Cleaver

by Tim Parks

You rest. Hermann laughed. I must go. No more walks in the snow, eh, Mr Englishman!

  Du Kriminello! Hermann had just gone out through the porch when Jürgen rushed across the room after him. Raising himself on an elbow, Cleaver glimpsed his small leather cap beside Hermann in the open doorway. The oil lamp began to sway slightly. Jürgen was yelling. Du bisch narrisch, Hermann said coldly. Verrückt. Wie dein Vater.

  Doktor! Hermann called back into the house now, Los! The doctor was already crossing the kitchen with his bag, but now there was a cry. Jürgen must have thrown a punch. There was a scuffle just outside the front door. Cleaver could hear shouts and grunts. The doctor rushed out. Cold air flowed into the room. The lamp was swinging. The town-dressed woman reappeared. Cleaver has forgotten her name already. He must tell her he needs to pee, but she too hurried outside to shout at the men in the snow. There was a jingle of harness. Rosl, he remembered. The shouting went back and forth. A horse neighed and stamped. Now Jürgen and Rosl came in pushing and pulling each other as they headed across the room to the corridor again. Dumm, she was saying angrily. Jürgen thrust his way past her. Betrunken! Cleaver heard Hermann calling to his horse. Juli, ha! Across the room, skeletal face lit by the fire, her shadow stretching and contracting with the swinging lamp, the old woman snored. Cleaver sank back on the bed.

  Cool hands are on his legs now. Cleaver opened his eyes. The doctor told me to make this. It was Rosl. She was standing on the ladder at the foot of the bed. It is antibiotic, she said. She held up a tube of cream or ointment. For a moment Cleaver panicked. I need to pee. She didn’t understand. Bathroom, Badezimmer. You can wait? she asked. I am fast finished. Her hands were strong and sure, rubbing a cool cream into his ankles. Perhaps he could wait. It was strange to see a woman’s face over his legs in the half-light. Now she had taken a foot in both hands and began to bandage it. What was all the shouting about? he asked. Rosl smiled at the foot, fastening a safety pin. She looked up at him from shrewd eyes. She is pretty, Cleaver thought. A pretty blonde forty-year-old.

  She helped him roll over and put his knees over the platform by the ladder. She took a bandaged foot and placed it on a rung. His legs were leaden. There was a sharp pain from the ankle. On top he still had his shirt and pullover, but below they had stripped him to his underpants. As soon as he had steadied himself on the floor he saw the flesh over his knees was pink and blistered. He moved stiffly. Here, she said. She offered a shoulder. In the toilet, Cleaver unwrapped the woollen scarf from his right hand. The fingertips were covered in bright red blisters.

  Later he woke again to a shriek. Someone was shrieking hysterically. Now the only light was the glow from the fire. What time is it? Cleaver wondered. What is going on here? When the scream came again, he swung his legs over the edge of the bed and climbed slowly down the ladder. Someone’s in pain. He stood for a moment, leaning both tingling hands against the stove. It was insulated with a white padding. Holding onto a chair, pressing a hand on the wall, he hopped to the door. The sobbing came from upstairs. There was a broad corridor in deep shadow. Everything is panelled with wood. A door slammed and a woman was shouting.

  Cleaver couldn’t see. Feeling left and right for support, he limped into the darkness, found the stairs. An oil lamp crossing the landing up above showed him antlers and perhaps a stuffed fox, a framed embroidery. There was mayhem in a room whose door kept opening and closing. Cleaver pulled himself up as quickly as he could. Only a few hours ago, I was dead, he thought. I was buried in the snow. Then he collided with Rosl. Herr Cleaver, kommen Sie! She was wearing a nightdress. Kommen Sie! She pulled him after her. The girl was shrieking again.

  Stumbling through the door, Cleaver was aware of a large bed with tall thick wooden posts, a ponderous dresser, the smoky light and smell of the oil lamp. Seffa was crouched on the pillows, breathing hard, one side of her body pressed against a monumental headboard. She wore a white nightdress and was hiding her face in her hands. Jürgen was leaning over her shouting. He grabbed a wrist. What’s going on here? Cleaver asked. It didn’t occur to him to speak in German.

  Herr Cleaver, said a voice. Cleaver turned and saw Frau Stolberg standing by the drawn curtains. Still dressed, she wore black. Then he realised that her arms were cradling a baby. Please, she said in English, go.

