I twisted the calendar free from her grip, slid it back in the drawer, closed and locked the bureau and threw the key on top of her secretaire cabinet — well out of reach.
'I guess not,' she said, a twinkle in her eye. From then on, 'Edeltraud' became her way of referring to Elsa.
I remember the details of that weekend as if it was yesterday. Everything felt like the present and past at once. I missed moments as they were happening, before they had been sifted out of the concrete world and blown off to the distant, untouchable realm of the past. The countdown had started. If I could've stopped time I would have, but time is the greatest thief of all: it steals everything in the end, truth and lie. That afternoon I waited hours for Pimmichen to take her nap but nothing made her sleepy. I told her I was going up to take one myself. Standing at the base of the stairs, she watched me go up. I was losing my patience with her and turned around twice to let her know. The second time, she was gone.
The raindrops drumming on the roof gave me a sense of cosy intimacy with Elsa. I listened to her tell me all about the creatures of the earth — what it would be like, for example, to live in an ant's skin, greeting each other with flexible rods on our heads. Or if we humans had been conceived as turtles in form, how would that have changed our lives? She compared it to walking around with our houses weighing upon our backs: it would be uncomfortable but there could be great advantages. We wouldn't have to build homes, there'd be no homeless in the world, we could change the view outside our window every day, and wherever we were on earth, we'd always be at home, which would eliminate bloodshed over borders. I felt a certain warmth go through me when she said 'our' house and 'our' backs, as if together, she and I would have the four legs we needed to be one, even if only one turtle.
She asked me where I thought the mind was located, in the heart or brain. I answered the brain, hoping that was right. She squinted her eyes to think, then claimed hers was outside her body. Right as she was speaking to me, she said, her mind was seeing a three-storey house cut open like a dollshouse, and we were nothing but two tiny ephemeral individuals in the triangular-shaped room at the top right.
I begged her not to do that — in a way, she stopped living the moment her mind forsook her body. I warned her one day it might decide not to come back. I was bothered by her mind gallivanting around instead of staying put with me. In using my leg as a pillow she had made it fall asleep, but I hadn't shifted it in case she changed position. She lifted her head up as if to look at me, but her stare was blurry and unfocused. I wondered if she could see me. Maybe I was nothing other than a white smear, soft clay out of which she could fashion the face of her choice. With one childlike hand she pulled my head down, and slowly, emptily, kissed me.
After that, there was a quiet in the air, and not just because neither of us was moving or speaking. It was a blessed quiet that existed on its own and had to be respected. She lay facing the wall with that same stare. I stroked her hair, hoping that this time her thoughts were closer to me.
***
I passed the older Pole on my way to the bathroom. His socks were soaking in the sink and his hairy feet were quite a sight. I was, as anyone can imagine, glowing to an extent that I'd forgotten what it was I was carrying in the ceramic basin. The wrinkled nose, twisted mouth and singular Slavic interjection brought me back down to earth. I surprised myself at how natural I was in pointing to my grandmother's bedroom, shrugging as if to say, 'It's part of life.' He patted me on the shoulder before scurrying away.
I cleaned the Kachelofen, lit the first fire of the season, thinking to myself if only Elsa would love me, the whole house would be hers, I'd give her everything I had. Pimmichen noticed my changed mood. She asked if we'd received any mail today (there used to be mail on Saturdays back then).
'I don't know; I haven't had time to check.'
She frowned, worrying her chin with her three-finger goatee. The Poles were arguing over something that I assumed, from the complex sounds, to be philosophy or astrophysics. Unexpectedly, the older one exposed his molar. I burst out laughing, imitated their grandiose sounds, then pointed to my back tooth. We all roared, except Pimmichen, who hadn't caught on.
