The Sleepwalkers (77 page)

It was a warm sultry day. Huguenau looked now and then at his watch, then he went into the garden, surveyed the fruit, which hung on the branches still unripe, and estimated the crop. Well, in these times things would never be allowed to ripen; long before that everything would be stolen. One fine morning Esch would find his garden cleared out. It wouldn’t be long either; on the sunny side the plums were already reddening, and Huguenau put up his hand and tested the fruit between his fingers. Esch should put barbed wire round his garden; but the crop was certainly not worth so much expense. After the war barbed wire would be cheap enough.

Waiting is like barbed wire stretched inside one. Huguenau looked once more up into the branches, blinked up at the grey clouds; where the sun should be they brightened to a dazzling white. He whistled for Marguerite several times; but she did not appear and Huguenau became annoyed; of course she was down at the river again with those boys. He felt inclined to go and fetch her. But he had to wait for the Major.

Suddenly—he was just on the point of whistling for her again—Marguerite stood before him. He said severely: “Where have you been hiding again? There’s visitors coming.” Then he took her hand, and crossing the courtyard they went through the entry hall to the street and kept watch for the Major. I sent Esch off too soon, Huguenau could not help telling himself again and again.

At last the Major appeared round the corner; he was accompanied by the aged commissariat officer, who also filled the rôle of adjutant to the Town Commandant. Although Huguenau had reckoned on having the Major to himself, he felt nevertheless flattered that the visit should take such an official form. Really it had been stupid to let Esch go, the whole staff should have formed up in line and Marguerite in a white
dress should have presented a bouquet of flowers. In some way or other Esch was responsible for this omission too, but there it was, anyhow, and Huguenau’s ceremonial fervour had to be confined to a few low bows when the two officers stopped in front of the house.

Fortunately the commissariat officer said good-bye at the door, so that the occasion ceased to be official and became private, and when the Major crossed the threshold Huguenau fairly shone with affability and devotion. “Marguerite, make a curtsy,” he commanded. Marguerite stared into the strange man’s face. The Major ran his fingers through her black curls: “Well, won’t you say how do you do, little Tartar?” Huguenau apologized: “It’s Esch’s little girl.…” The Major raised Marguerite’s chin: “So you’re Herr Esch’s daughter?” “She’s only staying here—a sort of foster-child,” Huguenau said. The Major stroked her curls again: “Little black Tartar,” he repeated as they passed through the entry to the courtyard. “French by birth, Herr Major … Esch intends to adopt her eventually … but that’s unnecessary, she has an aunt in any case … wouldn’t Herr Major like to see the printing-office straight away? please step this way, to the right.…” Huguenau ran in front. “Very well, Herr Huguenau,” said the Major, “but I should like to say good-day to Herr Esch first.” “Esch will be here in a few minutes, Herr Major, I thought that the Herr Major would like to look over the printing-shop first without being disturbed.” “Herr Esch does not disturb me in the least,” said the Major, and Huguenau was dashed by his somewhat sharp tone. Esch must have been intriguing somehow … well, he would soon get on his track yet and then there would be a full-flavoured secret report number 2. And because such a report was a certainty, Huguenau felt reassured, for no one can endure this inner stream of events to be held up or dammed by external forces. And so Huguenau said formally: “Herr Esch unfortunately had to go to the paper factory … I had to make sure that the paper would be delivered … but perhaps the Herr Major would like to inspect the printing-shop meanwhile.”

The press was set in motion in honour of the Major, and in honour of the Major Huguenau quite gratuitously had a section of the appeal for “The Moselle Memorial Association” run off. He still held Marguerite by the hand, and when Lindner drew off the first sheets of the appeal, Huguenau lifted the uppermost one and held it out to the Major. He felt compelled to apologize once more: “It’s a very simple make-up,
I’m afraid; at the very least it should have had a proper Iron Cross with a laurel wreath … in a matter under the immediate patronage of the Herr Major.”

