Then suddenly a stretch of road, proper paved road. And they stop behind the dark, windowless back wall of an immense-seeming building.
The farmer jumps out and holds open a door.
‘Gentlemen, step inside.’
A dark door opens silently in the dark façade. They go inside, half numb from their ride, with stiff legs.
And as they walk in, for all of them the penny drops: ‘My God, we’re in Altholm! This is the auction room for Jersey cattle!’
One of them says audibly, through gritted teeth: ‘Fucking farmers!’
VI
The enormous room is completely dark.
On the other side, on the platform, there are a couple of candles stood on a table. Two plain stearine candles on a couple of chipped enamel candlesticks.
The gentlemen grope towards the two flickering points of light. They bump into overturned benches, chairs, railings and pillars. They lose contact with each other, call out to one another in stage whispers that seem to come from all over, and finally all meet up again at the foot of the stage.
‘Who’s our spokesman?’
And Manzow: ‘Me, of course.’
The door to the left of the stage opens and two men walk on. A tall, strongly built man a few of them can recognize: Franz Reimers, the leader of the Bauernschaft.
And another, in horn-rims. He too is familiar to a few: Padberg of the Bauernschaft newspaper.
Manzow starts speaking right away:
‘Thank you, gentlemen, for keeping your word in the end. You’ve had your fun with us. Well, we don’t mind that, so long as the end result is good.
‘Well, gentlemen, what I suggest is this: We put an end to ceremony and the atmospheric lighting, and sit down somewhere, if you’re agreed, where we can get a mug of beer and a shot of corn, and say what’s on our minds. How about it?’
Every word of Manzow’s was repeated by a slavish echo. Anyhow, it’s dispiriting enough to be speaking at the feet of people towering above you on a stage. The friendliness sounded off, the mateyness forced.
Reimers the farmer says:
‘The Altholm representatives wish to know under what conditions the farmers are prepared to forgive the humiliation done to them, and conclude peace with the town of Altholm.
‘The conditions are these:
‘One: The return of our flag, with all honour.
‘Two: The immediate dismissal of the guilty parties Frerksen and Gareis.
‘Three: Criminal proceedings and punishment of the police officers who assaulted farmers with naked weapons.
‘Four: A lifelong and adequate pension for injured farmers.
‘Five: A fine of ten thousand marks.
‘If the representatives of Altholm here present are prepared to accept these conditions, I have drawn up a document which they can sign, as liable bondsmen.
‘And no discussion.’
‘But Herr Reimers,’ calls Manzow, half indignant, half amused. ‘We can’t do that. The flag was seized by the prosecution office. How can we sack public officials? How can we predict the outcome of legal cases—?’
‘Do you accept the conditions?’
‘But how can we—?’
The candles on the stage are snuffed out. A door bangs. The gentlemen are left standing in the dark.
VII
It’s after midnight when they finally find their way out of the hall, with matches and curses.
There are incidents: Medical Councillor Dr Lienau takes a tumble, loses touch with the rest of the group, and is brought to light much later by a rescue expedition, with barked shins and swearing horribly. He claims bitterly that the hall is full of hidden farmers, who under cover of darkness were hitting him.
Then Dr Hüppchen’s quiet squeal is heard, the sound of a slap, and Toleis’s low voice gruffs: ‘Doctor, you’re a pervert!’
(How come Toleis is in the hall? He was meant to stay and watch the car.)
Finally the last of them emerge through the dark doorway, standing under the night sky, which has never seemed purer or clearer.
They stand there at a loss as to what to do, but Manzow declares: ‘We can’t break up like this. First we have to talk about what we’ll tell the others. Anyway, I’m thirsty.’
‘So am I.’
‘Me too.’
‘All of us are.’
‘I suggest,’ Manzow proclaims, ‘Toleis drives us all to the Red Nook. There we can say what we have to say and remain undisturbed.’
‘Oh dear, does it have to be such an off-colour place!’ begs the doctor.
‘If we go, then so can you,’ says Manzow.
‘Anyway, it’s almost midnight, and no one will see us.’
