"Faster," said Köster.
The tyres began to whistle. Trees, telegraph poles flew humming past. A village clattered by. I was now perfectly clear-headed.
"Step on it," said Köster.
"Can I hold him still, then? The road's wet."
"You'll feel it. Come into third before the bends and accelerate round."
The engine bellowed. The air beat against my face. I crouched behind the windscreen. And suddenly I merged into the thunder of the engine, car and body became one, one single tension, one high vibration; I felt the wheels under my feet, I felt the earth, the road, the speed—with a jolt something slipped into place, the night howled and blew; it drove everything else out of me; my lips pressed together, my hands became vises and I was now simply driving and racing, unconscious and at the same time utterly alert.
At one bend the car skidded, behind. I steered against it, once, twice, and accelerated. For an instant everything was loose like a balloon, then the car took on again.
"Good," said Köster.
"It was wet leaves," I replied and was conscious of the warmth and relief that pours over the skin after every danger.
Köster nodded. "That's the devil of forest turns in autumn. Have a cigarette?"
"Yes," said I.
We pulled up and smoked. "You can turn round now," said Köster then.
I drove back to the city and got out. "It was good that we went, Otto. I'm over it now."
"I'll show you another curve technique next time," said
he. "Throwing round with the brake. But you can only do it when the roads are drier."
"Right, Otto. Sleep well."
"Sleep well, Bob."
Karl swept off. I went into the house. I was exhausted, but quite calm and no longer depressed.
Chapter XXIII
At the beginning of November we sold the Citroën. The money sufficed to carry on the workshop for a while, but week by week our position went from bad to worse. People put up their cars for the winter to save petrol and tax, and repairs became ever less frequent. We helped ourselves out with the taxi but the takings were too slender for three, so that I was quite glad when the proprietor of the International offered to take me on again as pianist every night from December on. He had done pretty well lately; a cattlemen's club had taken one of the back rooms at the International for their weekly meeting, then the horsedealers' club followed suit, and finally the Mutual Benefit Cremation Society. In this way I was able to leave the taxi to Lenz and Köster, and it suited me quite well anyway, for without it I should often have been at a loss to get through the evenings.
Pat wrote to me regularly. I waited eagerly for her letters, but I could not picture to myself how she lived; and sometimes, in the dark, dirty December weeks when it did not get really light even at midday, I could fancy that she had long ago slipped from me and all was over. It seemed to me an endless time since she had gone away, and I could not think that she would ever come back. Then came nights filled with desperate, wild longing, when there was no help but to go and sit with the pros'titutes and cattlemen and drink till morning.
The proprietor had obtained permission to keep the International open on Christmas Eve. There was to be a grand carnival for the bachelors of the various clubs. The president of the cattlemen's club, Stefan Grigoleit, presented two suckling-pigs and a number of trotters. He had been two years a widower and had a soft heart, so he wanted to spend Christmas in company.
The proprietor erected a twelve-foot silver fir tree beside the bar; Rosa, who was an authority in all homely matters, undertook the decoration of the tree. Marian and Kiki, the pansy, who as a result of his defect had considerable feeling for the beautiful, helped her. The three started their work at noon. They used up a vast quantity of coloured balls, candles and tinsel, but there was no denying at the finish that the tree did look magnificent. As a special compliment to Grigoleit, a number of pink little marzipan pigs were hung on it.
I had lain down on the bed in the afternoon to sleep for a few hours. When I waked it was dark. I had to think a moment—whether it was night or morning. I had been dreaming, but had forgotten what it was about. But I was still far away, and imagined I heard a black door slam behind me. Then I realized someone was knocking.
"Who's there?" I called.
"It's me, Herr Lohkamp."
I recognised Frau Zalewski's voice.
"Come in," said I, "the door's open." The latch creaked and I saw Frau Zalewski standing in the doorway against the yellow light of the passage.
"Frau Hasse's here," she whispered. "Come, quick. I can't tell her."
I did not move. I needed to find myself first. "Send her to the police," I then answered.
"Herr Lohkamp!" Frau Zalewski raised her hands.
"There's nobody else here. You must help me. After all you are a Christian."
She stood in the rectangle of the doorway like a black, dancing shadow.
"Cut it out," said I peevishly. "I'm coming."
I put on my things and went out. Frau Zalewski was waiting for me.
"Does she know anything yet?" I asked.
She shook her head and pressed her handkerchief to her lips.
"Where is she then?"
"In her old room."
Frida was standing at the kitchen door sweating with excitement. "She's got a hat on all over egrets, and a diamond brooch," she whispered.
"See to it that blathering kitchen slut doesn't listen," said I to Frau Zalewski and went in.
