I'm Not Stiller

  'I've no idea whether it's the right one,' said Stiller in some embarrassment, when he finally handed over the little packet, once very elegant, now a trifle tattered from its long stay in his trousers pocket, and waited for Sibylle to open it. 'Iris gris!' she laughed. 'Is that the right one?' he asked, while Sibylle immediately unscrewed the little bottle and rubbed a few drops on the back of her hand. I think Iris gris is wonderful!' she said, and Stiller sniffed at her hand, the one and only hand at last, his disappointment growing at every breath. 'No,' he said, 'that's not it.' Sibylle sniffed too. 'But isn't it lovely?' she consoled him, without having to sham, and put the little bottle in her pocket. 'Thank you very much!'

  Soon afterwards Stiller paid, and they emptied their glasses, without having reached any agreement as to whether Sibylle was going back to her hotel or not. What did he intend? Stiller seemed to have completely made up his mind, but to what?

  'Drink up,' he said, without impatience, still seated but taking her fur coat from the nearby hook. 'It's not important,' remarked Sibylle, 'But I must tell you. It's really not important—' His lack of curiosity made it even more difficult to find the right words; Stiller seemed to suspect nothing yet, nothing at all. Or did he already know and really consider it unimportant? 'I'm a goose,' she smiled. 'I took revenge, you see, took revenge in such a silly way, two nights in succession with two different men—' Stiller didn't seem to hear, didn't seem to understand, he said nothing and didn't even wince; and then the fat innkeeper's wife came back with the change and took the opportunity of asking whether the lady and gentleman would like breakfast in their room or not. She stayed by their table as a gesture of hospitality. The relentless conversation about avalanches, the weather in general, and hotel-keeping after a world war, lasted almost ten minutes.

  When they were at last alone together again, Stiller asked with her fur coat on his knees: 'What did you mean by that?' Sibylle looked at the beer mat he was twisting round on the table, and repeated it with a clarity which seemed to her now, however Stiller might take it, indispensable, her last chance to make a clean breast of things: 'Two nights in succession I slept with two different men—that's what I mean...' Now he knew. And the future (thought Sibylle) now depended solely on Stiller's reaction to this monstrous trifle.

  The revelling railwaymen threw down their cards, one of them wiped the slate clean with a sponge, now that it was settled who had to pay, and the commentary on the lost game, which there was no changing now, turned to yawns. It was eleven o'clock. With their railwaymen's caps already on their heads they, too, wished the couple, who were left alone in the bar-parlour, a good night 'together'. Stiller went on fiddling with the beer mat. 'I know that—' he said. 'Only I never told anyone. Anyway, it was a long time ago. I knew perfectly well whom I loved, but all the same—! I was actually on my way to her, yes, it was the eve of our reunion. I suddenly went into a skid—in just the same way,' he said putting down the beer mat. 'I know that...' He had no more to say. 'Went into a skid,' this expression evidently consoled Sibylle greatly, it restored to her the possibility, even the certainty of afterwards getting back on the road. And that evening (so she says) she still believed it might be a road they could travel together.

  This proved to be an error.

  The following morning—after a wretched night—they said good-bye to one another at the little station of Pontresina. When the train at last began to move, Sibylle continued to stand like a statue on a plinth, and both of them, Stiller at the open window, Sibylle on the platform, waved a half-hearted farewell. (Since then Sibylle, my public prosecutor's wife, has never seen the missing Stiller again.) She herself walked slowly back to the hotel, asked for her bill, packed, and left the same day. It was impossible simply to return to Rolf now, she felt, and Redwood City seemed to be the solution; she had to work, to be alone, to earn her own living. Otherwise she would have felt a helpless victim, not knowing where she belonged; the road from woman to whore had proved astonishingly short. In Ziirich Rolf welcomed her with the opening remark that he was willing to have a divorce. Sibylle left it to him to make the necessary arrangements and asked his permission to take little Hannes with her to Redwood City. Their conversation was confined to the future, to practical problems. As regards Hannes, their joint son, it was difficult to decide what was best for the child himself: Rolf asked for twenty-four hours in which to think it over. Then to her amazement, he agreed. Sibylle thanked him by weeping on his hands, and shortly before Christmas, after being accompanied to the Central Station by her husband, left for Le Havre, where she embarked for America.

