by Sladek, John
Section XV: The Second World War
The real reason Karl disliked Clark was that Jews had undoubtedly cost Germany the Second World War. There could be no other explanation. Germany had what everyone acknowledged the world’s finest fighting men. They had the best planes, the best guns, everything. But the army had so dissipated its efforts by hauling around mewling Jews and killing them that its efficiency had suffered, he told Ed. Karl would never forgive the Jews for that.
‘It’s the real reason Germany lost. Not the second front, but that Jewish fifth column. Not the American bombers, but the sabotage in Germany’s bosom.’
‘I know just what you mean,’ Willard Bask agreed. ‘I spent eighteen months in Stuttgart, and believe you and me, there ain’t a finer kind of folks anywhere than the Germans. We had some godawful fights in them honkytonks, sure, but I respect a man who fights for what’s coming to him. Know what I mean? I mean I respect a man who stands up on his hind legs and comes at you with a broke bottle like a white man, and don’t go messing around with Big Knives or razors and stuff.’
Ed Warner scratched a mole. ‘I don’t get it,’ he said. ‘Didn’t Germany win the war?’
Not listening, Karl went on. ‘German logistics were all snarled. Instead of troop trains and supply trains, they had carloads of Jews lolling about the countryside. Getting a free ride, while the world’s finest fighting men had to walk.’
‘Know just what you mean,’ Willard said, nodding fiercely. ‘One night this big German and me started out cuttin’ each other up with busted bottles, and before the night was over, we was old pals, swapping stories about women. Next night, it was just the other way round …
‘But Germany won the war, Karl. Look at Germany today. One of the top industrial nations in the world. Two continents are overrun every year with German tourists. They have one of the biggest, best-equipped armies in Europe. How can you say they lost?’
Karl cocked his head and frowned, realising something had gone wrong. He had to make Ed understand the truth. Smiling, he began his explanation once again. The light reflected off the octagonal shapes of his lenses, blanking out the eyes.
Section XVI: Cesspools
When Harold Kelmscott looked at Clark Markey, what did he see?
He saw the ancestor of Clark Markey performing ritual sacrifice of Christian children. He saw the ancestor of Clark Markey breeding money from money: usury: a sin. He saw the ancestor of Clark Markey cursing Christ as He bore His cross, and telling Him to go faster up Calvary. He saw Christ turn to look at that ancestor, saying, ‘I go, but thou shalt wait till my return.’ He saw the ancestor of Clark Markey buying and selling Christian kings.
What were the five sources of the hatred Harold bore the Jew before him?
Old half-remembered stories from childhood; his parents’ anti-Semitism; popular slogans recalled unconsciously; the intense dislike of Karl for Clark, as reflected in his glasses; bitterness because Clark had not offered Harold a candy bar.
From what two-fold reason springs this last bitterness?
From Harold’s abstention from candy during Lent: first, he would naturally have taken pleasure in refusing a temptation of Satan; secondly, he would have enjoyed refusing the candy on religious grounds, implying that Clark was cruelly intolerant to offer it, and thus wounding him.
When Clark’s name was called over the intercom, he went meekly and quietly upstairs. As soon as he was gone, Harold drew and fired a histrionic sigh. ‘Good riddance, good riddance,’ he clucked. ‘I never could stand Jews, not even when they were my best friends. Do you know why?’
‘Because they cheat you?’ Karl prompted, hoping for an anecdote.
‘No, because, during the Middle Ages, the Jews used to slit open the throats of Christian babies and throw them into cesspools.’
Henry thought about the cesspools. He was becoming compulsively clean in habit if not in fact, and only barely restrained himself from wiping off door knobs and answering the phone with a Kleenex.
‘Cesspools, eh?’ Karl looked disappointed. ‘Well, you’ve got to expect it. Anyone mean enough to charge a dollar for a candy bar would stoop to just about anything.’
‘Anything. Their name comes from Judas, you know – their secret leader (you recall he killed Christ).’
‘That’s right. For money, wasn’t it?’ As he spoke, Karl stared hard at the back of Willard Bask’s neck.