Frau Hasse was by the window. She swung round as I entered. She had obviously been expecting somebody else.
It was idiotic, but my first glance went to the hat and the brooch though I did not intend it. Frida was right; the hat was blatant, the brooch less so. The whole person was pretty much got-up, like that of one who would show another how well he was doing. On the whole, she didn't look so bad; better anyway than all the years she had been here.
"Hasse's at work still on Christmas Eve, I suppose, eh?" she asked sharply.
"No," said I.
"Where is he then? On holiday?"
She came up to me swaying her hips. I smelt her strong perfume. "What do you want with him then?" I asked.
"Get my things. Settle up. After all, part of it belongs to me."
"You don't have to, any more," said I. "It all belongs to you now."
She stared at me.
"He's dead," said I.
I would rather have said it differently. With more preparation, and gradually. But I didn't know how to begin. Besides my head was still muddled from the afternoon sleep—that sleep that brings a man near to suicide when he wakes.
Frau Hasse was standing in the middle of the room, and in a most extraordinary way I saw quite distinctly, the moment I told her, that if she fell over there was nothing she would hit herself against. It was curious, but I saw nothing else and thought nothing else.
She didn't fall, of course. She stood and looked at me.
"So," she said, "so—" Only the feathers of her egret hat trembled. Then suddenly, before I could realise what was happening, I saw the scented, made-up woman grow old before my eyes. It was as if time beat down on her like rain in a thunderstorm, every second a year—the strain broke, the triumph was extinguished, the face decayed. Wrinkles crept into it like worms; and then, as with a groping, uncertain movement she reached toward the back of a chair and sat down as if she were afraid of breaking something, it might have been no longer the same woman—so weary, dilapidated and old did she look.
"What did he have?" she asked without moving her lips.
"It happened suddenly," said I. "Quite suddenly."
She was not listening. She was looking at her hands.
"What shall I do?" she murmured. "Whatever shall I do now?"
I waited some time; I felt disgusting. "But surely you have somebody you can go to," said I at last. "It would be as well not to stay here. You wouldn't want to stay here anyway—"
"T
hat's all different now, though," she replied, without looking up. "Whatever shall I do—"
"But surely you've somebody waiting for you. Go to him and talk it over with him. Then after Christmas go to the District Police. The things are there, the bank balance as well. You have to report there to draw the money."
"Money, money," she murmured dully. "What money?"
"Quite a bit. Twelve hundred marks more or less."
She lifted her head. Her eyes suddenly had a mad lo"ok. "No," she shrieked; "it isn't true!"
I made no reply. "Say it isn't true," she whispered.
"Perhaps it isn't," said I. "On the other hand he may have been quietly keeping back the odd penny in case of need."
She stood up. She was suddenly completely changed. Her movements had something jerky and mechanical about them. She brought her face up quite close to mine.
"Yes, it is true," she hissed. "I feel it's true! The wretch! Oh, the wretch! To let me go through all that, and then it's like this. But I will take it and I'll chuck it away all in one night, chuck it out on the street I will, so that nothing is left of it. Nothing. Nothing."
I kept silent. I had done enough. She was over the start, she knew Hasse was dead, the rest she must now settle herself. She would probably be bowled over again when she heard that he had hanged himself, but that was her own affair. Hasse couldn't be brought to life again on her account.
She was crying now. Tears simply welled out of her. She cried in a high, plaintive way like a child. It lasted some time. I would have given anything to be able to smoke a cigarette. I can't bear seeing people cry.
At last she did stop. She dried her face, mechanically took out her powder box and powdered herself without looking in the glass. Then she put the box away again but forgot to close her handbag. "I don't know anything any more," said she in a broken voice. "I don't know anything. He was probably a good husband."
"He was that."
I gave her the address of the District Police and told her it would be closed to-day. I thought it better she should not go there at once. She had had enough for to-day.
When she had gone Frau Zalewski came out of her sitting room. "Is there no one here but me, then?" I asked, furious with myself.
"Only Herr Georg. What did she say?"
"Nothing."
"So much the better."
"All depends. Sometimes it isn't better."
"I've no pity for her," declared Frau Zalewski energetically. "Not the least."
"Pity is the most useless article in the world," said I irritably. "It's the reverse side of gloating, you ought to know that. What's the time now?"
"Quarter to seven."
"I want to telephone Fräulein Hollmann at seven o'clock. But so that nobody hears. Is that possible?"
"There's nobody in, except Herr Georg. I've sent Frida off already. If you like you could sit in the kitchen. The cord reaches just that far."
"Good."
I knocked on Georg's door. It was a long time since I had been to see him. He was sitting at his desk and looked damned bad. About him lay a pile of torn-up paper.
