Authors: Peter Stamm
In the vicarage the lights were on, and as soon as Michael stepped inside, he could smell the dinner that Mandy had cooked. And as he took off his sodden boots and his heavy coat, she stepped out into the kitchen doorway and looked anxiously at him. It had gotten cold, he said, and she said dinner was ready. Then Michael stepped up to Mandy, and he kissed her on the mouth, as she smiled up at him. Over supper they discussed one possible name for the baby, and then another one. And when it was bedtime they squeezed each other’s hands, and each went to their own room.
As it got colder and colder in January, and it was almost impossible to heat the old vicarage, Mandy moved one evening from the guest bedroom into the warmer room of the master of the house. She carried her blanket in front of her, and lay down beside Michael as he moved aside, without a word. And that night, and in all the nights to come, they lay in one bed, and so learned to know and to love one another better. And Michael saw everything, and Mandy was not ashamed.
But was it a sin? Who could know. And hadn’t Mandy’s own blood affirmed that it was a child of God that was growing, a child of purity? Could there be anything impure about purity?
Even if Michael hadn’t thought it possible, his word reached the people and the Communists of the village. They were touched by the wonder that had occurred, and one couldn’t say how: for such people came to the door and knocked. They came without many words, and brought what they had. A neighbor brought a cake. She had been baking, she said, and it was no more trouble to bake two than one. And was Mandy doing all right?
On another day, Marco the publican came around and asked how far along they were. Michael invited him in, and called Mandy, and made tea in the kitchen. Then the three of them sat at the table and were silent, because they didn’t
know what to say. Marco had brought along a bottle of cognac, and set it down in front of them. He knew full well, he said, that it wasn’t the right thing for a small baby, but maybe if it had a colic. Then he asked to have it explained to him, and when Michael did so, Marco looked at Mandy and her belly with disbelief. Was that certain? he asked, and Michael said no one knew, and no one could know. Because it was pretty unlikely, Marco said. He had picked up the cognac again, and was looking at the bottle. He seemed to hesitate, but then he put it back on the table, and said, three stars, that’s the best you can get hereabouts. Not the one I serve my customers. And he was a little confused, and he stood up and scratched his head. Back in the summer you rode pillion on my bike, he said, and he laughed, think of it. They’d gone bathing, the whole lot of them, in the lake outside F. Who’d have thought it.
When Marco left, Frau Schmidt was standing in the garden, with something she had knitted for the baby. With her was Nurse Ulla from the retirement home, whom Michael had suspected of being a Communist. But she was bringing something herself, a soft toy, and she wanted Mandy to touch her as well.
It was one after another. The table in the front room was covered with presents, and the cupboard housed a dozen or more bottles of schnapps. The children brought
drawings of Mandy and the baby, and sometimes Michael was in the pictures too, and perhaps an ass or an ox as well.
Before long the people were coming from W. and the other villages, wanting to see the expectant mother, to ask her advice on this or that matter. And Mandy gave them advice and comfort, and sometimes she would lay her hand on the arm or the head of the people, without saying anything. She had become so earnest and still that even Michael seemed to see her anew. And did all that needed to be done. In the village, various quarrels were settled during these days, and even the dogs seemed to be less ferocious when Michael walked down the street, and on some houses the straw stars and Christmas wreaths were back up on the doors again, and in the windows, because the whole village was rejoicing, as though Christmas was yet to come. Everyone knew it, but no one said it.
One time, Dr. Klaus came to see that all was well. But when he knocked on the door, Michael did not welcome him in. He sat upstairs with Mandy, and they were quiet as two children, and peeked out of the window until they saw the doctor leaving.
The next day, Michael went to W. to see the doctor. He poured schnapps, and asked how things stood with Mandy. Michael didn’t touch the schnapps. He merely
said everything was fine, and they didn’t need a doctor. And these stories that were making the rounds? He that is of the earth is earthly, and speaketh of the earth, said Michael. Be that as it may, said the doctor, the baby will be born on earth, and not in heaven. And if you need help, then call me, and I’ll come. Then they shook hands, and nothing more was said. Michael, though, went back to the retirement home in the village and spoke to Nurse Ulla. She had four children herself, and knew the ropes. And she promised him she would assist when the time came.
