by Hans Fallada
“Later, later,” said the clerk indifferently. “First calm yourself a little. You are to come along now,” and he motioned to a fat man.
“First calm myself!” said von Prackwitz to Studmann. “That’s simply ridiculous. How can I calm myself when I’m treated in this way?”
“No, really, Prackwitz, pull yourself together. If you go on fuming like this, they’ll keep us to the last. And then I ask one more thing of you: don’t shout at the officials.”
“Why shouldn’t I shout at them? I’ll blow them up properly. Keeping me here for hours!”
“For half an hour.”
“Anyway, they’re used to being shouted at. They’re all old noncoms and sergeants—you can see it.”
“But you’re not here as their superior, Prackwitz. It’s not their fault that you were caught gambling.”
“No. But just look at young Pagel, the roué. Sits there as if the business didn’t trouble him at all, smirking and grinning like some Buddha. What are you grinning like that for, Pagel?”
“I was just thinking,” said Pagel, smiling, “how crazily everything happened today. Over a year I’ve been struggling for a little money and today I get it, piles and piles. Snap! It’s confiscated.”
“And that makes you laugh? Well, you’ve got a funny sense of humor.”
“And then another thing,” Pagel went on, unheeding. “This afternoon I wanted to get married …”
“You see, Pagel,” said Rittmeister triumphantly, suddenly in a good temper. “I guessed at once in Lutter and Wegner’s that you were worried about a woman.”
“Yes. And this evening I heard that my dear intended had been arrested for something and taken to Police Headquarters.… And now I’m sitting here, too.”
“Why was she arrested?” asked the Rittmeister curiously, for the consideration of events did not interest him so much as the events themselves.
Von Studmann shook his head, and Pagel remained silent.
The Rittmeister recollected himself. “I’m sorry, Pagel; of course, it’s no concern of mine. But it beats me why you sit there pleased and grinning just because of that, I must say. After all, it’s an extremely sad business.”
“Yes,” said Pagel. “It is. It’s funny. Very funny. If I had won the money only twenty-four hours earlier, she wouldn’t have been arrested and we would now have been married. Really very funny.”
“I wouldn’t think about it any more, Pagel,” suggested von Studmann. “That’s all finished and done with now, thank God. In a few hours we’ll all be sitting together in the train.”
There was a silence. Then Prackwitz cleared his throat. “Give me a cigarette, Pagel. No, you’d better not. I owe you so much already.”
Pagel waved his hand. “That’s all gone.”
“But, man, don’t talk such nonsense! You lent me money. Do you remember how much you gave me?”
“Doesn’t matter,” said Pagel. “I wasn’t meant to have any of it; that’s been proved.”
“Gambling debts are debts of honor, Herr Pagel,” declared the Rittmeister sternly. “You shall get your money back, you can depend on that. Of course, it won’t be possible at once. First we must have the harvest in and begin threshing.… Are you coming with me?”
“What, just in order to wait for the money?” said Pagel sullenly. “I’d like to start doing something worth while at last … if I only knew what. But if you have some proper work for me, Herr Rittmeister—”
“Of course I’ve got work for you, man,” said the Rittmeister excitedly. “You’ve no idea how much I’ve been wanting a couple of reliable men. To give out fodder, pay wages, distribute allowances, make a tour of inspection through the fields every now and again at night—you can’t imagine the things that are stolen from me.”
“And forests and fields,” added von Studmann. “Trees, animals—no brick houses with falling façades, no cocaine, no gambling clubs.”
“No, of course not,” said the Rittmeister eagerly. “You would have to promise me, Pagel, that you won’t gamble as long as you’re with me. That’s quite out of the question.” He turned red. “It doesn’t really matter if you don’t promise,” he said a little blusteringly. “I can’t really insist on that. Well, what do you say?”
“I’ll come to the station tomorrow morning in any case and tell you then,” said Pagel hesitatingly. “Eight o’clock at Schlesische Bahnhof—that was it, wasn’t it?”
