The Drinker (4 page)

“Give me your hand.”

She switched off the light and led me by the hand. In the other hand I still held the brandy bottle. It was completely dark in the bar-room. I crept after her. Moonlight through a little dusty window fell on the narrow angular staircase. I swayed, I was very tired. I thought of my own bed, of Magda, of my long way home.

It was all too much for me. The only consolation was the bottle of brandy in my hand, that would give me strength. I would have preferred to stop already and take a pull out of the bottle, I was so tired. The stairs creaked, the bedroom door groaned softly as it was opened. There was moonlight in the room, too. A rumpled bed, an iron wash-stand, a chair, a row of hangers on the wall.…

“Get undressed,” I said softly, “I’ll be with you in a moment.” And more to myself, “Are there any stars here?”

I went to the window, which looked out over an orchard. I opened it a little; the spring air with its soft breeze and its perfumes entered, mild as a tender caress. Under the window lay the sloping tar-papered roof of a shed.

“That’s good,” I said, softly again. “That sloping roof is very good.”

I couldn’t see the moon, it was behind the house-roof above my head. But its glow filled the sky with a whitish light; only the brightest stars were to be seen, and even they looked dim. I was uneasy and irritable.

“Come on,” she cried angrily from the bed. “Hurry up! Do you think I don’t need any sleep?”

I turned, and bent over the bed. She lay on her back, covered to the chin. I stripped the cover back and laid my face for a moment against her naked breast. Cool and firm. Breathing gently. It smelt good—of hair and flesh.

“Hurry up!” she whispered impatiently. “Get undressed—stop that nonsense. You’re not a schoolboy any more!”

I straightened up with a deep sigh. I went to the window, took the bottle and swung myself out on to the shed roof. I heard a furious cry behind me, but I was already letting myself drop into the garden.

“Drunken old fool!” she called from above, and then the window banged.

I stood among bushes. I smelt the scent of lilac. The spring night was perfect in its purity. I put the bottle to my mouth and drank deeply.

7

I walk and walk. I walk along, singing to myself one of those
Wanderlieder
that I used to sing when hiking with Magda. Then for long stretches I limp on aching feet. I have stubbed my toe against a stone, it is bad going for my shoeless feet. My socks have long since been torn to ribbons. I come to a stream, clamber down the bank, sit on a stone and put my feet in the water, which shocks me for a moment with its icy coldness. Then it feels good, and sitting on the stone I fall asleep. I wake up shivering, icy. I have fallen from my seat, I walk on. The faster I walk, the longer the road seems to become. The fruit trees along the roadside positively fly past me, yet I seem to be no further on. I don’t know where I am, only that I’m a long way from home. I don’t know what time it is, only that it’s still night. The moon is some two handsbreadths above the horizon. And I walk on. I walk through a sleeping village. Not a light anywhere, everyone asleep, I am the only one abroad. Erwin Sommer, proprietor of a wholesale market produce business. Not now, not now, that was before. The one who is walking through this moonlit night, who is he? Once he was someone—long ago he was. Down and out now, finished, almost forgotten.… At my shuffling step, a dog wakes up in his kennel and starts to bark. Other dogs awaken and now the whole village is barking and I shuffle through it on sore feet, a tramp, and yesterday I was still … oh, shut up! And I stop in the shadow of the wooden church spire and raise the bottle to my mouth again and drink. That stills the questions, soothes the pain, that is a whip for the next half hour on the road. But there is not much left in the bottle. I’ll have to go easy with the precious stuff. I’ll swallow the last mouthful—and it must be a big one—on my own doorstep, before I face Magda. But Magda is asleep. I shall lie down very quietly on the sofa, there won’t be any argument tonight. And tomorrow? Tomorrow is a long way off. By tomorrow I shall have had a deep, deep sleep, I shall have forgotten everything that happened today, I shall be the head of the firm again, who had committed a small blunder, it’s true, but who is perfectly capable of making amends.…

