Berlin Stories (13 page)

Once when the omnibus was cruising full steam ahead, everything proceeding smoothly and properly, and with no one even remotely plotting an ambush or violent coup, someone slipped aboard—a person who apparently had been accustomed from an early age to go through thick and thin and strike down anyone and anything that got in his way.

“Full up, sir,” the official remarked.

“Stupid, ridiculous nonsense,” replied Monsieur Dreadnought. He was without a doubt the sort of person who thought it advisable to engage in the most ruthless power politics. “I beg your pardon, did you not hear what I said?” the good carman inquired. But now a veritable downpour of invectives was unleashed upon his unfortunate head. This powerful flood of unforeseen unpleasantnesses was so overwhelming that the good man was forced to give in. All the same he complained, saying:

“It's just not right, not right at all, and it's a good thing not all people are like this gentleman who's cursing me even though all I did was tell him we were full. It was my duty to tell him so, but certain people insist on trampling and flattening everything once they've made up their minds to do something. I don't go around saying ‘full' for my own amusement, or because I want to antagonize people, or out of Schadenfreude. Every person has his tasks to perform and his duties to fulfill, and it just happens to be my duty to tell people ‘full' when the car is full up. It isn't fair for a person to take offense like that. It's downright preposterous how quick some people are to fly into a rage. Well then! I'll stick with the ones who have some sense; thanks and praises be to God, there are still some of them left.”

This is what the conductor said as the omnibus unhurriedly trundled on its way.

1916

Let me not forget to write down two small memories from my stay in the metropolis. One concerns a horse's head, the other an old, poor match-seller. Both these things, the horse and the woman, are surrounded by night. One night, as on so many others that had already been frittered away and poured out into oblivion, I was roaming through the streets in my elegant, though admittedly only borrowed overcoat, when at one of the busiest spots I beheld a horse harnessed to a heavy cart. The horse was standing there quietly in the indefinite darkness, and many, many people were hurrying by, passing the beautiful animal without paying it even the slightest heed. I too was hurrying past, I was in a big rush. A person whose ambition it is to go in search of amusement is always in a terrible hurry. But struck by the marvelous sight of the white horse standing in the black night, I stopped in my tracks. The long strands of hair hung down to the animal's large eyes from which a nameless sorrow peered out. The horse stood there unmoving, as if it were a white, ghostly vision just arisen from the grave, displaying a humility and patience that spoke of majesty. But I was drawn on; after all, I was in search of amusement. Another night, too, found me out and about in pursuit of the most wretched entertainment. I had already passed through all sorts of public houses when I turned onto an unlit street, and then a shout came to me from the darkness: “Matches, young sir!” It was an old, poor woman who had cried out thus. I stopped short, for I happened to be filled with heartfelt good spirits, reached into my vest pocket to find a coin and gave it to the woman without taking any of her wares. How she thanked me then and wished me good fortune in the dark future. And how she held out her old, cold, gaunt hand to me! I took her hand and pressed it, and then, happy at this small experience, continued on my way.

1914

One day, when I was looking for a suitable room, I entered a curious house just outside the city and close to the city tramway, an elegant, oldish, and seemingly rather neglected house, whose exterior had a singularity which at once captivated me.

On the staircase, which I slowly mounted, and which was wide and bright, were smells and sounds as of bygone elegance.

What they call former beauty is extraordinarily attractive to some people. Ruins are rather touching. Before the residues of noble things our pensive, sensitive inward selves involuntarily bow. The remnants of what was once distinguished, refined, and brilliant infuse us with compassion, but simultaneously also with respect. Bygone days and old decrepitude, how enchanting you are!

On the door I read the name “Frau Wilke.”

Here I gently and cautiously rang the bell. But when I realized that it was no use ringing, since nobody answered, I knocked, and then somebody approached.

Very guardedly and very slowly somebody opened the door. A gaunt, thin, tall woman stood before me, and asked in a low voice: “What is it you want?”

Her voice had a curiously dry and hoarse sound.

“May I see the room?”

“Yes, of course. Please come in.”

