The strudlhof steps, p.88
The Strudlhof Steps, page 88
“Direct?!” cried Mary (this was like a flash of inspiration).
“Yes, probably. That is, I’m not exactly certain. Maybe I’ll make a stopover in—Budapest.” She paused for just a split second before the last word.
“And what do you think you’ll do in Budapest?!” Mary asked. She wasn’t able to modulate her voice. She’d virtually lost control over it, in fact. Lea’s manner of speaking, always very disengaged, was altogether familiar to her friend, but now it was generating tension and pressure inside Mary, as if she were trying to compel the other woman to abandon her normal way—just this once, just as an exception—because her way suddenly seemed to Mary to be even more out of place, less to the purpose than ever before; she started in on Lea as if she wanted to make the other woman jettison something fundamental to her. The utter futility, the outright impossibility of her exertion were evident enough, however, to thrust Mary herself into a state of impatience it was just barely possible for her to contain.
“Perhaps I’ll talk to Etelka Grauermann,” came the answer, gentle and almost dreamy (like deep, soft shadows in coves or inlets).
“No, you mustn’t do that, Lea!” (Suddenly she was saying “Lea” instead of “Mädi.”) “That would be the worst course of action you could possibly take. What’s more, I hear a hornet’s nest of some kind has just now been stirred up at the Grauermanns’. Etelka sent for her brother from Vienna, and he had to depart quickly. I happen to know his fiancée; that’s how I found out all this on Thursday. Does Robert know that you want to go to him in Belgrade?”
“Yes. He sent for me.”
Mary at first paused and said nothing. Then: “So Robert is definitely not in Budapest?”
“No. Robert’s waiting for me in Belgrade. He handed in his telegram on Friday morning, but I didn’t receive it until Saturday and started out yesterday.”
“Oh if only you’d set out on Saturday! Then we would have had more time,” Mary cried.
“I wanted to. But Kitty” (this was the Fraunholzers’ daughter) “was just home from her studies over the weekend and was so glad to be with me. I just couldn’t bring myself to leave her in the lurch. And on Sunday I couldn’t have taken care of getting the things Robert needed or anything else anyway.”
“When did Robert leave Gmunden?”
“On the tenth.”
“And how long was he with you?”
“More than a week. From August thirty-first, to be exact.”
“And how was it?”
“I can’t really tell you over the phone the way I’d like to,” answered Lea Fraunholzer after a brief, silent pause. “I might still—be happy again. But only under certain conditions.”
“Conditions! My sweet, good Mädi . . .” All of a sudden the driving force inside Mary now discovered gentleness as its best means; it struck her as the best way to obtain entry at last into the mellow, faraway world that never quite unfurled but before which she’d always beaten her wings (and had them beaten), humming and buzzing like a bumblebee trying to find the right hole. “Conditions! It’s up to you to create those conditions, but not to dictate them . . . and in Belgrade, not Budapest; trust me on that . . . But we can’t talk about this on the phone, Mädi dear. I have to see you. Urgently; no two ways about it. No matter how much you have to do in Vienna over this one single day. I can only imagine. So any time you like. Even if it’s just for half an hour. That’s enough time.”
“But they’ve booked me solid with errands and business of all kinds,” said Lea, although not in a tone of complaint or opposition, but more with a tinge of kindhearted regret. “Robert too. His telegram went on and on. There was so much about important matters that are personal and business-related at the same time and about how he has to wait in Belgrade to see how they turn out. Can you picture it? And on top of all that, he’s scheduled a certain discussion for which he thinks I’m more appropriate than he. I hope he’s not wrong.”
