There was one sentence he looked at again and again: Accordingly, all bodily processes in feature, speech, and gesture are correspondences.
Maybe someday he could allow an entire sentence to fly into the word tree, so he could look at it at any time.
The burning candle was reflected in the glass of the picture of the angel. The reflection of the burning candle left only the angel’s wings and head visible. He got up and blew out the candle. Tell stayed on the bed. Johann lay back down even closer to Tell than before, petted him as he had never petted him before, got the Bible out of the bookcase, and read to Tell what Father had read to him last winter when they had talked about angels. Balaam’s donkey. That’s you, Tell. You’re the only one who noticed that it wasn’t me but an angel. Like Balaam’s donkey that saw the Angel blocking the path, tried to squeeze past him, and then because the angel wouldn’t allow it, went down on his knees and was beaten three times by Balaam until the Lord opened Balaam’s eyes so he could see the Angel of the Lord standing in the path.
He would never, ever deliver Anita’s greeting. It was painful to separate from Adolf. Unless he distanced himself from Adolf, he could not neglect to do what Anita had asked. Anita and Adolf belonged together. He was alone. Since no one was there, he did some howling, but only a little bit. When Tell started to howl with him, he was able to stop. He recited to Tell the two lines he was going to make into a poem someday:
Oh, that early in the day
I should be so lonely.
He would wrap himself in this language as soon as he couldn’t stand it here anymore. Trepidation, bijoux, curiosity, exuberance, whitecaps, freckles, weeping willow, reincarnation, kingdom of heaven, chattels, memorial, Beatrijs, correspondence. He compared his father’s words with the words that Adolf had from his father: manhood, footwear, consequences, role model, bad example, bootlicker, fop, womenfolk, litmus test. He didn’t envy Adolf the word manhood, but only the ease with which he said it, as if it was a make of car. He could not use his provisional dick-word, even when he was speaking only to himself. He had heard the kind of people who said dick and how they said it. It wasn’t the way he wanted to talk about the most precious part of himself. He couldn’t even say ass. Mother always said anus. It was the only High German word in her language. Whenever she said it, she looked uneasy. Johann would certainly never say that word. All these proffered words pained him.
“You are who you are,” he said. And his member responded: I am who I am.
And Johann said, quietly, “IAWIA, can you hear me?”
Josef said, too, that he preferred to play the piano for himself alone. Johann would find words for himself alone.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Taking Leave
JOHANN FEARED THE MOMENT when his eyes would meet the teacher’s. In the village, the teacher was both referred to with reverence on hundreds of occasions and feared for his fits. People said they came from his silver plate. In any case, Johann wet his much-too-long hair and combed it as smooth and flat on his head as he possibly could. Whenever the teacher mentioned tango boys or love-locks, Johann felt he meant him.
He was glad when he ran into Göser’s Trudl and Lichtensteiger’s Helmut. When Trudl started talking about yesterday and the day before, he didn’t know where to look. She thought it was swell the way he’d stood up for her. He could only shake his head and say, “Aw, come on, Trudl!” But she insisted.
“It’s really true,” she said, while Helmut One nodded vigorous agreement. “It really is. That lunatic would have beaten me to death if you hadn’t stood up and said: Herr Teacher, may I please be excused? And the look he gave you—I was really afraid for you. When he turned toward you, I got right up off the floor and put the key back into the harmonium. It had fallen out when I crashed against it. Then I snuck back to my seat because I could see it was your turn now. You caught him off guard. We all know he’s a good-natured person, but when he gets one of his fits, anything is possible. I thought I was done for. And then you pipe up: Herr Teacher, may I please be excused? And even though you interrupted him at his touchiest moment—when he’s giving someone a thrashing—he didn’t just smack you one. You know as well as me he only gives excuses during recess, and then you go and ask him in the middle of a fit. Oh jeez, I thought, poor Johann. Did you see the way he looked at you? But you—you meet his stare, stare back cool as a cucumber, but friendly-like. He walks toward you, slowly, but instead of pasting you one that would have sent you flying into the harmonium, if not worse, he walks right past you, goes to the door, opens it, gives a little bow, and says: At your service, Herr Johann, you may be excused. And you walk past him—I think you even said: Thank you, Herr Head Teacher—and all of a sudden he was our nice Herr Heller again, our beloved teacher!”
