Arch of Triumph

by Erich Maria Remarque

  Ravic thought he’d be unable to talk. He thought if he talked he would seize his glass, smash it against the edge of the table, and dig the sharp splinters into Haake’s eyes. He took the glass, carefully and with effort, emptied it, and put it quietly down again.

  “What is that?” Haake asked.

  “Pernod. A substitute for absinthe.”

  “Ah, absinthe. The stuff that makes the French impotent, eh?” Haake smiled. “Pardon me! Nothing personal intended.”

  “Absinthe is prohibited,” Ravic said. “This is a harmless substitute. Absinthe is said to make one sterile, not impotent. That’s why it is prohibited. This is anise. Tastes like licorice-water.”

  It worked, he thought. It worked and without much excitement either. He could answer, easily and smoothly. There was turmoil deep inside him, roaring and black—but the surface appeared calm.

  “Do you live here?” Haake asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Have you lived here long?”

  “Always.”

  “I understand,” Haake said. “A foreign German. Born here, eh?”

  Ravic nodded.

  Haake drank his fine. “Some of our best men are Germans born in foreign countries. Our Fuehrer’s deputy, born in Egypt. Rosenberg, in Russia. Darré comes from Argentina. It’s the political conviction that counts, eh?”

  “Only that,” Ravic replied.

  “I thought so.” Haake’s face radiated satisfaction. Then he bowed slightly across the table, and it seemed as if he clicked his heels under the table at the same time. “By the way—permit me—von Haake.”

  Ravic repeated the ceremony. “Horn.” It was one of his former pseudonyms.

  “Von Horn?” Haake asked.

  “Yes.”

  Haake nodded. He became more intimate. He had met a man of his own class. “You must know Paris well, eh?”

  “Fairly.”

  “I don’t mean the museums.” Haake grinned like a man of the world.

  “I know what you mean.”

  The Aryan superman would like to go slumming, and doesn’t know where to go, Ravic thought. If I could get him into a hidden corner somewhere, a lonely bistro, an out-of-the-way brothel—he deliberated quickly. Some place where he wouldn’t be disturbed and hindered.

  “There are all sorts of interesting things here, eh?” Haake asked.

  “You haven’t been in Paris long?”

  “I come here every other week for two or three days. Sort of a check-up. Pretty important. We have built up quite a few things here during the last year. It’s working out wonderfully. I can’t talk about it, but”—Haake laughed—“you can buy almost anything here. A corrupt lot. We know almost everything we want to know. We don’t even have to look for information. They bring it themselves. Treason as a form of patriotism. A result of the party system. Each party betrays the others and their country for their own profit. Our advantage. We have a great many friends here of our political persuasion. In the most influential circles.” He lifted his glass, examined it, found it empty, and put it down again. “They don’t even arm themselves. They think we won’t demand anything from them if they are unarmed. If you knew the number of their planes and tanks, you would laugh yourself sick at these candidates for suicide.”

  Ravic listened. He was all attention and yet everything swam around him as in a dream just before the awakening. The tables, the waiters, the sweet nocturnal commotion of life, the gliding rows of automobiles, the moon above the houses, the multicolored electric signs on the house fronts—and the garrulous manifold murderer opposite him who had ruined his life.

  Two women in short tailored suits passed by. They smiled at Ravic. It was Yvette and Marthe from the Osiris. They were having their day off.

  “Chic, Donnerwetter!” Haake said.

  A side-street, Ravic thought. A narrow empty side-street—if I could get him there. Or into the Bois. “Those are two ladies who live by love,” he said.

  Haake looked after them. “They’re very good-looking. The people here know all about that, don’t they?” He ordered another fine. “May I offer you a drink?”

  “Thanks, I’d rather stick to this one.”

  “They are supposed to have fantastic brothels here. Places with performances and that sort of thing.” Haake’s eyes glittered. They glittered as they had years ago in the stark light of the cellar.

  I must not think of that, Ravic thought. Not now. “Have you ever been in one?” he asked.

