CHAPTER VI

STARVED TO DEATH

A small party to celebrate their reconciliation brought the two close together. Besides their common love of learning, or in other words, intellect, there were many things of which both had the same experience. Kien spoke for the first time of the deranged wife, whom he kept locked in at home where she could hurt no one. It was true his big library was there too; but since his wife had never shown the slightest interest in books, it was unlikely that, in her ravings, she would realize what treasures surrounded her. A sensitive mind like Fischerle's must surely understand what suffering this estrangement from his library caused him. But no book in the world could be more safely stored than with this mad creature who had but one idea —money. He carried the bare essentials round with him, and he pointed to the piles of books which had meanwhile been erected; Fischerle nodded respectfully.

'Yes, yes,' Kien resumed his narrative, 'you would not think such people could be, people who think of nothing but money. You made a fine gesture in renouncing money, even money which had been honourably spent. I would like to prove to you that the expressions I previously uttered against you were the outcome of a mood only, a mood which moreover may well have had its origin in my own sense of guilt. I would gladly recompense you for injuries which you were forced to bear in silence. Look upon it, therefore, as a recompense if I enlighten you on the true state of things in this world. Believe me, dear friend, there are people who do not only think of money often, but people who think of it always; every hour, every minute, every second of their lives they think of money! I will go further and even put forward the proposition that they think of other people's money. Such natures are afraid of nothing. Do you know what my wife tried to force from me?' 'A book!' cried Fischerle. 'That would have been comprehensible, culpable though such conduct must have been adjudged. No. A will!'

Fischerle had heard of such cases. He himself knew a woman who had tried something of the kind. To repay Kien's confidence he told him in a whisper the mysterious story, though not without insistently demanding that his confidence would be respected; it might cost him his head. Kien was taken aback when he learnt whose story it was: Fischerle's own wife's. 'Now I can admit to you,' he cried, 'your wife put me in mind of my own at the very first glance. Is your wife called Thérèse? At that time I did not wish to hurt your feelings, so I kept my impressions to myself.' 'No, she's called the Capitalist, she hasn't any other name. Before she was called the Capitalist, she was called Skinny, because she's so fat.'

The name was not correct, but every other detail was. At the tale of Fischerle's will all manner of suspicions were aroused in him. Was Thérèse in secret a professional harlot? Nothing was too low for her. She gave out that she went early to bed. Perhaps she passed her nights under other Stars of Heaven? He recollected that appalling scene when she had undressed and swept the books off the divan on to the floor. A harlot alone would have been capable of such shameless-ness. While Fischerle spoke of his wife, Kien compared the details — the illness, the litany, the attempted murder — with what he remembered of Thérèse and had imparted to the dwarf only a few moments since. No doubt, if the two women were not identical, they must surely be twin sisters.

Later, when Fischerle in a sudden burst of confidence asked him to call him by his Christian name, and, aquiver with friendship, awaited his answer, Kien decided not only to fulfil this wish; he promised to dedicate his next important work to him, possibly that revolutionary thesis on the Logos in die New Testament, although the dwarf was no scholar and his education lay all before him. In this hour of reconciliation Fischerle learned that there were people here at home who spoke Chinese better than Chinamen and a dozen more languages as Well. 'I always thought so,' he said. This fact, if it was a fact, really impressed him. But he didn't believe it. All the same, it was something for a man to be able to pretend so much intellect.

