transacted some other business on the way; and left Imre to himself. When I returned to my room an hour or so later, he was stretched out, sound asleep, on the long green sofa. His sword and his close-fitting fatigue-blouse were thrown on a chair. The collarless, unstarched shirt (that is so much an improvement on our civilian garment) was unbuttoned at the throat; the sleeves rolled up to his shoulders, in unconscious emphasizing of the deepened sun-tan of his fine skin. The long brown eye-lashes lying motionless, against his cheek, his physical abandonment, his deep, regular, soundless breathing... all betokened how the day had spent itself on his young strength. Once left alone, he had fallen asleep where he had sat down.
A great and profoundly human poet, in one famous scene, speaks of those emotions that come to us when we are watching, in his sleep, a human being that we love. Such moments are indeed likely to be subduing to many a sensitive man and woman. They bring before our eyes the effect of a living statue; of a beauty self-unconscious, almost abstract, if the being that we love be beautiful. Strongly, suddenly, comes also the hint at helplessness; the suggestion of protection from us, however less robust. Or the idea of the momentary but actual absence of that other soul from out of the body before us, a vanishing of that spirit to whom we ourselves cling. We feel a subconscious sense of the inevitable separation forever, when there shall occur the Silence of "the Breaker of Bonds, the Sunderer of Companionships, the Destroyer of Fellowships, the Divider of Hearts"—as (like a knell of everything earthly and intimate!) the old Arabian phrases lament the merciless divorce of death!
I stood and watched Imre a moment, these things in my mind. Then, moving softly about the room, lest he should be aroused, I began changing my clothes for the afternoon. But more than once the spell of my sleeping guest drew me to his side. At last, scarce half dressed, I sat down before him, to continue to look at him. Yes.. his face had the same expression now, as he slumbered there, that I had often remarked in his most silent moments of waking. There were not only the calm regular beauty, the manly uprightness, his winning naïveté of character written all through such outward charm for me; but along with that came again the appealing hint of an inward sadness; the shadow of some enrooted, hidden sorrow that would not pass, however proudly concealed.
"God bless thee, Imre!" my heart exclaimed in benediction, "God bless thee, and make thee happy!... happier than I! Thou hast given me thy friendship. I shall never ask of God... of Fate... anything more... save that the gift endure till we two endure not!"
The wish was like an echo from the Z... park. Or, rather, it was an echo from a time far earlier in my life. Once again, with a mystic certainty, I realized that those days of Solitude were now no longer of any special tyranny upon my moods. That was at an end for me, verily! O, my God! That was at an end!....
Imre opened his eyes.