His responsibilities in this
situation
seemed to cause him some anxiety.
Musil - Man Without Qualities - v2
There was not enough time for all the available material.
The old gentleman, who had nodded mournfully to everything said at his bedside, was still muttering in a low, troubled voice when the five of them stopped again, several beds farther on, to consider the next case Dr.
Friedenthal had cho- sen for them.
This time it was someone who was himself engaged in art, a cheer- ful, fat painter whose bed stood close to a sunny window. He had paper and many pencils on his blanket, and busied himselfwith them all day long. Clarisse was immediately struck by the happy restless- ness of his movements. "That's the way Walter should be painting! " she thought. Friedenthal, seeing her interest, quickly snatched a sheet ofpaper from the fat man and handed it to Clarisse; the painter snickered and behaved like a serving girl who'd just been pinched. But Clarisse was amazed to see a sketch for a large composition, drawn with sure, accomplished strokes, entirely sensible to the point of banality, with many figures woven together in accurate perspec- tive and a large hall, everything executed in meticulous detail, so that the whole effect was of something so salutary and professorial that it could have come from the National Academy. "What amazing crafts- manship! " she cried impulsively.
Dr. Friedenthal responded with a flattered smile.
The artist gleefully made a rude noise at him.
"You see, that gentleman likes it! Show him some more, go on!
Amazing how good it is, he said! Go on, show him! I know you're only laughing at me, but he likes it! " He spoke good-humoredly, holding out the rest of his drawings to the doctor, with whom he seemed to be on easy terms although the doctor didn't appreciate his work.
"We don't have time for you today," Dr. Friedenthal told him and, turning to Clarisse, summed up the case by saying: "He's not schizo- phrenic; sorry he's the only one we have here at the moment. Schizo- phrenics are often fine artists, quite modem. "
"And insane? " Clarisse said dubiously.
"Why not? '' Dr. Friedenthal answered sadly.
Clarisse bit her lip.
Meanwhile Stumm and Ulrich were already on the threshold to
the next ward, and the General was saying: "Looking at this, I'm re-
1068 • THE MAN WITH0 UT QUALITIES
ally sorry I called my orderly an idiot this morning. I'll never do it again! " For the ward they were facing was a room with extreme cases ofidiocy.
Clarisse had not yet seen this and was thinking: "So even academic art, so respectably and widely recognized, has a sister in Bedlam-a sister denied, deprived, and yet so much a twin one can barely tell the difference! " This almost impressed her more than Friedenthal's remark that another time he might be able to show her expressionist artists. She made up her mind to take him up on it. Her head was down, and she was still biting her lip. There was something wrong with all this. It seemed to her clearly wrong to lock up such gifted people; the doctors might know about diseases, she thought, but probably did not understand art and all it stood for. Something would have to be done, she felt. But it was not clear to her what. Yet she did not lose heart, for the fat painter had immediately called her "that gentleman"-it seemed to her a good omen.
Friedenthal scrutinized her with curiosity.
When she felt his gaze she looked up with her thin-lipped smile and moved toward him, but before she could say anything an appall- ing sight made her mind a blank. In this new ward a series ofhorrible apparitions crouched and sat in their beds, everything about their bodies crooked, unclean, twisted, or paralyzed. Decayed teeth. Wag- gling heads. Heads too big, too small, totally misshapen. Slack, drooping jaws from which saliva was dribbling, or brutish grinding motions of the mouth, without food or words. Yard-wide leaden bar- riers seemed to lie between these souls and the world, and after the low chuckling and buzzing in the other room, the silence here, bro- ken only by obscure grunting and muttering sounds, was oppressive. Such wards for severe mental deficiency are among the most horrify- ing sights to be found in the hideousness of a mental institution, and Clarisse felt herself plunged headlong into a ghastly darkness that blotted out all distinctions.
But their guide, Friedenthal, could see even in the dark, and pointing to various beds, he explained: "That's idiocy over there, and over here you have cretinism. "
Stumm von Bordwehr pricked up his ears. "A cretin is not the same as an idiot? " he asked.
"No," the doctor said, "there's a medical distinction. "
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 1069
"Interesting," Stumm said. "In ordinary life one would never think of such a thing. "
Clarisse moved from bed to bed. Her eyes bored into the patients, as she tried with all her might to understand, without succeeding in the least in gleaning anything from these faces that took no cogni- zance of her. All thought in them was extinguished. Dr. Friedenthal followed her softly and explained: "congenital amaurotic idiocy"; "tubercular hypertrophic sclerosis"; "idiotia thymica . . . "
The General, who meanwhile felt that he had seen enough of these "morons" and assumed that Ulrich felt the same way, glanced at his watch and said: "Now, where were we? We mustn't waste time! " And rather unexpectedly he resumed: "So, if you'll bear in mind: the War Ministry finds itself flanked by the pacifists on one side and the nationalists on the other. . . . "
Ulrich, not so quick to tear his mind away from his surroundings, gave him a blank stare.
"This is no joke, my friend! " Stumm explained. 'Tm talking poli- tics! Something's got to be done. We've come to a stop once before already. I f we don't do something soon, the Emperor's birthday will be upon us before we know it, and we'll look like fools. But what is to be done? It's a logical question, isn't it? And summing up rather bluntly what I told you, we're being pushed by one crowd to help them love mankind, and by the other to let them bully the rest of the world so that the nobler blood will prevail, or however you want to call it. There's something to be said for both sides. Which is why, in a word, you should somehow bring them together so there'll be no damage! "
"Me? " Ulrich protested at his friend's bombshell, and would have burst out laughing in other circumstances.
"Certainly you-who else? " the General replied decisively. 'Tll do all I can to help, but you're the campaign's secretary and Leinsdorf's right hand! "
"I can get you admitted here! " Ulrich announced firmly.
"Fine! " The General knew from the art ofwar that it was best to avoid unexpected resistance in the most unruffled manner possible. "If you get me in here I might meet someone who has found the Greatest Idea in the world. Outside they seem to have lost their taste for great ideas anyway. " He glanced at his watch again. "I hear
1070 • THE MAN WITH0UT QUALITIES
they've got some people here who are the Pope, or the universe. We haven't met a single one, and they're the ones I was most looking forward to getting acquainted with. Your little friend's terribly con- scientious," he complained.
Dr. Friedenthal gently eased Clarisse away from the defectives.
Hell is not interesting, it is terrifying. If it has not been human- ized-as by Dante, who populated it with writers and other promi- nent figures, thereby distracting attention from the technicalities of punishment-but an attempt has been made to represent it in some original fashion, even the most fertile minds never get beyond child- ish tortures and unimaginative distortions ofphysical realities. But it is precisely the bare idea of an unimaginable and therefore inescap- able everlasting punishment and agony, the premise of an inexorable change for the worse, impervious to any attempt to reverse it, that has the fascination of an abyss. Insane asylums are also like that. They are poorhouses. They have something of hell's lack of imagina- tion. But many people who have no idea of the causes of mental ill- ness are afraid of nothing so much, next to losing their money, as that they might one day lose their minds; an amazing number of people are plagued by the notion that they could suddenly lose themselves. It is apparently an overestimation oftheir self-worth that leads to the overestimation of the horror with which the sane imagine mental in- stitutions to be imbued. Even Clarisse suffered a faint disappoint- ment, which stemmed from some vague expectation implanted by her upbringing. It was quite the contrary with Dr. Friedenthal. He was used to these rounds. Order as in a military barracks or another mass institution, alleviation of conspicuous pains or complaints, pre- vention of avoidable deterioration, a slight improvement or a cure: these were the elements of his daily activity. Observing a good deal, knowing a good deal, without having a sufficient explanation for the overall problems, was his intellectual portion. These rounds through the wards, prescribing a few sedatives besides the usual medications for coughs, colds, constipation, and bedsores, were his daily work of healing. Hefelttheghostlyhorroroftheworldhelivedinonlywhen the contrast was awakened through contact with the normal world, which did not happen every day, but visits are such occasions, and that was why what Clarisse got to see had been prepared not without a certain sense of theatrical production, so that no sooner had he
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 1 0 7 1
aroused her from her absorption with one phenomenon that he im- mediately went on to something new and even more dramatic.
They had hardly left this ward when they were joined by several large men in crisp white uniforms, with hulking shoulders and jovial corporals' faces. It happened so silently that it had the effect of a drum roll.
"Now we're coming to a disturbed ward," Dr. Friedenthal an- nounced, and they approached a screaming and squawking that seemed to issue from an immense birdcage. They stood in front of a door that . had no handle, which had to be opened with a special key by one of the attendants. Clarisse started to enter first, as she had done up until now, but Dr. Friedenthal pulled her back roughly.
"Wait! " he said with emphasis, wearily, without apology.
