“Here!” I noticed at the feet of the old woman a bush of silver,—bitter wormwood. (The court of the Ancient House, being a part of the museum is carefully kept in its prehistoric state.) A branch of the bush touched the old woman, she caressed that branch; upon her knees lay stripes of sunshine. For a second I myself, the sun, the old woman, the wormwood, those yellow eyes, all seemed to be one; we were firmly united by common veins and one common blood, boisterous, magnificent blood, was running through those veins.
I am ashamed now to write down all this, but I promised to be frank to the end of these records: yes, I bent over and kissed that soft, grown-together
mouth of the old woman. She wiped it with her hand and laughed.
Running, I passed through familiar, half-dark, echoing rooms, and for some reason I ran straight to the bedroom. When I had reached the door, a thought flashed: “And if she is there ... not alone?” I stopped and listened. But all I heard was the tick-tock of my heart, not within me, but somewhere near, outside me.
I entered. The large bed,—untouched. A mirror ... another mirror in the door of the cupboard, and in the keyhole an ancient key upon an ancient ring. No one was there. I called softly: “I-330, are you here?”—and then in a still lower voice with closed eyes, holding my breath,—in a voice as though I were kneeling before her, “I-, dear.” Silence. Only the water was dripping fast into the white basin of the washstand. I cannot now explain why, but I disliked that sound. I turned the faucet hard and went out. She was not there, so much was clear. She must be in another “apartment.”
I ran down a wide, sombre stairway, pulled one door, another, a third,—locked. Every room was locked save that of “our” apartment. And she was not there. I went back again to the same apartment without knowing why. I walked slowly, with difficulty; my shoe-soles suddenly became as heavy as cast-iron. I remember distinctly my thought, “It is a mistake that the force
of gravity is a constant; consequently all my formulae....”
Suddenly—an explosion! A door slammed down below; some one stamped quickly over the flagstones. I again became lightfooted, extremely light! I dashed to the railing to bend over, and in one word, one exclamation, expressed everything: “You!”
I became cold. Below in the square shadow of the window-frame, flapping its pink wing-ears, the head of S- passed by!
Like lightning I saw only the naked conclusion. Without any premises (I don’t recall any premises even now) the conclusion: he must not see me here! And on the tips of my toes, pressing myself against the wall, I sneaked upstairs into the unlocked apartment.