The Island of Second Sight

by Albert Vigoleis Thelen

  One page tells you nothing about a book. Twelve pages don’t tell you much about a book. But Matthias—were you pulling my leg back then, exactly ten years ago? Books do not ripen like wine and women. Whatever is contained within their pages can undergo transformation only within us readers. In themselves, books are dead. I was holding a corpse on my arm.

  I was overcome with sorrow, in combination with hot flashes and a desire to drown myself. Beatrice peeked over at me from behind her own writer, to see how my encounter with Bianca was getting along. But before this woman with gold in her heart could look up the aforementioned symptoms in a medical book and pour out some drops of Aethusa cynapium into a glass, I tossed the hunk of trash into the fireplace. We didn’t have any Karl May at hand, but we had some grappa and a sheaf of galley proofs.

  “Don’t cry, darling,” Beatrice said, “you’ll get over this calamity, too.”

  White Mary was ablaze in the fireplace, our candles were burning down in the Christmas Eve drafts seeping through cracked walls into the sala where Marsman had done some writing.

  If someone wants to get far in literature, says Don Quixote, it will cost him time, sleepless nights, hunger, and nakedness; it will cost him a swirling head and stomach cramps and other things connected with the above-mentioned symptoms.

  Perhaps I can be permitted, as Sancho Panza, to supplement the Knight’s insights by averring that a writer who produces works in the manner described can have similar effects on his reader—ècco: Bianca Maria.

  VII

  Mémé, her grandchildren called her. She loved this childlike name which stood in such marked contrast to her austere, passionate, uncompromising nature.”

  With these words, Count Harry Kessler begins the first volume of his memoirs. I am copying them down now for the thirteenth time. The first twelve times, I did it from the author’s manuscript, emended many times over. Now I am using the printed text, which incidentally is nearly identical to the one I remember from the days when I took a step upward and became the exiled writer’s secretary. Both he and I often stumbled over that opening objective-case proper noun, but Kessler could not bring himself to write simply, “Her grandchildren called her Mémé.” When he sent off the typescript of his memoirs, he had a weak moment: he reinstated the somewhat inelegant version of his opening sentence. Mémé retained her place of honor as an ornamental initial, a detail the rather humdrum Fischer edition of Times and Faces fails to highlight. When Kessler showed me his author’s copy, he was pale with rage and literally trembling over his whole body at the unauthorized textual alterations the publisher had made out of fear of the Nazis. He said to me, “They couldn’t even leave my first sentence alone! How could I have ever let pass such a monstrosity?” He was disconsolate, until a letter from his dear friend Annette Kolb revived his spirits. This writer praised Kessler as the superb stylist he in fact was, pointing expressly—I haven’t forgotten it in all these years—to page 13 of the book. Right here, she wrote, we are confronting a great master of German prose style.

  Aha, my reader is thinking, finally a character of world renown in the Recollections of Vigoleis, after all these dubious types like Zwingli, Arsenio, Ulua, or whatever their real or manufactured names are! But please be patient; Harry Kessler is going to get a chapter to himself, maybe even two. As yet the Nazis haven’t chased him out of Germany; the madhouse hasn’t yet flung open the doors of the solitary cells. The Count’s head is, for the moment, only on somebody’s blacklist somewhere. In our next chapter we shall hear the crazed shouts calling for Germany to awaken and for Jewry to croak. Patience, please! I needed the reference to Times and Faces in order to introduce into my narrative another Mémé, our own Mémé—a personage who, I’ll grant you, wasn’t quite as beautiful as the Count’s mother, and whose name, to be honest, was a little different. But all we need to do is change two letters, and to avoid objections from syntactical nitpickers, I won’t put her name at the beginning. In all other details I can easily borrow from Kessler. And that brings us to the true beginning of this chapter.

