I Confess

by Johannes Mario Simmel

  "And what was wrong with all those people, Martin?"

  "None of them liked me."

  "Well, then you must be glad to be back here with us. Everybody's waiting for you here."

  A knock on the door. "Come in," cried Dr. Freund.

  The door opened and two children walked in—fat Toni and the little giri with the black braids. "What is it?" asked Dr. Freund.

  ''Herr Doktor," said the little girl, "our teacher has just told us that Martin Frank is going to be in our class today, so we thought we'd ask if he was here already and whether we could welcome him."

  Martin was obviously stunned. He stared at the little girl. Dr. Freund rose, smiling. "Well, that's a happy coincidence." he said. "You've come just at the right time. This is Martin," and he pushed Martin forward gently as

  he said to him, ''You see, I told you the truth. Everybody here is waiting for you."

  Both children were smiling. "Hm," said Martin, looking thoroughly confused.

  "Let me introduce you," said Dr. Freund. "This is Martin, and this is Toni, the president of Class II B, and this is Ilse. She's vice-president."

  Toni and Ilse shook hands with Martin. "Welcome!'* said Ilse. "We're happy to have you with^us," said Toni.

  "So," said Dr. Freund, rubbing his hands. "And now that you're here, I won't have to take Martin up to you. You can manage that just as well yourselves, can't you?"

  "Of course, Herr Doktor."

  "Good." Dr. Freund nodded. "So go along, Martm. I'll be seeing you."

  My son looked helplessly from one child to the other. •"You mean you want me to . . ." he began hesitantly.

  "Yes, Martin," said Toni. "The other children would like to meet you too." He took Martin's hand. Use flung her thin arm around his shoulders, and thus they led a silent Martin out of the room. The door fell shut; we were alone. I said, "I presume the children were sent down to do this."

  "Naturally," Dr. Freund replied happily. "Now come on, the performance isn't over."

  We hurried back to the projection room. We had just reached the small windows when there was a knock on the door in the classroom. "Come in," cried the young teacher.

  Ilse and Toni led Martin into the room. At the same moment every child in the room rose, smiled at Martin, who seemed overcome, and cried out, "Good morning, Martin!"

  Martin's restless eyes fluttered. He passed the back of his hand across his nose, cleared his throat and said something that sounded like a grunt.

  The teacher walked up to him. "Well, at last!" she

  cried happily. "You certainly kept us waiting, Martin. Where have you been all this time."

  "At the ... at the ... I had to see the doctor," he finally managed to say.

  "Aha." The teacher nodded. "But now you're here and are going to stay." As she spoke she led him forward gently until he was standing in front of her dais. "And now we've got to find a nice seat for you." She stopped, looked around. "For goodness sakes! There's something we've forgotten. Martin doesn't have a seat."

  "What do you mean, Frau Lehrerin?" cried one of the boys, jumping up. "Of course there's a seat for him. We cleared this one," and he pointed to an empty desk next to his.

  The teacher slapped her forehead as if vexed with herself. "How could I have forgotten? Of course. Martin, look!" And she led him to the desk beside which the boy was standing.

  Martin swallowed heroically. He couldn't believe his eyes. The desk was covered with a piece of shelf paper. On it the children had drawn a wreath of flowers in colored crayons. In the middle of the wreath the word "Welcome!" was printed in large red letters. Martin was speechless. All the children were watching him. No one spoke.

  "Do you like your desk, Martin?" asked the teacher.

  Another deep grunt issued forth from a desperate Martin.

  "You don't like it?"

  "Yes, I do." The words were almost inaudible. He looked from one child to the other. "Thank you," he finally managed to say softly.

  "So," said the teacher. "And now sit down, Martin. We're doing arithmetic. You can start right in with us."

  "I . . ." Martin began and stopped.

  "What is it?"

  "I don't have any school things with me.'*

  *T[ have a notebook you can have," cried one of the boys. "Here you are. And you can keep it."

  "And here's a pencil," said Martin's neighbor. "I don't need it. You can have it."