I don't know how it started but in no time the three of us were sitting around Pimmichen's footrest, shuffling the deck like croupiers until cards either fell or flew, especially those up our sleeves, sneaking in 3s with suites of 8s, adding a stowaway card to every one swept off the deck, erasing points from whoever took the lead. Pimmichen didn't pick up any of this, neither did she Janusz's laughter every time he looked up at her, remembering what he'd witnessed me carrying earlier in the day. I felt sorry for Pimmichen, so demure, unaware and lost in her big armchair, but I couldn't help getting a laugh out of it too. Elsa's kiss contributed to my drunkenness as much as the sips of their vodka.
I had a headache in the morning, but forced myself up early. Elsa's eyes were no longer absent; on the contrary, they were feverish, full of life. She accepted the tray without noticing the garden-fresh ivy I'd decorated it with, dug her rapturously over-arched feet into my mother's nightgown, stretching it more tightly into her own shape. Unaware of the extra volume her breasts gave her, she dipped the fringes of my mother's shawl in her tea every time she leaned forward.
'Johannes, I've been thinking. Wouldn't it be possible for me to go to Madagascar too?'
All I could think was thank God I hadn't told her the truth the day before, because I'd been tempted to after the kiss. Suddenly the carefree manner in which she crunched her toast got on my nerves, and so did her licking of the teaspoon. I took my time and said as neutrally as possible, believing my words as I spoke them, 'You'd risk my grandmother's life and my own. This seems to be your specialty.'
She flinched and took to wrapping a curl around her finger. 'Can't you just let me out in the street at night? Tell me what I must do to get the train that'll take me to the port? I can disguise myself — I've been thinking about it. If I'm caught, I'll never say a word about you, I swear to God.'
I held up a wet fringe for her to see. She gave it a few slaps, scattering the crumbs sticking to her fingers until she noted my disapproving glance and picked one up off the rug to crush between her front teeth.
'Everybody's on the lookout for Jews. You'd be shot on the spot. The longer you wait, the more of a chance you'll have. Why not give it another year?'
Her downcast face was an insult to me. I was incensed by her inconstancy. She'd be caught, she'd be executed! I was protecting her! And what little was left of my family — thanks to her! I was keeping her alive! Helping her all I could! After all we'd done and lost for her! For her, I was a traitor to my country! All she could do to thank me was bite the hand that fed her!
I was trapped in my lie as much as she was.
xiv
Sunday, all through the night, I tossed and turned feverishly, unable to admit defeat. That's when the idea came to me. It was improbable, crazy, yet not any more so than the war had been, not a bit. In fact, it was really just a continuation of the past logic, a branch continuing into smaller branches and twigs instead of being cut off. My plan took some preparation, so I skipped school on Monday and Tuesday, after which this became a habit.
I warned Elsa that the truth was a dangerous notion that no one needed in order to live. Truth was poison. It should be shunned at all costs, because even when people think they have it, at most they have a fraction of it. The same flower seen by two people would not look exactly the same if they were to redraw it in their minds — already it's not one any more, but two. She need not worry about plucking the real one, but the one most pleasing to her senses. If her senses came up with a less painful world than the real, she would be wrong not to live in that world.
I handed her the box of carefully selected clippings, minus any articles condemning the Nazis' doings. The high figures in the captions sounded like an exploit. She looked from one to the next, to me, to the next and back to me. There were lumpy hills mad
e of shoes. There were glistening hills made of spectacles. There were shaggy hills made of hair. There were mountain ranges of clothes. There were skeletons wearing nothing but loose skin, standing in doom, or buried as bare in mounds of each other. I told her that if I'd lied to her about Madagascar, procrastinated so long, kept her cut off from the outside world, from news of anyone in particular, it was only in order to protect her from the truth. As she could see for herself, the extermination of Jews had been highly organised and all-inclusive. I told her of the vast green world of Hitler's dream just outside our walls, yet admitted that I felt happier there with her, walled in my own dream, than I would have roaming about freely in his.
In a way, my lie was not unfounded. What I said existed on its own; these things had actually happened. I just gave a voice to an alternative truth — gave the ending a different spin. We lost the war, but we could have won: it was an equal possibility. Sifting the facts, all anyone would be left with was a few ifs. I was just giving life to what existed in the abstract absolute, the invisible branches in the empty spaces between the real . . . the hundred and one that weren't but could have been. Besides, Elsa's parents and fiancé, in all likelihood, had not survived. That much would have been true. I didn't invent what was depicted in the pictures.
