by Nescio
IV
It was a month later. It had been below freezing for a fortnight but at the beginning of the week there was a sudden change. And now it was night, and raining heavily. All day long it had been raining hard, almost without a break. The water ran in streams down my window-pane. It felt cozy inside. I liked it. I had no stove and my summer coat was still at the pawnshop. I had never owned a winter coat. The frost was a problem; you had to stay in bed out of poverty, it was the only way to keep warm. Usually in these circumstances I would just drop by Bavink’s. But just then the man had taken to sleeping all day and walking around all night. I had sat by his stove all night, alone and abandoned—he would have wanted me to but it wasn’t exactly fun. And now I sat listening to the rain clatter on the roof and was glad it was thawing, thawing hard. My bread, two thick slices, was directly on the tabletop; my last plate had gotten broken the previous night. Next to the bread was my cash: four blue bills, two rijksdollar coins, three guilders, and a few cents. And my kerosene burner stood on the floor in the corner, the water was starting to bubble in the little kettle on it. Next to it was my teapot, lid off, ready for the water to boil; there was already tea inside. And I sat with my legs stretched out under the table, barefoot, in a shirt, my hands in my pants pockets, and I looked at my food, at my wonderful money, at the flame of my oil lamp, at the single light of my little burner, and I listened to the rain and I was happy.
It was eight o’clock. I put my watch down on the table next to my money, the watch that was no longer on its way to the pawnshop, and I said, “For now you’ll stay right here with Old Man Koekebakker, little watch,” and I put my hand back in my pocket. I was used to having conversations with my things since there’s so little that’s worth saying to most people.
I was out of the woods for now—dear Autumn hadn’t let me down. The falling leaves, the southwest wind bending the trees on Veerschenweg even farther to the northeast and blowing snatches of Tall Jan’s bells to my ears and making the towers sway and shake in fear beneath the black clouds—I had finally transmuted it to gold at my writing desk and now I could sit and look at it in the form of my own money, money you can count on and that never lets you down and never leaves you in the lurch. I had gotten home an hour before, soaked to the skin, with a loaf of bread, a half pound of butter, six ounces of sausage, a half pound of sugar, three ounces of tea, and a box of cigars, twenty-five for four cents—riches I hadn’t known since my birthday, and that was months ago. I had already put away the sausage, that was for tomorrow. I had had a little cupboard built next to the window, and that’s where I put everything all in a row on the bottom shelf: butter, tea, sugar, sausage, all the things that can taste so good when you haven’t had them for a long time. And the rest of the loaf of bread, minus the two slices, was up on a higher shelf.
My clothes were hanging up to dry at the top of the stairs, under the rafters: jacket, sweater, pants, underpants, shirt, and socks. The water started to boil, the lid of the kettle rattled up and down. I looked at the steam and started thinking about how I would get my coat from the pawnshop tomorrow and for once not eat dinner in the kosher restaurant—beef and potatoes for thirty cents, pea soup with meat for thirty-five cents. And I was just thinking that it wouldn’t be unreasonable to think about getting a little something to drink in the house when my meditations were interrupted by a heavy footstep outside the door. Someone was fumbling with my door. You couldn’t knock because the door was made of wallpaper glued to a couple of screens, if you knocked you would put your hand right through it. People knew that. “It must be Hoyer,” I thought, “he can never find the hook.” The hook was on the inside but the door never closed properly and you could just get your finger through the crack and open the door from the outside. “Come in,” I shouted, too lazy to get up. “Easier said than done,” I heard a voice say, “how does it work?” “I don’t recognize that voice,” I thought, “who can it be?” I stood up and opened the door, and a trickle of water ran over my hand. “It’s Japi,” the man said. “Come in,” I said again. There he stood, water streaming from every fold of his clothes and off his hat too.
“Sure is raining,” Japi said. “Can I put my jacket somewhere? Wait a minute, have to put this down first.” He took a package wrapped in newspaper out from under his jacket—books, you could tell—and put it on the table. “So, is there somewhere to hang this?” he said, handing me his jacket. He leaned his hat against my little cooking stove.