  "Th ... thanks," mumbled Martin. With his forefinger he was tracing the colored flowers. He wasn't looking at anybody; his shoulders were shaking.

  "So you'll write with pencil today, not with ink," said the teacher. "That's all right, isn't it?"

  Martin nodded wordlessly.

  'Trau LehrerinI" cried Ilse.

  "What is it, Dse?"

  "Martin doesn't have to write in pencil. I have a second pen for him." She walked over to Martin. "And look,'* she said.

  In the upper right hand comer of the desk the children had fashioned a lid out of cardboard. It was secured to the desk with a thumbtack. Ilse removed the thumbtack, Ufted the flap and revealed the inkwell underneath it. She dipped her pen into it and handed it to Martin, who took it.

  "There,'' said the teacher, going back to the blackboard. "And now we can go on with the lesson."

  The children wrote. So did Martin, without hesitation. In a short while his pen was dry. "Now watch," said Dr. Freund, who was standing behind me.

  I saw MartLQ hesitate, then slowly, carefully, he removed the thumbtack, lifted the cardboard hd, dipped his pen into the inkwell, closed the hd again with the thumbtack and went on writing.

  "Did you see that?" Dr. Freund sounded overjoyed. "He didn't rip off the lid. He opened and closed it again so as not to damage his beautiful new desk."

  I had a lump in my throat.

  Martin wrote. After a while he opened the lid again carefully, dipped in his pen and closed it again. He repeated this procedure solemnly throughout the entire lesson. I stood at the Uttle window and watched him. I

  thought of the child Martin had tried to hang and the live mouse he had taped down, and I thought of Yolanda.

  "Shock," said Dr. Freund. "I knew we wouldn^t get anywhere without it. Now, of course, we must wait for the first relapse."

  8

  The "shock" remained with Martin. A week passed without any sign of a relapse. He obviously felt right in his new surroundings, he went to school gladly every morning and I accompanied him because the school was quite some distance away from us and he didn't know the way yet. At any rate, that was my excuse for accompanying him. To be honest, I was magically attracted to Dr. Freund. I longed to be near him, I loved talking to him, and when I was in his presence, I was at peace. While Martin was attending his various classes, I sat in Dr. Freund's office and listened to him talk about his problem children, his anxieties, his successes and failures. We also spoke about Martin.

  "I don't want you to have any illusions about the boy," he told me. 'The relapse will come. It always does. We will have many relapses before we have a cure." He threw up his hands. "My God, how easy healing would be if the first success were a lasting one! Unfortunately this is never the case. Because it is always achieved, as in Martin's case, by a shock. And a shock only startles, it doesn't heal."

  Martin's attitude toward me didn't change. He seemed aware of my existence, but he spoke to me only when necessary. In the evening, when we got home, he did his

  homework and went to bed. Now he washed himself. Dr. Freund had persuaded him to. It was a strange time, as I think back on it now. I would have had every reason to be desperate about my plans that had gone awry. But I had no longing to go away, I had quieted down incredibly in these few days of my acquaintance with Dr. Freund. It was on November 11 that there was a letter for me in the morning mail. A summons. To appear on November 14, at ten o'clock, at the police station in the first district for the purpose of "supplying informatioru"

  I went there in a most unusual frame of
mind which had been preceded by many hours of cogitation. I faced my chances dispassionately. "For supplying information . . .'* Anything could lie hidden behind these words. I really couldn't have expected my crimes to remain forever unsolved. The police must have come upon a clue as a result of some mistake made by me, somehow, somewhere. Now they would question me, once, twice, over and over again. Perhaps I would be smart enough to answer their questions to their satisfaction, perhaps not.

  Of course I could still resort to flight. But in aH probability, if they were in the least suspicious of me, they had already notified the border and I would walk into a trap. Also I no longer had the rashness of earlier days; I had grown sluggish and tired and knew that I was sicker. My breathing was more labored^ my headaches were more frequent. I could rid myself of them easily with Mord-stein's morphine. Still, I wasn't the man I used to be; I too had changed. In all probability it was Dr. Freund who

  had changed me. His words, spoken on that first night, remained with me. One couldn't run away all the time. In every life there came a day on which one had to stop and stand with one's back to the wall and face reaUty. I was tired of running away.

