Flotsam (29 page)

She pushed her hand through his arm. “Forget about it. That’s the simplest thing to do. What’s more, I think it’s going to stop raining.”

They went outside. Drops were still falling, but above the mountains hung a gigantic rainbow. It spanned the entire valley like a many-colored bridge. Beyond the forest, between torn clouds, a burst of yellow-white light flooded the landscape. They could not see the sun; they only saw the light which streamed forth like a luminous mist.

“Come,” Ruth said, “it’s going to be better now.”

That evening they came to a sheepfold. The shepherd, a taciturn middle-aged farmer, was sitting in front of the door. Two sheep dogs were lying beside him. They dashed out barking as the two approached. The farmer took his pipe out of his mouth and whistled them back.

Kern went up to him. “Could we sleep here for the night? We’re wet and tired and can’t go any farther.”

The man looked at him for some time. “There’s a hayloft up there,” he said finally.

“That’s all we need.”

The man looked at him again for a time. “Give me your matches and your cigarettes,” he said finally. “There’s a lot of hay there.”

Kern handed them over. “You’ll have to climb up the ladder inside,” the shepherd explained. “I’ll lock the fold behind you. I live in the town. Tomorrow morning early I’ll let you out.”

“Thanks. Thanks very much.”

They climbed up the ladder. It was dusky and warm up there. After a while the shepherd appeared, bringing them grapes and some cheese and black bread. “Now I’m going to lock up,” he said. “Good night.”

“Good night and many thanks.”

They listened as he climbed down the ladder. Then they took off their wet things and lay down on the hay. They got their night clothes out of their bags and then began to eat. They were very hungry.

“How does it taste?” Kern asked.

“Wonderful.” Ruth leaned against him.

“We’re lucky, aren’t we?”

She nodded.

Below them the shepherd was locking up. The hayloft had a round window. They crouched beside it and watched the shepherd walk away. The sky had cleared and was reflected in the lake. The shepherd walked slowly across the mowed fields with the thoughtful strides of a man who spends his days close to nature. There was no one else in sight. He walked in solitude
across the fields and it seemed as though he were carrying the whole sky on his dark shoulders.

They sat at the windows until that colorless hour before nightfall when the light makes all things gray. Behind them in the play of shadows the hay grew to a fantastic mountain range. Its smell mixed with the smell of peat and whisky that rose from the sheep. They could see them through the holes in the floor, a confused mass of woolly backs, and they could hear the thousand little sounds that gradually grew quieter and quieter.

Next morning the shepherd came and opened the sheepfold. Kern went down. Ruth was still asleep. Her face was flushed and her breathing was rapid. Kern helped the shepherd unbar the fold and drive out the sheep.

“Would you let us stay here one more day?” he asked. “We’d be glad to help you in return if that’s all right with you.”

“There’s not much you can do to help. But you’re welcome to stay here if you like.”

“Thanks.”

Kern inquired about the addresses of Germans living in the town. The place was not included in Binder’s list. The shepherd mentioned a few people and told him where they lived.

Kern started off in the afternoon when it was beginning to get dark. He found the first house without difficulty. It was a small white villa surrounded by a little garden. A tidy housemaid opened the door. She admitted him at once to a small reception room instead of making him stand outside. A good sign, Kern thought. “May I speak to Herr Ammers or to Frau Ammers?” he asked.

“Just a minute.”

The maid disappeared and presently returned. She led him into a living room, furnished in modern mahogany. The floor was so highly polished he almost lost his footing. There were antimacassars on all the furniture. After a minute Herr Ammers appeared. He was a little man with a pointed white beard and a friendly manner. Kern decided to tell his true story.

Ammers listened sympathetically. “So you’re an exile and have no passport or residential permit?” he said. “And you have soap and household things to sell?”

“Yes.”

“I see.” Herr Ammers got up. “My wife can take a look at your things.”

He went out. After a little while his wife entered. She was a faded, sexless creature, with a face the color of overcooked meat and pale, haddock eyes.

“What sort of things have you there?” she asked in a simpering voice.

