The Safety Net (31 page)

It took only two minutes to reach the brightly lit courtyard of the manor: again they got out, again Blurtmehl’s hands, his arm, and Käthe pale again, serious too—as he was about to say something in the elevator she shook her head and pointed to the ceiling, where there was no doubt a microphone, her
lips hung slackly, she’d probably had a bit too much to drink. Blurtmehl had run up the stairs and was waiting at the top, concerned for them, in a gentle voice offering treatment, a few exercises, a sponging down, and when they refused with a smile, asked them to “ring if you need me.”

Eva Klensch had retired for the night: kitchen, living room, dining room, were all neat as a pin. Käthe went into the bathroom, opened the window, looked out: “It struck me,” she said, “that from the Schröters’ you can look straight up here, almost into here, and down there—look—you can see the light in their house. Now Luise is sitting in Katharina’s room, listening to the Bach on a cheap cassette deck, or whatever those things are called. Have you ever been in Katharina’s old room?”

“No.”

“It’s almost like a little museum. On the wall there’s her First Communion photo, next to it a reproduction of a Lochner Madonna—Mao, Che Guevara, Marx too, and an Italian whose name I’ve forgotten—and on the bedside table is her old cassette deck. And she’s sitting there now, our good Luise, with tears in her eyes, listening to the Saint Matthew Passion. I’ll get her a better set, a nice new one with a full, rich tone. I’m very tired, Fritz, very tired—and you must be half dead after all those goings-on this morning, those interviews—you did very well.…”

He came and stood beside her, placed his hand on her shoulder, and looked over to where the light was still burning in the Schröters’ house. “You know, during those interviews I had an idea: one could prepare them in advance, for radio and television, as a sort of stockpile: on amalgamation, wages, cultural affairs, on domestic and foreign policy, on security matters. One could even introduce slight variations to provide a semblance of actuality. While chatting away there I was thinking of something quite different and hardly ever gave a direct answer to a direct question, only where it concerned the children. I must talk to Amplanger about it someday, to see whether that couldn’t be arranged: spending an afternoon to produce a stockpile of interviews. Of course I would have to
change my clothes several times: the clothes are more important than the words, the clothes distinguish the various situations more clearly. The background would also have to vary: that’s easily arranged, sometimes a few books in the background, sometimes pictures, sometimes modern furniture, sometimes antiques—that would save a lot of work, a lot of bother—for radio interviews I could change my voice a little, sometimes a bit hoarse, then clear, sometimes alert, sometimes tired.… That would make it possible to tape enough interviews for several years in seven or eight hours. I could tape obituaries as well: for Kortschede, for Pottsieker, Pliefger—maybe for Bleibl, too—for cardinals and presidents—what do you think? Of course, someone from the union would have to agree to a similar manipulation.”

“They won’t do that, you know how they want everything—what do they call it?—alive.”

“Live they call it, but then it’s possible that the taped word sounds more alive than the live word—Veronica once tried to explain to me that artificial birds, mechanical ones, can walk more naturally than live birds—I keep thinking about that—in the same way a sound or video tape might sound much more spontaneous than a live interview—what they call live is deader than dead. As dead as the little paper that died under my hands—and proliferates.…”

“Afraid again?”

“Afraid of boredom, Käthe, that’s the disease Grebnitzer has not yet discovered. Afraid of the growth that’s like a prairie fire. The next to throw himself at my feet or on my breast will be Küster. With its inexorable logic the computer has predicted Küster’s surrender, up to now Amplanger has always been right in these things. So, after Blume, we’ll swallow Küster, then Bobering, and it will all turn into a gray, horrible newspaper mush, with a few tiny dashes of liberalism. I have allowed our little paper to decay, I have allowed it to die.…”

“And if you were to retire—completely, once and for all?”

“I was very close to it, but now—Bleibl must have suspected,
or he may have even known from Amplanger. And that’s why he nabbed me at the very last moment—nailed me, if you like. Why is it that I am never bored at Rolf and Katharina’s, not even at Herbert’s, there at least I get annoyed—but at the Bleibls’, not at Kortschede’s, no, or Pottsieker’s, not even at Pliefger’s, but at the Fischers’, and of course never with you. If only we could go for walks together more often. I have a lot of things I’d like to tell you that I wouldn’t exactly care to see immortalized on tape.”