As soon as they got on to Christian name terms, there was no end to their mutual understanding. They worked out their redemption plans for the following days. Fischerle calculated that their capital would last them about a week; people might come with even more valuable books, and to let these go to perdition was a crime worthy of the death penalty. In spite of the unpleasing calculation Kien was enchanted with these words. Once the capital was expended, they would have to take more energetic measures, Fischerle added with a serious face. What he meant by this he kept to himself. To start with he explained the immediate plans to Kien. Their mission would begin at 9.30 and end at 10.30. During these hours the police are busy elsewhere. From earlier experience Fischerle knew that the cordon round the Theresianum withdrew at 9.20 and marched back to its post at 10.40. Arrests are made regularly at eleven; doubtless his dear friend remembered his own narrow escape early this morning. Naturally Kien remembered; it had struck eleven just as they looked up at the church clock. 'You're a sharp observer, Fischerle !' he said. 'Dear friend, when one's lived so long with the dregs! Life there isn't any fun, respectability doesn't pay there, present company excepted, but live and learn.' Kien perceived that Fischerle possessed precisely what he himself lacked, a knowledge of practical life, to its last ramifications.

Next morning, punctually at half past nine, he was at his post, refreshed, relieved and resolute. He felt refreshed because he was carrying less learning about with him. Fischerle had taken over the remainder of the library. 'You can put something into my head,' he joked, 'and if there's not room, I'll cram some into my hump !' He was relieved because the ugly secret of his wife no longer weighed on him, and resolute because he was under another person's orders. At 8.30 Fischerle took leave of him; he wanted to make a small reconnoitring expedition. If he should not come back, then all was in order.

Behind the church he met his staff. The Fishwife, in spite of being fired, had turned up again. She held her nose a good few inches higher than before. The chief owed her twenty schillings, and it lay with her to remind him; relying on his debt to her she dared to approach him. The sewerman was complaining of his wife. Instead of being content with the 15 schillings he had brought home, she had asked him immediately for the other five. She knew everything. That was why he respected her. She had dinned him awake that morning with those miserable schillings he had drunk. "What do you expect,' said the blind man who had been walking up and down groaning behind the church for the last two hours and had not even taken his usual morning coffee, 'what do you expect, if you have only one woman! A man can do with a hundred women!' Then he asked about the sewerman's wife. Her weight made him thoughtful and he said no more. The hawker, torn from his dreamless sleep the night before by the sacristan, had only just remembered the parcel he had forgotten under the bench. Full of fear, although it was only books, he looked for it. He found it; Fischerle was already outside and greeted him with a slight twitch of his nose.

'Ladies and gentlemen,' began the chief, 'we have no time to lose. To-day is an important day. Our enterprise is forging ahead. The turnover is growing. In a few days I shall be a made man. Do your duty and I will not forget you!' He looked at the sewerman blankly, at the blind man promisingly, at the Fishwife forgivingly, at the hawker contemptuously. 'My business friend will be there in half an hour's time. Until then I will instruct you so that you know exactly what you have to do. Whoever doesn t know will be fired !' He took each of them, in the same order as before, and impressed on them the very much larger sums which they were to demand to-day.

The business friend did not recognize the sewerman, which was not surprising as the man's face was no more than a shining turd. He asked the Fishwife if she had not been there yesterday, at which, just as she had been instructed, she complained furiously of her double. That heartless creature had been pawning books for yean, a thing she'd never yet done herself. Kien believed her, for her indignation pleased him, and he paid her what she asked.

Fischerle set his richest hopes on the blind man. 'First of all tell him how much you want. Then wait a minute or two. If he thinks it over, tread on his toes until he pays attention to you, and whisper in his ear: 'Kind regards from your wife Thérèse. She's dead.' The blind man wanted to know about her; he was distressed that her presumably generous dimensions had been reft from him by death. He regretted all deceased women; for men, were they never so dead, he had not the least sympathy. Fat women, who could thus never again be his, made him on his good days almost a body-snatcher, but on button days, only a poet. To-day Fischerle cut short his questions with a reference to a buttonless future. 'First get rid of buttons, my dear sir, then you can think of women! Buttons and women together are impossible!' With such prospects before him, the burden of a dead Thérèse was easy to carry as far as Kien. Her name was safe from oblivion all the way across the haymarket behind the church to the entrance hall of the book section. The intellect and the memory of the blind man, ever since he had been wounded in the war, extended no further than the names and figures of women. When, his eyes wide and gloating on the backside of a naked Thérèse, he pushed open the glass door, he burst out at once with her name, rushed up. to Kien, and, to fulfil the chief's instructions, trod belatedly on his toes.

