Young Torless

by Robert Musil

  He held his breath, but he could not manage to hear any more. Nevertheless he did not lose the feeling that Basini was not asleep either, but was straining to hear through the darkness, just like himself.

  So the quarter-hours passed... hours passed. Only now and then the stillness was broken by the faint sound of the bodies stirring, each in its bed.

  Törless was in a queer state that kept him awake. Yesterday it had been sensual pictures in his imagination that had made him feverish. Only right at the end had they taken a turn towards Basini, as it were rearing up under the inexorable hand of sleep, which then blotted them out; and it was precisely of this that he had the vaguest and most shadowy memory. But tonight it had from the very beginning been nothing other than an impelling urge to get up and go over to Basini. So long as he had had the feeling that Basini was awake and listening for whatever sounds he might make, it had been scarcely endurable; and now that Basini was apparently asleep, it was even worse, for there was a cruel excitement in the thought of falling upon the sleeper as upon a prey.

  Törless could already feel the movements of rising up and getting out of bed twitching in all his muscles. But still he could not yet shake off his immobility.

  'And what am I going to do, anyway, if I do go over to him?' he wondered, in his panic almost speaking the words aloud. And he had to admit to himself that the cruelty and lust in him had no real object. He would have been at a loss if he had now really set upon Basini. Surely he did not want to beat him? God forbid! Well then, in what way was his wild sensual excitement to get fulfillment from Basini? Instinctively he revolted at the thought of the various little vices that boys went in for. Expose himself to another person like that? Never!

  But in the same measure as this revulsion grew the urge to go over to Basini also became stronger. Finally Törless was completely penetrated with the sense of how absurd such an act was, and yet a positively physical compulsion seemed to be drawing him out of bed as on a rope. And while his mind grew blank and he merely kept on telling himself, over and over again, that it would be best to go to sleep now if he could, he was mechanically rising up in the bed. Very slowly-and he could feel how the emotional urge was gaining, inch by inch, over the resistance in him-he began to sit up. First one arm moved. .. then he propped himself on one elbow, then pushed one knee out from under the bedclothes... and then . . . suddenly he was racing, barefoot, on tip-toe, over to Basini, and sat down on the edge of Basini's bed.

  Basini was asleep.

  He looked as if he were having pleasant dreams.

  Törless was still not in control of his actions. For a moment he sat still, staring into the sleeper's face. Through his brain there jerked those short, ragged thoughts which do no more, it seems, than record what a situation is, those flashes of thought one has when losing one's balance, or falling from a height, or when some object is torn from one's grasp. And without knowing what he was doing he gripped Basini by the shoulder and shook him out of his sleep.

  Basini stretched indolently a few times. Then he started up and gazed at Törless with sleepy, stupefied eyes.

  A shock went through Törless. He was utterly confused; now all at once he realised what he had done and he did not know what he was to do next. He was frightfully ashamed. His heart thudded loudly. Words of explanation and excuse hovered on the tip of his tongue. He would ask Basini if he had any matches, if he could tell him the time…

  Basini was still goggling at him with uncomprehending eyes. Now, without having uttered a word Törless withdrew his arm, now he slid off the bed and was about to creep back soundlessly to his own bed-and at this moment Basini seemed to grasp the situation and sat bolt upright.

  Törless stopped irresolutely at the foot of the bed.

  Basini glanced at him once more, questioningly, searchingly, and then got out of bed, slipped into coat and slippers and went padding off towards the door. And in a flash Törless became sure of what he had long suspected: that this had happened to Basini many times before.

  In passing his bed, Törless took the key to the cubbyhole, which he had been keeping hidden under his pillow.

  Basini walked straight on ahead of him, up to the attics. He seemed in the meantime to have become thoroughly familiar with the way that had once been kept so secret from him. He steadied the crate while Törless stepped down on to it, he cleared the scenery to one side, carefully, with gingerly movements, like a well-trained flunkey.

  Törless unlocked the door, and they went in. With his back to Basini, he lit the little lamp.

  When he turned around, Basini was standing there naked.

  Involuntarily Törless fell back a step. The sudden sight of this naked snow-white body, with the red of the walls dark as blood behind it, dazzled and bewildered him Basini was beautifully built; his body, lacking almost any sign of male development, was of a chaste, slender willowyness, like that of a young girl. And Törless felt this nakedness lighting up in his nerves, like hot white flames. He could not shake off the spell of this beauty. He had never known before what beauty was. For what was art to him at his age, what-after all-did he know of that? Up to a certain age, if one has grown up in the open air, art is simply unintelligible, a bore!

  And here now it had come to him on the paths of sexuality . . . secretly, ambushing him . . . There was an infatuating warm exhalation coming from the bare skin, a soft, lecherous cajolery. And yet there was something about it that was so solemn and compelling as to make one almost clap one's hands in awe.

  But after the first shock Törless was as ashamed of the one reaction as of the other. 'It's a man, damn it!' The thought enraged him, and yet it seemed to him as though a girl could not be different.

  In his shame he spoke hectoringly to Basini: “What on earth d'you think you're doing? Get back into your things this minute!”

