The Dedalus Book of German Decadence (17 page)

[…]

Blaugast was a compliant resident in the unkempt hothouse of her willing sexuality. The small change of skilfully engineered paroxysms with which she supplied him, seemed riches indeed to his impoverished life. Good taste, which was far removed from her coarse-grained disposition, she replaced with experience. Hers was an adaptable genius, her amenability in some cases bordering on the extravagant. Once when, as they were walking along the street, she noticed how his eyes were drawn to the bare knees of a schoolgirl, she spent the morning, while he was brooding away the apathetic hours at the office, making herself a daring gym-slip, in which she was waiting for him when he returned, with ankle-socks that left a generous expanse of leg exposed.

She tackled the depressions that cast all kinds of shadows over his alert sex with arts which, born of shamelessness, ensured high pressure. She had the heroism of the courtesans of the age of cavaliers, when the dignity of kings had been transformed into submissive vassaldom in their mistresses’ boudoir, and had not been afraid to yoke the amorous arts of other women to her triumphal car. She would choose the right moment to loan out her property, in order to possess it all the more completely, renouncing the gossamer nets of jealousy, whose only effect is to reduce the value of the sacrificial lamb. Like a slave-mistress, who regards the health and well-being of her charges with pleasure and avoids maltreating them, so as not to damage valuable flesh, she was busy fattening up her partner’s demands with enticing prospects. She was not merely happy to allow his restlessness the complete freedom of action which he needed in sexual matters, she was constantly on the look-out for ways of recharging the battery of his passion and picking up windfalls from his pleasure by looking on. Her contacts with the
demimonde
and the adjacent terrain were a worm-eaten bridge which Blaugast, encouraged by her approbation, set off along with the ambition of breaking cynically listed records.

[…]

Wanda brought him
cocottes
who were practised in every nuance of bashful protest, and irrepressible
bourgeoises
who had retained a modicum of decency in the frenzy of their nocturnal industry, blushing unseen between demand and supply.

[…]

Blaugast suddenly found himself at the centre of a bustle of activity to which he yielded passively and which washed up some very dubious jetsam at the sluice gates of his world of ideas. The curious swarm of love-goblins whispered abroad the news of his endeavour, which, once it had been given free rein, was not allowed to rest. There were page-girls in boy’s jackets and coy velvet knickers who served at banquets which, following a pedantically drilled ceremonial, degenerated into orgies. The spark of puberty smouldered in the faces of debauched children, wanton kisses inflamed the memory of bridal fears. (…) Lesbians demonstrated their lingering raptures. The cheap schnapps that Wanda poured down his throat destroyed his will-power, his upright gait and his honesty of spirit. Habit and the boorishness of the vulgar fastened their claws on him.

*        *        *        *

When, irritated by distaste for work and dissipation, he gave up his job in the office, Wanda had her own way of dealing with the changed situation. Initially she met his apathy, which accepted adversity without taking any measures to deal with it, with undisguised contempt. In her anger at the sudden unreliability of a refuge she was determined not to abandon, in her disappointment at the inglorious collapse of her economic security, she forgot the basis of their elective companionship. She did not even attempt to shake him out of his lethargy, to foster his will to live and set him in the right direction. Abruptly and unambiguously she refused him the tribute that was the justification for their union. Her body, which still had the power to arouse him, was no longer in his possession. Unconcerned about the problem of his physical needs which tore him to shreds, she obstinately repulsed him until he was nothing more than an idle mouth among the junk of her household goods, a parasite who felt the wrath of her displeasure. And her colleagues, whom previously she had spurred on to minister to the beseeching Blaugast, now kept their fearful distance since the rumour of his collapse had gone round the district. (…) Who did come, occasionally at first, then in increasing numbers, were the men. It was the clients from Wanda’s infamous practice who now visited her in her room, paying for their robust pleasures with money from which, on lucrative days, there was a pittance to spare for her now useless companion.

Blaugast’s response to the reversal towards which his condition was heading was a mysterious paralysis. The disease to which he was succumbing, was torturing him with treacherous spasms, undermining him, sucking away his strength to defend himself. The lascivious secrets of the next room first came to his notice in the form of stifled whispers that disturbed his sleep. Listless and dishevelled, dazed from sedatives, hair unkempt, he had appeared in the doorway of her chamber with its insistently vulgar scent of eau de cologne and cosmetics, gaudy paper flowers and its russet lampshade. A burly fellow, his made-up tie twisted over his collar, was standing there, legs astride, buttoning his braces.

