Extinction (34 page)

, that my father was a
benefactor of the Church
and my mother
a good wife and mother
. The
Linzer Volkszeitung
noted:
They are survived by one son, who works in Rome as an academic, and his two sisters
. I read that the burial was to take place on Saturday morning and that Wolfsegg had
lost its master
. It could be clearly seen on the pictures that
the metal rod had penetrated right through the vehicle
, my mother’s head propelling against the rear window and almost severing it. All three passengers, including my
mother, had been found in their seats. The car had plowed with full force into the truck, which was thought to have braked suddenly at the Gaspoltshofen turnoff. It was carrying a consignment of metal rods to a firm in Schwanenstadt. The newspapers concluded that the
blame lay with the driver of the truck
but that he
could not be held legally responsible
, as
a driver who rams another vehicle is always to blame
. The local population
shares the family’s grief
, I read. I also read that
the funeral would be conducted by the archbishop of Salzburg, a family friend
. The archbishop of Salzburg and my father had been at school together as boarders at Lambach High School.
A whole village mourns
, I read. Hearing footsteps in the hall, I got up and put the newspapers back on the table as I had found them, with the cook’s spectacles on top. The kitchen is a big, vaulted room. When we were children it was our favorite place, especially in winter, as it was always warm, even in the coldest weather, when the rest of the house was poorly heated. The kitchen was always the most entertaining place until we were five or six, when I made friends with the gardeners and Johannes opted for the huntsmen. The cook has been with us for decades. She at once treated me as the
master
, assuming that this dignity had now passed from my father to me. It was intended to pass to my brother, but now the burden had fallen on me. I was not yet aware of its full implications. Would you like a cup of coffee, sir? she asked. I said I had already helped myself to coffee. Would you like to read the papers, sir? she asked, in the same tone of voice. No, I said, at once taking refuge in a lie, though it occurred to me that the cook was bound to know I had been reading her papers, that I had fallen upon them with avidity.
No, thank you
, I said, unconvincingly. So-called simple people have a fine ear for the wrong tone of voice and the dishonest use of language. She said she had no idea how many guests were expected, which made her calculations difficult. But you probably don’t know either, sir. I said I had no idea and had only just
arrived home, from Rome. Yes, from Rome
, she said. I’ve forgotten how to talk to simple people, how to conduct any kind of conversation with them, I thought. This depressed me. Since I’ve been in Rome I’ve forgotten how to communicate with simple people, I thought. At one time I would have found it easy to talk to the cook, to ask her a question, listen to her answer, follow it up with another question, and so forth, but I had lost the skill. With the gardeners I was lucky,
having been able to hold a brief conversation with them, but with the cook I failed, probably because I was preoccupied all the time by the thought that she knew I had fallen avidly upon the newspapers and that she was bound to think this indecent, that she had caught me out in low conduct. On the other hand, it seemed to me quite natural to be distressed, in such a distressing situation, to be so agitated as to be unable to behave normally and have a simple conversation with the cook. I saw no reason to reproach myself. I did not think my conduct at all surprising, but it was nonetheless humiliating to have been caught out. I felt like a criminal as I stood facing this woman, who had meanwhile noticed that her spectacles were not exactly where she had left them. I may have imagined all this, but I had a strong suspicion that she knew I had been through her papers and lapped up everything about the accident with my usual avidity. But my avidity has abated and is no longer as gross as it was just now, I thought. The cook can see that I am base and contemptible, I thought. She can see it in my demeanor. Knowing this for sure, she is exploiting her knowledge by staring at me in this searching manner. For a so-called simple person, especially a female of the species, this is
extraordinary behavior
, I thought. She was hiding her hands behind her back, as if tying her apron, but this was only pretense, as she was embarrassed at being caught out in a show of disrespect, in what struck me as a quite unbecoming show of disrespect. By subjecting me to such scrutiny she’s betraying the fact that she herself is base and contemptible, I thought. This was no way to look at the master, I thought. Why should this happen to me? On the other hand, I realized that my own situation was even more embarrassing, for I was the first to be guilty of low conduct: hers was merely a reaction to mine. Her shamelessness was in no way comparable with mine. Her shamelessness is nugatory beside mine, I thought, which is far more basic. I should have forbidden myself to look at the newspapers, I should have ignored them, but then I would have been
