The Road to the Open

George von Wergenthin sat at table quite alone to-day. His elder brother Felician had chosen to dine out with friends for the first time after a longish interval. But George fel...

George had seen Else again in Florence a year before his mother's death. She was then taking drawing lessons from an old grizzled German, about whom the legend was circulated th...

"Well, it's like this, last year--at the time of the great coal-strike--Therese Golowski made a speech in some Bohemian hole, which contained an expression which was alleged to...

They got out at the Praterstern. The great stream of the Sunday crowd was flowing towards them. They went towards the Hauptallee, where there was no longer any crush, and stroll...

In this way they came to the end of the Prater where Oskar's carriage was waiting. Squashed, but none the less good-tempered, they drove to a wine-restaurant in the town. Oskar...

"Cute answer, eh," said Ehrenberg, puffing at his cigar. "I don't mind, of course, staying away from your real 'at homes.' But when I'd like to dine quietly at home on a Thursda...

George gave his brother a hand-shake which meant a salutation and a goodbye at the same time. As he unobtrusively disappeared through the open door of the dining-room he looked...

It was striking nine from the tower of the Church of St. Michael when George stood in front of the café. He saw Rapp the critic sitting by a window not completely covered by the...

"I don't wish that for a minute," replied Leo with a smile, "and you need not misunderstand me so perversely. One really can't bear a grudge against these people if they regard...

"_Bon voyage_," said George, and shook hands with him with unusual affection. This did Heinrich good. This warm pressure of the hand not only made him suddenly certain that Geor...

"Well then, a blonde little girl," began Heinrich again, "once expressed her conviction to me, quite different, you see, from Fräulein Sissy, that platonic love did, as a matter...

They went on talking. It was just like one of those conversations they had had so often during the last few years. It began lightly and flippantly, and eventually finished in a...

Only an hour ago, in the fly, when he held her in his arms and kissed her, she had of course no idea that he had other thoughts than for her. And yet at a certain moment, with h...

On these excursions Nürnberger frequently came to speak of his youth, to speak about the parents whom he had lost very early, of a sister who had died young and of his elder bro...

"Yes, yes, we hope so, though I am afraid that you won't be able to live on your salary at the commencement, and it is very questionable how long your little money will hold out...

Anna was leaning out of the window. George chatted with her, behaved as though he had not the slightest idea of leaving and then jumped in at the last minute. The train went awa...

Apart from this there was no personal note in any of the letters from home. The remembrances to him which Frau Rosner felt in duty bound to append to her letters to her daughter...

George hurried up to his room and fetched a few books for Anna and a volume of Goethe's poems and the manuscript of his quintette for himself. They both sat there, read, worked,...

"Yes, I went into the country a few times with my mother. It is a small fairly old house in Salmansdorf with a beautiful garden, which leads straight out to the fields and fores...

George felt a sense of antagonism. "And he dares," he thought, "to hold forth about Anti-Semitism. Is he any better? any juster? Does he forget that I am a German myself...?"

"All there was to tell. The Demeter affair is over. Her heart is throbbing once more only for the poor and the miserable--until it is called back." And Anna confided Therese's w...

"The curtain rises," said Heinrich. "Feast in the King's garden. Night. The princess is to be married to the Duke Heliodorus next day. I call him Heliodorus for the time being,...

The grey in front of the compartment window slowly cleared. George watched the telegraph wires outside sweeping and shifting across each other with swift movements and he though...

He had been living in the villa for two weeks, had been feeling well and in good form for serious work. He spread out every morning on the little table, where Therese's needlewo...

He was holding her hand in his all the time and looking at her fingers. Then he said: "Do you know that there is a little summer-house at the top end of the garden? Yes, of cour...

A few, a very few, were given the awful inner faculty of being ready to feel every experience as new and individual--were given the strength to endure standing in a new world as...

"What is there so much to talk over?" she replied in a tired voice. "Why, in a month's time you'll be.... You'll have as little chance of taking me with you as you have to-day....

He had then taken his midday meal by the big window of a restaurant in the Ringstrasse, made purchases and given orders at his tradesmen's, looked up Heinrich, whom he did not f...

In moments like this the only relation to his beloved art of which he was conscious was that he was able to understand it with deeper appreciation than any other human being. An...

George looked through the window and saw roofs, chimneys and weather-beaten pipes, while fairly near was the light-grey tower with the broken stone cupola. The sky opposite was...

"Yes, my dear George, I don't like being quite alone, and must create some society for myself as quickly as possible, people I choose myself ... otherwise, any one who wants to...

But he felt that he ought not to. Not yet. Perhaps to-morrow. She would not escape him between this evening and to-morrow morning ... and he rushed aimlessly about the empty str...