The Piano Teacher: A Novel (37 page)

To cheer her up, Mother suggests an outing—but you can’t wear that outfit. Her daughter doesn’t hear. Encouraged by her silence, Mother pulls out some hiking maps from old dusty drawers, in which Father used to dig and delve, tracing paths with his finger, looking for destinations, tracking down food stops. In the kitchen, the daughter sticks a sharp knife inside her handbag without being seen. Normally, the knife sees and tastes only dead animals. The daughter doesn’t yet know whether she will commit murder or throw herself at the man’s feet and kiss them. She will decide later whether to stab him. Or seriously and passionately plead with him. She does not listen to her mother, who is vividly describing routes.

The daughter waits for the man who should come to plead with her. She sits down quietly at the window and weighs departing against staying. First she opts for staying. I may go
tomorrow, she decides. She looks down into the street. Then she leaves. The morning lectures are going to start soon at the Engineering School: Klemmer’s department. She once asked him about it. Love points the way. Desire is its ignorant advisor.

Erika Kohut goes out, leaving Mother behind; Mother investigates Erika’s reasons. For a long time now, Mother has been familiar with time as an extremely malevolent carnivorous plant; but isn’t it too early in the day to expose oneself to it?

The child usually begins the day somewhat later; that’s why the erosion of the day likewise sets in later.

Erika clutches the warm knife in her bag and walks through the streets, toward her goal. She offers an unfamiliar sight, as if made to flee people. People have no qualms about staring. They make remarks as they turn around. They are not ashamed of their opinion of this woman, they express their opinion. In her irresolute semi-miniskirt, Erika grows to her full height as she enters a hard competition with youth. Youth, visible everywhere, openly laughs at the teacher. Youth laughs at Erika because of her exterior. Erika laughs at youth because of its interior, which has no real substance. A male eye sends a signal to Erika: She shouldn’t wear such a short dress. Her legs aren’t all that great! The woman walks about, laughing. Her dress doesn’t suit her legs and her legs don’t suit her dress, as even a moderate critic would put it. Erika rises above herself and others. She anxiously wonders whether she can deal with the man. Youth mocks even downtown. Erika jeers back loudly. Anything they can do, she can do better. She’s been doing it longer.

Erika crosses open squares in front of museums. Pigeons soar up. In the face of her resoluteness! Tourists gawk first at Empress Maria Theresa, then at Erika, then back at the empress. Wings rattle. Museum hours are posted. The streetcars on the Ring head toward traffic lights. Sunlight flickers through dust.
Young mothers begin their daily march behind the bars of the Castle Garden. The first “Prohibited” signs are hurled down on gravel walks. From their heights, the mothers drip venom. Everywhere, two or more people now communicate. Colleagues get together, friends get into arguments. Drivers dash energetically across the Opera Crossing because the pedestrians are out of sight, remaining underground, where they have to bear the brunt of any damage they themselves cause. Down there, they cannot find scapegoats, i.e., drivers. People enter stores after first evaluating them on the outside. A few people stroll aimlessly. The office buildings on the Ring swallow up person after person, people dealing in import/export. In the Aïda Café, mothers discuss their daughters’ sexual activities, finding them dangerously premature. They praise their sons’ commitment to school and sports.

Erika Kohut clutches the aberration of a real knife in her handbag. Is the knife going on a trip or is Erika going to eat humble pie and beg for male forgiveness? She doesn’t know as yet; she will decide when she arrives. The odds are still on the knife. Let it dance! The woman is heading toward the Secession Gallery. A renowned artist is showing something after which art can no longer be what it was. From here, Engineering, the opposite pole of art, is already visible in the distance. Erika only has to cross over and then through Ressel Park. Wind wafts now and then. Voices of the youthful thirst for knowledge accumulate here. Eyes graze Erika, who faces them. At last, people are looking at me, Erika exults. For years upon years, she avoided such gazes by remaining monoecious. But if something lasts and lasts, it eventually erupts. Erika does not confront the gazes unarmed—you dear little knife, you. Someone laughs. Not everyone laughs so loud. Most people don’t laugh. They don’t laugh because they see nothing but themselves. They don’t notice Erika.

Groups of young people coagulate in the flowing stream. They form vanguards and rear guards. Committed young men resolutely have experiences. They keep talking about them. Some want experiences with themselves, others experiences with others: to each his own.

On the facade of the Engineering School, the columns bear the metallic male heads of the institute’s famous scientists, who invented bombs and defense systems.

A gigantic church, the Karlskirche, crouches like a toad in the midst of the bleak wasteland. Water bubbles up, self-assured and chatty. One walks purely on stone, except in Ressel Park, which is meant to be a green oasis. You can also take the subway, if you feel like it.

Erika Kohut discovers Walter Klemmer in a group of congenial students at various stages of knowledge. They are laughing loudly together. But not at Erika, whom they do not even notice. Walter Klemmer loudly demonstrates that he is not playing hooky today. He has not had to rest longer after this night than after other nights. Erika counts three boys and one girl, who likewise seems to be studying some kind of engineering, thus constituting a technological innovation. Walter Klemmer cheerfully puts his arm around her shoulders. The girl laughs loud, briefly burying her blond head in Klemmer’s throat; his neck likewise has to carry a blond head. The girl laughs so hard she can barely stand up, as her body language communicates. The girl has to lean on Klemmer. The others agree with him. Walter Klemmer also laughs and shakes his hair. Sun embraces him. Light encircles him. Klemmer keeps laughing loudly, and the others join in at the tops of their lungs. What’s so funny? asks a latecomer and then has to join in the laughter. He catches the bug. Something is described to him in splutters of mirth, and now he finally knows what he’s laughing about. He
outsplutters the others because he has to make up for lost laughing time.

Erika Kohut stands there, looking. She watches. It is broad daylight, and Erika watches. When the group has laughed its fill, it turns toward the Engineering School. As the students move, they keep bursting into hearty guffaws. They interrupt themselves with their own laughter.

Windows flash in the light. They do not open to this woman. They do not open to just anyone. There is no good person, although he is called for. Many would like to help, but do not. The woman twists her neck very far to the side and bares her teeth like a sick horse. No one puts a hand on her, no one takes anything from her. She feebly peers back over her shoulder. The knife should dig into her heart and twist around! The remainder of the necessary strength fails. Her eyes alight on nothing, and, with no burst of rage, fury, or passion, Erika Kohut stabs a place on her shoulder, which instantly shoots out blood. The wound is harmless, but dirt and pus must not get in. The world, unwounded, does not stand still. The young people must have vanished into the building for a long time. One building lies next to the other. The knife is placed back in the handbag. A gap yawns in Erika’s shoulder; tender tissue has divided unresistingly. The steel has entered, and Erika exits. She places a hand on the wound. No one follows her. Many people come toward her, forking around her like water around a dead ship’s hull. None of the terrible pains, expected at any second, begin. A car window blazes.

Erika’s back, where the zipper is partly open, is warmed. Her back is warmed by the ever more powerful sun. Erika walks and walks. Her back warms up in the sun. Blood oozes out of her. People look up from the shoulder to the face. Some turn around. Not all. Erika knows the direction she has to take. She heads home, gradually quickening her step.