Mr. Mani (15 page)

—Me, naturally.

—At first just to pass the time until his son came back with some glasses. Little by little, though, I began to be fascinated by the story that he was telling me so wonderfully well. His bald head was sticking out of that old urn like the head of some wise snake, and even though his German, Grandmother, was very basic, you could see he had a way with words the minute he began telling me about the men who dug and were dug up at Knossos, whom he described as though they were all one big family, Sir Arthur Evans and his English archaeologists who came here at the turn of the century and King Minos and his royal court who lived here three and a half millennia ago. In fact, I was so impressed that it occurred to me at once that, if all went well, old Koch might get to see at least part of his dream come true, and that Germans would come to the ruins of the Labyrinth from all over the Reich to study their own history and be solaced by another, ancient civilization for the sorrow and disillusionment of our own, which we take so seriously, Grandmother, that it turns to a dragon in our hands. Just imagine, Grandmother, even then I began...

—Yes, while the battle was still raging all around me.

—I plead guilty to that too ... Anyway, I jotted down some notes, and I was so carried away that in the end I couldn't restrain myself, and as evening began setting in and the young man still hadn't returned, I decided to let my hostage out of his urn before killing him for his son's absconding, although I was careful then too not to give him his glasses back, so that he couldn't run away. And so, as nearsighted as I was, he began leading me from room to room and wall painting to wall painting, pointing out all the things he had already told me about. I was determined to pump him for all he was worth, because the more he told me about that ancient world, the more it excited me...

—Because it bore no guilt, Grandmother, and therefore had no fear...

—That's how he explained it.

—For example, for example, Grandmother, even such details as no fortifications having been found around the palace, which itself is eloquent testimony not only to the inhabitants' basic peacefulness, but to their taking peace for granted. And the paintings on the walls really do radiate such happiness and calm ... even the great bull was so loved by everyone that the young men held tournaments in which they leaped over its back ... and except for one double-bladed ax, not a single weapon was found anywhere...

—No. That's the opinion of all the scholars, whom my guide was merely quoting...

—What?

—What did you say?

—You're astonishing, Grandmother!

—I'll get to that in a minute ... aren't you a shrewd one, though!

—In a minute ... in a minute ... just wait...

—Jewish scholars ... how odd...

—I'm getting to it ... in a minute you'll understand everything ... although permit me, wisest Grandmother, to congratulate you right now, even though, historically speaking, there were no Jews in the world at the time...

—Not a blessed one.

—They simply hadn't invented themselves yet.

—Well, then, Grandmother, it would seem that they're not quite as old as they think.

—I understand ... I understand...

—He said the same thing to me that first night while describing the island and the people who lived on it ... which was why...

—Of course he did.

—Mani.

—Yes. Perfectly simple.

—Mani nothing. Just plain Mani.

—I don't think it's a shortened form of anything ... but...

—Maybe of mania...

—Josef.

—Killed him, Grandmother?

—Wait ... wait a minute ... why are you in such a rush...

—But he did keep his promise. His son was just waiting for it to get dark before slipping out of town unseen, because the Greeks were sure that the English were successfully repelling our attack and might have endangered his father in their rush to get at me, which was the reason he waited. As soon as the first stars came out, though, there was a rustle in the underbrush, and before I could reach for my schmeisser, Grandmother, a short, delicate girl of about my age was standing there, the son's wife and my ghost's daughter-in-law, who had come to get the lay of the land. She had brought a pot of hot food and a jug of coffee for the night, and also, as if I had an insatiable lust for glasses, five pairs of them wrapped in a towel. The only problem was that they were all old folks' reading glasses that must have belonged to the young Manis' grandparents. They looked just like your glasses, Grandmother, which only used to make me see worse when I tried them on as a child...

