Amerika (5 page)

40. To the novelist Robert Musil, who linked Kafka and the Swiss writer Robert Walser in an early review of “The Stoker” and
Meditation (Betrachtung),
Karl Rossmann evokes a “feeling of excited children's prayers and something of the uneasy zeal of carefully-done school exercises and much which one can only describe with the phrase moral delicacy.” See
Kafka: Kritik und Rezeption,
p. 35.
Return to text.

Amerika:
The Missing Person

I

THE STOKER

_______________

A
s he entered New York Harbor on the now slow-moving ship, Karl Rossmann, a seventeen-year-old youth who had been sent to America by his poor parents because a servant girl had seduced him and borne a child by him, saw the Statue of Liberty, which he had been observing for some time, as if in a sudden burst of sunlight. The arm with the sword now reached aloft, and about her figure blew the free winds.

“So high,” he said to himself, and although he still had no thoughts of leaving, he found himself being pushed gradually toward the rail by an ever-swelling throng of porters.

In passing a young man whom he knew from the voyage said: “So you don't feel like getting off yet?” “Oh, I'm ready all right,” said Karl with a laugh, and in his exuberance, sturdy lad that he was, he lifted his trunk up on his shoulders. But looking out over his acquaintance, who swung his walking stick several times as he set off with the other passengers, he realized that he had forgotten his umbrella below deck. Quickly he asked his acquaintance, who seemed not at all pleased, whether he would be so kind as to wait there for a moment with his trunk, surveyed the scene quickly so he could find his bearings on his return, and hurried off. Downstairs he was disappointed to find a passageway that would have certainly shortened his path blocked off for the first time, probably on account of all those disembarking passengers, and was obliged to make his way laboriously through numerous small rooms, corridors that constantly turned off, many short stairs in rapid succession and an empty room with an abandoned desk, until at last, having gone that way only once or twice and always in company, he had quite lost his way. In his uncertainty, not encountering a soul and hearing only the constant scraping of a thousand human feet above him, and from a distance like a last gasp the final workings of the engine being shut down, he began without further reflection to knock at random on a little door before which he had halted. “It's open,” cried a voice from within and, sighing with genuine relief, Karl stepped into the cabin. “Why do you have to bang on the door like a madman?” a huge man asked, almost without looking at Karl. Through a skylight somewhere a dull light, already expended on the upper decks, fell into the miserable cabin, where a bed, a closet, a chair, and the man were packed side by side, as if in storage. “I've lost my way,” said Karl, “on the voyage over I never really noticed what a terribly big ship this is.” “Yes, you're right,” the man said with a certain pride as he tinkered with the lock on a small suitcase, which he opened and closed continually with both hands, listening for the bolt to snap into place. “But do come in,” the man continued, “you're hardly going to stand there like that.” “Am I not disturbing you?” Karl asked. “How could you disturb me?” “Are you a German?” Karl sought to assure himself, for he had heard a great deal about the dangers facing newcomers in America, especially from Irishmen. “Yes, yes,” said the man. Karl continued to hesitate. Suddenly the man seized the door handle and pulled Karl into the cabin along with the door, which he promptly shut. “I simply can't stand having people stare in at me from the corridor,” the man said, toying with his trunk again. “Everyone who walks by looks in; who could possibly stand that?” “But the corridor is completely empty,” said Karl, who was pressed uncomfortably against the bedpost. “It is now,” said the man. When else but now? thought Karl. It's not easy talking to this man. “Lie down on the bed, that'll give you a bit more room,” said the man. Karl crawled in as best he could, laughing loudly at his initially futile attempt to swing himself onto the bed. No sooner was he lying down than he cried: “Oh, my goodness, I forgot all about my trunk.” “Well, where is it?” “Up on deck, an acquaintance of mine is keeping an eye on it. Let me see, his name is . . . ?” From the secret pocket his mother had attached to the lining of his coat, Karl drew a visiting card: “Butterbaum, Franz Butterbaum.” “Do you really need the trunk?” “Of course I do.” “Then why did you give it to a stranger?” “I had forgotten my umbrella below deck, so I ran to get it, but didn't want to drag along my trunk. And then I got lost.” “You're alone? Unaccompanied?” “Yes, I'm alone.” Perhaps I should stick with this man—thought Karl—for where else could I find a better friend just now? “And you've lost your trunk too. Not to mention your umbrella,” and the man sat down on the chair as though he