Hanns Heinz Ewers Alraune
Joe Bandel
Published by Joe Bandel at Smashwords
Copyright 2010 Joe Bandel
Hanns Heinz Ewers Alraune story copyright Wilfried Kugel
Galeotto poem copyright Wilfried Kugel
Translations copyright Joe Bandel
In cooperation with the Hanns Heinz Ewers estate
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author. Note: Some illustrations have been removed to comply with Smashwords file size and compliance requirements.
Written by Hanns Heinz Ewers and translated
By
Joe E. Bandel
Illustrations by Mahlon Blaine
Other Titles In Print
Alraune
Anarchist Knight:Apprentice
Magister Templi
Modern Survivalism
Hanns Heinz Ewers Volume I
Coming Soon!
Vampire
Fundvogel
Hanns Heinz Ewers Volume II
This book is dedicated to my children and step-children., Lyssa, Crystal, Whitney, Dylan, Sarah and Jason. Dreams can come true. Even if it is four pages at a time. Don’t ever give up! Thanks to Dr. Kugel for permissions.
Visit
Anarchist World
on the web at
Translating Alraune
“Deine Tage sind wie die schweren Trauben blauer Glyzenen, tropfen hinab zum weichen Teppich: so schreitet mein leichter Fuss weich dahin durch die sonnenglitzernden Laubengänge deiner sanften Tage.”
Your days are like the heavy (grapes/bunches/clusters) blue Glyzenen, dropping down to soft carpet: so stride my light feet softly in them through the sun glistening arbor your gentle days.
What the hell does “Glyzenen” mean? Look it up in the dictionary; it’s not there. Google it on the internet; it’s not there. Try some online German-English dictionaries; it’s not there…
What did Endore’s write? “glycinias” Well, what does that mean? Look it up in the dictionary; it’s not there. Google it on the internet; ah, there it is–Archaic German word for wisteria–not used anymore–Maybe back when he translated it some old Germans were still alive that knew the meaning of the word.
[Editor’s note. S. Guy Endore translated a 1929 version of Alraune for John Day Publishing Company]
What is “Wisteria”? Google it on the internet–Oh, what beautiful thick flowers. We don’t have those here in northern Minnesota. Now let’s get back to the translation. “Dropping down to soft carpet?” That can’t be right. Wisteria grows outside and doesn’t fall onto the carpet! When those thick blossoms fall they will form a carpet on the ground though! Let’s try it like this:
Your days are like the heavy blue clusters of wisteria dropping down to form a soft carpet. My feet stride lightly and softly through them as I enter the glittering sunlight in the arbor of your gentle days.
Just for grins lets see what Endore came up with.
“Your days drop out of your life even as the heavy clusters of blue glycinias shed their blossoms one by one upon the soft carpet. And I tread lightly through the long, sunny arbors of your mild existence.”
What the hell! That’s not even close! Where did he come up with that “days dropping” and “blossoms one by one” bit? None of that is in the text at all. Obviously he was embellishing a bit. (Something that Endore did quite a bit of.)
Such was my experience with the very first page of Alraune. But it was not my last. The John Day version of Alraune turned out to be very mangled and censored to boot. There are different types of censorship and I ran into most of them. Let’s take chapter five to give some brief examples.
Now in the story Alraune’s father agrees to cooperate with the experiment in exchange for a couple bottles of whiskey the night before he is executed. Thus he is so drunk the next morning that they have to help him walk up to where the sentence of death is read to him. Suddenly he realizes what is about to happen, sobers up immediately, says “something” and begins to fight back. But first he utters a word–What is that word? It may give a clue to the entire incident. Let’s see how it really goes:
She laughed, “No, certainly not. Well then –but reach me another slice of lemon. Thank you. Put it right there in the cup! Well then –he said, no –I can’t say it.”
“Highness,” said the Professor with mild reproof.
She said, “You must close your eyes first.”
The Privy Councilor thought, “Old monkey!” but he closed his eyes. “Now?” he asked.
She still hesitated, “I –I will say it in French –”
“That’s fine, in French then!” He cried impatiently.
Then she pressed her lips together, bent forward and whispered in his ear, “Merde!”
Of course “Merde!” means “Shit!” in French. He said “Shit!”, sobered up and started fighting for his life! Let’s see what the John Day version did with it.
She laughed. “Of course not. How silly. Well –just let me have a piece of lemon. Thanks –put it right into the cup! –Well, then, as I was saying –but no, really, I can’t tell you.”
“Your Highness!” the Professor said in a tone of genial reproach.
Then she said: “You’ll have to shut your eyes.”
The Councilor thought to himself, “What an old ass.” But he closed his eyes. “Well,” he asked.
But she resisted coyly. “I’ll –I’ll tell it to you in French.”
“Very well then, Let it be –French!” he cried impatiently.
She pursed her lips, bent her head to his and whispered the offending word into his ear.
