The Wall

by Marlen Haushofer

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  AFTERWORD

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Copyright Page

  For my parents

  Today, the fifth of November, I shall begin my report. I shall set everything down as precisely as I can. But I don’t even know if today really is the fifth of November. Over the course of the past winter I’ve lost track of a few days. I can’t even say what day of the week it is. But I don’t think that’s very important. All I have to rely on is a few meagre jottings; meagre, because I never expected to write this report, and I’m afraid that much that I remember will be different from my real experiences.

  All reports probably suffer from this shortcoming. I’m not writing for the sheer joy of writing; so many things have happened to me that I must write if I am not to lose my reason. There’s no one here to think and care for me. I’m quite alone, and I must try to survive the long, dark winter months. I don’t expect these notebooks will ever be found. At the moment I don’t even know whether I hope they will be. Perhaps I will know, once I’ve finished.

  I’ve taken on this task to keep me from staring into the gloom and being frightened. For I am frightened. Fear creeps up on me from all sides, and I don’t want to wait until it gets to me and overpowers me. I shall write until darkness falls, and this new, unfamiliar work should make my mind tired, empty and drowsy. I’m not afraid of morning, only of the long, gloomy afternoons.

  I don’t know what time it is exactly. Probably around three in the afternoon. I’ve lost my watch; but it wasn’t much use to me before. A tiny, gold watch, really nothing but an expensive toy that never showed the right time. I have a ball-point pen and three pencils. The ball-point is almost dry, and I very much dislike writing in pencil. My writing doesn’t stand out clearly against the paper. The delicate grey strokes blur into the yellowish background. But I have no choice, after all. I’m writing on the backs of old diaries and yellowed business paper. The writing paper belonged to Hugo Rüttlinger, a great collector and hypochondriac.

  This report should really start with Hugo, since had it not been for his mania for collecting and his hypochondria I wouldn’t be sitting here; I probably wouldn’t be alive at all. Hugo, my cousin Luise’s husband and a fairly wealthy man. His money came from a saucepan factory. They were quite special saucepans, produced by nobody but Hugo. Unfortunately, although I had it explained to me often enough, I’ve forgotten what was unique about those saucepans. And it’s irrelevant to the matter at hand. Anyway, Hugo was so wealthy that he needed to do something special. So he organized a hunt. He could just as easily have bought himself race-horses or a yacht. But Hugo was afraid of horses, and felt sick the minute he set foot on a boat.

  He only kept up the hunt, too, for appearance’s sake. He was a bad shot, and loathed shooting innocent deer. He invited his business partners along, and they, together with Luise and the huntsman, were the ones who bagged the game while Hugo sat in an armchair in front of the hunting-lodge, hands folded across his belly, and dozed in the sun. He was so agitated and over-tired that he nodded off the minute he sat down in a chair - an enormous, fat man, tormented by dark anxieties, with too many people making too many demands on him.

  I was very fond of him, and shared his love of the forest and a few quiet days in the hunting-lodge. It didn’t bother him if I stayed somewhere nearby while he slept in his chair. I went for little walks and enjoyed the silence after the hubbub of the city.

  Luise was a passionate hunter, a healthy, red-haired character who threw passes at every man who crossed her path. Since she hated housework, it was very pleasant for her that I was there to pay a bit of attention to Hugo, make cocoa and mix his innumerable potions. He was obsessively concerned with his health, something I didn’t really understand at the time, because his life was one constant rush and his only pleasure a little nap in the sun. He tended to feel very sorry for himself, and apart from his efficiency in his business (which I had to take for granted), as fearful as a little child. He had a great love of perfection and order, and always travelled with two toothbrushes. Of the things he used every day, he had several of each; this seemed to give him a sense of security. Otherwise, he was thoroughly cultured, tactful and bad at cards.

  I can’t remember ever holding a conversation of any importance with him. Sometimes he would make little moves in that direction, but would quickly stop himself, perhaps from shyness or simply because it was too much of an effort. In any case, this was very pleasant for me, because we would only have been embarrassed.

