By now I’d been walking for about four hours. I had no idea why I’d turned off the road or why I’d not yet turned back. The burning in my head had subsided; the tingling in the base of my nose was gone. All I could feel was a terrible hollowness in my heart. A door had opened, promising the sublime, but then it had slammed shut, robbing my life of all hope and meaning. I felt as bereft as if I’d awoken from the sweetest of dreams to face the pain of truth. In no way did I hold this against her, I felt no anger. I was only sad. All I could think was: ‘It shouldn’t have come to this.’ The truth was she could not find it in her to love me. And with good reason. Never in my life had anyone loved me, ever. In any case, women were mysterious creatures. Passing my mind over all the women I had known or observed, I was driven to conclude that true love was beyond them. When they were in a position to love, they did not. Instead they ached for the unattainable – the opportunities missed, the salve that their broken hearts longed for – thereby mistaking their yearnings for love. But soon I realized that I was judging Maria unfairly. In spite of everything, I knew full well that she was nothing like those others. And I had seen how much she was suffering. It was not possible for her to suffer like that purely out of pity for me. She was suffering because she longed for something she could not find. But what was it? What was I lacking? Or rather, what were we lacking?
How painful it is, after thinking that a woman has given us everything, to see that in truth she has given us nothing – to see that instead of having drawn her closer, she is further away than ever!
It should never have come to this. But as Maria had said, there was nothing to be done; on my part especially …
What right did she have to treat me like that? I could have carried on as I was, shunning human company and leading a mediocre existence, but at no point having to face how very empty my life was: I’d have dragged on through life, convinced that my strange temperament allowed me no more, and never would I have known what it meant to lead a happy life. I’d have suffered from loneliness, while still believing that one day I might be rescued. Such was my state of mind when Maria, or rather her painting, came into my life. She had swept me away from my dark and silent world, delivering me to the land of truth and light. And now she had vanished, offering no reasons, and as suddenly as she’d come. But for me there was no hope of sinking back into my old torpor. For as long as I lived, I would travel far and wide, meeting with people whose languages I did or did not know, and everywhere I went, I would be looking for Maria Puder. In every pair of eyes, I would be searching for the Madonna in a Fur Coat. I knew from the outset that I would never find her. Yet it was not in my power to give up searching. She had condemned me to a lifelong quest for a cypher, for someone that did not exist. She should never have done this to me.
The years ahead seemed too bleak to endure. And neither could I find a reason to bear such a burden. As I battled with these thoughts, a curtain lifted. I remembered where I was. This lake before me was the Wannsee. One day, while I was travelling with Maria Puder to Potsdam to see the park of Frederick II’s New Palace, she’d pointed it out to me through the train window, telling me that more than a century earlier, the great poet Heinrich von Kleist and his beloved had committed suicide under the trees where I was now standing.
What had brought me here? What had possessed me to return to a place I’d only glimpsed in passing? It was almost as if I’d come straight here, in answer to a promise. Could it be that, after parting with the one person I trusted most in this world – after hearing her declare that there was a point beyond which two people could not be together – I’d come to this spot where two people had gone together, even into death, as some sort of retort? Or was I merely seeking to convince myself that there were lovers in this world who refused to pull away from each other? I cannot say. My recollection of my train of thought is hazy. But all of the sudden the ground beneath my feet seemed to be on fire! I could almost see the two lovers stretched out before me, one bullet in her breast and one in his head. And there, twisting through the grass, were two streams of blood, flowing from their wounds and running into the puddle that was forming around my feet. Their blood, like their fate, was conjoined. And there they still were, just a few steps away. Side by side … Turning on my heels, I raced back along the same path that had brought me.
From below I could hear laughter rising from the lake. I could see couples spinning around, their arms round each other’s waists, as if setting out on an endless journey. Now and again, the inn’s front doors flew open, letting out snatches of music and stomping feet, as those who had skated long enough climbed up the hill, most probably to drink grog and enjoy a bit of dancing.
They were having fun. They were alive. While I stood apart, locked up inside my own head, and watched – not, as I now understood, from above, but from below. It was not a surfeit of idiosyncrasy that had led me to shun society. I had pulled away because there was a part of me missing. But life was meant to be lived, as these people were doing. They were taking their share of life, and giving something back. What was I in comparison? What did my soul ever do, apart from gnawing away at me like a woodworm? This gramophone, this wooden inn, this ice-covered lake, these snow-covered trees and this jumbled crowd: they were all busy with the tasks that life had given them. There was meaning in everything they did, even if I could not see at first glance. And I was but the wheel that had spun off its axle, still searching for reasons as I wobbled off into the void. No doubt I was the most useless man in the world. The world would be no worse off without me. I expected nothing of anyone and no one expected anything of me.