As you see, we don’t even get to know what the word was in the John Day edition and a subtle nuance has been lost. Still, you might think I am making mountains out of molehills. What difference does that little bit have to do with the story? Well let’s take a more substantial piece of censorship. Later in the same chapter almost one entire page of text has been censored. I won’t share it here because it will spoil the story but this entire section was omitted from the John Day version. Curiously enough Mahlon Blaine illustrated a portion of it which shows that he was familiar with it. It was translated but didn’t make it into the book.
Something that is also missing in the John Day edition is much of the emotional content and beauty of the writing itself. Consider this paragraph at the end of chapter five:
There is one other curious thing that remains in the story of these two people that without ever seeing each other became Alraune’s father and mother, how they were brought together in a strange manner even after their death. The Anatomy building janitor, Knoblauch, threw out the remaining bones and tatters of flesh into a common shallow grave in the gardens of the Anatomy building. It was behind the wall where the white roses climb and grow so abundantly –
How heart wrenching and touching in its own way! Let’s see how the Endore’s version handles it:
Again the bodies of these two, who, though they had never seen each other, yet became Alraune ten Brinken’s father and mother, were most curiously joined in still another manner after their death. Knoblauch, the old servant who cleaned out the dissecting rooms, threw the remaining bones and bits of flesh into a hastily prepared shallow ditch in the rear of the anatomy garden, back there against the wall, where the white hedge-roses grow so rankly.
When you consider that nearly every single chapter of the John Day version has been gutted of its emotional content in one way or another, it is not surprising that it never became as popular with the reading public as it did it Germany. There it could be read in its entirety as the author intended. For the first time Alraune is now available to the English speaking world in an uncensored version that brings the life and emotion back into the story. I am proud to have been able to be a part in the restoration of this classic work of horror.
A final note for those that have read the John Day version:
What I read then is different, entirely different, has different meaning and I present her again like I find her, wild, hot –like someone that is full of all passions!
Describes the house on the Rhine before the thought of Alraune came into the world.
Expains how the idea for Alraune came about.
Informs how Frank Braun persuaded the Privy Councilor to create Alraune
Gives the particulars of how they found Alraune’s mother
Informs about her father and how Death stood as Godfather when Alraune came to life.
Deals with how the child Alraune grew up.
Shares the things that occurred when Alraune was a young girl.
Details how Alraune became Mistress of the House of Brinken.
Speaks of Alraune’s lovers and what happened to them.
Describes how Wolf Gontram was put into the ground because of Alraune.
Renders to the reader the end of the Privy Councilor through Alraune.
Gives an account of how Frank Braun stepped into Alraune’s world.
Mentions how Princess Wolkonski told Alraune the truth.
Describes how Frank Braun played with fire and how Alraune awoke.
Tells how Alraune lived in the park.
Proclaims how Alraune came to an end.
Hanns Heinz Ewers
Hanns Heinz Ewers was born in Dusseldorf Germany on 3 November 1871. Both of his parents were artists. His father was a painter and a singer. His mother was a painter and a gifted storyteller. He, himself, was a writer, poet, playwright, filmmaker and comedian.
His film, The Student of Prague, was the first film ever to make use of a double. His most famous novel, Alraune, has been translated into twenty languages and made into a film five times. He is mostly known as a horror writer in the tradition of Edgar Allan Poe.
Why then have most people not heard of him?
The easy answer is that he was a strong supporter of German nationalism during the Second World War even though he was also a strong supporter of the Jewish cause as well. In the end Ewers books were banned in Nazi Germany and he died in 1943 persona non grata in poverty.
After the war his Nazi affiliation caused his literary works to be shunned and he has been largely forgotten.
This is the easy answer. The harder and more accurate answer is very complex because he was a very complex person. As I translate more of his material I will try to find more answers to the life of this very interesting person as well.
Galeotto
We read of Lancelot one
day for pleasure, how love
constrained him. We were alone
and without any suspicion
A Galeotto indeed, that book,
and he who wrote it. That day
we read no more.
Dante, The Inferno V 127
We read once–Oh, what was it, Isolde?
On a summer afternoon in the foliage of the summer house
The little book was red and the edges were gold–
A tame dove sat on your shoulder–We were entirely alone
And the carrier of the plague was the world around us.
No little breeze stirred the leaves–there we read – Was it the love
Tragedy of the couple from Rimini, run through by a spear?
Was it the dream song of Lancelot? What was it then?
–Was it the sultry heartfelt song of longing, which Echegaray wrote?
Was it Tristan’s love drunken journey on the ocean?
I don’t know what it was. Yet what clings fast in my brain
Is how you softly laid your right hand on mine, my sweet love.
And my fingers loosened your braids–That is when you looked into my eyes
And in their depths lay the magic word that was true, the right word
At the right moment. Our hearts pounded, the sun burned and our souls
Demanded their destiny–Thick was the foliage that encircled our love.