A quarter of an hour later, they’re at Minchen Wendehals’s in the Red Nook, comfortably ensconced around a big corner table.
It’s a pleasant nook they’re sitting in, with cheerful wallpaper and agreeable low lighting, separated from the other bar by a curtain. The waitress is neither unsettlingly attractive nor simply too tarty, and they’re over the initial surprise that—with the exception of Dr Hüppchen—she knows them all by their first names.
They’re also agreed that they will order and pay collectively. Only they’re not quite sure what that means in precise terms. But when the six pork knuckles arrive, with sauerkraut and mushy peas on the side, that doesn’t seem to matter all that much.
The gentlemen tuck in. Beer and schnapps are also there in abundance.
Suddenly Textil-Braun emits a cry: ‘I say, gentlemen, look . . .’
In their initial hunger, no one had paid any attention to Dr Hüppchen; now they’re all staring in horror at his plate.
The vegetarian has scorned his meat, but the raw-food man has compromised to the extent that he ate his peas and his sauerkraut. But the teetotaller didn’t want beer and schnapps, he secretly ordered himself some raspberry juice, and now—hideous to behold—he has poured some of it over his cabbage and mushy peas.
‘What’s the matter, gentlemen? It’s delicious!’
And he raises a forkful to his mouth.
‘Doctor!!!’
‘Do me a favour, will you, and eat that somewhere we don’t have to see it.’
‘But just try—’
Manzow complains: ‘I can feel my gorge rising, and my teeth are on edge.’
And Lienau: ‘That’s so warped. The French eat shit like that.’
Dr Hüppchen flushes: ‘But you don’t have to look!—Of course, if it does put you off . . .’
After all, the gentlemen are clients of his accountancy office, also he is syndic of the small-business group. So he swings his chair round, turns his back on the company, and eats with his plate on his knee.
All are relieved.
‘Your mother must have been a strange woman!’
‘I pity whoever marries you, Doctor!’
‘Who’s going to marry him?! Toleis, do you want to marry the doctor . . . ?’
Because they’ve brought Toleis in with them, partly because they’re not sure if they can find their way home in one or two hours by themselves, and partly to be sure of getting his silence.
That’s really the most important thing, the silence, and no sooner is the table cleared, and the waitress sent away, than Manzow rises to his feet.
‘Gentlemen! After today’s ordeal, I know we’re all longing for the pleasurable part of the evening . . . So I’ll try and keep it short.
‘The committee has, for the moment, let’s say, failed in its task. No fault of ours. With the patience of saints we endured an undignified drive and contemptuous treatment in the auction hall.
‘The demands we were finally confronted with, gentlemen, were so absurd that they couldn’t even form the basis for any discussion.
‘I suggest we go back to our mandant and give back our office.
I further suggest we tell Mayor Gareis that on reflection we agree with his idea of taking the fight to the farmers and opposing the boycott
.’
An indignant Lienau calls out: ‘What, and side with the Red bastard? Never!’
‘Have you got any better ideas?’
But Lienau, stuck and scowling over the rim of his beer glass: ‘Never!’
‘We must also decide,’ Textil-Braun chips in quietly, ‘what to report on today’s experiences. If what happened gets out, it can do us a lot of damage.’
And Meisel: ‘I suggest all participants pledge themselves to silence.’
‘I wouldn’t give such a pledge,’ declares Lienau. ‘Stuff must get to hear about this.’
‘What good would that do? Stuff’s not allowed to publish anything, that’s already settled.’
‘Stuff published the open letter to the town, don’t forget.’
‘That was a piece of work! He’ll live to regret it too, Stuff! The town is starting proceedings.’
‘Come on, that was a small ad.’
‘An ad—how can you be so naive!’
‘Come on, one Stuff is worth ten thousand of those smarmy News types.’
‘Haven’t you heard that the News and the Chronicle are stablemates and all?! I feel sorry for you.’
Manzow beseeches them: ‘Gentlemen, please, we’re not here to discuss Stuff!’
No one listens.
‘Even if Gebhardt buys Stuff a hundred times over, the man won’t be bought!’
‘Don’t say that so loud, there are probably people here who already own him.’
