Every Man Dies Alone (17 page)

“And how have you come to us?” screamed the brownshirt suddenly. “Look at the state of you, pig! Is this how you show up for work? Whoring around with girls! Come here sapped and drained, and we have the privilege of paying you! Where’ve you been, where did you get yourself those bruises, you miserable pimp!”

“They worked me over,” said Enno, shy under the other’s gaze.

“Who, who was it who worked you over, that’s what I want to know!” screamed the brownshirt. And he brandished his fist under Enno’s nose and stamped his feet.

The moment had come when any kind of thought left Enno Kluge’s skull. Threatened with fresh blows, he was deserted by caution and good intentions and whispered, trembling, “Beg to report, sir, the SS worked me over.”

There was something so convincing in the man’s fear that the tribunal immediately believed him. A comprehending, approving smile spread over their faces. The brownshirt screamed, “You call that worked over? Punishment is the term for that, just punishment.

What is it?”

“Beg to report, sir, just punishment!”

“Well, bear it in mind. Next time you won’t get off so easily! Dismissed!”

For the next half hour Enno Kluge was shaking so hard that he couldn’t work at his lathe. He hung around the washroom, where the boss finally ran him to ground and chased him back to work with a tongue-lashing. He stood next to him, and watched as Enno wrecked one piece after another with his clumsiness. Everything was spinning round in the little fellow’s head: the scolding from the boss, the mockery of his colleagues, the threat of concentration camp and punishment battalion; he could see nothing clearly. His normally deft hands let him down. He couldn’t work, and yet he had to, otherwise he would be completely lost.

Finally the supervisor saw it himself, that this wasn’t ill will and shirking. “If you hadn’t just been off sick, I would say go home to bed
for a couple of days and get well.” With those words, the supervisor left him. And he added, “Mind you, you know what would happen to you if you did that!”

Yes, he knew. He carried on, tried not to think of his pain, the unbearable pressure in his head. For a while, the shimmering, spinning iron drew him magically into its spell. All he need do was hold his fingers there and he would have peace, get put to bed, could lie there, rest, sleep, forget! But then he remembered that willful self-mutilation was punishable by death, and his hand recoiled…

That was it: death in the punishment battalion, death in a concentration camp, death in a prison yard, those were the outcomes that daily threatened him, that he had to try and keep at bay. And he had so little strength…

Somehow the afternoon passed, and somehow, a little after five, he found himself in the stream of those going home. He had so longed for quiet and rest, but once he was standing in his cramped little hotel room again, he couldn’t manage to put himself to bed. He trotted off again, and bought himself a few provisions.

And then the room again, the food on the table in front of him, the bed beside him—and it was more than he could do to stay there. He felt cursed, he just couldn’t stand to be in that room. He needed to buy some toilet articles, and try to get hold of a blue work shirt at some secondhand stall.

Off he trotted again, and as he stood in a chemist’s shop, he remembered that he left a large, heavy suitcase full of things at Lotte’s, when her husband returned on furlough and so roughly threw him out. He ran out of the chemist’s, got on a streetcar, and chanced it: he went straight to Lotte’s place. He couldn’t abandon all his things there! He dreaded getting a beating, but he had to go, he had to go to Lotte’s.

And he was in luck. Lotte was at home and her husband was away. “Your stuff, Enno?” she said. “I put it all down in the cellar, so that he wouldn’t see it. Wait, I’ll find the key!”

But he clutched at her, pressed his head against her thick bosom. The strains of the past few weeks had been too much for him, and he started crying.

“Oh, Lotte, Lotte, I can’t stand it without you! I miss you so much!”

His whole body was convulsed with sobbing. She was taken aback. She was used to men of all shapes and sizes and types, including even a few weepers, but then they were drunk, whereas this one was sober… And all that talk of missing her and not managing with
out her, it was ages since anyone had said something to her like that! If they ever had!

