Iron Gustav

by Hans Fallada

  With a laugh she freed herself and returned to the dressing table, where she went on talking as if it had all gone out of her mind immediately.

  Ever deeper and ever more swiftly downwards.

  He thought only of her. He dreamed only of her. Yet he did not wish to possess her. A slave is without possessions. His ignominy, his disgrace – those are his possessions and pleasure.

  He continued on his way. At times he was even proud – proud of being able to discover this world. He never for a moment considered whether this world was worth discovering.

  He entered the villa, and went into the bedroom. Tinette lay in bed, perhaps still asleep. Under his gaze, she slowly awoke. She stretched, yawned, and from the warmth of the bed came her hand, which he could kiss. Or else she stretched her leg from under the covers, and said that she had cramp and he must give her a massage.

  Brother, as much as sister, the prisoner of instinct, slave of lust, in love with suffering – Eva Hackendahl and Heinz Hackendahl alike. Ever deeper downwards.

  § IX

  While the year 1918 ended in bloody street-fighting, the year 1919 began even more bloodily and with more militant strikes. On his way to Dahlem, Heinz was searched twenty times for weapons, on the one hand by the Civil Guards, on the other by the Military Guards – the so-called Noskitos (under General Noske) – and then by the Spartacists and, on the next corner, by the Independents. Meanwhile, the barbed-wire entanglements of trench warfare were to be found in the streets of Berlin, and everywhere there were notices: ‘Halt! Anyone proceeding further will be shot!’

  Meanwhile, cannon were being fired at Police Headquarters, the Berlin Schloss and the Imperial stables, the sailors were settling a wage rise – while at the same time fighting for a National Assembly or a Soviet state, and also negotiated for better armistice conditions – and the Spartacists were promising the workers a six-hour day, and Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg were being shot. Simultaneously, hunger grew, murders increased and the troops returned from the Front dispersed themselves and joined the masses. Uniform upon uniform returned, and only a few groups remained armed, at the wish of the government, or with its permission, or else in defiance of it. At this time, the general death rate in Berlin ‘only’ tripled, but death from pneumonia increased eighteen times.

  And while all this was going on Heinz Hackendahl, under Tinette’s guidance, was becoming acquainted with Berlin nightlife. That winter very many bars had opened and every week saw new ones added to their number; all were very much alike, living on pimping and prostitution; their customers drank heavily and in a hurry, as if someone stood behind them to snatch the glass from their lips.

  Here then was Heinz Hackendahl, seventeen-year-old schoolboy, in a wine bar. The dress of the lady with him was not more open than the dresses of those other ladies parading their seductive whispers from table to table; neither was it less so. The jazz band (it had to have if possible at least one black deserter from the army of Occupation on the Rhine) was clamorous. And then they all sang in English … And Heinz could feel the champagne going to his head; he talked faster and faster while Tinette was splitting her sides with laughter … Yes, he was released at last, laughing at himself as he told her how timid he had been at first and how he had not even dared to look at her. But now he was sitting next to her, a champagne glass in his hand …

  The music stopped. Swiftly, noisily, the iron shutters rolled down. In a shaking voice the manager asked the ladies and gentlemen to be quiet a moment. A small crowd of unemployed had collected outside … The police would be coming any moment.

  But before anyone could speak or even set down a glass, the lights went out … Darkness … The ends of cigarettes glowed, a woman laughed shrilly, a man burst out with ‘Sickening rubbish!’

  Then there was silence, for through the shutters penetrated a buzzing sound, malignant as from a furious swarm of bees, a hum that rose and fell – and now and then they thought they could distinguish voices …

  Suddenly all understood that this was no casual meeting of unemployed in the square outside, but a demonstration against that particular bar. They had heard the shouts of ‘Down with the profiteers!’

  Suddenly the street door burst open, glass splintered.

  ‘Not a visitor here – my word of honour!’ screamed the manager.

  Then the lights flashed on. Obviously one of the waiters was in league with the crowd outside; however large the tips there was always a traitor. Three or four soldiers in field-grey were standing in the entrance, looking at the frightened faces.