“One minute, old man,” I said, and I took his jacket and hat out to the common area, hung the jacket next to my own wet clothes, and shook out the hat and put it on the floor in the corner.
Japi was already seated, squeezing out his pants legs and looking around. “To what do I owe the pleasure, sir?” “Just call me Japi,” he said. He unwrapped the package and put Le Lys dans la vallée down on the table. “There you go, friend.” “Thanks,” I said, “and what are those?” “Oh,” Japi said, “some of Appi’s books.” “Is Appi reading the Handelsblad these days?” “No,” Japi said, “the paper is from my old man. There’s a want ad in there.” “A want ad?” “A want ad, look, I just got it from the old man.”
“‘Seeking assistant clerk for a busy export business’—got that? a busy export business—‘thorough knowledge of modern languages, steno, typing. Applicants with prior experience in export’—hear that? prior experience!—‘will enjoy preferential consideration.’ Enjoy preferential consideration, I like that one. ‘Salary: 300–400/yr. Apply at #1296, Handelsblad ofc.’ It’s like Floris the Fifth. Floris the Stiff more like it. Floris the Stiff jumps over the Overtoom. Never heard that? Why do you think they filled in the Overtoom canal? They got tired of seeing that stiff guy jumping over it all the time. The 300–400 a year sounds nice to me, the rest not so much.”
“You think you’ll answer the ad?” I asked. “Think?” Japi said. “I have to, according to the old man. He says it can’t go on like this. I don’t see why not. Am I a burden on him? I’ve slept at home only twice this month, he doesn’t give me a cent. Look at this.” He stuck out a leg. I saw a brand-new yellow shoe. “What the devil, I know those shoes.”—Where had I seen yellow shoes like that?—“They’re a bit darker now because of the water,” Japi said, and he stuck out his other foot next to the first. “From Appi! And why? Because I’m not a burden on my old man, I go around in my old shoes till they have more holes than a sieve. Appi’s a good guy. Can’t paint, and never will, that’s for sure, but you can count on him. He didn’t have any socks on hand, I’m barefoot in these shoes,” Japi said, and good-naturedly pulled up a pants leg to show me his naked leg. “And he has books. I couldn’t get through all those books if I read night and day for a year.”
Appi’s father had a butcher shop that was doing well, he could afford it. And Japi was right when he saw that Appi would never learn how to paint. His father would later get him a job painting houses, signs, and billboards.
I made tea. Squatting next to the burner, I poured the water into the teapot and put it on top of the kettle. Japi sniffed.
“Smells good,” he said, and turned all the way around, scooting his chair over so he could sit with his nose right above the teapot. “I had a fight with Bavink,” he said. “Really?” I said. I had heard from Hoyer that they were roaming around everywhere together, day and night, that they slept in the same bed—Japi under the covers and Bavink on top—and took turns drinking jenever out of the one beer glass Bavink had left. “I busted his stove Sunday night.”
In one night he had heated it so hot that it broke. And still he kept piling more coal in and poking it around and kept looking at the belly and smoking his pipe, with the stove between his knees so to speak. And he didn’t say anything, until Bavink suddenly saw that there was a huge crack in the belly and raised hell. Japi let him thunder on, he stood up and moved his chair away, Bavink opened the grate with the poker and burned a hole in the floor with the glowing coals he dragged out. And when Bavink was s
till raging, Japi said “You and your stove” and coolly left and went back to his old man’s house and put on one of his brother’s clean collars and got a piece of pie from his mother that was left over from dessert. He spent one night at home and the next afternoon he ran into Loef on the street, he’d already met him too. Loef, who later drowned swimming, just when he was starting to make something of himself—he took Japi back to Bavink and said, “Here Bavink, I have a stove-buster for you.” And Bavink had laughed. And Japi went straight to the shelf and found a new bottle of Bols in the usual place, “next to Dante.” And the three of them knocked back most of the bottle and then Japi cut thick slices of Bavink’s bread to make sandwiches and then all three of them were off to Amstelveld and they bought a new stove for seventy cents (it was Monday), a prehistoric model, and they got it home in a wheelbarrow, the three of them.
