Wolf Among Wolves (11 page)

“But what are you?” asked von Prackwitz. “You must eventually belong to some group or party.”

“Why?” asked von Studmann. “Why must I?”

“Well, I don’t know,” said von Prackwitz, a little perplexed. “We all eventually belong to something, for the elections if for no other reason. Somehow one has to subordinate oneself, to toe the line. It’s, so to speak, orderly.”

“But if no order exists for me?” asked von Studmann.

“Yes,” said Prackwitz. “I remember that I had a chap once in my squadron, a crank we always said—what was his name? Grigoleit, yes, Grigoleit. A proper orderly kind of man. But he refused to touch a carbine or a side-arm. Imploring him didn’t help, reprimands didn’t help, punishments didn’t help. ‘Yes, Herr Lieutenant,’ he’d say—I was a lieutenant, it was before the war. ‘But I’m not allowed to. You’ve your code and I’ve mine. And because I’ve my code I’m not permitted to disobey it. One day my code will be yours.’ And such cranky pacifist stuff. But he was a decent sort, not one of those shirkers who shout, ‘No More War’ because they’re cowards.… Well, we could have made his life a perfect hell for him, of course. But the Old Man was reasonable and said: ‘He’s only a poor idiot,’ and so he was reported as unfit for service, sub-section fifteen you know, because of insanity.”

The Rittmeister paused, meditating, perhaps recalling the fat, round-headed Grigoleit, with his platinum-blond hair, who did not at all look like a martyr.

Studmann, however, burst out laughing. “Oh, Prackwitz,” he cried, “you haven’t changed a bit. And now in all innocence you’ve certified me as suffering from imbecility and insanity! Without even noticing. That reminds me
vividly how you tried to console our Old Man, when he cut a very poor figure in the maneuvers, with the story of a major who even fell off his horse in front of the assembled general staff and still wasn’t kicked out of the service. And do you remember …”

With that the two friends lost themselves in mutual reminiscences, and their voices became more animated. But that didn’t matter. The café had begun to fill, and the waiters were busy running about with beer glasses amid a hum of voices. The two men’s conversation was just one of many.

After a while, when they had remembered enough and laughed enough, the Rittmeister said: “I would like to ask you something, Studmann. I live so much alone on my bit of land and meet only the same people. But you are here in the capital and in such a swell place at that you must surely hear and know more than any of us.”

“Ah, but who knows anything nowadays?” asked Studmann, and smiled. “Believe me, even Prime Minister Cuno hasn’t the slightest idea what will happen tomorrow.”

But Prackwitz followed up his idea. He sat there, leaning back a little, his long legs crossed, smoking in ease and comfort. “You think, perhaps, I’m free from your worries—Prackwitz has an estate and is a great man. But I’m not very secure. I have to be very cautious. Neulohe doesn’t belong to me; it belongs to my father-in-law, old Herr von Teschow—I married little Eva Teschow long before the war—I beg your pardon, you know my wife, of course. Well, I’ve rented Neulohe from my father-in-law—and the old boy didn’t let me have it for nothing, I can tell you. Sometimes I’ve frightful worries. In any case, I must be very prudent. Neulohe is our only means of existence, and if things went wrong, the old man doesn’t love me and he’d take away my bit of land on the least provocation.”

“And what would happen to you?”

“Well, you know, I’m no hermit, and Eva still less, so we’ve our scrap of social life in the district and, of course, also with the comrades of the Reichswehr. And one hears all sorts of things and all sorts of rumors.”

“And what do you see and hear yourself?”

“That something’s on the boil again, Studmann. I’m not blind. The countryside is full to the brim with people—fatigue parties they call themselves, but you’ve only to look at them. ‘Black Reichswehr’ goes the whisper.”

“That may be because of the Allied Powers and the Control Commission, commission for snoopers.”

“They may be burying arms, of course, digging them up again and fetching them away; that might account for it. But it’s not only that, Studmann; there’s a
good deal more than rumor, and there’s more going on than before. No doubt they are enlisting supporters among the civilian population, maybe in my own village—the proprietor is usually the last person to hear that his house is burning. Neulohe borders on Altlohe, where there are many industrial workers; that means, of course, war to the knife between them and us of the manor and the farmers at Neulohe. For one side has the food and the others the appetite, and it’s like a powder barrel. If it goes up in the air, I shall go with it.”

