Gustav Meyer (1868–1932) was an Austrian author who published under the name Gustav Meyrink. He is among the most esteemed German-language writers of his time within the genre of supernatural fiction. He was a banker before he took to the pen. An arrest on charges of profiteering led to his bank being ruined. By the time of his release after he was found innocent, he was ostracized from the community. Meyrink then moved to Vienna, where he became an editor and began publishing satirical stories whose aim seems to have been to insult the wealthy and notable figures of the city, certainly earning him the title of gadfly. By the early twentieth century, though, he turned away from satire and began to work with more fantastical and phantasmagorical elements. The utterly unique “Blamol” (1903), reprinted here in a new translation, was one of the first stories to display his new interest. Meyrink’s novel The Golem (1914), by far his best-known fiction, has been adapted to film numerous times.
True, without error, certain and most true, I shall tell you: that which is below is as that which is above.
—Smaragdine Table
THE OLD SQUID SAT IN FRONT of a thick blue book found in a wrecked ship and slowly imbibed himself with ink.
Cloddwellers have no idea how busy a squid can be all day long.
This one had devoted himself to the study of medicine and from dawn till dusk two poor little starfish had to help him turn the pages—because they owed him so much money.
Around his midsection—where other people have a waist—he wore a golden pince-nez, part of a marine loot. The lenses—left and right—were placed far away and anyone who accidentally looked through them became disagreeably dizzy.
——Peace and quiet all around.
That’s when a polyp came flying at him, bag-shaped snout stretched forward, tentacles trailing behind like a bundle of rods, and it dropped to lie near the book.—It waited until the old fellow glanced up, and then greeted him profusely, after which it unwrapped a tin box out of his body.
“You’re the purple polyp from Turbot Alley, aren’t you?” said the squid graciously. “Right, right, I knew your mother well, she was born von Octopus.” (You, perch, bring me the Polyps’ Almanach de Gophalopoda.) Well, what can I do for you, dear polyp?”
“The inscription,—uhm, uhm—read the inscription.” The polyp coughed sheepishly (he had such a slimy pronunciation) and pointed to the tin can. The squid stared at the can and scrutinized the inscription like a prosecutor: “So, what do we have here?—Blamol!? That’s an invaluable find. Certainly from the stranded Christmas steamer? ‘Blamol—the new remedy—the more you take it, the healthier you become!’
“I want to open the thing immediately. You, perch, fetch me the two lobsters, you know, Coral Bank and Branch II, the brothers Scissors, but be quick about it.”
No sooner had the green sea anemone, which was sitting nearby, heard about the new remedy than she immediately flitted up to the polyp:—Oh, she was so eager to take the remedy;—alas, so eager!
And with her many hundreds of prehensile tentacles, she performed a delightful bustle, so that the bystanders could not take their eyes off her.
—Holy shark!—was she beautiful! The mouth was a bit large, but that is so piquant on a woman.
Everybody was engrossed in her charms and overlooked the arrival of the two lobsters that diligently endeavored to slash the tin can with their claws, all the way speaking their Chechen dialect.
A light push, and the can fell apart.
Like a hailstorm, the white pills erupted from the tin and—lighter than cork—disappeared upward, as quick as lightning.
Everyone scrambled in excited confusion: “Stop, stop!”
But nobody was fast enough to grab anything. Only the sea anemone succeeded in catching a pill, quickly putting it in her mouth.
General displeasure: one would have liked to box the brothers Scissors ’round the ears.
“You, perch, you could have paid attention!—What are you my assistant for?”
It was a good ranting and scolding! Only the polyp could not utter a word, instead angrily slamming his clenched tentacles on a seashell so that the mother-of-pearl was crushed.
All of a sudden there was a deathly silence:—The sea anemone!
A blow must have hit her: she could not move a limb. Tentacles stretched out, she whimpered quietly.
With an air of importance, the squid swam along and commenced an unfathomable examination. With a pebble he tapped or pricked different tentacles. (Hm, hm, Babynskian Phenomenon, disruption of the pyramidal tracts.)
Finally, with the sharpness of a fin-edge, he crisscrossed the sea anemone’s belly a few times, taking on an impenetrable gaze, then he straightened in a dignified motion and said: “Lateral sclerosis. The lady is paralyzed.”
“Can we do something? What do you think?” cried the good seahorse. “Help her, help her. I’ll rush to the pharmacy.”