MEMO: Power
We are fighting for, and we expect to win, a return of power to the hands of the white, Anglo-Saxon, God-fearing, Protestant, not overly-intellectualized citizens of American descent, especially in our Southern states, men of integrity who have kept the old values.
– Masterson
Section XVII: Old Values
Willard Bask was about six feet tall, slender, with a fine square-featured face that showed only a trace of weakness around the jaw. His clear eyes were the blue-grey of distance, and the necessary impression of fanaticism they produced was softened by his serious grin. Willard spent his summers on the beach, and used lamps to keep his tan dark all winter. Against it, his teeth seemed even and almost sound. His sculptured hair glistened like the whorls of thumb prints in grease. Like the grin, the nose of Willard twisted slightly to one side; he seemed always about to share a private joke with some invisible audience to his right.
Willard opinioned that it might not be all the fault of the Jews, things were all screwed up in the papers and they slanted things. He was sure things could be fixed up again, if the Southern coloured stopped listening to agitators and tended their knitting.
‘Let folks be, that’s what I always say,’ he said often.
MEMO: Dwelling patterns of the Allendar and Bask families: Patrilocal or matrilocal? At first the kinship arrangements of the Allendar and Bask families may seem complex and even arbitrary, but a closer inspection reveals many basic formations common to Southern United States tribes. At the heart of this scheme we find, of course, the familiar automobile, usually an older Ford or Mercury equipped with phallic aerials(s), with mammary steering knob (see formation of the form ‘guffer’s knob’ in Frazer, ‘Courtship in the Merc’) and certainly with twin anal ‘tailpipes’. The greater mobility provided by these vehicles has not led, as expected, to a breakup of the old matrilocal dwelling patterns, but only extended the range of such patterns from village to county, up to 150 miles.
The seven children of Faron Bask and Maypearl Allendar Bask are a case in point: Selma and Wilma settled in the same village with their spouses, while Travis, Truman, Orman, Willard and J.B. moved on to a city at too great a distance to maintain easy contact. Willard’s wife, Nelline Parker, bore him four children between her 13th and 17th years. They were then divorced and he moved back into the county of his birth at his mother’s death. He left home again, the following year abandoning Etta Leich, his second wife, shortly before her miscarriage. His younger brother, J.B., followed an exactly similar pattern, while Wilma and Selma followed its opposite, e.g., leaving the village at the death of their mother. Travis died, and Orman and Truman had not yet married. The Merc belonging to Travis had fender skirts; but when Truman inherited it, these were removed and a sunshade added. The pattern is self-evident.
– Masterson
Section XVIII: Patterns
‘It’s them communists, if you’ll excuse the expression,’ he said earnestly. ‘They come down and stir up the coloured. I can’t blame the poor coloured. They see all this white pussy around, agitatin’, telling them they’re as good … Well, you can see what that’ll lead to, but what can I do? Live and let live, that’s my middle name. But you’ve got to admit the coloured and white used to get along just fine, just fine, without no outside interference. Well, I’m not going to complain. I know God didn’t intend coloured and white to mix any more than a washer woman means to mix up coloured and white clothes – it’s the white ones get ruint. But who am I to make trouble?’
He glanced around accusingly. A bitt
er, nagging note came into his voice. ‘I’m not complaining. To each their own, that’s my motto. I think birds of a feather ought to flock together. Why, when I used to pump gas …’
Section XIX: Going out of style
‘The Southern coloured are just different, and if I sat around here explaining till Doomsday, you wouldn’t understand what I meant unless you lived down there. I mean different. Like they don’t know the value of a dollar. Soon as they get a nickel in their jeans, they just got to spend it, like it was burning a hole in their pocket.’
Lazily, he unstraddled a chair to fish a five-dollar bill out of his watch pocket with two fingers. Willard was buying coffee for everyone. The deliveryman set down the box of lukewarm covered containers and reached for his change, but Willard waved it away. Before he could taste his own coffee, however, his name was called on the intercom.
