The Right Hand of Sleep (20 page)

—Walter. He paused. —About the marching in Villach. If it was true.

—Oh. That, said Else. She made a little wave. —Probably because of my cousin, Kurt.

—What about him?

—He got into trouble. He had to leave.

They had reached the pines and now walked side by side down the steepening hill. —Without a word, she said, half to herself.

—What’s that? said Voxlauer.

—He left us without a word. Kurt. In the middle of the night.

—Us?

—Us. Resi and myself.

Voxlauer slowed for a moment, but as Else kept walking he sped up again. She was looking down the slope into the woods, walking quickly.

—He took care of you, before he left? Your cousin? said Voxlauer, still half a step behind her.

—Yes.

—You and Resi.

—Yes, Oskar.

—Else?

—What?

Voxlauer hesitated, arranging the words carefully in his throat. —He’s an illegal, is he, your cousin?

She nodded. —Yes, Oskar. He was. Until last month. Now he’s just the opposite.

—He’ll be coming back, then, Voxlauer said slowly.

—I wish he wouldn’t.

Voxlauer was quiet for a time. —And the father?

—What about him?

—Where is he?

—With Kurt, wherever that is. I don’t care.

—Ah.

She took a half step toward him. —Oskar—

—They were both of them illegals, were they? The two of them?

—Right, she said, turning back down the slope. —Lovely young garden-variety Black Shirts. The two of them together.

—That’s a . . . a surprise, said Voxlauer.

—Is it, Oskar? Is it such a surprise?

They were standing now side by side looking in the same direction down the trail. Past a little rise they could see the rust-colored stripe of the junction road dimly through the trees and scrub.

—Who was he, then? said Voxlauer finally.

Else frowned slightly. —Who was who?

—The father.

—A boy, Oskar. That’s all. She shrugged. —From Marein. His mother looks after Resi now.

Voxlauer was quiet again for a few moments. —Why is that?

She had begun walking again, stiff-legged and deliberate. He followed close behind her. They passed silently into a stand of elms showing their first hesitant green. Her steps in the brown leaf cover ahead of him made small brittle noises as she went, as though she were walking over waxed paper, or onionskin. He drew alongside her.

—Why is that? he repeated.

—What?

—Why does his mother look after her?

—Because I’m unfit, of course, Oskar. It’s not right that I look after her. Is that what you wanted to know? I’m unfit. That’s all. She was taken away from me.

—But why? he said again, unable to check himself. —What had you done?

—Oskar, she whispered, turning toward him. Her face was wet and she was trembling. —Can we stop this, Oskar? For God’s sake? If we don’t stop right away, I have to go. I’ll have to go, Oskar. Do you hear?

He looked at her for a few seconds, then shut his eyes. The fear that he’d half forgotten in the last weeks rose and heaved under him again all at once and he felt weak-kneed as if from sudden vertigo. —Go where? he said finally, opening his eyes. But Else had begun walking again, moving away from him down the slope.

Later that day, when Voxlauer arrived at the ponds, he found a pine-green sedan parked alongside the bridge and Ryslavy slumped over between the cottage steps and the woodpile. He picked up two splints from the pile and clacked them together next to Ryslavy’s ear.

—Citizens of the Reich! This is your Führer speaking!

Ryslavy jerked violently awake, looking around him with wide-open, bulging eyes. Seeing Voxlauer he began cursing immediately. —You’ll get yours, little friend. By God you’ll get yours.

—I was just thinking about going to see you, Pauli. Tomorrow or the day after. And here you are laid out on my doorstep like a birthday present.

Ryslavy sat back against the wall. —Just you come a little closer, birthday boy.

—Thanks all the same, said Voxlauer. He leaned lightly against the woodpile. —I’ve been wondering about you a little.

—What, pray tell?

—I don’t rightly know.

—No?

Voxlauer shrugged. —If you’re still in business, I suppose.

—In business? said Ryslavy, eyes narrowing.

Voxlauer nodded.

Ryslavy studied him awhile longer, then let out a grunt. —They haven’t stopped drinking beer, if that’s what you’re getting at. Or started caring much who pours it for them.

—Still eating trout?

—They’ll still eat mine, Oskar. Don’t you worry. If I have any left to fry, that is. He looked toward the ponds accusingly.

Voxlauer took another splint from the woodpile and began knocking the dirt from his boots. —It’s true I haven’t been around so much lately.