Kien changed colour. He saw her coming. She has broken out. Her blue skirt gleams. The mad woman, she blued it and starched it, starched it and blued it, Kien himself goes blue and limp. She's looking for him, she wants him, she wants new starch for her skirt. Where are the police; She must be shut up at once, she's a public danger, she's left the library unguarded, police, police, where are the police, ah, the police don t come till 10.40, what a disaster, if only Fischerle were there, Fischerle at least, he wouldn't be afraid, her twin sister's his wife, he knows what to do, he's dealt with her, he'll destroy her, the blue skirt — appalling, appalling, why doesn't she die, why doesn't she die, she ought to die, this very moment, in the glass door, before she gets to him, before she strikes him, before she can open her mouth, ten books for her death, a hundred, a thousand, half the library, all of it, the ones in Fischerle's head, then surely she must be dead, for ever, it's a lot, but he swears it, he'll hand over the whole library, but she must be dead, dead, dead, absolutely dead! 'I'm sorry to say she's dead,' said the blind man with genuine regret, 'and sends you her kind regards.'

Ten times at least Kien made him repeat the joyful tidings. He wanted no details, he could never have enough of the fact alone; he pinched himself doubtfully to the very bone and called himself by his own name. When he realized that he had neither misunderstood nor dreamed it, nor muddled it up, he asked whether he was quite sure and where the gentleman had heard of it? Out of gratitude he was polite. 'Thérèse is dead and sends you her kind regards,' repeated the blind man, annoyed. At the sight of this creature his dream grew lean. His authority was reliable but he could not name it. For the parcel he wanted 4500 schillings, but he must have the parcel back as well.

Kien hastened to pay off his debt in money. He feared that the man might ask for the promised library. What luck that this morning early Fischerle had made himself responsible for it all. It would have been impossible for Kien to carry out his vow on the spot, Fischerle was not here, and whence was he to produce books all of a sudden? In any case he paid up quickly so that the bearer of good tidings should vanish. If Fischerle, of whose whereabouts he was uncertain, were by chance to sense danger, he would come to warn him, and the library would be lost. Promise or no promise, a library was worth more than any promise.

The blind man counted the money slowly. With such a gigantic sum the tip would have been worth having; he might have asked for one, but he wasn't a beggar any longer. He was an employee of a firm with a large turnover. He loved the chief, because he had finished off the buttons. Now if he got a hundred schillings' tip for instance, he could buy himself several women at once. The chief wouldn't mind. In his old manner he stretched out his hollowed hand and said, he wasn't a beggar, just the same he felt he might ask... Kien eyed the door, he thought he saw a shadow approaching, he pressed a note into the man's hand, it happened to be for a hundred schillings, pushed him away with his arm and implored: 'Go now, as quickly as you can, quickly, quickly!'

The blind man had no time to regret his incompetence; he might have asked for more, but the results of his good fortune were too much on his mind. Talking loudly, he reappeared at Fischerle's side; the latter was more interested in the effect of his trick than in the soft words of the blind man, who, for love and money, could contain himself no longer. He hesitated a little before taking the money out of his hand, he did not snatch at it; time enough to find a small sum and a big disappointment. Astonishment at his hundred per cent success almost knocked him out. He counted it two or three times carefully, repeating again and again: 'There's character for you! There's a man of character! You'll have to look out for yourself, Fischerle, my boy, with a character like that!' The blind man assumed the character was his and remembered in time the hundred schillings in his left pocket. He held it down to the dwarf's nose and called: 'Look at the tip he gave me, chief, and I never once asked him for it! A man what gives a hundred schilling tip's a good man!' And it happened that Fischerle, for the first time since he took over the direction of his new firm, let part of the booty slip through his fingers, so deeply engrossed was he with the character of his enemy.

