You don't take that
sufficiently
into account.
Musil - Man Without Qualities - v2
'
"I seem, without having had a say in the matter, to have been born with another kind of morality.
"You asked me what I believe. I believe there are valid reasons you can use to prove to me a thousand times that something is good or beautiful, and it will leave me indifferent; the only mark I shall go by is whether its presence makes me ·rue or sink.
''Whether it rouses me to life or not.
''Whether it's only my tongue and my brain that speak of it, or the radiant shiver in my fingertips.
"But I can't prove anything, either.
"And I'm even convinced that a person who yields to this is lost. He stumbles into twilight. Into fog and nonsense. Into unarticulated boredom.
"Ifyou take the unequivocal out ofour life, what's left is a sheep- fold without a wolf.
"I believe that bottomless vulgarity can even be the good angel that protects us.
"And so, I don't believe!
"And above all, I don't believe in the domestication of evil by
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 837
good as the characteristic of our hodgepodge civilization. I find that repugnant.
"So I believe and don't believe!
"But maybe I believe that the time is coming when people will on the one hand be very intelligent, and on the other hand be mystics. Maybe our morality is already splitting into these two components. I might also say into mathematics and mysticism. Into practical im- provements and unknown adventure! "
He had not been so openly excited about anything in years. The "maybe"s in his speech did not trouble him; they seemed only natural.
Agathe had meanwhile knelt down before the stove; she had the bundle of pictures and papers on the floor beside her. She looked at everything once more, piece by piece, before pushing it into the fire. She was not entirely unsusceptible to the vulgar sensuality of the ob- scenities she was looking at. She felt her body being aroused by them. This seemed to her to have as little to do with her self as the feeling of being on a deserted heath and somewhere a rabbit scutters past. She did not know whether she would be ashamed to tell her brother this, but she was profoundly fatigued and did not want to talk anymore. Nor did she listen to what he was saying; her heart had by now been too shaken by these ups and downs, and could no longer keep up. Others had always known better than she what was right; she thought about this, but she did so, perhaps because she was ashamed, with a secret defiance. To walk a forbidden or secret path: in that she felt superior to Ulrich. She heard him time and again cau- tiously taking back everything he had let himself be carried away into saying, and his words beat like big drops of joy and sadness against her ear.
13
ULRICH RETURNS AND LEARNS FROM THE GENERAL WHA T HE HAS MISSED
Forty-eight hours later Ulrich was standing in his abandoned house. It was early in the morning. The house was meticulously tidy, dusted and polished; his books and papers lay on the tables precisely as he had left them at his hasty departure, carefully preserved by hisser- vant, open or bristling with markers that had become incomprehen- sible, this or that paper still with a pencil stuck between the pages. But everything had cooled off and hardened like the contents of a melting pot under which one has forgotten to stoke the fire. Painfully disillusioned, Ulrichstaredblanklyatthesetracesofavanishedhour, matrix of the intense excitement and ideas that had filled it. He felt repelled beyond words at this encounter with his own debris. "It spreads through the doors and the rest of the house all the way down to those idiotic antlers in the hall. What a life I've been leading this last year! " He shut his eyes where he stood, so as not to have to see it. "What a good thing she'll soon be following me," he thought. "We'll change everything! " Then he was tempted after all to visualize the last hours he had spent here; it seemed to him that he had been away for a very long time, and he wanted to compare.
Clarisse: that was nothing. But before and after: the strange tur- moil in which he had hurried home, and then that nocturnal melting of the world! "Like iron softening under some great pressure," he mused. "It begins to flow, and yet it is still iron. A man forces his way into the world," he thought, "but it suddenly closes in around him, and everything looks different. No more connections. No road on which he came and which he must pursue. Something shimmering enveloping him on the spot where a moment ago he had seen a goal, or actually the sober void that lies before every goal. " Ulrich kept his eyes closed. Slowly, as a shadow, his feeling returned. It happened as if it were returning to the spot where he had stood then and was again standing now, this feeling that was more out there in the room
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 839
than in his consciousness-it was really neither a feeling nor a thought, but some uncanny process. If one were as overstimulated and lonely as he had been then, one could indeed believe that the essence of the world was turning itself inside out; and suddenly it dawned on him-how was it possible that it was happening only now? -and lay there like a peaceful backward glance, that even then his feelings had announced the encounter with his sister, because from that moment on his spirit had been guided by strange forces, until . . . but before he could think "yesterday," Ulrich turned away, awakened as abruptly and palpably from his memories as if he had bumped against some solid edge. There was something here he was not yet ready to think about.
He went over to his desk and without taking off his coat looked through the mail lying there. He was disappointed not to find a tele- gram from his sister, although he had no reason to expect one. A huge pile of condolence mail lay intermingled with scientific com- munications and booksellers' catalogs. Two letters had come from Bonadea; both so thick that he did not bother to open them. There was also an urgent request from Count Leinsdorfthat he come to see him, and two fluting notes from Diotima, also inviting him to put in an appearance immediately upon his return; perused more closely, one of them, the later one, revealed unofficial overtones of a very warm, wistful, almost tender cast. Ulrich turned to the telephone messages that had come during his absence: General Stumm von Bordwehr, Section ChiefTuzzi, Count Leinsdorf's private secretary (twice), several calls from a lady who would not leave her name, probably Bonadea; Bank Director Leo Fischel; and, for the rest, business calls. While Ulrich was reading all this, still standing at his desk, the phone rang, and when he lifted the receiver a voice said: "War Ministry, Culture and Education, Corporal Hirsch," clearly taken aback at finding itself unexpectedly ricocheting off Ulrich's own voice, but hastening to explain that His Excellency the General had given orders to ring Ulrich every morning at ten, and that His Excellency would speak to him right away.
Five minutes later Stumm was assuring him that he had to attend some "supremely important meetings" that very morning, but abso- lutely had to speak to Ulrich first. When Ulrich asked what about, and why it could not be taken care of over the phone, Stumm sighed
840 · THE MAN WITH0UT QUALITIES
into the receiver and proclaimed "news, worries, problems," but could not be made to say anything more specific. Twenty minutes later a War Ministry carriage drew up at the gate and General Stumm entered the house, followed by an orderly with a large leather briefcase slung from his shoulder. Ulrich, who well remem- bered this receptacle for the General's intellectual problems from the battle plans and ledger pages of Great Ideas, raised his eyebrows interrogatively. Stumm von Bordwehr smiled, sent the orderly back to the carriage, unbuttoned his tunic to get out the little key for the security lock, which he wore on a fine chain around his neck, un- locked the case, and wordlessly exhumed its sole contents, two loaves of regulation army bread.
"Our new bread," he declared after a dramatic pause. "I've brought you some for a taste! "
"How nice of you," Ulrich said, "bringing me bread after I've spent a night traveling, instead of letting me get some sleep. "
"Ifyou have some schnapps in the house, which one may assume," the General retorted, "then there's no better breakfast than bread and schnapps after a sleepless night. You once told me that our regu- lation bread was the only thing you liked about the Emperor's ser- vice, and I'll go so far as to say that the Austrian Army beats any other army in the world at making bread, especially since our Commis- sariat brought out this new loaf, Model1914! So I brought you one, though that's not the only reason. The other is that I always do this now on principle. Not that I have to spend every minute at my desk, or account for every step I take out of the room, you understand, but you know that our General Staff isn't called the Jesuit Corps for nothing, and there's always talk when a man is out of the office a lot; also my chief, His Excellency von Frost, may not, perhaps, have a completely accurate idea· of the scope of the mind-the civilian mind, I mean-and that's why for some time now I've been taking along this official bag and an orderly whenever I want to go out for a bit; and since I don't want the orderly to think that the bag is empty, I always put two loaves ofbread in it. "
Ulrich could not help laughing, and the General cheerfully joined in.
