The Call of the Toad

by Günter Grass

  Before the close of the session—“miscellaneous” was under discussion—Frau Johanna Dettlaff deplored failings on the part of the executive partners and was seconded by Karau when she moved to have the admonitory sentence “Private affairs and business must be kept separate” read into the record. It was Vielbrand, however, who brought up Brakup’s dubious expense account.

  These unpleasantnesses were aired after the couple left their secluded position at the window with the panoramic view and went back to the conference table. Alexandra was no longer smoking. Frau Dettlaff said that she was on the trail of certain “hidden reserves”—“As the wife of the manager of a district savings bank, I know whereof I speak”—but Marczak, who knew more than he thought wise to say, made light of this by characterizing Reschke’s financial methods as “unorthodox but profitable.” Wróbel argued that Brakup’s slight irregularities should be forgotten and that the Board should, as he did, express their confidence in the executive couple. “We all know to whom we owe the idea of reconciliation and its implementation …”

  Wróbel spoke softly, as though pleading for forbearance: he didn’t know much about finance, but there was no evidence of wrongdoing because no money was missing; the money, on the contrary, had multiplied almost miraculously. He saw no reason to be small-minded. And Pan Marczak, who was so to speak at home with financial matters, said the same.

  It was friend Wróbel who in the same soft voice brought alarming news to Hundegasse a few days later. Piątkowska had just applied a layer of mastic to the right wing of a kneeling late-Gothic angel and asked her Alexander to put water on for coffee when Wróbel arrived with news from Erna Brakup’s sickbed.

  Coffee and angel had to wait. Because Wróbel had been economizing on gasoline lately—and for weeks now not a word has been written about Reschke’s car—they took the Nowy Port streetcar at the Brama Wyżynna stop and got out at Brzeźno. A wet, cold, blustery wind was blowing from the northwest. Rain squalls like whiplashes. The former fishing village now beach resort presented a picture of general decay. The new houses were deteriorating more quickly than the surviving old ones. Streets and sidewalks in similar condition. The visitors had to jump over puddles.

  Wróbel led them to a side street. To the left, fishermen’s shacks alternated with rotting woodsheds. The new interlocking boxlike structures that lined the right side also blocked off the street: it was a blind alley. In the other direction the street lost itself in sand dunes. A gap made by a narrow passage revealed the Baltic making little waves.

  Among the half-timbered cottages with tarpaper roofs and front verandas was Erna Brakup’s home. Lying under a fluffy eiderdown and in her hat, she sang out: “Come in, come in. I’m feeling a lot better. Be on my feet soon.” Her felt boots were standing at the foot of the ancient bedstead with the chamberpot under it.

  From then on she spoke only her rudimentary Polish, first with Wróbel, then with Piątkowska more sparingly; not a word to Reschke.

  What Alexandra translated for her Alexander sounded like time run backward; only Erna Brakup’s cough was in the present, because what she talked about took place in times of war or before wars. Her childhood, spent partly in the country and partly in the lower city, seems to have been most eventful. Time and again between Matern and Ramkau, cows calved; the teacher at the Weidengasse grade school kept breaking his cane; barns burned down, floods threatened; there was one less brother after the beginning of the First World War, and then, mournfully, she came to the flu-and-rutabaga winter of 1917.

  Several times between her coughing fits she must have mentioned potato bugs, because in his diary Reschke compares Brakup’s childhood memories with his own: “Strange, that as early as the First World War the Colorado beetle should have appeared in such numbers. We were told it didn’t cross the Rhine until the mid-thirties, and then spread as far as the Ukraine …”

  True. From the Polish campaign on, or at the latest from the French campaign on, we had to collect them in bottles, even in the rain, with numb fingers. Those disgusting yellow-and-black striped bugs. They said the British dropped tons of them from planes at night. At any rate we had to bring in at least three quart bottles full to the brim … Alex organized the collections … And Reschke and I … Anyway, regardless of the weather Brakup had to …

  She was shaken by a hacking cough. The bedroom was also her living room. On the wall, across from the bed, hung a clock that had stopped. There was a gas stove in the glassed-in veranda—originally the panes had all been yellow and green, but a few had been replaced by milk glass. Piątkowska put water on to boil. With it she would fill a stoneware jug for use as a hot-water bottle and also brew a pot of herbal tea. Later the old woman dutifully drank it sip by sip.