Prackwitz and Studmann looked at each other. The Rittmeister made an almost angry gesture. “Hasn’t Fate answered your question yet?” said Studmann. Pagel kept silent. “For the game was your question, wasn’t it, Pagel?”
“But I won,” said Wolfgang obstinately.
“And sit here without anything!” laughed the Rittmeister scornfully. “Be a man, Pagel! I find your indecision horrible. Pull yourself together. Give up gambling.”
“Are you worried about the girl?” asked Studmann.
“A little,” admitted Pagel. “It’s really so strange for me to be sitting here, too.”
“Well, do what you must do,” cried the Rittmeister angrily. “I’m not going to beg you to come to Neulohe.”
“In any case, we shall be seeing each other at the station,” added von Studmann hastily, for someone was calling out. From the adjoining room came a thick-set man who ran to doors and windows, inspected them, shook his head. “Thieves! What a nerve, robbing the police!” he shouted.
He hammered against the door. Officer, open up! Hey, Tiede, see that no one escapes—!
Confusion, yells, laughter.
Policemen entered. The fat Criminal Commissar stormed up and down. “Get into line, all of you. We’re going to search you. Will you be quiet over there? Look under the tables and chairs as well.”
It appeared that one or two of these arrested had not known how to employ the time more usefully than by screwing off the bronze door- and window-fittings. There were no more door-handles, no more window-handles, no more lock-fittings. Even the policemen laughed. The Commissar himself could not but smile.
“What a nerve! Have you ever heard of such a thing? Of course the fellow’s already gone, or the fellows, for there must have been a few of them—one man couldn’t have hidden it all. I questioned them and noticed nothing! Well, I shall have to look through the identity lists at once.”
“A moment, Herr Commissar!” called Studmann.
“What do you want? You heard, didn’t you? I haven’t any time now. Oh, it’s you, man. I’m very sorry, Oberleutnant von Studmann. The light’s so bad. What are you doing in our shop, my old friend of the Baltic Corps? Well, come along, then; of course it’s your turn next. Only a few formalities, but you’ll get a fine. Still, you needn’t turn gray because of that; the currency devaluation will settle that. Your friends? How do you do, Rittmeister? How do you do, Lieutenant? I’m Commissar Künnecke, formerly quartermaster-sergeant in the Rathenower Hussars.… Yes, this is how we meet again. Wretched times, aren’t they? So you’re the young man who made that enormous pile? Incredible. And just then the wicked police had to come in! Yes, the money has gone bye-bye; we don’t give it back again. What we have we keep. Ha, ha! But you shouldn’t let it worry you. Money of that sort never yet brought any luck—thank your Creator you are rid of it! The doorknobs? Our colleagues will enjoy pulling our legs tomorrow. I still can’t help laughing. It was good bronze—they’ll get a sack of money from the old-iron merchant. All right, and now the personal details. Herr von Studmann—occupation?”
“Reception manager.”
“You? Lordy, lordy, lordy! What have we come down to? You—reception manager! Excuse me, Herr Oberleutnant …”
“Certainly, certainly—and at that I am an ex-reception manager, now agricultural apprentice.”
“Agricultural apprentice? That’s better. Even very good. Land is the only real thing today. When were you born?”
XI
Outside a door lined with sheet-metal stood a table, an ordinary
deal table, on which lay a packet of sandwiches and a thermos flask. At the table sat an old man in police uniform, reading a newspaper by the very weak illumination of a fanlight. Hearing footsteps coming along the passage, he lowered the paper and glanced up over his pince-nez.
The young man came slowly nearer. At first it seemed as if he was about to walk past the table. “Excuse me,” he said, “does this lead to the police prison?”
“It does,” said the official, folding his paper carefully and laying it on the table. “But it is only a door for those on duty,” he added.
The young man hesitated. “Well, what’s on your mind? Do you want to give yourself up?” the old man asked.
“What do you mean—give myself up?” asked Pagel.
