Today, having arrived early, she stood in the waiting room, staring at the framed photographs arranged in a line along the far wall. She had glanced at them in the past, but never before had she actually taken the time to study them, and as she did this, she felt somewhat disturbed. The first photograph, in faded sepia, featured two little boys dressed as court jesters in wide ruffled collars, black ballet slippers, and knit bodysuits patterned with interlocking diamonds in a diagonal arrangement. One boy faced the camera, his hands on his hips, while the other boy hid behind him, one naughty eye peering out, the rest of his face obscured. The boy facing the camera wore a leather belt with a small knife attached to it, covered by a leather sheath. The other boy held a knife, without its sheath, behind his back, as if to stab his more confident brother. Underneath the photograph, a caption in cursive script read: The Children of the Suppancics Family. The next photograph pictured the back of a woman’s head, her bare neck, her wide back clothed in some kind of woolen jacket. She glanced slightly to the side, the beginnings of a double chin detectable. The bare blatant neck instantly reminded Josephine of Vicki’s short hair and how upset she’d felt when Vicki had strode into the sitting room yesterday, ready to challenge her when all Josephine felt was sadness, remembering Vicki’s fine dark curls, the way she used to run her fingers unencumbered through Vicki’s hair when she was a child. Dark curls with hints of copper and gold, a mercurial color that changed with the light. In the morning sun, a reddish brown, and by nightfall, a blackberry hue. Lev had tried to console her, saying it was only hair and it would grow back, while at the same time he took Vicki’s side, playing the diplomat, tap dancing between them, or at least this was the image Josephine evoked when she thought about it.
The next photograph: a close-up of an eye—the pupil, the cornea, the white eyelashes, the delicate eyebrow arched over the upper eyelid. Underneath, the same cursive script stated: The Right Eye of My Daughter Sigrid. She wondered if Sigrid was Dr. Dührkoop’s niece, or the photographer’s daughter, whoever he was. She could hear the muted murmur from behind the office door, where Dr. Dührkoop was in deep discussion with another patient. The walls, padded with green damask, had been purposefully designed to soften distinct sounds. Even as Josephine strained to listen, she could only pick out a few discernible words: cat, Arthur, Vienna. Mainly, a woman spoke, and Dr. Dührkoop probably nodded and jotted down notes in his notebook. Josephine moved on to the next photograph, strangely comforted by the sound of the woman’s voice droning on in the next room, as if she too had irresolvable troubles. In another photograph, titled Riki Raab, a tall woman twined a long flowing piece of tapestry around her body, suggesting nakedness underneath. She wore a strange pointed hat, almost papal in character, and through half-closed lids, she glanced at the viewer with a mixture of arrogance and embarrassment.
The doorknob turned. A boy, about sixteen, walked out of the office. His face reddened when he saw her, and he brushed past. As the doctor ushered Josephine into his office, she could hear the boy’s hurried steps echoing down the long hallway that led to the stairs.
On the chaise lounge, she made herself comfortable. The doctor sat in the opposite chair, his legs crossed, his leather-bound notebook resting on his lap, a pen stuck between the pages. A low coffee table positioned in the middle of the room featured an array of African figurines carved from onyx. On the windowsill, orchids, a deep magenta, sprouted new buds. Through the window, Josephine stared at the tops of the linden trees swaying in the wind. Dr. Dührkoop always began each session in the same way, with a bout of silence that felt uncomfortably palpable. He studied her from behind his wire-rim glasses, his hands laced over his kneecap. His square garnet ring, set in gold, always caught her attention, the deep red color alluring. Josephine thought he kept his fingernails a tad too long, accentuating his slender tapered fingers. She swallowed, and it seemed as if he heard. “Would you like some tea before we start?”
“No, thank you, Doctor. It’s much too hot out for tea.”
“Hmm, yes, it is rather warm.”
He adjusted the pillow behind his back and then refocused his gaze on her. Josephine had a fleeting image of the doctor licking her neck, the texture of his tongue rough like a cat’s, the licks quick and precise as if he were lapping up milk. She tried to redirect her thoughts, but the image perversely stuck.