Section XX: Gone, but not forgot
‘Did you ever notice how Willard just throws money away?’ asked Karl when he had left. ‘Anyone who does that must have a bit tucked away. It wouldn’t surprise me to learn that his background is – Biblical, if you get my meaning.’
‘I had the same thought,’ said Harold. He took a reflective sip of the coffee Willard had bought him – black, for it was Advent – and asked, ‘What sort of name is Willard, anyway? Surely not a Christian name.’
Ed Warner finished his own coffee and started on Willard’s untouched cup. ‘Well, he’s gone now. No use talking about the dead,’ he said firmly.
‘He’s not –!’
Section XXI: Irregularities
‘He’s not!’ Karl screamed, his Michelin-tyre head inflating dangerously.
Harold’s long celluloid teeth clicked on his paper cup. ‘Of course not. He’s been fired, I’m sure.’ He looked warningly at Ed. ‘Caught, I suppose, with his hand in the till.’
‘What till?’ Ed’s yellow cheeks turned the colour of pleasure.
‘HE’S NOT DEAD!’
‘Prove it.’
Karl seemed about to collapse, but Harold shook his head. ‘You should know better than that, Ed. It’s up to you to prove that what’s-his-name is dead.’
For answer, Ed clutched his chest and crumpled to the floor.
Section XXII: Fake
Karl crowed. ‘He’s faking! Knows he lost!’
The old man’s lips turned blue. ‘He’s dying!’ Eddie snatched up the phone and dialled an emergency number. The number was printed in red ink on a card stuck to one corner of the bulletin board. Any user of the telephone confronted the bulletin board and read its notices without realizing it.
‘Join a bowling team now!’ ‘THIMK’, ‘THINK’, ‘We don’t make much money but then we don’t have ulcers, either.’ ‘Give generously to Univac.’ ‘Join and contribute now: AMERICANS FOR PRIVATE ENTERPRISE.’ ‘We are asking for flowers for Willard Bask, departed this afternoon. Please sign name and write amount clearly.’ ‘Good books for starving Asia.’
‘Forget it,’ said Karl, pressing down the phone cradle. ‘Do you want to get us all in trouble with the authorities? I told you, he’s faking. He’s not really turning blue.’
Eddie flushed, and his chin, raw with fresh pustules, began to tremble. Shoving Karl aside, he began to dial again. At that moment, the intercom sputtered:
‘Edwin EEEEEEEEEEEEEEP! Futch.’
He dropped the receiver and threw both hands to his face.
‘Go on, kid,’ said Karl gently. ‘If it will make you feel any better, I’ll call the hospital for Ed. All right? Now go on.’ He spanked Eddie lightly, starting him towards the door that led to the stairs. With a zombie stride, the youth marched out.
Karl replaced the telephone receiver and lit a cigarette.
‘Ed’s just faking,’ he announced. ‘Let’s get back to work and just ignore him.’
Harold licked his lips and glanced towards the door. ‘Too bad about young Eddie. though. So young – to go like that.’
‘Yes, death is a natural thing,’ Karl said, blowing a smoke ring. ‘We must learn to accept it and live with it. There must be nothing frightening or shameful about dying – it is as natural as pee-pee and poop.’
‘Yes, the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away, as the saying goes.’
The figure on the floor coughed, one sudden explosive noise, then lay still. Using his dirty grey handkerchief, Henry picked up the phone and dialled an emergency number.
Section XXIII: Real
‘All right, Ed, keep it up, right to the last minute,’ Karl yelled down the hall to the covered basket the ambulance men were removing. ‘Keep on faking! You’re only fooling yourself!’
His voice was shrill with fury. It excited the professional interest of the intern, who had stayed behind to fill out the death certificate.
‘Why don’t you sit down for a moment?’ he invited. ‘I know it’s hard to believe in the death of someone close.’ He pressed Karl into a chair and asked Henry his name.
‘Karl Henkersmahl. He’s a stapler.’
‘1 see. Oh, Mr. Henkersmahl? Karl? Would you mind putting a few staples in this form for me? It’s the death certificate of Mr. Warner.’
