The relatives are coming

Some of my siblings have already arrived. I can love someone to the point of insanity and miss them like fury, but I hate meeting them at the station. All my siblings hate to be met at the station. In spite of that, I still feel obliged to go and meet each new arrival. And each new arrival feels obliged to tell me when they’re coming, so that I can be there to meet them.

The first to arrive was the beautiful Aloisia. She is still beautiful. If anything, she’s even more radiant than she was before. And I had expected to meet a physical and emotional wreck. I had dreaded meeting Aloisia. A year ago, Aloisia’s husband, Hugo Moppe, died. Hugo Moppe’s death shattered us, but only because of Aloisia. Even Leberecht in far-off Brazil was convinced that Aloisia would rapidly fade away and follow Hugo into the grave in the space of a year.

One isn’t supposed to speak ill of the dead, though I don’t really know why. If someone dies, it doesn’t make him any better. And it’s not really the dead man one speaks ill of, so much as his living placeholder. I am unable to say whether Hugo Moppe is pleasanter or more likable now as a corpse or ghost than he was before. All I remember is the living man, the way he was when I met him in Bonn, and he was a nightmare. By comparison to him, Johanna’s Anton is a marvel of handsome spirituality, a fiery intellect, a dazzling raconteur, an inexhaustible font of wisdom and deep kindness.

It was when we were living with Uncle Kuno in Bonn that Hugo Moppe first put in an appearance. I no longer know who unearthed him. I was certainly innocent.

At the time Moppe was an assistant in a pharmacy in Bonn. I know that pharmacists are honorable, pleasant, helpful, and generally saintly people. I know that. But ever since I met Moppe, I’ve first had to fight back inner shudders whenever I run into one.

If I’d merely run into Moppe somewhere, I couldn’t have had any objection to him. His case only became acute through his association with Aloisia. Originally, he was as pallid, colorless, and uninteresting as a washed-out pair of pajama bottoms. But what is a sensible man going to hold against a pair of pajama bottoms, especially if they’re not his? He will only start to assume a posture of aggression once they’re hung over his lamp as a form of decor, and he is required to admire them, instead of merely getting rid of them.

Aloisia, whose function in life was to get herself admired for her mild, tranquil beauty by all comers, fell in love with Hugo Moppe. In all her born days she had never taken the initiative: with Moppe she did. I still remember how impressed I was when she poured his tea and buttered his bread. I believe it was the first time her hands had ever held a teapot. Next, I was struck when she went into a pharmacy to buy an unguent. Moppe suffered from eczema, in a sort of pallid characterless version. In her whole life, Aloisia had never bought anything herself. Never had she invited anyone to come or go or stay. She asked Moppe to supper every night. He came, and he ate. He spoke little and showed no signs of being in love with Aloisia. I don’t believe he even found her beautiful. Perhaps I’m being unfair, but I don’t believe he was capable of finding anything beautiful anywhere. Dusty and a little mulish, he sat with us and was far and away the most boring table companion we had ever had. He was so deeply charmless that Laura was once moved to one of her rare outbursts of passion. She said, “That Moppe is no good to man or beast.”

We puzzled our heads endlessly as to what Aloisia saw in him. Our whole family was stumped, and it never occurred to Aloisia to help us. The more she sensed the general rejection, the more stubbornly she displayed attention and affection to her idol. The idol let it wash over him. The only time I saw Moppe indicate anything like passion was when he declared Wellingtons practical in rainy weather, and that he had a weakness for crepes.

Of course, we tried everything to drive a wedge between Aloisia and Moppe. But it had the opposite effect. And she had such a splendid selection of admirers. Perhaps she didn’t want to be admired. Perhaps she was even looking for someone who didn’t see her beauty. If only she hadn’t married him. But one day she stepped forward and said she was engaged to be married to him. Probably it was she who proposed, and he was good enough to accept. The worst of it was that Moppe came from a place called Anklam and was going to take over his father’s pharmacy—the pokiest and most pitiful pharmacy in all Anklam, as Luitpold once wrote after a visit there. Places like Anklam exist in the world, and they too will have their charms. Nothing against Anklam. But to spend one’s life in Anklam with Hugo Moppe and a wretched pharmacy is something one wouldn’t wish upon a person who has done one no wrong.

