This time they didn’t sing any more, they danced, rattling their hard heels in a sailor’s jig. Their legs whirled faster and faster, always faster, pounding the sandy floor. I picked up the program to see who they were. They were the three Dicksons.
But when I looked back at the stage again they weren’t there, the three Dicksons weren’t there. There were only six legs springing up there on the stage, stamping and whirling on the boards in an amazing tempo, avoiding the hook, six slender black legs. The curtain fell and the audience applauded. They had not noticed, didn’t see how the six legs came out from behind the curtain, walked up to the board one after another and bowed.
Who had stolen their bodies? No, it could not be. Someone might want those legs but certainly not the bodies. The bodies were not worth anything. Those ugly heads, narrow chests and monkey arms—no one would want them. But those legs, those six strapping legs of steel and sinew, so slender and sturdy—those majestic six legs!
My hotel was on 25th St. DeMayo. The desolate Casino Theater next door was still noisy. I went inside. Three women were on the stage, the program said they were the Graziella Trio. They were boring blonde girls in long blue velvet dresses with the sides slit open. They sang their song, and then for a refrain they raised their dresses high into the air and danced. They didn’t wear petticoats. Their legs were stuck into high black tights. Slender, sturdy legs of steel, I could tell at once that they belonged to the three Dicksons. Suddenly I felt a great fear—I knew that something would be stolen from me too. Not just my legs—everything! But the feeling only lasted a moment, and then I laughed about it.
Then the thought came to me, what now? What could the Dicksons do about this theft? These women had certainly given them their old woman legs and were now proudly going around the world with these magnificent Dickson legs. How could the Dicksons prove this theft? No insurance would pay such a claim and it would eventually need to be settled in court. I went into my hotel and wrote a letter to the Dicksons offering my services as a witness.
Page 914 in the hand of the Lady
The Great Garden
Not the one at Cintra, not La Mortella at Ischia, not the Villa D’Este Garden, The Mirror of Dreams, in Este, not the dark mysterious one in Chislehurst, not the one at Lokrum, the island in the Adriatic sea, not the one at Schweriner castle, not the magical gardens in Haiti created by a German poet while posted as consul in Negro land. No, no. It is none of these, like all of them perhaps and yet like none of them.
Sometime—when the right word fails, when the beast that devours is eaten, when the past becomes the future, when beautiful lies smash unpleasant truth to pieces—perhaps then!
Weary I ride through the evening somewhere, always along some field or forest. There is a wall, a long gray wall with high trees behind it. Behind this wall lies the great garden. Sometimes the wall is broken for a short space and patched with fence railings. If I wish I can see through to the other side into this mysterious place.
The road continues on into the distance, smooth, unending. Now there is a meadow. Deep bushes dream sleeping, swans sing in dark ponds as night comes. There is no sound, not the smallest, faintest sound.
When I come to the gate I will slip from the saddle, kiss the nose of my gray and with my whip tap lightly on the heavy iron. I know it will open—slowly, lightly, with no grating of hinges. It will open by itself, this mighty gate will open and receive me into the arms of the great garden, the garden of my desire.
There in the distance a beautiful woman wanders through the plane trees. Where she goes her steps ring like the sound of wind chimes. When she breathes her breath shines like a silver fog. When she laughs the nightingales forget their song. When she speaks pearls drip from her lips.
“Boy,” she says to me. “My dear boy.”
I am so happy that my girl calls me “her boy”.
“Dear boy,” she says and kisses my hands.
No words can describe what I feel as she takes my hands and kisses them. Peace lies in the eyes of this beautiful woman and her kisses fill me with peace—
Soon—I will come upon the gate, soon—
I never find the gate, only breaks in the wall repaired with fence rails. I can look into the mysterious garden if I wish. There are only deep bushes, dark ponds and a long, wide road that never ends. There is the wall, the long gray wall with high trees rising above it.
Weary I ride through the evening along fields and forests—somewhere.
