brittle, imperceptibly peeling off the plaster. In another part of the house, a toilet flushed. And in yet another, a child cried in its sleep; then a short moment later came the sound of caring footsteps hurrying to the rescue.
She tried not to let the life of the house distract her from following Madame down the dark staircase, but the old woman seemed to be swept beyond her reach. Iâm dying, Frau Direktor thought. Look, even the staircase was changing, becoming narrower and narrower and altogether black. She heard the faint sounds of people talking. But then this too was gone, as though they had stopped. The air grew hot and stuffy. The house now filmy and transparent: a ghost house, like a stage with paper doors, no glass in the windows, and walls of scrim. Snow lay on the street outside,- the streetlamps glowed. A few flakes came down, weaving in and out of the lamplight, settling on the black iron of the lamp cages. A brewerâs cart with great casks strapped in place rolled down the street,- the horse team snorted in the cold. From the black sky above, snowflakes drifted down in lazy spirals. White coming out of the void ⦠And then even the snow ceased to fall.
In the top floor of their town house, she saw the dark little room with the bedside lamp that gave hardly any light. And she saw the huddled lump in the narrow bed. Then the room faded, leaving her alone in the empty night. It was much better when you didnât have to breathe. Was this how you came to an end? With a pause in eternity stretching from one heartbeat to the next, one moment to the next, one age to the next â when nothing moves, in a deep, patient stillness? Was this the life after death? A long silence between living and dying. Yet no oblivion ⦠Only a long gray staircase leading up and down from one moment to the next â to walk upon time as though upon a stair â when your lifetime was but a single landing.
And when you died, dissolution. An interminable fading while the intricate machine of your existence shut down. All its components taken out and disassembled. One by one each piece crushed, or melted, or rusted away,- until nothing stood on the steps of time but the soulless dust of souls. And this, too, to be swept off the gray stairway. No molecules, no atoms. Only the pause in the clockâs second hand existed. One duration flowing into another, And when she had endured eternity she was in another time. Another place. Times and places, places in time. Forward or backward. Persisting. Existing.
Enduring
in the minds around her ⦠A fresh breeze scented with jasmine and gardenia swept into a brightly sunlit morning room. The sound of a fountain pen scratched softly across a paper tablet. But that was all she knew or heard or saw: her enduring had narrowed the senses down to a slim band. As though, when swept off the staircase of eternity, all her senses had been pressed together, only to be handled selectively, and one at a time.
A writerâs hand wrote with a black fountain pen,- the writerâs script tilted dramatically forward, as though everything he thought was angled only toward the future. Then, as the enduring faded, a few familiar senses returned as well. She recognized the hand immediately, though it had changed with old age, the script feebler. Herr Kinderweise. As old as a man could be.
But this was not the study in Vienna, the study of the galloping man! Where were they? And even as the last shred of the enduring dissipated and her senses bloomed in all directions, Frau Direktor knew somehow one important fact â she existed no more, She was some years dead. But this did not particularly trouble her, for the police had long ago enacted whatever fate decreed, and for that she was grateful: because it seemed she had been spared the grim pain of punishment. And now her senses were free, to drift upon the wind. She forgot about Herr Kinderweiseâs new study and raced out to
She tried not to let the life of the house distract her from following Madame down the dark staircase, but the old woman seemed to be swept beyond her reach. Iâm dying, Frau Direktor thought. Look, even the staircase was changing, becoming narrower and narrower and altogether black. She heard the faint sounds of people talking. But then this too was gone, as though they had stopped. The air grew hot and stuffy. The house now filmy and transparent: a ghost house, like a stage with paper doors, no glass in the windows, and walls of scrim. Snow lay on the street outside,- the streetlamps glowed. A few flakes came down, weaving in and out of the lamplight, settling on the black iron of the lamp cages. A brewerâs cart with great casks strapped in place rolled down the street,- the horse team snorted in the cold. From the black sky above, snowflakes drifted down in lazy spirals. White coming out of the void ⦠And then even the snow ceased to fall.
In the top floor of their town house, she saw the dark little room with the bedside lamp that gave hardly any light. And she saw the huddled lump in the narrow bed. Then the room faded, leaving her alone in the empty night. It was much better when you didnât have to breathe. Was this how you came to an end? With a pause in eternity stretching from one heartbeat to the next, one moment to the next, one age to the next â when nothing moves, in a deep, patient stillness? Was this the life after death? A long silence between living and dying. Yet no oblivion ⦠Only a long gray staircase leading up and down from one moment to the next â to walk upon time as though upon a stair â when your lifetime was but a single landing.
And when you died, dissolution. An interminable fading while the intricate machine of your existence shut down. All its components taken out and disassembled. One by one each piece crushed, or melted, or rusted away,- until nothing stood on the steps of time but the soulless dust of souls. And this, too, to be swept off the gray stairway. No molecules, no atoms. Only the pause in the clockâs second hand existed. One duration flowing into another, And when she had endured eternity she was in another time. Another place. Times and places, places in time. Forward or backward. Persisting. Existing.
Enduring
in the minds around her ⦠A fresh breeze scented with jasmine and gardenia swept into a brightly sunlit morning room. The sound of a fountain pen scratched softly across a paper tablet. But that was all she knew or heard or saw: her enduring had narrowed the senses down to a slim band. As though, when swept off the staircase of eternity, all her senses had been pressed together, only to be handled selectively, and one at a time.
A writerâs hand wrote with a black fountain pen,- the writerâs script tilted dramatically forward, as though everything he thought was angled only toward the future. Then, as the enduring faded, a few familiar senses returned as well. She recognized the hand immediately, though it had changed with old age, the script feebler. Herr Kinderweise. As old as a man could be.
But this was not the study in Vienna, the study of the galloping man! Where were they? And even as the last shred of the enduring dissipated and her senses bloomed in all directions, Frau Direktor knew somehow one important fact â she existed no more, She was some years dead. But this did not particularly trouble her, for the police had long ago enacted whatever fate decreed, and for that she was grateful: because it seemed she had been spared the grim pain of punishment. And now her senses were free, to drift upon the wind. She forgot about Herr Kinderweiseâs new study and raced out to
Similar Books