—No?

Voxlauer grinned. —You come up here to sack me, Pauli?

—We’d just have you in town then. Thank you kindly.

—It wouldn’t be so bad. I could help you lay sandbags.

—No thank you.

—Or courier your bribes, depending . . .

Ryslavy made a face. —On what?

Voxlauer scratched his chin. —Your plan of action. Your tactical agenda.

—I think we’ll keep you in reserve for the moment, Oskar, if you’ve no objections. Seeing as how you appreciate your work.

—Is it so very obvious? said Voxlauer.

In the last light they went up and cast lines into the creek. Ryslavy lay with his head against a tussock of new grass, smoking and holding forth on selected topics. Occasionally he sat forward to check his line. Voxlauer had a second rod and was casting into a shallow eddy.

—They’re no more socialists than I am, Ryslavy was saying. —If they’re a workers’ party then I’m a burr up a barmaid’s ass.

—You wish you were.

—They went after the perfumed citizens straight off, no dillydallying. Old man Kattnig, Otto Probst, that new doctor moved into the Villa Walgram. Even came snuffling round
my
door, if you can believe it, that first week. Turned out I was a Zionist.

—If you’re a Zionist, then I am a wheel of cheese, said Voxlauer, yawning.

—Believe me, Oskar. Nobody was more surprised than I was.

—I believe it very well.

—Came round your mother’s house, naturally. Brought along some paperwork. Mentioned you, of course, I needn’t say what regarding. She asked could any of them speak French.

Voxlauer said nothing.

—They want her, all right. Your Père too, rest his bones. “Your personal loss, et cetera, was a loss for all of Germany.” She was grand, though. Asked did Germany feel the loss of all Austrian geniuses so deeply. That buggered ’em.

—They mentioned me?

—Hmm. Ryslavy nodded, fumbling with his pipe. —Toward the end.

—Well?

—“We sympathize with your shame, et cetera, Frau Voxlauer,” et cetera. The paperwork came out again. A pardon or some such was hinted at. She told them to get pissed.

—Ah, said Voxlauer.

—For pity’s sake don’t club away like that. For pity’s sake, Oskar. A little charity. Ryslavy took up his rod with a gesture of despair and arced it soundlessly out over the water. —These are graceful, delicate things we’re after. Beautiful things.

—Floating sausages, said Voxlauer. —Bug-eyed gluttonous little fiends.

—Conversely, the favored food of your prophet, according to apostles Paul and Peter, said Ryslavy, raising a hand in benediction.

—I never knew! said Voxlauer thoughtfully. He reeled in his line and cast again. —Who’s your favorite apostle, Pauli?

Ryslavy cursed picturesquely. —Speaking of which, that heap of kidneys is making things hot for me a little. Not to dirty the subject.

—Our boy Rindt of the greasy knickers?

—That’s the one.

—Sopping piss off barstools not enough for him anymore, I guess.

Ryslavy shrugged. —Black Shirts drink free on Tuesday. He grinned crookedly. —The pan-German angle.

Voxlauer spat into the grass.

—Wish I’d thought of it myself, really.

—You did, Pauli. You couldn’t stomach it, that’s all.

Ryslavy laughed joylessly. —You expect me to work the pan-German maneuver, Oskar? Me? Paul Abraham Ryslavy, money-lender? Corrupter of womenfolks? The bandy-legged menace? He hunched over in the twilight, leering.

—Speaking of which, said Voxlauer. —Could you spare half a schilling?

—Very comic, said Ryslavy. He stared blankly out at the water.

—I thought not, said Voxlauer.

—You go to hell.

They cast quietly for a time. —Is it all so far gone, then? said Voxlauer quietly.

Ryslavy thumbed his nose. —They drink until they’re pissed, then they toddle home. It’s a happy time, really.

—We could all do with one of those.

Ryslavy moved his pipestem fondly from his right mouth corner to his left. —I’d say you’ve done all right, Oskar.

—What’s that?

—You’ve done all right.

Voxlauer cast again. —What would you know about it.

—You’ll notice, said Ryslavy—I haven’t asked where you’ve been.

—I wasn’t expecting you to.

—Still. I haven’t asked.

—Shall I light you a candle, brother?

—Do you remember Sarah Tilsnigg? My second cousin?

Voxlauer didn’t answer for a moment. —I might remember.

—You always did have a weakness for the mountain air. Had an effect on you like a pound of oysters.