  Cleaver looked back to Seffa. She had dropped her hands and he could see her face was bruised. Jürgen was speaking sharply to her. His massive hand grasped her wrist. Rosl whispered: They want that Seffa says the man that is the father.

  Stop, Cleaver said. He had to steady himself against the door frame. Stop! Downstairs the dog was barking. Jürgen ignored him. Na, des isch et woar! Seffa whined. She seemed distraught but adamant. Jürgen slapped the girl.

  Jürgen! Rosl shouted.

  Leave her alone! Cleaver lurched across the room. His right leg buckled. Falling, he had to grab at Jürgen from behind. The peasant shoved an elbow into his chest. Everyone was shouting. Climbing to his feet, Cleaver stumbled sideways, and, as Jürgen turned to yell at Rosl – Walsche! Scheiße! – he managed to sit himself on the bed between father and daughter. He spread out his arms. The blistered fingertips were throbbing. Leave her alone. You can talk about it some other time. What’s the hurry?

  Jürgen stared at him. The man had been drinking. His rough, broad cheeks were flushed. Downstairs the dog was yapping constantly. Das war Hermann! Jürgen yelled. Na Tatte, des isch et woar! She was denying it. Cleaver kept his arms spread out in defence of the girl. What’s the hurry? he demanded. Leave her be. He felt sure they must understand.

  Rosl said: He wants to kill the man who it is.

  Frau Stolberg said something to her son. Jürgen hesitated, grimaced, then spat. Cleaver felt the spit land in his beard. Jürgen turned on his heels and strode out of the room. Tatte! Seffa called. Na Tatte, des isch et woar! She burst into tears. They could hear him pounding down the stairs, the dog barking furiously. Rosl ran out of the room.

  Cleaver rubbed at his beard with the wrist of his pullover and found his lip was bleeding. Looking up, he saw Frau Stolberg watching him from her steady eyes. The baby in her arms was snuffling, her great-grandchild, Cleaver realised. I have to thank you, he said, for pulling me out of the snow. The woman gave no signs of either understanding or acknowledging. So Seffa had disappeared to give birth, Cleaver realised. The doctor came for mother and baby, not for me. Danke schön, Frau Stolberg. Sie hat mich … The words wouldn’t come to mind. Hilfen, he said limply. Gehilfen? Geholfen?

  Frau Stolberg ignored him. She said something to Seffa that seemed to involve the words waschen and essen. Perhaps. All at once both women were leaving the room. Only now did Cleaver notice Jesus holding a bleeding but luminous heart in a heavily carved frame over the headboard. He felt confused. You died and woke in another world. Struggling to his feet, he saw there was a mirror over the dresser.

  It was a tall mirror. Cleaver crossed the room. In the dim light a thickly bearded face was looking at him. I’ve changed. He hadn’t seen himself for a month and more. The nose was starker, the skin chapped and wrinkled. Looking down, he saw that if his legs were hardly thin, still the flabbiness was gone. Then he caught his eyes. They are the same, the same bright mixture of assertion and vulnerability. Feeling strangely pleased with himself, he limped to the door.

  You were very … Rosl didn’t know how to finish the sentence.

  Back in the kitchen, Cleaver had been sitting for half an hour or so at the big stone table. He didn’t feel ready to tackle the ladder over the stove. Then Rosl appeared. Very … mutig, she said. Thank you.

  Mutig?

  Ja. She pulled a stern face and held up a tense clenched fist. Strong, she said.

  Cleaver smiled. You’re welcome. Where’s Jürgen now? Is he going to start again?

  He is gone, Rosl said. Will you drink?

  Gone? Cleaver didn’t understand. Where, how? What time is it? It was halb zehn, she said. Half-past nine. Cleaver had assumed it was the middle o
f the night. He shook his head in amazement. Only half-past nine? Rosl brought him a glass and a bottle of schnapps, a jug of water, then a wooden plate with bread and speck. He has taken the …

  Again she was lost for words. She came to sit opposite Cleaver at the table, then got up, climbed on the bench by the stove, pulled a blanket off the bed and brought it to him. She bent down and put it over his bare knees. He has taken the Schlitten, she said. She looked around, couldn’t find what she was after, then, smiling, lifted her arm and slid the palm of her hand down an imaginary slope. Whee! Schlitten fahren!

  Sled, Cleaver said. Her face across the stone table was a refined version of Jürgen’s, he thought. She had a trim, unused air about her, as if of a younger woman whose life has been suspended, preserved, while her troll-like brother was wizened almost.

