by Tim Parks
He had to go back outside, along the wall of the building where a path had been shovelled clear of snow and then in again through another larger door. Now the cows were on his right. A lever could draw apart the vertical wooden bars corresponding to each cow’s head. They thrust their necks through the gaps to eat, then the bars closed again. They are trapped when they eat and trapped when they fuck, Cleaver thought. The cows didn’t seem to mind. Only where a couple of animals had finished the hay in front of them did they twist their necks and stretch out long pink tongues to lick at their neighbour’s fodder. The trough was grey stone and their tongues when they licked made a low rasping noise.
Opposite the animals, there was a wall of tightly packed hay. A loose pile was ready in the centre of an otherwise meticulously swept floor. Cleaver was surprised by the pleasure of its sweet smell, as if, on this icy morning, he were breathing in summer. The stalks pricked his sore fingers. Limping along the trough, he shared the hay out. His body ached. The cows stretched their necks impatiently. The soft pink noses snorted. Without thinking, Cleaver found himself talking to them. Here you go, sweetheart. Easy now. Hey, give me time, give me time! The cows resumed their eating. Through grimy windows the light was coming up.
Later, Cleaver watched Rosl set up the filter in the dairy room where the Graukäse was made. It was a sort of child’s construction game of differently perforated cylinders, discs and blotting papers that assembled in the form of a conical tower, perhaps four feet high. With tense hands, Cleaver lifted a full pail and poured. The milk streamed across the silvery steel shedding flecks of grit. Where’s Jürgen? he asked.
Rosl seemed exhausted. He drinks, she said. He is betrunken. Then he sleeps in the bar. On the … the Boden. She indicated the floor. Maybe two or three nights.
You don’t think he went to hurt Hermann?
Rosl shrugged. Her mood has changed, Cleaver thought. She was cooler.
If you want me to leave, he offered, I can go down to Luttach today. The path should be easy from here.
You must rest, she said. It is … soon for you to walk in the snow. Your feet … But if you want, go.
Then she showed him how to wash the filters. It is years I don’t do this, she said. She gave him rubber gloves and a plastic apron. There was a gas boiler fed by a cylinder and an impressive armoury of nylon scrapers. Everything must be one hundred per cent clean, she said. Sauber? Cleaver said. Sauber sauber.
The hot water on rubber gloves was torture. Cleaver enjoyed it. He spent twenty minutes and more removing every trace of milk and dirt from the various utensils. It was a simple, demanding job. I am calm, he kept telling himself. How did that happen?
The day was bright when he walked out again. The sun had topped the peaks to the east. The white landscape gleamed. Cleaver stood still, listening intently. He put an experimental foot in the snow. It had lost its crust. Over the door, water had begun to drip from the round green sign that advertised Forst beer.
Guten Morgen, Cleaver said, going back into the parlour. Frau Stolberg’s ancient mother was dunking bread in milk. She lowered her shawled head to push soggy chunks between her gums. Cleaver had realised now that the curtain to the left of the stove behind the bar led through to the kitchen proper. Again he went to offer help. The ceiling here was low and black and the place smelt strongly of smoked ham and frying. Setzen Sie sich! Frau Stolberg shooed him back into the parlour, then followed with a plate of perhaps a dozen eggs. Seffa appeared, carrying a large battered holdall. Morgen, she said. It was only when she set the holdall down on the chair beside her and leaned over it that Cleaver realised the baby was inside. Can I see? he asked.
The girl seemed barely changed from when she had come to Rosenkranzhof that first night for her dog. Her shabby clothes were loose, the limp hair was cut without style. But one cheek was deeply bruised and whereas Cleaver remembered her expression as vacant, now there was a troubled alertness about the eyes. Warming her hands round a bowl of milk, she glanced towards the door at the slightest sound.
Kann ich das Kind sehen? Cleaver repeated.
Rosl and Frau Stolberg were eating in silence. Seffa shrugged her shoulders. Leaning over the holdall, Cleaver saw the baby wrapped in white wool, eyes closed, puffy lips frowning, a small pink cap on her head. Acting on impulse, he plunged his hands into the bag and picked the child up. Herr Cleaver! Frau Stolberg objected. He lifted the sleeping baby to his shoulder, careful to keep her soft skin from his beard and patted her gently on the back. How light babies are, he said to Rosl. Sie ist sehr … hübsch, he told Seffa. The girl was anxious.