  ***

  My friend the public prosecutor informs me that the final hearing (with the verdict) is fixed for Tuesday week.

  ***

  America brought Sibylle a period of almost monastic solitude. She stayed in New York. When young Sturzenegger came over from California to fetch the secretary he really didn't need, Sibylle had already found another job—thanks to her knowledge of European languages, a pretty good job. She was proud. And Sturzenegger, who didn't take it to heart, went back to his Redwood City alone after entertaining Sibylle to a French supper in Greenwich Village. There was no more skidding. The road, her road, was pretty hard. For the first time Sibylle, the daughter of rich parents, found herself in the same position as other people, namely alone and responsible for herself, dependent on her abilities, dependent on demand, dependent on the moods and good faith of an employer. Strangely enough, it gave her a sense of freedom. Her work was dull, she had to translate business letters into German, French, and Italian, always more or less the same ones. And the first home of her own she had ever had was such that even when the sun was shining outside she could scarcely read or sew without the electric light, hardly ever dared to open a window because everything immediately became covered in soot, and had to put wax in her ears in order to sleep. Sibylle was aware that millions of people lived in worse conditions than she and that therefore she had no right to complain. Complaint was altogether out of the question, if only because of Rolf. Fortunately, she was able to leave Hannes in a German-Jewish children's home during the day. She spent her free time, whenever the weather permitted, with Hannes in the nearby Central Park, where there were trees...

  She began, as the saying goes, a new life.

  Once, in February, Sibylle had a bit of a fright, though she doesn't know to this day whether the fright was based on mere fancy or on reality. They were sitting in Central Park again, Hannes and she, feeding the squirrels; the sun was warm, snow still lay in the shady hollows, the ponds were still partly frozen, but the birds were twittering and spring was on its way. The ground was damp; they were sitting on the slate-black Manhattan rock, and Sibylle was as merry as Rumpelstiltskin, so secret and incognito did she feel in this huge city. Between leafless branches they saw the familiar silhouettes of the skyscrapers in the bluish haze; at the edge of the great park, beyond the silence, there was a ghostly hum and every now and then the hoot of a siren came from way over on the Hudson. A policeman rode along in the black dusty earth of the bridle path. Boys were playing baseball. Here and there on the long benches sat a man reading a newspaper, or a pair of lovers strolled past, then a lady leading her dog to one of the rare trees. Sibylle enjoyed the fact that she knew nobody. She only saw the man, who walked past behind her, from the back, but for a moment she was absolutely certain it was Stiller, and Sibylle was within an ace of involuntarily calling out. Of course she talked herself out of it. How could Stiller be wandering about New York? A trace of disquiet remained, nonetheless, half hope, half fear that it might really be Stiller. Sibylle took Hannes by the hand and walked through the park, not to look for him but rather to run away; all the same, she had to go in the same direction. Of course, as she expected, she did not see the man again.

  She had completely forgotten this figment of her imagination (as no doubt it was) when, a few days later, as she was being carried down into the subway on the escalator, she saw him being car
ried upwards. It was impossible to get off. Had he not stared at her, even if he had made no sign of greeting? The unlikelihood was her consolation. Or was Stiller trailing her? In any case, when he reached the top of the escalator, the man she had taken for Stiller did not walk on, but immediately crossed over to the escalator coming down. There was a terrible crush, which made calm observation impossible, quite apart from her inner turmoil. What did a U.S. Army greatcoat mean in America? Later Sibylle talked herself out of it again; she had stared so hard at the man on the escalator that he might have fancied his chances, although he didn't know Sibylle, and that was why he had turned back. Could be. At the moment Sibylle acted completely mechanically; she forced her way into the nearest compartment of some underground train or other, the doors closed and off they went. For a few weeks she felt nervous every time she went out into the street, but in vain; she never again saw a man who might have been confused with Stiller.

