The End of Days (24 page)

The miniature grandfather clock, standing on a shelf beside
the entryway, is just striking ten with tinny strokes, although he knows it has to
be at least 11:30 by now. All around he sees tables and cabinets, chairs with woven
seats, stools and ottomans, glass cases with jewelry tangled in old silverware;
lamps dangle from the ceiling, and the walls are hung with oil paintings, mirrors,
barometers, crucifixes, and trays that once held movable type; shelves bear
candelabras, plates, books, and glasses, and under the tables are wooden buckets and
baskets filled with linens. Everything is squeezed in tightly together, each object
casting its shadow on the next, so that, even on this bright May day, the room lies
in its own twilight. At first the man cannot make out a seller, and no one speaks to
him in greeting; only after his eyes have become accustomed to the low light does he
see a man sitting in an armchair off in the back, immersed in a book.

What might please his mother? His mother who didn’t want to
take anything when she moved to the rest home but the yellow wall hanging with its
Uzbek sun, the small dark-blue suitcase, whose contents are unknown to him, and the
little box with the gold buttons. He wouldn’t mind acquiring this set of Goethe’s
writings for his own use — the final authorized edition, surprisingly complete
with all its volumes — that no doubt costs less here than at an antiquarian
bookshop. At random he pulls out Volume 9, the spine of which is a bit scraped, and
leafs through it; he reads “Farewell,” then puts the book back in its place. How can
he carry an entire Goethe edition on the train to Berlin? A brooch set with
amethysts might be nice, or a silver spoon with the Vienna city arms, but he doesn’t
feel like asking the shopkeeper to open the glass case. Finally he sees a miniature
double portrait leaning up against a Meissen soup tureen, a double portrait of
Prussian Kaiser Wilhelm II and Kaiser Franz Joseph as allies,
In Steadfast
Loyalty
is written on the picture, and since his Viennese mother has wound
up in Prussia, he thinks it might work, the piece’s political context now lying far
in the past; he takes the picture from the shelf, approaches the man and asks:
Excuse me, how much?

4

The owner of the Goethe edition and the clock is already
nearly eighty when she has to leave everything behind, and in February ’41, leaning
on her cousin’s arm, she begins her journey to the Jewish Home for the Aged on
Malzgasse, which, for the sake of convenience, has been designated the first
collection point for deportations to the East. The clock strikes eleven, the clock
strikes twelve,
Morning wind wings about the shady bay
, then her cousin
returns to the empty apartment. He sits for a while at the table, where a moment ago
he shared a last cup of tea with the old woman.
Es vert mir finster in di
oygn,
everything’s going black before my eyes. Then the clock strikes one.
The old woman was forced to turn in her seven-armed candelabra the year before, for
the metal collection. It’s surely long since been melted down. But the Goethe
edition at least: the man now packs it up, grabbing three or four volumes at a time,
in the very suitcase in which he transported it twenty years before on his cart. He
removes the pendulum from the clock, wrapping the clock in a pillowcase and tying it
up to make a package that he can put in a coal sack and hang over his shoulder. With
suitcase and sack he leaves the apartment, which has grown completely cold, a thin
sheet of ice has already formed on top of the water in the bucket. If he hadn’t
slipped the clock’s pendulum into the breast pocket of his jacket, he’d think he was
still hearing the clock ticking right through the sack and the soft fabric, as
though he were hearing it through snow, he could swear the clock’s hands were still
moving behind his back. After all, before the old lady started on her journey to
Malzgasse, she had wound the clock one last time, just as she had done every morning
for the last fifty years. With the stopped clock on his back, the old woman’s cousin
walks through the February cold, the pendulum peeking out of his breast pocket with
its delicate little hook, and the key to wind it is in his trouser pocket, where it
is slowly growing warm. The cousin walks to the neighborhood around Arenbergplatz,
rings a doorbell, speaks with someone, nods, then takes the streetcar to Mariahilfer
Strasse 117, rings the bell, speaks, nods, then heads to Linzer Strasse 439, rings,
speaks; Haidgasse 4, and finally he finds himself standing on Dampfschiffstrasse
10/6 in District II before a door, he rings the bell, speaks, and here he is finally
relieved of his burden that has now become an inheritance, a reminder to the woman
answering of something she doesn’t want to be reminded of, objects speak without
speaking, and the woman now knows something she didn’t want to know: that there is a
moment when it is forever too late. Last of all, the now-warm key from the cousin’s
trouser pocket — oh, right — and the pendulum. The woman takes the key,
pendulum, suitcase, and the coal sack, and carries them to a room belonging to her
only in part, strangers are sitting there on beds, strange children playing under
the table, strangers quarreling, and here — as if all these things had nothing
to do with her — she takes the packet out of the sack, unwraps it, places the
clock on the table, hooks the pendulum in its place, and already the clockwork
begins ticking again, her mother’s life is still there in the tightly wound spring;
she shoos a few children away, sits down in front of the clock, and watches as time
— which is now forever too late — passes. Time is like a briar that has
gotten caught in wool, you tear it out with all your strength and throw it over your
shoulder. Minutes pass that no longer matter, cleanly divided by the minute hand one
from the next.

