Panorama (21 page)

Josef grows ever more lonely, sticking to a corner of the courtyard on his own, though when the weather is nice and almost everyone is outside, he holes up in the classroom, where he reads a lot and feels best of all, dreaming of what the world outside looks like, all of it open and beautiful and unattainable, as in a panorama that you see before your eyes, but which you can’t enter, though he wanted to enter and go even farther, leaving The Box behind, Josef no longer having to spend time in the dormitory or eat with the students, The Bull’s screams no longer audible, and no one calling him a pig. But Josef can leave The Box only during the vacation, or in special instances, when a visitor from afar asks for him at The Box through Herr Lindenbaum in the visitors room, and if The Bull grants permission for Josef to receive a pass. As soon as Josef gets such a pass for an afternoon’s leave, he runs to the inspector on duty, who gives him the key to the clothing room so that he can put on a good suit, as well as quickly wash his face and hands, Josef running to bring back the key, at which the inspector casts another glance at him to make sure all is in order, upon which he runs into the visitors room to the waiting guest and is freed from The Box for a number of hours, though this happens much too rarely.

Only the pupils from the city and the surrounding area have it better, since they can leave The Box every week, or almost every week, as long as there is nothing going on, only new students not being allowed to go home in the first weeks, nor are others encouraged to visit them, The Bull very clear about this, since it does nothing to help them adapt to the spirit of The Box. Whoever has good grades can leave after the two o’clock meal on Saturday in order to get themselves ready, after which they are inspected and then get their pass from the same inspector, while others leave later in the afternoon, some having a bath first, though those who have gotten into a bit of trouble have to wait until nine o’clock on Sunday morning to leave, or even until eleven, though anyone who has behaved really badly has to stay
at The Box. Pupils from the two highest classes who don’t visit their parents can leave on Sunday after the two o’clock meal if they are in good standing, something that’s called a free pass, though they have to be back by six o’clock sharp. They head into the city, most of them together, going to the movies, walking around, sitting in the pastry shop and stuffing themselves, some even going for a beer or a liqueur, which is forbidden, yet no one asks them about it, while at The Box they brag about it, and no one tells on them, for you can’t squeal on the older ones, it being a sign of disloyalty to everyone. Whoever doesn’t respect this is swept into a corner or a closet without anyone seeing and promptly thrashed and beaten relentlessly, Josef knowing this to be the case and having seen it happen for himself, though he has never told on anyone, for he wouldn’t want a beating, it all frightens him so, and he wants to remain free. Josef has discovered a way to get on Herr Lindenbaum’s good side. Accidentally, he had heard that you only have to give Herr Lindenbaum a present and he’ll be very friendly, so Josef had brought him a piece of real butter, causing Lindenbaum to wonder to himself and ask if Josef was regretting something he had done, but he said he was just happy to give him the butter. Herr Lindenbaum then took it and thanked him and said that Josef was a good boy and should make sure to come to him if he needed anything. This pleased Josef, for he already knows that Herr Lindenbaum lets a few pupils whom he likes out of The Box for a couple of minutes in order to buy some crumb, cheese, and pound cake over at the bakery, these being two of the nicest minutes you can have, except that they go by too fast, Herr Lindenbaum saying that The Bull was willing to look the other way because the grub in The Box really wasn’t all that good.