Aloisia wanted it that way. She moved in with Moppe in Anklam. At least if the bloody pharmacy had been in Munich or Berlin. Then there might have been a chance that one day a fairy-tale prince might have appeared to rescue Aloisia. To begin with, we continued to think in those terms, and believed that one day Aloisia would awaken from her sorry spell. Later on, we gave up that belief. She kept on declaring that she was content, and we had to believe her. Anyone visiting her would see her by turns in the shop and at home, always hard at work. She scrubbed the steps and darned Moppe’s underwear. She wore burlap aprons and patched rather unglamorous dresses. She pampered Moppe. She suffered when he had a cold and was miserable when he cut his finger. Her whole life revolved around him. For us it looked like a study in grey. One could almost have wished that Moppe were a drinker and beat Aloisia. That would have been something. But he didn’t drink, and he didn’t hit her. Dull, apathetic, and indifferent, he accepted her and did his tedious work. We decided we would view Aloisia as one of the great lovers in history, a miracle and a riddle. She didn’t even get pregnant to lighten her life. She seemed not to miss being a mother, being apparently altogether fulfilled by Moppe.

And then, about a year ago, Hugo Moppe died. He had survived the war. Flat feet kept him from being drafted. He died of fish poisoning. Ever the miser, he had tucked into some leftover fish salad that was past its best, and which he knew Aloisia meant to throw away.

I didn’t feel sorry for Moppe, I felt sorry for Aloisia’s death when I heard the news of Hugo’s passing. It was clear to me that my sister would either kill herself or die of natural causes in short order. I didn’t have the money to visit her. Uncle Kuno was with her, and Luitpold. Both of them tried to whisk her away, but she insisted on staying in Anklam. She couldn’t tear herself away from Moppe’s graveside, we thought. She was very calm, we could hear that. “Eerily calm,” they say in such situations.

We’re not a family of letter writers, and Aloisia was always the laziest of us anyway. She wired me the time of her expected arrival. I was surprised she could stand to leave Anklam at all, site of the pharmacy and Moppe’s mortal remains. Perhaps, before she withered away entirely, she wanted to see the family one last time.

I know that none of my siblings care to stay with Elfriede. But then I thought that Aloisia, the grief-stricken widow, would fare well there. Elfriede was delighted to have her noble Good Samaritanism validated by the mourning Aloisia. The rest of us had passed the hat around so that she was only accountable for the emotional upkeep.

On the platform I found myself being hugged by a beautiful lady. She seemed fresh, healthy, radiant, and confident. Was Aloisia just pretending? But even the most gifted disguise has its limits. I felt like someone prepared inside and out for a funeral who unpredictably walks into a carnival. I almost had the feeling that Aloisia was making fun of me. I needed fully an hour before I had adjusted to this unexpected Aloisia and was able to enjoy her.

From the get-go, there was a dully swelling enmity between Elfriede and Aloisia. It made Elfriede almost ill when her highly polished Christian qualities suddenly had no employment. She had even put out an old picture of Moppe on Aloisia’s nightstand and garnished it with flowers and black ribbons. “Oh, my Lord, Moppe,” said Aloisia blithely, “what did you want to put him up for?” For the first time I could feel Elfriede’s alienation.

Aloisia was cheerfulness itself. She bought new dresses, she put on makeup, she tried out extravagant hairdos, and she flirted. Even with Elfriede’s minister husband.

