A Gushing Fountain

by Martin Walser

  “So, büble, what seems to be our problem?” said a voice behind him. He turned around. Oh jeez, it was Crooked Hat. Johann couldn’t get out a single word. Did it have to be Crooked Hat, the nickname they always shouted to needle him? Johann could only point to his bike lying in the grass.

  “You got a flat,” said Crooked Hat. Johann nodded. Crooked Hat leaned his own bike against the nearest tree. Then, as if someone had assigned him the task, he took the repair kit out of Johann’s saddlebag, stood the bike on its head, rotated the rear tire, and then brought it to an abrupt stop. “Lucky for us,” he said, pulling the nail out of the tire and the tube, a real cobbler’s nail with a square head. He unscrewed the valve cap, pushed the valve out of the rim, and could then pull the tube out of the tire at the spot where the hole was. He abraded the area with the emery paper, spread adhesive on it, chose the size patch he needed from the repair kit, positioned it over the puncture, and then pressed down with both thumbs for quite a long time. While he pressed he gave Johann a cheerful smile. Then he pushed the tube back into the tire, reseated the valve, and pumped it up. “So, büble, all set to go.” Where was Johann headed?

  “Langenargen,” said Johann. He had meant not to tell anyone where he was going. Now he had betrayed himself.

  “Then you’d better get going,” said Crooked Hat, “before you put down roots.” Anita had told him that her father always said that. Crooked Hat returned to his bicycle and then looked back.

  Johann said, “Thank you very much.” Fortunately, Crooked Hat heard him.

  “You’re welcome,” he said. “Maybe you can scratch my back sometime in return.” Then he mounted his bicycle and rode off, the large, light-colored rucksack hanging limply from his shoulders as always.

  When Johann went to stand his bike right side up, he saw a piece of paper lying next to the saddle. Written on it in the cursive handwriting he knew was Father’s, a single word: Beatrijs. It was harder for him to throw something away than to hang onto it, so he stuck the paper in his pocket. As he pedaled through Nonnenhorn, Beatrijs found a place in his word tree. Beatrijs now swung between Swedenborg and Balaam. Johann’s word tree was the opposite of a Christmas tree. It was more motion than tree: a tree made of motion, always moving and always a tree. An apple tree in motion.

  For a while, Johann looked down at the road he was riding on to avoid the next nail. But then he forgot to. Simply kept on riding. On through Nonnenhorn. When he passed the wine shop where Edmund Fürst was an apprentice, he wished he could stop by. Every morning, Edmund took the 6:00 a.m. train here. When he comes home in the evening, it’s either a muster or he embroiders. He spent one entire evening meeting explaining about the embroidery. When he finished the explanation, he said, “So, now you all can laugh.” His father had started doing it when he was out of work, and Edmund had taken it over from him. There’s a company in Offenburg that sends postcards with pictures of Rothenburg or Dinkelsbühl. Edmund embroiders copies of them, and the company pays him for them.

  One hundred eight thousand, six hundred twenty-four embroideries for Nuremberg. His mother gets one pfennig per newspaper per day. After having his lunch in Memmingen, his father is about to get into Herr Mehltreter’s car. Hans Schmied is already behind the wheel. Herr Fürst raises his foot to step in and falls down dead. It is Frau Fürst’s doing that all their names have to begin with E. Her name is Ernestine. Eva is now Edeltraud. When she announced the new name in all her houses, Frau Fürst explained it was according to Section 11.