  Over the bed, more precisely, over the headboard, hung a multicolored picture of the Sacred Heart, its blood dripping into a golden cup, which matched the glowing heart-red brooch resting on Brakup’s felt hat. Her broad face had grown perceptibly smaller. Wróbel held her right hand, which had emerged from the side of the eiderdown, its fingers reaching for his. She was breathing regularly now. A strong sour smell. Her visitors thought she had at last fallen asleep. They were already at the door when her old-time German reached their ears. “What about the Board what I resigned from the other day? And what about the desert? The war still going on? You going so soon? All right. Then go.”

  Wróbel came back to Hundegasse with them only for a cup of coffee. There the late-Gothic angel was kneeling, his mastic priming on gesso still waiting for a layer of gold leaf. The angel, about three feet high, was kneeling on the kitchen table. While Reschke poured coffee, Piątkowska applied the extremely thin gold leaf and immediately tamped it with a soft camel’s-hair brush. The men, forbidden to move the air, were sitting off to one side with their coffee cups.

  At first they talked about Brakup—how long she was likely to last—then came to the board of directors. They took the members one by one, made entertaining comparisons between Bieroński and Karau, devoted a few words to the Bungagolf project, considered the possibility of a trip to Silesia together in the spring, as well as a visit to the latest reconciliation cemeteries. They thought of including Allenstein and Stolp, and even of making a last try in Bromberg. They praised the soup kitchens in some of the retirement communities, judged their activity—unlike the reburial program—to be sensible because it promoted reconciliation. But then, as though in passing, and while Piątkowska stroked the gold leaf on the angel’s wing with her soft brush, Jerzy Wróbel let fall the word resignation. And at the very next Board meeting, he announced his resignation. He would not, could not, go on. As a Pole, he regretted having helped the new German land grabbers with his knowledge of the country and of the registry of deeds. As a patriot, he was therefore resigning. Unfortunately too late. He was ashamed of himself.

  This happened at the start of the meeting. The Board took it in their stride. Our couple hesitated. Or for tactical reasons were they waiting for the Bungagolf project to be settled and point 3 on the agenda to be discussed? Point 3 dealt with explanatory inscriptions on historical buildings and with street signs in the Old and Right cities. Because this motion in all its particulars had been drafted by Wróbel, who left the conference room immediately after resigning, Father Bieroński took over. It was moved that side by side with their Polish designations, street signs and monuments display the traditional German names, as was already the case to the right of the portal of St. Bartholomew. There one could read, on a moss-green plaque ornamentally scalloped around the edges, what the church wished to be called in Polish, English, Russian, and German.

  Wróbel had supported his motion by quoting from well-known political historians who had long wanted to see German cultural achievements in the western provinces of Poland recognized: “The time of suppressing, indeed of denying, is past. A pan-European view of culture demands a new openness …”

  Pouncing on the word “Europe,” consistory councilor Karau proposed the use
of as many languages as possible on large attractive signs and deplored the absence of Swedish as well as French inscriptions.

  The vice president of the National Bank disagreed. Few Scandinavians, he pointed out, had been seen during the main tourist season. American and French visitors were equally rare. Now at last it would be possible to dispense with Russian signs altogether. With this Father Bieroński could only agree. In conclusion Marian Marczak produced documents showing that to date over seventy percent of the foreign visitors had been German, a trend that seemed likely to continue.

  Before the motions under point 3 of the agenda were put to a vote, Vielbrand asked the executive partners, who had been silent thus far, for their opinion. Since Wróbel’s resignation and departure, our couple had been sitting there as though under a bell jar. Or had their thoughts taken flight, homeward to Alexandra’s kitchen and the kneeling angel?

