The Journey (7 page)

The voices defiled the street, therefore it was better to keep silent and to quietly march on with irregular steps. Legs marched now over the bridges. Each wanted to walk along the balustrade in order to gaze at the frozen river. But here it was particularly dark, and so there was hardly anything
to see. Only dirty flecks of foam flickered silver-gray among the dolorous depths, and far off by the dam, where the water never froze, the thundering sound of the raging water could be heard. Here was the island on which Paul and Zerlina had often played as children. There had also been a swimming school that one could visit before such things were forbidden. There had been carts belonging to vendors who ordered colorful drinks for sale, as well as colorful ices and cheap candy, all of it meant to seduce folks with delight and requiring only a small sacrifice of money. Now the island was quiet and empty, certainly no longer ready to receive its regular visitors, and above all not the forbidden ones, especially since the island was now forbidden to everyone. It could no longer be reached, the entrance to it was closed, fenced in with barbed wire because something had occurred there that was now forbidden, and no one should know about it.

Now the island lay behind the wanderers, sunken, an old playground to which no path led any longer. The travelers no longer thought about it, and the bridge was gone as well. Slowly the piers gave way and collapsed, sinking into one another and falling almost soundlessly onto the ice. Then the place was gone, the traffic disappeared, after which there was a long road and everything melted together, and yet another road, gone, gone, everything forbidden now finished, no longer there, not a single memory even attempting to assert itself with a shudder, the forbidden now completely dead behind the gate that was sealed tight and would last and was there and locked the forbidden up for good.

Some halls of the Technology Museum that lay in the adjacent building had been cleaned out, nothing left in them but empty bunks and whitewashed walls. That was the gathering place for those people who were no longer wanted and yet who nonetheless were still there, since anyone who is condemned still exists before being destroyed, just as there must be a place for it all to occur, and so it all began here. Hundreds of bodies lay squeezed tightly together in the darkness that was only here and there broken by the muffled light of an occasional flashlight. But the night was constantly full of the sounds of rustling and groans.

It was impossible to find Ida and Leopold in the darkness. In surly fashion, the nervous commander from the office in charge of new detentions recommended waiting until morning.

“In six hours there will be enough light. You’ll find them both then. No one gets lost here.”

But all are already lost, and it is necessary to make fine distinctions. Whoever comes too late and has to be taken in should be happy to find a little spot on which he can rest. Now it is night and you have to make sure to find a place to rest. But where? It doesn’t matter, the main thing is that you are there. The cross-eyed youth with the service cap aslant on his head smoked one cigarette after another. Wasn’t that forbidden? For a commander nothing was forbidden, and he could run off at the mouth. He could fill the reeking hall with orders, as well as with the anger that unconsciously and without restraint accompanied the power conferred on him, and that he could vent on the prisoners in the museum at will.

Those formerly known as human beings now appeared made of wax, but they were still alive. As the morning dawned its gray, they sat upon their bundles and rocked their upper bodies to and fro, though they did not pray. They had no future, nor was the past recognizable within them any longer. “Here you can’t remember anything.” The cross-eyed youth walked back and forth among the cowering people. He was almost completely dressed in leather. It was forbidden to those whose lives had been snuffed out to wear anything upon their heads inside the halls, but Cross-Eyes wore a leather cap. In his right hand he swung a leather whip with which he could strike whenever it pleased him. And yet he didn’t harm anyone, silent threats being enough to satisfy him. Sometimes he murmured: “Soon they’ll be here, so order must be kept. No one can be sick.”

An old woman next to Ida lifted herself up and stood in front of him: “What will it be like, Herr Commander?”

Cross-Eyes maintained his haughty stance: “Don’t worry, don’t worry.”

The old woman wanted to sit down again, but she lost her balance and fell backward over her bags. Others also sank down. A young woman pulled together some whining boys and girls and distracted them with games. They sang and clapped their hands.

Amid the singing a mad woman howled: “Let me be! The soup scorched my tongue! You can’t eat my soup! I want to get out! The pope ordered it! Ha!”

The unhappy woman began to rant. Since no one knew how to calm her down, Leopold stepped in.

“I’ve been a general practitioner for years. The woman is delusional. Her condition is dangerous. She needs to be isolated and to have a shot of camphor. She can’t come along in this condition.”

