The Pledge

by Friedrich Dürrenmatt

  “I said hello. The old woman looked at me attentively and very calmly. Her face was waxen, unreal, but still curiously animated. In her wrinkled yellowish hands she was holding a little black gilt-edged book, evidently a psalter, but it was almost impossible to believe that this woman was about to die; such a vital, unbroken force emanated from her, despite all those tubes crawling out from under her blanket. The priest remained seated. With a gesture as majestic as it was awkward he indicated a chair next to the bed.

  “‘Sit down,’ he said, and when I had taken the seat, his deep voice sounded again from the window, before which he towered as a mighty silhouette. ‘Tell the chief what you have to report, Frau Schrott. At eleven we’ll have to proceed with Extreme Unction.’

  “Frau Schrott smiled. ‘I’m sorry to put you to so much trouble,’ she said with great charm, and her voice, although quiet, was still very clear, in fact quite lively.

  “‘It’s no trouble at all,’ I lied, convinced now that the old woman was going to inform me of some bequest for needy policemen or something like that.

  “‘It’s a rather unimportant and harmless story I have to tell you,’ the old woman continued, ‘the sort of thing that probably happens in all families once or several times, which is why I forgot it, but now that eternity is drawing near, I suppose it had to come up again. I mentioned it in my general confession, purely by chance, because a moment before, a granddaughter of my only godchild had come with flowers and wearing a little red skirt, and Father Beck got all upset and told me to tell you the story, I really don’t know why, it’s all in the past, but if Reverend Beck thinks—’

  “‘Tell him what happened, Frau Schrott,’ said the deep voice by the window, ‘tell him.’ And in the city the church bells started ringing the end of the sermon, a dark, distant clanging.

  “‘Well, I’ll try,’ the old woman began again, and started to chatter. ‘It’s been such a long time since I’ve told a story. I used to tell stories to Emil, my first husband’s son, but then Emil died of consumption, there was nothing anyone could do. He would have been as old as I am now. Or rather, as old as Reverend Beck. But now I’ll try to imagine that you’re my son, and that Reverend Beck is my son, too. Because right after Emil, I gave birth to Markus, but he died three days after he was born, premature. He was a six-month baby, and Dr. Hobler thought it was best for the poor little thing.’ And on and on she went in this scattered manner.

  “‘Tell the story, Frau Schrott, tell it,’ the priest admonished her in his bass voice, sitting immobile by the window except for an occasional Moses-like movement of his hand as he stroked his wild gray beard, emitting all the while a distinct succession of mild, steady waves imbued with the odor of garlic. ‘We don’t have much time. We have to proceed with Extreme Unction!’

  “Now she suddenly became proud, downright aristocratic. She even raised her little head a bit, and her eyes flashed. ‘I am a Stänzli,’ she said. ‘My grandfather was Colonel Stänzli, who led the retreat to Escholzmatt in the Sonderbund War, and my sister married Colonel Stüssi of the Zurich General Staff in the First World War, who was General Ulrich Wille’s best friend and knew Kaiser Wilhelm personally, as I’m sure you remember.’

  “‘Of course,’ I said, feeling bored, ‘naturally.’ What did I care about old Wille and Kaiser Wilhelm? Spit it out already, I said silently in my thoughts, to whom do you want to bequeath your money? If only I could smoke, a Suerdieck cigarillo would be just the right thing to blow some jungle air into this hospital atmosphere and these damn garlic waves. And the priest droned on like the bass register of a giant organ, stubbornly, relentlessly: ‘Tell the story, Frau Schrott, tell the story.’

  “‘You should know,’ the old lady continued, and now her face took on a strangely fierce, almost hateful expression, ‘you should know that my sister with her Colonel Stüssli were to blame for the whole thing. My sister is ten years older than I, she’s ninety-nine now, she’s been a widow for forty years, she’s got a villa on the Zurichberg, she’s got Brown-Boveri stock, she owns half the Bahnhofstrasse….’ And then suddenly, out of the mouth of this little old lady on her deathbed, came a muddy stream, or let’s put it this way: such a filthy, squalid flood of profanity that I wouldn’t dare to reproduce it. At the same time the old creature raised herself slightly, and her little ancient head with the snow-white hair wiggled back and forth with astonishing vigor, as if mad with joy over this burst of rage. But then she calmed down again, because fortunately the nurse came in—now, now, Frau Schrott, let’s not get upset, nice and easy now. The old woman obeyed, and made a feeble movement with her hand when we were alone again.

