Berlin Alexanderplatz: The Story of Franz Biberkopf (32 page)

Franz is not K.O. and they can’t get him K.O.

Pums’s gang, flush with money, have vanished from Berlin. Two of them are away on a jaunt in the Oranienburg district, at their summer quarters, while Pums is taking the cure at Altheide on account of his asthma, getting his machine oiled up. Reinhold tipples a bit, every day a few little nips of brandy, in fact, the man is enjoying things and getting used to it, a fellow has to get something out of life sometimes and he discovers he was quite silly to have lived so long without it, only on coffee and lemonade, that’s not living at all! Reinhold has a few thousand marks lying around, but nobody knows that. He would like to do something with the money, but at first he can’t decide what. Certainly not go to that summer dump like the others. He’s just picked up a fine dame who once saw better days, and he rents a swell house in Nurnberger Strasse for her, so he can dig himself in there when he wants to play the grand mogul or perhaps when things get hot. Everything’s in fine shape, he has his regal place in the West End and, of course, on the side, the old joint, too, with a jane in it, every few weeks another one. The boy can’t get along without his little game.

Then it so happens, at the end of May, that a couple of men from Pums’s gang meet again in Berlin and start chattering about Franz Biberkopf. They’ve heard there’s been some talk in the club about him. Herbert Wischow is getting people all het up against them, we’re a pack of swine, they say. Biberkopf didn’t want to help us in that affair at all, they say, and then we tried to use force, and afterwards we kicked him out of the car. So we let them know: he wanted to squeal on us, there was no question about using force, nobody grabbed him, but afterwards we couldn’t do anything else. There they sit, shaking their heads, none of them wants In have a row with the club. A fellow’s hands would be tied that way and then he’d be left out in the cold. And then they suggest this, we ought to show our good will and take up a collection for Franz, since he showed in I he end that he was a decent fellow all right, we ought to help him get a good rest, and put up the money it cost him in the hospital; we oughtn’t to act shabby about it.

Reinhold is adamant: We gotta kill that fellow dead. The others are not against the idea, really not at all, but there isn’t anyone of them ready to do a thing like that, moreover it won’t hurt to let the poor boob go around with his one arm, You can’t tell how it will end once you start anything with a fellow like that, the man’s got the luck of the devil himself. Well, they collect the money, a couple of hundred marks, only Reinhold doesn’t give a pfennig, and one of them is to go to see Biberkopf, but not when Herbert Wischow is around.

Franz is quietly reading first the
Mottenpost
and then the
Grüne Post,
he likes it best because there’s no politics in it. He studies the number for November 27, 1927, it’s an old number, dating from before Christmas, that was the time of Polish Lina, wonder what she’s doing? It tells here in the paper about the ex-Kaiser’s new brother-in-law getting married, the princess is 61, the bridegroom 27, that’ll cost her a heap of gold, for he won’t become a prince. Bullet-proof armored vests for police officers, I’ll never believe that.

All of a sudden, there’s Eva squabbling outside with somebody, somebody, well, well, don’t I know that voice. She doesn’t want to let him in, better peep out and see. Franz opens the door, his
Grune Post
in his hand. It’s Schreiber, one of Pums’s men.

Well, well, what’s the matter? Eva shouts into the room: “Franz, he’s only come here because he knows Herbert isn’t around.’: “What do you want, Schreiber, something out of me, what do you want?” “Told Eva and she won’t let me in. Why nor. are you a prisoner here?” “No, I’m not” Eva: “You’re afraid he’ll squeal on you. Don’t let him in, Franz.” Franz: “Now what do you want, Schreiber? Come on in with him, Eva, let him in.”

They are sitting in Franz’s room. The
Grüne Post
is lying on the table, the new brother-in-law of the ex-Kaiser is getting married, two men behind him are holding the crown over his head. Lion-hunting, rabbit-hunting, to truth all honor. “Why do you want to give me any money? I wasn’t in with you on that job.” “Why, good Lord, you stood watch, didn’t you?” “Nope, Schreiber, I didn’t, I didn’t know a thing, you just stuck me there; I didn’t know what I was supposed to do there.” Ain’t I glad to be out of that, no need to stand in that dark courtyard any longer. I’d pay him something not to have to stand there any more. “Nope, that’s all bunk, and you needn’t be afraid of me, I never squealed on anybody in my life.” Eva shakes her fist at Schreiber: There are others watching, I tell you, you’re taking a risk to come up here. Herbert’ll show you a thing or two.