From that moment, something in me changed, setting my life on a new course. From then on, I have believed myself to be useless and worthless. I have, on occasion, felt myself on the verge of coming back to life – of returning to the land of the living. As I mulled over my change in circumstances, I would, for a few days, allow myself to be consoled. But then I would return to my deep-rooted conviction that this world had no use for me. There was nothing I could do to free myself from its influence – so much so that even today, so many years later, I can still recall the full force of that moment when I pulled away from the world, my courage shattered. I can see just as clearly that I was not mistaken in my conviction …
I raced down to the asphalt road and headed back to Berlin. I hadn’t eaten anything since the previous night, but I did not feel hungry so much as nauseous. My legs weren’t tired, but every muscle in my body was taut. I was walking slowly now, steeped in thought. The closer I came to the city, the greater my despair. I simply could not accept the fact that I would be spending all my days without her – the very idea seemed remote, impossible, absurd … yet I could never go to her with my head bowed, to beg. It was not in my nature; it would serve no purpose … I conjured up mad scenes that had more than a little in common with my childhood fantasies, except that they were even bloodier and more improbable. How splendid it would be to call her to the telephone just before she was to take the stage at the Atlantic and (after I had asked her forgiveness for having disturbed her and bade her farewell) pump a bullet into my head, while she listened at the other end! Upon hearing this deadly sound, she would pause, uncomprehending, before madly screaming ‘Raif! Raif!’ into the receiver. And if, by chance, I happened to hear her cries as I lay there on the ground, taking my last breath, I would die smiling. With no idea of my whereabouts, she would flail about in desperation, too distracted to call the police, and when, the next day, as she leafed through the papers with trembling hands, reading the details of this mysterious tragedy, she would seize up with remorse and regret, knowing she would never be able to forget me, now that I had bound myself to her memory in blood.
By now I was close to the city, passing over and under the same bridges. It was almost evening. I had no idea where I was going. I went into a little park and sat down. My eyes were burning. Leaning back, I looked up at the sky. The snow was turning my feet to ice. But I sat th
ere for hours, nevertheless. A strange numbness spread through me. Oh, to die here of cold, to be buried without fanfare the next day! What would Maria do, when she chanced upon the news a few days hence? What sort of shadow would pass across her face? What regret would overtake her?
My thoughts kept going back to her. I got up and continued on my way. I still had hours to go before I reached the city centre. I began to mumble to myself as I walked. Everything I said, I said to her. My head was spinning with a thousand brilliant ideas, a thousand seductive illusions – just as it had been during our first few days together. But I knew, nevertheless, that no words existed that could change her mind. As my eyes filled up with tears, I would tell her in a trembling voice that it was nigh impossible for two people to find the kind of intimacy that we had already shared, therefore unthinkable for us to part for such an absurd reason … At first it would seem strange to her, to see a man as meek and calm as I speaking with such passion, but the moment would arrive when she reached out slowly to take my hands and smile and say: ‘You’re right!’
Yes … I had to see her and explain everything. I had to persuade her to reverse this frightful decision to which I had agreed so easily this morning. And she would reverse it. It occurred to me now that she might even have been offended by the speed with which I’d left the house, without a word of protest. I had to see her at once, before the night was out.
I wandered aimlessly until eleven in the evening, when I began to pace up and down in front of the Atlantic, waiting for her to arrive. But she didn’t. Finally I asked the doorman with the sequined coat: ‘I don’t know, she didn’t come tonight,’ he said. Her illness must have taken a turn for the worse, I now decided. I raced over to her building. Her window was dark. She must have been sleeping. Thinking it best not to disturb her, I went back to the pension.
For three days I waited for her outside the Atlantic, going afterwards to her front door to look up at her dark window, and never once did I find the courage to do more than head back to my room. Every day I sat there, trying to read. I was only turning the pages, oblivious to the words, and sometimes I would gather my resolve and go back to the beginning, but after reading the first few lines my mind would be wandering once again. I knew that there was nothing more for me to do save accept her decision as final and wait for time to pass. But in the evenings my feverish imagination took hold, tormenting me with impossible thoughts. And then, late at night, I would rush out onto the street, in contravention of all my daytime resolutions, to wander around her house and any other street I thought she might take. By then I was too ashamed to ask the doorman with the sequined coat, so I made do with watching the entrance from a distance. Five days passed like this. I saw her every night in my dreams, closer to me than she ever was before.
On the fifth day, after seeing that she had still not turned up for work, I telephoned the Atlantic and asked to speak to Maria Puder. They told me that she had not been in for a few days on account of illness. So she really was seriously ill. Did I have any reason to doubt that? Why had I needed some sort of confirmation? She was hardly going to change her working hours or tell the doorman to drive me away! I set out for her building, determined to wake her up even if she was asleep. Whatever limits she set on our relationship, I surely had the right to do so. Yes, we’d both been very drunk. But it wasn’t right to attach such importance to the morning after.
Breathlessly, I raced up the stairwell and without a moment’s hesitation pressed the doorbell. Just one short ring. Then I waited. Not a sound from inside. I pressed again, several times, this time for longer. I was hoping for footsteps but I heard nothing. Then the opposite door cracked open: it was a maid, who looked half asleep.
‘What do you want?’ she asked.
‘I’m looking for the person who lives here.’
After giving me a good look, she growled: ‘There’s no one there.’ And my heart skipped a beat.
‘Did they move?’
