The ethereal blue-green of the sky left me defenseless.
Someone was always there to guide me, and then it was the right path. It was my fault if I paid no heed and tried, deaf and headstrong, to take a different path. But then the man who wanted to guide me stood sadly at the crossroads, watching me go astray. Yet none of them ever reproached me or said afterwards: You see, why did you not follow us. They merely did their job unassumingly and waited for me to entrust myself to them.
Thus, I was also guided by my brother, the motherless one, to my mother. How could I guess that he knew her? Nor would I have ever dreamt that this was necessary. Now, in hindsight, I naturally realize that there was no other possibility.
It all took place that afternoon when I was with my father for the last time. The others, as he had already surmised, came into my room little by little. First my teacher, whom I had not seen for a very long time; for I imagined I had nothing more to learn. He strode in swiftly, keeping his body rigidly erect, although he seemed to be in pain, or perhaps precisely for that reason, so that no one would notice. Only his head stooped forward at a slight angle under the burden of thoughts. Most of the certainties that one believed in rarely stood their ground against his lucid, penetrating gaze. They simply vanished, and that was why he initially radiated an icy emptiness. Yet his gaze was not unkind, and if one entrusted oneself unprotestingly to the blue of his eyes, everything was fine. He was accompanied by a small, ugly puppy, and he seemed very concerned about it. The puppy licked its feet, which it had injured.
After shaking our hands (he did it with a very firm squeeze), the teacher halted at the bookcase and read the titles while listening to us.
The next to arrive was a large, fat man. I could always hear him wheezing in the stairwell, which made me smile. My father smiled too; we could not help it the wheezing alone made us feel good. And what a radiant smile emanated from the man's beardless face as he lingered at the threshold for a moment, completely out of breath, waving amiably at us. The doorway seemed too narrow for him, and, after stepping into the room, he also filled it out completely. Not because he was so fat, it was really his personality. He moved like a grand gentleman, everything instantly belonged to him, and there was nothing that could elude his cheeriness. Whenever he laughed, it came from infinite depths, and a merry quaking infected everyone and everything — the people, the furniture, the books. One felt like dancing. It was like an overwhelming piece of music.
He tapped my cheeks with his fleshy hand as if to say: Do not worry, my boy. And my father cried out to him: "This way, old boy!" and pointed at the chair by his side, where the old boy then settled with a moan. I believe his vision was poor, perhaps he was even blind. But that made no difference; for he perceived everything with his ears.
We waited quite a while, and they chatted — I no longer know about what. I must confess that I uneasily listened towards the door. For I venerated more than anyone or anything the man who was still to come, and I was afraid I would not pass his strict muster. My father and my teacher were also uneasy, although they tried to conceal it. Only the fat man remained calm and utterly sure of himself.
Finally, the man we were expecting came — accompanied by my brother. Perhaps they had first met on the stairs, perhaps earlier. My brother, incidentally, was the youngest of us, even younger than I. To my astonishment, his head was bandaged; indeed, some blood had oozed through on the right side of his forehead. Now I knew he had once been hurt in an accident; but that was a long time ago, and he usually did not wear a bandage. So he must have been injured again, or else the old wound had broken open.
I was always very worried about him. He would easily get enthusiastic about something, but was just as quickly disappointed, and it was to be feared that someday, the wrong word, randomly spoken, might reduce him to despair. No one knew better than I how much tender shyness was meant to be disguised by his somewhat eccentric behavior, and what unsated hunger for life was masked by the cynical curl of his lips. So he did not care if from one minute to the next he did the exact opposite of what he had only just claimed in all earnestness; and if people then felt shocked, he would even jeer at them. That was how I had first met him. He had been sitting in a restaurant garden with a number of students, entertaining them with his jokes. The students were fairly drunk and they guffawed at what he said. Incidentally, he too was a student in those days. I was sitting at the next table and I had noticed that he glanced at me several times as if trying to determine whether I was laughing too. Finally, since the noise was becoming too much for me, I stood up, paid, and left the restaurant. At the exit from the garden, he was suddenly at my side, and without so much as asking me whether I even cared to have him come along, he said: "Those professors try to teach us that those mountains back there and these trees and the gables of the houses and that puddle there, which reflects the stars, and this soft night wind that grazes through the archways, and the laughter that we hear from the meadows — that in reality, all those things may be something entirely different and would stop being what they are if we no longer felt them as such. The people who talk to us like that have their podiums and their tenure; it is easy for them to talk. But what can we go by if we are still nothing?" And as we walked side by the side through the streets of the old town, he spoke to me about those things with such girlish tenderness, as befitted the mild summer night. But he broke off somewhere in mid-sentence and said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world: "Now let's visit the hookers and act like pigs!" And that was where we went. He acted very familiar and exuberant with the girls, and I was eager to see what would come of it. But one of the girls leaned over me and said: "Take him away. It would be too bad about him." I do not know what prompted her; but it dawned on me that she was right, and that no purer boy existed than this one who was experimenting there with indecencies. She had spoken so softly that he could not possibly have heard, and yet he seemed to have: for he took his hat and left the house. In the street, he tried to spit in a virile way and cursed: "God damn it, not even these women know what they are here for."
