The Post Office Girl

by Stefan Zweig

  “We’ll take it slow, Christine, step by step. No diving into this. No fantasies or false hopes. Let’s think. Pack it in today and we’re finished with everything. One little movement and life is over. Actually a wonderful idea—I still remember the way my high-school teacher used to preach that the only respect in which man is superior to animals is that he can die when he wants to, not just when he has to. Maybe it’s the one freedom you can always count on—the freedom to throw your life away. But the two of us, we’re still young, we don’t know what we’d be throwing away. We’d just be throwing away a life we didn’t want, a life we rejected, and yet it’s conceivable there’s another we might welcome. Life is different with money—at least I believe it is, and so do you. And if we believe in something—you do understand me?—then our ‘no’ to life isn’t completely true, and we’d be destroying something we have no right to destroy, the unlived life in us, the chance for something new, maybe something magnificent. That handful of money might allow something still unrealized inside me to flourish, something that can’t emerge now, that’s wilting like this stalk I’ve broken off, wilting just because I’ve broken it off. Something that would grow in me. And you? You might have children, you might … Who can say? … And the very fact that there’s no way to know is wonderful … You understand me, I think … The kind of life that’s behind us isn’t worth living, scraping along miserably from one week to the next, from one day off till the next one. But maybe, maybe it’s possible to make something of it, it would just take courage, more courage than the other way. And if it goes wrong after all, a gun isn’t hard to find. So what do you think … if the money’s pretty much there for the taking, why not just take it?”

  “Yes, but … but where would we go with the money?”

  “Abroad. I know foreign languages, I speak French, I even speak it very well, I speak excellent Russian, a little English too, and the rest can be learned.”

  “Yes, but … they’ll investigate, don’t you think they’d find us?”

  “I don’t know, no one can know that. Possibly, even probably, but maybe not. I think it depends more on us—whether we can stick it out, whether we’re smart enough, careful enough, whether we think things through properly. Of course it’ll be a terrible strain on us—probably not a good life, with people hunting us, being eternally on the run. I can’t speak for you. Do you have the guts? You’ve got to be sure.”

  Christine tried to think. It was all so sudden. She said, “On my own I don’t have the courage for anything. I’m a woman—I can’t do anything just for myself, I can only do something for someone else, with someone else. But for two people, for you, I can do anything. So if it’s what you want … ”

  He picked up his pace.

  “That’s just it, I don’t know if it’s what I want. You say it’s easy for you with someone else. For me it would be easier alone. I’d know what I was getting into. A ruined, mangled life—fine, chuck it. But I’d be worried about dragging you along. It wasn’t your idea, it was mine. I don’t want to drag you into anything, I don’t want to seduce you into doing anything, and if you’re going to do something, you’ve got to do it for your own sake, not for mine.”

  Little lights emerged behind the trees. They were coming to the end of the path across the fields. Soon they’d be at the station.

  Christine was still dazed. “But … how are you going to do this,” she said anxiously. “I don’t understand. Where will we go? I always read in the paper about how they catch all these people. So what are you picturing?”

  “I haven’t even begun to think about it. You overestimate me. Ideas come in a flash, but only fools act on them without thinking. That’s why they always get caught. There are two kinds of crimes (to use the word conventionally): crimes of passion and crimes that are premeditated, thought out beforehand. The crimes of passion may be more beautiful, but most of them go wrong. Those clerks who raid the till in order to go to the races, sure they’ll win or somehow the boss won’t notice, they all believe in miracles. But I don’t believe in miracles, I know that the two of us are completely alone, all alone against a vast organization that’s been built up over centuries and commands the expertise and experience of thousands of individual investigators. The individual detective may be an idiot and I may be a hundred times smarter and more cunning, but they have experience and the system is behind them. If we—notice I’m still saying ‘if’—if we really decide to do this, it can’t be reckless or childish. What’s done rashly is done badly. It has to be planned down to the last detail—every contingency has to be worked out. It’s a matter of probabilities. Let’s think it all through carefully and precisely. Come to Vienna on Sunday and we’ll decide then, not now.”