  Uli came to sit at Cleaver’s feet.

  So, is it a boy or a girl? he asked.

  A girl.

  I didn’t realise she was pregnant. I thought she was fat. Then I haven’t seen her for weeks now.

  Rosl didn’t reply. When he sipped the schnapps his lips smarted.

  Your hand, she said. She held up one of her hands and made it tremble. You are cold?

  My hand always shakes. I’m okay. Then he asked: You don’t have a mobile here?

  She had her chin propped on her forearms now.

  A telephone? Cleaver repeated.

  Ja ja. She pulled an expensive-looking silver gadget from her pocket.

  Does it get a signal?

  Here, she said. Call.

  Cleaver was taken aback. Maybe tomorrow, he said. I’ll pay obviously.

  The two of them were silent for a while. Only now did Cleaver realise that the ancient woman had disappeared. She has gone to bed. He chewed a slice of speck. Uli moved to settle down on the hearthrug. There were still embers in the fire. Upstairs footsteps moved along the corridor. Cleaver was aware of resisting all kinds of questions, all the Gothic scenarios he had imagined in that month at Rosenkranzhof. The Stolberg family is not your business, he thought. Finally he said: You are not worried about Jürgen?

  Rosl sighed. I worry and I don’t worry.

  After a few moments, Cleaver said: This is the first conversation I have had for more than a month. With a person that is, he added.

  Rosl smiled. She got up to tend to the fire.

  I won’t ask the next question, Cleaver thought. The silence grew longer. He broke a piece of bread and ate it piece by piece. Finally Rosl came back to her seat and said, My mother, you know, has found you only ten metres from the door here. She is bringing in wood and she sees your hat.

  That’s incredible, Cleaver said. I thought I was in the middle of nowhere.

  Jürgen carried you.

  Carried me!

  Rosl stood up, pulled a comically grim face and threw an imaginary sack of potatoes over her shoulders. Staggering under the weight, she trudged a few steps, legs splayed in snowshoes, as if through deep drifts across the parlour. Cleaver laughed. At the same time he felt he might weep. In her blue nightdress and thick woollen socks, the blonde hair tied back from a glowing face, the woman was so beautifully present to him. I had got used to the dolls, he thought.

  Mutter is angry that it is not a boy. She wanted a boy for Trennerhof.

  Ah, Cleaver said.

  Trennerhof is from Mutter’s family, not from my father. Trennerhof, Trennerhof. She is thinking only of that.

  You don’t care for Trennerhof, Cleaver said.

  No, I am a Walsche. I am not existing. Ppph! She made a gesture of contempt.

  A Walsche?

  An Italiana. I married an Italian.

  Right. Cleaver remembered that Hermann had used the word.

  I live in Bozen. Bolzano.

  Where your father was in the Polizeiregiment.

  Ja. Many years ago.

  There is a photo in Rosenkranzhof. Of the regiment.

  Oh? Rosl didn’t seem to be interested. My father was the radio man. He had the radios. She pointed up at the shelves.

  Cleaver was perplexed. But it made more sense than Hermann’s version. Funny the radios without the electricity, he said.

  Rosl laughed. Mutter wants no news in Trennerhof. Only a man, for the … Kühe.

  She has Jürgen.

  Jürgen drinks. He drinks all the time.

  At least he shaves, Cleaver said. He mimed a man using a razor. Rosl smiled. When there was a silence, Cleaver drained his schnapps. It was good. He studied the blisters on his fingertips. They were painful, but seemed harmless enough. He was aware of a great sense of mental well-being. Rosl seemed in no hurry to go to bed.

  You have left Rosenkranzhof now, she smiled.

  Cleaver shrugged. I hurt my ankle. That’s why I tried to come up here. Ankle, he repeated. He pushed back his chair and tapped the injured part. I can’t walk properly. Then he told her how it had happened, the late-night visit from Jürgen and Frau Stolberg, the broken stair. At once he sensed a new tension in the woman. She was alert. She hadn’t known about this. Frau Stolberg, Cleaver said, your mother, went down the track, to that ledge at the bottom, that place where there is the cable down to Steinhaus. With his hands, Cleaver traced the sag of the cable draped down the mountainside. Rosl jumped to her feet. She turned to the fire, crouched down to stroke the dog. Rosenkranzhof is a horrible place, she said.

  Cleaver watched her. Have a drink, he said. She shook her head. Then they heard the sharp wail of the baby. Because it’s a girl, Rosl said quietly, I will ask to bring her to live with me in Bozen.