“So have I—d’you think that here—I don’t think so, we’re talking half out of the window, aren’t we … Rolf explained to me that when you hold your head out of the window, speak and hear outside the window …”

“He may be right—so let’s talk.…” Mist obliterated the view, a wind came up, banks of fog drifted past, even the trees became invisible, a foggy dampness that turned into rain. The light in the Schröters’ house was no longer to be seen.

“So if you want to confess a few things to your wife, you have to stick your head out in the rain, and she must stick her head out in the rain to hear them: you’re still the best remedy against boredom—the children, the grandchildren, and I can’t tell you how glad I am Sabine has left Fischer. There have been times when I’ve been bored at her place, at my own daughter’s: I don’t like the kind of houses they build for themselves, don’t like their taste, let alone Fischer’s. Even the finest paintings they have hanging there, paintings I even like, seem like forgeries to me even when they’ve been proved to be genuine—especially then. There’s something about them that kills art, even music—I’m glad our child has left all that behind. Let her stay for a while at Rolf’s.… Come along, we’ll catch cold—d’you hear the screech owls? Don’t be afraid.”

He closed the window, it was raining harder now, splashing against the panes, and Käthe went over to the corner of the room and turned up the thermostat. “Perhaps you can soon resign—not right now, of course, but in three or four months:
illness or something—then they can finally elect Amplanger; why you?”

“I have an invaluable image—and you know that. Moreover, I’m vulnerable and open to attack—Rolf and Veronica and Holger I—and you know that.… I’ve even been successful.”

“You? Successful?”

“Now listen.… Inherited a little newspaper, obtained a license, newsprint, even the journalists to go with it. And expanded … bought a manor house, made president—I’m even efficient, not only successful.…”

“You efficient?”

“Now, Käthe …”

“You gave Eickelhof away without lifting a finger, you’ve already given up Tolmshoven—you can’t get either of your sons even the smallest job on the paper, your daughter’s unhappy.…”

“Unhappy? It’s years since I’ve seen her so happy. But I won’t claim to be the cause of her happiness.”

“You’re scared stiff of Bleibl, you’re afraid of Zummerling—oh, Tolm, dear Fritz. We should move from here—drive away, move away.”

Already in her nightgown, Käthe helped him with his shoes, undid the laces, pulled off his shoes, then his socks—the rest he could manage himself, even hung his jacket, shirt, and trousers on the stand, threw his underwear on the chair, put on his pajamas.…

He lay down beside her, took her hand, knew she was praying, was silent, listened to the rain, waited until Käthe crossed herself and sent a sigh after her prayer.

“Sad, old dear?”

“Yes, it’s my legs. Because I can’t bend down anymore. But it really was a nice evening. I’m glad we finally got together with the Schröters, we must go over there sometime. My children don’t make me sad: Sabine is on the right path, at least I’ll be able to help her. I’m not worried about Rolf and even less about Katharina. Herbert, there’s a lot I don’t understand
about him, we shouldn’t have sent him to that boarding school, although that’s what he wanted. Maybe we should move to his place, into that high rise that we own somehow.…”

“And is ghastly …”

“Horrible—maybe we should take a whole floor there, with a little apartment for Blurtmehl. But then there would be a helicopter circling over the place, day and night, at least half a police detachment permanently on the balconies and stairs and in the elevators—the people would move out, move away. That’s not a bad idea, Käthe, move away before we’re forced to—why don’t you look for a real estate agent, a house that’s big enough but not too big …?”

“There are supposed to be some lovely old vicarages around, one could convert them, modernize them. They’re all building those new, bungalow-type things.… I’m so tired, Tolm, don’t forget: Dresden, and the children, and your fourth grandchild is on the way.” Her hand dropped out of his as she fell asleep. He listened to the rain, after a while got out of bed, opened the window a bit, set the thermostat lower, stood by the open window and smoked one more cigarette, he would talk to Holzpuke.… Move away, that was a good idea. Tolmshoven—he had already taken leave of it, it wasn’t all that painful.… Perhaps move to a hotel, a suite for themselves, a smaller one for Blurtmehl. But hotels were hard to keep under surveillance.…

It was still raining, almost harder than the evening before, and when he looked through the window in the dim early-morning light he could see the puddles in the garden that had formed in the usual places; he could also see the officer pacing up and down between vestry and vicarage under the glass overhang, not the same one as last night, a younger man, with transceiver and machine pistol, a loden cape hanging loosely over his shoulders.