‘All right, who? Gossip isn’t the same thing as evidence!’
‘Well, the Stahlhelm, for instance.’
‘The Stahlhelm’s never paid so much as a penny to Stuff.’
‘No, they gave it to Schabbelt. When Hindenburg got elected.’
‘That’s a scurrilous lie. Our venerable president doesn’t need—’
‘And now Stuff’s flirting with the Nazis.’
‘With those green youths? I’m sorry, Herr Braun, but you really are a political novice!’
‘Councillor!’
The storm, the fight even, seems unavoidable when Manzow upsets a couple of beer glasses. At the same time he calls out: ‘Betty! Betty! Betty!’
And when the waitress appears: ‘Look what I’ve gone and done. A fresh tablecloth please. And then, why don’t you come and join us for a bit? And bring your friend, Berta, as well. And if you know of a couple more nice girls . . . ?’
‘I’ll go and see, Franz,’ says Betty. ‘But you’ll have to have wine, otherwise Frau Wendehals won’t allow it. We can go and adjourn to the club room . . .’
Betty vanishes, and Manzow announces: ‘In five minutes, the girls will be here. By then we have to have agreement.’
‘Who said anything about girls?’
‘Are you going to buy the wine? I can’t afford luxuries like that.’
‘Those nasty whores.’
‘Hey! The term “whores” is inappropriate. These are all respectable girls who won’t go with just anyone.’
Manzow rises. ‘Can we have a vote, please? We resign our posts. Those in favour . . . ?
‘Damn. Three for, three against. Hang on, Toleis, you’re the driver, who said you could vote? All right. Three for, two against. Carried. We resign.
‘Two: We declare the negotiations a failure because of intransigence on the part of the farmers?
‘Four in favour, one against. Toleis, put it away. You’ll only confuse me.
‘We accept Gareis’s proposals? Two in favour, three against. Rejected, then. Even so, I’m going to go and talk to Gareis. If you’re going to be such bloody idiots, I don’t see why I should do what you want.’
‘Why are we voting, then, if you’re going to do what you want anyway?’
‘Quiet!—Now I want everyone to pledge themselves to silence regarding all the details of today. All right?—Three in favour, two against. So we all pledge.’
‘Why? I didn’t give my word.’
‘But, Councillor, you’ve been outvoted!’
‘Does that make me have to give my word?’
Dr Hüppchen pipes up, ‘Toleis should have got a vote too.’
‘Listen, we’re not starting all over again. Everyone is hereby committed to silence.’
‘I’m going to tell Stuff anyway!’
‘In that case,’ Manzow says coolly, ‘everyone will pay his own share of the costs of the expedition. I was going to put it on the municipal traffic public relations budget.’
‘Even the girls?’
‘Everything!’
‘Hmm,’ says the medical councillor. ‘If that’s not corruption. But all right. I’ll keep quiet, if it matters so much to you.’
‘You see! It just needs finessing, and a bit of common sense. And now let’s go over to the club room. Don’t want to keep the girls waiting now.’
VIII
Three hours later.
There is an oppressive heat in the club room, but the curtains are tightly drawn. Clouds of smoke hang under the ceiling.
On the leather sofa sits Manzow in trousers and shirt—no collar—discussing marriage with Toleis.
‘You know, Toleis, if my old lady wanted something, I’d know it the day before. I’d sniff it out. I can smell it on her.’
Toleis nods solemnly. ‘Yes, Herr Manzow, I’ve heard of that happening.’
Medical Councillor Dr Lienau has one hand buried in a girl’s cleavage and is singing whatever comes into his head, in complete disregard of the gramophone, to whose music, Dr Hüppchen, the only sober man present, is dancing with another girl.
Textil-Braun, lucky man, has his arms round two girls. They are playing drinking games with him. He opens his mouth carefully, slurps, and babbles on: ‘I’m not letting you!’ and gets wine all over his chest.
Meisel is listening to what the waitress is telling him, about what her brother heard at the Labour Exchange, from the Communists.
‘I tell you, chubby, they’ve got his sabre. They’re just keeping it secret.’
