Sleeping in Flame (27 page)

Although it's a famous story, I didn't realize how short it was. Before reading, I did a quick line count and saw it was no more than 1500 words. Her copy was in English and I knew I'd have to get hold of the German original too, but for the moment this would be enough.

Whether we have better memories, or simply a better capacity for wonder as children, what struck me was how well I remembered the story, although it had been more than twenty years since I'd last read it: The poor miller's daughter who can supposedly spin straw into gold (according to her father), the king's interest, her desperation when it comes times to actually do it.

_When she began to weep, the door suddenly opened, and a little man entered._

Not a midget or a dwarf, "a little man."

What I had forgotten was that he first takes a necklace and a ring from the girl before he does any spinning for her. That made no sense, even in the land of fairy tales. If she was so poor, where did she get all the jewelry? I

decided to hold off on the cynicism until I'd read the whole story.

Just after that comes the first intriguing part of the story. When the girl has nothing left to give but still must spin gold for the king, the little man demands her first child when she becomes queen. She agrees! Until that point we're obviously supposed to not only be on her side, but feel great pity for both her poverty and helplessness. But if she is so virtuous, why would she accede
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so quickly to such a terrible and inhuman demand? All that is said to justify her decision is, _Who knows whether it will ever come to that?

thought the miller's daughter. And since she knew of no other way out of her predicament, she promised the little man what he demanded_.

Lured to the kitchen by the strong perfume of fresh coffee, I got up feeling like a graduate student at work on his thesis: "A Critical Examination of the Role of Early Germanic Sexism in

'Rumpelstiltskin,' by Walker J.

Easterling." There's probably some weenie out there actually writing something like that.

Warming my hands around the coffee cup, I looked down into the courtyard, but today there was no Rumpelstiltskin bicycle leaning up against the wall. I remembered the scene in _The Bicycle Thief_ where the little boy watches his father steal a bicycle and then get chased by the mob. My father?

The only father I'd ever known was Jack Easterling of Atlanta, Georgia. A tall, quiet man who sold ad space in the _Atlanta Constitution_ and liked nothing more than to have a catch in the backyard with his son Walker, who was never a very good baseball player.

Walker, Moritz, Alexander (Rednaxela), Walter.

Easterling, Benedikt, Kroll . . .

What was the last name of the boy in my Rumpelstiltskin dream? My coffee break was over.

Before sitting down again with the book, I typed those names into the computer, too.

The king comes in the next morning, and seeing his third haul of new gold, decides to marry the girl. Nothing more is heard of their relationship until a year later when the queen delivers her first child.

_The little man had disappeared_ (?!) _from her mind, but now he suddenly appeared in her room and said, 'Now give me what you promised_.'

Wait a minute. I knew it was a story, but how in the world could he have

'disappeared' from her mind when from the beginning he'd been the reason for her success? I was chewing on that when a few lines later I found the key to the story.

_The queen was horrified and offered the little man all the treasures of the kingdom if he would let her keep the child, but the little man replied, "No, something living is more important to me than all the treasures of the world._"

Why would he say that? If he was magical enough to spin straw into gold, couldn't he just as well have conjured up a real child of his own? Something in what he said the night before slid into my mind. Something about how the girl promised to love him even if he couldn't do it. What was _it_, sex? An intriguing notion, and it made sense. I read the line again. . . . _something living is more important to me than all the treasures of the world_.

I put on my screenwriter's hat and started thinking about motivation.

The little man falls in love with the girl and does her spinning. He thinks she'll love him for it, even though he's not a "real" man because he's incapable of taking her to bed. But that makes him fight all the harder for her because he hopes that by doing all these magical things, she'll love him anyway.

I sat back in the chair and snorted. What would Freud or Bruno Bettelheim say? This had to go into the computer too. I went over and started typing, not watching what was happening on the screen. When I did have a few words written, I looked up to check.

On the monitor was a picture of a room. It was clear and in color and looked like a movie. A television flickered in a corner of the room and I

realized one of my old films was showing there: the film I had made with Nicholas when Victoria and I first came to Vienna. I even knew the scene. It had been so difficult to shoot that we'd had to do it over and over until

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Nicholas blew his top at me and said, "Start acting like a human being, will you?"

Someone in the room laughed.

The picture bled away and was replaced by one of Victoria and a man in bed, fucking: the actor I'd introduced her to who owned all of the nice

Hoffmann furniture. They were moving around like mad dogs, howling and biting, eating each other alive. Despite the passage of time and my great love for Maris, what I saw punched me in the stomach. While my friend humped my wife, she began hitting him on the back with her small fist. She cried out "I hate you! I hate you, Walker!" The man laughed and put his hand over her mouth. She bit it and made him yelp. My memories of sleeping with Victoria were quiet and comfortable. She used to tickle my back with her long fingernails, and laugh when I tried to roll her around or do something different.

The television picture bled away until the screen was empty. Just the room was there now. I heard footsteps somewhere off-camera and then the madman on the bicycle walked into the scene. He had a large bowl of popcorn in one hand and was humming. Sitting down in the room's only chair, he picked up a remote control box from the floor and changed the channel.

Another of my old films came on.

"What are you doing?"

Popcorn sprayed across the floor when the man jumped up. He looked all around him but clearly didn't know where I was.

"Walter, are you here?"

"What the fuck are you doing? Where did you get those films?"

"Where are you?"

"I'm here. Here! Looking right at you!"

He smiled, but there was only dark in his mouth.

"You still have your magic. I can't see you but you can see me. That's wonderful. You _can_ still do it if you want."

"I don't want anything."

He kept looking around, as if he'd spy me in a corner sooner or later.

Giving up, he spread his arms like a minister in front of a congregation.

"You're really _not_ here. That makes me so happy. My son still has his magic.