Then the hawker came pushing forward; as on the previous day his turn came last. His unhappy face quite upset the blind man. Kindly as he was by nature he advised him to ask for a tip too. This time the chief heard. As soon as the hawker, this snake in the grass, who thought of nothing but his own advantage, approached him, he woke up automatically out of his dream and screeched at him: 'Don't you dare!' "Would I dare?' asked the victim, bewildered.

Since the previous day and in spite of his brief sleep, he had shrunk considerably. He would achieve nothing with violence, that he clearly saw. True he still firmly and fixedly believed that the real parcel was hidden in the church, but so cleverly that no one could find it. So he gave up hope of success and tried another way. He would gladly have been as small as Fischerle, so as to get into his mind, or even smaller, so as to get into the parcel itself and direct the sale from within. 'Crazy, that's what I am,' he told himself, 'no one's smaller than a dwarf.' But he did not doubt that the stature of the dwarf was inextricably connected with the hiding place of the parcel. He was much too smart. While others slept he was awake. Add the sleeping hours to the waking ones, and it was obvious how much smarter he must be than the others. He knew that, he was much too smart not to know that, but all the same he'd have liked to be rid of all this smartness, for a fortnight, shall we say, and have gone to sleep all that time like other people, in one of those nursing homes with every modern convenience, like they have nowadays; a chap like him gets about a bit and hears a lot of talk, other people hear it too, but they sleep it all off, he never sleeps off a thing, because he can't sleep, so he remembers every word of it.

Behind Fischerle's back, the blind man signalled to him, he held up the hundred schilling note and repeated with silendy moving lips his recommendation about the tip. He was afraid the hawker might come back defeated, because he wanted a word or two with him about his women. The chief knew nothing about that sort ofthing, he was only a deformed dwarf. The sewerman was a coward because of his own old woman, he wouldn't touch another, drinking was all he ever did without his old woman. Better tell the others nothing abouc this new situation, they'd all be wanting something, and in no time, out of all that money, he wouldn't be left with so much as a single woman on hand. The hawker was the only one to tell. He wouldn't say a word, if you talked something over with him, he was silent; he was much the best to talk to.

In the meantime the only one to tell was thinking of his job. He was to ask for the colossal sum of two thousand schillings. Should the business friend ask him whether he had not been there before, he must say: 'Yes, of course, with the same parcel! Don't you remember me?' If the flagpole got into one of his moods, the hawker must withdraw as fast as possible, without the money; in case of emergency he must even leave the parcel behind. The flagpole's habit was to draw out his revolver and shoot, one two. It didn't matter about the parcel. The books in it were not so very valuable. Fischcrle would settle up with his business friend as soon as he was normal again and could be talked to. In this devilish fashion, Fischerle planned to be rid of the hawker. He saw the infuriated Kien before him, his rage at the shameless demand and the reappearance of the hawker with the same books. He saw himself, Fischerle, shrugging his shoulders and dismissing his employee with a friendly grin. 'He won't have anything more to do with you? What am I to do? I'm afraid I shall have to dismiss you. He says, you insulted him. What did you do then? It's no use any more. You can go. Once I've got another partner, I'll take you on again, in a year or two. Look after yourself until then, and I'll see what I can do for you. I've a heart for hawkers. He says, you're a common fellow, a snake in the grass, thinking of nothing but your own advantage. How do I know what he means by that? Get out!'

At that moment Fischerle appeared in the glass door and said: 'Ready to go, I see.' 'A good thing I locked her up,'said Kien. 'Lock me up? Not on your life!' Fischcrle started back. 'She deserved her death. Even to-day I don't know for certain if she could read and write fluently.' Fischerle understood. 'And my wife can't play chess! What d'you say to that? Makes your blood boil, doesn't it?* 'I would gladly have learnt some details. We have to be content with such scanty information. My informant has vanished.' True, he had sent him away himself, but he was ashamed to confess to Fischerle the tremendous oath he had sworn. 'And he left his parcel here, the ass! Give it to me! I'm carrying everything already, I can carry this too.'

