Little Man, What Now?

by Hans Fallada

  So he walked, and when he got to Alt-Moabit, it was eleven-thirty. He looked round to find the cheapest place to phone from, but then just hurried into the nearest pub and ordered a beer. He resolved to drink it very slowly and smoke two cigarettes at the same time. And then to make his phone call. By that time the half an hour till midnight would be over.

  But before the beer was even on the table, he had jumped up and rushed into the telephone box. The coin was already in his hand, how it had got there he didn’t know, and he asked for Moabit 8650.

  A man’s voice came on first, and Pinneberg asked for the maternity ward. There was a long wait, and a woman’s voice asked: ‘Hello? Is that Mr Pinneberg?’

  ‘Yes. Nurse, tell me …’

  ‘Twenty minutes ago. Everything went perfectly smoothly. Mother and child both doing well. Congratulations.’

  ‘Oh, that’s wonderful, nurse, thank you, nurse, thank you.’

  Suddenly Pinneberg was in high good humour, the nightmare had gone, he was happy. ‘Now tell me, nurse, is it a boy or a girl?’

  ‘Sorry,’ said the nurse at the other end of the line. ‘I’m sorry, Mr Pinneberg, we’re not allowed to.’

  You could have knocked Pinneberg down with a feather. ‘But why not, nurse? I’m the father, you can tell me.’

  ‘I’m not allowed to, Mr Pinneberg. The mother has to tell the father herself.’

  ‘Oh, I see,’ said Pinneberg, feeling quite abashed by so much forethought.

  ‘May I come over straight away?’

  ‘Good heavens, no! The doctor’s with your wife at the moment. Tomorrow morning at eight.’

  And with that, after a hasty ‘Goodnight, Mr Pinneberg’, the nurse rang off. Johannes Pinneberg, however, stepped like a man in a dream out of the telephone kiosk, and without any idea where he was, marched right through the pub towards the street, and would have gone on if the waiter had not taken him by the arm and said: ‘Listen here, young man, you haven’t paid for your beer.’

  At that Pinneberg woke up and said very politely ‘Oh, please excuse me’, sat down at his table, took a swig from the glass, and seeing the waiter still casting a baleful look at him said, ‘Please excuse me. I’ve just heard on the phone that I’m a father.’

  ‘Goodness me!’ said the waiter. ‘That’s enough to scare the pants off anybody. Boy or girl?’

  ‘Boy,’ claimed Pinneberg boldly. He could hardly reveal he didn’t know.

  ‘It would be,’ said the waiter. ‘They cost the most. You can’t get away from it.’ He looked again at Pinneberg, sitting huddled in his chair and said, still uncomprehending: ‘Well, just to cut the damages a bit, I’ll stand you the beer.’ Then Pinneberg came to himself and said: ‘Not at all! Not at all!’ laid down a mark and said: ‘It’s fine. It’s just fine!’ and rushed out.

  The waiter stared after him, recognition finally dawning: ‘He’s pleased. The dimwit is actually pleased! He’s got a shock coming.’

  It was a three minutes’ walk home, but Pinneberg went on past the cinema, past where he lived, deep in thought. He was thinking how he was going to get some flowers before eight in the morning. What do you do, when there’s nowhere to buy flowers, and you have no garden to pick them from? You go out and steal them! And what better place to steal them than the public flower beds of Berlin, to which you, as a citizen, had a certain right?

  And so began Pinneberg’s wanderings through the hours of night: to the Grosser Stern, to Lützowplatz, to Nollendorfplatz, to Viktoria-Luise-Platz, to Prager Platz. At each of the squares he stopped and stared thoughtfully at the beds. Though it was already the middle of March not one of them had been planted out yet: quite a scandal really.

  Such flowers as there were didn’t add up to much. A few crocuses or a scattering of snowdrops in the grass. Was that fit for Lammchen? Pinneberg was very dissatisfied with the city of Berlin.