  Her grandchildren called her Mamú. She loved this childlike name that stood in such marked contrast to her austere, passionate, uncompromising nature. Austere? Did Mamú have an austere nature? Right away our description is beginning to get shaky. And when Kessler goes on to say of Mémé’s childlike name, “She seemed to cherish it as a cloak and a shield against a hostile, cold world,” our reservations begin to multiply. For to the very end of her life, our Mamú used a different method to defend herself against the world’s enmity. With the aid of Christian Science she erected about herself a fortress replete with embrasures, moats, and spouts for pouring down boiling pitch. Her ramparts were patrolled by a squadron of aged and aging ladies who were devoted to the same science, who sang its hymns badly out of tune, and who took care that no un-Christian influences ever threatened their recent converts’ trust in Scientism or, what would be worse, ever prayed their way into her fortune of millions. Yes, Mamú was a millionaire. As such, she had an easier time than most in making progress within Christian Science. Faith is difficult with no money at all. The Vatican would long since be a heap of rubble if the rock on which Peter’s church stands didn’t have veins of gold that can even withstand the aqua fortis of hypocrisy. But let us remain for the present with our high-carat faith in Mamú. Soon enough we shall see that sham and pretense can also exist outside of the various established churches.

  “Until her final hour,” Kessler continues in his description of Mémé, “she was and remained beautiful and regal.” If we just delete the words “beautiful and,” his words again fit Mamú. She was regal, but with a light tinge of Viennese coloration, which is what made her so irresistible.

  What Kessler goes on to say in praise of his mother is irrelevant; from here on I shall have to be content with my own recollections.

  In Mamú’s retinue there was a Parisian cosmetician, who herself embodied the worst kind of advertisement for her profession. She was beautiful, and had no need whatever of salves and lotions; sans rouge she had rose-colored cheeks. She never used lipstick, yet she sported the kissable cherry lips illustrated in the marketing brochures she passed around. Her eyebrows were thin lines that required no plucking, and not one single false lash disfigured her eyelids. The girl’s bosom—a poem, whose accents took full effect without the aid of foam rubber. She possessed, of course, noble fetlocks and marvelous hands; her hair was of iridescent chestnut hue. She had turquoise eyes that deep down harbored obscure secrets. Who would be the lucky treasure hunter to explore their depths? Her voice—to continue in this fanciful vein—was like the murmuring of a conch shell. Of course many men had put this shell to their ears, but the one she actually permitted to do so was a Spaniard, and then he did it all wrong. The girl was not a Spanish beauty; she came from the opposite end of Europe, from Finland. She laughed at us when we complained about the millions of mosquitoes on the island. Back in her native Nordic lake district, she was used to them by the whining and biting billions that darkened the sun. This exemplar of pulchritude, this hovering goddess with so much experience of mosquitoes, this natural beauty who challenged Nature itself, and whom a Spanish suitor desired with such desperate passion that he turned more and more ashen as time went on—this young woman’s name was Selkä Kyliki. In Mamú’s house she was called “Auma.”

  Before we could call her by that name, the Finnish girl came to our house to learn English. She already spoke Spanish and French fluently, was able to get by in German, and knew the many dialects of her homeland.

  She often talked about her friend Mamú, and as such things will happen, she told Mamú a lot about the two of us. Mamú wanted to get to know us, she said, and this matched our own desire to pay a visit to the elderly lady. But then we would have to hurry, Auma said, and Mamú almost didn’t dare to invite us. But if we were in fact the “nice people” Auma told her we were, then she wanted to meet us before she died, and we would have to promise to st
and at her bier when it was all over. Such was, in outline, the nature of her wish, which was for us of course tantamount to a command.

  Mamú had kidney trouble. The doctors, reputable specialists of whom there were a few on the island, had given her up. A German professor of medicine had concurred with their death sentence, and thus we could be certain that Mamú’s days were numbered. As is well known, one doesn’t play games with kidneys. The physicians decided that this caso could live another two, at most three weeks at the maximum, though they feared for their professional standing by saying so. One month, and then Goodbye Mamú! This was a harsh calculation. Anyone who has ever taken a vacation knows how quickly those few days are over.

  That is how things stood with this very ill woman. We called her “Mamú” in our own conversations well before we were actually summoned to her bedside to submit to her special test: were we in fact “nice people”? Were we nice enough to be on hand when the time came, and then to accompany her to her grave? A woman of this type, a 72-year-old dying woman who requests the company of a Vigoleis and a Beatrice for her final weeks—people she knows only from hearsay, but whom she asks for, out of thousands of possibilities, just because they are reported to be “nice”—a woman who desires the presence of strangers at a time when most people would want a priest, the immediate family, or the family lawyer? A human being of this kind must, I told myself, be in possession of practical wisdom and quixotic gifts to a degree that not even a busted kidney could impair. Let those doctors say what they want about your chances, Mamú, but in the meantime keep on consulting Higher Authorities! When would you like us to visit?

