Sometimes Sissy or Holst intervene. Sissy, for example, coming and picking up the bag with the key, when in reality he doesn’t know if she picked it up, or even if she saw it. It doesn’t matter, but it’s forbidden by the rules he himself has drawn up. As for Holst, he has become Enemy Number One, so to speak. He is the one who recurs most often, with his grey felt boots, his overcoat, his tin box, his flaccid figure, but the oddest thing is that Frank is incapable of reconstructing his face. It’s nothing but a smudge. More exactly an expression.
What kind of expression? If he is not careful, he would let himself think about it for minutes on end, or at any rate for too long, because there is nothing here to count the minutes – if he really had to, he would have to take his pulse to measure time.
What would you call the look they exchanged when Holst was at his window and Frank was waiting for the tram?
It doesn’t have a name.
Well, Holst’s expression doesn’t have a name either. It’s a mystery, an enigma. And for someone in Frank’s position, it is not a good idea to linger over enigmas, even if it seems to do you good at the time.
Questions should be approached one by one, tirelessly, with a cool head as far as possible; the prisoner mentality is to be avoided at all cost.
There was this.
Then that happened.
Such and such a person acted in such and such a way.
Without leaving anything out, not the details, not the people.
All day he has his coat on, with the collar up, his hat on his head, and he spends most of his time sitting on the edge of the bed. His bucket is only emptied once a day, a bucket that has no lid.
Why is it another prisoner who comes to empty it? Why doesn’t Frank take part in the daily exercise when at least three of his neighbours to the left do?
He has no desire to walk round and round in circles in the courtyard. He doesn’t see them. He hears them. He has no desire for anything. He doesn’t complain. He has never tried to make his guards feel sorry for him – they change almost every day anyway – and he doesn’t moan, as others must, in order to get a cigarette, or just to take a drag on a soldier’s cigarette.
There was this.
There was Frank.
Then there was this and this.
The neighbours in Green Street, Kromer, Timo, Bertha, Holst, Sissy, Mr Kamp, old Wimmer, others too, including the violinist, Carl Adler, the blond man on the second floor, and even Ressl, even Kropetzki. He mustn’t leave anybody out, he doesn’t have paper or pencil, but he keeps his list up to date, tirelessly, with, in the margin, anything that could be of interest, however slight . . .
There was Frank . . .
Holst’s face, or rather Holst’s expression, won’t divert him from the task he has undertaken.
Sissy has probably recovered.
Recovered or died.
What matters is the list, to think, to forget nothing, while avoiding giving things more importance than they have.
There was Frank, son of Lotte . . .
That reminds him of the Bible, and he smiles scornfully, because it sounds like a pun. He isn’t in prison to make puns.
Though of course they haven’t put him in a prison, but in a school, and that must mean something.
5.
The nineteenth day.
They haven’t put him in a prison, but in a school.
He automatically picks up where he left off yesterday. It is like an exercise. He has got used to it very quickly. The trigger ends up happening all by itself, and then the mechanism keeps going round and round, like in a watch. You do one thing, then another. You always perform the same actions at the same times, and as long as you pay attention, the thoughts continue to grind away.
There is nothing upsetting about the school in itself, and if there really are sectors, as Timo put it, Frank must be in an important sector, since people are shot here almost every day. What might be the most disturbing thing is that they’re still ignoring him, or pretending to.
He hasn’t been questioned and he is still not being questioned. He isn’t being watched. If he was, he would notice. They are leaving him alone. They don’t bother with his underwear, which he has been wearing for nineteen days. He hasn’t been able to wash himself properly even once, because they don’t give him enough water.
He doesn’t feel any resentment towards them. As long as it doesn’t mean a kind of contempt for him, he doesn’t care. He hasn’t shaved. Other people his age don’t yet have much of a beard, but he started shaving when he was very young, as a game. Before, he used to shave every day. Now his beard is more than a centimetre long. It was hard at first, but it’s starting to feel soft to the touch.
There is a real prison in the town, which they have taken over, of course, and which must be full. It isn’t necessarily where they put the most interesting cases.
There’s nothing to prove they are taking him for a ride. The guards never talk to him, but he has realized that it’s because they don’t know his language. The prisoners who bring him his jug of water and empty his bucket also avoid saying anything to him. Those prisoners move around. You see some who are clean-shaven, who have hair that has been cut, which means there is a barber in the school. Why should the fact that they don’t take him there, like the others, mean that they’re forgetting him? Doesn’t it just mean that he is in solitary confinement?
There was somebody behind all this, somebody who denounced him or something like that. He goes over the names, each person’s actions, studies every possibility. He is always embarrassed to go on his bucket, in full view of the walkway through that large window. But he has stopped being ashamed of not being shaved, of his dirty underwear, of his clothes that are all crumpled from sleeping in them.
At nine, the others are taken down for their exercise. It must be a deliberate thing, making them go down so early, so that they feel the cold, especially as some of them don’t have coats. Why not wait until eleven o’clock or midday, when the sun has had time to take the edge off the air?
