miserable witch Němcová!
He came in. She melted in the shine of his smile. Then she lay face down, her muscles happily relaxed, lots of glass cups suctioned to her back. He went to the kitchen and brought out a steaming towel. When removing the glass cups he dropped the towel onto her back. The patient almost screamed, the burning fabric scalded her back so, but she imagined herself looking like a screaming pig and controlled herself. Afterward, he spread the burning towel over her entire back, pressing it down in various places: the nape, the waist, the thighs. Now the towel was warming her up agreeably.
“Turn onto your back.”
Betty Pankl signed the marriage certificate in her childlike, ornamental handwriting. Then her husband took the queen of the dahlia dance off to his prosaic, brutal, military world.
Červený Kostelec—a city both small and poor. A world of disappointment, misery, and suffering. Her husband’s coarse manners were better suited to the barracks. Betty got to know his habits well, without ever getting used to them. She never quite managed to tolerate Němec’s personality. From the start, fights broke out between husband and wife, leading to violent scenes: her husband was jealous of Betty’s admirers at society balls, he would haul her off mid-dance and at home he gave vent to anger befitting a military man. People said that one time he wanted to shoot his wife and that some day he might really do it.
Later came the journeys, those journeys that left Betty half-dead from exhaustion, those transfers from somewhere to somewhere else in Bohemia or Moravia. In this way, the Austro-Hungarian monarchy made Němec pay for his active participation in the Czech national movement. From Červený Kostelec they had to move to Josefov, and when Betty was seven months pregnant, they set off on a long journey along dusty, uneven roads to Litomyšl. From there they went to Polná, then back from the east to a place far in the west, to Domažlice, and then to Všeruby, a mountain village, and then all of a sudden off to the east again, to Nymburk, and when that was over they headed north, to Liberec. Over this period, Betty had four children, became chronically ill, met Czech patriots, and burned all the literary drafts that she had written in the German language.
Above all, when her husband was transferred to Prague, she got a chance to spend a long time in the city. She decided that it was there where she would put down roots. Not long after her twenty-third birthday she felt healthy enough to take part in social and cultural life. Prague made a deep impression on her. This young woman never missed a ball, or any operatic or theatrical performance, or any excursion or meeting organized by Czech writers.
It was Sunday, a lukewarm March day. Betty put on a new spring dress and a straw hat with a ribbon. I like to imagine that the ribbon was green, so it would match the color of her eyes. Writers, artists, students, and their girlfriends met up among the rocks and woods of Šárka. Spring was already in the air, even though the branches of the trees were still bare. She had always liked that time of year just before the arrival of spring; she called it the era of hope. The groups of friends headed toward the castle submerged in the Star Forest. Nebesky, the poet whose pseudonym was Celestial, approached Betty, whom he’d met a few days earlier on Sofia Island. In Šárka, the poet admired the wild-looking rocks; Betty looked at the emergent grass. The young poet picked a bunch of violets with which he decorated his friend’s hat. He talked to her about German philosophy and other things, but the main theme of the monologue was the role he believed the Czech nation would one day play. Celestial made an effort to impress her, this beauty from the provinces, and she listened to him attentively, but with reserve. The poet held forth more and more because he found this young woman had unusual intelligence and powers of understanding. On their way back, they reached Saint Margaret’s Chapel, where they broke away from the group to continue their walk to Strahov. Prague was at their feet, the dark blue ribbon of the Vltava dividing it in two. From up above, the river looked like a winding stream that crossed a few narrow walkways. Above the couple’s heads, the stars blinked and