We were entirely alone in a green tent–exiled into some fairyland of legend.
You were the Queen: I was the hero. The cupola, the Galeotto,
That made our love Possible–was the entire world!
-Hanns Heinz Ewers
Arsis
Will you deny, dear girl, that creatures can exist that are– not human – not animal – strange creatures created out of absurd thoughts and villainous desires?
You know good, my gentle girl, good is the Law; good are all our rules and regulations; good is the great God that created these regulations, these rules, these laws.
Good also is the man that values them completely and goes on his path in humility and patience in true obedience to our good God.
But there is another King that hates good. He breaks the laws and the regulations. He creates – note this well – against nature. He is bad, is evil, and evil is the man that would be like him. He is a child of Satan.
It is evil, very evil to go in and tamper with the eternal laws and with insolent hands rip them brazenly out of place.
He is happy and able to do evil – because Satan, who is a tremendous King, helps him. He wants to create out of his prideful wish and will, wants to do things that shatter all the rules, that reverse natural law and stand it on its head.
But he needs to be very careful: It is only a lie and what he creates is always lunacy and illusion. It towers up and fills the heavens – but collapses at the last moment and falls back to bury the arrogant fool that thought it up –
His Excellency Jacob Ten Brinken, Dr. med., Ord. Professor and Counselor created a strange maiden, created her – against nature. He created her entirely alone, though the thought belonged to another.
This creature, that was baptized and named Alraune, grew up and lived as a human child. Whatever she touched turned to gold, where ever she went became filled with wild laughter.
But whoever felt her poisonous breath, screamed at the sins that stirred inside them and on the ground where her feet lightly tread grew the pale white flower of death. It struck dead anyone that was hers except Frank Braun, who first thought of her and gave her life.
It’s not for you, golden sister, that I write this book. Your eyes are blue and kind. They know nothing of sins. Your days are like the heavy blue clusters of wisteria dropping down to form a soft carpet. My feet stride lightly and softly through them as I enter the glittering sunlight in the arbor of your gentle days. I don’t write this book for you my golden child, gracious sister of my dream filled days –
But I write it for you, you wild sinful sister of my hot nights. When the shadows fall, when the cruel ocean devours the beautiful golden sun there flashes over the waves a swift poisonous green ray. That is Sins first quick laugh over the alarmed dying day.
That’s when you extend yourself over the still water, raise yourself high and proclaim your arrival in blighted yellows, reds and deep violet colors. Your sins whisper through the deep night and vomit your pestilent breath wide throughout all the land.
And you become aware of your hot touch. You widen your eyes, lift your perky young breasts as your nostrils quiver and you spread wide your fever moistened hands.
Then the gentle civilized day splits away and falls to give birth to the serpent of the dark night. You extend yourself, sister, your wild soul, all shame, full of poison, and of torment and blood, and of kisses and desire, exultant outward in joyous abandon.
I write about you, through all the heavens and hells – sister of my sins – I write this book for you!
Chapter 1
Describes the house on the Rhine before the thought of Alraune came into the world.
THE white house in which Alraune was thought into existence existed long before she was born–long before she was even conceived. This house lay on the Rhine a little out of the city on the large Villa Street leading out to the old Archbishop’s Palace where the university is today. That is where it lies and Legal Councilor Sebastian Gontram and his family once lived there.
You walk in from the street, through the long ugly garden that has never seen a gardener. You come to the house, from which stucco is falling, search for a bell and find none. You call and scream and no one comes. Finally you push the door open and go inside, climb up the dirty, never washed stair and suddenly a huge cat springs through the darkness…
Or even better–
The large garden is alive with a thousand monkeys. They are the Gontram children: Frieda, Philipp, Paulche, Emilche, Josefehe, and Wülfche. They are everywhere, in the boughs of trees, creeping through the earth in the mine pits. Then there are the hounds, two cheeky spitzes and a Bastard Fox terrier. In addition there is a dwarf pinscher that belongs to Attorney Manasse. He is quite the thing, like a brown quince sausage, round as a barrel , scarcely larger than a hand and called Cyclops.
The yard is filled with noises and screams. Wülfche, scarcely a year old, lies in a child’s wagon and screams high obstinate screams for hours. Only Cyclops can beat this record and he yelps, hoarse and broken, incessantly. Wülfche never moves from his place, only screams, only howls.
The Gontram rogues are resting in the bushes late in the afternoon. Frieda, the oldest, should be looking out for them, taking care that her brothers are behaving. But she thinks they are behaving and sits under the decaying Lilac leaves with her friend, the little Princess Wolkonski.
The two chatter and argue, thinking that they soon will become fourteen years old and can get married, or at least have a lover. Right now they are both forbidden from all this and need to wait a little longer. It is still fourteen days until their first Holy Communion. Then they get long dresses, and then they will be grown up. Then they can have a lover.
