The Walk (10 page)

TOMZACK

In any other place and on any other road but this dear yielding country road I would have expected him. His woeful, gruesome air, his tragic, atrocious appearance, infused me with terror and took every good, bright, and beautiful prospect, all joy and gaiety away from me. Tomzack! It is true, dear reader, is it not, the name alone has the sound of terrible and mournful things? “Why do you persecute me, why need you meet me here in the middle of my road, you miserable creature?” I cried to him; but Tomzack gave me no answer. He turned his great eyes upon me; that is, he looked down from high up on me below; for he surpassed me in length and height by very considerable degrees. Beside him, I felt like a dwarf, or like a poor weak little child. With the greatest of ease the giant could have trodden me underfoot and crushed me. Oh,
I knew who he was. For him there was no rest. Restlessly he went up and down in the world. He slept in no soft bed, and could live in no comfortable homely house. He was at home everywhere and nowhere. He had no home country, and of no state was he a citizen. Without motherland and without happiness he was; he had to live completely without love and without human joy. He had sympathy with no man, and with him and his mopping and mowing no man had sympathy. Past, present, and future were to him an insubstantial desert, and life was too small, too tiny, too narrow for him. For him there was nothing which had meaning, and he himself in turn meant something to nobody. Out of his great eyes there broke a glare of grief in overworlds and underworlds. Infinite pain spoke from his slack and weary moments. A hundred thousand years old he seemed to me, and it seemed to me that he must live for eternity, only to be for eternity no living being. He died every instant and yet he could not die. For him there was no grave with flowers on it. I eluded him, and murmured to myself: “Goodbye, keep well nevertheless, friend Tomzack!”

Without looking back at the phantom, the pitiful colossus and superman, and candidly I had not the remotest desire to do so, I walked on and soon afterwards, proceeding thus in the warm yielding air and erasing the sad impression which the strange figure of a man, or rather of a giant, had made upon me, I came into a pine forest, through which coiled a smiling, serpentine, and at the same time roguishly graceful path, which I followed with pleasure. Path and forest floor were as a carpet, and here within the forest it was quiet as in a happy human soul, as in the interior of a temple, as in a palace and enchanted dream-wrapped fairy-tale castle, as in Sleeping Beauty's castle, where all sleep, and all are hushed for centuries of long years. I penetrated deeper, and I speak perhaps a little indulgently if I say that to myself I seemed like a prince with
golden hair, his body clad in warrior's armour. So solemn was it in the forest that lovely and solemn imaginings, quite of their own accord, took possession of the sensitive walker there. How glad I was at this sweet forest softness and repose! From time to time, from outside, a slight sound or two penetrated the delicious seclusion and bewitching darkness, perhaps a bang, a whistle, or some other noise, whose distant note would only intensify the prevailing soundlessness, which I inhaled to my very heart's content, and whose virtues I drank and quaffed with due ceremony. Here and there in all this tranquillity and quietude a bird let his blithe voice be heard out of his charmed and holy hiding place. Thus I stood and listened, and suddenly there came upon me an inexpressible feeling for the world, and, together with it, a feeling of gratitude, which broke powerfully out of my soul. The pines stood straight as pillars there, and not the least thing moved in the whole delicate forest, throughout which all kinds of inaudible voices seemed to echo and sound. Music out of the primeval world, from whence I cannot tell, stole on my ear. “Oh, thus, if it must be, shall I then willingly end and die. A memory will then delight me even in the grave, and a gratitude enliven me even in death; a thanksgiving for the pleasures, for the joys, for the ecstasies; a thanksgiving for life, and a joy at joy.” High up, a gentle rustling, whispering down from the treetops, could be heard. “To love and to kiss here must be divinely beautiful,” I told myself. Simply to tread on the pleasant ground became a joy, and the stillness kindled prayers in the feeling soul. “To be dead here, and to lie inconspicuous in the cool forest earth must be sweet. Oh, that one could sense and enjoy death even in death! Perhaps one can. To have a small, quiet grave in the forest would be lovely. Perhaps I should hear the singing of the birds and the forest rustling above me. I would like that.” Marvellous between trunks of oaks a pillar of sunbeams fell into
the forest, which to me seemed like a delicious green grave. Soon I stepped out into the radiant open again, and into life.