  Now it was Basini who seemed taken aback. Hesitantly, and without shifting his gaze from Törless, he picked up his coat from the floor.

  “Sit down-there!” Törless ordered. Basini obeyed. Törless leaned against the wall, with his arms crossed behind his back.

  “Why did you undress? What did you want of me?”

  “Well, I thought..

  He paused hesitantly.

  “What did you think?”

  “The others

  “What about the others?”

  “Beineberg and Reiting .

  “What about Beineberg and Reiting? What did they do? You've got to tell me everything! That's what I want. See? Although I've heard about it from them, of course.” At this clumsy lie Törless blushed.

  Basini bit his lips.

  “Well? Get on with it!”

  “No, don't make me tell! Please don't make me! I'll do anything you want me to. But don't make me tell about it... . Oh, you have such a special way of tormenting me . . . !” Hatred, fear, and an imploring plea for mercy were all mingled in Basini's gaze.

  Törless involuntarily modified his attitude. “I don't want to torment you at all. I only mean to make you tell the whole truth yourself. Perhaps for your own good.”

  “But, look, I haven't done anything specially worth telling about.”

  “Oh, haven't you? So why did you undress, then?”

  “That's what they wanted.”

  “And why did you do what they wanted? So you're a coward, eh? A miserable coward?”

  “No, I'm not a coward! Don't say that!”

  “Shut up! If you're afraid of being beaten by them, you might find being beaten by me was something to remember!”

  “But it's not the beatings they give me that I'm afraid of!”

  “Oh? What is it then?”

  By now Törless was speaking calmly again. He was already annoyed at his crude threat. But it had escaped him involuntarily, solely because it seemed to him that Basini stood up to him more than to the others.

  “Well, if you're not afraid, as you say, what's the matter with you?”

  “They say if I do whatever the
y tell me to, after some time I shall be forgiven everything.”

  “By the two of them?”

  “No, altogether.”

  “How can they promise that? I have to be considered too!”

  “They say they'll manage that all right.”

  This gave Törless a shock. Beineberg's words about Reiting's dealing with him, if he got the chance, in exactly the same way as with Basini now came back to him. And if it really came to a plot against him, how was he to cope with it? He was no match for the two of them in that sort of thing. How far would they go? The same as with Basini?.. . Everything in him revolted at the perfidious idea.

  Minutes passed between him and Basini. He knew that he lacked the daring and endurance necessary for such intrigues, though of course only because he was too little interested in that Sort of thing, only because he never felt his whole personality involved. He had always had more to lose than to gain there. But if it should ever happen to be the other way, there would, he felt, be quite a different kind of toughness and courage in him. Only one must know when it was time to stake everything.

  “Did they say anything more about it-how they think they can do it? I mean, that about me.”

  “More? No. They only said they'd see to it all right.”

  And yet. . . there was danger now. .. somewhere lying in wait .. . lying in ambush for Törless.. . every step could run him into a gin-trap, every night might be the last before the fight. There was tremendous insecurity in this thought. Here was no more idle drifting along, no more toying with enigmatic visions-this had hard corners and was tangible reality.

  Törless spoke again:

  “And what do they do with you?”

  Basini was silent.

  “If you're serious about reforming, you have to tell me everything.”

  “They make me undress.”

  “Yes, yes, I see that for myself. . . And then?”

  A little time passed, and then suddenly Basini said: “Various things.” He said it with an effeminate, coy expression.

  “So you're their-mi-mistress?”

  “Oh no, I'm their friend!”

  “How can you have the nerve to say that!”

  “They say so themselves.”

  “What!”

  “Yes, Reiting does.”

  “Oh, Reiting does?”

  “Yes, he's very nice to me. Mostly I have to undress and read him something out of history-books-about Rome and the emperors, or the Borgias, or Timur ....... oh well, you know, all that sort of big, bloody stuff. Then he's even affectionate to me. And then afterwards he generally beats me.”

  “After what? Oh, I see!”

  “Yes. He says, if he didn't beat me, he wouldn't be able to help thinking I was a man, and then he couldn't let himself be so soft and affectionate to me. But like that, he says, I'm his chattel, and so then he doesn't mind.”

  “And Beineberg?”

  “Oh, Beineberg's beastly. Don't you think too his breath smells bad?”

  “Shut up! What I think is no business of yours! Tell me what Beineberg does with you!”

  “Well, the same as Reiting, only. . . But you mustn't go yelling at me again....”

  “Get on with it.”

  “Only... he goes about it differently. First of all he gives me long talks about my soul. He says I've sullied it, but so to speak only the outermost forecourt of it. In relation to the innermost, he says, this is something that doesn't matter at all, it's only external. But one must kill it. In that way many people have stopped being sinners and become saints. So from a higher point of view sin isn't bad, only one must carry it to the extreme, so that it breaks off its own accord, he says. He makes me sit and stare into a prism. .”

  “He hypnotises you?”

  “No, he says it's just that he must make all the things floating about on the surface of my soul go to sleep and become powerless. It's only then he can have intercourse with my soul itself.”

  “And how, may I ask, does he have intercourse with it?”