—Leave off it, Pauli, for the love of God.

—What year was that? What summer?

—I don’t remember. Eighteen hundred and three.

—We had fine summers up here, though, it’s a fact.

—A few.

—I think of them all the time now. I must be getting old.

—That must be it.

—Père told those endless, wonderfully complicated fairy stories. Do you remember them?

—Some.

—What happened to him, Oskar? To go from such a normal life—go so all at once—

—It wasn’t so all at once. You didn’t see it, that’s all. Maman kept things quiet.

—There were the problems with his pieces, I remember that much. His pieces not getting played, and so on. Don’t say that wasn’t a part of it.

—It was something inside of him, Pauli. In the brain. It wasn’t the goddamned good-for-nothing pieces.

—What makes you so blessed sure?

—Because it’s inside of me too, Pauli. That’s why.

—Oh, said Ryslavy.

They sat awhile in silence. Ryslavy chewed his pipe. —Vulgo Holzer was broken into a few weeks back, he said. —Turned on its ass proper.

—Is that so?

—Just so you’re careful, that’s all, Oskar. These are chancy times.

—I’ve heard that already, said Voxlauer. —You’ll be happy to know of a fellow deep thinker—

There was a hit on his line and he brought it in hard, with a whirring and buzzing of the reel. A fish no longer than a finger struggled fiercely against the hook. Voxlauer pulled it in, cursing.

—Sprats hit quickest just now, Ryslavy said, comfortable again. —The old ones drop lower, in my experience, when dark is coming on. A heavier plumb might clear it, maybe. Or a better floater. You might try one of those damselflies.

Voxlauer yanked the sprat from his line and threw it back. —You’re bothering me tonight, Pauli.

Ryslavy sighed. —I bother myself, lately. He drew his rod back pensively. —You know about her family, I suppose?

—Enough.

—Not simple, is it.

—It’s simple. Voxlauer cast again. —It’s simple up here.

—Don’t believe it, boy. It’s no simpler up here than anywhere. Things take a bit longer to happen, that’s all. Ryslavy jerked his head down valley. —Your nudists know that, you can bet. They won’t be around much longer.

—Look at me, Pauli. I’m fully dressed.

—And thank God for it.

—I couldn’t agree more.

Ryslavy leaned over, took Voxlauer’s arm and shook it. —Don’t make trouble for me, old man. I’m begging you now.

Voxlauer laughed. —Trouble, Pauli? You must not have looked at me too well just now. Am I worth fretting over?

—No, you jackass. I am. I’m worth fretting over for weeks.

—Fret away, then. You don’t need my permission.

—Everyone knows who it was at the Holzer farm. The whole town knows it.

Voxlauer didn’t answer. The creek had darkened now into a small cautious band of gray. The light above it was dim and gravel-colored.

—That seems very far away now, all of that, he said finally.

Ryslavy was quiet a moment. —Well, Oskar. It’s your business, as you say. But for God’s sake don’t pay any more visits to the Holzer boys. Buy your butter in Pergau from now on.

—I just might at that, said Voxlauer.

It rained all that night and the next day and in the evening wide pink spots appeared on the sky and it grew clear and cold. Voxlauer rapped on the window and watched Else move in the warm honeyed light of the kitchen toward the door. She fumbled a moment with the catch. —Fish still belly-down? she said, pushing open the screen.

—I never looked. He brushed the hair from her face and looped it carefully behind her ears. —Ryslavy was by. I think he’d sack me if his conscience would permit him. Lucky for me he’s a sentimentalist.

—He can’t sack you if he doesn’t pay you, Oskar. You still think like a Bolshevik. She took his wrist and brought it along her mouth.

—He gives me a general amnesty, Fräulein. That’s something. And then there are the fishes.

—Tsk, Oskar! What do
you
need an amnesty for, of all people.

—Oh, I’ve done terrible things, Fräulein.

—I know what you’re thinking of, Herr Gamekeeper. Paul Ryslavy has no business giving out amnesties in that province.

—Well, said Voxlauer, shrugging. —He tries to look out for me.

She laughed slyly. —Some things nobody else can do for you,
Oskarchen.

—If you say so, Fräulein. He paused a moment. —He doesn’t seem to like you much. I suppose that’s no surprise.

She made a face. —That man. He should nurture his friendships.

—He thinks he does.

—What does that mean?