  At the time everyone was talking about nuclear wars and their consequences, and this led Hugo to keep a little store of food and other important things in his hunting-lodge. Luise, who found the whole business ridiculous, got annoyed, and worried that he would tell everybody and encourage burglars. She was probably right, but where these matters were concerned Hugo could develop an obstinacy that brooked no opposition. He got pains in his heart and cramps in his stomach until Luise gave in. But she basically didn’t care either way.

  On the thirtieth of April the Rüttlingers invited me to drive with them to the hunting-lodge. I had been widowed for two years at the time, my two daughters were almost grown up and I could use my time as I saw fit. Not that I made much use of my freedom. I had always been sedentary by nature, and felt happiest at home. But I seldom turned down Luise’s invitations. I loved the hunting-lodge and the forest, and was happy to take on the three-hour car journey. On that thirtieth of April, too, I accepted the invitation. We were to stay for three days, and no one else was invited.

  The hunting-lodge is actually a two-storey wooden villa, built out of massive branches and still in good condition today. On the ground floor there’s a big rustic kitchen with a bedroom next to it and then another little bedroom. On the first floor, ringed by a wooden verandah, are three little bedrooms for the guests. It was in one of these rooms, the smallest one, that I was staying at the time. About fifty yards away, on a slope leading down to the stream, there was a little log cabin for the huntsman, merely a one-room hut, in fact, and beside it, just next to the road, was a wooden garage that Hugo had had built.

  So we drove for three hours and stopped in the village to collect Hugo’s dog from the huntsman. The dog, a Bavarian bloodhound, was called Lynx, and although he was Hugo’s property he had grown up with the huntsman and been trained by him. Curiously, the huntsman had managed to teach Lynx to acknowledge Hugo as his master. Certainly he paid no attention to Luise, he didn’t belong to her, and stayed out of her way. He treated me with friendly neutrality, but liked being near me. He was a beautiful creature with a dark, reddish-brown coat, and an excellent hunting-dog. We talked to the huntsman a little, and it was agreed that he should go out stalking with Luise the following evening. She intended to shoot a roebuck; the close season finished on the first of May. This conversation dragged on as they will in the country, and even Luise, who could never understand this, checked her impatience, so as not to put the huntsman, who was indispensable to her, in bad humour.

  We didn’t get to the hunting-lodge until about three o‘clock. Hugo immediately set about carting new supplies from the boot of his car into the bedroom beside the kitchen. I made coffee on the spirit stove, and after our snack - Hugo was already starting to nod off - Luise suggested that he go back to the village with her. It was pure badness, of course. But she was very clever about it, saying that movement was imperative for Hugo’s health. At around five o’clock she’d finally persuaded him, and set off with him triumphantly. I knew they would end up in the village inn. Luise loved to mix with the woodcutters and farmhands, and it never occurred to her that the sly fellows might be laughing at her behind her back.

  I cleared
the crockery from the table and hung the clothes in the wardrobes; when I’d finished I sat down in the sun on the bench by the house. It was a fine, warm day, and according to the weather report it was due to stay bright. The sun slanted over the spruce-trees, and was close to setting. The hunting-lodge is in a little basin at the end of the gorge, beneath steeply ascending mountains.

  While I sat there and felt the last warmth on my face, I saw Lynx coming back. He had probably disobeyed Luise, and she had sent him back as a punishment. I could see she’d scolded him. He came up to me, looked at me fretfully and laid his head on my lap. We stayed sitting there like that for a while. I stroked Lynx and spoke comforting words, because I knew Luise treated the dog in quite the wrong way.

  When the sun disappeared behind the spruce-trees it grew cool, and bluish shadows fell across the glade. I went into the house with Lynx, lit the big stove and started preparing a kind of risotto. I didn’t have to, of course, but I was hungry myself, and I knew that Hugo liked a proper hot dinner.