* *
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Page 919 In the hand of the Baron
I know very well that it is a joke and I would heartily laugh over it if it happened to someone else. But I still can’t get over it, not today or ten years from now and if I see the Baroness again or the wit that gave her the idea I will shove my riding whip through their faces. Get the hangman for me!
Baroness Isabeau Primavesi, descendant of the Eleventh Hussar, was certainly no saint! She had slept with the Polish violinist and Mr. Von Staching. I believe that she had a love affair with her chauffeur as well and heaven knows whom else.
That time I made a pass at her at court—well, yes, I wanted to have her because she was a beautiful woman and highly popular at the spa. Yes, I went to great pains over her, more than over several other women.
Then at the Casino Ball it finally happened. We were sitting in a niche and I boldly spoke to her, told her what I wanted. I know that I spoke well. First she became pale and then red at my ardent words. Her ears and forehead burned bright red. She didn’t offer me her hand as she stood up but she said:
“Come to my castle tonight around three o’clock. You will see a light in a window. Climb up to it—”
Then she hurried away and danced a Quadrille with a Finnish partner.
That night I climbed over the garden fence and ran up to the castle. I quickly saw the window; a faint light shone out through the closed shutters. I took the ladder that was leaning on the wall and climbed up quickly, knocked lightly on the glass but no one answered. I knocked again, and then I opened the shutters, cautiously pushed the window up and climbed into the room.
I could easily see that it was the luxurious sleeping place of Baroness Isabeau. Her clothes lay there over the divan, her yellow silk gown that she had been wearing that evening. Where was she? Ah, there was a light burning over there behind a curtain. So that was her bed. She was in there. I softly called out her name, no answer, only the soft rustling of fabric.
I quickly undressed, went to the back and pushed the curtains apart. There stood the low, broad ostentatious bed of the Baroness—empty. But tied to the bedpost staring wide eyed at me was an ancient scrawny mountain goat. He raised himself up on his hind legs bleating loudly when he saw me.
I don’t know how I got dressed again. The ladder was gone and I had to jump down. Perhaps it was only my imagination but I thought I heard two voices laughing as I ran through the garden.
Early the next morning I set off to the spa. It was only coincidence that I met Amundsen along the way in Hamburg and went off to the North Pole with him instead.
Oh no, it was not just a joke, it was a cowardly, contemptible insult, a scalding affront, as if someone had spit into my face. At the time I didn’t realize it, felt I was to blame. I felt sick, wounded in my pride, that was all.
But I see things differently today. If she had wanted to make a point, make a joke, a good joke, she didn’t need to do that. All she would have needed to do was say:
“You stupid delusional idiot think you want to conquer the Baroness Isabeau? Do you think she wants you? She chooses her own lovers. Go comfort yourself with a mangy old goat my boy. It will be good for you!”
But she placed that old buck in the room just for me, it lay there on purpose in her room most certainly just for me! I have never heard of a man being so insulted!
Page 940 In the hand of the Baron
Kochfisch, my attorney, has a tapeworm. He has been running around with it for years, at times troubled and ann
oyed by it. But besides that he is blissfully happy. He is such a simple fellow. It’s true he has a few days that are very unpleasant. It’s not easy moving through life being tormented by a parasite. Dear God, if only I had it so light! There is no power in this world that can drive out the parasite that I carry through life!
Earlier it was like being on the stage. I ran around playing my role straight, being funny at times and then tragic. I played my role moderately well. Then suddenly I vanished through the trap door and up above a woman was playing my part. There was no warning, no cue. I was gone and she was there.
I don’t know what happened while I was under the stage. I was fast asleep. When I woke up again I was standing on the stage and the woman was gone. I have to wonder, who is this double that wants to invade me? There is only one thing I know.
It was in Monterey in the state of Coahila at the circular arena, the amphitheater. There were one-plank seats everywhere. The people on the benches were screaming and spitting, The fat and sweaty police chief sat in his box. His fingers were covered with diamond rings. Indian soldiers patrolled the area.