The attendant who had opened the door had opened it only a crack, while covering the open space with his powerful body; after first listening and then peering inside, he hastily slipped in, followed by a second attendant, who took up a position at the other side of the entrance. Clarisse's heart started to pound. ,
"Advance guard, rear guard, cover flank! " the General said ap- preciatively. And thus covered, they walked in and were escorted from bed to bed by the two attending giants. What were sitting in the beds thrashed about, agitated and screaming, with arms and eyes, as if each of them was shouting into some private space that was for himself alone, and yet they all seemed to be caught up in a raging conversation, like alien birds locked in the same cage, each speaking the dialect of its own island. Some of them sat without restraints, while others were tied down to their beds with straps that allowed only limited movement of the hands.
"To keep them from attempting suicide," the doctor explained, and listed the diseases: paralysis, paranoia, manic depression, were the species to which these strange birds belonged.
Clarisse again felt intimidated at first by her confused impressions and could not get her bearings. And so it came as a friendly sign when she saw someone waving to her excitedly from a distance, call- ing out something to her while she was still many beds away. He was moving back and forth in his bed as if desperately trying to free him- self in order to dash over to her, outshouting the chorus with his complaints and fits of rage, and succeeding in concentrating Cia-
1072 · THE MAN WITH0 UT QUALITIES
risse's attention on himself. The closer she came to him, the more she was troubled by her sense of his addressing himself only to her, while she was completely unable to understand a word of what he was trying to say. When they finally reached his bed, the senior at- tendant told the doctor something so softly that Clarisse could not hear, and Friedenthal, looking very grave, gave some instructions. But then he said something in a light vein to the patient, who was slow to react but then suddenly asked: "Who's that man? " with ages- ture indicating Clarisse.
Friedenthal nodded toward Siegmund and answered that it was a doctor from Stockholm.
"No, that one! " The patient insisted on Clarisse. Friedenthal smiled and said she was a woman doctor from Vienna.
"No. That's a man," the patient contradicted him, and fell silent. Clarisse felt her heart thudding. Here was another who took her for a man!
Then the patient intoned slowly: "It is the seventh son of our Em- peror. "
Stumm von Bordwehr nudged Ulrich.
"That is not so," Friedenthal told him, and continued the game by turning to Clarisse, saying: "Do tell him yourself that he's mistaken. " "It's not true, my friend," Clarisse said in a low voice to the pa-
tient, so moved she could barely speak.
"You are the seventh son," the patient replied stubbornly.
"No, no," Clarisse assured him, smiling at him in her excitement
as if she were playing a love scene, her lips stiff with stage fright. "Yes you are! " the patient repeated, and looked at her in a way she could not find words for. She could not think of another thing to say, and just kept gazing helplessly with a fixed smile into the eyes of the lunatic who took her for a prince. Something remarkable was hap- pening in her mind: the possibility was forming that he might be right. The force of his repeated assertion dissolved some resistance in her; in some way·she lost control over her thoughts, new patterns took shape, their outlines looming from mist: he was not the first who wanted to know who she was and to take her for a "gentleman. " But while she was still gazing at his face, caught up in this strange bond, taking no account of his age or of any other vestiges of a normal life still left in his countenance, something quite incomprehensible was
IntotheMillennium(TheCriminals) · 1073
beginning to happen in that face and in the whole person. It looked as though her gaze was too heavy for the eyes on which it rested; they began to slide away and fall. His lips, too, began to quiver, and like heavy drops merging more and more quickly, audible obscenities mixed themselves with a rush of jabbering. Clarisse was as stunned by this slithering transformation as if something were slipping away from her; she impulsively reached out to the miserable creature with both arms, and before anyone could interfere, the patient leapt to meet her: he cast off his bedclothes, knelt at the foot of the bed, and began to masturbate like a caged monkey.
"Don't be such a pig! " the doctor said quickly and sternly, while the attendants instantly grabbed the man and his bedclothes and in a flash reduced both to a lifeless bundle on the bed. Clarisse had turned dark red. She felt as dizzy as when the floor of an elevator all at once seems to drop away from under one's feet. Suddenly it seemed to her that all the patients they had already passed were shouting at her back and the others, whom they had not yet seen, were shouting at her from in front. And as chance would have it, or the infectious power of excitement, a friendly old man in the next bed, who had been making good-natured little jokes while the visi- tors stood nearby, leapt up the instant Clarisse hurried past him, and began raving at them in foul language that formed a disgusting foam on his lips. On him, too, the attendants' fists descended like a heavy press, crushing all resistance.
But the magician Friedenthal had even more tricks to conjure up. Under guard at the exit as they had been at the entrance, the visitors left this ward at the far end, and suddenly their ears seemed plunged into healing silence. They found themselves in a clean, cheerful cor- ridor with a linoleum floor, and encountered people in their Sunday best and attractive children, all greeting the doctor confidently and politely. They were visitors, waiting to get to see their relatives, and once again the impact of this healthy world was disconcerting; for a moment all these discreet and well-behaved people in their best clothes seemed like dolls, or extremely well-made artificial flowers. But Friedenthal passed through them hurriedly and announced to his friends that he was now about to take them to the ward for mur- derers and others of the criminally insane. The watchful looks and behavior of the attendants at the next iron gate did not bode at all
1074 · THE MAN WITHOUT QUALITIES
well. They entered a cloistered courtyard surrounded by a gallery, resembling one of those gardens of modem design that have many stones and few plants. The empty air first seemed like a cube of si- lence; it was only after a while that one noticed figures sitting mutely along the walls. Near the entrance some retarded boys were squat- ting, runny-nosed, dirty, motionless, as if a sculptor had had the gro- tesque idea of attaching them to the pillars flanking the gate. Near them, the first figure by the wall, sitting apart from the others, was an ordinary-looking man still in his dark Sunday suit, but without a col- lar; he must have just been admitted, and was indescribably moving in his impression of not belonging anywhere. Clarisse suddenly imagined the anguish she would cause Walter if she left him, and almost burst into tears. It was the first time this had ever happened, but she quickly suppressed it, for the other men past whom she was being escorted merely gave the impression of habitual submission to be expected in prisons: They greeted the doctor with shy politeness and made minorrequests. Onlyone made anuisance ofhimselfwith his complaints, a young man who emerged from heaven knew what oblivion. He demanded to be released at once, and why was he here in the first place? When Dr. Friedenthal replied evasively that such requests were handled by the superintendent, not by him, the young man persisted; his pleas became repetitive, like links in a chain rat- tling past faster and faster; gradually, a note of urgency came into his voice and grew threatening, finally turning into brutish, mindless danger. At that point the giants pushed him back down on the bench, and he crept back into his silence like a dog, without having received an answer. By now Clarisse was used to this, and it merely became part of her general excitement.
There would have been no time for anything else, since they had reached the armored door at the far end of the courtyard, and the guards were banging on it. This was something new, for up to this point they had used great caution in opening doors but had not an- nounced themselves. On this door they banged their fists four times, and listened to the stirrings from the other side.
"That's the signal for everyone inside to line up against the walls," Dr. Friedenthal explained, "or sit on the benches along the walls. "
And indeed, as the door turned slowly, inch by inch, they could see that all the men who had been milling around quietly or noisily were
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 1075
behaving obediently, like well-drilled prisoners. Even so, the guards were so cautious as they entered that Clarisse suddenly clutched at Dr. Friedenthal's sleeve and asked excitedly whether Moosbrugger was here. Friedenthal only shook his head. He had no time. He hast- ily admonished the visitors to stay at least two paces away from every prisoner.
His responsibilities in this situation seemed to cause him some anxiety. They were seven against thirty, in a remote, walled courtyard full of insane men almost all of whom had committed a murder.
Those who are accustomed to carrying a weapon feel more ex- posed without it than others, so one could not hold it against the General, who had left his saber in the waiting room, that he asked the doctor: "Don't you have a weapon on you? " "Alertness and experi- ence! " Dr. Friedenthal replied, pleased at the flattering question. "It's all a matter of nipping any potential disturbance in the bud. "
And in fact at the slightest move among the inmates to break ranks, the guards rushed in and thrust the offender back into place so swiftly that these attacks seemed to be the only acts of violence oc- curring. Clarisse did not approve of them. "What the doctors don't seem to understand," she thought, "is that although these men are shut in here together all day long without supervision, they don't do anything to each other; it's only we, coming from the world that is foreign to them, who may be in danger. " She wanted to speak to one of them, suddenly imagining that she could certainly find a way to communicate properly with him. In a comer right near the entrance was a sturdy-looking man of medium height, with a full brown beard and piercing eyes; he was leaning against the wall with his arms folded, silently surveying the visitors' activity with an angry expres- sion. Clarisse stepped toward him, but Dr. Friedenthal instantly re- strained her with a hand on her arm. "Not this one," he said in a low voice. He chose another murderer for Clarisse and spoke to him. This was a short, squat fellow with a pointy head, shaved convict fashion, apparently known to the doctor as tractable, who instantly stood at attention and, answering smartly, showed two rows of teeth that dubiously suggested two rows of gravestones.