Suddenly something terrible happens. Eva saw Schreiber put his hand in his pocket. He wants to take out the money and coax Franz with the bills. But Eva has misunderstood the movement. She thinks he wants to get out a revolver and shoot Franz down, so he won’t say anything, he’s sent here to put Franz on the spot. And she jumps up from her chair, white as the wall, her face terribly distorted, screaming piercingly, then all at once she falls over her own legs, and gets up again. Franz rises with a start, Schreiber rises with a start, whatsa matter, whatsa matter wit’ her, oh boy, oh boy! She runs around the table to Franz, quickly, what am I to do, he’s going to shoot, it’s death, the end, it’s all over, murder, the world’s coming to an end, I don’t wanta die, don’t wanta get my block knocked off, it’s all over.

She stands, runs, falls, stands in front of Franz, white, yelling, quivering throughout her whole body: “Beat it behind the mirror! Murder! Help! Help!” Her eyes are big as fists, as she screams: “Help!” An icy chill goes through the bones of the two men. Franz doesn’t know what’s the matter, he only sees the movement, what’s going to happen next? Then he understands: Schreiber has his right hand in the pocket of his trousers. Franz goes all a-tremble. It’s like that time when he was standing watch in the courtyard, they want to start up again. But he doesn’t want to, I tell you, he doesn’t want to, he doesn’t want to let himself be thrown under a car. He groans and tears himself free from Eva; the
Grüne Post
is lying on the floor, the Bulgarian is married to a Princess. Gotta see, first gotta get the chair in my hands. He groans aloud. As he has eyes for Schreiber alone and not for the chair, he kicks the chair over. We gotta get that chair and pounce on him. Gotta - auto on the Magdeburg road - they are ringing the alarm-bell of the hospital, Eva is still yelling, well, let’s save ourselves. Forward the air is thick, but we’ll push through! He bends to take hold of the chair. Schreiber, aghast, rushes out by the door, why they’re all crazy here! The doors begin to open along the corridor.

Downstairs in the cafe they heard the screams and the tumult. Two men rush up at once and meet Schreiber on the stairs as he runs past them. But he keeps his head, and calls out as he waves towards them: Get a doctor quick, an apoplectic fit. And he’s off, clever dog, that he is.

Upstairs in the room Franz is lying unconscious beside the chair. Eva crouches to one side between the window and the mirror, and screams as she crouches, as if she had seen a ghost. They lay Franz cautiously on his bed. The landlady knows all about Eva’s condition. She pours water over her head. Then Eva says softly: “Gimme a roll.” The men laugh: “She wants a roll.” The landlady lifts her by the shoulders, they put her on a chair. “She always says that, when she has an attack. But that’s not an apoplectic fit. It’s only nerves and her troubles with that sick man. He probably fell down. Well, why does he get up, anyway”? He’s always getting up, that makes her nervous.” “Then why was that fellow shouting about an apoplectic fit?” “Who?” “The one we passed on the stairs just now.” “Why, because he’s a damned ass. Don’t I know my Eva, five years now! Her mother is the same. When she screams, water’s the only thing that helps.”

When Herbert gets home that evening, he gives Eva a revolver, it may come in handy, she must not wait till the other fellow shoots, then it’s too late. He himself starts off right away, looks for Schreiber, of course he can’t be found. All of Pums’s people are on a vacation, none of them wants to get mixed up in the affair, Schreiber, of course, has faded into space. He has pocketed Franz’s money and is off to Oranienburg, to the summer quarters. But not before he’s humbugged Reinhold; Biberkopf didn’t take the money, but Eva listened to reason, he slipped it to her, and she’ll fix it up. Well, that’s that.

In spite of everything, the month of June has come to Berlin. The weather is still warm, but it looks like rain. Many things are happening in the world. The airship “Italia,” with General Nobile, has crashed, and sends a wireless to say where it is lying: viz., northeast of Spitzbergen, it is a difficult place to get to. Another airship has better luck, in one swoop it has raced from San Francisco to Australia, in 77 hours, and made a smooth landing. Then the King of Spain is at odds with Primo, his dictator, well, let’s hope things will be straightened out again. A pleasant impression, which one receives from the very first, is afforded by a certain betrothal between two young people from Baden and Sweden: A princess from matchbox land has made a safety-match with a prince of Baden. If you consider how far apart Baden and Sweden are, you are astonished that things can go pit-a-pat across such a distance. Yes, my son, I’m weak about women, they touch the spot where it’s too much for me! I kiss the first and think of the second, and steal a sly look at number three. I’m weak about women, yes, it’s no joke. What shall I do, I don’t try any more, and if some day for the women I go quite broke, then I’ll write “sold out” on my heart’s front-door.