  ‘Come out, the lot of you,’ said one of them grinning maliciously. ‘We want to say goodnight to you.’

  The guests sat as if thunderstruck. ‘This is scandalous!’ called out one, and broke off when he met the soldier’s eye. ‘Well, hurry up, or shall I give you a hand?’ cried the soldier still more threateningly. And he pointed to his belt, where hand grenades hung.

  A guest rose. ‘I’ve come from the trenches,’ he declared. ‘I hold the Iron Cross. I demand that you inform the people outside.’

  ‘Go and tell them yourself, my boy!’ replied the man in field-grey, giving the other a push so that he reeled to the door, where a second field-grey with another push assisted him into the street. One heard a dull roar, shouts, a scream …

  ‘I won’t go out,’ yelled someone. ‘I’m not going to let them beat me to death. There must be an exit at the back.’

  ‘Come on with you!’ The soldier reached out – the guest hit back. There was a short scuffle, then he too was thrown outside and once more the riot in the street became audible.

  ‘Man, be sensible,’ implored someone. ‘I’ll give you a hundred marks if you’ll let us go to the lavatory or the courtyard.’

  ‘Three hundred from me!’

  ‘A thousand!’

  ‘Offer him five hundred, Bubi. I have some money with me,’ whispered Tinette. ‘Offer a thousand.’

  ‘A thousand!’

  ‘Oh, no, we’d only become rich then. But we want no money from profiteers … Our kids are starving and you dirty dogs swill champagne!’

  ‘Come on, come on,’ cried the field-greys, who were increasing in number. Others were coming in from the street, civilians too; angry faces, pale, lined faces, rough faces. They dragged the chairs from underneath the guests, they pushed men and women towards the entrance.

  ‘Clear up the joint from the back. Watch the doors! Don’t let anyone go to the lavatory. Don’t let yourself be diddled by the women.’

  ‘My things! My fur coat!’ screamed a woman, defending herself vigorously.

  ‘Fetch them tomorrow, love. I doubt if your fur will survive unscathed.’

  A gentleman got on a chair. ‘It’s madness to let ourselves be pushed out one by one – it’ll only be ten times worse for each. I suggest we all go out in single file, close together, a gentleman and then a lady, and so on. Come on … I’ll go in front. Come along, Ella, keep close … And get through as quickly as you can. Oskar, behind Ella!’

  ‘Here, wait, you’ve been to the Front, comrade,’ said the field-grey. ‘Why are you swilling champagne with profiteers? Here, wait a bit!’

  ‘Didn’t we swill in the trenches?’ cried the man angrily. ‘Didn’t you go to a pub sometimes and have one? This is my pub!’

  ‘Wait – I’ll let you out through the yard, comrade!’

  ‘No, thanks. I’ll share what the others get. Now, all behind one another! Come on, Ella.’ And he made for the entrance, the others following. Through the open door came the bellowing of the impatient crowd.

  ‘Come on, Tinette, we mustn’t be the last.’

  Tinette was very pale, but not from fright. ‘Fetch my coat!’ she commanded. ‘Nonsense! I won’t go in the street half naked.’

  They were outside.

  ‘Another chap with a tart,’ jeered someone.

  The dimly lit square roared with a thousand throats, screaming, threatening, laughing, mocking … a m
ass of dark faces, many women there …

  ‘Hurry up, Tinette. Keep close behind me. For heaven’s sake don’t let go of my coat.’

  A man with arms raised to protect himself rushed into the narrow passage left by the crowd and Heinz hurried after, he too protecting his face with his arms and keeping his head well down. He could feel Tinette clinging to him.

  On either side people struck and screamed at him. ‘Profiteer! Traitor! Shirker! Pimp! Tart’s lapdog!’ A woman spat on him. Blind to everything, hardly feeling the blows in his excitement, he pressed forward, anxious only not to lose touch with the powerfully built man in front who was forging ahead through the crowd like a battering ram, clearing a passage with his broad shoulders, brushing aside those who tried to stop him, but never answering or hitting back – irresistibly forging ahead.