"You seem to be less enchanted with the great ideas of mankind than you were? " Ulrich asked.
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 841
"Everyone is less enchanted with them," Stumm declared while he sliced the bread with his pocketknife. "The new slogan that's been handed out is 'Action! ' "
"You'll have to explain that to me. "
"That's what I came for. You're not the true man of action. " "I'm not? "
"Well, I don't know about that. "
"Maybe I don't either. But that's what they say. "
"Who's 'they'? "
"Amheim, for one. "
"You're on good terms with Amheim? "
"Well, ofcourse. We get along famously. Ifhe weren't such a high-
brow we could be on a first-name basis by now! "
"Are you involved with the oil fields too? "
To gain time, the General drank some ofthe schnapps Ulrich had
had brought in and chewed on the bread. "Great taste," he brought out laboriously, and kept on chewing.
"Of course you're involved with the oil fields! " Ulrich burst out, suddenly seeing the light. "It's a problem that concerns your naval branch because it needs fuel for its ships, and if Amheim wants the drilling fields he'll have to concede a favorable price for you. Besides, Galicia is deployment territory and a buffer against Russia, so you have to provide special safeguards in case ofwar for the oil supply he wants to develop there. So his munitions works will supply you with the cannons you want! Why didn't I see this before? You're positively born for each other! "
The General had taken the precaution of munching on a second piece of bread, but now he could contain himself no longer, and making strenuous efforts to gulp down the whole mouthful at once, he said: "It's easy for you to talk so glibly about an accommodation; you've no idea what a skinflint he is! Sorry-1 mean, you have no idea," he amended himself, "what moral dignity he brings to a busi- ness deal like this. I never dreamed, for example, that ten pennies per ton per railway mile is an ethical problem you have to read up on in Goethe or the history of philosophy. "
"You're conducting these negotiations? ''
The General took another gulp of schnapps. "I never said that
842 · THE MAN WITH0UT QUALITIES
negotiations were going on! You could call it an exchange ofviews, if you like. "
"And you're empowered to conduct them? "
"Nobody's empowered! We're talking, that's all. Surely one can talk now and then about something besides the Parallel Campaign? And if anyone were empowered, it certainly wouldn't be me; that's no job for the Culture and Education Department, it's a matter for the higher-ups, even the Chiefs of Staff. If I had anything at all to do with it, it would be only as a kind of technical adviser on civilian intel- lectual questions, an interpreter, so to speak, because of Arnheim being so educated. "
"And because you're always running into him, thanks to me and Diotima! My dear Stumm, ifyou want me to go on being your stalk- ing horse, you'll have to tell me the truth! "
But Stumm had had time to prepare himself for this. "Why are you asking, if you know it already? " he countered indignantly. "Do you think you can nail me down and that I don't know that Arnheim takes you into his confidence? "
"I don't know a thing! "
"But you've just been telling me that you do know. "
"I know about the oil fields. "
"And then you said that we have a common interest with Arnheim
in those oil fields. Give me your word of honor that you know this, then I can tell you everything. " Stumm von Bordwehr seized Ulrich's reluctant hand, looked him in the eye, and then said slyly:
"All right, since you're giving me yourword ofhonor that you knew everything already, I give you mine that you know all there is. Agreed? There isn't anything more. Arnheim is trying to use us, and we him. I sometimes have the most complicated spiritual conflicts over Di- otima! " he exclaimed. "But you mustn't say a word to anyone; it's a military secret! " The General waxed cheerful. "Do you know, inciden- tally, what a military secret is? " he went on. "A few years ago, when they were mobilizing in Bosnia, the War Ministry wanted to ax me. I was still a colonel then, and they gave me the command ofa territorial battalion; of course, I could have been given a brigade, but since I'm supposed to be Cavalry, and since they wanted to ax me, they sent me to a battalion. And since you need money to fight a war, once I got there they sent me the battalion cashbox too. Did you ever see one of
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 843
those in your time in the army? It looks like a cross between a coffin and a corn crib; it's made ofheavywood with iron bands all around, like the gate to a fortress. It has three locks, and three officers carry the keys to them, one each, so that no one can unlock it by himself: the commander aJ. ld his two co-cashbox-key-unlockers. Well, when I got there we congregated as iffor a prayer meeting, and one after the other we each opened a lock and reverently took out the bundles of banknotes. I felt like a high priest with two acolytes, only instead of reading the Gospel we read out the figures from the official ledger. When we were done we closed up the box, put the iron bands back on, and locked the locks, the whole thing over again, except in reverse order. I had to say something I can't remember now, and that was the end ofthe ceremony. Or so I thought, and so you'd have thought, and I was full of respect for the unflagging foresight of the military adminis- tration in wartime! But I had a fox terrier in those days, the predeces- sor to the one I have now; there was no regulation against it. He was a clever little beast, but he couldn't see a hole without starting to dig like mad. So as I was going out I noticed that Spot-that was his name; he was English-was busying himselfwith the cashbox, and there was no getting him away from it. Well, you keep hearing stories about faithful dogs uncovering the darkest conspiracies, and war was almost upon us too, so I thought to myself, Let's see what's up with Spot. And what do you suppose was the matterwith Spot? You must remember that Ord- nance doesn't provide the field battalions with the very latest supplies, so our cashbox was a venerable antique, but who would ever have thought that while the three ofus were locking up in front, it had a hole in the back, near the bottom, wide enough to put your arm through? There'd been a knot in the wood there, which had fallen out in some previous war. But what was to be done? The whole Bosnian scare was just over when the relief troops we had applied for came, and until then we could go through our ceremony everyweek, except that I had to leave Spot home so he wouldn't give our secret away. So you see, that's what a military secret sometimes looks like! "
"Hmm . . . it seems to me you're still not quite so open as that cashbox ofyours," Ulrich commented. "Are you fellows really closing the deal or not? "
"I don't know. I give you my word of honor as an officer on the General Staff: it hasn't come to that yet. "
844 • THE MAN WITH0 UT QUALITIES
"And Leinsdorf? "
"He hasn't the faintest idea, of course. Besides, he wouldn't have anything to do with Arnheim. I hear he's still terribly angry about the demonstration-you remember, you were there too. He's now dead set against the Germans. "
"Tuzzi? " Ulrich asked, continuing the cross-examination.
"He's the last man we'd want to find out anything! He would ruin the scheme at once. Of course we all want peace, but we military men have a different way of serving it than the bureaucrats. "
"And Diotima? "
"Oh, my dear fellow, please! This is altogether a man's affair; she couldn't think of such things even with gloves on! I certainly can't bring myself to burden her with the truth. And I can see why Am- heim wouldn't tell her anything about it. He talks such a lot and so beautifully, it might well be a pleasure for him to hold his tongue about something for once. Like taking a dose of bitters for the stom- ach, I imagine. "
"Do you realize that you've turned into a rogue? " Ulrich asked, and raised his glass. "Here's to your health! "
"No, not a rogue," the General defended himself. "''m a member of a ministerial council. At a meeting everyone proposes what he would like and thinks right, and in the end something comes out that no one really wanted, the so-called outcome. I don't know ifyou fol- low me--l can't express it any better. "
"Of course I follow you. But the way"you're all treating Diotima is disgraceful, just the same. "
'Td be sorry to think so," Stumm said. "But a hangman, you know, is a disreputable fellow, no question about it; yet the rope manufac- turer who supplies the prison with the rope can be a member of the Ethical Society.
