Arnold growled something and went on playing. "Usually it's very pleasant here," Mutzig said eagerly. "We really have a lot of fun. Arnold was a Mason; that's not simple, you know. And his wife is cheating on him; his mother told him that."
Stockmann threw his cards on the table. "Damn the luck! The solo cross was a sure thing. How was anyone to know the three knaves would be sitting in one hand!"
Arnold bleated something and shuffled again. "Sometimes one doesn't know which is better when' you want to get married," Mutzig said, "to have lost an arm or a leg. Stockmann says an arm. But how can you hold a woman in bed with one arm? And you do have to hold them, don't you?" "That's not important. The main thing is that you are alive."
"That's true. But you can't support yourself with that all your life. After the war those things are different. Then you're not a hero any more; you're just a cripple."
"I don't think so. They have wonderful prostheses."
"That's not what I mean," Mutzig said. "I don't mean work."
"We have to win the war, that's what we have to do," Arnold suddenly announced in a loud voice. He had been listening. "Let others risk their bones for a change! We have done our part."
He shot an unfriendly glance at Graeber. "If all the slackers were out there we wouldn't have to keep withdrawing all the time!"
Graeber did not reply. You could not quarrel with amputees; anyone who had lost a limb was always in the right. You could quarrel with someone who had been shot through the lungs or had a shell splinter in his stomach and might be in even worse shape; but it was strange—not with an amputee.
Arnold went on playing. "What's your opinion, Ernst?" Mutzig asked after a while. "I have a girl in Muenster; we still correspond. She thinks I have been shot in the leg. I have not written her about this yet."
"Wait. And be glad you don't have to go back any more."
"I am, Ernst. But you can't keep on being glad indefinitely."
"You make me sick," one of the kibitzers sitting around the card players said suddenly to Mutzig, "Get drunk and be men."
Stockmann laughed. "What are you laughing about?" Arnold asked.
"I just thought how it would be if a heavy bomb slammed down on us tonight—right on top of us so that there was nothing left but jelly—then why would we have tormented ourselves with all these worries?"
Graeber got up. He saw that the kibitzer had lost both feet. A mine or frozen, he thought automatically. "What's become of our anti-aircraft guns?" Arnold growled at him. "Do you need them all out there? There are practically none here any more."
"Nor outside either."
"What?"
Graeber realized he had made a mistake. "Outside we are waiting for the new secret weapons," he said. "They're said to be real wonders."
Arnold stared at him. "Damn it all! What sort of way is that to talk? That sounds as if we had lost the war. That's impossible. Do you think I want to sit on a pushcart and sell matches like the men after the first war? We have rights. The Fuehrer has promised!"
He slammed his cards down on the table in excitement "Come, turn the radio en" the kibitzer said to Mutzig. "Music."
Mutzig turned the knob. A flood of brassy words poured out of the loud-speaker. He turned the dial. "Leave it on," Arnold demanded angrily.
"Why? It's only another of those speeches."
"Leave it on, I say! That's a Party oration. If everyone would only listen to them regularly, things would be better with us!"
Mutzig sighed and turned the dial back. A siegheil orator screamed into the room. Arnold listened with clenched jaws. Stockmann made a sign to Graeber and shrugged his shoulders. Graeber went over to him. "Take care of yourself, Stockmann," he whispered. "I've got to go."
"Something better to do, eh?"
"It's not that. But I have to be off."
He walked out. The glances of the others followed him. It seemed to him that he was naked. He walked slowly through the room; he believed that would be less-offensive to the amputees. But he saw how they looked after him. Mutzig hobbled with him to the door. "Come again," he said in the faded light of the gray corridor. "Today you had bad luck. Usually we are much gayer."
Graeber stepped out into the street. It was growing dark now, and all of a sudden his fear for Elisabeth came upon him again. All day he had tried to escape from it. But now in the uncertain light it seemed to creep upon him once more out of every corner.
He went to Pohlmann. The old man opened the door at once. It was as though he had been expecting someone else. "It's you, Graeber," he said.
"Yes. I won't bother you for long. I just wanted to ask you something."
Pohlmann opened the door. "Come in. It is better not to stand outside. No need for people to know—"
They went into the room where the lamp stood. Graeber smelled fresh cigarette smoke. Pohlmann did not have a cigarette in his hand. "What did you want to ask me, Graeber?"
Graeber looked around. "Is this all the room you have?" he asked.
"Why?"
"I might want to hide someone for a few days. Is that possible here?"
Pohlmann was silent. "It's not anyone who is wanted," Graeber said. "I would only do it as a precaution. Very likely it won't be necessary at all. I am anxious about someone. Perhaps it is only imagination."
"Why do you come to me for that?"
"I don't know anyone else."