  Keep going. To Thunau, Goren, Langenargen. As he came up to the bridge over the Argen, Johann dismounted. The bridge was suspended on thick steel cables from four massive stone piers that looked like they belonged to some palace or castle. They would go well with the door of the safe in the office back home. As he pushed his bike across this bridge, he had a solemn feeling. He couldn’t imagine a river bigger than the Argen. Or more transparent. You could see every rock and every little stone. Most of all, he couldn’t imagine any river livelier than this one. How the water hurried forward and broke into silvery ripples against the rocks and rushed forward again, as if wanting to reach the lake as quickly as possible. This was not the first time he’d seen the Argen. He had been on its banks more than once. Two years ago this fall, with relatives farther upstream in Apflau. They had gone to fetch a big barrel of apple cider. While their father was in the house, Johann and Josef had taken turns cranking the handle of the fruit press. Johann just had to try out every crank he encountered. Josef had gotten his hand caught in the gears, and while he screamed, Johann had to turn the crank backwards, and at first he turned it the wrong direction, but then back. Josef’s hand looks crushed and bloody. Afterwards, they say it was a miracle none of his tendons had been injured. Josef has the ambition to be something that will involve piano playing. Mother said his guardian angel had never intervened so clearly before. His hand between the gears, and no injury to his tendons! Or only to the one on his little finger, and even then just barely. Ever since, Josef was unable to move his little finger over next to his ring finger. It didn’t affect his piano playing at all. But when he gave the German Greeting, you could see the little finger standing off from the others a bit. The first time the squadron leader Edmund saw Josef giving the salute like that, he said, “Well, there goes your chance to be in the Adolf Hitler Lifeguard Regiment.”

  Johann didn’t get back on his bicycle at the other end of the bridge. He didn’t know where he was going.

  When he passed a boy his own age, he asked as casually as he could where the circus was in Langenargen.

  “On the Hirschenwies,” said the boy.

  “Oh,” said Johann, “on the Hirschenwies.” The other boy could tell from his face that Johann didn’t know where that was.

  “Straight down from the train station toward Klosterstrasse, then into Klosterstrasse and along the wall.” Johann’s expression said that now everything was really clear to him.

  “Merci,” he said, and, “So long.” And he pushed his bicycle forward, hoping that at least he was going toward the train station. You always come to the train station in a town. Or does he just think that because he lives across from a train station? Langenargen was obviously a much bigger town than Wasserburg. Here every street had its own name. Suddenly he heard the trumpet playing “La Paloma.” He mounted his bike at once and rode toward the music. Then he heard the voice of the muscleman and in answer, the voice of Dumb August. And then he saw the two of them with their Roman chariot and the two ponies. They were announcing this evening’s performance of La Paloma Circus on the Hirschenwies. “Marvels never seen before, neither here nor anywhere else. Come tonight, folks. Come, look, and be amazed. Money-back guarantee if we fail to amaze you.”

  “With compound interest,” August added.

  Johann had the impression that August and the muscleman were drunk. They were constantly laughing about what they themselves had just said. Suddenly, he felt sorry for both of them.

  Johann had only to follow them to reach the Hirschenwies. It was much bigger than their back courtyard. The six wagons were arranged so that from outside, you could only see the feet of the circus people walking back and forth. So he would go in. Hello, Anita . . . He had practiced the speech a hundred times while riding here. But that didn’t mean that when he stood facing Anita he would be able to get out even a single word. Adolf had simply jumped into the circus ring, strode over to the cage, reached between the bars, felt the ropes and chains, and said: They’re real all right. The drum and the accordion had played a fanfare for him; the ringmaster praised him. And rightly so. It was really fabulous the way Adolf jumped into the ring without the least hesitation. Fabulous, Adolf. Johann now regretted that he had not asked Adolf to ride with him. If Adolf had been with him, it would have been no problem to walk around the wagons and go in: Well, so here we are. Hello everyone. But it was unthinkable to visit Anita with Adolf. Johann would rather not do it at all.

  He went ba
ck to his bike and rode down to the lake. He sat on the retaining wall and looked at the water. Today it was absolutely still, that water. Should he go to a restaurant and eat something? The restaurants in Langenargen had already set tables outside. Back home, they would probably set the tables on the terrace, too. Although Herr Kalteissen the bailiff had not been in the restaurant for a long time to mark the piano, the gramophone, the highboy, and the safe for repossession, Mother still sent Johann into the village to ride slowly past Café Schnitzler and the Linden Tree and count how many guests were sitting outside. Should he simply ride home now and carry the bike up the back stairs? On New Year’s Day, the dark bird had perched on the transom above the back door, and when they shooed it away, it kept coming back until January third, when Father died. Then the bird had disappeared. Herr Waibel’s two horses that had pulled the hearse wearing their black caparisons were the only things audible on the long ride from the house to the cemetery. What would Mother do when she discovered he was missing? Couldn’t be found anywhere? Yes, Josef’s bicycle would also be gone. But what would she think? He couldn’t imagine how his mother would explain his disappearance to herself. He had to go home. But he had to see Anita, too. At least to bring her the chocolate bar. Then he could ride back.