  You don’t have children? Cleaver asked.

  No.

  Perhaps you should take Seffa, too.

  I wanted to bring Seffa, many years ago. But she is not leaving without her father. She loves her father.

  Or the father of her baby.

  Rosl was still stroking the dog. Now she stood up and seemed ready to go. She shook her head. Then Cleaver had the distinct impression that Rosl knew who the father of the child was. Both women knew. He wondered now if he had understood right when Jürgen had said: Das war Hermann. Does the baby have a name? he asked.

  Sie heißt Ulrike, Rosl said.

  XVI

  ALEX? CLEAVER ASKED.

  It was as if he were calling through smoke.

  Alex!

  Dad!

  Cleaver woke in a sweat to the sound of footsteps crossing the room. Wer ist da? He asked. Schlafen Sie, said Frau Stolberg. He heard her pulling on boots, pushing open the door. Then he was aware of the cows complaining and almost at once someone else was by the table. He turned on his side and saw Rosl buttoning a coat.

  What’s happening?

  Jürgen isn’t home. Die Kühe …

  Can I help? Cleaver asked.

  You sleep, Rosl said.

  Cleaver climbed down from the bed and went out into passageway to the toilet. Where did they put my watch? The house was quiet, but the cows were bellowing loudly outside. Over the door going back into the kitchen there was a bunch of dried heather and to the right, built into the wall, a small iron door for stoking up the stove on the other side. No dolls in Trennerhof, he noticed.

  Limping about in the dark, Cleaver found a basket of logs by the hearth and laid two side by side in the embers of the fire. His fingers were stiff and extremely sore. He blew on the coals. Where were the matches for the lamp? He stripped a long splinter from a log, lit it from the first flame that sprung in the grate and carried it carefully to the table. The wick took at once and the room steadied in a shadowy yellow light. Only then did he remember the splinter under his nail. The pain of the frostbite had masked it, but it’s still there. The fingertip is inflamed. He could see a black smudge beneath the nail. Ow! Don’t touch.

  Cleaver looked around for his clothes. Uli was on the old lady’s chair. She wagged her tail but didn’t get up. Trousers, shirt and sweater were folded on the bench under the stove. Dry. Why doesn’t this pain bother me more? Cleaver wonder
ed. Fingers and feet were craving to be scratched, but his mind was calm. Something about the big room with its clutter of boots by the door, its silent old radios, its stove and bric-a-brac and smoky smell, made him feel rested.

  In the porch, the only thing that would fit on his swollen feet was a dilapidated pair of wellingtons, Jürgen’s presumably. What if Jürgen had set off last night to have it out with Hermann?

  Outside the air was raw. Dawn was hardening a skyline of peaks and cloud beyond Luttach. To his left the huge mass of Schwarzstein was weirdly blue and white. It’s so vast, Cleaver muttered. A grey field of frozen snow stretched away to the cut of the gorge.

  Cleaver replenished the firewood basket from the log pile under the eaves. He could hear chickens clucking in the shed beyond. Long icicles had formed from the guttering near the chimney. He breathed deeply, the air is good, then walked round the house to the cowshed.

  There was a heavy wooden door, and after that a curtain of thick black plastic. The smell of straw and shit and warm animal breath was overpowering. He waited for his eyes to grow accustomed to the dark. The cows were standing side by side, their backs toward him, their heads trapped between the vertical wooden bars between stall and feeding trough in the main part of the barn.

  There was the dull sound of a dozen pairs of jaws champing on hay. Cleaver walked along the line and found Rosl with her head pressed into a cow’s belly, a three-legged stool strapped round her thighs. Milk squirted into the pail in sharp spurts. The woman was sighing with the effort. Her wrists tensed as she pulled down, relaxed coming up. The hands clenched and unclenched on the teats. She doesn’t wear a ring, Cleaver noticed.

  Can I help?

  She didn’t move her head to look at him. She must already have been aware he was there. Ein moment, she said. The cow shivered and kicked out a leg in irritation. Rosl said a harsh word, and slapped the creature on the flank. Then she lowered her head again.

  Frau Stolberg, Cleaver saw, was working at the other end of the line. The cows seemed oblivious to anything but their eating. There was fresh shit in the gutter behind their hoofs. Go round, Rosl said. Da hinten, sehen Sie? She pointed. And give more Heu. Heu, you understand?