Kaputt (17 page)

"La revedere, Domnule
Kane—I'll be seeing you."

"
La revedere, Domnule Capitan
,"
said Kane
.

We shook hands and smiled. Kane's was the shy, uncertain smile of an uneasy animal. As I was leaving a carriage stopped before the shop. Kane rushed to the door and bowing down to the ground he said, "Good day,
Domna Principessa."

It was one of those old-fashioned lordly carriages, black and solemn—a sort of open landau with its hood lowered and fastened down by broad leather straps—that are still to be seen in the Romanian countryside. The seats were upholstered in gray material; the spokes of the wheels were painted red. A pair of splendid white Moldavian horses with long manes, their quarters glistening with sweat, were harnessed to the carriage. Sitting on high, wide cushions was a thin lady, no longer young, with the skin of her face withered under a thick coating of white powder. She sat stiffly upright, dressed in pale blue and held in her right hand a red silk parasol with a lace flounce. The brim of her broad Florentine straw hat cast a slight shadow on her lined forehead. There was a proud look in her filmed eyes, but their arrogance had something vague and distant because of her near-sightedness. Her face was motionless, her gaze turned upward, toward a blue silk sky on which white clouds lightly floated, resembling the shadows of clouds mirrored in a lake. She was Princess Sturdza, bearer of a great Moldavian name. Next to her sat Prince Sturdza, proud and remote,- he was still a young man, tall, lean, rosy, dressed in white, his brow shaded by the brim of a gray felt hat. He wore a stiff high collar, a gray tie, gray cotton gloves and black buttoned boots.

"Good day,
Domna Principessa
," said Kane bowing down to the ground. I saw the blood rushing to the back of his neck and pulsating in his temples. The Princess did not return the greeting, did not turn her neck that was encircled by a tight lace collar held up by short pieces of whalebone,- instead she ordered in a dry and imperious voice, "Hand my tea to Grigori." Grigori, the coachman, was perched on his seat, wrapped in a heavy, faded green silk robe that reached down to the heels of his red leather boots. On his head he wore a little Tartar skull cap of yellow satin embroidered in red and green. He was fat, flabby and pale; he was a member of the Orthodox sect of the
Skoptsi
—the emasculated—whose holy city is Jassy. The
Skoptsi
marry young, and as soon as they have begotten a son, they have themselves castrated. Kane bowed to the eunuch Grigori, mumbled a few words; then darted into the shop, and a few moments later came out again, again bowed to the ground, and in a trembling voice said:
"Domna Principessa,
forgive me, I have nothing left, not a single tea leaf,
Domna Principessa—"

"Hurry up now, my tea," said Princess Sturdza in a hard voice.

"Excuse me,
Domna Principessa—"

The Princess turned her head slowly, stared at him without batting an eyelid, and said in a tired voice, "What are these stories? ... Grigori!"

The eunuch turned and lifted his whip, the long Moldavian whip with a red tassle and a carved handle painted red, blue and green. He dangled it wickedly above Kane's shoulders and brushed his neck with it.

"Excuse me,
Domna Principessa..."
said Kane lowering his head.

"Grigori!" said the Princess in a faint voice.

Then, as the eunuch raised his whip, lifting and stretching his arms as if he were holding a flagpole in his fist, and rose to his feet to strike a better blow, Kane turned toward me, stretched out his hand, touched with trembling fingers the bag of tea that I was clutching under my arm, and sweating, pale, imploring, said to me in a low voice, "Excuse me,
Domnule Capitan
—" He grasped the bag that I smilingly held out to him, and he handed it to Grigori with a bow. The eunuch diverted the violent blow to the back of the horses that started, reared and were off; with a sharp tinkling of bells, the carriage disappeared in a cloud of dust. A dab of foam from the bit of one of the horses had fallen onto my shoulder.

"La dracu, Domna Principessa, la dracu!"
I shouted. But the carriage was already far away, it was already taking the turn at the end of the road, toward the Jockey Club and the
Fundatia.

"Thank you,
Domnule Capitan,"
said Kane in a soft voice, lowering his eyes with shame.

"It's all right,
Domnule
Kane, but to the devil with Princess Sturdza,
la dracu
all these Moldavian nobles."

My friend Kane lifted his eyes, his face crimson with large drops of sweat on his forehead.

