“Yes, but what more? Is the impression then not [[186]]exactly the same as when I saw the same in reality at Fotheringay?”
“No, not in the least, because you did not climb on a chair with three legs. This time you take a chair,—with four legs, by preference an easy-chair,—you go and sit down before the picture, in order to enjoy it completely and for a long time—[We do enjoy ourselves in seeing anything dismal!]—and what is the impression which it makes on you?”
“Well, dread, anguish, pity, trouble!… just the same as when I looked through the hole in the wall. You supposed the picture to be perfect, so I must have the same impression from it as from the reality.”
“No, within two minutes you feel pain in your right arm out of sympathy with the executioner, who has to hold up so long that blade of steel.…”
“Sympathy with the executioner?”
“Yes; an equal sense of pain and discomfort … and also with the woman who sits there so long in an uncomfortable position, and probably in an uncomfortable state of mind, before the block. You still sympathize with her; but this time not because she had to wait so long before being decapitated——and if you had anything to say or to cry,—suppose that you felt disposed to trouble yourself with the matter,—it would be nothing else than, ‘Give the blow, man, she is waiting for it!’ And if afterwards you look again at that picture, and look often at it, is [[187]]your first impression that it is not yet done? ‘Is he still standing and she lying?’ ”
“But what motion is there then in the beauty of the women at Arles?” asked Verbrugge.
“Oh, that is quite different! In their features you may read a whole history.[3] Carthage flourishes, and builds ships: you hear Hannibal’s oath against Rome … here they twist cords for their bows … there the city burns.…”
“Max! Max! I believe that you left your heart at Arles,” said Tine.
“Yes, for a moment … but I have got it back again: you shall hear it. Observe, I do not say I saw a woman there who was in this or that respect beautiful—no, they were all beautiful, and so it was impossible there to fall in love, because the next person always drove the preceding from your admiration, and really I thought of Caligula or Tiberius,—of which of them do they tell the story?—who wished that all humankind had but one head … now therefore involuntarily I wished that the women of Arles.…”