"Day, Georg," said I, "what are you doing?"
"Stocktaking," he replied with a faint smile. "Good occupation for Christmas."
I stooped to look at one of the bits of paper. It was a college notebook with chemical formulae.
"Why this?" I asked.
"There's no object any more, Bob."
He looked pretty transparent. His ears were like wax. "What have "you had to eat to-day?" I asked.
"What does it matter? It's not that, anyway. Not food. But I simply can't go on any more. I must give up."
"Is that very bad?"
"Yes," said he.
"Georg," I replied calmly, "look at me now. Do you suppose I didn't once want to be something more than pianist in a whore shop, in the Café International?"
He kneaded his hands about. "I know, Bob. But that doesn't help me. For me it was everything. And now I see there's no object in it. There's no object in anything. What do we live for, I'd like to know."
I could not help laughing, he sat there so miserable and took it all in such grim earnest. "You silly ass," said I. "Why, now you've found out something. Do you suppose you're alone in your wonderful wisdom? Of course there's no object. One doesn't live for a purpose, anyway. It's not so simple as that these days. Come, you get dressed. You're coming along to the International with me. We're going to celebrate your coming of age. You've been a schoolboy up to now. I'm collecting you in half an hour."
"No," said he. He was damned far gone.
"Oh, yes you are," said I. "You're going to do me the favour. I don't want to be by myself to-night."
He looked at me doubtfully. "If you like," he replied then despondently. "After all what does it matter."
"There, you see," said I, "already that's quite a good election slogan for a beginner."
At seven o'clock I put through the call to Pat. After seven the fee was half, so I could talk twice as long. I sat on the table in the hall and waited. I didn't want to go into the kitchen. It smelt too much there of haricot beans, and I didn't want to associate Pat with that.
A quarter of an hour later the call came through. Pat was at the instrument immediately. As I heard her warm, deep, slightly hesitant voice so close beside me, I became so excited I could hardly speak. It was a sort of tremour, a boiling of the blood, against which no effort of the will availed anything. . . .
"My God, Pat," said I, "are you really there?"
She laughed. "Where are you then, Robby? At the office?"
"No, I'm sitting on the table at Frau Zalewski's. How are you?"
"Well, darling."
"Are you up?"
"Yes. I'm sitting on the window seat in my room and have my white bathing dress on. It's snowing outside."
I suddenly saw her clearly before me. I saw the snowflakes whirling, I saw the fine, dark head, the straight shoulders, inclined slightly forward, the bronzed skin.
"My word, Pat," said I, "this damned money. If it weren't for that I'd be sitting in an aeroplane now and arrive there before the night's out."
"Ach, darling—"
She was silent. I listened in to the light scratching and humming of the wire. "Are you there still, Pat?"
"Yes, Robby. But you mustn't say things like that. It made me quite giddy."
"I feel damned giddy, too," said I. "Tell me everything you do up there."
She began to speak, but soon I no longer heard what she was saying. I heard only her voice, and as I sat there on the table in the dark hall, between the boar's head and the kitchen with the haricot beans, a door seemed to open and a wave of warmth and light came in, soothing and bright, full of dreams and desire and youth. I propped my feet against the table, I rested my head in my hand, I looked at the boar's head and the repulsive kitchen door, but I could not help myself—summer was all at once there; wind, sunset over the fields of corn, and the green light of the woodland path.
The voice ceased. I breathed deep. "It is lovely to talk to you, Pat. And to-night what are you doing there?"
"To-night there's a little party. It starts at eight o'clock. I'm just getting dressed for it."
"What are you going to wear? The silver dress?"
"Yes, Robby. The silver dress you carried me along the passage in."
"And whom are you going with?"
"Nobody. It's here in the sanatorium. Below in the hall. We all know each other, you see."
"It must be difficult for you in the silver dress not to be false to me."
She laughed. "Not in that at all. I have memories there."
"So have I. I've seen its effect. But I'm not asking for details, that's all. You can be false if you like, I only want not to know it. Afterwards, when you come back, it will only be like a dream to you and past and forgotten."
"Ach, Robby," said she slowly and her voice sounded deeper than before, "I can't be false to you. I think too much of you fo
r that. You don't know what it is like being up here. A beautiful sunshiny imprisonment. One amuses oneself as well as one can, that's all. When I think of your room, sometimes I don't know what to do; then I go to the station and watch the trains come up from below, and think I am nearer to you if I get into a compartment, or pretend I have come to meet someone."
I bit my lip. I had never heard her talk like that before. She had always been shy, and couched her liking in a gesture, a glance, rather than in words.