Mr. Mani (14 page)

—No, not to fight for those ruins, Grandmother, but for what might be resurrected from them, for the new man we talked and thought about so much on those long winter evenings back in ‘39 when I was studying for my German history exams. You already knew for sure then, Grandmother, that a world war was unavoidable, and you were worried about being blamed for it as we were for the last one and left without justification while the fruits of victory rotted in our hands ... And so I thought that perhaps here, on this island of all places, the rationale that my grandmother was looking for might be found, which is a thought that I've been gnawing away at for the last three years...

—I swear.

—But what makes you say I vanished? I never did ... how did I?

—But I was simply cut off ... I had lost my glasses ... and I misread the battle, because I confused south with north...

—How can you say such a thing, Grandmother? You, who pushed for the transfer of a nearsighted person like me to a unit of tigers and wolves...

—Not at all! If I really had deserted, I would have been court-martialed and shot at once ... It's unimaginable that you should judge me more harshly than the general staff of the 7th Paratrooper Division. Why can't you see that I was saved by a miracle, and that it's a miracle that I'm standing before you right now? From a purely military point of view, it would have been far easier to die with the thirteen hundred other pack wolves who were killed in the first twenty-four hours on that triangular battlefield you see down below you...

—Yes. One thousand three hundred. It's a number I happen to know by heart, and you'll soon see why...

—Soon ... if you let me tell my whole story. I'm beginning to think you'd be happier if I were one thousand three hundred and one...

—Because you'd finally think I had something in common with the real Egon...

—I meant...

—Never mind...

—I'm sorry, Grandmother ... I really am...

—I'm sorry...

—Because I know that deep down you've never come to terms with the basic fact of my existence...

—Sometimes I can't help thinking that...

—Well, then, I was wrong, and I have to ask you once more for forgiveness, Grandmother. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry: I'll say it a thousand times before I let this day with you be spoiled...

—How? Why? On the contrary, on the contrary, Grandmother, I never dreamed of dishonoring Egon, far from it, I was acting for the glory of Germany. Who if not I, Grandmother, shared your anguish from the time I was a child over the unfair blame put on Germany for that pointlessly beastly first war, a blame so great that I even imagined it weighing on the soil of his grave in France, in that field full of crosses...

—Of course I remember that visit. I even remember how awful those French peasants were in that village of Mericur, when they saw Opapa standing in his white uniform and saluting his son's grave.

—But I do ... why shouldn't I? How old was I?

—That's all? Really?

—You see? And I really
do
remember it, honor-bright as only a child can be when dreaming of the day when someone in white uniform will come to salute
his
grave ... so that not only haven't I forgotten Egon's death, I've done everything to make it more meaningful...

—It wasn't the fatigue, Grandmother It was the isolation that I wasn't used to. Why, from the day I was drafted until that night, I never had a moment to myself. I was surrounded all the time by the wolf pack, wherever I went I marched in line under some officer's watchful eye, if it wasn't one set of orders or superiors it was another, day in and day out, in the end I was even dreaming other people's dreams ... and now, all of a sudden, without the slightest warning, I was totally alone, in a strange landscape, without a single German in sight, and worst of all, Grandmother, without an officer to tell me what to do. And so my first task was to find myself a CO, which I did, for lack of anyone better, by commissioning myself, a promotion that was so successful that I bowed to its authority immediately and ordered myself to prepare a strategic position behind those huge urns that could double as a hideout and a lookout. And since without my glasses my combat capabilities were inevitably restricted, I opened my stretcher, Grandmother, lay down on my back, and ate my first battle rations to the song of the crickets while staring in a trance at the sky, which was full of glorious new stars that you'll soon be seeing for yourself. And thus, at the end of the first day of battle, on the night between the twentieth and twenty-first of May, 1941, I fell into a deep, almost prehistoric sleep, from which I was awakened in the morning by the whinny of a mule that had been led into the palace by two Greek civilians—whom, on the spur of the moment, I took prisoner at once, jumping out of my hiding place.