“Well,” said the old man slowly, “it’s getting on for four. Sometimes about this hour someone who is troubled because he’s been up to something comes and gives himself up. But then you must go to the Night Division. I’m only on duty at the door.”
“No,” said Pagel, “I’ve not been up to anything.” He fell silent. Then, seeing the old man’s calm glance: “I only want to speak to my girl-friend. She’s inside there.” And he motioned with his head toward the door.
“Now?” The old man was almost indignant. “At night, between three and four?”
“Yes.”
“Then you have really been getting up to something which won’t let you rest?”
Pagel made no reply.
“There’s nothing doing. Visits aren’t allowed now. And anyway …”
“Isn’t it possible at all?”
“Absolutely impossible!” The old man reflected. At last he said: “And you know it as well as I do. You’re just standing here like this because it won’t let you rest.”
“I’m here in the police station quite by accident. I didn’t come here on purpose.”
“But you came to this door on purpose? It wasn’t easy to find at night, eh?”
“No.”
“There, you see,” said the old man. “It’s just the same with you as with those who come to give themselves up; they also say that they don’t come because of a bad conscience. Bad conscience! There’s no such thing anymore. Why do you come, then, at two or three in the night? That’s a strange time. A man’s alone with himself then; he suddenly gets very different thoughts from the daytime. And then he comes here.”
“I don’t know,” said Pagel gloomily. And he really did not. He didn’t want to leave Berlin without at least having asked her whether it was true. Sometimes he told himself that the official must have misinformed him—it was preposterous. He knew Petra! And then again he told himself that an official wouldn’t tell him anything that was untrue; he had no interest in telling him a lie. Yes, the game was finished; victory had turned into defeat. How alone Peter now is. Peter—someone was once with him, something alive, that clung to him. Is everything now lost?
“I am going away early tomorrow morning,” he pleaded. “Can’t anything be done tonight? No one need notice anything.”
“What are you thinking?” cried the old man. “There are night warders inside. No, it’s absolutely impossible.” He thought for a moment, looked at Pagel critically. “And anyway …”
“What do you mean—‘and anyway’?” Pagel asked, somewhat angrily.
“And anyway, visitors are not usually permitted.”
“And unusually?”
“Unusually neither.”
“I see,” said Pagel.
“This is a police prison here,” said the old man, feeling there was some need to explain the situation. “In the remand prison the examining magistrate can give permission for visits, but here it’s not allowed. Most of them only stay with us a few days.”
“A few days? …”
“Yes. Perhaps you can inquire next week in Moabit Prison.”
“Is it quite certain that I can’t visit her tomorrow morning? No exceptions are made?”
“None at all. But naturally, if you know something to prove that your girlfriend is inside without cause, and tell it to the Commissar tomorrow, then she’ll come out—that’s plain.”
Pagel reflected.
“But you don’t look as if you had any information of that sort, do you? Otherwise you wouldn’t come here to me at night. You just want to have an ordinary talk with your girl-friend, don’t you—in private?”
“I wanted to ask her something,” said Pagel.
“Well, write her a letter, then,” said the old man kindly. “If there’s nothing in it about the charge she’s here for, then it’ll be handed over to her, and she’ll also be allowed to reply.”
“But it’s precisely about the charge that I want to ask her!”
“Well, young fellow, then you’ll have to be patient. If you want to inquire about that, you can’t do it in the remand prison, either. Until the charge has been tried, nobody is allowed to discuss the matter with her.”
“How long will that take?” asked Pagel desperately.
“Well, that depends entirely on the charge. Has she confessed?”
“That’s just it. She has confessed, but I don’t believe her. She’s confessed something she hasn’t done.”
The old man seized his newspaper very angrily. “Now run along to bed,” he said. “If you want to persuade a self-confessed prisoner to withdraw her confession, then you can wait a long time for permission to visit her. And you won’t be allowed to write to her, either, which is to say, she won’t get your letter. You certainly have a nerve. You want me to help you to visit her secretly. No, you go home. I’ve had enough.”