To which Charlie Amberg adds: I’ll pull out an eyelash and stab you dead with it. Then I’ll take a lipstick and make you all red with it. And if you’re still angry, there’s one more thing I’ll do: a poached egg I’ll order and splash spinach over you. You, you, you, you. Then I’ll order a poached egg and splash spinach over you.

So the weather is still warm and it looks like rain; at noon it touches 72°
Fahrenheit. Under these climatic conditions the girl-murderer Rutowski appears before the Criminal Court of Berlin and is called on to exonerate himself. In this connection the question crops up: Is the victim Else Arndt the run-away wife of a certain school-board member? He has written to say he considers it a possibility, perhaps a desirability, that the murdered woman, Else Arndt, should be his spouse. In the case of an affirmative answer, he wishes to give important testimony before the court. There is objectivity in the air, in the air there is objectivity, there it is in the air and it’s in the air, in the air. In the air there is something idiotic, in the air there is something hypnotic, it’s in the air, it’s in the air, and it won’t get out of the air.

But next morning the municipal electric railway is opened. The National Railroad Board takes this as a pretext to stress once more the danger, attention, look out, don’t get on, wait your turn, you render yourself liable to punishment.

Arise, weak Spirit, and get on your Feet

There are states of swoon which amount to death in the living body. Franz Biberkopf, still unconscious, is put back into bed, he keeps on lying there on into the warm days and reaches this conclusion: I’m at death’s door, I feel it, I’m going to croak. If you don’t do something now, Franz, something real, final, comprehensive, if you don’t take a club in your hand, a saber, and beat around you, if you don’t run loose, no matter how, Franz, my li’l Franz, li’l Biberkopf, old horse, then it’s all over with you for sure, then you can have your measure taken for a coffin.

Groaning: I don’t want to, and I don’t want to, and I won’t croak, he looks at the room, the wall-clock ticks, I’m still here, still am I here, they want to close in on me, Schreiber almost shot me down, but that shall not happen. Franz lifts his remaining arm: it shall not happen.

A real fear pursues him now. He will not stay in bed. And even if he croaks in the street, he just must get out of bed, he has got to get out. Herbert Wischow has gone to Zoppot with dark-eyed Eva; she has a rich beau well on in years, a stock-exchange man whom she exploits. Herbert Wischow goes along with them incognito, the girl works well, they see each other every day, united they march, but sleep separately. In this beautiful summertime Franz Biberkopf goes marching back to the street again, alone again, our one and only Franz Biberkopf, tottering, but on his feet. Look at the cobra now, it creeps along, it moves, it has been injured. Hut it’s still the same old cobra, even if it has black circles under its eyes, and the fat reptile is now thin and wasted.

Something has become clearer to the old boy, who drags himself through the streets now, in order not to croak in his room, something has become clearer than it was before to this old boy who is now running away, away from death. Life has been worth something to him, anyway. Now
he sniffs the air, he noses the streets as if they belonged to him and wanted to take him in. He gapes at the poster columns, as if they were an event in his life. Yes, my boy, you can’t go far now on your two legs, now you’ve got to clutch and cling tight to something firm, now you must set as many teeth and fingers as you have left together and hold on fast, just so as not to be knocked off.

Life is a hellish thing, isn’t it? You knew it once before, that time in Henschke’s saloon when they wanted to kick you out with your armband, and that fellow attacked you, and you hadn’t done anything to him. And I thought that the world was peaceful, that there was law and order, but there’s something out of order, there they are and how terrible they seem now! That was in a moment of clairvoyance.

And now come thou, come hither and I will show thee something. The great whore, the whore of Babylon, that sitteth upon many waters. And I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet colored beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns. And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet color, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand. And upon her forehead was a name written,
MYSTERY
.
BABYLON
THE
GREAT
.
THE
MOTHER
OF
HARLOTS
AND
ABOMINATIONS
OF
THE
EARTH
. And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs.