North

by Louis-Ferdinand Celine

  There are reasons for my subscription to the Figaro … . . mostly the “Chronicle of the Fates” … I’ve seen the passing of characters who’d been really looking forward to eating the inside of my skull … worms and all, the arrogant jerks! … Greetings to the bereaved family! … left with Aulnoy-les-Topines on their hands … its forests and château … keep after that notary!

  It’s perfectly possible that in a year … two years? … this whole valley of the Oos will be nothing but a trickle of atoms … which makes it worth talking about … No order in my story? … you’ll get your bearings … no head nor tail? … dammit! I left you at the Hotel Stern without giving you the key … I didn’t have time … just a few words about those pregnant women … oh well! … the whole book is at Gallimard’s and they don’t give a shit either! reminiscences and memoirs! … the one thing that gets a rise out of them is vacation! I’ll take you back to the pregnant women … anyway I hope so … our first stop after Paris was definitely Baden-Baden … and I haven’t told you about it … like I was ashamed almost … but it’s no more shameful than Marble Arch or Times Square! … the Medway or the banks of the Oos … Lichtenthalallee! … the promenade of Europe’s creamiest cream … anyway the same people as in Evian or Bath … that’s right, matter of luck! … the wheel turns, the stakes are down! … Has luck frowned on you? … scum of the Universe! You’ve won? … the world is yours … the streets bear your name! … chancelleries … every one of them … waiting in line to lick your ass! … The “Everything Goes” Casino of History has a roulette wheel that means business, that doesn’t give a shit if you’re right, a thousand times right! … cheat … phony chips … you’re in! who cares! … If your number comes up, the world will adore you! … our chips looked pretty rotten to us … I asked Madame von Dopf … strolling on Lichtenthalallee … along the Oos, that murmuring gurgling little river, sparkling all colors … why they’d’put us there … people unfit to be seen … in this setting? in this hotel?

  “Oh, never fear, Monsieur Céline, they’ve got some idea … you’ll see, the great disaster will develop according to plan … the armies of the Reich are leaving Russia according to a plan! … ten thousand dead per kilometer … as for France, I can’t say … not yet … but there too it will surely be so many per kilometer … Prince Metternich was telling me only yesterday, reprisals in Paris, already … Take care, Monsieur Céline, our madmen are extremely devious and chivalrous and methodical … isn’t that a baroque mixture? … you’ll see! … Baroque art is a German art … typical, don’t you think? … typical! … they take their time, you’ll see, Monsieur Céline, you’ll see it all … take my own house in Potsdam, I haven’t the slightest doubt that I was bombed by the Luftwaffe! not by the RAF, not at all! … by order of the madman, to do away with me and my house and my husband’s papers! … at the stroke of noon they came, at lunch time … I’d gone to see my daughter in Grünwald … my house isn’t there any more! … a detachment from the Chancellery came to search the ruins! they didn’t find a thing … I owe my life to Prince Metternich, he called for me at eleven o’clock … and now Baden-Baden … to think that when my husband was still alive we were thinking of buying here … a villa … there’s fate for you! … I too wonder why they’ve put us here, all of us together … or rather, I don’t wonder … you must have noticed … those bombs that fall … not far from the hotel … just at lunch time … so regularly that people have stopped being afraid … they get used to it … they don’t believe in it any more … If you can get away from the Simplon, go, Monsieur Céline! … the Hotel Simplon is asleep and its guests … under a spell! … only a bomb can wake them! … I’m joking, Monsieur Céline … to tell the truth, this valley is a paradise … nowhere in the world such trees, such groves … perhaps at Tsar-skoïe-Selo? … and the willows hanging over the Oos … not leaves but tears of gold and silver … an enchantment, you can’t deny it … and so many birds …”

  “Marvelous, Madame von Dopf!”

  “In the days of Max of Baden we may have had more nests … there was a Society, for the birds of Lichtenthal… they had their sanctuary, planted with chickenweed and hemp-seed … and for migratory birds another sanctuary in the rocks … in those days they took care of everything …”

  I wasn’t going to point out to her that if die birds were squawking all around us it~Was because of Bébert, who stuck right with us, the faithful torn! … he followed at our heels… thinking of titmice, warblers, and robins … he and the birds understood each other, in a certain way …