Kern unpacked his wares, of which there were not very many left. The woman fussed over her selection, she looked at the sewing needles as though she had never seen anything of the sort before, she smelled the soap and tested the toothbrushes on her thumb, she asked about prices and finally decided to consult her sister.

The sister was an exact duplicate. Small though he was, the bearded Ammers must have ruled the house with an iron hand, for the sister, too, was completely subdued and had a quavering, frightened voice. At every other instant the two women glanced at the door. They dallied and hesitated until Kern finally began to lose patience and started to pack up his things. “Perhaps you’ll think it over until morning,” he said, for he saw that even now they could not make up their minds.

The wife looked at him in alarm. “Perhaps you’d like a cup of coffee?” she said.

Kern had not had any coffee in a long time. “If you have some made,” he said.

“Yes, yes indeed. Just one minute.”

She lumbered out, as awkward as a lopsided keg, but quickly nevertheless. The sister stayed in the room.

“A cup of coffee will taste fine,” Kern said to make conversation.

The sister emitted a strangled laugh like a turkey gobbler and then was suddenly silent as though she had swallowed the wrong way. Kern looked at her in amazement. She bobbed her head and made a shrill piping sound through her nose.

The wife came in and put a steaming cup on the table in front of Kern. “Take your time drinking it,” she said considerately. “There’s no hurry and the coffee is very hot.”

The sister gave a sudden brief laugh and then ducked her head nervously.

Kern never got to drink his coffee. The door opened and Ammers came in with short, springy steps, followed by a disgruntled-looking policeman.

With a pontifical gesture Ammers pointed at Kern. “Officer, do your duty. Here is an individual without a country and without a passport—banished from the German Reich!”

Kern stiffened. The officer looked at him. “Come with me,” he growled.

For a moment Kern had the feeling that his brain had stopped working. He had anticipated everything but this. Slowly and mechanically, as though in a slow motion picture, he got his things together. Then he straightened up. “So that was the reason for your kindness and for the coffee,” he said
awkwardly and with difficulty, as though he must at all costs make himself clear, “just to keep me here.” He clenched his fists and took a step towards Ammers, who recoiled. “Don’t be afraid,” Kern said softly, “I’m not going to touch you. I’ll just curse you. I curse you and your children and your wife with the whole strength of my soul. May all the unhappiness in the world fall on you! May your children revolt against you and leave you alone in poverty, sickness and misery!”

Ammers turned pale. His beard trembled. “Protect me,” he ordered the policeman.

“He hasn’t injured you yet,” the officer said phlegmatically. “Up to now he’s only cursed you. If, for example, he had called you a dirty informer that might perhaps have been an injury—principally on account of the word dirty.”

Ammers looked at him in a rage. “Do your duty!” he snapped.

“Herr Ammers,” the officer announced calmly, “it’s not your place to give me orders. Only my superiors can do that. You have denounced a man and I have come. You may leave the rest to me.” He turned to Kern. “Follow me.”

The two went out. Behind them the door was slammed shut. Kern walked silently beside the official. He still could not get his thoughts in order. Somewhere inside him an indistinct voice said
Ruth
—but he simply did not dare think further.

“My boy,” said the policeman after a while, “sometimes sheep go to call on hyenas. Don’t you know who he is? He’s the local spy of the German Nazi Party, and he has already denounced all sorts of people.”

“My God!” Kern said.

“Yes,” replied the officer, “that’s what you call a prize boner.”

Kern was silent. “I don’t know—” he said dully after a moment. “All I know is there’s a sick person waiting for me.”

The policeman looked down the street and shrugged his shoulders. “That doesn’t help a bit. And it has nothing to do with me. I’ve got to take you to the police station.” He looked around. The street was empty. “I can’t advise you to run for it,” he went on. “There’s no point. Of course I have a game leg and couldn’t run after you, but I would shout at you and then if you didn’t stop I’d draw my revolver.” He looked Kern up and down for a couple of seconds. “Naturally that would take some time,” he explained. “You might even get away from me, particularly at a place we’re just coming to, where there are all sorts of alleys and corners and where shooting is out of the question. If you were to escape, I couldn’t really do anything. Unless I had put you in handcuffs first.”

Suddenly Kern was wide awake and filled with an unreasoning hope. He stared at the officer.

