Traveller of the Century

by Andres Neuman

  Telling stories of the happy times …

  Isn’t it moving? said Sophie, the way the young girl with the posy and the old lady spinning meet fleetingly in the street? The girl must be in love, because she has brought a posy from the fields, which she will take to tomorrow’s fair. Yet for the old lady there is no tomorrow, what she sees is the close of day, and she waits for nightfall, spinning. I can just see her watching the girl pass by, smiling, then turning to one of her neighbours and saying: When I was a young girl … Anyway, shall we go over it again? No, no, replied Hans, it’s fine as it is.

  … O playful boy, your flowering youth

  Is like a day full of delights,

  A calm and cloudless sky,

  Herald of the celebration of your life.

  Enjoy, my child, the sweet state

  Of this happy season.

  I say no more; but if perchance

  That celebration tarries, fear thee not.

  I much prefer this tone! Hans said, excitedly, it sounds far more authentic! The best thing when tackling important themes is to pretend to be discussing very simple things.

  In front of the watercolour’s reverse side, Sophie combed her hair slowly, as one weighing up the day. Arms and legs crossed, still excited, Hans contemplated her from the bed in the very way he had said important subjects should not be considered—with solemnity. He didn’t know why Sophie’s meticulous, wistful way of dressing moved him so, as if those exquisite gestures of withdrawal encompassed a miniature farewell.

  You are my good fortune, you know, Hans whispered. She stopped combing her hair, turned and said: I know what you mean, my love, the same thing happens to me, I get up each morning, I remember I’m going to see you, and I feel the urge to give thanks. But then I come to my senses and say to myself, no, this wasn’t good fortune, it was an act of boldness, our boldness. You could have left and you stayed. I could have ignored you and I did the exact opposite. All of this was intentional, magically intentional. (You sound like the old man, said Hans.) What old man? (The organ grinder, of course, who else?) Ah, speaking of which, when (yes, yes, soon), in fact, do you know, sometimes I think we haven’t been fortunate. I mean, we could have met somewhere else or later on. Sometimes I try to imagine what it would be like to live in other times, maybe things would be easier for us then.

  Hans said: Sophie, my love, other times will come, and they won’t be so different from now. Is that a prophecy? she asked, laughing.

  That same morning, before Sophie came to translate Bocage and Leopardi, Hans had got up early to say goodbye to Álvaro, who was travelling to London on business and to see his relatives. They met at the Café Europa. Álvaro congratulated Hans for being only ten minutes late. After breakfast (a hot chocolate and an anisette for Álvaro and a coffee followed by another coffee for Hans) they walked towards the carriage rank, where Álvaro’s manservant was waiting for them, luggage ready, beside the coach. As they passed the twisted towers of St Nicholas’s Church, Álvaro crossed himself and muttered: Please, Lord, let them fall down on my return.

  As the carriage loomed, the two friends looked at one another as if they had only just realised one of them was leaving. Hans had the uncomfortable impression of swapping places. Álvaro smiled uneasily, trying to calm himself and trying to understand why he remained troubled. They didn’t know what to say, how to embrace each other. I’ll miss you, Hans shouted at last to the head poking out of the side of the carriage. I-it’s o-only t-two w-weeks! replied Álvaro’s head amid jolts.

  As Frau Zeit had predicted months before, at that time of year, the inn, incredibly, had almost no vacancies. Two fair-haired young girls moved quietly about, helping lay the tables and do the laundry. The majority of guests were distant relatives, or friends of distant relatives of the Wandernburgers who had remained in the city for the summer. Hans, unaccustomed, would occasionally cross them on the stairs, and it would take him a moment to recover from the shock and return their greeting. That morning, the Zeits were expecting some of their own relatives, who were coming to spend a few days with them, and who would be obliged to spread out between the innkeeper’s lodgings and the only vacant room, number three. The very room Lisa would hide away in to do her homework.

  Cousins, nephews and nieces, uncles piled rowdily into the inn. Some were stout and sluggish like Herr Zeit, others slender and jumpy, like Lisa. Stationed in the doorway, Frau Zeit welcomed them one by one, gave them each a perfunctory kiss and gently ushered them inside. However, as soon as she spied cousin Lottar, she wiped her hands on her apron and stepped forward to greet him.