  “‘All these flowers,’ she said, ‘they’re from my sister. She sends them just to annoy me. She knows very well I don’t like flowers. I hate to see money wasted like that. But we never had a falling-out, as you probably imagine. No, no, we have always been sweet and kind to each other. All the Stänzlis have this politeness, even though we can’t stand one another. You see, we use our politeness to hurt each other. Oh, if we could draw blood with politeness, we would. And a good thing it is, this discipline in the family, because otherwise all hell would break loose.’

  “‘The story, Frau Schrott,’ the priest urged again for a change. ‘Extreme Unction is waiting.’ By now, in my wish for something to smoke, I had replaced the little Suerdieck with one of my big Bahianos.

  “The endless babbling flood continued: ‘Back in ’95, I married Dr. Galuser, God bless his dear departed soul, he was a physician in Chur. That fact alone was an affront to my sister with her colonel, my husband wasn’t a fine enough gentleman for them, I could definitely tell, and when the colonel died of influenza later, right after the First World War, my sister got more and more unbearable. She practically sainted her fancy militarist, it was disgusting.’

  “‘Tell the story, Frau Schrott, the story,’ the priest kept after her, but not at all impatiently; at most, he betrayed a faint sadness at so much confusion. I was drifting. Once in a while his voice startled me out of my stupor: ‘Extreme Unction’s coming soon, get to the point, tell the story.’

  “There was nothing to be done; the old woman went on nattering away on her deathbed, sliding from one subject into the next, inexhaustibly, despite her feeble, high-pitched voice and the tubes beneath her blanket. To the extent that I was still able to think, I vaguely expected some banal story about a helpful policeman, and then the announcement of a bequest of a few thousand francs, just to annoy the ninety-nine-year-old sister; I prepared some warm words of gratitude, and in order not to succumb to despair altogether, I resolutely suppressed my unrealistic dreams of a good smoke and yearned for my customary aperitif and the traditional Sunday dinner in the Kronenhalle with my wife and daughter.

  “‘And then,’ the old woman continued, ‘after the death of my dear departed husband, the late Dr. Galuser, I married the late Herr Schrott, who used to be our chauffeur and gardener and general handyman; yes, he did all the things that have to be done in a big old house and that really ought to be done by men, like heating, fixing the shutters, and so forth, and even though my sister made no comment about it and even came to Chur for the wedding, I know she was angry about this marriage. Not that my sister would ever show it, oh no, she wouldn’t give me that pleasure. Anyway, that’s how I became Frau Schrott.’

  “She sighed. Outside, somewhere in the corridor, the nurses were singing. Christmas carols. ‘Well, it was quite a harmonious marriage with my dearly beloved,’ the dying woman continued after listening to a few bars of the song. ‘Even though it was probably harder for him than I can imagine. My blessed Albert was twenty-three when we married—since he had been born in 1900 exactly—and I was already fifty-five. But I’m sure it was the best thing he could do. You see, he was an orphan; his mother was—oh, I don’t want to even say what she was, and as for his father, nobody knew who he was, not even his name. My first husband had taken the boy in when he was sixteen; he couldn’t cope with
school, you know, he never was much good at reading and writing. Marriage was simply the cleanest solution. As a widow, you see, you get talked about; not that there was ever anything between me and Albie, bless his dear soul, not when we were married either, how could there have been, with such a great difference in age; but my assets were limited, I had to keep a budget in order to get by with the rent I collected from my houses in Zurich and Chur; but imagine my blessed Albie, with his limited mental capacities, having to go out and fend for himself in the struggle of life—he would have been lost, and as a Christian one does have certain obligations. So we lived together honorably; he did this and that in the house and the garden, a good-looking man, I have to say, a big, firm fellow, always dressed in a dignified way, as if for a formal occasion; I never had cause to be ashamed of him, even though he hardly said anything, except maybe, “Yes, Mumsy, of course, Mumsy,” but he was obedient and temperate in his drinking; not with food though, he loved to eat, especially noodles, all sorts of pasta in fact, and chocolate. That was his passion, chocolate. But for the rest, he was a good, decent man and stayed that way all his life, so much nicer and so much more obedient than the chauffeur my sister married four years later, despite her colonel. He, too, was only thirty.’

  “The old woman fell silent, apparently exhausted, while I innocently awaited the bequest for needy policemen.

  “‘Tell the story, Frau Schrott,’ the priest’s voice wafted from the window with relentless indifference.