  I’ve been talking a lot about Madame von Dopf, I haven’t shown her to you … an elderly lady, slight and frail, dressed in violet satin … half-mourning … oh, but not sad! always ready to laugh … not the least dismayed by the things that were happening … they gave her a kick … “Jewels I hadn’t worn since I went into mourning” … she wore them all … three necklaces, rings, beautiful bracelets … “A showcase, Monsieur Céline, a showcase! … all that was left of my house! … I’m ridiculous, aren’t I? … a young woman dresses to please, an old woman to look rich, you’ve got to be rich or go under! … My nieces now … they came to see me in Potsdam … they were going to be married soon … my house was enormous, too big, four stories, my husband’s offices, much too big for me … I was thinking of coming here to end my days … I’d have given them my house … Hitler solved that problem … It’s too comical!… where are my nieces now, I wonder? … I’ll probably never see them again … and where do you think I shall end? … at the Hotel Simplon? … under another bomb? Oh, certainly not in the Oos! … nobody has ever succeeded in drowning himself in the Oos! … not a single gambler … not even the unluckiest! … at Monte Carlo everybody can drown himself! the sea is right there … here the Oos is made to order for the Casino! … it laps and gurgles but never drowns anybody, never! … do you hear it? … an amusing detail, Monsieur Céline: the gurgling can be regulated, it varies with the time of day and the weather … regulated by a maiden lady employed by the Casino and the Society of Springs and Fountains … the Oos must neither splash nor disturb nor drown … it must charm! … the Valley authorities think of everything … everything here must be as in a dream … you can see for yourself …”

  That didn’t exactly apply to us … for my money our life was no dream … extra-crummy reality! … like now in ‘59 … the bourgeoisie try so hard to think they’re still living in 1900 … stupid masquerade! … yes, you can’t deny it, certain attractions, old-time plush, all so cushioned and reassuring … Gypsy serenades for centuries and centuries of debauchery … but for us branded beasts, don’t make me laugh! you seldom see animals enjoying themselves in front of the slaughter-bouse … a cute monument even so! worth looking at even for us hunted animals! Russian church … five cupolas, enormous gold onions against the blue sky … quite an effect, you say… .’ oh yes! oh, what a dazzling prayer! … the pope is there, waiting … waiting for the tsars to come back … or some grand duke at least … two have turned up since 1917 … donors neither one … came to borrow icons … to exhibit them in Rome … . the pope never saw them again … this pope lived at the Simplon too, in the kitchen! … he was part of the Valley … pending better days the authorities put him up at the hotel … he showed people through the church now and then … Uli, me, Bébert, and Madame von Dopf got him to talk a litle … before going on to the”rose garden” … that’s where the promenade ended … ever since the Romans … the first Baths … it’s ended there … you must rest a while … the “rose garden” wants no tramps! no goof-off bottle washers … no picnickers! … the “rose garden” is open only to the better class of strollers … the flowers have been there since Tiberius …

  Boskets … arbors … roses … glowing pastels … beyond belief … there we were on a marble bench … Madame von Dopf telling us again about her stays in China, with her husband the general, the brilliant reorganizer of Mao’s army … that baneful little clown wouldn’t have lased two months with
out him! … ah, Monsieur Céline, believe me! … her husband in such a place!

  “You know, Monsieur Céline, the Devil triumphs because the people who know him well are gone … that Adolf, for instance … he can do just as he pleases! no one to fear! … another solitary devil! …”

  I myself had been thinking that things were going from bad to worse … this Madame von Dopf was nuts, but not far from wrong I’d say … No news from my mother … or anybody else … a little over the radio … barricades going up in Paris … the staff of the Simplon kept in touch via Lausanne … . the whole town for that matter … croupiers, manicurists, shopkeepers, the Legationsrat himself, our Führer … all of them convinced that “Radio-Sottens” ° was a good deal more reliable than “Télé-Gobbels” … Schulze, our Führer, didn’t come out openly for the Allies, but after every really big defeat he ordered a high Mass at the Casino church, he and his family took communion … why not? … we were there in that enchanted spot thinking things over … in between the roses, Madame von Dopf pointed out the site … a few bricks were still standing … of the “Pavilion of the Philosophers” … where Grimm, Madame de Staël, and Constant met every morning … Madame von Dopf had come here as a little girl, she knew every bush, every path, all the mazes, the despair of governesses …

  I know something of China too … Italy … and Spain … and Monte Carlo … I’ve got to admit, Monsieur Céline, that I’ve been spoiled … as no one is today … not even a queen! I have no qualms about saying … it’s all over … even a queen by divine right has to think of public opinion … even the most coddled millionairess has her “daily report” … her chambermaid keeps it up very carefully … every little folly of her mistress, gala dinners, lovers, miscarriages, all out in the open… the times have changed!… more fragile than Mary Stuart! more beset than Marie-Antoinette … and yet, Monsieur Céline, ignorant I am and ignorant I will die … stupid me! … I shall leave behind me a bill in more than four figures … I am lost!