At these words he remembered their reconciliation of the previous evening and apologized to Kien for having addressed him too formally; it was merely out of his natural respect. In fact he already despised him, for he was now four times as rich as Kien. He looked upon it as a favour to go on knowing him, and had it not been for the last fifth of the capital, he would simply have been silent. Besides, Kien's domestic arrangements were beginning to interest him more closely. Perhaps his wife really was dead. All the signs pointed to it. If she had been still alive, she would have hauled her man home long ago. Any woman would have hauled home such an ass of a man with so much money. He didn't believe in her madness, all the details Kien had told him of her, were totally in order. That this weakly, skinny creature could have locked up anyone, let alone such a competent woman, seemed to him impossible and ridiculous. She would have broken down the door all the more, if she were mad. So she must be dead. But what was happening to the flat? If there was anything of value in it, there were things which ought to be fetched out; if it was only full of books, these could at least be pawned. The flat itself could be sold to someone else for a huge premium. In any case, something had happened and capital, whether large or small, was lying about unused. 

In the street Fischerle looked up anxiously at Kien and asked: 'Dear friend, what are we to do now with the beautiful books at home? The whore's gone and the books are all alone.' He placed the outstretched fingers of his right hand close together, grabbed at them with his left hand and broke them suddenly asunder just as if he had wrung the whore's neck in person. Kien was grateful to him for this reminder; he had been waiting for it. 'Calm yourself,' he said, 'the caretaker has undoubtedly sealed up the flat. He is honesty itself. How otherwise could I walk so calmly beside you? As to whether the woman was a harlot, I could not absolutely decide.' He was just; she was dead, it seemed to him proper not to condemn her without valid proof. Moreover he was ashamed of himself for not having noticed in eight long years what her real profession was. 'A woman who isn't a whore, there s no such thing!' Fischerle, as usual, had found the right solution. It was the outcome of a life spent under the Stars of Heaven. Kien recognized the truth of the statement at once. He himself had never yet touched a woman. Could there be — outside the sphere of knowledge — any better justification for his conduct than the fact, that they were all harlots? 'Alas, I must confess you are right,' said he, disguising his agreement in the form of a parallel experience. But Fisherle had had enough of the whore and swerved to the caretaker. He doubted his honesty. 'First of all there are no honest men,' he declared, 'except us two, naturally, and secondly there are no honest caretakers. What do caretakers live on? Blackmail! And why? Because they couldn't live any other way. A caretaker can't live on flats alone. Others might, but not a caretaker. We had a caretaker, he took a schilling offmy wife for every gentleman she brought in. If she came home one night without a gentleman — in her profession nothing's impossible — he used to ask, where the gentleman was. I haven't one, she said. Show me the gentleman or I'll show you up, he used to say. Then she used to cry. Where was she to find a gentleman? Went on for an hour and more like that sometimes. To end it all she always had to show him the gentleman, even if it was only a tiny one,' Fischerle held his hand out flat at knee-height, 'she could have hidden him easy if the creature had had any sense. A pity for the schilling! And who went down the drain? Me of course!'

Kien explained to him in this case he had to do with a landsknecht, a loyal, reliable fellow, as strong as a bear, who never let beggars, hawkers and other scum over the threshold. It was a pleasure only to watch the way he dealt with that mob, many of whom did not even know how to read and write. He had beaten many of them, literally, into deformities. As a reward for the peace which he owed to him — because for learning you need peace, peace and yet more peace — he had appointed him a small honorarium of 100 schillings a month. 'And the fellow takes it ! The fellow takes it !' Fischcrle's voice snapped out. 'A blackmailer! Aren't I right? A regular blackmailer! Ought to be locked up, at once ! Locked up, I say, locked up !'

