I

I and another leper cautiously drew near to the very wall, and looked up. From where we stood its top was not visible, but it rose straight and smooth, and as it were bisected the sky. Our half of the sky was dark grey, toned gradually into dark blue on the horizon, so that it was impossible to say where the black earth began, and where the sky ended. The dark night sighed and groaned dull and sad, crushed between the earth and the sky, and with each sigh there spluttered out from her bosom sharp hot grains of sand, which intensified the torture of our burning sores.

“Let us try and climb over,” said my companion, and his breath, as he spoke, was loathsome and fœtid, even as my own. He bent his back and I stood on it, but the wall towered as high above us as ever. As it bisected the sky, so it divided the earth, lying on it like a sated boa-constrictor, going down into the abysses and up into the mountains, while its head and its tail stretched beyond the horizon.

“Then, let us pull it down,” the leper proposed.

“Let us pull it down,” I agreed.

So we threw ourselves with our breasts against the wall, and it became red with the blood of our wounds, but remained dull and immovable as before. We fell into despair.

“Kill us! kill us!” we groaned as we crawled along, and people turned their faces from us in disgust, so that we saw only their backs convulsed with profound loathing.

So we dragged ourselves along, until we met with a man dying of starvation. He was sitting leaning against a stone, and it seemed as though the very granite was sore with the sharpness of his pointed shoulder-blades. There was not an ounce of flesh upon him, and as he moved, his bones rattled and his dry skin crackled. His under jaw was dropped, and from the dark aperture of his mouth there issued a dry, rasping voice:

“I am star⁠—ving.”

But we only laughed, and slouched on the faster, till we came upon a quartette who were dancing. They advanced and retired, they took one another by the waist and wheeled round, but their faces were pale, and tortured, and smileless. One of them began to weep, because he was tired of their endless dance, and begged to be allowed to stop; but one of the others, without speaking, gripped him by the waist and whirled him round, and once again he began to advance and retire, and at each step a great troubled tear dropped from his eye.

“I should like to dance,” said my companion with a snuffle. But I dragged him away. And once more the wall rose before us, and by it two persons were squatting on their heels. One of them at regular intervals kept striking his forehead against the wall, and then would fall down insensible. Then the other would regard him seriously, feel with his hand first the man’s head and then the wall, and as soon as the other recovered consciousness would say:

“Try again; there’s not much of it left.”

And the leper laughed.

“They’re fools,” said he cheerfully, puffing out his cheeks. “They think that there is light beyond. But it is dark there also, and there too are lepers dragging themselves along, and entreating ‘Kill us!’ ”

“But what about the old man, eh?” I asked.

“Well! what of him?” retorted the leper. “He was indeed a stupid blind and deaf old man. Who could discover the hole he picked through the wall? Could you? Could I?”

I was enraged at this answer, and beat my companion cruelly on his blistered skull, exclaiming:

“Why, then, do you try to climb over it?”

And he began to weep, and we wept together, and continued on our way, entreating:

“Kill us! kill us!”

But faces were shudderingly turned from us, and none was willing to kill us. And yet, they slay the handsome and the strong; us they are afraid to touch! The bastards!

II

For us time was not; there was neither yesterday, nor today, nor tomorrow. Night never left us, never reposed behind the mountains, so as to return strong, coal-black, and still. Therefore was she always so tired, out of breath, and morose. She was malign. It would come to pass, that she could no longer endure to listen to our sobs and groans, to look upon our sores, our grief and evil case, and then her dark, dully working breast would boil over with a stormy rage. She would roar at us like a mad imprisoned beast, and angrily wink her fearful flaming eyes, which shed a red light on the bottomless pits, on the sombre proudly quiescent wall, and on the miserable group of trembling humanity. They pressed against the wall, as though it were a friend, and entreated it to protect them, but it was ever our enemy⁠—ever. The Night was disgusted at our pusillanimity and cowardice, and burst into angry laughter, which shook her speckled grey paunch, and the bald, ancient mountains caught up that satanic laughter. The wall with grim mirth sonorously reechoed it, playfully showering stones upon us, breaking our heads and flattening out our bodies. So those great ones made merry, and shouted one to the other, while the wind whistled a wild accompaniment, and we lay prone, and listened in horror, as within the bosom of the earth a tremendous something kept growling⁠—and will dully keep on so doing⁠—tapping and demanding freedom. Then we all prayed: “Kill us!”

But, though we were dying every second, we were immortal, like the gods.

And there passed by a gust of anger mingled with delight, and the Night, weeping tears of rue, sadly sighed, and like a consumptive spat out upon us damp sand. We with joy forgave her, laughed at her in her exhaustion and weakness, and became jocund as children. The sob of the starving man seemed to us a sweet song, and with cheerful envy we watched the quartette which kept on advancing, and retiring, and floating round in the endless dance.