On her fourth morning, she guzzled a bottle of champagne in Elfriede’s kitchen before moving to a hotel. That’s where she still is, cheerful and content, visiting me at Liebezahl’s and spending a lot of time with Johanna. She’s not manically cheerful, as had been my initial fear, just happy, sensible, and with her feet on the ground.

Aloisia has money because she was able to realize a good profit from the sale of the pharmacy in Anklam. Even Magnesius, with whom she discussed further plans, thinks she is businesslike and takes her seriously. Which is saying something. She wouldn’t dream of ever setting foot in Anklam again as long as she lives, she told me.

Curiosity can make a fellow ill-mannered. “Do you think of Moppe still?” I asked Aloisia when she was sitting in my room at Liebezahl’s one evening.

“Why would I?” replied Aloisia. “Oh, Ferdinand, I know what you mean, I know what you want to hear. Elfriede thinks it’s bad of me not to mourn him—you don’t think it’s bad, but you don’t really understand it either. It’s just I’m not mourning him. I don’t understand why you have to have detailed explanations for everything. Elfriede would be happy to learn that I’d lived like a martyr at Hugo’s side, and that he’d treated me terribly. That would just about buy me the right to perk up a bit after his death. But he didn’t maltreat me, and I didn’t suffer through him. Accordingly, I ought to be suffering now that he’s dead. But I’m not suffering. I feel great. Moppe doesn’t exist for me anymore. I don’t think of him in the daytime unless someone makes me, and at night I haven’t once had a dream with him. Elfriede wouldn’t approve, but she could just about understand it if I were numbing my terrible pain with all this wild, desperate pleasure-seeking, and one day collapsed in a madhouse. But believe me, Ferdinand, I don’t have anything to numb. I know none of you could stand Moppe. I know he was a boring zero. I suppose I saw something different in him than the rest of you. There’s nothing unusual about that—everyone means something different to everyone. And even if you threaten to beat my brains out, I can’t tell you if I loved him or not. Maybe I did, maybe I didn’t, I don’t know. At any rate, he occupied me, and above all he attracted me. Why and how is something I’ve never bothered my head about. It seemed pointless to me to try and solve a puzzle that no one has ever been able to solve. Anyway, the attraction he had for me when he was alive, now that he’s dead, he doesn’t have it anymore. He didn’t leave the least aftertaste—I can barely remember what he looked like, and it doesn’t interest me. I told Elfriede all that, and she thought I was reprehensible. God knows why she has to get involved in all these things that don’t concern her. The only thing that might be reprehensible is that I refuse to put on an act for the sake of some stupid convention. Oh, and by the way, I’ve got a date with Magnesius tonight. I know you all take him for a cunning profiteer and all-round bad hat—but I see him differently. I think he’s nice and I quite like him.”

The next morning, Elfriede came to see me. She was deathly pale and deadly serious. “My dear brother,” she began, “I hope to goodness you can soon free yourself from this awful, wicked circle, and find some more dignified profession. If you turn your mind to it, I’m sure you can. Even in our family, there are many good and positive energies, some of which have unfortunately been misdirected. But truly, I think only Aloisia and Johanna are past saving.”

I got a little impatient. Waiting for me outside my office I had, among others, a man with broken fingernails, a winegrower who wanted to get married for the fourth time, a girl who had been beaten by her mother with a curtain rod, five deserted wives, and a sixth who wished to be deserted because her husband snored. I had my work cut out for me. At lunchtime I was supposed to be meeting Lenchen, and in the evening I was picking up my brother Toni at the station. Before that, I urgently had to see my fiancée Luise.

Luise enthusiastically made common cause with Aloisia. I am a little surprised she feels drawn to the Aloisia of today, it doesn’t quite make sense to me. But then what makes sense? Aloisia thinks Luise is charming. That doesn’t mean much. At the moment, Aloisia likes anyone who likes her.

I sniffed at the bunch of roses that our pretty graphologist, Fräulein Kuckuck, put out for me. Of late she has an advice-needing admirer who is bombarding her with trainloads of roses. She can no longer cope with them herself and has taken to distributing them in the nearby offices.