She decides to become very virtuous and start going to the May devotions at church immediately. She needs to gather herself together in these days, be serious and sensible.
“–and perhaps also because Schmitz will be there,” says Frieda.
The little Princess turns up her nose, “Bah–Schmitz!”
Frieda pinches her under the arm, “–and the Bavarian, the one with the blue cap!”
Olga Wolkonski laughs, “Him? He is–all air! Frieda, you know the good boys don’t go to church.”
That is true, the good ones don’t do that. Frieda sighs. She swiftly gets up and shoves the wagon with the screaming Wülfche to the side, and steps on Cyclops who is trying to bite her ankles. No, no, the princess is right. Church is not the answer.
“Let’s stay here!” she decides. The two girls creep back under the Lilac leaves.
All the Gontram children have an infinite passion for living. They can’t say how they know but deep inside, they feel in their blood that they will die young, die fresh. They only have a small amount of time compared to what others are given and they take this time in triple, making noise, rushing, eating and drinking until they are saturated on life.
Wülfche screams in his wagon, screaming for himself alone as well as for three other babies. His brothers fly through the garden making themselves numerous, as if they were four dozen and not just four. They are dirty, red nosed and ragged, always bloody from a cut on the finger, a scraped knee or some other good scratch.
When the sun sets the Gontram rascals quietly sweep back into the house, going into the kitchen for heaping sandwiches of buttered bread laid thick with ham and sausage. The maid gives them water to drink colored lightly with red wine.
Then the maid washes them. She pulls their clothes off and sticks them in wooden tubs, takes the black soap, the hard brush and scrubs them. She scrubs them like a pair of boots and still can’t get them clean. Then she sticks the wild young ones back in the tubs crying and raving and scrubs them again.
Dead tired they fall into their beds like sacks of potatoes, forgetting to be quiet. They also forget to cover up. The maid takes care of that.
Around this time Attorney Manasse comes into the house, climbs up the stairs, knocks with his cane on a few doors and receiving no answer finally moves on.
Frau. Gontram moves toward him. She is tall, almost twice the size of Herr Manasse. He is a dwarf, round as a barrel and looks exactly like his ugly dog, Cyclops. Short stubble stands out all over him, out of his cheeks, chin and lips. His nose appears in the middle, small and round like a radish. When he speaks, he barks as if he is always snapping.
“Good evening Frau Gontram,” he says. “Is my colleague home yet?”
“Good evening attorney,” says the tall woman. “Make yourself comfortable.”
“Why isn’t my colleague home yet?–and shut that kid up! I can’t understand a single word you are saying.”
“What?” Frau Gontram asks. Then she takes the earplugs out of her ears. “Oh yes,” she continues. “That Wülfche! You should buy a pair of these things Attorney. Then you won’t hear him.
She goes to the door and screams, “Billa, Billa–or Frieda! Can’t you hear? Make Wülfche quiet!”
She is still in apricot colored pajamas. Her enormous chestnut brown hair is half-pinned up and half-fallen down. Her black eyes appear infinitely large, wide, wide, filled with sharp cunning and scorching unholy fires. But her skeletal face curves in at the temples, her narrow nose droops and her pale cheeks spread themselves tightly over her bones. Huge patches burn lividly on–
“Do you have a good cigar attorney?” she asks.
He takes his case out angrily, almost furiously.
“How many have you already smoked today Frau Gontram?”
“Only twenty,” she laughs. “But you know the filthy things are four pennies apiece and I could use a good one for a change. Give me the thick one there! – and you take the dark, almost black Mexican.”
Herr Manasse sighs, “Now how are you doing? How long do you have?”
“Bah,” she made a rude sound. “Don’t wet yourself. How long? The other day the doctor figured about six months. But you know how precise they are in that place. He could just as well have meant two years. I’m thinking it’s not going at a gallop. It’s going at a pretty trot along with the galloping consumption.
“You shouldn’t smoke so much!” The little attorney barks.
She looks at him, her thin blue lips pulling high over gleaming teeth.
“What? What Manasse? No more smoking? Now stop with the friendly airs! What am I supposed to do? Bear children all year long? The brats in this house already drive me crazy. That’s why it’s galloping–and I’m not supposed to smoke?”
She blows a thick cloud of smoke into his face and makes him cough.
He looks at her, half-poisoned, half-living, and admires her. He doesn’t take anything from anyone. When he stands before the bar he never tells a joke or minces words. He barks, snaps, bites without respect or the smallest fear.–But here, before this dried up woman whose body is a skeleton, whose head grins like a death’s head, who for a year and a day has stood three quarters in the grave and laughed at herself the last quarter, here he feels afraid.
Her unrestrained shimmering locks are always growing, always thicker, always fuller as if pulling nourishment from her decaying body. Her perfect gleaming teeth clamp around a cigar; her eyes are enormous, without hope, without desire, almost without awareness but burning with fire–These leave him silent. They leave him feeling smaller than he really is, almost as small as his hound.