—Yes, I had to take them prisoner, and in a minute you'll understand why. But first, if you're rested, why don't we go on to the next station. I promise that from here on the trail is much easier going. We'll swing around now to the western side of the hill and look down on the city ... here, let me help you up...

—No, it won't get dark for quite a while. We started out at four, and we'll be back at seven sharp, untouched by darkness and in time for Bruno Schmelling's dinner...

—Don't worry ... I'll send one of the Italians tomorrow to fetch it...

—It's all right ... it really is...

—No, I won't forget. But really, Grandmother, instead of worrying about that wretched chair, why don't you look at the fabulous view now coming into sight in the special light this place has whose clarity is so great that it sometimes stretches my mind almost painfully. And listen, Grandmother, to some poetry that I memorized:
There is a land called Crete amid the wine-red sea,/ Beauteous, fertile and girdled by water,/ Settled by peoples innumerable and boasting of ninety cities / Many are the tongues there spoken,/ And on it is Knossos, citadel of royal Minos,/ Friend of mighty Zeus Nine years did he rule there...
etcetera, etcetera ... ha ha...

—Maybe...

—Maybe.

—Just like that ... I felt like it. But hold on to my belt now and listen to that Greek ship tooting away down there as it enters the harbor. When I hear those ships' horns in my sleep at night, I sometimes think that I've managed after all to board one of Father's warships...

—I mean, Grandfather ... I was thinking of Opapa...

—Perhaps you're right and I'm purposely dragging out the story. And it may well be, Grandmother, that already then the first seed was sown of what you call my “vanishing” and Schmelling calls my “entanglement,” although I simply call it my POWer play. Because the minute I saw those two Greek civilians, the truth about whom I couldn't have imagined then in my wildest dreams, coming into that big room...

—I'll get to that ... in a minute...

—No, that's a surprise ... I have to keep you in suspense to make sure you'll stay with me to the end...

—Soon ... soon. Anyway, these two men were leading a mule loaded with two or three saddlebags that they meant to hide up there for a rainy day, because they, Grandmother, hadn't the least doubt that we Germans would win the battle that was still going on. And knowing the place well, they realized immediately, by the way the urns had been moved, that someone was hiding there. They froze ... and before they could run off to tell the English—who, because of the silence,
I
thought had won the battle—I decided to take them prisoner rather than be taken one myself, and so I jumped out of my hiding place with my schmeisser pointed straight at them, at least as far as my vision permitted, and yelled at them in English to surrender

—Hands up!
That's what they taught us in Athens to say to any Englishman trying to strike up a conversation...

—Kill them?

—But what for, Grandmother? They were civilians, and in May ‘41 killing civilians wasn't standard procedure yet. No one knew at the time that they were our worst enemies...

—Two, a father and son. And of the two of them it was the son, who was only a few years older than me and looked like one of us, well built and blond with a rather pleasant face, who panicked at the sight of my schmeisser, while the father remained cool and collected, perhaps because in any case he looked like a ghost who had just stepped out of a grave in the palace. He had on a dusty black suit and a thin, striped tie that was knotted around his neck like a rope, and he was bald and wore glasses ... which, to tell you the truth, Grandmother, was reason enough in itself for my preemptive strike...

—Of course ... although as soon as I snatched them off his nose and put them on my own I saw that I needn't have bothered, because the same world that had been all big and blurry now became as tiny and far-off as if I were looking through a telescope. Not that I returned them to him, because I confiscated them and stuck them in my pocket for further examination. I could tell from the glimmer of a smile on his face that he realized at once that the black scorpion that had fallen on him was a German paratrooper with the bad luck to get lost and lose his glasses, which seemed so perfectly natural to him that right away, without waiting to be asked any questions, he began chatting politely in simple but quite understandable German. He began by introducing himself as a tour guide to the old palace who had come up there that morning to see if the fighting hadn't ruined his ruins, to which he added that he would be glad to take me home with him to look for a better pair of glasses ... and seeing that I looked doubtful, because I suspected a trap...

—Exactly.