"Ask him why he's here," Dr. Friedenthal whispered to Clarisse's brother, and Siegmund asked the broad-shouldered man with the pointy head: "Why are you here? "
1076 · THE MAN WITHOUT QUALITIES
"You know that very well! . . was the curt reply.
"No, I don't know," Siegmund-who did not like to give up too easily-said rather foolishly. "So tell me why you're here. . .
"You know that very well! " The response was repeated with a stronger emphasis.
"Why are you being rude to me? . . Siegmund asked. "I honestly don't know why! "
"This lying! . . Clarisse thought, and she was glad when the patient simply answered: "Because I choose! I can do as I like! . . he insisted, and bared his teeth at them.
'Well, there's no need to be rude for no reason," the hapless Sieg- mund persisted, just as unable as the insane man to come up with anything new.
Clarisse was furious with him for playing the stupid role of some- one teasing a caged animal in a zoo.
"It's none of your business! I do as I like, get it? Whatever I like! " The mental patient barked like a sergeant and produced a laugh from somewhere in his face, but not his mouth or eyes, which were both charged with uncanny anger.
Even Ulrich was thinking: "I wouldn't care to be alone with this fellow just now. " Siegmund was having a hard time standing his ground, since the madman had stepped up close to him, and Clarisse was wishing he would seize her brother by the throat and bite him in the face. Friedenthal complacently let the scene take its course, for after all, as a medical colleague Siegmund ought to be able to handle it, and Friedenthal was rather enjoying the other's discomfiture. With his sense of theater, he waited for the scene to reach a climax, and only when Siegmund was beyond uttering another word did he give the signal to break it off. But the desire to meddle was back in Clarisse; it had somehow grown stronger and stronger as the man drummed out his answers. Suddenly she could no longer hold back and, walking up to the man, said:
''I'm from Vienna! "
It made as little sense as a random sound one might entice from a bugle. She neither knew what she meant by saying it nor where the idea had come from, nor had she stopped to wonder whether the man knew what town he was in, and if he did know, her remark would be even more pointless. But she felt tremendously sure ofher-
IntotheMillennium(TheCriminals) · 1 0 7 7
self as she said it. And in fact miracles still do happen, occasionally, and they have a partiality for insane asylums. As she spoke, flaming with excitement, a glow came over him; his rock-grinder teeth with- drew behind his lips, and benevolence spread over the glare in his eyes.
"Ah, Vienna, city of dreams! A beautiful place! " he said with the smugness of the former petit bourgeois who has his cliches in order.
"Congratulations! " Dr. Friedenthallaughed.
But for Clarisse the episode had become an event.
"Now let's go on to Moosbrugger! " Friedenthal said.
But this was not to be. They moved cautiously back through the
two courtyards and were walking up an incline toward what ap- peared to be a distant isolated pavilion, when a guard who seemed to have been looking for them everywhere came running up to them. He whispered to Friedenthal at some length, something important and disagreeable, to judge by the doctor's expression as he listened and asked an occasional question. Finally, Dr. Friedenthal turned back to the others with a grave, apologetic air and told them that he had to go to another ward, to deal with an incident that would take some time, so that he would, regretfully, have to curtail their tour. He addressed himself primarily to the official personage in the Gen- eral's uniform beneath the lab coat; Stumm von Bordwehr gratefully assured him that he had seen enough ofthe outstanding organization and discipline of this institution, and that after what they had been through, one murderer more or less did not matter. Clarisse, how- ever, had such a disappointed, stricken face that Friedenthal pro- posed to make up the visit to Moosbrugger, along with some other ipteresting cases, some other time; he would give Siegmund a call as soon as a date could be arranged.
"Very kind of you"-the General thanked him on behalf of the group-"though for my part, I really can't say whether other obliga- tions will allow me to be present. . .
With this reservation, a future visit was agreed upon, and Frieden- thal set off along a path that soon took him over the rise and out of sight, while the others, accompanied by the attendant Friedenthal had left with them, headed back to the gate. They left the path and took a shortcut across the grassy slope between fine beeches and plane trees. The General had slipped out ofhis lab coat and carried it
1078 ·THE MAN WITHOUT QUALITIES
jauntily over his ann, as one might carry a raincoat on an outing, but nobody seemed to feel like talking. Ulrich showed no interest in being coached further for the evening's reception, and Stumm was himself too preoccupied with what was awaiting him at his office, though he felt called upon to make some amusing remarks to Cla- risse, whom he was gallantly escorting. But Clarisse was absent- minded and quiet. "Perhaps she's still embarrassed over that filthy pig," he mused, feeling the need to apologize somehow for not hav- ing been in a position to offer his chivalric protection, but on the other hand, it was probably best to say no more about it. So the walk back passed in silence and constraint.
It was only when Stumm von Bordwehr had entered his carriage, leaving it to Ulrich to see Clarisse and her brother home, that his good spirits returned, and with them an idea that gave a certain shape to the whole depressing episode. He had taken a cigarette out of the big leather case in his pocket, and leaning back in the cushions and blowing the first little blue clouds into the sunny air, he thought comfortably: "Terrible thing, to be out of one's mind like that. Come to think of it, all the time we were there I didn't see a single one of them having a smoke! People don't realize how well off they are as long as they're still in their right mind! "
34
A GREAT EVENT IS IN THE MAKING. COUNT
LEINSDORF AND THE INN RIVER
This eventful day culminated in a gala reception at the Tuzzis'.
The Parallel Campaign was on parade, in glory and brilliance: eyes blazed, jewels blazed, prominence blazed, wit blazed. A lunatic might conceivably conclude from this that on such a social occasion eyes, jewels, prominent names, and wit amount to the same thing, and he would not be far off the mark: everyone who did not happen
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 1079
to be on the Riviera or the north Italian lakes was there, except for those few who refused on principle to recognize any "events" so late in the season.
In their place were quite a number of people whom no one had ever seen before. A long respite had tom holes in the guest list, and to fill it up again new people had been invited more hastily than was consonant with Diotima's circumspect ways: Count Leinsdorfhimself had turned over to her a list of people he wanted invited for political reasons, and once the principle of her salon's exclusiveness had thus been sacrificed to higher considerations, she had no longer attached the same importance to it. His Grace was, in fact, the sole begetter of t h i s f e s t i v e g a t h e r i n g : D i o t i m a was o f t h e o p i n i o n t h a t h u m a n i t y c o u l d be helped only in pairs. But Count Leinsdorfheld finnly to his asser- tion that "capital and culture have not done their duty by our histori- cal development; we must give them one last chance! "
Count Leinsdorf was always coming back to this point.
"Tell me, my dear, haven't you come to a decision yet? " he would ask. "It's high time. All sorts of people are coming to the fore with destructive tendencies. We must give the cultural sector one last op- portunity to restore the balance. " But Diotima, deflected by the wealth of variation in the forms of human coupling, was deaf to all else.
Finally, Count Leinsdorf had to call her to order.
"You know, my dear, I hardly seem to know you anymore! We've given out the password 'Action! ' to all and sundry; I myself had a hand-surely I may tell you in confidence that it was I who was be- hind the Minister of the Interior's resignation. It had to be done on a high level, you understand; a very high level! But it had really become a scandal, and nobody had the courage to put a stop to it. So this is just for your own ears," he continued, "and now the Premier has asked us to bestir ourselves a bit with our Inquiry Concerning the Desires of the Concerned Sections of the Population with Respect to the Con- duct of Home Affairs, because the new Minister naturally can't be expected to have it at his fingertips; and now you want to leave me in the lurch, you who have always been the last to give up? We must give capital and culture a last chance! You know, it's either that or . . . "
This somewhat incomplete final sentence was uttered so menac- ingly that there was no mistaking that he knew what he wanted, and
1080 • THE MAN WITH 0 U T QUALITIES
Diotima obediently promised to hurry; but then she forgot again and did nothing.
And then one day Count Leinsdorf was seized by his well-known energy and drove straight to her door, propelled by forty horse- power.
"Has anything happened yet? " he asked, and Diotima had to admit that nothing had.
"Do you know the Inn River, my dear? " he asked.
Of course Diotima knew the Inn, second only to the Danube as Kakania's most famous river, richly interwoven with the country's ge- ography and history. She observed her visitor rather dubiously, while doing her best to smile.
But Count Leinsdorf was in deadly earnest. "Apart from Inns- brock," he said, "what ridiculous backwoods places all those little towns in the Inn Valley are, and what an imposing river the Inn is in our culture! And to think I never realized it before! " He shook his head. "You see, I happened by chance to look at a highway map today," he said, finally coming to the point, "and I noticed that the Inn rises in Switzerland. I must have known it before, of course, we all know it, but we never give it a thought. It rises at Majola, I've seen it there myself; a ridiculous little creek no wider than the Kamp or the Morava in our country. But what have the Swiss made ofit? The Engadine! The world-famous Engadine! The Engad-Inn, my dear! Has it ever occurred to you that the whole Engadine comes from the name Inn? That's what I hit upon today. While we, with our insuffer- able Austrian modesty, of course never make anything out of what belongs to us! "
After this chat Diotima hastened to arrange for the desired recep- tion, partly because she realized that she had to stand by Count Leinsdorf, and partly because she was afraid of driving her high- ranking friend to some extreme if she continued to refuse.
