The Tin Drum (10 page)

I felt fine under the table, in the leeward shadow of the dangling tablecloth. Gently drumming, I countered the fists thumping cards above me, gave myself over to the course of the game, and declared skat in just short of an hour: Jan Bronski lost. He had good cards, but still lost. No wonder, since he paid so little attention. Had other things on his mind than diamonds without two. Had slipped the low black
shoe off his left foot right at the start of the game, while still talking to his aunt, playing down the previous little orgy, and stretching his gray-stockinged left foot right past my head toward my mama, who was sitting opposite him, sought and found her knee. At the first touch Mama scooted closer to the table so that Jan, who in response to Matzerath's bid passed at thirty-three, lifting the hem of her skirt, could, first with his toe and then with his entire filled sock, which was of course fresh that day and practically clean, wander about between her thighs. You've got to admire my mama, who despite this woolen molestation under the table still managed, on the taut tablecloth above, to win the most daring games, including clubs without four, sure-handedly and accompanied by the most amusing banter, while Jan, increasingly bold below, lost several hands above that even Oskar could have taken to the bank with somnambulistic certainty.

Later on, sleepy little Stephan crept under the table too, soon fell asleep, and couldn't understand before falling asleep what his father's trouser leg was doing under my mama's dress.

Clear to partly cloudy. Occasional light showers in the afternoon. Jan Bronski came back the very next day, picked up the birthday gift he'd given me, the sailing ship, exchanged that pitiful plaything for a tin drum at Sigismund Markus in the Arsenal Arcade, returned to our flat, slightly rain-spattered, late that afternoon with the old familiar drum with its red and white pattern of flames, held it out to me, and grasped at the same time my trusty tin wreck, on which only traces of red and white lacquer remained. And while Jan clutched the worn drum and I the new one, all eyes—Jan's, Mama's, and Matzerath's—remained fixed on Oskar; I almost had to laugh—did they think I was bound to the past, that I nourished principles in my breast?

Without letting out the scream they all expected, without sounding the glass-slaying song, I relinquished the scrap-metal drum and turned at once with both hands to my new instrument. After two hours of intense drumming I hit my stride.

But not all the grownups around me proved as perceptive as Jan Bronski. Shortly after my fifth birthday, in nineteen twenty-nine—there was a good deal of talk about a stock-market crash in New York, and I wondered if my grandfather Koljaiczek, with his lumber business in far-off Buffalo, had suffered any losses—Mama, worried by my lack of
growth, which was now clearly evident, took me by the hand and began our Wednesday visits to Dr. Hollatz on Brunshüferweg. I put up with these thoroughly annoying and endlessly protracted examinations because even at that age the pleasing white uniform worn by Sister Inge, who assisted at the side of Dr. Hollatz, attracted me, reminded me of the photo of Mama's days as a nurse during the war, and enabled me, by concentrating intently on the constantly changing folds of her nurse's uniform, to ignore the bellowing flood of words, by turns strongly authoritative and unpleasantly avuncular, gushing from the doctor.

His spectacles reflecting the office furnishings—there was a good deal of chrome, nickel, and polished enamel; and also shelves and glass cabinets in which stood neatly labeled jars containing snakes, newts, and toads, as well as pig, ape, and human embryos—capturing these fetuses in alcohol with his spectacles, after each examination, Hollatz would shake his head gravely as he leafed through the record of my illness, have Mama tell him yet again about my fall down the cellar stairs, and calm her as she heaped endless reproaches on Matzerath, who had left the trapdoor open, declaring him guilty now and for all time.

When, on one such Wednesday visit months later, no doubt to prove to himself, and possibly to Sister Inge as well, the success of his treatment thus far, he tried to take away my drum, I destroyed the larger part of his snake and toad collection, as well as every conceivable embryo.

Except for full glasses of beer still covered with coasters, and Mama's perfume bottle, it was the first time Oskar had tested himself on a number of full and carefully sealed glass containers. My success was unique and overwhelming, a surprise to all concerned, even to Mama, who was well aware of my relationship to glass. With my very first carefully clipped note I sliced the cabinet in which Hollatz kept his loathsome curiosities wide open, and sent a nearly square pane of glass toppling from the display side of the cabinet to the linoleum floor, where, retaining its square shape, it smashed into a thousand pieces; then, giving my scream a sharper profile and an almost profligate intensity, visited that rich note upon one jar after another.

