The Journey
Page 27
Nonetheless Zerlina spits because she cannot control herself. She says she is sorry. “I did it out of overwhelming disgust!” The offense is severely reprimanded by the guards on duty, though it is also greeted with a considerate smile from the indentured engineer because the orderly completion of the systematic execution has been disrupted.
At reasonable cost the ashes can be sent to your house in a simple mail packet that holds an urn carefully wrapped in wastepaper, the package addressed and insured against loss and theft. Because it is likely that only a few will want such a service, a special public depository is constructed out of concrete, lead, and glass that allows for a tasteful display of human ashes. The rows run back and forth in an amazing zigzag fashion, left and right of the main street from the town gate. It’s like being in a bazaar or the terrarium of a zoological garden, everything is done to attain the most comfort for the public, which wants to behold such things in orderly fashion. In this installation the urns live one atop another in four vertical rows, one next to another, much like postal boxes, each one magnificently decorated, a jewel locked behind glass. Whoever rents a box has one key, which the crematorium makes sure that you have, while a second key remains in the administrative chambers of the enterprise itself. Thus anyone passing by can take it all in with complete comfort. Everywhere flowers decorate the little boxes, whether it be inside next to the urns or outside hung from hooks and rings, thus signifying the eternal gratitude of those left behind.
Different classes of execution can be carried out, according to the resources available to the family or the readiness of the victim himself. Allowances are happily made for individual tastes by making various choices beforehand. Zerlina has paid a great deal. She wants to hear the cinema’s organ play a chorale and the national anthem. It’s a moving moment that leaves not a single eye dry. It’s a rare treat. One can’t often afford such a splurge. The organ whimpers and whines and complains to the living that they should be bold enough to not have anything to do with executions. Suddenly a rabbit runs into the middle of the ceremony. No one knows how it got into the hall. It disrupts the somber atmosphere inside the theater, but eventually everyone is lightened by laughter because the sight is so strange. Luckily a press photographer is also there who has a flashbulb and the presence of mind to use it. A couple of snapshots calm the bedazzled little creature. This is also true for the inconsolable widow, who, bent over, has taken her seat in the first row of the parquet, and who is moved as much by the lavish flowers as by the music, but for whom nothing is better than to push back the black veil in order to have a better view of the innocent animal as it hops about the suffering hall without a care in the world.
Only the officials from the ash factory are upset and become angry, because they are afraid that such an unheard-of incident will lead to bad rumors circulating in the city. Yet the manager knows what to do. That’s why he acts fast and presses the electric bell that is normally used at the end of any execution ceremony. Immediately a servant appears with a large broom. The man sweeps lightly back and forth in order to shoo away the rabbit as he pushes the broom across the smooth floor until Zerlina grasps the seriousness of the situation and is already outside without having had a chance to pluck a flower or a garland, which was her most pressing wish.
Now the execution of Dr. Kmoch, the deserving president of the Medical Board, can proceed without further disruption. The national anthem begins, the powerful tremolo chords of the cinema organ are tenderly accompanied by the melody of the lead violin. Most of the audience rise to their feet. On the brightly lit stage copper-brown doors open left and right, set in motion invisibly as the scaffold draped in black, which holds the beautifully decorated coffin, moves forward soundlessly. Slowly it moves away, as is tactfully appropriate to such an occasion, the farewell itself being somber, as is proper. Now the flower-draped box is almost to the rear of the hall as it wobbles slightly, as if timidly entering a dream, the Medical Board on its feet and standing still at the back. The copper doors close again as mysteriously as they opened. Now the organ opens all registers to send forth the rhythms of the national anthem in thick waves of sound over the ceremonial hall and outward into every corner of the crematorium, as far as the oven that runs efficiently, and then farther into the open, where the running rabbit can hear it as well.
