What happened then astonished him. It wasn’t his mother who answered, and she couldn’t have understood, anyway; she was quite lost. Minna choked back a sob that could just as well have been a hiccup. Minna knew a good deal more about it than Lotte.
It was the old gentleman who raised his head, looking at him. He asked, “You are speaking of Gerhardt Holst?”
“Yes.”
“Curious.”
He rummaged about among his scraps of paper, fished one out at last, and examined it closely. Frank held his breath.
“He has just asked for a visitor’s permit.”
“To see me?”
“Yes.”
He wasn’t going to leap with joy, to dance around the room in front of them. And yet his face was transfigured. Now he had tears in his eyes, like Minna. But he was afraid to believe it. It would be too wonderful. It would mean he hadn’t made a mistake. It would mean …
“He asked to see me?”
“One minute … No.”
Frank stood paralyzed. No doubt about it, the old gentleman was a sadist.
“It was not exactly that. A certain Gerhardt Holst sent in a request to the authorities for a visitor’s permit. He addressed very high authorities indeed. But it is not for himself.”
Hurry up, by God! And Lotte was listening to it all as though it were the radio!
“It is for his daughter.”
No! No! No! He mustn’t cry. He must do anything to keep from crying. Otherwise, he might spoil everything. It wasn’t true! It wasn’t possible! The old gentleman would pick up another scrap of paper and discover he was mistaken.
“You see, Frank,” Lotte cried tremulously, with a beatific quaver in her voice, as if her radio had just played a sentimental tune, “you see, everyone believes you. I told you you’d get out. All you have to do is listen to these gentlemen.”
She was a fool, an idiot! He wasn’t even capable of hinting that, it was better that she never know the void that had opened between them.
And then she asked, with the air of a devout worshipper addressing a bishop, “And have you, sir, granted the permission?”
“Not yet. This request has only just reached me from another office. I have not had time to study it.”
“I think you’ll make her very happy. She’s our neighbor across the hall from us. They’ve known each other for years.”
It wasn’t true. If only she’d keep quiet! Or rather, what difference did it make what she said? Even if everything fell through now, even if Sissy didn’t come, the fact remained that Holst had asked.
They understood each other. Frank was right. It would be the same if Holst came or not. Not exactly the same, but it would mean the same thing.
God, if only they’d finish! If only they’d do him the favor of not questioning him any more that morning, let him go up to his own room. Strange— “his own room,” he had thought. To throw himself on his bed, clutching to his breast his still-warm truth before it evaporated.
“She’s a very well-bred young girl, believe me, a real young lady.”
How could you be angry with anyone so stupid, even if she was your mother? And Minna, with her false cousinly air, who took advantage of their having risen now to sidle up and touch him when no one was looking!
“I thought,” the old gentleman interrupted, “that you asked just now to see Gerhardt Holst.”
“Either one.”
“You have no preference?”
He hoped he wasn’t making a mistake! “No.”
A glance from under the glasses, and the two acolytes knew it was time to take him away. He didn’t know how he left the room. His mother and Minna stayed. What more would Lotte have to say on the subject of Sissy?
He reached his room almost at the same time as his tin bowl, still nice and hot, and he simply held it between his knees, not eating, feeling its warmth spreading through him. The window was closed up there, beyond the gymnasium. It didn’t matter. From now on, if necessary, he could get by without it. There was a lump in his throat. He wanted to talk. He wanted to talk to Holst, for Holst to come here.
He had just one question: “How did you come to understand?”
It seemed impossible, and if it was true, it was a miracle. Frank had done everything so that no one would understand. He himself hardly understood. He had prowled around Holst and, at certain moments, he had compelled himself to believe that he hated him, that he despised him: he had laughed at the tin lunch box, at the badly fitting felt boots.
When had it happened?
Was it the night when Holst, coming back from the streetcar station, saw him standing glued to the tannery wall with the knife in his hand?
He had to stop. It was too much for him. He had to keep calm, sit there sensibly on the edge of his bed. He wouldn’t even lie down, because then it would be worse. He couldn’t look at the window and scream, could he?
He wasn’t going to go crazy. It wasn’t the right time. Little by little he would regain his composure. If it had happened, it meant the end.
He had always known. It was one of those things you knew and didn’t try to explain. In any case, he didn’t have the strength to hold out much longer.
Holst had understood!
And Sissy?
Had she always known that it would happen this way, too? Frank had known. Holst had known. It was terrible to say it. It sounded like blasphemy. But it was true.
Holst should have come and killed him that Sunday, during the night, or the next day, but he hadn’t.
It had to have happened this way. Frank couldn’t have done anything else. He didn’t know why, but he felt it.
If he wasn’t afraid of torture, of the officer with the brass ruler or the old gentleman and his two acolytes, it was because no one could ever make him suffer the way he had made himself suffer when he pushed Kromer into that room.
Would the old gentleman say yes?
