The Collected Stories of Heinrich Boll (102 page)

Meanwhile the mother of the young lady continues to accept flowers and chocolates with the same kindly smile: we are glad to make this sacrifice on the altar of high society, while we tremble: our credit keeps rising, and people are whispering that I am an illegitimate son of A’s.

We have advanced from butter and cheese to pâté and goose-liver sausage; we no longer roll our own but smoke only the better brands. And we are informed: the young lady from Bonn is coming! She actually arrives! She arrives in the car of a secretary of state whose toes she is said to have rid of a whole colony of sinister corns. So be prepared: she is about to appear!

We spent three days in a state of extreme nervousness, and instead of ten-pfennig cigarettes we now smoke fifteen-pfennig cigarettes, since they do a better job of calming our nerves. I shave twice a day, whereas I used to shave twice a week as befits any normal unemployed person. But I have long ceased to be a normal unemployed person. We copy testimonials, over and over again, each one neater and more cogent than the last, type out
curricula vitae
(eighteen copies to be on the safe side), and rush off to have them notarized: a whole stack of paper will supply information on the tremendous capabilities that predestine me for the position of clerk in the outer office of a department head.

Friday and Saturday go by while we consume (on credit, of course) a quarter of a pound of coffee and a package of fifty fifteen-pfennig cigarettes a day. We try to converse in a jargon that might conceivably correspond to government circles. My wife says: “I’m really so down, dahling,” and I reply: “Sorry, dahling, must stick it out.” And we actually do stick it out until the following Sunday. Sunday afternoon we are invited for tea with the young lady (a reciprocal gesture for those twelve bouquets and five boxes of chocolates). Her mother has assured us that I would spend at least eight minutes alone with her. Eight minutes. I buy two dozen plump pink carnations—three for each minute: magnificent specimens of carnations, so plump and pink they seem about to burst. They look like the essence of rococo ladies. I also buy a delightful box of chocolates and ask my friend to drive us there in his car. We drive to the house, honk like mad, and my wife, who is pale with excitement, keeps whispering: “I’m really so down, dahling, so down.”

The young lady looks delightful, slender and self-assured, quite the government pedicurist, yet she is gracious and charming, although a little reserved. She sits enthroned at the head of the table, fussed over by her mother, and I am dismayed to count seven persons at the table: three young scoundrels with their wives and an elderly gentleman who is kind enough audibly to admire my flowers—but our chocolate box is
really delightful, it is made of smooth gold cardboard, has a lovely pink pompon on top, and altogether looks more like an exquisite powder box than a box of chocolates: this box, too, is audibly admired by the elderly gentleman (I am deeply grateful to him for this), and during the introductions I notice that the mother says to her daughter: “Mr B and wife,” then after a pause, with more emphasis: “Mr B.” The young lady throws me a meaningful glance, nods and smiles, and I can feel myself turning pale: I feel that I am the favourite and now accept the presence of those three young scoundrels and their wives with a smile.

The tea party progresses somewhat stiffly: first we discuss the enormous advances in the chocolate industry since the currency reform, a conversation prompted by a chocolate box that seems to have caught the fancy of the elderly gentleman. I have a dark suspicion that he has been invited to the tea party by the mother for tactical reasons. But for my taste the old fellow is too blatant about it, too undiplomatic, and the other three scoundrels, whose chocolate boxes remain ignored, give a bitter-sweet smile and the tea party progresses stiffly until the young lady takes out a cigarette: a ten-pfennig one, and embarks on some delicate government gossip. We spring to our feet, all five of us, to offer her a light, but she accepts only mine. I can feel my chest swelling and begin to have visions of my office in Bonn: red leather armchairs, cinnamon-coloured curtains, fabulous filing cabinets and, as my superior, a retired colonel who for sheer compassion can hardly see straight …

Suddenly the young lady has vanished, and for a while I fail to notice the signals of her mother who is trying to convey to me that I should leave the room, until my wife nudges me and whispers: “Idiot—out!”

