Beneath the Wheel (18 page)

Next to the living-room window was a small unlit hall window. After he had waited for some time there appeared at this window an indistinct shape, which leaned out and looked into the darkness. Hans recognized from the shape that it was Emma and his heart palpitated with apprehension. She stood at the window for a long while, calmly looking across to him, yet he had no idea whether she recognized him or even saw him. He did not move once and just peered in her direction, wavering between hope and fear that she might see who it was.

And the shape vanished from the window. Immediately afterward the little bell at the garden door chimed and Emma came out of the house. At first Hans was so scared he wanted to run off, but then he stayed, leaning against the fence, unable to move, and watched the girl approach him slowly in the dark garden. With each step she took, he felt the urge to run off but something stronger held him back.

Now Emma stood directly in front of him, no more than half a step away, and with only the fence between, she peered at him attentively and curiously. For a long time neither of them said a word. Then she asked:

“What do you want, Hans?”

“Nothing,” he replied and it was as if she had caressed him when she called him Hans.

She stretched her hand across the fence. He held it timidly and tenderly and pressed it a little. When he realized that it was not being withdrawn, he took heart and stroked the warm hand. And when it was still left to him to hold, he placed it against his cheek. A flood of desire, peculiar warmth and blissful weariness coursed through him. The air seemed lukewarm and moist. The street and garden became invisible. All he saw was a close bright face and a tangle of dark hair.

Her voice seemed to reach him from far-off in the night when she said very softly:

“Do you want to kiss me?”

The bright face came closer, the weight of the body bent the fence boards slightly toward him; loose, lightly scented hair brushed his forehead, and closed eyes with wide lids and dark eyelashes were near to his. A strong shudder ran through his body as he shyly placed his lips on the girl's mouth. He shied back trembling at once but the girl had seized his head, pressed her face to his and would not let go of his lips. He felt her mouth burn, he felt it press against his and cling to him as if she wanted to drain all life from him. A profound weakness overcame him; even before her lips let go of him, his trembling desire changed into deathly weariness and pain, and when Emma unloosed him, he felt unsteady and had to clutch the fence for support.

“You come back tomorrow evening,” said Emma and quickly slipped back into the house. She had not been with him for more than five minutes but it seemed to Hans as if hours had passed. He gazed after her with an empty stare, still holding onto the fence, and felt too tired to take a single step. As if in a dream he listened to his blood pounding through his brain in irregular, painful surges, coming from the heart and rushing back, making him gasp for breath.

*   *   *

Now, through the window, he saw a door open inside the living room and the master enter; probably he had been in his workshop. Suddenly Hans became afraid he might be seen and he left. He walked slowly, reluctantly, with the uncertainty of someone who is slightly intoxicated. With each step he felt like going down on his knees. The dark streets, the drowsy gables, the dimly lit red windows flowed past like a pale stage setting. The fountain in Tanner Street splashed with unusual resonance. As if in a dream he opened a gate, walked through a pitch-black hallway, climbed a series of stairs, opened and closed one door after another, sat down at a table that happened to be there and only after some time did he become aware of being home in his room. There was another long pause before he could decide to undress. He did it distractedly and sat undressed in the window for a long time until the fall night suddenly chilled him and drove him between the sheets.

He felt he would fall asleep that instant but he had no sooner lain down than his heart began to throb again and there was the irregular violent surging of his blood. When he closed his eyes, it seemed as if Emma's lips were still clinging to his, draining his soul, filling him with fever.

It was late at night before he fell into a sleep which hurried in a headlong flight from dream to dream. He was steeped in darkness, and groping about, he seized Emma's arm. She embraced him and they slowly sank down together into a deep warm flood. Suddenly the shoemaker was there and asked him why he refused to visit him; then Hans had to laugh when he noticed that it was not Flaig but Heilner who sat next to him in the alcove in the Maulbronn oratory, cracking jokes. But this image also vanished at once and he saw himself standing by the cider press, Emma pushing against the lever and he struggling against her with all his might. She bent across the vat feeling for his mouth. It became quiet and pitch-black. Now he once more sank into that deep warm depth and seemed to die with dizziness. Simultaneously he could hear the headmaster deliver a lecture but he could not tell whether it was meant for him.

