Death in Breslau

prophecy referred to Anwaldt (yeladim sounds like Anwaldt). And it almost proved true. A major from the Stasi, a hefty Uzbek with pockets full of scorpions, arrived at the psychiatric hospital so as to accomplish the secret mission. Anwaldt was to die within white walls (amoc — white), in a room where windows were fitted with bars (sevacha — a grille), with his belly full of scorpions wriggling (chul — to wriggle). But I interpreted that prophecy differently and altered destiny. Anwaldt became a language specialist who — in hospital — taught himself to be a pretty good expert in Semitic languages. And the Uzbek and his brothers from the desert stayed in the Dresden hospital …”

Mock strolled up and down the room, proudly thrusting his hefty chest forward.

“So you see, Maass? I am destiny. Yours too … Do you want to know my interpretation of that last prophecy? Here it is: amoc is ‘Maass’, then — jeladim ‘children’, akrabbim ‘scorpions’, chul ‘to fall’. ‘Children’, ‘scorpions’, and ‘to fall’ are omens of your death.”

Mock stood in the middle of the room and raised his arms above his head. He froze in this position of a pagan priest and in a grave voice proclaimed:

“I, Eberhard Mock, relentless fate, I, Eberhard Mock, impending death, ask you, son, do you prefer to fall to the street from this floor or die from the venom of little scorpions, children still, scorpion children but with murderous poison already in their tails?”

Mock clearly emphasized the words “scorpion children” and “to fall out”. Maass could not understand what scorpions he was talking about until Anwaldt opened a small medical box. Maass peered inside and paled. Little, black arachnids were rotating their pincers and flexing their abdomens as they tried to clamber out of the box. The German language long unheard by him repeated itself in his ears. The verb ausfallen — “to fall out” — hissed and vibrated. He made towards the open window.

In the darkness of the night, the neon smoker on the sign opposite blew a series of smoke rings.