Pagel stood there, uncertain. “But it does happen sometimes that someone confesses to a thing he hasn’t done. I’ve often read it.”
“So you’ve read that, have you?” asked the old man almost venomously. “Then let me tell you, young fellow, anyone who makes a false confession has always been up to something worse. Yes, a man confesses to housebreaking because at the same hour he committed a murder. That’s how it is. And if your girl-friend’s confessed, then she’ll very well know why. I wouldn’t do any persuading if I was you. Otherwise she’ll find herself in a worse mess.” The old man squinted angrily at Pagel through his pince-nez.
Pagel, however, stood as if thunder-struck. New light had been thrown on Petra’s confession. Yes, she had confessed to street-walking in order to escape something worse; she had confessed to street-walking in order to escape him. Prison was better than living with Wolfgang Pagel. Faith lost, confidence lost—gone from him, gone from the world, away from the intolerable to that which could be tolerated! A big win lost again—gone, vanished.…
“Thank you very much,” he said very politely. “You have given me good advice.” And he went slowly down the passage, followed by the old man’s suspicious glance.
It was the right hour to fetch his things from Tannenstrasse. At this hour his mother would certainly not be expecting him; she would be sound asleep. In Alexanderplatz he would certainly find a taxi. Thank God that Studmann had lent him some money. Studmann, the non-gambler, the only capitalist; Studmann the helpful. He could almost think of Studmann and Neulohe with pleasure.
Chapter Nine
A New Start to a New Day
I
A girl and a man are lying on a bed in a hotel room. The man is against the wall in the narrow bed. A light whistling accompanies his breathing through his nose. The girl has just awoken, her chin resting on her folded arms, lying on her stomach, blinking at the night table which is already bright.
Sophie Kowalewski had been on a jaunt in the old city and had then landed up in an hotel on Weidendamm Bridge. Hence the hooting of the steamer. Steamers sail on the Spree—or wasn’t this the Spree?
Quietly, so as not to wake the man, Sophie Kowalewski slipped out of bed, ran to the window, and raised a corner of the curtain. The sky stood a bright blue above the iron curves of the bridge.
I shall have wonderful weather in Neulohe, she thought. M
arvelous thing, to lie under a tree at the edge of the wood and let yourself roast. No mistress. No bathing suit, thank you. And when there’s the moon, to bathe quite naked in the cold grayish pond in the middle of the forest.…
She let the curtain fall and quickly began to dress. She gave herself a slight rinse and gargled hastily—she could do all that thoroughly in the hostel; she would still have time before the train went. A joyful excitement, something like the anticipation of approaching happiness, filled her. Neulohe … the lilac bush behind the fire station, where she had experienced her first kiss—Oh, God! In the hostel she would put on fresh underwear. The things she had on filled her with disgust.
She was ready. Bag in hand, she peered hesitantly toward the bed. She made two steps in its direction and murmured very cautiously: “Dearie.”
No answer.
“I’m going now, darling.…”
No answer, only a light whistling through his nose.
It was not a sudden inspiration which made Sophie look at the sleeper’s clothes, untidily thrown over a chair. Ever since she woke she had been thinking that this stupid night might at least produce the fare to Neulohe. She had to be a little careful with her money now there were no fresh supplies to be got at home. In a flash she was by the chair. She found the wallet at once (she had watched last night where he put it).
There was not much money in it—very little for a man who had spent several millions on champagne last night. For a moment she hesitated. With a woman’s eye she saw that his clothes were carefully kept, but were not new; perhaps he had scraped all his money together for this one big bust. There were such men, she knew. They saved and saved and promised themselves the world from such an evening, a happiness such as they had never yet experienced. Then they awoke next morning, sober, desperate, penniless.…
Sophie stood there undecided. Her glance wandered from the few bank notes to the clothes, to the sleeper.… This little bit of money wouldn’t be any use to her. And she was on the point of putting the notes back into the wallet.