  In all that turmoil, amid people who spat and struck at him, Heinz was comforted to feel Tinette’s grip on his back, sometimes firm, sometimes weak, but always there; he was not able to look round or to say anything. Once he cried out. A woman had stabbed him in the cheek, possibly with a knitting needle, getting past his arm. A swift, burning pain, followed by the soothing trickle of blood …

  Would it never end? It was only a small open space which at other times one could cross in two minutes; yet it felt as if he had been there hours. On and on, ever deeper into the crowd whose blows and abuse had lost nothing of their force. Somebody tripped him and he might have fallen but for the grip on his back.

  Suddenly it was all over – one last weak cuff … He saw the big man in front of him turn and make for the pale-faced lad who had struck out. Here stood only spectators attracted by the noise. The square was behind them. They were in a street.

  ‘You strike me, eh, you dirty scamp?’ shouted the big man, infuriated by the humiliation he had undergone. ‘Come on, I’ll give it to you.’ And he went for the retreating lad, while those around muttered.

  ‘Come on, come on,’ urged Tinette. ‘Let’s get away from here. I’ve had enough of it.’

  Side by side they hurried on in the middle of the road, faces – inquisitive, malicious, frightened – looking at them. They turned a corner and Heinz took Tinette’s arm. ‘Shall we get a car?’ he panted. ‘You weren’t hurt, were you, Tinette?’

  She pushed his arm away. ‘Don’t touch me!’ she almost screamed. ‘You’re one of these – these Germans!’

  ‘Tinette, they’re half starved and poor, they don’t know what they’re doing. And after all perhaps it wasn’t quite right of us to go into such places at a time like this. These people have had to endure terrible suffering. Naturally they’re envious.’ He spoke incoherently, excitedly. Although they had beaten him up and cursed him, he felt they were justified. He was on their side, because he understood them. Still in his confusion, because he said to himself that he was confused, he felt he was perhaps worse than them. ‘What do you think, Tinette?’

  ‘Yes, that’s what you’re all like,’ she said bitterly. ‘Just because you’re gloomy and drab and dull you hate brightness, gaiety and laughter. You’d like to make the whole world as gloomy and drab as yourselves. You kill anything that’s cheerful.’

  We used to be cheerful, he thought. It isn’t true what she says. Our gaiety disappeared in these last terrible years. Or weren’t we ever gay?

  ‘You Germans,’ she went on feverishly, ‘all you love is Death. You’re always talking about it, about dying; one must know how to die, you keep on saying. You fools, anybody can die. One must learn how to live! Yes, one must understand life. Oh, when I think of the lovely happy life there is in my own country! I haven’t been able to laugh since I came here.’

  ‘That’s not true, Tinette,’ he cried. ‘Look how often you’ve cheered us up with your laughter!’

  She wasn’t listening. ‘That’s the reason why you started this war, because you hate laughter, you hate life. You wanted the whole world to be as boring and serious as you are yourselves. But you lost the war!’

  She looked at him with flashing eyes – they were standing in the glare of a wine bar – looked at him as if he were her enemy, one loving death and hating life. Then she saw the cut on his cheek.

  ‘Oh, so you got something? Look, a souvenir from one of your sisters! And you say they don’t know what they’re doing. I’d soon teach them what I think of the way you go on here. And you can be certain we will teach you too.’

  ‘Come on, Tinette,’ he implored. ‘Come home … Erich will be anxious.’

  ‘Home?’ she said. ‘Do you think I’m going to be put off by that? Never!’ Looking round she saw the wine bar. ‘Bar Napoli. We’ll go in here! I’ll go in bars every evening – just because!’

  ‘Do come home,’ he begged. ‘What can we do there? It’s only boring now the mood’s gone. It’s not because I’m afraid …’

  ‘Are you coming or not? I’ll go by myself then.’

  ‘Please, Tinette …’

  ‘Are you coming?’

  ‘Be reasonable, Tinette. There’s no sense …’

  ‘Then I’ll go alone. But if you abandon me tonight, Henri, you need not come again, you understand?’

  ‘No. No. I can’t …’

  ‘Go ahead! Stay with your soldiers. Be one yourself. Be dirty again and unkempt – then you’ll be one of them.’

  ‘Tinette!’

