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.
Musil - Man Without Qualities - v2
He had a premonition that things could hap- pen at any moment, requiring by their unprecedented nature great presence of mind.
He could not help wondering what he would do if an irresistible need forced him to leave the group and he were to stumble, alone and without an expert guide in a place where all men are equal, upon a madman.
Clarisse, on the other hand, was walking a step ahead of Dr. Frie- denthai. His having said that they had to wear these white coats so as not to alarm the patients buoyed her up like a life vest on the current of her impressions. She was mulling over some of her pet ideas. Nietzsche: "Is there a pessimism ofstrength? An intellectual predis- position to whatever is hard, sinister, evil, problematic in life? A yearning for the terrible as a worthy foe? Perhaps madness is not necessarily a symptom of degeneracy. " She was not thinking this in so many words, but she remembered it as a whole; her thoughts had compressed it all into a tiny packet, admirably fitted to the smallest space, like a burglar's tool. For her this excursion was half philosophy and half adultery.
Dr. Friedenthai stopped in front of an iron door and took a flat key from his pants pocket. When he opened the door they stepped out
1064 • THE MAN WITHOUT QUALITIES
from the shelter of the building and were blinded by the brightness. At the same moment Clarisse heard a frightful shriek such as she had never heard before in her life. For all her pluckiness, she winced.
"Just a horse! " Dr. Friedenthal said, smiling.
And in fact they were on a road that led from the front gate, along the side of the administration building, and around to the kitchen yard of the institution. It was no different from other such roads, with old wheel tracks and homely weeds on which the sun was blaz- ing hotly. And yet all the others too, with the exception of Dr. Frie- denthal, felt oddly disconcerted a n d - i n a startled, confused fashion-almost indignant, to find themselves on a wholesome and ordinary road after having already survived a long, arduous passage. Freedom, at first blush, had something disconcerting about it, even though it was incredibly comforting; it actually took some getting used to again. With Clarisse, who was more vulnerable to the clash of contrasts, the tension shattered in a loud giggle.
Still smiling, Dr. Friedenthal strode ahead across the road and on the other side opened a small but heavy iron door in the high wall of a park. "This is where it begins," he said gently.
And now they really found themselves inside that world to which Clarisse had felt herself inexplicably attracted for weeks, not only with the shudder at something incommensurable and impenetrable, but as though she were fated to experience something there that she could not imagine beforehand. At first there was nothing to differen- tiate this world from any other big old park, with the greensward sloping up in one direction toward groups of tall trees, among which small white villa-like buildings could be seen. The sweep of the sky behind them gave promise of a lovely view, and from one such look- out point Clarisse saw patients with attendants standing and sitting in groups, looking like white angels.
General Stumm took this as the right moment to resume his con- versation with Ulrich. "Now, let me prime you a bit more for this evening," he began. "The Italians, the Russians, the French, and the English too, you lmow, are all arming, and w e - "
"You want your artillery; I lmow that already," Ulrich interrupted.
"Among other things! " the General continued. "But if you don't ever let me finish, we'll soon be among the loonies and won't be able to talk in peace. So, as I was saying, we're in the middle of all this, in
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 1065
a very risky position from the military point of view. And in this fix we're being badgered-I'm referring to the Parallel Campaign-to think of nothing but the goodness of man! "
"And your people are against it! I understand. "
"Not at all, on the contrary! " Stumm protested. 'We're not against it! W e take pacifism very seriously! But we must get our artillery bud- get through. And ifwe could do that hand in hand with pacifism, so to speak, it would be the best safeguard against all those imperialistic misunderstandings that are so quick to assert that we're endangering world peace! It's true, ifyou like, that we're in bed with La Drangsal, just a little. But we also have to proceed with caution because her opposition, the nationalist movements, who now have their people inside the Campaign too, are against pacifism and in favor of getting our army up to scratch! "
The General had to cut himself short, with an expression of bitter- ness, for they had almost reached the top of the incline, where Dr. Friedenthal was awaiting his troop. The angels' gathering place turned out to be lightly fenced in; their guide crossed it without pay- ing it much attention, as a mere prelude. "A 'quiet' ward," he ex- plained.
They were all women; their hair hung loose down to their shoul- ders, and their faces were repellent, with fat, blurred, puffy features. One of them came rushing up to the doctor and forced a letter on him. "It's always the same thing," Dr. Friedenthal explained to his visitors and read aloud: " 'Adolf, my love! When are you coming to see me? Have you forgotten me? ' " The woman, about sixty, stood there with an apathetic face and listened. "You'll send it out right away, won't you? '' she begged. "Of course! " Dr. Friedenthal prom- ised, then he tore the letter into pieces in front of her eyes and smiled at the nurse. Clarisse instantly challenged him: "How could you do this? " she asked. "These patients must be taken seriously! "
"Come along," Dr. Friedenthal said. "There's no point in wasting our time here. Ifyou like, I'll show you hundreds ofsuch letters later. You must have noticed that the old woman didn't react at all when I tore it up? "
Clarisse was disconcerted, because what Dr. Friedenthal said was true, but it confused her thoughts. And before she could straighten them out again, they were further disturbed when, on their way out,
1o66 · THE MAN WITH0UT QUALITIES
another old woman, who had been lying in wait for them, lifted up her skirt and exposed to the passing gentlemen her ugly old-woman's thighs up to her belly, above coarse woolen stockings.
