Magic Hoffmann

by Arjouni, Jakob

  ‘You mean the hat?’

  ‘Don’t I look like Bocuse?’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘You again,’ Nickel punched him on the shoulder, ‘what a wag!’

  Then he took Fred to one side and whispered: ‘Annoyingly, a friend of Lycka’s has dropped by and we couldn’t send her away. Lycka knows about everything, but in front of Heike we’d better not talk about...you know what I mean.’

  ‘And when will we talk about you know what?’

  ‘After dinner. I’ve prepared everything.’

  Nickel showed Fred down a short hall into the living room. The enormous room took up almost the whole ground floor. With polished floor boards, beams on the ceiling, white plaster walls and any amount of antique peasant furniture, the room looked like it belonged in a lifestyle magazine. Lighting was provided by candles throughout the room and a ceiling lamp of colourful stained glass. The outline of a garden with fruit trees could be seen through a sliding glass door. The only thing that stood out from the rustic idyll was the dining table with its orange plastic table cloth and blue Chinese bowls, spoons and teacups.

  Two women stood at the sliding door. Two women, one type: sociable, clever, self-confident. Both had oval faces, pointed noses and practical short haircuts. Both wore flat shoes, freshly washed jeans and dark pullovers. Both had rolled up their sleeves, and they greeted Fred with a powerful handshake. And both gave him an old-fashioned look when he turned his back on them.

  Then they sat down at the orange plastic table cloth, and Nickel served dinner. There was rice, rice and rice. Accompanied by tea. No alcohol, no mounds of meat. Fred tried not to show his surprise.

  ‘I thought you wouldn’t know these different preparations. This one’s with onions and various spices, this one’s with aubergine paste, this is with mango - all vegetarian, try them all,’ insisted Nickel, as if trying out what was on the table were somewhat weird.

  ‘Why be extravagant when simple things taste better, don’t you think?’

  Then he laughed and Lycka and Heike joined in. Students, Fred remembered.

  In fact Lycka was an articled clerk in a lawyer’s office. Having moved to Berlin three years ago from Hildesheim, she met Nickel at a church function. A wild man, she thought as he stood next to her with his beret and long hair, listening closely to the lecture about vanished Indian cultures. Admittedly she’d subsequently talked him out of the beret, and the length of the hair often came up for discussion, but from the point of view of their character and common interests she felt they went well together. They had planned the pregnancy, then bought the house so the child would have a garden, then conceived the child, produced the child, and now they were thinking of planning a second. They had a large circle of friends, looked after an elderly neighbour and went to the cinema once a week. They still felt comfortable in the East, even if the initial enthusiasm had given way to a more sober assessment. Lycka used a humorous comparison to explain the situation to good friends from the West: very pleasant but rather simple-minded people, in whose company she felt like a white woman in the bush; she often wore grimy clothes deliberately, and she always took the trouble to give good advice.

  When the rice had been distributed, Nickel raised his steaming teacup. ‘If I may toast in Chinese, so to speak: to my friend Fred! As you know,’ he turned to the women, ‘he has been travelling for a long time. Now he’s back home.’ He blinked at Fred. ‘And I hope we never depend on the post again for so long to hear from each other.’

  They clinked glasses, and the women looked curiously at Fred. Fred nodded, said ‘thank you’ and burned his tongue.

  Nickel resolved: ‘Enjoy!’

  All four leaned over their bowls, and Fred chewed away, his initial dismay giving way to reassurance - at least the rice hadn’t been spiced with his two hundred thousand. Still the uneasy feeling remained that each tiny element of the decor had cost more than the entire meal, and that the recipes seemed to come from Nickel’s Rosicrucian mother. Yesterday evening Nickel had answered the question about his parents by saying he’d had nothing to do with them for a long time and that was fine by him. Did Nickel know his cooking was just like his mother’s?