Suddenly the instrument returns to complete silence. Everyone is moved and weeps for the nation. Still the guests look on as the black-and-brown curtain is drawn across the stage with rustling cords, signaling an end to it all. The opera is over, the audience abandoned. The performance was wonderful and has made an unforgettable impression on everyone gathered here. Everyone has forgotten the incident with the rabbit. How surprised people will be to see it tomorrow in the newspaper. But maybe that won’t happen, for the crematorium has a lot of influence, maintains the most crucial ties, and won’t be above employing bribery to prevent the publication of the photo. Such things cannot happen on opening night. There can be only one view of the quality of the execution. The actors have carried themselves valiantly. The staged performances were appropriate and suited the exaggerated pretensions one can make on a fine stage. The music was met with the approval of the critics and the listeners, and even if the incident with the rabbit gets out, it doesn’t matter, because its entrance was charming and only demonstrated a great love of animals. All in all the production and direction were superb, the media is impressed, it greets the production with enthusiastic praise, only finding fault with the meager courtesy of the star attraction, the doctor having neglected at the end of the execution to step out from behind the curtain and acknowledge the cheers of those left behind.
Yet nobody reads the papers anymore, for none exist. The crematorium is also empty. It doesn’t matter that the doctor didn’t take a bow, for he is no longer behind the curtain. He has disappeared. Nor is there anybody in front of the curtain, there are no mourners there. Actors and audience have dissipated. The crematorium’s curtain separates nothing from nothing, death is everywhere and there is nothing else but what once was, and that is nothing as well. It’s all in the past, long gone, finished, utterly changed, outside of time, Ruhenthal now gone and Leitenberg gone. There was only the journey and that’s all there still is. Yet nobody journeys anywhere, but instead they just keep traveling, from rubble to rubble, from one spot to another, the rubbish of reality all that there is, and yet not even that, because that’s also the nothing that hides in the face of nothing, the grave itself, the threadbare wall, the unseen face that does not look back, the fairy tale of nothing, the fairy tale devoid of magic, betrayal that cannot betray, steps that lead nowhere and without reason and without sense, where no one gets on and no one gets off.
Locales are abandoned because no locales exist. Leaning out of the window has become even more dangerous. Nobody dares to. No one sees anything. The faces are either hidden or drowned. Nobody has a home. Everyone is in flight and keeps on the move, because there’s no other choice. Not even the ground exists onto which one might collapse. If anyone still runs around, it’s mere folly. The graves that exist have been torn open and then sealed again without a hand having stirred. Nothingness has set in motion its own journey and whirls along because it can do nothing else. Chopped-off hands, which used to indicate directions on signposts, lie everywhere. They don’t belong to anyone, nor is anyone afraid of them. They cause no fear; they are either just a last vestige of danger or simply a new trend. Yet there is nobody there who can understand what they mean.
If an eye looks at a hand it’s with an empty gaze that does not recognize it or anything else. Yet an idea is still there, itself the first moment of creation, as it looks, imagines itself, and seeks to imagine, and since it wants to look, then something is again there. It wants to know itself, and in doing so gives rise to something more than itself, a being, whether it be a being that consists of nothing or is indeed a being, an idea that dares to exist, a nascent idea. It roams around outside, it cannot r
emain buried. It wants to make sense of the hands that cannot be untangled, that point their fingers in no direction that can be found on any map. Yet the idea grows stronger because it is. It doesn’t give up and keeps trying, finally sorting through the images before it says: “There!”
The hands also point in that direction. And whatever once was reawakens again and exists once more, a “there” that is once again where it used to be. Yet what once was meant to follow the idea no longer exists. The immense effort now appears to have been in vain, a moment of creation that led to no creation, such nothingness being immensely powerful as it threatens Being with forgetting. Uphill or downhill everything is empty. There are or there are not destroyed graves. Yet the idea does not shrink, does not give in. It wants to belong to someone and command him. It’s a person. He is not happy, but the idea makes him happy. He wants to follow it, yet he is too tired, the effort too much. The body cannot do what the idea wants it to. The body is too tired, and what the chopped-off hands point to doesn’t make sense. They don’t point toward anything and don’t connect to any idea, but are pointless direction with no end. Thus everything is senseless.