—Exactly ... and so right away, no less calmly than before, he suggested sending his son for the glasses and remaining with me as a hostage, which was far too logical and fair an offer for me to turn down, Grandmother ... at which precise point my odd relationship with those two men began...

—In a minute ... I'm getting to it...

—No, they're not around anymore ... but wait ... just wait...

—No, you're wrong. It wasn't a trap, and it was no fault of their own that the battle was over by the time I got back to the battlefield. You see, I still was convinced that the island was swarming with English, and although I was determined to put up a fight and not be taken prisoner, how could I fight without my glasses? And so, as I said, I gladly accepted that German-speaking ghost's offer to be my hostage, although I took every precaution and made him descend to an inner room of the palace, where I tied his hands and legs thoroughly with first-aid gauze and then, seeing as how he was very small and slender, helped him to climb into one of those giant urns, in which I could be sure he would stay put. As for his son, who was white as a sheet and too frightened to move at the spectacle of his father being trussed up so efficiently, I sent him off to fetch the promised glasses, although not before ordering him to bring his mule to a oack room too and to leave it tethered there as an additional deposit...

—Yes, indeed, Grandmother, I was full of grand notions of honor ... although for someone who had just met the enemy for the first time, you can see I behaved very sensibly. Since then I've arrested and tied many more people on this island, but I can remember my hands shaking as I wrapped gauze around that wrinkled ghost, who actually smiled at me most considerately, as if he couldn't have agreed more with what I was doing...

—But I really needed them. Because whatever you may think, Grandmother, I have definitely been nearsighted since the fifth grade....

—I wish to reiterate, dear Grandmother Andrea, as patiently as I can, that I did not hear any sounds of battle. That's one reason I took you up this hill, so that you could see for yourself how far it was from the isolated valley I landed in to where the fighting was going on. The actual battle took place down there, along the coast and right outside Heraklion, which you can see directly beneath you...

—Perhaps I didn't believe it.

—Perhaps I couldn't believe it. Don't forget, in those first few days the whole brilliant operation was hanging by a hair...

—Perhaps I didn't want to believe it, either ... I don't deny that you have a point there, Grandmother...

—That's so. I admit it. Sometimes I despair prematurely to avoid disappointment later. I admit it.

—But look here, the minute I try to be nice and take part of the blame on myself, you want to lay it all on me ... just like you've always done...

—As usual? Automatically, Grandmother? Have I been to blame from the minute I was born? In that case, there's really no point in going on with my story...

—No, I've had enough! Let's stop this, then ... let's go back down ... what's the point of even trying to explain ... let's stop this right here and now...

—Yes. Of course. I'm angry at you for not wanting to listen to me, Grandmother, because you've already passed judgment on me and decided that I ran away from the battle when I didn't at all and was simply trying to understand it. From the minute I was thrown out of the belly of that airplane, all by myself into the world, with all those bullets whizzing by me and the screams of dying men, I realized that getting killed was easy but that understanding was hard, and I made up my mind to do things the hard way. That's why, having disentangled myself from that tree, I headed south toward solitude, Grandmother, trusting in the power of the pure reason within me to issue the proper commands, or at least, commands as proper and responsible as any of the general staff's. And so great was the command for solitude, Grandmother, that I even about-faced and killed a flock of goats to keep from being followed, or from being distracted by the human expression on their dumb faces. And thus, Grandmother, as solitary as could be, I stumbled in the dead of night on the remains of an ancient civilization that stirred and enchanted my soul. But I still had no idea how to connect with it, which made it only natural, Grandmother, that, finding myself with a Greek tour guide in my clutches, I decided to make the most of him. And in fact, he was most generous with his time despite the humiliating position I had put him in and began talking to me not as my foe or captured prisoner, but as a potential intellectual companion, trying his best to converse in the slow, simple German that, so he said, he had acquired leading tours. You have to realize that, although as soon as he saw the sky full of German parachutes he was convinced of our victory and even assumed that there would be among the invaders a few culture-loving humanists who would want a guided tour of the famous Labyrinth once the fighting was over, he had never dreamed that, already on the first morning, he would be facing his first humanist while bound hand and foot...