A Perfect Waiter (19 page)

“As little as you did when you took Jakob away from me, or when I saw things in that light. Of course, he was simply doing what he wanted.”

The tea had gone cold. A fly was squatting on Erneste's saucer. He stared at the slices of cake on the plate. Frau Moser hadn't reappeared. Klinger's house was pervaded by an almost soothing hush.

“And now, tell me why you came. What do you want?”

“Jakob has written to me. I've received two letters from him.”

“You're in contact with him?”

“In a manner of speaking.”

“You've been in contact with him all this time?”

“Not at all. I hadn't heard from him for thirty years. I didn't even know if he was still living in America—if he was still alive, even.”

“So he's alive.”

“Yes.”

“What does he want?”

“He asked me to get in touch with you.”

“Why?”

Erneste took Jakob's letters from his breast pocket and put them down beside the tray. Klinger glanced at them. He evidently recognized Jakob's handwriting, but ingrained reserve forbade him to reach for them at once.

“What's it about?”

“Money.”

Erneste stared at the letters intently, almost as if they might dissolve into thin air.

“I'm here as his go-between,” he said. “That's the role he assigned me. He wants you to help him financially. That's my job.”

“Is he sick?”

“No. At least, I don't think so.”

Erneste handed Klinger the letters. He didn't take his eyes off him during the minutes that followed. Klinger put his glasses on. His expression underwent a gradual change. “Nobel Prize … plenty of cash … FBI… Weston …” He rose to his feet, occasionally muttering the words
aloud as he read them. Then, abruptly, he froze and looked down at Erneste.

“He must be insane, absolutely insane, to think he can melt my heart with these fairy tales. Weston, Burlington and the rest of those witch hunters—they drowned in their own mire long ago. Times have changed, nobody's after me anymore. I'm a man of repute in the States as well.”

Erneste shrugged. “You must help him all the same.”

“How old and ugly he must have become, and how low he's sunk, to have to resort to such tricks. You can't be frightened of people who've lost all their clout. The men he talks about, the ones he claims are after him, have long been completely devoid of influence. Their boss died ten years ago. How uninformed does he think I am?”

“You won't help him?”

Klinger sat down again. He replaced the letters on the table and removed his glasses.

“I couldn't even if I wanted to. He should know that.”

“Why not?”

Overcome by a fit of uncontrollable agitation whose sudden violence even he found surprising, Erneste jumped to his feet and shouted the words again and again. His question remained unanswered. Klinger, who was unprepared to reply, called Frau Moser. He slumped a little in his chair and shook his head, but that was no answer. Moments later Frau Moser entered the room, in which the fading daylight only dimly disclosed the two men's drained and exhausted faces. She looked from one to
the other, then signed to Erneste to accompany her. He didn't demur. He picked up the letters, pocketed them, and turned to go. Without bidding Klinger goodbye, he silently left the room in which his cries still seemed to linger in the air. By the harsh glare of a flash of lightning, real or imaginary, the scene underwent a transformation, and he left the room feeling just as he had when leaving that other room in Giessbach thirty years before. Where Jakob had been kneeling, Klinger now sat, and where Erneste stood, Erneste stood again, beyond anyone's power to help. He felt the door handle just as he had felt it then, although this time he didn't touch it because the door by which he left the room was open. He went out into the hallway. Frau Moser walked ahead of him to the front door, where she took leave of him with a nod. The attic room was now deserted. And so, from one moment to the next, he returned from the past to the present. He walked back down the hill, made his way through the village to the station, sat down on a bench on the platform, and waited for the next train. He looked at his watch: another seventeen minutes.

Twelve minutes later he got up and left the station. He walked through the village again and headed back to Klinger's house, striding along quickly and purposefully now that he knew the way and had no need to ask for directions. When he came to Klinger's gate he rang the bell again and again, but he guessed, even as he pressed the button for the first time, that no one would answer. He was unwanted now. To that extent he now resembled
Jakob and had been put on a par with him. That lent him a certain strength. Now that they knew who he was and what he wanted, they were deaf to his plea.

Erneste got up early the day after his visit to Klinger. He had a bath and shaved, and while shaving he inspected his face closely in the mirror. He managed to examine it with the eye of a stranger. Although traces of his beating were still visible, they were now so faint, he had no need to fear that they would arouse unwelcome suspicions. He could go back to work with an easy mind.

An hour later—he walked there as usual—he entered the Restaurant am Berg by the tradesmen's entrance and was surprised to find that his reappearance was greeted with pleasure, not only by the manager but also by his fellow waiters—even by the chefs and kitchen hands. Although none of them slapped him on the back, still less inquired the reason for his absence, he could tell from their friendly faces that they had missed him a little and might even have been worried about him. Erneste resumed work as if he had never been away. He supervised the tables in the Blue Room, which were just being set, checked the position of the napkins and the arrangement of the cutlery and glasses. For the first few hours, during which he occasionally undertook minor adjustments with an economical touch, he felt thoroughly at ease in his accustomed environment. He wasn't a guest or visitor
here; he was at home, having been given to understand that he was needed. He even exerted himself rather more than usual for the next few days, blind to everything that happened outside his work.