  For a while they talked about this and that. Heike was studying Romance languages and literatures, but before that she’d had a go at architecture and theatre studies and even philosophy, and that led to a lot of refined debate. Then Lycka told a few anecdotes about life in a lawyer’s office, Nickel cursed - without reason, but nonetheless vehemently - typical German behaviour, whereupon Heike complained about a professor who was giving her bad, that is to say racially motivated, marks. Her grandfather had been Belgian, and you could spot it a mile off. ‘Culture is culture,’ agreed Nickel, ‘it’s what differentiates people. And I don’t mean that judgementally. Of course there are certain cultures which can tolerate each other less well. Such as the Rumanian - now, if I’m to be quite honest...’

  He left the sentence unfinished and smiled at the assembled company. Heike nodded and helped herself to more rice. ‘I always notice it in the university canteen: the others load up their plates so much...’ she made a sweeping gesture, ‘I only take this much...’ She looked as if she were stroking a mouse. ‘And then they keep asking me if I’m not hungry, and then I understand: my grandfather was Belgian. These Teutonic portions are not for me.

  Nickel and Lycka nodded and chewed noisily in agreement. Fred observed Heike from behind his spoon and felt she was putting on a fair bit of weight, despite the small portions. Not out of the question that her father was Belgian.

  ‘There are two sides to everything,’ said Nickel, ‘naturally we’re in favour of multiculturalism, but when you see what’s going on around the world - well, I’m just happy our borders are secure against fanatics.’

  Lycka nodded. ‘And if anyone needs to protect themselves against fanatics, it’s us - with sane immigration laws Hitler couldn’t have become Chancellor!’ She laughed, and Heike and Nickel joined in. Fred felt as if he were back in maths class, when his fellow pupils had all cheerfully worked out the decimal place, like rolling off a log.

  ‘The worst thing these days is this uranium smuggling.’ Lycka continued. ‘If a Russian brings one full suitcase in, that’s enough to poison the whole of Germany. Just imagine: a single Russian! And how many come every year...? If it were up to me, and I say this as a mother: the Russians...’ she made a gesture like a conductor silencing an orchestra.

  Then they talked about all kinds of other horrors in the world - hunger, drugs, wars - and they were all of the view that central Europe must stick together. Lycka kept doling out the rice, and eventually Nickel enquired if Fred had found his way with no problem. Fred told them about the remarkable conversation he’d eavesdropped on in the tube, and asked if it could really have been about cars. Whereupon the other three looked at each other and laughed, and Nickel said: ‘Yes, yes, the Ossis and their cars.’

  Fred looked anxiously round the table, but nobody seemed to want to explain the thing to him. He had already been struck several times by this amused repetition of sentences and these cryptic smiles. As if this were some game: whoever doesn’t know what we’re not saying is out.

  After the third portion of rice, Fred put his spoon down. ‘Nickel, how about you show me your son?’

  ‘But...’ Nickel pointed to his newly filled bowl.

  ‘Sorry, but I don’t have that much time.’

  Nickel and Lycka exchanged glances.

  ‘All right then.’ Nickel dabbed at his lips with the serviette. ‘But you’ll have to be quiet.’

  The nursery was on the first floor.

  Fred looked up from the little sleeping head in the cot and nodded. ‘OK, sweet. And now to my money.’

  Nickel shook his head, smiling. ‘Just wait till you’ve got one yourself. Now all you can see is a baby, but then...!’

  He ushered Fred out of the nursery and took him next door, into a room with a desk and bookcase
s. He bent down and removed a small metal box from behind a pile of newspapers.

  ‘Now,’ he said, as he put it on the table and rubbed his hands, ‘the treasure has been raised.’

  Fred had a sinking feeling at the sight of the box.

  ‘You should know,’ Nickel explained, ‘that in the first couple of years detectives from the bank kept appearing at my place and Annette’s, looking for the money. They are probably surveying us to this day, and it wouldn’t surprise me if someone had been following you since your release.’

  Fred responded to Nickel’s enquiring look with a shrug of his shoulders. He had been stuck in there for four years, and his instinct had long since told him that this had made him the rightful owner of the money. The idea that the bank might take a different view was almost a new one on him.

  ‘Well, maybe they’ve written it off in the mean time. Either way, I’ve taken all possible precautions. Not one pfennig of the money has surfaced. For example, Lycka’s father paid for the house.’ He lowered his voice. ‘That’s why he keeps having free holidays in Sweden - you get it?’