He slept until late in the morning. It was a bright, sunny day. He walked up and down in the garden for a long time, trying to become fully awake and clear his mind which seemed enveloped by a thick drowsy fog. He could see violet asters, the very last flowers to bloom, standing in the sunshine as though it were still August, and he saw the dear warm light flood tenderly and insinuatingly around the withered bushes, branches and leafless vines as though it were early spring. But he only saw it, he did not experience it, it did not matter to him. Suddenly he was seized by a recollection of the time when his rabbits were still scurrying about the garden and his water wheel and his little mill were running. He thought back to a particular day in September, three years ago. It was the evening before the day commemorating the battle of Sedan. August had come over to see him and had brought some ivy vines along. They washed down their flagpoles until they glistened and then fastened the ivy to the golden spikes, looking forward with eagerness to the coming day. Not much else happened but both of them were so full of anticipation and joy. Anna had baked plum cakes and that night the Sedan fire was to be lit on the rock on the mountain.

Hans could think of no reason why that evening came back to him now, nor why its memory was so overpoweringly beautiful, nor why it made him feel so miserably sad. He did not realize that his childhood took on this shape and dress once more before departing from him, leaving only the sting of a happiness that would never return. All he perceived was that these memories did not fit in with his thoughts of Emma and of the previous evening and that something had happened that could not be combined with his childhood happiness. He thought he could see the golden spikes on the flags glisten once more in the sunlight and hear his friend August laugh, and all of that seemed so glad and cheerful in retrospect that he leaned against the rough bark of the great spruce and broke into a fit of hopeless sobbing which brought him momentary relief and consolation.

Around noon he went to look up August, who had just been made senior apprentice. He had filled out considerably and grown much taller since Hans saw him last. Hans told him of his father's suggestion.

“That's a problem,” was August's first response. He put on an experienced, worldly-wise expression. “That's a problem, all right … because you're not what I would call a muscle-man. The first day you'll be standing at the smithy all day long swinging the forge-hammer, and a hammer like that is no soup ladle. You'll be lugging the heavy iron around all day, you'll clean up in the evening, and handling a file isn't child's play either, you'll only get the oldest and worst files to use until you know the ropes, files that don't cut anything and are as smooth as a baby's ass.”

Hans' confidence dropped instantly.

“Well, do you think I should forget the idea?” he asked timidly.

“Ho there! That's not what I said. Don't drop your pants. I just meant that at the beginning it's no child's play. But otherwise, well, being a mechanic can be pretty good, you know. And you've got to have a head on your shoulders, or you'll just be a blacksmith. Here, have a look.”

He took out a few small finely worked machine parts made of glistening steel and showed them to Hans.

“Yes, you can't be off a half-millimeter with these. All made by hand except for the screws. It means eyes open and a steady hand! All they need is some polishing and tempering; then they're ready.”

“Yes, that's beautiful. If I just knew…”

August laughed.

“You afraid? Well, an apprentice is chewed out lots of the time. No two ways about that. But I'll be here and I'll help you and if you start next Friday I'll just have finished my second year and'll get my first wages on Saturday and on Sunday we'll celebrate with beer and a cake and everything. You too, then, you'll see for yourself what it's like here. And besides, we used to be friends before.”

At lunch Hans informed his father he'd like to become a mechanic and asked whether he could start working in a week.

“Well, fine,” said Giebenrath senior, and in the afternoon he took Hans to Schuler's workshop and signed him up.