The Major had put up his hand to the Iron Cross at his buttonhole and seemed reassured to find it still hanging there. “Oh, the Iron Cross—you don’t need another, surely that would be superfluous.” Huguenau bowed: “Yes, the Herr Major is quite right, in such difficult times a modest make-up will have to do, I can only agree with the Herr Major there, but a modest little block wouldn’t have added much to the outlay … of course that’s a matter of indifference to Herr Esch.” The Major did not seem to have heard. But after a while he said: “I think, Herr Huguenau, that you do Herr Esch an injustice.” Huguenau smiled politely and a little scornfully. But the Major was not looking at him, but at Marguerite: “I would have taken her for a Slav, this little black Tartar girl.” Huguenau felt called upon to mention once more that the child was French by birth. “She only comes here.” The Major bent down to Marguerite: “I’ve a little girl like you at home too, she’s a little bigger, it’s true, fourteen … and not as black as a little Tartar either … her name is Elisabeth …” and after a while he said: “So, a little French girl.” “She can only speak German,” said Huguenau, “she’s forgotten everything.” The Major asked: “And do you love your foster-parents very much?” “Yes,” said Marguerite, and Huguenau was astonished that she could tell such a lie, but as the Major seemed absent-minded he repeated distinctly: “She stays with her relations.” The Major said: “Driven from home …” that really sounded somewhat absent-minded, he was an old gentleman after all, and Huguenau said in corroboration: “Quite true, Herr Major, the right phrase, driven from home.…” The Major looked at Marguerite attentively. Huguenau said alluringly: “The case-room, Herr Major, you haven’t seen the case-room yet.” The Major passed his hand over the child’s brow: “You mustn’t look so cross, you mustn’t wrinkle up your brow like that …” the child considered earnestly and then said: “Why not?” The Major smiled, passed his fingers lightly over her eyelids, under which the hard eyeballs rested, smiled and said: “Little girls mustn’t have furrows on their brows … that’s a sin … hidden and yet visible, that’s what sin always is.” Marguerite recoiled and Huguenau remembered how she had broken away from Esch; she was quite right, he thought. The Major now passed his hand over his own eyes: “Well, it
doesn’t matter …” and Huguenau felt that the Major too was struggling to break away, though with feeble powers, and he was actually glad when he saw Esch on his rather too low bicycle, which made him look bandy-legged, riding into the courtyard and springing off by the outside ladder.

They all went into the courtyard to greet Esch; the Major stood between Huguenau and the little girl.

Esch leant his bicycle against the wall beneath the ladder and went slowly up to the group. He showed no trace of surprise at finding the Major there, so little surprise did he show and so calmly did he greet the guest, that Huguenau began to suspect that this lean schoolmaster already knew of the visit. So he gave vent to his ill-humour:

“What do you say to this unexpected honour? Aren’t you even surprised?”

“I’m very glad,” said Esch.

The Major said:

“I’m very glad that you’ve returned in time, Herr Esch.”

Esch said gravely:

“Perhaps at the eleventh hour, Herr Major.”

Huguenau said:

“It isn’t so very late yet … would the Herr Major like to see the other offices too? the ladder, I’m afraid, is a little awkward.”

Esch said:

“It was a long way.”

The child said:

“He came on his bicycle.”

The Major said dreamily:

“A long way … and he is not yet at the goal.”

Huguenau said:

“We’ve the worst already behind us … we’ve two pages of advertisements already … and if we could secure the orders of the military authorities as well …”

Esch said:

“It’s not a question of advertisements.”

Huguenau said:

“We haven’t even a block of an Iron Cross—I suppose you think that doesn’t matter either!”

The child pointed at the Major’s chest:

“There’s an Iron Cross.”

The Major said:

“The true badge of honour is always invisible, only sin is visible.”

The child said:

“Lying is the greatest sin.”

Esch said:

“The invisible is at our backs, we come out of falsehood, and if we do not find the way we must lose ourselves in the darkness of the invisible.”

The child said:

“Nobody hears you when you tell a lie.”

The Major said:

“God hears it.”

Huguenau said:

“Nobody hears a deserter, nobody recognizes him, even if all he says is right.”

