The Wall (20 page)

“You didn’t accompany my father?”

“How’s that? I mean, what are you saying?”

“Nothing at all. Accompanied is all I mean.”

“Where to? Good Lord! What was I supposed to do?”

“Save him!”

“How so?”

“I don’t know. I was just thinking. One could see them off, even if they couldn’t be saved. Perhaps at the train station. To wave with a white handkerchief, or with a blue one signifying hope. As soon as the train starts moving. Until it no longer can be seen.”

“Forgive me, but did you go to the train station?”

“No, I couldn’t. I was no longer here but gone. Away, far away. I thought, Perhaps the old ones will be spared. What a foolish idea. Why should they be? It was because of my parents that I stayed in this country. Also my grandmother, who was almost ninety then.”

“Was she transported as well?”

“No. On the day before she was supposed to be, she was prudent and died. All by herself. No one did anything to her, and it wasn’t suicide.”

“How fortunate! But of course such old people they didn’t—”

“Yes, they did! Why wouldn’t they? There was no one too old to go.”

“How do you know about the grandmother if you were already gone?”

“Those who came after me told me so. I also learned about my parents from them, and about many, many others. And what happened then? Don’t ask. I know, and I don’t know. In any case, there’s nothing to say about it.”

“But Franziska?”

“Her parents poisoned themselves. They didn’t want to suffer and just took some pills to go to sleep. That happened months earlier, after they had given up their apartment and moved with two other older couples into a dismal little room in a musty old folks home. They were discovered much too late—they couldn’t be woken. When Franziska and I showed up after breakfast
in order to start the move, they had already been taken away. Franziska ran to the hospital with me, but she didn’t see her parents again, neither alive nor dead. It was not allowed, and she pleaded to no avail. Then came the burial. They should have a grave in the central cemetery, if everything is still the way it was.”

“Nothing happened there.”

“The dead, who are still among us! It’s good that they’re there! Simple graves, thank goodness they still exist!”

“And tomorrow? After tomorrow? The future? Will you just keep going?”

“Do you have the desire to? Not me. Time has stopped, or I have stopped. It doesn’t matter what happens. Whatever happens tomorrow or in the future has nothing to do with me or with this day.”

“You said that you still love.”

“Yes, I did, and it’s true. That’s a time frozen still. That’s Franziska, who is always there, for she doesn’t exist.”

Anna then turned off the night light. The sudden darkness blinded me, and from the window the cool air poured in. Anna didn’t say another word, but only rustled her covers, perhaps curling up small beneath them. I didn’t know why she had turned out the light so suddenly, whether out of fear or because of my talking, whether out of compassion or tenderness or only because she was tired. Anxiously I listened for some sign, but the thick darkness released no sound. I could have said something, or at least wished her good night, but I was too uncertain that my voice would be lost to the darkness, the risk of being cut off by it frightening me. All that Anna gave off was a quiet hesitancy, nothing else, she having drifted off, or she not wanting to give any explanation in her own apartment. Therefore my silence was warranted; no word could possibly be expected of me. Already my eyes had gotten used to the dark, and yet the surroundings were hardly recognizable, only the nearby table’s edge recognizable in the light gray of the submerged room, the window soon appearing as if cut out of the darkness, behind it the drab and milky color of the night’s lofty freedom and the tender starry lights in the distance that floated above the hill’s slope on the other side of the river. I raised myself up a bit in order to better see the lights, but they didn’t appeal, for they were cold and unmoving. No stars shone that way; they were too fixed and hard.

Soon I turned away, settled myself into bed, pressed my head into the pillow, turned slowly toward the wall, as quietly as possible, and beheld nothing more than a weak, washed-out glow. It was neither comforting nor hopeless, only near and nonetheless uncertain, but at ease, since I didn’t disturb it. As I closed my eyes, the same indistinct wall remained, only thicker. It didn’t bother me, but instead finally left me alone. I had raised the covers higher, pressing my chin in between my folded hands, because I didn’t want to be anywhere else except by myself and with myself, no matter how strange the room that surrounded me, no matter how strange the acceptable covers and the strange web extending from my father’s hands to my body. What belongs to me? I asked myself. What do I own? “Myself,” I whispered. “Myself, and nothing but myself.” But that is also only a fiefdom, a fleeting possession. The Father can always take it away, and then I am no more. I loved someone. Why had I confessed that to Anna? And whom did I love?