There had to be something to give him hope, so that he could believe that this was meant to serve some purpose. Frank was eager for them to come. He wouldn’t promise a thing—that would be stupid—but he’d let them think that he was going to be a good deal more talkative afterward. Let them come for him, quickly!
He would give ground. He’d give ground from now on, lots of it. On any subject they chose. Kromer, for instance, since it didn’t matter now that Frank knew he was safe.
He wondered which he would really prefer: to talk to Holst or to Sissy. He didn’t really have anything to say to Sissy. He only wanted to look. To have her look at him.
“Tell me, Monsieur Holst …”
“How did you find out, Monsieur Holst, that a man, no matter what he was …”
He couldn’t find the words. None of them expressed what he wanted to say.
“You can run a streetcar, can’t you, or whatever? You can wear boots that make street urchins turn to stare at you and the well-dressed boys shrug their shoulders. You can … you can … I understand what you’re going to say … That doesn’t … It’s enough to do what must be done, because everything is equally important … But I, Monsieur Holst, how could I have … ?”
It was impossible that Holst had asked for a visitor’s permit for Sissy. Frank began to weaken, to ask questions, to doubt. Perhaps it was some machination on the old gentle-man’s part? If that was true, Frank would hunt him all the way to the bottom of hell if he had to.
And how was it possible that Holst, who’d always avoided contact with the Occupation forces, who must have suffered because of them, had addressed himself to very high authorities, as the old gentleman had said. For that, he had to go through intermediaries, to compromise himself, to humiliate himself before them.
No one came for him. Time dragged on. He couldn’t sleep. He didn’t want to. He wanted the question settled now.
He found himself lying down. He didn’t know if he had set his bowl of soup down on the floor or not. If he had spilled it, it would smell all night. It had happened to
him once before. He wanted to cry. He wouldn’t tell Holst he had cried. He wouldn’t tell anyone. No one saw him. He stretched out his arm as though there was someone beside him, or as if someday someone might be there.
Perhaps, except everything would have had to be different!
He refused to accept that Chief Inspector Kurt Hamling was his father.
Why did he think of that?
He wasn’t thinking about anything. He was crying like a baby. He was sleepy. His wet-nurse used to stick a pacifier in his mouth on such occasions. He would sniffle a few times, begin to suck, and then calm down.
It wouldn’t be long now. And time didn’t matter. How old was the woman in the window? Twenty-two? Twenty-five? Where would she be in ten years, in five? Perhaps her companion would be dead. Perhaps he was dead already. Perhaps at this very moment she was carrying in her body the germ of the disease that would kill her.
What would Holst say? How would he act?
Sissy would be silent, he knew. Or she would just say: “Frank!”
The old gentleman would be there. It didn’t matter. He felt hot. Perhaps he had a fever. He hoped he wasn’t getting sick, not now. The old gentleman wore glasses and had been dressed in black from head to foot. But why? He always wore gray. Frank was a Catholic. He had Protestant friends and sometimes he had gone to church with them. He had seen their clergymen.
He had to be careful, since the big American desk was changing shape, becoming a sort of altar. Lotte looked ridiculous dressed like that. She always dressed like that when she wanted to look distinguished. She overdid it with the grays and whites. He vaguely remembered a photograph of a queen dressed like that, only she was softer, more ethereal. But that was a queen. Lotte ran a whorehouse and she was ethereal, too. As for that poor Minna, she looked as though she had just come out of a convent. Cousin Minna.
Why was she crying? Lotte dropped her handkerchief, rolled into a ball, and Holst stooped to pick it up and handed it to her with his long arm. He said nothing because it was not the moment. The old gentleman was reading his little scraps of paper and was in danger of mixing them up. It was a very complicated prayer and of the utmost importance.
Sissy looked into Frank’s eyes so intently that his pupils ached.
There was no longer a gun on the desk, but a key. They would be given a key instead of a ring. Not a bad idea. He had never heard of it being done, but it was a good idea. Who were they going to give it to? Evidently it was the key to a room with a window and a blind. It was dark. The blind should be closed and the lamp lighted.
He looked. His eyes were open. Someone turned on the light in his classroom. The civilian was standing beside his bed, the soldier waiting at the door.
“I’m coming …” he stammered. “I’m coming, I tell you.”
He didn’t move. He was forced to make a violent effort. His legs were stiff, his back ached. The man waited. The courtyard was dark. It was swept by the searchlight like a beam from a lighthouse. Frank had never seen the sea. He would never see it. He knew it only from the movies and there was always a lighthouse.
He’d gone to the movies with Sissy twice. Twice!
“Coming …”
He put on his jacket again. He felt like he was forgetting something. Ah, yes! He must be very nice to the old gentleman, encourage him.
The little room. The stove was purring. It was much too hot. That was maybe on purpose, too. They didn’t tell him to sit. It was going to be a standing session, though today, he didn’t know why, he would have felt better sitting down.
“Perhaps you could tell me a little about Kromer?” Nothing got by him, the old gentleman! He understood that this was the right moment!
“Gladly.”
