The Ride Across Lake Constance and Other Plays
Page 19
(KOERBER-KENT wants to follow him but returns again. QUITT paces up and down. )
KOERBER-KENT
(With lowered head) I don’t envy you, Quitt. I could also tell you about myself, like the others, but that’s not my way. I never talk about myself. I’m proud that I eliminated myself from my own calculations long ago. I’m not interested in poking around the lint in my navel. I’m glad that I can be replaced. (Pause.) I pity you, Quitt. And I’m afraid for you. I recently saw a drawing a painter made of his dying wife: the pupils had lost almost all their color in the fever, and the iris, too, had become very pale. Nothing but a dark circle separated it from the white of the eye around it, and the centrifugal force of dying had even thickened this circle. It was as if the eyes sighed toward the observer. The artist’s pencil had hatched an endless sea of sighs from a mortal seeing hole, as I called it. And the following morning the woman is supposed to have really died. (A popping sound backstage. ) What was that?
QUITT
Hans is at work. He isn’t very good at uncorking bottles. There’s almost always a pop when he opens the cooking wine.
(Pause.)
KOERBER-KENT
Aren’t you afraid to die? (He raises his head and wants to transfix QUITT—but QUITT happens to be standing behind him.)
QUITT
Over here.
KOERBER-KENT
Don’t you ever quickly push everything away from you just because you are deathly afraid? (QUITT steps away from him and comes to a halt with his back to him. KOERBER-KENT lowers his head again and closes his eyes.) Someone once told me how he dreamed he was dying. He was sitting on a sled and said: I am dying. Then he was dead, and at some point they closed the coffin lid over him. And only then did he become deathly afraid: he didn’t want to be buried. He woke up, his heart was fibrillating. Besides, he was very ill, the dream wanted to kill him. Cause of death: a dream, you could say. (Very loudly) You see, dying in your sleep isn’t at all peaceful, but perhaps the worst death of all.
(QUITT has kept pacing around in the meantime, absentmindedly, and now stands in front of KOERBER-KENT.)
QUITT
(Very softly) Really?
KOERBER-KENT
(Is startled. Looks up at QUITT now.) I know from other stories (One can hear a key turning in a lock backstage and a door handle being pressed down.) that a dying person keeps looking away whenever his eye catches a specific object, as though he could postpone death in this way … (He listens.) Someone pushed down a door handle just now, no? Why don’t I hear a door opening? (Pause.) Once during a meal I personally sat opposite a man who suddenly started putting the table in order: put the knife and fork parallel to each other, wiped the edge of the glass with his napkin, shoved the napkin into its silver ring. Then he keeled over dead.
QUIIT
(Distracted) Who kneeled on the bread?
KOERBER-KENT
He keeled over dead, I said. (Frightened) You’re afraid too.
QUITT
(Scratching his pants absentmindedly) Damnit, the cleaner didn’t get that spot out either. Yes? I’m listening.
KOERBER-KENT
He was still smiling beforehand–(Two or three distinctly audible steps backstage.) but in his deathly fear he bared his lower teeth instead of his upper teeth, as you would expect. Nothing wrong with a dead dwarf, that’s still a vegetative process, almost. But a fully grown corpse, just imagine that! It’s monstrous. (He listens.) Why doesn’t he walk on? Wasn’t someone just walking back there?
QUITT
My baby fat starts growing back when I listen to you. You and your deathly fear—at the moment everything seems thinkable to me and also beside the point.
KOERBER-KENT
What? What?
QUITT
It was just the floor creaking, I’m sure of it.
(PAULA appears in a dress and with a veil in front of her face. At the sight of her, QUITT unzips his fly halfway down and up again. A garbage can cover bangs loudly on a hard floor backstage.)
KOERBER-KENT
As I said, I’ve got an eye for those who are marked. (He points to QUITT. ) It’s that thin line on the upper lip … (He notices PAULA.) It’s you! How good that you are here. Perhaps you could … him … (He tries to find the word.) What’s the word?
QUITT
Congratulate him?
KOERBER-KENT
No.
QUITT
Work on him?
KOERBER-KENT
Something like that … no.
QUITT
Take him over your knees?
KOERBER-KENT
(Panic-stricken) Oh, God, how did this happen? I can’t find the right word any more. What are they doing to me? Come down, eclipse of the sun! Hellfire, burst forth from the earth!
(QUITT walks up to PAULA and whispers in her ear.)
PAULA
(Loudly) “Deathly afraid?” (To KOERBER-KENT) You are trying to make him deathly afraid? Do you think he’ll admit us back into the market?
KOERBER-KENT
(Screams) I know what I’m talking about. I’ve seen thousands die in the war. (QUITT sighs. KOERBER-KENT resumes normal tone of voice at once.) Am I keeping you from something?
QUITT
Not at all.
KOERBER-KENT
(Screams) I can read signs. I know why you hunch up your shoulders when you walk around. But soon you will shoulder the necessary weight of death, no matter what, Hermann Quitt. Even if you dangle your arms back and forth like that and scurry every which way. Even if you sit up straight as a candle in your deathly fear! (He begins walking out backward. HANS appears, wearing his chef’s hat.) You won’t even be able to imagine the moment. There will be nothing but abrupt, animalistic, anxiety-ridden anticipation. You will be so afraid you won’t even dare to swallow, and the spit will turn sour in your mouth. Your death will be gruesome beyond all imaginings, complete with moaning and bellowing. I know what I’m talking about. With moaning and bellowing. (He walks backward into HANS and emits a scream. Exit.)
(HANS also exits. QUITT and PAULA look at one another for a long time.)
QUITT
If you keep looking at me, I will lose the rest of my feelings.
PAULA
I won.
QUITT
Why?
