The Dedalus Book of German Decadence (14 page)

He set off early in the morning and met Meinewelt at the station, together with the painter Saarmünster who were going for the same reason. He also came across a crowd of Munich bohemians who gathered together when they heard his name and started whispering. The furtive glances and the smiles, the badly concealed envy and the stupid gazes conveyed to Sebastian the topic of their conversation. Meinewelt was sitting with a schoolteacher from Pomerania whose poems had started to appear in the journal, a tousled individual with a Tyrolean hat, leggings and waterproofs who offered a sweaty hand and who almost crushed Sebastian’s in a demonstrative exhibition of strength. Sebastian returned to Munich on the next train.

After he had wandered aimlessly around the streets, and crept past his own flat without entering, he made his way to the villa. His dissatisfaction had turned into churning resentment which completely filled him, a grudge against everyone, the world, Désirée, himself  …  In the empty compartment on the way back to Munich he had used the moment of composure to pinpoint this particular mood, and a poem in prose emerged with the title ‘To be sung to a Lute’, which contained the following sentence: ‘My soul is a sunflower in the night.’ He spoke the words out loud, and sought to express as much scorn as woe. For he was seeking for some strident word, a crude gesture, for something shrill and rending with which to lacerate his sensitivity, the dreamy vagueness of his daily moods. He sought for some naked spot, somewhere to drive in this goad, for something deep and inviolate in order to lash it, but it was apparent that everything was twitching and raw on the surface, and that the beauty in the depths had long since been dissipated. He tore open his coat, seized the paper and read it, in the middle of the street, among the jostling crowd  …

‘My soul is a large, dark concert hall, the music has died away, the lights are extinguished and the listeners have gone. The doors are open to the darkness, my soul is dark, deserted and empty, and only dead sounds haunt my soul.

My soul is a small, wintry field next to the mountain lake of my homeland, and in the summer grass grew in this field, and boats rested on the shore, and lovely shadows danced among the high grasses. Now there is snow on my soul, snow in the clouds which press upon the mountains, and the icy mantle of the lake is groaning beneath the weight of snow.

My soul is the veil which conceals its chastity, and my soul still trembles from the far warmth of its chaste nakedness.

My soul is a sunflower in the night.

The mist that hangs over the town, putridity, incense and sweat, laughter, sighing, trembles in my soul. A torn page upon which a poem was written, or was it a prayer?

My soul is  …’

Sebastian was still holding the paper when, bent, he ran up the steps into the villa. It was only when he saw Désirée in the conservatory, under the yucca tree, that he screwed it up and threw it into the small, bubbling waterfall beside the steps which seized it, swirling it through the channel of the little stream, around the artificial island and into the concealed drain, then out, out into the swollen Isar between the tree trunks and the drowned.

The fine sand of the pathway deadened his footsteps, and he noticed how Désirée started, happily, when he appeared before her. She was lying on the couch, half on one side, reading a book bound in pale pink vellum which resembled human skin. She was resting in a charming attitude propped on her right hand, the sleeve, slipping to her elbow, revealing a white arm, smooth yet muscular; her left hand was holding her loosened hair in a knot above her head.

She sat up when he appeared, pulled up her knees and let her hair tumble over her breast and shoulders. The book slid from the pillows and Pandora, who had been playing with a golden comb, jumped out and hid behind Désirée, purring and baring its teeth, and fixing its claws in the purple cloth.

‘Where have you been? You bring such cold with you! Your shoes are wet, you’ve been wading through puddles.’

There was no trace of displeasure in her voice, and her eyes were shining as she looked at Sebastian. He sat silently on an edge of the couch, picked the book up and browsed through it, avoiding Désirée’s glances. It was the
Chansons de Bilitis
by Pierre Louys. Sebastian did not know the work but guessed its contents for he knew how little Désirée would tolerate anything near her which would contradict the mood of the moment or assert its individuality in defiance, whether it be an inanimate object, a living, rational creature or a work of art. Yes, she was mistress, mistress of all: the rest of the world could choose between avoiding her or surrendering to her. And with that mistrust towards all her creatures Sebastian felt once again that he was nothing more than the cat, the cameo on her gown, the golden comb in her hair, and the book on her purple couch. He had leafed through the book in a distraught, prejudicial manner, thinking more of his own suffering rather than the poems which were painted on fine, matt parchment, but suddenly everything faded when he caught sight of the title ‘Bilitis’ under the heading
Bucoliques en Pamphylie
:

‘One woman covers herself with white wool  …  Another dresses in silk and gold, a third in flowers, green leaves and grapes  …  But I, I can only live naked  …’

And following an old habit of his, and one which filled the rooms at home with verses, rhymes and rhythms, Sebastian continued, reading out loud:

‘My lover, take me as I am, without garments, jewels, sandals, here I am, Bilitis, alone  …

My hair is black of their black, my lips red of their red.

