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NATURE MORTE Between the open door of the terrace and the massive chest of drawers stands a short black-lacquered wooden column on which a white wide-mouthed faience bowl is brimming with a huge somewhat unimaginatively arranged bunch of flowers.
And there is a voice whispering passionately.
"Thirst is the inner sensation of the need to drink. Looking at the full range of this need, we may distinguish three different kinds of thirsts: dormant, otherwise known as regular thirst; artificial, or false thirst; and burning thirst. Dormant thirst is but the search for that latent equilibrium which exists between the processes of evaporation and secretion, and the need for these processes, with the purpose of replenishing the evaporated and secreted fluids. This form of thirst follows us everywhere and in a certain sense it is part of our existence. The artificial or false thirst, however, which is peculiar only to humans, is derived from our congenital instinct to seek in everything we take in through our mouth some unearthly power which nature has failed to provide. Beverages produced by fermentation can soothe, at least so it seems to inebriates, this desire. The slaking of this sort of thirst may degenerate into a state in which the need to drink ceases only when the drinker is completely debilitated."
A still life: half-open red roses, yellow gladiate lilies, blue irises, mauve larkspurs, white daisies, but also wildflowers of the field, crimson clover, sweet William, knapweed, cow-wheat, dead nettle, poppy, rape, comfrey and wild millet, and even blades and ears of common grasses, bent-grass, foxtail, couch grass and oat grass, all of them framed in white baby's breath, are standing erect or hanging over and off their receptacle, motionless and everlasting, while the white muslin curtain of the door is alternately rising, floating, billowing, and getting deflated in the fine breeze.
Henriette, bending over her tabouret, is engrossed in her embroidery.
And thus the whisperer continues.
"Amatory thirst is not very different from the one just mentioned. This thirst, too, is most conspicuously characterized by chapped lips, and among young lovers it is quenched by a variety of saliva and other secretions. However, at this time, let us not talk of the things young lovers take into their mouths when their desire reaches the pitch of frenzy. Suffice it to say that while the tongue of the one is dipped into the well of the past, that of the other swallows the future up to the larynx."
Kornélia winces, a lovely drop of blood is perched on her fingertip; she has been watching it emerge, and now she thrusts the finger quickly into her mouth; she draws on it, as if wishing to suck a lot more than what there is in the finger. She lowers her embroidery into her lap and looks at the still life around her.
And the whispering continues.
"Burning thirst develops when the slaking of dormant thirst becomes impossible. This most aggravated form of thirst makes one's tongue burn while the gums go dry, the tongue sticks to the roof of the mouth, and one's whole body is consumed by agonizing hot flashes."
She closes her eyes, opens them. The curtain stirs, slowly swelling out. She closes her eyes and opens them again.
"What are you thinking about? Or are you daydreaming?"
There is no response.
"His every line, his every word is full of anxiety. Your poor, poor father."
No response.
Relentlessly the voice goes on whispering.
"The sensation of thirst is more intense, more excruciating, and more maddening than any other bodily sensation, and for this reason it is no accident that in most languages it is synonymous with uncontrollable desire, and we often use it to form phrases such as thirst for revenge and bloodthirsty."
"If we are done, I shall read it out loud, whether you want me to or not."
Some time goes by again. It sounds as if the whisperer's throat were being cleared, but the words do not continue.
"For God's sake, Kornélia, do give in. No point in resisting. Are you still hoping that memory will preserve your pictures?"
Kornélia opens her eyes, looks at the unchanging still life around her, closes her eyes.
"If you don't come with me to the dining room I will have to have my supper sent up again. You're breaking my heart; just think, the food will be steaming, sending out its aroma, and I won't be merciful, I will devour it to the last morsel."
The whispering is so dry that it is barely a whisper any more.
"Appetite, if it does not reach the point of hunger, is always accompanied by a pleasant sensation; those who fast voluntarily often give an account of having reached a state of heavenly lightness; however, nothing heavenly looms over the peaks of thirst, for thirst does not carry one to otherworldly heights, rather it drives one into irrepressible and miserable restlessness; and those who have no hope of slaking their thirst will be hurled into depression or plagued with hallucinations."
Kornélia gets up, walks to the flowers and lifts out a blade of grass. Water is collecting into a drop at the end of the blade; she licks it off, nibbles momentarily on the grass then lets it drop to the floor. She pulls out another one. Henriette looks up and, with her mouth slightly open, remains motionless; she cannot help seeing Kornélia pull an iris out of the bunch and not only make the water drop onto her tongue, but also take the succulent stalk between her teeth and suck it, chew it, an animal voraciousness distorting her features.
"Oh, my pet, don't! My heart is breaking. Kornélia. My poor, poor little Kornélia. I'll bring you something. I'll do anything."
And there is a voice.
"But Kornélia did not hear any of these words. Hunger can be suffered, but thirst drives one into fanciful hallucination, into madness. At this stage the soul no longer knows the meaning of shame or humiliation. With a single movement she lifted the whole bouquet from the wide-mouthed bowl. Water from the stems of the flowers poured onto the floor, but what did she care if it appeared to her to be a waterfall coming over the rocky peak. No, this I cannot look at idly, shouted Henriette. She jumped up to stand in Kornélia's way to prevent Kornélia's terrible humiliation. But she was not as quick as the delirious girl who simply let go of the flowers which scattered inertly all over the floor, and with both hands grasped the bowl because her parched lips wanted only water, water, only water, nothing else."
But Henriette also gets hold of the bowl; their knees are pressing against the short column, which tips over, the bowl falls to the floor and shatters to pieces.