And finally Studmann said slowly: “I think you oughtn’t to worry, Prackwitz. You must simply wait. We learned that from the war. You worried and were afraid only when you were in reserve or lying quietly in the trenches; but once you got the order to advance, then you were all right and went ahead and everything was forgotten. You won’t miss the signal, Prackwitz. We learned in the trenches to wait quietly without brooding over it—why shouldn’t you do the same now?”
“You’re right,” said the Rittmeister gratefully, “and I’ll remember it. It’s funny that we seem to have lost the art of waiting. I think it’s this idiotic dollar. Rush, hurry, quick, go and buy something, make haste, run.”
“Yes,” said Studmann, “to chase and be chased, hunters and hunted at the same time—that makes people so bad-tempered and impatient. But there’s no need to be either.” He smiled. “But now I must be off; I’m not quite free from it myself. I see the porter beckoning me; perhaps a director is already chasing after me to inquire why I’m nowhere to be seen. And I shall chase after the chambermaids, so that the rooms of the departures will be free at twelve. So, good hunting, Prackwitz. And should you be in town tonight at seven and have no engagement—”
“By then I’ll be back in Neulohe some time,” said von Prackwitz. “But I’ve been tremendously pleased, absolutely tremendously pleased, to have met you again, Studmann, and if I come to town again …”
IV
The girl was still sitting on the bed, alone, motionless, idle. Her head drooped; the line of the shoulder, nape and head was feminine and soft. In the small bright face the lips were parted, and the eyes gazing at the worn floorboards saw nothing. Under the overcoat, which had fallen open, the skin glimmered light brown, firm.
The room was stuffy, full of smells. The house was wide awake now and carried on its routine; shouting, calling, weeping, banging doors, clattering up and down the stairs. In this house Life manifested itself mostly in noise and decay. In the copper workshop on the ground floor could be heard the screech of sawing copper, sounding like cats, or children being tortured. Then it was almost quiet again, with only the whirring and humming sound of the leather transmission belts.
The girl heard a clock strike twelve. Instinctively she raised her head toward the door. If he was going to look in after the pawnbroker’s, bringing her something to eat, he ought to come now—he had mentioned something of having breakfast together. But he did not come, and she had a conviction that he would not. He was certain to go straight to his friend’s. If he got money he would come later; but he might also go straight on to the gambling club, and she wouldn’t see him until the early hours of the morning, either penniless or with money in his pockets. Anyway, she would see him again.
And then it hit her: Was it so certain she would see him again? He’d always gone away and he’d always come back. Whatever he’d done, or wherever he’d been, he always ended up with her in Georgenstrasse. He would cross the courtyard, go up the steps—and reach her, either excitedly happy or utterly exhausted. I’ve never made any demands on him, she thought. Why shouldn’t he come back? I was never a burden to him. But was this true? Had she not, in fact, made a demand, unspoken but insistent, that he should always return to her?
Even my love can become a burden to him, she reflected, filled with unutterable sadness, and then he won’t come back.
It grew hotter and hotter. She jumped up from the bed and went to the mirror. Yes, there she was—Petra Ledig. Hair and flesh, a sudden attraction, desire, consummation—the world was full of it. She thought of the thousand rooms in which at this hour the morning desire awakened. Kisses were exchanged, women were slowly undressed, bedsteads creaked, the transient sigh of lust escaped. And people separated at all hours in a thousand rooms, parted from one another every minute.
Had she believed she was secure? That it could continue? In her heart she knew, had always known, that it wouldn’t. In the streets people were all in a hurry, rushing to catch their trains, to meet their girls, to spend their money before it became valueless. What endured, then? How could love endure?
All was futile on which she had set her heart. That they should be married this morning had seemed important enough for her to make a scene about it. Could it change anything? And if she sat there hungry and in debt, was that any reason why he should return? Did it matter in what condition she was deserted—whether, for example, she had a car and a villa in Grunewald, or not? The significant fact was that he did not come back. Whether she jumped out of the window or sold shoes again or walked the streets was all the same in that case.