Franziska is no more, but outside the wind blows, and my love is there. Will she enter my lair and dally with me? Why would she do that? She has no room, and if she comes closer, all the way in, she won’t find any. Is she not sitting there, or is she calling from a distance that cannot be measured? Then I let myself drift off to sleep and wandered away into the silent vanished joy where I once met her before we were husband and wife. Was Franziska in the fog or in sunshine? Franziska at my side as we walked, someone next to someone, or also no one. Now we were where one shouldn’t be, hidden dreamers in a green forbidden landscape. The little train laughed and carried the wanderers with many resounding whistles slowly along the length of the river, a traveling home, for the lovers wanted it so, and everywhere back then was home, everywhere a place of love they chose to visit. Here I am, it said, Here I am, the echo, and every place became a destination, home reached via the shortest journey. Soon the train stopped, and love stepped out, the gravel under its feet crunching, tickets gathered at the exit by a heavy hand, then vendors offered things for sale, wares offered up on portable stands and waiting for loose change, also baskets on the ground in which seasonal fruit was piled up. Soon there followed an imploring array of vendors, there being a ramp across the rails. All the hopeful merchants hawked their goods on and on, the children barefoot, accompanied by chickens and a sullen black dog. There was no more time, or had it dissolved into the dense cover of forest that wound around the path
that climbed toward the heights? The blessed escape into the many-layered heights from the open flats, where summer forgets that there it feels like autumn. Trust in the light of day, the limbs warm, and all at the ready. The path forks, softly moving on, and where shall we go today?

“Are you awake?”

“No, I’m asleep, Johanna. I’ve been asleep for a while.”

“Then I’m sorry that I bothered you.”

“Don’t worry! I’ll sleep some more. I always sleep.”

“You can’t anymore. The order has arrived.”

“Please let me! There’s still time till tomorrow.”

“Unfortunately not. It’s already tomorrow.”

“You can’t scare me. It’s today.”

“No, you’re wrong! It’s already tomorrow! Just read the date!”

“I don’t want to. I can’t read it.”

“You have to, because it has to do with you. Later, you can sleep without end.”

“So read it to me, if I have to know it so bad!”

“Oh, don’t be so difficult! The men are already waiting outside!”

“What do they want?”

“They have brought your coffin, Arthur.”

“I don’t need any coffin.”

“Propriety demands it. You have to.”

“What, then?”

“One can only be cremated in a coffin.”

“I don’t want to be cremated. I just want to be buried in the coolest earth. Near a spring, out in the green forest, where there is plenty of shade.”

“Perhaps your wish can be fulfilled, but it’s not possible without a coffin. In any case, you have to get up, because they want to take you with them.”

“I’m not dead. Just send them all away!”

“You know your job. Duty is duty. At eleven you are supposed to be cremated.”

“I don’t want to. I am not at all dead. It must be a mistake.”

“It’s no mistake. Here it is in black-and-white. Arthur Landau, the corpse, is to be picked up and brought to the crematorium. The cremation is arranged for eleven, the mourners are planning to show up on time, the flowers and wreaths are ready.”

“That’s nonsense, Johanna! I don’t want any flames swallowing me up!”

“Save me your useless concerns and hurry up! I already have my mourning dress. It’s lovely!”

“I don’t want to be dead! Can’t you hear? Chase away the men! No one burns anyone who is alive!”

“How can you be so stupid, such a clever man! Everyone will be burned when his hour has come. I’ll weep for you. The children will honor your name and never forget.”

“It all seems to me so stupid! I won’t go!”

“So do you want them to yell at you and beat you until you lie in your coffin?”