There was a sudden cackle of laughter. Grotesquely gaunt, her toothless mouth gaping, the ancient lady peered up at Cleaver and the child. She said something loud and fast of which Cleaver could distinguish not a word. The gnarled hands made an expansive gesture. He would never have imagined there could be such vitality in the old skeleton. She belched and laughed again and pointed at him. Frau Stolberg was speaking too, in a voice that seemed unusually soft. Listening without even trying to understand, Cleaver felt the slight trembling of the living child, so unlike poor Olga. Ulrike, he said gravely, Guten Morgen.
The old lady laughed and clapped and exclaimed to the others. Seffa was upset. She reached out to have the baby to herself. Cradling the bald head in one hand, Cleaver bent forward to pass the tiny girl to her. My father, he remembered Alex had written, always came across as a very fatherly man, though it was more rhetoric than reality. No doubt he’ll make an excellent grandfather, Mother would say wryly. Sitting down again, he asked Rosl, Can I use your phone?
Rosl had left it in her room. Eat first, she said. It is hot now. Cleaver had a plate of eggs and speck and black bread in front of him. As he ate, he listened to the women talking. They spoke in low, business-like tones, but with an edge of tension. They were discussing the question of Jürgen, he guessed. Perhaps Rosl had offered to use her phone to call down to Luttach. How long would her battery last? Frau Stolberg seemed resigned.
All at once, the ancient lady leaned across the table and shook her daughter’s wrist. Mutter! Frau Stolberg said. There was a faint smell to her. Oma – that is my grandmother – Rosl eventually translated for Cleaver, says you are … She hesitated, A fine man. And very, how do you say, handsome.
Cleaver was chewing speck. Is that so? he smiled. He turned to the ancient creature and bowed his head in acknowledgement. It was obvious she was all but blind. And my mother, Rosl went on, asks, How are your hands and feet this morning?
Cleaver turned to Frau Stolberg. Es geht mir gut, danke. He remembered that formula. Only, I have a bad splinter. He showed his finger to Rosl. She got up and stood behind him so as not to block the light. She laid his blistered hand across hers which was dry and cool. Das ist schlimm, she said. It was infected. Mutter? Kommen Sie. Frau Stolberg stood and bent stiffly over the hand. She shook her head. Na, ich sehe nicht gut. Die Augen. For the first time she spoke in such a way that Cleaver could understand. Ich kann das nicht sehen.
While he was finishing his breakfast, the women prepared a bowl of scalding water. Rosl indicated that he should put his hand in it. It will be … schmerzhaft, she said. Pain. Frau Stolberg moved a chair to the window. Setzen Sie sich hier hin. Hier ist Licht.
Rosl left the room to fetch needles, nail clippers, tweezers, scissors and even a small knife. She pulled up a chair opposite him so that their knees were touching. Ow! Cleaver let out a wail and pulled his hand away. Sorry. Then the baby began to cry. The ancient woman laughed. She hadn’t understood what was going on. Seffa got up and began to walk the child back and forth across the room.
Hier, Frau Stolberg said. She poured Cleaver a glass of transparent liquid from a bottle without a label. He sank it in one and immediately recognised the taste. Gebirgsgeist. He had to shake his head. Now the woman was putting a dishcloth in his hands. You can bite, Rosl said. Bite? No? Frau Stolberg indicated he could clench his teeth on it.
Cleaver accepted.
He watched Rosl’s puckered mouth and squinting eyes as she tried to ease a needle under the nail. The fingertip was swollen. The pain was extraordinarily sharp. He bit on the towel. One moment, she said, withdrawing the needle and standing up. Pulling the cloth out of his mouth, Cleaver took a breath. Rosl brought over another chair, put the bowl of hot water on it and pushed in Cleaver’s hand. Hold it there. She had lanced the pus under the nail and the finger began to bleed into the water. Hold it. She grabbed his wrist when he started to pull it away. The water was scalding.
They sat silent together for perhaps a minute, watching the blood cloud the water. Then Cleaver asked: Just to pass the time, you know, can you tell me why there is a bar in the room, a counter, for beer, and that Forst sign outside the door?