I handed Japi a cup of tea. He drank it out of a mixing bowl, I didn’t have a cup for him. He groaned in contentment and banged the bowl down on the table. “What I could really use now is some bread,” he said. “Don’t mind me, I think I can find it.” He’d had his eye on my cupboard for a while. “Hey,” he said, “did you know you have meat in the house?” Did I know! He was already putting some sausage on the bread. “Sausage on bread—the people’s victuals.” My sausage, my treasure, the object of my reveries of luxury: the ham I was saving for tomorrow. Of course Japi went straight for that. I have to admit that he didn’t forget about me—he gave me two slices of sausage on every slice of bread. There was enough for that. And Japi ate. How he could eat! The bread was there next to him on the table and he just sliced away. I started to enjoy it. “Don’t be shy, Japi, there’s enough money.” Japi hadn’t noticed the money yet. “Damn!” he said. “It’s a pot of gold! They must have printed another one of your pieces.” I nodded. “As well they should,” he said. “What else are those people good for besides paying our expenses, I’d like to know. I’ve also written a thing or two in my day.” He stuffed his mouth full of bread and sausage and wiped his hands on the newspaper before crumpling it up. “I shouldn’t be writing anything, though, it’s not like I’m any good.”
Then out from his inner pocket came an old, moldering, nasty-smelling newspaper with the creases worn through. It was The Vlagtwedde Sentinel and he showed me an article with “Letters from Amsterdam” at the top. He’d written six, he said, but his brother had lost the other five. Japi helped himself to another slice of bread. “You don’t want any more?” he asked. I declined and Japi took the last quarter pound of my sausage. “The people’s victuals” seemed to agree with him. “Did it at night,” Japi said with his mouth full, pointing to the paper with his knife. “After hours. I always had to go back to the office in the evening. Sometimes I had to hold my head under the faucet to stay awake. Now I’d say no thank you. What do I care? Nothing. It only tires you out. I’d rather just walk around and look at people and the carriages and the houses. And especially at the pretty girls and the fresh-faced brides. You can always pick out women who have just gotten married, you can tell right away. And then I think about the fun I don’t have with all those dear creatures. I’d rather do that than write about it. What do the numskulls care what I see. They just shuffle down their own streets, staring down at the ground with tedious faces stuck to their heads because it’s a lost cause, life is so hard, it makes them miserable. What have they ever done for me? Let ’em keep their couple dollars.”
The article was quite well done, but Hoyer said later that he was sure Japi didn’t write it.
“Now I could really go for a pint of beer,” Japi said, leaning back. “Sorry, man,” I said, “none in the house, no beer and no jenever and no clothes to go across the street in, but have a cigar.”
The rain clattered on the roof like it was about to break through and the windows were white with water. Japi was not in the mood to go outside, I was sure of that. He lit a cigar, looked at the smoke for a while, then said, “That Hoyer, what kind of a guy is he really?” Hoyer and Japi didn’t get along. I’d already realized that. Hoyer was a penny-pincher and spoke his mind too. “He’s useless,” Japi said, “he should stick to smearing his paints around, he’s no good for anything else.”
Bavink had left town for the day, “on business” Japi said, and he (Japi) had run into van Houten on the way home from the office. Van Houten, a friend of Bavink’s, worked in an office and thought he could write. He had already published a brick of a novel, which had cost the publisher a pretty penny. Japi let himself be invited out to dinner. Hoyer was there too, he was the first one to say, “Hey, freeloader!” Japi thought that was excellent. After all, who among us is not a freeloader? “The bourgeoisie are there to pay our expenses.” That same night he had asked Hoyer to loan him a rijksdollar, just to needle him. He knew perfectly well that Hoyer wouldn’t happen to have any money on him at the moment. But even big ol’ Hoyer got taken eventually, he couldn’t help it. Japi borrowed Hoyer’s ridiculous salmon-colored coat and never brought it back. Japi didn’t get much enjoyment out of it, though. He was always getting into fights about it, and eventually some roughnecks tore a sleeve off, on the bridge in Ouderkerk.
“Look at that,” Japi said, “quarter past nine. Time to get going. Listen to that rain.” He went and stood by the window. “Pitch black,” he said. “Can’t see anything through this rain. Phew, I’m shivering, my pants legs are still wet. Too bad you don’t have anything to drink in the house.” I fetched his jacket. It was still water-logged.
