Franz Nabl

“ And at last I went to bed one night, set my mind on Wolansky, and said over and over to myself a thousand times: Die, you dog! You've got to die! I order you to die!
"I said it over till I fell into a sort of trance. It wasn't sleep, I tell you. You can't sleep when you are in a state like that. And in my trance, I could feel another arm grow out of my side here and grow longer and longer, and grow out through the window although the window was closed, and grow out across the street and down the street and right through the walls and across the river. ”

“ It seems as if I've got to find somebody who understands me and can excuse me, or it will kill me. Shall I tell you? Shall I?"
I was startled, I was reasonably sure that Banaotovich was no criminal, since he had lived half a century in his native city, undisturbed and from all he had told me solvent and respected. I had always known that he was a queer fish, a brooding, solitary sort of person, and I settled myself to listen to some harmless bit of psychopathy which meant nothing except to the unfortunate subject. ”

“ I was miserable, and I had a feeling that she might understand and be brought closer to me by sympathy. Now that I think of it, I can see that I was an egregious idiot, but I discovered long ago that we aren't rational beings after all. We are driven or drawn by mysterious forces, and we go to our destination because we can't help it. ”

“ I had been married to the other woman for four years. We were completely estranged. We could scarcely bear to speak to each other. I couldn't be easy one moment in the same house with her. I had a cot in my office out in town because I couldn't even sleep soundly at home. It was hell. The terror in her eyes made me physically sick. My wife learned about the other woman. My wife was a devout Catholic, and there was no possibility of a divorce. I could read in my wife's face just what went on in her mind. She knew the other woman had become my only reason for living. ”

“ I've killed three people, a crazy scoundrel, a hard man, and a pure, innocent woman. But I did it all because I had to. A sanitarium wouldn't do me or anyone else any good, and it would be a heavy expense. I have taken the responsibility for another pure, innocent woman, and I must support her. The war and the depression swept away my father's fortune, and my present business has dwindled away till I am making only the barest living. I have applied for the agency for a big Berlin insurance company, and if I can get it, along with my other business, I shall be fairly comfortable. ”

“ And it may have been that there was some telepathic contact between you and Wolansky, and when he had his apoplectic attack——"
The sarcastic smile deepened on Banaotovich's face. "So you have it all explained, and I'm acquitted?" he inquired.
"Acquitted?" I cried. "You were never even accused. If the state were to bring action against every man who had a feeling that he would be happier if someone else were out of the way, the state would have a big job on its hands!"
"Very true," Banaotovich assented icily. "I see I haven't got very far with you yet. ”

“ What I wanted most of all was to get away from this melancholy citizen with power and madness in his gray eyes.
"No, you don't know quite all of it yet," he insisted. "Perhaps if I tell you the whole story, even if you can't excuse me—and I don't deserve your excusing, I don't want your excusing—you can understand me a little belter, and think of me a little more kindly.
"There was another woman. I couldn't help it, any more than any of us can help anything. A fine, sympathetic young woman, who loved me because she knew I was unhappy. I had been married to the other woman for four years. ”

“ But in his last year in the Gymnasium he had, for what reason I never knew, excited the animosity of a cantankerous old professor who had publicly declared that Gustav was not the kind of boy who should have a Gymnasium diploma and that he, the professor, was determined never to give him a passing grade. My father had admired the boy very much, and at one juncture when my marks looked perilously low, he had employed Gustav to tutor me. Gustav had been so successful that Father was delighted and made him a present of a silver cigarette case with Gustav's initials and mine engraved on it. ”

“ He looked at me sadly, almost compassionately. "There is nothing to forgive," he said, very quietly. "I am all you called me and a thousand times worse. Now let me finish my story."
"You don't need to," I said hastily. ”

“ But the Hindoo and I made some experiments with telepathy, and I discovered that there are other ways of killing a man besides stabbing him or giving him poison.
"I learned how to make a man in front of me on the street turn around and look at me. I learned how to make you dream about me and come and tell me the dream the next morning," (when he said that, I jumped, for I remembered having done exactly that thing!) . "I learned how to bring out a bruise on Wolansky's face although he lived on the other side of town ”

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