A Chosen Sparrow

by Vera Caspary

  I saw myself, too, elegant, cared-for, pearls at my throat, a fitting portrait for the splendid frame. “And if my plans are otherwise?”

  “We are in a position to disprove anything you might say.”

  “And what does my husband expect me to say?”

  “Or any claims you instead to make.”

  “You are not at all clear. I wish you would say what you mean.”

  The reflected smile was no longer boyish or disarming. “Your word has no value. Whatever statements you make, even though you may swear to them under oath,” the tone of aristocratic urbanity had also been dropped; his voice showed vulgar hatred, “no one will believe an adulteress.”

  “Are you crazy?”

  “We have proof.”

  “What! I don’t understand and,” I tried to maintain my dignity, “I refuse to argue with you. I am sure Gerhard does not believe this foolishness.”

  “My dear Leni, it will do you no good to deny fact. Everyone has seen you with this fellow, constantly, shamelessly.”

  “If there had been any shame, we would not have let ourselves be seen.”

  “Two days ago there was an incident,” he laughed and rearranged the flower in his buttonhole, “two hours in the forest. Beside the brook.”

  Temper betrays more flagrantly than guilt. Scarlet heat tinted my neck and face. “You mean…no, it’s impossible…the fern dell? But nothing happened. We talked, we argued…” Lame excuses stumbled from my lips.

  “You were seen. We have a witness.”

  “No, Wolfy! It’s not true. Your witness lies if he says he saw anything. We had an argument.” Regretfully I thought about the rejection, the waste of ardor.

  “Our witness saw everything. She will swear in court if necessary. And she was not alone. There were two others, but we would prefer not to involve small children.”

  My temper jetted up like a rocket. “That liar! Who would believe Frau Stompfer? A thief, a blackmailer…”

  “You paid her blackmail to keep her from talking about these tender meetings in the forest.”

  I beat my heels upon the floor. The sound was muffled by a Persian rug laid over a lesser carpet. “I know her well, I lived in her house. She is a liar, a criminal…”

  “She has never been in prison.”

  I raised my hand. He backed away, graceful and smiling. I felt a shrew, a Stompfer myself, with my crude gestures and shrillness.

  “You must be careful, Leni. People are not so quick to believe a girl brought up in jail with thieves and prostitutes and gypsies. It would be safer for you to take advantage of your husband’s generosity and remain here, quietly.”

  “So you think no one will believe me? They will take the word of Frau Stompfer instead?”

  “In a Christian country the word of a Christian is more readily accepted.”

  Trying to speak I was voiceless. My lips moved impotently, my tongue trembled. This was my home, I was mistress here, he was hired to work for us, hardly better than a servant. Why did I allow this insolence? Wolfy’s image smiled upon my weakness.

  “You understand?” he said with gentle guile.

  “I understand.” I spoke as softly as he had, and with equal guile. Understanding brought me around; I was too angry for a display of temper. The heat receded. I could think coldly. No doubt Gerhard, dismayed by my question about Konni, had arranged that Wolfy find out how much I had revealed to Victor. But that was all. I did not believe the threats had been arranged, the insults calculated. Wolfy had gone beyond instructions, happy at the chance to humiliate a woman. A Jew. His resentments were all too clear. Wolfy was not like Gerhard with a divided soul; he was all of one piece. Prejudices were holy to General von Schamberg’s son, prejudices had nourished him and were cherished. Deprived of hatred Wolfy’s kind had no worth. Gerhard, rich enough to afford whim and change, could move from this to that opinion, allow affections to veer; all at the same time appease an old love, husband a Jewess, employ a displaced baron for unpleasant tasks and, above all, remain lord of the castle. “I understand,” I told Wolfy and added with calculated humility, “Please allow me to think it over. And tomorrow I will give my answer to my husband.”

  I wanted to find Gerhard, to have it out with him at once. My emotions were too lively to be contained until morning. Early the next day, if I had my wish, Wolfy would follow Count von Mefistdorf…to Rome, to Egypt, to oblivion so far as I was concerned. They (those

  who would not let him forget) would be routed. This much of loyalty remained for the man who had cried out his need for me. In this way I was still weak, still clung to the earlier image of the man I had taken as my husband.