  He continued his wanderings, through Nikolsburger Platz and on to Hindenburgpark. Then to Fehrbelliner Platz, Olivaer Platz and Savignyplatz. Nothing. Not a flower for this day of days. Finally, however, he raised his eyes from the ground and saw a clump of bushes covered with shining yellow blossom. Sprays as golden as the sun, without a green leaf; nothing but yellow flowers on the bare twigs. He didn’t stop to think. He didn’t even look to see whether anyone was watching. Waking from his dream, he climbed over the iron railing, went over the lawn and picked a whole armful of those golden branches. And he went back over the lawn and the railing, quite unmolested, and walked all the way home with the brilliant sprays in his hand. A kindly star must have been shining over him in his ecstasy, for he passed dozens of policemen before he climbed the ladder to his little home in Alt-Moabit. Stopping only to thrust the twigs into a can of water, he flung himself into bed with a deep sigh, and fell asleep the moment he lay down.

  He had naturally forgotten to put on the alarm, but he just as naturally woke on the dot of seven, lit the fire and made his coffee, heating up his shaving water at the same time. He put on fresh underwear, made himself as clean and spruce as possible, then, whistling with all his might, at ten to eight he grabbed his flowers and marched out.

  Behind his joy there had been the slight fear that the porter would object to letting him into the hospital so early, but no such obstacle arose. He simply said: ‘Maternity block’, and the porter answered automatically: ‘Last building straight ahead!’ Pinneberg smiled and the porter smiled back. It was a different sort of smile, but Pinneberg didn’t notice.

  He floated with his gleaming yellow bush down the asphalt path between the hospital blocks, and all the sick and dying people in them didn’t concern him one jot.

  Then he met a nurse again, and the nurse said: ‘This way, please!’ and he went through a white door and into a long room, and for a moment he had the sense of many women’s faces looking at him. And then he saw them no more, for directly in front of him was Lammchen, not in a bed, but on a stretcher, with a soft melting smile all over her face, and she whispered in a faraway voice, ‘Oh my Sonny!’

  He bent over her very gently, and laid the stolen twigs on the coverlet, whispering ‘Oh Lammchen! It’s so good to see you again. Just to see you again.’ She slowly reached up to him, letting fall the nightie with the funny blue rings of letters from her tired white arms. They found their way round his neck and she whispered: ‘The Shrimp’s here. He’s really here. It’s a he, Sonny.’

  He suddenly noticed that he was crying, in jerky sobs, and he said angrily: ‘Why haven’t these women given you a bed? I’m going to kick up an almighty fuss right now.’

  ‘There’s no bed free yet,’ whispered Lammchen. ‘I shall get one in an hour or two.’ She too was crying. ‘Darling Sonny, are you very happy? You mustn’t cry. It’s all over now.’

  ‘Was it bad?’ he asked. ‘Was it very bad? Did it make you scream?’

  ‘It’s over,’ she whispered. ‘I’m beginning to forget about it already. But we won’t let it happen again for a while, will we? Not for quite a while.’

  A nurse said from the door: ‘Mr Pinneberg, come along now if you want to see your son.’ And Lammchen smiled and said: ‘Say hello to our Shrimp.’

  He followed the nurse into a long narrow room. There were more nurses standing there looking at him, and he was not at all embarrassed that he had been crying and was still sobbing a little.

  ‘Well young man, how does it feel to be a father?’ asked a fat nurse with a deep bass voice.

  ‘You can’t ask him that yet!’ said another nurse. Why! it was that golden-blonde one who had put her arm round Lammchen so kindly yesterday. ‘He doesn’t know, he hasn’t even seen his son.’

  Pinneberg nodded and laughed.

  Then the door opened into a side room, and the nurse who had called him was standing on the threshold with a white bundle in her arms, and in the bundle was a very old, very red, very ugly, wrinkled face, with a pointed pear-shaped head, and it was squealing: sharply, piercingly, plaintively.

&
nbsp; Then Pinneberg was suddenly wide awake, and all his sins came back to him, from the very earliest days: the masturbation, the little girls, that dose of clap, and how on four or five occasions he had been completely drunk.

  And while the nurses were smiling at the ancient little wizened dwarf, the fear rose higher and higher. Lammchen can’t have taken a proper look at him. Finally he could restrain himself no longer, and asked fearfully: ‘Tell me nurse, does he really look all right? Do all new-born babies look like that?’

  ‘Oh lord!’ exclaimed the dark nurse with the bass voice. ‘Now he doesn’t like the look of his son! You’re much too handsome for your father, little lad.’

