Gustav Klimt The Virgins (Le Vergini) painting

Gustav Klimt The Virgins (Le Vergini) paintingGustav Klimt The Fulfillment (detail I) paintingGustav Klimt The Embrace (detail_ square) painting
For the civilized man there are none of those swift transitions of joy and pain which possess the savage; words form slowly like pus about his hurts; there are no clean wounds for him; first a numbness, then a long festering, then a scar ever ready to reopen. Not until they have assumed the livery of the defence can his emotions pass through the lines; sometimes they come massed in a wooden horse, sometimes as single spies, but there is always a Fifth Column among the garrison ready to receive them. Sabotage behind the lines, a blind raised and lowered at a lighted window, a wire cut, a bolt loosened, a file disordered—that is how the civilized man is undone.
I returned to the house and darkened the rooms once more, relaid the dust-sheets I had lifted and left everything as it had been.

The manuscript of Murder at Mountrichard Castle lay on the chest of drawers in my club bedroom, reproaching me morning, evening and night. It was promised for publication in June, and I had never before disappointed my publishers. This year, however, I