The House of a Thousand Floors (CEU Press Classics)

by Jan Weiss

  ON THE TORTURE OF FLOWERS

  By Ohisver Muller

  Brok opened the book at a random page:

  HOW TO TORTURE A ROSE TO DEATH

  A Provence Rose (Rosa Centifolia) in full bloom is separated from the shrub by fire. — The flame must be held at the stem until the rose collapses. The stem is then scraped with broken glass all the way up to the blossom and placed in a vase with boiling water. The vase is then slowly filled drop by drop with a strong solution of vitriolic acid dripping through a glass pipette. An aroma meter measures the rapid rise and fall of the rose's fragrance. Using an aromaphone, you will hear the faint wailing of the queen of flowers. Its colour will fade, subsequently it will turn blue and finally its petals will fall off. — The pistil is then cut out."

  Is this what Ohisver Muller's soul looks like? Is this madness or perversion? Look, a white lily in a vase, infected with black spot. A chrysanthemum suffocated by nicotine fumes under a glass bell. A blood-red peony, its pistil pierced with a poisoned needle, is being fed with alcohol!

  Such torture of flowers is of course quite an innocuous game, which shows the infantile nature of the cretinous pervert! But these detailed instruments that only hint at their terrible purpose — are they not models for those used in torture chambers where living creatures are tormented?

  Fleeing from this chamber of marvels, the astonished Brok found himself on the threshold of — a children's room! What an incredible contrast! A magical corner full of intimacy and childhood dreams! A cot with net sides . A toy railway, its large circle spread over a cheerful carpet, with a long train and tiny tin railway station. There's even a tunnel, bridge and a railway switch. — Next to it is a box of building blocks; some are scattered around while others form a half-finished church that will be completed after dinner. A red laterna magica with glass slides. Several toy rubber stamps and a piece of paper with the same words printed over and over again, each print fainter than the previous one: Ohisver Muller. Ohisver Muller. Ohisver Muller.

  Was it possible that this accursed tyrant and inquisitor had a little son? Or had he created a temple to his own childhood to satisfy his sentimentality? — Did he send the train running around the carpet and project the glass slides on the wall?

  So, will there be a family room next to the children's room, with a sewing machine and family portraits on the walls, or a bedroom, or a kitchen with a stove and a shelf full of white cups?

  The room was red and empty, except for a small round table in the centre, with a crystal bowl filled with clear water on top. Floating inside the bowl was a human heart...

  The next room was blue. Again, there was a crystal bowl with water, but this time there were two sky-blue eyes in it.

  Nothing surprised Blok any more. He quickly passed through room after room. At one point, he burst into a rank space crawling with purring and crying black cats. There must have been a hundred of them! After this compost heap, he entered a magnificent hall full of treasures.

  Purchased, stolen and misplaced crowns that had belonged to emperors and kings, golden sceptres, orbs, monstrances from cathedrals, ceremonial robes from the Vatican, from Buddhist temples and from the rock temple of the Dalai Lama. Exquisite works of old masters, brought here from galleries all around the now bankrupt Europe, are framed by diamonds as big as a goose egg set in gold.

  Rods made of platinum, gold, solium and radium.

  Tangled heaps of rings, chains and necklaces.

  A barrel full of golden watches!

  A chest of earrings!

  Rows of cases filled with coins from all around the world.

  In the middle of the hall was a gaping black hole surrounded by a railing. To gauge its depth, Brok dropped one of the golden rods inside and counted while listening: nothing!

  Then he noticed an electric switch on the edge of the abyss. He turned it and the abyss was flooded with light all the way down to the bottom. And now Brok understood: this was the entrance to a gigantic shaft of a thousand floors which formed the foundations of Mullerdom. This entire bricked up space was an incredible treasure trove where Muller had gathered objects looted from all the corners of the globe.

  From here Brok entered a dressing room.

  A scaffolding of shelves and rows of hanging hooks held a tangle of junk. Generals' uniforms, impeccable suits once worn by stock exchange brokers, monks' frocks and bishops' vestments, striped sailors' shirts, cowboy hats, top hats, flat caps worn by underworld angsters, beggars' rags full of holes and patches, white sheets of apparitions.