  But Pinneberg was still afraid. ‘Please, nurse, was any other child born here tonight? Yes? Please show it to me, so I know how they look.’

  ‘Would you believe it,’ said the blonde nurse. ‘He’s got the nicest babe in the whole ward and he doesn’t like him. Come here, have a look at this, young man.’ And she opened the door to the side room, and went in with Pinneberg, and there, sure enough, were sixty to eighty cots with dwarfs and gnomes in them, old and wrinkled, pale or red. Pinneberg looked anxiously at them, half reassured.

  ‘But my little boy has got such a pointed head,’ he said at last, hesitantly. ‘Please, nurse, that’s not water on the brain, is it?’

  ‘Water on the brain?’ said the nurse, and began to laugh. ‘You fathers are the limit! That’s how it’s meant to be: a baby’s head gets pressed together when he’s born, it grows out later. Now you go to your wife, but don’t stay too long.’

  Casting one more glance at his son, Pinneberg went to Lammchen, who beamed at him, and whispered. ‘Isn’t our Shrimp sweet? Isn’t he beautiful?”

  ‘Yes, he is sweet,’ he whispered. ‘He is beautiful!’

  THE LORDS OF CREATION HAVE CHILDREN AND LAMMCHEN EMBRACES PUTTBREESE

  It was a Wednesday at the end of March. Holding a suitcase, Pinneberg walked slowly, step by step, up through Alt-Moabit, and turned into the Little Tiergarten. He ought by rights at this time to be on his way to Mandels department store, but he’d taken another day off to fetch Lammchen from the hospital. In the Little Tiergarten he put down the case once again; there was plenty of time still, he didn’t have to be there till eight. He’d been up since half-past four; the room was in wonderful order, he had even waxed and polished the floor and changed the beds. It was right that everything should be bright and clean, now that a new life, a different life, was to begin. There would be a child at home. All must be sunshine from now on.

  It was pretty in the Little Tiergarten now, the trees were turning green, the shrubs were green already: spring was coming early this year. Later it would be nicer still when Lammchen could take the Shrimp into the Big Tiergarten. It was farther away, but not so depressing as here, where despite the early hour unemployed people were already sitting around. Lammchen took that sort of thing so much to heart.

  Up with the suitcase and onwards! Through the main door and past the fat porter, who at the word ‘Maternity’ answered quite automatically: ‘Straight ahead, last building.’

  A few taxis drove by with men sitting in them: fathers, presumably, better off than he, who could afford to pick up their wives by car.

  Maternity Block. He’d been right: that was where the cars were stopping. Should he get one? He stood there with his suitcase, not knowing what to do, it wasn’t a long walk home, but perhaps it was the proper thing to do, perhaps the nurses would think it was dreadful of him not to have a car.

  Pinneberg stood and watched a taxi turning awkwardly into the small square, and the man called to the driver: ‘It’ll be a little while.’

  ‘No,’ said Pinneberg to himself, ‘No, it can’t be done. But it isn’t right; it isn’t right at all.’

  He went into the hall, put down his case and waited. The men who had arrived by car had already disappeared; they were no doubt long since with their wives. Pinneberg stood and waited. If he spoke to a nurse, she said hurriedly, ‘I’ll be with you in an instant!’ and ran off.

  A feeling of bitterness began to rise up in Pinneberg. He knew he must be wrong, the nurses could have no idea who came with a car and who without. Or was that really so? Why otherwise should he have been left standing here? Was he less important than the others? Was his Lammchen less important? Oh no, what a lot of nonsense, he was an idiot to think like that, of course they didn’t make exceptions! But his pleasure was gone. He stood staring gloomily into space. Thus it began and thus it would go on; it was perfectly fruitless to believe that a new, brighter, sunnier life was beginning, things would be exactly as before. He and Lammchen were used to it, but wasn’t there going to be anything better for the Shrimp?

  ‘Nurse, please!’

  ‘In a moment. I’ve just got to …’

  And she was off. Gone. Well, it didn’t matter, he’d got a day off, which he would like to have spent with Lammchen. He could wait until ten or eleven. What he wanted was neither here nor there; it was of no consequence.

  ‘Mr Pinneberg! You are Mr Pinneberg, aren’t you? The case, please. Where’s the key? Good. The best thing would be if you went over to the Administration Block straight away and got the papers. Meantime your wife can get dressed.’