  I went to the police station. I had to wait a long time. There were quite a few people ahead of me. I sat in a dirty, cold passageway beside the door to which I had been told to come. I was in that faraway mood in which anything goes. It was Uke the way one feels about life when one is slightly tipsy. I didn't give a damn about anything. Perhaps the morphine had taken its toll. I was so calm that I was able to start a quite interesting conversation with a man who arrived ten minutes after me and sat down beside me. He seemed about forty-five; he was shabbily dressed and sympathetic. I liked him right away.

  "It's taking a long time today," he said patiently.

  "Yes."

  "Have you been here often?"

  "No."

  "I was just wondering. I've had to come several times."

  "Is that so?"

  "Yes."

  The conversation was petering out when he suddenly decided to introduce himself. "My name is Hohenberg."

  "Pleased to meet you," I said, as we shook hands. "My name is Frank."

  "Are you here because of your child too?" he asked, a little shyly.

  "No. Why?"

  "You have no children?"

  "Y ... yes," I said slowly. "A son."

  "I do too." He nodded several times. "My God, if I had ever thought. . ." he stopped speaking and sighed.

  "Is anything wrong with your boy?"

  "Everything is wrong with my boy," he said dully. "His name is Herbert. He is ten years old. He was a good boy until a while ago, then the devil must have got into him.

  You can't ima^e what we've gone through with him, my wife and I. Especially my poor wife."

  "Is Herbert iU?"

  "Yes, Herr Frank. Not physically. I think his soul is sick."

  "His soul?"

  "Yes. My wife and I are convinced that's it Something changed him."

  "In what way?"

  Hohenberg looked around nervously, then he whispered, "He's been expelled from school."

  "Why?"

  "For a sex offense. Just think of it! My son. He tried to rape a girl. Dreadful, isn't it?"

  I said nothing.

  "They hushed it up," he said. "They hushed it up out of deference to me because they knew me. We emoUed Herbert in a different school. For six months everything was all right. But now . . ."

  "But now?"

  "The same thing. A relapse. Worse than the first time. This time the police were drawn into it because the mother of the girl reported it. That's why I'm here. His case is coming up in juvenile court. Can you imagine that, Herr Frank? A conviction—at the age of ten?" He covered his face with his hands.

  I thought for a moment, then I said, "Listen Herr Hohenberg, I think I can give you some good advice. I have a problem child too. And there is a perfectly wonderful educator here in Vienna, a certain Dr. Freund. He has a clinic for parents and children in trouble, every Thursday from four to eight. Why don't you take Herbert to see him?"

  "You think it might help?"

  "If he can't help you, nobody can," I said. "As far as Fm concerned, the man is a saint. Try it. He has done wonders for my boy. I'll be glad to make an appointment for you."

  "Would you do that?"

  "Gladly."

  We exchanged addresses and telephone numbers, and I promised to call him. The door next to where we were waiting opened and a police officer came out. "Herr Walter Frank?"

  I rose.

  "Coming," I said coolly. Then T did something strange. I still don't understand what got into me, but I turned to Hohenberg and said, "Come to see me sometime. I'm sure we have a lot to talk about."

  "I'll be happy to, if you'd like it." He seemed embarrassed.

  "Some evening. How about Saturday?"

  "Saturday would be fine, Herr Frank." Now he was smiling.

  "Saturday at 8:30, after supper," I said, feeling suddenly quite gay and never giving a thought to the fact that I mightn't be able to keep the appointment.

  "Saturday at 8:30," he repeated.

  "Fine. I'm looking forward to it. Bring your wife."

  "I'm sorry, but I won't be able to do that. She just left for the country."

  "All right tfien," I said. "So you'll come alone," and with that I turned and walked past the police officer into the office. In the doorway I stopped dead. The room was small. A desk stood in front of a window. A second police officer sat behind it and in front of it sat Wilma.

  She looked at me solemnly, then moved her head in an almost imperceptible greeting. "Hello, Wilma," I said and held out my hand. She took it and pressed it gently.