untrue to my character
, which required me to leaf through them. Seeing the cook eyeing the pile of newspapers, I was sure I had been caught out. For a moment I hated the woman. But then I saw that
she
was afraid of
me
, and my attitude changed. I no longer felt any real hatred, for although she could undoubtedly read my guilt in my face and believed she had seen through me, it would have been unforgivably
stupid to be afraid, even for a moment, of a person like the cook, who after all
depended on me
and was a stupid person of the most harmless kind. To be honest, I must say that I dislike these broad, rosy peasantish faces larded with stupidity. I have always disliked them, but that is unfair, as there is more good nature in these broad, rosy peasantish faces than in any others. Yet I’ve always been suspicious of this good nature, I thought. And of good nature generally, of the very notion of good nature, which I can’t make anything of and basically find repugnant. The cook knew me as a child, I thought. I can’t pretend to her, so why am I getting worked up about her? She knows me through and through. But of course that isn’t true, I thought: what does this woman know about me, about what I am and who I am? It’s ludicrous to agonize over my relations with the cook.
No, no more coffee
, I said, ill-temperedly, and left the kitchen. I saw Caecilia coming toward me; behind her was Amalia, and behind Amalia was my brother-in-law, the wine cork manufacturer. You’ll have to get used to your brother-in-law and the word
brother-in-law
, I told myself. Suddenly all three of them were in front of me, seemingly about to accuse me. I have no idea what put this absurd idea into my head, but it seemed as though I was suddenly confronted by accusers, about to be accused for some reason, possibly for all kinds of reasons. But Caecilia said simply that they were going across to the Home Farm to talk to the huntsmen, who would be carrying the coffins at the funeral. They had to discuss who was to carry which coffin. As only the huntsmen were mentioned, I said that naturally the gardeners too must be involved in carrying the coffins. It irritated me to have to talk constantly about coffins. What struck me as strange about this conversation was that we spoke constantly of
coffins
, though it was normal on such occasions to speak of one coffin. The huntsmen can’t carry all the coffins, I said.
The huntsmen and the gardeners will carry the coffins. Two will be carried by the huntsmen and one by the gardeners
. The huntsmen will carry Father’s coffin, and of course Mother’s, and the gardeners will carry Johannes. Caecilia and Amalia cut the wine cork manufacturer out of this conversation about who should carry the coffins. He was relegated to the background and had no say in the matter. It’s obvious, I said, that Mother’s coffin should be carried by the huntsmen, and as I said this I remembered her relations with them. And obviously Father should be carried by the
huntsmen, as he was
their
huntsman. (For decades he was the
Master of the Upper Austrian Hunt
, a title he received during the Nazi period and retained for twenty years afterward.) First the huntsmen, carrying Father and Mother, followed by the gardeners, carrying Johannes—it’s quite simple, I said. My sisters were suddenly clinging to me like leeches. It seemed as though they were loading everything onto me, having already loaded the whole of Wolfsegg onto me. When I looked at them in their black dresses they made the same comic but repulsive impression as they did in their tasteless dirndls. The mocking expressions had gone from their faces, but the embittered look remained. They suddenly had quite unhealthy, grayish-white faces, made all the more depressing by the black dresses they were wearing. When one of them spoke, the other could not wait to join in. They constantly interrupted each other—nothing had changed. Both had their hair combed back in the same way, and they were wearing identical shoes. Amalia had moved back to the main building from the Gardeners’ House and reverted to being Caecilia’s sister, I thought, her fellow conspirator. No longer conspiring
against
me, it seemed, but
for
me, which I found distasteful. I was repelled by the shameless opportunism that they suddenly directed at me now that my parents and my brother were dead. These sisters, who for decades regarded me as a
monster
and a base
deserter
, now cling to me and put on their helpless-little-women act, I thought. I mustn’t get carried away by these thoughts and feelings, or I’ll lose control. I’ll stay quite calm. They started filling me in on how the accident had happened, though I had been filled in already by the newspapers. One would interrupt the other and take over from her, and my brother-in-law had no chance to say anything. I let them go on, and as they talked I found that their accounts of the accident were quite different from what I had read in the newspapers. Everyone recounts