Graeber did not know himself why he had come. He had simply felt that he had to look for a hideaway in case worst came to worst. '
"Who is it?"
"Someone I want to marry. Her father is in the concentration camp. I am afraid that she may be taken, too. She hasn't done anything. Perhaps I'm just imagining all this."
"Nothing is imagination in these times," Pohlmann said. "And precaution is better than regret. You can have this room if you need it."
Graeber felt a wave of warmth and relief. "Thank you," he said. "Thank you very much."
Pohlmann smiled. Suddenly he looked less frail than before. "Thank you," Graeber said once more. "I hope I won't need it."
They were standing in front of the shelves of books. 'Take any of them you want," Pohlmann said. "Sometimes they help you get through an evening."
Graeber shook his head. "They don't help me. But there's one thing I'd like to know: how does all this fit together— these books, these poems, these philosophies—with the inhumanity of the S.A., the concentration camps and the liquidation of innocent people?"
"They don't fit together. They simply exist at the same time. If the men who wrote these books were alive most of them would be sitting in a concentration camp too."
"Perhaps."
Pohlmann looked at Graeber. "You intend to get married?"
"Yes."
The old man pulled a volume from a shelf. "I can't give you anything else. Take this. It's nothing to read; it's pictures, just pictures. There have been times when I was not able .to read and spent whole evenings just looking at pictures. Pictures and poems—they always helped as long as I had oil for the lamp. Later, in the dark, of course there was only prayer left."
"Yes," Graeber said without conviction.
"I've thought a great deal about you. And I've thought about what you said to me recently. There's no answer." Pohlmann hesitated and then said softly: "Only one. You must believe. What else remains?"
"Believe in what?"
"In God. And in what's good in men."
"Haven't you ever doubted that?" Graeber asked.
"Of course," the old man replied. "Often. How else could I believe?"
Graeber went to the factory. It had grown windy, and torn fragments of cloud drifted low over the roofs. A company of soldiers was marching across the square in the half darkness. They were carrying packages and were on their way to the station and to the front. I might be one of them, he thought. He saw the linden tree looming darkly in front of the demolished house and suddenly he felt in his shoulders and his muscles the same strong sur
ge of life he had experienced the first time he had seen the tree. Strange, he thought, I feel sorry for Pohlmann and he cannot help me— but every time I go to see him I feel life deeper and closer than usual.
CHAPTER XIX
YOUR papers? Just a moment."
The clerk took off his eyeglasses and looked at Elisabeth. Then he ceremoniously got up and went behind the wooden partition that separated his counter from the large room beyond.
Graeber looked after him and then glanced around. There were people between him and the exit. "Go to the door," he said softly. "Wait there. If you see me take off my cap, go to Pohlmann at once. Don't worry about anything, go at once. I'll come later."
Elisabeth hesitated. "Go!" he said again, impatiently. "Maybe the old goat has gone to get someone. We can't risk it. Wait outside."
"He might want to ask me more questions."
"We'll find out about that. I'll tell him you felt faint and went out for a breath of air. Go, Elisabeth!"
He stood at the counter and looked after her. She turned around and smiled. Then she disappeared.
"Where is Fräulein Kruse?"
Graeber whirled around. The clerk had returned. "She will be here right away. Is everything in order?"
The clerk nodded. "When do you want to get married?"
"As soon as possible. I haven't much time. My furlough is almost over."
"You can get married at once if you like. The papers are ready. With soldiers it's all simple and quick."
Graeber saw the papers in the man's hand. The clerk smiled. All at once Graeber felt weak. His face flushed. "Is everything attended to?" he asked and took off his cap to wipe away the sweat.
"Everything is attended to," the clerk replied. "Where is Fräulein Kruse?"
Graeber laid his cap on the counter. He turned and looked for Elisabeth. The hall was full of people and he could not see her. Then he noticed his cap on the counter and remembered it was the signal they had agreed on. "Just a moment," he said quickly. "I'll get her at once."
He pushed his way swiftly through the crowd. He. hoped he could catch up with her in the street; but when he came to the exit she was standing calmly behind a pillar; waiting. "Thank God you're here! Everything is in order. Everything is in order, Elisabeth."
They went back. The clerk handed Elisabeth her papers.
"Are you the daughter of the Health Councilor Kruse?" he asked.
"Yes."
Graeber held his breath. "I know your father," the clerk said.
Elisabeth looked at him. "Have you heard anything of him?" she asked after a while.
"Nothing. Haven't you heard from him at all?"
"No."
The clerk took off his glasses. He had short-sighted, watery blue eyes. "Let's hope for the best." He gave Elisabeth his hand. "Good luck. I took your business under my wing and saw it through myself. You can marry today. I can make the arrangements for you. Right now if you like." .
"Right now," Graeber said.
