Burning Secret (8 page)

A
LL WAS EXPLAINED
: they had been looking for him here, they’d been expecting him for some time. His mother, terrified despite her anger by the frantic way the distressed child had rushed off, had made sure that a search was mounted for him in Semmering. Everything had been in terrible turmoil, the most alarming
assumptions
were rife, when a gentleman came to say that he had seen the child in the ticket office of the railway station at about three in the afternoon. They soon found out at the station that Edgar had bought a ticket to Baden, and without hesitation his mother
immediately
set off after him. Ahead of her she sent telegrams to Baden and to his father in Vienna, causing much emotion, and for the last two hours everything possible had been done to find the fugitive.

Now they had captured him, but without using force. In quiet triumph, he was led indoors, but strangely enough he felt that none of the harsh words they spoke touched him, because he saw joy and love in their eyes. And even that pretence, that appearance of anger lasted only a moment. Then his grandmother
hugged him again, in tears, no one mentioned his wrong-doing any more, and he felt he was surrounded by wonderful loving care. The maid took his jacket off and brought him a warmer one, his grandmother asked if he was hungry, was there anything else he wanted, they questioned him and fussed around him with affectionate anxiety, and when they saw how
self-conscious
he felt they desisted. He felt, with pleasure, the sensation that he had despised but missed of being a child, and he was ashamed at his rebellion of the last few days, wanting to be rid of all this, to exchange it for the deceptive pleasure of his own isolation.

The telephone rang in the next room. He heard his mother’s voice, caught a few words: “Edgar … back … yes, he came here … the last train,” and wondered why she hadn’t flown at him angrily, had just looked at him with that strangely subdued expression. His repentance grew wilder and more extravagant, and he would have liked to escape the solicitude of his grandmother and his aunt to go into the next room and ask her to forgive him, telling her very humbly, entirely of his own accord, that he wanted to be a child again and obedient. But when he quietly stood up, his grandmother asked, slightly alarmed, “Oh, where are you going?”

He stood there ashamed. They were already afraid if he so much as moved. He had frightened them all, and now they feared he would run away again. How could they understand that no one was sorrier for his flight than he was?

The table was laid, and they brought him a hastily assembled supper. His grandmother sat with him, never taking her eyes off him. She and his aunt and the maid enclosed him in a quiet circle, and he felt strangely soothed by this warmth. All that troubled him was that his mother didn’t come into the room. If she could only know how sorry he was, she would surely have come in.

Then a carriage rattled up outside, and stopped in front of the house. The others were so startled that it made Edgar, too, uneasy. His grandmother went out. Loud voices flew this way and that through the darkness, and suddenly he knew that his father had arrived. Timidly, Edgar realized that he was alone in the room again now, and even that moment of isolation troubled him. His father was stern, was the only person he really feared. Edgar listened to the voices outside; his father seemed to be upset, he spoke in a loud and irritated voice. The voices of his grandmother and his mother chimed in, striking a soothing note, they obviously wanted to mollify him. But his father’s voice remained hard, firm as the footsteps now approaching, coming closer and closer, they were in the next room, they were just outside the door that was now thrown open.

His father was very tall. And Edgar felt unspeakably small before him as he came in, nerves on edge and apparently really angry.

“What on earth were you thinking of, you little
wretch, running away? How could you frighten your mother like that?”

His voice was angry, and his hands were working
frantically
. Stepping quietly, Edgar’s mother had entered the room behind him. Her face was in shadow.

Edgar did not reply. He felt he ought to justify
himself
, but how could he say he had been deceived and beaten? Would his father understand?

“Well, don’t you have a tongue in your head? What happened? You can tell me! Was there something you didn’t like? You must have had a reason for running away! Did someone harm you in any way?” Edgar hesitated. The memory of it made him angry again, and he was about to voice his accusations. Then he saw—and it made his heart stand still—his mother make a strange movement behind his father’s back. A movement that he didn’t understand at first. But now that he looked at her there was a plea in her eyes. Very, very gently she raised her finger to her lips in the sign that requests silence.

At that, the child felt something warm, an
enormous
, wild delight spread through his entire body. He understood that she was giving him the secret to keep, that the fate of another human being lay on his small, childish lips. And wild, jubilant pride filled him to think that she trusted him, he was overcome by a readiness to make the sacrifice, he was willing to exaggerate his own guilt in order to show how much of a man he was. He pulled himself together.

“No, no … there wasn’t any reason. Mama was very kind to me, but I was naughty, I behaved badly … and then … then I ran away because I was scared.”

His father looked at him, taken aback. He had expected anything but this confession. He was disarmed, his anger gone.

“Oh, well, if you’re sorry, then very well. I won’t say any more about it today. I expect you’ll think harder another time, won’t you? Don’t let such a thing ever happen again.”

He stopped and looked at the boy, and now he sounded milder.

“How pale you look! But I think you’ve grown taller. I hope you won’t play such childish pranks any more. After all, you’re not a little boy now, you’re old enough to see reason!”

All this time Edgar was looking at his mother. He though he saw something sparkling in her eyes. Or was it just the reflection of the light? No, it was a moist, clear light, and there was a smile around her mouth thanking him. He was sent to bed now, but he didn’t mind being left alone. He had so much to think of, so much that was vivid and full of promise. All the pain of the last few days vanished in the powerful sensation of this first real experience; he felt happy in the mysterious anticipation of future events. Outside, the trees rustled under cover of dark night, but he was not afraid any more. He had lost all his impatience with life now that he knew how full of promise it was. He felt as if, for the
first time, he had seen it as it was, no longer enveloped in the thousand lies of childhood, but naked in its own dangerous beauty. He had never thought that days could be so full of alternating pain and pleasure, and he liked the idea that many such days lay ahead of him, that a whole life was waiting to reveal its secret to him. A first premonition of the rich variety of life had come to him; for the first time he thought he had understood the nature of human beings—they needed each other even when they appeared hostile, and it was very sweet to be loved by them. He was unable to think of anything or anyone with hatred, he did not regret anything, and found a new sense of gratitude even to the Baron, the seducer, his bitterest enemy, because he had opened the door to this world of his first true emotions to him.

All this was very sweet and pleasant to think of in the dark, mingling a little with images from dreams, and he was almost asleep already. But he thought the door suddenly opened and someone came in. He did not quite believe it, though, he was too drowsy to open his eyes. Then he sensed a soft face breathing close to his, caressing his own with mild warmth, and knew it was his mother kissing him and stroking his hair. He felt the kisses and her tears, gently responding to the caress, and took it only as reconciliation, as gratitude for his silence. Only later, many years later, did he recognize those silent tears as a vow from a woman past her youth that from now on she would belong only
to him, her child. It was a renunciation of adventure, a farewell to all her own desires. He did not know that she was also grateful to him for rescuing her from an adventure that would have led nowhere, and that with her embrace she was handing on to him, like a legacy, the bitter-sweet burden of love for his future life. The child of that time understood none of this, but he felt that it was very delightful to be loved so much, and that through this love he was already drawn into the great secret of the world.

When she drew back her hand from him, her lips left his, and her quiet figure went away, skirts rustling, a warmth was left behind, breathing softly over his lips. And he sensed a sweet longing to feel such soft lips many times again, and be so tenderly embraced, but this mysterious anticipation of the secret he longed to know was already clouded by the shadows of sleep. Once again all the images of the last few hours passed vividly through his mind, once again the book of his youth opened enticingly. Then the child fell asleep and began to dream the deeper dream of his own life.

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