I stayed away from a class with which I was supposed to resume work this afternoon, and did not return to the boarding school until the wonted hour had struck.
On this night I could get no more real sleep than on the nights before. Whether I lay awake or dozed, my thoughts incessantly hovered about the mystery of these days, endeavored to overcome its fascination, and to see clearly. Was the rapture which this maiden's beauty gave me not a danger? Had I the right to let my pain at Mara's disappearance pass away in this rapture? Was the pain not just and rightful? Every love is a test of love, and one must meet the test! What must I nourish and justify within me, Mara's love or my love? If I yield and bow to the will of her love, how can I be faithful to mine? The love of man and woman shall be like two linden-trees which grow separately side by side, their tops only forming a single indistinguishable dome; but if one trunk leans upon the other, they will wound each other in the storm and will become crippled. Let the love of man and woman be like a sword with two edges; neither edge may grow dull out of love for the other, else they cannot unite to form a point. Let the love of two be the untroubled unity of the man and of the woman of purest essence, so that the man shall admit nothing womanish, and the woman nothing mannish into her being; else they will become a puzzling confusion, not a unity.
"Let the morrow be governed by my will!" I said to myself; and a dream, the only one to abide with me from among the fugitive half-dreams of the night--a dream confirmed my resolution, although it flowed like a tributary into the stream of the thoughts that I thought I had, and brought nothing surprising.
I saw Mara walking amidst the mountains of my home on a snowy night. Neither moon nor stars shone in the heavens, there was merely the faint gleam of the snow in contrast to the edge of the dark forest; but Mara's figure was bright and of distinctive color, as she had appeared to me under the tropical sun. In red shoes she strode down the snow-clad river valley, stepped up to the dark houses, and peered in at the windows; immediately all the windows of the house were illumined as with the rays of a bright light, and became dark again when the maiden wandered on. Tirelessly she did the same thing at every house that faced toward the river, in every hamlet, the length of a long road. At last she came to my native town and to the house of red sandstone in which my mother lay in travail. Mara stretched, and grew, and looked in at the window; the house lighted up within and grew more and more light, flames flickered within, burst forth at all the windows, and united together above the high roof. Like a great scarlet flower the house stood there in the night, the light of the fire flowed over the snow in the yard and across the ice of the river, and illumined the snow-covered houses of the city on yonder side. From all the church steeples the clocks struck the first hour of the day, one after the other; when the sound of the last stroke died away, the fire in the house was suddenly extinguished, and once more I caught sight of Mara, who had eluded my eyes. She came out upon the highway, placed a naked baby boy on his feet in the snow beside her, and strode back the way she had come. The boy kept hold of a fold of her garment, and with his poor little legs trotted along beside her; his heavy head tottered in every direction, his eyes were tightly closed, and he uttered a plaintive croaking. Mara too had closed her eyes, a quiet joy animated her countenance, her feeling seemed to be far off from the poor little creature which, side by side with her, tramped up into the snowy forest.
With a shudder I had awaked, and after long pondering I had returned to my thoughts of the previous evening: yes, this day should be subject to my will!
And so in the morning I went at the wonted hour not into the park but into the city. Reading the paper, I stood in squares and at cross-roads and waited. Ill at ease, I goaded myself through the streets, as though dragged hither and thither in a stream of molten metal; I loitered in the café and the bookshop. But my mind was so absorbed that the waiter or dealer who brought me what I had ordered startled me as if from sleep. My eye saw Mara wandering in the park, resting at the fountain, sitting beside me on the bench under the erythrina, transparent, like a figure formed of water, in a rain of drops of fire; and my heart was filled with a longing to which I had willed it should not yield.
At noon when, unheeding the shadeless heat, I sauntered toward a bridge which spanned the deep valley of the river--there in the middle of the road, engulfed by the undulating air, there walked Mara! The desire of my conceit, to avoid her, was of no avail against my overpowering joy. I stepped up to her. How daintily she moved in the obedient folds of her brownish-gray garment, beneath the hem of which the tip of her red shoe peeped out and disappeared again. Like a blossom of the softest red the clasp of her girdle shone beneath her breast. Her eyes seemed to me full of the joy of meeting again, as they gleamed forth from the shade of her hat. My will gave itself up and died, as shame dies. Whispering her name as a greeting, I turned round when I reached her, and by her side I retraced my steps. She looked straight ahead, a childlike smile softened the expression of her mouth, heretofore so serious, and her lips blossomed red in her white face. I strode along beside her and lost myself. Why do I not snatch her to my bosom? Why do I not kiss myself to death on her lips?
Yes--why did I not do that?
When I chanced to become aware that she avoided the populous streets, then indeed there came to me a fleeting consciousness, an angry pain at my weakness, and I turned into the main street. She remained by my side. If you do not do her will, then she will do yours. Because you did not go to her, she came to you! And as I had purposed, I meant now to subject her to my will. But in my distracted excitement I could think out no plan; nothing occurred to me but to go aimlessly hither and thither, to turn back, and to stand still. And in this very inability I recognized how fully I was under her spell.
I began to speak.