The Mexicans, Indians and Spanish along with a few mulattos and Chinese sat in the sun on one side. The foreign colonists, the Germans and French, sat in the upper box in the shade. There were no English. They didn’t come to the bullfights.
But the loudest were the Yankees, so called gentlemen, railroad employees, mine officials, mechanics and engineers. They were all crude and drunken.
Near the box of the police chief in the middle of the shaded side sat nine tall bleached blondes from Madame Baker’s Pension. No coachman would have touched them in Galveston or New Orleans but here the Mexicans fought over them, sprinkled them with diamonds.
It was four o’clock and the show should have started an hour ago. The Mexicans waited quietly, undressing Madame Baker’s ladies with their eyes. They stretched out, enjoying these free hours and the sight of these lusty women. But the Americans were getting impatient, shouting louder and louder.
“Bring out the women! Bring the damned women! “
“Are they still painting their faces?” one called out.
“They should be naked, the old swine!” a tall lank one howled.
The side in the sun screamed in delight. “They should come naked!”
The cuadrilla stepped onto the sand. At point as Matador was Consuelo da Llarios y Bobadilla, the womanly “fountain”. Her lips were painted fire red, her face thickly covered with blue powder. Her giant breasts were tightly pressed up to her chin in a corset that was partly unlaced. Behind her came four fat women and two thin ones all dressed in tight fitting pants as Banderilleros. Their long and short legs showed grotesquely in the sun. There were two other women as well sitting on worn out old mares as Picadors, lances in their hands.
The crowd cheered, clapping their hands. A thousand shameless, disgusting things were thrown and fell like hail into the sand. Just one of Madame Baker’s ladies unconsciously pulled at her lip with a small glimmer of sympathetic awareness of what was about to happen. The Aguazil, a female dressed in a black velvet jacket, brought the keys She was greased all over and rode up on a paralytic mule that almost collapsed under its rotting burden. These spongy prostitutes had been chosen as the favorites by ten thousand of their patrons in the city just for this bullfight.
The gate was unlocked and a young bull, more like a calf, shoved against the gate and stumbled into the arena. But the young animal had absolutely no desire to harm anyone. It mooed loudly and tried to get back inside the gate. It was afraid and pressed itself tightly against the planks. An Indian was poking at it through cracks in the planks with a stick trying to get it riled up, to give it courage.
The woman came up, waved the red cloak in front of its eyes, screamed, tried to excite the ox with the result that it turned around and pushed its stupid head hard against the shaking gate. Consuelo, the illustrious Matador, got up her courage and pulled the animal by the tail just like she pulled the mustaches of her customers.
The Mexicans screamed, “Cowards! Cowardly bull! Cowardly woman!”
A completely drunken Yankee bellowed incessantly, “Blood! Blood!”
One of the lady Picadors tried to drive her nag up to the bull. She hacked deep holes into it with her long pointed spurs but the mare wouldn’t budge from its spot. The other women beat with thick cudgels on its legs, strained at the bit to pull the mare toward the bull. They beat at the ox as well trying to get it to turn around so the horse could attack. The bull finally turned around. Both animals stood there facing each other, mooing and neighing under the force of the heavy blows. But they didn’t even consider attacking each other.
The Banderilleros took up their darts. They ran past the bull, planting their barbed sticks in its neck, its back, anywhere they could. The bull stood trembling in ridiculous terror and let it all happen.
“Bad bull! Bad women!” the Mexicans screamed.
“Blood! Blood!” the Yankee bellowed.
They dragged the nags to the side. Consuelo da Llarios y Bobadilla reached for her sword. She saluted, pointed and stabbed—in the side!
Those in the sun raged in fury. The stab should go between the horns, through the neck and into the heart so the bull would sink to its knees. Now she stabbed it again—in the snout. Blood dropped into the sand. The poor animal mooed and trembled.
Like one giant mouth the crowd screamed in anger. They threatened to press into the arena. The drunken Yankee drowned them all out with his bellow:
“That’s right! That’s good! Blood! Blood!”