For four days Elsa showed no signs of grief. It was almost as if what I'd shown her did not affect her personally. I felt relieved. The worst was over and done with, though I found myself resenting her coldness, perhaps too because she was as cold with me. Then, for no reason, she stopped eating. She'd fasted before at regular intervals, so I didn't give it much thought. But the days went by — a week, more days.
I tried to coax her into being reasonable, but in the end she left me no choice: I had to force the food into her mouth. Despite the condition she was in she was clever, manipulative. She hugged me — no, clung to me like a child, mature woman that she was — and the moment I softened, patted her back, she spat out whatever I'd got her to eat. Those nights the hunger must have been acute, for in the mornings I found her arms marked with dark arcs.
It was more than I could take. Sick with worry, I decided to tell her the truth. But the truth itself is what stopped me. What was this great big truth? I examined the facts from every angle. I couldn't give her loved ones back to her, and that's what her mourning was about. All I'd be giving her was her freedom, but freedom to do what? To stray about her old, drab neighbourhood, point to where she used to live, hear the morbid details about the fate of every person she used to know? What roof would she have over her head? She'd told me the roof of her family's garret leaked — and that was before the war! How would she afford to eat? What would she do for a living? What was freedom if dictated solely by constraints?
And yes, I'll be perfectly honest, I considered myself too. What about my own life? Would she realise I hadn't been obliged to admit anything to her? Would she be grateful for my honesty, or would she regard me as having been a monster from beginning to end? Of course she would. I'd have sacrificed my own happiness for her, and she, in thanks, would slam the door in my face. She who'd emptied my house of my mother and father in coming to it. And who else would ever love me, the way I looked? No, never once did I want a replacement for Elsa, but this last reason served as a justification, too, for my wrongdoing back then. And the most difficult reason to cough up. I respected the person Elsa thought I was, didn't want to lose him either.
After taking what cash was left in my parents' safe, I chanced a jewellery shop on Graben. Two salesgirls were flirting with a French officer, both leaning over the display case. They saw I was waiting, and the officer even motioned to me, but the first girl didn't move a muscle and the second caught him by the neck and lifted her legs up, winning her a smack on the backside. They were making a contest out of who weighed less. Her rival demanded her turn. Finally, one looked down her nose at me as if I was a nuisance to ask, 'Ja? What is it?'
I should have just left, but was inexperienced enough to believe my openness would win me better service. I explained I was looking for a gift for a special woman, but didn't know what a woman would really like, a necklace or bracelet. I admitted that a ring might scare her off, unless I chose a gem that could be considered one of friendship, like an amethyst — weren't amethysts yellow, or was I confusing them with amber? Her sneer compelled me to stammer that yellow roses were less meaningful than red, so it must be the same with jewels . . .
With a haughty shrug she suggested I learn more about the woman's likes and dislikes, and, while I was at it, about women in general. She and her friend exchanged a smirk before taking up where they'd left off. Their contest was a draw, signifying that their shoes had to be taken off to assess their real weight. By the time I'd thought of an appropriate insult, another officer had come in to fetch his friend, reminding him of the law against 'fraternisation'. He was answered, 'Fraternisation, yes, but not sororisation.'
I took the long boulevards, Mariahilfer Straße and Linke Wienzelle, scoffing each time I saw Austrian girls getting cuddly with the French, probably so they wouldn't get in trouble if they were pinned for their war deeds. Superficial blonde bitches, I thought, and not even real blondes, most of them 'mousy browns' who bleached their hair. I passed by close enough to have slapped them, standing there in the arms of the enemies who'd defeated their husbands, fathers, brothers. Whores! My heart cried out all the more for my Elsa.