For a long moment Mary’s hopes—raised quite high—were summarily dashed; they had sprung up on learning that Fraunholzer had asked his wife (is that what she was again?! is that what she could once more become?) to journey to Belgrade. What now popped into her mind, quick as lightning and with no words (à la trópoi, as for all of us) could have been rendered with grammatical truncation roughly as follows: “Men; put nothing past them. He needs her now, simple as that.” But her anxiety that mere pragmatic issues could loom substantial enough to outweigh, let alone rule out, the reconciliation of man and wife couldn’t survive more than a very short spell in Mary’s mind. She had too deep a belief in her nights with Oscar. This quashing of her hopes had passed by in a flash, the way telegraph wires running alongside the train tracks appear to drop back down at each pole, interrupting their renewed ascent each time—or the way a light bulb sometimes blinks. It was over that soon. Her initial outlook was restored that soon. She was confident that the business end could be settled, but confident of so much more as well (who would be inclined to hold the opposite opinion, by the way?). Even so, Mary’s own weakest point was bound to become apparent to her sooner or later during this telephone conversation, the one point that quite significantly diminished the clarity and value of her judgment in regard to the present situation: she didn’t know Fraunholzer, not more than slightly, at any rate, or not really at all, considering everything—a handsome man, energetic. Years before. That was it. A gap here. Here she was out of her depth with Lea. Grete Siebenschein’s observations about Fraunholzer couldn’t balance out Mary’s deficiency, which realization again brought her bad conscience to the fore, inducing in her a feeling almost like that of a schoolgirl who hadn’t prepared and then is unexpectedly called on. She could long before have sought out opportunities to study Fraunholzer from closer up, as it were. Right after early summer, for example. But he was in Belgrade all the time. Still. Before then. Years before, in fact. She didn’t understand her own self at this point. Yet didn’t look for excuses. Her attitude really deserves to be pointed out.
“On top of everything else are all the errands I’m supposed to take care of for mother and Lily out in Wolkersdorf” (Lea meant her younger sister, the one Mary’s children were friends with), “all waiting for me in Vienna. You know how totally helpless Lily is with so many day-to-day concerns, like understanding a letter from the bank and how to answer it what directions to give—all those kinds of things. Yes, she’s still out there” (answering a question Mary had tossed in), “because the weather is still so fine; the children are already back, though, because of school, but then she wasn’t feeling very well, either, and neither was Mama; Walter’s out there as well” (that was Lily’s husband—incidentally, the Küffer sisters didn’t bear the slightest resemblance to each other; Lily was wheat-blond and slender, a very stylish type), “and he doesn’t know how to do anything, either; ‘I’m not a businessman,’ he always says. And the whole lot of them are too lazy ever to come up to Vienna—just a short hop away—to take care of whatever needs seeing to. They pile everything onto the housekeeper’s shoulders as ‘urgent business for when the Frau Consul returns from Gmunden.’ They knew what I’d be facing, of course, but not that I’d be able to stay in Vienna for no more than a single day. It’s too bad I really couldn’t get away from Gmunden any sooner; the boy wasn’t feeling well” (the Fraunholzers’ younger son). “And now all of a sudden Robert sends a telegram about some appointment I’m supposed to keep for him here, at the Sacher Hotel, of all places, and with some geriatric Frenchman.”
“And with everything in such a rush, how are you supposed to get visas for Hungary or Belgrade?”
“Robert arranged the whole thing by telephone from Belgrade. All I have to do is go there with my passport, and I’ll have it in ten minutes.”
Mary thought with lightning speed and remarkable precision for a woman: “If she really wants to, she can also use her connections to get a proper visa for Hungary right away, which will let her spend time in Budapest.” Mary didn’t know whether a transit visa for the trip to Belgrade was even required, nor whether Mädi was also going to have to call at the Hungarian consulate general in any event. The question was already on her lips when it appeared to be getting too far ahead of things, too nigglingly concerned with petty details, too close to the sensitive spot. Instead she said:
“So what you’ll do, then, is speak your beautiful French at the Sacher and manage things beautifully. I know you, Mädi!” Mary’s voice was now unusually gentle. “But now tell me, dear heart, when and where can I see you, no matter for how short a time?” (As she was speaking, Mary resolved as quick as lightning to maintain a uniformly gentle approach during their upcoming conversation and in this spirit simply to ask as a favor of Lea not to leave the train in Budapest under any circumstances or to confront her husband with an either-or choice or to make any of the other serious mistakes to which it seemed her friend had lately been inclining.)