You don't take that sufficiently into account. "
"You got that from Arnheim! "
"Could be. I don't know. One's mind gets so complicated nowa- days," the General complained sincerely.
"And where do I come in? "
'Well, you see, I was thinking, here you are, a former army offi- cer . . . "
"Never mind. But what has this to do with being, or not being, a 'man of action'? " Ulrich asked, affronted.
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 845
"Man of action? " the General echoed, mystified.
"You began everything by saying I wasn't a man of action. "
"Oh, that. That's got nothing at all to do with it; I just happened to
start with it. I mean, Amheim doesn't exactly think ofyou as a man of action; he once said so. You have nothing to do, he says, and that puts ideas into your head. Or words to that effect. "
"Idle ideas, you mean? Ideas that can't be 'introduced in spheres of power'? Ideas for their own sake? In short, true and independent id~as! Is that it? Or possibly the ideas of an 'unworldly aesthete'? "
'Well," Stumm von Bordwehr agreed diplomatically, "something like that. "
"Like what? What do you think is more dangerous to the life of the mind-dreams or oil fields? There's no need to stuff your mouth with bread; stop it! I couldn't care less what Amheim thinks of me. But you started off by saying, 'Amheim, for one. ' So who else is there who doesn't see me as enough of a man of action? "
'Well, you know," Stumm affirmed, "quite a few. I told you that 'Action! ' is now the great rallying cry. "
'What does that mean? "
"I don't really know either. Old man Leinsdorf said: 'Something has to be done! ' That's how it started. "
"And Diotima? "
"Diotimacalls it aNew Spririt. So now lots ofpeople on the Coun- cilaresayingthat. Iwonderifyouknowwhatit'slike,thatdizzyfeel- ing in your stomach when a beautiful woman has such a head on her shoulders? "
'Til take your word for it," Ulrich conceded, refusing to let Stumm wriggle out of it. "But now I'd like to hear what Diotima has to say about this New Spirit. "
"It's what people are saying," Stumm answered. "The people on the Council are saying that the times are getting a New Spirit. Not right away, but in a few years; unless something unexpected happens sooner. And this New Spirit won't have many ideas in it. Nor is it a time for feelings. Ideas and feelings-they're more for people who have nothing to do. In short, it's a spirit of action, that's really all I know about it. But it has sometimes occurred to me," the General added pensively, "to wonder if, in the end, that isn't simply the mili- tary spirit? "
846 • THE MAN WITH0UT QUALITIES
"An action has to make sense! " Ulrich claimed, and in all serious- ness, far beyond this jesters' motley conversation, his conscience re- minded him ofthe first conversation he had had on that subject with Agathe, on the Swedish rampart.
But the General agreed. ,"That's what I just said. If someone doesn't have anything to do, and doesn't know what to do with him- self, he becomes energetic. Then he starts boozing, bawling, brawl- ing, and bullying man and beast. On the other hand, you'll have to admit that someone who knows exactly what he wants can be an intri- guer. Just look at any of our youngsters on the General Staff, silently pressing his lips together and making a face like Moltke: In ten years he'll have a general's paunch under his tunic buttons-not a benign one, like mine, but a bellyful of poison. So it's hard to decide how much sense any action can make. " He thought it over, and added: "If you know how to get hold of it, there's a great deal to be learned in the army-I'm more and more convinced ofit as time goes on-but don't you think the simplest thing would be ifwe could still find the Great Idea? "
"No," Ulrich retorted. "That was nonsense. "
"All right, but in that case there's really nothing left but action. " Stumm sighed. "It's almost what I've been saying myself. Do you re- member, by the way, my warning you once that all these excessive ideas only end up in homicide? That's what we've got to prevent! But," he wheedled, "what we need is someone to take over the lead- ership. "
"And what part have you had the kindness to assign to me in the matter? " Ulrich asked, yawning openly.
"Very well, I'm leaving," Stumm assured him. "But now that we've had this heart-to-heart talk, ifyou wanted to be a true comrade there is something important you could do. Things are not going too well between Diotima and Arnheim. "
"You don't say! " His host showed some small signs of life.
"You'll see for yourself; no need to take it from me. Besides, she confides in you more than in me. "
"She confides in you? Since when? "
"She seems to have got used to me a little," the General said proudly.
"Congratulations. "
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 847
"Thanks. And you ought to look in on Leinsdorf again soon. On account of his antipathy to the Prussians. "
"I won't do it. "
"Now look, I know you don't like Amheim. But you'll have to do it anyway. "
"That's not why. I have no intention of going back to Leinsdorf. "
"But why not? He's such a fine old gentleman. Arrogant, and I can't stand him, but he's been splendid to you. "
''I'm getting out of this whole affair. "
"But Leinsdorf won't let you go. Nor Diotima either. And I cer- tainly won't! You wouldn't leave me all alone . . . ? "
''I'm fed up with the whole stupid business. "
"You are, as always, supremely right. But what isn't stupid? Look, without you, I'm pretty dumb. So will you go to Leinsdorf for my sake? "
"But what's this about Diotima and Amheim? "
"I won't tell you; otherwise you won't go to Diotima either! " Sud- denly the General had an inspiration. "If you like, Leinsdorf can get you an assistant to take care of whatever you don't like. Or I can get you one from the War Ministry. Pull out as far as you like, but keep a guiding hand over me! "
"Let me get some sleep first," Ulrich pleaded.
"I won't go till you promise. "
"All right, I'll sleep on it," Ulrich conceded. "Don't forget to put
the bread of military science back in your bag. "
WHAT'S NEW WITH WALTER AND CLARISSE. A SHOWMAN AND HIS SPECTATORS
Toward evening his restlessness drove Ulrich to go out to Walter and Clarisse's. On the way he tried to remember Clarisse's letter, which he had either stowed away irretrievably in his luggage or lost, but he could recall nothing in detail except for a final sentence, "I hope you'll be coming back soon," and his general impression that he would really have to talk with Walter, a feeling tinged not only with regret and uneasiness but also with a certain malice. It was this fleet- ing and involuntary feeling, of no significance, that he now dwelled on instead of brushing it aside, feeling rather like someone with ver- tigo who finds relief by getting himself down as low as he can.
When he turned the comer to the house, he saw Clarisse standing in the sun by the side wall where the espaliered peach tree was. She had her hands behind her and was leaning back against the yielding branches, gazing into the distance, oblivious to his approach. There was something self-forgetful and rigid in her attitude, but also some- thing faintly theatrical, apparent only to the friend who knew her ways so well; she looked as ifshe were acting out a part in the signifi- cant drama ofher own ideas and one ofthose ideas had taken hold of her, refusing to let go. He remembered her saying to him: "I want the child from you! " The words did not affect him as disagreeably now as they had at the time; he called out to her softly and waited.