She remained standing in front of the mirror and looked at herself as if looking at a dangerous stranger she had to be careful of. The figure in the mirror looks very pale, a brownish pale, and as if consumed from the inside. Its dark eyes shone, its hair hanging, with some loose locks, over its brow. She looked at herself breathlessly. It was as if everything was holding its breath. The house seemed to heave another sleepy sigh and then go silent. She herself still breathed. She shut her eyes and an almost painful shudder of happiness ran through her. She felt how warm her cheeks grew; they became hot. A good warmth, a lovely heat! Oh life, oh, love of life! It’s led me from here via there, to here. Houses, faces, beatings, rows, dirt, money, fear. Hear I am, oh, sweet, sweet life! He can never leave me again. I have him inside me.
Life whirred, life bussed tirelessly up and down, stirring in every stone. It overflowed from the windows. It looked askance and it railed. It laughed—yes, it laughed as well. Life—wonderful, sweet, everlasting life! He can never leave me again. I have him inside me. Never thought of it, never hoped for it, never wanted it. I have him inside me. Life was racing, and we were just racing along with it. We never arrived anywhere. Everything slid away from us. Everything was lost. But something remained. Grass doesn’t grow over all footprints, not every sigh is in vain. I remain. And he remains. We!
She had opened here eyes and now looked at herself. This is me, she thought for the first time in her life: she pointed her finger at herself. She was now without fear. He would return. He, too, one day would understand that she was “I” as she understood it. Now that she was no longer “I” but “We,” she understood it too.
V
When the Rittmeister visited Berlin one of his chief amusements was to stroll along Friedrichstrasse and a stretch of the Leipziger, and look at the shops. Not that he made large purchases, or intended to—no, the show windows amused him. To the eye of a provincial they were so wonderfully arranged. In some windows there were delightful trifles which simply dragged you into the shop for the pleasure of pointing at them and saying: “That one.” And in others were to be seen such frightful atrocities that you were moved again and again to laughter. Often he was tempted to carry such an article home, to see how Eva and Vi would be amused at, say, a man’s head made of glass, the mouth serving as an ash tray. (One could also connect the head with the electric light and it would glow horribly red and green.)
But the experience that, after a few days, these curios stood about the house unnoticed, had made the Rittmeister cautious; he was now content to laugh by himself. If he wanted to take a present back—one may be ever so retired and white-haired a cavalry officer and yet like to stop before a lingerie shop to choose something silky or of lace. It was delightful to buy some trifle of that kind. Every time he entered such a shop the trifles had become lighter and more fragrant, ever more delicate in tint. You could squeeze in one hand a pair of knickers into a tiny ball, and it would spread out again, softly rustling. Life might have become gray and dismal, but female beauty seemed increasingly fragile and delicate. That brassiere made entirely of lace! The Rittmeister could well remember the gray drill corsets of prewar days, into which a husband had to lace his wife as if he were reining in a restive horse.
Or he entered a delicatessen shop. However worthless money might have become, here all the showcases were bursting: green asparagus from Italy, artichokes from France, fattened geese from Poland, Heligoland lobster, corn cobs from Hungary, English jams—the entire world had rendezvous here. Even caviar from Russia was back again; and foreign money, procurable only out of “friendship” and at exorbitant rates even so—here one could eat it up by the hundredweight. It was very puzzling.
After his talk with Studmann, the Rittmeister had plenty of time, so he strolled once again into his old haunts. But this time his joy was damped. Life went on in Friedrichstrasse rather as one imagined it must in an Oriental bazaar. Dealers, beggars, strumpets: almost shoulder to shoulder they stood on both sides of the pavement. Young men displayed suitcases filled with shining cut-glass bottles of perfume. One, yelling and shouting, flourished braces. A woman, disheveled and dirty, handled long, shimmering silk stockings which she offered, with an impudent smile, to the gentlemen. “Something for the little lady, Count. Put them on her yourself, and see what fun you’ll have for that miserable bit of paper, Count.”