PAULA
Because you were the first to talk.
QUITT
Now it’s your turn.
PAULA
I love you, still. (She laughs.)
QUITT
Why are you laughing?
PAULA
Because I succeeded in saying that.
QUITT
I can’t buy myself anything with that.
PAULA
You are so artificial. You’re sacrificing the truth now for a slick cliché.
QUITT
Moreover, I didn’t give you any excuse for it. (Pause.) I keep having to get used to you all over again. (He looks her over from head to foot.)
PAULA
I’m not one of those.
QUITT
Who, after all, is one of those? (Pause.) I’m tired. When I take a step I feel as if my real body has stayed behind. I don’t need you. When I saw you I was happy, but I also was a bit turned off. I took that as a sign that all my desire for you is gone.
(She laughs. He regards her considerately until she has finished. )
PAULA
What you say is supposed to humiliate me. But the voice that I hear flatters me.
QUITT
You’ve changed. You’re out of breath. Before, when you used to show your feelings you used to be much more self-assured. Why can’t it be that way now? Stop playing the humble woman. I only want to touch you when you talk matter-of-factly. (Spitefully) Incidentally, why are you by yourself and not with the team? Do you call that creative?
My head hurts. Besides, I like you better when you wear pants.
PAULA
Your head
is also hurting me, yes, your whole life … (QUITT pats her arm.) You pat me the way a conductor raps his baton … (She caresses him.)
QUITT
Your caresses tickle me.
PAULA
Yes, because you don’t want to enjoy them. (QUITT’S WIFE enters. She is wearing the same dress as PAULA. She notices, stops, and leaves again.) Now caress me too. (QUITT caresses her and steps away from her.) That was one too few. (QUITT returns and caresses her once more. ) Oh yes. (Pause.) Tell me about yourself.
QUITT
(Animatedly) I was thirsty a few days ago. (Pause.) It just occurred to me.
PAULA
Look at me, please.
QUITT
I don’t like to look at you.
PAULA
Well, what am I like?
QUITT
Unchanged.
PAULA
Before I got to know you better I thought you were unfeeling and tough. I once heard you say of me—the brunette there—as about a whore.
QUITT
You always tell yourself stories like that afterward.
PAULA
What would you say I would say now? Mr. Quitt?
QUITT
Don’t call me that. (She puts her hand on his shoulder. Suddenly she begins to choke him. He lets her do so for some time, then shakes her off. QUITT’S WIFE has returned in a different dress. She watches, giggling inaudibly, sucking her thumb. QUITT seats himself in the deck chair and lowers his head. PAULA squats down and wants to take his head in her hands. He gives her a kick. She falls down and gets up, warbling. He kicks her again. She gets up, warbling. He wants to kick her again, but she eludes him, warbling.) Your slimy tongue. Your absurd hips.
PAULA
(Lifts her dress.) Look at the way my thigh is twitching. Can you see it? Why don’t you come closer? (QUITT grunts.) Come on.
(QUITT puts his hand on her thigh. PAULA presses her head close to him. Pause.)
QUITT
All right, get lost now. (He steps back. Pause.) The saliva in your mouth will run over in a moment. And the way your eyeballs jerk back and forth! (He turns away. Pause.)
PAULA
I’m going already. It’s no use. I’ll sell.
QUITT
(Regards her.) And I’ll determine the fine print.
PAULA
Only promise me that you won’t clean up the moment after I’ve left.
QUITT
Buying yourself a hat can be very comforting.
PAULA
Now I know why I like you. It’s so easy to think of something else when you’re talking.
QUITT
Tomorrow at this time it will already be lighter, or darker. Perhaps that will comfort you too.
PAULA
(Suddenly embraces QUITT’S WIFE, releases her, and tosses QUITT a friendly as well as a serious kiss as she walks out.) “No hard feelings …”
(QUITT throws a stool after her. PAULA exits.
QUITT’S WIFE comes closer. They stand opposite each other, not saying anything. The stage light changes after some time. First sunshine, then cloud shadows moving across the two of them. Crickets chirp. Far off in the distance a dog barks. The sound of the ocean. A child screams something into the wind. Distant church bells. Woolly tree blossoms blow across the stage. Both of them as silhouettes in the dusk against the backdrop of city lights, which are just coming on. The noise of an airplane engine, very close, slowly receding—while previous stage lighting comes back on. Quiet.)
WIFE
(Softly) You look so unapproachable.
QUITT
Remembering does that. I’m just remembering. Let me be. I’ve got to remember to the end. (He sits down on the deck chair. She steps closer. He touches her lightly with his foot.)
WIFE
Yes?
QUITT
Nothing, nothing. (He leans back and closes his eyes.)
WIFE
(Sighs.) Oh.
QUITT
(To himself) So that it crashes and splinters …
WIFE
What will you do?
QUITT
(To himself) Stop. Destroy. (He looks back at her.) Strange: when I look at you, my thoughts skip a beat.
WIFE
I’d like to speak about myself for once too.
QUITT
Not again!
WIFE
Why, are you listening to me?
QUITT
You could have been talking about yourself while you asked that. Did you wash your hair?
WIFE
Yes, but not for you. I am not well.
QUITT
Then scream for help.
WIFE
When I scream for help, you reply by telling me a story how you once needed help. (Pause. She laughs a few times in quick succession as though about something funny. QUITT doesn’t react.) Help!
QUITT
You have to shout at least twice.
WIFE
I can’t any more.
QUITT
(Gets up. ) Then do away with yourself. (He turns away.)
WIFE
(Mechanically wipes the dandruff off his shoulders.) You’re up to something. I can’t look at you for too long, otherwise I’ll find out what.
QUITT
What do you want? I have a pink face, my body is warm, pulse eighty.
(Pause.)