Hanns Heinz Ewers Alraune

by Joe Bandel

  Yet it also brings sorrow and pain whereever it is. The house where it stays will be pursued by bad luck and it will drive its owner to greed, fornication and other crimes before leading him at last to death and then to hell. Nevertheless, the alraune is very beloved, much sought after and brings a high price when it can be found.

  They say that Bohemian general Albrecht Wallenstein carried an alraune around with him and they say the same thing about Henry the Eighth, the English King with so many wives.”

  The attorney became quiet, threw the hard piece of wood in front of him onto the table.

  “Very interesting, really very interesting,” cried Count Geroldingen. “I am deeply indebted to you for sharing that bit of information Herr Attorney.”

  But Madame Marion declared that she would not permit such a thing in her house for even a minute and looked with frightened, believing eyes at the stiff bony mask of Frau Gontram.

  Frank Braun walked quickly back to the Privy Councilor. His eyes glowed; he gripped the old gentleman on the shoulder and shook it.

  “Uncle Jakob,” he whispered. “Uncle Jakob–”

  “What is it now boy?” The professor asked. He stood up and followed his nephew to the window.

  “Uncle Jakob,” the student repeated. “That’s it!–That’s what you need to do! It’s better than making stupid jokes with frogs, monkeys and little children! Do it Uncle Jakob, go a new way, where no one has gone before!”

  His voice trembled; in nervous haste he blew a puff of smoke out from his cigarette.

  “I don’t understand a word you are saying,” said the old man.

  “Oh, you must understand Uncle Jakob!–Didn’t you hear what he said?–Create an Alraune, one that lives, one of flesh and blood!–You can do it Uncle, you alone and no one else in the world.”

  The Privy Councilor looked at him uncertainly. But in the voice of the student lay such certainty, conviction and belief in his skill that he became curious against his will.

  “Explain yourself more clearly Frank,” he said. “I really don’t know what you mean.”

  His nephew shook his head hastily, “Not now Uncle Jakob. With your permission I will escort you home. We can talk then.”

  He turned quickly, strode to the coffeepot, took a cup, emptied it and took another in quick gulps.

  Sophia, the other girl, was trying to evade her comforter and Dr. Mohnen was running around here and there hyper as a cow’s tail during fly season. His fingers felt the need to wash something, to pick something up. He took up the alraune and rubbed it with a clean napkin trying to wipe the dust and grime away that clung to it in layers. It was useless; the thing had not been cleaned for over a century and would only get more napkins dirty. He was filled with the sense that something was not right. He swung it high and skillfully threw it into the middle of the large wine bowl.

  “Drink alraune,” he cried. “You have been treated badly in this house and must certainly be thirsty!”

  Then he climbed up on a chair and delivered a long solemn speech to the white robed virgins.

  “I hope you can stay eternally as pure as you are tonight,” he finished.

  He lied, he didn’t want that at all. No one wished that, much less the two young ladies, but they clapped with the others, went over to him, curtsied and thanked him.

  Chaplain Schröder stood next to the Legal Councilor complaining powerfully that the date was nearing when the new Civil Law would go into effect. Less than ten more years and the Code of Napoleon would be gone and people in the Rhineland would have the same civil rights as over there in Prussia! It was absolutely unthinkable!

  “Yes,” sighed the Legal Councilor, “and all the work! A person has to learn everything all over again, as if they don’t have enough to do as it is.”

  He was completely indifferent on the basis that it would not effect him very much since he had studied the new laws already and had passed the exam, thank God!

  The princess left and took Frau Marion with her in her carriage. Olga stayed over with her friend again. They stood by the door and said goodbye to the others as they left, one after the other.

  “Aren’t you going too, Uncle Jakob?” the student asked.

  “I must wait a bit,” said the Privy Councilor. “My carriage is not here yet. It will be here in a moment.”

  Frank Braun looked out the window. There was the little widow, Frau von Dollinger, going down the stairs nimble as a squirrel in spite of her forty years, down into the garden, falling down, springing back up. She ran right into a smooth tree trunk, wrapped her arms and legs around it and started kissing it passionately, completely drunk and senseless from wine and lust.

  Stanislaus Schacht tried to untangle her but she held on like a beetle. He was strong and sober in spite of the enormous quantity of wine that he had drunk. She screamed as he pulled her away trying to stay clasped to the smooth tree trunk but he picked her up and carried her in his arms. Then she recognized him, pulled off his hat and started kissing him on his smooth bald head.

  Now the professor was standing, speaking some last words with the Legal Councilor.

  “I’d like to ask a favor,” he said. “Would you mind giving me the unlucky little man?”

  Frau Gontram answered before her husband could. “Certainly Herr Privy Councilor. Take that nasty alraune along with you! It is certainly something more for a bachelor!”

  She reached into the large wine bowl and pulled out the root manikin but the hard wood hit the edge of the bowl, knocking it over, and it rolled to the floor with a loud crash that resounded through the room. The magnificent old crystal bowl broke into hundreds of crystal shards as the bowl’s sweet contents spilled over the table and onto the floor.