  The practitioners of medical science, myopic as ever, had zeroed in on renal cancer. But they overlooked another science, Christian Science, which also had its claims and demands. This latter science of course cannot raise the dead, but it is capable of postponing death within certain limits. It is vital to know something about this special set of beliefs. Ignorance of it can lead to blindness—not the blindness of fate, but of those who write out prescriptions in defiance of fate.

  It was the third time that we were summoned to a deathbed on this island. Is it at all surprising, then, that we were less than deeply touched as we bowed to the old lady laid out before us under a palm tree in her garden? Was it heartless of us not to be overwhelmed by the event, but instead just curious about what it might lead to? “Laid out before us”—that is of course an allusion to death, which is precisely the topic at hand. In reality, the ailing woman was resting on a chaise longue, an American patent model with dozens of adjustments. One shift of the mechanism and presto!—just the proper angle for breathing one’s last.

  It had been several days since Auma had practiced her cosmetic art on Mamú’s face, and as a consequence we could plainly see the effects of physical decline. I estimated her chances at less than a week. Beatrice, a pessimist in matters of the short run, gave her two weeks. If we could have had any idea of the stony accretions inhabiting her kidneys at the time, we might have expected her to succumb during our very first visit.

  Several women ministered to Mamú during her final days: an elderly, experienced German nanny, a Mallorcan housemaid, and of course Auma, Mamú’s Finnish light of the sun and “beautiful little darling.” In addition, there was one of Mamú’s daughters, an imposing boxy woman with a bust of the type one often sees behind the ticket counter at a circus. She had been summoned by wire from Paris, and had now taken charge like someone used to having her tune danced to. Another daughter, married and living in Budapest, was expected any day, as was Mamú’s only son, who lived in the United States. Mamú wanted her children, her children’s children, friends, and nice people near her as she joined the choir invisible in the classic manner we read about in novels: with laying-on of hands and final blessings. After it’s all over, let the descendants squabble over the inheritance. That is an ugly prospect, so it’s better to die beautifully, if at all possible. Mamú wanted very much to die in this fashion, and yet in all probability she would never perish as gloriously as her husband had. We soon were told about his unique manner of joining the majority, but I wish to save that for later. Right now I am about to take Mamú’s heart by storm. Quite literally I am going to spit my way to the heart of a dying woman.

  This is how it was done: just as Mamú was not an ordinary mortal, neither was she an ordinary “terminal.” The way she received us was stylish, the style being that of the upper crust, the only class that could do justice to a situation of this kind. Mamú’s daughter, the busty one whose front end supported some genuine diamonds, had ordered the kitchen help to wheel out some very fancy hors d’oeuvres on a sideboard. There were mixed drinks, too, of a variety to please every taste. Madame la fille was sure that everyone would just adore the tomato-juice cocktail she had prepared herself and was now offering to all assembled. I had no choice but to accept, naturellement. No sooner had I taken a swig of this concoction—too big a swig, I confess—when with an even more natural reflex action, I discharged the entire mouthful onto the greensward.

  This was an awkward moment. I had misbehaved. Everyone’s eyes were on me—something I like even less than tomatoes. “Rotgut!” was my contribution to a conversation being conducted in French. I turned as red as a tomato. The dying Mamú heard me. And with queenly politesse she said to me in German, “Just what are you doing? Expectorating on my lawn? What’s the matter? Don’t you like that tomato brew either? Or did it just go down the wrong way?”

  “No, not that,” I stammered, my face redder than ever. Madame la fille’s eyes stabbed me to the quick. I wasn’t the first boche, she said, whose barbaric palate never got beyond choucroute. Now this was a dastardly affront. What would Baron von Martersteig do in a situation like this? Would he draw his sword? Bow politely and leave the scene? I myself haven’t much of a sense of etiquette, and what little I have isn’t much help with tomato-juice cocktails. So all I could do was blush and remain silent.