“Keep it short, Elfriede,” I say in the kindly but inflexible tones of a busy expert. “Is it your husband?”

“What makes you say such a thing?” replies Elfriede, “nothing’s the matter with him. Of course, it was mean of Aloisia to call him sweetie, and of Felix to let it pass—but you know how magnanimous I am, Ferdinand.” This was actually news to me, but I didn’t say anything.

My time-wasting relation carried on like this for a while, till I made her aware that from now on every minute of her being here would set her back. Thus far her presence had set me back, from now it was going to be her money.

Elfriede told me she had received a letter from Uncle Kuno to the effect that it might be a few more days till he and Laura and possibly others would be here. By chance, Laura had seen a Negro toddler in an orphanage, and wanted to keep him. Then, while Uncle Kuno was busy with the paperwork, Laura had seen a second Negro child that also found favor with her.

Why should Laura not take a liking to Negro children? Negro children are delightful. I can’t imagine any normal woman who wouldn’t be crazy about the little chocolate bonbons that go skipping around on two legs. “I’d like to take her too,” Laura will have said calmly. “Kuno, will you see to it.” The Negro children will be well looked after by Laura and will be happy with her.

“Not that I have any objection,” said Elfriede, who evidently did have objections. Laura wouldn’t raise the children properly, Laura had no idea about the raising of children. Laura had so many children of her own she sometimes couldn’t remember their names.

I still didn’t know what was so riling Elfriede. I think something like this: one sews dresses and buys Bibles for Negro children, one doesn’t adopt them. Elfriede might have been troubled by the circus-like aspect of Laura’s road shows. I will admit we used to give the impression of a group of tumblers when we traveled with Laura as children.

Maybe Elfriede doesn’t think Laura ought to have the Negro children, without knowing it herself. Perhaps she is tormented by the thought of people who always know what they want and act accordingly. Not many people know what gives them joy in life, and I’m sure Elfriede will never be among them.

“Children aren’t toys,” said Elfriede. Good God, there are people to whom the whole world is a toy, and who love it and take it as seriously and carefully as they take their toys.

“Elfriede,” I said, “to me it’s a terrible thought that a couple will embark on the production of a future school inspector or structural engineer only after mature reflection and with grim seriousness. Fifty-year-old structural engineers are only rarely pleasant toys, though they might like to have the feeling they once were.” Elfriede remarked coldly that she regretted that she couldn’t join me in my outlandish notions. Maybe she really did regret it. I gave her three red roses and saw her to the door.

In the astrological scents department, I could hear Elfriede in discussions with Liebezahl. “This is an unusually discreet perfume,” said Liebezahl, “but its effect on the opposite sex can be extremely strong, and may cause you to be molested, Madam—I see it as my duty to make you aware of the risk.”

“Pah, a decent woman can always stand up for herself—I mean, as long as the perfume has a soothing effect on the wearer—” Elfriede began to stammer.

“Of course, of course—naturally…” I could hear the bow in Liebezahl’s voice. Elfriede had made the purchase.

That evening, my attendance was required at the first meeting of Eulogies for the Living. Liebezahl founded it, of course with a beady eye to the financial interests of his overall enterprise. I don’t quite understand how Liebezahl hasn’t collapsed under the weight of so many ideas. Of course, it’s a fine thing for a man to have ideas, but I can’t help thinking it would be a fine thing if Liebezahl would just occasionally spare us.

Eulogies for the Living is in its trial phase just now. Liebezahl doesn’t have terribly high expectations of it, but he feels obliged to try out each one of his ideas. It has often happened that ideas that seemed wholly unpracticable and uncommercial later go on to be highly successful. Above all, Liebezahl is able to set them going in such a way that they don’t lose money.

