d  her exquisite threat.  She had
turned  around. The  artist had  put  into  this face  the total  essence of
maternal tenderness and feminine caress. The fire of pure, proud youth shone
in the  tender but resolute eyes; the bronze  silk  of  her hair  above  her
finely etched eyebrows  appeared to be a diadem. Her  mouth,  with its noble
and  youthful features, exuded love  and intelligence. She stood half-turned
but  had revealed  her  entire  face,  and  she  sparkled with the  youthful
strength  of  life  and with  a  joy  as  disturbing  as sleep  filled  with
passionate tears.
     Ammon looked at  the picture mutely. It seemed to  him that he had only
to utter a  single word in order to break the  paints' silence, and then the
woman would approach him with lowered eyelashes, still more beautiful in her
movements than in  the  distressing immobility  of  the miraculously created
living body. He saw the dust on  her legs,  which were ready to move on, and
the individual hairs behind  her  little ear were like the radiant attire on
heads of grain. Joy and yearning held him in tender captivity.
     "Dogger, you're a  despot!" said  Ammon. "Could  anyone strike  a  more
painful blow to  the heart?"  He  stamped  his  foot. "I must be delirious,"
cried  Ammon. "To paint like that  is impossible; no one on  earth  could or
would dare to do this!"
     And  the actual eyes  of a woman gazed at him still more  expressively,
more intently, and more deeply.
     Ammon  was almost frightened, and with his heart  beating  violently he
pulled  the curtain over  the painting. Something  held him to the  spot; he
could not bring himself to pace up and down, as  he usually did when  he was
disturbed. He was afraid to stir  or  to look around; the silence,  in which
only his breathing and the crackling of the burning candle were audible, was
as unpleasant as the smell of fumes. Finally, overcoming his numbness, Ammon
walked up  to  the third canvas,  uncovered the painting ... and the hair on
his head bristled.
     What had Dogger  done  in order to produce  a  nightmarish  effect that
could rekindle superstitions? The woman stood before Ammon in the same pose,
with her head turned around while she continued  walking;  but her  face was
unaccountably  transformed, and  yet it  was  the  same --  down to the  last
feature-as the one at which Ammon had just looked. The mocking eyes met  his
with an inscrutable vividness, and the effect was fearsome. Now, at a closer
range, their gaze  was sombre; the pupils glittered differently;  the mouth,
which had an evil and base expression, was  prepared to bestow  a  loathsome
smile of madness; and the beauty of  her wondrous face had become repulsive:
it exuded a ferocious, greedy fire and was capable of strangling a person or
of  sucking  someone's  blood;  a  reptile's  lust  and  a  demon's  passion
illuminated its  vile oval, which was full of aroused voluptuousness, gloom,
and  frenzy; and an  infinite agony seized Ammon when  he looked closely and
discerned in this face a readiness to begin speaking.  The half-opened lips,
between  which  her teeth  shone repulsively, seemed to  be  whispering; the
figure's  former  soft  femininity emphasised  still  further  the  horrible
aliveness of  the head, which all but nodded from  the frame.  Ammon  sighed
deeply and  let go of the cord; the  curtain rustled as it sped down, and he
fancied that a diabolical face had winked  at him  and hidden itself beneath
the falling folds.
     Ammon turned around. A large and  thick folder lying  on the table drew
his distracted attention;  when he opened it, he found it full of  drawings.
But  they were strange and  wild.... Ammon examined one after the other  and
was  struck by the superhuman skill  of fantasy  evidenced  in them.  He saw
flocks of ravens flying  over fields of  roses;  hills that were covered, as
though by grass, with electric  lights; a river, dammed up by green corpses;
hirsute, interlaced hands that were gripping  bloodied knives;  an inn, full
to  overflowing with drunk fish and lobsters; a garden in which gallows with
executed men had  taken strong root; the huge  tongues of execution  victims
hung to the ground and children were swinging on them and laughing; corpses,
which  were  reading  yellowed  tomes  in  their  graves  by  the  light  of
luminescent pieces  of  rotten wood; a swimming pool, full of bearded women;
scenes  of depravity,  such as  a feast of cannibals who were skinning a fat
man; in the same drawing, a  hand jutted  out of a cauldron  which hung over
the fire;  weirdly hideous figures, who had red whiskers  and  blue heads of
hair, and who were  one-eyed, three-eyed, and blind, paraded before him  one
after the  other-one was eating  a snake,  another was  playing dice with  a
tiger, a third cried, and jewels  fell from  his eyes.  In  almost  all  the
drawings gold sequins were strewn over the  clothes of the figures; they had
been  done  with care, as in general any  beloved work is done. Ammon leafed
through the drawings  with a terrible curiosity. The door slammed; he jumped
away from the table and saw Dogger.