My locks flow around my head as plumes  …

Take me as my mother made me, in a night of love long ago and if I please you thus, do not fail to tell me.’

He stopped, and put the book down  …  The world of the Greeks.

A chord of the deep music of Greece resounded in this book, and there was something reminiscent of that great, pure, fructifying sensuality which had given birth to the gods and to the marble temples on the mountains. Strange that the music of this poetry had moved him so, and that the atmosphere of this conservatory, the foliage and the perfume which the proximity of her body, her loosed hair exhaled, should announce to his senses the same breath of this knowledge  …  But why was it that that strange illusion of Greece should seem more familiar to him than the colourful, overwhelming reality which surrounded him? That the printed word should entrance him, whereas the living song should call forth a secret bitterness which drove him to despise himself?

[…]

He gazed in distress at Désirée, and from mute discord his soul stretched out its arms towards her, hoping to hear from her lips the answers which his confused senses withheld. She was combing her hair and tying it into a Grecian knot, and this new hair-style gave her features an unfamiliar look which surprised Sebastian. Her face became reposed and a serene nobility altered her very contenance. Her eyes met Sebastian’s, and everything was spoken in this gaze. It was very still in the hall and only water, only eyes were speaking. Answer! Answer! The palms stood so silent and so tall in the suffocating heat of the conservatory and the light was so soft and subdued through the glass in the ceiling. And this beautiful woman, what answer was needed?

Désirée was thinking of Bilitis. She turned her eyes from Sebastian and quickly glanced at the statue of the god Pan, and then at the yucca with its wide leaves and cup-like, light green blossoms which grew in profusion between the branches. Was it not all so lovely, so peaceful? Had not a poem been real? And after Désirée had ordered her hair she loosened her belt and laid it on the couch. In a few seconds her robe had dropped to the sand, and she rose from the floods of dark purple, from the foam of fine rustling silk, smiling quietly, and totally naked. Then she picked many of the yucca blossoms, pressed them with both hands between her breasts and waded through the narrow stream to the statue of Pan, laying the light green chalices upon the high pedestal. She stood so for a moment, the rosy splendour of her limbs displayed against the marble pallor of the stone.

Hellas! Not a word had been spoken between them since he had read the poem aloud, and all that inner conflict which had tormented him with a thousand questions had been answered, by the clear and untroubled enjoyment of poetry in the form of Désirée, an enjoyment whose consistency and necessity no longer stood in doubt: ‘Without garments, jewels, sandals, here I am, Bilitis, alone  …’ She gave him the answer he was waiting for from the very depths of her nature, unsolicited, unambiguous: it was Life, unfathomable as everything is that is unified and whole. He could see her profile: her right arm rested on the pedestal and was embracing the feet of the marble god, the tulips on which she had trod were bent and crushed beneath her toes and a faint reflection of her nakedness could be seen in the flowing water which separated the steep little island as though it were a vision risen from the flood and remote from reality.

Sebastian lay on the couch and looked across at the island, at Désirée, his chin propped between his hands. He longed for her to stay as she was, in the charming pose of the classical courtesan, stepping before Priapus with her sacrificial offering. The cool water had made her skin paler and she stood before the marble, almost white except for her hair which gleamed with golden life, with a more perfect beauty than art was able to bestow on marble images. He saw all this and uttered it to himself.

And whilst he saw it and uttered it he suddenly realised that he was not gazing at this woman with the eyes of a lover, but with the eyes of an artist  …

[…]

Then something extraordinary happened. Pandora, who had remained quiet up till now, leapt with one bound from the couch across the stream, with a second bound was up on the pedestal and, before Sebastian could stop it, it was crouching on Désirée’s naked shoulder.

She started, with a light cry, and took her arm from the pedestal in order to hold the cat. She came laughing through the stream which washed the black earth from her feet; she shivered, frisked and laughed, her laughter coming like yelps of joy. She was standing in front of Sebastian, her mouth, open in laughter, showing her strong white teeth. The cat had pressed its body against the golden locks and its eyes were gleaming in the same colour, glittering down at Sebastian.