  Her work, as I have said, was dull. She sat in a room devoid of daylight, convinced after a week that she couldn't stand this unnatural state of affairs. No idea whether it was raining outside or brilliant sunshine, no awareness of the time of the day, never a breath of air that smelt of storm or people or leaves or even of rain-wet asphalt—and it was all the more frightful because Sibylle was absolutely the only one who missed anything: she thought she would suffocate with all the air-conditioning. The certainty that it would be exactly the same in any better-class firm rendered her utterly helpless. What alternative had she but the diligence bom of desperation? As a result, she was highly valued, and when she gave notice after a year they kept her on by doubling her salary.

  Now Sibylle was able to afford another, more cheerful apartment, two rooms with a so-called roof garden on Riverside Drive looking out on the broad Hudson. And here, on the eighteenth floor, she was blissfully happy. She and Hannes sunned themselves in the shelter of a red party-wall, from where they could see a great deal of sky and even some landscape—forest. And to the east the sea. Even in the hazy distance Hannes could already distinguish whether it was the he-de-France or the Qjteen Mary coming into port. And in the evening, when darkness fell, the curving garland of lights on the Washington Bridge was right in front of their window. Here Sibylle lived for almost two years. The idea of returning to Switzerland occurred to her less and less often.

  She liked life in America very much (she says) without being thrilled by it; she enjoyed its strangeness. Yet she had never seen the true America, the West. Sibylle planned to travel across to the opposite coast, to see Arizona, Texas, the flowers in California; but she was an employee, and that meant she could live, live well even, just so long as she sat in front of her typewriter and typed: in return she had the freedom of her week-ends, which covered a radius of no less than a hundred miles. She loved New York. During the first few weeks it seemed to her that nothing was easier than associating with Americans. They were all so open, so easy-going; she made more friendships, or so it seemed, than at any time in her life. She also enjoyed being so unmolested as a woman, indeed, it was as though on landing in America she had ceased to be a woman; in spite of all the sympathy people showed her they treated her as though she were completely neuter. After her recent experience this was a boon, of course, at least at first. And even later (so she says) she had no desire for a man, certainly not for an American man. She had 'friends', in the American sense; most of them had cars, and that was not unimportant, especially in summer, when it was so hot in New York. In time, however, this lack of any atmosphere, such as exists even in Switzerland, began to irritate her. It was not easy to say what was really lacking. Everyone praised her new spring dress, her look of good health, her son; compared with Switzerland in particular, it was simply delightful how lavish people were with praise. But suddenly Sibylle wondered whether they so much as saw what they were praising at all. It was remarkable to discover (she says) how wonderful and great was the diversity of erotic play; Sibylle had never realized it so clearly as here, where this diversity doesn't exist. When she left a restaurant, when she left a subway, when she left a social gathering, she never had the feeling of being missed by a man in that enchanting way which somehow uplifts both parties, without their making an effort to see one another again. Never, in the street, did she encounter that quick glance of purposeless delight, never in conversation was there any hint of the exciting realization that people are divided into two sexes. Everything remained on a comradely level and as far as it went very nice; but a tension was missing, a wealth of subtle radiations, a playful artistry, a magic, a threat, the exciting possibility of living complications. It was flat, not unintelligent, heavens alive, the place was seething with cultured people; but it was lifeless, somehow without charm, naive. Then Sibylle felt like a woman under a cap of invisibility: seen by no one, no, not seen, they heard what she said and found it amusing, interesting, may be, but it was a meeting in a vacuum chamber. It was funny: they talked about 'sex problems' with such premature candour, with the enlightened frankness of eunuchs who don't know what they are talking about. Nobody here seemed to see any difference between sex and eroticism. And when they took their exuberant deficiency for health, no, it wasn't always funny, it was tedious. What had New York not got to offer! It was a shame to be bored here. The concerts alone! But life itself, everyday existence, shopping, lunch at the drugstore, travelling by bus, waiting at a station, the hustle and bustle that makes up nine-tenths of our life, was so immensely practical, so intensely lustreless.