  “Frau Schrott nodded. ‘You see, Chief,’ she said, ‘in the forties my life with Bertie gradually started to go downhill, I’m not sure what was wrong with him, but something must have been damaged in his head; he got more and more blank and quiet, stared into space a lot, didn’t speak for days at a time, only did his work, always properly so I had no reason to scold him, but he would drive around for hours on his bicycle. Maybe the war confused him, or the fact that the army hadn’t taken him; who’s to say what goes on in a man’s head! Also, he was eating a tremendous amount; fortunately we had our chickens and rabbits. And then that thing happened to my dear departed Albert, the thing I’m supposed to tell you about. The first time was near the end of the war.’

  “She stopped talking because once again the nurse and a doctor had entered the room. They busied themselves in part behind the medical contraption, in part behind the old woman. The doctor was German, blond, straight out of a picture book, cheerful, peppy, on his routine round as the doctor on Sunday service, how are you, Frau Schrott, chin up, my, my, you’ve got excellent results, don’t give up now; then he strode away, followed by the nurse, and the priest admonished the patient: ‘Tell the story, Frau Schrott, Extreme Unction’s at eleven,’ a prospect that did not seem to alarm the old biddy in the least.

  “She resumed her tale: ‘Every week my poor little Albie, God bless his soul, had to bring eggs to my militarist sister in Zurich. He would tie the little basket to the back of his bicycle and come back in the evening, because he would start out early, at five or six in the morning, always dressed up in black, with a round hat. Everyone gave him a friendly greeting when he pedaled through Chur and then out into the country, whistling his favorite song, “I am a Switzer lad and love my country dear.”

  This time it was a hot midsummer day, two days after the national holiday, and this time it was past midnight when he came home. I heard him fussing and washing in the bathroom for a long time, went there, and saw my dear Bertie all covered with blood, his clothes, too. “My God, Bertie,” I asked, “what happened to you?” He just stared, and then he said, “An accident, Mumsy, I’ll be all right, go to sleep, Mumsy,” so I went to sleep, even though I wondered because I hadn’t seen any wounds. But in the morning, when we were having breakfast and he was eating his eggs, always four at a time, and his slices of bread with marmalade, I read in the newspaper that a little girl had been murdered in the canton of St. Gallen, probably with a razor, and then it occurred to me that in the bathroom the night before, he had been cleaning his razor, even though he always shaved in the morning, and then I suddenly realized what had happened, it came like a revelation, and I got very serious with Albie, God bless his soul, and said, “Albie dear, you killed that girl in St. Gallen canton, didn’t you?” Then he stopped eating his eggs and bread and marmalade and pickles and said, “Yes, Mumsy, it had to be, it was a voice from heaven,” and then he went on eating. I was all confused that he could be so sick; I felt sorry for the girl, I also thought of calling Dr. Sichler, not the old one but his son, who is also very capable and very sympathetic; but then I thought of my sister, she would have been tickled pink, it would have been the best day of her life, so I was just very stern and firm with my blessed Albie and told him plainly: “This must never, never happen again,” and he said, “Yes, Mumsy.” “How did it happen?” I asked. “Mumsy,” he said, “I kept meeting a little girl with a red skirt and blond braids when I drove to Zurich by way of Wattwil, a big detour, but ever since I met this girl near a little patch of woods I always had to take the detour, the voice from heaven, Mumsy, and the voice told me to share my chocolate with her, and then I had to kill the girl, it was all the voice from heaven, Mumsy, and then I went into the woods nearby and lay under a shrub until night came, and then I came back to you, Mumsy.” “Albie,” I said, “you’re not going to drive your bicycle to my sister anymore; we’ll send the eggs by mail.” “Yes, Mumsy,” he said, smeared some jam on another slice of bread, and went into the courtyard. I suppose now I really should go to Father Beck, I thought, so he’d give my blessed Albie a serious talking-to, but then I looked out the window, and seeing my blessed Albie so faithfully doing his duty out there in the sun, quietly and a little sadly mending the rabbit hutch, and seeing how spick-and-span the whole courtyard was, I thought, “What’s done is done, Albie is a good, decent fellow, and basically such a kind soul, and besides, it won’t happen again.”’