We often sat up all through the night; I spent most of my time with him. In this way, I casually learned things about him that he would never have admitted if asked directly. If, for example, I had asked him why he acted so nervous, he would have laughed and replied: "Quite simply out of fear! I once met a man in the street, he was so unthinkably ragged and seedy that you simply could not pass him by. Yet his eyes were as soft as a roe's. I happened to have some money in my pocket, so I gave him a little. I also bought him some bread and asked him what his name was and where he lived, so that I could bring him clothing the next day. He named an old-age home in a poor section of town. When I went there, no one had ever heard of him. The administrator said I had probably come upon a tramp and had been hoodwinked. Now that is not so bad. But what I got to see in that home practically knocked me for a loop. Lots of old men who could have been my great-grandfathers were sitting around, waiting for their food. They clutched sticky bowls in their hands in order to receive it, and their conversation went: 'Is there going to be cabbage today or fish soup?' And what a stench and filth, they are not to be described. I was close to vomiting. When they received their soup, greedily making sure that the senile neighbor did not get more, they quickly toddled off into a dark corner to spoon it up. The spittle flowed from their mouths and the snot from their noses. Can one not get disgusted at nature for being constituted in this way? Since then I have been quite simply fearful that some day all people might become like those old men, that they will only lurk for their bad lunch and otherwise stink and be gobbled up by vermin. And perhaps I am to be part of that."
However, I believe that he was just talking, and that this was not the real reason. He had already tried several professions, never enduring any for more than three months. He also kept moving from town to town. At first, when he arrived somewhere, he would say: I have finally found the right thing. And he promptly attempted
to convert others to his new position. But all at once, he disappeared; for a long time, no one knew where he was living or if he was even alive, until they finally heard from him. He was an orphan, his parents had died when he was still in the cradle. Some relatives or other must have raised him. I presume that these relatives were to blame. Naturally, it ill befits me to rebuke them; for as a boy, he must have been difficult to understand. But something must have happened at some point. Perhaps at a meal, when they asked him, while chewing: How much longer? And why? And when finally? For I noticed that he was particularly disgusted by people who were having lunch and sating themselves. But I never dared to touch on this issue.
He claimed that I was exactly like him. This was not quite true. However, he was my younger brother, there can be no doubt. Sometimes, at the crack of dawn, it would happen that he would go over to the window and gaze out into the uncertain. Then he abruptly spun around, his eyes glowing with faith and pleasure: "Come, let us die together." I admit that he nearly talked me into it. He was like a lover. As I have already mentioned: he had no mother, and that explains a great deal.
However, the bandage he now wore on his head looked good on him; it gave his face a manly touch; why, he looked like a warrior.
He yanked open the door for the other visitor, whom he was accompanying, and, with an angular bow, he ushered him in. He winked at me roguishly, like a grandson behind his grandfather's back.
If I still knew the names of those men, my description of them would not have to be so long-winded. But in this way, I can talk about them with the terms "father," "brother," "teacher," and "old boy," and that may suffice. I also have to mention that it was not I who had chosen them as relatives and models; it was they who selected me to carry out a mission on which they had set their hearts. Almost against my will; for I often yearned to live like other people — that is: without a mission or a mandator. I would then sigh: Why me? Just as they had chosen me, they could easily reject me at any time, if I did not work out to their satisfaction. And then I would have been doomed, since there was no road back to other lives once this road was taken. And resistance was useless.
However, I have no appropriate designation for this last visitor. Earlier, he must have had a very special name, which made it unnecessary to add any essential epithet. I never dared to address him first, even mentally, with either a request or a complaint, much less with refractory words. It was a question of respect. Knowing that he existed sufficed.
So how shall I designate him now? The judge? He was certainly a strict and unique judge. He stood upright in nothingness like the law itself. As it was later revealed: once, in a highly critical moment, he had pronounced a verdict that set a universal standard and perhaps saved the world. However, the designation "judge" is too narrow for him. "Judge" conjures up a defendant and the insurmountable barrier separating the two. But the man I am speaking of was probably very far away; yet it was not impossible going to him and reaching him, though it may sound presumptuous to say so. For the difficult position of judge that was assigned to him had not killed his humanity, but merely concealed it. As for me, I always called him the "forebear," and this designation is probably the one that best suits his character. Only one should not think of this label as something senile (in fact, my father was older and, above all, looked older); it should merely clarify his rank and the degree of respect that we felt towards him.
Everyone turned in his direction when he entered the room. My father, despite his years, nimbly leaped up from the couch and strode towards him. The fat man likewise tried to get to his feet, but, sighing, gave it up and only held his torso solemnly erect until the forebear had settled down. Naturally, my father had reserved the place of honor for him, on the couch, but he refused it and sat down on the most uncomfortable chair, which was at the table. Moreover, the plaited straw of this chair was tattered. My father had to reoccupy his place on the couch. This was quite unpleasant for him, for he did not dare lean back, he simply sat half on the edge. I myself remained standing the whole time, as was proper. My brother also remained standing; he leaned against the wall next to the couch.