Esch said:

“Nobody can see another in the darkness.”

The Major said:

“Visible, and yet hidden from each other.”

The child said:

“God doesn’t hear it.”

Esch said:

“He will hear again the voices of His children.”

Huguenau said:

“It’s best for nobody to hear one, one must fight one’s way by oneself … we’ll bring it off yet.”

The Major said:

“We have forsaken Him and He has left us to ourselves … so alone that we can no longer find each other.”

Esch said:

“Imprisoned in our loneliness.”

The child said:

“No one will be able to find me.”

The Major said:

“The one we forsake we must seek for ever.”

Huguenau said:

“Do you want to hide?”

“Yes,” said the child.

The milky grey sky began to break up; in several places it became blue. Barefooted and inaudible, the little girl had flitted away. Then the men went too. Each in a different direction.

Well, they were with me again yesterday, Nuchem and Marie, and we sang together. At my suggestion we sang first of all the hymn:

We sang it to the air of Andreas Hofer’s song, Marie accompanied it on the lute, Nuchem hummed and beat time with his soft smooth hands. During the singing they exchanged glances a few times, but it may have been that I only fancied so, for Dr Litwak’s talk had made me suspicious. At any rate I bawled out the song as loud as I could, and that for various reasons. For on the one hand I wanted to reassure Nuchem’s family, who doubtless were assembled outside my door by this time: the children in the very front, probably, with their ears pressed against the door panel, then the white-bearded grandfather with his body bent forward, his hand forming an ear-trumpet, while the women kept more in the background, perhaps one of them weeping quietly to herself, the whole bunch gradually drawing nearer, yet not daring to open the door,—yes, on the one hand I wanted to reassure them, but on the other hand it was a sadistic pleasure to me to know that they were out there, and to
allure and repulse them at the same moment. But by bawling so loudly I wished also to say to Nuchem and Marie: don’t stand on ceremony, my children, you see that I’m occupied with myself and my voice, unbutton your frock-coat, Nuchem, lift the tails of your coat and make a bow to the lady, and you, Marie, throw off your prudishness, lift your skirt with two fingers, and dance, both of you, dance to Jerusalem, dance in my bed, make yourselves at home. And so I no longer even sang Marie’s words to the air, but my own, the authentic ones: “To Mantua in chains was led, Brave Hofer leal and true,” unfortunately that was all I knew, but I modulated these lines to the tune and found that they went beautifully.

At last, however, Marie concluded the song with the flourish that always rounds off songs sung to the lute, and she said:

“We did that splendidly, now as a reward we’ll have a little prayer too.”

And already she had slipped down on her knees before her chair, raised her clasped hands to her face, and begun the hundred and twenty-second psalm:

“I was glad when they said unto me, Let us go into the house of the Lord. Our feet shall stand within thy gates, O Jerusalem. Jerusalem is builded as a city that is compact together: Whither the tribes go up, the tribes of the Lord, unto the testimony of Israel, to give thanks unto the name of the Lord.”

I could not have stopped her except by smashing the lute over her head. So I knelt down too, stretched my arms out and prayed: “Let us make tea for the daughters and young men of Israel, let us pour rum into the tea, war-rum, hero’s rum, synthetic rum, that we may forget our loneliness, for our loneliness is too great, whether it be in Zion or in the holy city of Berlin.” But while I was uttering these words and beating my breast with my fists, Nuchem had got up: he planted himself before me, he turned his bottom to me, and with his praying countenance fixed on the open window, at which the greasy and torn curtains fluttered in the night breeze like a faded gold, red and blue army banner, he set his swaying body in motion. Oh, that was indecent, that was indecent of Nuchem, who after all was my friend.

I sprang to the door, tore it open and shouted:

“Come in, Israel, drink tea with us, behold the obscene postures of my friend and the unveiled face of the lady.”

The lobby, however, the lobby was empty. They had slipped away,
they had scattered into their rooms, the women tumbling over the children, the rheumatic grandfather, who could not straighten himself, along with them.