“I’m not going to be at home for more than an hour all day,” Lea said. “From five thirty to six thirty at the latest. Then I’ll take off with my little traveling case, though I’m not going directly to the station. Before that I have to stop off and see a friend of my mother’s who’s invited me to supper. She lives near the Belvedere Palace, which works out well, because I’m leaving late in the evening from the State Station.” (She wasn’t yet calling it the East Station, the name just now coming to be standard.) “I already had my luggage sent there from the West Station. But I really need at least that one short hour at home to take a little breather, smarten up a bit, and drink a cup of tea. Come to me then. But please, no later than six. I really want to talk to you.”
Mary solemnly promised.
She stepped away from the phone.
Now she was alone once more.
All that spirited, strenuous talking had left Mary’s mouth dry; she sat back down at the breakfast table and poured more tea. As she was setting the cup back down, she was confronted in a strange way—as if it were approaching her in total silence from every side at once, fully shaped and formed—with an inward attitude, one she understood completely, though it remained behind glass, so that it could have no grasp on her (the double sense being obvious: Mary could neither actively and effectively grasp what was being presented to her from outside, nor could she in turn come within its grasp—it remained encased in crystal, behind a purely transparent wall, as if the air had turned solid, become an invisible wall). What she ought to do—and she felt it very distinctly—was change places at once with all that was occupying her now, to push it off to the edge and place herself in the center. Everything was in reverse placement at the moment, however. Even so, she felt called upon to stand up, walk over to the window, and look along the street. Were the taxis quietly and slowly rolling across it in uniform order? She got up. Not quickly, but with deliberate slowness instead, heedful, first looking down at herself. Even without the sun beaming in directly, light fell onto her from the tall, broad window. An astute woman, beautifully poised, her features—those of an ancient race—now grown quite august, her copper-gleaming thick hair around temples whose skin shimmered like the inside of a pearl oyster; and all these qualities—her limbs, covered now, her tunnel-deep eyes instinctive with spirit, her small hands, her slender but strong legs, on which she stood so firmly, her tiny feet, so steadfast and sturdy in supporting her—all of these were aspects of a perfection mounting to fullness when their total effect was contemplated as they blended into a true womanly splendor seldom achieved until about age forty, with most women not attaining to that fulfillment, if at all, until they’re around fifty. Daughter, granddaughter, great-granddaughter! Budding and blossoming worlds away from me, yet within her there moved the identical mechanism of spirit as in you, in me, in the reader. She who sensed the summons from the window; who intuited the concentric onslaught of the silence; who felt the readiness of the spangled, spectral battle ranks, battalions of strength, in the emptiness; alert to the rightness, the rescuing force of the command to change locations lightning fast, which would have made room for the right positions to be rearranged immediately.
But there was no Mary there.
She began at once to link pieces together. Her thoughts did not just flee from the admonition to change places; they packed it down tight, crammed it in, squeezed it hard, and tied it together.
First and foremost, she had not yet found out anything about how exactly long Lea had in mind to stay in Belgrade with her husband (which is what he needed to turn back into, had to become once again, in spite of everything!). Besides, if some kind of scandal had suddenly broken out in Budapest, wasn’t it within the realm of possibility that Lea wouldn’t even find him in Belgrade but would be received instead upon her arrival by a housekeeper or some retainer of that kind acting on instructions? Mary now deeply regretted that she hardly knew Fraunholzer! And at some point she really ought to have observed Etelka Stangeler and Grauermann, once at least, which would have been easy to arrange through Grete here in Vienna at some time before the height of summer! She had the same feeling a farmer might have who suddenly discovers among his fields whole expanses he’d never seen before, tracts never turned over by a plow, never planted, never harvested. A farmer would be able to make such an appalling discovery only in sleep and dreams, which would be dire enough, whereas in this case it was almost as if she had either never lived at all in regard to all these matters or lived only behind invisible walls.
She started walking back and forth in the room. Not pacing leisurely, though. Something was impelling her.
Very well: it was what it was. And she’d see what she’d see in the afternoon. She held fast to her decision about pursuing a gentle course.