Karl moved slowly and reluctantly, but with a great deal of ceremony (Feierlichkeit) and precision beautiful to behold. He placed one staple neatly in each corner of the form.
‘Say, he really is dead, isn’t he?’ he murmured then, scratching his head. ‘I thought he was just faking.’
‘It’s too late for that,’ said the intern, with a mysterious smile. Though he wore a white uniform, he was a black man.
Section XXIX: The End of All Clerks
One by one, they were all called. Henry thought of quitting first. He even went so far as to interview with another firm, one specializing in famous information. But that night he dreamed that he was brushing his teeth when the toothbrush began ramming wooden splinters up his gums. It was a warning, perhaps.
In the spring, Bob and Rod left, smiling, asking that no flowers be sent after them, that they be cremated by a reliable firm recommended by a leading consumer magazine, and that their ashes be mingled.
At midsummer, Harold left, crossing himself and making signs to ward off the evil eye.
‘Nothing to be afraid of,’ Karl assured him with a serene smile. ‘It’s as natural as wee-wee and grunt.’
But when Karl’s own name was called he behaved in a strange, unnatural manner. The sound made him jerk erect, spoiling a staple. He carefully replaced it, tidied his desk, and with a private, one-sided smile lifted from the bottom drawer a heavy object encased in leather. This he carried into the lavatory and shut the door. A shot rang out. Before Henry, who was the only one left, could try the door, his own name was called on the intercom.
PART TWO: MASTERSON
Section I: The Figure at the Head of the Stairs
Masterson, or a bulging, obnoxious, enigmatic person like Masterson, stood at the head of the stairs. Henry saw he would have to squeeze past him to gain the fourth floor. The eyes in their lenses were quiet and horrible as glass, watching him ascend. In his hand, Henry carried the sheet of paper with his motto: ‘If you work good, we’ll do good by you.’ It was folded in neat thirds, and he held it up before him, like a shielding dental chart.
Who was this Masterson if this were indeed he? Was he truly the author of all memos, or a figurehead? Had he killed the real Masterson and assumed his place? The figure above, beetling over Henry, seemed almost like a great cancer that had once totally absorbed a man; now its vague memory of his lineaments served it to spew forth an idea of death upon the rest of the world.
As Henry moved closer, however, the cancer cleared its throat and stepped back to let him pass. As it did so, he saw the light had been wrong. This was the face of a fat, weary, self-pitying man, nothing more.
Section II: The Fourth Floor
Masterson explained to Henry that he was closing the third floor department and moving all clerks into the draughting room on this,
the fourth, floor.
The old clerk with skin like parchment appeared once more and led Henry into a large room he’d never known existed, where a dozen draughtsmen hunched low over their boards. As he passed them, he saw that each man was working on an entirely different project.
The first draughtsman was drawing large circles and small circles, and dividing them into quadrants. Mandalas, wheels, gunsights? Henry wanted to ask him what he drew, but he seemed preoccupied.
The second was drawing a long, continuous curve on a roll of paper. He might have explained that this represented infinity, but Henry did not pause to hear.
The third drew a histogram showing apparently the sales or consumption of oxen and earthen jars. It seemed too self-evident to enquire about, but was it?
The fourth copied, from the cover of a book of matches, the picture of a girl, labelled DRAW ME, but he was copying it upside down and reversed. Intrigued, Henry asked him why, but the draughtsman was, alas, stone deaf.
The fifth copied stylized arrowheads, from a pattern book. Henry was too frightened to ask him what his intention was.
The sixth was beginning a schematic diagram called MOODY’S LATEST SERMONS. He asked Henry to get out of his light.
The seventh had outlined a set of regular polygons, and was now beginning to black them in. ‘If you like them,’ he said to Henry, ‘you might pay. Otherwise please move on and give another a chance to see them.’
The eighth drew a bird’s wing, ‘Detail 43B.’ Henry was struck speechless by the beauty of it.
The ninth drew a ‘valve in cross-section’. ‘It means,’ he explained, ‘that “My life has for several years been a theatre of calamity.”’ Henry did not understand.