Since there was nothing Johann could say, he started talking about something else. He would rather not have said anything at all. He had to pull himself together now, get ready so he wouldn’t just run away at the first glance from the teacher. Everybody in the schoolroom was talking about yesterday—about Johann.
Adolf whispered, “Now you can show off again like ten naked niggers, can’t you?”
The teacher came in, went to the front of the room, called out, “Heil Hitler,” and received the pupils’ “Heil Hitler, Herr Teacher” in return. The teacher looked only at Johann. And how he looked at him, milder than ever before.
After school, Ludwig said to Johann, “You would’ve thought he was trying to cozy up to you.”
Adolf said, “Sure, since Johann’s playing the show-off now. Tango hairdo, love-locks, artist’s mane—a regular dandy.”
However, today was also Johann’s next-to-last morning in this school. From Monday on, he would be attending the secondary school in Lindau. Two of them, he and Berni, were going to be secondary school pupils starting next Monday.
When the bells started tolling eleven o’clock, the teacher interrupted his lesson as always and struck a pose so everyone could see how much he suffered from the clanging of the church bells, booming loudly over from the church next door. He held his ears. His face: one huge grimace of pain. After the bells had finally come to rest, he said, “Adolf, go open the door for the poet.” Adolf, his favorite pupil, was used to such assignments. He was at the door at once, opened it, and in staggered—and almost fell—Schmitt the tinsmith. Johann probably knew the master tinsmith Schmitt better than anyone else here. Almost every day, he was the first at the regulars’ table. The master tinsmith had never shown up later than nine. They started drawing his beer as soon as he entered the dining room. When Johann watched the tinsmith drain his glass without once setting it down, he sometimes had the impression he wasn’t drinking for his own sake but rather to water his magnificent mustache. Today, Johann could tell as soon as he saw him that the tinsmith had watered more than just his mustache. Johann had never seen him so unsteady on his feet—or, yes he had, once before, when the tinsmith had forgotten who he was. Mother had had to call up Frau Schmitt and ask if her husband was at home. Only when the master tinsmith heard from his own wife that he wasn’t at home did he concede it was possible that the person who was not at home was himself.
Adolf grabbed the hand of the staggering man and led him to the teacher at the front of the room; he offered him the chair behind the teacher’s desk. Once the master tinsmith was seated, the teacher said they all should greet the poet with the German Greeting. He himself at once raised his right arm and stretched his hand out so flat and straight that the fingers actually curved upwards a bit. Everyone followed his example and cried out, “Heil Hitler, Herr Schmitt.” The tinsmith stood up, clicked his heels together, laid his hands along the seams of his trousers like a soldier, lowered his chin a tiny bit, cried, “Yes, Sir,” and then slumped back onto the chair. He realized he had forgotten something, jumped up again, stretched out his right hand, cried, “Heil Hitler,” and—almost while still uttering this acknowledgement—collapsed back onto the chair.
The teacher called, “Irmgard, Leni!” Both jumped up and took a wreath out of a basket that stood next to the harmonium—a rather small wreath, actually much too small for four hands. But it had apparently been agreed upon or ordered to be that way. Together they had to take the little wreath out of the basket, carry it with their four hands to the master tinsmith, place it on his head, and maybe even press it down on his head to make sure it didn’t slip off first thing. The tinsmith looked startled but left his hands where they were, resting on his knees. As soon as the wreath was on his head, he made an effort to straighten up as much as he could.
The teacher said that with this laurel wreath, the Wasserburg School was honoring the outstanding poetic achievement of the regional poet Georg Schmitt. The fact was that he was more than just a regional poet. His verses were intended to be sung all over Germany, as proved by the song for which he, the teacher, had written a melody so that everyone could sing it. He gave them the pitch with his tuning fork, said, “Three, four!” and led all four classes, who had risen from their seats, in singing:
How oft on a flowering hillside
or at rest by a freshet’s flow
have I gazed upon northern beauty
or felt the southland’s glow.
