Then I sat at the window in my room to wait for Koster.
It was very still.
I thought that to-morrow evening I should be with Pat, and suddenly a hot, wild expectancy seized me, before which all else—fear, anxiety, melancholy, despair—vanished.
To-morrow evening I would be with her —that was an inconceivable happiness, something I had almost ceased to think possible again.
So much had perished since then.
I took my bag and went down.
Everything was suddenly near and warm, the staircase, the stale smell of the landing, the cold, glinting rubber-grey of the asphalt, over which Karl was just approaching.
"I've brought a few rugs," said Koster. "It will be cold.
Wrap yourself well in."
"We take turns driving, eh?" I asked.
"Yes.
But I'll drive to start.
I had a sleep this afternoon."
Half an hour later we left the city behind us and the immense silence of the clear moonlit night received us.
The road ran white ahead to the skyline.
It was so bright we were able to drive without the searchlight.
The sound of the engine was like a deep organ note; it did not disturb the stillness, only made it the more sensible.
"You ought to sleep a bit," said Koster.
I shook my head.
"Can't, Otto."
"Then stretch out at least, so you'll be fresh early to-morrow.
We have all Germany to cross yet."
"I rest like this quite well."
I remained seated beside Koster.
The moon glided slowly across the sky.
The fields gleamed like mother-of-pearl.
Now and then villages flew past,, sometimes a town, asleep, empty, the gullies of the streets between the rows of houses filled with ghostly, immaterial moonlight that made the night an unreal film picture.
Toward morning it turned cold.
The meadows were suddenly shimmering with dew, the trees stood out like molten steel against the greying sky; in the woods it began to blow and here and there from chimneys streamers of smoke arose.
We changed over and I drove till ten.
Then we had a hasty breakfast at. an inn by the roadside and I drove again till twelve. From then on Koster kept the wheel.
It went quicker when he drove alone.
In the afternoon, as it was turning dark, we reached the mountains.
We had snow chains and shovels with us and enquired how far we would be able to get.
"With chains you might try it," said the secretary of the Automobile Club. "There's very little snow this year.
But how it may be the last few kilometres I can't say exactly.
You may stick there possibly."
We had a big start on the train and decided to try and get right up.
It was cold so there was no fear of fog.
The car climbed the zigzags like a clock.
Halfway up we put on the snow chains.
The road was shovelled clear but at many places it was iced over and the car danced and skidded.
Occasionally we had to get out and push.
Twice we sank and had to shovel Karl out.
At the last village we got them to give us a bucket of sand, for we were now very high and were anxious lest the curves on the descent ahead might be iced.
It was now quite dark, the mountain walls towered steep and bare above us into the night, the pass narrowed, the engine roared in bottom gear, and curve after curve dropped downward.
Suddenly the beam of the searchlight slid off the slope and plunged into nothingness, the mountains opened, and lying before us we saw below the network of the village lights.
The car thundered through between the bright shops of the main street.
Pedestrians sprang aside; startled by the unusual sight, horses shied; a sleigh set off down a slope on its own; the car raced up the turns to the sanatorium and pulled up in front of the porch.
I jumped out; as through a veil I saw curious faces, people, the office, the lift; then I ran down the white corridor, threw open the door, and saw Pat; as I had seen her a hundred times in dream and desire, she came toward me and I held her in my arms like life itself and more than life.