Look, we've got the money so let's get out of here, we don't want to get into danger by taking some ill-considered risk.

But the money was supposed to be the least important thing.

Money is unimportant, but it's reassuring to have it.

But I don't want to be reassured, I'm all worked up, it'll only take me a minute to take it out and spit on it. Keep a hold on him. No sooner said than done. Even Rainer helps with the holding, so Sophie won't think he's only doing it for the dough. You little fucker, you wouldn't have thought this would happen to you, would you, you thought something nice was going to happen to you, you swine. It is yanked out and spat on. That's what this guy was going to foist on me. Me. The fellow won't be foisting his wretched little tool on any women in a hurry. I'll bet he's lost interest today. Hey, come on now!

Hans kicks the salesman from Linz and his pecker, which won't be stirring for at least six months, that's for sure, and to think that at first it looked as if he was going to reap more than he'd sowed. He kicks at his neck and at scraps of underpants that glow white in the dark, making the fellow from Linz tip over sideways, shed a little Linz blood, and fall suddenly silent. He won't have sustained any permanent injuries. Still, he won't forget it.

They shoot back into the dark, out into the street which originally spewed them forth, not even the dark city by night can stand ill-bred adolescents such as these.

Shouldn't we piss on him too, asks Hans, turned on by what Anna did, no, we're not going to do anything else now, we're off, puffs Anna, clawing at him. Suddenly she's in a hurry.

Sophie is wearing a simple dark dress and blends in with the courtyard wall. Shudders keep on passing through her, again and again. These shudders are linked to a strange sensation of urgency in her lower abdomen and they recur with increasing frequency. She is unable to interpret the feeling. But it isn't puppy love or loyal friendship. No doubt it is something on the negative side, as the feeling that she shouldn't obey the sensation indicates, you can never rely on sensations. Come on, Sophie, breathes Rainer, and he takes her in his arms. She shakes him off and darts back into the street like a black thread being pulled very rapidly over a smooth tabletop.

TO INTRODUCE SOME clarity into their fogged lives, Rainer, Anna and Hans dash off to where clarity is present full-time: at Sophie's villa in Hietzing. It is always a radiantly sunny day there, and there are always young folk radiant with youth. The day is radiant to keep them company, as it were. This spring it is already quite warm, giving promise of a hot summer that will scatter the youngsters in many and various directions once they've passed their exams. Some of them are hoping it'll be the same direction as Sophie takes. Presently Sophie's naked feet will be tripping across the promenade, the asphalt is already warm, indeed hot, and the tennis racket is enjoying the view from its Vuitton bag. Mama will be hysterically wrapped up in silken scarves and kerchiefs to guard against the sun, as usual, because the sun is always bad for her, Mama being blonde and her skin extremely white. Mama will direct the entire operation from the cafe, constantly hurtling to the telephone with a display of professional nerves. She will say she is meeting Sophie for tea. Obedience is lodged within Sophie like a coil spring, tensing and relaxing painlessly. Like some beautiful, graceful animal: you squeeze its flanks with your commanding thighs but do it no harm or permanent damage. Hans will stay behind in Vienna, clowning around with frisky hairdressers every so often, now that he knows what you can get up to with tarts like that. He is not yet one of those who pine for Sophie and the Riviera because he has never heard of the Riviera. Alas, Rainer and Anna have heard of it. What threatens them is the woods. Which have so often intruded their unpleasant attentions on the siblings. Out where the woods are darkest and most solitary, of all places, Auntie Pussy waits, tempting people with healthy country air, the very people who'd rather be unhealthy than healthy. To think there are so many others who consider health the most important thing in Life. And they can't go. First the body must be revitalised, before university studies replace the revitalisation process and start on their destruction.

But before that there are still the school-leaving examinations. Which you don't talk about, because that's bad form.

And before that there's Sophie, what a coincidence, you think of Sophie with a tennis racket and there it promptly is, the tennis racket, plus Sophie. Both are sitting in a cream-coloured Porsche being driven by a young aristocrat. Instantly Rainer drowns him in hatred, that hatred of his that was waiting, dammed-up, impatient, to be poured upon something or other. It doesn't matter who's sitting beside Sophie. He must be hated. This is unfair, seeing that the fellow (leaving his background aside) may have honourable intentions. Every one is different from his predecessor. This makes for variety. Sophie flits out of the beautiful car, she too is very beautiful in her tennis dress, she is not sweating (which often happens when you indulge in sundry sports). Sweat cannot get a purchase on Sophie. She is an angel. A bodiless being. Rainer digs his upper teeth into his lower lip. Sophie's white figure leans against the Porsche window and whispers dainty words to the driver, which you cannot hear, even Rainer cannot hear them, though he is the language expert around here. What were you saying to that guy? he promptly asks. Hey, are you crazy, I suppose you think I owe you explanations about everything I do, you must be nuts (Sophie). Whereupon Rainer nervously slaps his thigh muscles several times. This doesn't make them any tougher and he hurts himself the most in the process. Anna makes a half-hearted attempt to grab at Hans's thigh muscles, which afford a firmer purchase than Rainer's, but Hans evades the groping hand and tries to convey to Sophie's eyes, with his own eyes, the news that Love has taken secret root. Also, his eyes devour Sophie's figure, which is highly visible today. Rainer and Hans are out to scale the heights where Sophie is on offer, they are jostling each other to the abyss, each of them wanting to reach the top first. Speechless, Anna grabs at Hans, to whom, after all, she represents a genuine little peak compared with him, so why does he want to be off climbing the highest mountains right away before he's properly acclimatised?

Flowers that are starting to blossom early are glowing in the garden. The gardener is snipping away at something nascent to perfect its shape. The gravel crunches under the departing Porschewheels. The gravel is sent flying when the machine gets up speed. The rival is rapidly distancing himself, as is right and fitting. Sophie has loaded all her weight onto her standing leg. This is in fact better than standing on both legs at the same time. In this position she is the Eternal Seductress to Rainer and Hans. Rainer prefers Sophie to the Eternal Melody of the Forests, perhaps she will invite him to the Riviera for the summer, because if you're in love you cannot bear to be without the loved one for a single minute, that is exactly how Sophie feels about it too. Hans makes some superficial comment about Sophie's legs, because there is no depth to him and so he cannot make any comment on her thoughts. She looks down at herself and says she never really noticed. Come on in, all of you. The whisky's over there, help yourselves, I'm just going to get changed, won't be a moment. Rainer and Hans, each after his own fashion, one with a great many words and the other in the few he knows, both say she should stay as she is. Anna maintains an embittered silence and keeps a watch on Hans, her property. But the unfeeling property in question is hankering after a new owner who will be in a better position to look after it. Hans sizes up a desk lamp made of chrome steel, doubtless because electric current is his special field, maybe there is some electrical job to attend to here, which will secure him a better footing.