  He stopped, his voice suddenly brighter. It was his other voice, the child’s voice hidden inside him that she loved.

  “Isn’t it amazing? This afternoon you went back to work and I went for a walk. I looked at the world again—it was the last time, I thought. There it was, so bright and beautiful, so full of warm sunny life, and there I was, still fairly young and quick and spirited. I reckoned everything up and asked myself what I’d actually accomplished in this world, and the answer was painful. Sad to say, I haven’t acted or thought for myself at all. At school I studied what the teachers wanted me to study and thought what they wanted me to think. In the war they gave me orders and I went through all their drills and paces. When I was a prisoner I had just one wild dream—someday I’ll be out!—but doing nothing wore me down, and when I got home I toiled for other people, mindlessly, aimlessly, just for a scrap of food and a pittance so I could go on breathing. Sunday will be the first time I’ve had a chance to think for a while about something that concerns me alone, me and you; and I’m looking forward to it. You know, I’d like us to build it like a bridge, a structure where every nail and screw has to be in its place and a millimeter’s difference is enough to bring it down. I want to build this thing to last for years. It’s a great responsibility, I know, but for the first time it’s my responsibility—yours too—not some squalid little responsibility like what they give you in the military or in those companies where you’re just a nobody answering to somebodies you don’t even know. Whether we do it or not, we’ll have to see—but still, just to have an idea, to think it through, work it out, and calculate the alternatives down to the ultimate consequences, that’ll be a pleasure I’d never expected to have. It’s good I came today.”

  They were near the station; they could make out the lights distinctly. They stopped.

  “Better not come with me. Half an hour ago it wouldn’t have mattered whether anyone saw us together. Now I can’t be seen with you—that’s” (he laughed) “part of our great plan. Nobody can suspect that you have an accomplice, and if someone was able to describe me that wouldn’t help us a bit. Christine, we have to start thinking of everything now, I told you it won’t be easy, the other way would have been easier. But on the other hand I’ve never known, we’ve never known, what it is to be alive. I’ve never seen the ocean, I’ve never been abroad. I’ve never known what life is—always thinking about what everything costs means we’ve never been free. Maybe we can’t know the value of life until we are. Sit tight and stay calm, don’t worry, I’m going to work everything out down to the last detail, on paper even, and then we’ll review it point by point and weigh the possibilities. And then we’ll decide. Do you want to?”

  “Yes,” she said, loud and clear.

  The wait until Sunday was unbearable for Christine. For the first time she was afraid of herself, afraid of people, afraid of things. It became a torment to unlock the till in the morning, handle the banknotes. Were they hers, or were they government property? Were they all still there? She counted and recounted the blue bills and never got to the end of it—either her hand began to tremble or she lost track of the total. Her confidence was gone, and with it any objectivity. She was uncertain, confused: she thought everyone must know her intentions, be in o
n her fears, be watching her and spying on her. “This is madness,” she reasoned with herself. “I’ve done nothing. We’ve done nothing. Everything’s in order, every banknote’s in the safe, the accounts balance, let anyone inspect them.” But it did no good: she couldn’t bear people’s eyes on her, and when the telephone rang, she quailed and needed all her strength to lift the receiver to her ear. And she nearly passed out when, on Friday morning, the policeman came in unexpectedly, his tread heavy and his bayonet clanking. She clutched the table with both hands as though hanging on for dear life, but the policeman, his Virginia cigar in the corner of his mouth, only wanted to send a money order to the young mother of his illegitimate child, his monthly payment, and he joked with good-natured acerbity about how long he’d be paying for his brief pleasure. But she couldn’t laugh, and her hand shook as she filled out the money order. Only when the door banged shut behind him was she able to breathe again, pulling out the drawer to convince herself that the money was still there, 32,712 schillings and 40 groschen, precisely as entered in the ledger. At night she couldn’t sleep, and when she did she had frightful dreams, since imagination is always more terrible than reality, and what has yet to happen is more dreadful than what already has.