  He rode back along the lake in the direction of Wasserburg, back to the mouth of the Argen. The landscape became more and more wild. There were a few fishermen’s huts there, everything more shaded by trees than in the bay at home. He tried the door to one of the huts. It was open. Inside it smelled of tar and fish. This hut might do. Back into town. Back to the Hirschenwies. And this time he just rode straight there and then around the farthest circus wagon. The ring was set up. The pole for the Wiener family had been raised along with the two shorter poles. Anita and her parents were sitting at a table. Anita saw him before her parents did. He would not have gone closer if, being able to see him, she had not seen him. If she had not seen him now, he would have gone home at once. But she did see him, jumped up, and cried, “Johann!” Her father invited him to sit down. No, said Anita, she hadn’t seen anything of Langenargen yet and wanted to take a stroll through town with Johann. Stroll was a word he had, until now, only heard Adolf say. Once Adolf had said that he wasn’t about to stroll through life when he could march. Johann had never heard this word from the House of Brugger before, because it didn’t occur in the books he read.

  He was going to leave his bike against the nearest tree, but Anita said, “Let’s take the bike along.” As soon as he was beside her, pushing the bike, he realized it was a good idea. That way, both hands had something to do and he knew why he was walking next to Anita—in order to push the bike. They went toward the lake and then along the shore the same way he had ridden earlier. He played the local authority, suggested they walk as far as the mouth of the Argen. Last night, she hadn’t even noticed they were driving across a river and had no idea it was a suspension bridge. He said they could walk along the Argen until they reached the bridge. It was one of the most beautiful bridges in the world, if not the most beautiful. Said it as if familiar with all bridges and especially all suspension bridges.

  “How is Axel Munz?” he asked.

  He wasn’t hurting anymore, but he was quite gloomy. He wanted to quit. Get away from the circus, away from everything. When you asked him where he wanted to go, he said: Where there’s different police.

  When they got to the mouth of the Argen, Johann said, “There,” and pointed to a bench. He acted as if that had been his goal all along. Emerging from under the bench were the mighty roots of the tree that arched above it. And there was a view of the lake. Johann sat down on the front edge of the bench. Anita leaned back against the armrest and put her feet up on the bench. She rested her chin on her knees and hugged her legs with her arms. Johann got out the chocolate bar and gave it to Anita.

  “For you,” he said.

  “Thank you,” she said, took the bar, tore open the paper, and held the chocolate out to him so he could break off a piece for himself. Then she broke off her own piece. And they kept at it until the whole bar was gone. Every time Anita held the bar out to him to break off another piece, he looked at her. He broke off only the tiniest of pieces so he could look at Anita more often. How round her forehead was. And the same with her bangs. And she had eyelashes like no one else in the world. He realized that when she hadn’t been there in person, he had imagined her much too vaguely. In front of them, two swans flew across the water with necks extended. Their huge wings made a sighing noise.

  “The air is crying because the swans are beating it with their wings,” said Anita. Johann longed to ask her to say something else like that. But you can’t ask something like that. You know exactly what you can and can’t say. And what one longs to say is what it’s least possible to say. Sentences that he could not articulate occurred to him. In the books of poetry Father had left behind, which he almost preferred to Karl May, there were sentences he would also have liked to say. To Anita. But they were unsayable. It would have been obvious that someone else had written them for a different girl. Make up some of your own. Open your mouth, count on something coming out that would be possible at this moment: Anita on this bench, under this tree, not twenty yards from the lake, and on the far shore above the lake was the Säntis, that white-powdered mother hen of stone, as Father called it, sitting there and letting the sun roll right off its back. He couldn’t say that, either.

