The Empire of the Senses

by Alexis Landau

  The men had taken a break, leaning on their pickaxes and shovels. They were exhausted, sweating in the cold. A few of them smoked. The sun was setting, illuminating the dirt so that it appeared a fiery red.

  “Should we keep them working?” Otto asked. He stomped his feet to get the blood flowing, grinding his discarded cigarette butts into the snowy ground with his heels.

  “Give them a few minutes.”

  The men watched Otto and Lev with intensity, their mouths hanging open, their eyes squinting at the setting sun. Up above, an eagle emitted a piercing cry.

  Otto cocked his head. “A mating call.”

  Lev had never seen such a large bird. He wondered how it didn’t fall from its own weight.

  “I greatly admire birds.” Otto followed the figure eights the eagle drew in the air, the elaborate looping and swerving and sudden downward dives. Then Otto turned and strode toward the men, his heavy gray cloak flying behind him.

  “Get to work! Get to work!” he shouted in Russian, his arms thrown up as if urging the wind to blow harder, faster. He kicked one of the men in the shin. The man yelped. Otto’s gray form flew down the line. As he approached, they picked up their tools again, throwing the force of their bodies behind each swing.

  The way the tip of Otto’s sharp boot had shot out so unexpectedly and kicked the man, as if he routinely dispensed such bright and sure violence, made Lev uneasy. When Otto walked back, his jaw tensed and released. He reminded Lev of a powerful dray horse, the way one could detect a ripple of movement twitching beneath its skin.

  Otto impatiently pulled out a cigarette, his eyes trained on the men hacking at the soil.

  Lev, feeling the urge to speak, to explain, to fill up the still air with words, started telling Otto about the problem with the workers, how they dug around the stones because the stones were precious, holding secrets of the land, whereas he had been instructed to crush them up. “The natives, they’re backward. Still on the three-field system of cultivation. And they leave big round stones sitting in the middle of a cleared field, as if afraid to touch them, as if their ancestors dwelled in the porous gray matter.” Lev laughed. “Strange, no?”

  The rushing urgency of a distant train echoed through the trees, causing the workers to pause for a moment.

  Otto snorted. “They’re pagans, protecting stones, thinking there’s life in them. But it’s better than Christ, our savior.” He sneered. “A perfect lie.”

  Lev pulled up the collar of his coat. The wind cut through it. “You’re not a Christian?”

  “Turn the other cheek—do you think I would believe in something invented for the sole purpose of keeping us enslaved? It goes against our very instincts as men.”

  “Our instincts as men,” Lev repeated.

  “To fight and fuck and reap the infinite pleasures of aliveness—religion condemns this—condemns what it means to be human, what it means to exist in the world, in the here and now.” His cheeks glowed carmine pink from the pleasure he took in the boom of his voice. But it was not an unpleasant voice, Lev thought. It vibrated with the warmth and vigor of a man who did not live in fear.

  “Who knows what exists beyond this?” Otto stretched out his arms to encompass the whole of the surrounding forests, trees, the distant steppes, the dirt, the working men, the two of them. He added, “The meek shall inherit nothing,” and with it, he unwittingly emitted a light spray of spittle.

  Lev took a few steps back. “We don’t know anything beyond this.”

  Otto’s eyes shone in the diminishing light. “Precisely!”

  Two hours later, Lev and Otto reclined on cushions, drinking tea from small steaming glasses. Otto had convinced Lev to come to his lodgings, where he was boarding with a Russian family—a middle-aged woman named Antonina and her uncle, who spoke fanatically of the Japanese war, the only war the Russians ever lost. But Antonina kept interrupting and shouting at him to fetch fresh water for the samovar. The uncle flinched every time she shouted, but he didn’t move. He sat stationed on a pillow next to Lev and Otto, asking softly, “But how long will the war last?”

  Antonina fussed over Otto, refilling his tea glass.

  Otto sighed. “What do you care—so long as England gives money and the earth gives men.”

