The Berlin Stories (43 page)

This idea appealed to Otto’s romantic imagination. Often, when we were alone together, he would tell me with tears in his eyes: “I shan’t be here much longer, Christoph. My nerves are breaking down. Very soon they’ll come and take me away. They’ll put me in a strait-waistcoat and feed me through a rubber tube. And when you come to visit me, I shan’t know who you are.”

Frau Nowak and Otto were not the only ones with “nerves.” Slowly but surely the Nowaks were breaking down my powers of resistance. Every day I found the smell from the kitchen sink a little nastier: every day Otto’s voice when quarrelling seemed harsher and his mother’s a little shriller. Grete’s whine made me set my teeth. When Otto slammed a door I winced irritably. At nights I couldn’t get to sleep unless I was half drunk. Also, I was secretly worrying about an unpleasant and mysterious rash: it might be due to Frau Nowak’s cooking, or worse.

I now spent most of my evenings at the Alexander Casino. At a table in the corner by the stove I wrote letters, talked to Pieps and Gerhardt or simply amused myself by watching the other guests. The place was usually very quiet. We afl sat round or lounged at the bar, waiting for something to happen. No sooner came the sound of the outer door than a dozen pairs of eyes were turned to see what new visitor would emerge from behind the leather curtain. Generally, it was only a biscuit-seller with his basket, or a Salvation Army girl with her collecting-box and tracts. If the biscuit-seller had been doing good business or was drunk he would throw dice with us for packets of sugar-wafers. As for the Salvation Army girl, she rattled her way drably round the room, got nothing and departed, without making us feel in the least uncomfortable. Indeed, she had become so much a part of the evening’s routine that Gerhardt and Pieps did not even make jokes about her when she was gone. Then an old man would shuffle in, whisper something to the barman and retire with him into the room behind the bar. He was a cocaine-addict. A moment later he reappeared, raised his hat to all of us with a vague courteous gesture, and shuffled out. The old man had a nervous tic and kept shaking his head all the time, as if saying to Life: No. No. No.

Sometimes the police came, looking for wanted criminals or escaped reformatory boys. Their visits were usually expected and prepared for. At any rate you could always, as Pieps explained to me, make a last-minute exit through the lavatory window into the courtyard at the back of the house: “But you must be careful, Christoph,” he added: “Take a good big jump. Or you’ll fall down the coal-chute and into the cellar. I did, once. And Hamburg Werner, who was coming after me, laughed so much that the bulls caught him.” On Saturday and Sunday evenings the Alexander Casino was full. Visitors from the West End arrived, like ambassadors from another country. There were a good number of foreigners—Dutchmen mostly, and Englishmen, The Englishmen talked in loud, high, excited voices. They discussed communism and Van Gogh and the best restaurants. Some of them seemed a little scared: perhaps they expected to be knifed in this den of thieves. Pieps and Gerhardt sat at their tables and mimicked their accents, cadging drinks and cigarettes. A stout man in horn spectacles asked: “Were you at that delicious party Bill gave for the negro singers?” And a young man with a monocle murmured: “All the poetry in the world is in that face.” I knew what he was feeling at that moment: I could sympathise with, even envy him. But it was saddening to know that, two weeks hence, he would boast about his exploits here to a select party of clubmen or dons—warmed discreet smilers around a table furnished with historic silver and legendary port. It made me feel older.

At last the doctors made up their minds: Frau Nowak was to be sent to the sanatorium after all: and quite soon—shortly before Christmas. As soon as she heard this she ordered a new dress from the tailor. She was as excited and pleased as if she had been invited to a party: “The matrons are always very particular, you know, Herr Christoph. They see to it that we keep ourselves neat and tidy. If we don’t we get punished—and quite right, too… I’m sure I shall enjoy being there,” Frau Nowak sighed, “if only I can stop myself ! worrying about the family. What they’ll do when I’m gone, goodness only knows. They’re as helpless as a lot of sheep….” In the evenings she spent hours stitching warm flannel underclothes, smiling to herself, like a woman who is expecting a child.

On the afternoon of my departure Otto was very depressed.

“Now you’re going, Christoph, I don’t know what’ll happen to me. Perhaps, six months from now, I shan’t be alive at all.”

“You got on all right before I came, didn’t you?”

“Yes… but now mother’s going, too. I don’t suppose father‘11 give me anything to eat.”

“What rubbish!”

