by H. G. Adler
I couldn’t stay here forever, so I had to decide something. If nothing better occurred to me, then I had to sit on a step and wait until someone came along and helped me. Eventually Fräulein Zinner would have to lose patience and leave the building, which gave me hope that she would find me, unless she used another stairwell that I didn’t know about. What would happen to me then I didn’t dare think about. She was prepared to welcome a difficult guest (though who knew what had moved her to do so, perhaps a moment of compassion), though she wasn’t at all prepared for a patient who would have to be tended to and who could not go to dinner. She would stand before me, tall and strange, her head lifted up high and above the protective scarf, though from my perspective, bent down and somewhat bewildered, perhaps even repulsed, myself indeed small and meek before her, a cowering puppy on the stairs. I couldn’t allow myself to sit there. I gathered myself together and had already decided for sure to mount the last floor, no matter the cost, but the steps rose higher than my feet and wouldn’t bow to my weakness. I had to querulously acknowledge my powerlessness and rest awhile longer to gather my strength and attack the devilish ascent.
I leaned against the window, but I was immediately shocked to find that the paint did not stick to it but instead came off in washed-out flecks that stuck to my jacket. Thus I could no longer lean against it and had to try to wipe the nasty traces from my jacket, but neither rubbing nor swatting at them seemed to work. Like spongy flour, they attached themselves to the fibers of the fabric. While saying a quick prayer, I sought release from my plight, but it hardly eased me, my pleas crumbling to nothing, unfortunately useless. Then I sought refuge again on the landing and clung to it with both hands, my gaze wandering cockeyed over the wall, following its surface halfway up to the next floor. Graffiti, scrawled in pencil or scratched out with knives or nails, waited for the absolving hand of whoever might paint the room, the names and monograms obliterated and painted over which sat here unused and pointless, probably inscribed by those in search of something, having seen their day, a beginning without end, even in the double strangeness of an international bureau for refugees and its search office, perhaps posting a silent request—as I had once been told back there in the Office for Returnees—passing searchers who wanted to know that not everything was lost, there were some who had been saved and were found again, the harvest of gentle patience, just once, after many years, indeed.
I decided to try to find this stairwell during daylight in the next few days, once I again felt better, in order to carefully explore the graffiti from the ground floor to the top. It certainly made no sense to do so, but such never-resting desire could be just the thing to provide an enticing sustenance. There were so many people once known and yet forgotten, the mention of their names enough to bring them back, and that could indeed be good. They exist, they exist, even strangers exist, and it’s comforting to know they exist; one should know them and gather them and humbly commemorate the signs they left behind, this being perhaps a first step toward self-awareness. Names written down—oh, the courage of avowal, where all the others have already fled—then to bow before the wall of life and in hasty humility offer up that they exist, when indeed they no longer exist, stumbling up and down the stairs in further flight, now indeed more prepared for their own passing, since with bold recklessness they have inscribed their names. Trembling, I pulled a pencil from my pocket, a worn-down stub from who knows where. Wait, now I remember that, absentmindedly, I had taken it from the phone booth of my guesthouse, a stubby thing that was useless, though here it was, me staggering to the wall, bending over and getting down on my knees, for I wanted to be way down, down where it hadn’t even occurred to the others to search for a spot, where the wall was only marked by thoughtless feet, that being where I scribbled it ever so slowly, nothing but an “A,” a big clumsy “A.” Then I let the stub fall, it being no longer of any use to me or to anyone else, rolling away, at first slowly, then a bit faster, nearing the landing where I expected there would be some resistance, but the gap between the flooring and the iron bars of the landing that ran below was large enough to let it pass through, soon rolling on and disappearing, floating on air, though I couldn’t see it but instead felt it, a soundless flight down through the stairwell of the Search Office, a message descending from the dreaming Adam, me listening and finally hearing it hit, two times, one right after the other, it likely having hit and bounced up, the horror of such a fall wishing to occur twice in one life. But then it was over—stillness, nothing moving—and the porter in his cell hadn’t heard a thing, or it simply didn’t worry him. He had seen too much in his job already to ever be frightened by a mere thought.
I pulled myself up and felt a pang in my hips, but I staggered over to the landing, though I didn’t look down; I hadn’t lost anything, my head feeling heavy. Then something rattled; it could have been the wind or something rustling in my ears, perhaps someone opening a door. I can hardly describe the alarm it set off inside me. All I could do was smile about my flight of fancy, for it was only an illusion and not an incident, or an incident in the most hopelessly serious sense, myself again aware that everything had collapsed, the stairwell empty and fallen. I had done nothing, yet all of it was burned out, no flooring and no roof, only an empty shell, a flourishing space amid nightmarish growth extending to the wounded ends of the universe, and something there within it, unfathomably small and lost, almost nothing, only the shiftless tiniest trace of a past without a home anywhere in the world. Then I no longer looked at the markings and names that I had not read, nor did I even look at my own “A,” which could have been just three scratches, a chance rune, nothing in particular and nothing worth bothering about, no “A,” it already having been sucked into the filthy cloud of dust and covered over, gone. No, I had done nothing. It rose high above me, the steps finally carrying me up, always very steep, though they held my step, and as the first two lifted me upward, they did so more easily than I expected. Above, steps could be heard, me feeling premature joy as I was still far below, for it was just an echo, those not being my steps. Then I looked up and heard her voice, not at all impatient but instead full of calm assurance, but friendly, and tinged with only a touch of concern.