I have hidden the empty bottle in the garden bushes, and now, very quietly, on my bare feet, I mount the steps to the front door. I manage to unlock the door without a sound. I am not a bit drunk now, though I have only just taken one or two long swigs of brandy—there was more left in the bottle than I had thought. So much the better. I am all the more clear-headed and certain. I shan’t make any mistake, I shan’t wake anyone up. How cunning I am. I am tempted to go into the bathroom to bathe my sore feet, but my clear head reminds me that the noise of the taps would awaken Magda, so I sneak into the kitchen. I can wash in the kitchen. Only little Else sleeps next to the kitchen. She’s good to me, she comforted me, she’s not hard and efficient like Magda. I switch on the light, I look round the kitchen. I choose a large enamel basin, and I think to look into the boiler by the stove, to see if there is any warm water. The water is actually luke-warm still. I am proud of my cleverness. I get the washing soap, the hand-towel, kitchen cloths, a brush. I sit on a chair and put my feet into the water. Oh, how good it feels, how soothing that gentle caress is! I lean back, I close my eyes—if only I had something to drink now, I would be absolutely happy.

There’s always something lacking for human happiness, we can never be perfectly content. I’ve drunk all the red wine, and there’s nothing else to drink in the house. Tomorrow I must start a wine-cellar, and there must be a few bottles of schnaps in it, too. Schnaps is a very good thing—a pity I’ve wasted so many years of my life when I might have been drinking schnaps—in all moderation of course. I lean back still further, enjoying the bath, feeling the burning pain recede … and suddenly I jump up! The water slops out of the basin and floods over the tiled floor. But I take no notice of that. I have had a revelation. Of course we have something to drink in the house! Didn’t Magda get some Madeira for certain kinds of soup, ox-tail for instance? And doesn’t she use rum for her preserves? I know that from her housekeeping accounts. And I run on my bare feet into the larder, I search, I sniff at bottles, I smell vinegar and oil—and here, here it is: “Fine old Sherry,” and here’s port wine, no less, the bottle three-parts-full, and rum, half-full—oh, how beautiful life is! Intoxication, forget-fulness, to float along on the stream of forgetfulness, into the twilight, deep into the darkness where there is neither failure nor regret … good alcohol, I salute you.
La reine
Elsabe, I have rested on your naked breast, I have breathed the scent of your hair and your flesh!

I have filled the basin again, I have set the three uncorked bottles before me, I have taken a long pull from the rum bottle. At first it repels me after the gentler, purer taste of the brandy. The rum tastes sharper, more burning, it is adulterated and all the more fiery on that account. I feel it spreading in my blood like dark-red clouds, it stimulates my imagination, it makes me more wide-awake, more watchful, more cunning.… I know I must tidy up the kitchen properly, wipe the flood off the floor, carefully cork the bottles and put them away again. Nobody must notice anything, not even Else. Good little Else, she’s fast asleep, she’s young still, she sleeps the sleep of youth, but I, her master, I sit here in the kitchen and watch over her sleep. If a burglar were to come now … but where did I leave the corks? I don’t see them anywhere, I haven’t got them in my pockets either—perhaps they’re still in the larder? I must go and look, I must put the bottles away properly corked. But the water is so gentle to my feet, and I am getting so tired, I would like to sleep, just for a brief moment, then I’ll tidy up, I’ll put everything in perfect order, and I’ll find the corks too.…

Who’s coming? Who is disturbing me again? Oh, it’s only Magda, efficient Magda. In the middle of the night, no, rather towards morning, there she stands in the kitchen door-way looking spick-and-span, fully dressed anyway, and stares silently at me with a pale startled face. I half straighten up, make a gesture of greeting, nod to her and say cheerfully: “Here I am again, Magda! I just made a little trip, a little excursion into the springtime. Have you heard the larks sing yet this year? Tomorrow we’ll go together. You’ll see how lovely and green the birches are, and you can make the acquaintance of the Queen of Schnaps,
la reine d’alcool
, I’ve christened her Elsabe.… You’re so clever, Magda, I saw you at the books with Hinzpeter, in the office. You’ve been through the books, you’ve a clear view of things now. I’ve always been afraid of that clear view! I drink to you, Magda, and again and again! I know it’s your rum, but I’ll replace it, I’ll replace everything. We’ve still got money. I can sell the business. It belongs to me, I’m the boss, I can do what I like! Or have you got something to say against it?”