He opened his notebook, smoothing down a blank page. “How are you feeling this week?”
“I’m fine, thank you, Doctor.” In the beginning of each session, she felt awkward lying on the couch, her feet dangling off the edge. He preferred her to lie on her back so she wouldn’t have to face him, especially during the moments when she described more intimate details, but it seemed rude, staring up at the ceiling. And most of the time, she liked to look at his face. He reminded her of Mahler, a less handsome version, but with the same imposing forehead and Roman nose, the same style of spectacles and swept-back hair. But not facing him, he had explained, would allow her to speak more freely. Over the weeks, she had grown accustomed to the sound of his voice, low and calm, and the movement of his pen scratching against the paper whenever she said something noteworthy. But today, she felt the urge to see his reaction to her words, to gaze into his gray quiet eyes.
“You seem”—he leaned forward in his chair—“to be carrying tension. Especially in your upper spine.”
She breathed, feeling her ribs rise and fall beneath her folded hands.
“Try to relax your shoulders, your jaw, your mouth, your eyes, your hands.” When he said these things, she felt as if he were touching her in all of those places. Her head grew heavy, despite the morning sun filtering into the room. Her eyelids involuntarily started to close. She sighed. “My daughter.”
“Vicki.” His chair creaked as he shifted positions.
“Yes, Vicki.” She paused, opening her eyes. “Yesterday, she cut off all her hair.”
“And this has greatly upset you.”
“Yes, it did.”
“Why do you think it was so upsetting?”
She touched her forehead. “Well, I suppose if I really think about it …”
The doctor laughed lightly. “Yes, that is what we do here.”
She turned her head to look at him. He smiled encouragingly.
“I suppose Vicki reminded me of that American ambassador’s daughter who’s always in the press, running around with foreign correspondents. She’s only twenty, but they say she’s had five lovers plus a broken-off engagement to some financier from Chicago. I don’t want Vicki to become like that, but when she cut off her hair, I thought, Now this is the first step toward provocative behavior.”
“Hmmm.” He scribbled something down in his notebook.
“Young women these days are”—she searched for the right words—“sexually vivacious.”
“ ‘Sexually vivacious,’ ” he repeated, smiling again.
“Yes,” Josephine replied, shifting onto her side so that she faced him squarely. Again, without meaning to, she thought of Titian’s painting Venus and the Lute Player. Venus, positioned on her side, squarely faces the viewer, her white body exposed save for a light handkerchief draped across her lap. The lute player stops with his music to gaze at her lovely figure. Should seeing or hearing be the primary means of perceiving beauty? This was apparently the painting’s question, and she had debated it with Lev when they first met. Because he used to paint, of course he vowed that sight was the primary function for perceiving beauty, whereas she remained convinced that sound conveyed beauty in its purest, most objective form. For a moment, she imagined herself as Venus and the doctor as the lute player, stopping to admire her. She blushed at this vain fantasy.
“What were you thinking just now?”
“That when I look at you, I feel as if you’re listening to me more intently, as opposed to when I am staring up at the ceiling. Then I can’t see your expression and I wonder what you’re thinking.”
“But that’s not importa
nt.”
“What isn’t?”
“What I think.”
“But it is.”
He shook his head, taking off his glasses. “Josephine.” When he said her name, her heart beat faster. He slid the stainless steel ashtray closer to him and then lit a cigarette. “Do you think the reason why you were so bothered by Vicki’s haircut and by the amorous activities of the American ambassador’s daughter is that you yourself had once been sexually vivacious, only to be punished for it by Herr K’s sexual advances? This quality attracted him, and you don’t want Vicki to suffer the same fate, or to carry on the tradition, so to speak?”
“I did feel it was my fault, with Herr K.”
“Because you were young and very pretty. You told me your mother had said if you weren’t so precocious, none of that business would have happened.”
Josephine felt her cheeks burn. “Yes, she did say that.”
“And you felt guilty about your attractiveness, and you thought, perhaps, if you were less appealing, he would have left you alone.”