“What took you so long? I called down again and then came out to look for you.”
“I’m coming!” I called with a breaking voice.
It sounded more uncertain than I wanted it to, so I tried to make up for this bad impression by quickly bounding up the stairs two at a time. Fräulein Zinner stood there in her hat and coat, her purse under her arm.
“You don’t have to hurry anymore!”
Her response disappointed me, for why had I exerted myself so? I didn’t want to say anything in return, yet when she started to come down the steps toward me her heels sounded loud and I was bitterly affected. I was also scared by the thought that I would immediately have to go through the adventure of the stairwell again. Although this time I would be headed down the stairs and accompanied by someone, at the moment it felt like too much.
“No, no! Please, no! Wait there! I’ll come up!”
I said that with such pressing and beseeching urgency that she stopped and could do nothing but stop and do as I asked.
“Well, as you wish. We can sit for a while in my office.”
“Yes, please! That’s the reason I asked.”
I don’t know how I managed to stumble upward—perhaps through some kind of magic, for certainly not through my own strength—myself almost stumbling head over heels, my legs having dragged themselves along and barely lifting one after the other over the steps. Reeling and exhausted, I felt that I knew what it was like to be left for dead. I couldn’t stand on my feet, and as a distraction I extended my hand, though in truth I really did it in order to seek support, which she returned too slowly for my needs and gripped too softly.
“Good evening!” I rasped, and saw that she didn’t understand me. “Please, do forgive me for being so shamefully late!”
“It wasn’t so bad,” she replied, somewhat distracted.
She wanted to let go of my hand, but I grabbed her more tightly in order that she see that, at the moment, I couldn’t yet relinquish her help.
“It wasn’t so bad that you have to excuse yourself that much. In these parts, we don’t make such a big deal about such things.”
“I haven’t gotten used to that yet. I’m totally inexperienced. Totally! Where, indeed, might your office be?”
“Do you feel all right, Herr Landau? Your hands are cold and damp.”
“No, I’m fine. Forgive me! I’ll be all right in a minute. A bit faint. Please, your office. Maybe sit for a while. Very, very weak.”
Fräulein Zinner took me under the arm and carried me more than I walked along myself to her office door. Here she had to let go of me in order to get the key from her pocket, but I held on to her shoulder, my only wish being to sit down. She unlocked the door, turned on the light, after which I sat or nearly lay down on a chair. It was uncomfortable and pressed at me. She looked at me seriously and with such extreme pity that it shook me and made me tremble inside. I turned to her sharply and yet beseechingly.
“Don’t worry so, and just give me a minute! Everything will soon be all right!”
She turned on a space heater and pushed it closer to me.
“Many thanks! But I don’t need it. I feel warm, much too warm.”
“Do you have a fever? What’s wrong with you?”
“Nothing, nothing at all! Just give me five minutes! You’ll see, everything will be better! It was just the stairs, believe me. Really!”
From my hand Fräulein Zinner took the hat that I had absentmindedly played with, and then I managed to free myself from the oppressive jacket without standing up. She then took the jacket as well. I quietly let her do so. My hostess said nothing. The quiet pleased me, and slowly the whizzing inside my head calmed down, the cold sweat ending, my heart not beating as fast as earlier. I stroked my hair to straighten it out, as it had again fallen into disarray, and blinked feebly at the garish globes that suffused the room with an almost consistently strong light, but which didn’t bother me. Fräulein Zinner moved to sit down in a corner, which I observed without interest, though even if I didn’t care what she was doing, I did nonetheless note that she moved around with some glasses, pouring something into them, busying herself with a tin cup, then with a plate or a little dish on which she laid something, most likely a dry roll. When she came over to me, I forced myself to look in another direction and heard a second chair being shoved around and a tray placed upon it.
“Can I offer you something?” she whispered. “It will help you feel better.”
Then I turned toward her, though I didn’t look at what she was offering.
“You really are making too much of a fuss. I’m feeling better already.”
“You may be better, but you haven’t been well for some time.”
“You know that?”
“Of course.”
She lifted up a glass, indicating that I was to take it. It was full of red wine, sweet, but too much so, and strong. I drank it all down slowly, without setting the glass down.
“That will warm you up. That’s it.”
She took the glass from me and filled it again. I waved my hand and she understood, setting the glass down. Then she handed me a little plate with some glistening sugary cookies. I took one, broke it in two, and chewed slowly.
“Now I’m healthy as a horse!”
In order to prove it, I tried to stand; I certainly could have done so, but it wasn’t allowed.
“We’re in no rush. You’ll feel better in half an hour.”
