Homo Sapiens: In the Maelstrom by Stanislaw Przybyszewski and translated by Joe E Bandel
She laughed hysterically and then looked at Janina with wild hate, but only a moment…
“You naturally did not know that he was married… How he lies, ha, ha, ha, how he lies…”
Suddenly Janina’s strength left her. She threw herself on the bed and sobbed.
Isa became very serious; she stood up.
“Did I insult you?” she asked coldly.
But she expected no answer, she went to the bed end where the little one lay, looked at him attentively and then stood in the middle of the room.
“But don’t cry. I did not want to insult you… How beautiful the child is! And you have no guilt… You are only a small, weak girl.”
And again she began to laugh.
Strange that you have a child… How old are you actually? Eighteen? Nineteen? Well, farewell and don’t cry. He will come back, he will come, she raged… I will drive him back to you, immediately—immediately…
“Don’t torment me!” Janina suddenly cried out.
“Torment? Torment? Ha, ha, ha… I will send him here immediately… tout de suite, tout de suite…”
On the street she stood for a long time.
A few street boys went past her, laughed impudently at her and threw obscene words at her.
She looked around timidly and began to go, quick, senselessly quick… “Only not back, only not back, only not back to the liar,”
she murmured softly to herself.
“But my God! what disgusting people live here! Why do you harass me, why do you push me then? What did I do to you?”
She gnashed her teeth in impotent rage.
Suddenly she felt a violent pain. A fellow had run into her and brutally pushed her aside so that she almost fell.
The pain brought her to consciousness.
She began to go slowly, kept close to the wall, she became anxious like a small child, a crying cramp worked its way up in her with all strength, she choked it down with difficulty, but could not prevent the tears from running unstoppably over her cheeks.
Then she came to an empty square, sat down on a bench and calmed herself. And only now everything flew through her brain with visionary clarity and a wild pain began to rage in her. She lost her senses.
And in the moment she collected herself. Geißler will give money. Only away, far, far away from him, Geißler will give money, Geißler, Geißler she repeated incessantly.
She got into a cab and gave Geißler’s address.
The pain raged ever wilder… As if a hell had been unleashed in her… Ha, ha, ha… Mais non, pas du tout; je suis au contraire tres enchantée… très enchantée… These big letters: Isak Isaksohn… No, how comical! Isak Isaksohn… Ha, ha, ha… Falk is a genius. He must improve the race, it is his duty, his duty… Here I can buy fabrics—Friedrichstraße 183, and yes, what was his name? Isak Isaksohn and Friedrichstraße 183…
Then she suddenly felt an unspeakable disgust. The person took her, with the same hands he embraced her as the girl there—with the same mouth he kissed her…
She shook herself. A morbid rage overcame her, it became unbearably tight to her, she would have liked to tear her clothes apart. The disgust choked her ever more violently.
Why did he not drag the woman into my bed?! Ha, ha, ha… He should have done it before my eyes…
She could no longer control herself. She cramped and crawled into herself and stretched up again, she felt an unbearable pain in the breast, in the head, everywhere, everywhere…
Oh que j’ai mal, que j’ai mal… Mon Dieu, que jai mal!
When she entered Geißler’s room, she was seized by a sudden cheerfulness.
“How well you look at me! You are like a small, shy boy… Ha, ha, ha… And you have such a beautiful, soft coat… Well, don’t look at me as if I fell from heaven… I am after all Erik Falk’s legally, legally you understand? on the Mairie of the fifteenth arrondissement in Paris legally married wife…”
She laughed heartily.
Geißler looked at her astonished. But since she laughed so heartily, he laughed with.
“Just think, Walther, we haven’t even greeted each other…” She kept his hand in hers.
“How big and good your hand is! And so warm, so warm.”
“You didn’t meet Erik downstairs?” asked Geißler a little uneasily. “Erik Falk? My husband?” She choked with laughter. “No, no!
My husband, ha, ha, mon mari! quelle drôle idée plus philosophique qu’originale, n’est-ce pas?”
She looked around and sat down. Geißler looked at her helplessly.
“Why do you look at me so sadly? Ah,—ah…” she stood up again… “He was here, he told you everything…”
Geißler turned around and busied himself with the papers.
“Did he tell you about his little son, and about his little mistress? Ha, ha, ha… did he want to lighten his heart with you?”
“Well, you know, Isa, you don’t need to take that so to heart. You are after all a woman, and a man is organized quite differently…”
She had sat down again in the meantime, but suddenly she felt a great fatigue, she was near fainting.
“Give water!”
She drank greedily a large glass.
“Ha, ha… I have not seen my husband, no, no, je ne l’ai pas vu depuis cinq jours… Strange preference for my mother tongue. I have almost forgotten it… I was in a hideous, German boarding school… At five o’clock we had to get up… O! brr! But how strong you are and your hand so big and so good.”
She suddenly looked at him fixedly.
“You don’t need to look so mournful. I want no pity. I want money. Give me money,” she said harshly.
He looked at her frightened. “What do you need it for?”
“You are a nice gentleman! Ha, ha, ha. You ask a lady what she needs money for! Just give me money, I have a very bad affair…”
“Isa, be serious for a moment. You don’t want to do stupid things?”
“What do you think?”
“Well listen, Isa. You know very well what you are to me… very bad things are going on with you now… And there you know to whom you should turn… I mean, well—you will not misunderstand me… You know me… But… pas de sentiments, n’est-ce pas? How much do you need?”
“Three, four hundred…”
“I will give you five hundred.”
She did not understand him, stared only at him with growing rapture. Her senses began to confuse.
“How splendid you are!… And give me your big, warm hand… Yes, so, hold me tight, hold me tight… O que j’ai mal, que j’ai mal…”
She fell into a hysterical crying cramp.
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