Hanns Heinz Ewers Volume I (Collected Short Stories by Hanns Heinz Ewers)

by Hanns Heinz Ewers

  “They cheated us! They stole our money!”

  They sprang howling over the banks tearing the planks off. Here and there they struck a soldier down, took his rifle and sword. The Toreadors, a fearful knot down in the arena, tore the gate open and ran out screaming letting those in the sun onto the sand.

  The colonists stood up urgently looking for an exit out of their box. The police chief followed them but went only two steps before a bullet struck him in the back. Then fights flared up in the shadowed places and then where the music had played earlier. It was not long before the fighting was right next to the box and in the bullpens. Browning rifles fired blindly into the dust and long machetes cut down harmless spectators. The sunny side raced yelling and screaming over the sand and climbed up into the box. Revolution!

  Madame Baker pushed her women ahead of her. She herself carried the little Maud Biron who had fainted and hung like a sack in her arms. She didn’t speak another word as she stepped down the stairs. The people made way for her.

  I saw someone in a hat calling out to me from a coach. The coachman had been lounging at the coach stop but now climbed up into the seat, took the reins, snapped and cracked the whip over the four horse team and drove the coach over toward me. The man in the hat was Chateney. He had been with me up in the box.

  “Are you crazy?” he cried. “Do you want to get yourself shot? Get in!”

  The coach stopped and I got in.

  “To the train station!” he cried to the coachman.

  “Why there?” I asked.

  “We promised to meet Ritter in San Pedro tomorrow, remember? His big race is early morning at eight o’clock. We can get there an hour early if we leave right now on the train.”

  “Leave now?” I cried. “Now, when things are just getting interesting?”

  “What is interesting about this?” Chateney cried. “You can see trouble often enough but this is a revolution! Let these fools settle it by themselves!”

  I went with him but it was against my will. I was too weak to stand up against him and it was a good thing for me that I did go. The next morning as Ritter’s jockey steered his chestnut to victory against the beer brewers champion I was once more myself. I had exited from the stage of my life, disappeared down the trapdoor and the woman had taken my place, stolen my body.

  It happened when Madame Baker stepped up onto the parapet. At the time it felt good, like I had dissolved, like my entire self had dissolved and nothing was left of the man that had been laughing at the crude scene playing out below down in the sand.

  I trembled, afraid, and wanted to sneak away but couldn’t tear my gaze away from this strong woman. I wanted her to take me as well, carry me in her arms like she carried Maud Biron. I had only one fervent wish, to lie there like a poor little girl against the strong breasts of this great woman. I had become a woman—a woman—

  It was a coincidence that saved me, a coincidence and Clement Chateney. He bet twenty thousand coins on Ritter’s horse and I am happy to say that I also made a nice profit.

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  Page 972 In the hand of the Baron

  When I think back about it, I, Baron Jesus Maria von Friedel, cavalry lieutenant and globetrotter lived my life, no one else. The strange being that chased me out of my body and brain, that took possession of me only appeared in short episodes. No, she didn’t take possession of me; she threw me out of my own self! I know it sounds funny but I don’t know of any other way to say it. But I always came back again as my own person.

  She has been there ten or maybe twelve times, not any more than that and only for short periods, a day, an hour, a few times each week and then for five months as I—no, no, as she, not I, served the Baroness Melanie.

  I don’t know what it was like in my childhood. I was simply a child, never a boy and never a girl until the time when my uncle took me away from my old aunts. But I am certain that up until then I never felt one way or the other. I was a true neutral and I call my youth at castle Aibling the neutral time of my life. Does this dilapidated old castle with its sleeping woods have some influence over me? All I know is that I was not either, not male or female. Or perhaps I was both- and I was only sleeping.

  But then for twenty years I was a man, a man that sometimes lost his place to a woman. Even then I was only one, a man or a woman. But now since I’ve been back in this castle everything has shifted and things appear to be different. I am both a man and a woman and for nearly equal times.

  I sit here in my high riding boots, smoking my short pipe, writing with my broad slanted handwriting in this book. I just came back from my morning ride, was out hunting rabbits with my greyhound. I look back at two pages I wrote yesterday at this same time. It is in the hand of a woman.

  I sat here at this window in women’s clothes. By my feet lay the lute to which I had even been singing. It appears that I am musically talented when I am a woman. Here is the song I composed, played and sang, Dreaming through the beeches. Dreaming through the beeches! It makes me want to vomit! God in heaven, how I hate this sentimental woman! If there was only a way to drive out this hateful parasitical tapeworm!

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  Page 980 In the hand of the Baron

  Yesterday evening I was down in the village. Kochfisch had something to do at the house in the forest and he asked me to ride over to see Bollig, the butcher. He had delivered some bad meat to us last week and needed to replace it. I rode to the butcher’s and it was around dusk when I arrived. I called but no one came to the door, then I called again.

