The Other Side of Silence

by Andre Brink

“Then if you don’t mind, I’d like to go through it with you,” says Hanna.

  The paper, it turns out, has been misplaced.

  “I remember what was wrong,” says Hanna, unperturbed. “First, you said I broke three cups. It was only two. And that I lost one of Herr Dieter’s shirts in the wash. But it was only a sock, which little Gretchen took to make a puppet. And…”

  Frau Hildegard explodes: “Are you telling me I’m a liar?”

  “No, Frau Hildegard. I’m only saying there were some mistakes: And when one has as little money as I have a single pfennig can make a difference.”

  “Are you complaining about your wages now?”

  This is when Herr Dieter comes in from the garden to go to the bank, leaving mud-tracks all over the floor, which Hanna will have to mop up later. “What’s all this squabbling about?” he asks benignly, winking at Hanna.

  “This – this wench is accusing me of cheating her!” (The word she uses is Dirne.)

  “It was only a few mistakes, if you please, Herr Dieter,” Hanna points out in a faltering voice. “She says I lost one of your shirts in the wash…”

  “I can’t remember missing a shirt,” he says. “A sock, yes. But I think I saw Gretchen making off with it.”

  “Are you siding with a young guttersnipe against your own wife?” asks Frau Hildegard, nostrils flaring. “And in my condition…”

  “I’m just trying to be fair,” he says jovially. “Anyone can make a mistake.”

  “I do not make mistakes,” Frau Hildegard hits back, tearing the hat from her head and marching off to her bedroom where, they both know, she will now spend the rest of the day with compresses on her forehead.

  “I’m so very sorry, Herr Dieter,” stutters Hanna. “But I need my money, and in this way I shall never earn anything.”

  “I’ll sort it out with her,” he promises. And he gently pinches her cheek. “Leave it to me.” Just before he turns away he appears to change his mind and comes back. “Would you be interested in earning a few pfennig on the side?”

  She looks hard at him, but there seems to be no guile or threat in his smiling pink face. “I’ll do anything, Herr Dieter.”

  “At what time do you finish your work?” he asks.

  “At eight o’clock, Herr Dieter. But sometimes Frau Hildegard wants me to do the darning after mat.”

  “Not tonight,” he says firmly. “Come to my study just after eight.”

  She doesn’t move. “Herr Dieter…?”

  “Now off you go,” he orders with a bright smile.

  All kinds of uneasy thoughts keep tumbling through her mind as she picks her way through the day’s tasks: making the beds and sweeping the floors, taking the children to the park, going to the market, cooking lunch, doing the washing, polishing the silver, preparing dinner, putting the children to bed. And then it is eight o’clock.

  He looks up when she appears in the doorway to the Herrenzimmer.

  “Close the door, Hanna,” he says, pushing away his ledgers, leaning back, folding his arms on his broad chest. “Come closer. You’re not scared of me, are you?”

  She shakes her head, swallowing hard. The scene suddenly reminds her so much of Pastor Ulrich’s parsonage that she breaks out in a sweat.

  “How old are you, Hanna?”

  She tells him. Then adds in a hurry, “I don’t do bad things, Herr Dieter.”

  “I wouldn’t dream of expecting bad things from you,” he says, so kindly that her misgivings begin to seep away. “Come, sit down.” He points to an easy-chair at the other side of the desk.

  She approaches, but chooses not to sit down.

  “I’ll be frank with you, Hanna,” he says. “You’re not what one would call a particularly pretty girl.”

  She looks at him without expression.

  “But you do have lovely hair.”

  Still no reaction from her.

  “Show me your titties,” he says in a matter-of-fact tone as if he is asking to check her fingernails.

  Hanna takes a few steps back, turning her head fleetingly to calculate the distance to the door.

  “I promise you I’m not going to lay a finger on you,” he says. He thrusts a hand in the pocket of his house jacket and takes out a small assortment of coins and puts them on the corner of the desk. She does not count them openly but even a quick glance tells her that this may amount to several days’ wages.

  She makes no movement.

