The hermit
General Henrik is an accomplished man who might have honor within his community, if it weren't for his tendency to remove himself from community entirely. He doesn't have guests at his castle, and he uses the time and space alone to think about his life, to contemplate, and to consider his past. He is an archetypal hermit, and the quest of the hermit is very often to attain personal enlightenment. His obsession with the past means that he is attempting to understand something that validates or redeems his past suffering.
The stranger
As noted, Henrik isn't exactly a people-person. When he hears of a decorated stranger in town, though, he cannot help himself but to invite the man over. This symbolic stranger turns out to be his mortal enemy, an old friend with some unspoken beef between them. Throughout the story, the man remains a stranger to the reader, but Henrik talks to him as if there is something obvious between them, an elephant in the room. The stranger turns out to be something like a brother to Henrik, and the issue between them is perceived betrayal.
The motif of time past
Henrik is described as a nostalgic person. He doesn't like time slipping forward into the future. He wishes he could rewind the clock to simpler times. The changing technology of progress is a kind of horror to him, and he just wants to forget about time altogether. He wants some sacred innocence back, but because time only moves forward, there is nothing for him but the ambient hope of redemption. The reader learns that it was not just good in the past that keeps his attentions backward; there were also emotional traumas and painful moments.
The femme fatale
Specifically, there is one moment within which Konrad and Henrik's entire conflict can be captured. Henrik had worked very hard to find the wife he wanted for himself, a lovely gal named Krisztina. But, Konrad, a natural flirt, goes hunting with the couple (the hunt is common symbolism for mate acquisition), and threatens Henrik's pride by having sexual chemistry with his wife. This makes Krisztina into the femme fatale, the precious woman whose approval Henrik needs desperately who proves to be his undoing.
Choices and consequences
The motif of reaction and consequence is on full display throughout the book. As the men talk, they come to painful moments within their conflict when it becomes tempting to assign guilt, to point the finger. This is an attempt to make the other accept responsibility for the consequences of their behavior. In the end, the reader sees that Henrik is clearly on a journey to accept responsibility for his emotionally zealous response to Krisztina's flirtatious nature. He is responsible for objectifying her and elevating her attention. He is also responsible for his overly competitive and insulting behavior.