had begun to take an interest in Karl's affair. “But I don't believe that my trunk is lost.” “Blessed are those who believe,” said the man, giving his thick short dark hair a vigorous scratching. “People's conduct on board ship varies from one port to the next; in Hamburg your friend Butterbaum might have looked after your trunk, but here both will probably disappear without a trace.” “Well, in that case I'll have to check up on deck at once,” said Karl, looking around for a way out. “Stay,” the man said and, putting his hand on Karl's chest, pushed him roughly back onto the bed. “But why?” asked Karl, who had become annoyed. “It makes no sense,” said the man. “I'll be leaving in a moment, and we can go together. Either the trunk has been stolen, in which case it's hopeless and you can moan about it till the end of your days, or that person is still looking after it, in which case he's an idiot and should keep on looking after it, or else he's just an honest man who has left the trunk there, and it'll be easier to find if we wait till the ship has emptied out completely. The same goes for your umbrella.” “Do you know your way around the ship?” Karl asked suspiciously, for he believed there must be some hidden flaw in the otherwise convincing notion that his belongings could be more easily found when the ship was empty. “But I'm a stoker,” said the man. “You are a stoker,” Karl cried with delight, as if this announcement surpassed all his expectations, and propping up on his elbows, he took a closer look at the man. “One could see into the engine room through a hatch next to the cabin in which I slept in with the Slovaks.” “Yes, that's where I worked,” said the stoker. “I've always been very interested in technology,” said Karl, following his own train of thought, “and would no doubt have eventually become an engineer if I hadn't had to go away to America.” “But why did you have to go away?” “Ah well!” said Karl, dismissing the entire affair with a wave of his hand. At the same time he smiled at the stoker as though seeking indulgence concerning matters that he had not disclosed. “But there must have been a reason,” said the stoker, and one could not tell whether he was requesting an explanation or attempting to forestall one. “I too could become a stoker,” said Karl, “my parents no longer care what I do.” “There'll be an opening for my job,” said the stoker, and basking in this knowledge, he put his hands in his trouser pockets and stretched out by swinging his legs, which were clad in creased leatherlike iron-gray trousers, onto the bed. Karl had to move closer to the wall. “You're leaving ship?” “Oh yes, we're marching off today.” “But why? Don't you like it here?” “Well, that's just how it is; one's own preferences aren't always taken into account. Besides, you're right, I don't like it here. In any case, you're probably not completely set on becoming a stoker, though that's actually when it's most likely to happen. So I strongly advise against it. If you wanted to study in Europe, why wouldn't you want to study here? The American universities are, of course, incomparably better.” “That may well be so,” said Karl, “but I've barely any money to pay for my studies. I once read about someone who worked for a business by day and studied at night till he became a doctor and then, I believe, a mayor. But that takes great perseverance, doesn't it? And that's something I'm afraid I lack. Besides, I wasn't an especially good student, and it wasn't that hard for me to leave school. And the schools over here may be even stricter. I know hardly any English. In any case people here are often very prejudiced against foreigners.” “So you've already run into this too? In that case everything is fine. Then you're my man. You see, we're on a German ship, it belongs to the Hamburg Amerika Line, so why aren't all of us here Germans? Why is the chief machinist a Romanian? His name is Schubal. It's really incredible. And that scoundrel mistreats us Germans on a German ship. Now I don't want you to get the idea”—he was out of breath now and fanned himself with his hand—“that I'm complaining for the sake of complaining. I know you've no influence and are only a poor little fellow. But this is too awful.” And he pounded several times on the table, keeping his eyes on his fist as he did so. “I've served on so many ships”—he reeled off twenty names as if they were a single word; Karl became very confused—“made my mark, got praised, all of the captains greatly appreciated my work, and even spent several years serving on the same merchant vessel.” He stood up as if this were the high point in his life—“and here on this tub, where everything is kept on such a tight leash, where one may not even joke around—I'm useless, always get in Schubal's way, am simply a lazybones who deserves to be thrown out, and am paid only out of pity. Can you understand that? I certainly can't.” “You shouldn't stand for it,” Karl said in an agitated voice. So at home did he feel on the stoker's bed that he had almost lost the feeling that