  Lili, I must say, Lili, the dancer, found it quite natural that I should check over the bills …

  How preposterous it was! … we were enjoying ourselves! … and what fine weather! … hot but breezy … weather fit for Paradise…

  I, always a worrier, never relishing the passing moment, seeing no one about, neither under the arches nor oh the lawns, I wondered … the wherefore of this silence … especially at eleven in the morning, the family hour … in such weather … our rose garden so fragrant … unbearable! … that Lili, usually so timid, asked Madame von Dopf if we couldn’t move on to that other bench … under the plane trees, in the shade … Madame von Dopf was telling us how when she was a young bride at the Simplon her husband, then a captain, had challenged the Brazilian ambassador to a duel over a rose! … yes! … a black and purple rose! … that had fallen … on their balcony … from the ambassador’s windows! … oh purpose! said her husband … no! … His Excellency protested … the affair had been smoothed over … thanks to the prince! …

  “Prince Metternich …”

  Madame von Dopf had more memories … many more … Achtung! … Achtung! … a siren wails … attention please! and man! a fanfare! … were they going to announce a victory? … impossible! for at least two years there’d been nothing but retreats … a separate peace with Russia? … possible … the loudspeaker was pretty far away … between the hotel and the rose garden … I listen … we listen … no, not a victory! … Achtung! Achtung! … an attempt on Hitler’s life! … all we needed!

  “They don’t tell us if he’s dead,” says Madame von Dopf. And adds: “Fine kettle of fish if he’s not.”

  Nothing to be surprised about, reader… at the time of that assassination plot, events incidents and mumps were so hopelessly tangled that even today we’re mostly reduced to parallel misunderstandings … contradictory conspiracies … the best way, I believe, is to think of a tapestry, top, bottom, and middle … with all the themes, objects, colors helter-skelter and upside down! … any attempt to set them before you fiat, standing, or recumbent would be a fraud … the truth is that after the attempted assassination there was no orderm anything …

  If they’d killed him, succeeded, there’d have been some order! ever since he came off alive, look where we’re at! disorder forever!… so why shouldn’t I be telling you about the Hotel Simplon, Baden-Baden, after the Stem in Sigmaringen … though we weren’t there until much later! … try and get it straight! … time! space! I chronicle the best I can! … That’s right! … painters and musicians do as they please! … and they’re feted, showered with millions and honors … even movie actors and tennis players … should I, the historian, be forbidden to tack it together bassackward? … blighted forever? … Howling shame! … disgrace! … escaping in rags and tatters! … the pack at my heels! … hangings too good! … Greetings, Ladies and Gentlemen … the stakes are down? never mind! … cast off! get your bearings! … the wheel wobbles? … so what?! … the ball’s gone nuts? … contrition! … foolishness! … all the fault of that half-assed plot! …

  Ah, Ladies and Gentlemen, naturally I didn’t see anybody in that “garden of Paradise”! … on the benches or in the arbors! … they’d holed up, right after the first achtung! achtungs! at the bottom of the Simplon cellars … where nobody could see them or hear them! … but there at the swimming pool, nearby, the angry shouts redoubled! the ruckus! not only from the loudspeakers, no, the public! … the whole Simplon, staff and guests … they didn’t give a shit about Adolf and the assassination plot … if they’d ripped him to pieces or not … “Your ass! Whore! Get yourself buggered! Jump in the drink! Bitch!”

  Somebody’s ass! … a fat ass?… whose ass could it be? …

  “The Führer’s dead!”

  “Stinker, who said so? Throw her in the drink! … asshole! unverschämt! … raus! raus! throw her out!” …

  Sounded bad … then different people shouting … “

  “Right to talk! … Boches! motherfuckers! insulting a lady!”

  “A lady? Throw her in the crapper! …”

  They haul off! Wham! … bam! …

  “A cocksucker … that’s what she is!”

  From the rose garden we could hear it all … a free-for-all … for and against … but whose ass? …

  “Whore!”

  The whole valley echoed …

  “Beat it, you two-bit cunt!”

  A woman running away from the swimming pool … coming our way …

  “Madame von Dopf! … Madame von Dopf! …”

  We know her … Mademoiselle de Chamarande! … It’s her and her curves that have thrown them off … the whole swimming pool howling and fighting! … and it goes on! … whoosh! … bzing! … haymakers! … a champion wham! … from the diving board! … another! … they’re throwing each other into the pool! … they come up punching … Mademoiselle de Chamarande … here she is … she sits down beside us … out of breath … her bathing suit in tatters … she takes Madame von Dopf’s hand … she bursts into tears …

  “Madame! Madame! I implore you … they struck me! … they’re crazy! … they want to kill me because their Ftihrer’s dead!.. .“they’ll come here, Madame von Dopf! … they’ll kill us all! … they said so!”