Wanda was sitting with her back to him on the stool in front of the dressing table, powdering her breasts. She did not turn round, as he leant against the door-post, unshaven, with swollen eyelids and his shirt all undone. Only her strong teeth gnawed at her lower lip as he surveyed the scene, dumbfounded, until his eye met her imperious expression in the mirror. ‘Who’s that?’ asked the burly fellow, smoothing out a crumpled handkerchief with his thumb, then blowing his nose noisily.

‘That’s my landlord; he also acts as my servant’, Wanda replied, without turning round.

‘He can fetch us some hot water from the kitchen.’

When Blaugast just stood there, shoulders sagging, his vertebra giving way, with a stupid look on his face, unable to comprehend, she suddenly snapped at him, baring her tongue, which was covered in spittle, ‘Didn’t you hear, you moron? You’re to bring water for me and the gentleman –’

Blaugast nodded. Something gigantic, pale and horrible rose up before him, like a dust-cloud before a storm, enveloping him, darkening his mind. Finally he understood. Wearily, legs bent, he shuffled into the kitchen. Like an obedient automaton, mechanically responding to the drive from the motor, he filled the crockery from the pan warming on the stove. Washing-up water, lukewarm and stale, dribbled in a disgusting trickle down his fingers. He ignored it. Clumsily, woodenly, as if his body were fixed with hinges, he carried the jug and basin back into the room.

That was the beginning….

*        *        *        *

With a tin that had lost its lid and that he had found on the rubbish tip behind the cemeteries, Blaugast walked along the rows of benches in the parks selling matches. His stock, half a dozen battered wooden boxes, was not reduced by this activity. As if by mutual agreement, the pensioners warming their arthritic limbs in the sun, the redundant and the unemployed who whiled away their involuntary holidays here alongside mothers and nursemaids, all left his paltry merchandise untouched. The coppers, which nevertheless appeared on the bottom of the container, automatic profit for which no noticeable service was returned, were the deposit of unknown partners or good-natured speculators. Blaugast’s complete silence gave his appearance, which was neglected, though not intentionally, a special nuance which was more effective than any wheedling, and invited charity. The inimitable technique of scarcely visible movements of the lips, eyes directed to one side, the spittle-glazed corners of his mouth set in a silent appeal, was a profitable investment that brought interest and dividends. There was still a trace of elegance and vanity about his person, giving him a slightly comic air, which acted as a bizarre provocation, eliciting the mockery of passers-by. The goose-step of his uncontrollable legs caused by consumption of the spinal chord, the changed look in his eyes from paralysis of the pupils and the ragged formality of his preferred attire all brought him the nickname of ‘Little Baron’, a title to which he would respond with a stiff bow. The children who ran after him in the streets knew it, and the customers of the beer-gardens and popular taverns who called out when the patient beggar appeared and made him the butt of all sorts of pranks and jokes. The grocers and other shopkeepers, standing respectfully behind their counters, their blood sluggish from servility towards their customers, welcomed the opportunity to work off their repressed desire to tyrannise others afforded by his willingness to conform to any conditions their charity might impose.

‘Little Baron, how delightful to see you!’ the regulars would exclaim whenever his bent figure hesitantly approached the table where they were eating. Now the moment was come for them to release the unbearably high tension of their dammed-up sadism into a harmless earth wire, to show off their superiority in front of the tipsy ladies. Purses were opened, crown coins glinted in the light of the ceiling lamp, for all to see. The atmosphere was electrified by the orgasm with which the strong and secure are overcome when confronted with the visible frailty of someone worse off than themselves

‘Be a good chap, Little Baron, and do the bird for us.’

