A Perfect Waiter (4 page)

On the last Sunday in May 1935 Erneste went down to the landing stage by himself. The sky was clear, but a thick layer of mist floated above the water. It was considerably colder than the day before, and had rained heavily that
morning. No hotel guests were expected this Sunday. The most recent arrivals, a Russian family from Paris complete with grandmother and two servants, had checked in last night.

Erneste was waiting for the steamer. His was an unplanned existence. Any plans affecting him were made by others, people who knew their business and to whom he willingly deferred. His work at the hotel brought him more than just a sense of security; he felt snug there. Having always been alone, he was barely conscious of his solitude. At night, when he sank wearily into bed, he felt safe, and that sensation lulled him to sleep at once. He had no reason to wish for a change in his circumstances.

He could have gone on living like that for many years more. The war of which everyone spoke was a distant threat. It was still just a word, and as long as it didn't make itself felt there was no serious cause for concern.

Erneste stood beside the lake and watched the little steamer draw nearer. On the foredeck, as they gradually increased in size, he made out a trio of figures with two members of the crew—short, sturdy men in uniform—moving around in front of them. One was holding the hawser he would throw out and make fast to a bollard once he'd vaulted ashore.

Erneste was waiting for some additions to the hotel staff. The receptionist had handed him a slip of paper bearing their names and particulars: Jakob Meier, a young German trainee waiter from Cologne, and Trudi and Fanny Gerber, two Swiss girls from Sumiswald who
would be employed in the hotel laundry. He glanced at his watch. The steamer was on time. It was half-past four when the vessel nudged the landing stage and jolted it.

While still on board the girls hovered behind Jakob in subdued silence, as if using the German youngster to conceal them from view. They politely murmured their names, but so softly that Erneste scarcely caught them. This was probably the first trip they'd ever made on their own, in fact they might never have left their village before. They were wearing threadbare clothes and lace gloves yellow with age. No one had told them that lace gloves were unsuitable for a laundry maid; on the contrary, some well-meaning soul had probably urged them to wear those gloves. Heaven alone knew where they'd acquired them—possibly at a rummage sale.

Jakob offered to carry the girls' suitcases. As he stooped to pick them up, flexing his knees a little because he was so tall, and looked up at Erneste from below, a lock of dark hair fell over his right eye, which was gray. His gaze was so forthright and open that Erneste had to meet it. He didn't look away but stared back. Timidly, the two girls stepped ashore with Jakob at their heels. When Erneste made his way up the narrow gangway to fetch the rest of the luggage he passed so close to the young man that they almost touched.

His emotions were unequivocal and, consequently, threatening, but he managed to concentrate on what had to be done. While the two girls stood on the landing stage, staring forlornly at the ground, he carried Jakob's
luggage down the gangway, so his nervous tremor wasn't noticeable. He had never encountered anyone who seemed to hold himself so erect. The young man from Germany moved with purposeful ease, as if he had long ago made up his mind to go far in life and outshine everyone in his path. At the same time, there was something gentle and dreamy about him. He was in no hurry, for all his resolute air, and gave those around him plenty of time to observe and admire him.

And so, on the last Sunday in May 1935, Erneste found himself face to face with nineteen-year-old Jakob Meier for the first time, in the presence of two mute girls whose lips would remain sealed throughout their six months at the Grand Hotel. Trudi and Fanny merely nodded at Erneste when he bade them welcome. They seemed to have left the power of speech behind in their village across the lake.

It wasn't until all four of them were standing on the shore that Jakob shook Erneste's hand and introduced himself. “Jakob Meier,” he said simply, and the handshake that accompanied this formal introduction seemed to say: “Here I am, having come here purely for your sake.” The little world in which Erneste had so blithely installed himself collapsed under the aegis of Jakob Meier's shadow. He quit that world for evermore—for evermore, he knew it—and gladly, unresistingly left it behind. He was entering uncharted territory, and uncharted territory was what he had always longed for without realizing it. Caught in the fine mesh of Jakob's net, he felt safer there than in
the infinity of ocean in which he had thoughtlessly and aimlessly been swimming until now. It was Jakob's handshake that wrought this change at a stroke, the cool, firm grip of the long, slender fingers that clasped his own.