She calmed him down as well as she could. “He’s only here for three weeks on his furlough, and then you can come back to me, Enno! Now pull yourself together, and get your things before he comes back. I don’t need to remind you!”

No, he knew only too well what threatened him!

She took him to the tram, and carried his case.

Enno Kluge rode back to his hotel, feeling a little better. Only three weeks, four days of which were already up. Then the man would be back at the Front, and he would be able to sleep in his bed! Enno had imagined he could get by without women, but he couldn’t, it was beyond him. He would visit Tutti in that time; he saw that if you put on a show and cried, then they weren’t so bad. They even helped you right away! Maybe he could stay the three weeks at Tutti’s. The lonely hotel room was too awful!

But even with the women, he would work, work, work! He wouldn’t pull any stunts anymore, not he! He was cured!

Chapter 16

THE DEMISE OF FRAU ROSENTHAL

On Sunday morning, Frau Rosenthal woke with a scream from deep sleep. Once again, she had had the horrible recurring nightmare: she was on the run with her Siegfried. They were hiding, and their pursuers walked right past them, even though the two were so badly hidden, she felt the men must be toying with them.

Suddenly Siegfried started running, and she set off after him. She couldn’t run as fast as he could. She cried out, “Not so fast, Siegfried! I can’t keep up! Don’t leave me behind!”

He lifted up off the ground, he flew. Flew at first just a few feet above the cobbles, but then higher and higher, until finally he disappeared over the rooftops. She was all alone on Greifswalder Strasse. Tears ran down her face. A big, smelly hand snuck out and covered her face, and a voice hissed in her ear, “Now I’ve got you at last, you Jewish bitch!”

She stared at the blackout screen in front of the window, at the daylight trickling in through the cracks. The terrors of the night faded before those of the day ahead. Another day! Once again, she had missed the judge, the only person in the world she could talk to! She had been determined to stay awake, but she had fallen asleep again. Another day alone, twelve hours, fifteen hours! Oh, she could stand no more of it! The walls of the room closing in on her, always the same face in the mirror, always counting the same bills—no, she
couldn’t go on like that any more. Even the very worst couldn’t be as bad as being locked in alone, with nothing to do.

Quickly Frau Rosenthal gets dressed. Then she goes to the door. She draws the bolt, quietly opens the door, and peers out into the corridor. Everything is quiet in the apartment, and in the rest of the house. The children are not yet making their racket outside—it must be very early still. Perhaps the judge is still in his library? Then she can say good morning to him, exchange two or three sentences with him to gain the courage to withstand the unending day?

She risks it—in spite of his interdiction, she risks it. She crosses the corridor and goes into his room. She shrinks back from the brightness streaming in through the open windows, from the street, from the public life that seems to be here, along with the fresh air. But even more she shrinks back from a woman who is running a carpet sweeper back and forth over the Zwickau rug. She is a bony old woman; the kerchief tied round her head and the carpet sweeper confirm that this is his cleaning woman.

At Frau Rosenthal’s entry, the woman stops her work. She first stares at the unexpected visitor, blinking rapidly, as though not quite believing her eyes. Then she props the carpet sweeper against the table and starts flapping her arms and hands at her, while going “Shh! Shh!” to her as though shooing chickens.

Frau Rosenthal, already in retreat, says pitifully, “Where is the judge? I must speak to him for a moment!”

The woman frowns and shakes her head violently. Then she embarks on a fresh round of hand flapping and “Shh! Shh!” sounds, until Frau Rosenthal has gone back into her room. There, while the cleaning woman gently shuts the door, she collapses into the chair by the table and bursts into tears. All for nothing! Another day condemning her to lonely, senseless waiting! A lot of things are happening in the world—maybe Siegfried is dying right now or a German bomb is killing Eva—but she is condemned to sit in the dark and do nothing.