  The uncle nodded wisely, as if in agreement. His creased face was brown and spotted from working in the fields. Lev thought one could hide coins in the deep ravines of his forehead. The uncle added, “In the Japanese war, we didn’t have a fighting chance. Before the Battle of Mukden, I saw entire regiments lying in a drunken stupor on the ground.” He sucked on his cheroot, rocking forward and back on his haunches, a soft swaying movement that made Lev sleepy. Perhaps, Lev thought, I should remove my coat.

  Antonina bellowed, “We need more water, Uncle. Get more water for tea.” She fanned herself with a loose kerchief, but the shifting hot air did nothing to alleviate her discomfort.

  Lev felt warm inside the cramped living room. The thatched ceiling was low, just above their heads when they were standing. He had not removed his jacket because he did not know how long he was staying, and now he was sweating, whereas Otto had stripped off most of his clothing, save for a white cotton undershirt. Antonina had immediately picked up his discarded shirt, gloves, and cloak, folding each item on the chair near the fire.

  “Uncle. Get more water!” she shouted again.

  He slowly rose, his stiff body unfurling. Lev thought he could hear the creaking of the old man’s bones. The peeling wallpaper, a ghastly yellow, seemed as if it had been applied to the rotting walls over a century ago. Antonina smoked continuously, nearly keeping up with Otto’s pace, and a cloud of rosy smoke encircled them. Her low-cut linen blouse revealed an ample bust, and under her long skirt, knitted booties encased her tiny feet. She fanned herself, causing the smoke to move swiftly about her face. Wind blew against the house, and for a moment, this distracted her from shouting at the old man, who was now shuffling back with fresh water and new tea leaves.

  But she resumed. “Ah! You forgot the zakouska! Go back, go back.”

  Uncle turned around, sighing laboriously. Through his thin shirt, the progression of his vertebrae was visible.

  Antonina turned to Otto, muttering, “We have no servants. For once, he could help me. That is all I ask.” She shook her head.

  Lev smiled; the Russian language always sounded as if the speakers were in a perpetual state of anguished dissatisfaction.

  Uncle brought back plates of sardines, shirred eggs, smoked herrings, and pickles, which he indicated sharpened the appetite. Such a feast, Lev thought, his mouth watering as he restrained himself from being the first to eat. But when Otto started shuffling sardines down his throat, Lev reached for a piece of black bread, gingerly spooning a dollop of herring on top of it. Antonina sprung up to retrieve some cognac as well as Bénédictine and kummel. She poured the amber liquid into stout glasses. Along the rim, small pieces of glass had chipped off. Lev worried that imperceptible pieces of glass might be floating in the drink, but then he noticed Otto also had a chipped glass and he didn’t even flinch, swallowing down his cognac in one fell swoop. Lev took a sip, the fiery liquor gathering in the pockets of his mouth.

  “If only we had vodka,” Uncle said, sipping his cognac.

  “Is it really forbidden?” Otto asked, his eyes half-closed in the dim lamplight. His large body looked relaxed, louche, pantherlike in its uncoiled sleekness, his shapely head cradled in his enormous hand.

  Antonina funneled the last drops of a blush-colored wine down her throat. She swallowed hard, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. “The rich can still get it.”

  Uncle nodded, eyeing his cognac suspiciously. “I heard Mazel sells it in the back room of the apothecary.”

  Antonina grimaced. “All Jews are traitors to Russia. I would not set foot in that Jewish shop.”

  “You were at the tailor’s last week getting your winter coat mended,” Uncle reminded her.


  The fire crackled. Otto yawned.

  “And the cobbler’s before that.” Uncle pointed to her gleaming leather boots, which stood upright next to the fire. They had just been polished and given new soles.

  Lev fingered his glass. “In Austria and Germany, the Jews are entirely loyal. In fact, they subscribed the greater part of the last two Austrian war loans.”

  Otto roused himself, slipping another sardine into his mouth. “This is true.” He licked his thumb appreciatively.

  Lev added, “Many Jews are fighting for Germany. Risking their lives in this war.”

  “That is different,” Antonina snapped. “In Germany and Austria, the Jews have civil rights; therefore naturally they are patriotic. In Russia, however, the Jews have no civil rights. So they betray us. So we kill them.” She paused. “But some vodka would be nice.” She examined her hands, frowning at their roughness. “Does one really have to go to that dirty little apothecary?”