he stood on the uncertain ground of a ship moored off the coast of an unfamiliar continent. “Have you been to the captain? Have you sought to obtain your rights from him?” “Oh go away, just go away. I don't want you here. You don't listen to what I have to say and then try to give me advice. How could I possibly go to the captain?” And the stoker sat down wearily, burying his face in both hands. “I couldn't have given him any better advice,” Karl said to himself. And it occurred to him that he should have fetched his trunk rather than remain here and make suggestions only to hear them dismissed as stupid. On entrusting him with the trunk, his father had asked him in jest: How long will you hang on to it? And now that expensive trunk was perhaps lost. The only consolation was that his father would not discover anything about his present circumstances, even if he were to make inquiries. All the shipping company could say was that he had reached New York. Karl did regret, though, that he had barely made use of the belongings in the suitcase, especially since he should have changed his shirt sometime ago. So he had been economizing in the wrong places; now, at the outset of his new career, precisely when he needed to appear in clean clothes, he would have to turn up in a dirty shirt. What wonderful prospects! Otherwise the loss of the trunk wouldn't have been so bad, since the suit he wore was better than the one in the trunk, which was meant only for emergencies and had been patched by his mother shortly before he left. He remembered now that there was still a piece of Veronese salami in the trunk, which his mother had packed in as an extra present, but of which he had eaten only the tiniest portion, for he had not had much of an appetite during the voyage and the soup handed out in steerage had more than sufficed. He would have liked to get his hands on the sausage so that he could bequeath it to the stoker. For one could gain the confidence of such people quite easily, merely by slipping them a little something; Karl knew this from his father, who had gained the confidence of all the lower-ranking employees he dealt with by handing out cigars. All that remained for Karl to give away was a little money, but now that he had perhaps lost his trunk, he did not want to touch that for the moment. His thoughts returned to the trunk, and he could no longer understand why he had even bothered to keep such close watch over his trunk that he had barely slept, only to let somebody relieve him of it so easily. He recalled the five nights he had lain in bed always suspecting that a little Slovak two beds away had his eyes on the trunk. That Slovak had awaited the moment when Karl would at last succumb to weakness and doze off so that he would then be able to take the long stick, with which he had played or possibly practiced all day, and pull the trunk over to his bed. By day the Slovak looked fairly innocent, but when darkness fell he would rise occasionally from his bed and look over at Karl's trunk with a mournful expression on his face. Karl could observe this very clearly, for there was always someone prey to an emigrant's unease who would turn on a little light—even though the ship's regulations expressly forbade this—and attempt to decipher the incomprehensible brochures put out by the emigration agencies. If there was such a light nearby, Karl could doze off for a while, but if it was some distance away or the room was dark, he had to keep his eyes open. These exertions had left him quite exhausted. And had perhaps been in vain. Woe betide that Butter-baum, should he ever run into him again!

Just then, interrupting the perfect silence, came the sound of short little taps, as of children's feet approaching from afar; as they came closer, the sound grew louder and was now that of steadily marching men. They seemed to advance in single file, as was only natural in this narrow passageway; one could hear a clashing as of weapons. About to stretch out in bed and fall asleep, freed at last from all concerns about trunks and Slovaks, Karl gave a start and nudged the stoker so as to alert him, since the head of the procession appeared to have reached the door. “It's the ship's band,” said the stoker. “They've played up on deck and are going inside to pack. Everything's ready, so we can leave. Come on.” Taking Karl by the hand, he at the last moment seized a picture of the Madonna from the wall above his bed, stuffed it into his breast pocket, grabbed his trunk, and left the cabin quickly with Karl.

“I'm going to the office to give these gentlemen a piece of my mind. There's nobody around anymore, so it's no longer necessary to watch what one says,” the stoker said repeatedly, using a variety of formulations, and without breaking stride gave a few side kicks to flatten a rat that had crossed his path, but he merely succeeded in driving it even more quickly into its hole, which it reached just in time. Besides, his movements were slow, for though he had very long legs, they nonetheless weighed him down.