Herr K’s pomaded moustache, the peppery scent of it, suddenly flooded her senses. Her throat tightened. “He probably would have.”
Dr. Dührkoop leaned forward, his face growing more animated.
“Your sexuality was a liability, robbing you of your girlhood—and now you feel threatened by Vicki’s burgeoning womanhood because it brings back the trauma.”
Josephine clutched a pillow to her chest. “Yes, the trauma.” The way he kept using the past tense—when she was pretty, was sexual, was appealing—made her wonder if he would still describe her in this way. Had she aged that much? Under her eyes, slight hollows had appeared, making her face, at certain times of day, more shadowy. The creases around her mouth were more pronounced. But beyond these minor signs of age, she still felt young and sprightly. Her carriage had remained erect, her neck long, her skin soft and pale, and her hair, heavy with golden strands, crowned the top of her head. She touched the end of her thick braid.
He leaned back into his chair, smoking thoughtfully. The desk clock indicated a few minutes still remained. But not enough time, Josephine thought, for the word association game, which had unsettled her last time. He’d barked a series of unrelated words, and after each one, she had to respond with a word she found similar in meaning, as a pathway into her subconscious mind.
He languorously folded one leg over the other. “Your anger toward Vicki is misguided. That helpless girl on the balcony, blamed for merely defending herself, is angry.”
Josephine nodded, doubting if this was true. She had been angry with Vicki but not necessarily because of any girlhood trauma. She had been angry simply because the haircut was an act of defiance, and it seemed as if Vicki no longer wanted a mother, as if she could dispense with her as easily as discarding a pair of torn stockings. Old stockings thrown out in the trash.
She heard the waiting room door open and close. The doctor wrote down a few perfunctory notes in his notebook. Josephine watched him, wondering what he wrote. She suppressed a smile, imagining him jotting down a grocery list instead of an assessment of her psychological condition. With studied seriousness, he could be scribbling: wine, cheese, black tea, endive, olives. At least that’s what she thought he ate, living the bachelor’s life without anyone to cook for him properly, although she had heard his mother visited quite often.
She sat up, rubbing her forehead.
“We have a few more minutes. Is there anything else you would like to discuss today?”
The clock read five minutes to one. The sounds of lunchtime traffic filtered through the half-open window, jostling her out of this dim cocoon. A tram rattled past. A line of horses trotted down the street, headed for the park. Rearranging the pillows, even though Dührkoop told her not to bother, Josephine thought of something she could say to fill the last five minutes.
“I still think of my mother all the time. Sometimes, I feel as if she’s lingering here, observing me, trying to make contact.”
“I see.”
“Do you think that’s a strange thing to say?”
He scratched his clean-shaven face. “Not necessarily.” He then produced a cream-colored card embossed with the name BALTHAZAR WEHDANNER, THE EVANGELICAL CHURCH OF ST. JOHN. He handed the card to Josephine. “His awakening meetings have a tendency toward fanaticism, but I do think he’s a gifted spiritualist. A number of my patients have found him quite extraordinary.”
She slipped the card into her purse, snapping the clasp shut. “Thank you, Doctor.”
“Please,” he said, walking her to the door. She enjoyed, for a brief moment, the feeling of his hand on her back. The lightness of his fingertips made her pliable, loose-limbed, off balance.
He opened the door. “Do feel free to call on me any time, outside of our regular sessions.” He always said this at the end, but today, the timbre of his voice was different, as if he really wanted her to call.
“Of course, Doctor. Thank you.” She still felt his hand on her back as she walked through the waiting room, past an elderly woman clutching a parasol. Down the hall, down the staircase, through the marble atrium, outside under the glass-plated portico, the bright sunlight hitting her face, she felt his hand there still, burning through her chiffon blouse.
That night, Franz came late to dinner. Josephine hovered over the pea soup on the stove, thinking how again Marthe had added too much cream. “Marthe,” she sighed, “add more broth to the soup, please.”