She shakes her head mutinously: she’s not going to go on like this any more. She just won’t! If she’s going to be unhappy, and persecuted, and live in fear, then at least she’ll do it in her own way. Let the door close behind her forever; she can’t do anything to prevent it. His hospitality was well-intentioned, but it’s not for her.

When she’s standing beside her door again, she reflects. She goes back to the table and picks up the heavy gold bracelet with the sapphires. Maybe…

But the cleaning woman is no longer in the study, and the windows
have been closed again. Frau Rosenthal stands in the corridor, near the front door, and waits. Then she hears the sound of crockery, and she goes towards the sound till she finds the woman in the kitchen, washing up.

She holds out the bracelet to her and says haltingly, “I really must speak to the judge. Take it, please take it!”

The servant has furrowed her brow at this latest disturbance. She casts a fleeting glance at the bracelet. Then she starts to shoo her away again, with those rowing motions of her arms and the “Ssh! Ssh!” sounds. Put to flight, Frau Rosenthal goes back to her room. She sinks down beside the bedside table; out of the drawer she takes the sleeping pills the judge gave her.

She hasn’t taken any of them yet. Now she shakes them all out, as many as there are, twelve or fourteen, into the hollow of her hand, goes over to the washstand, and washes them all down with a glass of water… Now she will be able to speak to the judge in the evening, and learn what she must do. She lies down on the bed, fully clothed, the blanket pulled up halfway. Still lying on her back, her eyes turned up to the ceiling, she waits for sleep to come to her.

And it seems to be coming. The tormenting thoughts, the recurring visions of terror born from the fear in her brain, fade. She shuts her eyes, her limbs relax, grow heavy, she has almost found safety in sleep…

But then, on the edge of sleep, it’s as though a hand jolts her back into wakefulness. She starts, she feels such a powerful shock. Her body shudders as in a sudden cramp…

And again she’s lying on her back, staring at the ceiling, the same mill churning out the same tormenting thoughts and images. Then—gradually—it slows, her eyes fall shut, sleep is at hand. Then once again, on the threshold, the jolt, the shock, the cramp that comes over her whole body. Once again, she is expelled from peace, quiet, oblivion…

After the third or fourth time, she no longer expects sleep to come. She gets up, walks slowly, a little unsteadily, to the table, and sits down. She stares into space. She knows that the white thing in front of her is the letter to Siegfried that she began three days ago; she has only written a few lines. She sees more: she sees the banknotes, the jewels. At the back of the table is the tray with her food for today. Normally, she would throw herself at it ravenously, but now she just eyes it indifferently. She doesn’t feel like eating…

While she sits here like this, she has a dim sense that it’s the sleeping
pills that have wrought this change in her: they weren’t able to put her to sleep, but they have at least taken away the desperate panic of the morning. She sits there like that, and sometimes she almost nods off in her chair, but then she jumps again. Time has passed, she doesn’t know if it’s a lot or a little, but some of this terrible day must have passed…

Then, later, she hears footfall on the stairs. She collapses—in an instant of self-scrutiny, she tries to ascertain whether it’s even possible for her to hear sounds on the stairs from this room. But the critical minute is already over, and she merely listens tensely to the sound of the person dragging himself slowly up the steps, continually stopping, coughing lightly, and then dragging himself further along by the banister.

Now she doesn’t just hear Siegfried, she sees him, too. She sees him very clearly, as he makes his way up the still quiet staircase to their apartment. Of course they’ve abused him again, he has a couple of bandages carelessly thrown around his head, already bled through, and his face is bruised and splotchy from their blows. Siegfried is struggling to climb the stairs. His chest is whistling and wheezing, his chest hurt by their kicks. She sees Siegfried turn the corner of the staircase…

For a while she continues to sit. Most probably she has nothing on her mind, certainly not the judge and her agreement with him. She needs to get up to the apartment—what will Siegfried think if he finds it empty?—but she is so terribly tired, it’s almost impossible to lever herself up out of the chair!