Kien sought to calm his friend. He should not compare a vulgar fellow like that with himself. Naturally it was vulgar to accept money for a service, but this form of immorality was deeply implanted in the plebs and even extended to the educated classes. Plato fought in vain against it. For this very reason he, Kien, had always had a repulsion from accepting a Chair. For his work in the sphere of learning he had never yet accepted so much as a farthing. 'Plato's all right!' countered Fischerle — he was hearing the name for the first time — 'I know Plato. Plato's a wealthy man. You're a wealthy man. How do I know? Because only wealthy men talk that way. Now take a good look at me. I'm a poor devil, I've nothing, am nothing, shall be nothing, and yet I take nothing. There's character for you! Your caretaker, that blackmailer, takes ioo schillings, a fortune I tell you, and beats up poor devils all day too. But at night — I bet you he's asleep at night, it someone breaks in he won't notice it then, he lies and sleeps, he's got his hundred schillings in his pocket, but he'll let them loot the books; I can't stand for anything like that, it's a scandal, aren't I right?'

Kien said he didn't know if the caretaker slept heavily or not. It was presumable at least, because everything about him was heavy, except his four canaries, who were made to sing whenever he wanted. (He mentioned them in the interests of accuracy.) On the other hand, the fellow was of a fanatical vigilance; he had constructed himself a special peep-hole eighteen inches above ground level so that he could the etter watch those who went in and out. He knelt there all day. 'I'd eat him alive!' Fischerle bunt in. 'That kind are all informers. An informer like that! A vulgar brute! If I had him here dear friend, you'd open your eyes, how I'd knock him about, with my little finger I'd knock him all to bits! Are informers scum or aren't they? They are, I say, and aren't I right?' 'I hardly think that my caretaker was ever an informer by profession,' Kien reflected, 'if indeed such a profession should exist. He was a policeman, an inspector, unless I mistake, and has long been retired.'

At that Fischerle renounced his plan. No burglary of that kind for him. He wasn't having anything to do with the police at present, before going to America, emphatically not, and above ail not with retired pohcemen; they're much the worst. Out of laziness they go for the innocent. Because they mayn't arrest any more, they go mad on every occasion and beat harmless deformities into deformity. A pity all the same, it wouldn't hurt to fit oneself out a bit better for America. A man goes to America only once. A world champion ought not to arrive as a beggar, not that he is, but he may be, and people might say: he came here with empty hands, we won't have him staying here with full ones, let's take it all away from him. In spite of his world championship Fischerle was not at all sure of himself in America. Sharks are everywhere and everything in America is huge. From time to time he stuck his nose into his left armpit and strengthened himself with the smell of his money, which was stowed there. That comforted him, and after his nose had been there a fraction of time, it popped gaily up into the air again.

