Flotsam

by Erich Maria Remarque

  He was alone for a few days; then he got two new cell mates. He spotted them immediately as refugees. One was middle-aged and very quiet; the younger was about thirty. They wore shabby clothes and you could see the care they had taken to keep them clean. The older one immediately lay down on his bunk.

  “Where have you come from?” Kern asked the younger man.

  “From Italy.”

  “How is it there?”

  “It was good. I was there two years. Now it has changed. They are checking up on everything.”

  “Two years!” Kern said. “That really is something!”

  “Yes, but it only took them a week to catch me here. Is it always that way?”

  “It’s been getting worse in the last six months.”

  The newcomer propped his head in his hands. “It’s getting worse everywhere. What’s going to happen now? How is it in Czechoslovakia?”

  “Worse there too. Too many there. Have you been in Switzerland?”

  “Switzerland is too small. They spot you right away.” The man stared straight ahead. “What I should have done was to go to France.”

  “Do you know French?”

  “Yes, sure.” The man ran his hands through his hair.

  Kern looked at him. “Shall we speak French? I’ve just been learning it and I don’t want to forget.”

  The man rolled up his eyes in astonishment. “Speak French?” He gave a dry laugh. “No, I couldn’t do that! Get thrown into jail and then carry on a French conversation—that’s too ridiculous. You certainly have funny ideas.”

  “Not at all. It’s just that I lead a funny life.”

  Kern waited a while to see whether the man would change his mind. Then he climbed up on his bunk and repeated irregular verbs until he fell asleep.

  He awoke to find someone shaking him. It was the man who had refused to talk French. “Help!” he gasped. “Quick! He’s hanged himself.”

  Kern sat up, still half asleep. In the pale gray of early morning a black body hung in front of the window, its head drooping. He leaped from his bunk. “A knife! Quick!”

  “I haven’t a knife. Have you?”

  “Damn it, no. They took it away. I’ll lift him. You try to work the belt over his head.”

  Kern got onto the bunk and tried to lift the hanging body. It was as heavy as the world, much heavier than it looked. The clothes were cold and dead as he. Kern exerted all his strength. He could scarcely lift him. “Hurry,” he panted. “Loosen the belt. I can’t hold him here forever.”

  “Yes.” The other man climbed and went to work on the hanged man’s neck. Suddenly he stopped, reeled and vomited.

  “You damn fool!” Kern roared. “Can’t you go on? Get him loose! Quick!”

  “I can’t look at him,” groaned the other. “His tongue, his eyes—”

  “Then get down here. You lift him and I’ll get him loose.”

  He put the heavy body in the other man’s arms and sprang up on the bunk. The sight was hideous. The pale and swollen face, the eyes protruding as though about to burst, the thick black tongue—Kern felt for the thin leather strap which had cut deep into the folds of the bloated neck. “Higher,” he shouted, “lift him higher!”

  He heard a gurgle below. The man was vomiting again. At the same instant he let the hanged man fall and the jerk drove his eyes and tongue out as though he were sneering hideously at the helplessness of the living. “Damnation!” In desperation Kern sought for something that would bring the man below him to his senses. Suddenly, like a flash of lightning, the scene between the blond student and the jailer went through his mind. “Why, you damned washerwoman!” he roared. “If you don’t take hold immediately, I’ll kick your guts out! Get going, you yellow-bellied coward.” As he spoke he kicked and felt his foot strike home. He kicked again with all his strength. “I’ll break your skull!” he screamed. “Go on and lift!”

  The man kept quiet and lifted. “Higher!” Kern raged. “Higher, you filthy washrag.” The man lifted higher and Kern succeeded in loosening the noose and slipping it over the hanged man’s head. “All right. Now lower him.”

  Between them they laid the limp body on the bunk. Kern tore open his vest and trouser band. “Get the slit in the door open,” he directed. “Call the guard. I’ll begin artificial respiration.”