—Of course. It was the first thing I did. Don't think I had forgotten where I was. Mani Senior translated thè news that the young lady and her husband had gathered, because meanwhile, Mani Junior, looking very confused and frightened, had stepped slowly out of hiding too and had joined us shivering all over, holding a child in one hand, a little boy of about three, and a small sack of barley for the mule in his other hand. He was wearing a faded old overcoat, which he took off and gave to his father.

—They indeed had brought me their whole family, perhaps because they thought it best to die together...

—I'll get to that in a minute ... Because Mani Junior was quite beside himself. He began hugging and kissing his father and actually sobbing quite shamelessly in strange spasms, like some sort of mental defective, so that his wife and father had to grab him and hold him to protect him from his worry at seeing the old man stuck in an urn for safekeeping. I myself had no idea then, Grandmother, that this was but my first taste of the sweet-and-sour dish known as Fear-of-the-Conqueror that we've been eating ever since then until it's coming out of our ears. I'm talking about the terror that each of us creates even when he's just taking an innocent walk and thinking the most humane of thoughts—the stares that follow your every movement as a soldier, though you yourself may be sick of your own self. I could feel it beginning that summer evening, standing there without my glasses but with my cocked
schmeisser
gun aimed at that family of civilians that kept trying to calm me with all kinds of promises to ward off any sudden desperation that my finger might feel on the trigger, because I had already told them about my firm commitment to the sixth commandment. And so, even though, looking back on it now, the situation of the German forces in Heraklion that evening was far from good, Mani Senior, who stood glimmering like a ghost in the darkness, quite extravagantly promised me an imminent German victory even though his family had just seen English reinforcements moving up a nearby road, because he was confident that the English would never recover from the shock of the German attack. The English, he assured me with a wry touch of Anglophobia, were only in their element when fighting Asiatics or Africans, against whom their Englishness gave them strength, just as barbarism did the barbarians. He knew them well—and against real Europeans, and especially real Europeans with air superiority, they were on much shakier ground. And yet the fact was, Grandmother, that even though I was greatly cheered by what he said, which turned out to be perfectly correct, I was still in a hopeless situation. After all, I could hardly have asked that young lady to take me by the hand and bring me back without my glasses, like a schoolboy who fled, to my platoon...

—Did I say that?

—I meant a schoolboy who failed.

—Perhaps...

—Well, even if it was more than just a slip of the tongue, Grandmother, and the truth of the matter is that I really did flee a little, there's no need to shed any tears over it, because the story has a happy end...

—First of all, that here I am, standing in front of you, happy and alive myself. And secondly, that I've put these three years to use preparing the summation of the defense for the terrible Judgment Day that our poor Germany is in for, compared to which, dear Grandmother, the judgment of Versailles will seem child's play.

—Soon ... that's a surprise ... there'll be a time to tell you everything...

—But even if you're right again, Grandmother, and I really did overinvolve myself with that family by capturing it a bit too personally, it was collaborating with me for reasons that I didn't understand yet, though at the time I attributed it either to its fear of an armed enemy soldier falling myopically out of the sky, or else to, its pity for the same soldier, who was really quite lonely and frightened and in need of some family warmth after many long months without leave, to say nothing of being all scratched and bitten by the wolf pack....

—I don't follow you, Grandmother.

—But how?

—Killed them? There you go again...

—And the little boy?

—But how could I?

—Maybe...

—Maybe...

—Maybe. Maybe. And again, Grandmother, and only tentatively, for the sake of the argument, I'm prepared to admit that my inexperience with occupied civilians may have made me act irresponsibly, and that I should have stopped such sentimental conduct immediately, nipped it in the bud. I should have accepted a cup of coffee from the jug young Mani's wife brought and ridden away on my commandeered mule, putting that ruined Labyrinth behind me and galloping blindly off into the night until its silence was broken by a fatal Australian bullet, or better yet, by the longed-for shout of a German officer. But it seemed that Mr. Mani, and perhaps not unjustifiedly, was worried that I might lose my head and come back to kill him as I had killed the flock of goats—and so, believe it or not, O most clever and astute Grandmother, even though he was falling off his feet, the ghost offered his services as a hostage once again, and after eating a bit of his daughter-in-law's food, embracing his son and grandchild, and even handing me a little tourist's brochure in German about the antiquities of Knossos, he went back and lay down by his urn, thus taking himself prisoner again, and roundaboutly, Grandmother, according to your logic, me too. Before I could even think, he had signaled his son and daughter-in-law to cover him with that warm old winter coat and beat a hasty retreat—and in no time, Grandmother, they had vanished into one of the anterooms of that ruined palace, which the darkness had turned back into an ancient maze.