“Help?!—Are you crazy, sir? Do you think I studied medicine in order to cure diseases?” The squid became increasingly vehement. “It seems to me you are taking me for a barber, or do you want to mock me? You, perch—hat and cane—yes!”
One by one, they all swam away. “The things that can happen to anyone here, in this life. It’s terrible, isn’t it?”
Soon the place was empty, only from time to time did the perch return grudgingly to look for some lost or forgotten items.
At the bottom of the sea, the night stirred. Rays of light, of which nobody knows where they come from and where they disappear, floated like veils in the green water, shimmering so wearily as if they were never again to return.
The poor sea anemone lay immobile and watched them in bitter pain as they rose slowly, slowly upward.
Yesterday, by this time, she had been fast asleep in a safe hiding place.—And now?—To die outside, like an—animal!—Beads of air pearled on her forehead.
And tomorrow it is Christmas!!
She thought of her distant husband, who was wandering about, God knows where—Three months and already a seagrass widow! Truly, it would not have been a wonder if she had cheated on him.
Oh, if only the seahorse had stayed with her!
She was so afraid!
It was getting so dark it was almost impossible to make out one’s own tentacles.
Broad-shouldered darkness crept out from behind rocks and algae, devouring the blurred shadows of coral reefs.
Ghostly black bodies glided past—with glowing eyes and violet-lit fins—Night fish!—Evil rays and monkfish that stalk in the dark. Murderously lurking behind shipwrecks—
Coy and quiet as thieves, clams open up their shells and lure the late wanderer onto soft cushions for gruesome debauchment.
Far away, a dogfish barks.
-—- A bright gleam flickers through the green algae: a luminous medusa guides drunken boozers home—Eeldandies and slovenly Moraystrumpets swimming fin-in-fin. Two silver-decked young salmon have stopped to look contemptuously at the exciting crowd. Rakish singing resounded:
“Among the green seagrass
I asked her
If she craved me.——
—Yes, she said.
Then down she bent—
and I pinched her.
Oh, among the green seagrass…”
“No, no, out of the way, Shoo—naughty salmon—Shoo!” an eel roared suddenly.
The silvery one continues: “Be quiet! You need to speak Viennish. That’s because you’re the only creature that does not live in the Danubian region, I suppose—”
“Pst, pst,” soothed the medusa, “shame on you, look who comes!”
All of them fell silent and gazed timidly at a few slender, colorless figures that demurely moved in their direction.
“Lancet fish,” someone whispered.
? ? ? ? ?
-—- “Oh, these are high lords,—councilors, diplomats and such.—Yes, they are from birth destined to natural wonders: they have neither brain nor backbone.”
Minutes of silent admiration, and then everyone swims peacefully off.
The noises die away.—The deathly hush deepens.
Time passes.—Midnight, the hour of terror.
Weren’t those voices?—They cannot be shrimps,—so late now?—
The Night Watch makes the rounds: Policecrabs!—
How they are pawing with armored legs, crunching the sand, dragging their prisoners to secure places.
Woe to him who falls into their hands;—they do not shy away from any crime,—and their lies stand in court like oaths. Even the electric ray tingles when they approach.
The sea anemone’s heartbeat halts in horror, she, a lady, lies there helpless, out in the open! What will happen if they see her? They will drag her to the judge, that perjurious crab,—the biggest crook in the whole deep sea—and then—and then—
They approach—now—one more step, and shame and ruin will sink their fangs in her belly.
The dark water quivers, the coral trees groan and tremble like seagrass, a pale light shining far away.
Crabs, rays, monkfish duck low and dart in wild flight across the sand as rocks break and whirl upward.
A bluish, glistening wall––as tall as the world—comes flying through the sea.
Nearer and nearer the phosphorescence hunts: the glowing giant fin of Tintorera, the demon of annihilation, sweeps along and rips abyssal glowing funnels into the foaming water.
Everything twists into crazed swirls. The sea anemone flies across bubbling expanses, up and down—over lands of emerald froth. Where are the crabs, where are shame and fear! Roaring destruction storms throughout the world. A bacchanal of death, a jubilant dance for the soul.
Her senses blink out, like dull light.
A terrible jolt. Whirling, and faster, faster, faster and faster, everything twirls backward and crashes to the bottom, all that the spinning funnels had wrested from the ground. A few armors break.
When the sea anemone finally emerged from unconsciousness after the fall, she found herself lying on a bed on soft algae.