“Take me with you, Christoph. Let me be your servant. I could be very useful, you know. I could cook for you and mend your clothes and open the door for your pupils….” Otto’s eyes brightened as he admired himself in this new role. “I’d wear a little white jacket—or perhaps blue would be better,” with silver buttons….”

“I’m afraid you’re a luxury I can’t afford.”

“Oh, but, Christoph, I shouldn’t want any wages, of course.” Otto paused, feeling that this offer had been a bit too generous. “That is,” he added cautiously, “only just a mark or two to go dancing, now and then.”

“I’m very sorry.”

We were interrupted by the return of Frau Nowak. She had come home early to cook me a farewell meal. Her stringbag was full of things she had bought; she had tired herself out carrying it. She shut the kitchen-door behind her with a sigh and began to bustle about at once, her nerves on edge, ready for a row.

“Why, Otto, you’ve let the stove go out! After I specially told you to keep an eye on it! Oh, dear, can’t I rely on anybody in this house to help me with a single thing?”

“Sorry, mother,” said Otto. “I forgot.”

“Of course you forgot! Do you ever remember anything? You forgot!” Frau Nowak screamed at him, her features puckered into a sharp little stabbing point of fury: “I’ve worked myself into my grave for you, and that’s my thanks. When I’m gone I hope your father’ll turn you out into the streets. We’ll see how you like that! You great, lazy, hulking lump! Get out of my sight, do you hear! Get out of my sight!”

“All right. Christoph, you hear what she says?” Otto turned to me, his face convulsed with rage; at that moment the resemblance between them was quite startling; they were like creatures demoniacally possessed. “I’ll make her sorry for it as long as she lives!”

He turned and plunged into the inner bedroom, slamming the rickety door behind him. Frau Nowak turned at once to the stove and began shovelling out the cinders. She was trembling all over and coughing violently. I helped her, putting firewood and pieces of coal into her hands; she took them from me blindly, without a glance or a word. Feeling, as usual, that I was only in the way, I went into the living-room and stood stupidly by the window, wishing that I could simply disappear. I had had enough. On the window-sill lay a stump of pencil. I picked it up and drew a small circle on the wood, thinking: I have left my mark. Then I remembered how I had done exactly the same thing, years ago, before leaving a boarding-house in North Wales. In the inner room all was quiet. I decided to confront Otto’s sulks. I had still got my suitcases to pack.

When I opened the door Otto was sitting on his bed. He was staring as if hypnotised at a gash in his left wrist, from which the blood was trickling down over his open palm and spilling in big drops on the floor. In his right hand, between finger and thumb, he held a safety-razor blade. He didn’t resist when I snatched it from him. The wound itself was nothing much; I bandaged it with his handkerchief. Otto seemed to turn faint for a moment and lolled against my shoulder.

“How on earth did you manage to do it?”

“I wanted to show her,” said Otto. He was very pale. He had evidently given himself a nasty scare: “You shouldn’t have stopped me, Christoph.”

“You little idiot,” I said angrily, for he had frightened me, too: “One of these days you’ll really hurt yourself—by mistake.”

Otto gave me a long, reproachful look. Slowly his eyes filled with tears.

“What does it matter, Christoph? I’m no good… What’ll become of me, do you suppose, when I’m older?”

“You’ll get work.”

“Work….” The very thought made Otto burst into tears. Sobbing violently, he smeared the back of his hand across his nose.

I pulled out the handkerchief from my pocket. “Here. Take this.”

“Thanks, Christoph….” He wiped his eyes mournfully and blew his nose. Then something about the handkerchief itself caught his attention. He began to examine it, listlessly at first, then” with extreme interest.

“Why, Christoph,” he exclaimed indignantly, “this is one of mine!”

One afternoon, a few days after Christmas, I visited the Wassertorstrasse again. The lamps were alight already, as I turned in under the archway and entered the long, damp street, patched here and there with dirty snow. Weak yellow gleams shone out from the cellar shops. At a hand-cart under a gas-flare, a cripple was selling vegetables and fruit. A crowd of youths, with raw, sullen faces, stood watching two boys fighting at a doorway: a girl’s voice screamed excitedly as one of them tripped and fell. Crossing the muddy courtyard, inhaling the moist, familiar rottenness of the tenement buildings, I thought: Did I really ever live here? Already, with my comfortable bed-sitting room in the West End and my excellent new job, I had become a stranger to the slums.