But nothing has stilled my longing,
not mountains or meadows or streams,
till you, dear German homeland,
fulfilled all my fondest dreams.
“You will now sing this song while you escort the poet through the village as his honor guard.” Again he called out, “Adolf!” Adolf fetched the master tinsmith, led him out, and saw to it that he made it down the broad sandstone steps into the schoolyard without falling. Then they all lined up, the tinsmith at the head between Adolf and Guido, and behind them the four classes. The teacher called, “Forward, march,” raised his hand in the German Greeting, and the column set off. Frommknecht’s Hermann, who was in charge of everything having to do with music, led the singing, and the song resounded. It was repeated until they arrived at the Schmitts’ little house. Frau Schmitt, the only seamstress in the village whom everyone referred to as a tailor, had prepared a basket full of soft pretzels. The pretzels were sliced open and spread with butter. She removed the laurel wreath from her husband’s head and then passed the pretzels around to the boys and girls and praised them all for their singing. Johann was well prepared to sing along, because he had learned the melody the day before. Everything above a high C was his specialty. He competed with Ludwig, who also had a voice that reached the high notes without effort. . . . noooothing has stiiiilled my loooonging. It went up to a high F sharp. Johann had the feeling that the others were only singing to allow him and Ludwig to rise to the high notes. Too bad Adolf didn’t think much of singing. Music’s okay, he would say. Music at the proper time and place. He sounded like Herr Brugger.
Afterwards, when everyone had dispersed, Adolf stayed beside Johann and continued on with him past his own house; once past the linden tree, they were finally all by themselves and Adolf said, “I could have killed you yesterday and the day before.”
Johann thought: I’d like to see you try. But all he said was, “Sometimes I could kill you, too.”
“Yesterday and the day before were the first time for me,” said Adolf.
“The day before was the first time for me,” said Johann.
“Then we’re even,” said Adolf. When they reached the steps to the terrace, they turned around. And it was back down the hill to the Bruggers’, and back up, and back down, and back . . . They no longer took Main Street down to the linden tree and from there around the Linden Tree Restaurant to the Bruggers’. Now they took the back way that ran along beneath and between blooming trees almost the whole distance, and wasn’t tarred.
Thank goodness Adolf had said that about wanting to kill him. Since Adolf said it, Johann could look him in the eye again. Now they could talk to each other again. As they walked back and forth, neither said anything that the other didn’t already know. But nothing was said the same way it had been said before. This day was the day that had never been before. They talked as they were able to talk only on this day. They were something like kings. They felt that way because they were walking back and forth between their houses, and everything that occurred to them was at their command. Johann was waiting for Adolf to begin talking about Anita. He would say: She sent you her best. Actually, she was waiting for you. She only wants you, not me.
As more and more sentences went back and forth between him and Adolf, as they both sensed that this talking to each other would never come to an end, as Frau Schorer—when they went past her for the third time—called out, “My, don’t you two have weighty things to discuss!”, as Johann sensed that it made no difference at all what they talked about, he also felt that he could forego Anita. He would convey her greeting, degrade himself to a mere messenger who had no chance with her. You’re the only one who has a chance, Adolf, he would say. She started talking about you, sent you her best. But to be the first to mention Anita—that he couldn’t do. He could look at Adolf when Adolf was talking. Despite his terrible haircut, Adolf had a beautiful head. You could see so clearly the way his neck joined his head, because there was no hair to cover even a quarter-inch. It wasn’t a long neck. Adolf was a ram. A clean-shaven ram.