Oh, he is very educated, Attorney Manasse is. She calls him a veritable conversational encyclopedia. It doesn’t matter what the topic of conversation, he can give the information in the blink of an eye.
Now he’s thinking, has she given up on finding a cure? Is she in denial? Does she think that if she ignores death he will not come? Does she think death is not in this house? That when he does come, only then will she go?
But he, Manasse, sees very well that death is here even though she still lives. He has been here all along hiding throughout the house, playing blind cow with this woman that wears his face, letting her abandon her numerous children to cry and race in the garden.
Death doesn’t gallop. He goes at a pretty trot. She has that right. But only out of humor, only because he wants to make a joke, to play with this woman and her life hungry children like a cat plays with the fish in a fish bowl.
Only this woman, Frau Gontram, thinks he is not even here. She lies on the lounge all day long smoking big dark cigars, reading never-ending books and wearing earplugs so she can’t hear the noise her children make–He is not here at all?–Not here?
Manasse sees very well that Death is here
Death grins and laughs out of her withered mask, puffs thick smoke into his face. Little Manasse sees him perfectly enough. He stares at him, considers for a long time which great artist has painted this death. Is it Durer? Or Bocklin? Or some other wild harlequin death from Bosch, Breughel or a different insane, inexcusable death from Hogarth, from Goya, from Rowlandson, Rops or Callot?
It is from none of these. Sitting before him is a real death, a death you can willingly go with. It is a good, proper and therefore romantic Rhinelander’s death. It is one you can talk with, that sees the comedy in life, that smokes, drinks wine and laughs. It is good that he smokes thought Manasse, so very good, then you can’t smell him–
Then Legal Councilor Gontram comes into the room.
“Good evening colleague,” he says. “Here already? That’s good.”
He begins a long story about all that has happened during the day at the office and before the court. Purely remarkable things that only happen to lawyers once in a lifetime happen to Herr Gontram every day. These strange and often lusty occurrences are sometimes comic, often bloody and highly tragic.
Not a word is true. The Legal Councilor has an incurable shyness of telling the truth. Before his morning bath, yes, even before he washes his face in the basin, from the moment his mouth first opens wide he lies. When he sleeps, he dreams up new lies. Everyone knows that he lies, but his stories are so lusty and interesting they want to hear them anyway. Even when they aren’t that good they are still entertaining.
He is in his late forties with a short, very sparse beard and thinning hair. A gold pince-nez with a long black cord always hangs crookedly over his nose and helps his blue shortsighted eyes see to read.
He is untidy, disorderly, unwashed, and always has ink spots on his fingers. He is a bad jurist and very much against doing any work, always supervising his junior lawyers but not doing anything himself. On this basis he oversees the office managers and clerks and is often not seen for weeks at a time. When he is there, he sleeps. If he is awake, once in awhile he writes a short sentence that reads, “Denied” and stamps the words “Legal Councilor” underneath.
Nevertheless he has a very good practice, much better than the knowledgeable and shrewd Manasse. He understands the language of the people and can chat with them. He is popular with all the judges and lawyers because he never makes any problems and all his clients walk. For the accused and for the jury he is worth the gold he is paid, you can believe that.
Once a Public Prosecutor said, “I ask the accused be denied extenuating circumstances, Legal Councilor Gontram is defending him.”
Extenuating circumstances, his clients always get them, but Manasse seldom receives them despite his scholarly ways and sharp speeches.
There is still more, Legal Councilor Gontram had a couple of big, important and provocative cases that created sensations throughout the land. In both cases he fought through the entire year and finally won. These cases suddenly awoke in him a strange energy that up until then had lain sleeping inside of him.
The first was so full of tangles, a six times loser, nearly impossible case that went from lawyer to lawyer, a case with complicated international questions that he had no suspicion of when he took it. He just thought it was interesting and liked it.
The Koschen brothers out of Lennep had been condemned to death three times. In a fourth resumption he continued on and won their freedom despite hair splitting circumstantial evidence.
The other was a big million-dollar dispute over Galmeiberg Mfg. from Neutral-Moresnet that every jurist in three countries knew about. Certainly Gontram at the least had fought through to the very end and obtained a victorious verdict.
Since then for three years he handles all the legal casework for Princess Wolkonski. Remarkably, this man never says a word about it, about what he really does. Instead he fills the ears of those he meets with lies, cheeky inventions of his legal heroics. Not a single syllable comes over his lips of the real events of his day. This makes it seem like he detests all truth.
Frau Gontram says, “Dinner is just about ready and I’ve already set out a bowl of fresh Woodruff salad. Should I go get dressed?”
“Stay the way you are woman,” the Legal Councilor decides. “Manasse won’t mind–” he interrupts himself, “Dear God, how that child screams! Can’t you hold him?”