  Reschke stood up to speak, which was unusual, and spoke for both. He saw no objection to bilingual signs, though he pleaded for inscriptions in four languages, including Russian. Respect for the cultural achievements of others must be regarded as an integral part of the reconciliation which Frau Piątkowska and he had been promoting for the past year. Since then the work of reconciliation had made a name for itself not only in Gdańsk but also in Silesia and Pomerania. More and more cemeteries had been opened for those coming home. Therefore, let us first and foremost give thanks to the many dead. It is from their silent help that the German-Polish Cemetery Association has drawn the strength it needed. Yet for some time now the idea has suffered. Worse, by adulterating it with a sordid striving for profit, we have stirred up an evil brew. It does not smell good, it stinks to high heaven …

  At this point in his speech Reschke must have been shouting. In any case, I read him with reverberations: “Here and now the limit of the acceptable has been reached. We could live with the retirement communities, which after all, because of their convenient location, help the residents to prepare for death. This reburial business, however, precisely because it is flourishing, is thoroughly reprehensible if not obscene. And now land is to be taken. Money is to be made from the grandchildren’s and great-grandchildren’s only too well-known pursuit of pleasure. The whole business is adorned with the wordplay of reconciliation, as though golf courses were nothing more than enhanced cemeteries. No. I no longer recognize our idea. What was lost in the war is being retaken by economic power. True, it’s being done peacefully. No tanks, no dive bombers. No dictator rules, only the free market. Am I right, Herr Vielbrand? Am I right, Pan Vice President of the National Bank? Money rules. Frau Piątkowska and I both regretfully must draw the line. We resign.”

  I see that Reschke, though used to speaking extemporaneously as a professor, was exhausted when he sat down. It can only be conjectured how short or how long the silence was after his swan song. No mention is made of ironic applause, from Vielbrand for instance, but Alexandra’s intervention is recorded in the diary: “Contrary to our agreement, she took the floor and deplored—as I had before her—the failure of the Lithuanian component of the contract of incorporation. ‘Bad condition of Soviet Union ruined whole thing,’ she cried. Only thanks to my help, ‘because Pan Aleksander always backed me up,’ had she felt optimistic until recently. She asked to have the Lithuanian paragraph stricken from the contract of incorporation and the separate Wilno Reconciliation Cemetery account diverted to charitable purposes. ‘There’s plenty poor people.’ Then she spoke softly, because toward the end of my speech I had spoken loudly, too loudly. She spoke sentence after sentence first in Polish, then in her lovable German, so I was able to understand her conclusion: ‘Now I’m interested in Poland only. Not because I’m nationalistic but because I’m afraid. Why afraid when I’ve never been coward? Pan Aleksander once said: We better watch out or Poland will be on German menu. I say what I see: Germans always hungry even when full. And that makes me afraid …’ Then my Alexandra sat down and reached for her cigarettes and holder. She smoked with her eyes closed, ignoring Dettlaff, whose many bracelets jangled …”

  “But my dear Frau Piątkowska, why this doom and gloom?” That was consistory councilor Karau.

  Reschke claims to have heard Frau Johanna Dettlaff hissing under her breath: “You can still tell she was a red-hot Communist.”

  Then Vielbrand stood up. “We are all dismayed; we cannot but regard the resignation of Herr Reschke and Frau Piątkowska as a painful loss. But I must reject categorically all allegations of German greed. History, God knows, has taught us a lesson. For years we were forced to go in sackcloth and ashes. Our posture today is, if anything, too modest. No one need be afraid of us. I beg you therefore not to act with undue haste. I beg you, honored Frau Piątkowska, as well as our dear Herr Professor, to reconsider your decision. In the moving words of your anthem: ‘Poland is not yet lost …’”

  After that it gets farcical, or simply absurd, embarrassing. Friend Reschke, what devil possessed you, possessed our couple, to make you so sheepishly accept, after your vehement resignation, the “honorary chairmanship” that Vielbrand magically pulled out of his hat? Though that post was not provided for in the contract of incorporation, it was approved by the remaining members of the Board without a single dissenting voice, and offered to the two of them. Did the couple hope to rescue their idea from grasping interests? For this they lacked the mechanism. Apart from the honor, the honorary chairmen were given nothing. No right of appeal, no veto power. They could not sign or refuse to sign anything. No more say in financial matters. Reschke’s “hidden reserves” were laid bare, his transactions brought to light.