In stepping over a beggar I noticed some second-hand gramophones on the footpath for half price. I chose one, along with a recording of a French singer in vogue at the time, Edith Piaf. After I'd paid the seller, the beggar claimed his due; he was raking in tons of change.
The gift was a flop. Seeing Elsa's swollen face distort, I wished it was she who'd been disfigured instead of me; everything would have been easier. She covered her ears until I heard myself blurting out reassurances I'd never planned to — she had everything to live for, she must get herself together, stop acting like a baby, surely there were hundreds of others like her right here in this city, I had a plan I'd given much thought to.
Elsa's suddenly expectant eyes put me on the spot. I had no plan, not the foggiest notion, but, fearing to let even a second's silence come between us, I plunged headlong into the first idiotic vagary that came to mind — that she had so many pent-up feelings, I was certain she had it in her to paint great works of art with subjects and symbols that I could display to bring us into contact with others in the same boat. With a growing sense of shame I heard myself jabbering on, 'You know, at first I thought I'd take care of old people so I could search their houses one by one for any other survivors like you. You know how long that would take? Think about it: this way we could reach out to a whole public at once. There must be other people doing what I'm doing. And there'd be no risk for me — you know, it's not like anyone could come across anything put down in writing. Any compromising intent could be laid at the door of artistic fantasy.'
'Who says I have talent? You think feelings are enough to give life to great art? You fancy that a third-rate artist peddling his Danube boat scenes and kitschy fruit bowls hasn't got just as many feelings as your great artist? How do you know he didn't pour all his feelings into that bowl of fruit?'
'He did, he didn't: doesn't matter. There's always folk with no taste who appreciate such tacky efforts.'
'Maybe your "folk with no taste" get as much out of such tacky efforts as others do out of a Rembrandt or Giotto. They might be more sensitive than the elite — they don't need all that magnificence to pick up on the simple love and awe a poor soul felt on seeing that bowl of fruit or that boat making its insignificant way down the Danube. One day there'll be museums for bad art. They've marked the world just as much as any of culture's top dogs.'
I thought I'd win a point with her by saying, 'At the end of the day, who's to judge what is great and not great? Perhaps in the end it's all great.'
'No. It isn't. But feeling isn't what makes artwork great or not. Nor t
echnique. Many a bad artist has mastered technique.'
'So what are you trying to say?'
'Never mind. I don't even have technique so there's no use wasting your time, though I appreciate your intention, truly.'
'I'm sure it would work.'
'You really want my opinion? It's far fetched; it stands no chance.'
'Listen, it's a way for me to get out of the house, make contacts. How am I going to meet anyone if I stay in doing nothing all the time? Besides, we have nothing to lose. Tell me, what's the worst that can happen?'
She began a list. I cut her off. 'Let me finish. Before the world went topsy turvy, that's what I wanted to do — be an artist when I grew up. Not this. Just look at me.'
My plan isn't what brought her back to life, but I really think arguing with her about it did. It wasn't really believing. It was needing to believe, to have faith in faith, for faith, because of faith — in itself a suspension of disbelief; a disbelief of disbelief. I tried a spoonful of soup. For the first time in a number of days she didn't splurt it back out.
I didn't get in trouble for the school I missed because my teachers believed me when I told them I'd come down with the flu. It was plausible because I'd lost ten kilos. I couldn't say the same for Pimmichen. She'd been finishing off what Elsa, then I, didn't consume; three meagre portions still equalled one hearty meal — two of those per day plus breakfast. Her zip wouldn't stay done up when she sat down. This, too, because she was being spoiled by her two new 'breadwinners', as she called them, Janusz and Krzysztof, who brought her bread filled with nuts and raisins, covered with poppy or sesame seeds, and Viennoiseries, as Pimmichen liked to call them. I didn't know where they could be getting their hands on these, and especially in such quantities, at that time. Pimmichen had an inkling they were working in a bakery, which she said would explain why they were gone before dawn. I was glad for their company. Their keeping Pimmichen busy and happy when they were there gave me the opportunity those vital weeks to consecrate more time to Elsa.
Caging Skies Page 16