  Strangely, all these had been made to fit a small figure with narrow shoulders and short legs. Some coats and jackets had massive padded shoulders; others had padded fronts to create a fake belly. There was even a coat with a false hump.

  One corner bristled with walking sticks, tribal rods, ornamental rods decorated with silver, whips, cat-o'-nine-tails, walking sticks with hidden daggers, bishops' staffs and cripples' crutches. Cabinets held pipes, spectacles, false teeth, ears, noses and wigs. Rubber limbs with spring mechanisms —

  And — the most terrible sight — a row of stuffed heads with human faces stretched on them! The work of a taxidermist, these faces had been skinned complete with beards and eyebrows! Flexible rubbery larvae, they would create new unmistakeable human features if stretched over a face!

  What a multitude of perfect disguises! A face of a long-deceased man reused like a hat! No wonder not even the devil himself knew what Muller looked like! He roamed the floors of Mullerdom as a general, a one-legged cripple, a portly stock broker with a golden chain across his paunch, or a hunchback. But who was he?

  Brok stood at the threshold of another room.

  In an open rusty cage a sad tree trunk stood, like a skeleton, with a hideous orang-utan swinging from one of the branches.

  Brok stepped back. He was convinced the ape saw him, and indeed, as he appeared in the doorway, the orangutan bared his wide porcelain-like teeth. Brok recovered his courage and slowly walked step by step under the row of sharp white teeth over his head.

  Finally, he reached for the handle of the door opposite, soundlessly opened it and, just as slowly, slipped through before closing the door behind him.

  XLV

  The omniscience machine · This, if you please, is Himl · A skull within reach · The voices of the stock market

  Then he looked around. A massive, swollen, monstrously complex round thing covered the entire opposite wall of the room. The sight of it made Brok shiver. At first glance, this grotesque cluster of trembling spirals, bells, buttons, pipes and phosphorescent clocks merged into some kind of a painfully surprising formation resembling a living organism rather than an inanimate machine, the insides of a universal robot coming to life.

  An endless row of keys, like a long piano, round, of unequal length. In their bloodless fragility they bore a resemblance to the manicured fingers of a dead girl. Brok caught a glimpse of a glass organ, made of countless pipes, each bigger than the previous one. The machine was made of a range of peculiar forms, repeated with unbearable consistency a thousand times. A thousand keys, a thousand bells, a thousand lamps, a thousand bulging little eyes, flashing their glass flames like cats' eyes sending mysterious signals.

  In the middle of this monstrous organism resembling the altar of a terrible god in its symmetry, a white circle gleamed like a huge communion wafer set in a bizarre monstrance. Under the circle was a calyx-shaped loudspeaker cut out of some precious material.

  Opposite this horrifying altar, someone is sitting in a deep armchair with his back to Brok who can only see a tuft of red hair like a tiny flame flickering above the headrest.

  Brok held his breath.

  Was this Muller?

  A small, dwarfish figure, seated at the bottom of a lounge chair. — More like a little girl with red hair — not even the head was visible.

  Brok quietly went around the chair.

  In it he saw a tiny, dry little man with a hideous face, his body
wrapped in a green dressing gown. His mouth was bracketed between two ugly lines and repulsive drooping cheeks. The rolled lower lip was blackened and dried to the gum. A red beard, divided into two under his chin, ran down from his mouth reaching his lap.

  And his nose! The bold arc of a vulture's beak. The magnificent centripetal line of a snail's shell. An arc suggesting strength and perseverance. An arc of ridicule, hatred, revenge and victory over the world!

  Ohisver Muller!

  This, if you please, is Him!

  This pathetic yellow dwarf, buried alive at the bottom of an armchair as if in a cracked coffin.

  Those hairy ears with blackened lobes! — Were these the ears that made everyone in Mullerdom go silent and tremble with fear?

  And these two poisonously green, slimy darting little things surrounded with wrinkles? Were they the all-seeing eyes that looked into the thousand floors and hundreds of thousands rooms at the same time?