He would have preferred to talk about the gun, which he noticed on the desk. Then he would be done with the threat they were saving up for the end.
“Why did he give you money?”
“Because I procured certain merchandise for him.”
“What kind of merchandise?”
“Watches.”
“He was in the watch business?”
He wanted to beg: “You’ll give permission?”
All through the session he had to keep swallowing that question.
“Someone had asked him for watches.”
“Who?”
“I think it was an officer.”
“You think so?”
“That’s what he told me.”
“Who was the officer?”
“I don’t know his name. A high-ranking officer who collects watches.”
“Where did you meet him?”
“I never saw him.”
“How did he pay you?”
“He paid Kromer, who gave me my share.”
“What was your share?”
“Half.”
“Where did you buy the watches?”
“I didn’t buy them.”
“You stole them?”
“I took them.”
“Where?”
“At a watchmaker’s I used to know. He’s dead now.”
“You killed him?”
“No. He had been dead a year already.”
It was going too fast. Normally it would have been enough for three or four sessions. He felt dizzy. Was he picking up the pace to get to the end more quickly?
“Who had the watches?”
The old gentleman consulted one of his scraps. They knew. Frank would have sworn they had known everything from the beginning. Then why all this pretense? What more did they want to know? What were they hoping for? After all, they were wasting their time more than they were wasting his.
“They were hidden at his sister’s. I went. I took them and left.”
“That is all?”
Sullenly, like a little boy caught doing mischief, he said, “I went back into the house again and killed her.”
“Why?”
“Because she recognized me.”
“Who was with you?”
“I was alone.”
“Where did this take place?”
“In the country.”
“Far from the city?”
“About five or ten miles.”
“Did you go on foot?”
“Yes.”
“No!”
“You’re right. No.”
“How did you get there?”
“By bike.”
“You own a bicycle.”
“I borrowed one.”
“From whom?”
“I rented it.”
“Where?”
“I don’t remember. In a garage in the Upper Town.”
“Would you recognize the garage if you were taken to the Upper Town?”
“I don’t know.”
“And if you were shown the truck you used, would you recognize that?” They knew that, too. It was depressing. “You will see it tomorrow morning in the courtyard.”
He didn’t reply. He was thirsty. His shirt was wet under his arms and his temples were beginning to throb.
“How do you know Carl Adler?”
“I don’t know him.”
“Yet it was he who drove the truck.”
“It was dark.”
“What do you know about him?”
“Nothing.”
“Did you know that he did something with radios?”
“I didn’t.”
“He had a radio transmitter in the truck.”
“I didn’t see it. It was dark. I didn’t look in the back.”
“Who was sitting there?”
“I don’t know.”
“Was there someone?”
“Yes.”
“Then someone must have introduced him to you. Who?”
“Kromer.”
“Where?”
“In a bar across from the movie theater.”
“Who was he with?”
“He was alone.”
“What names did he use when he introduced you?”
&n
bsp; “He didn’t mention names.”
“Would you recognize the one in the back?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Describe him.”
“He was fairly big and had a mustache.”
He was lying, but he’d gained some time.
“Go on.”
“He was wearing overalls.”
“In the bar?”
“Yes.” They didn’t know him. He felt sure of that. He wasn’t risking anything, then. “Wait a minute. I think he had a scar.”
“Where?”
He thought of the brass ruler. He improvised: “Across his face … the left cheek … Yes.”
“You are lying, are you not?”
“No.”
“I would be very sorry if you were, because that would prevent me, a priori, from giving the authorization I have been asked for.”
“I swear I don’t know him.”
“And the scar?”
“I don’t know.”
“The description?”
“Again, I don’t know. I’d certainly recognize him if I saw him, but I can’t describe him.”
“The bar?”
“That’s true.”
“Carl Adler?”
“I really don’t know why I didn’t tell you his name. I saw him again twice in the street. He didn’t recognize me.”
“The radio transmitter?”
“They never mentioned it to me.”
Would he give permission? He anxiously studied the face of the old gentleman, who seemed to take a secret pleasure in being more inscrutable than ever. He rolled a cigarette. Then he began speaking slowly and softly.
“Carl Adler was shot yesterday by another service. He did not talk. It is necessary for us to find his accomplices.”
Suddenly Frank flushed. Were they going to make him the kind of offer Lotte had accepted?
He knew nothing, it was true. They would end up convinced of that. But he might know. They would use him to try to find out.
He found it hard to breathe. He didn’t know where to look. Once again, he was ashamed. What would he do if they asked him outright, if they made him a deal? What would Holst do?
He closed his eyes and stiffened. It was too easy. He shouldn’t count on it. It would never happen. He wasn’t crying. He wouldn’t start crying in a moment like this.
He waited. The old gentleman must be playing with his scraps of paper. Why didn’t he say something? Nothing could be heard but the purring of the stove. Time passed. Then Frank opened his eyes and saw the acolyte standing next to him, waiting to take him back. The soldier was already at the door.
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