It’s none of his business, because he doesn’t go down. If he did, he wouldn’t get the chance soon after that to see the window.
The mechanism is in motion, the thoughts are grinding away, but they don’t prevent him, from nine onwards, from starting to wait. It’s nothing, less than nothing. If he was living in a real prison, there wouldn’t be anything like it, because there you have to be careful to avoid any contact, however remote, with the outside world. Most likely, nobody here thought of that window. It is a real oversight not to have taken precautions, because it might have an important role to play.
Above the assembly hall or the gymnasium, on the other side of the courtyard, you sense a gap, maybe a street, maybe with low houses like most of those in the area, each with one family. Even further, much further, the back of a building rises into the sky, a building with at least three upper floors, which is almost entirely hidden by the assembly hall. Because of the cut-off corner of the roof, a window is visible, just one, right at the top, probably on the third floor, which suggests tenants who are quite poor.
Every morning, just before half past nine, a woman opens the window, wearing a dressing gown – like Lotte – and a brightly coloured scarf around her hair and shakes out blankets and rugs over the void.
From this distance, it is impossible to make out her features. From the speed with which she moves, he assumes she is young. In spite of the season, she leaves the window open for a while, while she comes and goes, checking on something inside, pans on the boil, or maybe a baby; she must have a baby because she almost always puts things out to dry on a line hung across the window, and the items are very small.
Who knows? It’s possible she sings. She must be happy. He imagines she is happy. When she closes the window again, she is at home, with the smells of her household reasserting themselves.
Today, the nineteenth day, it puts him in a bad mood that he is being disturbed at a quarter past nine,
in other words, before she appears at her window. Ever since he arrived, he has waited like this for them to come and get him. He thinks about it all day long. And now, when it finally happens, he curses because they have disturbed him a quarter of an hour too early.
It is a man in plain clothes, accompanied by a soldier, who stops on the walkway outside his door. He has a brown moustache and looks like a school supervisor. Frank immediately tells himself he must be one of the two men who was beating someone up as he himself waited in the next room on the day he arrived. He is the kind of man who would calmly beat people up on command, feeling no hate, as conscientiously as a clerk doing sums in an office.
Is that why they are taking Frank downstairs? Neither the plainclothes man nor the soldier so much as glances at his room. They don’t say anything. They simply motion to him to come out. The plainclothes man walks in front, and he follows, without even thinking of looking in the other classrooms as he promised himself he would. There is something better than that. It is the hour when the prisoners are exercising in the courtyard. He sees them, both as he goes along the walkway and when he descends the outside staircase.
He forgets to watch them. All he will remember is a kind of long dark line, like a snake. They are in single file, with about a metre’s distance between them, and they form an almost closed oval, with a few undulations.
What will it mean if they beat him? That they have made a mistake, that they suspect him of crimes he hasn’t committed – because they don’t care about Miss Vilmos. The curious thing is that he has forgotten about the sergeant; that seems to him so venial, he doesn’t feel at all guilty.
They take him to the little building where he was received the first day, and he climbs the same steps. This time, they don’t keep him waiting. He is admitted immediately to the old man’s office. The old man is in his place, and when Frank looks around he sees his mother.
His first reflex is to frown. Before taking a closer look at her, or saying anything to her, he waits for the old man’s instructions. But the old man is as indifferent as ever. He is writing something in his cramped handwriting, and it is Lotte who’s the first to speak. Her voice takes a while to find its normal register. It is too flat, like when you speak in an empty cave.
‘You see, Frank, these gentlemen have authorized me to come and see you and bring you some things. I didn’t know where you were.’
She utters these last words very quickly. She must have been given her instructions. There are probably subjects she is allowed to talk about and others that are forbidden.
Why does he seem to be giving her the cold shoulder? Basically, he doesn’t feel comfortable. He doesn’t feel trusting. She has come from elsewhere. She is too much herself. It is incredible how much herself she is. He recognizes the smell of her powder. She has put rouge on her cheeks, as she does every time she goes out. She is wearing her white hat with the half-veil that hides her eyes a little, out of self-consciousness, because of her tiny wrinkles, her onion peels she calls them, talking about her eyelids. She must have spent at least half an hour in front of the mirror in the big bedroom. It is easy to imagine her pulling on her glazed leather gloves and fluffing up her hair on both sides of her hat.
‘I can’t stay long, Frank.’
They have limited her visiting time. Why doesn’t she just come out and say it?
‘You look well. If you only knew how happy I am to see you looking so well!’
That means: ‘To see that you’re alive.’
Because she must have thought he was dead.
‘When did they tell you?’
‘Yesterday,’ she replies in a low voice, with a furtive glance at the old man.
‘Who told you?’
She doesn’t answer his question, but says, with forced enthusiasm, ‘Just imagine, they’ve given me permission to bring you a few little things. Especially underwear. You’re going to be able to change at last, my poor Frank.’