  No sooner had they resigned from their executive positions and taken their seats as honorary chairmen than Frau Johanna Dettlaff and Marian Marczak expressed their willingness to take their place. Immediately after changing chairs, the new executives asked Vielbrand to bring the board of directors, now full of holes, up to full strength, whereupon Vielbrand picked up the phone, reached four—exactly four—candidates waiting in their hotel rooms, and summoned them to the conference room, where they were welcomed, questioned, appointed, and confirmed. The two honorary chairmen may have been surprised to see that everything had been thought out in advance and went off smoothly, as if rehearsed.

  One of the four freshly baked members was Torsten Timmstedt, whose planning activity in Düsseldorf was mentioned only in passing; all those present except for our couple seemed to be in the know. According to Reschke’s notes, none of the new members was under thirty or over forty. The seats of the resigned Brakup and Wróbel and the now executive Marczak were taken by two young men born and raised in Gdańsk and a young woman who claimed to be of German extraction but barely understood the language of her parents. If Timmstedt, who took Frau Dettlaff’s place on the Board, had acquired his business experience as manager of an insurance company, the professional experience of the two other young men was of a complementary nature: one was the director of an architectural firm which already had plans for Bungagolf on the drawing board, the other a member of the secretariat of the Bishop of Oliwa. The young woman of speechless German descent proved to be the owner of a private travel agency which was beginning to compete with the government Orbis agency. All the new members were of one mind: Efficiency is what counts.

  Reschke, the fool, wrote in his diary: “Refreshing, how fairly the young people, once in positions of responsibility, set to work on the remaining motions. Just as I had suggested, they put through street signs in four languages, though substituting Swedish for Russian. Less to our liking was that all of them, Timmstedt in the lead, demanded a more expeditious pursuit of the reburial program. All our planning calculations, he said, show that the common graves will require constant attention. Considering the volume of prepaid orders received so far, not nearly enough second burials have been processed. The clientele—he actually used the word clientele!—are growing impatient at the unconscionably long waiting period. The office in Bochum is no longer equal to thes
e and future tasks. Frau von Denkwitz shares this opinion. She is prepared to move to Düsseldorf with all the files and documents, but has requested a word of confirmation from the honorary chairman, whose trust she does not wish to lose …” What could Reschke do but nod?

  Timmstedt then said that more cemetery land must be leased if the reburial program was to proceed smoothly. I don’t know what decision the new Board reached. No sooner had Timmstedt revealed his plans and provided a buzzword by demanding a “covering of all bases” than Alexandra asked her Alexander to leave with her. She said, “Angel waiting, you know, for us in kitchen.”

  So it was not until much later that our couple learned that between the former sports center, which in the sixties had been transformed into the Baltic Opera House, and the area of the former United Cemeteries already under lease, an extensive tract, once the Maiwiese, also known as the Small Drillground, had now been made available to the Cemetery Association. Where the people had paraded and celebrated final victory in advance, where Reschke and I were in the crowd wearing the uniform of Hitler Cubs, where a rostrum with flags and trimmings had cast its Sunday morning shadow, there would soon be room for common graves in tight formation.

  After the end of the war, a gauleiter, who for a time had given his name to the stadium behind the Cemetery of Reconciliation, was put on trial in this same sports center. In those days, when Reschke and I were still students at St. Peter’s, then became Luftwaffe auxiliaries, ending up in the Labor Battalions—in those days, the crematorium above the United Cemeteries was still operating.

  The three-foot kneeling angel on the newspaper-covered kitchen table. I must admit that Reschke describes his Alexandra’s craft with love. He celebrates her tools as if they were ritual objects, and calls the gilder’s cushion, on which she cuts the gold leaf into suitable squares, “her altar, handled like a palette, on which, with boxwood tweezers, she slowly, solemnly picks up extremely thin leaf before pressing it with a brush of soft camel’s hair against the gesso sizing on the angel’s ancient wood. A collapsible parchment screen protects the leaf on the gilder’s cushion from drafts …”