  Sibylle often went into the Italian quarter, to buy vegetables she said; in reality she went to see, hungry for something worth seeing. Or did the fault lie with Sibylle? After about half a year she had the bitter feeling that she had disappointed everyone. She had a little book full of addresses, but she no longer dared ring anybody up. How had she disappointed all these friendly friends? She didn't know and nobody told her. She was seriously depressed by it. Meanwhile, and this perplexed Sibylle even more, she had forfeited nothing; if she met one of her friends by chance, they said Hallo Sibylle! just like the first time, and there was no trace of disappointment on the other side. Apparently all these frank and easy-going people did not expect anything else from a human relationship; there was no need for this friendly relationship to go on growing. That was the saddest thing for Sibylle: after twenty minutes you have got as far with these people as after half a year, as after many years, nothing more is added. Friendship stops at sincere good wishes for the other's well-being. People have friends simply to make life pleasant, and then there are psychiatrists, like motor mechanics for the inner life, if a person has defects and cannot patch himself up. Anyhow, you shouldn't burden your friends with a gloomy face; in fact they have nothing else to give than a quite general and non-committal optimism. It was better to lie in the sun in the little roof garden. And yet, in spite of all the trouble Sibylle had with this carefree lack of content that characterizes the vast majority of Americans, she was far from the idea of returning to Switzerland...

  After a correspondence that had gradually died away, after a mutual silence that threatened to become final, Rolf, her husband, rang her one afternoon at her office. 'Where are you speaking from?' she asked. 'Here,' answered Rolf, 'at La Guar-dia. I've just landed. How can I meet you?' He had to wait till five o'clock, since Sibylle couldn't simply walk out, and in the end it was getting on for six when Sibylle, the secretary, appeared in the agreed hotel lobby on Times Square. 'How are you?' they asked one another. 'Fine, thank you,' they both replied. Sibylle led him across Times Square. 'How long are you staying here?' she asked; but naturally they could scarcely talk in the crush. She took Rolf, the bewildered newcomer, up the Rockefeller Tower to show him something of New York right away. 'Are you in New York on business?' she asked and then corrected herself: 'I mean professionally?' They were sitting in the famous Rainbow Bar and had to order something. 'No,' said Rolf, i'm here on your account. On our account...'

  They found one another pretty much unch
anged, only a little older. Sibylle showed him the latest snap of Hannes. 'He's no kid any more, no, he's a regular guy already!' Rolf cut her short after a bit. 'I've come,' he said, 'to ask you—I mean, either we must get a divorce or we must live together. But once and for all.' They didn't ask one another anything else. 'In which direction do you live?' inquired Rolf, and Sibylle showed him the district, pointing out the play of lights, the incredibly colourful dusk over Manhattan; but not everybody finds the woman of his life again as he is looking at it...

  'Babylon,' exclaimed Rolf, who had to look down again and again at this net of shimmering strings of beads, this skein of light, this endless flowerbed of electric blossoms. One is astonished that in these depths down below, whose sounds are no longer audible, in this labyrinth of rectangular windows threaded by gleaming canals, which is repeated over and over again with no change, a person does not get lost every minute; that this never-ending movement from one place to another does not stop for a moment, or pile up into a hopeless chaos. Here and there it is dammed up into a pond filled with a white-hot glow—Times Square, for instance. The skyscrapers tower black all round, vertical, yet spread out from one another by perspective like a cluster of crystals, larger and smaller crystals, thicker and thinner. At times trails of brightly coloured mist drift past, as though one were sitting on a mountain top, and for a while there is no more New York: the Atlantic has engulfed it. Then it is there again, half order as though on a chessboard, half confusion as though the Milky Way had fallen down from the sky. Sibylle pointed out the districts whose names she knew: Brooklyn behind a curtain of bridges, Staten Island, Harlem. Later everything became even more colourful; the skyscrapers no longer rose like black towers before the yellow dusk, now it was as though the night had swallowed up their bodies, and what remained were the lights in them, the hundreds of thousands of electric light bulbs, a screen of whitish and yellowish windows, nothing else, thus they hovered above the bright haze that was roughly the colour of apricots, and in the streets, as though in canyons, ran streams of glittering quicksilver.