Authors: Bernhard Schlink
“Were you at the Yankees-Indians game last week?”
“It wasn’t much of a game. Did you see it? Now I have to go. Thanks for babysitting.” From the apartment door she waved to him, that coquettish fluttering of her hand.
He lay down again. He couldn’t sleep anymore, and listened to Jill’s satisfied cooing and gurgling. Then he took a shower and shaved with the pink ladies’ razor he found on the edge of the bathtub. Under the sink he found some detergent, soaked his underwear, shirt, and socks, and put on his jeans and the biggest sweater he could find in Françoise’s closet. When he went over to Jill’s crib, she was lying with her eyes open. She looked up at him, screwed up her mouth, and began screaming until she turned red. He lifted her up, forgot where Françoise had put the bottle, and ran through the apartment looking for it. Jill wouldn’t stop screaming.
He had never wanted to have children. He had also never wanted not to. The subject had just never interested him. When he and Steffi had gotten married, it was understood that one day they would have children. And with Hanne, who had had herself sterilized, having children was not an option. He had a godson, the oldest son of his school friend Jürgen, who had become a judge in Mosbach, married at twenty-three, and had had five children. Georg had taken his godson to the Frankfurt Zoo and the Mannheim Observatory, had read him bedtime stories whenever he visited, and for his tenth birthday had given him a big Swiss army knife with all its blades, screwdrivers, bottle openers, corkscrews, scissors, file, saw, magnifier, tweezers, toothpick, and a tool to scale fish. Georg would have liked to have had a knife like that himself. It was too heavy for the practical boy, who wasn’t the least bit interested in fishing.
Georg found the bottle. Jill emptied it in a flash and went on screaming. What does the brat want now? he wondered. He remembered the instruction to hold her upright and tap her lightly on the back; he did so, she burped, and continued screaming.
“What more do you want? Why are you screaming at me at the top of your lungs? Men don’t like women who scream, and they don’t like ugly women, and if you go on like this your face will get crooked and you’ll be ugly.”
Jill quieted down. But as soon as he stopped talking she began screaming again, so he talked and talked, rocked her back and forth, walked her up and down. He couldn’t bring himself to utter “oochy-coochy-coo” or “patti-patti-poo,” though he realized she’d be just as pleased with those as with any fairy tales, Wild West stories, or detective stories he could remember.
He put her down on the cabinet in the bathroom and removed her wet diaper. It wasn’t only full of pee, but full of poop too. He washed her bottom and rubbed lotion on it. He waved Jill’s legs in a cycling motion, moved her arms left and right, up and down, and let her hands reach for his thumbs and hold them tight. He pinched the fat on her thighs, arms, and hips. She squealed with delight. Actually, there’s almost no difference between little children and little kittens, he thought. Children are more work—one invests more in them, and that’s why people later have more to offer than cats have. But that’s as it should be. He studied her face, looking for some sign of comprehension. She had thin dark hair, a high forehead, a snub nose and snub chin, and no teeth. He couldn’t make out what was going on in her blue eyes; when he bent over her, he saw his reflection in them. She laughed. Was that a sign of comprehension? On the edge of her ears he discovered a thick dark down. She was still holding on to his thumbs.
“My little hostage. No more flirting when Mama comes home. She mustn’t find out what a paper tiger I am. Is that clear?”
Jill fell asleep. Georg laid her in her crib, called Jürgen in Germany, and asked him to disregard the letter he hadn’t yet gotten. He had decided to replace the old story with the new one, so Jürgen shouldn’t bother with the instructions he had enclosed. “But why? And what are you doing in New York?” His friend was concerned.
“I’ll call again,” Georg said. “Say hi to the kids.”
Georg knew there were problems that had to be dealt with and decisions to be made. What should his next step be? What were the others planning? What can I do? he wondered. What do I want to do? But the outside world was far away. He knew the feeling from being in a train: the only things that separated you from the passing landscape, cities, cars, and people were a thin wall and thin glass. But this separation and the speed were enough to encapsulate you. And also, you could no longer do anything where you started from, or at the place you were to arrive. When you got there you might deal with problems and decisions—but in your capsule you were condemned to passivity, and you were free. Also, when no one knows that you are sitting in the train, when no one is expecting you and you are traveling to a completely unknown city, being cut off takes on an existential quality. No car trip can compare with it; as a driver you are busy steering, or as a passenger you are involved in what the driver is doing. In Françoise’s apartment Georg was experiencing the same isolation from the world. Of course, all he had to do was walk out and involve himself with the life outside. He knew that that was what he faced, that he had to do it and would. He didn’t feel inwardly blocked. It was just that the train hadn’t yet arrived, and the schedule with the arrival time had been lost.