She goes past him with long, slow strides, opens the door to the antechamber where the maid has pushed the child’s wagon. She takes Wülfche, carries him in and sits him in a highchair.
“No wonder he screams,” she says. He’s completely wet.”
But she does nothing about it, leaving him to dry out by himself.
Be still, you little devil,” she continues. “Can’t you see I have company?”
But Wülfche is determined to disturb the entire visit. Manasse stands up, pats him, strokes his chubby back, and brings him a Jack-in-the-box to play with. The child pushes the Jack-in-the-box away, bellows and screams incessantly. Cyclops accompanies him from under the table.
Then Mama says, “Now wait, sugar drop. I have something for you.”
She takes the chewed black cigar stub from out between her teeth and shoves it into the baby’s mouth.
“There Wülfche, how do you like that? Well?”
The child becomes still in the blink of an eye, sucking, pulling and beams, overjoyed, out of huge laughing eyes.
“Now attorney, you see how you must deal with children?” says the tall woman. She speaks confidently and quietly, completely earnest.
“But you men don’t understand anything at all about children.”
The maid comes and announces that dinner is ready. While the others are going into the dining room she goes with unsteady steps up to the child.
“Bah,” she says and rips the cigar stub out of his mouth. Immediately Wülfche starts to howl again. She takes him up, rocks him back and forth and sings him a melancholy lullaby from her Wolloonian homeland in Belgium.
She doesn’t have any more luck than Herr Manasse. The child just screams and screams. She takes the cigar stub again, spits on it and rubs it against her dirty apron to make sure the fire is completely out and puts it back in Wülfche’s red mouth.
Then she takes the child, washes him, changes him, and tucks him into bed. Wülfche never stirs, lies quiet still and contented. Then he falls asleep, beaming blissfully, the ghastly black cigar stub always in his lips.
Oh yes, she was right, this tall woman. She understands children, at least Gontram children.
During the dinner and into the evening they eat and the Legal Councilor talks. They drink a light wine from the Ruwer. Frau Gontram finishes first and brings the spiced wine.
Her husband sniffs critically.
“I want champagne,” he says.
She sets the spiced wine on the table anyway. “We don’t have any more champagne. All that’s left in the cellar is a bottle of Pommery.”
He looks intently at her over his spectacles, shakes his head dubiously.
“Now you know you are a housewife! We have no champagne and you don’t say a word about it? What? No, champagne in the house! Fetch the bottle of Pommery– Spiced wine is not good enough.”
He shakes his head back and forth, “No champagne. Imagine that!” He repeats. “We must procure some right away. Come woman; bring my quill and paper. I must write the princess.
But when the paper is set in front of him, he pushes it away again. He sighs.
“I’ve been working all day long. You write woman, I’ll dictate to you.”
Frau Gontram doesn’t move. Write? She’s a complete failure at writing!
“I can’t,” she says.
The Legal Councilor looks over at Manasse.
“See how it is, Colleague? Can’t she do this for me? I am so exhausted–”
The little Attorney looks straight at him.
“Exhausted? He mocks, “From what? Telling stories? I would like to know why your fingers always have ink on them, Legal Councilor. I know it’s not from writing!”
Frau Gontram laughs. “Oh Manasse, that’s from last Christmas when he had to sign as witness to the children’s bad behavior!–Anyway, why quarrel? Let Frieda write.”
She cries out the window to Frieda. Frieda comes into the room and Olga Wolkonski comes with her.
“So nice to have you here,” the Legal Councilor greets her. Have you already eaten this evening?”
Both girls have eaten down in the kitchen.
“Sit here Frieda,” bids her father. “Right here.”
Frieda obeys.
“Now, take the quill and write what I tell you.”
But Frieda is a true Gontram child. She hates to write. Instantly she springs up out of the chair.
“No, no,” she cries. “Olga should write, she is so much better than I am.”
The princess stays on the sofa. She doesn’t want to do it either. But her friend has a means to make her submit.
“If you don’t write,” she whispers. “I won’t lend you any sins for the day after tomorrow.”
That did it. The day after tomorrow is Confession and her confession slip is looking very insufficient. Sins are not permitted during this time of First Communion but you still need to confess. You must rigorously investigate, consider and seek to see if you can’t somehow find yet another sin. That is something the Princess absolutely can’t understand.
But Frieda is splendid at it. Her confession slip is the envy of the entire class. Thought sins are especially easy for her. She can discover dozens of magnificent sins easily at a time. She gets this from Papa. Once she really gets started she can attend the Father Confessor with such heaps of sins that he never really learns anything.
“Write Olga,” she whispers. “Then I’ll lend you eight fat sins.”
“Ten,” counters the princess.
Frieda Gontram nods. It doesn’t matter to her. She will give away twenty sins so she doesn’t have to write.