And pair by pair we ourselves began to whirl round, and I, the leper, found a temporary partner. Oh, it was so cheery, so charming! I put my arm round her, and she laughed, and her little teeth were so milky white, her little cheeks so rosy pink. It was so charming!

One could not understand how it came about, but suddenly her teeth, which were displayed in joyful laughter, began to chatter, our kisses turned to bites, and with a shriek, from which all joy had not yet departed, we fell to gnawing and killing one another. And she of the milk white teeth beat me even on my sick weak head, and stuck her sharp nails into my breast, piercing to the very heart⁠—she smote me, me the leper, the miserable, so miserable. And this was more terrible than the anger of the Night, or the soulless laughter of the Wall. And I, the leper, wept and trembled with fear, and quietly, unobserved of any, I kissed the hideous feet of the Wall, and besought it to let me, me alone, pass through into that world where there are no madmen, and where people do not slay one another. But the Wall would not let me through, and then I spat on it, beat it with my fists, and called out:

“Look at this murderess! She is laughing at you.”

But my voice was hideous, and my breath fœtid, and no one cared to listen to me⁠—the leper.

III

And again we crept on, I and the other leper; and again a noise arose around us, and again the quartette circled noiselessly, shaking the dust from their dresses, and licking our bleeding wounds. But we were weary, we were sick, our life was a burden to us. My fellow-traveller sat down, and rhythmically beating the ground with his swollen hands, he jerked out the horrid words:

“Kill us! kill us!”

We then jumped with a sudden movement to our feet, and hurled into the crowd; but they gave way before us, and we saw only their backs. We cursed their backs, and entreated:

“Kill us!”

But immovable and deaf were the backs, like a second wall. It was so terrible never to see the faces of people, but only their backs⁠—immovable, silent. Now my companion deserted me. He had seen a face⁠—the first face⁠—and it was, even as his own, full of sores and horrible. But it was the face of a woman. And he began to smile and walk round her, stretching out his neck, and diffusing a fœtid odour; but she too smiled at him with her mouth all fallen-in, and casting down her eyes which had lost the lashes.

And they married one another. And for a moment all faces were turned towards them, and appealing round of laughter shook people’s sturdy bodies. And I, the leper, laughed too: surely it is a stupid thing to get married when one is ugly and sick.

“Fool,” said I in derision. “What wilt thou do with her?”

The leper answered with a pompous smile:

“We will deal in stones, which fall from the wall.”

“And the children?”

“We will kill them.”

How stupid to beget children only to kill them! But then she will soon deceive him; she has such shifty eyes.

IV

They had finished their work⁠—the one who was occupied in knocking his head against the wall, and the other who was helping him. When I arrived there, one of them was hanging by a hook driven into the wall. He was still warm, and the other was quietly singing a cheerful song.

“Go and tell the starving man,” said I, and he obeyed, singing as he went. And I saw the starving man struggle up from his stone. Trembling and stumbling, hitting against everything with his sharp elbows, sometimes on all fours, sometimes staggering, he managed to reach the wall, where the man was swinging. His teeth chattered; he laughed gleefully like a child:

“Only a little piece of a foot!” But he was too late; already others, being the stronger, had forestalled him. Pressing one against the other, clawing and biting, they clung round the corpse; they gnawed and munched his feet with relish, and crunched the bones they had worried. But they would not let him have any. He squatted down on his heels, and watched the others as they ate, swallowing with furred tongue, and emitted a prolonged howl from his great empty mouth:

“I am st⁠—ar⁠—ving.”

Was it not laughable! He had died for the famished one, and the latter did not get even a piece of his foot! And I laughed, and the other leper laughed, and his wife too winked her crafty eyes in derision.

But he howled only the more loudly and furiously:

“I am st⁠—ar⁠—ving.”

And the hoarseness went out from his voice, which rose in a pure metallic sound, piercing and clear; and striking against the wall, then reverberating, it flew over the dark abysses and the hoary tops of the mountains.

And presently those, who were near the wall, began to howl; and they were numerous, and as greedy and hungry, as locusts, and it seemed as though the burnt-up earth howled in unbearable tortures, opening wide her stony jaws. It was as though a forest of dried-up trees, bent in one direction by a violent wind, stretched forth their trembling hands to the wall, gaunt, piteous, prayerful; and so great was their despair that the very rocks trembled, and the purple white-capped thunder clouds fled in terror. But the wall remained high and immovable, and unconcernedly reechoed the moan in multiplied reverberations into the dense fetor-laden atmosphere.

