innocent in relation to a third person? Since, in relation to a third person, they were so very sophisticated! But what worried me most was that the third person was none other than Fryderyk, he, so circumspect, so self-controlled! And here, all of a sudden was this march across the park, like a challenge, like the initiation of a campaign—his march with the girl to the boy! What was it? What could it be? And hadn’t I provoked it all—by spying on him I had brought into the open his secret passion, he had been spotted in his secrecy—and now the beast of his secret longing, released from its cage, in union with my beast, was on the prowl! This is how things stood at the present moment, namely, the four of us were de facto partners, in silence, in this undeclared business, where any clarification would have been impossible to stomach—where shame was choking us.
Knees, hers-his, four knees, in pants, in a dress, (young) … In the afternoon, the previously announced Vaclav made his appearance. A handsome man! Without a doubt—a tall and elegant gentleman! Endowed with a fairly prominent yet delicate nose with lively nostrils, an olive gaze and a deep voice—a trimmed little mustache coddled itself below that sensitive nose, above his full and crimson lip. A type of masculine comeliness that pleases women … who admire the grandeur of form as well as the overly delicate details, the innervation, for instance, of the long-fingered hands with their fingernails cleared of cuticle. Who could cast doubt on his foot, highbred,high-arched, in a yellow, tight-fitting shoe, and his ears too, shapely and smallish? And those little inlets of baldness above his brow that made him look more intellectual, weren’t they interesting, even delightful? And what about the whiteness of his complexion, wasn’t this a troubadour’s whiteness? Truly, a striking gentleman! A winning patron! A refined lawyer! I hated him with my physical being from the very first moment with a hate mixed with disgust, a hate caught unawares by its own vehemence and conscious of its injustice—because he was, after all, full of charm and comme il faut. It was indeed not right and fair to find fault with such trivial imperfections as, let’s say, a slight plumpness and roundness making their appearance on his cheeks and hands, playing in the vicinity of his belly—this too, after all, was refined. But perhaps it was the excessive and slightly lascivious refinement of his organs, his mouth overly adapted for tasting, his nose overly refined for smelling, his fingers skilled at touching—yet these were the very things that made him a lover! It is conceivable that I was put off by his incapacity for nakedness—because that body of his needed a collar, cufflinks, a handkerchief, even a hat, it was a body in shoes, absolutely demanding these supplements of toiletry and tailoring. … But who knows, perhaps what annoyed me most was that he converted some of his faults, such as the onset of baldness, or his softness, into attributes of elegance and style. The carnality of an ordinary boor has the huge advantage that the boor pays no attention to it, and as a result, it doesn’t annoy you, even ifit’s in conflict with the esthetic—but when a man takes care of himself, brings out, accentuates his carnality, picks at it, messes with it, then his every defect becomes deadly. However, where did I come by such sensitivity to the body? Whence came this passion for snooping, timid and unfriendly, as if from a hole in the corner?
In spite of it all, I must admit the newcomer behaved intelligently, even with class. He didn’t puff himself up, said little and not too loudly. He was extremely affable. And his affability and his modesty were the result of excellent manners, but they were also bred into his unsuperficial nature, which was reflecting itself in his gaze and seemed to pronounce: I respect you, you respect me. No, he wasn’t at all enchanted with
Knees, hers-his, four knees, in pants, in a dress, (young) … In the afternoon, the previously announced Vaclav made his appearance. A handsome man! Without a doubt—a tall and elegant gentleman! Endowed with a fairly prominent yet delicate nose with lively nostrils, an olive gaze and a deep voice—a trimmed little mustache coddled itself below that sensitive nose, above his full and crimson lip. A type of masculine comeliness that pleases women … who admire the grandeur of form as well as the overly delicate details, the innervation, for instance, of the long-fingered hands with their fingernails cleared of cuticle. Who could cast doubt on his foot, highbred,high-arched, in a yellow, tight-fitting shoe, and his ears too, shapely and smallish? And those little inlets of baldness above his brow that made him look more intellectual, weren’t they interesting, even delightful? And what about the whiteness of his complexion, wasn’t this a troubadour’s whiteness? Truly, a striking gentleman! A winning patron! A refined lawyer! I hated him with my physical being from the very first moment with a hate mixed with disgust, a hate caught unawares by its own vehemence and conscious of its injustice—because he was, after all, full of charm and comme il faut. It was indeed not right and fair to find fault with such trivial imperfections as, let’s say, a slight plumpness and roundness making their appearance on his cheeks and hands, playing in the vicinity of his belly—this too, after all, was refined. But perhaps it was the excessive and slightly lascivious refinement of his organs, his mouth overly adapted for tasting, his nose overly refined for smelling, his fingers skilled at touching—yet these were the very things that made him a lover! It is conceivable that I was put off by his incapacity for nakedness—because that body of his needed a collar, cufflinks, a handkerchief, even a hat, it was a body in shoes, absolutely demanding these supplements of toiletry and tailoring. … But who knows, perhaps what annoyed me most was that he converted some of his faults, such as the onset of baldness, or his softness, into attributes of elegance and style. The carnality of an ordinary boor has the huge advantage that the boor pays no attention to it, and as a result, it doesn’t annoy you, even ifit’s in conflict with the esthetic—but when a man takes care of himself, brings out, accentuates his carnality, picks at it, messes with it, then his every defect becomes deadly. However, where did I come by such sensitivity to the body? Whence came this passion for snooping, timid and unfriendly, as if from a hole in the corner?
In spite of it all, I must admit the newcomer behaved intelligently, even with class. He didn’t puff himself up, said little and not too loudly. He was extremely affable. And his affability and his modesty were the result of excellent manners, but they were also bred into his unsuperficial nature, which was reflecting itself in his gaze and seemed to pronounce: I respect you, you respect me. No, he wasn’t at all enchanted with
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