Yet again, the suitcase and coal sack with the clock wrapped
in its pillowcase are transported by the woman through the streets of Vienna, for a
new official directive has ordered her to move from Dampfschiffstrasse to Obere
Donaustrasse, and three months later from Obere Donaustrasse to
Hammer-Purgstall-Gasse 3/12. Although the woman finds these moves quite burdensome,
she nonetheless lugs the
Complete Works
of Goethe along with her, as well
as the clock, these last two remaining possessions of her mother, who has long since
been deported. And when she arrives at one or the other location, she unwraps the
clock, winds it, then lays the key beside it, just as her mother always used to.
Perhaps there’s secretly something magical about these inherited belongings, just
like in the fairy tale, where, in time of need, a comb thrown over your shoulder can
grow into a forest.

But no forest has grown as of August 13, 1942, when she boards the
train at the Aspang Station in Vienna that will take her to Minsk. Forcing the
doors, clearing out the shared apartment that served as a transit station for Jews
at Hammer-Purgstall-Gasse 3/12, and making an inventory takes the Gestapo’s Division
for the Processing of Jewish Personal Effects two and a half days. The clock has
meanwhile come to a stop. The key for winding it lies, as always, beside it. Chaim
Safir sticks the key through the little oval opening, through which you can see the
pendulum, and into the clock case, then he puts the clock in a laundry basket, in
which a stack of plates, a vase made of porcelain, several glasses and a crystal
carafe are already awaiting deportation. To keep things from breaking, Chaim Safir
stuffs some items of clothing between them, then he picks up the basket, carries it
downstairs, and says to Herr Gschwandtner: All that’s left now is the furniture.
Herr Gschwandtner follows him to do a check, looking around the room, he opens the
cabinet doors, looks under the beds, pushes a little footstool aside, deftly pulling
the suitcase out from behind it, saying: It’s probably full of jewels, you idiot.
Chaim Safir says: I’m sorry, I overlooked the suitcase. Herr Gschwandtner says, The
thing weighs a ton. At first the lid refuses to open, but then it does, such a
mazl
, Herr Gschwandtner says to Chaim Safir, nothing but books, just
look what’s on the back of them: nothing but Goethe; he slams the suitcase shut
again.
To be or not to be
, he says, grinning, as he gets to his feet. Chaim
Safir nods without meeting Herr Gschwandtner’s eyes. Herr Gschwandtner pokes at the
suitcase with his shoe-tip and says: This one goes downstairs too.