The good seahorse—who had not gone to work for the day—leaned over her.
Cool morning water fanned her face, and she looked around. The chattering of barnacles and the cheerful bleating of a lamprey reached her.
“You’re in my country cottage,” the seahorse answered her questioning look, looking deep into her eyes. “Wouldn’t you want to go back to sleep, my gracious lady? It would do you good!”
The sea anemone couldn’t sleep for all she tried. An indescribable feeling of disgust pulled down the corners of her mouth.
“What a storm, last night! Everything is still spinning before my eyes,” the seahorse continued. “By the way, can I tempt you with a bit of smoked ham, a piece of Sailor’s speck?”
At the mere hearing of the word “ham,” the sea anemone became so nauseated that she had to squeeze her lips tight. In vain. A choking sensation seized her (the seahorse glanced discreetly aside) and she vomited. The Blamol pill, undigested, came up, soared among air bubbles, and disappeared upward.
Thank God the seahorse had not noticed. The invalid suddenly felt well again, good as new.
She curled up comfortably.
Oh, wonder, she could curl up again, move her limbs like she used to. Delight and more delight! Beads of air filled the eyes of the overjoyed seahorse. “Christmas, it’s really Christmas today,” the cheering continued, “and I’ll have to report to the squid what happened, right away. In the meantime, I trust you will sleep well.”
“What do you find so wonderful about the sea anemone’s sudden recovery, my dear seahorse?” asked the squid, with a benign smile. “You are an enthusiast, my young friend! Although I do not speak, in principle, with laypeople (you, perch, fetch a chair for the gentleman) about medical science, this time I shall make an exception and I shall seek to adapt my language to your comprehension as much as possible. So, you think Blamol is a poison and its effect is paralysis. Oh, what a mistake! Incidentally, Blamol has long been dismissed, it is a remedy of yesterday, today Idiotine Chloride is usually prescribed (in other words, medicine progresses inexorably). The fact that the illness coincided with the swallowing of the pill was mere coincidence—everything, it is a well-known fact, is coincidence—because, first of all, sub-lateral sclerosis has completely different causes, although discretion forbids me to mention them, and secondly, like all these remedies, Blamol does not work untill it is spat out. Even so, of course, it is only beneficial.
“And finally, as far as the healing is concerned—well, there’s a definite case of autosuggestion here. In reality (you see what I mean: the thing in itself, after Kant) the lady is just as sick as yesterday, even if she does not notice it. Autosuggestion often works, especially with people with inferior thinking. Of course I have said nothing of the sort, you know that I appreciate the ladies very highly: Honor the women, They plait and weave—As Schiller puts it.
“And now, my young friend, enough of this subject, it would just upset you unnecessarily—By the way, will you do me the great pleasure of this evening? It’s Christmas and my marriage.”
“Wha—? Marr…” the seahorse blurted out, but he caught himself in time: “Oh, it will be an honor, Mister Mediconsult.”
“Who is he marrying?” he asked the perch while floating away.
“You don’t say: the lousy mussel??”
“…Why not! Another marriage of convenience.”
When, in the evening, the sea anemone, arriving a little late but with a radiant complexion, swam into the room, holding the seahorse’s fin, the guests’ jubilation seemed never to end. Everyone embraced her; even the veil snails and the cockles that acted as bridesmaids put their girlish shyness aside.
It was a brilliant party, of the kind only rich people can throw. The mussel’s parents were billionaires and had even ordered marine luminescence. Four long banks of oysters had been laid out. After a full hour of feasting, more dishes were still brought to the tables. The perch never ceased to swim around, serving a hundred-year-old air salvaged from the cabin of a submerged wreck. She went about pouring from a shimmering pitcher (held, of course, upside down). Everyone was already tipsy. The toasts dedicated to the mussel and her groom were completely lost in the popping of the corkpolyps and the clatter of the knifeshells.
The seahorse and the sea anemone sat at the far end of the table, completely in the shade, and in their merriment they paid little attention to what happened around them.
“He” sometimes furtively squeezed one of “her” tentacles, and then another, and she rewarded him with a provocative glance. Then toward the end of the meal the music ensemble played this beautiful song:
“Yes, to kiss,…
to frolick
with young gentl’men
is all the more for ladies
very modern,”
—and while the mischievous guests traded winks, no one could dismiss the impression that everyone here fantasized all sorts of tender relationships.