Jakob gave him an unabashed stare. Perhaps he'd seen through him.
Had
he seen through him? Later on they would talk about everything, or almost everything, but never about that. There were subjects one didn't discuss, and the longer they knew each other the more numerous such subjects became. At that moment Erneste vowed to help the young man, to stand by him like a brother, to extricate him from any predicament, to ward off any threat, to preserve him from mortal danger even at the cost of his own life. The thoughts that ran through Erneste's head at that moment were so intense that they retained their immediacy thirty years later. He seemed to see Jakob as the son he would never have, as the sympathetic brother he'd never had, as the father and mother he would have liked, and as many other things—things he couldn't even admit to himself.

Jakob told him frankly that this was not only his first job at a regular hotel, but his first regular job of any kind. He was just nineteen, the only son of a widow, and had grown up in humble circumstances in Cologne. His father had been killed in France in 1918, shortly before the war ended. The widow jealously hoarded her late husband's letters and photos, but Jakob himself had never missed him. He hadn't seen much of the world before, but a bit more than the two girls, who were now standing huddled
closely together. They didn't survey their surroundings, just stared at their feet and their suitcases and showed no sign of noticing what was going on around them.

Although Jakob hadn't seen much of the world, he'd grown up in a big city, and Erneste surmised that this had left its mark on him. He would be starting right at the bottom in Giessbach, but Erneste felt sure there was nothing to prevent his rapid promotion. His talent was obvious. Jakob gave a sudden smile, although Erneste hadn't spoken, that being the surest way of not making enemies needlessly.

While the steamer was laboriously casting off and heading away from the shore, the two of them stowed the luggage on the front bench of the cable car. The girls sat down on the rearmost bench and didn't move. Scared stiff of being spoken to by the two young men, they spent the brief trip to the hotel staring timidly, earnestly, at their glove-encased hands. They didn't look where they were going or out the window, quite unlike Jakob, who was interested in anything novel and unfamiliar. He asked Erneste questions, wanted to know when this funicular, of which a photograph appeared in
Meyers Konversationslexikon
, had been constructed. “Back in 1875,” Erneste replied, and, when the Grand Hotel came into view, went on to tell Jakob the name of the man who had designed the massive building: “Horace Edouard Davinet. It was completed in 1879. Many important people have stayed here since then—princes, industrialists and big landowners from all over Europe.” He was telling him only
what he told everyone, but he spoke more softly than usual. His tone was a trifle constrained.

Jakob had never ridden in a cable car before. He was interested in knowing how often it was used and whether there had ever been an accident. Erneste had heard all these questions scores of times, so he found it easy to answer them on this occasion too. He answered them gladly, happy to be able to do so in such a practiced manner, for every word that escaped the young man's lips delighted him, and he didn't mind if Jakob noticed how much pleasure he derived from the sight of him and his unfeigned, almost childlike curiosity. During the ride, which took only six or seven minutes, Jakob confided that this was his very first sight of mountains except in photographs, and that he was looking forward to his job because he hadn't done anything worth mentioning so far. He had left school early and had always dreamed of going out into the world. “And now at last I really have.” Erneste smiled. “Just like me,” he said. “I was like that too—I couldn't wait to conquer the world.” He had found a kindred spirit.

The allocation of sleeping quarters wasn't one of Erneste's responsibilities, so it was pure chance that the two young men were assigned a room together. Members of staff were housed either in pairs in tiny attic rooms in the hotel itself or in dormitories in an annex. The morning after Jakob's arrival the alarm clock went off punctually at six. They were hardly out of bed before Erneste, who had slept badly, was instructing his new roommate in his duties. To begin with, these were menial tasks requiring neither intelligence nor special aptitudes, just a certain sense of tidiness and cleanliness.

