Confessions of an Author

Chapter Four. A YOUNG MAN BECOMES EDUCATED IN THE UNUSUAL

I could not rid myself of the depressed mood I was in. I would sit in the hotel lobby and vacantly stare into nothingness for hours on end. Sure, I was young and healthy, and there were moments in which I managed to forget. But, moments like that were short and few. The only things that made a lasting impression upon me were the sweet and tender letters Mama wrote to me. If I ever succeed in forcing myself into a higher esteem for my fellow men, I will give to the world this collection of letters written by a marvelous woman. They deserve a high ranking place among the most noble documents of mankind.

But finally the day arrived that I laughed for the first time. And about what does one laugh first? About the miserable old husband who has a beautiful young wife. I had noticed the wretch in the reading room of my Swiss hotel. He bothered all the young people with invitations. His beautiful wife, a golden-haired Swede, was bored. He needed company to cheer her up, at least during the evening hours, he kept assuring them. And he held one champagne party after the other. He had always avoided me, which I can fully understand since I never bothered to smile and my eternally stern-looking features could not have possibly endeared me to him.

Finally he decided to talk to me, inquiring after the reason of my sorrow. The man was so preposterous that I managed a smile when I answered, “That's because so far you have always neglected to invite me.” His face lit up with delight. He refused to let go of me and I started to regret that I had bothered to talk to him in the first place.

He introduced me to his wife. She pretended to be very demure and disinterested but the occasional glances she threw at her husband indicated that she was highly satisfied. Now and then she would lean toward me and, as if unintentionally, she would afford me a look into her low-cut gown, showing me her finely veined milk-white breasts and deeper, all the way down to her navel and below. I was assured that, aside from her blue silken gown, all she wore was silk stockings.

When she got up out of her club fauteuil, I noticed, not without displeasure, that she had beautiful flaring and inviting hips, a marvelously modeled behind and promisingly well-shaped thighs. At first I was surprised that I noticed such a thing and then my surprise turned into sadness because, after all, I had traveled Paris and Madrid without paying any attention at all to the many beautiful women that live there.

But my serious mood did not last long. That idiot husband of hers made me laugh with his overzealousness. I got the distinct impression that he wanted to force his wife upon me! I finally accepted his invitation to a “small and intimate supper,” as he called it. It took place in one of the large rooms of the suite in which the couple lived. To my surprise I was the only guest and I could not help but make a remark about that. The man answered, and when he spoke he poked me in the shoulder blades, “But most people are so boring, no youth!”

I had to disagree. I remembered the names of several young people with whom I had exchanged some conversation.

“They are very nice and sociable people,” I said.

The man smiled mysteriously.

“Yes, yes, you are right … sociable; you know, but people, just plain people! One wouldn't want to socialize with them … it's like you said, nice, but, you know, their conversation is so, so … dull. Like I said, their words are so, so artificial; everything they say is so, ahem, well-dressed!”

At that moment his wife entered the room. She wore a simple black dress. Come to think of it, I don't know whether one could call it a dress. It looked as if she had wound a few yards of soft black silk around her naked body, starting under her arm pits. Her neck, shoulders and arms were bare, her white skin contrasted sharply with the gown and her reddish-blonde hair accentuated it even more. One thing was sure: this woman looked gorgeous!

She must have noticed the admiration in my eyes. Bending her upper body slightly backwards, she proffered her hand. Her husband, enraptured, reached for it and pressed his slightly heavy lips upon her fingers, showing no intention to let go of her hand. She jerked it away from him, turned toward me and said with a smile, “Ah, he is so … so …! But, why don't we sit down?”

She threw herself upon one of the low couches, behind which a huge mirror stretched all the way to the ceiling.

“Don't you prefer to sit next to me?”

Madame suddenly did not appear as reticent and honorable as she had been downstairs.

“You are not from northern Germany by any chance?”

“I am an Austrian, my dear lady.”

“One can see that immediately. You are so nice and have so much natural charm. Those other gentlemen in the hotel… ach … Berlin! Leipzig! And those two young ruffians … those Americans! You know …”

She held out one hand and allowed her husband to hand her a smoker's tray. She took a cigarette, put it in her mouth and then offered one to me and one to her husband. While doing this, her arms and my face came suspiciously close together. “You are still very young, or is it impossible to seduce you?” she asked smilingly.

“Isn't she marvelous?” exclaimed the man.