  Gerhard was in none of the large halls or salons, and I panted up the winding staircase to his tower, in his private study looked up at his mother’s face. Frau Irmengarde, her son had promised, would have loved the Jewish daughter-in-law. There was little love in her relentless glance. If Gerhard had gone out, one of the cars would have been taken. I did not want to show my curiosity and disbelief to the chauffeur, so pulled on a raincoat and went to the garage. All the cars were lined up neatly in their places. If he had gone on foot, I might meet him in the village.

  The night was still, the Sternsee quiet as a mirror. Through thin clouds a few stars dared show faint light, haze betrayed the hiding place of the moon. Rain fell, Schnürlregen in wispy strings cool upon my cheeks. The earth smelled of moisture, fresh herbs, mushrooms. My dog walked beside me sedately, never running off to sniff the earth because dampness had sent the rabbits into holes and field mice to their nests. The narrow footpath left the forest, crossed a meadow, entered the village. Behind closed shutters the houses slept. When I turned at the post office, silence ended. Sound burst out of Imml’s Gasthaus, lusty choruses accompanied by a painful piano. Litzi ran toward the entrance, planted her little feet on the path, barked indignantly, hurried back to me, tail riding high.

  I walked on. The voices pursued, robust, fiercely male, not always in tune. “Trink, trink, Brüderlein, trink” … and shouts, laughter, two heavy chords, then the “Deutschmeister Marsch.” Traditional, inoffensive songs chilled me. It was not the lack of musical harmony nor the atrocious lagging of some singer who could not hit the notes at the right time but the feeling that they…who?…were drawn together in more than convivial pleasure.

  I walked long and far. The rain stopped, the moon shone out of drifting clouds, giving movement to the light which changed and changed back from dusk to silver. The forest shadows changed shape and the woods had an eerie sense as though enemies hid behind every tree. My dog had vanished. “Litzi! Litzi!” I shouted frantically although there was no cause for fear since she knew her way home. And so I turned and hurried back to the castle.

  The gates were locked. It was not late but the old watchman probably thought the master and mistress were safe inside. Rather than wait for the cranky creature to wake, pull on trousers, thunder at the unseen intruder, recognize me and humbly beg my gracious pardon, I ran the length of the peninsula around to a hidden gate near the bathing pier, entered by way of the greenhouse. At this hour the door to the main hall was locked. I had hurried off without my keys but knew a passage that led through the chapel.

  Dampness and moonlight entered through a window that some servant had carelessly left open. Carvings and images gleamed with a silvery luster. Time had made no changes in the chapel, the beams had not been altered, nor saints moved from their niches. I knew our Virgin well, bland-eyed, rococo, her head bent over her son’s gilded curls, on her face a look of faint sorrow at the flaw in the child, cracked paint and two toes broken off the plump foot. Poor Baby Jesus, I always touched his hurt gently as if he were a wounded infant. Standing beside the silvered Virgin, I saw something that struck me like a blow above the heart. Time and time again I had seen Liebhofen’s ground-floor windows without noticing similarities, the same proportions, spacing, the same twisted bars and, beyond, the clouds imprisoned. As a child in prison I ha
d looked at the sky through just such windows.

  Not a great thing but it struck with force. Foundations were shaken, reality shed. I knew the illusion of time relived, dwelt in another place, shed my adult body and looked out at clouds and moon through the same bars. The prison alarm sounded…so close that I felt the vibration, so real that I knew it in ears and mind and heart, and once again I watched the prisoners in their flapping rags rush out to the parade ground. This was not only my prison, it was Wardenthal, it was all prisons, all camps where the gaunt people shoved and pushed to be on time, in place, at attention so that they should not be tardy nor irritate their captors nor call attention to themselves while they waited for hours in the sun, the storm, the cold, the rain. I saw their faces, every one of the staring, skeletal faces, my friends. And I knew that high above in tower windows, sipping wine and eating sweets, the lovers looked down upon the slaughter of little girls.