Now there should come, as it emerges here, an inn, and, that is, a very fine, attractive, and coaxing one, an inn situated near the edge of the forest out of which I have this moment walked, an inn with a charming garden full of refreshing shade. The garden should lie on a pretty hill with a good view all around, and right beside it there should stand an extra, artificial hill, or bastion, where one could stay and for quite a long time enjoy the splendid prospect. A glass of beer or wine would also certainly not be unwelcome; but the person who is out walking here recalls just in time that his excursion is not really all that strenuous. The toilsome mountains lie far off in the bluish, luminous, white-misted distance. He must frankly confess that his thirst is neither murderous nor heathenish, since till now he has had to cover only relatively short stretches of the road. Indeed, it is here a question more of a delicate, gentle walk than of a voyage or excursion, more of a subtle circular stroll than a forced march; and therefore he justly, as well as wisely, declines to enter the house of joy and refreshment, and he takes his leave. All serious people who read this will certainly accord him affluent applause for his fine decision and goodwill. Did I not, as much as an hour ago, take the opportunity of announcing a young songstress? Now she enters.

Enters, that is, at a ground-level window.

For now I returned from the forest recess to the highway, and there I heard        —

But stop! Relax in brief respite. Writers who understand their profession take the same as easily as possible. From time to time they like to lay their pens aside a while. Uninterrupted writing fatigues, like digging.

What I heard from the ground-level window was the most
delicious, fresh folk or opera song, a matutinal banquet of sound, a morning concert, which entered my astonished ears completely free of charge. A young girl still a schoolgirl, but slim already and tall, was standing in her bright dress at a drab suburban window, and this girl was singing out and up into the blue air simply ecstatically. Most agreeably surprised, and enchanted by the unexpected song, I stood a little to the side lest I might disturb the singer and rob myself both of my attendance and of my pleasure. The song which the little one sang seemed to be of a cheerful and delicious nature; the notes had the very sound itself of young innocent joy in life and in love; they flew, like angel figures wearing the snow-white plumage of delight, up into the heavens, whence they seemed to fall down again and to die smiling. It was like dying from affliction, dying perhaps also from too delicate a delight, like a too exultant loving and living and a powerlessness to live any more because of a too rich and beautiful vision of life, so that to some extent its tender thought, overflowing with joy and love, rushing exuberantly into being, seemed to fall over itself and break itself in pieces. When the girl has finished her simple but rich and charming song, her melodious Mozartian or shepherd girl's aria, I went up to her, greeted her, asked her for permission to congratulate her on her beautiful voice, and complimented her on her extraordinarily spiritual performance. The little songstress, who looked like a doe, or a sort of antelope in girl's form, looked at me with her beautiful brown eyes full of question and surprise. She had a very delicate, gentle face, and she gave me a captivating and polite smile. “To you,” I said to her, “if you know how to train carefully and tend your beautiful, young, and rich voice, a process which will require your own intelligence as well as that of others, belongs a brilliant future and a great career; for to me you seem, I frankly and honestly confess, to be the great operatic singer of the future
in person! You are obviously clever, you are tender and supple, and you possess, if my suppositions do not entirely deceive me, a most decidedly courageous soul. You have fire, and an evident nobility of heart; this I just heard in the song which you sang so beautifully and really well. You have talent, but more: you have indubitably genius! And now I speak no vain and untrue words. I take it upon myself therefore to ask you to pay very special attention to your noble gift, to preserve it from deformity, mutilation, and thoughtless premature exhaustion. At present, I can only tell you in all sincerity that you sing exceedingly well, and that this is something very serious; for it means much; it means above all that you will be expected industriously to sing a little bit further every day. Practice and sing with wise, beautiful moderation. The extent and scope of the treasure in your possession you yourself certainly know not at all. In your vocal accomplishment there sounds already a high degree of natural grace, a rich sum of unsuspecting vigorous being and life, and an abundance of poetry and humanity. It is permissible to tell you, and to give you positive assurance, that you therefore promise to become in every way a genuine singer, because it is likely that you are a person who is compelled to sing by her very inmost nature, and who appears only to live, and only to be able to enjoy life, when she begins to sing, thus transforming all her actual delight in life into the art of song, whence all that is humanly and personally significant, all that is suffused with soul, all that is full of understanding, ascends into something higher, into an ideal. In a beautiful song there is always a concentration and compression of experience, perception, and feeling, an explosive aggregate of condensed life and animation of the soul, and with such a song, a woman who makes good use of her situation, and mounts the ladder of her opportunities, may as a star in the firmament of music move profoundly the hearts of many people, amass great wealth,
transport a public to demonstrations of stormy and enthusiastic applause, and draw down upon herself the sincere love and admiration of kings and of queens.”

Serious, and astonished, the girl listened to the words I spoke, though I uttered them certainly more for my own delight than in any hope that the little thing might appreciate and understand them, for she lacked the necessary maturity.