Olga sits at the table, picks up the quill and looks questioningly.
“Now write,” says the Legal Councilor.
“Honorable Princess–”
“Is this for Mama?” the princess asks.
“Naturally, who else would it be for? Write!”
“Honorable Princess–”
The princess doesn’t write. “If it’s for Mama, I can only write, ‘Dear Mama’.”
The Legal Councilor is impatient.
“Write what you want child, just write!”
She writes, “Dear Mama!”
Then the Legal Councilor dictates:
“Unfortunately I must inform you that there is a problem. There are so many things that I must consider and you can’t consider things when you have nothing to drink. We don’t have a drop of champagne in the house. In the interests of your case please send us a basket of spiced champagne, a basket of Pommery and six bottles of–”
“St. Marceaux!” cries the little attorney.
“St. Marceaux,” continues the Legal Councilor. That is namely the favorite of my colleague, Manasse, who so often helps.
With best Greetings,
Your–”
“Now see, Colleague!” he says. “You need to correct me! I didn’t dictate this letter alone but I will sign it single handedly, and he puts his name on it.
Frieda turns away from the window, “Are you finished? Yes? Well, I can only say that you didn’t need to write the letter. Olga’s Mama is coming and she’s in the garden now!”
She had seen the princess a long time ago but had kept quiet and not interrupted. If Olga wanted to get ten beautiful sins she should at least work for them!
All the Gontrams were like that, father, mother and children. They are very, very unwilling to work but are very willing to let others do it.
The princess enters, obese and sweaty, large diamonds on her fingers, in her ears, around her neck and in her hair in a vulgar display of extravagance.
She is a Hungarian Countess or Baroness. She met the prince somewhere in the Orient. A marriage was arranged, that was certain, but also certain, was that right from the beginning it was a fraud on both sides.
She wanted the marriage to make her impossible pregnancy legal. The prince wanted the same marriage to prevent an international scandal and hide his small mistake. It was a net of lies and impudent fraud, a legal feast for Herr Sebastian Gontram, everything was in motion, and nothing was solid. Every smallest assertion would prompt legal opposition from the other side. Every shadow would be extinguished through a court ruling.
Only one thing stayed the same, the little princess. Both the prince and the princess proclaimed themselves as father and mother and claimed her as their own. This product of their strange marriage is heir to many millions of dollars. The mother has the advantage, has custody.
“Have a seat, princess!”
The Legal Councilor would sooner bite his tongue than call this woman, ‘Highness’. She is his client and he doesn’t treat her a hair better than a peasant woman.
“Take your coat off!” but he doesn’t help her with it.
“We have just written you a letter,” he continues and reads the beautiful letter to her.
“But of course,” cries the princess. “I will take care of it first thing tomorrow morning!”
She opens her purse and pulls out a heavy envelope.
“Look at this, Honorable Legal Councilor. I came straight here with it. It is a letter from Lord, Count Ormes of Greater-Becskerekgyartelep, you know him.”
Herr Gontram furrows his brow. This isn’t good. The King himself would not be permitted to demand him to conduct any business while at home. He stands up and takes the letter.
“That’s very good,” he says. “Very good. We will clear this up in the morning at the office.”
She defends herself, “But it’s very urgent! It’s very important!”
The Legal Councilor interrupts her, “Urgent? Important? Let me tell you what is urgent and important, absolutely nothing. Only in the office can a person judge what is urgent and important.”
He reproaches her, “Princess, you are an educated woman! You know all about proper manners and enjoy them all the time. You must know that you don’t bring business home at night.”
She persists, “But I can never catch you at the office Honorable Legal Councilor. During this week alone I was–”
Now he is almost angry. “Then come next week! Do you think that all I do is work on your stuff alone? Do you really believe that is all I do? Do you know what my time alone costs for the murderer Houten? And it’s on my head to handle your millions as well.”
Then he begins to tell a funny story, incessantly relating an unending imaginary story of a strange crime lord and the heroic attorney that brings him to justice for all the horrible sex murders that he has committed.
The princess sighs, but she listens to him. She laughs once in awhile, always in the wrong places. She is the only one of all his listeners that never knows when he lies and also the only one that doesn’t understand his jokes.
“Nice story for the children!” barks Attorney Manasse.
Both girls are listening eagerly, staring at the Legal Councilor with wide-open eyes and mouths. But he doesn’t allow himself to be interrupted. It is never too early to get accustomed to such things. He talks as if sex murderers were common, that they happen all the time in life and you can encounter dozens of them every day.
He finally finishes, looks at the hour. “Ten already! You children must go to bed! Drink your spiced wine quickly.”
The girls drink, but the princess declares that she will under no circumstances go back to her house. She is too afraid and can’t sleep by herself, perhaps there is a disguised sex murderer in the house. She wants to stay with her friend. She doesn’t ask her Mama. She asks only Frieda and her mother.