  Lisa saw Lottar walk in, drop his luggage and approach her with his arms outstretched. Aware that her mother was watching her, Lisa gave a little cry and rushed to embrace him. But while she was greeting her second cousin, whose eyes slid down as he clutched her waist, she glanced over to the light streaming in through the doorway.

  From the other end of the inn, a nasal voice belonging to one of the Zeit family members suddenly rang out: Come here will you, please, dear, your son won’t stop … Little Thomas keeps … he keeps giving little … Can you hear me, dear?

  Bumping his belly against the belly of his brother, Herr Zeit declared: It’s August already! Who would have thought it?

  In a corner of the kitchen, Frau Zeit was speaking to her daughter in hushed tones: Is that clear? If you behave in that manner cousin Lottar will never like you (I don’t want cousin Lottar to like me, said Lisa), well you’ll have to. He’s a doctor’s son. He’s respectable. He’s not a bad man. It’s enough that he noticed you. So not another word and be nicer to him, do you hear? Answer me, Lisa, answer me!

  Lisa marched out of the kitchen, her mother behind her. At that moment, Hans, who had just returned and was looking around surprised by all the commotion, almost walked headlong into Lisa. She paused to straighten her hair and smile at him. Then she turned and shouted at her mother: If you’d ever been in love you wouldn’t speak to me like that! Frau Zeit stopped in her tracks, bewildered. What, she stammered, what on earth are you talking about? Lisa disappeared down the corridor. Having no one else to speak to, the innkeeper’s wife looked at Hans and exclaimed: Heavens! What a girl! Do you understand her?

  Lisa spent the rest of the day shut away in her room and refused to have lunch. Frau Zeit explained to cousin Lottar that Lisa was indisposed. Cousin Lottar nodded ambiguously and said this was perfectly natural, because Lisa had grown a lot since last summer and was no longer a child.

  A few minutes before five o’clock, Lisa voluntarily came out of her confinement and walked into the kitchen wearing a nonchalant expression that made her mother even more infuriated. Without saying a word, she helped prepare the lemonade, and when it was time hurried to take it upstairs herself to room number seven.

  Before knocking at the door, Lisa eavesdropped outside. Hans’s deep, rather serious voice, was reciting sweet words:

  … you wish me to abandon my love,

  to accuse and scorn her, while my desire

  is to bite, go mad, to die for her.

  As usual, Lisa knocked on the door twice without waiting to be told to enter. For this reason, she was able to hear the reply of that stuck-up prig who came there almost every afternoon: You’ve done a perfect job! That was scant praise for a man like Hans.

  She walked in deliberately slowly, holding the jug; the sun from the window shredded the lemon pulp, setting off explosions of light. Turned towards her, smiling, the adorable Hans sat holding a piece of paper covered in jottings. Opposite him, the prig sat upright, her hair dishevelled, stupidly clutching a quill. Lisa moved forward. The room was a complete mess. There were open books strewn everywhere, the water jug was filthy, and, to top it all, the prig had clumsily allowed her beautiful peach shawl, which she didn’t deserve, to fall to the floor. Even poor Hans’s bed was unmade—if the chambermaids weren’t more careful she would tell her mother. Lisa glanced at the bedclothes, becoming absorbed in them for a momen
t until Hans gave a slight cough. Then she carried on walking as if she had never stopped. She went over to them, leant over to fill their glasses, placed the jug on the table and walked out closing the door roughly.

  It is night now. The noises, the voices, the scrape of furniture have long ceased. The sound of the cricket emerging from silence floats through the air. The inn is a pool of darkness, scarcely interrupted by the oil lamps on the ground floor. The dining room is deserted, the stove cold. There are no stirrings on the first floor either. No light illuminates the stairs. Yet, somewhere along the corridor on the second floor, the flame of an oil lamp flickers slowly. Lisa is walking barefoot, on tiptoe, as though the ground were covered in prickles, balancing so as not to spill anything from the plate, aware it might give her away the next day. Lisa’s icy feet reach the end of the passageway and stop at the door to room number seven. This is when her hands begin shaking and she fears she may tip up the plate or make some other blunder. Her pointed breast swells beneath her nightdress, holds the air for a moment, then hollows out again. She can hear herself breathing. She counts the breaths. One. Two. Three. Now or never.