  Fred didn’t answer. Where was his share?

  ‘But you don’t need to worry about that. The most important thing is,’ Nickel beamed as he knocked on the metal box, ‘in here is a monthly income of two thousand five hundred marks for the rest of your days, with no tax or other deductions, money from Luxembourg, ready to blow.’

  Fred stared at the box, then he raised his eyes and stared at Nickel. Slowly, he put his hands in his trouser pockets and felt for his cigarettes.

  ‘What does this mean?’

  ‘What does it mean? It means you’ll never have to worry about money again.’ Nickel made haste to open the box and withdraw various papers.

  ‘Here... all at top rates of interest. If you don’t touch the capital, you’ll be able to cash it in one thousand years from now.’

  ‘A thousand years...’

  ‘Just a figure of speech. Of course it would be even better if you could leave the interest in the account. Then you’ll be a rich man soon.’

  Fred lit a cigarette and took a couple of puffs in silence. After a while he said, without looking at Nickel: ‘I want it in cash.’

  ‘Pardon?’

  ‘Cash: notes, readies! And I want it soon. Close these accounts and get it for me.’

  ‘But Fred!’ Nickel’s mouth was wide open. ‘That... that can’t be done, and anyway... are you mad? What would you do with all that money?’

  ‘Travel to Canada.’

  ‘But you can. You simply have it sent over to you monthly. It’s even better, you don’t run the risk of the German tax authorities getting on your case one day.’

  Fred shook his head. ‘I want cash. That was the deal, and that’s what we’ll do.’

  Nickel stared at him in amazement. Then he looked ahead at the desk, gathered the papers up slowly and put them back in the box. His expression changed to one of cold concern. ‘Well,’ he sighed, ‘I can’t do it. My money is bound up with yours, and I have no desire to go broke just because you want to chuck yours out of the window. That is a carefully calculated investment system, and you can’t simply break off in the middle.’

  Fred raised his eyebrows. ‘So...?’

  And suddenly he had to laugh. It all seemed so pitiful to him. He reflected briefly that he was wanted by the police, though he didn’t think that Nickel would know, and he said: ‘We’ll have to see. As far as I know the statute of limitations doesn’t yet apply. If you don’t free up the money within a week, I’m turning you in.’

  ‘What...?’ Nickel paused, his hands on the box. Then he attempted to laugh. ‘You can’t be serious!’

  ‘And until I have the money, you can give me your credit cards. The faster you move, the less you’ll find missing from your account afterwards.’

  ‘But Fred. This is crazy! That way you’ll ... you’ll destroy my life. If I close the accounts I won’t be able to pay off the house, and I’ll have to stop my studies, and Lycka and Johann and... Please Fred, don’t do this.’

  Fred went to the window, opened it and flicked out the cigarette. Then he zipped up his hooded jacket and turned round. ‘I mean it Nickel. A few years in the joint would certainly upset your life a little more.’

  ‘You don’t know what you’re saying.’

  ‘I’ve never known better.’ Fred went back to the desk. ‘Your credit cards and the PIN number.’

  ‘Hold it a minute, Fred. We can discuss the whole thing!’

  ‘No. And certainly not that. There’s a policeman near the hotel at the front, who can be here in five minutes. Four years, Nickel. It’s a long time. Your son will be going to school, and Lulla... well, maybe she’ll stand by you.’

  Nickel’s eyelids began to twitch, and his chin projected forward. He was on the point of losing control. His fingers clenched the sharp edges of the metal box.