  It would only be a waste of breath, Lev told himself, to argue with this cow of a woman. She reminded him of a farm animal—asinine, bullheaded, at constant war with the surrounding stimuli so that she could barely focus. Right now, she picked at her teeth with the long tapered nail of her pinky finger. Before this, she had been examining the end of her plait, which looked like a miniature broom. Lev glanced away. Such a lack of decorum, such beastly manners revolted him. Of course, over the years he had grown accustomed to Josephine’s habits—her stringent cleanliness, her starched white dresses, her impeccable table manners. Even when Lev stared at Josephine from across the dining table with nothing to say, which had occurred more and more frequently before the war, she sat erect in her chair, her long neck daintily bent over her soup, her elbows suspended above the tablecloth as if little flames threatened to burn her otherwise—that was how fastidious she was about such details. He would watch her and drink his wine and think what a beautiful picture he saw before him, and sometimes, this would console him. Other times, when they did speak, she would obsess over the minutiae of the house—the gardener had ruined her lilies again, Marthe couldn’t find a good housemaid to assist her, the other one had quit unexpectedly, the windows needed cleaning, and could they perhaps replace the faded rug in the sitting room? Lev always nodded, his eyes glazing over as he watched her mouth move but failed to hear the words.

  It was nearly ten o’clock. Uncle had since retreated to the far corner of the room, where he sat by the window, smoking his cheroot, staring out at the flat dark fields. Antonina had excused herself to prepare Otto’s bed. He reminded her that she had promised him fresh linens. She waved her hand impatiently, too tired to quarrel.

  Otto poured himself more cognac. He sat with his legs splayed out on the floor, like an overgrown child. “How long have you been out here, in this wasteland?”

  “Three years come spring.”

  “You’re from Berlin?”

  Lev nodded. “I worked in a textile factory. Production manager.” He clearly pictured the office where he had spent his days, the glass-paneled walls designed so he could look out onto the machinery and survey the workers. He had a nice velvet chaise in his office, of a faded cobalt color. Sometimes, he took afternoon naps there.

  Lev felt as if he were discussing a stranger’s life, a life still ongoing, running parallel to the one he led now. He often stopped in the middle of a field or mused at the dirty wall of the latrine (someone always wrote some obscenity there, at eye level, damning the officers’ better pay or extolling the merits of a particular prostitute) and thought, while his stream of urine shot into the hole: What would I be doing now if the war hadn’t happened?

  He told Otto, “I have a wife and two children.” He saw Josephine, all in white, and Franz clinging to her. Vicki hung back from the picture, but she was there, on the edges. She had been so young when he left, just four, sucking her thumb. Afterward, she would reach up with her thumb coated in saliva, expecting someone to dry it off. Lev always did, using the perfectly folded handkerchief in his front pocket. “There,” he would say as if performing a magic trick, “all clean.” Josephine would complain that he had ruined his handkerchief and now Marthe would have to wash and iron it all due to the stubbornness of a little girl who refused to stop sucking her thumb. She would murmur that he was spoiling Vicki, and he should discipline her by applying a smack to the top of her hand. But he could never bring himself to do it.

  “Your wife, is she beautiful?” Otto asked greedily.

  They heard Antonina humming as she prepared Otto’s bed, the Russian soft and melodic. The fire had died down, leaving only embers.

  “Yes,” Lev said. “Yes, she is.”

  Otto grinned, wolfish. “If I had a wife, no matter how beautiful, all I’d do is cheat on her.” Then he frowned, as if trying to solve a difficult equation. Lev marveled at how quickly Otto’s expression changed; it reminded him of Greek theater, the masks of comedy and tragedy, two sides of a face. Otto continued, “Marriage, or rather monogamy, it isn’t natural.” He shook his head. “But we’ve been forced into thinking it so. Let us observe nature, and imitate it. Animals do not endlessly carp and pine after one mate.”

  Lev glanced at the smoldering embers. Leah, her moonlike face, the way her almond eyes laughed at him, the freckled constellations scattering her neck. How would he find her again?

  Antonina had stopped humming, maybe to eavesdrop, or maybe she had run out of songs. She passed from room to room, her head bowed and her full skirt trailing behind, catching dust and dirt on its hem. As she went, she blew out each candle within its glass sconce.