The woman led me down a strangely dark corridor to the room, whose appearance immediately charmed and delighted me. Its shape was, as it were, refined and noble, a little narrow perhaps, yet proportionately tall. Not without a sort of irresolution, I asked the price, which was extremely moderate, so I took the room without more ado.

It made me glad to have done this, for a strange state of mind had much afflicted me for some time past, so I was unusually tired and longed to rest. Weary of all groping endeavor, depressed and out of sorts as I was, any acceptable security would have satisfied me, and the peace of a small resting place could not have been other than wholly welcome.

“What are you?” the lady asked.

“A poet!” I replied.

She went away without a word.

An earl, I think, might live here, I said to myself as I carefully examined my new home. This charming room, I said, proceeding with my soliloquy, unquestionably possesses a great advantage: it is very remote. It's quiet as a cavern here. Definitely: here I really feel I am concealed. My inmost want seems to have been gratified. The room, as I see it, or think I see it, is, so to speak, half dark. Dark brightness and bright darkness are floating everywhere. That is most commendable. Let's look around! Please don't put yourself out, sir! There's no hurry at all. Take just as much time as you like. The wallpaper seems, in parts, to be hanging in sad, mournful shreds from the wall. So it is! But that is precisely what pleases me, for I do like a certain degree of raggedness and neglect. The shreds can go on hanging; I'll not let them be removed at any price, for I am completely satisfied with them being there. I am much inclined to believe that a baron once lived here. Officers perhaps drank champagne here. The curtain by the window is tall and slender, it looks old and dusty; but being so prettily draped, it betokens good taste and reveals a delicate sensibility. Outside in the garden, close to the window, stands a birch tree. Here in summer the green will come laughing into the room, on the dear gentle branches all sorts of singing birds will gather, for their delight as well as for mine. This distinguished old writing table is wonderful, handed surely down from a past age of subtle feeling. Probably I shall write essays at it, sketches, studies, little stories, or even long stories, and send these, with urgent requests for quick and friendly publication, to all sorts of stern and highly reputable editors of papers and periodicals like, for example,
The Peking Daily News
, or
Mercure de France
, whence, for sure, prosperity and success must come.

The bed seems to be all right. In this case I will and must dispense with painstaking scrutiny. Then I saw, and here remark, a truly strange and ghostly hatstand, and the mirror there over the basin will tell me faithfully every day how I look. I hope the image it will give me to see will always be a flattering one. The couch is old, consequently pleasant and appropriate. New furniture easily disturbs one, because novelty is always importunate, always obstructs us. A Dutch and a Swiss landscape hang, as I observe to my glad satisfaction, modestly on the wall. Without a doubt, I shall look time and again at these two pictures most attentively. Regarding the air in this chamber, I would nevertheless deem it credible, or rather postulate at once with certitude almost, that for some time here no thought has been given to regular and, it seems, wholly requisite ventilation. I do declare that there is a smell of decay about the place. To inhale stale air provides a certain peculiar pleasure. In any case, I can leave the window open for days and weeks on end; then the right and good will stream into the room.

“You must get up earlier. I cannot allow you to stay in bed so long,” Frau Wilke said to me. Beyond this, she did not say much.

This was because I spent entire days lying in bed.

I was in a bad way. Decrepitude surrounded me. I lay there as if in heaviness of heart; I neither knew nor could find myself anymore. All my once lucid and gay thoughts floated in obscure confusion and disarray. My mind lay as if broken in fragments before my grieving eyes. The world of thought and of feeling was jumbled and chaotic. Everything dead, empty, and hopeless to the heart. No soul, no joy anymore, and only faintly could I remember that there were times when I was happy and brave, kind and confident, full of faith and joy. The pity of it all! Before and behind me, and all around me, not the slightest prospect anymore.

Yet I promised Frau Wilke to get up earlier, and in fact I did then also begin to work hard.

Often I walked in the neighboring forest of fir and pine, whose beauties, wonderful winter solitudes, seemed to protect me from the onset of despair. Ineffably kind voices spoke down to me from the trees: “You must not come to the dark conclusion that everything in the world is hard, false, and wicked. But come often to us; the forest likes you. In its company you will find health and good spirits again, and entertain more lofty and beautiful thoughts.”