When she spoke again, her voice was softer, perhaps because she’d heard the panic in my voice: ‘No, her mother never came back from Prague. And she fell ill. No one to look after her so the doctor at the infirmary sent her off to hospital.’
Hearing this I rushed across the landing. ‘Where is she then? Is it serious? Which hospital did they take her to? When …’
Taken aback by my frantic questions, the maid retreated a step: ‘Stop shouting. You’ll wake up everyone in the building … They took her away two days ago. I think it was Charité Hospital.’
‘What’s wrong with her?’
‘I don’t know.’
I didn’t even think to thank her. I left her staring in amazement as I flew down the stairwell four steps at a time. The first police officer I came upon told me where I could find Charité Hospital. I went straight there, with no idea of what I was going to do. On first glimpsing the enormous stone building from a hundred metres away, a chill went through me. But I walked resolutely, passing the large gate and calling for the porter to come out of his room to speak to me. Though I was given a level of courtesy beyond what I deserved – I had, after all, arrived in the middle of the night and forced him out into the freezing cold – the porter could tell me nothing about Maria. He had no news of a woman having been admitted recently, let alone what she might be suffering from or where I might find her. Although he tried to cover up his frustration with a smile, he had the same reply for every question: ‘If you can come tomorrow morning at nine, they’ll be able to tell you.’ That was all he would say.
It was during that long night, as I paced the hospital’s high stone walls, that I came to appreciate just how much I loved Maria Puder and how desperately I was attached to her; I thought about nothing but her. When I looked up to see patients peering down at me, through windows bathed in a pale yellow light, I tried to guess which one hers might be, and oh, how I longed to be at her side, wiping the sweat from her brow and attending to her every need!
That night I came to understand how it was possible to be more attached to another person than to life itself. And that night I also came to understand how hollow life would be without her. As hollow as a walnut shell, tossed by the winds.
As the wind hurled the snow from one wall to next, it came close to blinding me. The streets were deserted. Now and again a white car went through the front gate, and a little later it came out again. A police officer gave me a long stare when passing me for the second time. Passing me for the third time, he asked me why I was there. I told him I knew someone inside and he suggested that I should go home and rest and come back in the morning, but when we ran into each other after that, he gave me a pitying glance and moved on.
As the sky brightened, the streets slowly came to life. Now there were more white cars going in and out of the hospital gate. At nine o’clock sharp, I got permission from the doctor on duty to come inside, even though it was not a visiting day. It was my desolate expression, I imagine, that convinced him to make an exception for me.
Maria Puder was in a single room. I was shown in by a nurse who told me that I should not stay long as the patient needed rest. She was suffering from pleurisy, but the doctor did not think her condition was serious. Maria turned her head, and the moment she saw me, she smiled. But then her expression changed. She looked alarmed. Once the nurse had left us alone, she said: ‘What’s wrong, Raif?’
Her voice was still the same. But her pale face had taken on a yellowish hue. Coming closer to her, I said: ‘What’s happened? Have you seen yourself?’
‘It’s nothing … I suppose it will pass … but you look exhausted.’
‘Last night the people at the Atlantic told me you were ill. I went to see you at home and the maid across the hall told me they had brought you here. They didn’t let me in, so I waited until it was morning.’
‘Where?’
‘Here … outside the hospital.’
She looked me up and down, with the gravest of expressions. She seemed about to say something, bu
t then she stopped.
The nurse came into the room. I bade Maria goodbye. She nodded, but she did not smile.
Maria Puder stayed in hospital for twenty-five days. They might have kept her there longer, but she told the doctors that she was growing restless and that she could look after herself better at home. Carrying with her a great deal of advice and a long list of prescriptions, she left the hospital one snowy day and made her way home. I have little recollection of what I did over those twenty-five days. I don’t think I did anything but visit her in the hospital, to sit at her bedside, watching her vacant stare, her face drenched in sweat, and her chest rising and falling as she struggled to breathe. Indeed, I was not really living; because if I had been, I would remember a few details, if nothing else. All I can recall is an overwhelming sense of dread. I was terrified I might lose her. Whenever her fingers strayed beyond the covers, or her feet quivered beneath it, I saw the shadow of death. I could see it even in her face, her lips, her smile: I sensed in them a surrender, an acceptance of some awful fact, a readiness even – as if all they needed now was to find the right opportunity. And what would I do then? Yes, I would have to take care of the final stages, preserving the peace, choosing a cemetery as I consoled her mother, who would have returned from Prague by then, and finally with a few others we would lay her to rest in the earth … After a while everyone would leave, but I would return in secret to stand alone beside her grave. And that was when it would begin. That was when I would truly lose her for ever. And then what would I do? I could imagine it in detail up to that moment, but what would happen afterwards? Yes, after we had laid her to rest in the earth and all the others had gone their separate ways, what was I to do? From then on there would be nothing more for me to do for her. And there would be nothing more absurd or meaningless than to still be here on earth. It was soul-destroying, just to contemplate. One day, when she’d begun to show some sign of improvement, she said: ‘Speak to the doctors. Have them let me go.’ And then, in the most casual of whispers, she added: ‘You’ll do a better job of looking after me.’