We did not speak; but once she said that I had red lips.  And once I said that she was superficial, for I wanted to make her angry.

The next day we met again.  That was not by chance.  We walked in the meadows.  She put her hand on my shoulder and was good to me.  I thought of the kick that I would once day receive from her.

...  Yesterday I hurt her, because I called her superficial.  There was something like crying in her voice when she said: 

“I’m really not as superficial as you believe, Olaf.  Twice I have been in love unhappily and once it bloomed happily.”

It seemed to me that her hand on my shoulder had become heavier...

We walked slowly.  We saw no people.  Wind came across the meadows.  In the sky there were clouds everywhere, threatening rain.

She looked at me.  Her look was naked and spoke of passion.

That was neat, how I suddenly seized her and threw her into the grass with me and half-intoxicated whispered to her:  “You, my”—­and how she lay there weary and sobbed:  “Olaf"-Afterwards I performed my school work badly.  I probably won’t be promoted.

Kuno Kohn

For six months I have been living in the house.  None of the inhabitants has noticed anything.  I am careful.

The white suit brings me luck.  I earn enough.  And I have begun to save; for I feel that one’s powers decline.  I am tired frequently; sometimes I have pain.  I shall also become fat and old.  I don’t like to put make-up on-I am no longer being supervised.  Kuno Kohn has made me free.  I am thankful to him.

Kuno Kohn is repugnant; he has a hunchback.  His hair is the color of brass, his face is beardless, and worn with furrows.  His eyes seem old, encircled with shadows.  A scar, like a stream of rain, runs from his nose.  One of his legs is swollen.  Kuno Kohn said once that he has an abscess in the bone.

The first meeting had been strange: 

It was raining.  The streets were wet and dirty.  I stood under a street lamp and looked at my wet clothes.  When the wind blew, I was chilled.  My feet ached in my shoes.

Few people were on the street.  Most of them on the other side.  Protected by the trees.  With their coat collars up.  With the hat crooked over the forehead.  No one was watching me; I was standing there, sad.  The gravel crunched beneath me.  Hard and sudden, so that I cried out.  A

policeman came by, hands behind his back.  He moved slowly.  He looked at me suspiciously, proud of his authority.  With a stark look, he felt that he was master.  He moved further on.  I laughed scornfully; he did not look back.  The policeman despised me.

I yawned:  it had become late.—­Along came a man who was small and deformed.  He stopped when he saw me.  He had unhappy eyes; on his lips was an embarrassed smile.  He hid part of his face behind scrawny fingers.  And he rubbed his right eye-lid, like someone ashamed of himself.  And he coughed slightly...  I went up close to him, so that he felt me.  He said:  “Well—­:  I said:  “Come, little one.”  He said:  “I’m actually homosexual.”