“Do you have a long way to go in this weather?” I asked. “I could go by the old man’s,” Japi said, “but that’s half an hour away too. That’s your nest, is it?” Japi shoved the curtain aside and sat down on my bed and yawned. “I think I’m coming down with something,” he said. “You know what you should do, go get a half dram of old jen-ever, it’s on me. I’ll pay you back when I get the chance.” I was still standing there with his jacket over my arm. “Wear my jacket,” he said. I stumbled out to the attic—my sweater was more or less dry. The liquor store wasn’t far. I draped Japi’s wet jacket over my sweater. The thing felt cold and unpleasant. And I went down the stairs like that and across the street. There was no line and I was back within ten minutes. When I came upstairs I found Japi lying there snoring, in his clothes, with his shoes on. “Hello!” I shouted and shook him by the shoulder. He mumbled something. “Hello, jenever’s here.” He looked drowsily up at me and sat up slowly. “Oh,” he said, “so I see.” He drank a sip. “That’ll fix me right up. Say,” he said, “can’t I spend the night here? I didn’t get a wink of sleep last night or today either.” What was I supposed to say? He could sleep on the floor, he said, if he could just have something to put under his head. “Thank God,” he said, throwing both his shoes across the room at the same time, “Thank God I’m out of those dripping wet monsters!” Then he hung his pants over the back of a chair, “to dry out.” He pushed my little burner aside, put Appi’s books down in the corner, put his jacket on top, and kept his sweater on. Then he took my best blanket, rolled himself up in it, took another sip of jenever, and lay down with his head on the little pile and said, “Sleep tight.”
And I went back to the table and sat down, looked at my money, and dozed off. When I woke up the lamp was out of oil and sputtering. I crept into my bed and slept badly because of the cold. Japi didn’t notice a thing.
When day broke and I woke up, for the umpteenth time, I heard him rummaging around. He was busy making tea, had gone downstairs on his own to get water and told my startled neighbor that he was a cousin of mine. He had slept great, was just a bit stiff. He hoped he hadn’t woken me up. “I already ate,” he said. “I think you’re pretty much out of bread.” He had to go. He wanted to talk to Bavink who in those days usually went to sleep around ten in the morning. He brought me a mixing bowl of tea in bed and stood by the window slurping his own bowl. He held it tight in both hands and looked out. “Times are tough all over,” he said. “Well th
en, ciao, I can get my jacket from the clothesline myself.” At the door he turned around again. “A place like this looks a lot nicer at night.”
I thought so too. I stumbled out of bed, cold and miserable. My money was still lying on the table. He had said he didn’t need his old man’s money, I thought, or the bourgeoisie’s money either. You try saying that.
V
“Koekebakker,” Japi said, “I feel so strange inside.” It was one afternoon at Bavink’s. I’d stopped by to talk to Bavink but he was out. Japi was sitting at the table with a little dime bottle of ink and a pile of newspapers in front of him. “Koekebakker, I feel so strange inside.”
“Well you certainly smell like jenever,” I said.
“No,” Japi said, “it’s not the jenever. I think my soul is too big.” Can you believe it? That sponger! “What are the newspapers for, Japi?” I asked. Japi slapped the pile. “Daily News, Koekebakker, Daily News. Some of them are a month old.” “Have to apply for a job again, Japi?” “You guessed it. Can’t go on like this. Grab a chair. Look: KH14684, Daily News. Dear Sirs:”—“How many have you done so far?” I asked.—“First one. It’s slow going. You people who’ve never worked in an office, you don’t know what it’s like. What’ll you have to drink, man? You don’t mind if I keep going, do you?” and he dipped his pen in the ink and then stared at the blank page. “Koekebakker,” Japi said, looking helplessly around and putting down his pen. “It’s no good. I’m not the man for this. I worked in an office once, and I’m not cut out for it. I know from experience. I don’t understand anything about it. What’s the point of it all? I’m perfectly satisfied as I am. Let’s just put that all away.” And he picked up the stack of newspapers and carefully placed them out of sight beneath the table.