Gilgi (4 page)

“Thanks, Father.” Gilgi takes Herr Kron’s hand. He looks up from his newspaper.

“I hope the next year is a happy one for you, Jilgi, with good health, and—jus’ forget what Mother told you before.”

“I already have, father.”

“Well, tha’s all right, then.”

“Thanks, Mother.” Gilgi kisses Frau Kron on the temple.

“D’you like your presents, child? The silk won’t shrink when you make it up. What d’you think of the handbag?”

“Quite beautiful, Mother.” Gilgi picks up the handbag. Mother is looking so nervous and expectant, you have to say something more, but what, what, what? “Quite beautiful, really qui …” She’s expecting something, she was worried, now you have to say something, something loving and kind, but you can’t just do that to order, you can’t do it precisely because it’s expected, your tongue feels as heavy as lead, heavier and heavier … “I—I mean—quite beautiful, really … I mean, I’m—so happy, Mother—really.” Gilgi breathes out and sinks into her chair. How do other people always know exactly the right words to say at the right time?

“Eat, Jilgi, drink, Jilgi.” Eat, Gilgi, drink, Gilgi. She forces some birthday cake down, isn’t really hungry. Eat, Gilgi, drink, Gilgi! Damned decent of these people. For
twenty-one years they’ve given me accommodation, food, and drink. Got me an education. That man there who’s reading the newspaper, and who has no actual responsibility for me, gives me fifty marks every year. Why? That fat woman there, she cried for five nights and couldn’t sleep that time I had scarlet fever. Why? Eat, Gilgi, drink, Gilgi. And what about me? How have I paid them? Dammit, I have debts.

“Another piece of cake, Jilgi?”

“No, thanks, Mother.” Should I go to a
Kaffeeklatsch
with her some time soon? Pointless waste of time. Should I spend every evening at home now? Pointless waste of time. Being with you two is always a pointless waste of time. Was, is, and ever shall be. Eat, Gilgi, drink, Gilgi. And for sure, if I spill even half a tear now, I’ll smash everything up.

Gilgi has gone to see her friend Pit.

“Pit, my birth was a mistake.”

“Lots of them are.”

“Don’t you think children ought to be grateful to their parents?”

“For what?”

“For money and feelings and all kinds of things.”

“Gilgi, you know I don’t have time for stupid conversations.”

Eat, Gilgi, drink, Gilgi. She’s perched on the decrepit camp bed, her legs crossed, her chin resting on her hands.

“I’m freezing, Pit.”

“Then you’ll have to go somewhere where it’s warmer.” Pit is unfriendly; he usually is. Gilgi doesn’t mind.—Poor
guy. He never has any money. He’s studying economics—and he earns his living by tutoring. Now and then he plays the piano in seedy bars. Sometimes he doesn’t have enough to eat. They’ve been friends for years. She likes him, you can rely on him.

Pit is sitting at the table, with books and notepads in front of him, and a pot of black tea. Gilgi knows he can’t offer her any, because he only possesses one cup. Pit isn’t equipped for visitors.

Gilgi looks around the bare, unadorned room, a shabby room in the old part of Cologne. She sees Pit’s mop of red hair, his white face with the sharp, angry lines around the mouth, his small, intelligent eyes. Pit’s crazy! Everything could be so easy for him. His father has the best house in Marienburg, has money and a famous name. Pit is his only son—

“Why did you leave home, Pit?”

“What business is that of yours?” He doesn’t like being asked.

“What is it that you want, anyway? If it’s help with your bourgeois problems, I’ll throw you out!” Gilgi pulls the blanket up over her knees, exposing the neatly folded nightshirt of white cotton with red trimming which lies under the pillow. “Touching,” Gilgi laughs. Red-faced, Pit gets up and shoves the nightshirt back under the pillow. He gives Gilgi a poisonous look: “Who told you to make yourself so free with the place?” Steer clear of these women, he has no use for these women, he can get along just fine without them, they shouldn’t come to him and sit on his bed. His hands are trembling; he’d like to hit that girl there. Slowly he goes back to the table, pushing his hips into the edge. Box her ears, right and left. Box her
ears. Disgusting. I have to keep a clear head, my intellect is weak enough as it is.

“Pit, I meant to ask you something, I might leave home entirely and set up on my own.”

“Should’ve done that ages ago.” Why can’t she pull her skirt down? There, at the top of her stocking, you can see a strip of white skin. I’m a pig. Box someone’s ears.