The behavior of this woman had made me bold enough to answer, “Dear lady, it would be a pleasure to be seduced by you.”

The tottering husband applauded, “Hurrah for Austria! What do you say, Syddi, wasn't I a good boy?”

She reached him her hand so he could kiss it.

“The lady wanted to talk about the Americans?”

“Oh yes, well I … now look at that. If I don't watch out, this horrible man would stick my whole hand into his mouth! …”

She withdrew her hand and dried it on her thigh.

“Oh yes, one of them, the blond one, what's his name? Jenkinson, right?” she turned to her husband, “Jenkinson. Now, listen to this, he says to me, 'Madame, you are very beautiful … I would like to give you a check every month!' “

“Just think of it,” interrupted her blockhead husband, “that's what he said, right in front of me, too!”

“Of course, we just laughed at him. He could not take that and he left. Before champagne had been served!”

I must admit that the entire conversation made me feel slightly ill, and if it had not been for the beautiful body of this mysterious woman, I would have left the room before these people would laugh at me like they did at poor Mister Jenkinson. But my curiosity was great enough to keep me there. What was going to happen next? The door to the adjoining room opened and a very young manservant announced that dinner was served.

“Don't you want to offer me your arm?” asked the lady.

A slight shiver ran up and down my spine. It seemed that she had a special ability to detect this because she looked up at me with a passionate gleam in her eyes, pressing her bosom against my arm at the same time. I sat next to her during dinner and her blockhead husband was sitting opposite us. Now and then I noticed her leg pressing against mine and some of her warmth rubbed off on me. Besides, I was still very curious. And when she poured me a glass of wine, she did it in such a way that I had an extremely good view of the hairs in her armpit. When she did that it is possible that some ardor was shining in my eyes, because she turned rather abruptly toward me, handing me my glass and now I could freely look under both!

“See, isn't she beautiful when she raises her arms!” was her husband's exclamation.

I would have loved to go for his throat, but she pushed me with her well-rounded shoulder and laughed, “Oh that man! But he is sort of nice, don't you agree?”

After we had finished our supper, the man left the room for a moment. She grabbed my hand and said, “I know what you are thinking. You are thinking, 'Thank God, he has left!' But you are doing him a great injustice. He can stay here and watch. It should be no reason for us to be ashamed.”

I just stared at her and couldn't think of anything to say. She thought it was very funny …

“If you are an Austrian, then you must have met lots of women?”

“Is that so obvious?”

“Oh, I am sure. One can talk about everything with Austrians, and it is not necessary to pretend!”

She suddenly got up, quickly pressed her upper arms against my lips and went into the room where we had sat before. She stretched out on the sofa and said, “Quickly, come here and sit down next to me!”

I noticed that one of her thin shoulder straps had loosened itself somehow and that now her bosom seemed even fuller and peeked through her gown.

“My husband is only going to get some more champagne. Ah, I am so giddy, I just love it, I am ready to do about anything.”

She laughed out loud and stretched her arms. At the same time she smiled very invitingly at me. I was beginning to get slightly horny; the quiet life I had led for the past several weeks became noticeable. And, oh, those little blonde hairs in her armpits! She noticed that I had no desire to talk. She looked at me penetratingly and called out, “Well, why don't you come over here!”

She took my arms and pulled me down toward her, suddenly my face was buried in her shoulder. She put her arms around me.

“I wish that we could have some fun!” she said. “My dear husband likes some fun, too, but all these young people are so terribly dumb.

Why don't you kiss me? Please, kiss me. I give you my full permission.”

She pulled up her knee and I could feel it press against my back.

“But what if your husband comes back?”

“Well, so what?”

Without loosening her hold on me she raised her upper body and called out, “Hugo! The champagne, please!”

The next moment, the old man walked in from the other room with an ice bucket and when he saw us in this compromising situation he exclaimed happily, “Ah!”

I wanted to get up quickly but she did not let go of me, on the contrary, she pulled me closer toward her and kissed me passionately.

Meanwhile the old nut had filled three glasses and happily exclaimed, “Finally, finally, a nice cozy evening!”

She held out one hand and received one glass of champagne. She handed that to me and reached out for a second one for her.

“Children, now we shall drink!”

She first toasted with me and then with her husband. I suddenly had a splendid idea. I took a sip out of my glass, pulled her black silken gown a little bit lower and emptied the contents into her cleavage. She laughed and her husband veritably howled with pleasure, “Oh, those funny Austrians!”