  “Holy Mother of God!” she cried out. “It is certainly a good thing that it is finally leaving my house!”

  Chapter Three

  Informs how Frank Braun persuaded the Privy Councilor to create Alraune

  THEY sat in the carriage, Professor Ten Brinken and his nephew. They didn’t speak. Frank Braun leaned back staring straight ahead, sunk deeply into his thoughts. The Privy Councilor was observing, squinting over at him watchfully.

  The trip lasted scarcely half an hour. They rolled along the open road, turned to the right, went downhill over the rough road to Lendenich. There in the middle of the village lay the birthplace of the Brinken family.

  It was a large, almost square complex with gardens and a park. Back from the street stood a row of insignificant old buildings. They turned around a corner past a shrine of the patron Saint of the village, the Holy Saint John of Nepomuk. His statue was decorated with flowers and lit with two eternal lamps that were placed in niches by the corners.

  The horses stopped in front of a large mansion. A servant shut the fenced gate behind them and opened the carriage door.

  “Bring us some wine Aloys,” commanded the Privy Councilor. “We will be in the library.”

  He turned to his nephew. “Will you be sleeping here Frank? Or should the carriage wait?”

  The student shook his head, “Neither, I will go back to the city on foot.”

  They walked across the courtyard, entered the lower level of the house at a door on the right hand side. It was literally a great hall with a tiny antechamber and a couple of other small rooms nearby.

  The walls were lined with long immense shelves containing thousands of books. Low glass cases stood here and there full of Roman artifacts. Many graves had been emptied, robbed of their cherished and carefully preserved treasures. The floor was covered in thick carpet. There were a couple of desks, armchairs and sofas that stood scattered around the room.

  They entered. The Privy Councilor threw his alraune on a divan. They lit candles, pulled a couple of chairs together and sat down. The servant uncorked a dusty bottle.

  “You can go,” said his master. “But don’t go too far. The young gentleman will be leaving and you will need to let him out.”

  “Well?”
he turned to his nephew.

  Frank Braun drank. He picked the root manikin up and toyed with it. It was still a little moist and appeared to be almost flexible.

  “It is clear enough,” he murmured. “There are the eyes–both of them. The nose pokes up there and that opening is the mouth. Look here Uncle Jakob. Doesn’t it look as if it is smiling? The arms are somewhat diminutive and the legs have grown together at the knees. It is a strange thing.”

  He held it high, turned it around in all directions.

  “Look around Alraune!” he cried. “This is your new home. You will be much happier here with Herr Jakob ten Brinken than you were in the house of the Gontrams.”

  “You are old,” he continued. “four hundred, perhaps six hundred years old or even more. Your father was hung because he was a murderer or a horse thief, or else because he made fun of some great knight in armor or in priestly robes.

  The important thing is that he was a criminal in his time and they hanged him. At the last moment of his life his seed fell to the earth and created you, you strange creature. Then your mother earth took the seed of this criminal into her fertile womb, secretly fashioned and gave birth to you.

  You the great, the all-powerful–Yes you, you miserable ugly creature!–Then they dug you up at the midnight hour, at the crossroads, shaking in terror at your howling, shrieking screams.

  The first thing you saw as you looked around in the moonlight was your father hanging there on the gallows with a broken neck and his rotting flesh hanging in tatters.

  They took you with them, these people that had tied the noose around your father. They held you, carried you home. You were supposed to bring money into their house. Blood money and young love.

  They knew well that you would bring pain, misery, despair and in the end a horrible death. They knew it and still they wanted you, still they dug you up, still they took you home, selling their souls for love and money.”

  The Privy Councilor said, “You have a beautiful way of seeing things my boy. You are a dreamer.”

  “Yes,” said the student. “That’s what I am–just like you.”

  “Like me?” the professor laughed. “Now I think that part of my life is long gone.”

  But his nephew shook his head, “No Uncle Jakob. It isn’t. Only you can make real what other people call fantastic. Just think of all your experiments! For you it is more like child’s play that may or may not lead to some purpose.

  But never, never would a normal person come up with your ideas. Only a dreamer could do it–and only a savage, a wildman, that has the hot blood of the Brinkens flowing through his veins. Only he would dare attempt what you should now do Uncle Jakob.”

  The old man interrupted him, indignant and yet at the same time flattered.

  “You crazy boy!–You don’t even know yet if I will have any desire to do this mysterious thing you keep talking about and I still don’t have the slightest idea what it is!”

  The student didn’t pause, his voice rang lightly, confidently and every syllable was convincing.

  “Oh, you will do it Uncle Jakob. I know that you will do it, will do it because no one else can, because you are the only person in the world that can make it happen. There are certainly a few other professors that are attempting some of the same things you have already done, perhaps even gone further.

  But they are normal people, dry, wooden–men of science. They would laugh in my face if I came to them with my idea, would chide me for being a fool. Or else they would throw me completely out the door, because I would dare come to them with such things, such thoughts. Thoughts that they would call immoral and objectionable. Such ideas that dare trespass on the craft of the Great Creator and play a trick on all of nature.

