Beware of Pity by Stefan Zweig

  But yet another, far more mysterious, factor was responsible for the fact that I found the daily company of the two girls so exhilarating. Ever since I had been sent, at an early age, to the military academy, that is to say, for the last ten or fifteen years, I had lived continuously in a masculine, a male environment. From morning till night, from night till morning, in the dormitory at the military academy, in camp, in barracks, in the mess and on the march, in the riding-school and in the class-room, always and always I had breathed an air that reeked of the male, first of boys, then of grown lads, but always of men, men; I had grown used to their virile gestures, their firm, noisy tread, their guttural voices, their tobacco-y smell, their free and easy ways and sometimes coarseness. To be sure, I was extremely fond of most of my fellow-officers, and could not really complain that my feelings were not reciprocated. But there was one exhilarating element that this male atmosphere lacked; it contained, as it were, insufficient ozone, insufficient power to rouse, invigorate, stimulate, quicken, electrify; and just as our excellent military band despite its exemplary rhythm and swing, nevertheless remained a brass band, its music therefore harsh, blaring, depending solely for its effect on rhythm, because it lacked the delicately sensuous tones of stringed instruments, so did even our jolliest times in barracks lack that element of subtlety which the presence or even the mere proximity of women invisibly adds to all social intercourse. Even when, as fourteen-year-old cadets, we had promenaded two by two through the town in our smart gold-laced uniforms and had come across other lads flirting or chatting idly with girls, we had felt regretfully that because of our monastic incarceration our young lives had been violently robbed of something that was every day permitted to our contemporaries as a matter of course, in the streets, in the parks, in railway trains and in dance-halls: the untrammelled enjoyment of the society of young girls. We, segregated, imprisoned behind iron bars, stared at these short-skirted imps as though at enchanted beings, dreaming of even a single conversation with a girl as of something unattainable. Deprivation of that kind is not easily forgotten. The fact that, later on, swift and, for the most part, cheap adventures with all kinds of accommodating wenches came our way, by no means compensated for those sentimental boyish dreams, and I could tell by the gauche and clumsy way in which I stammered and stuttered whenever I happened to be introduced to a young girl in society (although I had by this time slept with a dozen women) that long years of deprivation had impaired, robbed me of, my naïve and natural ease of manner.

  And now all of a sudden that unavowed yearning to form for once a friendship with young women, instead of with moustachioed, male, uncouth fellow-officers, was being fulfilled in the most perfect way. Every afternoon I sat, completely at home, with the two girls; the limpidity, the femininity of their voices, gave me a sense (I cannot express it otherwise) of positively physical wellbeing, and it was with a feeling of almost indescribable happiness that for the first time in my life I enjoyed complete freedom from shyness in the presence of young girls. For the specially happy thing about our relationship was the fact that, because of the unique circumstances, there was none of the galvanic tension which is as a rule inevitably present when two young people of opposite sexes spend a long time in each other’s company. During the long hours when we sat chatting together there was a complete absence of that hot-house atmosphere that usually makes a tête-à-tête in the half-darkness so dangerous. At first, I am bound to admit, the full voluptuous lips, the plump comely arms of Ilona, the Magyar sensuousness revealed in all her soft, lithe movements, had excited me, young fellow that I was, in the most agreeable fashion. More than once I had had to steel my hands against the desire to crush the warm, soft creature with the laughing black eyes just once in my arms and cover her with kisses. But Ilona had confided to me right at the very beginning of our acquaintance that she had been engaged for two years to a law student in Beskeret and was only waiting for some improvement in Edith’s condition, or her complete recovery, to marry him — I gathered that Kekesfalva had promised his poor relation a dowry should she wait until then. And besides, of what crudeness, what perfidy would we not have been guilty if, without being really in love, we had indulged in furtive kissing and hand-holding behind the back of the pathetic creature who was fettered so helplessly to her invalid chair! Ilona’s initial sensuous, tantalizing attraction very soon ceased to trouble me, and whatever I was able to feel in the way of affection was concentrated more and more fervently on the hapless creature with whom life had dealt so harshly, for, inevitably, in the secret chemistry of the emotions the feeling of pity for a sick person is imperceptibly bound up with tenderness. To sit by the lame girl, to cheer her with my conversation, to see her wan, restless mouth soothed by a smile, or at those moments when, yielding to a fit of temper, she would start up impatiently, to reduce her to shamefaced submission by a mere touch of the hand and to receive in return a grateful look from her grey eyes — such little intimacies incidental to my platonic friendship with this helpless invalid made me happier than the most passionate love-affair with another woman could have done. Thanks to these mild spiritual upheavals, I discovered — for how much fresh knowledge had I already to thank these last few days! — tender zones of feeling hitherto completely unknown and unsuspected.