But when she gave him her promise, Leinsdorf said:
"And this time, I beg ofyou, dearest lady, don't fail to invite--er- that x you call Drangsal. Her friend Frau Wayden has been pestering me about this person for weeks, and won't leave me in peace! "
Diotima promised this too, although at other times she would have regarded putting up with her rival as a dereliction of duty to her country.
35
A GREAT EVENT IS IN THE MAKING. PRIVY COUNCILLOR MESERITSCHER
When the rooms were filled with the radiance of festive illumination and the assembled company, an observer could note among those present not only His Excellency, together with other leading mem- bers of the high aristocracy for whose appearance he had arranged, but also His Excellency the Minister of War, and in the latter's en- tourage the intensely intellectual, somewhat overworked head of General Stumm von Bordwehr. One observed Paul Arnheim (with- out the "Dr. ": simple and most effective; the observer had thought it over carefully-it's called "litotes," an artful understatement, like re- moving some trifle from one's body, as when a king removes a ring from his finger to place it on someone else's). Then one observed everyone worth mentioning from the various ministries (the Minister of Education and Culture had apologized to His Excellency in the Upper House for not coming in person; he had to go to Linz for the consecration of a great altar screen). Then one noted that the foreign embassies and legations had sent an "elite. " There were well-known names "from industry, art, and science," and a time-honored allegory of diligence lay in this invariable combination of three bourgeois ac- tivities, a combination that seized hold of the scribbling pen all by itself. That same adept pen then presented the ladies: beige, pink, cherry, cream . . . ; embroidered, draped, triple-tiered, or dropped from the waist. . . . Between Countess Adlitz and Frau Generaldirek- tor Weghuber was listed the well-known Frau Melanie Drangsal, widow of the world-famous surgeon, "in her own right a charming hostess, who provides in her house a hearth for the leading lights of our times. " Finally, listed separately at the end of this section, was the name of Ulrich von So-and-so and sister. The observer had hesi- tated about adding "whose name is widely associated with his selfless service on behalf of that high-minded and patriotic undertaking," or even "a coming man. " Word had gone around long since that one of
1081
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these days this protege of Count Leinsdorf was widely expected to involve his patron in some rash misstep, and the temptation to go on record early as someone in the know was great. However, the deep- est satisfaction for those in the know is always silence, especially when it proceeds from caution. It was to this that Ulrich and Agathe owed the mere mention of their names as stragglers, immediately preceding those leaders of society and the intelligentsia who are not named individually but simply destined for the mass grave of "all those of rank and station. " Many people fell into this category, among them the well-known professor of jurisprudence Councillor Herr Professor Schwung, who happened to be in the capital as a member of a government commission of inquiry, and also the young poet Friedel Feuermaul, for although his was known to be among the moving spirits behind this evening's gathering, that was a far cry from the more substantial significance of a title or the triumphs of haute couture. People such as Acting Bank Director Leo Fischel and family-who had won admittance thanks to Gerda's grueling efforts, without any help from Ulrich, in other words because of Diotima's momentarily flagging attention-were simply buried in the comer of one's eye. And the wife of an eminent jurist (who was well known but on such an occasion still below the threshold ofpublic notice), a lady whose name, Bonadea, was unknown even to the observer, was later exhumed for listing among the wearers of noteworthy gowns because her sensational looks aroused great admiration.
This impersonal seeing eye, the surveying curiosity of the public, was of course a person. There are usually quite a lot of them, but in the Kakanian metropolis at that time there was one who overtopped all the rest: Privy Councillor Meseritscher. Born in the Wallachian town of Meseritsch, whence his name, this publisher, editor, and news correspondent of the Parliamentary and Social Gazette, which he had founded in the sixties of the last century, had come to the capital as a young man, sacrificing his expectation of taking over his parents' tavern in his native town in order to become a journalist, having been attracted by the political promise of liberalism that was then at its zenith. And before long he had made his contribution to that era by founding a news agency, which began by supplying small local items of a police nature to the newspapers. Thanks to the indus- try, reliability, and thoroughness of its owner, this rudimentary
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 1083
agency not only earned the esteem of the papers and the police but was soon noticed by other high authorities as well, and used by them for placing items they wanted to publicize without taking responsibil- ity, so that the agency soon found itself in a privileged position for tapping unofficial information from official sources. A man of great enterprise and a tireless worker, Meseritscher, as he saw this success developing, extended his activity to include news from the Court and Society; indeed, he would probably never have left Meseritsch for the capital if this had not been his guiding vision. Flawless reporting of "those present. . was regarded as his specialty. His memory for people and what was said about them was extraordinary, and this as- sured him of the same splendid relationship with the salon that he had with the prison. He knew Society better than it knew itself, and his unflagging devotion enabled him to make people who had met at a gathering properly acquainted with each other the very next morn- ing, like some old cavalier in whom everyone has for decades been confiding all their marriage plans and the problems they were having with their dressmakers. And so, on every sort of great occasion, the zealous, nimble, ever-obliging, affable little man was a familiar insti- tution, and in his later years it was only he and his presence that con- ferred indisputable prestige to such occasions.
Meseritscher's career had reached a peak when the title Privy Councillor was bestowed upon him, and this involves an interesting peculiarity. Kakania was the most peace-loving of countries, but at some time or other it had decided, in the profound innocence of its convictions, that, wars being a thing of the past, its civil service should be organized as a hierarchy corresponding to military ranks, complete with similar uniforms and insignia. Since then the rank of Privy Councillor corresponded to that of a lieutenant colonel in His Majesty's Imperial and Royal Army. But even though this was not in itself an exalted rank, the peculiarity was that according to an immu- table tradition, which, like everything immutable in Kakania, was modified only in exceptional cases, Meseritscher should really have been named an Imperial Councillor. An Imperial Councillor was not, as one might suppose from the term, superior to a Privy Council- lor, but inferior: it only corresponded to the rank of captain. Mese- ritscher should have been an Imperial Councillor because that title was given, other than to certain civil servants, only to those engaged
1084 · THE MAN WITH0UT QUALITIES
in independent professions such as, for example, court barber or coach builder, and, by the same token, writers and artists; while Privy Councillor was at the time an actual high-ranking title in the civil service. That Meseritscher was nevertheless the first and only mem- ber of his profession to be so honored expressed something more than the high honor of the title itself-indeed, even more than the daily reminder not to take too seriously whatever happens in this country of ours; the unjustified title was a subtle and discreet way of assuring the indefatigable chronicler his close association with Court, State, and Society.
Meseritscher had been a model for many journalists in his time, and was on the boards of leading literary associations. The story also went around that he had had made for himself a uniform with a gold collar, but only put it on, sometimes, at home. Chances are the rumor was untrue, because deep down Meseritscher had always pre- served certain memories of the tavern trade in Meseritsch, and a good tavemkeeper also knows the secrets of all his guests but doesn't make use of everything he knows; he never brings his own opinions into a discussion but enjoys noting and telling everything in the way of fact, anecdote, or joke. And so Meseritscher, whom one met on every social occasion as the acknowledged memorializer of beautiful women and distinguished men, had himself never even thought of going to a good tailor; he knew all the behind-the-scenes intricacies of politics, yet had never dabbled in politics in even a single line of print; he knew about all the discoveries and inventions of his time without understanding any of them. He was perfectly satisfied to know that they existed and were "present. " He honestly loved his time, and his time reciprocated his affection to a certain degree, be- cause he daily reported its presence to the world.
When Diotima caught sight of him as he entered, she immediately beckoned him to her side.
"My dear Meseritscher," she said, as sweetly as she knew how. "You surely didn't take His Excellency's speech in the Upper House today as an expression of our position-you couldn't have taken it literally? "
His Excellency, in the context ofthe Minister's downfall and exas- perated by his cares, had made a widely noticed speech in the Upper House in which he not only charged his victim with having failed to
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 1085
show the true constructive spirit of cooperation and strictness of principle, but also let his zeal carry him to making general observa- tions that in some inexplicable fashion culminated in a recognition of the importance of the press, in which he reproached this "institution risen to the status of a world power" with pretty much everything with which a feudal-minded, independent, nonpartisan, Christian gentleman could charge an institution that in his view is the dead opposite of himself. It was this that Diotima was diplomatically trying to smooth over, and Meseritscher listened pensively as she found in- creasingly fine and unintelligible language for Count Leinsdorf's real point of view. Then suddenly he laid a hand on her arm and mag- nanimously interrupted her:
"My dear lady, how can you upset yourself like this? " he summed up. "His Excellency is a good friend to us, isn't he? What if he did exaggerate? Why shouldn't he, a gallant gentleman like him? " And to prove that his relationship to the Count was unruffled, he added: 'Til just go and greet him now! "
That was Meseritscher!