‘Gareis said the whole episode with the sabre was a lie.’
‘Maybe they lied to him. I even know who’s got it.’
‘Ach!’ yells Manzow. ‘Don’t keep going on about that sabre! We’ve all got one of our own! Or haven’t we?’ And he looks around provocatively.
There’s something in the air. It must have been a cue, because they all look at each other, only Dr Hüppchen goes on dancing.
‘Or is there anyone here who’s not got a sabre?’ bellows Manzow.
‘I want to see the bastard!’
And Braun echoes: ‘Bastard, come forward!’
And Meisel: ‘Hey, psst! Doctor! Didn’t you hear? You’re to come forward.’
‘What was that . . . ?’ asks the doctor. ‘I’m afraid I missed that.’
Expectant silence.
‘Hey, Doctor,’ begins the Medical Councillor, ‘I was wondering why you’ve got such a squeaky voice. Was it always squeaky?’
‘You wouldn’t exactly be an asset to the church choir either,’ squeaks Dr Hüppchen, and goes on dancing.
‘The bastard doesn’t drink,’ wails Manzow. ‘What’s the use of anything if the bastard doesn’t drink? Someone here’s not pulling his weight!’ he complains.
And Lienau: ‘Come on, fellow, let’s get a drink down you. A proper one, mind!’
Pause.
All of a sudden the men are no longer interested in their girls, they are all fixed on the doctor, who is dancing with floppy limbs.
Betty brings in the cognac.
‘There’s no one in the lounge bar, you can make as much noise as you want.’
The beer glass full of cognac is hidden behind an array of glasses and bottles.
‘Quiet!’ yells the medical councillor. ‘Turn that music down! Come over here, Doctor, we’ve got something to say to you!’
The doctor comes over expectantly.
‘Let go your wench! What do you think you’re doing with a woman?’
Suddenly the med
ical councillor bellows: ‘Everyone stand! Dr Hüppchen, advance!’
He giggles sheepishly. ‘I say, you’re not going to shoot me, are you?’
‘Dear Doctor!
‘Esteemed comrades!
‘It’s now three years since Dr Hüppchen came to our beautiful town. When we saw the plate outside his door, accountant, we thought he won’t be with us long!
‘But Dr Hüppchen has stayed. He has become a citizen and a valued member of our community. That’s why it’s only fitting that we adopt him as a full member of our group and make an honest Altholmer of him.
‘Do we want to do that, my fellow members?’
Shouts of applause.
‘Are you willing, Dr Hüppchen?’
‘Yes. Thank you very much—’
‘I’m talking, thank you. Now kneel down.—Come on, man, I told you to kneel!’
‘It’s a bit dirty here, and this is my best suit—’
‘Kneel down on the armchair if you must. That’s actually better.—Now, Betty, if you’d kindly blindfold the good doctor.’
‘Oh, not that! Please—’
‘Oh, don’t be a spoilsport. Every one of us went through this rite. I’m going to knight you in the Altholm fashion. Tie it tight, Betty. Can you see anything, Doctor?’
‘Not a thing. Oh, please—’
‘Doctor, before I knight you, you have to swear your oath of allegiance. Say after me: Ulam.’
‘Ulam—’
‘Much louder! Arrarat . . .’
‘Arrarat.’
‘Not like that. You have to open your mouth much wider. Again. Very wide. Ulam Arrarat . . .’
‘Ulam Arra—’
Two men hold his head fast, the third slowly tips the cognac in a thick stream down his neck.
‘Guh . . . uh . . . uh . . . help! Gentlemen, no, how can you . . . ?’
He tears off the blindfold and stares round, seeing only hostile faces. Even the perpetually smirking Meisel looks cross.
‘It’s time you learned, Doctor! It’s mean always being sober when everyone else is getting drunk. That’s not solidarity or companionship.’
‘I would never have . . . Gentlemen, my principles. It’s cowardly . . .’
And suddenly he’s smiling miserably. A bad approximation of a smile, a sorry-looking grimace.
‘Of course. I understand. It doesn’t matter. If force is applied, it doesn’t count.’