She said nothing. She looked silently at me, then at my bleeding feet. She was very pale. Two tears welled up in her eyes and ran slowly down her pale cheeks. She didn’t wipe them away. Intently I followed their course with my eyes, until they fell on her dress. Those tears didn’t upset me; on the contrary it pleased me that she wept, it was a sweet feeling to me, that she could still suffer on my account.

I drank again.

“You’re so mercilessly efficient. Yes, I didn’t get the prison contract, but you’ll put that right somehow. I’ve always lived in your shadow; you never let me feel your superiority, but I could never reach as high as you, and now I’m right down. But one can live below the surface as well. I met a curious girl who is right down, too, but she can feel pain and happiness. One can feel joy and sorrow down below, Magda, it’s just like being up above, it’s all the same whether you live up or down. Perhaps the most beautiful thing is to let yourself fall, to shut your eyes and plunge into nothingness, deeper and deeper into nothingness. One can go on falling endlessly Magda. I haven’t reached the end, I haven’t touched bottom yet. All my limbs are still intact.”

“Erwin,” she pleaded, “Erwin, don’t say any more. Stop drinking now. You’re ill, Erwin. Come, go to bed. I’ll bandage your feet. They look terrible. I’ll bandage your feet.”

“You see,” I cried, and drank again, “you begrudge me even these few mouthfuls. They’re your bottles, of course, but I’ll pay for them. I’ll pay you in cash or kind. That’s fair dealing, you can’t say anything against that. You ask about my feet. I’ve been on a trip in the country, while the efficient mistress is at work, surely the master can have some relaxation, once in a while. I walked barefoot, walking barefoot is supposed to be healthy.…”

She let me go on talking. She had quickly left the kitchen and returned with a large sponge, a jar of ointment, and some bandages. She knelt beside me, and while I went on talking over her head, more and more thickly and incoherently, she washed my feet, washed the dirt of the road out of my wounds, wiped them gently, applied the ointment, and bandaged them up.

“Good, good,” I said, “you’re really good to me, Magda. If only you weren’t so damned efficient!”

8

I wake up, I am lying in bed, the windows are open, the curtains move gently in the breeze. Outside, the sun is shining. It must be rather late, the bed beside me is made already. There is no one in the bedroom but myself. I feel very sick. There is a burning dryness in my stomach. Only slowly can I bring myself to think. I become aware of pain in my feet. I turn back the covers and see the bandages. And like a thunderclap everything comes to me again: the way I watched the shadows on the glass from outside my office, all that vulgar boozing in the bar-room, the shameful scene in that common barmaid’s room, my drunken shoeless walk home, and worst of all, the scene in the kitchen with Magda! How I degraded myself, oh, how I degraded myself! A burning wave of remorse sweeps over me. The shame of it, the torturing shame of it! I hide my face in my hands, I shut my eyes tight.… I don’t want to see, I don’t want to hear, I don’t want to think any more. I set my jaw, I grind my teeth. I groan: “It can’t be true! It isn’t true! It can’t have been me! I’ve dreamed it all! I must forget all about it. Straight away, I must forget all about it. None of it must be true!”

I tremble as if with a cramp, and then come the tears, tears for all that I have so wantonly thrown away. Endless, bitter, and eventually comforting tears.