The glass jars shattered. The greenish, partly coagulated alcohol sprayed, flowed forth, carrying its preserved, pale, somewhat gravely staring contents across the red linoleum floor of the office and filling the room with a stench so tangible, if I can use that word, that Mama
got sick and Sister Inge had to open the window onto Brunshüferweg. Dr. Hollatz managed to turn the loss of his collection to his advantage. A few weeks after my assault he published an article in a professional journal called
The World of Medicine
which described the glass-slaying vocal phenomenon Oskar M. The thesis Dr. Hollatz spent over twenty pages expounding is said to have caused quite a stir in medical circles both in Germany and abroad, finding voices pro and con among qualified experts. Mama, to whom several copies of the journal were sent, was so proud of the article it gave me pause, and she could not stop reading bits of it aloud to the Greffs, the Schemers, her Jan, and after every meal to her husband Matzerath. Even customers in the shop had to put up with passages from the essay and duly admired Mama, who mispronounced the technical terms with an imaginative flair. As for me, the fact that my given name had appeared in a journal for the first time meant next to nothing. My already finely tuned skepticism allowed me to recognize Dr. Hollatz's little essay for what it was when examined more closely: the long-winded, not unskillfully formulated irrelevancies of a doctor angling for a professorship.

Today, in the mental institution, when his voice can't even budge a toothbrush glass, when doctors of Hollatz's type are constantly coming in and out, administering so-called Rorschach tests, association tests, tests of all kinds, trying to find some high-sounding name to justify his forced confinement, today, Oskar likes to think back on the archaic early days of his voice. In that first period he sangshattered items composed of quartz sand only when necessary, but then quite thoroughly, whereas later on, during the heyday and decadence of his art, he plied his talents under no external pressure at all. Succumbing to the mannerism of a late period, a devotee of
I'art pour I'art,
out of pure playfulness, Oskar sang glass back to its original structure, and grew older as he did so.

Klepp kills time by the hour drafting hourly schedules. The fact that he wolfs down blood sausage and warmed-up lentils while drafting them confirms my thesis, simply stated: Dreamers are gluttons. The fact that Klepp works fairly hard filling in the columns supports my other thesis: Only true lazybones invent laborsaving devices.

This year again Klepp spent over two weeks planning each hour of his day. When he came to see me yesterday, he behaved mysteriously for a while, then fished the piece of paper folded nine times from his breast pocket and handed it to me beaming, even smugly: he had invented yet another laborsaving device.

I skimmed the slip of paper, found little new there: breakfast at ten, meditation till lunch, a nap after lunch for an hour, then coffee—back to bed if possible, an hour of flute sitting in bed, up out of bed and an hour of bagpipes marching round the room, half an hour of bagpipes in the courtyard, every other day two hours for beer and blood sausage or two hours of movies, but in either case, before beer or movies, discreet propaganda for the illegal German Communist Party—half an hour—don't overdo it! Evenings were filled three times a week playing dance music at the Unicorn, on Saturday afternoon beer and Party propaganda were postponed till evening, afternoon being reserved for a bath including massage on Grunstraß; followed by forty-five minutes of hygiene in U9 with a girl, then coffee and cake with this same girl and her girlfriend at Schwab's, a shave just before closing time, if necessary a haircut, a quick photo at the photomat, then beer, blood sausage, Party propaganda, and relaxation.

I praised Klepp's neatly traced schedule, requested a copy, and asked what he did in his spare time. "Sleep, or think about the Communist Party," Klepp replied after the briefest reflection.

Had I told him how Oskar was introduced to his first schedule?

It began innocently enough with Auntie Kauer's kindergarten. Hedwig Bronski picked me up every morning, took me, along with her Stephan, to Auntie Kauer on Posadowskiweg, where we were forced to play ad nauseam with six to ten kids, a few of whom were always sick. Fortunately my drum counted as a toy, no building blocks were forced upon me, and a rocking horse was only shoved under me when an equestrian drummer with paper helmet was required. Auntie Kauer's black silk dress, buttoned a thousandfold, offered the score for my drum. I can safely say I dressed and undressed that skinny woman, all wrinkles, several times a day, buttoning and unbuttoning her with my drum, without ever thinking about her body.

