done. But how painful; how bitterly painful!





A STORY WHICH WILL NEVER BE FINISHED




Exhausted with the painful uncertainty of the day, I fell asleep,
dressed, on my bed. Suddenly my wife aroused me. In her hand a
candle was flickering, which appeared to me in the middle of the
night as bright as the sun. And behind the candle her chin, too, was
trembling, and enormous, unfamiliar dark eyes stared motionlessly.

"Do you know," she said, "do you know they are building barricades
on our street?"

It was quiet. We looked straight into each other's eyes, and I felt
my face turning pale. Life vanished somewhere and then returned again
with a loud throbbing of the heart. It was quiet and the flame of the
candle was quivering, and it was small, dull, but sharp-pointed, like
a crooked sword.

"Are you afraid?" I asked.

The pale chin trembled, but her eyes remained motionless and looked
at me, without blinking, and only now I noticed what unfamiliar, what