        VIII. THE EXPLANATION
     Even   at  the   most  dangerous   moments   Ammon   never   lost   his
self-possession;   however,  taken   unawares,   he   experienced  momentary
confusion.  Dogger  had apparently not expected to see Ammon; he stopped  at
the door  irresolutely  and looked  around, but soon  he grew pale  and then
flared up so that his bare neck reddened with anger.
     "By what right did you come  here?" he shouted, striding over to Ammon.
"How am I to regard this? I didn't expect such a thing! Eh? Ammon!"
     "You're right,"  answered Ammon  calmly, without lowering  his eyes. "I
had no right to enter.  But I would have felt guilty only if I  hadn't found
anything;  now  that I've  seen something  here, I dare think that I've thus
acquired the  right to reject the  charge of impudence. I'll say more: had I
found out  after I left what  I would have seen if  I had gone upstairs, and
had I  not done so  -- then I would have never forgiven  myself  for  such an
omission.  My  motives  were the following....  I'm  sorry,  but  the matter
demands frankness, whether you like it or not. I had vague doubts about your
cows, Dogger,  and  about the turnips and the well-fed pheasant hens; when I
accidentally came upon the true path to your  soul, I  attained my goal. The
fearful power of a genius guided your brush. Yes, my eyes stole your secret,
but I  am no less proud of this  thievery than Columbus  was of  the Western
Hemisphere, since my calling is to seek, to pursue, to make discoveries!"
     "Shut up!" cried  Dogger. His  face did  not contain a trace of  placid
equanimity, but  nor did it show any malice, which is out of place in people
of lofty character; it expressed distressed indignation and pain. "You still
dare.... Oh, Ammon, you, with  your  conversations about  that accursed art,
caused me to lose sleep owing to agonies that are beyond your comprehension,
and  now, bursting into  here,  you want  me  to  believe that your  deed is
praiseworthy. What makes you think you can take such liberties?"
     "I am a seeker,  a seeker of adventure," Ammon coldly retorted. "I have
a different  set of morals. There would be no merit in dealing with people's
hearts and souls and never being cursed for these  experiments. What good is
a soul that lays itself servilely open to view?"
     "However,"  said  Dogger,  "you are daring! I don't like people who are
too daring. Leave. Return to your room and pack. You'll  be given a horse at
once; there's a night train."
     "Fine!" Ammon walked towards the door. "Farewell!"
     He was at the door when suddenly both of Dogger's hands  seized him  by
the shoulders and spun him around. Ammon saw the  pathetic face of a coward;
he sensed  Dogger's  boundless fright and, not  knowing what was the matter,
grew pale with alarm.
     "Not  a  word," said Dogger, "absolutely not a word to  anyone! For  my
sake, for God's sake, have mercy-say nothing to anyone!"
     "I give you my word; yes, I give you my word. Calm down."
     Dogger let go  of Ammon. His gaze, filled with  hatred, stopped on each
of the paintings in  turn. Ammon walked out,  descended the  staircase, went
into his own room, and prepared to  go. Half an hour later, accompanied by a
servant  and without encountering Dogger again, he went out through the dark
entrance from the garden side, where a carriage stood;  he  climbed  in  and
rode off.
     The starry dew  of  the  sky,  the agitation,  the limitless,  fragrant
darkness,  and  the breath  of roadside thickets  intensified his  enchanted
exultation. The earth's  huge, blind heart beat muffledly in time to Ammon's
exultant heart, greeting  its  son the seeker. Ammon groped uncertainly  but
tenaciously for the true nature of Dogger's soul.
     "No,  you  can't  get  away  from   yourself,  Dogger,  no,"  he  said,
remembering the drawings.
     The  coachman, who  was  racking  his brains  over  the  guest's sudden
departure, timidly turned around and asked:
     "Is there some urgent matter, sir?"
     "Matter?  Yes, precisely-a  matter. I must  go to  India  at  once.  My
relatives   there   have   come   down  with  the   plague-my   grandmother,
sister-in-law, and three first cousins."
     "Is that so!" the peasant said in suprise. "Goodness me!"

        IX. THE SECOND AND LAST MEETING WITH DOGGER
     "My  friend," Tonar said to Ammon  upon opening a letter, "Dogger, whom
you visited  four years ago, requests that you  go to him immediately. Since
he does not know your address, he's transmitting his request through me. But
what could have happened there?"
     Ammon,  without  concealing  his  surprise,  quickly  walked up  to his
friend.
     "He's asking me over? How does he express himself?"