  On Sunday morning Ferdinand was waiting at the station. He looked at her closely. “Poor thing! You look terrible, you’re a nervous wreck. You’ve been worrying, haven’t you? I was afraid of that. It was probably a mistake to tell you beforehand. But it’ll be over soon. Today we’ll reach our decision, whether to go forward or not.”

  She glanced at him. His eyes were bright, his gestures vigorous and free. He noticed her eyeing him.

  “Yes, I’m feeling fine. It’s been ages since I felt as good as I’ve been feeling these last few days. At last I know the pleasure of thinking something out for myself, just for me and all on my own … Not just a tiny bit of some project I don’t care about, but something I’m building from the ground up, for me and nobody else. A castle in the air for all I know, maybe it’ll tumble down in an hour. Maybe you’ll blow it away with a word, maybe we’ll demolish it together. Even if we do, for once it was my own work and it was fun to do. I had a hell of a good time thinking through every last contingency, working out a campaign against every army, state, police force, newspaper, testing it in theory against every earthly power, and now I’m in the mood for real war. At worst we’ll lose, but when did we ever win? Well, you’ll soon see!”

  They left the station. Fog shrouded the buildings in gray chill. Porters and attendants waited with lifeless faces. Everything was dank; the damp chill turned every word into a puff of condensation. There was no warmth in the world. He took her arm to steer her through the traffic on the street. She gave a nervous start.

  “What is it, what’s wrong?”

  “Nothing,” she said. “I’m just so scared. Whenever anyone speaks to me, I think I’m under observation. I have the idea that everyone knows what I’m thinking. I know it’s silly, but I feel it’s written on my forehead, I’m terrified the people in the village have gotten wind of everything. When the forest ranger’s assistant asked me on the train, ‘So what are you up to in Vienna?,’ I turned so red that he began to laugh, and then I was glad. Better he think that than the other thing. But tell me, Ferdinand” (she pressed close to him) “it won’t always be this way, will it, if we … if we actually do it? Because I know I’m not strong enough for that. I couldn’t stand always living in fear like that, being afraid of everyone, not being able to sleep, not sleeping because I’m afraid of a knock at the door. It won’t always be this way, will it?”

  “No,” he replied, “I don’t think so. That’s only here, where you’re living your old life. Once you’re out there in different clothes, with a different name, in another world, you’ll forget the person you were. You told me yourself about how once you were someone completely different. The danger would be to go into this with a bad conscience. If you feel it’s wrong to rob that robber baron, the state, then that’s definitely not good and I’ll call it quits. As for me, I feel totally justified. I know I got shafted, and I’m risking my skin on my own account and not in a war for a dead idea, for the House of Hapsburg or Mitteleuropa or some other political abstraction that has nothing to do with me. But, as I said, nothing’s been decided yet, we’re just ‘playing with ideas,’ and playing is supposed to be fun. Buck up, I know you’ve got what it takes.”

  She took a deep breath. “I think I can stand a certain amount, you’re right, and I also know we have nothing to lose. I’ve endured plenty, but this part is just so hard, the uncertainty. Once it’s done, you can count on me.”

  They went on. “Where are we going?” she asked.