  “Take off your shirt,” he says again, tapping one finger very lightly on the small pile of coins.

  “Please, Herr Dieter,” she says, her voice catching in her throat.

  “I’m sure you have very charming little tits,” he says.

  “You really are not going to touch me?” she asks.

  “I give you my word.” He remains sitting in his big chair behind the desk.

  She stares at him for several seconds, then at the money, before with a little shrug – what strange creatures men are – she raises her hands and starts unbuttoning, with dumb fingers, her plain white shirt. Again she looks at him, then draws apart the two flaps.

  “Take it off.”

  She takes a deep breath and shakes the garment from her shoulders, still briefly, instinctively, covering her breasts with her hands, then resigns herself, her eyes fixed on a spot on the floor. Embarrassed, vexed with herself, she feels her nipples stiffen.

  He is silent for such a long time that she finally has to look up. There is a curiously intense expression on his fleshy face. But he says nothing. At last he gives a small, stifled moan, moves one hand across his face, and says, “You can go now. Thank you.”

  She is in such a hurry that she only does up half the buttons; and she is already at the door when he says, “Your money.”

  Flustered, she turns back, glances cautiously at him – but he seems to have lost interest in her and has returned to his ledgers – and shuffles hurriedly to the desk, scoops up the money, dropping a few coins, bends over to retrieve them, bangs her head against the desk as she straightens up too quickly, and scurries out.

  Nine days later (Hanna keeps count), when she is summoned to the study again after the day’s work is done, she once more, perfunctorily, as if she is taking off a sock, bares herself to the man’s command; but this time he gets up behind the desk and says, “Would you mind if I touched them?”

  “Just touch?” she asks.

  “Just touch.”

  “All right. But that will cost more.”

  In the weeks that follow, his touching, which at first is a mere brushing with the fingertips, becomes bolder; some times, when he has been carried away somewhat by the squeezing and kneading, her breasts feel tender and painful and keep her awake during the night.

  She never lets on though, but she does insist, very apologetically, on a few extra pfennig.

  The time comes, soon after Frau Hildegard has been confined with her fifth child, when Herr Dieter asks, as a special favour, if she would mind taking off all her clothes. Only if he promises not to touch her below her navel, she says. He accepts. Later he will offer her double the past rate for the privilege to touch, but Hanna refuses. It is a difficult decision, because it may mean two whole marks more, and Frau Hildegard has really gone crazy with her fines in recent weeks; but in the end she remains resolute. She will not have another Pastor Ulrich, not even if he pays.

  ∨ The Other Side of Silence ∧

  Twenty-Four

  In the meantime the daily routine becomes ever more charged with chores and duties. Since the birth of the new baby the other children have grown more demanding; it is seldom before ten o’clock that Hanna is allowed to creep upstairs with her meagre light. (She has considered giving up the candle to save money, but she is too scared of the dark where terrible things lurk.) Many nights she is required to carry the baby upstairs with her, if Frau Hildegard, who bears the child a most unconscionable grudge, needs an undisturbed sleep. And he seems to have permanent diarrhoea, which mea
ns so much more washing. In addition there are all the errands to be run, what with Frau Hildegard incapacitated most of the time.

  The only escape, on some of her rare days off, is the visits Hanna pays to Fraulein Braunschweig at her old school. It means spending a few of her hard-earned pfennig on the tram, but there is no other way as the Klatts live far from the centre and if she goes on foot it will take the whole afternoon. They talk non-stop. There is always so much to tell, not about the work because it is not worth wasting time on that, and not about Herr Dieter, because she finds that too embarrassing; but about the children whom she likes even in spite of the trouble they cause and the pranks they play on her; and about her thoughts, and the books the teacher has lent her, and her dreams of a distant future when she will be out of service and working in a library or a bookshop, earning money for her travels around the world.