  He kneeled behind the grizzled head, took the cold dead hands in his warm, living ones and began to move the man’s arms. He heard a wheezing rattle as the thorax rose and fell and sometimes he paused to listen; but there was no breathing. The man who wouldn’t speak French was rattling at the slit in the door and shouting: “Guard! Guard!” It made a dull echo in the cell.

  Kern went on working. He knew you were supposed to keep it up for hours—but after a while he stopped.

  “Is he breathing?” the other asked.

  “No.” All at once Kern was desperately tired. “There’s no sense in this. The man wanted to die. Why shouldn’t we let him?”

  “But, for God’s sake—”

  “Be quiet, man,” Kern said very softly and viciously. He could not have stood another word. He knew exactly what the man was going to say. But he knew, too, that the other man would hang himself again if he survived. “You try it,” he said more calmly after a moment. “This man probably knew why he had had enough.”

  A moment later the guard came. “What’s the row? Are you all crazy?”

  “Someone has hanged himself.”

  “Good God, what a nuisance! Is he still alive?”

  The guard opened the door. He smelled strongly of bologna sausage and wine. He snapped on his pocket flashlight. “Is he dead?”

  “Probably.”

  “Well, then, tomorrow morning’s time enough. Sternikosch can bother his head with it. I don’t know a thing about it.”

  He was going to leave. “Stop!” Kern said. “You’ll get orderlies at once. From the emergency squad.”

  The guard stared at him.

  “If you’re not back here in five minutes, there’ll be a scandal that will cost you your job.”

  “There’s a chance he can still be saved! With oxygen!” shouted the other prisoner like a ghost from the background where he was raising and lowering the hanged man’s arms.

  “A nice beginning for the day,” the guard growled as he left.

  A few minutes later the orderlies came and took the hanged man away. Shortly afterward the guard came back. “You are to turn over your suspenders, belts and shoestrings.”

  “I won’t hang myself,” Kern said.

  “No matter. You’re to hand them over.”

  They handed over their things and crouched on the bunk. There was a sour smell of vomit. “In an hour it will be light, then they can clean it up,” Kern said.

  His throat was dry and he was very thirsty. Everything inside him was dry and dusty. He felt as though he had swallowed coal dust and cotton. As though he would never be clean again.

  “Horrible, wasn’t it?” the other said presently.

  “No,” Kern replied.

  That evening they were put in a larger cell in which there were already four men. Kern decided they were all refugees; but he paid no attention to them. He was very tired and climbed into his bunk. However, he couldn’t sleep. He lay with open eyes staring at the little rectangle formed by the barred window. Later, around midnight, two more men were brought in. Kern could not see them, but he heard their voices.

  “How long do you think it will be before we get out?” the voice of one of the newcomers inquired anxiously out of the dark.

  There was a pause before an answer came. Then a bass voice growled, “Depends on what you’ve done. For murder with intent to rob, a life sentence; for political murder, a week.”

  “All I’ve done is to be picked up for the second time without a passport.”

  “That’s more serious,” grunted the bass voice. “You can be dead certain of four weeks.”

  “My God! And I have a chicken in my trunk. A
roast chicken! It will be spoiled by the time I get out.”

  “That’s a safe bet,” agreed the bass voice.

  Kern pricked up his ears. “Didn’t you have a chicken in your trunk once before?” he asked.

  “Yes, that’s right,” the newcomer replied in astonished tones. “How do you know that, sir?”

  “Weren’t you locked up that time too?”

  “Yes, I was! Who’s asking these questions? Who are you? How do you happen to know that, sir?” the voice from the darkness asked excitedly.

  Kern laughed. He was suddenly laughing as if he were going to choke. It was like a spasm, a painful cramp, it released all the emotions that had been dammed up inside him—his rage at being imprisoned, his loneliness, his anxiety about Ruth, his struggle to keep his self-control, his horror at the hanged man; he laughed and laughed in violent outbursts. “The Chicken,” he groaned. “As I live and breathe, the Chicken. And in the same fix. What a coincidence!”

  “You call that a coincidence?” snarled the enraged Chicken. “A damned fatality, that’s what it is.”

  “You seem to have bad luck with roast chickens,” said the bass voice.