  Unknown and unsuspected tender zones of feeling — but also, it must be admitted, very dangerous ones! For, despite the most resolute efforts, it is never possible for a relationship between a healthy person and an invalid, a free person and a prisoner, to hang fire for ever. Unhappiness makes people vulnerable, incessant suffering unjust. Just as in the relations between creditor and debtor there is always an element of the disagreeable that can never be overcome, for the very reason that the one is irrevocably committed to the role of giver and the other to that of receiver, so in a sick person a latent feeling of resentment at every obvious sign of consideration is always ready to burst forth. One had constantly to be on one’s guard against overstepping the scarcely perceptible boundary beyond which sympathy, instead of soothing, only hurt her the more. On the one hand, pampered as she was, she demanded to be waited on by everyone like a princess and cosseted like a child; on the other hand this very consideration for her was likely to embitter her, since it made her more acutely aware of her own helplessness. If, for instance, one obligingly pushed the little stool nearer to her to spare her the effort of having to reach out for book or cup, she would flare up, her eyes flashing: ‘Do you imagine I can’t look after myself?’ Just as a caged animal sometimes, for no apparent reason, will attack the keeper whom it usually fawns upon, so from time to time she was seized with a malicious desire to shatter at one blow the serenity of the atmosphere by suddenly referring to herself as ‘a wretched cripple’. At such moments of tension one had to keep a tight hold on oneself in order not to upbraid her unfairly for her cantankerousness.

  But to my own astonishment I found the requisite strength again and again. In some mysterious way, once one has gained an insight into human nature, that insight grows from day to day, and he to whom it has been given to experience vicariously even one single form of earthly suffering, acquires, by reason of this tragic lesson, an understanding of all its forms, even those most foreign to him, and apparently abnormal. I refused, therefore, to be put off by her occasional fits of rebellion; on the contrary, the more unfair and unwarranted were her outbursts, the more did they move me; gradually, too, I realized why my visits, my presence, were so welcome to Edith’s father and Ilona, to the whole household. Long protracted suffering is apt to exhaust not only the invalid, but the compassion of others; violent emotions cannot be prolonged endlessly. Edith’s father and Ilona certainly shared to the full the sufferings of the poor impatient invalid, but by now their capacity for suffering was to some extent spent, they had become resigned to it. They regarded the invalid as an invalid, her lameness as a fact; they now waited with downcast eyes until the brief nerve-storms had played themselves out. But they were no longer appalle
d as I was appalled each time afresh, and because I was the only one to whom her suffering was a continually fresh source of consternation, I came to be the only one in whose presence she was ashamed of her lack of control. I had only to say, when she lost her self-control, ‘My dear Fräulein Edith!’ and the grey eyes would be lowered obediently. She would blush, and one could tell that she would have liked to run away from herself; but her crippled legs fettered her to her chair. And I could never take leave of her without her saying in a certain pleading way that shook me to the core, ‘You will come tomorrow, won’t you? You’re not angry with me because of all the stupid things I said today?’ At such moments I felt a kind of obscure amazement at the thought that I, who had, after all, given her nothing except my sincere sympathy, should possess so much power over another person.

  But it is the way of young people that each fresh piece of knowledge of life should go to their heads, and that once uplifted by an emotion they can never have enough of it. As soon as I discovered that my ability to feel pity was a force that not only stirred me myself positively pleasurably, but extended its beneficent influence beyond my own personality, a strange metamorphosis began to take place within me. Ever since I had first allowed this capacity for sympathy to enter into my being, it seemed to me as though a toxin had found its way into my blood and had made it run warmer, redder, faster, pulsate and throb more vigorously. All of a sudden I could no longer understand the slothful torpor in which I had hitherto lived as though in a grey, insipid twilight. A hundred and one things to which I had never even given a passing thought began to excite me and to occupy my thoughts. All around me I perceived, as though that first glimpse into the sufferings of another had given me a fresh, a keener, a more understanding eye, things that engaged my attention, thrilled me, shook me. And since this whole world of ours is crammed, street upon street, room upon room, with poignant tragedies, drenched through and through with burning misery and distress, my days were passed from morn till night in a state of heightened attentiveness and expectation. Strange — I found, when trying new mounts for the regiment, that all of a sudden I could no longer, as formerly, give a stubborn horse a savage blow over the crupper without a pang, for I was guiltily aware of the pain I was causing and the weals seared my own skin. Or, again, I would find myself digging my nails into the palms of my hands when our testy Captain struck a poor Ruthenian Uhlan a resounding blow in the face with his clenched fist for saddling a horse badly, and the lad stood there rigidly at attention, his hands pressed to his sides. The soldiers standing about would either stare or laugh vacuously, but I, I alone, would see the hot tears of shame spring to the lashes of the dull-witted lad beneath his lowered lids. All of a sudden, too, I found I could no longer stand the ribald jokes in the officers’ mess at the expense of clumsy or awkward comrades; ever since I had realized in the person of the weak, defenceless Edith the torture of helplessness, I was revolted by any act of brutality and moved to pity by any form of helplessness. Countless trifling things that had hitherto escaped my attention I now noticed, ever since chance had squeezed into my eyes those first hot drops of sympathy; little, simple things, but each of them with the power to move and stir me deeply. It struck me, for instance, that the woman at the tobacconist’s shop where I always bought my cigarettes held the coins that I handed to her remarkably close to the thick lenses of her spectacles, and I was immediately troubled by a suspicion that she might be suffering from cataract. The next day, I thought, I would ask her about it very tactfully and perhaps ask Goldbaum, our regimental doctor, to be so kind as to examine her. Or it occurred to me that the volunteers had of late been pointedly cutting that little red-haired chap K., and I remembered having seen in the newspaper (how could he help it, the poor lad?) that his uncle had been sent to prison for embezzlement; I made a point of sitting by him in the mess and entered into a lengthy conversation, immediately perceiving from his look of gratitude that he knew I was doing it simply to show the others how unsporting and caddish their behaviour was. Or I would put in a word for one of my troop whom the Colonel had ordered four hours’ fatigue duty.