Then in February, the time came: the baby was born. Mandy was assisted by Michael, and by Nurse Ulla, whom he had called in. As word spread of the impending event, people gathered on the village streets to wait in silence. It was already dark when the baby was born, and Ulla stepped up to the window and held it aloft, that all might see it. And it was a girl.
Michael sat at Mandy’s bedside, holding her hand and looking at the baby. She’s no beauty, said Mandy, but that was more of a question. And Nurse Ulla asked the new mother where she meant to go with her baby, as she would no longer be able to run the minister’s household anymore. Then Michael said: He that hath the bride is the bridegroom. And he kissed Mandy in full view of the
nurse. And she later told everyone of it: that he had given his word.
Because the child could not be called Jesus, they called it Sandra. And as the people in the village believed it had been born for them, they didn’t mind that it was a girl. And all were contented and rejoiced.
The following Sunday attendance at church was greater than it had been for a long time. Mandy and the babe sat in the front pew. The organ was playing, and after it had played, Michael climbed up to the pulpit and spoke as follows: Whether this is a child that has long been awaited in the world, we do not know, and may not know. For you yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night. But ye, brethren, are not in darkness. For they that sleep sleep in the night; and they that be drunken are drunken in the night. But let us, who are of the day, be sober.
That which is born of the flesh is flesh, said Michael, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. But we, beloved, should be called the children of God.
Go Out into the Fields …
B
ACK THEN, THE
time you left Trouville and climbed the narrow path up the hill, and then crossed the harvested field to get a good view. The earth clung to your soles in thick clumps, the leather was sodden. There was this kid, a boy, ten years old or even younger. He watched as you crossed the field, set up your folding chair, and started sketching the landscape. First he watched you from a distance, then he slowly came closer, step by step, wary as a cat. His clothes were old and dirty, their color like the earth from which he emerged. His hair was slightly reddish, almost transparent when the sun struck it in the odd moments when it broke through the clouds. His nose was blocked and he sniffled
persistently. He kept his mouth slightly open to breathe, which distorted his otherwise pretty face, and gave it an expression of stupidity.
YOU GIVE HIM
a cloth from your paint box, a little scrap of linen you normally use to clean brushes.
Here, wipe your nose.
The way he stares at you. He wipes his nose and then wipes his neck too, as though he was sweating. But the weather is cool and he’s jacketless. It’s a gesture he must have copied from his father.
Do you live near here?
He nods and takes his cap off.
Is that your field?
He nods again, takes a step closer, and tries to take a peek into your sketchbook. His shoulders are hunched, as if in the expectation of blows. You can see in his face how the question has come about, via many detours. And then his fear of asking it. But his curiosity is too strong.
Why are you doing that, monsieur?
Why are you doing that? The most terrible of questions. The question you don’t even dare ask yourself. He doesn’t ask what you’re doing. He doesn’t seem to be stupid. He must have watched other painters.
Has he ever seen a painting? Maybe a saint in church. But a landscape? How futile it must seem to him, you standing there in his father’s field in your muddy boots, trying to capture the mouth of the river and the sea and the few houses in his village, the only one he knows.
You buy yourself off with a coin. He thanks you with a bow, and he’s gone, and you work on, quickly, so as not to miss the moment. You’ve almost missed the fishing boats in the river mouth. They’re on their way back to port.
It will rain later, and you will ask yourself where the boy is now, and whether he has a roof over his head. His question worries you. You ask yourself what quarter the clouds are coming from. Who cares? Weather is for farmers.
You are just hand and eye now. You hum a tune from Mozart, your Mozart. To paint the way he composed, with such facility and lightness. To paint in such a way that no one will ask any questions.
Why are you doing that? Because you’re a painter. Nothing else, just a painter.
