I turned my face away from the
rain on the window and the mournful mistiness of the November fields, or
my mind from the talk of the person next to me, to think with a smile of
the beauty of that supper. Not that I had beautiful things to eat, for
lengthy consultations with the waiter led only to eggs; but they were
brought down steep steps to a little nook among the beeches at the
water's edge, and this little nook on that particular evening was the
loveliest in the world. Enthusiastically did I eat those eggs and murmur
'Earth has not anything to show more fair'--as much, that is, of it as
could be made to apply. Nobody could see me or hear me down there,
screened at the sides and back and overhead by the beeches, and it is an
immense comfort secretly to quote. What did it matter if the tablecloth
were damp, besides having other imperfections? What if the eggs cooled
down at once, and cool eggs have always been an abomination to me? What
if the waiter forgot the sugar, and I dislike coffee without sugar?
Sooner than go up and search for him and lose one moment of that rosy
splendour on the water I felt that I would go for ever sugarless. My
table was nearly on a level with the sea. A family of ducks were slowly
paddling about in front of me, making little furrows in the quiet water
and giving an occasional placid quack. The ducks, the water, the island
of Vilm opposite, the Lauterbach jetty half a mile off across the little
bay with a crowd of fisher-boats moored near it, all were on fire with
the same red radiance. The sun was just down, and the sky behind the
dark Putbus woods was a marvel of solemn glory. The reflections of the
beech trees I was sitting under lay black along the water. I could hear
the fishermen talking over at the jetty, and a child calling on the
island, so absolute was the stillness. And almost before I knew how
beautiful it was the rosiness faded off the island, lingered a moment
longer on the masts of the fisher-boats, gathered at last only in the
pools among the rushes, died away altogether; the sky paled to green, a
few stars looked out faintly, a light twinkled in the solitary house on
Vilm, and the waiter came down and asked if he should bring a lamp. A
lamp! As though all one ever wanted was to see the tiny circle round
oneself, to be able to read the evening paper, or write postcards to
one's friends, or sew. I have a peculiar capacity for doing nothing and
yet enjoying myself. To sit ther