  Again and again, day after day, I found fresh opportunities for indulging, trying out, this passion that had suddenly possessed me. And I said to myself: from now on, help anyone and everyone so far as in you lies. Cease to be apathetic, indifferent! Exalt yourself by devoting yourself to others, enrich yourself by making everyone’s destiny your own, by enduring and understanding every facet of human suffering through your pity. And my heart, astonished at its own workings, quivered with gratitude towards the sick girl whom I had unwittingly hurt and who, through her suffering, had taught me the creative magic of pity.

  Well, I was soon to be awakened from romantic emotions of this kind, and pretty thoroughly too. We had been playing dominoes one afternoon, and then had talked and whiled away the time so agreeably that we none of us noticed how late it was. At length, at half-past eleven, I looked up in dismay at the clock and hurriedly took my leave. But as Herr von Kekesfalva accompanied me out into the hall, we heard from outside a humming and droning as of thousands and thousands of bumble-bees. The rain was drumming on the eaves in a regular downpour. ‘The car will take you home,’ Kekesfalva reassured me. That was quite unnecessary, I protested; the thought that the chauffeur should, solely on my account, have to dress again at half-past eleven and get out the car, which had already been put away in the garage, was really distressing to me. (All this consideration for, entering into the feelings of, others was entirely novel to me; I had only acquired the habit during these last few weeks.) But, after all, there was considerable temptation in the thought of whizzing home comfortably in a soft, well-sprung coupé in foul weather like this instead of trudging for half an hour, dripping wet, along the muddy high-road in thin shoes; and so I gave in. Despite the rain, the old man refused to be deterred from seeing me to the car and putting the rug over my knees. The chauffeur started up, and we raced off homewards through the pelting rain.

  It was wonderfully comfortable and luxurious, speeding along so noiselessly and smoothly in the car. Nevertheless, as we now turned off towards the barracks — we had reached the town in an incredibly short time — I knocked on the glass partition and begged the chauffeur to stop when he reached the Rathausplatz. Better not drive past the barracks in Kekesfalva’s elegant coupé, I thought. I knew it didn’t look well for a subaltern to come rolling up like a Grand Duke in a posh car and be assisted out of it by a chauffeur in livery. That kind of showing off was not regarded with favour by the bigwigs, and my own instinct, besides, had long told me to mix my two worlds as little as possible — the luxurious world of the Kekesfalvas where I was a free man, independent, pampered, and the other world, the world of duty, in which I had to keep my place, in which I was a poor devil who felt himself lucky if the month had thirty instead of thirty-one days. Without my knowing it, one side of me was reluctant to have anything to do with the other; sometimes I was no longer able to decide who was the real Toni Hofmiller, the one who was a mere subaltern or the one who spent his time at the Kekesfalvas’.

  The chauffeur drew up obediently in the Rathausplatz, two streets away from the barracks. I got out, turned up my collar and was about to walk rapidly across the wide square. But just at that moment the storm burst forth with redoubled fury, and the wind rained wet blows full in my face. Better, therefore, to wait a few minutes in the shelter of a house-door before running across the two streets to the barracks. Or, to be sure, the café was still open and I could sit there in safety until the heavens had emptied the contents of their largest watering-can. The café was only six doors away, and lo and behold, behind the dripping window-panes there was still a glimmer of gas-light! Perhaps some of my comrades were still squatting round our table; it would be a splendid opportunity to set things right, for it was high time I put in an appearance again. Yesterday, the day before yesterday, the whole of this week and last week I had absented myself. Really, they had every reason to b
e fed up with me, for even if one is fickle, one should at least observe the formalities.

  I opened the door. In the front half of the café the lights were already extinguished for reasons of economy, newspapers were lying about all over the place, and Eugen, the head waiter, was counting the takings. Only in the billiard-room at the back could I still see a light and the glimmer of polished uniform buttons. Yes, by Jove, there they still were, those everlasting tarock players, Jozsi, Ferencz, and Goldbaum, the regimental doctor. Evidently they had long since finished their game, and were merely lolling about in that familiar state of café inertia in which one is afraid to make a move; and so it was a regular godsend for them that my arrival should break in upon their boredom and lethargy.