  ‘All right,’ said Pinneberg, took his form and set off.

  ‘They’re going to give me a lot of hassle,’ he thought, in his ill-temper. But he was mistaken, everything went quite smoothly. He got his papers, signed something, and was ready.

  And then it was back to the corridor. The cars were still waiting. Suddenly he caught sight of Lammchen, still only partially dressed, running from one door to the next. She beamed, and waved to him: ‘Hello, Sonny love!’

  And she was away. ‘Hello, Sonny love!’ Well it was still the same old Lammchen, anyway, however rotten life might be, she still beamed and waved and called ‘Hello Sonny’. And she couldn’t be feeling too good either, only two days ago she’d fainted when she got up.

  So he stood, and waited. There were now several men waiting, that was evidently the way it was—he hadn’t been signalled out for neglect. Silly of them to have their cars wait so long, though; he wouldn’t want to throw his money away like that. The fathers talked among themselves:

  ‘It’s a good thing I’ve got my mother-in-law at home just now. She’ll do all the work for my wife,’ said one man.

  ‘We’ve got a maid. A woman can’t do it all, with a tiny baby, and so soon after giving birth.’

  ‘Permit me to disagree,’ said a fat man with glasses, emphatically. ‘It’s nothing for a healthy woman to give birth. It’s good for her. I said to my wife: of course I could get you some help, but it would only make you sluggish. You’ll get better quicker, the more you have to do.’

  ‘I’m not sure …’ said another, hesitantly.

  ‘No question! No question!’ insisted the spectacle-wearer. ‘I’ve heard that in the country they have children and then go straight out and harvest hay the next day. Any other way just makes them soft. I’m very against these hospitals. My wife’s been here nine days and the doctors still didn’t want to let her go. “I beg your pardon, Doctor,” I said. “She’s my wife, and I decide. How do you think my Germanic ancestors treated their women?” He went as red as a beetroot! You can be sure his ancestors weren’t Germanic.’

  ‘Was it a difficult birth?’

  ‘Difficult! My dear Sir! I tell you the doctors were with my wife for five hours, they fetched the consultant at two in the morning.’

  ‘My wife tore so badly, I can tell you they had to put in seventeen stitches.’

  ‘My wife’s rather narrow too. This is the third, but she’s still narrow. Well, it does have its advantages of course. But the doctors said: “Dear lady, this time it went off all right, but next time …”

  Another man asked: ‘Did you get a lot of printed matter to do with the baby?’

  ‘Terrible. Nothing but a nuisance. Prospectuses for prams, baby fo
od, stout.’

  ‘Yes, I got a token for three bottles of stout.’

  ‘It’s supposed to be wonderful for the woman. It creates more milk.’

  ‘I wouldn’t give my wife any. It’s alcoholic, isn’t it?’

  ‘What d’you mean? Stout’s not alcoholic.’

  ‘Of course it is.’

  ‘Have you read the doctors’ testimonials for it in the prospectus?’

  ‘Oh, who pays attention to testimonials any more? My wife isn’t having any stout.’

  ‘I’m going to get my three bottles, and if my wife doesn’t want them, I’ll drink them. Saves buying a pint.’

  The wives started coming.

  A door opened here, another opened there, and they came out with oblong white parcels in their arms, three women, five women, seven women, all with a similar parcel, and all with similar rather soft melting smiles on their pale faces.

  The men were silent.

  They looked towards their wives. Their expressions, so confident a moment ago, became uncertain, they took a small step forward and stopped again. They had become strangers once again. All they had eyes for was their wives, and the oblong parcel in their arms. They were all very embarrassed. Then suddenly they were very loudly and noisily concerned about them. ‘Well, hello. No, let me. You look wonderful! Completely recovered. Do you think I could carry him? Oh well, whatever you think. But I will take the case. Where is the case? Why’s it so light? Oh, of course, you’ve got it all on. How’s the walking going? A bit unsteady, eh? I’ve got a car outside. We’ll fetch it. That’ll be a surprise for the little chap, going by car, he’s never tried it. He won’t notice. Don’t say that. You hear so much these days about repressed childhood memories from the very earliest time, perhaps he’ll enjoy it …’