  My hosts still hadn’t come home by seven o’clock. It seemed hardly likely now that they would be home before half-past eight. So I fed the dog, ate my portion of risotto and, by the light of the oil-lamp, read the newspapers that Hugo had brought with him. I grew sleepy in the warmth and the silence. Lynx had withdrawn into the stove door, where he panted quietly and contentedly. At nine I decided to go to bed. I locked the door and took the key with me to my room. I was so tired that I went to sleep immediately, despite the cold, damp quilt.

  I was awoken by the sun shining on my face, and immediately remembered the previous evening. As we had only one key to the lodge, and the huntsman had the other one, Luise and Hugo would have had to wake me when they came back. I ran down the stairs in my dressing-gown and unlocked the front door. Lynx welcomed me, whining impatiently, and dashed past me into the open. I went into the bedroom although I was sure no one would be there, since the window was barred and Hugo couldn’t have pushed his way through even an unbarred window. The beds, of course, were untouched.

  It was eight o’clock; they must have stayed in the village. I was very surprised. Hugo couldn’t stand the short beds in the inn, and he would never have been so inconsiderate as to leave me alone in the hunting-lodge overnight. I could find no explanation for what had happened. I went back up to my bedroom and got dressed. It was still very cool, and the dew glistened on Hugo’s black Mercedes. I made tea and warmed up a bit, and then set off towards the village with Lynx.

  I barely noticed how cool and damp it was in the gorge, because I was brooding about what might have happened to the Rüttlingers. Hugo might have had a heart attack. As always happens when you’re dealing with hypochondriacs, we had stopped taking his condition seriously. I quickened my pace and sent Lynx on ahead. Barking cheerfully, he made off. I hadn’t thought to put on my climbing-boots, and stumbled clumsily along behind him over the sharp stones.

  When I finally reached the end of the gorge I heard Lynx howling with pain and shock. I walked around a pile of logs that had been blocking my view, and there was Lynx, sitting wailing. Red saliva was dripping from his mouth. I bent over him and stroked him. Trembling and whining, he pressed close to me. He must have bitten his tongue or chipped a tooth. When I encouraged him to go on with me, he put his tail between his legs, stood in front of me and pushed me back with his body.

  I couldn’t see what he was so frightened of. At this point the road emerged from the gorge, and as far as I could see it lay deserted and peaceful in the morning sun. I reluctantly pushed the dog aside and went ahead on my own. Fortunately, thanks to Lynx’s obstruction, I had slowed down, for a few paces on I gave my head a violent bump and stumbled backwards.

  Lynx immediately started whining again, and pressed himself against my legs. Baffled, I stretched out my hand and touched something smooth and cool: a smooth, cool resistance where there could be nothing but air. I tentatively tried again, and once more my hand rested on something like a window-pane. Then I heard a loud knocking sound and glanced around before realizing that it was my own heartbeat thundering in my ears. My heart had been frightened before I knew anything about it.

  I sat down on a tree-trunk at the side of the road and tried to think. I couldn’t. It was as if all my thoughts had abandoned me all at once. Lynx crept closer, and his bloody saliva dripped on to my coat. I stroked him until he calmed down. And then we both looked over to the road, so quiet and glistening in the morning light.

  I stood up three more times and convinced myself that here, three yards from me, there really was something invisible, smooth and cool blocking my path. I thought it might be a hallucination, but of course I knew that it was nothing of the kind. I could have coped much more easily with a momentary insanity than with this terrible, invisible thing. But there was Lynx with his bleeding mouth, and there was the bump on my head, which was beginning to ache.

  I don’t know how long I stayed sitting on the tree-trunk, but I remember my thoughts kept hovering around quite trivial matters, as if they wanted to keep away at all costs from this incomprehensible experience.

  The sun rose higher and warmed my back. Lynx licked and licked and finally stopped bleeding. He couldn’t have hurt himself too badly.