  “I have been in several. For observation, naturally. To see how low a people can sink. But surely not in the right ones. Of course I’ve got to be careful. It could be wrongly interpreted.”

  Ravic nodded. “You needn’t be afraid of that. There are places where tourists never come.”

  “Do you know about them?”

  “Of course. Quite a lot.”

  Haake drank his second fine. He became friendlier. The inhibitions he had had in Germany fell from him. Ravic felt that he was completely unsuspecting. “I intend to stroll about a bit tonight,” he said to Haake.

  “Indeed?”

  “Yes. I do it now and then. One should learn everything one can.”

  “Right! Absolutely right!”

  Haake stared straight at him for a moment. Get him drunk, Ravic thought. If it won’t work any other way, get him drunk and drag him off somewhere.

  Haake’s expression had changed. He was not tipsy, he was only lost in thought. “It’s a pity,” he said finally. “I would have liked to come with you.”

  Ravic did not reply. He wanted to avoid anything that might make Haake suspicious.

  “I must go back to Berlin tonight.” Haake looked at his watch. “In an hour and a half.”

  Ravic sat there completely calm. I must go with him, he thought. Surely he lives in a hotel. Not a private apartment. I must go with him to his room and catch him there.

  “I’m just waiting here for two acquaintances of mine,” Haake said. “Should be here any minute. They are traveling with me. My things are already at the station. We are going straight from here to the train.”

  I’ve lost, Ravic thought. Why haven’t I a gun with me? Why did I, idiot that I am, come to believe in recent months that what happened before was an hallucination? I could shoot him on the street and try to escape through a subway entrance.

  “It’s a pity,” Haake said. “But perhaps we can make it next time. I’ll be back again in two weeks.”

  Ravic breathed again. “All right,” he said.

  “Where do you live? I could call you up then.”

  “In the Prince de Galles. Just across the street.”

  Haake took a notebook out of his pocket and put down the address. Ravic looked at the elegant covers of flexible red Russian leather. The pencil was a thin gold one. What must be in there, he thought. Probably information that will lead to torture and death.

  Haake put his notebook back into his pocket. “Chic woman you were talking to before,” he said.

  Ravic had to think for a second. “Ah so—yes, very.”

  “In the movies?”

  “Something of that sort.”

  “Good acquaintance?”

  “Just that.”

  Haake looked straight ahead, meditatively. “That’s the difficulty here—to make the acquaintance of someone nice. One doesn’t have time enough and does not have the right opportunities—”

  “That can be arranged,” Ravic said.

  “Really? You aren’t interested?”

  “In what?”

  Haake laughed in embarrassment. “For instance, in the lady with whom you spoke?”

  “Not in the least.”

  “Donnerwetter, that wouldn’t be bad. Is she French?”

  “Italian, I think. And a few other races mixed in.”

  Haake grinned. “Not bad. Naturally at home we can’t have that. But here one is incognito, to some extent.”

  “Are you?” Ravic asked.

  Haake was ta
ken aback for a second. Then he grinned. “I understand! Of course not for those in the know—but otherwise, strictly incognito. Besides, it just occurs to me—have you any contact with refugees?”

  “Very little,” Ravic said carefully.

  “That’s a pity! We would like to have certain—you understand, information—we even pay for it—” Haake raised his hand “—naturally that’s out of the question in your case! Nevertheless, the smallest item of news …”

  Ravic noticed that Haake went on looking at him. “It’s possible,” he said. “You can never tell—it may happen sometime.”

  Haake moved his chair closer. “One of my tasks, you know. Connections from the inside to the outside. Sometimes it is difficult to get at them. We have good people working here.” He raised his eyebrows meaningfully. “With us it is something else, of course. It’s a matter of honor. It’s the fatherland, isn’t it?”

  “Of course.”