  Was this the skull in which the monstrous dream of heaven and hell on earth was born?... I have it in front of me, within reach, and I could destroy it... crush it underfoot together with its dream — shatter that gigantic nonsense into a thousand pieces!

  Suddenly Ohisver Muller wanted to sneeze. His hand approached his nose, covered it. Brok was curious to see what would happen next and, to his astonishment, the nose — that magnificent victorious nose — remained in Muller's hand, and in its place was a flat thing without bone, merely two holes in a small bump stuck in the middle of a face. He recognised it now, it was the face he had seen in the window that had opened above him when he had lost consciousness in the hall of mirrors.

  The victorious nose was placed back.

  And why were those slimy green eyes that might sink if they didn't hold on to the wrinkles around them looking so intently at the gleaming white circle?

  What was it? A mirror?

  Yes, it was a strange mirror! It had its silvery transparent depth, but nothing in this room was reflected in it. The mirror was b l a n k!

  A shiny silver distance at the bottom and nothing more.

  Then all of a sudden the impenetrable end of the silver distance came closer — grew darker — and Brok could see indistinct swarming as if he were looking into an ant hill with a magnifying glass that was too strong. Then, as if the magnifying glass were placed nearer, the swarming became blacker, its contours more distinct.

  And then — Brok almost shouted:

  The stock exchange!

  Indeed, it was the stock exchange seen from a bird's eye view!

  Brok remembered the glass eye inserted into the ceiling.

  He could see the stock exchange with the transparent Atlas in the centre and the ant hill of black top hats —

  Now the little man in the armchair reached into the machine with his dry fingers. The machine made a screeching sound like a cat in heat in the middle of a summer night. A silence followed and then the chalice in front of the altar spoke.

  Brok realized that it was the stock exchange speaking. A chaotic mixture of mysterious whispers, footsteps and excited cries melted into a single fermenting ball with tailcoats, faces and top hats floating on the surface.

  But Muller's hand was reaching for the keyboard again. The sound ball fell apart and two clear voices stood out from the tangle of noises.

  "Did you buy?"

  "I lost."

  "Bad times!"

  "The mulldor is falling."

  "How much?"

  "25!"

  "Oh!"

  "Shhh!"

  And another two voices:

  "What now?"

  "99!"

  "And tomorrow?" "Kawai!"

  "That damned voice!" "He escaped!" "He killed Orsag!" "He tore out his eyes!"

  "Who?" "The voice!"

  "And the Great Muller?"

  "Shhh!"

  And another dialogue:

  "The white ones are losing value!"

  "The princess has escaped!"

  "He abducted her!" "Who?" "The voice!"

  "And our lord and provider?" "Enough of this sweet talk!" "The end is nigh!"

  "Shhh!"

  "Why be afraid? Something greater than Muller himself is coming!"

  "The secret of UNIVERSE revealed!"

  "God was unmasked!"

  "The stock exchange has crashed!"

  "Well, who'll come out the winner?"

  "Shhh!"

  "Stop hissing!" "Muller will fall!" "Fall!"

  "And who will win.?"

  "Him!" "The voice!"

  XLVI

  "Herr Erlebachì" · The hunchback holds court "I am no longer apackhorseì" · Arrest hunchback Chulkovì · As if a pack of dogs moulted here — · "Death to parasitesì"

  At that moment, Ohisver Muller lazily rose from the armchair and touched the keyboard as if playing a chord he had long ago grown tired of. Then, unperturbed, he called into the crystal calyx:

  "Herr Erlebach!"

  The silver circle showed Petr Brok a pale face against the black and white mosaic of tailcoats and shirtfronts. It was distorted with terror.

  "Herr Erlebach!"

  The face fell to the ground and the hands flew up, palms upturned.

  "Mercy, mercy!" the calyx wailed.

  But Ohisver Muller continued unmoved:

  "Herr Erlebach! — 95! — 64! — Red mirrors, room number 7!"