  “Quiet!” snapped another. “A plague on your roast chickens! Is it decent to start an exile’s stomach rumbling in the middle of the night?”

  “Perhaps there is some profound relationship between him and chickens,” the bass suggested oracularly.

  “He might try roast rocking-horses,” snorted the man without a country.

  “Or stomach ulcers,” whinnied a high falsetto.

  “Perhaps in a previous existence he was a fox,” the bass voice theorized, “and now the chickens are getting back at him.”

  The Chicken’s protest penetrated the conversation: “What a God-damned low trick, to make fun of a man even when he’s down on his luck!”

  “What better time?” asked the bass voice soothingly.

  “Quiet!” roared the guard from outside. “This is a respectable prison, not a night club.”

  Chapter Eleven

  KERN SIGNED HIS SECOND order of deportation from Austria. It was for life. This time he felt no emotion whatever. It simply occurred to him as he signed that he would probably be back in the Prater by the following morning.

  “Have you any other possessions in Vienna you want to take with you?” the official asked.

  “No. Not a thing.”

  “You know that you will be liable to at least three months’ imprisonment if you return to Austria?”

  “Yes.”

  The official watched Kern for a while. Then he quickly reached in his pocket and pushed a five-schilling note toward him. “Here, buy a drink with this. I can’t change the laws, you know. Ask for Gumpoltskirchener. It’s especially good this year. And now off with you!”

  “Thanks!” Kern said in amazement. It was the first time he had ever been given anything by the police. “Many thanks! I can certainly use this money.”

  “All right, all right! On your way now. Your escort is waiting in the vestibule.”

  Kern put the money in his pocket. Not only could he buy two glasses of Gumpoltskirchener with it, but he could also ride back to Vienna in the streetcar. That was less dangerous, and he would still have two schillings left over for unforeseen emergencies.

  They went out the same way they had gone the first time with Steiner. Kern had a feeling that it had been ten years since then.

  From the station at the end of the line they had to go on a way on foot. Presently they came to an inn that advertised new wine. There were a few tables and chairs in the front yard. Kern remembered the official’s advice. “Shall we drink a glass of wine?” he asked his escort.

  “What?”

  “Gumpoltskirchener. It’s especially good this year.”

  “We might as well. It’s still too light for the customs.”

  They sat down in the front yard and drank the clear, dry Gumpoltskirchener. It was very quiet and peaceful there. The sky was clear and high and apple green. An airplane, like a distant falcon, soared off toward Germany. The proprietor brought out a hurricane lamp and put it on the table. It was Kern’s first evening out of doors. For two months he had not seen the open sky. He sat still, enjoying the short period of peace that was still his. In an hour or two fear and flight would begin again.

  “It’s enough to make you puke,” the official snarled suddenly.

  Kern glanced up. “I think so too!”

  “That’s not what I mean.”

  “I suppose not.”

  “I mean with you refugees,” the official explained dourly. “You detract from the dignity of our profession. Nothing but refugees to escort, day after day! From Vienna to the border, again and again. What sort of a life is that? A fellow never gets a decent job in handcuffs any more.”

  “Perhaps in a year or two you’ll be taking us to the border in handcuffs,” Kern replied dryly.

  “That wouldn’t make up at all!” The official looked at him contemptuously. “You’re nothing at all in a political sense. I had the quadruple murderer Müller Second to escort, with orders to shoot at the first move. And then two years ago Bergmann, the woman killer, and later Brust, the ripper—not to mention Teddy Blümel, the corpse defiler. Those were the days! But you—you’re enough to make a guy pass out with boredom!” He sighed and emptied his glass. “Well, anyhow—you do understand something about wine. Shall we drink another glass? This time I’ll pay.”

  “All right.” They drank the second round companionably. Then they left the inn. Meanwhile it had grown dark. Bats and moths swooped across their path. The customs house was brightly lighted. The old officials were still there. Kern’s escort delivered him to them. “Sit down for a while inside,” one of the customs men said. “It’s still too early.”

  “I know,” Kern replied.