  "Sit down, Herr Frank," said the officer behind the desk. The other man sat down in front of a typewriter and looked at me curiously. Well, I thought, this is it. I would have Uked to know how much Wilma had already told about and against me. She was just another woman after all, I thought.

  "Should I leave?" she asked the man behind the desk.

  "No. Please stay."

  She shrugged.

  So there was to be a confrontation. Very good. Would Dr. Freund look after Martin? And my money was still at home. If only Fd put it away. Too stupid of me. They'd probably keep me here. They could certainly take me into custody right away. I hadn't thought that they already knew so much. And that Wilma would be here .. .

  "You know why we summoned you, Herr Frank?" asked the officer. He was lean and tall and his face was grey from overwork.

  "Yes."

  "Good. That simplifies matters. Do you want to speak or shall we interrogate you?"

  I had never felt so weak in my life as at this moment. My intention to fight (with my back to the wall) was forgotten. I was ready to confess everything.

  "Fll speak." (And why hot? It would have to end someday, somehow. Yolanda was dead. Mordstein was

  321

  dead. Margaret, my wife—God knows where she was. Why shouldn't I speak? Before they could pass sentence on me, I'd be dead too. .. .)

  "Very well," said the overworked officer behind the desk and nodded to his colleague seated at the typewriter, who inserted a piece of paper. "Then please speak, Herr Frank."

  "Yes."

  He raised his hand. **But please only about things that concern Herr Lauterbach."

  11

  It took me a few seconds to grasp that they knew nothing at all about me, that they only wanted to interrogate me about wretched Jacob Lauterbach, who was sitting in jml because of some foreign exchange illegaUties. It took a moment or two for me to get control of myself before I could say anything at all. Wilma watched me earnestly during these few seconds, as I wrangled with myself. She sat there without saying a word. She would have let me go ahead and ruin myself, without doing anything to help me. Well . .. yes.

  I talked about Lauterbach. I explained that I had gone to see him to discuss a business matter with him.

&nb
sp; "What business?"

  Export. Textiles. I was in textiles. (The officer looked at my false papers.)

  "And did that deal—whatever it was—go through?"

  Unfortunately not. Lauterbach was arrested the day before it was consummated.

  That was all.

  I felt it was awfully little and did what I could to help Lauterbach. I said he had made an excellent impression

  on me; I couldn't imagine him involved in any illegal transactions.

  The officer stopped me. That was all, he said. Then he thanked me for coming, gave me back my papers and shook hands with me. A few minutes later I was out in the passage again. Wilma was also dismissed. The second officer, who had conducted us to the door, called out, "Herr Robert Hohenberg." My new friend rose. As he passed me I said, "Until Saturday." He nodded. Then the door closed behind him.

  I walked beside Wilma to the stairs and down them. We stepped out into the street together. It was snowing hard, large flakes. "Walter," said Wilma in a choked voice.

  "Yes?"

  Her little face was trembling. "I'm leaving Vienna.**

  "So?"

  Where was the sweetness of her presence? The magic of her look? Where? It was snowing. Hushed flake after flake. Her face was strange to me, I barely recognized her. How long ago it all was. ...

  "Our group has had an offer from Germany. An engagement in the Rhineland. We're giving Felix's play."

  "1'm.glad for you, Wilma."

  "Walter!" It sounded like a cry for help. She was leaning against the wall of a house, a scarf wound around her head,-her cheeks red, her hair windblown.

  "Yes, Wilma?"

  "I said I'd go, Walter. I didn't have the courage to say no."

  Pedestrians passed us, cars tooted, streetcars clanked by. We stood still in the midst of chaos. "Oh Walter, Walter, have you any idea what I've been through during these last days? I wanted to call you, I wanted to go to you, in the middle of the night. There were moments when nothing seemed to matter. Nothing."

  I was silent.

  "But I was afraid. The old, dreadful fear. I couldn't go

  to you. I didn't dare. And now . . ." Her voice petered out.

  "And now?" I thought of Dr. Freund. What would he have said? What would he do in my place?