By the time dusk set in, Hans had almost forgotten his new job. All he could think of was meeting Emma in the evening. This took his breath away. The hours passed too slowly, then too quickly; he drifted into the encounter like a boatman into rapids. All he had for supper was a glass of milk. Then he left.

It was just like the night before: dark, drowsy streets, dimly lit windows, lanterns' twilight, couples ambling.

At the shoemaker's garden fence he became apprehensive, flinched at every noise. Standing there he felt like a thief listening in the dark. He had not waited more than a minute when Emma stood before him, stroked his hair, then opened the gate for him to come into the garden. He entered carefully. She drew him after her quietly along the path bordered by bushes, through the back door into the dark hallway.

There they sat down on the topmost step of the cellar stairs. It was a while before they could make each other out in the dark. The girl was in high spirits, chattering and whispering. She had been kissed before, she knew something about love; this shy, affectionate boy was just right for her. She took his head in her hands and kissed his eyes, cheeks, and when it was the mouth's turn she again kissed him so long and so fervently that the boy leaned dizzy, limp, without a will of his own against her. She laughed softly and pinched his ear.

She chatted on and on. He listened not knowing what it was he heard. She stroked his arm, his hair, his neck and his hands, she leaned her cheek against his and her head on his shoulder. He kept silent and let everything happen, filled as he was with a sweet dread and a profound and happy fearfulness, only flinching occasionally, softly, briefly, like someone in a fever.

“What a boyfriend you are!” she laughed. “You don't try anything at all.”

And she took his hand and stroked her neck with it, passed it through her hair and laid it against her breast, pressing against it. He felt the soft bosom and the unfamiliar heaving, closed his eyes and felt himself swooning into infinite depths.

“No! No more!” he said fending her off as she tried to kiss him anew. She laughed.

And she drew him to her and hugged him so tight that, feeling her body against his, he went out of his mind.

“Don't you love me?” she asked.

He could not say a thing. He wanted to say yes but could only nod—so he just kept nodding for a while.

Once more she took his hand and with a laugh placed it under her bodice. When he felt the pulse and breath of another life so hot and close to him, his heart stopped, he was sure he was dying, he was breathing so heavily. He drew back his hand and groaned: “I've got to go home now.”

When he tried to get up he began to totter and nearly fell down the cellar stairs.

“What's the matter?” asked Emma, astonished.

“I don't know. I feel so tired.”

He did not notice how she propped him up on the way to the garden gate, pressing against him, nor when she said good night and closed the gate behind him. Somehow he found his way home through the streets, he did not know how, as though a great storm dragged him along or as though a mighty flood tossed him back and forth.

He saw pale houses, mountain ridges above them, spruce tops, night blackness and big calm stars. He felt the wind blow, heard the river stream past the bridge posts, saw the gardens, pale houses, night blackness, lanterns and stars reflected in the water.

On the bridge he had to sit down. He felt so tired he didn't believe he'd make it home. He sat down on the railing, listened to the water rubbing against the pilings, roaring over the weirs, cascading down the milldam. His hands were cold, his chest and throat worked fitfully, blood shot into his brain and flooded back to his heart leaving his head dizzy. He came home, found his room, lay down and fell asleep at once, tumbling from one depth to the next in his dreams—through immense spaces. Around midnight he awoke, exhausted and in pain. He lay half-waking, half-sleeping until early dawn, filled with an unquenchable longing, tossed hither and thither by uncontrollable forces until his whole agony and oppression exploded into a prolonged fit of weeping. He fell asleep once more on tear-soaked pillows.

Chapter Seven

H
ERR
G
IEBENRATH
applied himself to his work at the cider press with dignity and considerable noise; Hans helped him. Two of Flaig's children had responded to the invitation. They were sorting apples, shared a little glass between them with which they sampled cider, and clutched big hunks of bread in their fists. But Emma had not come with them.

Not until his father had been gone for half an hour with the cooper did Hans dare ask where she was.

“Where's Emma? Didn't she feel like coming?”