This time it was someone who was himself engaged in art, a cheer- ful, fat painter whose bed stood close to a sunny window. He had paper and many pencils on his blanket, and busied himselfwith them all day long. Clarisse was immediately struck by the happy restless- ness of his movements. "That's the way Walter should be painting! " she thought. Friedenthal, seeing her interest, quickly snatched a sheet ofpaper from the fat man and handed it to Clarisse; the painter snickered and behaved like a serving girl who'd just been pinched. But Clarisse was amazed to see a sketch for a large composition, drawn with sure, accomplished strokes, entirely sensible to the point of banality, with many figures woven together in accurate perspec- tive and a large hall, everything executed in meticulous detail, so that the whole effect was of something so salutary and professorial that it could have come from the National Academy. "What amazing crafts- manship! " she cried impulsively.
Dr. Friedenthal responded with a flattered smile.
The artist gleefully made a rude noise at him.
"You see, that gentleman likes it! Show him some more, go on!
Amazing how good it is, he said! Go on, show him! I know you're only laughing at me, but he likes it! " He spoke good-humoredly, holding out the rest of his drawings to the doctor, with whom he seemed to be on easy terms although the doctor didn't appreciate his work.
"We don't have time for you today," Dr. Friedenthal told him and, turning to Clarisse, summed up the case by saying: "He's not schizo- phrenic; sorry he's the only one we have here at the moment. Schizo- phrenics are often fine artists, quite modem. "
"And insane? " Clarisse said dubiously.
"Why not? '' Dr. Friedenthal answered sadly.
Clarisse bit her lip.
Meanwhile Stumm and Ulrich were already on the threshold to
the next ward, and the General was saying: "Looking at this, I'm re-
1068 • THE MAN WITH0 UT QUALITIES
ally sorry I called my orderly an idiot this morning. I'll never do it again! " For the ward they were facing was a room with extreme cases ofidiocy.
Clarisse had not yet seen this and was thinking: "So even academic art, so respectably and widely recognized, has a sister in Bedlam-a sister denied, deprived, and yet so much a twin one can barely tell the difference! " This almost impressed her more than Friedenthal's remark that another time he might be able to show her expressionist artists. She made up her mind to take him up on it. Her head was down, and she was still biting her lip. There was something wrong with all this. It seemed to her clearly wrong to lock up such gifted people; the doctors might know about diseases, she thought, but probably did not understand art and all it stood for. Something would have to be done, she felt. But it was not clear to her what. Yet she did not lose heart, for the fat painter had immediately called her "that gentleman"-it seemed to her a good omen.
Friedenthal scrutinized her with curiosity.
When she felt his gaze she looked up with her thin-lipped smile and moved toward him, but before she could say anything an appall- ing sight made her mind a blank. In this new ward a series ofhorrible apparitions crouched and sat in their beds, everything about their bodies crooked, unclean, twisted, or paralyzed. Decayed teeth. Wag- gling heads. Heads too big, too small, totally misshapen. Slack, drooping jaws from which saliva was dribbling, or brutish grinding motions of the mouth, without food or words. Yard-wide leaden bar- riers seemed to lie between these souls and the world, and after the low chuckling and buzzing in the other room, the silence here, bro- ken only by obscure grunting and muttering sounds, was oppressive. Such wards for severe mental deficiency are among the most horrify- ing sights to be found in the hideousness of a mental institution, and Clarisse felt herself plunged headlong into a ghastly darkness that blotted out all distinctions.
But their guide, Friedenthal, could see even in the dark, and pointing to various beds, he explained: "That's idiocy over there, and over here you have cretinism. "
Stumm von Bordwehr pricked up his ears. "A cretin is not the same as an idiot? " he asked.
"No," the doctor said, "there's a medical distinction. "
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"Interesting," Stumm said. "In ordinary life one would never think of such a thing. "
Clarisse moved from bed to bed. Her eyes bored into the patients, as she tried with all her might to understand, without succeeding in the least in gleaning anything from these faces that took no cogni- zance of her. All thought in them was extinguished. Dr. Friedenthal followed her softly and explained: "congenital amaurotic idiocy"; "tubercular hypertrophic sclerosis"; "idiotia thymica . . . "
The General, who meanwhile felt that he had seen enough of these "morons" and assumed that Ulrich felt the same way, glanced at his watch and said: "Now, where were we? We mustn't waste time! " And rather unexpectedly he resumed: "So, if you'll bear in mind: the War Ministry finds itself flanked by the pacifists on one side and the nationalists on the other. . . . "
Ulrich, not so quick to tear his mind away from his surroundings, gave him a blank stare.
"This is no joke, my friend! " Stumm explained. 'Tm talking poli- tics! Something's got to be done. We've come to a stop once before already. I f we don't do something soon, the Emperor's birthday will be upon us before we know it, and we'll look like fools. But what is to be done? It's a logical question, isn't it? And summing up rather bluntly what I told you, we're being pushed by one crowd to help them love mankind, and by the other to let them bully the rest of the world so that the nobler blood will prevail, or however you want to call it. There's something to be said for both sides. Which is why, in a word, you should somehow bring them together so there'll be no damage! "
"Me? " Ulrich protested at his friend's bombshell, and would have burst out laughing in other circumstances.
"Certainly you-who else? " the General replied decisively. 'Tll do all I can to help, but you're the campaign's secretary and Leinsdorf's right hand! "
"I can get you admitted here! " Ulrich announced firmly.
"Fine! " The General knew from the art ofwar that it was best to avoid unexpected resistance in the most unruffled manner possible. "If you get me in here I might meet someone who has found the Greatest Idea in the world. Outside they seem to have lost their taste for great ideas anyway. " He glanced at his watch again. "I hear
1070 • THE MAN WITH0UT QUALITIES
they've got some people here who are the Pope, or the universe. We haven't met a single one, and they're the ones I was most looking forward to getting acquainted with. Your little friend's terribly con- scientious," he complained.
Dr. Friedenthal gently eased Clarisse away from the defectives.
Hell is not interesting, it is terrifying. If it has not been human- ized-as by Dante, who populated it with writers and other promi- nent figures, thereby distracting attention from the technicalities of punishment-but an attempt has been made to represent it in some original fashion, even the most fertile minds never get beyond child- ish tortures and unimaginative distortions ofphysical realities. But it is precisely the bare idea of an unimaginable and therefore inescap- able everlasting punishment and agony, the premise of an inexorable change for the worse, impervious to any attempt to reverse it, that has the fascination of an abyss. Insane asylums are also like that. They are poorhouses. They have something of hell's lack of imagina- tion. But many people who have no idea of the causes of mental ill- ness are afraid of nothing so much, next to losing their money, as that they might one day lose their minds; an amazing number of people are plagued by the notion that they could suddenly lose themselves. It is apparently an overestimation oftheir self-worth that leads to the overestimation of the horror with which the sane imagine mental in- stitutions to be imbued. Even Clarisse suffered a faint disappoint- ment, which stemmed from some vague expectation implanted by her upbringing. It was quite the contrary with Dr. Friedenthal. He was used to these rounds. Order as in a military barracks or another mass institution, alleviation of conspicuous pains or complaints, pre- vention of avoidable deterioration, a slight improvement or a cure: these were the elements of his daily activity. Observing a good deal, knowing a good deal, without having a sufficient explanation for the overall problems, was his intellectual portion. These rounds through the wards, prescribing a few sedatives besides the usual medications for coughs, colds, constipation, and bedsores, were his daily work of healing. Hefelttheghostlyhorroroftheworldhelivedinonlywhen the contrast was awakened through contact with the normal world, which did not happen every day, but visits are such occasions, and that was why what Clarisse got to see had been prepared not without a certain sense of theatrical production, so that no sooner had he
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 1 0 7 1
aroused her from her absorption with one phenomenon that he im- mediately went on to something new and even more dramatic.
They had hardly left this ward when they were joined by several large men in crisp white uniforms, with hulking shoulders and jovial corporals' faces. It happened so silently that it had the effect of a drum roll.
"Now we're coming to a disturbed ward," Dr. Friedenthal an- nounced, and they approached a screaming and squawking that seemed to issue from an immense birdcage. They stood in front of a door that . had no handle, which had to be opened with a special key by one of the attendants. Clarisse started to enter first, as she had done up until now, but Dr. Friedenthal pulled her back roughly.
"Wait! " he said with emphasis, wearily, without apology.