Breathing heavily, I go out of the room. My conversation with the young lady is carried on in a completely down-to-earth, businesslike manner. She receives me in the drawing-room, looks with a sigh at her watch, and I realize that some of the eight minutes have already passed—probably half of them. As a result, my speech, which I cautiously begin with “Sorry,” turns out to be somewhat confused, but she smiles in spite of it all, accepts my gift of three English pound notes, and finally says: “Please don’t overestimate my influence—I’m willing to try simply because I’m convinced of your abilities. You will receive an answer in about three months.” A glance she casts at her watch tells
me that it is time for me to leave. I toy briefly with the notion of kissing her hand, but refrain, whisper my most humble thanks, and stagger out. Three months. Incidentally, she was pretty.

I return to the tea party and on the faces of the three young scoundrels, whose chocolates were almost totally ignored, I discern poisonous envy. Soon there is an impatient honking outside, and the young lady’s mother announces that her daughter has been summoned back to Bonn by telegraph in order to relieve the cabinet minister of his calluses; his golf game was to begin at nine tomorrow morning and it was already five o’clock, and with those calluses he would not be able to play. We look out into the street to see the minister’s car; it is powerful but not particularly elegant. The young lady leaves the house with a charming little leather case and a briefcase. The tea party breaks up.

When we get home my wife, who has taken careful note of everything, tells me that I was the only one to be alone with “her”. The question as to what “she” is like, I answer with: “Charming, my dear, quite charming.”

I do not tell my wife about the three-month waiting period. Instead I discuss with her what further courtesies we can show “her”. My idea of offering “her” three months’ salary is rejected by my wife as an appalling lack of good taste. We finally agree on a motor scooter to be delivered to her anonymously but in such a way that she will know who sent it. Surely she would find it practical if she were motorized and would be able to ride from house to house with her charming little leather case. If she succeeds in treating the cabinet minister successfully (the fellow seems to have an advanced case of fallen arches), perhaps my intolerable waiting period of three months will be curtailed. Three months is more than I can manage, our credit is not all that great—I hope that the motor scooter, which I shall buy on instalments, will tip the balance, and that after only one month I will be sitting in those red leather armchairs. For the time being we both—my wife and I—feel completely down, and we sincerely regret that there is no such thing as an eighteen-pfennig cigarette—that would now be the very thing for our nerves …

At the time, when I declared my desire to join the Customs service, the whole family was indignant. Only Uncle Jochen was sensible: “Go ahead,” he said, “go ahead and join it.”

One must make allowances for a certain degree of indignation: I had completed high school, taken a few terms of philosophy, was an ensign first-class in the Reserve—and now merely wished to become a Customs officer.

I have an excellent figure, am healthy and intelligent; moreover, I have always been obedient, so my career was off to a good start. A sense of duty was coupled in me with what I would almost like to call a calm broadmindedness.

By the time I had completed my training period and gone home for a few days’ leave, with three shirts, three pairs of underpants, three pairs of socks, a nice uniform and the title “Customs Probationer”, the family’s indignation had somewhat subsided. My father unbuttoned a bit and was to be heard saying publicly: “My son, you know, the one who was an ensign first-class—my son is now with the Customs.”

My first day on duty I guarded the barrier at Bellkerke. It was hot and completely quiet—an afternoon; nothing was happening and, although I was tired and moody, numerous thoughts crossed my mind. After being relieved, I sat down, put those thoughts into some useful order and wrote a short treatise: “Possible Border Incidents During Border Duty”, a completely theoretical essay, I must admit, but one which as a modest tract aroused the attention of my superiors. In addition, the essay led to my promotion (out of turn) to Customs Assistant. This proves that my studies in philosophy had not been altogether in vain. I was transferred to the internal Customs service.

By the time I next went on leave, the family was already completely reconciled. In my free time I pondered on a short treatise for which I had as yet no title. In bold moments I almost considered “The
Frontier of Philosophy” but, while I was still uncertain as to the title, the work progressed well. I submitted it for publication in
The Customs Service News Letter
, where, under the title of “The Philosophy of the Frontier”, it reinforced my reputation as an analytical Customs officer and resulted in my appointment to full clerk.