Suitcase and clock spend the weekend in the depot along with
all the other items. On Monday morning the assessor comes and sorts the new arrivals
according to value: the basket with the clock, carafe, and dishes is sent to
Krummbaumgasse, ground floor, for private sale; since the suitcase looks so shabby,
he doesn’t even open it before saying: That too. On the ground floor of
Krummbaumgasse, shabby suitcases like this one — packed and then abandoned
— sell for 2
reichsmark
a piece (a pig in a poke, you take your
chances, part and parcel, lock, stock, and barrel, blind man’s bluff, who doesn’t
like a surprise), each is sold along with its contents, but opening the lid
beforehand is not allowed. The newspaper prints a notice announcing the arrival of a
new assortment of furniture and accessories for sale; a young wartime bride applies
for an invitation to view the goods, enclosing her pay slip, she’s certainly poor
enough and has a husband on the Eastern front, making ends meet isn’t easy for her.
If she receives an invitation, she’ll be allowed to bring two friends or relatives
when she comes, and she does receive one, so she brings her mother and a girlfriend
— oh just look at that, isn’t that adorable, and really it’s not expensive. A
vase, a carafe made of crystal, a set of sheets, or a plate. Just look at the clock,
you can see its pendulum through the hole, maybe it doesn’t work, oh I’m sure it
does, what’s that rattling around inside?, look, the key, I’ll fish it out, careful,
let’s wind it up, my goodness, look at the size of this platter, why are you
surprised? they’re the ones who carve up babies, what nonsense, it’s really
beautiful, and I’m going to take this suitcase, it’s such a good deal, go ahead, who
knows what’s inside, Jesus it’s heavy, maybe stones, maybe treasure, could I
possibly have just a tiny peek inside first? Madame, a peek would cost more, all
right, if you insist, how bad can it be, I’ll take it as is, maybe it’ll be the
surprise of my life, but let’s not open it till we get home, why not? I want to see
what’s inside, why do you always have to be so impatient. . . . The clock strikes
three, even though it’s only just after nine-thirty. What a pretty chime, I wouldn’t
like it myself, it sounds annoying, not to me, I’ll fix it to show the right time, I
think it’s pretty, so do I, what do you want with a clock?, everyone needs a clock.
And I’ll take the platter. The Jewish platter? Why not? I’ll baptize it this
Saturday: I’m making ham hocks.

Two years later when the war finally comes to an end, the
wartime bride has a daughter, but her husband fell in Russia. The miniature
grandfather clock strikes with tinny strokes all the hours that a life contains in
peacetime, it strikes from one to twelve, one to twelve, and the next day the same
thing, twice from one to twelve, it strikes at the crack of dawn when the janitor’s
broom bumps against the front door from the outside, it strikes in the empty
apartment all morning long while the girl is at school and the woman is at her
office, strikes in the afternoon during the hour for coffee and cake, and in the
evening during the lullaby
The moon is arisen
, it even strikes late at
night when the war widow lets down her hair without a man to hang his belt over the
back of the chair. It strikes from one to twelve for all the length of a peaceful
Aryan life.

When the war widow approaches her fiftieth birthday, her
elderly mother dies, and she dissolves her mother’s household with her daughter, who
is meanwhile grown; in the basement, she finds the old Goethe edition: the surprise
of her life back then, the pig in the poke; the volumes smell of the cellar but are
not mildewed. The man in the antique shop next door, who’s always sitting around
reading, pays her a respectable sum for the
bit of rubbish
. The shabby
valise that in its day cost her mother a mere 2
reichsmark
, even full, also
contains an assortment of patches in different colors, and these she might still
have use for herself.

For over twenty years more, this clock goes on striking its tinny hours
in this chance Vienna household, each day from one to twelve and then again, until
day after day comes to an end; her daughter has her own life now, and when her
grandchildren come to visit, they peer through the oval hole to see the clock’s
pendulum swing back and forth without ever getting tired, but they aren’t allowed to
touch, the clock needs dusting, the woman already needs reading glasses, and walking
is starting to be difficult for her; her daughter visits far too seldom, alas, but
what can you do? The woman sometimes falls asleep in front of the television, not
waking up until the clock strikes twelve in the middle of the night; her
grandchildren are fairly spoiled; the woman eats a crescent-shaped
Kipferl
for breakfast each morning; she goes on living and living and winding the
clock, always placing the key beside it. And finally, when her final hour has
tolled, the woman dies a peaceful Aryan death.

Her daughter doesn’t like all the old clutter one bit; an
apartment should be empty and bright, and she already has more than enough in her
own household; good Lord, all the things her mother kept squirreled away: the shabby
valise with the patches is the first to go, and as for the rest — just look,
that same old antique shop dealer is still sitting right there in his shop reading!
Might he have use for a clock, really a very special piece from Grandmother’s era?
Yes, the key is still there, and when the clock strikes the hour, it has such a
bright, friendly chime it really warms the heart to hear it.