     "As  they used to do at the end of the eighteenth  century. 'I shall be
greatly indebted to you,'" read Tonar, '"if you inform Mr. Ammon Koot that I
would be most grateful to  him if he  would meet with  me at once....' Won't
you explain what this is about?"
     "No, I don't know."
     "Really? You're a sly one, Ammon!"
     "I can only promise to tell you afterwards, if things go all right."
     "Very  well. My curiosity's been aroused. What, are you already looking
at the clock? Take a look at the train schedule."
     "There's a train at  four," said Ammon, pressing the buzzer.  A servant
appeared in the doorway. "Hert!  High  boots, a revolver, a  laprobe, and  a
small  travelling-bag.  Farewell,  Tonar.  I'm  going  to  Liliana's  cheery
meadows!"
     Not  without  trepidation did Ammon heed the  strange man's summons. He
still remembered the  painful blow that the two-faced  woman in the wondrous
paintings  had  dealt  to his  soul,  and  he  involuntarily  connected  the
paintings with Dogger's invitation. But  it was  pointless to try and  guess
what Dogger wanted from him.  Undoubtedly, something serious  was  in store.
Deep in thought, Ammon stood at the train window. With the thoroughness of a
blind  man  who gropes for  something that he needs, he  mused  upon all his
knowledge of  people, of all the  complex junctures of their souls,  and all
the  possibilities that followed from what he had seen  four years ago; but,
dissatisfied, he finally refused to predict the future.
     At eight o'clock in the evening Ammon stood before  the quiet house, in
the garden where flowers prayed vividly,  luxuriantly,  and joyfully, to the
sun  setting amidst silvery clouds. Elma met  Ammon; the musical clarity was
missing from her  movements and expression; a  grieving, nervous,  suffering
woman stood before Ammon and softly said:
     "He wants to  speak with you. You don't know-he's dying, but,  he still
hopes he'll get well;  please make believe that you consider his  disease to
be nothing at all."
     "We must save Dogger," said  Ammon after  a moment's thought.  "Has  he
kept anything secret from you?"
     He  looked  Elma  straight  in  the  eye  and  imparted  a   cautiously
significant tone to the question.
     "No, nothing. And from you?"
     This was said gropingly, but they understood each other.
     "Probably," said Ammon  inquisitively, "you were  not  left in the dark
regarding the haste of my previous departure." "You  must excuse  Dogger and
... yourself."
     "Yes. For the sake of that which you know well, Dogger must not die."
     "The doctors are deceiving  him, but I  know everything.  He won't live
out the month."
     "It's absurd," said Ammon, walking after Elma, "I know a person who's a
watchman  in a garden and is one hundred and  four  years old. But he, to be
sure, understands nothing of paints."
     When  they  came  into  the  sick-room, Dogger  was  in  bed. The early
twilight shaded  his transparent  face like  a light, airy fabric;  the sick
man's hands were under his head. He was hirsute, thin, and morose; his eyes,
which glittered expressively, rested on Ammon.
     "Elma, leave us alone," wheezed Dogger, "don't be offended."
     The woman smiled at him sadly and left. Ammon sat down.
     "Here's still one more adventure, Ammon," Dogger began to speak weakly.
"Enter it in the column for extremely distant journeys. Yes, I'm dying."
     "You  must be a hypochondriac," said Ammon  lightheart-edly. "Come now,
that's just a weakness."
     "Yes, yes.  We  practise lying.  Elma  says the same as  you,  while  I
pretend that I don't believe death is near,  and she is satisfied with that.
She doesn't want me to believe what she herself believes."
     "What's wrong with you,  Dogger?" "What?"  Dogger  closed his eyes  and
smiled grimly.  "You see, I drank some cold spring water.  I  must tell  you
that for the past eleven  years all the water I drink  has  been neither too
hot nor too cold. Two years ago, in  the spring, I was walking in the nearby
hills. The snow  runoffs  rushed along sparkling stone  channels among vivid
greenery,  pounding  on every side. Blue cascades whipped up  snowy foam and
leaped from ledge to ledge; they jostled one another like frightened herd of
sheep  which streams  through a tight gate in a  living wave of white backs.
Oh, Ammon, I  acted unwisely,  but  the  stifling hot  day tortured me  with
thirst.  The sky's oppressive heat beat down on my head from the precipitous
heights, and the profusion of water foaming about increased my sufferings. I
was far from home, and  I felt  an uncontrollable urge to drink this savage,
cold,  carefree  water that  had  not  been  defiled  by  a thermometer.  An
underground spring  was not  far  away; I bent down  and drank-the icy  fire
scorched my lips. The tasty water smelled of grass and fizzed like sparkling
wine.  Rarely does one have  occasion to quench his thirst so blissfully.  I
drank for a  long time and  then ... I became  ill.  Sick people, you  know,
often have  very keen hearing, and I, albeit not without making  an  effort,
overheard Elma and the doctor behind the doors. He did a good job of beating
around  the bush for a  while, but all the  same  he gave me  grace for  not
longer than the end of the month."