She is shocked by him, shocked by the way he looks, his crumpled clothes, his turned-up coat collar, his dirty shirt with no tie, his unkempt hair, his nineteen-day growth of beard and his loose shoes. She feels sorry for him, that’s obvious. He doesn’t need anybody’s pity, especially not Lotte’s. She disgusts him, with her make-up and her white hat.
Would the old man want her? Has she tried? He is sure she has put on good underwear just in case.
‘I put everything in a suitcase. These gentlemen will give it to you.’
She looks around for the suitcase, which is against the wall. He recognizes it.
‘Above all, you mustn’t let yourself go.’
What does she mean?
‘Everyone’s been very kind. Everything’s going very well.’
‘What’s going well?’
He is harsh, almost vicious. He hates being like that, but he can’t do otherwise.
‘I decided to close the business.’
She is holding her handkerchief rolled into a ball in the hollow of her hand and looks as if she is on the verge of tears.
‘It was Hamling who advised me to do it. You were wrong not to trust him. He’s done all he could.’
‘Is Minna still with you?’
‘She doesn’t want to leave me alone. She sends you her regards. If I could find another apartment, we’d move, but it’s almost impossible to find one.’
This time, the look Frank gives her is pitiless, almost angry. ‘Will you leave the building?’
‘You know how people are. Now that you’re not there any more, it’s worse than ever.’
‘Is Sissy dead?’ he asks curtly.
‘No, of course not! What makes you think that?’
She looks at the little gold watch on her bracelet. For her, time still counts. She knows how many minutes she is still entitled to.
‘Does she go out?’
‘She doesn’t go out. She’s . . . You know, Frank, I don’t know what exactly she’s got. I think she’s just down. She’s finding it hard to bounce back.’
‘What’s the matter with her?’
‘I don’t know. I haven’t seen her personally. Nobody sees her, except her father and Mr Wimmer. They say she’s suffering from depression.’
‘Has Holst gone back to working on the trams?’
‘No. He works at home.’
‘Doing what?’
‘I don’t know that either. Some kind of bookkeeping. The little I’ve been able to find out was through Hamling.’
‘Does he see them?’
Before, the chief inspector only knew the Holsts by name.
‘He’s been to their place several times.’
‘Why?’
‘Frank, what do you want me to say? You ask questions as if you didn’t know the building. I don’t see anybody. Anny’s left. Apparently, she’s being kept by a . . .’ Talking about the occupiers is probably not allowed here. ‘If Minna had left me, too, I don’t know what would have become of me.’
‘Have you seen any of my friends?’
‘No, nobody.’
She is disconcerted, disappointed. She must have come all cheerful, the way you go to see a patient in hospital, taking them grapes or oranges, and he isn’t even taking her good intentions into account, it is as if he resents her, as if he holds her responsible for his own disappointment.
He points to a package on the chair, next to his mother.
‘What’s that?’ he asks.
‘Nothing. Some things that were in the suitcase that I’m not allowed to leave you.’
‘I don’t want you to move house.’
She sighs, losing patience. Doesn’t he understand she can’t talk as freely as she would like? Yes, of course he knows. But he doesn’t care. So the tenants are making life impossible for Lotte? What of it? He forbids her to move house, full stop. Is it up to her or to him to decide? Who matters right now?
‘Has Holst talked to you?’
For some reason, she seems embarrassed as she replies:
&
nbsp; ‘Not directly.’
‘Has he had Hamling say something to you?’
‘No, Frank. Why are you bothered about that? There’s nothing to worry about from that direction. It’s all over. If I want to get another opportunity to come and see you, you mustn’t go on like this the first time around. I’d like to kiss you, but it’s better not. They might think you’re whispering a message in my ear.’
He doesn’t have any desire to kiss her anyway. She must already have been here for a while before he came down, if they had time to search the suitcase before his arrival.
‘Be good. Look after yourself. Above all, don’t worry about a thing.’
‘I’m not worried.’
‘How strange you are.’
She, too, can’t wait for it to be over. She will go and wait for her tram opposite the gate and she will snivel all the way home.
‘Goodbye, Frank.’
‘Goodbye, Mother.’
‘Take care of yourself.’
Of course he will! As if he had the intention of letting himself waste away!
The old man raises his eyes, looks at them in turn, then points out the suitcase to Frank. A plainclothes man leads Lotte back across the courtyard, and her steps can be heard as she walks away, her high heels on the hardened snow. The old man speaks slowly, searching for his words. He is determined to use the right expression, and his pronunciation is as correct as he can make it. He has taken lessons and continues to practise.
‘You must go and get ready.’
He utters the syllables carefully. He doesn’t seem unpleasant, merely anxious to act properly. He is hesitant about launching into a longer sentence and repeats it mentally before taking the risk.
‘If you’d like to have a shave, we can take you to see the barber.’
Frank refuses. A mistake. It would have allowed him to discover another part of the buildings. He can’t say what impulse he obeyed. He isn’t particularly determined to be dirty, to play the hairy prisoner. The truth – it will take him some days to realize it – is that when his beard was referred to, he automatically thought of Holst’s felt boots.
The Snow Was Dirty Page 15