The eye focuses and then discovers names next to the hands. They once named roads. Yet now there are no roads. The names mean nothing, they are faded, the color having drained from the names, separated from the hands, which are nothing more than dust-covered stumps. And no matter how much the gaze wishes to join together the hands and the names, it still cannot figure out how they belong to each other; they are so badly injured that they no longer mean anything. The names are mixed up and cannot find their owners. Yet there are no owners, there are just Anybodys, who are not names and not hands, but rather figures that belong to no one and which creep between the hands and the names, looking for a direction in which to head, although the eye sees no direction to recommend to them. They turn this way and that, each step changing the direction, then they grow tired and appear to rest, but only for a short while, an irrepressible drive pushing them on. Yet there is no road they can take, since none exists.
Each Anybody appears to be in the same situation. Perhaps each one knows that he has never been here, but rather has been transformed here. Back then it was someplace else altogether, but he cannot recall, he does not remember the name or the direction. This one with an idea is unsure of what is Nothing or what is Something, then he chooses Something. He feels overwhelmed by a past he does not know, yet which he can sense, Something having won out after all. This grants great courage and strength to the body, allowing him to decide to act. As soon as he exists, then he can ask questions. He stops another Anybody and tries to gain his attention. That doesn’t work. Anybody doesn’t stop and stumbles on uncertainly, not knowing he himself is a Nobody and not even an Anybody. Yet he tries again to help this Nobody recognize Something, and indeed, he’s there, he gives a start; is he in fact now an Anybody? Yet he does not know anything, but rather mumbles dark sounds from an unknown tongue, it all having been a mistake. Better to try something else. The Question asks the Question whether Anybody knows which way to go? No, Anybody doesn’t know, he knows no one in these parts. There are no roads here, they are elsewhere. But there must be roads, says the answering voice. The word road means something. Because of it this conversation makes sense and therefore has meaning.
Now the Question grows silent and wanders off. He tries his feet, which don’t betray him. Here is a wooden pole with many hands pointing outward that have not been knocked off. This crossroads is in good shape. Each hand is sure of the direction in which it points and knows the name of the town it points toward, which indeed might exist, because the hand also says how many kilometers away it is. One has to go that far in order to get there. Unkenburg is only eight kilometers away, says the hand. Clearly the outstretched finger points the way, that being the direction one can follow. One has to give the body a direction and then guide it in order that it can make the connection. From here the body must go forward, because Unkenburg is a ways off from this point. One thinks about the distance ahead, and then sets off.
What one was once capable of must also occur now. Once time is restored, the familiar and reliable exist again. Once time exists again, you must trust how long it takes to get somewhere. But what is Unkenburg? It’s not recognizable, the memory of it is still lost in the brooding. It is a place, though there is no one there. Are there other names you might know? They are not to be found here. They must be farther off than these hands indicate. How many kilometers is it to Leitenberg? It doesn’t say. And to Stupart? That’s a large city that certainly must be known everywhere. But Stupart is not written down, no matter how much the eyes search for it. It’s better not to keep trying to look for it, for your strength won’t hold out long enough to press through the unknown. The main city of Stupart should certainly be known. But no, it’s not. It was known, and through long patience perhaps it will be discovered again. You have to hold on to the known even when it is not known. And so Unkenburg. It’s that way.
Yet the mouth shapes the words Leitenberg and Stupart. These old names sound sad. Eight hundred years have passed, if not more. The city must be much older. The source of the name is locked away somewhere in the realm of speech. The names of old places are lost and forgotten. At the moment it is wiser not to pretend that this city ever existed. If anyone says “Leitenberg” or “Stupart,” there are immediately ears that hear it, faces that turn in the direction of the sound of the voice. Now the mouths of strangers open and slowly send back a sound of their own, one that’s a little sad, dark, and incomprehensible, yet sympathetic and friendly:
“Never heard of it. No. Don’t know it. Must be someplace else or it doesn’t exist. So much has been destroyed. It’s certainly not here.”