It was still chilly an hour later, when Erneste handed Jakob a broom and told him to sweep all the terraces and outside steps, a job that would take him several hours, if not the whole morning. He mustn't hurry, Erneste emphasized, because it was essential that guests looking up from their breakfast or leaning over their balconies in their bathrobes be spared the sight of hectic activity. They must never get the impression that the Grand Hotel was understaffed, or that its employees were overworked and rushed off their feet. “Take it easy,” Erneste told Jakob.

“Act as if you had all the time in the world. Don't work too quickly or too slowly—just work steadily, then the guests will feel at ease. Never forget, they've no wish to be reminded that there's another world outside Giessbach. Look up from your work now and then, and if you catch some guest's eye, don't look away. Smile back and nod, but don't overdo it or you'll embarrass people. Never be pushy, always self-effacing. It's presumptuous of an employee to be arrogant.”

Erneste briefly checked on Jakob twice during the first two hours. He was making good progress. At ten o'clock he asked him to come with him. “You must be hungry, aren't you? Everyone gets hungry around this time.” Jakob nodded. He propped his broom against the wall and followed Erneste into the hotel by a rear entrance. They made their way through the kitchen, where lunch was being prepared—a hive of activity in which the chefs' raucous voices drowned all other sounds. Other members of staff were flocking to the canteen behind and ahead of them, some coming the other way. The passage was narrow, and people trying to squeeze past each other were thrust against the walls, which were damp in places.

In the canteen they had some coffee and hurriedly wolfed the guests' breakfast leftovers: rolls and croissants, butter and preserves, ham and cheese—anything that had been laid out on two long tables. They wouldn't get their midday meal until the last guests had left the dining room, which could often be after three, so it was advisable to stock up for the next few strenuous hours.

For a short time the canteen, too, was a scene of hectic activity that differed from the display of calm composure to which the management attached such importance when guests were around. This turmoil recurred at the same time every morning, between ten and half-past.

Erneste went on ahead and pointed to two vacant places. They sat down side by side at one of the pair of wooden tables that took up most of the room. The canteen made a gloomy impression. The only window, which was covered by a faded blind, was small and dirty and wholly superfluous. The bench on which they sat had no back to it.

Erneste introduced Jakob to the colleagues nearest them and the latecomers who took their places when the others had gotten up and hurried off, but Jakob felt convinced that none of them registered his name any more than he registered theirs. Too many people were coming and going, there was too much noise, and since most of the names sounded foreign he would have failed to memorize them even under more favorable conditions. Besides, many of them seemed to be deep in thought despite the noise. Some simply ignored him, others pulled faces as if they didn't grasp what Erneste was getting at. Jakob had never seen so many different nationalities in one place, not even at the central station in Cologne. While his left elbow was brushing that of an Italian, a Serbian's hand patted his shoulder, and while he was nodding to a Spaniard, a Portuguese turned to go. All were impatient, none looked him in the eye.

None of the staff who entered and left the canteen during this short break for breakfast was older than thirty-five, the majority being between sixteen and twenty-five. Senior hotel employees seldom quit their places of work at this hour. Moreover, the people who congregated here were exclusively male because the chambermaids were busy cleaning the rooms.

Although it didn't escape Erneste that the young German was attracting no more attention than any other trainee, it filled him with pride to be sitting beside Jakob as a matter of course. The others obviously didn't share his admiration. He searched their faces for a glimmer of envy and found none—not yet, but a second look at Jakob would soon change their minds. Jakob was handsome, as they couldn't fail to notice in the long run. He, at least, was not unaffected by Jakob's ease of manner. The others might be familiar with the feeling of friendship between men, but the feeling that linked him and this youngster was something quite else—that they couldn't know. He almost grasped Jakob's hand and squeezed it, but he naturally refrained from doing so. For one thing, he feared he might be rebuffed; for another, he was well aware how unseemly such overt gestures were, even here, where the rules weren't as strict as they were outside.