Eulogies for the Living does what it says on the package. Liebezahl has ascertained that most people in their lifetimes don’t hear much about themselves that is good. To be celebrated and lauded in the highest terms, someone first has to be lying in his coffin. Then he will be regaled with flowers, tears, music, and much impassioned recognition of his qualities. But what good is all that to the deceased? Any thinking person must realize that once dead he will have diminished capacity for enjoyment and understanding. So why not—thus Liebezahl—move forward the commemoration and delight the living person?

Of course, it wasn’t an altogether straightforward matter for Liebezahl to find parties for this idea, because people don’t like to be put in mind of death, least of all their own. So he suggested that society members should be accounted dead as regarded their lives to date, and a newer, better life would commence for them. This made play with the ancient wisdom that a person reported to have died has especially long to live.^*

Liebezahl spent a week sweating over the promotional literature, trying to make it plain, persuasive, and illuminating. He wanted all departments to recruit for it. Eulogies for the Living already had over a dozen members.

And tonight was the first meeting. Every four weeks the celebratee would be randomly chosen. The first lucky winner was one Bobby Ampel.

Bobby Ampel is a man of thirty-four, but not really. The word “man” doesn’t sit well on him. There are males of the species who even at the age of seventy are wizened striplings. Bobby Ampel is a stripling. He has prior convictions for bigamy, misleading a public official, and black marketeering. Other than that, he is an angelic fellow with a heart of gold. The one doesn’t exclude the other. Sometimes a degree of viciousness is needed to resist certain temptation. Ampel isn’t vicious, he is someone who is constantly fooled by others. Currently, he is leading a rather quiet life in his brother-in-law’s candle factory.

Liebezahl’s most spacious room was ceremonially decked out in garlands, flowers, drapes, and potted palms. In the middle of the room stood a huge garlanded armchair in which Bobby Ampel sat enthroned. In front of him was a lectern with lofty candles at either side. Music was provided by a trio. Mourners sat round the walls, some of them society members, others invited guests. The windows were draped, the only light being provided by the candles on the lectern. A soft scent of incense and roses filled the room. Liebezahl had personally attended to every detail. For publicity reasons, it was important that this first celebration be a particularly impressive occasion.

The band played a tender rendition of “Enjoy your lives…” Then the amulet salesman, a resting actor, mounted the podium. His voice trembled with feeling. “And so we end the life to date of our beloved Bobby Ampel. Who could ever hope to truly do justice to the wonderful faculties of this man? Words fail us. His life to date was pure and without stain, sacrificing himself to the good of others. He was a sunbeam in all of our lives. What would we be—what would the world be—without him? Who can think of this kindly heart without emotion? Have we ever thanked him properly? He must and shall remain an example to us for all time. His life was a battle, and one he can be proud of. Bobby Ampel, we will never forget your life’s work, your loyalty and unstinting activity, your fiery spirit and proud manhood. You were a font of bliss and a spur to your loved ones, and to your employees the burningly revered ideal of a true leader.”

Bobby Ampel had tears in his eyes, and the rest of the room seemed moved as well. The trio played a slow rendition of “By the well at the gate…,” and Liebezahl laid down a wreath of cornflowers at Ampel’s feet. Other society members, in their Sunday best, followed with bouquets and wreaths. There were further brief addresses and poem recitals, till finally Liebezahl brought the stirring celebration to an end with a few well-chosen words and led the mourners to the pub across the road, with whose landlord he had made a cut-price deal. The wake had a special piquancy because the dear departed, decked with his floral tributes, took full part in it.

Both members and guests seemed to me to have been powerfully impressed, and to crave similar commemoration for themselves. Liebezahl was reasonably satisfied, but thought it needed a few tweaks. Anyway, he had just thought of the next thing.

I went around to Luise, bringing her Fräulein Kuckuck’s roses, and for half an hour I didn’t know what to talk about with her.

People who don’t know how to talk to each other are usually no good at silence either. I am thinking continually of what to say, and don’t dare lose myself in my own thoughts.