“I can't stay this way, I am drenched,” The beautiful woman wiggled and wound as if she were a bacchante.

“No, she can't stay that way,” seconded her husband.

She fingered around with her gown, made me hold one end of it, spun around like a top and suddenly she stood before me wearing nothing but black silken stockings!

Her husband screamed with delight and waved his champagne glass as if he were a drunken satyr. He threw off his tail coat and opened his fly. The nude woman, however, threw herself upon me, embracing me firmly. Her husband left quickly to get us another bottle.

“Drink, drink!” he hollered and filled the glasses again.

The nude woman reached for her head, loosened some pins and then she shook and her golden-blonde hair cascaded down her naked shoulders.

“But it is much too warm here,” cried the satyr, and he tried to take off my vest. I tried to avoid him. But he tore off his own shirt now, exposing his body, covered with gray curly hairs. Then I felt the beautiful woman.

“Don't be a spoilsport. Take off your clothes; you haven't even looked at me.” But she sounded happy and her laughter rang like a clear bell.

And the next moment she posed in front of me, stretching and moving her body in the most alluring and seductive positions. Then she laid down upon the carpet, opened up her thighs and stretched with her beautiful fingers the lips of her private parts.

“Look, children, isn't that beautiful!”

Her husband crouched in an easy chair, his hot eyes staring at his wife, his lower jaw slack, drooling like a horny ape, one hand fingering his limp member. She had meanwhile, crawling on all fours, sneaked up to me and tried to render me helpless by tickling the back of my knees. I buckled for just a moment, closing my eyes and before I knew what was happening I was stretched backwards upon the carpet and she had opened my trousers quick as lightning and lifted my shirt. A joyful outcry followed, “Oh, Hugo, look how beautiful!”

Her fingers caressed and played around with my member. I was lost. I turned, my eyes saw a frenzied raging woman, her face and expression were a demand for passion and lust. She let herself fall backwards, opening up invitingly and then she kept staring at me. I threw myself upon her as if I were a hungry predator. We rolled around on the carpet like maniacs. Near me I heard a barely suppressed screaming. The woman under me groaned, moaned and laughed, her body bucked convulsively …

Finally I woke up out of this wild, wild dream. The woman did not want to let me go and she clamped her legs around me, pushing up toward me, keeping me captive within her, when suddenly she relaxed and let out a never ending, “Aaaah!”

I was lying down next to her, trying to hide my face. I was ashamed and disgusted and if someone had come in and killed me, I would have been grateful. The conversation between the couple jarred me back to reality, but it also increased my disgust.

“Hugo, what did you think of that? Hugo, bring us some more champagne! Hugo!”

I arose. And then I saw this horrible old man, standing there, fully nude, except for the trousers that were hanging around his feet, jumping up and down while feverishly pulling his limp member with both hands.

“Marvelous, marvelous,” he kept calling the same word over and over again. He skipped toward the ice bucket, lifted the bottle out of it and sat down upon the cubes, starting to groan the moment he sat down as if he suddenly had an erection. His wife went over to him, kneeled in front and proffered her buttocks. Quick, quick and it was over, she grabbed the bottle, poured a glass and emptied it in one draught. She filled another one, looked up and saw that I was putting on my clothes. Infuriated, she got up and jumped at me, but, because I sidestepped her, she fell to the floor.

“What are you going to do?” she cried out.

I did not answer anything else but, “Out!” and turned away from her.

“No, no, you cannot do that, I won't let you,” she said as if she were a pouting child. And then she started to flatter me and, sidling up to me, she whispered, “My poor husband does not make you feel ashamed, does he? It is his only pleasure. All he wants to do is look at us, and isn't it far more exciting when somebody is looking at you!”

The poor wretch had gotten up out of his ice bucket and, though barely covered, he walked over to me and begged me to stay. Possibly he meant well when he said, “Ah, it is always so much nicer and different when a real gentleman does it instead of the servants. After all, a valet only does his duty!”

“You stupid ass!” screamed the woman.