  Haake looked up. “My acquaintances are arriving.” He put a few notes on the china plate after he had added up the amount. “It’s convenient that the prices are always on the saucers. We might initiate that at home.” He stood up and extended his hand. “Auf Wiedersehen, Herr von Horn. I am very pleased to have met you. I’ll call you in two weeks.” He smiled. “Discretion, of course.”

  “Of course. Don’t forget.”

  “I never forget anything. Not a face or an appointment. I can’t afford to. That’s my profession.”

  Ravic stood before him. He felt as if he would have to push his arm through a wall of cement. Then he felt Haake’s hand in his. It was small and surprisingly soft.

  He stood there undecided for another moment and followed Haake with his eyes. Then he sat down again. Suddenly he felt himself trembling. After a while he paid and left. He went in the direction in which Haake had gone. Then he recalled that he had seen him and the other two step into a taxi. There would have been no point in driving after them. Haake had already checked out of his hotel. If he had happened to see him again somewhere he would only become suspicious. He turned around and went to the International.

  “You were being sensible,” Morosow said. They were sitting in front of a café on the Rond Point.

  Ravic looked at his right hand. He had washed it with alcohol a number of times. He had felt foolish for doing it, but he could not help it. Now his skin was dry as parchment.

  “You would have been crazy if you had tried anything,” Morosow said. “Good thing you were unarmed.”

  “Yes,” Ravic replied without conviction.

  Morosow looked at him. “You aren’t such an idiot that you want to be tried for murder or for attempted murder?”

  Ravic did not answer.

  “Ravic—” Morosow put the bottle down hard on the table. “Don’t be a fantast!”

  “I am not. But can’t you understand that it sickens me to have missed this opportunity? Two hours earlier and I could have dragged him off somewhere—or could have done something else—”

  Morosow filled the two glasses. “Drink this! Vodka. You’ll get him later.”

  “Or not.”

  “You’ll get him. He’ll come back. That sort of fellow comes back. You’ve hooked him thoroughly. Prost!”

  Ravic emptied his glass.

  “I could still go to the Gare du Nord. To see whether he leaves.”

  “Of course. You could also try to shoot him there. Twenty years in the penitentiary at least. Have you any more ideas like that?”

  “Yes. I could watch to see whether he really leaves.”

  “And be seen by him and ruin everything.”

  “I should have asked him at which hotel he was staying.”

  “And make him suspicious.” Morosow refilled their glasses. “Listen, Ravic. I know you’re sitting here now and thinking you’ve done everything wrong. Get rid of it! Smash something to bits if you feel like it. Something big and not too expensive. The palm garden at the International, for all I care.”

  “No point in that.”

  “Then talk. Talk about it until you get sick of it. Talk it out of your system. Talk yourself calm. You aren’t a Russian, otherwise you would understand that.”

  Ravic straightened up. “Boris,” he said. “I know rats must be exterminated and one should not get into a biting match with them. But I can’t talk about it. Instead of that I’ll think about it. I’ll think how I can do it. I’ll prepare for it like an operation. As far as one can prepare for anything. I’ll get used to it. I have two weeks’ time. That’s good. That’s damned good. I can get used to being calm. You are right. One can talk things to death and so become calm and deliberate. But one can also think things to death and attain the same end. Hatred. Think it to death coldly, purposefully. I’ll kill so often in my thoughts that it will be like a habit when he returns. One acts more deliberately and calmly the thousandth time than the first time. And now let us talk. But about something else. About those roses there if you like! Look at them! They are like snow in this sultry night. Like white foam on the restless surf of the night. Are you satisfied now?”

  “No,” Morosow said.

  Ravic remained silent.

  “I’ll be satisfied when we’ve talked about it a hundred times,” Morosow said.