“I can’t see quite how you can prevent it,” said von Studmann.

“Prevent it? … But perhaps I’ll have to decide whether to join with them or not. One doesn’t want to stand out against one’s friends. They’re the old comrades in the Reichswehr, Studmann, and if they’re taking a risk in order to get us out of the mire and I haven’t gone in with them, I should die of shame. Yes, but perhaps it’s only talk, worked up by a few adventurers, a hopeless
Putsch—
and to risk for that one’s estate, living and family …” The Rittmeister looked questioningly at Studmann.

“Haven’t you got anybody in the Reichswehr whom you could ask in confidence?”

“Good heavens, Studmann. Naturally I could ask, but who knows? In this sort of thing only three or four people are ever really in the know, and they won’t give a definite reply. Did you ever hear of a Major Rückert?”

“No. In the Reichswehr?”

“You see, Studmann, that’s just it. This Rückert is said to be the man who … But I can’t even find out whether he belongs to the Reichswehr or not. Some say yes, others no, and the very cute just shrug their shoulders and say: ‘Perhaps.’ he doesn’t know himself!’ And this sounds as if others were backing him. It’s enough to drive me crazy.”

“Yes,” said Studmann, “I understand. If it’s necessary you’d join in at once; but if they’re crazy adventurers—no, thank you.”

“Quite.”

Both were silent. But Prackwitz still looked expectantly at Studmann, the former first lieutenant and present reception manager (nicknamed “Nursie” by the regiment). He had turned out to be a man with very curious, even suspicious, views about money and God-ordained poverty.… Looked at him as if expecting from his reply liberation from all doubts.

And finally Studmann said slowly: “I think you oughtn’t to worry, Prackwitz. You must simply wait. We learned that from the war. You worried and were afraid only when you were in reserve or lying quietly in the trenches; but once you got the order to advance, then you were all right and went ahead and everything was forgotten. You won’t miss the signal, Prackwitz. We learned in
the trenches to wait quietly without brooding over it—why shouldn’t you do the same now?”

“You’re right,” said the Rittmeister gratefully, “and I’ll remember it. It’s funny that we seem to have lost the art of waiting. I think it’s this idiotic dollar. Rush, hurry, quick, go and buy something, make haste, run.”

“Yes,” said Studmann, “to chase and be chased, hunters and hunted at the same time—that makes people so bad-tempered and impatient. But there’s no need to be either.” He smiled. “But now I must be off; I’m not quite free from it myself. I see the porter beckoning me; perhaps a director is already chasing after me to inquire why I’m nowhere to be seen. And I shall chase after the chambermaids, so that the rooms of the departures will be free at twelve. So, good hunting, Prackwitz. And should you be in town tonight at seven and have no engagement—”

“By then I’ll be back in Neulohe some time,” said von Prackwitz. “But I’ve been tremendously pleased, absolutely tremendously pleased, to have met you again, Studmann, and if I come to town again …”

IV

The girl was still sitting on the bed, alone, motionless, idle. Her head drooped; the line of the shoulder, nape and head was feminine and soft. In the small bright face the lips were parted, and the eyes gazing at the worn floorboards saw nothing. Under the overcoat, which had fallen open, the skin glimmered light brown, firm.

The room was stuffy, full of smells. The house was wide awake now and carried on its routine; shouting, calling, weeping, banging doors, clattering up and down the stairs. In this house Life manifested itself mostly in noise and decay. In the copper workshop on the ground floor could be heard the screech of sawing copper, sounding like cats, or children being tortured. Then it was almost quiet again, with only the whirring and humming sound of the leather transmission belts.

The girl heard a clock strike twelve. Instinctively she raised her head toward the door. If he was going to look in after the pawnbroker’s, bringing her something to eat, he ought to come now—he had mentioned something of having breakfast together. But he did not come, and she had a conviction that he would not. He was certain to go straight to his friend’s. If he got money he would come later; but he might also go straight on to the gambling club, and she wouldn’t see him until the early hours of the morning, either penniless or with money in his pockets. Anyway, she would see him again.