  A pig poked its head out of the window. Finally I climbed down from my horse, opened the door and went into the shop. No one was there, only the huge pig. It ran back from the window, came up behind the counter, raised itself up on its hind feet and laid its front feet on the marble counter top. I laughed and the pig grunted at me.

  Then to see better I took a match and lit the gas lamp. I could see very well—I saw—

  The pig had an apron on and in its belt hung a broad knife. It leaned over the counter and grunted. I had the feeling that it was asking me what I wanted. I laughed again. The butcher’s joke pleased me, letting his trained pig represent himself. But I still needed to carry out my errand so I called out for the butcher again.

  “Bolling! Bolling!”

  My voice reverberated through the still house. No one answered, only the pig grunting agreeably. Then it stepped around the corner and up to me on its hind legs. I turned around, there hanging on strong iron hooks was the flesh—four halves of two butchered bodies. They hung there like sides of pork, the heads down below, white and bloodless. I recognized them right away, two halves belonged to the stout Bolling and the other two belonged to his fat wife.

  The pig pulled out the broad knife from his belt, wiped it on the leather apron and grunted again. Then it asked—Ah, I understood its speech! It asked whether I wanted ribs, ham or shoulder? It cut off a great slab of meat, laid it on the scales, took some heavy white paper, wrapped the meat in it and gave it to me. I took it, unable to utter a single word and went quickly out the door.

  The pig accompanied me, gave a deep bow. I would be very satisfied in the future, it grunted. I would always receive only the best meat. He remained my obedient servant and hoped to see me again soon—

  My horse was gone. I had to go back up to the castle alone. I held the package in my hand repulsed by the way my fingers penetrated into the soft package. No, no, I couldn’t do it. I threw the package as far into the forest as I could. Night had long since fallen by the time I got back to the castle. I went to my bedroom, washed my hands and then threw myself onto the bed.

  Then suddenly, I don’t know how it happened; I was standing in the kitchen door. People were going past me, no one saw me. Kochfisch went by and I called out to him but he didn’t hear me. He went over to a group of people that were standing there and spoke to a lady. A fillet was sizzling in the pan and she called the cook to come over wit
h some cream and make some gravy. The lady standing there—it was I.

  Page 982 Immediately after in the hand of the Lady

  No, my dear Sir, the lady standing there was I! Just like it is me that is sitting here and writing. I have not the slightest thing to do with you. Nature has made some kind of a joke and imprisoned the two of us together in one body. I make no claim on this body when it belongs to you, but I ask, as my right, that you be respectful of me when I live in it.

  The next time you stand there in the kitchen door like you did yesterday evening and secretly spy on me pay more attention and be more careful. Realize that it is I and not you! You saw me, everyone saw me, everyone shook my hand and could feel me but I didn’t see you and no one else could see you or feel you. What were you then? You were less than the shadow of my reflection in the mirror.

  You are the one that is there when I am not there. When I do come you always crowd me out again, chase me out and burn out every last memory of me. Yes my dear Baron, you have never allowed yourself to play the Gentleman to the Lady. You have always, how should I say it, denied my very existence. But now you realize completely how close we are.

  You have lost this little game because of your blind anger against me that rages out of every line in this book you have written. Your book my dear Sir, most certainly, but also my book, our common book.

  You say that I am the one that always blindly intrudes, invades without asking your gracious permission or consent. Well this time I have stepped into your life unasked. I have a right to be here and that is why I am becoming more strongly rooted inside this body with every hour that strikes.

  You are going away, you are withering, have become a tired old tree and I am already receiving life from you, even today. Believe me, soon I will be alone in here, Mistress of the castle, able to spit you out like you want to spit me out. I do not enjoy writing in this black book. I’m only doing it, especially today, so that you will realize that I have been here and that you were not. Just look at this my poor Sir, I sit here writing in my own hand.

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  Page 983 immediately following in the hand of the Baron in heavy pencil written in especially large slanted letters.

  I, I, I am here! I am sitting here! I am writing this! I am Master in this castle! I will get a Doctor to come, two, three, perhaps even a dozen, the best doctors in Europe. I am sick, that is all, and you, you tidy woman are nothing more than my foolish illness! They will get rid of you my little worm, just wait!

  There, I have written three telegrams, two of them to Berlin and one to Vienna. Kochfisch is delivering them immediately to the Post Office. Yes, one of these gentlemen will have time for me and my money.

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  Page 984 In the hand of the Lady

  If only, my dear Baron, if only! Attack with your childish stroke and I will parry it, believe me. Just like I have done today.

  Kochfisch announced the Privy Medical Councillor, Doctor Mack today as if that would impress me. I let him wait for two hours before I first appeared. I, the illness, my dear Baron, wanted to consult with him about you!

  He seemed somewhat bewildered, disconcerted and didn’t know what to say. I was very obliging.

