darkness for some time. The night was as yet moonless, but luminous with a certain atmosphere of light. The stars were small. Near at hand, large shapes of trees rose up. Farther, lamps like little mushroom groups shone amid an undergrowth of darkness. There was a vague hoarse noise filling the sky, like the whispering in a shell, and this breathing of the summer night occasionally swelled into a restless sigh as a train roared across the distance.
“What a big night!” thought Siegmund. “The night gathers everything into a oneness. I wonder what is in it.”
He leaned forward over the balcony, trying to catch something out of the night. He felt his soul like tendrils stretched out anxiously to grasp a hold. What could he hold to in this great, hoarse-breathing night? A star fell. It seemed to burst into sight just across his eyes with a yellow flash. He looked up, unable to make up his mind whether he had seen it or not. There was no gap in the sky.
“It is a good sign—a shooting star,” he said to himself. “It is a good sign for me. I know I am right. That was my sign.”
Having assured himself, he stepped indoors, unpacked his bag, and was soon in bed.
“This is a good bed,” he said. “And the sheets are very fresh.”
He lay for a little while with his head bending forwards, looking from his pillow out at the stars, then he went to sleep.
At half-past six in the morning he suddenly opened his eyes.
“What is it?” he asked, and almost without