And when I have finished crying, the sun is still outside my window, the cool fragrant curtains sway in the gentle breeze. Life is still here, young and smiling. You can begin again at any time, it only depends on you. A little table is standing by my bed, with a breakfast tray upon it. The coffee is keeping warm under a cosy, and now I begin to have breakfast. I bite into a roll. Ineffectively I chew over and over on the first tough mouthful; but the coffee has been made extra strong, gradually my appetite returns, and I enjoy all the little delicacies which Magda has considerately laid out on the tray: sharp anchovies, lovely fat liver sausage, and wonderful Cheshire cheese. Rarely have I eaten with such relish. I feel like a convalescent. Thankfully I greet the neat familiar objects which surround me, greet them like faithful old friends whom I have missed for a long time. Now I find a note from Magda on the bedside table. She tells me that she has just gone to the office for a few hours, she asks me to stay in bed, or at least in the house, till her return; the bath-water has been heated for me.

Half an hour later I left the house. Although walking was very painful on account of my sore feet, I did not intend to remain inactive any longer. I had cleaned myself up from top to toe, put on fresh linen, my best suit—and now I was going to take my old place in the world again.

No hesitation this time; no peering out of door-ways after shadows; I went straight in. I gave a friendly greeting to my staff in the two outer offices, and entered my private office. Magda jumped up from my desk-chair. Formerly she had never sat at it; she had a place at a side table. It hurt me rather that she had already struck me off the list of active partners; she blushed deeply.

“Erwin!” she cried. “I thought.…” And she looked first at me, then at Herr Hinzpeter.

“Good morning, good morning, Herr Hinzpeter,” I said amiably, “Yes, you thought … but I found I felt much better this morning, except for my feet … of course, my feet … but never mind that. Now tell me what you’ve found out, and what you’ve already decided on. Can we make up for the loss of that prison contract?” I sat down in my desk-chair. I looked at them amiably, quite the boss, ready to listen to the suggestions of his staff before making his decision. Barely an hour ago I had been crying out that I wanted to forget, that I must forget.… And now here I sat. I couldn’t forget, for Magda’s pallor and my aching feet in their tight shoes reminded me: but I wanted them to forget. Another five minutes and it would seem like a bad dream to Magda, that not twelve hours before, she had seen me sitting at the kitchen table, three bottles in front of me, my dirty feet in a bowl, the tiled floor swimming with water—just a bad dream! She must forget! She must forget! (I quite realised that it was absolutely disgraceful of me, just to pass events over without a word, to wipe them off the slate, to allow no allusion to them: it was utterly and absolutely disgraceful!) Anyhow, it transpired that not for nothing had I counted on Magda’s energy.

Early in the morning she had already paid a visit to our friend the prison governor, to find out whether there wasn’t perhaps something to be salvaged. And lo and behold, the good fellow had in fact given her a tip, a very valuable tip.… One section of the prisoners, at the beginning of their sentence, were put on to picking oakum—old used or frayed rope was pulled to pieces, reduced to strands, and then, with the tow so gained, new rope was made. There was always a large demand for this old rope, and at the moment the prison administration’s supplies were almost at an end. The governor had suggested to Magda that she might go to Hamburg and buy up old cordage, two or maybe three truckloads. He said there was quite good business to be done in this way, provided one knew the right places to go to, and furthermore, he dropped a hint or two as to where those places were.

As I have said, I listened benevolently to all this. Of course it was only a small casual undertaking that, even with the most advantageous buying, could not nearly replace a three years’ grocery contract for almost fifteen hundred men, but it was something we could take in our stride, even if it didn’t really fit into the framework of my business.

“And who do you think should go, Magda?” I asked. “Perhaps you yourself …?”

“No, much as I’d like to,” she replied hesitatingly. “I don’t think I can go just now. Particularly now …” she broke off and looked at me rather helplessly, yet with meaning. This was one of those looks that I was not going to put up with in any circumstances. So I said, “You’re quite right, Magda. You can hardly be spared at the moment. And besides, there’s the household. Else is still rather young (dear comforting Else!) I think it’s best if I go. I feel quite well again, and as for my feet, well, I can arrange something about that … I can always take taxis …”

Magda hastily interrupted me. “You can’t go, in any case, Erwin. You know you’re not well.” She looked firmly at me, not maliciously, rather sadly and affectionately, but firmly. This time I lowered my glance.