  Panic seized me. I had to get out, out of this prison. I found a door, pushed through, not knowing it was the wrong way until I stood in solid blackness, lost, totally blind. Such violent darkness is not like the cessation of light in a familiar room with a known pattern of objects and spaces. I was nowhere, I had lost contact, the world had disappeared. Shock, a mouse running across the foot, the brush of cat’s fur against the unsuspecting thigh, cold hands on the throat, veins clogged with icy lava, the heart dies. No sounds, no screams; in a paralyzed throat the voice dies unborn. Muscles lock, bones wither, the body has no substance. “Where?” inquired my slowly awakening mind. In some hall or passage of the castle, I knew, but which one? When, after a session of immobility, I managed to stretch out my arms and totter a few steps, I found no walls on either side. This was no narrow passage but a large hall, sealed and windowless.

  Groping fingertips encountered a rough surface. I believed I was close to a wall along which I might safely edge myself toward a door, but this solidity soon ended. Despair deepened. I knew that I must be in a larger, more perilous darkness than I had thought, in some vast hall like the one in which we had danced on the night of the masquerade. The cold air reeked of fermenting mold. All sense of direction was gone, I did not know which way to grope. I saw myself caught here, undiscovered, dying in solitude.

  No one would think of looking for me in this dungeon. They would think, logically, that I had run off, offended by Wolfy’s threats and insults. Perhaps this had been his intention. But if I had run off, would I have gone without a change of clothes or toilet articles or money? Certainly Suzi would call this to the gnädiger Herr’s attention; surely Hansi would ask questions. Emboldened by the fear of rats, through cold and endless solitude I moved cautiously again, guiding the toe of one foot by the heel of the other, and after wandering in empty dark, touched another cold surface, the next pillar. This, then, became part of eternity, this aimless wandering among the posts. Whether I moved in a line or in circles, whether I found new pillars or only new encounters with the old ones, I could not tell. On my wrist a diamond-crusted watch ticked away the seconds, unseen. Horror remained at a level in me, neither diminished, nor increased, as I went on with the endless game of blindman’s buff with players of stone.

  A phantom shone before my eyes. I could not believe that I had seen that thin strip of light in the unmeasured space. Perhaps it had been there all along, undiscovered by panic-blinded eyes. The narrow yellow stripe dazzled like a jewel. I made slow progress toward it, watching steadily in the fear that if I lost it for a fraction of a second it would be gone forever. The light was real, it lay below a door. My hand groped and found a bolt, below it a modern knob. Before trying it I waited, shuddering at the thought that it might be locked and I would have to turn back into black space.

  The knob turned. I entered a passage lighted by a small electric bulb of tawny yellow set into an iron holder like the wall sconces that had borne candles the night of the masked ball. The corridor was long, lighted at the far end by a similar fixture. The passage ended in a V, flanked by two doors. I chose one and found myself in a place I could not at first believe, so lavish were its furnishings, so brilliant the contrast to its musty surroundings. Thick carpets warmed the floors, tapestries hung upon the walls, a settee and matching chairs were covered in striped damask satin, and upon the various small tables there were vases, porcelain figures, books in leather bindings and a number of those Egyptian figurines—bulls, cat-women, and two-faced gods—of the sort Gerhard collected. This room, for all of its elegance, was an antechamber; a curtained doorway led to the inner suite.

  Beyond the curtained doorway a jazz tune exploded. It was not heard outside in the great dark hall, but was contained in this suite, apparently made soundproof as part of the restoration of the eastern wing. Now, enclosed in it, I breathed the scents and heard the sounds. Oriental perfume, jazz, words: “Your bid”…“no trump”…“I pass.” A letdown, anticlimactic after the concentration of terror in the dark, this bridge game. They played three-handed, Gerhard, Wolfy and the other one (Konni, the Count von Mefistdorf, Kurt Heinrichs, Karl Hirsch…and how many other names had the wandering Jew-hater assumed during his migrant years?) still here and as lively as a bad habit. Gerhard had tried to break away, as one tries to free himself from drugs or alcohol or nail-biting, but had not succeeded, and now kept his secret in lush darkness. Behind the fan of cards Konni sat erect and slim as when he had worn a black uniform. On the hand that held the cards glittered a ruby, under the fringed lampshade his hair gleamed with chestnut dye.

