oon as it was impossible for him to calm it. His fixed
idea then, which had been intensified by a month of drunkenness, and
which was continually increasing in his absolute solitude, penetrated
him like a gimlet. He now walked about the house like a wild beast in
its cage, putting his ear to the door to listen if the other were there
and defying him through the wall. Then, as soon as he dozed, overcome by
fatigue, he heard the voice which made him leap to his feet.

At last one night, as cowards do when driven to extremities, he sprang
to the door and opened it, to see who was calling him and to force him
to keep quiet, but such a gust of cold wind blew into his face that
it chilled him to the bone, and he closed and bolted the door again
immediately, without noticing that Sam had rushed out. Then, as he was
shivering with cold, he threw some wood on the fire and sat down in
front of it to warm himself, but suddenly he started, for somebody was
scratching at the wall and crying. In desperation he called out: "Go
away!" but was answered by another long, sorrowful wail.

Then all his remaining senses forsook him from sheer fright. He
repeated: "Go away!" and turned round to try to find some corner in
which to hide, while the other person went round the house still crying
and rubbing against the wall. Ulrich went to the oak sideboard, which
was full of plates and dishes and of provisions, and lifting it up
with superhuman strength, he dragged it to the door, so as to form a
barricade. Then piling up all the rest of the furniture, the mattresses,
palliasses and chairs, he stopped up the windows as one does when
assailed by an enemy.

But the person outside now uttered long, plaintive, mournful groans, to
which the young man replied by similar groans, and thus days and
nights passed without their ceasing to howl at each other. The one was
continually walking round the house and scraped the walls with his nails
so vigorously that it seemed as if he wished to destroy them, while the
other, inside, followed all his movements, stooping down and holding his
ear to the walls and replying to all his appeals with terrible cries.
One evening, however, Ulrich heard nothing more, and he sat down, so
overcome by fatigue, that he went to sleep immediately and awoke in
the morning without a thought, without any recollection of what had
happened, just as if his head had been emptied during his heavy sleep,
but he felt hungry, and he ate.