But Clarisse was thinking: "This time Meingast is going through his transformation in our house. " He had undergone several rather remarkable transformations in his lifetime, and without reacting to Walter's lengthy answer to his letter, he had, one day, turned the an- nouncement of his coming into reality. Clarisse was convinced that the work he then immediately plunged into in their house had to do with a transformation. The thought of some Indian god who takes up his abode somewhere before each new purification mingled in her mind with the memory of creatures that choose a specific place to
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 849
change into a pupa, and from this notion, which struck her as tre- mendously healthy and down-to-earth, she went on to take in the sensuous fragrance of peaches ripening on a sunny wall. The logical result of all this was that she was standing under the window in the glow of the sinking sun, while the prophet had withdrawn into the shadowy cavern behind it. The day before, he had explained to her and Walter that in its original sense "knight" had meant boy, servant, squire, man-at-arms, and hero. Now she said to herself, "I am his knight! " and served him and safeguarded his labors: There was no need to say a word; she simply stood still, dazzled, and faced down the rays of the sun.
When Ulrich spoke to her she slowly turned her face toward the unexpected voice, and he discovered that something had changed. The eyes that looked toward him contained a chill such as the colors of a landscape radiate after the dying of day, and he instantly real- ized: She no longer wants anything from you! There was no trace anymore in her look of how she had wanted to "force him out of his block of stone," of his having been a great devil or god, of wanting to escape with him through the hole in the music, ofwanting to kill him if he would not love her. Not that he cared; it was doubtless a quite ordinary little experience, this extinguished glow of self-interest in a gaze; still, it was like a small rent in the veil oflife through which the indifferent void stares out, and it laid the basis for much that was to happen later.
Ulrich was told that Meingast was there, and understood.
They went quietly into the house to fetch Walter, and the three of them just as quietly came back out of doors again so as not to disturb the great man working. Through an open door Ulrich twice caught a glimpse of Meingast's back. Meingast was housed in an empty room detached from the rest of the apartment but belonging to it; Clarisse and Walter had dug up an iron bedstead somewhere for him; a kitchen stool and a tin basin served as a washstand and bath, and in addition to these the room, with its uncurtained window, held only an old kitchen cupboard containing books, and a small, unpainted deal table. Meingast sat at this table writing, and did not tum his head when they passed his door. All this Ulrich either saw for himself or found out from his friends, who had no scruples about providing much more primitive accommodations for the Master than they had
850 · THE MAN WITH0UT QUALITIES
themselves; on the contrary, for some reason, they seemed to take pride in his being content with it. It was touching, and it made things easy for them. Walter declared that if one went into this room in Meingast's absence one felt the indescribable aura of a threadbare old glove that had been worn on a noble and forceful hand.
And in fact Meingast greatly enjoyed working in these surround- ings, whose spartan simplicity flattered him. It made him feel his will forming the words on paper. And when in addition Clarisse was standing under his window, as she had been just then, or on the land- ing, or even if she was merely sitting in her room-"wrapped in the cloak of invisible northern lights," as she had confided to him-his pleasure was enhanced by this ambitious disciple on whom he had such a paralyzing effect. Then ideas simply flowed from his pen, and his huge dark eyes above the sharp, quivering nose began to glow. What he intended to complete under these circumstances would be one ofthe most important sections ofhis new book, and one ought to be allowed to call it not a book but a call to arms for the spirit of a new breed of men! When he heard an unfamiliar male voice coming from where Clarisse was standing, he had broken off and cautiously peered out; he did not recognize Ulrich, though he dimly remem- bered him, but he found no reason in the footsteps coming up the stairs to shut his door or tum his head from his work. He wore a heavy wool cardigan under his jacket, showing his imperviousness to weather and people.
Ulrich was taken out for a walk and treated to ecstatic praise ofthe Master, who was meanwhile devoting himself to his work.
Walter said: "Being friends with a man like Meingast makes one realize how much one has suffered from antipathy to others! As- sociating with him, one feels . . . let me put it this way: everything seems painted in pure colors, without any grays at all! "
Clarisse said: "Being with him, one feels one has a destiny. There one stands, entirely oneself, fully illuminated. "
Walter added: "Today everything splits into hundreds of layers and becomes opaque and blurred-his mind is like glass! "
Ulrich's reply to them was: "There are always scapegoats and bellwethers; and then there are sheep who need them! "
Walter flung back at him: "It was to be expected that such a man wouldn't suit you! "
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 851
Clarisse cried out: ''You once maintained that no one can live by ideas, remember? Well, Meingast can! "
Walter said more soberly: "Not that I always see eye-to-eye with him, ofcourse . . . "
Clarisse broke in: "Listening to him, one feels shudders of light inside. "
Ulrich retorted: "A particularly fine head on a man usually means that he's stupid; particularly deep philosophers are usually shallow thinkers; in literature, talents not much above average are usually re- garded by their contemporaries as geniuses. "
What a curious phenomenon admiration is! In the life of individu- als it occurs only in spasms, but it is firmly institutionalized in collec- tive life. Walter would actually have found it more satisfying if he himself could have occupied Meingast's place in his own and Cla- risse's esteem, and could not at all understand why this was not so; and yet there was a certain slight advantage in it too. The emotion he was spared in this way was likewise credited to Meingast's account, as when one adopts someone else's child as one's own. On the other hand, it was for this very reason that his admiration for Meingast was not really a pure and wholesome feeling, as Walter himself realized; it was rather an overcharged need to surrender himself to believing in him. There was something assiduous in this admiration; it was a "keyboard emotion," raging without real conviction. Ulrich sensed this too. One of the elementary needs for passion, which life today breaks into fragments and jumbles to the point where they are un- recognizable, was here seeking a way back, for Walter praised Mein- gast with the ferocity of a theater audience that applauds far beyond the limits of its real opinion the commonplaces that are designed to arouse its need to applaud. He praised him out of one of those des- perate urges to admire, which normally find their outlet in festivals and celebrations, in great contemporaries or ideas and the honors bestowed on them, in situations where everyone involved joins in without anybody really knowing for whom or for what, while being inwardly prepared to be twice as mean as usual the next day in order to have nothing to reproach oneself for. This was how Ulrich thought about his friends, and he kept them on their toes by aiming barbed remarks at Meingast from time to time; for like everyone who knows better, he had been annoyed countless times by his contemporaries'
852 · THE MAN WITH0UT QUALITIES
capacity for enthusiasms, which almost invariably fasten on the wrong object and so end up destroying even what indifference has let survive.
Dusk had already fallen by the time they had returned, still talk- ing, to the house.
"This Meingast lives on our current confusion of intuition and faith," Ulrich finally said. "Almost everything that isn't science can only be intuited, and for that you need passion and prudence. So a methodology for dealing with what we don't know is almost the same as a methodology for life. But you two 'believe' the minute someone like Meingast comes along! And so does everyone. But this 'belief' is almost as much of a disaster as if you decided to plump your es- teemed bodies down on a basket ofeggs to hatch their unknown con- tents! "
They were standing at the foot of the stairs. And suddenly Ulrich realized why he had come here and was talking with them the way he used to. It did not surprise him when Walter answered:
"And the world is supposed to stand still until you've worked out your methodology? ''
They evidently did not take him seriously because they did not re- alize how desolate this area of faith was that stretches between the certaintyofknowledge and the mists ofintuition! Old ideas swarmed in his head, crowding so thickly they almost suffocated thought. But now he knew that it was no longer necessary to start all over again, like a carpet weaver whose mind has been blinded by a dream, and that this was the only reason he was here again. Everything had become so much simpler lately. The last two weeks had annulled ev- erything that had gone before and had tied up the lines of his inner motions with a powerful knot.