     "You acted unnaturally," said Ammon with a smile.
     "Partly. But  I'm  becoming  tired of speaking.  Those two  pictures in
which she turned  around  ... where  do  you  think they are?"  Dogger  grew
agitated. "There's a box on the table; open the little grave."
     Ammon got  up and slightly raised  the lid of a beautiful  casket; from
the  rush of air a  bit of  white ash flew up and landed on his sleeve.  The
box, which was  filled to the top with fluffy ash, explained to him the fate
of the brilliant creations.
     "You burned them!"
     Dogger's eyes motioned assent.
     "If this isn't madness, then it's barbarity," said Ammon.
     "Why?" retorted Dogger  meekly. "One of them was evil,  while the other
was  falsehood.  I'll tell you their story. The task to which I dedicated my
entire life was to  paint three pictures that would be more perfect and more
powerful than anything that exists in art. No  one even knew  that I  was an
artist; no one,  except  for  you and my wife, has seen these paintings. The
grievous good fortune that befell  me was  to depict Life by separating what
is essentially inseparable. This was more difficult than sorting out, kernel
by kernel, a wagonload of grain that  has  been  mixed with a  wagonload  of
poppy seeds. But I did it, and you, Ammon, saw Life's two faces, each in the
full splendour of its  might.  When I had committed this sin, I felt that my
whole body, my thoughts and  my dreams, were  drawing me irresistibly toward
darkness;  before  me I  saw  its  complete embodiment  ... and I  could not
resist. Only  I know how I lived then, no  one else. But it was a dismal and
morbid existence of horror and decay!
     "The things that now surround me, Ammon  --  nature, farm work,  air,  a
vegetable-like happiness  -- represent nothing  but  a  hurried  flight  from
myself. I couldn't  show people my  fearful pictures,  since they would have
extolled me, and I, urged on by vanity, would have used my art in accordance
with  my soul's bent-on behalf of evil-and that would have destroyed me. All
my soul's dark instincts pushed me towards evil art and an evil life. As you
see,  in the  house  I honestly  eliminated every  temptation: there  are no
pictures, drawings, or statuettes. Thus I destroyed my  memory of  myself as
an  artist, but it  was beyond my power  to  destroy those two,  who  fought
between themselves to possess me. For whatever you may say, they really were
not  so badly done! But life's diabolical face at times tempted  me; I  shut
myself up, buried myself in my fantasies-the drawings-and became intoxicated
with nightmarish delirium  ... that folder no longer exists either. You kept
your promise to be silent, and since I trust you, I ask that after  my death
you exhibit my third painting anonymously;  it is truthful and good. Art was
my curse; I renounce my name."
     He was silent for a while and  then began to cry, but his tears did not
arouse any offensive  sensation  of  pity in Ammon, who  saw  that no person
could commit a greater act  of violence against himself. "The man has burned
himself out," Ammon thought. "Fate has  given him  an unbearable burden. But
soon he will have peace...."
     "And so, Ammon," said Dogger, growing calm, "will you do this?"
     "Yes, it's my  duty, Dogger;  I truly  admire  you,"  said Ammon,  who,
contrary to his own expectations, became more upset than he wanted to be. "I
admire your talent, your struggle, and ... your ultimate staunchness."
     "Give me your hand!" Dogger requested with a smile. His  hand-shake was
firm and brusque.
     "You see,  I'm not completely weak  yet," he said. "Farewell, restless,
thieving soul.  Elma will give you the  painting.  I  think,"  Dogger  added
naively, "that people will write about it."
     Ammon  and  his friend,  a  thin brunette  with a  face as mobile as  a
monkey's,  slowly made their way through the dense crowd that had filled the
hall to overflowing.  Amidst  the  other frames  and portrayals, above their
heads, stood a woman who was about to turn around and  who  seemed alive  to
troubled eyes; she was standing  on a road that led  towards some hills. The
crowd was silent.  The  most perfect work of art  in the world displayed its
power.
     "It's almost unbearable,"  said Ammon's friend. "Why,  she  really will
turn around."
     "Oh, no," Ammon disagreed, "fortunately, that's only a threat."
     "Fortunately? I want to see her face!"
     "It's better this  way, my dear,"  he sighed,  "let each person imagine
for himself what that face is like."

           1915