"It doesn't matter," I said, "it doesn't matter.
La revedere, Domnule
Kane."

"La revedere, Domnule Capitan,"
answered Kane, wiping his brow with the back of his hand.

Walking back toward the churchyard, I passed in front of the druggist on the corner of the Strada Lapusneanu and Strada Bratianu. I entered and went up to the counter.

"Good day,
Domniscoara
Mica."

"
Good day
,
Domnule Capitan
."

Mica smiled as she rested her elbows on the marble counter. Mica was a nice-looking girl, dark, buxom, with a forehead weighed down by a mass of curly black hair, a pointed chin, a large fleshy mouth, and a face covered with a light down that shone with bluish reflections. I had tried to date her before leaving Jassy for the Prut lines. Good Lord, I thought, it's two months since I have had a woman. I had not touched a woman in Bucharest. It was too hot. Good Lord, I scarcely know any longer what women are like.

"
Cum merge a sanatate—
How are you
—Domniscoara
Mica
?"

"
Bine, foarte bine—
Well, very well
—Domnule Capitan
."

A fine girl, but as hairy as a goat; she had large, black, glistening eyes and a thin nose in a plump dark face. There must have been some gypsy blood in her veins. She told me that she would like to go for a walk that evening after curfew.

"After curfew,
Domniscoara
Mica?"

"
Da, da—
Yes, yes
,
Domnule Capitan
."

Good heavens, what an idea! How was I to take a girl out after curfew, when police and military patrols shouted
stai, stail
from afar, and shot before there was time to reply? Besides, what an idea to wander around the ruins of houses wrecked by bombs and charred by fire. A house was still burning from the day before in Unirii Square, in front of Prince Gutsa Voda's statue. The Soviet bombers were hammering hard. For three hours the day before they had been flying over Jassy, calmly moving back and forth not more than nine hundred feet above the city. Some planes had grazed the roofs. A Russian bomber on its return trip, on its way to Skuleni, had fallen headlong into a field just outside the city beyond Capou.

The crew was made up of six women. I went to look at them. Some Romanian soldiers were rummaging inside the pilots' cabin,- they handled those poor girls with their grubby fingers, dirty with
cioiba, mamaliga
and
brenza.
"Let her alone, you bastard!" I had started shouting to a soldier who was running his fingers through the hair of one of the two pilots, a sturdy blonde with a freckled face. Her eyes were wide open, her mouth half-shut; one of her hands hung by her side, her head rested on the shoulder of her companion in an attitude of modesty and renunciation. They were two brave girls who had carried out their duty and were entitled to respect. Two honest factory girls, weren't they,
Domna Principessa
Sturdza? They wore gray overalls and leather jackets. The soldiers were slowly stripping them, unbuttoning the leather jackets, raising their limp arms, pulling the jackets over their heads. To keep up the head of one of the girls a soldier had caught her under the chin and was clutching her throat as if he had meant to choke her; his broad thumb with a black cracked nail pressed against the half-shut mouth and the thick, bloodless lips. "Bite his finger, you fool!" I shouted as if the girl could hear me. The soldiers looked at me and laughed. Another girl was wedged in between the bomb cradle and a heavy machine gun,- in that position it was impossible to remove the jacket from her. A soldier undid her leather helmet, grasped her by the hair and jerked her out, rolling her onto the ground near the remains of the plane.

"Domnule Capitan,
will you take me for a walk tonight, after curfew? " asked Mica resting her chin on her two open palms.

"Why not,
Domniscoara
Mica? It's nice to be out at night, after curfew. Haven't you ever been in the park at night? There is never anyone."

"Won't they shoot at us,
Domnule Capitan'."

"Let's hope so, let's hope that they shoot at us,
Domniscoara
Mica."

Mica laughed, leaned across the counter, put her fat hairy face close to mine and bit my lips.

"Come for me at seven,
Domnule Capitan.
Ill wait for you out there, in front of the druggist."

"Right, Mica, at seven.
La revedere, Domniscoara
Mica."

