The Right Hand of Sleep

by John Wray

  —That explains the black dress, said Voxlauer. —Or has somebody passed on?

  —Very comic. It was blue before I started sweeping, if that says anything to you. A heap of gray dust lined the entranceway behind her.

  Voxlauer came to the steps and put a hand to her forehead. Her hair was damp. —Should we go for a walk, till the air clears a little? he said.

  —Where’s Pauli?

  —He’s gone.

  Else sighed and stood up slowly and fetched a dustpan from the kitchen. She swept the dust into it and carried it around the corner of the house. Then she undid her housedress and stepped out of it and wiped her face and neck a few times and shook her head. —God knows what I’m cleaning for anyway, if we’re leaving tomorrow. Maybe I don’t quite believe it yet.

  —I don’t either.

  —Hard to imagine, isn’t it? She took his hand and led him back down the drive. —I sent Resi down an hour ago. On a bus.

  —A bus? What bus? said Voxlauer, raising his eyebrows.

  —The new Reichs-bus, Oskar. Pergau–Niessen–St. Marein. They’ve only just started it.

  —May it run for a thousand years.

  —May it run for the next few days before dropping into a ditch, and I’ll be satisfied. She took his arm.

  They walked on through the little town, past the churchyard and square, lifeless-looking as always, to the down-valley road. —Where are we going? Voxlauer asked when they’d come to the last of the outlying fields. —Up to the ridge?

  —Let’s keep on this way, said Else.

  —I’d rather go to the ridge, said Voxlauer, slowing.

  —We haven’t walked this way in ages. Come along, Herr Gamekeeper!

  They continued down as the road narrowed to little better than a mule track, steep-ditched and slashed with gullies, snaking sharply through the trees. Voxlauer began to feel the first stirrings of fear. —So he’s gone, then, said Else, looking back at him. —Pauli, I mean.

  —He is. Yes.

  —And he still holds me to blame for it all, does he? She smiled. —I suppose there’s no point in asking why.

  —He doesn’t hold you to any blame, Else.

  —It’s a strange way to leave if he doesn’t. He barely tipped his hat.

  —He offered to take us with him.

  —Should we have gone?

  Voxlauer nodded. —Yes. We should have.

  —But you didn’t want to, either.

  Voxlauer was quiet a moment. —I suppose I didn’t.

  —We’ll be all right, said Else. —Don’t you think so? I think we will.

  They walked farther to a washed-out curve with a view over the trees and lingered there for a time, looking up at the cliffs. The colony meadow shone in a ray of sun and above it a round, shadowed opening hung starkly in the light, black and partially veiled by pine scrub.

  —See the cave? said Else. She pointed. —There, just under the rocks?

  —I’d heard an old loony used to live there.

  —Years ago, yes. None of us ever saw him. Papa said he did, but Papa used to make up all sorts of horrible stories to make us behave. There was smoke sometimes, though, in the evenings. In the daytime too, in winter.

  —You never wanted to pay him a visit?

  Else laughed. —We were afraid to, of course. Kurt especially. We drew pictures of him to make up for it. He looked a little bit like you, actually, only three or four meters taller, with a walking stick made out of an old butter churn. And a broken stovepipe hat.

  —That’s more or less how I picture myself.

  —On your off days, Oskar, she said, patting him on the cheek. —Kurt tried to find him once, when we were a little older. He went up to the cave in the middle of the night with a candle, a box of matches and a spade, but all he found was a pile of tattered women’s dresses. Had nightmares for weeks after.

  —About the dresses?

  —About the man, I think, said Else. She laughed.

  They began walking slowly around the bend. —Piedernig knew him, said Voxlauer.

  —I can’t think how he would have. This was before—

  Voxlauer stopped suddenly. —What’s that sound?

  —What sound?

  He held up a hand. —Listen.

  The whine of an engine spiraled upward through the pines, high and keening as a bandsaw. The pines dampened the sound and smoothed it. It kept constant and dull and grew louder with each step as they followed it down the hill. Underneath and behind the keening was another sound, dimmer and harder to identify. It might not have been a sound at all but it quivered as a sound would along the ground and made them hurry forward. They came into a glade and the noise spread and brightened to a flat wail all around them, hanging on the air like a shield of shivering, spinning glass. Voxlauer covered his ears and began to run. Else was already running as fast as she could, screaming to him to hurry.

