The Torrents Of Spring

XXVI
At eight o’clock next morning, Emil arrived at Sanin’s hotel leading
Tartaglia by a string. Had he sprung of German parentage, he could not
have shown greater practicality. He had told a lie at home; he had said
he was going for a walk with Sanin till lunch-time, and then going to the
shop. While Sanin was dressing, Emil began to talk to him, rather hesitatingly,
it is true, about Gemma, about her rupture with Herr Klüber; but
Sanin preserved an austere silence in reply, and Emil, looking as though
he understood why so serious a matter should not be touched on lightly,
did not return to the subject, and only assumed from time to time an intense
and even severe expression.
After drinking coffee, the two friends set off together – on foot, of
course – to Hausen, a little village lying a short distance from Frankfort,
and surrounded by woods. The whole chain of the Taunus mountains
could be seen clearly from there. The weather was lovely; the sunshine
was bright and warm, but not blazing hot; a fresh wind rustled briskly
among the green leaves; the shadows of high, round clouds glided
swiftly and smoothly in small patches over the earth. The two young
people soon got out of the town, and stepped out boldly and gaily along
the well-kept road. They reached the woods, and wandered about there
a long time; then they lunched very heartily at a country inn; then
climbed on to the mountains, admired the views, rolled stones down and
clapped their hands, watching the queer droll way in which the stones
hopped along like rabbits, till a man passing below, unseen by them,
began abusing them in a loud ringing voice. Then they lay full length on
the short dry moss of yellowish-violet colour; then they drank beer at another
inn; ran races, and tried for a wager which could jump farthest.
They discovered an echo, and began to call to it; sang songs, hallooed,
wrestled, broke up dry twigs, decked their hats with fern, and even
danced. Tartaglia, as far as he could, shared in all these pastimes; he did
not throw stones, it is true, but he rolled head over heels after them; he
howled when they were singing, and even drank beer, though with evident
aversion; he had been trained in this art by a student to whom he had
once belonged. But he was not prompt in obeying Emil – not as he was
with his master Pantaleone – and when Emil ordered him to ‘speak’, or
to ‘sneeze’, he only wagged his tail and thrust out his tongue like a pipe.
The young people talked, too. At the beginning of the walk, Sanin, as
the elder, and so more reflective, turned the conversation on fate and
predestination, and the nature and meaning of man’s destiny; but the
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