I tried telling Luise about Bobby Ampel, that squashed little baby gangster. But Luise doesn’t care for bigamists, and she thinks Liebezahl’s field of operations, and hence mine, contemptible. Liebezahl is used to the reproach that he takes money for his philanthropic actions. “So, am I supposed to starve, then?” he asked. “Does a doctor not take money for dabbing the sweat from a fevered brow? Does a poet not take money when he laments the ancient pain of mankind in indelible rhythms, and causes our deepest, noblest feelings to resonate? Maybe not, but then only because no one was offering him any. Will a violinist or organist move his listeners to tears for nothing? Will a priest not accept payment for leading his flock to the throne of God with kindly zeal? Are all these noble professions to live off sunshine and fresh air?” Liebezahl probably doesn’t take himself as any less deserving than the noblest helpers and most luminous idols of mankind. The rascal probably doesn’t exist who is unable to come up with excuses for his profession, which isn’t to say that Liebezahl is a rascal in my book. In the space of another year he wants to have the most progressive psychotherapeutic institute in Europe, he is already in negotiations with doctors who will provide the undertaking with the necessary scientific gravitas. He predicts a proud future for himself. As a dignified old man, he may one day look back with a sentimental tear in his eye for his present happy-go-lucky fairground business.

Time is weighing heavy on my hands at Luise’s. Again, I find myself wishing I were by myself. But this wish has become less anguished since my latest thought. I imagined waking up one morning and being all alone in the world. All other humans have gone up in a puff of smoke or dust. In the whole world there is no living being. No one can bother me, torment me, threaten me. There is no one. The world has gone quiet, nowhere any strife, greed, hatred, envy, wickedness. All I hear are the sounds of the air, and my own breathing. I wander through the empty streets and buildings. In the kitchen and pantry of a derelict restaurant I assemble a meal for myself and drink a bottle of wine. I wander into bookshops and clothes shops and take what I need, without having to pay. I stand in the silent station and sit in the deserted waiting room. Millions of empty beds await me when it gets dark. If I knew that there was another human being anywhere in the world, I would race off to try and find him or her. I would throw myself at the meanest and lowest creature, sobbing with emotion. How does the hermit survive? Well, it probably makes a difference if one has turned one’s back on mankind voluntarily or was left behind by them. Anyway, the hermit knows there is no shortage of people, and if he wants to, he can seek them out whenever he likes. But the further I traveled over the deserted surface of the earth, the more deeply I felt the void all around me. Each time I saw anything beautiful, I would feel miserable. I didn’t need to justify the manner of my life to anyone, and I wasn’t able to please or annoy anyone either. I would have a voice for no reason. I would own everything in the world and own nothing. Probably I’d be too old to come to any new and living relation to trees and flowers.

And God? It would be blasphemy to try and make some stand-in human out of Him. He wouldn’t be able to replace him either. Supposing I believed in Him, I couldn’t even be good for His sake. I think we are made too accustomed from childhood to seeing God as a kind of cosmic policeman, striving to regulate the complicated interactions of people.

I have nothing against the fulfillment of wishes. But sometimes it’s good for a wish to remain unfulfilled. As always, I love being alone. But after thinking through my dream to the very last consequence, it’s become more of a nightmare, and I’m inclined to see the dullest bore and most miserable wretch as a life-saving companion. If, after days or weeks in the deserted world, I were to run into Luise, I’m sure she would seem anything but stifling to me. She would help me to attain a new life. Her foolish mouthing of idiotic pop songs would bring tears of joy to my eyes. Flowers, mountains, spring, autumn, books, diamonds, fine wines and good food, sad thoughts, bad moods, joyful recognition, gentle renunciations, and noisy desires—all these would once again have meaning. Oh, the tides would ebb and flood once more.

I said a very sincere goodbye to Luise.

^* Like Irmgard Keun herself, when her suicide was reported in 1940 in the UK’s Daily Telegraph.