But Kien no longer felt so happy about Thercse's death. Fischerle's words reminded him of the danger in which his library was. Everything drew him back to it, its distress, his duty, his work. What kept him here? A nobler love. So long as a single drop of blood ran in his veins, he was determined to ransom the wretched, to redeem them from a fiery death, to protect them from the jaws of the hog! At home he would, without doubt, be arrested. He must look facts steadily in the face. He was accessory to Therese's death. She was chiefly responsible but he had locked her in. By law, he would have been compelled to hand her over to an institution for the mentally unfit. He thanked God he had not obeyed the law. In an institution she would have been alive to-day. He had condemned her to death, hunger and her own greed had executed the sentence on her. He took back not one iota of what he had done. He was ready to answer for her to justice. His trial must end with an overwhelming verdict for acquittal. In any case the arrest of so famous a scholar, probably the greatest sinologist of his time, would cause undesirable publicity, a thing, in the interests of learning, to be avoided. The chief witness for the defence would be that very caretaker. Kien relied on him, but Fischerle's reflections on the venality of such a character did not fail of their effect. Landsknechts will go over to the master who pays them best. The crux of the matter was to guess who this opponent might be. Should there be any such person, had he an interest in bribing the caretaker with irresistible sums? Thérèse was alone. Not a word had ever been said of any relations. At her funeral, no one had followed the coffin. Should anyone pretending to be a relation appear in the course of his trial, Kien would have the origins of the person in question most carefully investigated. Some sort of a relation was of course possible. He decided to talk to the caretaker before he was arrested. An increase of his honorarium to 200 schillings would entirely win over this — as Fischerle so rightly called him — informer. This could not be regarded either as bribery or as an injustice of any kind; the caretaker was to tell the truth, nothing but the truth. In no circumstance whatever was it right that presumably the greatest sinologist of his time should be punished on account of an inferior woman, a woman of whom it could not be said with any certainty whether she were able fluently to read and write. Learning demanded her death. It demanded also his free pardon and rehabilitation. Scholars of his standing could be counted on the fingers of one hand. Women, unhappily, may be reckoned in millions. Thérèse belonged to the least of these. True her death had been as painful and cruel as could well be imagined. But for that, precisely for that, she was herself responsible. She might as well have starved peacefully to death. Thousands of Indian fakirs had died this lingering death before her and thought themselves redeemed thereby. The world admires them to this day. No one pities their fate, and their people, the wisest after the Chinese, call them saints. Why had not Thérèse wrung from herself the same decision! She clung too much to life. Her greed knew no bounds. She lengthened her life by one contemptible second after another. She would have eaten men, if there had been any nearby. She hated mankind. Who would have sacrificed himself for her? At her worst hour she found herself, as she deserved to be, alone and forsaken. So she clutched at the last chance left to her: she ate her own body, morsel by morsel, strip by strip, piece by piece, and thus, in indescribable agony kept herself alive. The witness did not find a body, he found bones, held together only by the blue starched skirt which she habitually wore. This was her well-merited end.

Kien's speech in his own defence became the perfect accusation of Thérèse. In retrospect, he destroyed her a second time. For some time now he had been sitting in an hotel bedroom with Fischerle; they had got there almost automatically. His close-knit chain of thought was not interrupted for a single moment. He was silent and thought over every little detail. Out of the words which the devoured woman had uttered while she was alive he reconstructed a text which could well have served as an example of its kind. He was past-master of brilliant emendations and could argue every letter. All the same he deeply regretted expending so much philological meticulousness on a mere murder. He acted however under the strongest compulsion and promised the world rich compensation in the work he would do in the immediate future. She, whose case was now under discussion, had been the chief hindrance to his work. He thanked the judge for his conciliatory conduct throughout, conduct which he, a man accused of murder, had certainly not expected. The judge inclined his head and declared with ceremonious courtesy, that lie knew well what befitted the greatest sinologist of the modern world. That 'presumably' which Kien placed before 'the greatest sinologist' when he spoke of himself, was omitted by the judge, for it was wholly superfluous. Kien was filled, at this public homage, with a sensation of justifiable pride. His accusation of Thérèse acquired a gentler tone.

'Certain extenuating circumstances must be allowed her,' he said to Fischerle, who was seated next to him on the bed, regretting the abandoned burglary, and sniffing at his money. 'Even in her worst moment, when her character must have been wholly undermined by hunger, she never dared to touch a book. I would like to add, that of course we are speaking of an uneducated woman.' Fischerle was annoyed because he understood, why did he have to understand non-sense, he cursed his own intellect, and only out of habit responded to the words of the poor devil next him. 'Dear friend,' he said, you're a fool. Nobody does what they don't know how. What d'you think, she'd have eaten up the most beautiful books, and with an appetite too, if she'd known now easy it was. Tell you what, if the cookery book that that hog at the Theresianum has put together, with 103 recipes—if that were in print — no, better say no more.' 'What do you mean?' asked Kien with staring eyes. He knew exacdy what the dwarf meant, but he wanted another than himself to place this ghastly thing in relation to his library, not he himself, not even in his thoughts. 'I can only say, dear friend, that when you got home you'd have found your flat empty, eaten bare, not a page, let alone a book!' 'God be praised!' Kien drew a deep breath. 'She is already buried and the blasphemous work will not come out so soon. I shall know how to bring it into question at my trial. The world shall listen! I intend to reveal, without mercy, all I know. A scholar's word still carries weight!'