  Mamú, now turning to Auma, continued, “So that’s how he behaves on his first visit? Auma darling, he’s priceless! I thank you from the bottom of my heart for bringing such a splendid fellow to my house to brighten up my last days!” Then she spread her moribund arms and called out, “Don Vigolo, come and give me a hug! I, too, think those cocktails taste like spew!” Bedazzled and maladroit, I bent down to the expiring dowager and received a kiss on the mouth that tasted of the apothecary shop. Her arms clung to me. The Ninth Symphony! “Embraced by millions”!

  “You priceless fellow—goldiges Mannerl!” Mamú, the American millionaire, preferred to speak Viennese German. For years she had held court in Vienna at the side of her famous spouse, who sported a Hungarian noble title in addition to Mamú’s checkbook. He was the scion of a lineage that included princes as well as counts. Mamú’s own bloodline was princely enough. Her forebears had used the intimate du with the Austrian Emperor Franz Joseph.

  Mamú’s daughter, insulted twice over, had gone back to the house. A nurse pushed the patented chaise longue farther down the yard. Auma whispered to us that we should go along with Mamú; the injection would hold for another half hour, and then she would suddenly fall asleep. Mamú doubtless wanted to put Beatrice to the test now—Vigo having passed his with flying colors.

  During the minutes that followed, Beatrice was likewise deemed worthy to stand at our new friend’s grave. To gain Mamú’s blessing it was unnecessary for her to break any rules of etiquette—which Beatrice never would have done anyway. She and Mamú had mutual acquaintances in Vienna. Just imagine, Beatrice’s piano teacher Juliusz Wolfsohn—how often hadn’t that man played at Mamú’s little villa on Schwarzenberg Square! Beatrice also got a kiss, a buss on the cheek. But just barely, for just as the ailing woman was bestowing it, she suddenly faded away. If Auma hadn’t alerted us to the medical injection, we would have thought that she had passed away in our arms. Just before she drifted into slumber, she asked us in a final whisper, and in English, “Do you belie
ve in healing by spirit?”

  Mamú’s automobile took us home. Her chauffeur, a Mallorcan, had the very same Christian name as the gallant Mallorcan cavalier who was Auma’s suitor. This led to some comical, and at times unpleasant, misunderstandings. As my reader will have guessed, Mamú didn’t die. And because Auma’s suitor, a genuine lawyer, was a daily guest at Mamú’s house, there was no choice but to give the chauffeur another name. Neither the driver nor his mistress had any notion about the magic of names, and so they settled for just plain “Miguel.” They might just as well have chosen “José” or “Francisco,” but José was the cook and Francisco was the gardener.

  During the English lessons that followed our visit, Auma had much to tell. We gave her our impressions, and she put in its proper context the question Mamú had asked us—whether we believed in healing by spirit. Mamú, Auma told us, was going to be healed by spirit. By what kind of spirit, I wanted to know. Foolish question!

  A Dutch lady, Auma explained, an adherent of Christian Science, had accepted the mission of playing tricks on the medical profession, specifically on that certain German professor. A faith-healer, a German woman, was already contracted for and paid in advance. Now it was only a matter of trust. Mamú, the “terminal” patient, must also have firm belief in a miracle, for otherwise the Great Spirit could be of no avail. We were dealing, after all, with cancer, and this meant that extreme measures were in order. Was it expensive? Yes, but money was no object. A human life was at stake. Of course. And besides, Mamú was a millionaire.

  I was suspicious. A Dutch lady? Was it the Dutch lady from the anarchists’ pensión, Mevrouw van Beverwijn? The very same. Did I know her? Hmm… well, yes. And I told Auma that the medium’s husband was suffering from sclerotic kidneys. Couldn’t he be faith-healed too? These Dutch plantation owners surely had enough money for that? Auma said—and she was no doubt right—that the husband probably didn’t believe in the power of prayer. In the absence of true faith, the Dutch lady had told Auma, no amount of prayer, direct or indirect, could be of any help. Old man van Beverwijn was not a believer—that we could all understand. To be married to a woman like that one, and then to believe in anything at all any more—that was too much for science to grapple with, even the Christian variety. That man’s life consisted of nothing but knuckling under to his wife. If he ever dared to resist, he got hissed at. The poor fellow. His marriage was so hopeless that his kidneys were atrophying in response.