Then I made myself more comfortable, smoothing out the pleats of my pants as best I could, as well as my shirt, and ran my hands to the right and left of my collar. Then it occurred to me to feel whether the knot of the poor tie had held or loosened. I poked at it and everything seemed to be fine. It only bothered me that my behavior was so unsuitable, as my outfit could hardly go unnoticed. Therefore I had to say something as a distraction.
“The tie is old, but hardly ever worn. A tie that pleases me. It’s from before the war, just imagine!”
“Here most people only have old things, often many years old. Even the natives. It’s not easy to buy things; people have to economize.”
“You don’t understand.”
“I’m sorry!”
“No matter. Whatever one owns here and is old, at least you’ve always had it. Nothing is interrupted, all your own things, a consistent string of time wonderfully split up into days, even if it were a thousand. Now do you understand?”
Yes, she understood and, with lips barely moving, she asked my forgiveness.
“No, that’s not necessary. You couldn’t know all that. Back there and here, everything is so different.”
“I know that, and yet I don’t know it well enough, for I have never known and have never known enough. That’s the main reason I wanted to get to know you. You see, I’ve talked to a lot of people and have read a lot, but the picture I have gotten from it all isn’t enough. I’ve heard about how many horrible things happened, but it’s not enough to simply describe the horrible; it doesn’t say enough, it’s dishonest, perhaps even unintentionally distorted. The truth must have been different. Not the horrible, but rather the human amid the horrible, is what’s important. Isn’t that so? I had hoped that you would know a lot about these things, and I hope you can share them with me.”
I looked at her doubtfully.
“I know you can share some of it to some extent, certainly you can. Everything that I know is not enough. I’m sure of that.”
Since I said nothing, Fräulein Zinner talked on.
“I have the feeling that you’ve been through a lot because of how you’ve been shaken to the core. And you seem to me to be truthful and talkative.”
“Talkative … well, yes. Perhaps too much so. But truthful? That I can’t judge. Though I do try my best.”
“That’s what I mean. My urge to tend to misfortune—you understand how I mean that, don’t you?—is what pushes me to take on this hopeless and thankless job. It’s all so lifeless. And it’s good that they will soon dissolve the Bureau for Refugees, which our Search Office is a part of. The lease is up next summer, and it won’t be renewed.”
“What will happen to this big building?”
“It was once a hotel. Hotel Ivanhoe. Maybe someone will open it up as a hotel again.”
“As a hotel …” I said absentmindedly.
“Maybe not, but they say so. It doesn’t matter to us.”
“But what do you do here besides close down the place, if I may ask?”
“I work on the card file of refugees with two other girls and a man who oversees us. The card file is supposed to be cleared up and closed down. Then it will be taken to another institution, where it will be stored.”
“What is this card file? I can hardly imagine.”
“Names, names. Anyone who has ever come to the Bureau for Refugees for advice, help, support, placement, or made an inquiry has to give his personal information—not to me here but rather at the other offices—and then this material comes up to us, is checked over, edited for all its statistical information, and then filed. I can tell you, it’s somewhat dismal work, but perhaps still the best to be had here.”
“Yet a lot gets done?”
“Illusions. Paper. Almost all just paper. Big words. Lots of activity. Names with hardly any people attached to them. The people were sent away, and all that’s left is the names. But I can see that saddens you, and perhaps I’ve put it too bitterly. When there’s too much hate for one’s neighbor rather than love, then such a bureau as ours is needed, and in the end something good does appear to come from all the waste of paper.”
“Tell me more!”
“There’s no lack of good will, but paper is stronger. It only uses names and dates, gulping them down insatiably, lik
e a gristmill, and life, as a result, ends up too short, indeed ground to bits. That’s why we have the Search Office, which is why I’m there. There the names are consulted, and sometimes a miracle happens that rewards all our efforts. A brother finds a sister, even entire families come back together. I’m egotistical enough that I have made this my main job, while my colleagues sink themselves much more into the paperwork than I do. I can only think that they just don’t feel as much pressure as I do. They’re happy when everything on the page is in order and the Search Office has its role in making it so. Thus the paper finally does, in fact, come to life. We also have open office hours, where we give out information on names and addresses. Fates hang upon them. How empty our card file seems when people come to me to ask and to beg for information about their next of kin, and the cards are blanks and cannot help or advise. Eyes empty out before me, behind them nothing but raw despair or simply disbelief that erects itself against disappointing news, and then the request to look through the cards themselves. If there’s enough time, I let them, if only to assuage their mistrust, although it’s always pointless, because, first of all, our cards are not in such great order, and second, they are of no help to the person roaming around in search of someone with no peace to be had. Disappointment only rises in ever greater amounts when this senseless search produces no results, when similar names confuse people, until finally they grow bitter and either break down or consume themselves with blustering complaints about what a hopeless system we have, or something worse. I patiently let it roll over me, because I hope that it will ease the misfortunate a bit, but my colleagues do nothing of the sort, choosing instead to complain that their lovely card file is now a mess, mauled and marked up by dirty fingers. Indeed, visitors are not allowed to peek into the card file, so my boss officially doesn’t know anything about it. He puts up with it, but silently so, and only because I have often pressed hard at his conscience.”