Since his wife's death Kien's words had grown bolder, and the very difficulties before him pricked on his lust for batde to new deeds. He passed a stimulating afternoon with Fischcrle. In his melancholy mood the dwarf had much feeling for jokes. He had the trial explained to him to die minutest detail and raisea no objection anywhere. He gave Kien good advice free, gratis and for nothing. Had he no relations who could help him, a murder trial was no light matter? Kien cited his brodier in Paris, a well-known psychiatrist; earlier he had amassed a fortune as a gynaecologist. 'A fortune, did you saye* Fischerle immediately decided to make a halt in Paris on die way to America. 'He's the right man for me,' he said, 'I'll consult him about my hump.' 'But he's not a surgeon!' 'Don't matter; if he's been a gynaecologist, he can do anything.' Kien smiled at die innocence of the dear fellow, who evidently had no idea of any such thing as specialization of knowledge. But he willingly gave him the exact address, which Fischerle noted down on a dirty piece of paper, and told him much of the beautiful relationship, which decades ago, had existed between him and his brodier. 'Learning demands an undivided allegiance,' he concluded, 'it leaves nothing over for customary relationships. It has separated us.'

'If you're on trial you can't make use of me anyhow. Tell you what, I'll go to Paris in the meantime and tell your brother I'm from you. I shan't have to pay him anything if I'm your good friend!* 'Of course not,' replied Kien, 'I'll give you a letter of recommendation, so that you get there safely. It would make me very happy, if he should really be able to relieve you of your hump.' He sat down and wrote at once — for the first time in eight years — to his brother. Fischerle's proposition seemed very suitable to him. He hoped soon to be able to withdraw once more entirely into his life of study, and the little fellow, much as he respected him, would then only be a burden. As a matter of fact, ever since they had been on Christian name terms, he had rather felt he would have to get rid of him sooner or later. If Fischerle could get rid of his hump, George would surely be able to make good use of him at his clinic as a male nurse. The dwarf carried the sealed and addressed letter into his room, took a book out of the parcel, his precious goods which the hawker had simply dropped on the floor, and placed the letter in it. The rest of the parcel was to serve its former purpose in the morning. Accurately calculated, Kien must have about 2000 schillings left. In a single morning these would easily be got from him. The evening therefore was spent in indignant colloquy about the hog and other unnatural creatures.

The next day began badly. Scarcely had Kien taken up his position at the window when a man with a parcel crashed into him. His balance was just good enough to save him from falling through the pane. The rough feuow pushed past. "What do you want? Why have you come? Wait a minute !' All his shouts were in vain. The creature flung himself up the stairs and did not even turn round. After lengthy consideration, Kien came to the conclusion that these must have been pornographic books. This was the only excuse for the shameless haste with which the man had fled from any examination of his parcel. Then the sewerman appeared, stood stock still before him and demanded in a resounding voice 400 schillings. Enraged by the previous encounter, Kien recognized him. In a trembling voice he approached him: 'You were here yesterday! Are you not ashamed?' 'Day before yesterday too,' squelched out the open-hearted sewerman. 'Get out of here! Repent of your sins! You'll come to a bad end!'

'I want my money,' said the sewerman. He was looking forward to the five schillings he would soon drink up. Without thinking about it — he never thought — he was sure that, as a labourer, he would only get his wages if he had done his work, that is, if he had delivered over the money paid to him. 'You will get nothing !' declared Kien, resolute. He stood on the stain. He was ready for everything. The books would be pawned over his dead body! The sewerman scratched his head. He could have squashed this bag of bones flat between finger and thumb. But he hadn't been told to. He only did what he was told. I'll go and ask the chief,' he grunted, and turned his backside on the other. That way of saying good-bye was easier than talking. Kien sighed. The glass door creaked.