“You can as far as I’m concerned,” says Frau Gontram. “But don’t you oversleep! You need to be in church on time.”
The girls curtsey and go out, arm in arm, inseparable.
“Are you afraid too?” asks the princess.
Frieda says, “What Papa was saying is all lies.”
But she is still afraid anyway and at the same time strangely longing for these things. Not to experience them, oh no, not to know that. But she is thinking how she wants to be able to tell stories like that! Yes, that is another sin for confession! She sighs.
Above, they finish the spiced wine. Frau Gontram smokes one last cigar. Herr Manasse stands up to leave the room and the Legal Councilor is telling the princess a new story. She hides her yawn behind her fan, attempts again to get a word in.
“Oh, yes, dear Legal Councilor,” she says quickly. “I almost forgot! May I pick your wife up at noon tomorrow in the carriage? I’d like to take her with me into Rolandseck for a bit.”
“Certainly,” he answers. “Certainly, if she wants to.”
But Frau Gontram says, “I can’t go out.”
“And why not?” the princess asks. “It would do you some good to get out and breathe some fresh spring air.”
“Frau Gontram slowly takes the cigar out from between her teeth. “I can’t go out. I don’t have a decent hat to wear–”
The Princess laughs as if it is a good joke. She will also send the Milliner over in the morning with the newest spring fashions.
“Then I’ll go,” says Frau Gontram. “But send Becker from Quirinusjass, they have the best.”
“And now I must go to sleep–good night!”
“Oh, yes, it is time I must get going too!” the princess cries hastily.
Legal Councilor escorts her out, through the garden and into the street. He helps her up into her carriage and then deliberately shuts the garden gate.
As he comes back, his wife is standing in the house door, a burning candle in her hand.
“I can’t go to bed yet,” she says quietly.
“What,” he asks. “Why not?”
She replies, “I can’t go to bed yet because Manasse is lying in it!”
They climb up the stairs to the second floor and go into the bedroom. In the giant marriage bed lies the little attorney pretty as can be and fast asleep. His clothing is hung carefully over the chair, his boots standing nearby. He has taken a clean nightgown out of the wardrobe and put it on. Near him lies his Cyclops like a crumpled young hedgehog.
Legal Councilor Gontram takes the candle from the nightstand and lights it.
“And the man insults me, says that I’m lazy!” he says shaking his head in wonderment.
“–And he is too lazy to go home!”
“Shh!” Frau Gontram says. “You’ll wake everyone up.”
She takes bedding and linen out of the wardrobe and goes very quietly downstairs and makes up two beds on the sofas. They sleep there.
Everyone is sleeping in the white house. Downstairs by the kitchen the strong cook, Billa, sleeps, the three hounds next to her. In the next room the four wild rascals sleep, Philipp, Paulche, Emilche and Josefche. Upstairs in Frieda’s large balcony room the two friends are sleeping. Wülfche sleeps nearby with his black tobacco stub. In the living room sleep Herr Sebastian Gontram and his wife. Up the hall Herr Manasse and Cyclops contentedly snore and way up in the attic sleeps Sophia, the housemaid. She has come back from the dance hall and lightly sneaked up the stairs.
Everyone is sleeping, twelve people and four sharp hounds. But something is not sleeping. It shuffles slowly around the white house–
Outside by the garden flows the Rhine, rising and breasting its embankments. It appears in the sleeping village, presses itself against the old toll office.
Cats and Tomcats are pushing through the bushes, hissing, biting, striking each other, their round hot glittering eyes possessed with aching, agonizing and denied lust–
In the distance at the edge of the city you hear the drunken songs of the wild students–
Something creeps all around the white house on the Rhine, sneaks through the garden, past a broken embankment and overturned benches. It looks in pleasure at the Sunday antics of the love hungry cats and climbs up to the house. It scratches with hard nails on the wall making a loose piece of plaster fall, pokes softly at the door so that it rattles lightly like the wind.
Then it’s in the house shuffling up the stairs, creeping cautiously through all the rooms and stops, looks around, smiles.
Heavy silver stands on the mahogany buffet, rich treasures from the time of the Kaiser. But the windowpanes are warped and patched with paper. Dutchmen hang on the wall. They are all good paintings from Koekoek, Verboekhuoeven, Verwee and Jan Stobbaerts, but they have holes and the old golden frames are black with spider webs.
Something sneaks through the still house
These magnificent beauties came from the ArchBishop’s old hall. But the broken crystal is sticky with flyspecks.
Something sneaks through the still house and each time it comes it breaks something, almost nothing, an infinite smallness, a crack. But again and again, each time it comes, the crack grows in the night. There is a small noise, a light creaking in the hall, a nail loosens and the old furniture gives way. There is a rattle at the swollen shutters and a strange clanking between the windowpanes.
Everyone sleeps in this big house on the Rhine but something slowly shuffles around.