  “All right. Take a good look at this summer. The Summer of 1939. It smells of sulphur. The roses look like snow on a mass grave in the coming winter. We are a gay people in spite of it, aren’t we? Long live the century of nonintervention! Of the petrifaction of moral instincts! There is much killing going on tonight, Boris. Every night! Much killing! Cities are burning, dying Jews are wailing somewhere, Czechs are perishing miserably in the woods, Chinese are burning in Japanese gasoline, the whip-death is creeping through concentration camps—are we going to be sentimental women when it comes to eliminating a murderer? We’ll find and exterminate him, that’s all, as we have had to do often enough with innocent people who only differed from us in the uniforms they wore—”

  “All right,” Morosow said. “Or rather better. Have you ever learned what can be done with a knife? A knife makes no sound.”

  “Don’t bother me with that tonight. I must sleep somehow. The devil knows whether I’ll be able to, in spite of my faking of being so calm. Can you understand that?”

  “Yes.”

  “Tonight I’ll kill and kill. In two weeks I’ll be an automaton. The problem is how I can get through that time. Through the time until I can first sleep. Getting drunk won’t help. Neither would an injection. I must fall asleep exhausted. Then it will be all right next day. You understand?”

  Morosow sat in silence for a while. “Get yourself a woman,” he said then.

  “How could that help?”

  “It can. It’s always good to sleep with a woman. Call up Joan. She’ll come.”

  Joan. Yes, she had been with him before. She had been talking about something. He had forgotten it. “I am not a Russian,” Ravic said. “Any other proposals?”

  “Simple ones. Only the most simple ones.”

  “That was no simple one.”

  “Good God! Don’t be complicated! The simplest way to tear oneself away from a woman is to sleep with her again occasionally. Not to let your fantasy run wild with you. Who wants to dramatize a natural act?”

  “Yes,” Ravic said. “Who wants to?”

  “Then let me telephone,” Morosow interrupted him. “I’ll get you something. I’m not a doorman for nothing.”

  “Stay here. It’s all right this way. Let us drink and look at the roses. Dead faces in the full moonlight after machine-gun fire can look just as white as that. Once I saw that in Spain. Heaven is an invention of the Fascists, the metal-worker Pablo Nonas said at that time. He had only one leg. He became somewhat embittered against me because I had not preserved his other leg in alcohol. He felt as though one-fourth of him had been buried. He did not know that the dogs had stolen and eaten it—”

  25

  VEBER CAME INTO the dressing
-supply room. He motioned to Ravic. They went out. “Durant is on the telephone. He wants you to drive over immediately. Something about a special case and particular circumstances.”

  Ravic looked at him. “That means he’s bungled an operation and wants to pin the responsibility on me, eh?”

  “I don’t think so. He’s very excited. Apparently he doesn’t know what to do.”

  Ravic shook his head. Veber remained silent. “How does he happen to know that I am back?” Ravic asked.

  Veber shugged his shoulders. “I’ve no idea. Very likely through one of the nurses.”

  “Why doesn’t he call up Binot? Binot is very capable.”

  “I told him that. He explained to me that this is a particularly complicated case. In your special field.”

  “Nonsense. There are very efficient doctors in Paris for every special field. Why doesn’t he call up Marteau? He’s one of the best surgeons in the world.”

  “Can’t you imagine why?”

  “Naturally. He doesn’t want to disgrace himself in front of his colleagues. It is different with an illegal refugee doctor. He must keep his mouth shut.”

  Veber looked at him. “It is urgent. Will you go?”

  Ravic tore open the strings of his gown. “Of course,” he said. “What else can I do? But only if you come with me.”

  “All right. We can take my car.”

  They went downstairs. Veber’s car stood glittering in the sun in front of the hospital. They got in. “I’ll work only if you are present,” Ravic said. “God knows otherwise this fellow might try to trap me.”

  “I don’t believe he’s thinking of anything like that just now.”

  The car started. “I’ve seen all kinds of things happen,” Ravic said. “I knew a young assistant doctor in Berlin who had everything to make him a good surgeon. His professor was operating; half drunk; made a wrong incision; said nothing; let the assistant doctor take over; he did not notice anything; half a minute later the professor made a scene; held the young doctor responsible for the wrong incision. The patient died during the operation. The young doctor a day later. Suicide. The professor went on operating and drinking.”