his
tragedy, as it were, as
he
sees it. The way the papers see it is different from the way my sisters see it, and probably also from the way my brother-in-law sees it. They all give quite different accounts of the same tragedy, each recounting a different tragedy, though it’s actually
the same tragedy
. Just as we read many different accounts in as many different newspapers, so my sisters give
their own differing accounts
of the same tragedy, so that in the end there are as many tragedies as there are people recounting them. Everyone recounts the
tragedy as he sees it, refracted by his own feelings, always the same tragedy, yet at the same time always a different one, I thought. Caecilia’s account was quite different from Amalia’s. Amalia constantly interrupted Caecilia’s account, and Caecilia constantly interrupted Amalia’s. My brother-in-law said nothing. Amalia always spoke of her mother’s head being severed by an
iron rod
, but Caecilia spoke of its being pierced by a
crosspiece
. I said nothing, not wishing to betray the fact that I was already familiar with the press reports, having read them all in the kitchen. Under no circumstances must I reveal this. I was not going to show myself in the worst possible light on the very first day. My sisters thought I knew hardly anything about the accident, and so they talked freely, recounting everything in their voluble and totally undisciplined fashion. The Lambach police had informed them of the tragedy as they were about to go to bed, and so instead of going to bed they had had to go to Lambach
to identify the bodies
, Amalia said. The car was completely wrecked, and as it was dark at the scene of the accident, the police had held lamps over them and made them stick their heads inside the totally demolished car so that they could properly identify the three bodies. Listening to all this, I did not find it hard to believe that my sisters were even baser characters than I was. Any nervousness they showed while telling their story could not hide their cold-bloodedness. It was
a joke
, they both said, almost simultaneously, that our parents and Johannes were taken away to Wels by ambulance long after they had died. The police had behaved correctly. The accident naturally caused quite a stir, and a number of farmers came running to the scene. Some of them in hastily buttoned nightshirts, Amalia said. At first they did not mention that my brother-in-law had been present too, though it was he who drove them to the scene of the accident. Although they had at once had to go through every possible formality, they were condemned to complete inactivity until the following morning. Amalia first went to the post office to send the telegram to me. They could of course have telephoned me, but the telegram relieved them of this ordeal. This I find understandable. They had then sent my brother-in-law to the Home Farm to collect the black banners, and it was he who hung the first one,
from the balcony
. Initially there had been a ghastly silence, said Caecilia. First of all Amalia went across and told the huntsmen of the accident.
They were already puzzled about the whereabouts of the car in which the master and mistress had left for Styria the previous afternoon. Caecilia then informed the gardeners. Caecilia had told Amalia to send a telegram to Spadolini as well as to me, with the message
Mother died. Caecilia, Amalia
. They were sure that Spadolini would come to the funeral. At first they had thought of having Spadolini himself, Archbishop Spadolini, to celebrate the requiem mass, but then, feeling sure that I would approve, they had decided to ask the archbishop of Salzburg,
with good reason
, Amalia said. The burial service too would be conducted by the archbishop of Salzburg. Spadolini himself would be sure to stay in the background, they said. They would naturally never be able to forgive themselves for depriving their mother of having the mass celebrated by Spadolini, they said, but I at once saw that this was pure hypocrisy. It was of course right and proper that the archbishop of Salzburg should celebrate the mass and conduct the burial. Privately I thought it self-evident that Spadolini, having been Mother’s lover, should celebrate the mass and conduct the burial, but I kept this to myself. I could not put myself beyond the pale for the rest of my life by suggesting anything so outrageous. So I told my sisters that we should stick to the existing arrangements, that the archbishop of Salzburg should celebrate the mass and conduct the burial. It had already been decided in my absence and could not be altered. I gained a certain advantage by deferring to them and agreeing to what they had arranged. I said that in addition to the archbishop of Salzburg and Spadolini there were certainly