Walter was expecting Ulrich to give him an answer that he could resent. He wanted to pay him back with interest! He had made up his mind to tell Ulrich that people like Meingast were saviors.
"I seem, without having had a say in the matter, to have been born with another kind of morality.
"You asked me what I believe. I believe there are valid reasons you can use to prove to me a thousand times that something is good or beautiful, and it will leave me indifferent; the only mark I shall go by is whether its presence makes me ·rue or sink.
''Whether it rouses me to life or not.
''Whether it's only my tongue and my brain that speak of it, or the radiant shiver in my fingertips.
"But I can't prove anything, either.
"And I'm even convinced that a person who yields to this is lost. He stumbles into twilight. Into fog and nonsense. Into unarticulated boredom.
"Ifyou take the unequivocal out ofour life, what's left is a sheep- fold without a wolf.
"I believe that bottomless vulgarity can even be the good angel that protects us.
"And so, I don't believe!
"And above all, I don't believe in the domestication of evil by
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 837
good as the characteristic of our hodgepodge civilization. I find that repugnant.
"So I believe and don't believe!
"But maybe I believe that the time is coming when people will on the one hand be very intelligent, and on the other hand be mystics. Maybe our morality is already splitting into these two components. I might also say into mathematics and mysticism. Into practical im- provements and unknown adventure! "
He had not been so openly excited about anything in years. The "maybe"s in his speech did not trouble him; they seemed only natural.
Agathe had meanwhile knelt down before the stove; she had the bundle of pictures and papers on the floor beside her. She looked at everything once more, piece by piece, before pushing it into the fire. She was not entirely unsusceptible to the vulgar sensuality of the ob- scenities she was looking at. She felt her body being aroused by them. This seemed to her to have as little to do with her self as the feeling of being on a deserted heath and somewhere a rabbit scutters past. She did not know whether she would be ashamed to tell her brother this, but she was profoundly fatigued and did not want to talk anymore. Nor did she listen to what he was saying; her heart had by now been too shaken by these ups and downs, and could no longer keep up. Others had always known better than she what was right; she thought about this, but she did so, perhaps because she was ashamed, with a secret defiance. To walk a forbidden or secret path: in that she felt superior to Ulrich. She heard him time and again cau- tiously taking back everything he had let himself be carried away into saying, and his words beat like big drops of joy and sadness against her ear.
13
ULRICH RETURNS AND LEARNS FROM THE GENERAL WHA T HE HAS MISSED
Forty-eight hours later Ulrich was standing in his abandoned house. It was early in the morning. The house was meticulously tidy, dusted and polished; his books and papers lay on the tables precisely as he had left them at his hasty departure, carefully preserved by hisser- vant, open or bristling with markers that had become incomprehen- sible, this or that paper still with a pencil stuck between the pages. But everything had cooled off and hardened like the contents of a melting pot under which one has forgotten to stoke the fire. Painfully disillusioned, Ulrichstaredblanklyatthesetracesofavanishedhour, matrix of the intense excitement and ideas that had filled it. He felt repelled beyond words at this encounter with his own debris. "It spreads through the doors and the rest of the house all the way down to those idiotic antlers in the hall. What a life I've been leading this last year! " He shut his eyes where he stood, so as not to have to see it. "What a good thing she'll soon be following me," he thought. "We'll change everything! " Then he was tempted after all to visualize the last hours he had spent here; it seemed to him that he had been away for a very long time, and he wanted to compare.
Clarisse: that was nothing. But before and after: the strange tur- moil in which he had hurried home, and then that nocturnal melting of the world! "Like iron softening under some great pressure," he mused. "It begins to flow, and yet it is still iron. A man forces his way into the world," he thought, "but it suddenly closes in around him, and everything looks different. No more connections. No road on which he came and which he must pursue. Something shimmering enveloping him on the spot where a moment ago he had seen a goal, or actually the sober void that lies before every goal. " Ulrich kept his eyes closed. Slowly, as a shadow, his feeling returned. It happened as if it were returning to the spot where he had stood then and was again standing now, this feeling that was more out there in the room
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 839
than in his consciousness-it was really neither a feeling nor a thought, but some uncanny process. If one were as overstimulated and lonely as he had been then, one could indeed believe that the essence of the world was turning itself inside out; and suddenly it dawned on him-how was it possible that it was happening only now? -and lay there like a peaceful backward glance, that even then his feelings had announced the encounter with his sister, because from that moment on his spirit had been guided by strange forces, until . . . but before he could think "yesterday," Ulrich turned away, awakened as abruptly and palpably from his memories as if he had bumped against some solid edge. There was something here he was not yet ready to think about.
He went over to his desk and without taking off his coat looked through the mail lying there. He was disappointed not to find a tele- gram from his sister, although he had no reason to expect one. A huge pile of condolence mail lay intermingled with scientific com- munications and booksellers' catalogs. Two letters had come from Bonadea; both so thick that he did not bother to open them. There was also an urgent request from Count Leinsdorfthat he come to see him, and two fluting notes from Diotima, also inviting him to put in an appearance immediately upon his return; perused more closely, one of them, the later one, revealed unofficial overtones of a very warm, wistful, almost tender cast. Ulrich turned to the telephone messages that had come during his absence: General Stumm von Bordwehr, Section ChiefTuzzi, Count Leinsdorf's private secretary (twice), several calls from a lady who would not leave her name, probably Bonadea; Bank Director Leo Fischel; and, for the rest, business calls. While Ulrich was reading all this, still standing at his desk, the phone rang, and when he lifted the receiver a voice said: "War Ministry, Culture and Education, Corporal Hirsch," clearly taken aback at finding itself unexpectedly ricocheting off Ulrich's own voice, but hastening to explain that His Excellency the General had given orders to ring Ulrich every morning at ten, and that His Excellency would speak to him right away.
Five minutes later Stumm was assuring him that he had to attend some "supremely important meetings" that very morning, but abso- lutely had to speak to Ulrich first. When Ulrich asked what about, and why it could not be taken care of over the phone, Stumm sighed
840 · THE MAN WITH0UT QUALITIES
into the receiver and proclaimed "news, worries, problems," but could not be made to say anything more specific. Twenty minutes later a War Ministry carriage drew up at the gate and General Stumm entered the house, followed by an orderly with a large leather briefcase slung from his shoulder. Ulrich, who well remem- bered this receptacle for the General's intellectual problems from the battle plans and ledger pages of Great Ideas, raised his eyebrows interrogatively. Stumm von Bordwehr smiled, sent the orderly back to the carriage, unbuttoned his tunic to get out the little key for the security lock, which he wore on a fine chain around his neck, un- locked the case, and wordlessly exhumed its sole contents, two loaves of regulation army bread.
"Our new bread," he declared after a dramatic pause. "I've brought you some for a taste! "
"How nice of you," Ulrich said, "bringing me bread after I've spent a night traveling, instead of letting me get some sleep. "
"Ifyou have some schnapps in the house, which one may assume," the General retorted, "then there's no better breakfast than bread and schnapps after a sleepless night. You once told me that our regu- lation bread was the only thing you liked about the Emperor's ser- vice, and I'll go so far as to say that the Austrian Army beats any other army in the world at making bread, especially since our Commis- sariat brought out this new loaf, Model1914! So I brought you one, though that's not the only reason. The other is that I always do this now on principle. Not that I have to spend every minute at my desk, or account for every step I take out of the room, you understand, but you know that our General Staff isn't called the Jesuit Corps for nothing, and there's always talk when a man is out of the office a lot; also my chief, His Excellency von Frost, may not, perhaps, have a completely accurate idea· of the scope of the mind-the civilian mind, I mean-and that's why for some time now I've been taking along this official bag and an orderly whenever I want to go out for a bit; and since I don't want the orderly to think that the bag is empty, I always put two loaves ofbread in it. "
Ulrich could not help laughing, and the General cheerfully joined in.
