"And yet he achieved little enough," the other answered. "He ran after women and sought the society of inferior persons for the sake of their flattery. It always astonished me anew when he managed to produce something of approximately solid worth. For neither his character nor his intelligence gave promise of it."
"In your wonderful charity you are capable of finding something excellent even in his work," the other replied. "But let us be frank: The only thing he sometimes succeeded in doing was to flatter the crude instincts of the mob. True earnestness or conviction he never possessed."
"I never claimed either for him," the first eagerly broke in. "Only I didn't want to deny the poor fellow that bit of piety which is demanded. De mortuis——"
And both voices withdraw into the distance.
"O you grave-robbers!" I cried and shook my fist after them. "Now I know what your friendship was worth. Now it is clear to me how you humiliated me upon all my ways, and how when I came to you in hours of depression you administered a kick in order that you might increase in stature at my expense! Oh, if I could only."…
I ceased laughing.
"What silly wishes, old boy!" I admonished myself. "Even if you could master your friends; your enemies would drive you into the grave a thousand times over."
And I determined to devote my whole thought henceforth to the epoch-making invention of my impregnating fluid called "Helminothanatos" or "Death by Worms."
But new voices roused me from my meditation.
I listened.