  As Lisa turns the handle slowly and pushes open the door, the oil lamp casts an intense glow over her hand, illuminating her knuckles, light seems to flow from her fingers. Hans hasn’t noticed yet, for he is no longer reading but forgetting, repeating in a dream the words of the book he was reading until a moment ago. On a chair beside the bed, the flame in the oil lamp flickers. Hans is lying on his back wearing only a pair of short white pants. The open book rests on his chest. Lisa gazes at Hans’s long legs, his big feet spread out. She approaches the bed. She crouches down and places the candle in its plate on the floor. When she stands up again, Lisa’s heart misses a beat—Hans’s eyes are shining now, staring at her with an intensity that startles her.

  Half propped up, Hans contemplates Lisa equally alarmed. He looks at her high, pointed shoulders. He looks at her dark figure through her backlit nightdress. He looks at her downy thighs, those slender thighs now leaning timidly against his bed. Is he still asleep? No, he knows perfectly well that he is wide awake. Lisa’s left shoulder strap begins to give way, it falls. Hans tries to think of the number thirteen. Is it a high or a low number? Her shoulders are high, her collarbones, too. He is having difficulty concentrating. Lisa carries on undressing like a sleepwalker, as if she were alone. Is it a high or a low number? That depends on what and when. Lisa’s skin and hair smell of warm oil. Hans lies still. He isn’t doing anything, he is blameless. He glimpses a nipple, like a new sun. Yet he can’t help telling himself that there comes a moment when lying still is no less of an action than moving. Thirteen, is it a lot or a little? Lisa’s fingertips are at once rough and delicate. These fingers explore his chest. Life is wretched, wretched. Choking with emotion, with conflicting desires, Hans manages to lift his arm and clasp Lisa’s wrist. The wrist rebels at first. Then loses its resolve. Lisa withdraws her hand, puts her nightdress back on. She refuses to look Hans in the eye or let him hold her chin, which moves from left to right, quivering like the wick of the oil lamp. Finally Lisa’s chin surrenders, he cups it in both hands, she consents to look at him, showing him her tear-stained cheeks. They say nothing. Before moving away from the bed, Lisa instinctively kisses him on the mouth and he does nothing to stop her. Lisa’s breath smells of caramel.

  When the door closes, Hans remains on his back, motionless, his pulse racing. His brow is bathed in a cold sweat, his skin is burning. He tries to think for a moment. Tries to convince himself he did the right thing, to pat himself on the back. Yet he seriously suspects that if Lisa had insisted a little more, if she had prolonged that kiss, he would have gone along with her, collaborated even. Life is wretched, wretched. He leaps out of bed, treading on the book that has fallen on the floor, he rushes over to the jug, wets his head a few times, does not feel the coolness of the water.

  The first thing Álvaro did on arriving back from his trip was to drop in at Old Cauldron Street. He climbed the stairs without speaking to Herr Zeit, who gazed at him sleepily from behind his desk. Álvaro had a bad feeling when there was no reply from number seven. When Lisa told him Hans had just gone out, he heaved a sigh of relief. He set off for the market square and, seeing that the organ grinder had already left, took a tilbury to the cave. There he found the three of them, Hans, the old man and Franz, singing a Neapolitan song to the strains of the barrel organ—the old man gave a low croaky rendering, Hans tried to sing along without knowing the words, and the dog barked and growled, showing an uncanny sense of rhythm.

  On their way to Café Europa, Álvaro confessed, in the nonchalant tone men sometimes adopt when revealing their feelings to another man: For a moment I thought you’d left. Why? asked Hans. It’s hard to explain, replied Álvaro, whenever I spend time with my relatives speaking in my own language, I feel as if Wandernburg no longer exists or has disappeared off the map, do you know what I mean? As though each day it were drifting farther away, and then I begin to think my friends are no longer there, or that they were perhaps a figment of my imagination. Álvaro, dear Álvaro, Hans laughed, I can’t decide whether you’re a fantasist or just plain sentimental. Is there a difference? Álvaro grinned.

  Hans stopped dead amid the criss-cross of reflections in Glass Walk. Just a moment, he said, but, but wasn’t the café over there, opposite the. Bah, Álvaro shrugged, it’s always the same story. Just keep walking, it’ll turn up.