The attendant who had opened the door had opened it only a crack, while covering the open space with his powerful body; after first listening and then peering inside, he hastily slipped in, followed by a second attendant, who took up a position at the other side of the entrance. Clarisse's heart started to pound. ,
"Advance guard, rear guard, cover flank! " the General said ap- preciatively. And thus covered, they walked in and were escorted from bed to bed by the two attending giants. What were sitting in the beds thrashed about, agitated and screaming, with arms and eyes, as if each of them was shouting into some private space that was for himself alone, and yet they all seemed to be caught up in a raging conversation, like alien birds locked in the same cage, each speaking the dialect of its own island. Some of them sat without restraints, while others were tied down to their beds with straps that allowed only limited movement of the hands.
"To keep them from attempting suicide," the doctor explained, and listed the diseases: paralysis, paranoia, manic depression, were the species to which these strange birds belonged.
Clarisse again felt intimidated at first by her confused impressions and could not get her bearings. And so it came as a friendly sign when she saw someone waving to her excitedly from a distance, call- ing out something to her while she was still many beds away. He was moving back and forth in his bed as if desperately trying to free him- self in order to dash over to her, outshouting the chorus with his complaints and fits of rage, and succeeding in concentrating Cia-
1072 · THE MAN WITH0 UT QUALITIES
risse's attention on himself. The closer she came to him, the more she was troubled by her sense of his addressing himself only to her, while she was completely unable to understand a word of what he was trying to say. When they finally reached his bed, the senior at- tendant told the doctor something so softly that Clarisse could not hear, and Friedenthal, looking very grave, gave some instructions. But then he said something in a light vein to the patient, who was slow to react but then suddenly asked: "Who's that man? " with ages- ture indicating Clarisse.
Friedenthal nodded toward Siegmund and answered that it was a doctor from Stockholm.
"No, that one! " The patient insisted on Clarisse. Friedenthal smiled and said she was a woman doctor from Vienna.
"No. That's a man," the patient contradicted him, and fell silent. Clarisse felt her heart thudding. Here was another who took her for a man!
Then the patient intoned slowly: "It is the seventh son of our Em- peror. "
Stumm von Bordwehr nudged Ulrich.
"That is not so," Friedenthal told him, and continued the game by turning to Clarisse, saying: "Do tell him yourself that he's mistaken. " "It's not true, my friend," Clarisse said in a low voice to the pa-
tient, so moved she could barely speak.
"You are the seventh son," the patient replied stubbornly.
"No, no," Clarisse assured him, smiling at him in her excitement
as if she were playing a love scene, her lips stiff with stage fright. "Yes you are! " the patient repeated, and looked at her in a way she could not find words for. She could not think of another thing to say, and just kept gazing helplessly with a fixed smile into the eyes of the lunatic who took her for a prince. Something remarkable was hap- pening in her mind: the possibility was forming that he might be right. The force of his repeated assertion dissolved some resistance in her; in some way·she lost control over her thoughts, new patterns took shape, their outlines looming from mist: he was not the first who wanted to know who she was and to take her for a "gentleman. " But while she was still gazing at his face, caught up in this strange bond, taking no account of his age or of any other vestiges of a normal life still left in his countenance, something quite incomprehensible was
IntotheMillennium(TheCriminals) · 1073
beginning to happen in that face and in the whole person. It looked as though her gaze was too heavy for the eyes on which it rested; they began to slide away and fall. His lips, too, began to quiver, and like heavy drops merging more and more quickly, audible obscenities mixed themselves with a rush of jabbering. Clarisse was as stunned by this slithering transformation as if something were slipping away from her; she impulsively reached out to the miserable creature with both arms, and before anyone could interfere, the patient leapt to meet her: he cast off his bedclothes, knelt at the foot of the bed, and began to masturbate like a caged monkey.
"Don't be such a pig! " the doctor said quickly and sternly, while the attendants instantly grabbed the man and his bedclothes and in a flash reduced both to a lifeless bundle on the bed. Clarisse had turned dark red. She felt as dizzy as when the floor of an elevator all at once seems to drop away from under one's feet. Suddenly it seemed to her that all the patients they had already passed were shouting at her back and the others, whom they had not yet seen, were shouting at her from in front. And as chance would have it, or the infectious power of excitement, a friendly old man in the next bed, who had been making good-natured little jokes while the visi- tors stood nearby, leapt up the instant Clarisse hurried past him, and began raving at them in foul language that formed a disgusting foam on his lips. On him, too, the attendants' fists descended like a heavy press, crushing all resistance.
But the magician Friedenthal had even more tricks to conjure up. Under guard at the exit as they had been at the entrance, the visitors left this ward at the far end, and suddenly their ears seemed plunged into healing silence. They found themselves in a clean, cheerful cor- ridor with a linoleum floor, and encountered people in their Sunday best and attractive children, all greeting the doctor confidently and politely. They were visitors, waiting to get to see their relatives, and once again the impact of this healthy world was disconcerting; for a moment all these discreet and well-behaved people in their best clothes seemed like dolls, or extremely well-made artificial flowers. But Friedenthal passed through them hurriedly and announced to his friends that he was now about to take them to the ward for mur- derers and others of the criminally insane. The watchful looks and behavior of the attendants at the next iron gate did not bode at all
1074 · THE MAN WITHOUT QUALITIES
well. They entered a cloistered courtyard surrounded by a gallery, resembling one of those gardens of modem design that have many stones and few plants. The empty air first seemed like a cube of si- lence; it was only after a while that one noticed figures sitting mutely along the walls. Near the entrance some retarded boys were squat- ting, runny-nosed, dirty, motionless, as if a sculptor had had the gro- tesque idea of attaching them to the pillars flanking the gate. Near them, the first figure by the wall, sitting apart from the others, was an ordinary-looking man still in his dark Sunday suit, but without a col- lar; he must have just been admitted, and was indescribably moving in his impression of not belonging anywhere. Clarisse suddenly imagined the anguish she would cause Walter if she left him, and almost burst into tears. It was the first time this had ever happened, but she quickly suppressed it, for the other men past whom she was being escorted merely gave the impression of habitual submission to be expected in prisons: They greeted the doctor with shy politeness and made minorrequests. Onlyone made anuisance ofhimselfwith his complaints, a young man who emerged from heaven knew what oblivion. He demanded to be released at once, and why was he here in the first place? When Dr. Friedenthal replied evasively that such requests were handled by the superintendent, not by him, the young man persisted; his pleas became repetitive, like links in a chain rat- tling past faster and faster; gradually, a note of urgency came into his voice and grew threatening, finally turning into brutish, mindless danger. At that point the giants pushed him back down on the bench, and he crept back into his silence like a dog, without having received an answer. By now Clarisse was used to this, and it merely became part of her general excitement.
There would have been no time for anything else, since they had reached the armored door at the far end of the courtyard, and the guards were banging on it. This was something new, for up to this point they had used great caution in opening doors but had not an- nounced themselves. On this door they banged their fists four times, and listened to the stirrings from the other side.
"That's the signal for everyone inside to line up against the walls," Dr. Friedenthal explained, "or sit on the benches along the walls. "
And indeed, as the door turned slowly, inch by inch, they could see that all the men who had been milling around quietly or noisily were
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 1075
behaving obediently, like well-drilled prisoners. Even so, the guards were so cautious as they entered that Clarisse suddenly clutched at Dr. Friedenthal's sleeve and asked excitedly whether Moosbrugger was here. Friedenthal only shook his head. He had no time. He hast- ily admonished the visitors to stay at least two paces away from every prisoner.
His responsibilities in this situation seemed to cause him some anxiety. They were seven against thirty, in a remote, walled courtyard full of insane men almost all of whom had committed a murder.
Those who are accustomed to carrying a weapon feel more ex- posed without it than others, so one could not hold it against the General, who had left his saber in the waiting room, that he asked the doctor: "Don't you have a weapon on you? " "Alertness and experi- ence! " Dr. Friedenthal replied, pleased at the flattering question. "It's all a matter of nipping any potential disturbance in the bud. "
And in fact at the slightest move among the inmates to break ranks, the guards rushed in and thrust the offender back into place so swiftly that these attacks seemed to be the only acts of violence oc- curring. Clarisse did not approve of them. "What the doctors don't seem to understand," she thought, "is that although these men are shut in here together all day long without supervision, they don't do anything to each other; it's only we, coming from the world that is foreign to them, who may be in danger. " She wanted to speak to one of them, suddenly imagining that she could certainly find a way to communicate properly with him. In a comer right near the entrance was a sturdy-looking man of medium height, with a full brown beard and piercing eyes; he was leaning against the wall with his arms folded, silently surveying the visitors' activity with an angry expres- sion. Clarisse stepped toward him, but Dr. Friedenthal instantly re- strained her with a hand on her arm. "Not this one," he said in a low voice. He chose another murderer for Clarisse and spoke to him. This was a short, squat fellow with a pointy head, shaved convict fashion, apparently known to the doctor as tractable, who instantly stood at attention and, answering smartly, showed two rows of teeth that dubiously suggested two rows of gravestones.