  A white fog then passed across the white circle and when it cleared, the silver distance had moved closer — Hotel Bar ELDORADO! — Under the opaque glass pendant lamps shaped like antediluvian skulls, the company of adventurers are sitting around an oak table. Brok read all about their business when he walked through the streets of West-Wester. — When was it? How much time had passed since then?

  There were some familiar faces: the hunchback Chulk-ov and the armless murderer Garpona. There was also the giant who had captured Brok in a net, the defeated and humiliated General Grant, who, judging from his speech, attire and manners, had quickly adjusted to his new environment.

  The hunchback is holding court:

  "Well, which of you is going to catch him? Kokoko! Will you kill him with your bare feet, Garpona? Or you, Secretary, will you give him Schwartz's rose, infused with old age, to smell? Lalalala! What will you do to him, Mothleg, with your sexual tincture? — Do you know how old he is? Do you want him to be consumed with love for Princess Tamara? — Meeeh! — None of you can do anything with your gas and powders and pills! — Which of you is going to capture him? — Meeeh!"

  "He's not a human being!"

  "He's a god!"

  "Would a god let you catch him in a net?" "There's only one God and that's Muller!" "The devil is stronger, then!"

  "Than Muller?" "Shhh!"

  All of them put their index fingers to their lips in unison. But the hunchback continued agitating:

  "You cowards! — Have you not understood what's going on? Whether he is a man or god, or nothing at all — whatever he is, he is greater, stronger and more powerful than Muller! That's why we should admit the truth, while there's still time! — And side with the one who is more powerful! Away with Muller!"

  Ohisver Muller rose from his armchair again, played a few dead chords on the keyboard, and then put his lips to the crystal calyx:

  "Sudar Chulkov!"

  The five men jumped up around the table, chairs tumbled, glasses shattered. Their hair was standing on end, their faces blurred with terror.

  Only Chulkov remained seated. His chair rattled as he pushed himself away from the table. He then grabbed his glass and threw it towards the ceiling. The faces around him followed his every movement, with an expression of astonishment, half dumb, half malicious. Petr Brok expected an explosion inside the armchair and to hear the voice whistling like a deadly bullet.

  But he waited in vain... It seemed that the man in the armchair was made of stuff with no nerves and no gall. — He hummed into the microphone with an inhumanly monotonous, sleepy voice:

  "Sudar C
hulkov! 95! — 64! — Red mirrors, room 7!"

  Brok eagerly followed the rebellious expression of the hunchback's trembling face in the miraculous circle. He saw him bang the table with his fist and shout defiantly up to the ceiling:

  "I won't go — I won't go! — I've done enough for you, benefactor! Meeh! From now on, I won't lift a finger for you! I got rid of old Galio for you and how did you reward me, father? — Fifty thousand stars, of course, a divine gift! — Cock-a-doodle-doo! — Every night I watch them and crow with anger! You didn't even let me into Gedonia! You promised and you didn't keep your word! But I'll get in there, without you, you filthy bastard! You know what you can do with your fifty thousand stars? You can pay others who are foolish enough, you red-haired devil! As of today, I am no longer a packhorse — I am a human being! Lalala!"

  The hunchback probably continued voicing his newly found courage towards the ceiling but Muller reached for the keyboard to silence him and cover the image of the defiant hunchback with a veil of fog.

  The next to appear in the circle was a humble police inspector in uniform. Muller dictated:

  "Floor 411 — West-Wester, Hotel Eldorado! — Arrest Sudar Chulkov! Imprison him in the Red Mirror Hall, 95, 64, 7!"

  The police uniform melted into the fog and Muller played his keyboard again. — The glass organ now screeched and wailed, as if someone was strangling little babies. — That was what those black cats sounded like in the hotbed he had just passed. — Was there a connection between the cats on heat and this diabolical altar?

  And lo and behold!

  Rows of phosphorescent green eyes were staring out of the machine like a thousand cats in darkness.

  The cacophony soon stopped and the circle cleared. Brok saw the camp and the slow film of the battlefield from a bird's eye view. From the barricade of the revolutionaries, it moved to the 'no man's land' between the fronts, then to the bloated ramparts of the mercenary army and into their sleeping camp.