  The visits are soon switched from the old classroom to Fraulein Braunschweig’s small apartment two blocks away, in a small alley near the Marktplatz. In the beginning Fraulein Braunschweig always has coffee ready for Hanna when she arrives; but when she discovers how voraciously the girl sets upon the sweetmeats she has prepared a few casual questions bring to light how little Hanna gets to eat in the Klatt household (a diet mostly of black coffee and stale bread, and leftovers if she’s lucky); from then on she makes sure that there is a full meal waiting on visiting days.

  As the friendship develops, Fraulein Braunschweig also begins to tell Hanna more about herself. About the young soldier, Otto, she once was engaged to and with whom she’d planned to see the world. But then the war with France broke out and he had to go.

  “On the last night before he left,” she says, “I couldn’t stop crying. I just knew he was going to die. But he was so full of life, so happy, he believed so much that great things would be happening to him in the war. And then – I suppose it was inevitable – then he…then we…well, we were engaged and everything, so we thought…” A long pause. “And the next day he went away. And he was killed. And only after that I found I was pregnant.”

  Hanna presses the teacher’s hand between both of hers. She is crying. It is, ironically, Fraulein Braunschweig who has to console her.

  “I was too confused to think straight,” says the teacher. “And of course I was still so young. All I could think of was what my parents would say. So I got rid of the child.”

  Hanna feels the skin on her jaws contract.

  “Oh poor you,” she says, “poor, poor you.”

  “That’s enough,” says Fraulein Braunschweig firmly. “It all happened very long ago.” She gets up, reaches out and briefly presses Hanna’s face against her. “In a way, you know, I’ve come to think of you as the child I haven’t had. So it’s not so sad after all. Come, I think it’s time for the books.”

  Fraulein Braunschweig allows Hanna to browse at will through her bookshelves. Over the months her small collection of travel books is unobtrusively extended to make sure that there will always be something new. Turkey, India, the Greek Islands, Ireland, South America, Africa.

  They do not speak about Fraulein Braunschweig’s past again; but it is not necessary. She has said as much as she is prepared to say. And there is so much else to talk about.

  Many times their conversation returns to Jeanne d’Arc with whom Hanna continues to have an intensely personal relationship. There are episodes from Jeanne’s life which never fail to intrigue and delight her. The journey from Vaucouleurs to Chinon, when she innocently sleeps every night between her escorts Poulengy and Jean de Metz, impressing them so deeply with her simple and forceful presence that they never think of touching her. Her disarming, girlish fondness for pretty clothes: a kidskin girdle, padded hose, leather shoes, finely wrought chain armour of polished steel – and of course her extravagant standard with its triumphant legend Jhesu Maria. The story of how, during the siege of Orleans, Jeanne is wounded by an arrow which penetrates fifteen centimetres into her flesh just above her left breast; she dissolves in tears, yet has courage enough to pluck it out with her own hands before she allows her soldiers to stanch the blood and dress the wound with olive oil and lard. And also the story of how, imprisoned in the castle of Beaurevoir en route to her trial and death in Rouen, she lapses into despair and, disregarding, for once, even the admonitions of her Voices, hurls herself from a tower twenty metres high, without even spraining an ankle. On and on the stories flow, and Hanna absorbs them all as if to quench a real and parching durst.

  On summer afternoons Fraulein Braunschweig sometimes takes a walk with her through the old town and tells her stories from the past, snatches of history interspersed with fantasy; apart from the story of Jeanne, Hanna is especially fond of the fairytales collected by the Grimms. It is as if the darkness in them illuminates obscure corners of her own life. The scarier they are – the opening of Bluebeard’s secret chamber, the killing of the little Gooseherd’s horse, the deaths of Snow White, the unfairness of the princess towards Rumpelstiltskin, the stepmothers and witches and wicked queens – the more enthralled she seems. If Fraulein Braunschweig is perturbed by this morbid fascination she never tries, at least not openly, to discourage Hanna. The poor child, she may think, has little enough to hold on to in the monotony of her dreary days; she may as well be indulged a bit. If there is time, the teacher will offer her informal lessons in the subjects she liked most when she was still at school: history, geography, literature. It remains rather rudimentary, but Hanna soaks up everything. When it is time to leave, it is like returning from one kind of world to another.