The police chief shot his revolver into the air to get some order.
“Calm down,” he cried. “This is the joke of it all! They are worthy of each other, the women and the bull!”
Those in the sun laughed, “Ah, Ah! They are equal, they deserve each other!”
The woman stabbed at the ox, six, eight, ten times she thrust her sword into its body. Once the sword struck a bone, the blade bent and tore out of her hand. The woman screamed; the animal trembled and mooed. But now the crowd had gotten the magnificent joke and they were laughing, doubling over with laughter.
One of the fat Toreadors brought a new sword but she didn’t want to give it to the Matador. She wanted to stab the bull with it herself. The Matador scolded her and tore it away from her. The other took the bent sword from off the ground and they both ran up to the ox.
The Picadors, one thin like a skeleton and the other round, could no longer wait to give the deathblow. They got off their mares, tore their weapons out of their girdles and wielding daggers raced to the dying bull. All of them sprang upon the animal. They didn’t aim any more, just stabbed and stabbed. Foam sprang out of red painted lips, dark blood sprayed over the golden tresses and the silver spangles covering them.
The ox just stood there unmoving, spewing blood out of a hundred holes. They pulled on its tail, pulled its legs up under its body. The gaunt one struck with her dagger, above, below, in both eyes. The animal was dead but the women murdered it again. Kneeling, lying over the carcass tearing it to pieces.
Consuelo do Llarios y Bobadilla tore the snout off it and pushed her sword in to the hilt. The Mexicans bellowed nearly bursting with laughter. Such a joke, such a splendid joke! The police chief sat proudly in his grand box rubbing his meaty hands over his belly, playing with the diamonds on his vest. Then he signaled for the music, trumpets blared, a new calf stumbled into the arena!
That’s when I saw how Madame Baker stood up from her place, bent over the partition, stepped into the nearby box with a light bow, came up to the police chief and she hit him, planted her fist right in the middle of his face. The fat man staggered back, blood dripped over his large splendid moustache. Everyone saw the blow; it was quiet in an instant. It was as if a great conductor had stopped his orchestra in the middle of the wildest tempo beat. In this sudden quiet Madame Baker threw her glove in his face.
“Oh, you son of a bitch!”
The colonists grinned in their boxes; they understood the humor of the situation completely. She, Madame Baker, bordello mother calling the police chief, the representative of the government, the keeper of the law and morals, calling him the son of a whore to his face.
But those in the sun saw it differently; they took it as war, war over there in the box. There was no turning back, no reconciliation from that. There was only him or her. There was only room for one! The fight was on and they had to take part in it. Revolution! There was the police chief with all his soldiers, hundreds of ugly Indians with loaded rifles in their arms. But Madame Baker was not afraid, she was a power. The governor was her friend and no one sitting there in the shadows didn’t know her women.
The crowd was quiet, staring up into the box, helpless, undecided. They waited breathless, perplexed. Which side should they choose? They hated the police chief and his band of extortioners but they hated the strangers almost as much. The scale hung very lightly. Which side should they throw their blood into?
Then Madame Baker stepped to the front of the parapet. It was apparent that she had acted impulsively without consideration and now for the first time realized that it really meant her or him. She was only an old prostitute and a seller of prostitutes—but she was also a Texas girl and deeply despised these yellow mongrels, these crude conceited apes, the diamonds they had and how they taxed her business.
“People,” she cried. “People of Monterey! You have been deceived! That was no bullfight! That was a slaughter! They have stolen your money from you! Get the women out of the sand, put your silver back into your purses!”
I once heard General Booth speak at the Crystal Palace. I know how that great man could grip the masses, yet his influence was nothing compared to that of Madame Baker at the women’s bullfight in Monterey, Coahila. She ripped the muzzle off the crowd, unleashed the tongues of the animals, whipped up the beast in every one of them and they screamed as one.
Hanns Heinz Ewers Volume I (Collected Short Stories by Hanns Heinz Ewers) Page 10