Cross-Eyes appeared out of nowhere. “Mind your own business, old man! She’s coming along. Regulations say so. Listen, old woman! Get ahold of yourself! If anyone hears this ruckus, it could mean trouble for you!”

“The soup stinks! I want to get out! Let me go, let me go! The pope called me!”

“Who does the old lady belong to?”

No one said a word. A stretcher was brought out. Two young men loaded the ranting woman onto it, though she desperately tried to fight them off and bit one of their hands so badly it bled. Other attendants rushed to help the young men, and Cross-Eyes ordered them to strap the raving old lady down on the stretcher.

Someone yelled: “That’s an outrage! That’s inhuman! No one declares war on the sick!”

“Who says so? One can’t jeopardize the whole group.”

“What do you mean, jeopardize? This madness is what’s really jeopardizing us.”

“They should be quick and be done with it.”

Leopold cried: “That’s not right! You should call someone who is in charge so that order is kept!”

“I’m in charge of order.”

“You don’t bring any order at all!”

“What does it matter to you? Does she belong to you?”

Caroline took her husband by the hand and tried to pull him away in order to appease them, but Leopold was very upset and didn’t want to leave the site of the incident.

“It’s not right! This patient doesn’t belong here! She needs to be admitted!”

Waves of subdued laughter erupted. “Admitted? Admitted? Tell us, are you perhaps free to take care of it?”

“Caroline, this is unheard of! This case needs to be reported to the
medical authorities! This is not how you treat human beings. If I had known that such an injustice was going to take place here I would have stayed home and not allowed my family to take part in this journey. The preparations for it are simply miserable.”

Leopold wandered off, proud and angry, Caroline leading him away as the laughter grew behind him. Cross-Eyes tapped his head with the tip of his finger three times: “Totally nuts!”

In the courtyard, Cross-Eyes stands in the first light of dawn and is wrapped up in a heavy coat. Nearby are some helpers who for the most part stand by quietly, but who at a sign suddenly start running around like raving madmen before returning to stand motionless again. They are dressed alike, but not as smartly as Cross-Eyes, for not as much leather clings to them. Some policemen plod back and forth and look up at the sky. It’s not their concern. They rub their hands. There are also three men in full battle dress with their medals and badges of honor. They are proud men who hold their little heads high with a decisive air. Their legs fidget with impatience. One of them is somewhat small and yawns, blowing a little cloud of smoke from his throat. Another one, who is their leader, calls over to Cross-Eyes, who then stands at attention after he has yanked his leather cap off his head.

“Begin!”

Cross-Eyes gives his helpers a sign, at which the pack fans out. One runs to the entrance and remains standing there as he pulls a list from his breast pocket and unfolds it with great seriousness. After a short while the forbidden people head through the gate in twos, bent over with the weight of their bags. They call out a number and their former name. The helper writes with his pencil and sometimes waves his list back and forth and barks at the swarm: “Faster! Move on!” The forbidden gather themselves in the courtyard and organize themselves in rows of four. Altogether there are a thousand who used to be known as human beings. Cross-Eyes marches in front of the rows, turns over his whip, and strides without a horse slowly along the length of the front row, while with the whip handle he gives every fourth man a light swat on the shoulder, calling out loud: “Four! Eight! Twelve! Sixteen!…”

Yet not all one thousand could present themselves, even though there was space enough for a much larger group. Twenty-four members of the
traveling group lay on stretchers. Between their legs and on top of them the sick ones’ belongings were piled such that they could not move. After Cross-Eyes had also counted the figures on the stretchers, he yanked his cap off his head and strode without a horse as fast as his crooked legs would carry his fat body to the mighty heroes, gathered himself together, and stood at attention.

“One thousand gathered. Twenty-four of them lying down.”

“Well done!”

One of the mighty heroes reached for the list and counted the number of those waiting once again. He hardly paid attention to the standing, which he quickly passed by, choosing instead to spend more time among the stretchers.

Across the courtyard a cry rattled out: “Medical report!”

Cross-Eyes yelled: “Medical report!”

One of his assistants charged into the Technology Museum.

The hero barked: “Filthy pigs!”

Cross-Eyes cried: “They’ll be right back in line!”