  Where the road met the creek and fell back into the pines a wheel spun above the ditch in a cloud of blue-black smoke. Coming up behind Else Voxlauer saw the shape of the wheel and the smoke around it and knew already what had happened. As they drew nearer he saw the rest of the machine, broken and inverted, and the body underneath pressed down deep into the grass.

  In the three days before his death Kurt spoke almost not at all, breath coming to him in sharp splintered gasps that seemed chipped as they came from a hard, glasslike column of air. Else brought food to him, cups of broth and bits of milk-soaked bread that he almost always refused. Occasionally Voxlauer would see the two of them whispering together. Catching sight of him from a corner of his eye, Kurt would stop and look over at him for a long moment, his face calm and blank.

  The windows were kept open on the warm summer air and every so often Kurt would take a deeper breath than usual and sigh mildly, like an old man unlacing a heavy pair of boots. He would lie quietly for hours then, barely breathing, until his chest would seize and blood would well in a froth over his tongue and lips. From the kitchen Voxlauer would hear him choking and rush down to help Else turn him onto his side. As they took hold of him he would scream and curse them both until his breath was gone, then once it was done quiet again into an uneasy, effortful state of rest. Within the hour he would be asleep, breathing shallowly through his nose, and they would steal two or three hours’ fitful sleep themselves, waking always to the sound of Kurt flailing back and forth across the bed.

  As soon as Kurt had been laid out Voxlauer sent word to the hospital in Niessen and the Polizeihaus. The next morning a doctor and the little SS officer from the funeral, both dressed in olive-colored field jackets and matching jodhpurs, pulled up in a beautiful jet-black Horch convertible with two uniformed SS privates in the back holding an elaborate folding stretcher across their knees. The doctor and the officer came briskly to the house and rapped on the screen door. The two privates waited by the car, staring up at the house.

  —Else Bauer? the doctor said as Else came to the door.

  —Yes. She looked at the officer, behind her at Voxlauer, then back to the doctor. —Come in, she said after a moment.

  The officer turned to the two privates and made a little gesture. They brought the stretcher from the car and set it on the grass. As he stepped in after the doctor, he caught sight of Voxlauer and stopped in mid-stride.

  —Who is this person? said the officer, frowning slightly.

  —A friend of the family, said Else. —Are you coming downstairs?

  The officer remained motionless.

  —It is my cousin you’ve come for? said Else, already halfway down the steps.

  The officer didn’t answer. Else went down with the doctor. The officer and Voxlauer stood a shoulder’s width apart just inside the door, studying each other. —Is that for me? said Voxlauer, looking at the two privates crouched in the grass over the stretcher.

  —I couldn’t say, Herr Voxlauer. Are you ill?

  —I’m tired, said Voxlauer, sitting down at the table. —Shouldn’t you
be attending to something or other?

  —I’m not needed downstairs at present, said the officer, taking a packet of cigarettes from his shirt pocket. —Peaceful up here, he said in his faint Reichs-German accent, a cigarette dangling slantwise from his mouth.

  —Not lately, said Voxlauer.

  —Of course, said the officer.

  Voxlauer drummed his fingers against the table.

  —Regarding the accident, said the officer. —Any thoughts worth mentioning?

  —None.

  —Pass anyone on the roadway yesterday evening? Anyone at all?

  Voxlauer sighed. —You’d have it much easier if I owned so much as a wheelbarrow, wouldn’t you.

  —I’m asking for your testimony, Herr Voxlauer. Surely that must have some significance, even to you. You’re a reliable witness, aren’t you? Clear-headed? Unsentimental? Sober?

  —You’d not much like the testimony I’d give.

  —Oh! I’m sure we would, Herr Voxlauer. I’m sure we’d all like to hear your testimony very much, should you feel inclined to give it to us. If not, however, we can certainly follow things to a satisfactory conclusion without your help.

  Voxlauer said nothing.

  —Do you? said the officer.

  —Do I what?

  —Do you feel so inclined?