  The poem he read more often than all the others in his father’s books began: How beautiful, Mother Nature, The splendors you invent To scatter across the meadows. He must have repeated that to himself a hundred times. And now he couldn’t. What if Anita laughed? Would he seize her and throw her in the water? He snorted.

  “What are you thinking about?” asked Anita.

  “Me? Nothing,” said Johann.

  “Same here,” said Anita.

  Too bad, thought Johann. Then he said, “My father told me that Eskimos greet each other by rubbing the tips of their noses together.”

  Anita laughed. Then she said, “Shall we try it?” He shrugged. “Come on,” she said, and was already kneeling on the bench. He knelt facing her, she moved her face closer, he also moved his a little toward hers, but less than she moved hers toward his. Then they rubbed the tips of their noses together, each nose circling the other and rubbing against it. “Nice,” said Anita.

  “Yes,” said Johann. “The Eskimos are a great people. There are no curse words in their language.”

  “How do you know that?” she asked.

  “My father told me,” he said, jumped up, ran down to the shore, and tested the water. It was cold melt water from the mountains. He took off his shoes and socks anyway, waded in up to his knees, and called back, “Come on.”

  She came down, took off her shoes and socks, and waded into the water, too. She shivered, and that was all the signal Johann needed. He went over and hoisted her up. Careful now, don’t slip on a rock. Anita uttered little squeals. She put her arms around his neck. When he’d carried her through the grass, she hadn’t done that. He carried her farther into the water.

  Quietly, Anita said, “Not so deep, Johann.”

  He made a face as if he didn’t want to comply. Back on shore, he put her down carefully, then ran to fetch the scarf he had packed the chocolate in. He used it to dry her feet and legs. Up to the decals of the whale and the volcano.

  “Neat,” he said.

  “What?” she said.

  “That the whale and the volcano are still there.”

  “Did you think they wouldn’t be? You still have my candle, don’t you?”

  “Of course I do. Did you think I didn’t?”

  Johann dared not stroke the whale and volcano. To stroke those two pictures at this moment, or even be allowed to touch them with his bare hand, without the scarf or the drying—that would be the most beautiful thing in the world that could possibly happen. All forbidden. He dashed off to the tree and the bench, sat do
wn, shoved his hands under his thighs, and stared at Anita coming up slowly over the rocks. She sat down next to him, and shoved her hands under her thighs just as he had. But instead of staring out at the lake as he was doing, she looked at him. He couldn’t understand how she could look at him like that, now. Turn her smiling face toward him! Now! He felt like the world had yet to be born. And it was up to him how it turned out. My God! And then she was smiling as if nothing was at stake.

  “Anita, Anita,” he said. He drew his right hand from beneath his thigh and placed it on the bench between himself and Anita. When Anita didn’t notice, didn’t notice immediately and answer by drawing her own hand out and placing it next to her, he felt he would boil over. He had to jump up and run over to his bicycle. He stopped beside the bike. He stood still without turning back to look at Anita. He would stand like that until . . . until . . . until everything was over. A thunderous noise broke in; an airplane roared over the lake, pulling three huge words: PERSIL—ATA—HENKEL. And soon became a mere rumble in the distance. When you couldn’t hear it anymore, you could still see it.

  “Man!” said Anita.

  Johann said, “Right.”

  He pushed the bicycle, and she walked beside him. Anita suddenly took hold of his left hand, which he didn’t need to push the bike, and swung it in time to their strides. And whistled “La Paloma.” Goodness, how she could whistle. Should he drop the bike and clap? Anita was swinging his left hand so vigorously with her right that they should have been able to take off and fly away, but he had the wrong reaction and tensed his hand and arm. By the time he noticed, it was too late. Anita laughed. He was glad when they finally reached the Hirschenwies and Anita said, “Here we are.” He could only nod. At that moment, he would have agreed to his own execution.