Then the hero barked: “Why aren’t they ready?”

Cross-Eyes cried: “Whoever’s fault it is will pay!”

Then the hero barked even louder: “Shut your trap, you pig! It’s all your fault!”

Cross-Eyes bowed and cried: “Yes, sir!”

Yet the assistant had returned with the list of the sick, wanting to hand it over to Cross-Eyes.

But then the hero yelled at him loudly: “Bring it here, or I’ll smack you in the mouth! Nussbaum, you come as well!”

The assistant and Cross-Eyes hurried toward the mighty hero, who began to review what they had written.

“What a miserable typewriter ribbon! Look at this, Nussbaum! Next time I’ll break your knees if the report is not typed more clearly!”

“Sorry, we put in for a new one. But no one sent us a new ribbon.”

“Disgraceful! There’ll be trouble for that.”

Cross-Eyes read the names of the ill to the hero, who then ordered that no one should be allowed to lie down who did not have a fever of 102 degrees. Nonetheless, it was obvious that almost all of those on the stretchers were very sick. Only two old men over eighty and a woman who
had given birth to a stillborn the previous night were allowed to stay. Otherwise, all of the weak and sick stood in rank and file, as well as the old woman whose attack of madness had so disturbed Leopold. As the hero finished checking the list, he nodded that he was satisfied. The authority’s honor had been preserved, and only through an act of grace had the forbidden been transformed into the allowed.

“Load it up!”

It began to snow. Heavy flakes fell from above. They didn’t worry themselves about those gathered below. They blanketed the copper green roof of the Technology Museum. If you stuck out your tongue between your lips you could perhaps catch a flake, but it was dangerous to do that since it was forbidden. Zerlina was happy when a flake stuck to her eyelash and hung there. How easily she could have gotten rid of it with a finger or with a shake of her head or with a blink of her eyelids. But Zerlina stood still, making sure not to move. The flake melted and ran cautiously away.

As long as the heroes are there, it’s forbidden to move, which Zerlina knew, even if it was not underscored that often. Life is forbidden, something that never quite hits home, because it has not ceased to go on. Even in the courtyard of the Technology Museum no order has been given. They simply have forgotten to enforce what is forbidden, and thus life is frozen and has turned to snow. The same flakes could fall on the heroes or be carried by the wind and drift down outside of the museum courtyard and onto one of the surrounding houses or onto a street. There are no exceptions as to who is part of the moment. There are differences only in how fate is meted out, but not in fate itself, everything now being frozen. One no longer had to forbid movement, for there was none. What you saw with your own eyes could hardly be believed. It was null and void and could only be believed if you closed your eyes. Then the snow melted.

Such was the fabled height of spring in the mountains. The spring runoff could be heard rushing down the slopes. Below, flowers bloomed in all their colors. Here above, winter lived on, arriving toward evening with full force. Then the mountains were closed off by the vixen Frau Lischka, no one allowed to enter them, not even the intruders, no matter how much they knocked and pleaded at the gate. “Sorry, but there’s no one home in winter.…” Frau Lischka turns away from the entrance to the mountains, but does not worry at all about the troublemakers. She keeps
watch over the stairwell and makes sure that the blackout is not violated. All the walls were iced over, and only with the help of ropes could one climb up the stairwell. The tenants sat behind the doors of their apartments and tended the fires in their ovens. Everything was bedecked and looked as if you could lie down in the snow, the flakes having fallen in plentiful heaps. Now one needed only to sleep, for tomorrow winter would be over. The sun will wake you and you can run through the fields.

Exclamations flew back and forth. Anguished cries. No, it was not snow, it was hail. Nonetheless, everything was covered with snow. Snowdrops could be heard. Tin roofs rattled. The crashing sound of pure rubbish. Everything has been brought along, nothing left behind. Frau Lischka no longer needs a doormat. Back home, the patients are safe and dry, only the poor doctor wastes away on a muck heap. What he needs is a shot to revive him, a shot of sun so that he won’t freeze. For there is no longer any heat. It is not necessary in the museum. The old machines don’t need any oil. The locomotive does not move, but when it breathes, steam rises from its smokestack. Perhaps it will take off. The forbidden ones are hanging upon it. If only they can make sure not to slip on the ice and under its wheels!