“Pit, I don’t know if it’s the right thing to treat the parents …”

“The right thing!” Snap! Pit has destroyed a pencil, broken it clean in two. “If you want to do the right thing, love your parents, your fatherland, and its dogs! Marry and have children. Every embryo should come under the anti-abortion law. The state wants children, the earth doesn’t have enough unemployed people yet.” Pit is talking himself into a rage.

“Stop it, Pit, there’s no need to be so nasty, I can read the satirical papers in a café if I feel like it.” You want to ask the man something, but he’s only got all that Socialist stuff in his head. I don’t understand politics, it doesn’t make sense to me. Gilgi runs all ten fingers through her hair. There’s no talking to Pit today. She wanted to tell him her ridiculous story. For the last week, she’s choked on every mouthful she’s eaten at home. It can’t go on like that, something has to be done. If they had brought her into the world, all right, then they could look after you, too, for as long as you can’t look after yourself. But now! Yes, if you loved them and belonged to them, then you’d just pay them back with feelings. But to take, take, take—without being able to give anything—dammit, you feel like such a heel! And what if you left home now? That would hurt them so much, a fine way of thanking them! So you thought that Pit might
know what to do, he sometimes hits upon the word that illuminates everything like a hundred-watt globe, but—no point at all, you’ll have to help yourself, Gilgi!—she won’t tell Pit her story.

Since when has she been so eager to talk about herself, anyway? A bad sign! Perhaps the ground is already starting to tremble under her feet? Rubbish, she’s still standing firm.

Pit is decorating a sheet of paper with angular doodles. He’s angry that he’s said so much. If the girl would just leave! She’s just sitting there, running her hand over her knee. She’s wearing silk stockings and smelling of flowers and
eau de cologne
. “Are you planning to stay much longer?” Gilgi glances up. Why is he looking at her like that? Silly boy, what’s wrong? She gets up and stands next to him. “You’re crazy, you are.” Her hand strokes his coarse, rust-red hair. She’s the right sort of girl, a good comrade, she doesn’t take it the wrong way when you’re abrupt with her. Pit keeps quite still while Gilgi’s hand strokes his hair, his face—her hand smells of violets—“Silly Pit, work alone isn’t enough. Intellect is all very well, but there are all kinds of other things about people which are important, too, the road you’re on might lead you right away from a full life.” She’d like to say even more, but that’s not so easy. Oh well, he’ll have understood all right what she means. Find a nice girl who likes you, it doesn’t have to be for all eternity.

“Ow, let go of my hand, Pit, you’re hurting me.”

“Go now, Gilgi.”

“See you, Pit.”

Gilgi stands in the street below, rubbing her wrist. What a grip that boy has! What a struggle he’s making of his life! And she wanted to ask him for advice! He could
do with some advice on his own account. Every man for himself, and God for all of us. Gilgi takes a little notebook from her handbag: Fräulein Margarethe Täschler, Thieboldstrasse. That’s where you’re going now. After all, you’ll be interested to see the being who brought you into the world. Wasn’t at all easy to get the name out of them at home; she found out the address herself.

You can feel the pre-Lenten carnival in the air … How did you, pigeon, pigeon, pigeon / Get into our kitchen … this year’s hits by Willi Ostermann blare forth from a window somewhere. Gilgi walks along Cathedral Street, past Central Station—Saturday night—they’re dawdling and teeming, rushing and chasing, she crosses Cathedral Square, has to hold on to her hat to stop it being blown away. Thank God, now she’s outside the Savoy Hotel, it’s less windy here. She smooths her trench coat and her hair, adjusts her little beret so that it sits properly again. Turns into Hohestrasse—people, people—they push their way along the narrow sidewalks, you can only make your way slowly. Obey the road rules! Walk on the right! You get quite jumpy when you’re used to taking long, brisk strides. A few morose hookers are standing in a side passage, they look well-behaved, earnest and annoyed, if they weren’t wearing make-up and using belladonna you could take them for unemployed telephone operators. Gilgi walks through Schilderstrasse. “Flowers—Flowers!” A little girl is standing at the corner, half-frozen. “Gimme a bunch.” Yellow mimosa, who should she give them to? She’ll take them to her mother, she might be pleased.