Then I became sad, much sadder than I had ever been in the darkness of my life, and I hastily stood up, turned around, and beheld the order that Johanna held clearly before my face. I couldn’t believe my eyes. Yet, as I read, my doubts were bitterly disappointed, because there it was, clearly written, that the pallbearers were supposed to pick me up in a black oaken coffin and seal me inside it in order to get me to the cremation punctually at eleven. I blinked at Johanna, who stood there calmly and offered me such an unforced and fresh smile that I doubted whether for her own sake she thought of me as valiant or whether she felt hardly concerned at all. Out on the street, it was darker yet. The men who stood quietly outside appeared to be in a hurry, but I took my stand before the door, determined to fight off any threat with my own bare fists if necessary. The order was indeed clear, which then recommended the greatest caution. To my great joy, Johanna was not in any mourning dress, although she had pretended earlier that she was. Instead, she had chosen her severe gray traveling outfit that she only rarely wore in order to protect it.

All of a sudden, I discovered that the children were also running around the room, but they had kept so still that I wasn’t surprised that I had overlooked them until now. I pointed at Michael, who absentmindedly turned the wheel of a wooden car, and then at Eva, who crouched in a corner and shyly clung to the little arm of her stuffed doll, sawdust running out of its wounded hand. Johanna sensed that the presence of the children was somewhat painful for me, and, indeed, made it clear that I didn’t have to worry about it, for she had already explained to them that today their father was to be taken away. Children absorb such things so easily, for they hardly
know what it means, Eva having no clue, and Michael thinking it was a great honor that was being awarded to me. I was only happy that the real truth was lost on them. All well and good, I grumbled angrily, and accused Johanna of being callous in her handling of the children. She found my rebuke strange, and said that I shouldn’t be so high-strung; the less fuss I made, the better it would be for the children. The longer it took, the harder it was to hide my disappearance from them, which is why it was better to let them in on it right away. This would also give me the chance to sweetly and tenderly say goodbye forever. I didn’t think at all about that, but nonetheless it helped to play with the children. I drew close to them and snapped my fingers playfully. Johanna didn’t interfere and seemed satisfied that I would bring the situation to a reasonable end. When at last she began to doubt whether I was at all intending to say goodbye but, rather, was just stalling for time, she grabbed me by the hand and looked at me disapprovingly.

“You are insufferable. If you keep stalling, I can’t stop the men from coming in and making short work of you. What would all the philistines from this neighborhood think? How embarrassing, don’t let that into your head! You’re making things completely impossible for your widow, for the neighbors will cut me off and talk nasty behind my back. Nor will anyone play with the children! The landlord will give us notice, and that I will have to find another apartment is all the same to you. That’s the way people are these days! But if you don’t make a fuss and just lie down in the box, hats will bow to you and people will feel bad for the children. Then everything will be fine, and no one will know who you were.”

“Do you not want me around anymore?”

“But, Arthur, who do you think I am? Don’t you know me better than that? It’s not that way at all. Feelings are better left out of it. There’s no time for them.”

I no longer recognized the Johanna I once knew, she had changed that much. All the care with which she had coddled me was gone. Everything was now only for Johanna, and I was forsaken! But then I tried a risky approach.

“Little Eva, my dear Michael, pay attention! Do you want your father to stay? Your dear good papa?”

Michael didn’t let go of his car, the little one crouched down with her doll, yet I was satisfied, because both children looked up.

“It’s true, then, you love your papa?”

The children looked at me curiously, making no sound and not moving an inch. I wanted to draw closer and gather them in my arms, but Johanna stepped in between to protect them.

“Do the children not recognize me?”

“No. They think you’re dead.”

That was too much for me. I turned away from Johanna and the children and walked outside, where the men who had set down the coffin lazily grabbed hold of it and with heavy boots stomped on the hard cobblestones with one foot after another.

“Can we finally have the body?” the one in command asked in a level tone.

“No, you can’t! There is no dead man to have, or at least I’m the dead man.”

The man who had asked—there was no doubt, he was the one in charge—scratched himself with his long fingernails, making an awful sound.

“We don’t want anyone living. Only the dead! Where is he?”