‘Pandora!’ she laughed and rubbed her cheek against the warm coat. Her whole body shivered. Then she threw herself down upon the wide couch, almost crushing the cat beneath her. Sebastian heard the cat miaow and scrabble against the velvet cloth. He jumped to his feet. ‘Get dressed,’ he cried. ‘For pity’s sake, get dressed  …’

[…]

He followed her uncertainly through the dusky rooms, trembling, scarcely able to control his senses. Pandora was rubbing against Désirée’s skirts and slipped into the bedroom with her; the heavy folds of the curtain closed behind the animal and the woman. Sebastian waited in the boudoir for a few moments, then pulled it aside.

Here was the altar on which he had made his offerings to Life, in this small, low, windowless room and which was almost completely taken up by a large, low bed, in this room whose walls were covered with purple hangings with priceless embroidery from floor to ceiling: strange flowers, gigantic flowers, chrysanthemums which, rooted in the dark earth, shot upwards in snow white shafts and, just below the ceiling, burst into blossom, in blossoms of wild golden fire, whirling, an explosion of glittering colours  …  The inauthenticity of the throne-room, the exotic temple to Pan and the alien majesty of jewels were here compounded, and the fountain of Youth flowed into the supple waters of silken pillows, sheets and coverings  …  and she had entered here, she who owed him an answer to the question which arose from wounded depths. She was standing at the head of the bed, her stretched fingers reaching downwards and pressing small imprints into the purple cover. She was still smiling, but it meant something different from what it had in the room from which they came. Sebastian realised that this smile was drawing its nourishment from his anger, his despair, and it was only gleaming in the anticipation of changing into a raging rictus, of violent passion  …  he knew all this as he clung to the curtains with cold, sweating fingers.

Between these two people flared a vision of crimson – the bed, the walls, the ceiling. But a black shadow lay in the middle of all this purple, in the middle of the bed, something black with glittering, silver-green eyes: it was rolled into a ball, and ready to pounce  …  Sebastian stepped to one side, his foot touching something concealed in a niche behind the arras: he dragged it, crying and laughing, from its hiding place. It was an object, a piece of furniture on three legs, something like a violin-case, an instrument upon which Satan was playing his most beautiful melodies  …  With a tug he jerked it into the air by one leg, swung it over his head and smashed it against the wall, splitting the tapestry along its entire length. In the same moment he heard a single sound behind him, inhuman, high, shrill, tearing  …  and felt something hot trickle down his back from his neck. It was blood: the wild animal had leapt at him and its claws were flaying his ear, cheek and scalp.

[…]

With trembling voice Sebastian declaimed the following:

‘She was naked to the waist. She sat rigid and upright in a tall black armchair in the middle of the room. Her hair was red and, parted in the middle, fell over her shoulders and across the back of the chair. Her eyes were of pale turquoise and of a deceptive gleam, her lips, which glowed like pomegranates, were cut of dark-violet amethysts. Her nipples, erectile, were of large rubies; a diamond sparkled in her navel. She sat like an Egyptian statue, her feet close together, and a dull golden brocaded cloth covered her loins and thighs. I do not know whether or not she saw me: there was no light in her dull, turquoise eyes. I walked back and forth before her, back and forth. I had a page in my hand on which a poem was written in red: I read it out aloud. But perhaps she did not hear it, she did not hear it, and I only saw her thick, fragrant hair. She was pale, silent. But the rhythm of my words inspired me, and I sang them from the paper. The sphinx sat motionless. I spoke fire, laughed smoke, and madness burst forth from my inspiration. The sphinx sat there in silence. My voice grew hoarse, and died away. My strength left me. I fell to the ground and my head hit the floor with a dull thud. But the sphinx gazed over me, motionless, into empty space. I regained consciousness and opened my eyes. I saw the sphinx sitting upright, her navel sparkling from her flesh like the sun from white banks of cloud. I dragged myself slowly towards her on my knees. I tried to stand. Finally I succeeded. I seized the brocade around her loins with hands that were cold, feverish: I put my last drop of strength into tearing that golden remnant from her body  …  I tore with violent desperation – it came away  …  I saw the sphinx before me, naked. The lower part of her body was made of stone. Thousands of years ago a chisel had given her the form of a female body.’