From afar I can already see a railway crossing which I shall have to traverse; but, at present, I have not got that far; for I shall have, it must be clearly realized, two or three important commissions to execute, and several insuperable arrangements to make. On these commissions a report must be drawn up, or delivered, in as much detail, and with as much precision, as possible. It will generously be permitted me to remark that I have in passing to present myself with all expediency at an elegant gentleman's outfitters or tailor's workshop to discuss a new suit which I must try on and have tailored. Second, I have to pay off heavy taxes in the local office or town hall; and third, I ought to take a noteworthy letter to the post office and throw it into the letter box. It will be seen how much I have to do, and how this apparently idle and easygoing walk is full of practical business affairs, and people will therefore, I hope, be so good as to excuse my loitering, appreciate my delays, and approve the long-winded discussions with professional and clerical people; yes, perhaps even welcome them as acceptable adjuncts and contributions to the entertainment. For all consequent lengths, breadths, and heights I humbly request in advance the reader's pardon. Has a provincial or metropolitan author ever been more diffident and courteous toward the circle of his readers? I hardly think so, and therefore, with my conscience utterly clear, I continue my little chat and narrative and report the following:

God bless my soul! It's high time I went over to Frau Aebi for
my dinner, or lunch. This very minute it is striking half past twelve. As luck would have it, the lady lives very near indeed to where I am standing; I need only slip, smooth as an eel, into the house, as into a loophole, and as into a shelter for poor starvelings and pitiful distressed gentlefolk.

FRAU AEBI

received me most magnanimously. My punctuality was a masterpiece. It is known how rare masterpieces are. Frau Aebi smiled when she saw me arriving, really most kindly. She offered me, in a cordial and winning way, which in a manner of speaking enchanted me, her nice little hand, and led me at once into the dining room, where she requested me to sit at the table, a request which I naturally and with the utmost conceivable pleasure, and completely without restraint, fulfilled. Without making the least ridiculous fuss, I began harmlessly and without reserve to eat and stoutly help myself, and I was a long way from guessing what was in store for me. Anyway, I began boldly to help myself and stoutly to eat. Such boldness, as is well known, costs not much in the way of sacrifice. With some surprise, however, I observed that Frau Aebi was watching me with something like devotion. This was quite noticeable. Obviously, it moved her deeply to watch how I helped myself and ate. This curious situation astonished me, but I attributed no major significance to it. The moment I wanted to supply a little conversation and diversion, Frau Aebi stopped me and said that she declined all forms of diversion with the greatest pleasure. This curious phrase took me aback, and I began to be anxious and afraid. Quite secretly I began to be terrified in Frau Aebi's presence. When I wanted to stop cutting it up and popping it in, because I distinctly felt that I was full, she said to me in an almost
delicate manner and tone of voice, through which gently shuddered a maternal rebuke: “But you are not eating! Wait, I'll cut you another big juicy slice.” A sense of dread rippled through me, and I plucked up the courage to object, politely and courteously, that my main purpose in coming here had been to deploy a certain intellectuality, whereupon Frau Aebi, smiling most captivatingly, said that she did not think this to be at all necessary. “I cannot possibly go on eating,” I said, in a dull muffled voice. I was almost suffocating, and was already perspiring with terror. Frau Aebi said: “I cannot possibly believe that you want to stop cutting it up and popping it in, and I do not think that you are really full at all. Quite definitely you are not telling the truth when you say that you are just about suffocating. I am compelled to consider that as mere politeness. I decline any form of intellectual chat, as I have already said, with pleasure. Certainly your main purpose in coming to me was to prove and demonstrate that you have a good appetite and are a big eater. This consideration I cannot under any circumstances forego. I would cordially ask you to be sensible and accommodate yourself to the inevitable; for I can assure you that there is no possibility that you will leave this table before you have eaten up and polished off everything that I have cut, and will cut, off for you. I am afraid you are helplessly vanquished; for you must realize that there are housewives who compel their guests to help themselves and pack themselves to the brim, until they burst. A deplorable, lamentable fate awaits you; but you must endure it bravely. Each of us in due course has to make some great sacrifice. So obey and eat. For to obey surely is sweet. What harm is done, if you perish in the attempt? Here, this most delicate, delicious, and large slice you must certainly demolish, I know you will. Courage, my good friend! We all need to be brave. What worth are we, if we persist forever steadfast in our own will? Concentrate all your strength,
and compel yourself to do the loftiest deed, to endure the most difficult trial, and to survive the most arduous struggle. You cannot believe how glad I am to watch you eat till you drop unconscious. You cannot imagine how disappointed I would be if you were to refuse me this; but you will do it, won't you? You'll bite your best and help yourself, won't you, even if you are so full that your back teeth are floating?”