  He smiled. “Strange, the whole thing was so easy, it was downright fun to consider the various alternatives about the escape and where to hide out and how to stay safe, and I really think I’ve worked out every detail—I can confidently say: it’s right, it works. I figured everything out, it was child’s play to plan out how we’ll get by and be safe once we have money. There was just one thing I wasn’t able to do—find a place, four walls, a room where we can discuss the whole thing in peace, and once again it was clear that it’s easier to live for ten years with money than for a single day without it. Really, Christine” (he smiled at her almost proudly) “finding a place where we wouldn’t be seen or heard was more trouble than our entire scheme. I considered every option. It’s too cold to walk out into the country, in a hotel someone might overhear—and I know you’d be anxious and upset—and we need to focus. In an inn the staff would be watching, especially if it’s empty. Outside we’d attract attention because we’d be sitting in the cold. Yes, Christine, no one would ever believe how hard it is to be really alone in a city of millions when you don’t have money. I came up with the wildest ideas, I even thought about climbing up St. Stephen’s. Nobody goes up there in fog like this—but that’s too absurd. Finally I approached the watchman at my old work site, the one that’s been shut down. He’s got a wooden shack there, a hut with a cast-iron stove, a table, and, I think, a single chair. I know the guy, and I gave him a long song and dance about a posh Polish lady I know from the war who lives with her husband in the Hotel Sacher and is too classy and well-known to be seen with me on the street. You can imagine how astonished the dolt was, and of course he considered it a great honor to be of service. We’ve known each other for a long time, and I’ve gotten him out of trouble twice. He’s leaving the key under the boards along with his identification so we’ll be safe even if something goes wrong, and he’s promised to light the stove in the morning. We’ll be alone there, it won’t be comfortable, but since what’s at stake is a better life, we can stand crawling into that doghouse for a couple of hours. No one will hear us there, no one will see us. We can make our decision in peace.”

  In Floridsdorf, far outside the city center, the construction site was boarded up and deserted. The forlorn abandoned building was a shell, with a hundred empty windows like unseeing eyes. Tar barrels, wheelbarrows, piles of cement bags, and bricks lay in wild disorder on the sodden ground—as if some natural disaster had interrupted the bustle of construction. For a workplace the quiet was unnatural. The key was under the boards. The damp fog kept out prying eyes; Ferdinand unlocked the little wooden hut, and the stove was in fact burning, it was warm and comfortable inside, with a nice smell of wood. He closed the door behind them and threw a few pieces of wood into the stove. “If someone comes, I’ll toss the papers in. Nothing can happen, don’t worry, and besides, nobody can come, nobody can hear, we’re alone.”

  Christine stood in the room, feeling she didn’t belong there. Everything seemed unreal; the only real thing was Ferdinand. He pulled some big sheets of paper out of his pocket, unfolded them, and said, “Please sit down, Christine, and pay attention. This is the plan, I’ve worked it out precisely, written it out three times, four times, five times; I think it’s completely clear now. I want you to read it through caref
ully point by point. Where something seems wrong to you, I’ll pencil in your questions or objections on the right, and then we’ll discuss them all together when you’re done. There’s a lot at stake, nothing can be improvised. But first something else that’s not in this outline. Something concerning the two of us that has to be discussed. So. We’re doing this together, you and I. In so doing we’ll be equally culpable, although I fear that the law will regard you as the true perpetrator. You are the official in charge, they’re going to search for you and pursue you, you’ll be a criminal in your family’s eyes, in everyone’s eyes; whereas, as long as we’re at large, no one’s going to know about me as the accomplice and plotter. So you have a bigger role than I do. And you have a job which would provide you with a living and a pension to see you through to the end of your life; I have nothing. So I’m risking a lot less in the eyes of the law and before—how to put it—let’s say before God. Our roles are unequal. You’re assuming a bigger risk—it’s my duty to warn you of that.” He saw her look down.

  “I had to be tough in telling you that, and I’m going to go on that way, not hiding any of the risks. First and foremost: what you are going to do, what we are going to do, will be irrevocable. There will be no going back. Even if we made millions with the money and repaid it five times over, you’ll never be able to come back here again and no one will pardon you. We’ll be cast out once and for all from the ranks of upright, honorable, trustworthy citizens, and for as long as we live we’ll be in danger. You’ve got to be aware of that. And no matter how careful we are, some accident, something we haven’t thought of, haven’t foreseen, might snatch us out of our fine new carefree lives and throw us into prison and, as they say, disgrace. In a venture like this there’s no such thing as security. We won’t be secure when we’re over the border, we’re not secure today and won’t be secure tomorrow or ever. You have to look at it as a duelist looks at his opponent’s pistol. The shot might miss, it might hit him, but one way or another he’s looking down the barrel.”