"Ask him why he's here," Dr. Friedenthal whispered to Clarisse's brother, and Siegmund asked the broad-shouldered man with the pointy head: "Why are you here? "
1076 · THE MAN WITHOUT QUALITIES
"You know that very well! . . was the curt reply.
"No, I don't know," Siegmund-who did not like to give up too easily-said rather foolishly. "So tell me why you're here. . .
"You know that very well! " The response was repeated with a stronger emphasis.
"Why are you being rude to me? . . Siegmund asked. "I honestly don't know why! "
"This lying! . . Clarisse thought, and she was glad when the patient simply answered: "Because I choose! I can do as I like! . . he insisted, and bared his teeth at them.
'Well, there's no need to be rude for no reason," the hapless Sieg- mund persisted, just as unable as the insane man to come up with anything new.
Clarisse was furious with him for playing the stupid role of some- one teasing a caged animal in a zoo.
"It's none of your business! I do as I like, get it? Whatever I like! " The mental patient barked like a sergeant and produced a laugh from somewhere in his face, but not his mouth or eyes, which were both charged with uncanny anger.
Even Ulrich was thinking: "I wouldn't care to be alone with this fellow just now. " Siegmund was having a hard time standing his ground, since the madman had stepped up close to him, and Clarisse was wishing he would seize her brother by the throat and bite him in the face. Friedenthal complacently let the scene take its course, for after all, as a medical colleague Siegmund ought to be able to handle it, and Friedenthal was rather enjoying the other's discomfiture. With his sense of theater, he waited for the scene to reach a climax, and only when Siegmund was beyond uttering another word did he give the signal to break it off. But the desire to meddle was back in Clarisse; it had somehow grown stronger and stronger as the man drummed out his answers. Suddenly she could no longer hold back and, walking up to the man, said:
''I'm from Vienna! "
It made as little sense as a random sound one might entice from a bugle. She neither knew what she meant by saying it nor where the idea had come from, nor had she stopped to wonder whether the man knew what town he was in, and if he did know, her remark would be even more pointless. But she felt tremendously sure ofher-
IntotheMillennium(TheCriminals) · 1 0 7 7
self as she said it. And in fact miracles still do happen, occasionally, and they have a partiality for insane asylums. As she spoke, flaming with excitement, a glow came over him; his rock-grinder teeth with- drew behind his lips, and benevolence spread over the glare in his eyes.
"Ah, Vienna, city of dreams! A beautiful place! " he said with the smugness of the former petit bourgeois who has his cliches in order.
"Congratulations! " Dr. Friedenthallaughed.
But for Clarisse the episode had become an event.
"Now let's go on to Moosbrugger! " Friedenthal said.
But this was not to be. They moved cautiously back through the
two courtyards and were walking up an incline toward what ap- peared to be a distant isolated pavilion, when a guard who seemed to have been looking for them everywhere came running up to them. He whispered to Friedenthal at some length, something important and disagreeable, to judge by the doctor's expression as he listened and asked an occasional question. Finally, Dr. Friedenthal turned back to the others with a grave, apologetic air and told them that he had to go to another ward, to deal with an incident that would take some time, so that he would, regretfully, have to curtail their tour. He addressed himself primarily to the official personage in the Gen- eral's uniform beneath the lab coat; Stumm von Bordwehr gratefully assured him that he had seen enough ofthe outstanding organization and discipline of this institution, and that after what they had been through, one murderer more or less did not matter. Clarisse, how- ever, had such a disappointed, stricken face that Friedenthal pro- posed to make up the visit to Moosbrugger, along with some other ipteresting cases, some other time; he would give Siegmund a call as soon as a date could be arranged.
"Very kind of you"-the General thanked him on behalf of the group-"though for my part, I really can't say whether other obliga- tions will allow me to be present. . .
With this reservation, a future visit was agreed upon, and Frieden- thal set off along a path that soon took him over the rise and out of sight, while the others, accompanied by the attendant Friedenthal had left with them, headed back to the gate. They left the path and took a shortcut across the grassy slope between fine beeches and plane trees. The General had slipped out ofhis lab coat and carried it
1078 ·THE MAN WITHOUT QUALITIES
jauntily over his ann, as one might carry a raincoat on an outing, but nobody seemed to feel like talking. Ulrich showed no interest in being coached further for the evening's reception, and Stumm was himself too preoccupied with what was awaiting him at his office, though he felt called upon to make some amusing remarks to Cla- risse, whom he was gallantly escorting. But Clarisse was absent- minded and quiet. "Perhaps she's still embarrassed over that filthy pig," he mused, feeling the need to apologize somehow for not hav- ing been in a position to offer his chivalric protection, but on the other hand, it was probably best to say no more about it. So the walk back passed in silence and constraint.
It was only when Stumm von Bordwehr had entered his carriage, leaving it to Ulrich to see Clarisse and her brother home, that his good spirits returned, and with them an idea that gave a certain shape to the whole depressing episode. He had taken a cigarette out of the big leather case in his pocket, and leaning back in the cushions and blowing the first little blue clouds into the sunny air, he thought comfortably: "Terrible thing, to be out of one's mind like that. Come to think of it, all the time we were there I didn't see a single one of them having a smoke! People don't realize how well off they are as long as they're still in their right mind! "
34
A GREAT EVENT IS IN THE MAKING. COUNT
LEINSDORF AND THE INN RIVER
This eventful day culminated in a gala reception at the Tuzzis'.
The Parallel Campaign was on parade, in glory and brilliance: eyes blazed, jewels blazed, prominence blazed, wit blazed. A lunatic might conceivably conclude from this that on such a social occasion eyes, jewels, prominent names, and wit amount to the same thing, and he would not be far off the mark: everyone who did not happen
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to be on the Riviera or the north Italian lakes was there, except for those few who refused on principle to recognize any "events" so late in the season.
In their place were quite a number of people whom no one had ever seen before. A long respite had tom holes in the guest list, and to fill it up again new people had been invited more hastily than was consonant with Diotima's circumspect ways: Count Leinsdorfhimself had turned over to her a list of people he wanted invited for political reasons, and once the principle of her salon's exclusiveness had thus been sacrificed to higher considerations, she had no longer attached the same importance to it. His Grace was, in fact, the sole begetter of t h i s f e s t i v e g a t h e r i n g : D i o t i m a was o f t h e o p i n i o n t h a t h u m a n i t y c o u l d be helped only in pairs. But Count Leinsdorfheld finnly to his asser- tion that "capital and culture have not done their duty by our histori- cal development; we must give them one last chance! "
Count Leinsdorf was always coming back to this point.
"Tell me, my dear, haven't you come to a decision yet? " he would ask. "It's high time. All sorts of people are coming to the fore with destructive tendencies. We must give the cultural sector one last op- portunity to restore the balance. " But Diotima, deflected by the wealth of variation in the forms of human coupling, was deaf to all else.
Finally, Count Leinsdorf had to call her to order.
"You know, my dear, I hardly seem to know you anymore! We've given out the password 'Action! ' to all and sundry; I myself had a hand-surely I may tell you in confidence that it was I who was be- hind the Minister of the Interior's resignation. It had to be done on a high level, you understand; a very high level! But it had really become a scandal, and nobody had the courage to put a stop to it. So this is just for your own ears," he continued, "and now the Premier has asked us to bestir ourselves a bit with our Inquiry Concerning the Desires of the Concerned Sections of the Population with Respect to the Con- duct of Home Affairs, because the new Minister naturally can't be expected to have it at his fingertips; and now you want to leave me in the lurch, you who have always been the last to give up? We must give capital and culture a last chance! You know, it's either that or . . . "
This somewhat incomplete final sentence was uttered so menac- ingly that there was no mistaking that he knew what he wanted, and
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Diotima obediently promised to hurry; but then she forgot again and did nothing.
And then one day Count Leinsdorf was seized by his well-known energy and drove straight to her door, propelled by forty horse- power.
"Has anything happened yet? " he asked, and Diotima had to admit that nothing had.
"Do you know the Inn River, my dear? " he asked.
Of course Diotima knew the Inn, second only to the Danube as Kakania's most famous river, richly interwoven with the country's ge- ography and history. She observed her visitor rather dubiously, while doing her best to smile.
But Count Leinsdorf was in deadly earnest. "Apart from Inns- brock," he said, "what ridiculous backwoods places all those little towns in the Inn Valley are, and what an imposing river the Inn is in our culture! And to think I never realized it before! " He shook his head. "You see, I happened by chance to look at a highway map today," he said, finally coming to the point, "and I noticed that the Inn rises in Switzerland. I must have known it before, of course, we all know it, but we never give it a thought. It rises at Majola, I've seen it there myself; a ridiculous little creek no wider than the Kamp or the Morava in our country. But what have the Swiss made ofit? The Engadine! The world-famous Engadine! The Engad-Inn, my dear! Has it ever occurred to you that the whole Engadine comes from the name Inn? That's what I hit upon today. While we, with our insuffer- able Austrian modesty, of course never make anything out of what belongs to us! "
After this chat Diotima hastened to arrange for the desired recep- tion, partly because she realized that she had to stand by Count Leinsdorf, and partly because she was afraid of driving her high- ranking friend to some extreme if she continued to refuse.