  Voxlauer looked out through the screen door, breathing in the sharp dusky smell of the burning cigarette and the heavy, grass-scented sweetness everywhere behind it. —I feel inclined to live, he said.

  The officer smiled and looked down at his fingernails. —Really? That surprises me, I must say. I’m almost beginning to think the Obersturmführer was wrong about you after all, God rest him.

  —The Obersturmführer’s not dead yet, I believe.

  —He is to us, the officer said, letting the words fall out of his narrow mouth one by one, distinct from one another and perfectly formed. —Listen closely now, Herr Voxlauer. My predecessor may, as one of his countless whims, have extended to you some small measure of protection but that protection is now at an end. It has already been decided by an authority greater than my own to regard his death as an assassination on behalf of Jewish interests, and to take the accused, once he has been recovered, to a full and public trial. Your testimony might prove of some slight interest to said authority. Alternatively, you may be tried as a collaborator and hanged. Do you follow me?

  —I follow, said Voxlauer, very quietly.

  —And?

  —I’ve told you already. I want to live.

  The officer shrugged his shoulders. A moment later the doctor and Else came upstairs.

  —They can’t move him, Else said, taking Voxlauer’s hand and gripping it.

  —I’ve been invited to give a statement at the Polizeihaus, said Voxlauer. —I explained to the officer here that we’re much too busy.

  —Yes, that’s right, said Else, turning to the officer. —He doesn’t have to go with you just now, does he?

  —Well. If he’s needed here, with the Obersturmführer, said the officer, still looking at Voxlauer.

  They stood without speaking, the four of them, for the briefest of instants in the narrow room. Then the doctor heaved a deep professional sigh and ran a kerchief over his damp flushed jowls. —The Obersturmführer needs time to recover his air, he said. He glanced at Voxlauer. —Don’t move him any more than necessary. He’s at an extremely delicate stage in his recovery.

  —I’ve just come to that conclusion myself, said Voxlauer.

  —Can you leave him something for the pain, at least? said Else.

  The doctor looked at her in surprise. —Herr Bauer is a soldier of the Schutzstaffel, Fräulein, he said flatly. He glanced over at the officer and coughed. The officer put out his cigarette hurriedly and went to the door.

  —Good day to you, Fräulein, said the doctor. He and the SS man bowed once more and went down the steps to the Horch and herded the two privates into it and drove away, leaving the stretcher half assembled on the drive.

  Voxlauer shuttered the room against the midday heat and took the pan of blood-spattered urine from beside the bed and arranged the pillows and the sheets. Kurt stared dazedly up at him. With eyes half closed and the lamplight behind him the resemblance to Else was full and utter: the round, smooth face, solemn and androgynous, the wide dark pupils, the heavy lids. His eyes followed Voxlauer as he moved around the bed. —Else? he murmured. He let his eyes fall closed completely, then opened them all at once, frowning. —Else, he repeated.

  —She’s here, said Voxlauer.

  Else came barefooted from the kitchen, smoothing the hair back from her face. Kurt’s eyes saw her, focused briefly, then fell closed again. —He asked for you, said Voxlauer, moving away.

  —Kurti? Else said. Kurt’s eyes opened and closed.

  —They didn’t even change the poultices, she said, looking over her shoulder at Voxlauer.

  Kurt smiled at this and made a low sound, midway between a croak and a laugh, lifting a hand and waving it in the air. —Let it be, he said hoarsely. —Let it.

  —Else, he said a moment later, opening his eyes very wide.

  Else sat down by the bed and leaned over. Kurt said something too quietly for Voxlauer to hear. Else took Kurt’s hand in hers and held it, whispering. As she whispered to him his body arched suddenly and he began groaning and sputtering, kicking angrily at the sheets and twisting his head from side to side. —Oskar! Else cried. Voxlauer came quickly and together they lifted Kurt and turned him over. The blood had already begun to pool in his mouth and he leaned his head down slackly and let it dribble out through his teeth. —I’ll get the pan, said Voxlauer, running to the kitchen.

  In the kitchen he cast about a moment for the pan before finding it. When he came back down into the bedroom Kurt had quieted and was breathing in even, steady gasps. His face glowed sallowly in the light coming through the shutters. Else sat motionless at the foot of the bed, staring dumbly ahead of her. Her hand lay on Kurt’s forearm. Kurt was looking at Voxlauer. He took his arm from Else’s and beckoned to him. —Voxlauer, he mouthed silently.