Our afternoon walks along avenues lined with chestnut trees to Jäschkentaler Forest, up the Erbsberg, past the Gutenberg Memorial, were so pleasantly boring, so silly and carefree, that even today I still wish I could go on those picture-book walks, holding Auntie Kauer's papery hand.

Whether we were eight or twelve kids, we had to harness up. This harness consisted of a pale blue knitted cord that served as a shaft. Attached in six places to the right and left of this shaft were woolen bridles for a total of twelve kids. Bells dangled at six-inch intervals. Auntie Kauer held the reins, and we trotted klingalingalinging along in front of her, prattling, I sluggishly drumming, through autumnal suburban lanes. Now and then Auntie Kauer would strike up a song: "Jesus, for thee we live, Jesus, for thee we die," or "Star of the Sea, I greet thee," stirring the hearts of passersby as we offered up "O Mary, help me," and "Swe-ee-eet Mother of God" to the clear October air. As soon as we reached the main street the traffic had to be stopped. Trams, autos, and horse-drawn carriages came to a standstill as we sang "Star of the Sea" all the way across the avenue. Each time Auntie Kauer would thank the policeman who led us across with a papery crinkling of her hand.

"The Lord Jesus will reward you," she promised, and rustled her silken dress.

I was actually sorry that spring when, with his sixth birthday behind him, Oskar had to leave the buttonable and unbuttonable Fräulein Kauer, because of Stephan and along with him. As always when politics come into play, there had been violence. We were on the Erbsberg, Auntie Kauer was removing our woolen harnesses, the new growth glistened, and the twigs were beginning to molt. Auntie Kauer was sitting on a moss-covered stone marker on the path that pointed in different directions for one- to two-hour hikes. Like a maiden with no idea what spring does to her, she was tra-la-la-ing with jerking motions of her head normally observed only in guinea hens, and knitting us a new harness, devilishly red it was to be, but unfortunately I would never don it: for just then there were cries from the bushes, Fräulein Kauer fluttered up, and, pulling red yarn along after her, strutted with her knitting toward the bushes and the cries. I followed her and the yarn, and was soon to see more red: Stephan's nose was bleeding profusely, and a boy named Lothar, with curly locks and blue veins standing out on his temples, was squatting on the chest of the skinny tearful little fellow, and seemed determined to batter Stephan's nose in.

"Polack," he hissed between blows. "Polack!" When, five minutes later, Auntie Kauer had us back in our light blue harnesses—I alone ran free, winding up the red yarn—she said a prayer for us that was normally only spoken between Offering and Transubstantiation: "Bowed with shame, full of pain and remorse..."

Then down the Erbsberg and a stop at the Gutenberg Memorial. Pointing a long finger at Stephan, who was whimpering and pressing a handkerchief to his nose, she explained gently, "He can't help it if he's a little Pole." On Auntie Kauer's advice, Stephan had to withdraw from her kindergarten. Oskar, though he was no Pole and didn't think very highly of Stephan, declared his solidarity with him. Then Easter came and they decided to give the school a try. Behind his broad hornrimmed glasses, Dr. Hollatz felt it could do no harm, and repeated his opinion out loud: "It can't do little Oskar any harm."

Jan Bronski, who intended for his part to send his Stephan to the Polish public school after Easter, couldn't be talked out of it, repeating over and over again to my mama and Matzerath that he was a Polish civil servant. The Polish state offered him an honest wage for an
honest day's work at the Polish Post Office. After all, he was a Pole, and Hedwig would be too, as soon as her application was approved. Moreover, a bright child of above-average gifts like Stephan could learn German at home, and as for little Oskar—he always sighed a little when he said Oskar—Oskar was six years old just like Stephan, it's true he wasn't talking yet, and was severely retarded in general for his age, and as far as his growth was concerned, but they should try it anyway, education was compulsory, after all—always assuming the school board had no objection.

The school board expressed misgivings and demanded a doctor's certificate. Hollatz declared that I was a healthy boy, albeit the size of a three-year-old, whose mental development, though I didn't talk very well yet, was in no way inferior to that of a five- or six-year-old. He also mentioned my thyroid gland.