“No,” she continued, “the best thing would be to send Herr Hinzpeter. He could leave this evening, already, and perhaps be back the morning after tomorrow …”

I interrupted her. “One moment, Magda, please. Thank you, Herr Hinzpeter, I’ll call you in again a little later.…”

I waited until the door had closed behind the book-keeper. Then I looked seriously at Magda.

“Magda,” I said, “we’ll let bygones be bygones. We won’t talk about this thing any more. We’ll forget it for good.”

She made a gesture as if she wanted to speak, to contradict this possibly all too-simple solution.

“No, no, Magda,” I said hastily, “let me finish—I beg you to let me go to Hamburg. It is most important to me, and as for my feet, well, I can manage.…”

She made an impatient gesture, as if my feet were entirely unimportant at the moment. This lack of interest in my well-being offended me very deeply, but without showing my feelings, I continued: “It will be very good for my state of mind if I got away for a day or two.” In a lower voice, I added: “Losing that prison contract has greatly upset me, I feel I’ve disgraced myself over it.”

She looked fixedly at me.

“Erwin,” she said, “you said yourself we should let bygones be bygones, and I’ll agree to that, although …” she broke off. “So don’t you start about it yourself. As far as that trip to Hamburg is concerned, I’m firmly convinced that it would not be good for you just now. It’s not distraction you need, but rest and concentration. Apart from that, I’ve made an appointment with Dr Mansfeld for both of us this afternoon.”

“That’s your wilfulness again, Magda,” I cried angrily. “What do I want with Dr Mansfeld? I’m perfectly healthy, apart from my feet, I …” “Oh, your feet!” she cried, now angry too, “that bit of sore skin will soon heal. No, you are really ill, Erwin, I’ve noticed for months past how you’ve changed. The doctor will have to examine you thoroughly.”

“Under your supervision,” I said ironically. “Thank you very much indeed.”

“Erwin,” she said pleadingly. “Just for this once, don’t let’s quarrel. Do come and see the doctor with me, just as a favour. Then he can decide whether it would be good for you to go to Hamburg.”

“Oh,” I said bitterly, “if he’s going to make decisions on your advice, we needn’t go at all. You can tell Hinzpeter straightaway that he’s got to go to Hamburg.”

We each stood at a window of the office, and stared into the street. For my part, I was not only staring, but drumming on the window-pane as well. Outside the spring sun was shining, and many women were passing by, dressed in flowered frocks. Only a short time before I had felt like a convalescent, and had greeted the familiar things around me with fresh interest, convinced that today a new life was beginning … and now the old creaking mill of our dissension was starting up again, grinding all my good resolutions to dust. And why? Because Magda was obstinate and wanted to decide everything on her own. No, this time I didn’t intend to give in. We had agreed that what was past was past, and I didn’t have to be submissive just on account of the events of last night.

Magda turned abruptly from the window towards me.

“Erwin,” she said softly.

“Yes?” I said sullenly, and went on drumming without looking at her.

“Erwin,” she repeated, “I don’t want to quarrel with you today. I feel as if we were in some terrible danger and had to keep together at all costs. So I will do as
you
wish; you go to Hamburg, but when you come back, do me the favour of coming with me to Dr Mansfeld.”

I turned to her and laughed happily.

“When I come back you’ll see for yourself how well I am, and you’ll give up this visit to the doctor on your own accord. All the same, I promise. Anyway, thank you very much Magda. I’ll bring you home something nice.…” and I laughed again. I was so happy at the prospect of the journey.

“I haven’t done this to get your thanks,” said Magda rather stiffly. “I’ve done it quite against my own better judgment. I’m convinced that this journey will do you no good.”

“But I’ll be going with your consent,” I interrupted again, “and afterwards we’ll see which of us was right. Now tell me, which firms were mentioned in connection with this business? Of course, I’ll look around on my own account as well.…”