And then it hit her: Was it so certain she would see him again? He’d always gone away and he’d always come back. Whatever he’d done, or wherever he’d been, he always ended up with her in Georgenstrasse. He would cross the courtyard, go up the steps—and reach her, either excitedly happy or utterly exhausted. I’ve never made any demands on him, she thought. Why shouldn’t he come back? I was never a burden to him. But was this true? Had she not, in fact, made a demand, unspoken but insistent, that he should always return to her?

Even my love can become a burden to him, she reflected, filled with unutterable sadness, and then he won’t come back.

It grew hotter and hotter. She jumped up from the bed and went to the mirror. Yes, there she was—Petra Ledig. Hair and flesh, a sudden attraction, desire, consummation—the world was full of it. She thought of the thousand rooms in which at this hour the morning desire awakened. Kisses were exchanged, women were slowly undressed, bedsteads creaked, the transient sigh of lust escaped. And people separated at all hours in a thousand rooms, parted from one another every minute.

Had she believed she was secure? That it could continue? In her heart she knew, had always known, that it wouldn’t. In the streets people were all in a hurry, rushing to catch their trains, to meet their girls, to spend their money before it became valueless. What endured, then? How could love endure?

All was futile on which she had set her heart. That they should be married this morning had seemed important enough for her to make a scene about it. Could it change anything? And if she sat there hungry and in debt, was that any reason why he should return? Did it matter in what condition she was deserted—whether, for example, she had a car and a villa in Grunewald, or not? The significant fact was that he did not come back. Whether she jumped out of the window or sold shoes again or walked the streets was all the same in that case.

She remained standing in front of the mirror and looked at herself as if looking at a dangerous stranger she had to be careful of. The figure in the mirror looks very pale, a brownish pale, and as if consumed from the inside. Its dark eyes shone, its hair hanging, with some loose locks, over its brow. She looked at herself breathlessly. It was as if everything was holding its breath. The house seemed to heave another sleepy sigh and then go silent. She herself still breathed. She shut her eyes and an almost painful shudder of happiness ran through her. She felt how warm her cheeks grew; they became hot. A good warmth, a lovely heat! Oh life, oh, love of life! It’s led me from here via there, to here. Houses, faces, beatings, rows, dirt, money, fear. Hear I am, oh, sweet, sweet life! He can never leave me again. I have him inside me.

Life whirred, life bussed tirelessly up and down, stirring in every stone. It overflowed from the windows. It looked askance and it railed. It laughed—yes, it laughed as well. Life—wonderful, sweet, everlasting life! He can never leave me again. I have him inside me. Never thought of it, never hoped for it, never wanted it. I have him inside me. Life was racing, and we were just racing along with it. We never arrived anywhere. Everything slid away from us. Everything was lost. But something remained. Grass doesn’t grow over all footprints, not every sigh is in vain. I remain. And he remains. We!

She had opened here eyes and now looked at herself. This is me, she thought for the first time in her life: she pointed her finger at herself. She was now without fear. He would return. He, too, one day would understand that she was “I” as she understood it. Now that she was no longer “I” but “We,” she understood it too.

V

When the Rittmeister visited Berlin one of his chief amusements was to stroll along Friedrichstrasse and a stretch of the Leipziger, and look at the shops. Not that he made large purchases, or intended to—no, the show windows amused him. To the eye of a provincial they were so wonderfully arranged. In some windows there were delightful trifles which simply dragged you into the shop for the pleasure of pointing at them and saying: “That one.” And in others were to be seen such frightful atrocities that you were moved again and again to laughter. Often he was tempted to carry such an article home, to see how Eva and Vi would be amused at, say, a man’s head made of glass, the mouth serving as an ash tray. (One could also connect the head with the electric light and it would glow horribly red and green.)

But the experience that, after a few days, these curios stood about the house unnoticed, had made the Rittmeister cautious; he was now content to laugh by himself. If he wanted to take a present back—one may be ever so retired and white-haired a cavalry officer and yet like to stop before a lingerie shop to choose something silky or of lace. It was delightful to buy some trifle of that kind. Every time he entered such a shop the trifles had become lighter and more fragrant, ever more delicate in tint. You could squeeze in one hand a pair of knickers into a tiny ball, and it would spread out again, softly rustling. Life might have become gray and dismal, but female beauty seemed increasingly fragile and delicate. That brassiere made entirely of lace! The Rittmeister could well remember the gray drill corsets of prewar days, into which a husband had to lace his wife as if he were reining in a restive horse.