He sat in the rocking chair in the living room and looked out the window. An inner courtyard with a tree, fire escapes, clotheslines, and garbage cans. He couldn’t distinguish from which apartments
the noises came: hammering, the clatter of pots and pans, a saxophone, children’s voices, and women chatting loudly across the courtyard. Françoise didn’t return. The shadows climbed up the walls. Around six Jill woke up, this time without screaming. When she fell asleep again he rinsed his clothes and hung them up to dry. Twilight was coming on. The sky over the neighboring houses and the World Trade Center turned red.
Françoise came home carrying a large brown shopping bag. “How’s Jill?”
“She’s asleep.”
“Still? She usually wakes up around six.”
“She did. I made some tea for her and gave it to her in her bottle.”
She looked at him skeptically. “I’m sorry I’m so late. I had to drop by Benton’s.”
“So you really … Where are they? How much time do I have to come out with my hands raised?” He stood up.
“No!” she called out. The shopping bag fell and burst open as she threw herself in front of the door to the bedroom. “Don’t do anything to her, don’t! I didn’t say anything about you! There’s an article about you in the
Times
, wait, I’ll show it to you.” She thrust out her left hand at him as if she were fending him off, bent down, pulled the newspaper from the ruins of the shopping bag, and began leafing through it. “I found it. Here.”
“I know the article.” So she really believed he was capable of doing something to Jill.
She straightened up. “Next week my vacation is over, and in any case I wanted to go to Townsend, and after reading the article …”
“Did you speak to Benton?”
“Yes, he’s pretty annoyed. He didn’t want that article in the paper. The painters in the stairwell called an ambulance and the police; then the reporters came, nosed around, and the man you
pushed down the stairs gave them your name. After he came to, he didn’t know what he was doing. It’s turned into a circus, Joe said, a regular circus.”
“Joe is Benton?”
“Yes. Do you know that the other one, the one who fell into the elevator shaft, broke both his legs?”
“How should I know that? I didn’t have time to stop and look.”
“Why did you do it?” she asked anxiously. He had become strange to her. Someone who lashes out indiscriminately, and before whom she had better watch her step.
“What did he tell you? Bulnakov—Benton—Joe; soon I’ll be calling the bastard sweetie and honey.”
“He said you’re no longer satisfied with the money you got in Cucuron, that you want more and are trying to blackmail him.”
“And what would I blackmail him with?”
“You found out that we … that he … that you weren’t dealing with the Russians in Provence, and you threatened to tell the Russians, and they’d be angry.”
“He says I came to him with this idiotic blackmail? And what was I supposed to have got from him in Cucuron?” Georg was really angry. “How stupid do you think I am? You know yourself that it’s bullshit—what’s this song and dance about? God, I’m fed up with your lies, fed up, fed up!” And with every
fed up
he gave her a slap in the face. He clenched his fists. She shielded herself with her arm. They stood opposite each other. Eye to eye, her terrified look and his enraged one. He took a deep breath. “It’s over, I won’t do anything more to you. Does Benton come here sometimes? Are you still having an affair with him?”
“That’s over. Anyone who comes here calls me up ahead of time in case the child’s asleep. You needn’t worry. And I certainly haven’t breathed a word to anyone. I don’t want to lose my babysitter, either.” She looked and sounded different from one minute to the
next. At first fearful, then conspiratorially serious, and with her last words cheerful, with a wink. “Oh look at this mess!” she said, picking up the burst bag. Milk was leaking onto the floor. “Will you help me with supper?”
Later, when they went to bed, he was unyielding. He took the bed next to Jill, while Françoise slept in the living room on the couch. He locked the door; he would hear Jill if she woke up, and if he didn’t, Françoise could knock and wake him up. He did hear Jill when she woke up in the night, even before Françoise did, and went into the other room and woke Françoise up. She gave Jill her breast, and he fell asleep. She took off her nightgown and slipped beside him under the blanket.