The lights on the Nowaks’ staircase were out of order: it was pitch-dark. I groped my way upstairs without much difficulty and banged on their door. I made as much noise as I could because, to judge from the shouting and singing and shrieks of laughter within, a party was in progress.

“Who’s there?” bawled Herr Nowak’s voice.

“Christoph.”

“Aha! Christoph! Anglais! Englisch Man! Come in! Come in!”

The door was flung open. Herr Nowak swayed unsteadily on the threshhold, with arms open to embrace me. Behind him stood Grete, shaking like a jelly, with tears of laughter pouring down her cheeks. There was nobody else to be seen.

“Good old Christoph!” cried Herr Nowak, thumping me on the back. “I said to Grete: I know he’ll come. Christoph won’t desert us!” With a large burlesque gesture of welcome he pushed me violently into the living-room. The whole place was fearfully untidy. Clothing of various kinds lay in a confused heap on one of the beds; on the other were scattered cups, saucers, shoes, knives and forks. On the sideboard was a frying-pan full of dried fat. The room was lighted by three candles stuck into empty beer-bottles.

“All light’s been cut off,” explained Herr Nowak, with a negligent sweep of his arm: “The bill isn’t paid… Must pay it sometime, of course. Never mind—it’s nicer like this, isn’t it? Come on, Grete, let’s light up the Christmas tree.”

The Christmas tree was the smallest I had ever seen. It was so tiny and feeble that it could only carry one candle, at the very top. A single thin strand of tinsel was draped around it. Herr Nowak dropped several lighted matches on the floor before he could get the candle to burn. If I hadn’t stamped them out the table-cloth might easily have caught fire.

“Where are Lothar and Otto?” I asked.

“Don’t know. Somewhere about… They don’t show themselves much, nowadays—it doesn’t suit them, here….

Never mind, we’re quite happy by ourselves, aren’t we, Grete?” Herr Nowak executed a few elephantine dance-steps and began to sing: “O Tannenbaum! O Tannenbaum!… Come on, Christoph, all together now! Wie treu sind Deine Blätter!”

After this was over I produced my presents: cigars for Herr Nowak, for Grete chocolates and a clockwork mouse. Herr Nowak then brought out a bottle of beer from under the bed. After a long search for his spectacles, which were finally discovered hanging on the water-tap in the kitchen, he read me a letter which Frau Nowak had written from the sanatorium. He repeated every sentence three or four times, got lost in the middle, swore, blew his nose, and picked his ears. I could hardly understand a word. Then he and Grete began playing with the clockwork mouse, letting it run about the table, shrieking and roaring whenever it neared the edge. The mouse was such a success that my departure was managed briefly, without any fuss. “Goodbye, Christoph. Come again soon,” said Herr Nowak and turned back to the table at once. He and Grete were bending over it with the eagerness of gamblers as I made my way out of the attic.

Not long after this I had a call from Otto himself. He had come to ask me if I would go with him the next Sunday to see Frau Nowak. The sanatorium had its monthly visiting-day: there would be a special bus running from Hallesches Tor.

“You needn’t pay for me, you know,” Otto added grandly. He was fairly shining with self-satisfaction.

“That’s very handsome of you, Otto… A new suit?”

“Do you like it?”

“It must have cost a good bit.”

“Two hundred and fifty marks.”

“My word! Has your ship come home?”

Otto smirked: “I’m seeing a lot of Trade now. Her uncle’s left her some money. Perhaps, in the spring, we’ll get married.”

“Congratulations… I suppose you’re still living at home?”

“Oh, I look in there occasionally,” Otto drew down the corners of his mouth in a grimace of languid distaste, “but father’s always drunk.”’

“Disgusting, isn’t it?” I mimicked his tone. We both laughed.

“My goodness, Christoph, is it as late as that? I must be getting along… Till Sunday. Be good.”

We arrived at the sanatorium about midday.

There was a bumpy cart-track winding for several kilometres through snowy pinewoods and then, suddenly, a Gothic brick gateway like the entrance to a churchyard, with big red buildings rising behind. The bus stopped. Otto and I were the last passengers to get out. We stood stretching ourselves and blinking at the bright snow: out here in the country everything was dazzling white. We were all very stiff, for the bus was only a covered van, with packing-cases and school-benches for seats. The seats had not shifted much during the journey, for we had been packed together as tightly as books on a shelf.