  Voxlauer came and crouched by the bed.

  —There you are, Voxlauer. The whites of Kurt’s eyes shone against his yellow face. His left eye socket was running and bruised and the ball had begun to darken around its edges. He let out a sigh.

  —What is it? Else said, taking hold of his arm again.

  Kurt’s eyes wandered up to hers. —Go away a minute, Liesi.

  Else hesitated, opening her mouth to speak, then stood without a word and left. Kurt’s eyes were wide and luminous as he watched her. He turned them back slowly, unwillingly, to rest on Voxlauer.

  —The time’s come for me to tell you my regrets, cousin-in-law. Kurt motioned to the stool.

  The sound of Else taking dishes from the cupboard carried from the kitchen. —I’m not interested in your regrets, Kurt, he said.

  Kurt attempted another laugh, a raw, hacking croak that collapsed on itself immediately. —I don’t believe you, he wheezed.

  —That’s your privilege, said Voxlauer, getting to his feet.

  —Two of your friends from the colony are dead.

  Voxlauer stopped short, staring at the shutters.

  —That’s better. Kurt took a breath. —Now sit quietly a minute.

  —Else! Voxlauer called.

  —No! Don’t call her! Listen to me, Voxlauer! I don’t want her. Voxlauer!

  —Else! Voxlauer called again. He saw her silhouette now through the slats of the shutters, bending over something in the garden.

  —Keep her away from me, Voxlauer, Kurt gasped. Voxlauer looked down at him straining desperately to meet his eyes, baring his teeth from the pain and effort of holding himself up. Just like one of my fits, Voxlauer thought, watching the blood rushing to Kurt’s face. He felt no pity or concern, only a remote, sterile curiosity at the tenacity of the life still animating the body propped tremblingly before him. Something in the abjectn
ess of Kurt’s features or in his own faraway state of mind made him think of the soldier he’d killed long ago in the Isonzo. Decades later, near the end of his own life, he would think of those two moments, standing over the deserter in the snow with the military police on all sides, and crouching at the foot of the bed as Kurt suffered through his last few conscious breaths, as connected by a wire that ran through all the moments in between, fixing them in precise order, like glass beads on a string. He waited another drawn-out, deliberate moment before speaking.

  —All right, Kurt. Lie back now. I’ll listen.

  —I’m dying, Kurt said feebly, falling back onto the sheets like a wooden effigy.

  Voxlauer said nothing. The screen door banged as Else came back inside.

  —Go now, Kurt murmured, his eyes losing focus.

  Voxlauer stepped away. Kurt’s eyes had closed and his forehead was beaded over with sweat. —Voxlauer! he said loudly as Voxlauer was halfway across the room.

  —Yes, Kurt? said Voxlauer, coming back to the bed. But Kurt turned his head and waved him impatiently away.

  Two days later they woke to find his body crumpled like a sheet of paper, thighs drawn in against the wound in his chest, head turned into the bed, one arm drawn in and one flung wide over the sweat-and blood-soaked bedcovers. Voxlauer reached out a hand and passed it over the blanched, ungiving skin, cool and mottled over with tiny blots. He bent down and with a great effort straightened the tucked and stiffened legs and pulled the sheets over them. Else hung back by the kitchen steps. A warm breeze carried through the open windows, moving the hair on the back of Kurt’s head lightly, ruffling it and smoothing it down again exactly as it would the hair on a living body. Voxlauer bent over the bed and took in a breath but smelled only the faint scent of sweat and the morning damp. Then he stepped away from the body and went past Else up the kitchen steps and out of the house.

  Thin wisps of cloud were massing into a palisade above the cliffs and he stood just outside the doorway, watching them. In Pergau the green copper steeple caught the first tentative rays of light and held them fast. A high bending file of rooks rose from it like a standard, thinning as he watched into a fine, dark thread. After a while Else came out and sat next to him on the steps. They sat wordlessly, looking across the valley. Nothing in her face or in her way of sitting beside him would have led anyone to believe that she was suffering. A short time later she stood and went back inside.