Rosl had taken hold of his finger now and was squeezing out any remaining infection. For a moment, he thought she was refusing to answer, or hadn’t understood. Then, still intent on his hand, her face grimacing as if the pain were hers not his, she said, Since many years, my father had a Stube, here in Trennerhof. For the tourists, you know? The walkers.
She took his hand out now and dried it on a towel on her lap. The people could sleep here, she explained. Even ten people. In summer it was always full. She moved his hand under the window and studied it carefully. People liked that there was … keine Elektrizität. It was an adventure. Hermann and his father came with their horses. They brought the pony-trekkers. She looked up from the finger into Cleaver’s face. This is very bad, you know. We must take away the … Nagel. How do you say? You will perhaps wait. You go to hospital.
No, Cleaver said. You do it. But pour me another drink. He smiled. Why did the bar close?
She frowned. Why do you want to know about my family? This is pain now, she said. Using the knife she began to saw horizontally across the base of the nail.
Cleaver closed his eyes. Through his teeth he said: I’m curious. Ever since I went to Rosenkranzhof I wanted to know why your father went there. I kept going to the ledge where there is the photograph of Ulrike.
Rosl was making sure she had cut the edges of the nail where it curved into the skin. Why have you gone to Rosenkranzhof? she asked.
Cleaver was breathing deeply. This is stupid, superficial pain, he told himself. It means nothing. It will end as soon as the splinter is out. I don’t know, he said. To prove something maybe. To live in silence.
Rosl picked up the scissors. And you have succeeded?
It was a very noisy silence.
And now you want to telephone someone?
It’s just a call I should have made before I left.
And then you go back to Rosenkranzhof?
Cleaver winced. In a sudden movement, she had levered back his nail so that it broke along the line she had scored. Cleaver let out a cry. Mehr heißes Wasser, Rosl called to her mother. Using the scissors she cut the nail free. Frau Stolberg came and took away the bowl. The baby on her shoulder, Seffa leaned over to look. She grimaced, said something. The raw skin was bleeding along the line where the splinter had entered. The broken piece was deep inside. What does she say? Cleaver asked. She says, not so bad as to have a baby, Rosl said. Seffa nodded. She understood the word baby. Already Frau Stolberg was back with fresh hot water. Rosl pushed his hand in. Cleaver tried to concentrate on her face. The small mouth and faintly wrinkled eyes had that soft grimness of a woman who is hurting a man gently, for his own good.
So you will go back? Now she pulled the hand out.
I don’t know, he said. She began to study the fingertip, picked up the tweezers, then changed her mind and chose the needle again.
Perhaps the silence will be quieter after this phone call, Cleaver said. Or perhaps I won’t want to go back at all. But you still haven’t told me why your father lived there.
She went into the flesh. Cleaver winced and shook his head fiercely from side to side. She had reached the splinter now. He was determined not to complain.
Ulrike has worked in the Stube, Rosl said. She was very beliebt, popular. You know? She married Jürgen. One day my father has killed a man. After that, he has gone to live in Rosenkranzhof. The Stube has been closed. Ulrike has wanted to leave Trennerhof, but Mutter has not let Jürgen go. Then they have been intending to open the Stube again, but Ulrike has had an accident at the Seilbahn … the telepherique. For to bring up the things.
Rosl was working with the tweezers as she spoke. She didn’t look up. Cleaver could see the delicate skin behind the ears where the hair was tied back. It was a good neck. There was a small mole. Frau Stolberg had begun to sweep the floor under the table, but Cleaver sensed she was listening. She knows Rosl is telling me their story, he thought.
Now!
He breathed hard as she made a first attempt to fasten on the splinter. There was a pause.
Why wasn’t your father put in prison?
Here no one has said who has done it. The police have not insisted.
Why not?
Because … because this man … war schuld. He was … schuldig … it is his fault.
This was about Ulrike? Cleaver asked.
Achtung, she warned. She pulled the splinter out. Cleaver shut his eyes. He felt its length retreat from deep inside his flesh.
Gut. Fertig.
Surprisingly bloodless between the points of her tweezers, the fragment of wood was almost a quarter of an inch long.
She smiled, pleased with herself. Yes, it was about Ulrike.
Cleaver sank his hand into the water. After a few moments, he asked: And Ulrike used to take your father his food at Rosenkranzhof?
Rosl stood up, shaking out the towel, pulling down her cardigan.
Now I go to get you the phone, she said.
