One sees clearly then, and is clearly seen, and we had no wish to see clearly, nor any wish clearly to be seen.

In the morning, therefore, and not only to escape this clarity, but also the heavy sleep which I knew so well and which steals upon one after a sleepless night of drinking, like a false friend, a quack healer, a good man out of his humour or a benefactor full of spite, I used to take refuge with Manes the fiaker. I would often turn up at six in the morning, just as he had left his bed. He lived outside the little town, near the cemetery. It took me about half an hour to reach him. Sometimes I would arrive as he set foot on the floor. His house was small, isolated and surrounded by fields and meadows which did not belong to him. It was painted blue, had a dark grey shingle roof and looked not unlike a human figure, not standing erect but moving. The effect of the dark blue walls against the fading greens and yellows of its surroundings was striking. As I pushed open the dark red gate which led to Manes’ cottage I would sometimes see him step out of his front door. He would stand there, in front of the brown door, in his rough shirt and underpants, bareheaded and barefoot, with a great, brown earthenware jug in his hand. He would first drink a mouthful, then he would spew water out of his mouth in great jets.With his mighty black beard and wild unruly hair, facing the rising sun in his coarse linen, he reminded me for some reason of primeval forest, of primitive man, of prehistoric times, of something confused and anachronistic. He would take off his shirt and wash at the fountain, puffing and blowing, all the while shouting, almost bellowing, as if the prehistoric world really had broken through into the modern. He would then pull on his shirt again and we would move towards one another to say good morning. This greeting was as cheerful as it was heartfelt. It was a kind of ceremonial and, although we saw each other almost every morning, it was still an unspoken confirmation of the fact that I did not look upon him as a mere Jewish cab-driver, and that to him I was not just an influential young gentleman from Vienna. From time to time he would ask me to read him the few letters which his son wrote to him from the Konservatorium in Vienna. These letters were quite short, but since in the first place he was slow in grasping the German language in which—God knows why—his son felt obliged to write to him, and second because his sensitive paternal heart desired these letters not to be too short, he made sure that I read them out very slowly. Often, too, he would ask me to repeat sentences two or three times. As soon as he stepped into the yard the chickens in their little run began clucking. The horses, almost as if they scented a mare, would whinny at the sun and at Manes the fiaker. First he opened the stable doors, at which both horses put their heads out over the transom at the same moment. He kissed them both, as a man kisses a woman, then went into the coachhouse to bring out the coach. Next he harnessed the horses. Last, he opened the chicken run and the fowl scattered, with much squawking and flapping of wings. It was as if an invisible hand had thrown corn about their run.

I also got to know Manes Reisiger’s wife. She generally rose half an hour or so later than he did, and asked me in for a cup of tea. I drank it in their blue kitchen, in front of the big tin samovar, while Manes ate grated radishes with onion bread and gherkins. It smelt strong, secret, almost homely, although I had never eaten this sort of breakfast. I loved everything in those days. I was young, just young.

I even liked my friend Manes Reisiger’s wife, although she was, in vulgar parlance, exceedingly plain.