The officer walked on indifferently. “Do you know,” he said thoughtfully after a pause, “sometimes people are too decent for their own good.”

Kern felt his hands wet with excitement. “Listen,” he said, “there’s a person waiting for me who is helpless without me. Let me go. We are on our way to France. We want to get out of Switzerland. It won’t make any difference one way or the other.”

“I can’t do that,” the officer replied phlegmatically. “It’s against the service regulations. I must take you to the police station. That’s my duty. Of course if you were to escape from me there would naturally be nothing I could do about it.” He stopped. “For example, if you were to run down that street, turn the corner and keep to the left—you’d be off before I could shoot.” He glanced at Kern impatiently. “Well then, I’ll
just put you in handcuffs. Damnation, where did I put the things?”

He turned halfway round and began a thorough search of his pockets. “Thanks,” Kern said and ran.

At the corner he took a quick look back. The officer was standing there, both hands on his hips, grinning after him.

* * *

Kern awoke and listened to Ruth’s quick, shallow breathing. He felt her forehead; it was hot and damp. She was sleeping deeply but restlessly and he did not want to wake her. The smell of the hay was overpowering, although they had spread blankets and bed covers on top of it. After a while she awoke of her own accord and in a plaintive, childish voice asked for water. Kern brought her the pail and a cup and she drank thirstily.

“Are you hot?”

“Yes, very. But perhaps it’s only the hay. My throat is parched.”

“I hope you haven’t a fever.”

“I mustn’t have a fever. I mustn’t get sick. I’m not sick, either. I won’t be sick.”

She turned over and pushed her head under his arm and went to sleep again.

Kern lay still. He wished he had a light to see how Ruth looked. He recognized from the damp heat of her face that she was feverish. But he had no flashlight. So he lay still, listening to her quick short breathing and watching the infinitely slow progress of the hand around the illuminated dial of his watch, which gleamed through the darkness like some pale and distant diabolical engine of time. Beneath them the sheep jostled each other, grunting from time to time, and it seemed to take
years for the circle of the window to grow brighter, announcing the day.

Ruth awoke. “Give me some water, Ludwig.”

Kern handed her the cup. “You have a fever, Ruth. Will you be all right alone for an hour?”

“Yes.”

“I’m just going to run down to the village and get some medicine.”

The shepherd came and opened the sheepfold. When Kern told him what had happened he made a wry face. “She must go to a hospital. She can’t stay here.”

“We’ll see if she isn’t better by noon.”

Despite his fear of meeting the policeman or a member of the Ammers family, Kern ran to the drugstore and begged the druggist to lend him a thermometer. The assistant let him have one after he had put up money as a deposit. Kern bought a bottle of arcanol and ran back.

Ruth’s temperature was 101.5. She took two tablets and Kern wrapped his jacket and her coat around her where she lay in the hay. By noon, despite the medicine, her temperature had risen to 102 degrees.

The shepherd scratched his head. “She needs nursing. If I were in your place I’d take her to the hospital.”

“I won’t go to the hospital,” Ruth whispered hoarsely. “Tomorrow I’ll be well again.”

“It doesn’t look like it to me,” said the shepherd. “She ought to be in bed in a room and not here in a hayloft.”

“No, it’s warm and nice here. Please let me lie here.”

The shepherd climbed down the ladder and Kern followed. “Why doesn’t she want to leave?” the shepherd asked.

“Because then we’d be separated.”

“That doesn’t matter. You could wait for her.”

“That’s just what I couldn’t do. If she’s admitted to a hospital they will find out she hasn’t a passport. Perhaps they might keep her there, although we haven’t enough money; but afterwards the police would take her to the border and I wouldn’t know where or when.”

The shepherd shook his head. “And you haven’t done anything? You haven’t committed any crime?”

“We haven’t passports and can’t get them, that’s all.”

“That’s not what I mean. You haven’t stolen something somewhere, or swindled someone or anything like that?”

“No.”

“And nevertheless they chase you as though they had a warrant for your arrest?”

“Yes.”

The shepherd spat. “Perhaps someone can understand that. A simple fellow like me can’t.”