But just then it occurred to her that she’d already made another appointment for the late afternoon. Her next rapid footsteps, then, hushed by the carpet, were back to the telephone. She listened. The room was silent; the bright furniture was gleaming. The instrument chirped, hummed, and then went dead. Mary dialed again; she was trying to reach her dentist. The line was busy. Everywhere in the room small invisible eddies were whirling. Past the street outside—the taxis protruding left and right—past and beyond the street, across the canal, the trees were aglow, green still in the sunlight, their leaves hardly turned, or better yet, not at all. A short whistle from the railroad, more a little snort.
She finally reached the office and postponed her appointment.
There was no more thought of tennis in the afternoon. Just now she had several telephone calls to make. Everything had to be rescheduled! Well, what of it! After all, quite a good bit more rescheduling was about to take place, and once and for all, at that—for Lea.
Without taking time to ponder in much detail, Mary was attempting to clear her afternoon and leave it completely blank, odd as that might seem; but you couldn’t rely for certain on anyone’s being punctual, besides which, having to wait in this or that case (at the dentist’s, for example) appeared almost unavoidable, which meant it would be best not to take on any obligations that might hamper her ability to arrive on time at Lea’s home in Döbling. While Mary was doing all she could to move forward into the morning most of the appointments and activities scheduled for the afternoon, the earlier time of day naturally grew more and more crowded as she kept busy at the phone, talking, waiting when a connection couldn’t be made right away, which of course happened repeatedly today. Her arms drooped; she stayed slightly bent over the little telephone table, and an almost sad look came into her face; nowhere to call home in the emerging emptiness. Finally, after a considerable time, all these calls—most of which interlocked and thus had to be made in a certain order—were over, and everything had fallen into place (for example, it would have made no sense to go to her milliner’s without bringing the materials and samples promised her by a certain shop in the center of town if she could come at three o’clock, but if what she needed had in turn been delivered to the shop already, then her appointment at the hatmaker’s could be rescheduled over the phone for earlier instead of having to be canceled outright for today; Mary wasn’t fond of showing up anywhere unexpectedly, because that usually resulted in having to wait longer; every one of her calls and visits was arranged for a fixed time, and she would hold to the appointed time precisely). She was able to step away from the telephone table now that everything was finally taken care of, even if not exactly as she would have preferred. But whatever could be changed had been changed. At just that moment, however, she suddenly caught sight of the list she’d been making, quickly and mechanically, to fill the vacuum of a morning that seemed completely free at that point, right up to the moment before Lea Frauholzer’s call had come to fill it to the brim from an unexpected quarter. But Mary wanted to have that list, to recall it: she seemed even to need it, reacting with a certain amount of apprehensiveness. It had been easy to make, but now it was only with effort that she succeeded in focusing on it again after the agitation of her talk with Lea. She did manage to retrieve it from that earlier void, though, the crucial point of which she herself had initially fixed on at the breakfast table, and added the lesser items to the initial vacuum by following a kind of gravitational pull. The item with highest priority was undoubtedly the Estudiantina (a large musical organization of Spanish students), whose general secretary was staying in Vienna at the moment and could be consulted during a sort of office hour he was holding at the Grand Hotel this morning. So Mary went swiftly to her bedroom and put on her hat, whereupon Marie came hurrying in—she never missed when Mary was about to go out, and now she needed a pod of vanilla, and could her employer perhaps bring one back from town? As for the Estudiantina, Mary was active in her role as a mother; the Spanish students had organized a kind of exchange, which included secondary students as well. Along with English and French, her boy had been pursuing Spanish out of sheer interest and had developed his ability to a remarkable extent (according to his teacher not long before). Mary went darting down the steps all fresh and fit. But at one point she tripped over a runner which was kinked and not lying flat. At least that was how it felt to her, so she told herself she’d stumbled. But that wasn’t necessarily how it really was; perhaps she hadn’t even made contact with that spot but had set her foot down awkwardly instead, not with elasticity and lifting power, but more in such a way as to bring about a kind of rebound and slight bump.