  You will not laugh at me Uncle Jakob, not you! You will not laugh at me or throw me out the door. It will fascinate you the same way it fascinates me. That’s why you are the only person that can do it!”

  “But what then, by all the gods,” cried the Privy Councilor, “what is it?”

  The student stood up, filled both glasses to the rims.

  “A toast, old sorcerer,” he cried. “A toast! To a newer, younger wine that will flow out of your glass tubes. Toast, Uncle Jakob to your new living alraune–your new child!”

  He clinked his glass against his uncle’s, emptied it in a gulp and threw it high against the ceiling where it shattered. The shards fell soundlessly on the heavy carpet.

  He pulled his chair closer.

  “Now listen uncle and I will tell you what I mean. I know you are really impatient with my long introduction–Don’t think ill of me. It has helped me put my thoughts in order, to stir them up, to make them comprehensible and tangible.

  Here it is:

  You should create a living alraune, Uncle Jakob, turn this old legend into reality. Who cares if it is superstition, a ghostly delusion of the Middle Ages or mystic flim-flam from ancient times?

  You, you can make the old lies come true. You can create it. It can stand there in the light of day tangible for all the world to see–No stupid professor would be able to deny it.

  Now pay attention, this is what needs to be done!

  The criminal, uncle, you can find easily enough. I don’t think it matters if he dies on a gallows at a crossroads. We are a progressive people. Our prisons and Guillotine are convenient, convenient for you as well. Thanks to your connections it will be easy to obtain and save the rare seed of the dead that will bring forth new life.

  And Mother Earth?–What is her symbol? What does she represent? She is fertility, uncle. The earth is the feminine, the woman. She takes the semen, takes it into her womb, nourishes it, lets it germinate, grow, bloom and bear fruit. So you take what is fertile like the earth herself–take a woman.

  But Mother Earth is the eternal prostitute, she serves all. She is the eternal mother, is always for sale, the prostitute of billions. She refuses her lascivious love to none, offers herself gladly to anyone that will take her. Everything that lives has been fertilized in her glorious womb and she has given birth to it. It has always been this way throughout the ages.

  That is why you must use a prostitute Uncle Jakob. Take the most shameless, the cheekiest one of them all. Take one that is born to be a whore, not one that is driven to her profession or one that is seduced into it for money. Oh no, not one of those. Take one that is already wanton, that learns as she goes, one whose shame is her greatest pleasure and reason for living. You must choose her. Only her womb would be like the mother earth’s. You know how to find her. You are rich–You are no school boy in these things.

  You can pay her a lot of money, purchase her services for your research. If she is the right one she will reel with laughter, will press her greasy bosom against you and kiss you passionately–She will do this because you have offered her something that no other man has offered her before.

  You know better than I what happens then, how to bring about with humans what you have already done with monkeys and guinea pigs. Get everything ready, ready for the moment when the murderer’s bleeding head springs into the basket!”

  He jumped up, leaned over the table, looked across at his uncle with intense forceful eyes. The Privy Councilor caught his gaze, parried it with a squint like a curved dirty scimitar parries a supple foil.

  “What then nephew?” he said. “And then after the child comes into the world? What then?”

  The student hesitated, his words dripped slowly, falling, “Then–we–will–have–a–magickal–creature.”

  His voice swung lightly, yielding and reverberating like musical tones.

  “Then we will see what truth there is in the old legend, get a glimpse into the deepest bowels of nature.”

  The Privy Councilor opened his lips to speak but Frank Braun wouldn’t let him get a word in.

  “Then we can prove whether there is something, some mysterious power, that is stronger than all the laws of science that we know. We can prove whether this life is w
orth the trouble to live–especially for us.”

  “Especially for us?” the professor repeated.

  Frank Braun said, “Yes Uncle Jakob–especially for us! For you and for me–and the few hundred other people that stand as Masters over their lives–and then prove it even for the enslaved, the ones on the street, for the rest of the herd.”

  Then suddenly, abruptly, he asked, “Uncle Jakob, do you believe in God?”

  The Privy Councilor clicked his lips impatiently, “Do I believe in God? What does that have to do with it?”

  But his nephew pressed him, wouldn’t let him brush it away, “Answer me Uncle Jakob, answer. Do you believe in God?”

  He bent down closer to the old man, held him fast in his gaze.

  The Privy Councilor said, “What do you mean boy? According to the understanding that everyone else uses, what I recognize as true and believe is most certainly not God. There is only a feeling–but that feeling is so uncontrollable, something so–”

  “Yes, yes, uncle,” cried the student. “What about this feeling?”

  The professor resisted like always, moved back and forth in his chair.

  “Well, if I must speak candidly–there are times–very rare–with long stretches in between–”

  Frank Braun cried, “You believe–You do believe in God! Oh, I knew it! All the Brinkens do–all of them up to you.”

  He threw up his head, raised his lips high showing rows of smooth shiny teeth, and pushed out every word forcefully.

  “Then you will do it Uncle Jakob. Then you must do it and I don’t need to speak with you any more about it. It is something that has been given to you, one out of a million people. It is possible for you–possible for you to play at being God!