And suddenly, Anita’s name was uttered. Adolf said Anita was kind of a lame goose. She’s anything but, thought Johann. Adolf probably saw a completely different Anita. Maybe he meant the way she acted when she wasn’t in the ring, wasn’t flying around the pole, wasn’t riding on Vishnu. A lame goose, clearly one of Herr Brugger’s expressions. Never had Ludwig or Guido or Paul or Helmut One or Helmut Two said about a girl that she was a lame goose. Johann was happy that Adolf had said something so completely inappropriate about Anita. He admired Adolf for not sinking to the ground in pure adoration. Instead, he was able to say something that, though untrue, still had some pride and independence to it. How strong, how lofty Adolf must be to be able to call Anita a lame goose. For Johann, it was a reason not to deliver her greeting after all. The fact would remain his secret. It felt good to have a secret like that. Not to mention, how was he going to prove to Adolf that he had been in Langenargen? For Adolf, he had been here. Adolf would think it was just showing off if Johann said that he had been in Langenargen and done thus and so. And yet Adolf was the only person who would have understood what had happened to Johann, because he had experienced something similar himself. And he had told only Johann about it, no one else. Because Franz Döbele lived far out at the edge of the village, the Bruggers let him eat lunch at their house in the winter. Once, Franz had spotted a tree trunk sawed into boards in the Bruggers’ yard. The boards were separated from each other by blocks of wood so they could dry out. But the way they had been stacked up, you could still see exactly what the tree trunk had looked like. Adolf said Döbele Franz had almost shed tears when he saw those boards. If he could have some boards like that, the airplane he was planning to build would be as good as finished. Adolf immediately gets the handcart out of the shed—his father was on the road in the Allgäu—and because Franz’s enthusiasm is infectious, he says, “You can have two of them.”
And Döbele Franz says, “The two in the middle.” They load them on the handcart and pull them out to Wasserburg Hill, where the Döbeles and other families who don’t have much live together in a way that people in the village can’t even imagine. As they are unloading the boards, Adolf hears the whistle—his father’s whistle. The long-drawn-out whistle that drops abruptly to a short, deeper pitch, the whistle Herr Brugger uses to call Adolf from wherever he is. But not when Adolf is at least a mile outside the village! Nevertheless, he does hear the whistle and runs back home, pulling the empty handcart behind him. Right away he spots his father’s car. So his father is back sooner than expected. Adolf himself can’t understand why he did it. Döbele Franz bewitched him. Stealing—just about the worst thing you could do. A scoundrel. He’s going
to be punished worse than ever. He sees his mother in the open doorway, and his father appears next to her. “Good thing you’re here,” he calls to him. “I just bought seven head of cattle in Simmerberg and resold them to a man in Konstanz. They have to be put onto a boat in Lindau. Getting seven cows to go peacefully up the gangway—nobody’s as good at that as my Adolf.” And he’s already heading for the car. Adolf follows, and the car is parked right next to the boards, of course. And what does Adolf see? The two middle boards, the ones he carried off with Döbele Franz, are no longer missing. Adolf said he had felt so light he could have risen into the air the next moment. Döbele Franz, he thought, would have called it taking off.
Johann felt awful. Adolf had told him everything. But he was keeping everything from Adolf.
They had reached the Bruggers’ again and were standing behind the house.
Suddenly, Adolf said if he were Johann he wouldn’t go to school in Lindau.
“Man, why don’t you stay here?” said Adolf. Johann would have to admit, wouldn’t he, that Herr Heller was the best teacher far and wide, a once-in-a-lifetime role model. “Remember those productions of Wilhelm Tell and The Death of Schlageter? Nobody else can teach you as much as Herr Heller.” Johann could not disagree.
Josef was taking French and would soon start learning Latin. Father had said whoever couldn’t speak French was unfortunate. Neither Ludwig nor Guido nor Paul, neither Helmut One nor Helmut Two expected him to stay in Wasserburg. But Adolf did. And Johann was happy that Adolf expected it and even demanded it. Fortunately, Adolf could not accept the fact that Johann was going to school in Lindau.
“Whadd’ya say?” said Adolf, and gave Johann two or three punches in the chest. Johann didn’t defend himself. They weren’t really punches, just touches, invitations. Johann was supposed to admit that Adolf knew better than Johann what was right for Johann. Adolf started in again about going to school in Lindau. Now came the words his father used against educated people: ink in your veins, starveling, loafer, drudge, shirker, pansy. Adolf could not know that Johann had already heard Adolf’s father use these words against Johann’s father, and also against Johann and Josef.
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