All eyes were turned to the wall, and darted on it fiery rays. They hoped and believed, that it would soon be falling and open out a new world, and in their blind belief began already to see the stones rock, the stone serpent, which had battened on the blood and brains of men, tremble from top to bottom. Maybe it was the tremble of the tears in our eyes, which we mistook for the trembling of the wall⁠—and still more piercing was our cry. Anger and exultation at the near approach of victory resounded in it.

V

But this is what happened then. High upon a rock there stood a gaunt old woman, her parched cheeks fallen in, her long locks uncombed like the grey mane of a starving old wolf. Her clothing was in rags, and exposed her yellow, bony shoulders, and her emaciated breasts, which had supported the life of many and been exhausted with maternity. She stretched forth her hands to the wall, and all eyes followed them. She began to speak, and in her voice was so much suffering, that the despairing moans of the starving man were silenced for very shame.

“Give me back my child!” cried the woman.

And we all kept silence, with a smile of fury upon our lips, and waited for the answer of the wall. The brains of him the woman called “her child” stood out upon the wall in grey patches, streaked with red, and we awaited impatiently and austerely the answer of the dastardly murderess. So still was it that we could hear the rustling of the thunderclouds passing over our heads, and dark night locked up her groans within her breast, only spitting out with a slight sibilant sound the fine burning sand, which ate into our wounds. Then once more resounded the stern, bitter demand:

“Cruel one! give me back my child.” Ever more stern and furious grew our smile, but the dastardly wall was silent.

And then from the speechless crowd there came forth an old man handsome and austere, and took his stand by the woman.

“Give me back my son,” said he.

How terrible it was, and withal how joyous! A cold shivering went down my spine, and my muscles contracted with the influx of an unknown threatening strength; but my companion nudged me in the side with chattering teeth, and a fœtid breath in a broad spurning wave issued from his decomposing mouth.

Then there came out from the crowd another person, who said “Give me back my brother!” And yet another who cried “Give me back my daughter!”

And then men and women, old and young, began to come forth, and stretching out their hands, shouted their implacable, bitter demand:

“Give me back my child!”

And then I too, the leper, feeling within me strength and hardihood, stepped forward in my turn, and cried loud and threateningly:

“Murderess! Give me back my Self!”

But she⁠—was silent. So false and dastardly was she, that she made as though she heard not, and my seamed cheeks contracted with malignant laughter, and a mad rage filled our sickened hearts. But she, stupidly unconcerned, remained silent!

Then the woman angrily stretched out her lean yellow hands, and yelled implacably:

“Then, be thou damned! Thou slayer of my child.”

And the austere handsome old man repeated:

“Be thou damned!”

And the whole earth repeated with resonant thousand-throated groan:

“Be thou damned! damned! damned!”

VI

And the black night sighed deeply: and, like a sea upheaved by a hurricane, dashed in all its heavy roaring mass upon the cliffs: the whole visible world rocked and swayed, and with a thousand tense and furious breasts beat against the wall. High to the heavily rolling thunderclouds was splashed the bloodstained foam, and stained them with red so that they became fiery and terrible, and cast a blood-red reflection down below to where there thundered and roared a low, but wondrously multitudinous, black, and savage Something. With an expiring groan, full of unspoken pain, it rolled back⁠—but the wall stood immovable and silent. But there was no timidity or shame in her silence. Lowering and threateningly calm was the glance of her baleful eyes, and proudly, like a queen, she let fall from her shoulders her purple mantle all adrip with blood, and trailed it amid mutilated corpses.

But dying as we were every second, we were immortal, like the gods.

And once more a mighty stream of human bodies broke out into a roar, and with all their strength hurled themselves against the wall. And again, and over and over again it was rolled back, until fatigue supervened, and a deathlike sleep, and stillness. But I, the leper, was close to the wall, and saw that it began to quake⁠—the proud queen⁠—and that the fear of falling ran in a shudder through its stones.

“It is falling. Brothers! it is falling,” I cried.

“Thou art mistaken, leper,” replied my brothers.

And then I began to question them:

“Supposing it does stand, what then? Is not every corpse a step towards the top? We are many, and our lives a burden. Let us strew the ground with corpses; upon them let us heap yet other corpses; and so mount to the top. And if there be left but one⁠—he will see a new world.”

And I gave a cheerful glance of hope around⁠—and there met it only backs, indifferent, fat and weary. The quartette circled round in endless dance, advancing and retiring, and black night, like an invalid, spat out its moist sand, and the wall stood firm in its indestructible massiveness.

“Brothers!” I entreated; “Brothers!”

But my voice was hideous, and my breath fœtid, and no one would listen to me, the leper.

Woe! woe! woe!