Marthe arranged red mullet fillets over pats of butter in a skillet. “I apologize, Frau Perlmutter—should I prepare the fish now?” She glanced at the clock on the wall. “Or would you prefer to wait until Franz arrives?”
“We’ll wait.”
“Also to serve the soup?”
Josephine sighed again. “Yes. I don’t like to start without him.”
At the dinner table, Lev complained he was hungry. Vicki sat next to him, playing with her silverware in a distracted manner. Her hair, Josephine mused, wasn’t entirely bad. It accentuated her long neck. And she’d fastened a pretty clip to her hair, one with rhinestones.
Josephine dabbed her forehead with a lavender-scented handkerchief, relieved it had finally cooled after such a ferociously warm day. “What did you do today, Vicki?”
She looked up from the table. “Oh, nothing really.”
Josephine raised her eyebrows. “Nothing?”
She shrugged. “Nothing of any note. I went to the library.”
“That gloomy building,” Lev said.
“Yes,” Vicki replied, suppressing a smile. “It is gloomy. I felt like a prisoner locked away in there with it so beautiful and warm out.”
Josephine stared out the window. Still no sign of Franz.
Lev poured himself a glass of red wine from the decanter. “I’m sure there were other prisoners, as you say, at the library.”
Vicki studied her nails. “Do we have to wait all night for Franz? I’m famished.”
Josephine’s chest tightened at Vicki’s demanding tone. Always so sharp, so quick to turn on her at a moment’s notice.
Vicki continued, “If I were the one late, you’d all be on the third course by now.”
“And if I were late,” Lev chimed in, “you’d be drinking coffee in the library by now.” Josephine flashed Lev a look. He was always encouraging Vicki to be cheekier, more insolent than she already was. About to disagree, she thought of Dr. Dührkoop’s calm peaceful face, the way her name rolled off his tongue, as if he’d known her all his life. He had worn an ice-blue tie today offset by a starched white shirt. She wondered if a woman had bought him the tie. A lover.
She heard the front door open and immediately she got up. Passing the kitchen, she motioned for Marthe to start serving the soup, but Marthe wasn’t there.
“Franz,” she called, moving swiftly down the hallway. The mounting anxiety she’d felt—fantasies of a crushed bicycle, a car running him over, a tram accident, one moment of dis
traction turning fatal—slowly melted away when she saw his face. A bit winded, he waved. Marthe took his coat. They were whispering, and this annoyed Josephine. “Franz,” she repeated, balling up a linen napkin in her palm, a napkin she didn’t realize until now she’d taken along from the dining table. “Where were you?”
He appeared oddly disheveled. His shirt wrinkled and hair tousled as if a woman had just run her fingers through it. She took his arm. He said he needed to wash up first, but she had so many questions: What did you eat for luncheon? How was your mathematics examination? Did you meet with Professor Schiller? And all she could muster was “Are you all right?”
Lev hollered something from the dining room, probably complaining about the soup. She squeezed Franz’s arm. “You’re winded.”
“I’ll just wash up first, Mother.” Then he said something about rush hour and stenographers on the tram and disappeared into the bathroom, closing the door behind him. She stood there, staring at the door, the smooth wood, the blond fibers. The toilet flushed, followed by the turn of the faucets, then running water. The momentary pause as he regarded himself in the mirror above the sink. His beautiful face. She wanted to speak with him privately before dinner, but he lingered in there. Lev called again. Touching the doorknob for a moment, she felt him tensing on the other side of the door. He didn’t want to talk to her tonight. He’d probably been with a girl.
At dinner, she watched him pick at his fish. Worried he would go to bed hungry, she resolved to leave out bread and jam where he could easily find it so he wouldn’t rummage through the larder in the middle of the night. Lev clapped at something Vicki said, but all Josephine heard was the proud defiance in her voice and his approving laughter. Then they started waltzing around the table, debating whether or not it was boring to waltz. Always debating. Those two could never sit calmly and discuss a topic in a civilized manner. Franz found it distasteful as well. He sat across from her, staring down at his plate.
The Empire of the Senses Page 27