prisoner told me that this “Arab”, Schniemann by name, used formerly to be more sensible, and even capable of proper work. He used to go with an outside working party to a factory in the town. There he had made an attempt to escape, but had been recaptured. As he resisted his new arrest with almost animal desperation, a violent commotion broke out around him; in the course of it, somebody had trodden on his arm, and broken it. When he returned from hospital, he was as insane as he is now; his arm, which had mended badly, was no further use to him, and he always kept his hand in his pocket. This added a characteristic and unforgettable touch to his melancholy figure.
42
Before I finally return to my own experiences, I must mention one man, a scintillating figure who made his appearance among us for a few brief days at the beginning of my stay here, only to disappear for ever, transferred to another asylum. On my very first day I had heard of a prisoner who because of a fight had already been eight weeks in the punishment cells on dry bread and water. If I thought of this man at all—with a shudder at the seemingly unbearable length of his solitary confinement—I pictured to myself a fellow like Liesmann, a fellow about thirty years old, with a brutal angular face, who wore a black patch over one eye, and went about the block mute and sullen. Everyone avoided him, even the most quarrelsome did not dare to start anything with Liesmann, who had a reputation for suddenly lashing out at the merest hint of an insult, and for not giving over until the other man was battered into submission.
And then Hans Hagen made his appearance in our block, a handsome healthy-looking young man of thirty, with the figure of a trained athlete, jet-black slightly wavy hair, and an ivory-coloured face of pure classical line. He had obtained from the head-nurse an entirely new outfit instead of the rags which the others were obliged to wear, and he wore his brown corduroy trousers and rush-coloured jacket as elegantly as if the best tailor had made them to measure. His every movement was swift, purposeful, beautiful. The way he spoke, and his dark eyes lit up as he did so, the manner in which he was able to impart charm and amiability to the most casual utterance was sheer delight in this place of misery.
“How can a young god like this come to be in such a hell?” I asked myself, and aloud, “A newcomer?”
“No,” they answered. “That’s the prisoner who was eight weeks in the punishment-cells for fighting.”
I could hardly believe my ears.
Later I often walked with Hans Hagen for a few minutes along the corridor or out in the yard, and I always listened to his chatter with new delight, whether he was talking of his youthful escapades in Rochester—he had been educated for some years in England—or of his bold sailing voyages to the North Cape. By what he told me, this passion for sailing had been his downfall. He had gone on buying bigger and more beautiful yachts and apparently he had committed some insurance fraud over the last yacht, which brought him into conflict with the law. As I have said, this was the version which he quite lightly and casually told me. As I later found out, he had been rather more frank and honest with other prisoners. He was one of three sons of a merchant in Rostock, who had a very flourishing sports outfitter’s business, a wealthy man who was able to give his sons a good education. But with the youngest, this same Hans, simply nothing would go right. In his schooldays certain things had happened which necessitated his hasty removal from Germany and his trip to England. There, too, he seems not to have led a particularly respectable and industrious life. He told me of his secret nocturnal trips from Rochester to the London suburbs, and when he was in a good mood he would sing me softly in a pleasant tenor voice, little songs he had picked up in bars and dance-halls there. In English of course—but still I found it delightful what pains he took to amuse me and cheer me up. Back home at Rostock, he officially devoted himself to the study of medicine, but in reality he was discovering his passion for the sea and sailing. He bought himself his first yacht, and I doubt if it was his father who financed the purchase. Even a prosperous sports outfitters’ concern cannot afford tens of thousands of marks for one of three sons, particularly as Hans Hagen merely wanted to live well on it, to make long expensive trips with his girl-friends, and never worry about money. At this time he found out how easily a good-looking and well-connected young man can do business even if he hasn’t a pennyworth of working capital. He dealt in houses, sold stocks and bonds, acted as car agent and insurance broker and picked up commissions right and left. His quick, brilliant, resourceful brain enabled him readily to perceive any good business opportunity and to step in quickly. He used his power over women unscrupulously, and there were not many men who could resist his charm either.
But as the money flowed in, so his requirements increased also. They were always a step ahead of his income, and his pocket-book was always empty. But he knew only one thing: at all costs he wanted to keep on with his life of pleasure, the only life that suited him. He became more and more unscrupulous about his choice of the means by which he obtained money: he stole cars off the streets, he even stole the handbags of women as they danced with him—in short, he became a swindler and a thief. That could not go on successfully for long.
His first case was hushed up because he was the son of an influential father; the second landed him in prison, and from prison into this sad place in which he had already been living for six years.
43
Six years—I could hardly believe my ears—this young man had been living for six years in these wretched surroundings, and had retained all the flexibility and charm of youth, he still bore about him the brightness of the outside world! It was a puzzle to me, after being there only a few days I was already worn down and crushed. Since then I have thought a great deal about Hans Hagen and I believe I have discovered how he managed to remain so unalterably strong.
First, nothing penetrated him very deeply. So nothing could deeply hurt him. He lived so much on the surface, his brilliant gifts enticed him here and there, he was always busy yet he never did anything seriously. He could do everything about the place, he cut the keepers’ hair in an unusually bold and elegant style, he laid bricks better than a bricklayer, he gave lessons in shorthand, English, French, Russian, he worked hard in the factory, he did carpentry, he had been looking after the pigs—he could do everything, but he did it in a brilliant offhand way, he was irresponsibility itself, nothing was durable. But the main reason for his immutability, his unconquerable youth, was that here in this death-house he lived hardly differently from outside. True, his surroundings had changed, but not Hans Hagen. If he had charmed women outside, here he charmed sick men. He did not overlook even the dullest one among them, he would not rest till a ray of his charm had touched him. He was the real king of this place, was Hans Hagen, and the authorities knew it too.
And like a king he collected his tribute—exactly as he did outside. I never saw Hans Hagen ask for anything, beg for anything. That was not necessary, to such an extent did his followers look after him. A keeper told me that while Hagen was in the punishment cell, there was a constant coming and going, every unguarded moment was taken advantage of to pass him something on the sly. There was an endless whispering at the spy-hole, whose glass had been broken so that the most precious commodity in the institution, matches, could be handed in to him. If another comrade was in the punishment cells he was forgotten, nobody thought any more about him. His reappearance was received as indifferently as his disappearance. Not so Hans Hagen. I have seen myself, often and often, how they came to him, these poorest of the poor, with hunger gnawing at their bowels. One outside-worker brought him a cucumber, another a pocketful of potatoes, here a piece of bread, there an onion, a few sprigs of parsley, carrots, windfall apples, salt, a handful of picked-up cigarette ends. In this place, these are all most precious valuables, difficult to obtain, there is none who can give out of an over-abundance, all are sacrificing what is most essential. And Hagen took everything, everything. He laughed, he thanked them, he made a joke. He could say “Thank you” so charmingly. And then he would turn his back and the giver was forgotten.
Hans Hagen had sometimes given me some of his surplus, in that swift spontaneous way that was peculiar to him. I was sitting disconsolately over my water soup, and Hagen cried: “Here, Sommer, catch!” and from the next table a piece of bread flew across to me, and he laughed heartily as I clumsily caught it; even as he laughed he had already forgotten that he had given me something precious for which I was obliged to be grateful to him. That is how he was: without memory. That is how he stands before me: without past or future, only living for today, abandoned to the moment. But it worried me that I allowed him to give me presents, that I accepted his company and his amiable chatter, without having anything to offer in exchange. For who was I, after all? A mediocre little businessman gone astray!