  Invariably, Hanna is invigorated when she arrives back at the Klatts’. This, after all, is only temporary. There will be an end to it. One day it will be over and she and Fraulein Braunschweig will set out to explore the far and improbable places of the world. But soon this vigorous optimism abates. Every month, when the new statement comes, she falls further into arrears with her debt. It is slowly dawning on her that it will never ease, and can only get worse. This is the whole logic behind her indenture. For better or for worse, in sickness and in health, this will last till death.

  This makes Herr Dieter’s tempting offers of increased payment for more exquisite favours that much more difficult to resist. Even so it takes many months before she agrees to go beyond exposing herself and administer more blatandy to his needs. It is only because he is so understanding and kind about it that she concedes at all. Initially he is satisfied to undo his trousers and sit back to be fondled with her well-meaning if clumsy hands. As with everything else, her gaucheness is painfully evident; yet in this kind of fondling it appears to add to his appreciation, and hopefully his enjoyment. Beyond this manual manipulation she will not proceed, although he begs for her mouth; that she finds dirty, a sinful act. Not against God, who does not exist anyway, but against the body itself. (There are still many years to go before Lotte will come into her life.) She is bemused to see a grownup, important man grovel so, to hear him plead so urgently – and offer so much money – for a favour as derisory as that. And perhaps, she sometimes thinks, it may not even be so bad, really; if in the beginning she was revolted by the sight and feel of his spurting seed, she gradually relaxes into vague amusement. In a detached way she feels almost proud to discover how much pleasure she can dispense. But she will not cross the boundaries she has imposed, whether through instinct or contrariness.

  Still the daily burden of work continues, and stealthily increases.

  As do the costs incurred: because the children have found out about the fines their mother imposes and now know how to blackmail Hanna into doing whatever they wish. If that fails, they will break something precious and blame her for it. Worse than any fine or punishment (because sometimes Frau Hildegard, more and more unhappy with the world as time goes on, will also deprive her of food; or take the strap to her, beatings which seem to work her up into a frenzy where she can no longer control herself at all) is the fatal knowledge of that debt piling up, piling up, measuring the le
ngthening distance between the present and the possibility of release.

  The only brief moments of escape are those late-night visits to the study with its pool of light among the textured shadows, the shiny surface of the big desk, the deep red of the leather upholstery on easy-chairs and couch, the eyes of her benefactor as he watches her strip off her clothes with gawky, graceless movements, discarding a shirt, shifting a skirt down her legs, stepping out of dropped knickers (and more often than not catching her foot in them and briefly losing her balance); or as he leans back to abandon himself, with eyes tightly closed, to the fumbling of her chafed hands in his lap.

  Whether she ever derives some fleeting pleasure or excitement from it herself is difficult to tell. She is aware, almost every time, of her nipples hardening. And occasionally, truth be told, she becomes wet, which flusters and unnerves her so much that she promptly and awkwardly puts on her clothes again. For this is the most intimate betrayal of all: by her own body. But pleasure? Unlikely. And yet it is not a purely mechanical or mercenary encounter either. The few coins, the four or five or sometimes even ten marks, do matter, and she does not hesitate to raise the price if she has worked unusually hard or he shows particular enjoyment. But that is not all. There is an intricate exchange in it as well, a subtle sharing perhaps; or possibly the mere knowledge that, even if it is only for a few minutes, half an hour, exceptionally an hour, she has been of service to someone, she has done something that is appreciated, in a dark and subterranean way she has been acknowledged.

  For she will always carry with her the early words he spoke to her: You’re not what one would call a particularly pretty girl. (But then, oh don’t forget, don’t ever forget!, he added, But you do have lovely hair.) And even more so the conversation she overheard very soon after she first arrived in the Klatt household. Frau Hildegard and one of her neighbours, a bosomy, cheerful woman named Kathe, were talking in the lounge; Hanna brought them coffee and Torte, and left. But as she closed the door behind her again she heard her name, and stopped to listen.