"This afternoon." Elisabeth replied. "Would two o'clock be all right?"
"I'll arrange it for you then. You'll have to go to the gymnasium in the high school. That's the registry office now."
"Thanks."
They stood at the doorway. "Why not right now?" Graeber asked. "Then nothing else can interfere."
Elisabeth smiled. "I must have a little time to get ready, Ernst. You don't understand that, do you?"
"Only half."
"Half is enough. Come and get me at a quarter of two."
Graeber hesitated. "It went so simply," he said then. "What didn't I expect! I don't know why I've become so jumpy. Probably it was pretty ridiculous, wasn't it?"
"No."
"I'm afraid it was."
Elisabeth shook her head. "My father thought the.people who warned him were being ridiculous tpo. He thought in our time nothing like that could happen—and then it did. We have had a stroke of luck, that's all, Ernst."
A few blocks away he found a tailor shop. A man who looked like a kangaroo was sitting there sewing a uniform.
"Can I get these trousers cleaned?" Graeber asked.
The man looked up. "This is a tailoring establishment. Not a cleaner's."
"I see that. I want to have my things pressed, too."
"The ones you have on?"
"Yes."
The tailor got up, grumbling. He examined the spot on the trousers. "It's not blood." Graeber said. "It's olive oil. A little benzine will take it right out."
"Why don't you do it yourself if you know so much about it? Benzine doesn't help at all with spots like this."
"Maybe. You must know more about it than I. Have you anything I can wear in the meantime?" he asked.
The tailor went behind a curtain and came out with a pair of checked trousers and a white jacket. Graeber took them. "How long will it take? I need my uniform for a wedding."
"One hour."
Graeber changed. "I'll come back in an hour, then."
The kangaroo looked at him distrustfully. He had expected him to stay in the shop. "My uniform is good security," Graeber said. "I won't run away."
Surprisingly, the tailor bared his teeth. "Your uniform belongs to the State, young man. But go ahead. And get a haircut. You will need it if you are going to get married."
"That's right."
Graeber went to a barber shop. A bony woman was on duty. "My husband is in the field," she said. "I am taking his place for the time being. Sit down. Shave?"
"Haircut. Do you know how to do that?"
"Dear God! I know it so well I've almost forgotten it again. Shampoo, too? We still have excellent soap."
"Yes, shampoo, too."
The woman was quite strong. She cut Graeber's hair and gave his head a thorough going-over with soap and a rough hand towel. "Do you want hrilliantine?" she asked. "We still have some of the French."
Graeber glanced up from a half doze and was startled. His ears seemed to have grown, so close had his hair been clipped at the temples. "Brilliantine?" the woman asked again peremptorily.
"What does it smell like?" Graeber remembered Alfons's bath salts.
"The way brilliantine smells. How else? It is French."
Graeber took the bottle and sniffed. The brilliantine smelled of old, rancid fat. The time of victories was already long past. He looked at his hair; where it hadn't been clipped close it stood up in tufts. "All right, brilliantine," he said. "But only very little."
He paid and went back to the tailor. "You're too early," growled the kangaroo.
Graeber did not contradict him. He sat down and watched the tailor ironing. The warm air made him sleepy. The war suddenly seemed far away. Flies hummed drowsily, the iron hissed, and the little room was full of an unaccustomed and forgotten security.
"That's the best I could do."
The tailor held out the trousers to Graeber. He looked at them. The spot was almost gone. "Excellent," Graeber said. The trousers smelled of benzine, but he said nothing about that. Quickly he put them on.
"Who cut your hair?" the tailor asked.
"A woman whose husband is a soldier."
"It looks as though you did it yourself. Hold still a minute."
The kangaroo snipped off a few of the tufts. "So! It will do now."
"What do I owe you?" ,
The tailor waved him away. "A thousand marks or nothing at all. So, nothing. A wedding present."
"Thanks. Do you know where there's a flower shop?"
"There's one in Spichernstrasse."
The store was open. Two women were standing in it, bargaining with the saleswoman about a wreath. "Those are genuine fir cones," the saleswoman said. "That's always expensive."
One of the women looked at her indignantly. Her soft, wrinkled cheeks trembled. "That's usury," she said. "Usury! Come. Minna! We'll find cheaper wreaths somewhere else."
"You don't need to take it," the saleswoman announced sharply. "I can get rid of my stock easily enough."
br /> "At those prices?"
"Oh yes, at those prices. I never have enough and I am sold out every evening, ladies."
"Then you're a war profiteer."
The two women stamped out. The saleswoman drew in her breath sharply as though to shout something after them; then she turned to Graeber. She suddenly had two bright spots in her cheeks. "And you? Wreaths or a coffin blanket? You see the stock is not large, but we have some very beautiful fir arrangements."