But when she gave him her promise, Leinsdorf said:
"And this time, I beg ofyou, dearest lady, don't fail to invite--er- that x you call Drangsal. Her friend Frau Wayden has been pestering me about this person for weeks, and won't leave me in peace! "
Diotima promised this too, although at other times she would have regarded putting up with her rival as a dereliction of duty to her country.
35
A GREAT EVENT IS IN THE MAKING. PRIVY COUNCILLOR MESERITSCHER
When the rooms were filled with the radiance of festive illumination and the assembled company, an observer could note among those present not only His Excellency, together with other leading mem- bers of the high aristocracy for whose appearance he had arranged, but also His Excellency the Minister of War, and in the latter's en- tourage the intensely intellectual, somewhat overworked head of General Stumm von Bordwehr. One observed Paul Arnheim (with- out the "Dr. ": simple and most effective; the observer had thought it over carefully-it's called "litotes," an artful understatement, like re- moving some trifle from one's body, as when a king removes a ring from his finger to place it on someone else's). Then one observed everyone worth mentioning from the various ministries (the Minister of Education and Culture had apologized to His Excellency in the Upper House for not coming in person; he had to go to Linz for the consecration of a great altar screen). Then one noted that the foreign embassies and legations had sent an "elite. " There were well-known names "from industry, art, and science," and a time-honored allegory of diligence lay in this invariable combination of three bourgeois ac- tivities, a combination that seized hold of the scribbling pen all by itself. That same adept pen then presented the ladies: beige, pink, cherry, cream . . . ; embroidered, draped, triple-tiered, or dropped from the waist. . . . Between Countess Adlitz and Frau Generaldirek- tor Weghuber was listed the well-known Frau Melanie Drangsal, widow of the world-famous surgeon, "in her own right a charming hostess, who provides in her house a hearth for the leading lights of our times. " Finally, listed separately at the end of this section, was the name of Ulrich von So-and-so and sister. The observer had hesi- tated about adding "whose name is widely associated with his selfless service on behalf of that high-minded and patriotic undertaking," or even "a coming man. " Word had gone around long since that one of
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these days this protege of Count Leinsdorf was widely expected to involve his patron in some rash misstep, and the temptation to go on record early as someone in the know was great. However, the deep- est satisfaction for those in the know is always silence, especially when it proceeds from caution. It was to this that Ulrich and Agathe owed the mere mention of their names as stragglers, immediately preceding those leaders of society and the intelligentsia who are not named individually but simply destined for the mass grave of "all those of rank and station. " Many people fell into this category, among them the well-known professor of jurisprudence Councillor Herr Professor Schwung, who happened to be in the capital as a member of a government commission of inquiry, and also the young poet Friedel Feuermaul, for although his was known to be among the moving spirits behind this evening's gathering, that was a far cry from the more substantial significance of a title or the triumphs of haute couture. People such as Acting Bank Director Leo Fischel and family-who had won admittance thanks to Gerda's grueling efforts, without any help from Ulrich, in other words because of Diotima's momentarily flagging attention-were simply buried in the comer of one's eye. And the wife of an eminent jurist (who was well known but on such an occasion still below the threshold ofpublic notice), a lady whose name, Bonadea, was unknown even to the observer, was later exhumed for listing among the wearers of noteworthy gowns because her sensational looks aroused great admiration.
This impersonal seeing eye, the surveying curiosity of the public, was of course a person. There are usually quite a lot of them, but in the Kakanian metropolis at that time there was one who overtopped all the rest: Privy Councillor Meseritscher. Born in the Wallachian town of Meseritsch, whence his name, this publisher, editor, and news correspondent of the Parliamentary and Social Gazette, which he had founded in the sixties of the last century, had come to the capital as a young man, sacrificing his expectation of taking over his parents' tavern in his native town in order to become a journalist, having been attracted by the political promise of liberalism that was then at its zenith. And before long he had made his contribution to that era by founding a news agency, which began by supplying small local items of a police nature to the newspapers. Thanks to the indus- try, reliability, and thoroughness of its owner, this rudimentary
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agency not only earned the esteem of the papers and the police but was soon noticed by other high authorities as well, and used by them for placing items they wanted to publicize without taking responsibil- ity, so that the agency soon found itself in a privileged position for tapping unofficial information from official sources. A man of great enterprise and a tireless worker, Meseritscher, as he saw this success developing, extended his activity to include news from the Court and Society; indeed, he would probably never have left Meseritsch for the capital if this had not been his guiding vision. Flawless reporting of "those present. . was regarded as his specialty. His memory for people and what was said about them was extraordinary, and this as- sured him of the same splendid relationship with the salon that he had with the prison. He knew Society better than it knew itself, and his unflagging devotion enabled him to make people who had met at a gathering properly acquainted with each other the very next morn- ing, like some old cavalier in whom everyone has for decades been confiding all their marriage plans and the problems they were having with their dressmakers. And so, on every sort of great occasion, the zealous, nimble, ever-obliging, affable little man was a familiar insti- tution, and in his later years it was only he and his presence that con- ferred indisputable prestige to such occasions.
Meseritscher's career had reached a peak when the title Privy Councillor was bestowed upon him, and this involves an interesting peculiarity. Kakania was the most peace-loving of countries, but at some time or other it had decided, in the profound innocence of its convictions, that, wars being a thing of the past, its civil service should be organized as a hierarchy corresponding to military ranks, complete with similar uniforms and insignia. Since then the rank of Privy Councillor corresponded to that of a lieutenant colonel in His Majesty's Imperial and Royal Army. But even though this was not in itself an exalted rank, the peculiarity was that according to an immu- table tradition, which, like everything immutable in Kakania, was modified only in exceptional cases, Meseritscher should really have been named an Imperial Councillor. An Imperial Councillor was not, as one might suppose from the term, superior to a Privy Council- lor, but inferior: it only corresponded to the rank of captain. Mese- ritscher should have been an Imperial Councillor because that title was given, other than to certain civil servants, only to those engaged
1084 · THE MAN WITH0UT QUALITIES
in independent professions such as, for example, court barber or coach builder, and, by the same token, writers and artists; while Privy Councillor was at the time an actual high-ranking title in the civil service. That Meseritscher was nevertheless the first and only mem- ber of his profession to be so honored expressed something more than the high honor of the title itself-indeed, even more than the daily reminder not to take too seriously whatever happens in this country of ours; the unjustified title was a subtle and discreet way of assuring the indefatigable chronicler his close association with Court, State, and Society.
Meseritscher had been a model for many journalists in his time, and was on the boards of leading literary associations. The story also went around that he had had made for himself a uniform with a gold collar, but only put it on, sometimes, at home. Chances are the rumor was untrue, because deep down Meseritscher had always pre- served certain memories of the tavern trade in Meseritsch, and a good tavemkeeper also knows the secrets of all his guests but doesn't make use of everything he knows; he never brings his own opinions into a discussion but enjoys noting and telling everything in the way of fact, anecdote, or joke. And so Meseritscher, whom one met on every social occasion as the acknowledged memorializer of beautiful women and distinguished men, had himself never even thought of going to a good tailor; he knew all the behind-the-scenes intricacies of politics, yet had never dabbled in politics in even a single line of print; he knew about all the discoveries and inventions of his time without understanding any of them. He was perfectly satisfied to know that they existed and were "present. " He honestly loved his time, and his time reciprocated his affection to a certain degree, be- cause he daily reported its presence to the world.
When Diotima caught sight of him as he entered, she immediately beckoned him to her side.
"My dear Meseritscher," she said, as sweetly as she knew how. "You surely didn't take His Excellency's speech in the Upper House today as an expression of our position-you couldn't have taken it literally? "
His Excellency, in the context ofthe Minister's downfall and exas- perated by his cares, had made a widely noticed speech in the Upper House in which he not only charged his victim with having failed to
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 1085
show the true constructive spirit of cooperation and strictness of principle, but also let his zeal carry him to making general observa- tions that in some inexplicable fashion culminated in a recognition of the importance of the press, in which he reproached this "institution risen to the status of a world power" with pretty much everything with which a feudal-minded, independent, nonpartisan, Christian gentleman could charge an institution that in his view is the dead opposite of himself. It was this that Diotima was diplomatically trying to smooth over, and Meseritscher listened pensively as she found in- creasingly fine and unintelligible language for Count Leinsdorf's real point of view. Then suddenly he laid a hand on her arm and mag- nanimously interrupted her:
"My dear lady, how can you upset yourself like this? " he summed up. "His Excellency is a good friend to us, isn't he? What if he did exaggerate? Why shouldn't he, a gallant gentleman like him? " And to prove that his relationship to the Count was unruffled, he added: 'Til just go and greet him now! "
That was Meseritscher!