That did it. Madame did not even try to keep me with her. She threw herself face down upon the sofa and pouted. I had gone into the other room and waited there till the blockhead husband came in to let me out of their apartment through a side exit. Once I was outside a shiver of disgust ran through me and I fled toward the street from whence I walked over to the hotel lobby. There I met the young servant of the fabulous couple. At first he looked at me in surprise, but then a sly smile curled around his lips when he noticed that I started to blush. I wanted to walk past him quickly but he walked up to me as if he had an important message.

“Sir, if you want me, I will gladly walk up to your room with you. I am game for anything you might desire.”

Did I understand correctly? I looked at the boy; he was blond, very young, well-built and his face was good looking and clean. He misinterpreted my staring at him because he said, “Room 8, Sir?”

I hastily answered, “No, thank you.” And I virtually ran up the stairs to my room.

I could not rid myself of the feeling that I had dirtied the memory of Marie. I surely would have found my way back into life and loving and consorting with women. But did it have to be this way, through the dirt? And the suggestion of the young servant had really topped it all! I was sad and melancholy when I walked up and down in my room. I now stood in front of the large middle window, looking out over the gigantic snow-covered mountains, shimmering in the light of the full moon.

I felt cold and I shivered.

Why couldn't I forget about the young man who had said that he was “game” for anything I might desire … anything! I imagined how he would behave together with me and the beautiful woman with her old billy goat husband. I visualized his body, tender yet muscular and very will built. Nude, next to the woman, upon her, under her, squirming on the carpet with her and the old horny bastard coming closer and closer, open mouthed and slack-jawed, drooling and with hot hands groping for the young man's well-rounded buttocks.

A hot desire painfully welled up in me and I tried to tell myself that my previous experiences would only make it natural that from now on I would never touch a woman again. I tried to convince myself that, because of the almost sacred memory of Marie, I was obliged to turn away from females. I suddenly had to think of my beautiful friend at the boarding school and I wracked my brain to make the memory more vivid.

I had become incredibly excited. If the young servant would have entered the room at that moment, I believe that I would have torn the clothes off his body and covered his naked flesh with passionate kisses. I would have implored him to teach me the delights of male relationships. I stared at the door, listened. No, he did not show up. And I was so unspeakably excited, unable to resist the demands of my body. I opened my trousers, my hand crawled toward my own naked flesh, touched and felt and the hand became more bold and insidious, it pulled out my member and the fingers started to play the game of love they used to play so long ago.

But then I stamped my feet, and shook my head. A horror for myself took hold of me … no! I'd rather have the first best whore off the streets … or … and again, like a secret missive, the other desire slipped back into my mind … or the young manservant. I left my room, just to run away from myself. I had not even turned on the light. I noticed, not without dissatisfaction, that my excitement had certain consequences, and I suddenly realized that my encounter with this Swedish nymphomaniac had not even been enough for me! I returned to my room, switched on the light, and rang for room service. When the maid entered I asked her if it was not too late to draw me a tub of water for a bath.

“No, Sir.”

“Fine, then I would like to take a bath.”

The girl hesitated before asking, “For one person … or …?”

I looked at the girl. She was of medium size, rather full-breasted and with wide hips; her nice, sun darkened face was framed by long dark curls and she had dark eyes. Without meaning anything else but a jovial remark, I answered, “Unless you want to take a bath with me.”

“Not a bath, Sir, but I will stay with you if you want me to.”

Now it was my turn to stare at her. And my passionate desires returned. I told myself very clearly: Girl or boy, as long as it is not my own hand.

“If the gentleman is willing to wait about fifteen minutes. I will have his bath prepared and … it won't be so difficult for me to enter his bathroom at such an unusual time.”

When she said that she bowed her head slightly, bit her lower lip and waited a while before she said, “It is to the right, at the end of the corridor, Sir.” And she did not move, as if expecting at least some kind of advances to be made by me. However, when I kept staring at her in utter amazement, she bowed slightly and disappeared.

What sort of a ridiculous day was it today, anyhow? Had everything and everybody gotten together in order to whip my senses? I let myself fall upon the couch and lit a cigarette. After I had tried to gather my thoughts for about ten minutes I got up again to walk over to the bathroom. I had not been able to gather my thoughts coherently, neither while I was resting on the couch nor on my way through the corridor toward my bath. There was only a certain feeling of apprehension, only a feeling of curiosity: Now what is going to happen, and what are you going to do about it?

When I entered the bathroom, the water was still running from the pipes into the white-tiled tub and a woman was dipping a thermometer into the water to check the temperature. She turned her head and asked, “Seventy-five, or more?”