Meanwhile I expanded my practical experience and planned to add to my essay an appendix entitled “The Burdens of a Functionary”. I had high hopes of this work: it was to show the complexity of our existence at the border as well as in the internal service, and to demonstrate that a uniform does not impair the free flow of thought. I wear the smart green uniform with pride.

Needless to say there is no dearth of envious colleagues, most of whom come from the raw ranks of the mere practitioners, crude types to whom the beauty of the written word cannot be conveyed. There are actually those among them of whom I know for a fact that they have never yet read the literary supplement of a newspaper. Not without a strong inner hesitation I have meanwhile started on a third essay: “Safety of the Frontier, or The Frontier of Safety?” Into this essay, in order to stop the mouths of the envious, I intend to weave much practical knowledge: above all, my experience that it is almost always the diplomats and the riffraff who get away with it, and I have found that the riffraff smuggle so diplomatically and the diplomats so riffraffishly that I will take the liberty of closing my essay with the words: Germans, stay at home and make an honest living! Actually I cannot see why—except in wartime!—one should bother to visit countries other than one’s own. French morals and English perfidy infiltrate our country, nothing else.

Under the influence of certain intimate occurrences, my appendix, “The Burdens of a Functionary”, became so copious that it almost threatened to turn into a little book of its own. But I persisted and continued my polishing efforts.

My promotion to inspector was made conditional upon demonstration of my practical qualities, and I did not hesitate to report immediately to the front line: I posed as a coffee buyer at a large West German railway station, penetrated the very heart of a gang of which I became a member, and gradually let the current of this gang carry me onward and upward. I slept in extremely dubious dumps, was obliged to consort—in the service of the state—with women as seductive as
they were dangerous, drank with thieves, ate with sinners, smoked with criminals and played cards with hard-boiled villains. Stubbornly, patiently, I soldiered on, towards the top, and one day—oh bliss of mission accomplished!—I could give the agreed signal: seventeen men, eleven women, were arrested, and among those captured was the head of the gang.

Although the security of commerce was not completely restored, it was now raised to a higher level. I was given special leave; none of the envious now dared to accuse me of inadequate practical experience. When shortly afterwards I submitted my just completed essay, my triumph was complete: I was promoted to chief inspector and am presumably justified in regarding my career as secure. Moral: let no one be prevented from following the career of his choice!

After travelling thirty-six hours the young man arrived dead tired in Cologne; it was a hot Sunday afternoon in summer. The station square was crowded; large posters and decorative banners proclaimed a pharmacists’ convention. The young man plodded from hotel to hotel, moving farther and farther away from the station, and finally found accommodation at the edge of the old part of the city. The hotel clerk told him he could share a room with another gentleman who had offered to give up the second bed in his room.

The young man climbed up the hot, narrow stairs carrying his only luggage: a briefcase and a bottle of lemonade he had asked for downstairs. On hearing a grumpy “Come in,” he opened the door; the first thing he saw was a small white table on which lay many little pieces of paper and a pile of loose, dark-brown tobacco. The room faced the street. The windows were open, the shutters pushed out, and in the wan light the tobacco took on a purplish look. Opposite the door was a mirror; the washbasin had a long, black, yellow-edged crack in it, and in an open wardrobe he first saw only musty darkness but then distinguished a crumpled raincoat and a shabby briefcase from which a leg of some underpants protruded. To the left of the door was an iron bedstead with a white counterpane on which lay a black jacket. He finally made out his roommate lying on the second bed in the shadows of the farthest corner: a stout, unshaven fellow, his blue and white striped shirt arching tautly over his belly. The young man took him for one of the many pharmacists who were filling up all the hotels.

He approached the stout, motionless figure, who from time to time puffed out clouds of smoke, and quietly introduced himself: “My name’s Wenk.” Without looking up or stirring, the man on the bed mumbled something that sounded like “Welter” and “That’s okay,” and continued to drowse.