—Supposedly, Grandmother, for the same purpose as before, that is, to find me some suitable glasses. And thus began Round 2, which commenced with the man's taking a candle from his pocket and lighting it without so much as a by-your-leave so that I might have a better view of his jail cell and not, God forbid, do anything rash in the dark...

—Yes, Grandmother, a glum, inscrutable type, but so decisive and efficient that I began to suspect him of having German blood. Right away, with that quiet, submissive cunning that becomes the second nature of all conquered civilians, he tried maneuvering me into spending a peaceful night with him—which he did, Grandmother, just imagine, by suggesting that I wrap him in gauze again so that the two of us could get a good night's sleep, all in a spirit of mutual trust. It was then that it first dawned on me, although by now I've had three years to consider it, that the whole episode of my lost glasses was simply a pretext for him to satisfy a suddenly surfaced whim to be a prisoner or hostage, bound hand and foot, before he died. Perhaps he needed to atone for some old feeling of guilt, or perhaps to pass it on to me, so that I would have pity on his family...

—Yes, Grandmother. Are you ready for the surprise?

—Hang on, I've gotten there. He died without any help from me, entirely under his own steam—and to the best of my knowledge, without even a single groan! His heart just mercifully stopped beating, as sometimes happens in books or in the theater but never in real life. First, however, he turned to me in the corner of that ancient room, with the crickets sawing away at the spring night and the flame of the candle flickering over the wrinkled parchment of his face, and asked me if I had any more questions before he went to sleep. To this day, Grandmother, I remember how startled I was by such obsequiousness coming from a man old enough to be my father, and how, in all innocence, I thought he was overdoing it, because I didn't realize that it was his way of taking his final leave of me and giving death the green light—the same death that was already casting its first beams inside him like the blinking headlight of a locomotive rounding a distant bend. In fact, his submissiveness only made me feel suddenly callous, and without even answering I went off to eat my battle rations in a corner while he turned away and snuggled up in his coat, preparing for his descent to Hades, which before long was well underway. He lay there in a perfect fetal position, all trussed and bundled up, while I went out for a walk about the site and discovered all kinds of little niches I hadn't noticed before, even getting lost for a while before finding my way back to my prisoner, who, rather oddly, I thought, was as serenely asleep as if he hadn't a fear in the world. And so I went over and woke him, Grandmother, with a light prod of my schmeisser and asked him who the gods of that ancient civilization had been. He awoke with great difficulty, as if climbing out of some deep well, opened his eyes that flickered like two fireflies, and told me quite firmly that this particular prehistoric culture had had no gods at all, which was why he was so fond of it. I asked him how he knew that, “Didn't you yourself,” I said to him, “tell me there were no decipherable written remains?” But he wasn't fazed by that at all, “That's just it,” he said. “If the people who lived here had had gods, they would have learned to write about them...”

—Exactly...

—Grandmother, I liked that answer so much that I still remember it three years later. It even made me warm up to him a bit and ask him if he was born here in Knossos. For the first time he hesitated and seemed uncertain. He had come to Crete years ago, he told me, because of the English, who had banished him from some small, desert city in Asia whose name would not mean a thing to me ... and that, in fact, was the last thing he ever said, because as soon as I stopped questioning him he bundled up again beneath the coat, and sometime during the night, while I was sleeping in my corner, he died...