“Warm,” I answered curtly.

She left me alone and I started to undress in front of the large mirror that was built into the wall. It had not happened since I had had my affair with Rita, but when I looked at myself in the mirror, standing there in the nude, I stretched my arms over my head, pressed my cheek against my right shoulder and watched my organ slowly swell and stiffen and finally erect itself. And a hot passionate desire took hold of me. I tiptoed to the door and listened. Was she about to show up? Why did she let me wait so long? She had to show up! I put on a robe and opened the door slightly. Then I heard a slight sound coming from the opposite door as if the little spyhole in it had just been closed. The next moment that door opened and a person, covered with a large bathrobe just like me, quickly walked over to me. The chambermaid. She quickly closed the door behind us and bolted it.

“Well,” she said and remained standing where she was.

I looked at her. She put down a purse and then she stepped slowly out of her robe. Standing in front of me, wearing only a very tight-fitting low-cut swimsuit with very short, short skirt, she lifted her arms high above her head and slowly turned around to grant me a good look at her. Her upper body was slightly bent and I could see her huge but nevertheless well-formed breasts. She asked, “Are you undressed?”

She seemed to take it for granted that one was supposed to be without clothes on in her presence. But this woman had something that was very distinctive, her voice was pleasant and I was not at all offended by her question. Not even when she asked me, “Do you want to get into the tub, or do you want to lie down upon the couch right now?”

I could feel my excitement increase. I just stood there, my arms hanging down the sides and I pulled in my stomach. My bathrobe came off and fell on the throwrugs that covered the tile floor of the bathroom and I just stood there, stark-naked. I heard her surprised exclamation and noticed how a delighted shiver ran through her body. Her voice was noticeably friendlier when she asked me to please make myself comfortable on the couch.

She threw her robe on the couch.

“Like this?”

And I stretched out on the couch. While doing so I wanted to grab her beautiful large breasts but she avoided me and sighed, “Please, don't.”

She reached for the leather purse and took a sponge out of it which she dipped into the tub.

“The water is very warm,” she said, bending over me, sprinkling my pubic hair and moistening my member with the sponge. She turned around and opened her leather purse again. I was looking at her backside and admiring the white, absolutely hairless legs and calves, and the gorgeous globes of her behind. I involuntarily spread out my arms and exclaimed, “Please, hurry up!”

And she did … she started to rub my pubic hairs and my organ with a perfumed soap. At first very quickly to create enough foam and then slowly, incredibly softly and excitingly. I started to groan, I bucked, but her fingers did not stop. To increase the excitement and to postpone a possible climax she would occasionally stop to tickle my belly and my chest, but she always returned to my member. She smiled at me, bit her lower lip and continually mumbled things like, “You have a beautiful body” or “Actually, I don't like a man's body, but yours …”

Sometimes she stopped completely and leaned back voluptuously. Her eyes would become large and shining. At one point it seemed as if she was about to take off her bathing costume, but she only slipped down one shoulderstrap and let one large breast hang free. I begged her to put it against my face but she shook her head and started to bite her lips again. However, she kept on soaping furiously and finally my excitement gave way to a furious release and with a sigh I let my head loll to one side. But she kept my member firmly in both hands and I could feel her tremble. Suddenly she let go of it and slipped back into her tricot suit, her breast was no longer visible. She jumped up and I could see that her face was quite distorted while she was shaking her head wildly.

“Come here, to me!” I called out, sitting up. But she backed up against the mirror that was built into the wall and kept staring at me. Her way of having sex with me had excited rather than satisfied me, so I jumped up and wanted to throw myself upon her. But she held up her hands pleadingly and said in an almost panting voice, “Oh, please, no … no man has ever possessed me … please get into the tub.” But I had already taken her hands in mine, intending to pull her toward me, when I caught the rather painful expression in her eyes. I stepped back without taking my eyes off her. She threw the sponge into the tub, quickly grabbed her robe and covered herself. “What are you doing?” I exclaimed. She wiped a few strands of hair away from her forehead and said, “I thank you, Sir, now I feel fine again,” … she smiled, “I don't think it has ever been as difficult as it was today.”

I hurried washing and cleaning myself, slipped into my bathrobe and sat down next to the girl on the couch. My physical excitement was gone and I only wanted to know about the meaning of this all, especially her almost inhuman resistance. She moved away from me, then she stood up and walked toward the door.

