E-text prepared by Christine Bell and Marc D'Hooghe
(http://www.freeliterature.org)
This is the third of the novels known as The Book of the Small Soulsand is by some considered the greatest of the series. Be this as itmay—and I confess that personally I like Small Souls the best—it is,beyond dispute, one of the most masterly and striking stories that thisgeneration has produced. It can be read separately and independently,but will be enjoyed more fully by those who are familiar with SmallSouls and The Later Life. The series will conclude with the nextvolume, which, in the English version, will be entitled Dr. Adriaan.
ALEXANDER TEIXEIRA DE MATTOS
HARROGATE, 10 August, 1917
When Gerrit woke that morning, his head felt misty and tired, as thoughweighed down by a mountain landscape, by a whole stack of mist-mountainsthat bore heavily upon his brain. His eyes remained closed; and, thoughhe was waking, his nightmare still seemed to cast an after-shadow: anightmare that he was being crushed by great rocky avalanches, which hefelt pressing deep down inside his head, though he was conscious thatthe red daylight was already dawning through his closed eyelids. He laythere, big and burly, sprawling in his bed, beside Adeline's empty bed:he felt that her bed was empty, that there was no one in the room. Thecurtains had been drawn back, but the blinds were still down. And,though he was awake, his eyelids remained closed and through them he sawonly the red of the daylight as through two pink shells: it seemed as ifhe would never be able to lift those two leaden lids from his eyes.
This after-weariness flowed slowly through his great, burly body. Hefelt physically rotten and did not quite know why. The day before, hehad merely dined with some brother-officers at the restaurant of theScheveningen Kurhaus: a farewell dinner to one of their number who wasbeing transferred to Venlo; and the dinner had been a long one; therewas a good deal of champagne drunk afterwards; and they had gone ongaily to make a night of it. One or two of the married ones had refused,good-naturedly, but had come along all the same, so as not to spoilsport; Gerrit had come too, in his genial way. At last, he had decidedthat that was about enough and that the road which the others weretaking was not his road: he was one of your sensible, moderate people,who never went to extremes; he was very fond of his little wife; indeed,he already felt some compunction at the idea of perhaps waking her atthat time of night, when he went into the bedroom, after undressing. Asa matter of fact, she did wake; but he had at once reassured her withhis gruff, good-natured voice and she had gone to sleep again. He hadstayed awake a long time, lying there with wide-open eyes angry at notbeing able to sleep, at having forgotten how to take a glass of winewith the rest. At last, in the small hours, when it was