What's my name? Tell me my name, Walter."

I was about to say something but stopped. "Tell me why you're here. Then I'll tell you."

"I've always been here. Every time you come back, I'm here. Every life you live, I'm here to see if you're ready to come home to me. The biggest mistake I ever made was letting you grow up. I should have kept you little.

When you were little you loved me so much. You didn't think about girls then; you only wanted to be with your Papa. Why did I ever let that happen?"

"The dreams are real? I lived those lives?"

He clapped his hands. "Yes! Yes! Do you know how happy I am to hear you ask that question?

This is the thirty-first life you've lived. Never once in any of them have you realized what's been going on. This is the first time! It means you're so close. What's my name, Walter? Tell Papa his name."

"No, not yet. Why have I had to live all these lives? What's the purpose?"

"The purpose? You don't remember? You don't remember betraying your own father? You're doing it now with that bitch in the hospital! Only this time it's going to be different if you keep it up, my boy. Oh, yes, this time you're not going to have another chance. Even a father loses his patience after this long. Every life you get more and more like your mother. Both of you promise and both of you lie.

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"Maybe it's just in your blood. Maybe I was wrong to think if I taught you, if I raised you right, you'd be different and see how much better it is to be like me. Like your father!"

I spoke as coolly as I could. "My father is in Atlanta."

His answer was cooler. "Oh, really? Watch the television. See for yourself, _Walker_."

In an instant I knew the place. I'd been there so many times since my parents told me where I'd really come from. The alley behind Conroy's

Restaurant in Atlanta. The only things different were a 1956 Chevrolet parked there, and the area looked much cleaner than I remembered. At the far end of it, a midget appeared holding something in his arms. Something large and wrapped in a white blanket. He went straight over to one of the garbage cans behind the restaurant, and after first kissing the thing inside the blanket,

laid it down carefully inside one of them.

He hovered over the can and whispered, "This time. Come home this time, Walter." The sound of someone approaching made him pull back fast. After one last tender look, the little man scurried away.

From the other end of the alley a bum slunk in, looking into every garbage can along the way.

When he reached this one he looked once, twice, and suddenly his face said everything. He lifted the white bundle gingerly out of the can, and for the first time I saw that there was a note pinned to the blanket. The bum saw it too, his drunken eyes trying to focus.

"Holy shit, a baby! Wait, what does it say? 'His name is . . . Walker?

Please take care of him.' Well, holy shit, Walker. Looks like someone doesn't want you."

Cradling the baby to his chest, he staggered away. Along the way, the note fell off without his seeing it.

Shortly after he left, a motorcycle roared through the alley and ran over the note. Somehow or other it stuck to the wheel.

"Now tell me my name, son."

Without my touching it, the monitor rose off Maris's table and exploded in midair.

"Fuck you, Papa."

"How are you?"

"Okay."

"You don't look okay. You look very un-okay."

"Worry. It gives you wrinkles."

"Come here."

"I can't move."

"Come here anyway."

I got up and walked over to her bed. She looked both pale and radiant.

"We're going to have a baby. What do you think of that?"

"I think I love you and I'm very happy."

She frowned. "You don't sound excited."

"Maris, I don't know what you're supposed to say when you find out you're going to be a father.

I guess I'm in shock."

"That's better. I think I am too, but it's nice, isn't it? I was so scared last night. I thought this is really it, folks. My time has come. Crazy how twelve hours later you can be glad for all that blood."

"What did the doctor say?"

"That it'd be best if I stayed here flat on my back for a couple of weeks. That part I don't like -- it means we can't get married till I'm Out of here."

"That can wait. Neither of us is going anywhere."

She took my hand and squeezed it. "What shall we name it? I've been thinking ever since they
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told me. I hope you don't mind, but I don't want to call it either Walker or Maris. I don't like it when people name their kids after themselves."

"I agree. How about Walter?"

"_Walter?_ Where'd you get that name?"

"Nowhere. It's a joke."

"'Walter Easterling' sounds like a fat banker." She squeezed my hand again. "They've given me every test in this hospital. They're very nice about it, but every time someone new comes into the room they want to give me another test."

"Maris, I'm sorry if I'm not good company. I'm sort of stoned right now.

You're the one who went through all the pain, but I'm woozy from sleeping in the waiting room, I guess."

"I can see. When they told me you did that I wanted to run out and kiss you. That wasn't necessary, but I'm secretly glad you did it."

Although she'd been through hell the night before, the news of the child had so buoyed her that she chatted away until she was exhausted. It showed in

her eyes first -- I literally saw something leave them before they dropped closed for a long second.

"I think I have to sleep now, my friend."

"Okay, sure. But you feel better?"

"I feel terrible, but I don't care. We're going to have a child, Walker.

You know how much I want that. I never told you before, but once when I was with Luc I missed my period for a couple of weeks and thought I was pregnant.

I've never felt so torn in my life. When my period came I was so happy I cried. I've always been ashamed of that, the being happy, but now I know I was right. Now the whole thing is right and I feel like the best is about to begin for us. It's the truth."

"That's a great compliment, you know?"

"It's going to be a good baby. You deserve the compliment."

I called from a phone booth near her building.

"Hello?"

"Mrs. Benedikt? This is Walker Easterling. Mrs. Benedikt, would it be at all possible for you to talk to me for a few minutes? It's really extremely important."

"No. I don't know. I don't want you coming up here again after what happened last time with Lillis. You understand."

"I do, I understand completely. But we can meet in a café. Mrs. Benedikt

--"

"Why do you want to talk? I told you everything."

"It's about Kaspar Benedikt. I have to tell you something that I found out about him."

"Like what?"

"Please come and meet me. I'm five minutes from your place. We can go to the café across the street."