“Do you want to leave me now? Please stay with me … I promise that I won't bother you, Miss …” And while I was talking to her I wondered why I suddenly had become so respectful toward her. But when I noticed that this girl, who had just committed such a licentious act upon me, started to blush, I got up and politely asked her to sit down.

“There is nothing to be worried about … I promise not to try and keep you here if you want to leave,” I said, beginning to get the uncomfortable feeling that I had just attacked a respectable woman whom I had now to ask for forgiveness, “But before you do … I implore you … please explain to me …”

She looked at me for a long time and her eyes were terribly sad, then she shook her head slowly.

“Please, Sir, let me go without an explanation.”

But I kept insisting, I flattered her, and finally she was unable to resist. But she did not want to talk here.

“Please, do get dressed first… I have to put my clothes on too, because somebody may ring for me … and when you are in your room, all you have to do is to call room service.”

Without answering I pulled the bolt on the door, looked out to see that nobody was there, and I let the girl walk out. The next moment she had disappeared behind the opposite door.

About a half-hour later she was standing in front of me, wearing a black tafetta dress, a white apron and little starched cap.

“I should have known that you would not have wanted my … particular service,” she said, “till now it had only been old men who called for me. I strongly believe that one recommends me to another … they never hesitate to say what they expect me to do … it is sometimes very difficult for me to hide my disgust.”

“But, why then …”

“Nobody has ever asked that question. Why does it have to be you, Sir?”

“Maybe only because I am young, and because I feel sorry for you.”

She pressed her fists against her eyes.

“And because I do not understand how a woman like you can resist so much. You are not an iceberg.”

“Fortunately it has never been difficult for me to resist.”

“And today …?”

She gave me a hungry look and then she pressed her arms close to her body.

“I don't want to talk about it any longer. I had to force myself to remember why I started this wretched trade.”

“The goal?”

She suddenly tensed and asked, “And can you tell me any decent way that a woman can make money, much more money than just the little amount she needs to scrape by. You can believe me when I tell you that I have tried. Night after night I worked on embroidery and I made the most beautiful things that sold very well. Fine, but when a year has passed, how much money is left? No, no, there is no work that pays enough. Oh, sure, one may become the mistress of some rich man; I could have been so lucky,” she added bitterly.

Out in the corridor the bell had been ringing several times and she did not seem to notice it. But now the shrill tone seemed to penetrate.

“Somebody is calling me … do you really want to hear the rest of the story?”

She did not wait for my answer and hurried out of the room. Once I was alone I paced up and down my room like a caged animal. I was completely confused. And I could barely expect her to return. When I thought I had waited too long, I pressed the bell button, and a few minutes later she reappeared.

“I hope we will never meet again, dear Sir … I had a good position in an office in Vienna. My salary … maybe you know how little a job like that pays; but my boss, a man between sixty and seventy, devoured me with his eyes every time I came close to him. I thought I could use that when I went to ask him for a raise. I explained my miserable living conditions to him.

“'Oh, but you could earn much more, my dear child,' he said to me. I was very upset, but he laughed. Oh, no, he was not lusting after my body, he assured me, what was he supposed to do with a young body that most likely would be insatiable. And he explained to me what I had to do, and for each single one of my shameful services he would give me half my present wages. That was how I made my money … without having to surrender my body.”

“Only to make more money?” I asked, amazed.

She just looked at me, and did not answer my question.

“One day that man suddenly died, just after I had left him. I shuddered when I thought that he could have died just as easily under my hands. And believe you me, every time one of those dotards requires my service, I am trembling with fear.” It seemed as if she were fighting a shiver of disgust before she went on, “I left Vienna soon thereafter and found a position in a distinguished small hotel, because I assumed that the tips during the season would be more than the wages of working for two years in an office.” An expression of incredible harshness clouded her face when she continued, “And I was not at all disappointed. One of the guests in the hotel happened to be a friend of my late Viennese employer and, as I soon found out, he knew all about our arrangement.” She paused. “And that is how I acquired, wherever I went, a circle of regular clients, making a small fortune during the past three years.”

“And you have kept your body unspoiled and I know you are very happy,” I jeered.

She winced and turned toward the door.

“Money, money, money! That's all you women ever think about, and you're willing to do anything to get it. You would even remain an untouched virgin, if you could make enough money out of it!”