Into society, that is, where the big world forgathers, I never went. I had no business there, because I had no success. People who have no success with people have no business with people.

Poor Frau Wilke, soon afterwards you died.

Whoever has been poor and lonely himself understands other poor and lonely people all the better. At least we should learn to understand our fellow beings, for we are powerless to stop their misery, their ignominy, their suffering, their weakness, and their death.

One day Frau Wilke whispered, as she stretched out her hand and arm to me: “Hold my hand. It's like ice.”

I took her poor, old, thin hand in mine. It was cold as ice.

Frau Wilke crept about her home now like a ghost. Nobody visited her. For days she sat alone in her unheated room.

To be alone: icy, iron terror, foretaste of the grave, forerunner of unpitying death. Oh, whoever has been himself alone can never find another's loneliness strange.

I began to realize that Frau Wilke had nothing to eat. The lady who owned the house, and later took Frau Wilke's rooms, allowing me to stay in mine, brought, of course in pity for her forsaken state, every midday and evening a cup of broth, but not for long, and so Frau Wilke faded away. She lay there, no longer moving: and soon she was taken to the city hospital, where, after three days, she died.

One afternoon soon after her death, I entered her empty room, into which the good evening sun was shining, gladdening it with rose-bright, gay and soft colors. There I saw on the bed the things which the poor lady had till recently worn, her dress, her hat, her sunshade, and her umbrella, and, on the floor, her small delicate boots. The strange sight of them made me unspeakably sad, and my peculiar state of mind made it seem to me almost that I had died myself, and life in all its fullness, which had often appeared so huge and beautiful, was thin and poor to the point of breaking. All things past, all things vanishing away, were more close to me than ever. For a long time I looked at Frau Wilke's possessions, which now had lost their mistress and lost all purpose, and at the golden room, glorified by the smile of the evening sun, while I stood there motionless, not understanding anything anymore.

Yet, after standing there dumbly for a time, I was gratified and grew calm. Life took me by the shoulder and its wonderful gaze rested on mine. The world was as living as ever and beautiful as at the most beautiful times. I quietly left the room and went out into the street.

1915
Translated by Christopher Middleton

My knowledge of this woman's life remains sketchy. Frau Scheer was out of the ordinary, and talented in the extreme. Statements she made in my presence served to indicate then as now that she had spent her youth gaily and happily in the provinces. When she spoke of her childhood, there was always an indescribable, bittersweet rapture in her gaze. Her words summoned up a pretty, tidy little town surrounded by forest, fields, and green meadows. It made her happy to be permitted to speak of these bygone days, and if it was my humble person who provided the occasion for this quiet happiness, I shall make so bold as to consider this a modest achievement on my part, as for a time there was no one old Frau Scheer saw more of than the author of these lines, who for several reasons took a pronounced interest in this eccentric, aging woman. I was the one to whom she told things, this poor, isolated female all alone in the world, I who with great pleasure lent his ear, listening attentively to her words. I was gripped by the peculiar fate of this—millionairess. Frau Scheer was a millionaire several times over. What poor creatures we human beings are, so variously deceived. This millionairess, this wealthy Frau Scheer, thanked me most touchingly and was glad when I announced my desire to come into her room in the evening and sit with her beside the lamp for a little while. Frau Scheer was ugly; the passions of a turbulent business career, sorrows, a sea of troubles and grueling worries, haste and the pursuit of commercial successes, the torments of raging jealousy and ongoing toils had imprinted upon her face the mark of the repugnant and repulsive. Nonetheless I easily succeeded in discovering in this face a beauty that had not yet been fully extinguished, and in the evening, with the yellow sheen of the lamplight streaming over her features, old Frau Scheer became oddly lovely, and the way she then spoke and sat there was both captivating and moving. As I learned just before her death from a personage who was close to her, she is supposed to have said once that she would have been able to acquire a fortune of twenty million if Heaven had given her a different husband.