Josef had also discovered that the lenses for his glasses were quite specialized, because after someone in The Box yanked them off his nose they broke, and the optician to whom you were allowed to go from The Box, if the inspector gave permission, said himself that he couldn’t get these lenses for at least fourteen days, though it was easier to get them in the center of the city. Josef informed the inspector of all this, and he agreed that Josef had to get there, and for that he got a pass. After that he sometimes secretly smashed his glasses into the ground in order to get out of The Box for a few hours, except that it was too expensive to do so very often, although it wasn’t
too bad, but he didn’t want anyone to discover what he was doing and it didn’t help all that much anyway. Josef did it only when he could no longer stand to constantly look at the faces in The Box and the courtyard and the classroom, it being wonderful when Herr Lindenbaum presses the button and the door opens, and Josef slams it shut with a bang, the first free minutes consisting of incredible happiness. He runs as fast as he can and thinks about freedom only for a moment, but it’s over before he knows it, for Josef cannot go any farther, as he would be caught immediately, which would only mean more trouble hounding him, and so instead he tries to enjoy every second, looking at his pocket watch, which others in The Box call an ugly old onion, because it’s not made of silver. Josef sees how the second hand continually moves and, once it has made a complete circle, before another minute has passed he has to be back in The Box, where the bell will continue striking, there never being an end to it. Then Josef puts the watch back in his pocket and only wants to forget it, vowing to have a bit more fun while buying some sweets and snacks, as well as a little present for Herr Lindenbaum, before he finally arrives at the office of the optician, who already knows him and says, “So the glasses have broken in two again? My boy, my boy, Zeiß the lens maker of Jena couldn’t keep up.” Then the glasses are fitted out, and it’s already time to return to The Box, Josef feeling numb, his head heavy, his heart almost standing still. And then The Box is there again and looks as peaceful as other buildings, it being larger and carrying a gold inscription with the school’s full name, Professor Felger sometimes commenting, “The institution is golden on the outside and cruddy on the inside!” Josef guesses that he should already be back by now as he slowly lifts his hand toward the doorbell, but he waits a bit longer, pulls the watch out of his pocket, and sees that there actually are a couple of minutes to go, after which he feels that he’s magnetized, as The Bull is by his wife when he has heart problems, though Josef eventually must yield as he pushes the button, Herr Lindenbaum looking out as it rings, and Josef is once again stuck in The Box.

Once when the older boys were down below for their bath, Josef went into a classroom just to be alone for a while, only to discover the boy to whom he had said that he was worried that his packet of money could be stolen because his desk was open, then the next morning it was really gone.
This time, however, he didn’t pay any attention to the boy and just wanted to read a book, but the boy said that it was time to take a bath, so why wasn’t Josef doing so, and that he was just about to go himself, in fact they could go together. Then Josef left and took his swim trunks, the hand towel, the soap, the nail brush, and the comb, rolling them all up together as everyone did at The Box, the boy coming along as well, when suddenly the latter said that he had to go back because he had forgotten something, and that Josef should go on ahead of him, the boy would soon follow. Josef didn’t think any more about it and was already in the bath, but when he returned from the bath to the classroom a classmate was upset that he had just received a packet of food that day and had eaten hardly anything from it, everything having been locked in the cabinet of his desk, and now it had all been stolen, only a couple of biscuits and some paper still left, while everything else was gone, even though he had asked his classmates if they knew anything about it, for everything had been there just an hour ago when he went to take a bath. No one in the classroom knew anything, everyone had left the little room, and after Josef listened for a while it finally dawned on him what had happened to his own packet of money, and so he went to the one who was so upset and said to him, “I need to talk to you, for I have a suspicion as to who it is.” Then he told him what he had observed on his way to the baths, that he couldn’t be absolutely certain, but that he believed that the boy must have taken it, and that he should inquire about him.

Then they went to the inspector on duty, who happened to be Löschhorn, after which they looked for the boy throughout the entire Box, until they finally found him and said he had to open his desk and cabinet, although he said that he had taken nothing, nor had he ever taken anything, though they said to him, “Then open up! If you haven’t taken anything there’s no problem, and you can just close them up again!” Then he had to open up, but he smirked through it all, for he was insulted that anyone would think he could have stolen anything, while once he had opened up everything it all looked as if there really was nothing inside that didn’t belong to him, though Inspector Löschhorn simply reached in and found everything from the package hidden behind other stuff, the middle schooler recognizing everything that belonged to him, the next development occurring when there appeared the name of a fine-goods store in Meerane, which
was where the middle schooler was from, Inspector Löschhorn asking, “Now, my boy, where did you get these things?” But the young boy still kept saying that he had never stolen anything, he knew nothing about how those things got there, though the middle schooler said that all of it was from the package he’d gotten that day, the young boy continuing to maintain that he had stolen nothing until the middle schooler yelled, “I also have witnesses!” The inspector, however, said there was no need for witnesses, the middle schooler just needed to say if all of it was his, whether anything was missing, at which the latter looked carefully at everything and said, “It’s all here. There are only two apples missing, which were already gone.” To that Inspector Löschhorn replied that the middle schooler should take all of his things, and the young boy would soon see the consequences of what he’d done, as the inspector would speak to The Bull, for thieves weren’t allowed at The Box, the inspector saying that he would have to lock the boy in the little room where The Paster teaches his cadets, while the middle schooler should give Josef something as a reward, since he was the one who had uncovered the thief. The middle schooler did indeed give Josef something, and was genuinely friendly to him from then on, but no real friendship developed from it.

