As Daniel was passing through The Füll he was startled: the windows in the Benda house were lighted. He suddenly recalled that Herr Seelenfromm had told him that Frau Benda had returned from Worms some time ago, and was living with her niece; she had become totally blind.
He went up the steps and rang the bell. A grey-haired, distressed-looking woman came to the door. He thought she must be the niece. He told her his name; she said she had heard of him.
“You probably know that Friedrich has disappeared,” she said in a sleepy, sing-song voice. “It is eight years since we have heard from him. The last letter was from the interior of Africa. We have given up all hope. Not even the newspapers say anything more about him.”
“I have read nothing about it,” murmured Daniel. “But Friedrich cannot be dead,” he continued, shaking his head, “I will never believe it, never.” Partly in distraction and partly in anxiety, he riveted his eyes on the woman, who stared at his glasses as if held by a charm.
“We have done everything that was humanly possible,” she said. “We have written to the consulates, we have inquired of the military outposts and missionary stations, and all to no purpose.” After a pause she said with a little more vivacity: “You do not wish me to ask you in, I hope. It is so painful to my aunt to hear a strange voice, and I cannot think of letting you talk to her. If I did, it would merely open her old wounds, and she has a hard enough time of it as it is.”
Daniel nodded and went on his way. A coarse laugh could be heard down in the entrance hall; it was painfully out of harmony with the depressed atmosphere of the Benda apartment. He felt his heart grow faint; he felt a burning desire for something, though he was unable to say precisely what, something sweet and radiant.
On the last landing he stopped, and looked with utter amazement into the hall below.
Herr Carovius was dancing like a Merry-Andrew around the door of his residence. He had a crown of silver paper on his head, and was trying to ward off the importunate advances of a young girl. His smiles were tender but senile. The girl wore a carnival costume. Her dark blue velvet dress, covered with threads of silver, made her robust figure look slenderer than it actually was. A black veil-like cloth hung from her shoulders to the ground, and then draped along behind her for about three paces. It was sprinkled with glittering tinsel. In her hand she held a hideous wax mask of the face of an old sot with a red nose. She was trying to fit the mask to Herr Carovius’s face.
She was working hard to make him yield; she said she was not going to leave until she had put the mask on his face. Herr Carovius shook the door, which in the meantime had closed, fumbled about in his pockets for the key, but the girl gave him no peace.