Frau Stolberg propped up the broom and came to study his finger. The nail was gone almost to the base and the exposed flesh was cut deeply in two places. To Cleaver’s surprise she went to a cupboard and returned with a pack of sterile gauze. Eyes fixed as ever, she patted the skin dry and secured the gauze round his finger with sticking tape. The baby started crying again. Seffa went to sit by the fire near her great-grandmother, pulled up her sweater and pushed the child’s mouth against a breast.
Man weisst nicht wo ist Jürgen? Cleaver asked.
Frau Stolberg did not reply, though Cleaver was sure she had understood. She went into the kitchen, returned with a large basin full of potatoes and began to peel them.
The field indicator on Rosl’s phone showed one notch. Seffa glanced up with an interest more intense than anything Cleaver had seen on her face so far. She wants her own phone of course. Is it possible she has a lover? Then he realised: I’ve forgotten the number. I have it in my phone, he explained, but the battery is dead.
Okay, give me yours, she said.
Cleaver’s ski jacket was hanging by the door. The phone was still in his inside pocket. The battery is dead, he repeated.
Sitting at the table again, Rosl rapidly took his phone apart, removed the SIM card and inserted it in her own phone. Frau Stolberg watched, uncomprehending. Rosl turned on her phone. The screen glowed. Cleaver took it, but didn’t understand how the thing worked. It wasn’t his familiar Nokia. Open the Phone Book and call Alex he told her, A-L-E-X. He wondered for a moment if you needed to add the international code. Rosl pressed and tapped, then handed it to him. Apparently not.
All four generations of women were watching Cleaver now. The old lady had her beads in her hands. He could see the fist working as she pushed each bead between finger and thumb. I must ask why it was called Rosenkranzhof, Cleaver thought. But he heard the phone ringing now with faint faulty tones.
Alex? he said. The signal was coming and going. Alex?
Dad! Cleaver’s son was already speaking. He must have seen his father’s name come up on the screen. Dad! Then Cleaver realised that he had no idea what to say beyond pronouncing his son’s name. The frenetic mental activity of the last month had completely evaporated.
How are you, Alex?
/> Dad, I’m fine. Listen …
The line broke up for a moment. Cleaver felt anxious. It was supposed to be a momentous call. The women were watching. Why didn’t I go on my own somewhere? Rosl had lit a cigarette.
Alex, I just wanted to say, about the book. It’s okay.
Dad …
No, it’s not okay. I mean, I hate it. I think it gives a completely false picture of me. All the same, I wanted to call – Cleaver knew his voice had gone cold, he was losing it – to say, well, that I don’t want the book to be the end of it, of us.
Dad! his son kept trying to speak. The line came and went. Cleaver was still trying to say the thing that had to be said, whatever it was. I mean, a son is more … than a book. That sounded hopeless. Alex, I’ve been thinking …
Dad!
But what finally stopped Cleaver talking was the look on Rosl’s face. As she breathed out cigarette smoke, a flicker of irony lit her blue eyes, as if, even without understanding the nature of this exchange, she knew she was listening to an old performer.
Dad, for fuck’s sake let me get a word in.
What? Cleaver asked.
Guess where I am.
What?
The line went again.
Guess where I am, where I’m speaking from.
Why? Cleaver wondered. Where? Manchester?
No.
Home, Chelsea?
No.
I don’t know. You’re being interviewed on TV. You’re going to Stockholm for the Nobel.
I’m climbing a mountain.
Good for you.
There was a pause.
Where? Cleaver asked.
I’m sitting on a sled.
Cleaver was alarmed.
With a guy called Hermann. Above a place called Luttago.
Luttach, Cleaver corrected. You haven’t brought your mother along, have you?
See you soon, his son said.
XVII
PERHAPS JÜRGEN IS dead and I will take his place here at Trennerhof. Cleaver had insisted on mucking out the stall. Where are you going? he asked Rosl. She was pulling on her boots at the door. To make clean the Stalle, she said, die Kühe. Someone had to clean out the shit. I’ll do it, Cleaver offered. She shook her head. Your hand … I’ll be okay with gloves, Cleaver insisted. The moment she heard Hermann was coming, Seffa had been anxious. Und Tatte? she broke in now. Kommt Tatte auch? Rosl and Frau Stolberg spoke together in low voices.