  But she had disappeared through the door.

  Mechanically he took out his handkerchief and began to wipe the blood from his cheek, looking hesitatingly at the wine bar. Suddenly he noticed he was without hat and coat. It was cold, a January frost. He’d have to fetch his coat …

  Turning round, he retraced his steps. Though they had left it barely a quarter of an hour before, the little square was already deserted and the bar lay in darkness. In front of the splintered door stood a policeman talking to a civilian.

  ‘Your things?’ asked the policeman. ‘Oh, were you in there then? Bit young for such places, aren’t you?’ Civilian and policeman both looked at Heinz in disapproval.

  ‘I only want my things,’ he said stubbornly. ‘If it can be managed.’

  ‘There’s nobody in the place now, they’ve all gone home. Did you get much of a hiding?’

  ‘Enough to go on with.’

  ‘Give me a few marks,’ the civilian suggested, ‘and I’ll take you in and get you your things. I’m a waiter here. Have you the cloakroom ticket?’

  ‘I have,’ said Heinz, following the man.

  ‘There’s also a lady’s hat on this number,’ said the waiter. ‘Must be some mistake.’

  ‘No, that’s right,’ declared Heinz, giving the man his money. He had taken only Tinette’s coat from the peg when the trouble started. ‘Don’t worry. I’ll take it to the lady.’

  ‘Where is she then?’ asked the waiter suspiciously.

  ‘Where should she be? In a bar.’

  ‘In a bar? What, already?’ The waiter was indignant. ‘Well, that’s a bit thick, you know. It’s not surprising if people lose their tempers.’

  Heinz, however, did not care what the waiter thought and he was equally indifferent to the policeman calling after him. Balancing Tinette’s little hat on the tips of his fingers he returned to the Napoli Bar, gave up his coat at the cloakroom, handed in the hat too and approached Tinette, perched on a stool. He sat down beside her.

  ‘I’ve just fetched your hat,’ he said.

  She turned round and faced him. Her mouth smiled but her eyes remained hard. They weren’t so much serious as angry, as she said, ‘So you’ve come back! I knew you would, Henri. You shouldn’t give up until your side is totally defeated, should you? Come on, let’s drink to the defeated, to their total defeat!’ He clinked glasses with her, without saying a word, but he clinked.

  § X

  Heinz went towards his destruction with open eyes, proceeding from defeat to defeat with a kind of stupid determination. Deaf to all warnings – from without and within – he shamelessly clung ever more
strongly to Tinette, regardless of her abuse of him, and without paying any attention to the mounting mockery of his brother.

  One evening Erich came home unusually early, bringing with him a girl in a black, high-necked dress. Her complexion was pale and unhealthy-looking and her dark hair was smoothly parted in the centre.

  All four had dinner together – little conversation but much drinking. Something was afoot. Something was being prepared which Heinz didn’t know about, about which the three others seemed to be in agreement. Again and again Erich rose to give the servants directions which he subsequently reported to his guest in a low voice … ‘No, no upper light at all … Perhaps it would be better to have only the fire.’ Or: ‘The violinist has just arrived; he’ll sit in the gallery. No, he needs no light, he’s blind.’

  Or: ‘Some more roast beef, my dear Fräulein?’

  ‘No thanks, I eat hardly anything … before.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking.’

  Heinz heard all this, considered it fleetingly, and thought about it no longer. He sat there in a pitiable condition. Tinette had ignored him all afternoon. For hours on end he had been alone in the study, had picked up a book, glanced at it, then put it down … Going into the hall he had listened, and two or three times he had knocked on her door but each time she had sent him away.

  He then did what he had never done before – he went to Erich’s cocktail cabinet and drank in quick succession several brandies. He didn’t do it for the taste, but to get senseless. During the dreary hours of that afternoon his chronic state of living in unfulfilled desire became unbearable. It can’t go on like this, he said to himself over and over again. Rather an end with terror than terror without end.

  At last he went to the telephone and ordered a taxi, and was about to leave when Tinette barred his way.

  ‘You can’t go now, Henri. I need you.’

  ‘It hasn’t looked like it all afternoon.’