  “Not at all, my child! … the Führer isn’t dead! he’s lived through worse! … just a little plot! you’re too exposed, that’s all! … those bathers see too much! … think nothing of it! your bathing suit is far too scanty! cover yourself and stay right where you are! Here, my handkerchief … dry your tears! You won’t have any eyes left!”

  “But my bathrobe, Madame von Dopf! … they tore it off me, my second-best bathrobe! … yellow and red! they wouldn’t give it back! …”

  “I expect not. I’ll go and get it! … they’ll give it to me!”

  “Madame von Dopf, they’re furious! Really furious!”

  “Not at me, dear child, old age puts a damper on the wildest … just wait… they’ll be only too glad to give me you
r bathrobe … yellow and red, you say?”

  The four of us stay right there … sure enough! … she starts off … the gravel walk to the swimming pool … slowly … and comes back almost immediately with the red and yellow bathrobe.

  “They didn’t say anything?”

  “Of course not! … nothing at all, my dear! … and now put it on! … we shall go back to the hotel … all together.”

  And so we did … the four of us pass through the crowd of flunkeys … a second before, they’d been punching each other, now they’re very quiet… not a murmur … Madame von Dopf looks at them, stops …

  “You know, my dear, they’re not entirely to blame.”

  She could say that again … For the last three weeks … ever since she arrived …our young lady had done her best to drive the swimming-pool males up the wall… every day a new bathing suit, more and more provocative … oh, a magnificent ass, I admit… but the things she did with it! … the bobbing and swaying … the rear view on the diving board! … and swimming … a crawl technique that gave her ten buttocks at once … lunging through the foam … over water, under water … enough to turn the pool upside down … the customers, I mean … barbers, croupiers, bath attendants … and the lounge lizards from our hotel … convalescent officers … yes, of course, their nerves shot to hell … that attempt on Hitler’s life had raised the temperature … plus her and her rear end! if not for Madame von Dopf, she’d have been lynched … one word and all was calm again … we passed in front of the horde, masseurs, bath masters, cooks, a slimy crew, bowing and scraping. Aside from her deplorable mania for exhibiting her bumpus, Mademoiselle de Chamarande was a sweet young thing, really pleasant, cultivated … a pharmacist at Barcy-sur-Aude … a “collaborator” by accident, she’d been in love … reciprocated! … with a lawyer in thé Milice ° … they were going to be married … their idyll had been short-lived … two days before D-Day the Fifis had gunned him down in the courtroom … she’d run away, her house was on fire, her pharmacy, the whole shebang, her grandmother too … an SS tank had picked her up in the alfalfa! the whole underground, had been looking for her … skin of her teeth … flat on her belly between the bullets! … ah, Mademoiselle de Chamarandel what she’d been through! … she could be pretty funny … in her flight she’d teamed up with the Milice families at Gérardmer… and that’s not all! … on the beach she’d made the conquest of the whole German Embassy … stopping place on their pullback to Frankfort … plus the croupiers from Monte Carlo on their way to open a new school in Stuttgart, a branch of our academy … In the position she was in … no more pharmacy, no more house, no more grandmother … and young thugs all over itching to scalp ° her … the young lady, no dope, had become very friendly with the gentlemen of both camps, Gaullist croupiers, Nazis from the embassies … but maybe a little too much rump for jittery young men … especially on the diving board! … witness the low brawl between the Vichy flunkeys, the “occult résistants” of the Simplon, and the Boche inhabitants of Baden-Baden, crippled, twisted hunchbacks from the hospitals, who went to the pool for the free striptease … all steaming exasperated, ready to do us in, they’d picked the cobbles to tie around our necks … if not for Madame von Dopf they’d have done it … Taking advantage of the lull we start back along the banks of the Oos … somebody comes running in the other direction … Fräulein Fisher! … one more that loves us dearly … and brags about being very mean … the Americans spanked her … she lumps us all together … she has a special kind of ugliness … so much like Quasimodo … that it can’t have hurt her any … in Algiers they spanked her … at the Consulate … now she’s with Schulze … his secretary … nature had given her a rough deal, her whole left cheek one strawberry mark, thick red hair done up in a cow’s tail, those eyes, one gray, one blue … with a squint … terrifying … and proud of it! … she came from the Hartz Mountains, home of the witches … she cultivated her décor, her room all full of pictures of witches … witch dolls … on the wall, witches painted on plates … hanging from the ceiling … witches riding on broomsticks … “All on our way to the Sabbath,” she warned us. That fine old legend meant a lot to her … She saw herself stirring the cauldron, with us and the Americans inside it, skinned and boiling nicely … In Algiers, after the landing, the Americans had disinfected her … we were to blame! such people! … and coming toward us now in a big hurry … what’s the good word? …