She wanted to leave. At the door she turned once more toward me, “But what do you think of it when someone who has a trade like mine wants to buy her life's happiness that way?”

“Independence with the money?”

“And possibly more,” she said bitterly, “possibly … love?”

I came toward her and wanted to grab her hand, but she backed away.

“How could you understand … how could I expect that any man would understand?”

“Is it because you are in love with a man …?”

At that moment this woman seemed so great and admirable to me, as I had never known any woman before to be. My feeling about her must have shown on my face, because she reached me her hand, “Believe me, Sir, I am flesh and blood, and once it was very difficult for me to resist, despite my love for the one I am trying to win … and that was today … after all, I am but a woman.”

This confession, in all its simplicity, yes I must use the word I hate so much, in all its chastity, shattered me completely. I brought the girl's hands to my lips. The next moment I felt her arm around my neck and a kiss was placed upon my forehead. And then I was alone.

Can this be understood. Yes, yes, by all the devils who dish out our minimum amount of happiness which God would deny us if He could, I can understand it. And I swear by everything that is human in me, and hence good, it is permissible to do it! I would adore any woman who would do such a thing, or a similar one, for me forever and ever, I would even allow her to put her feet upon my neck.

But the history of the chambermaid from the hotel in Switzerland has an ending, too. Or rather, it has one for me. And even though I must interrupt the chronology, here it is.

Two years after the experience I just wrote about I happened to meet her again. After a long absence I had arrived for a short visit to my birthplace, and I must admit that I wouldn't even want to stay there as a dead body out of fear that my many relatives would get the idea to visit my grave on All Soul's Day with fake mourning and adorn my grave with flowers to show hypocritically that they had forgiven me my missteps, while actually their entire morality consists of one simple fact: their balls have no strength. But anyway, I was visiting my birthplace and suddenly recognized the girl as one of the salesladies in a glove shop in which I had wandered to buy a pair of gloves. She recognized me immediately and she was afraid that I would give signs of recognition while we were not alone in the shop.

When the few clients had left, she looked up at me and offered her hand. And at that moment I remembered her. I did not open my mouth, but my eyes asked the question. And she told me in her simple and forthright manner which had made such a great and shattering impression upon me two years ago. It is terrible! Is the devil not even strong enough to protect his handiwork against that which so-called well-educated moralists prefer to call the wrath of God? This woman had practiced a well-paid profession (she had not even invented it, because I heard about one who was called la bette Savonaise, the beautiful soaping woman, who at the time of the Concodat satisfied the lusts of the diplomats and cardinals alike with foaming soap), and she had within a few years made enough money to deposit a bond so that she could get married to a certain young officer with whom she was deeply in love. Even though she had been poor, she did not want to become his mistress and she had worked hard to earn the money she needed to become an officer's wife. Her love for this man had been so strong that she had hesitated to run the risk of becoming a victim of her own passions. And away from her homeland, in strange hotels, she had set out to make money by satisfying the passions of strangers while keeping her own body pure.

Though her innate disgust for her profession proved to be a good companion, it often happened that the woman within her awakened and she not only longed to give but also ached to receive. Nevertheless, she never gave in to that desire. And, finally, the day arrived when she had achieved her goal. She forthwith traveled to the garrison where her groom was stationed and deposited the money required for the bond. She did not tell him where the money came from, and he believed her story that it was from an inheritance. These two people lived for one day in a dreamworld of absolute happiness. The abstinence she had been forced to practice for three full years gave way to one enormous frenzy of the senses during that night. She had given herself to that man in the full knowledge and security that she was his.

The next day she found her officer in his room with his brains blown out; in his extreme happiness and after a full night and day of cavorting, he had gone into the officer's casino to gamble a little bit. He had lost control of the situation and gambled away her entire dowry. That had been a year ago, and now she was a saleslady in this glove shop of my hometown. And she had become respectable. She had become pregnant but she did not want to give birth to the child. She told this to me, visibly shaken, but without passion and without the pretense of suffering.

We shook hands quietly and I left. I have never seen her since, but that may be because I went out into the world again soon thereafter. But doesn't it sound to you as if the devil had lost all sense of humor?

After this entire day of incredible experiences, I had no desire to remain in that hotel any longer. Especially when I found out that the Swedish redhead and her tottering husband had left the hotel as if in flight, I decided that I, too, had no desire to remain. I went to Zurich.