The boy who had stolen the things got a couple of slaps from The Bull, who then ordered even stronger measures, the kind that came at the end of a dressing-down from The Bull as he ordered a circle to be formed around the sinner in the middle, from which a couple of older pupils stepped forward to beat him for real. The one convicted is defenseless, even if he tries to hold his hands up to his face or pushes back with his elbows or kicks with his feet, for the others are much too strong, and the stronger boys like to hit with all their might until The Bull says that it’s enough. The Bull then leaves and everyone withdraws, and the guilty one is reduced to a lump covered in blue welts, but no one pays him any attention, since no one is allowed to do anything more to him. Yet as the stronger boy whisked the thief away from Josef’s classroom he no longer felt bad for him, for indeed he would not be allowed to remain at The Box, which is why a couple of days later he disappeared and went back to his parents who lived near Wurzen, since thieves were not tolerated at The Box.

When the study hall early in the morning is over, the bell rings again,
and the pupils pack their schoolbags, running across the courtyard into the school in good weather, otherwise the doors are opened and you can walk across without even a coat. School lasts until twelve, sometimes until one, a short pause occurring after each period, the one at ten lasting a bit longer, during which two half slices of bread stuck together with margarine and beetroot marmalade are distributed as a second breakfast from large baskets, the pupils lining up on the first floor in order to get a single serving each. During the longer break you can also go to Marta, the head nurse in the infirmary, if you feel you have something wrong with you, but on the other hand you shouldn’t just go anytime you feel like it, for Head Nurse Marta gets very cross if you show up needlessly, it being only reasonable to go if you’re bleeding or feel really sick. The head nurse believes in toughing it out, instead of going to her for any old scratch, for you can put up with a little headache or tummyache, the head nurse having little time to do anything if all two hundred and fifty pupils came to see her every day. If you show up, the head nurse asks what’s the matter, and then dispenses some kind of powder or a spoon of medicine, or sprays something in your eyes, washes out any small wound, smears on a salve, puts on a Band-Aid, or unrolls a bandage, everything taken care of in a jiffy. Josef can’t stand her, nor can many of the others, she being helped by two regular nurses as well as two dispensers, since more and more pupils end up having to stay in the infirmary. When Head Nurse Marta thinks that something is really wrong with a pupil, she orders him to go to the doctor, who then performs a thorough examination, though now there is a new doctor whom the head nurse doesn’t like, because he believes that one should be quite sympathetic when it comes to illness, and is against the use of powders and much more in favor of using wet wraps that slowly bring a fever down, this causing the illness to last longer, resulting in much more work for the nurses, which angers Head Nurse Marta more than anything else.

If a pupil says that he is sick, the head nurse sits him down in a chair, dips a thermometer in alcohol, and sticks it under his arm, and if it’s higher than 100 she says, “You have to stay in the infirmary.” If you have only a small fever you can get the things you need in the infirmary from The Box, but if it’s higher than 102 you have to stay and have someone get what you need, be it a nightshirt, slippers, toiletries, or whatever else you want,
though not all that much is allowed. When the head nurse thinks it’s infectious, she has isolation rooms where you are completely alone, Josef having always wanted to get such a room, while others are afraid of them, saying that’s where you go when you have scarlet fever or diphtheria, though if you are sick with these you don’t stay in the infirmary but instead an ambulance comes and takes you away. If the isolation rooms are empty, then sometimes Head Nurse Marta can stick someone in one of them as punishment for causing too much trouble or mischief elsewhere, though again what a pleasure Josef feels it would be to be punished so, if only the head nurse weren’t so nasty. Sometimes she also suspects that someone has intentionally made himself sick in order to get out of The Box for a while, yet she says she is proud to keep the pupils healthy, and that her sickroom is not overfull, except when there’s a rash of flu or a stomach virus, which can never be completely prevented, but that’s when the head nurse is in a bad mood and is always very upset that the new doctor is so against the use of powders. Josef wonders why so many pupils say how nice it is to be sick now and then, claiming that you can at least get some extra rest and don’t have to get up so early, many going back again and again, for he doesn’t find the grub up above any better, since it’s almost exactly the same as what’s served in The Box, except with much more broth, and herb tea rather than barley coffee, though it’s true that the doctor is very nice, always making a couple of jokes during his examination.