While holding the telephone to his ear with his right hand and listening to Holzpuke’s elaborate courtesies, he gathered up some kindling as he squatted on his heels, stuffed crumpled paper into the cold stove, piled the kindling on top, and, placing the matchbox upright against the cast-iron foot of the stove, tried to strike a match with his left hand. It worked, the paper flared up, the dry wood immediately started to crackle, he put on some more, placed the larger chunks in readiness, stood up, wiggled his feet into his slippers, pulled his bathrobe tighter, cocked an ear to the left where Sabine was sleeping with the
children, to the right where Katharina was sleeping. Fortunately he had heard the phone at once, and no one had been roused; it was still early, just past six-thirty, and he kept repeating: “Yes,” said: “But of course,” said: “By all means—do come over.” This mixture of extreme tension, in fact agitation, and courtesy with which Holzpuke tried again and again to explain his early telephone call, asked for an immediate interview, was nothing new. The only thing new was a certain dejection in Holzpuke’s voice, as he kept asking whether he hadn’t woken the children and the ladies at this early hour, and he seemed barely reassured by Rolf’s soothing “No, no, really you didn’t.”

“I suppose the simplest way would be for me to come to your place, but where can we talk without being disturbed?”

“The vicarage has been empty since yesterday evening, I have a key and I’m authorized to enter,” and he couldn’t resist adding: “Perhaps in the bishop’s room.”

“Where?”

“I’ll explain when you come.”

He added some more wood, lifted off the rings with the poker, put on a kettle of water, carefully opened the door to the bedroom and fished his clothes from the chair, threw them onto the bench by the stove, and groped under the bed for his shoes and socks. Katharina really did seem to be still asleep, and he pulled the cover up over her shoulder, which he had bared in throwing back the quilt as he got up. Then he carefully closed the window.

It was chilly, and he shivered a bit, couldn’t resist giving the quilt another tug, pulling it up a shade higher, would have liked to kiss the back of her neck—her long hair exposed a strip of golden-brown skin—but he refrained, afraid he might wake her.

Only now, while dressing, did he discover the second guard at the garden gate: transceiver, machine pistol, a police cape over his civilian clothes, not that young a man. The camper was going to present a problem: there was no wide entrance, only the little gate. He also saw that it was time to harvest the
nuts, pick them up off the ground where many had already dropped, the children could do that, they’d enjoy it.

He set the breakfast table, took milk, eggs, and butter out of the refrigerator, bread from the box, coffee from the buffet, searched in the kitchen drawer for the key to the vicarage, found it, and thought about the few people who attended early mass. There were always eight or nine of them, sometimes more, old Mrs. Hermes almost every day: who would be telling them at the locked church door that Roickler had left? Had Roickler at least notified the verger? Would it be the first time in many centuries that the bells didn’t ring in Hubreichen at a quarter to seven? Why did he wonder, why did he worry, about things that didn’t concern him? He poured boiling water on the coffee, warmed up the milk for the children, sliced some bread, looked at the time: in a few minutes the bells should start ringing.

Last night, while watching Roickler in the church, he had already been seized by an inexplicable sadness, something he had always found ridiculous in his father, who had sometimes expressed a similar feeling: they took something away from people and gave them nothing in return. He also thought of Käthe and Sabine, for whom it would be a bitter blow; then, when the coffee grounds had settled, he poured himself a mug, lit a cigarette, nodded when he saw Holzpuke coming through the gate, and went to meet him, holding his mug, the cigarette in his mouth, put a finger to his lips, went inside again to put more wood on the stove and fill a second mug. He had no trouble carrying them by the two handles in one hand, he’d learned to do this when he sometimes worked as a waiter and had to carry beer mugs.

Holzpuke smiled when he gave him the mug and warned him to walk carefully over the slippery path that was covered with wet leaves. “You’re very kind,” he said. “It’s true I missed my breakfast.”