"But, most gracious Lady, you are coming back, aren't you? I heard it was only for three or four days."
"Yes, dear friend, I am supposed to come back, and it is even arranged that I shall be back in Kessin in a week at the latest. But it is possible that I may not come back. I don't need to tell you all the thousand possibilities—I see you are about to tell me I am still too young to—but young people sometimes die. And then there are so many other things. So I prefer to take leave of you as though it were for ever."
"But, most gracious Lady—"
"As though it were for ever. And I want to thank you, dear Gieshübler. For you were the best thing here; naturally, because you were the best man. If I live to be a hundred years old I shall not forget you. I have felt lonely here at times, and at times my heart was so heavy, heavier than you can ever know. I have not always managed rightly. But whenever I have seen you, from the very first day, I have always felt happier, and better, too."
"Oh, most gracious Lady."
"And I wished to thank you for it. I have just bought a small bottle of sal volatile. There are often such remarkable people in the compartment, who will not even permit a window to be opened. If I shed any tears—for, you know, it goes right up into one's head, the salts, I mean—then I will think of you. Adieu, dear friend, and give my regards to your friend, Miss Trippelli. During these last weeks I have often thought of her and of Prince Kotschukoff. After all is said and done it remains a peculiar relation. But I can understand it—and let me hear from you some day. Or I shall write."
With these words Effi went out. Gieshübler accompanied her out upon the square. He was dumbfounded, so completely that he entirely overlooked many enigmatical things she said.
Effi went back home. "Bring me the lamp, Johanna," she said, "but into my bedroom. And then a cup of tea. I am so cold and cannot wait till his Lordship returns."
The lamp and the tea came. Effi was already sitting at her little writing desk, with a sheet of letter paper before her and the pen in her hand. "Please, Johanna, put the tea on the table there."
When Johanna had left the room Effi locked her door, looked into the mirror for a moment and then sat down again, and wrote: "I leave tomorrow by the boat, and these are farewell lines. Innstetten expects me back in a few days, but I am not coming back—why I am not coming back, you know—it would have been better if I had never seen this corner of the earth. I implore you not to take this as a reproach. All the fault is mine. If I look at your house—your conduct may be excusable, not mine. My fault is very grievous, but perhaps I can overcome it. The fact that we were called away from here is to me, so to speak, a sign that I may yet be restored to favor. Forget the past, forget me. Your Effi."