  The bridge players sipped drinks from gilt-edged glasses. Close by stood the usual liqueur bottles, the silver dish of sugared fruits. After he played a card Gerhard chose a sweet, handed the dish to Konni who selected thoughtfully, ate, sucked at his fingertips before wiping them clean with his handkerchief. Here it was all again, at Liebhofen’s heart, the loathed past, the past beloved. Time had passed, the war ended, the dead slept, the prisoners had scattered to many parts of the world, while these two recreated captivity, dwelt within their privileged prison regaling themselves as in the old days. Without victims to torment and excite them, without beatings and hangings and odd medical experiments to heighten the temperature of their love, they found other diversions, exquisite dinners, masked balls, mystic rituals, secret night games. And now they had Wolfy, a new generation to shape in their image. Here at the heart of the castle they looked backward and lived as if it were the day before yesterday.

  “Konrad Otto Hempel, Sturmbannführer in the S.S., Kommandant of the atrocious Camp Wardenthal, war criminal…” over and over in my mind to the rhythms of the jazz tune, “convicted, imprisoned, escaped, sought for many years…” as in rehearsal, I altered, improved, refined…“is hidden, can now be found at…” But here I stopped, began again with a series of new phrases. The three went on with their bridge game, unaware of an audience, complacent in the belief that Leonora sat sulking in her tower. Let them play on, let them worry about heart bids and no trumps, let them believe themselves safe while I took action. Decision had come of its own power, swiftly, without too much thought.

  On the table in the antechamber stood the inevitable candle in an iron stand, a packet of matches beside it, insurance against frequent failures of electricity during thunderstorms. Armed against darkness I left the suite softly, reentered the passage with the dim yellow light. Before I returned by the long route by which I had come I tried the corridor’s second door.

  Clarity dazzled. During the vigil in darkness I had forgotten the moon. In blue-silver light I recognized the eastern wing’s courtyard; surrounded by the avails and shuttered windows of unused rooms. When I had been brought to see it on my first tour of the castle, this court had been a neglected place with dusty cobblestones broken at the center by a sad circle of weedy earth and dead fountain. Now flowers grew in the circular bed and in their midst water jetted high in the moonlight. In this hidden courtyard the pampered fugitive could take the air in pleasant surroundings. The restored flower bed and fountain had been,
I had believed, temporary decoration for our Heurigen. Now I knew the reason for that and all the other entertainments. From dark windows the hidden man had watched the party in the courtyard, had listened to the cafe songs. The other end of his suite looked out on the Sternsee so he had been able to see the spectacle of the Venetian fete and hear the floating musicians play his favorite melodies. All of this lavish entertainment for his benefit, and as climax the masked ball so that he could join the dancers, impertinently costumed in a woman’s red silk domino.

  There were doors on the opposite side of the eastern courtyard, but they would, of course, be locked against the servants. The safest path of return would be the one by which I had come. With the candlestick like a talisman in my taut fingers I returned through the dim corridor to the black chamber. Here I was not so brave. After each step I turned to look backward, peering through the eerie uncertain light shed by the small candle. In the pounding of my heart I heard pursuers.

  At last in the chapel again I found a normal world, saw beyond the barred windows, the park in polished light, heard the chant of frogs, the crickets’ instruments, the owls and my dog, who had followed my scent, whimpering to be let in. The repentant wind sent the first fallen leaves through the chapel window. The clock on the Altbach church struck eleven.

  So early! Shock had altered my sense of time. The castle was as quiet as if we were all dead. Time and silence were my friends. I had time to consider an act so devastating that my heart shuddered and my legs became so unsteady that I had to put down the bags I had lifted from the wardrobe shelves and lie for a time on the chaise longue. When I reported to the authorities that the criminal Konrad Hempel was hidden in Liebhofen, I should also have to name Gerhard. Reason asked why not. In sheltering the fugitive Nazi he had committed a criminal act. My husband! In spite of the act of betrayal with his male mistress he had often been kind to me, certainly generous. The dresses and shoes, lingerie, the stacks of nylons, the bags and trinkets which I had chosen for packing represented only a fraction of the money he had spent for my pleasure. More than this, he had spent affection, fought instinct, conquered prejudices, demanded my love. I believe he tried to love me, too. Perhaps, if things had been different, we might have lived companionably at Liebhofen. I had tried my ignorant best to help him, to obey his whims, to show myself a devoted wife worthy of my place as mistress of his castle. Such things cannot be weighed in the balance. There was a deeper betrayal.