  “So you know that, do you?”

  “Of course. The borders are our home.”

  In the first gray of dawn Kern was back in the Prater. He didn’t dare go to Steiner’s wagon to wake him up since he did not know what might have happened in his absence. He wandered around. Autumn had come while he had been in jail and the trees, clothed in brilliant foliage, shone through the mist. He paused for a while in front of the gray-draped carrousel. Then he lifted the canvas and crawled inside. He sat down in a gondola. He was safe there from strolling policemen.

  He woke to hear someone laughing. It was broad daylight and the canvas cover had been thrown back. He shot to his feet. Steiner stood in front of him dressed in blue overalls.

  Kern leaped out of the gondola. Suddenly he felt at home. “Steiner!” he shouted beaming. “I’m here again, thank God!”

  “So I see. The prodigal son returned home from the police dungeons! Come here, let’s have a look at you. A little pale and thin from prison grub. Why didn’t you come in?”

  “I didn’t know whether you were still there.”

  “Yes, for the time being. But the first thing to do is to get some breakfast. After that the world looks different. Lilo!” Steiner shouted across to the wagon. “Our little one is back again. He needs a good big breakfast.” He turned back to Kern. “You’ve grown and you look more of a man. Learned anything, Baby, while you were away?”

  “Yes. That you’ve got to be tough if you don’t want to be rubbed out. And that they are not going to get me down! Besides how to sew bags and speak French. And that giving orders often gets you farther than begging.”

  “Excellent!” Steiner grinned. “Excellent!”

  “Where’s Ruth?” Kern asked.

  “In Zürich. She was ordered out of the country. Aside from that nothing happened to her. Lilo has letters for you. She is our post office. She’s the only one who has proper papers, you know. Ruth sent her letters for you to her.”

  “In Zürich—” Kern said.

  “Yes, Baby, is that bad?”

  Kern looked at him. “No.”

  “She’s living there with friends.
You’ll be in Zürich before long yourself, that’s all. It’s slowly getting hot here anyhow.”

  “Yes.”

  Lilo came up. She greeted Kern as though he had been out for a walk. For almost twenty years she had been living outside Russia; two months, so far as she was concerned, were nothing that had to be accounted for. She had seen men reappear from Siberia and China from whom no word had come in ten or fifteen years. In her deliberate fashion she put down on the table a tray with cups and a pot of coffee on it.

  “Give him his letters, Lilo,” Steiner said. “He’ll not eat breakfast until he’s seen them.”

  Lilo pointed to the tray. The letters were there, leaning against one of the cups. Kern tore them open. He began to read and suddenly he forgot everything. These were the first letters he had received from Ruth. They were the first love letters of his life. As though by magic a load fell from his shoulders—disappointment that she was not there, nervousness, anxiety, loneliness. He read, and the black ink marks began to light up as though they were phosphorescent. Here suddenly was a human being who cared for him, who was distracted about what had happened to him, and who told him that she loved him. Your Ruth. My God, he thought, your Ruth! Yours! It seemed almost impossible. Your Ruth. What had belonged to him so far? What had been his? A few bottles, a little soap, and the clothes he was wearing. And now a human being? The thick black hair, the eyes! It was almost impossible.

  He looked up. Lilo had gone into the wagon. Steiner was smoking a cigarette. “Everything all right, Baby?” he asked.

  “Yes. She says I’m not to come. She says I’m not to take any more risks on her account.”

  Steiner laughed. “The way girls write!” He poured a cup of coffee for Kern. “Now drink that and eat some breakfast.”

  He leaned against the wagon and watched Kern as he ate and drank. The sun came through the thin, white mist. Kern felt it on his face; he felt it as if he were inhaling wine. On the day before he had eaten his breakfast of lukewarm slops out of a discarded tin basin in a stinking room while a hobo named Leo gave a concert of farts—a specialty of his after waking. Now a soft fresh morning breeze caressed his hands, he was eating white bread and drinking good coffee, there were letters from Ruth in his pocket, and Steiner was beside him leaning against the wagon.