Then Blaugast would grasp his nose with the fingers of his left hand, stick his right arm like a beak through the gap made by his elbow and hop around squawking. It was a feeble, ridiculous sound, a gobbling whine, that gave added spice to many a tipsy customer’s evening glass. It was a screech that flew up and grated against iron bars and other obstacles, dying away in a hoarse cooing that was trampled underfoot by the braying laughter of his audience. That was the ‘Little Baron’s’ speciality. Tolerated by indulgent landlords and prized by wags as a poultry impersonator, he made his twitching way, a pedlar peddling his own degradation, through those realms where boredom was ever ready to pounce, and which he seemed heaven-sent to repel.

In the night clubs, the private rooms of wine-bars and clipjoints they went even further. The regulars there had recognised the tragic connection which still linked this wreck of a human being to the depraved lust and intemperance of his sex. As the champagne corks popped and modesty lost its way in the prison of drunkenness, the waiter, on the look-out for any service he could render, captured the wandering beggar outside the door of the joint and brought him to his customers. The half-naked women in the arms of their gentlemen amused themselves with the bewildered ‘Little Baron’. It sometimes happened, after he had downed a generous number of free schnapps, that he was engaged, for a fixed sum, to masturbate onto a plate. His groans and his ejaculation produced roars of delight. That was the second speciality which brought Blaugast renown, and which, when he woke up on the following morning, set a barbed-wire fence round even the most shabby of paradises, which caused him sorrow and inescapable torment.

One evening, under the veranda of a popular brewery, where the sooty acacias of a sand-strewn courtyard tried to create the illusion of rural solitude and back-to-nature freshness, he came across Wanda and her cronies. They were amorous husbands, drapers from the stores of the old town who, in her company, were frittering away the last remains of their respectability on their way to bankruptcy. One of them, in whom the malty strong ale had lit a spark of self-knowledge, grasped Blaugast by the lapel as he tried to make his escape.

‘Tell me I’m a swine, Little Baron.’

Blaugast staggered. The balance, which his ailing legs could only maintain in a steady shuffle, was disturbed by the grasping fist of the draper, and he stumbled against the edge of the table. He squinted up at the bloated face of his assailant from beneath defiantly dishevelled eyebrows.

‘Don’t be a coward, say it right out. I’m a swine, aren’t I, Little Baron?’

Blaugast bit on his tongue. Face to face with Wanda, who was subjecting him to a vengeful scrutiny, a rabid fury at his tormentor rose in his gorge. The one who had grabbed him by the lapel was lounging in his chair, waist-coat undone, baring his crooked fangs, giving off a stench of pickled fish and radish. His contempt for the criticism, which he invited loudmouthed, rendered him invulnerable.

‘Leave the fellow alone’, snapped Wanda viciously, squashing her cigarette-end in the pool in her saucer. ‘The old goat’s become rather unsavoury since he’s taken to tossing off what’s left of his brains onto night-club plates.’

The reference to the shame that was dragging him down into the bottomless depths, came sharp and violent, like a whiplash. A curtain was rent, sheaves of light sparked, and Blaugast saw a bright light.

‘Of course you are a swine,’ he said to the drunk, in a turmoil. ‘You’re all a bunch of swine, curs and bitches.’

A roar of applause greeted his answer. Snorts of laughter erupted from swollen bellies, garbage bubbled up to the surface, sluggish and scalding hot.

Only Wanda remained sour-faced, furious, indignant. ‘And what are you? A cesspool prince on official business. A man who cleans shoes for whores -’

Blaugast turned and left. His rebellion against the false powers to which he was in thrall and which befouled his life, was only brief. The gap in the fire which had opened up before him, so that the twisted grimace on the face of existence had become visible through the play of the flames, narrowed to disappear completely. His back hurt and he could hear darkness breathing audibly. A few tables further on a pack of Czech students greeted him with howls of delight and demanded ‘the bird’. Nerves in tatters, shipwrecked and clutching onto a spar, weakened by deprivation and terrified by relentless powers, he obeyed and did as they demanded. The man Wanda had spoken to followed him and penetrated the buzzing in his ears as far as the edge of his soul.

‘Cesspool prince!’ came the quavering old mans voice from his swollen lips.

[…]

Sometimes, in the cool corner of a shopping arcade, he would raise his fixed gaze from the ground and suddenly find himself face to face with photographs advertising a
thé dansant
or a ladies’ bar with a jazz band, showing women in all sorts of provocative poses. His chin would lose its connection with his upper jaw and his mouth would gape wide.