  “Now the nurse came back into the room, checked the instrument, rearranged the tubes, and the little old woman lying back in her pillow seemed exhausted again. I hardly dared to breathe. The sweat was running down my face; I ignored it. I was suddenly cold and felt doubly ridiculous for having expected a bequest from the old woman. And then this enormous array of flowers, all those red and white roses, flaming gladioli, asters, zinnias, carnations, obtained God knows where, a whole vaseful of orchids, senseless, blatant, and the sun behind the curtains, and that huge motionless priest, and the smell of garlic; I felt like flying into a rage, arresting the woman, but it would have been pointless, she was about to receive Extreme Unction, and there I sat in my Sunday suit, all spiffed up and useless.

  “‘Go on with the story, Frau Schrott,’ the priest admonished impatiently, ‘get on with it.’ And she went on. ‘And so my dear blessed Albert really did get better,’ she expounded in her calm, gentle voice, and it really was as if she were telling two children a fairy tale in which evil and absurdity happen just like goodness and just as wonderful. ‘He no longer went to Zurich; but when the Second World War was over, we could use our car again, the one I had bought back in ’38, because the car of Dr. Galuser, God bless his soul, was really out of fashion, and so Bertie, God bless his soul, drove me around in our Buick again. Once we even went to Ascona, and then I thought, Since he gets so much pleasure from driving, why not let him go to Zurich again, it’s not so dangerous with the Buick, he’ll have to keep his eye on the road and won’t hear any voices from heaven, and so he was driving out to my sister again and faithfully delivering the eggs like a good boy, and every once in a while he delivered a rabbit. But then unfortunately one day he didn’t come home until after midnight. I immediately went to the garage; I sensed it right away, because he had suddenly started taking chocolate truffles from the candy box, and sure enough I found Bertie, God bless his soul, washing the inside of his car, and everywhere I looked there was blood. “Did you kill a girl again, Bertie?” I said, in a very serious tone. “Mumsy,” he said, “don’t worry, i
t wasn’t in the St. Gallen canton, it was in Schwyz canton, the voice from heaven wanted it, the girl had a red dress and blond braids again.” But I was worried, and I was even sterner with him than the first time; I almost got angry. He wasn’t allowed to drive the Buick for a week, and I wanted to go to Father Beck, I really intended to; but my sister would have been just delighted to hear that, I couldn’t let that happen, and so I kept even stricter watch over Albert, God bless his soul, and then for two years things went really well, until he did it again, because he just had to obey the voice from heaven, my Albie, God bless his soul, he was crushed, he cried, but I noticed it right away because there were truffles missing from the bonbon box. This time it was a girl in the Zurich canton, again with a little red skirt and yellow braids. It’s unbelievable, how carelessly mothers dress their children.’

  “‘Was the girl’s name Gritli Moser?” I asked.

  “‘Her name was Gritli, and the ones before were Sonya and Eveli,’ the old lady replied. ‘I noted all the names; but Albie, God bless his soul, got worse and worse, he started to get absentminded, I had to tell him everything ten times, all day long I had to scold him like a schoolboy, and it was in 1949 or fifty, I’m not sure any longer, a few months after Gritli, that he started getting restless again, and jumpy; even the chicken coop was a mess, and the chickens were cackling wildly because he wasn’t feeding them properly, and he kept driving around in our Buick and staying away for whole afternoons, just saying he was out for a ride, and suddenly I noticed there were truffles missing in the bonbon box. Then I watched him closely, and when he stole into the living room, my Albie, God bless his soul, with his razor tucked into a pocket like a fountain pen, I went up to him and said: “Albie, you found another girl.” “The voice from heaven, Mumsy,” he replied, “please let me do it just this one time; it’s commanded by heaven, I have to obey, and she has a red skirt, too, and blond braids.” “Albie,” I said sternly, “I can’t allow this, where is the girl?” “Not far from here, near a gas station,” Albie said, God bless his soul. “Please, please, Mumsy, let me obey.” Then I put my foot down: “Absolutely not, Albie,” I said, “you gave me your promise; now clean the chicken coop and give the chickens a decent feeding.” Then Albie, God bless his soul, got angry, for the first time in our marriage, which was so harmonious otherwise, he shouted: “All I am is your servant,” that’s how sick he was, and ran out with the truffles and the razor to the Buick, and just fifteen minutes later I received a call telling me he had collided with a truck and died. His Reverence Beck came and Police Captain Biihler, he was particularly sensitive, which is why in my testament I have bequeathed five thousand francs to the police in Chur, and five thousand more will be going to the Zurich police, because I have houses here in the Freistrasse, and of course my sister came with her chauffeur, just to annoy me. She spoiled the whole funeral for me.’