"You seem to be less enchanted with the great ideas of mankind than you were? " Ulrich asked.
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 841
"Everyone is less enchanted with them," Stumm declared while he sliced the bread with his pocketknife. "The new slogan that's been handed out is 'Action! ' "
"You'll have to explain that to me. "
"That's what I came for. You're not the true man of action. " "I'm not? "
"Well, I don't know about that. "
"Maybe I don't either. But that's what they say. "
"Who's 'they'? "
"Amheim, for one. "
"You're on good terms with Amheim? "
"Well, ofcourse. We get along famously. Ifhe weren't such a high-
brow we could be on a first-name basis by now! "
"Are you involved with the oil fields too? "
To gain time, the General drank some ofthe schnapps Ulrich had
had brought in and chewed on the bread. "Great taste," he brought out laboriously, and kept on chewing.
"Of course you're involved with the oil fields! " Ulrich burst out, suddenly seeing the light. "It's a problem that concerns your naval branch because it needs fuel for its ships, and if Amheim wants the drilling fields he'll have to concede a favorable price for you. Besides, Galicia is deployment territory and a buffer against Russia, so you have to provide special safeguards in case ofwar for the oil supply he wants to develop there. So his munitions works will supply you with the cannons you want! Why didn't I see this before? You're positively born for each other! "
The General had taken the precaution of munching on a second piece of bread, but now he could contain himself no longer, and making strenuous efforts to gulp down the whole mouthful at once, he said: "It's easy for you to talk so glibly about an accommodation; you've no idea what a skinflint he is! Sorry-1 mean, you have no idea," he amended himself, "what moral dignity he brings to a busi- ness deal like this. I never dreamed, for example, that ten pennies per ton per railway mile is an ethical problem you have to read up on in Goethe or the history of philosophy. "
"You're conducting these negotiations? ''
The General took another gulp of schnapps. "I never said that
842 · THE MAN WITH0UT QUALITIES
negotiations were going on! You could call it an exchange ofviews, if you like. "
"And you're empowered to conduct them? "
"Nobody's empowered! We're talking, that's all. Surely one can talk now and then about something besides the Parallel Campaign? And if anyone were empowered, it certainly wouldn't be me; that's no job for the Culture and Education Department, it's a matter for the higher-ups, even the Chiefs of Staff. If I had anything at all to do with it, it would be only as a kind of technical adviser on civilian intel- lectual questions, an interpreter, so to speak, because of Arnheim being so educated. "
"And because you're always running into him, thanks to me and Diotima! My dear Stumm, ifyou want me to go on being your stalk- ing horse, you'll have to tell me the truth! "
But Stumm had had time to prepare himself for this. "Why are you asking, if you know it already? " he countered indignantly. "Do you think you can nail me down and that I don't know that Arnheim takes you into his confidence? "
"I don't know a thing! "
"But you've just been telling me that you do know. "
"I know about the oil fields. "
"And then you said that we have a common interest with Arnheim
in those oil fields. Give me your word of honor that you know this, then I can tell you everything. " Stumm von Bordwehr seized Ulrich's reluctant hand, looked him in the eye, and then said slyly:
"All right, since you're giving me yourword ofhonor that you knew everything already, I give you mine that you know all there is. Agreed? There isn't anything more. Arnheim is trying to use us, and we him. I sometimes have the most complicated spiritual conflicts over Di- otima! " he exclaimed. "But you mustn't say a word to anyone; it's a military secret! " The General waxed cheerful. "Do you know, inciden- tally, what a military secret is? " he went on. "A few years ago, when they were mobilizing in Bosnia, the War Ministry wanted to ax me. I was still a colonel then, and they gave me the command ofa territorial battalion; of course, I could have been given a brigade, but since I'm supposed to be Cavalry, and since they wanted to ax me, they sent me to a battalion. And since you need money to fight a war, once I got there they sent me the battalion cashbox too. Did you ever see one of
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 843
those in your time in the army? It looks like a cross between a coffin and a corn crib; it's made ofheavywood with iron bands all around, like the gate to a fortress. It has three locks, and three officers carry the keys to them, one each, so that no one can unlock it by himself: the commander aJ. ld his two co-cashbox-key-unlockers. Well, when I got there we congregated as iffor a prayer meeting, and one after the other we each opened a lock and reverently took out the bundles of banknotes. I felt like a high priest with two acolytes, only instead of reading the Gospel we read out the figures from the official ledger. When we were done we closed up the box, put the iron bands back on, and locked the locks, the whole thing over again, except in reverse order. I had to say something I can't remember now, and that was the end ofthe ceremony. Or so I thought, and so you'd have thought, and I was full of respect for the unflagging foresight of the military adminis- tration in wartime! But I had a fox terrier in those days, the predeces- sor to the one I have now; there was no regulation against it. He was a clever little beast, but he couldn't see a hole without starting to dig like mad. So as I was going out I noticed that Spot-that was his name; he was English-was busying himselfwith the cashbox, and there was no getting him away from it. Well, you keep hearing stories about faithful dogs uncovering the darkest conspiracies, and war was almost upon us too, so I thought to myself, Let's see what's up with Spot. And what do you suppose was the matterwith Spot? You must remember that Ord- nance doesn't provide the field battalions with the very latest supplies, so our cashbox was a venerable antique, but who would ever have thought that while the three ofus were locking up in front, it had a hole in the back, near the bottom, wide enough to put your arm through? There'd been a knot in the wood there, which had fallen out in some previous war. But what was to be done? The whole Bosnian scare was just over when the relief troops we had applied for came, and until then we could go through our ceremony everyweek, except that I had to leave Spot home so he wouldn't give our secret away. So you see, that's what a military secret sometimes looks like! "
"Hmm . . . it seems to me you're still not quite so open as that cashbox ofyours," Ulrich commented. "Are you fellows really closing the deal or not? "
"I don't know. I give you my word of honor as an officer on the General Staff: it hasn't come to that yet. "
844 • THE MAN WITH0 UT QUALITIES
"And Leinsdorf? "
"He hasn't the faintest idea, of course. Besides, he wouldn't have anything to do with Arnheim. I hear he's still terribly angry about the demonstration-you remember, you were there too. He's now dead set against the Germans. "
"Tuzzi? " Ulrich asked, continuing the cross-examination.
"He's the last man we'd want to find out anything! He would ruin the scheme at once. Of course we all want peace, but we military men have a different way of serving it than the bureaucrats. "
"And Diotima? "
"Oh, my dear fellow, please! This is altogether a man's affair; she couldn't think of such things even with gloves on! I certainly can't bring myself to burden her with the truth. And I can see why Am- heim wouldn't tell her anything about it. He talks such a lot and so beautifully, it might well be a pleasure for him to hold his tongue about something for once. Like taking a dose of bitters for the stom- ach, I imagine. "
"Do you realize that you've turned into a rogue? " Ulrich asked, and raised his glass. "Here's to your health! "
"No, not a rogue," the General defended himself. "''m a member of a ministerial council. At a meeting everyone proposes what he would like and thinks right, and in the end something comes out that no one really wanted, the so-called outcome. I don't know ifyou fol- low me--l can't express it any better. "
"Of course I follow you. But the way"you're all treating Diotima is disgraceful, just the same. "
'Td be sorry to think so," Stumm said. "But a hangman, you know, is a disreputable fellow, no question about it; yet the rope manufac- turer who supplies the prison with the rope can be a member of the Ethical Society.