WHEN YOU TRANSFERRED
the sketch in your studio, when you tried to remember the light and shade, and the reflexes on the sea—were there reflexes on the sea?—and the colors and the hues, all you could think about was
the boy and his question. The question you never asked yourself. Why are you doing that?
You could just carry on like that. You will carry on like that. Already you have material for a whole lifetime. Sketches. Folders full of sketches, a head full of landscapes ready to be painted. And every day there are more. Every landscape you see is a job for you. The sun rises and sets for you, the wind blows the clouds across the sky for you, the grass and the trees grow for you.
Why are you doing that? Why not? The pictures are good. You know how good they are. You love your pictures more than anything. Your little sketches. The walls of your studio are covered with them. And you love working in the open, being outdoors, contemplating landscapes, painting. Nothing but the changes in the light, the slow, almost imperceptible movement of the shadows. How irritating it always was, when you drew the street urchins in Rome and they ran off before you were finished. They left you with a load of unfinished sketches. Landscapes don’t run away.
You don’t paint them to show them off. You don’t exhibit your sketches. When your friends call on you in your studio, they want to see the big pieces you will exhibit, the landscapes with mythological or biblical scenes. They pass judgments that are baffling to you. You ignore them.
You’d rather do it wrong in your way than do it right according to the prescription of those twenty people. They all know better, give you advice, as if you didn’t know that you can’t pull off the big things, and why you can’t. The biblical figures, the mythological figures, basically they don’t interest you. Your true love is for the sketches, the little mood pieces.
If you could manage to depict the moment in just the way you sensed it, so that the boy in Trouville would recognize his village. That he might see the beauty of the village, the beauty of the moment. But who cares about such things?
Old Sennegon loved sunsets. In Rouen he went walking with you every evening. He told you Bible stories, always the same ones. It was as if he needed some pretext to be with you. The stories didn’t interest you. Stories and the past—they never interested you. What interests you is the present, the moment. Father Sennegon walked two paces ahead of you, his hands crossed behind his back. He spoke slowly and thoughtfully, and suddenly he stopped and said, Look, look at the colors of the clouds. As if you had been looking at anything else anyway.
You sat down on a bench and silently watched as the sun went down. Very slowly it grew dark. The changes were barely perceptible. Then, the second the sun dipped below the horizon, everything was different. That
terrible moment in which the light seems to die. You kept painting dusks, as if you wanted to stop time, to escape the certainty of death.
YOU ARE TWENTY-NINE YEARS OLD
. Soon you will leave your parents and travel to Italy. You must travel to Italy, if you are serious about becoming a painter. You are looking forward to the journey, but you’re a little afraid of it too. Everything will be different. You will meet new people, sleep in strange beds, learn another language. You are thinking about the women in Rome. You have visited the rue du Pelican once or twice, but the women in Rome are different. Michallon told you stories about them. And on that occasion you were interested in stories.
You’ve bought a suitcase and clothes for the journey, a broad-brimmed hat, paints and brushes. You are prepared. In a couple of days you will leave. When you walk through Paris now, everything looks completely different. It’s as though you were seeing it for the first time, it looks fresh and exciting. The beauty of the city is frightening to you. The last look is like the first.
You paint a self-portrait. Your father requested it. He wanted you to leave a picture of yourself. He will get on
better with your picture than with you. He won’t lose his temper with you for not getting up in the morning, for being absentminded, for wandering around aimlessly.
For the first time you look at yourself in the mirror with a painter’s eye. You’re not good-looking, but you like yourself. You smile. You will paint yourself smiling, with that smile with which you seduce women and drive your father white with rage. When he shouts at you and tells you to get on with it. You smile, and no one can do anything to you. You don’t shout, you just smile.
You sketch your face. You capture your likeness. You have always clung to pictures. When you were sent out on errands during your apprenticeship, you stopped in front of galleries and looked at the pictures, always the same pictures. Once, when one of them was suddenly not there—it was a study of Valenciennes—in your excitement you walked into the gallery to ask after the painting, to see it one last time. It was as though you’d lost a loved one. But then you didn’t dare. You said you’d gone in the wrong door, and you blushed and ran off.