  I realized I had to do something, and ordered Lynx to sit. Then I carefully approached the invisible obstruction with outstretched hands and felt my way along it until I bumped into the last rock of the gorge. I couldn’t get any further on that side. On the other side of the road I got as far as the stream, and only now did I notice that the stream was slightly dammed and was flooding its banks. Yet it wasn’t carrying much water. It had been dry all April and the snow had already thawed. On the other side of the wall - I’ve grown used to calling the thing the wall, because I had to give it some name or other now that it was there - on the other side, then, the bed of the stream was almost dry, and then the water flowed on in a trickle. It had obviously burrowed its way through the porous limestone. So the wall couldn’t extend deep into the earth. A fleeting relief flashed through me. I didn’t want to cross the blocked stream. There was no reason to believe that the wall suddenly stopped, because then it would have been easy for Hugo and Luise to get back.

  Suddenly I was struck by what might have been unconsciously worrying me the whole time: the fact that the road was entirely deserted. Someone would have raised the alarm ages ago. It would have been natural for the villagers to gather inquisitively by the wall. Even if none of them had discovered the wall, Hugo and Luise would surely have bumped into it. The fact that there was not a single person to be seen struck me as even more puzzling than the wall.

  I began to shiver in the bright sunshine. The first little farmhouse, only a cottage, in fact, was just around the next corner. If I crossed the stream and climbed up the mountain pasture a little, I would be able to see it.

  I went back to Lynx and gave him a good talking to. He was very sensible, of course, and encouragement would have been much more appropriate. It was suddenly a great source of comfort to me that I had Lynx with me. I took off my shoes and socks and waded through the stream. On the other side the wall ran along the foot of the mountain pasture. At last I could see the cottage. It lay very still in the sunlight; a peaceful, familiar scene. A man stood by the spring, holding his right hand cupped halfway between the flowing water and his face. A clean old man. His braces hung around him like snakes, and he had rolled up his shirtsleeves. But his hand didn’t get to his face. He wasn’t moving at all.

  I closed my eyes and waited, then looked again. The clean old man still stood motionless. I now saw that his knees and his left hand were resting on the edge of the stone trough; perhaps that was what stopped him falling over. Beside the house there was a little garden in which herbs grew along with peonies and bleeding-hearts. There was also a thin, tousled lilac bush that had already faded. It had been almost summery that April, even up here in the mountains. In the city even the peonies had faded. No smoke rose from th
e chimney.

  I beat on the wall with my fist. It hurt a little, but nothing happened. And suddenly I no longer felt any desire to break down the wall separating me from the incomprehensible thing that had happened to the old man by the spring. Taking great care, I crossed the stream back to Lynx, who was sniffing at something and seemed to have forgotten his fear. It was a dead nuthatch, its head caved in and its breast flecked with blood. That nuthatch was the first in the long succession of little birds that met their deaths so pitifully one radiant May morning. For some reason I can never forget that nuthatch. While I was contemplating it, I noticed the plaintive cries of the birds. I must have been able to hear them for a long time before I was aware of them.

  All of a sudden, all I wanted was to leave that place and get back to the hunting-lodge, away from those pitiful cries and the tiny, blood-smeared corpses. Lynx too had grown worried again, and pressed himself whining against me. On the way back through the gorge he stayed close by my side, and I spoke to him reassuringly. I can’t remember what I said, it just seemed important to break the silence in the murky, damp gorge, where greenish light seeped through the beech-tree leaves and tiny streams trickled down from the bare rocks on my left.

  We were in a bad situation, Lynx and I, and at the time we didn’t know how bad it was. But we weren’t lost entirely, because there were two of us.

  The hunting-lodge now stood in bright sunshine. The dew on the Mercedes had dried, and the roof gleamed an almost reddish black; a few butterflies fluttered over the glade, and there was a sweet scent of warm spruce needles. I sat down on the bench, and immediately everything I had seen in the gorge seemed quite unreal. It simply couldn’t be true, things like that simply didn’t happen, and if they did happen, then it wasn’t in a little village in the mountains, not in Austria and not in Europe. I know how ridiculous that thought was, but as it is exactly what I was thinking I won’t deny it. I sat quite still in the sun and looked at the butterflies, and I don’t think I really thought about anything for a while. Lynx, who had had a drink at the spring, jumped up on the bench next to me and laid his head on my lap. I was pleased by this mark of favour, until it occurred to me that the poor dog didn’t have any option.