  They played billiards, talked about London and browsed the foreign press. In the Gazette, Álvaro read an article about the revolt in Catalonia. Banners showing King Ferdinand dangling by his feet were waved, the unrest spread to Manresa, Vich, Cervera. The peasants joined the uprising backed by some dissident army members. That is good news isn’t it? remarked Hans. More or less, Álvaro said, it reeks of Carlism to me, I hope they don’t try to topple a traitor and crown an imbecile. What exactly is Carlism? asked Hans. Oof, sighed Álvaro, that’s what we Spaniards would like to know. Well, if you have the time I’ll try to explain it to you. Although the Carlists themselves would be hard pressed to do that.

  Hans listened with astonishment to Álvaro’s account of modern Spanish politics. And, as his friend had warned, it wasn’t easy to understand. That is, Álvaro summed up, the bastard Ferdinand plots against his traitorous father, is tried and absolved, and later on his father abdicates in favour of him, so far so good? Napoleon kidnaps them both, blackmails Ferdinand into returning the crown to his father, and his father hands it over to Napoleon’s brother. Aren’t we the limit! Ferdinand gives up his freedom, or rather he gives banquets at his castle until the war of independence is over. The bastard Ferdinand plays the martyr, and, as always, the people welcome him as if he were the Messiah. Bonaparte recognises Ferdinand as the bastard King of Spain, the republican constitution is torn up and the restoration begins, right? The bastard king accords an amnesty, some of us return and he reluctantly accepts the Constitution of Cádiz, which as you can imagine wasn’t upheld for very long. (I understand, nodded Hans, more or less, and what did you do after that?) For a while I thought of staying in Spain, but things didn’t look good and Ulrike wasn’t convinced either, our life was already elsewhere, and, besides, we planned to raise a German family, which we never did. Wait, I’ll have the same again. My God, if you existed! We leave again, the liberal era is soon over, and in ’21 there’s a revolt in Barcelona. I try to go and join it, but when my coach reaches the Pyrenees we are told the uprising is being put down, and at that point, I admit, I turned around and went back to Wandernburg. Do you know the thing I most regret in life, besides not having had a child with Ulrike? Not having pressed on that day. (Don’t talk nonsense, said Hans, what could you have done?) How should I know! I could have given them money, fired a few shots, anything! (Although I know you have, I find it hard to imagine you shooting someone.) Don’t be so shocked, there are times when violence is the only way of getting justice (I doubt it, Hans disagreed, fold
ing his arms), doubting it or fearing it, my friend, doesn’t make it any less true.

  Yes, the same again, thank you, where were we? Álvaro resumed. Ah, yes ’23. We could see it coming, Metternich and Frederick William had already tried it out in Italy. The hundred thousand bastard sons of Saint Louis arrived, fully armed, you see! To lend Ferdinand a helping hand, and that was the end of the constitution and of everything else. The Holy Alliance occupied Spain more completely than Bonaparte ever had, they persecuted half the population, the Inquisition was revived and so, my friend, my country returned to its favourite place—the past. That is Spain for you, Hans, an eternal merry-go-round. Scheiße! Do you like Goya? So do I, have you by any chance seen a painting called Allegory of the City of Madrid? Well, no matter. In this painting is a medallion with a portrait of Joseph Bonaparte. Like many other Enlightenment figures, Goya had sworn loyalty to him, but when Madrid is liberated from the French, Goya replaces the head of Joseph Bonaparte with the word constitution, what do you think of that? And when the French take back the city, he repaints the head. After the final victory, Don Francisco Goya did not hesitate to replace it once more with the word constitution, but wait! In 1815 he covers the word up with a portrait of that bastard Ferdinand, whose head remains there until the Liberal Triennium. After that the constitution is reinstated in the painting until ’23, and so on. You see what a merry-go-round Spain is! In my view Goya is the greatest genius in all of Europe, and that painting is the supreme expression of Spanish history (I wasn’t aware Goya was so calculating), no, Hans, he wasn’t calculating, half of Spain was doing the same thing, waiting to see who the victors were in order to save their own skins. Some people did it for their children’s sake, others to safeguard their positions, I’m sure I would have done the same for Ulrike. It’s as simple as that. And in the end what did we others do? We left.