Then the strangers’ mouths say some names that the voices listen to closely, names of places they’ve never heard of. Each one swears it’s known by another name, all of it a confusing back-and-forth, painful, bleak, buzzing, an antediluvian stammering that grows ever louder, becoming an unrecognizable scream. All the places that once existed are named, yet nobody knows them, the speakers standing there alone with their names. The moment a name is tossed into the circle, the chorus answers with this litany:
“Never heard of it. No. Don’t know it.”
They don’t know and have no idea. Then the toothless mouths shut upon their empty questions. All of the names of the places have been ticked off and not one has been found. Only the murky voices of the chorus slip deeper and deeper into the monotone singsong.
“Don’t know it—Don’t know it—Don’t know it—”
Gradually the muddy chorus peters out, becoming sadder and darker, a silent rain, until it can no longer be understood. But then another voice rises from the muddy depths, crying out incessantly:
“To Unkenburg! To Unkenburg!”
Is it the wise old railroad that calls out so? No railroad runs in this lost land. Only the rails stretch out ahead as they sleep in desolation on the moldy ties, though they are barely disturbed and still bend in sharply controlled curves. However, there is no longer any service on these tracks. The rails are also not lit up, their silver-gray withers and turns brown with rust. Only one question travels along the stretch and weighs down the telegraph wires, in which it remains stuck and never sees light of day. The high poles stand there starkly, barely holding up the wires. The railroad has fallen into disrepair without any attendants there, yet perhaps the tracks don’t lead to the destroyed graveyards, but rather to a place that still exists, and maybe that place is Unkenburg.
This name had once been heard. A captain had once had a general’s staff map on which all the names were listed. Wasn’t it Captain Küpenreiter? He was from Unkenburg, for it was there that he first saw the light of the world, and his mother lives there still. So there may be hope after all. Light and the world would mean salvation. Certainly Unkenburg is small enough that the captain can be found. He will certainly be happy to have someone there who
once stood with a shovel on the shooting range at Dobrunke. The captain had made an inspection and was satisfied with the job. Küpenreiter was who he was looking for, the house where his mother lived. Yet the captain was long gone, nor was the mother there. He has been taken prisoner and draws maps for the enemy. White flags, blue flags, maneuvers take place in the countryside as if for real. Küpenreiter must remember Leitenberg, for one can’t forget it. Too bad they took him prisoner. Or did he get to the other shore in time so that he could take cover in the woods? One would hardly think so. He would have had to flee very quickly and leave all the maps behind. But without maps he is lost, because he knows none of the names and can’t make out the coordinates. Full of sorrow he thinks of the Scharnhorst barracks, which have fallen to pieces and disappeared in the country left behind. Two thousand kilometers away. A hand had simply pointed to it and it was no more. It collapsed in the middle of the rubbish pit.
The plague memorial has survived intact. Schwind the reporter was right to wait it out there. He has dropped the camera, so no more pictures will be taken. Yet his hands are still free. He holds on with only his feet, but his hands are free and point off in many different directions. Yet nobody says which one is the best, and the reporter gives no reply no matter how often he is asked. He can’t, in fact, for he gave away his voice and no one has given it back. If one looks at him more closely it becomes clear that he has no face. He’s no longer alive, he only stands there and waits for the new day to dawn, though whether it will happen remains questionable. Yet to anyone who stands below him, it appears completely different; he believes the time has come and he won’t settle for getting no answers. Angrily he looks up at the plague reporter and lets him know that he no longer has any patience. Then Balthazar realizes that he who waits below will not put up with any nonsense, and fears for the future of his newspaper, which he cannot afford.