You don't take that sufficiently into account. "
"You got that from Arnheim! "
"Could be. I don't know. One's mind gets so complicated nowa- days," the General complained sincerely.
"And where do I come in? "
'Well, you see, I was thinking, here you are, a former army offi- cer . . . "
"Never mind. But what has this to do with being, or not being, a 'man of action'? " Ulrich asked, affronted.
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 845
"Man of action? " the General echoed, mystified.
"You began everything by saying I wasn't a man of action. "
"Oh, that. That's got nothing at all to do with it; I just happened to
start with it. I mean, Amheim doesn't exactly think ofyou as a man of action; he once said so. You have nothing to do, he says, and that puts ideas into your head. Or words to that effect. "
"Idle ideas, you mean? Ideas that can't be 'introduced in spheres of power'? Ideas for their own sake? In short, true and independent id~as! Is that it? Or possibly the ideas of an 'unworldly aesthete'? "
'Well," Stumm von Bordwehr agreed diplomatically, "something like that. "
"Like what? What do you think is more dangerous to the life of the mind-dreams or oil fields? There's no need to stuff your mouth with bread; stop it! I couldn't care less what Amheim thinks of me. But you started off by saying, 'Amheim, for one. ' So who else is there who doesn't see me as enough of a man of action? "
'Well, you know," Stumm affirmed, "quite a few. I told you that 'Action! ' is now the great rallying cry. "
'What does that mean? "
"I don't really know either. Old man Leinsdorf said: 'Something has to be done! ' That's how it started. "
"And Diotima? "
"Diotimacalls it aNew Spririt. So now lots ofpeople on the Coun- cilaresayingthat. Iwonderifyouknowwhatit'slike,thatdizzyfeel- ing in your stomach when a beautiful woman has such a head on her shoulders? "
'Til take your word for it," Ulrich conceded, refusing to let Stumm wriggle out of it. "But now I'd like to hear what Diotima has to say about this New Spirit. "
"It's what people are saying," Stumm answered. "The people on the Council are saying that the times are getting a New Spirit. Not right away, but in a few years; unless something unexpected happens sooner. And this New Spirit won't have many ideas in it. Nor is it a time for feelings. Ideas and feelings-they're more for people who have nothing to do. In short, it's a spirit of action, that's really all I know about it. But it has sometimes occurred to me," the General added pensively, "to wonder if, in the end, that isn't simply the mili- tary spirit? "
846 • THE MAN WITH0UT QUALITIES
"An action has to make sense! " Ulrich claimed, and in all serious- ness, far beyond this jesters' motley conversation, his conscience re- minded him ofthe first conversation he had had on that subject with Agathe, on the Swedish rampart.
But the General agreed. ,"That's what I just said. If someone doesn't have anything to do, and doesn't know what to do with him- self, he becomes energetic. Then he starts boozing, bawling, brawl- ing, and bullying man and beast. On the other hand, you'll have to admit that someone who knows exactly what he wants can be an intri- guer. Just look at any of our youngsters on the General Staff, silently pressing his lips together and making a face like Moltke: In ten years he'll have a general's paunch under his tunic buttons-not a benign one, like mine, but a bellyful of poison. So it's hard to decide how much sense any action can make. " He thought it over, and added: "If you know how to get hold of it, there's a great deal to be learned in the army-I'm more and more convinced ofit as time goes on-but don't you think the simplest thing would be ifwe could still find the Great Idea? "
"No," Ulrich retorted. "That was nonsense. "
"All right, but in that case there's really nothing left but action. " Stumm sighed. "It's almost what I've been saying myself. Do you re- member, by the way, my warning you once that all these excessive ideas only end up in homicide? That's what we've got to prevent! But," he wheedled, "what we need is someone to take over the lead- ership. "
"And what part have you had the kindness to assign to me in the matter? " Ulrich asked, yawning openly.
"Very well, I'm leaving," Stumm assured him. "But now that we've had this heart-to-heart talk, ifyou wanted to be a true comrade there is something important you could do. Things are not going too well between Diotima and Arnheim. "
"You don't say! " His host showed some small signs of life.
"You'll see for yourself; no need to take it from me. Besides, she confides in you more than in me. "
"She confides in you? Since when? "
"She seems to have got used to me a little," the General said proudly.
"Congratulations. "
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 847
"Thanks. And you ought to look in on Leinsdorf again soon. On account of his antipathy to the Prussians. "
"I won't do it. "
"Now look, I know you don't like Amheim. But you'll have to do it anyway. "
"That's not why. I have no intention of going back to Leinsdorf. "
"But why not? He's such a fine old gentleman. Arrogant, and I can't stand him, but he's been splendid to you. "
''I'm getting out of this whole affair. "
"But Leinsdorf won't let you go. Nor Diotima either. And I cer- tainly won't! You wouldn't leave me all alone . . . ? "
''I'm fed up with the whole stupid business. "
"You are, as always, supremely right. But what isn't stupid? Look, without you, I'm pretty dumb. So will you go to Leinsdorf for my sake? "
"But what's this about Diotima and Amheim? "
"I won't tell you; otherwise you won't go to Diotima either! " Sud- denly the General had an inspiration. "If you like, Leinsdorf can get you an assistant to take care of whatever you don't like. Or I can get you one from the War Ministry. Pull out as far as you like, but keep a guiding hand over me! "
"Let me get some sleep first," Ulrich pleaded.
"I won't go till you promise. "
"All right, I'll sleep on it," Ulrich conceded. "Don't forget to put
the bread of military science back in your bag. "
WHAT'S NEW WITH WALTER AND CLARISSE. A SHOWMAN AND HIS SPECTATORS
Toward evening his restlessness drove Ulrich to go out to Walter and Clarisse's. On the way he tried to remember Clarisse's letter, which he had either stowed away irretrievably in his luggage or lost, but he could recall nothing in detail except for a final sentence, "I hope you'll be coming back soon," and his general impression that he would really have to talk with Walter, a feeling tinged not only with regret and uneasiness but also with a certain malice. It was this fleet- ing and involuntary feeling, of no significance, that he now dwelled on instead of brushing it aside, feeling rather like someone with ver- tigo who finds relief by getting himself down as low as he can.
When he turned the comer to the house, he saw Clarisse standing in the sun by the side wall where the espaliered peach tree was. She had her hands behind her and was leaning back against the yielding branches, gazing into the distance, oblivious to his approach. There was something self-forgetful and rigid in her attitude, but also some- thing faintly theatrical, apparent only to the friend who knew her ways so well; she looked as ifshe were acting out a part in the signifi- cant drama ofher own ideas and one ofthose ideas had taken hold of her, refusing to let go. He remembered her saying to him: "I want the child from you! " The words did not affect him as disagreeably now as they had at the time; he called out to her softly and waited.