In Thieboldstrasse it’s dirty and dark. It takes Gilgi a while to find the number on the right building. The lobby stinks of rotten fish and yesterday’s laundry. Gilgi climbs
one staircase, another, the building is alive: somewhere a woman is screeching, a child is crying, a man is cursing. There’s a
Cologne Advertiser
lying on a doormat: … And we’ll still hold the time-honored official stag party, even if the whole Carnival disappears up its own … The spoilsports are just bashing their heads against Cologne’s sense of fun and tradition … Oh, the golden Rhineland humor! “The asshole’s boozed away all his unemploymen’ money again,” a woman yells. The building is alive, the building is breathing. Gilgi’s legs feel heavy. Why did she come here, what does she want here? Phew, she can’t breathe. No turning back. She sees a greasy little notice: Fräulein Margarethe Täschler, ladies’ dressmaker, ring twice. Gilgi rings. She hears a drag—drag—drag getting closer—what a stink there is in this building, I feel sick—tap—tap—tap—I’ve still got time to …

“Who’s there?” Why don’t they open up?

“Is someone there?”

“Yes.”

“Who?”

“Me.”

“Who you wanna see?”

“Fräulein Täschler.”

A safety chain rattles, the door opens: “Come in, Frollein, you gotta be real careful here, ’cos of the burglars. Jus’ the day before yesterday they attacked the poor woman nex’ door, people’re so bad now’days, come on in, Frollein.” Is this her, is this her, is this her? Gilgi clutches the bunch of mimosa to her chest. She doesn’t feel like letting her heart beat wildly, she doesn’t feel like getting excited. It’s a room with a grubby bed, a gas stove opposite, with a few cold fried potatoes sticking to a pan. Next to the window
there’s a black tailor’s dummy, a lady without internal organs. “That’s how we live, that’s how we live / That’s how we live every day …”

“Take a seat, Frollein.” The woman sweeps a few dirty underthings from the chair. A classy girl! If she’s come here for a dress—why else would she come here?

Fräulein Margarethe Täschler, ladies’ dressmaker, ring twice—you have to look at her, Gilgi—you’ve come here to look at her. Take your eyes off the lady without internal organs, the old girl is standing in the corner chirping at the stove, behind which a mangy cat is lying. Misss, misss, misss—and she beckons with a horribly crooked finger, like the witch in “Hansel and Gretel.” Misss, misss, misss—does the Frollein want to have a dress made? Misss, misss, misss. Everyone likes to make a good impression, now and then. One slips on a silk dressing gown, while the other entices a cat out of its hiding place. Misss, misss, misss—this is her, this is her. Gilgi holds fast to the bunch of mimosa and starts talking: yes, she heard about Fräulein Täschler, Fräulein Täschler was recommended to her, now she wants Fräulein Täschler to sew something for her, a dress with a little jacket, and she has brought the material along with her.

This is her. She’s skinny and dried-up, and she has no face at all, she’s lost it. She’s got a bathing cap, a light-colored bathing cap on her head, with yellow-gray strands of hair protruding from it over her forehead. “I got the cap on ’cos of my headaches, I got a cold compress underneath.” And Gilgi recommends aspirin and examines the fashion magazines that the witch-like fingers spread out in front of her. It’s impossible to look up, it’s impossible to look at a woman who has no face! Pan with fried potatoes
stuck on, lady without internal organs, grubby bed, stink compounded of rancid margarine, damp walls, and rotten floorboards.
Elegant World
, Special Beauty Issue: the beautiful grandmother writes to her granddaughter: Carnival, oh, in my day it was still such fun and so delightful, the men always crowded around me even at masked balls, because they could still see my beautiful complexion (using Pfeilring’s products was the secret) … Miss Germany 1931 … “you coulda won the title just as well, Frollein!” And the head with the bathing cap laughs, but the laughter isn’t genuine, it’s a lie. And the head bends down, and now it’s right next to Gilgi’s … I can’t stand the smell anymore, I have to light a cigarette.

The light’s bad, you can’t see anything properly, how can she sew here! The non-face has red eyes, those aren’t eyes, they’re inflamed lids, and they hurt. The beautiful grandmother writes to her granddaughter … You, you, you—why do you put up with it? Why are you living here, why is this your life? If you’re satisfied, someone should strangle you!

A gramophone is playing next door: Drink, drink, brother mine, drink … Why are you satisfied?—Leave all your troubles at home … Why? Drink, drink …

Accepted it, accepted it—I don’t know anything different—I only know the song about the gray-lit hours—Is there anything that’s worth the effort?

Gilgi offers Fräulein Täschler a cigarette. Unexpectedly, she takes it, leans against the bedpost, puffs away like a woman of the world, has a bathing cap on because of her headaches, has a wrinkled, dried-up body and no face. A crucifix hangs above the bed.

Gilgi’s measurements are taken. Bust, waist, height.
When the wrinkled fingers fumble at her waist and the noxious breath wafts into her face, she becomes as gray and pale as the greasy hand-towel beside the washstand.