  “Sir Professor, you thought you would find a gentleman didn’t you? But Jesus Maria is a woman’s name as much as it is a man’s name and today you see me as a woman that even—”

  The Privy Councillor gave me a very long lecture about Venus Urania; there was not a sentence that I didn’t already know. Then we talked about you, my dear Baron, and thoroughly occupied ourselves with this question.

  I have inherited your memories and way of thinking like I have everything else. Naturally the professor took me for you, dear Sir, and he took you for a homosexual that lived in a man’s body and ran around in women’s clothing. I gladly let him think it. I know my dear Sir, just how sick you really are. This is a little trifle in answer to what you have already chosen to write about me in this book. Listen very carefully my dear Sir, if you want war—I will take you up on it.

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  Page 996 In the hand of the Baron

  Am I really still here because this kind benevolent female gives her permission for me to wander a little longer upon this earth? I am not afraid of death, never have been. Haven’t I already died a hundred times—and come back to life again? But how do I know that this time is not the last?

  Other people die—and everything goes with them into the ground. The lungs don’t breathe any more, the heart quits beating, the blood stops flowing. Flesh, muscles, nails, bones, everything passes away sooner or later. But my flesh lives on, my blood roars, my heart beats—only I am not there. Don’t I have a right then to die? To die like other people? Why must I of all people become the sacrifice for some brain fever delirium?

  It is no miracle that—

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  The same page, in the same line but continued in the hand of the Lady

  —yet it is a miracle and you know it very well my dear Baron! Do you remember when you yourself had an experience in Kärnten when you were still a lieutenant? You were riding cross-country and came upon a tall beautiful plum tree that stood between a farmhouse and a barn. You always liked to eat plums and you said:

  “If only they were ripe!”

  You looked but couldn’t find a single ripe one. They were all still hard and green. Perhaps they would be ripe in a month! But the next morning, as you rode past, the plums were all ripe. Wasn’t that a miracle?

  You certainly had a good explanation. That night the house and barn had both been burned to the ground but the flames had not disturbed the tree that stood between them. The terrible heat had ripened the plums over night. That’s what caused it, but isn’t a miracle still a miracle even when you can explain it?

  And tomorrow morning when I or you fall into this body and experience everything that is to come, or when I become you, or you become me, isn’t that nevertheless a miracle as well?

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  Page 1002 In the hand of the Baron

  And—and—and you call yourself a Lady! This is too much—you are a—

  No, I will remain polite. Well then, well then, you take everything that I am and that I have. You know exactly how I suffer, want to see me become insane. Yet, before I—before I go—there is something I must ask. Damn me for asking. There is no where else I can escape from you. I ask, do you hear me; I ask just one thing of you. Leave me something in which you will not intrude.

  You should certainly feel some gratitude to this being that has given you everything. Just leave me—it is such a little thing—leave me this book. Don’t write in it any more. Let me at least in here be myself.

  Baron Jesus Maria von Friedel

  Page 1003 In the hand of the Lady

  My dear Baron!

  Really I am not at all indebted to you. I am here instead of you and not through you. There is nothing for me to be grateful for either. It is only out of compassion for you my poor—excuse me—you are like my father, my bad father—that I will promise to leave our book, not your book, alone for you in the future. Understand completely that this promise is good only as long as you do not provoke me into saying something through your own conduct.

  With sincere compliments,

  Your devoted,

  Jesus Maria, Baroness von Friedel

  Page 1008 In the hand of the Baron

  I’ve been through all the rooms in the castle. I recognize all my rooms but don’t recognize hers. She certainly has an advantage over me because she can remember everything that happens when she is I, but I can’t remember anything or almost nothing of what happens when I am she.

  Her rooms are in back near the forest. She moved the grand piano into them as well. There are three rooms, a living room, a bedroom and a dressing room. I opened the dresser and closet in her bedroom. They were full of woman’s clothes and other women’
s things. Suddenly the door opened and a young housemaid came in that I had never seen before.

  “May I kiss your hand, gracious Lady Baroness,” she said. “Shall I help you change clothes?”

  I waved at her to leave. So I have a lady’s maid when I am she! And all the servants call me Lady Baroness when I stay in these rooms! I opened her writing desk, apparently she is very organized. All the receipts lay bound in pretty little packets. On the top of the desk lay a slip of paper with notes written on it:

  Order pine soap!

  Get some Crême Simon!

  Eau d’ Alsace!

  Underneath these were the words:

  By all means have a black dress made for when he finally—

  When he finally what? Obviously for when I finally disappear completely! Then she will wear black and be in mourning! How touching, how affectionate, this—

  I ran out of her rooms. I suddenly had the feeling that I was going to transform again if I stayed there another second. I shut the door; breathed out in relief- making certain that I was still myself.

  I went up to Aunt Christine’s room. She was the oldest of my three aunts and yet had lived much longer than the others. I went into her room. I had not been into her room since I had been back at castle Aibling. The curtains were closed and the sunlight only shone feebly through them. The dust lay thick over everything. A faint lavender perfume rose from the ornamental covers that hung over the chairs and sofas.