the floor, and then set it down, heel first. It
was a detestable habit; and indulging in it made an ugly noise.

VI

Benda's absence lasted for hardly a year. His mother had not accompanied
him this time. She was not feeling well, and there was some danger that
she was losing her eyesight.

After his return he took to silent brooding. Though he never said a word
to his mother about the disappointment he had experienced, she knew
precisely what he had gone through, and spared him the humiliation that
would have followed any questions she might have asked.

He was oppressed by the memories the house awakened in him. Forgotten
pictures became living ones. The figure of the murdered woman appeared
in the nighttime on the balcony. Her shadow fell upon him, nestled up to
him in fact, as he sat at his writing-desk.

There were a great many things that still bound him to her whose spirit
had vanished from the earth, though her body remained.

It was impossible for him to forget her gentle look or the coyness of
her hands. He knew her fate; he knew her soul. But he was condemned to
silence. To withdraw from contact with the world and into the deepest of
loneliness had been her lot; it had also been his. At present it was
possible to get only one picture of her, the one her brother had given:
she sat in her cell and combed her yellow hair.

He held no one responsible; he blamed no one. He merely regretted that
men are as they are.

A former university friend of his came in, and tried to get him
interested in collaborating on a great scientific work. He declined. As
soon as his colleague of other days had gone, he visualised to himself
the entire conversation: The man was affable and insistent; and yet
there was in his very being an underground, enigmatic hostility. It was
the hostility he invariably felt whenever he had anything to do, either
of a purely external, business nature or in a social way, with men of
other faith. The least he had to fear was a prejudiced inimicality, as
if the individual in question were on the point of calling out to him:
You stay on that side, I'll stay on this. Keep off the bridge.

He was fully aware of this, but his pride forbade his fighting against
it. He renounced his natural right to life and a living. He declined the
university conceded privilege of co-existence. To go out and actually
win for himself the right to participate in the inevitable cont