He woke up and couldn’t remember his name.
That had happened before, he was sure. He had a memory of another morning.
But now it was night. A shaft of pale moonlight enveloped the foot end of his bed, and draped a figure standing there.
It was a woman, no doubt about it. Her silhouette was outlined clearly against the window, but her face was in darkness.
“Diotima?” he whispered out of the blue, he didn’t know why. It was just a name that floated up to the surface of the well of forgetfulness. Somebody he missed.
But no, surely it wasn’t her?
She came closer. Walked slowly around the head of the bed, came around to his right side. Raised her arm, and something glinted in her hand. .
Mitter. . Janek Mattias Mitter. . He remembered just as the pain cut him in two.
And before the scream had time to leave his mouth, a pillow had been pressed down over his face. He groped around with his hands, tried in vain to grasp his visitor’s wrists. . But he lacked the strength, and pain pumped white-hot glowing waves out of his chest and stomach.
I am nobody, he thought. Nothing but a colossal pain.
The last thing to come to him was an image.
An old picture, something he might have drawn himself once. Or taken from a book.
It was an image of death, and it was a very personal truth.
An ox.
And a swamp.
This was his life. An ox that had fallen into a swamp.
Sinking slowly down into the mud. Sinking slowly into death.
When night came, a calm and starry night, only his head was still above ground, and the last thing. . the very last thing to disappear, was the ox’s surprised eye, staring up at the myriad stars.
That was the final image.
And when night closed in over the eye, everything became nothing.