  Otto sleepily lit a cigarette, the last one of the night, he promised. “My supply is running low,” he added. Lev had no doubt he could get more. It seemed as if Otto had always been here, belonging to the massive forests and to the violence of the seasons—to the ice and wind, the springtime floods, the drenching summer heat. Lev could not picture him out of uniform, in civilian clothes walking jauntily along Berlin streets. He would look awkward in a suit. He wondered who made clothes for men with such broad shoulders and thick necks and arms that dangled almost down to the knees.

  “What did you do before the war?”

  “I am an artist,” Otto replied, as if it should have been obvious. He said his art drove him to join the war, to obtain the full taste and range of human experience, to see death and hear cannons and record it all in his sketchbook. It was late, but Otto became reanimated, his face bright and awake as he took Lev by the arm, leading him into his small room, where he kept his sketches rolled up and stored under his bed. Lev wondered if he was any good, or just one of the many artists flocking to Berlin. He hoped Otto was a bad artist. It would make him feel better about the fact that he hadn’t picked up a paintbrush in nearly six years.

  In the dim candlelight Otto unrolled his drawings, done in charcoal on paper, and laid them tenderly on the bed. He instructed Lev to hold the candle near, not directly above to avoid wax dripping, but close enough so he could see the drawings. Lev stared at two abstract bodies intertwined, taking comfort in the softness of freshly mounded graves. He felt the creep of envy envelop him. The sketches were good. Otto explained while the man and woman create a new life, underneath their passionate embrace, another body slowly decomposes. “It’s called Lovers in a Grave,” Otto added proudly. “It’s a sketch for what I’ll do later—I work in oils, but for now this will have to suffice.” He then spoke of how human matter is constantly transforming, how Goya and Callot showed this too, and how amazingly demonic it was, the way in which human matter shifts, right before our eyes. Lev remembered the men in the hospital ward, the change in tone and texture of a person’s skin once he had died, how a pale and damply twitching face transformed into a waxen one, tinged with a blue-purple glaze, the lips stiff, how the broken blood vessels, like miniature spider veins circling the nostrils, became more pronounced.

  Otto continued, “I insisted on going to the front line. I couldn’t possibly miss it. To know
something of men, I had to witness them in their unfettered state.”

  “Must be important for an artist,” Lev managed.

  Otto rolled up each sketch. “So very important! The most intense emotions must be sought out and experienced through lovemaking and dancing and drinking too much … and warfare—these feelings strike at the root of us, instinctually, I mean. Enough of the intellect, cooped up in our studios trying to replicate life”—Otto wiped his forehead with his discarded shirt—“instead of living it.”

  The Gay Science lay atop his nightstand. His ideas were so transparently Nietzsche’s, nearly quoted from the book, Lev thought smugly.

  “Well,” Lev said, “you weren’t wounded, at least.”

  “Why do you think I’m here, exiled to the hinterlands?” He pointed to his shoulder. “Shell fragments.”

  “The bits of iron deprive the wound of blood. Can cause gangrene and then infection, bleeding and then putrefaction.” Lev paused, weighing his next words. “I was a medic. Behind the front line—in the reserve trenches for a short time and then mostly at base.”

  “Ah, well, it doesn’t really matter.” Otto waved his cigarette in the air.

  Lev instantly heard the disappointment in Otto’s voice because he was only a medic, barely a witness to combat. It was the same restrained disappointment Lev found in Josephine’s letters, when she asked how he fared at the base. Was it any trouble dealing with the locals? Had the Russians encroached over the lines into the newly minted German territories? Did he ever, she wrote in her last letter, fear for his life? And then she followed this question up with a paragraph about the tragic fate of returning soldiers, fresh from Flanders, with no legs or arms. Oh yes, she went on and on about the poor soldiers, trying to goad him into feeling somehow unworthy that he had remained unscathed. He felt certain she wished for a more heroic post for him. Even if it meant death. Especially if it meant death, for there was little heroism in safety.

  “We need medics of course. Indispensable,” Otto rejoined, jolting Lev back to this small room, to the drawings on the bed, to his stomach full of herring and egg.