But Clarisse was thinking: "This time Meingast is going through his transformation in our house. " He had undergone several rather remarkable transformations in his lifetime, and without reacting to Walter's lengthy answer to his letter, he had, one day, turned the an- nouncement of his coming into reality. Clarisse was convinced that the work he then immediately plunged into in their house had to do with a transformation. The thought of some Indian god who takes up his abode somewhere before each new purification mingled in her mind with the memory of creatures that choose a specific place to
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 849
change into a pupa, and from this notion, which struck her as tre- mendously healthy and down-to-earth, she went on to take in the sensuous fragrance of peaches ripening on a sunny wall. The logical result of all this was that she was standing under the window in the glow of the sinking sun, while the prophet had withdrawn into the shadowy cavern behind it. The day before, he had explained to her and Walter that in its original sense "knight" had meant boy, servant, squire, man-at-arms, and hero. Now she said to herself, "I am his knight! " and served him and safeguarded his labors: There was no need to say a word; she simply stood still, dazzled, and faced down the rays of the sun.
When Ulrich spoke to her she slowly turned her face toward the unexpected voice, and he discovered that something had changed. The eyes that looked toward him contained a chill such as the colors of a landscape radiate after the dying of day, and he instantly real- ized: She no longer wants anything from you! There was no trace anymore in her look of how she had wanted to "force him out of his block of stone," of his having been a great devil or god, of wanting to escape with him through the hole in the music, ofwanting to kill him if he would not love her. Not that he cared; it was doubtless a quite ordinary little experience, this extinguished glow of self-interest in a gaze; still, it was like a small rent in the veil oflife through which the indifferent void stares out, and it laid the basis for much that was to happen later.
Ulrich was told that Meingast was there, and understood.
They went quietly into the house to fetch Walter, and the three of them just as quietly came back out of doors again so as not to disturb the great man working. Through an open door Ulrich twice caught a glimpse of Meingast's back. Meingast was housed in an empty room detached from the rest of the apartment but belonging to it; Clarisse and Walter had dug up an iron bedstead somewhere for him; a kitchen stool and a tin basin served as a washstand and bath, and in addition to these the room, with its uncurtained window, held only an old kitchen cupboard containing books, and a small, unpainted deal table. Meingast sat at this table writing, and did not tum his head when they passed his door. All this Ulrich either saw for himself or found out from his friends, who had no scruples about providing much more primitive accommodations for the Master than they had
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themselves; on the contrary, for some reason, they seemed to take pride in his being content with it. It was touching, and it made things easy for them. Walter declared that if one went into this room in Meingast's absence one felt the indescribable aura of a threadbare old glove that had been worn on a noble and forceful hand.
And in fact Meingast greatly enjoyed working in these surround- ings, whose spartan simplicity flattered him. It made him feel his will forming the words on paper. And when in addition Clarisse was standing under his window, as she had been just then, or on the land- ing, or even if she was merely sitting in her room-"wrapped in the cloak of invisible northern lights," as she had confided to him-his pleasure was enhanced by this ambitious disciple on whom he had such a paralyzing effect. Then ideas simply flowed from his pen, and his huge dark eyes above the sharp, quivering nose began to glow. What he intended to complete under these circumstances would be one ofthe most important sections ofhis new book, and one ought to be allowed to call it not a book but a call to arms for the spirit of a new breed of men! When he heard an unfamiliar male voice coming from where Clarisse was standing, he had broken off and cautiously peered out; he did not recognize Ulrich, though he dimly remem- bered him, but he found no reason in the footsteps coming up the stairs to shut his door or tum his head from his work. He wore a heavy wool cardigan under his jacket, showing his imperviousness to weather and people.
Ulrich was taken out for a walk and treated to ecstatic praise ofthe Master, who was meanwhile devoting himself to his work.
Walter said: "Being friends with a man like Meingast makes one realize how much one has suffered from antipathy to others! As- sociating with him, one feels . . . let me put it this way: everything seems painted in pure colors, without any grays at all! "
Clarisse said: "Being with him, one feels one has a destiny. There one stands, entirely oneself, fully illuminated. "
Walter added: "Today everything splits into hundreds of layers and becomes opaque and blurred-his mind is like glass! "
Ulrich's reply to them was: "There are always scapegoats and bellwethers; and then there are sheep who need them! "
Walter flung back at him: "It was to be expected that such a man wouldn't suit you! "
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Clarisse cried out: ''You once maintained that no one can live by ideas, remember? Well, Meingast can! "
Walter said more soberly: "Not that I always see eye-to-eye with him, ofcourse . . . "
Clarisse broke in: "Listening to him, one feels shudders of light inside. "
Ulrich retorted: "A particularly fine head on a man usually means that he's stupid; particularly deep philosophers are usually shallow thinkers; in literature, talents not much above average are usually re- garded by their contemporaries as geniuses. "
What a curious phenomenon admiration is! In the life of individu- als it occurs only in spasms, but it is firmly institutionalized in collec- tive life. Walter would actually have found it more satisfying if he himself could have occupied Meingast's place in his own and Cla- risse's esteem, and could not at all understand why this was not so; and yet there was a certain slight advantage in it too. The emotion he was spared in this way was likewise credited to Meingast's account, as when one adopts someone else's child as one's own. On the other hand, it was for this very reason that his admiration for Meingast was not really a pure and wholesome feeling, as Walter himself realized; it was rather an overcharged need to surrender himself to believing in him. There was something assiduous in this admiration; it was a "keyboard emotion," raging without real conviction. Ulrich sensed this too. One of the elementary needs for passion, which life today breaks into fragments and jumbles to the point where they are un- recognizable, was here seeking a way back, for Walter praised Mein- gast with the ferocity of a theater audience that applauds far beyond the limits of its real opinion the commonplaces that are designed to arouse its need to applaud. He praised him out of one of those des- perate urges to admire, which normally find their outlet in festivals and celebrations, in great contemporaries or ideas and the honors bestowed on them, in situations where everyone involved joins in without anybody really knowing for whom or for what, while being inwardly prepared to be twice as mean as usual the next day in order to have nothing to reproach oneself for. This was how Ulrich thought about his friends, and he kept them on their toes by aiming barbed remarks at Meingast from time to time; for like everyone who knows better, he had been annoyed countless times by his contemporaries'
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capacity for enthusiasms, which almost invariably fasten on the wrong object and so end up destroying even what indifference has let survive.
Dusk had already fallen by the time they had returned, still talk- ing, to the house.
"This Meingast lives on our current confusion of intuition and faith," Ulrich finally said. "Almost everything that isn't science can only be intuited, and for that you need passion and prudence. So a methodology for dealing with what we don't know is almost the same as a methodology for life. But you two 'believe' the minute someone like Meingast comes along! And so does everyone. But this 'belief' is almost as much of a disaster as if you decided to plump your es- teemed bodies down on a basket ofeggs to hatch their unknown con- tents! "
They were standing at the foot of the stairs. And suddenly Ulrich realized why he had come here and was talking with them the way he used to. It did not surprise him when Walter answered:
"And the world is supposed to stand still until you've worked out your methodology? ''
They evidently did not take him seriously because they did not re- alize how desolate this area of faith was that stretches between the certaintyofknowledge and the mists ofintuition! Old ideas swarmed in his head, crowding so thickly they almost suffocated thought. But now he knew that it was no longer necessary to start all over again, like a carpet weaver whose mind has been blinded by a dream, and that this was the only reason he was here again. Everything had become so much simpler lately. The last two weeks had annulled ev- erything that had gone before and had tied up the lines of his inner motions with a powerful knot.
Walter was expecting Ulrich to give him an answer that he could resent. He wanted to pay him back with interest! He had made up his mind to tell Ulrich that people like Meingast were saviors.
