hurried away with it; the rest followed.
I did not want to remain here alone, also my sleepiness had left me by now; for a moment I hesitated, it seemed to me that I was meddling too much in the affairs of this
house where no one had shown any great confidence in me; but finally I ran after the children. I heard the pattering of their feet a short distance ahead of me, but often
stumbled in the pitch darkness on the unfamiliar way and once even bumped my head painfully against the wall. We came into the room in which I had first met the old
people; it was empty, through the door that was still standing open one could see the moonlit garden.
“Go outside,” I said to myself, “the night is warm and bright, you can continue your journey or even spend the night in the open. After all, it is so ridiculous to run about
after the children here.” But I ran nevertheless; I still had a hat, stick, and rucksack up in the attic. But how the children ran! With their shifts flying they leaped
through the moonlit room in two bounds, as I distinctly saw. It occurred to me that I was giving adequate thanks for the lack of hospitality shown me in this house by
frightening the children, causing a race through the house and myself making a great din instead of sleeping (the sound of the children’s bare feet could hardly be heard
above the tread of my heavy boots)—and I had not the faintest notion of what would come of all this.
Suddenly a bright light appeared. In front of us, in a room with several windows opened wide, a delicate-looking woman sat at a table writing by the light of a tall,
splendid table lamp. “Children!” she called out in astonishment; she hadn’t seen me yet, I stayed back in the shadow outside the door. The children put the dog on the
table; they obviously loved the woman very much, kept trying to look into her eyes, one girl seized her hand and caressed it; she made no objection, was scarcely aware
of it. The dog stood before her on the sheet of letter paper on which she had just been writing and stretched out its quivering little tongue toward her, the tongue could
be plainly seen a short distance in front of the lampshade. The children now begged to be allowed to remain and tried to wheedle the woman’s consent. The woman
was undecided, got up, stretched her arms, and pointed to the single bed and the hard floor. Thc children refused to give it any importance and lay down on the floor
wherever they happened to be, to try it; for a while everything was quiet. Her hands folded in her lap, the woman looked down with a smile at the children. Now and
then one raised its head, but when it saw the others still lying down, lay back again.
One evening I returned home to my room from the office somewhat later than usual—an acquaintance had detained me below at the house entrance for a long
time—opened the door (my thoughts were still engrossed by our conversation, which had consisted chiefly of gossip about people’s social standing), hung my overcoat on
the hook, and was about to cross over to the washstand when I heard a strange, spasmodic breathing. I looked up and, on top of the stove that stood deep in the gloom
of a comer, saw something alive. Yellowish glittering eyes stared at me; large round woman’s breasts rested on the shelf of the stove, on either side beneath the
unrecognizable face; the creature seemed to consist entirely of a mass of soft white flesh; a thick yellowish tail hung down beside the stove, its tip ceaselessly passing
back and forth over the cracks of the tiles.
The first thing I did was to cross over with long strides and sunken head—nonsense! I kept repeating like a prayer—to the door that led to my landlady’s rooms. Only
later I realized that I had entered without knocking. Miss Hefter—
It was about midnight. Five men held me, behind them a sixth had his hand raised to grab me. “Let go,” I cried, and whirled in a circle, making them all fall back. I felt