  Fred, who had gained a feeling for such moments in prison, took a step back. ‘Calm down, Nickel. My heart bleeds. Everything other than giving me my money, as agreed, is going to bring you to a place where people fuck you and shit on you by turns. In your case, more shit. You can’t even play table football. Nothing that counts in there. Nothing to gain you that little bit of respect, so you’re left in peace. Or do you think they’re big into telling the plots of books? Do you know what saved me? That I was totally indifferent to the joint, the people in it, the four years, everything. Because I knew why I was doing it, and that in the end I would get what I wanted. So I was wrong, but that’s how I survived the four years. And you? All you’ll think about is everything you’re losing, and in six months at the latest you’ll be finished.’ Fred reached out his hand. ‘Give me the card.’ Silent and without looking at Fred, Nickel took out his wallet and dropped the credit card on the table. Fred pocketed it and asked for the PIN number. Nickel mumbled the four digits, Fred noted them down on a piece of paper.

  ‘I’m living in the Hotel Luck. Call me when you have the money.’

  He went to the door. ‘Oh yes...’ he turned around, his hand on the door handle, ‘I’d like it in a black leather suitcase. You know: the three of us just off the plane in Canada, each with a suitcase in their hand. And in my view, something has to happen as we had planned it.’

  Fred came down the stairs into the living room, waved at the two women in passing, and left the house.

  19

  Fred’s footsteps crunched through the gravel. Most house lights had been switched off, and the TV heroes were silent. Steel buildings glowed in the distance.

  Fred reached Teerstrasse and stopped at the Hotel Tradition. He needed a schnapps. The lunacy lay in the detail. Nickel’s ‘welcome dinner,’ the metal box, the crumpled, shabby investment documents. The fact that Nickel had offered him an unskilled worker’s wages was no longer the deciding factor, in retrospect.

  How had Annette put it? ‘He would have preferred for us to have moved into the student hostel. And once a week some vile ratatouille with his fellow students…’ In Dieburg, when Nickel repeatedly cooked ratatouille with meatballs for them and insisted that this was the essence of the southern peasant lifestyle, even though neither Annette nor he could stomach the chewy cubes of aubergine, it was charming proof of Nickel’s steadfastness and loyalty to things he believed in. Five years later he was still cooking aubergines, this time with rice. But now it was just cheap, practical, uncomplicated and shabby. From belief in yourself to a home of your own.

  Fred felt no qualms at the thought of squealing on Nickel. He almost thought it would serve him right. Either way, things had become clear: Annette and Nickel had finally taken their leave, and Fred knew again who he could count on: himself. It was no fun at the moment, but maybe after a couple of schnapps. And there was still Moni...

  After he had briefly assured himself that the police car had gone, he stepped into the glass entrance, that was lit up in pink like the rest of the establishment and resembled raspberry syrup. Fred
went through a noisy sliding door into a world of bright plastic: chairs, tables, lamps, the reception, the floor, the flowers.

  Against this garish hotchpotch, the porter behind the counter looked like a sack of cabbages. Grey and lifeless, he stared at a small TV screen. He was in his late forties, wore an ill-fitting brown suit, and endless sausages and beer had left thick bulges beneath his eyes. The television emitted a bored drone.

  ‘It’s all vacant,’ he said, turning down the volume and trying to smooth his few hairs into place.

  ‘Thank you, but I don’t want a room. Do you have a bar or something?’

  ‘At this time? It’s almost eleven.’

  Fred was taken aback. ‘Does that mean you don’t have anything to drink after eleven?

  ‘Could it mean anything else?’

  ‘Then give me one of those minibar bottles. I need it. I’ve eaten too much.’

  Fred placed his last twenty marks on the counter.

  The porter looked at the green note. ‘Well. It’s not strictly permitted. But I happen to have a half bottle of coffee liqueur... If I were to make you a present of it, and you made me a present of that... Then we wouldn’t be making a sale after ten at night.’

  ‘Couldn’t you give me another present?’

  ‘You probably want one of those American mixtures - I’m sorry.’

  Fred took the bottle and asked after a cigarette machine.

  ‘We don’t have one. Not worth it. They all buy at the Vietnamese place.’

  ‘Where can I find it?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘The Vietnamese.’

  ‘Don’t get funny.’

  Fred frowned.

  ‘Have a good evening then.’

  He wanted to make off, when he saw in the Coca Cola mirror behind the counter two green uniforms approaching the sliding door. Then the door opened and two policemen entered the hotel lobby. Two short rotund ones, who carried a smell of stale fat with them.