I walked up Strada Lapusneanu, crossed the churchyard, and pushed open the door of my house. I ate a little
brenza,
then I threw myself on the bed. It was hot; the flies hummed incessantly. A bare high-pitched buzz seemed to drop from the sky, a heavy sweet buzz, not unlike the thick scent of carnations, was lazily spreading from the sky dripping with sweat. By heaven, how sleepy I was! The
zuica
was simmering inside me. About five in the afternoon I awoke, went out into the cemetery and sat down on a tombstone buried in the grass. In olden times it had been a churchyard, this garden of mine, an ancient Orthodox cemetery, the oldest in Jassy. Where once a little church stood, in the center of the churchyard was the entrance to a public
adapost,
a shelter into which one descended by a steep little wooden staircase. The mouth of the
adapost
looked like the entrance to an underground mausoleum. Inside the shelter, there was a smell of rotten earth, a thick smell of tombs. On the roof of the
adapost,
which the heaped-up earth lent the shape of a sepulchral mound, rose a pyramid of tombstones placed crossways one on top of the other. From the spot where I was sitting I could read the posthumous praise of
Domnule
Grigorio Soinescu, of
Domna
Sofia Zanfirescu, of
Domna
Maria Pojaescu—carved in the tombstones. It was hot, my lips were parched with thirst, and as I breathed in the dead smell of the earth, I gazed fixedly at the rusty iron railings around a few tombs which had remained unscathed in the shadow of the acacias. I felt dizzy, nausea gripped my stomach.
La dracu
Mica,
la dracu
Mica and all her goat's hair. The flies buzzed wickedly, a damp wind rose from the banks of the Prut.

Now and then from the lower end of town, down toward Usine, Socola and Pacurari, from the railway works of Nicolina, from the buildings scattered along the banks of the Bahlui, from the Tzicau and Tatarasi suburbs, that were once the Tartar quarter, rang out the sharp sound of a rifle shot. Romanian soldiers and policemen are nervous, they shout
stail stail
and they fire at people without giving them a chance to raise their arms. And this was still daylight, the curfew had not yet sounded. The wind was swelling the foliage of the trees; the sun charged the air with an odor of honey. Mica was expecting me at seven—in front of the druggist's. And in half an hour I was to go and call for Mica to take her for a walk.

La dracu Domniscoara
Mica,
la dracu
the goats, too. A few passers-by slunk cautiously along the walls and brandished their passes in their right hands held high above their heads. There was really something in the air. My friend Kane was right. Something was about to happen. One felt that some misfortune was imminent. One felt it in the air, in one's skin, in one's finger tips.

When I arrived in front of the druggist's shop, it was seven sharp, and Mica was not there. The shop was closed. Mica had closed it early that evening, much earlier than usual. I could have wagered that she was not coming, that she had become frightened at the last moment.
La dracu
all women, they are all alike, they all become frightened, and always at the last moment.
La dracu Domniscoara
Mica,
la dracu
the goats, too. I walked slowly up the street toward the cemetery. Groups of German soldiers were passing by dragging their boots along the sidewalk. The owner of the
lustrageria,
on the corner of Strada Lapusneanu, just in front of the Corso Café-Restaurant, was wielding his last brush strokes on the shoes of his last patron for the day, a Romanian soldier seated high on his brass throne.

The glow of the sunset penetrated to the very back of the dark shop, causing the tins of shoe polish to glisten. From time to time I met a group of manacled Jews who trod along, their heads low, under the guard of Romanian soldiers in their sand-colored uniforms. "Why don't you polish the boots of those unfortunate ones for the last time?" laughed the Romanian soldier seated high on his brass throne. "Can't you see they are barefoot?" replied the owner of the
lustrageria
raising his pale, sweaty face. He was gently panting as he swung his brush with amazing lightness.

The aristocrats of Jassy were looking out of the windows of the Jockey Club—those fat, round-bellied Moldavian gentlemen, sweetly and tamely adipose, their faces smooth and flabby, their gloomy deeply circled eyes shining humid and languid; they looked like figures by Pascin. The houses, the trees and the carriages that stopped in front of the Fundatia Palace also looked as if they had been painted by Pascin. Farther away in the sky, toward Skuleni, toward the Prut sluggishly flowing between its muddy banks thick with reeds—there burst little red and white clouds of flak. The owner of the shoe-shine parlor, while putting on the shutters of his shop, glanced upward at those little clouds in the far-off sky, as if he were watching the approach of a storm.