They kept silent for quite a while. The fat man had leaned back in his armchair again, letting out an occasional wheeze.
I was already wondering if they expected me to break the silence. But how could I dare? The forebear, incidentally, had never visited me before; what would have prompted him to do so anyway? However, I had already seen him from afar and I knew that it was he, and that he had to make the decision about me.
At last, my father took the floor: "We have gotten together here in order to ask you to allow him to go to his mother," he said to the forebear, softly and gently.
Previously, I had never once thought about my mother or even remotely dreamt that she was the issue. But no sooner had my father mentioned her than I felt as if I had never desired anything else.
The forebear's face remained motionless. No one could tell whether he had even heard the request. His features were chiseled in stone. His forehead and his cheekbones stuck out sharply. His temples were hollow, and his cheeks sucked in as if from a wasting grief. His mouth was like a line, his lips pressed tightly together; his words were well guarded.
The fat man nervously ran his hand through his sparse hair and cleared his throat. But instead of him, my teacher virtually buttonholed the forebear in an unexpectedly sharp tone.
"I am prepared to act as her defense attorney. I wanted to do so long ago, but I was told it was too early. Very well, it is not my place to judge it. But now it is time to release her from the prison of a murderous name. The verdict may once have been justified — who would dare to doubt it. Her deed aroused such great repulsion and made everyone so profoundly aware of the danger to which the world would be exposed if this woman were still to be given a free hand, that strict laws were necessary to find the beginning of a new road and prevent any relapse. For we were probably by no means certain of our strength and success; otherwise the judgment would not have had to be so harsh. But this verdict was one-sided, like all verdicts. The road that it indicated has been taken, and the result is such that one is now tempted to approve of her deed."
The fat man thoughtfully swayed his head, and my father whispered soothingly: "Not that! Not that!"
Annoyed at the interruption, my teacher continued: "If not that, then nevertheless, none of us now has the right to pass such a judgment as was pronounced back then. This woman was excluded from the life in which she wanted, in her way, to assure herself a share. People did not wish to become guilty like her; they wanted to master their destinies. The attempt was to their credit, but it failed, and we now realize that it was doomed, since people went about it with only half their hearts. Destiny was not mastered, it was fearfully locked out. And man, not destiny, was the prisoner of his fear. The unconsumed grew outside the pale of the laws, inside of which people vegetated dishonestly, without warmth or beauty. But the Void attracts Being, and the world of appearances is on the verge of collapse."
The fat man nodded, and my father repeated the words: "Without warmth or beauty."
My teacher concluded with these words: "Sons must again be born of mothers, not of slave women. We, guilty of the failed attempt, do not have the right to forgive this woman. For we ourselves are in need of forgiveness. It is our duty to rescind the verdict that was issued under different circumstances. Let us stop evading destiny."
The forebear still sat there, inert. Only a very feeble twitching of his neck muscles revealed life and participation. It was as if words were attempting to rise from him and were being repressed. His eyes could not be seen, they lay deep in their sockets, concealed under the gray shrubbery of the brows. He seemed to be rigidly staring into space, perusing a text that remained invisible to us.
Now the others likewise spoke about my mother. The fat man, for example, talked fondly about her for a long time, not without accompanying his words with generous sweeps of his hands, as if trying to di
sperse all qualms. He also laughed in his friendly way; but I believe that, at bottom, he was deeply touched and could barely hold back his tears. His cheerfulness arched across a great sorrow; that was why we felt so comfortable with him, as if listening to some splendid music. The sound of his voice melted even the stone features of the forebear's face, and the creases grew softer, like mountain valleys in spring light. But I may simply have imagined that. "Why bother talking and deliberating so much," said the fat man. "We have done enough arguing, with ourselves and with the world. It would be nice to relax for once." He nearly choked and had to cough. His face turned crimson from the strain. Or was he only pretending he had to cough? I did not dare slap him on the back.
Everyone waited until his coughing fit was over and he breathlessly apologized with a gesture. Then I heard my father say in his shyly suppliant voice: "She is not a bad person, the poor thing. She will be delighted."
Now the forebear finally turned his face towards me. It is not really possible to talk about it and probably not permitted. I noticed that my brother was so agitated that he switched from one foot to the other. In so doing, he banged his head or his shoulder on a small picture hanging on the wall. It seemed to me as if, all that time, it had been rocking to and fro on its nail with a shuffling noise. I cannot say how long it took. I was nothing but the transparent thought of something greater.
"Why is he trembling?" those eyes inquired, imprisoning me in their scrutiny. I did not know that I was meant.
"It is not fear," answered my teacher next to me, and only now did I again stand solidly in the room. "It is the shaking of the leaves at the end of the day. It is the uncertainty of a person who does not know his mother."
I glanced, frightened, at my younger brother; for I feared that he would be insulted by that word. But he gave me a friendly smile.
An Offering for the Dead Page 6