ALREADY BY THE NEXT DAY
living together had become oddly routine. It reminded Georg of their last days together in Cucuron.
“What were you thinking, when from one day to the next you didn’t come back? Without a word?” Georg saw the pale blue morning sky through the venetian blind. Françoise lay exhausted and satisfied beside him, her head on his arm.
“Joe sent me to New York and told me to stay here.”
“But what were you thinking, I mean about me, about us?”
The strain of her concentrating was visible. She didn’t understand his question, but wanted to do the right thing: not disappoint him, but satisfy him with the proper answer.
“Don’t think so much,” he said. “Just tell me what happened.”
“It was my job. And Jill was on the way, and you were beginning to act crazy. I couldn’t risk my job, because I soon would have to provide for Jill and couldn’t rely on you anymore. You’ve always been … you always want more, and keep doing things that ruin what you have. In Provence, at any rate, you ruined everything with your pride and stubbornness. You just had to quarrel with Joe. In life you have to be content with what you’ve got.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
“You see? You don’t understand.”
“Aren’t you getting any support for Jill?”
“No, I don’t know who the father is.”
“Benton or your ex … Might she be mine?”
She raised herself on her elbow and looked down at him.
“That’s sweet. Sometimes I wished it. How you were in my mind when I was walking along Madison Avenue and a man ran in front of me who was wearing your aftershave, and I ached with longing.”
“And later, when Benton came back to New York, he told you that he had finally got the better of me, bought me out?”
“Yes.”
“Do you want to know what really happened?”
“Not now. Jill will be waking up in a minute.” She pushed the blanket away and kissed his chest.
Georg spent most of the day alone with Jill. Fran, as he now called her, was finishing her new translation at NYU. He called Helen, who had been given an appointment at Townsend Enterprises. He played with Jill, fed and bathed her. He read around in Fran’s books and systematically went through her closets, the boxes under her bed, and her desk. He found out that she was thirty years old, came from Baltimore, had gone to Williams College and Columbia, and had been married for six years to a David Kramer. In a drawer he found a photo of himself; he was lying in the hammock in front of the house in Cucuron, with Dopey on his stomach. When Fran came home at six, dinner was on the table.
The following days passed the same way. Evenings and mornings, when they had slept together and Fran was purring with satisfaction, Georg got occasional answers to occasional questions. She had hung up the picture of the cathedral in Cucuron because when she had been a student, she had lived across the street from the cathedral and had been happy and wanted something to
remember New York by. Yes, Townsend Enterprises was owned by Joe Benton. He had gotten around in the world, first as an Orthodox priest, then with the U.S. Marines, and then in an ashram in California. When he became a private detective, at first he had worked under his own name. But as his commissions got riskier and his clientele more well known, he had to assume disguises. Fran had worked for him for four years, and had become his lover in the second year. The commission for Gorgefield Aircraft was the biggest she could remember; it brought Joe thirty million. She was sorry it had cost Maurin his life, she said. But Georg had the impression that she didn’t care, and that she was somehow making him responsible for the attack on him and the death of his cats. Joe had connections to official authorities. “One hand washes the other, you know. Sometimes he needs the officials, and sometimes they’re happy to have a problem disposed of unofficially. CIA? No idea whether it’s the CIA or one of its offshoots.”
Politics didn’t interest Fran. So she wasn’t interested in the political dimension of her work, let alone the moral dimension. But, Georg asked himself, am I any different? I told Helen that for Benton/Bulnakov it would mean a defeat to pay me money, and that this defeat was what mattered to me. But what did I want to do with the money? Punish and avenge myself and cash in—I made it pretty easy for myself.
Nevertheless, the question remained what really interested Fran. Her job? She seemed to have an obsequious relation to her work; the obsequious relation to Benton had been part of it. “Did you love him?”—“He wasn’t bad to me. I have a lot to thank him for, he even wanted to pay for Jill.”—“Why didn’t you let him?” Georg wanted to hear her answer. Her submissiveness reminded him of the fatalism with which one submits to the weather, come rain or shine. So she could have taken Benton’s money as a gift from heaven. But no. “I can’t do that, because I don’t know
whether he’s the father.” She seemed surprised at his strange question, morally surprised. So the theory about the weather was out. Still, the job for her was just a job, just like the weather is only the weather; it left her uninvolved.