METROPOLIS was not illness. It was uttermost helplessness. Lying on the roof of the house which was opposite Freder's Hat, Josaphat watched the man who had chosen him as friend and brother. whom he had betrayed and to whom he had returned. He could not discern his face but he read from the pale patch which this face was in the setting sun. in the shower-bath of the search-light, that the man over there. whose eyes were staring across Metropolis, did not see Metropolis. Sometimes people would emerge beside him, would speak to him, expecting an answer. But the answer never came. Then the. people would go, crushed. Once Joh Fredersen came-came to his son. who stood on the narrow balcony, seeming not to know that his father was near. Joh Freclersen spoke to him for a long time. He laid his hand on his son's hand, which was resting on the railing. The mouth received no answer. The hand received no answer. Only once did Freder tum his head, then with difficulty, as though the joints of his neck were rusted. He looked at Joh Fredersen. Joh Fredersen went. And when his father had gone Freder turned his head back again on idle joints and stared out once more across Metropolis, which was dancing in a whirl of light, staring with blind eyes. _ The railing of the narrow balcony on which he stood appeared as an insuperable wall of loneliness, of deep, inward consciousness of having been deserted. No calling, no signalling, not even the loudest of sounds penetrated this wall which was washed about by the strong, lustrous surf of the great Metropolis. But Josaphat did not want to have ventured the leap from heaven to earth, to have sent a man, who was but performing his duty, into infinity, impotently to make a halt before this wall of loneliness. There came a night which hung, glowing and vapourous over Metropolis. A thunder storm, which was still distant, hurnt its warning Rres in deep clouds. All the lights of the great Metropolis seemed more violently, seemed more wildly to lavish themselves on the darkness. 1I7