He had his reasons, because he was naturally aware that he had achieved nothing. He tried to act as if all was well, but not even the hardest work could blind him to the reality of his utter failure. His attempt to gain a hearing had misfired. He had come away empty-handed, and that was a shattering blow. It wasn't Jakob who had failed, nor was it Klinger, who had refused to help; it was himself, Erneste, who had tried to help in vain. Klinger had used him to unburden himself by airing a secret he might well have taken to the grave but for Erneste's appearance on the scene. Erneste hadn't been sent for; he had come of his own volition. Perhaps his visit had injected some welcome but fundamentally unimportant variety into Klinger's life. Just a brushstroke, a dab of paint on the fading palette of his existence.

Erneste was troubled by the thought that his mission had achieved precisely nothing, so he tried to take his mind off this by concentrating on his work. He succeeded in banishing Jakob from his mind for as long as customers and colleagues claimed his attention, and whenever the thought of Jakob did cross his mind he shooed it away like a troublesome fly and readdressed himself to his various duties. He was assisted in this by two social functions, a big dinner on Friday night and a first-night party on the Saturday. Among those he waited on were a world-famous
Swedish tenor and an English conductor whose glances in his direction were so unambiguous that he felt startled rather than flattered. His mementos of the latter occasion were the Swedish tenor's autograph and the conductor's languishing gaze. A lot of eating and drinking was done both nights, so he had his hands full. The tenor and the Romanian prima donna attracted great attention when they left, whereas the conductor's departure passed almost unnoticed. He gave Erneste a last, silent look as he helped him on with his coat and slipped a visiting card into his pocket. There was a phone number scribbled on the back.

By Sunday morning, if not before, Erneste could shelve the thought of Jakob no longer. Wide awake at seven o'clock, only four hours after going to bed, he lay staring at his open wardrobe. He had a headache—everything gave him a headache these days. Jakob was waiting impatiently. He was waiting in the wardrobe, waiting among his clothes and the objects lying around. He was waiting here, waiting in New York, waiting for an answer, for a letter, money, help, but he'd even been denied a refusal. The only person who could answer him was too cowardly to do so. Writing to Jakob was out of the question, for Jakob was uninterested in the truth. On the other hand, Erneste didn't want to lie to him, so he wouldn't write, not yet. He couldn't act unaided. To act he needed Klinger's help, but Klinger had refused it and
would continue to do so unless he did something, so something had to be done. There was only one way out of this apparent impasse: he must bring pressure to bear on Klinger. There was only one thing to do and he would do it.

At eight he got up and had some coffee. Two cups, three, four. He didn't touch the bread, butter and jelly he'd set out on the kitchen table as if this were an ordinary Sunday. Taking a sheet of paper, he wrote Klinger's phone number at the top and beneath it his ultimatum. He went to the window and looked down at the street, then across at the house opposite, the one in which his unknown neighbor's shadow bobbed up and down in the small hours. The light was still on, so she'd probably dozed off after a sleepless night. The morning was cold. He put on a sweater and his overcoat, then left the apartment, buttoning up his coat against the chilly wind. The street was deserted. He set off for the phone booth, walking as fast as if he were in a hurry, which he wasn't.

The phone booth stank of urine and one of the panes was smeared with filth. A week ago the phone book had been intact. Since then, someone had wantonly torn some of its pages out of the cover. A few of them lay crumpled on the floor amid banana skins and other trash, but the phone itself was working.

Erneste unfolded the sheet of paper, smoothed it out on the shelf, and dialed Klinger's number. The receiver was heavy, the earpiece cold. He waited for Frau Moser to answer. She didn't sound surprised to hear his voice,
just asked what he wanted. “I must speak to Herr Klinger,” he said. “It's very urgent.” Frau Moser said, “I believe you, but you know he doesn't take calls in the morning. Never, not from anyone. Call back this afternoon. He's working.”

“I have to speak to him
now
. I can't wait any longer.”

“I'm not allowed to disturb him in the morning.”

“I know that, but I've
got
to speak to him! What I have to say to him is more important than his work. He can go back to work as soon as I've said it.”

“I'll see what I can do, but don't get your hopes up.” She put the receiver down and Erneste waited. While he was waiting and wondering if she really had gone to confer with Klinger or was simply holding her hand over the receiver, he turned and looked down the street. Nothing was stirring. The absence of movement matched his own situation.