  “That's an experiment he hasn't ever brought off yet. He sits there, and I have to lie on the ground so that he can put his feet on me. I have to get quite dull and drowsy from staring into the glass. Then suddenly he orders me to bark. He tells me exactly how to do it-quietly, more whimpering-the way a dog whines in its sleep.”

  “What's that good for?”

  “Nobody knows what it's good for. And he also makes me grunt like a pig and keeps on and on telling me there's something of a pig about me, in me. But he doesn't mean it offensively, he just keeps on repeating it quite softly and nicely, in order-this is what he says-in order to imprint it firmly on my nerves. You see, he says it's possible one of my former lives was that of a pig and it must be lured out so as to render it harmless.”

  “And you believe all that stuff?”

  “Good lord, no! I don't think he believes it himself. And then in the end he's always quite different, anyway. How on earth should I believe such things? Who believes in a soul these days anyway? And as for transmigration of souls-! I know quite well I slipped.

  But I've always hoped I'd be able to make up for it again. There isn't any hocus-pocus needed for that. Not that I spend any time racking my brains about how I ever came to go wrong. A thing like that comes on you so quickly, all by itself. It's only afterwards you notice that you've done something silly. But if he gets his fun out of looking for something supernatural behind it, let him, for all I care. For the present, after all, I've got to do what he wants. Only I wish he'd leave off sticking pins in me. ...

  “What?”

  “Pricking me with a pin-not hard, you know, only just to see how I react-to see if something doesn't manifest itself at some point or other on the body. But it does hurt. The fact is, he says the doctors don't understand anything about it. I don't remember now how he proves all this, all I remember is he talks a lot about fakirs and how when they see their souls they're supposed to be insensitive to physical pain.”

  “Oh yes, I know those ideas. But you yourself say that's not all.”

  “No, it certainly isn't all. But I also said I think this is just a way of going about it. Afterwards there are always long times-as much as a quarter of an hour-when he doesn't say anything and I don't know what's going on in him. But after that he suddenly breaks out and demands services from me-as if he were possessed-much worse than Reiting.”

  “And you do everything that's demanded of you?”

  “What else can I do? I want to become a decent person again and be left in peace.”

  “But whatever happens in the meantime won't matter to you at all?”

  “Well, I can't help it, can I?”

  “Now pay attention to me and answer my questions. How could you steal?”

  “How? Look, it's like this, I needed money urgently. I was in debt to the tuck-shop man, and he wouldn't wait any longer. Then I really did believe there was money coming for me just at that time. None of the other fellows would lend me any. Some of them hadn't got any themselves, and the saving ones are always just glad if someone who isn't like that gets short towards the end of the month. Honestly, I didn't want to cheat anyone. I only wanted to borrow it secretly. . .

  “That's not what I mean,” Törless said impatiently, interrupting his story, which it was obviously a relief for Basini to tell. “What I'm asking is how-how were you able to do it, what did you feel like? What went on in you at that moment?”

  “Oh well-nothing, really. After all, it was only a moment, I didn't feel anything. I didn't think about anything, simply it had suddenly happened.”

  “But the first time with Reiting? The first time he demanded those things of you? You know what I mean....”

  “Oh, I didn't like it, of course. Because it had to be done just like that, being ordered to. Otherwise-well, just how many of the fellows do such things of their own accord, for the fun of it, without the others knowing anything? I dare say it's not so bad then.”

  “
But you did it on being ordered to. You debased yourself. Just as if you had crawled into the muck because someone else wanted you to.”

  “Oh, I grant that. But I had to.”

  “No, you didn't have to.”

  “They would have beaten me and reported me. Think how I would have got into disgrace.”

  “All right then, let's leave that. There's something else I want to know. Listen. I know you've spent a lot of money with Bozena. You've boasted to her and thrown your weight about and made out what a man you are. So you want to be a man? Not just boasting and pretending to be-but with your whole soul? Now look, then suddenly someone demands such a humiliating service from you, and in the same moment you feel you're too cowardly to say no-doesn't it make a split go through your whole being? A horror-something you can't describe-as though something unutterable had happened inside you?”

  “Lord! I don't know what you mean. I don't know what you're getting at. I can't tell you anything-anything at all-about that.”

  “Now attend. I'm going to order you to get undressed again.”

  Basini smiled.

  “And to lie down flat on the floor there in front of me. Don't laugh! I'm really ordering you to! D'you hear me? If you don't obey instantly, you'll see what you're in for when Reiting comes back! . . That's right. So now you're lying naked on the ground in front of me. You're trembling, too. Are you cold? I could spit on your naked body now if I wanted to. Just press your head right on to the floor.

  Doesn't the dust on the boards look queer? Like a landscape full of clouds and lumps of rock as big as houses? I could stick pins into you. There are still some over there in the corner, by the lamp. D'you feel them in your skin even now? .. . But I don't mean to do that. I could make you bark, the way Beineberg does, and make you eat dust like a pig, I could make you do movements-oh, you know-and at the same time you would have to sigh: 'Oh, my dear Mother!' “ But Törless broke off abruptly in the midst of this sacrilege. “But I don't mean to-don't mean to-do you understand?”