"The old sow," Stumm von Bordwehr muttered, sufficiently out- raged and disgusted to forget politics for a while.
But Clarisse had discovered a resemblance between the thigh and the face. The thigh probably showed the same stigmata offatty physi- cal degeneration as the face, but this gave Clarisse for the first time an impression of strange correspondences and a world that worked differently from what one could grasp with the usual categories. She also now realized that she had not noticed the transformation of the white angels into these women, and indeed that even while walking through their midst she had not been able to distinguish the patients from the nurses. She turned around and looked back, but because the path had curved behind a building, she could no longer see any- thing and stumbled after the others like a child that turns its head away. From this point on, her impressions no longer formed the transparent flow of events that one accepts life to be, but became a foaming torrent with only occasional smooth patches that stuck in the memory.
"Another quiet ward, this time for men," Dr. Friedenthal an- nounced, gathering his flock at the entrance to a building, and when they paused at the first bed he presented its occupant to them in a considerately lowered voice as a case of "depressive dementia paralytica. "
"An old syphilitic. Delusions ofsin and nihilistic obsessions," Sieg- mund whispered, translating the terms for his sister. Clarisse found herself face-to-face with an old gentleman who, to all appearances, had once belonged to the upper reaches of society. He sat upright in bed, was perhaps in his late fifties, and had a very white skin. His well-cared-for and highly intelligent face was framed in thick white hair and looked as improbably distinguished as the faces one finds described only in the cheapest novels.
"Couldn't one do a portrait ofhim? " Stumm von Bordwehr asked. "The very model ofintellectual beauty! I'd love to give the portrait to your cousin! " he said to Ulrich.
Dr. Friedenthal gave a sad smile and commented: "The noble ex- pression is caused by a slackening of tension in the facial muscles. "
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · zo67
He demonstrated with a quick movement the unresponsive fixity of the man's pupils, then led them onward. 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.
Clarisse, on the other hand, was walking a step ahead of Dr. Frie- denthai. His having said that they had to wear these white coats so as not to alarm the patients buoyed her up like a life vest on the current of her impressions. She was mulling over some of her pet ideas. Nietzsche: "Is there a pessimism ofstrength? An intellectual predis- position to whatever is hard, sinister, evil, problematic in life? A yearning for the terrible as a worthy foe? Perhaps madness is not necessarily a symptom of degeneracy. " She was not thinking this in so many words, but she remembered it as a whole; her thoughts had compressed it all into a tiny packet, admirably fitted to the smallest space, like a burglar's tool. For her this excursion was half philosophy and half adultery.
Dr. Friedenthai stopped in front of an iron door and took a flat key from his pants pocket. When he opened the door they stepped out
1064 • THE MAN WITHOUT QUALITIES
from the shelter of the building and were blinded by the brightness. At the same moment Clarisse heard a frightful shriek such as she had never heard before in her life. For all her pluckiness, she winced.
"Just a horse! " Dr. Friedenthal said, smiling.
And in fact they were on a road that led from the front gate, along the side of the administration building, and around to the kitchen yard of the institution. It was no different from other such roads, with old wheel tracks and homely weeds on which the sun was blaz- ing hotly. And yet all the others too, with the exception of Dr. Frie- denthal, felt oddly disconcerted a n d - i n a startled, confused fashion-almost indignant, to find themselves on a wholesome and ordinary road after having already survived a long, arduous passage. Freedom, at first blush, had something disconcerting about it, even though it was incredibly comforting; it actually took some getting used to again. With Clarisse, who was more vulnerable to the clash of contrasts, the tension shattered in a loud giggle.
Still smiling, Dr. Friedenthal strode ahead across the road and on the other side opened a small but heavy iron door in the high wall of a park. "This is where it begins," he said gently.
And now they really found themselves inside that world to which Clarisse had felt herself inexplicably attracted for weeks, not only with the shudder at something incommensurable and impenetrable, but as though she were fated to experience something there that she could not imagine beforehand. At first there was nothing to differen- tiate this world from any other big old park, with the greensward sloping up in one direction toward groups of tall trees, among which small white villa-like buildings could be seen. The sweep of the sky behind them gave promise of a lovely view, and from one such look- out point Clarisse saw patients with attendants standing and sitting in groups, looking like white angels.
General Stumm took this as the right moment to resume his con- versation with Ulrich. "Now, let me prime you a bit more for this evening," he began. "The Italians, the Russians, the French, and the English too, you lmow, are all arming, and w e - "
"You want your artillery; I lmow that already," Ulrich interrupted.
"Among other things! " the General continued. "But if you don't ever let me finish, we'll soon be among the loonies and won't be able to talk in peace. So, as I was saying, we're in the middle of all this, in
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 1065
a very risky position from the military point of view. And in this fix we're being badgered-I'm referring to the Parallel Campaign-to think of nothing but the goodness of man! "
"And your people are against it! I understand. "
"Not at all, on the contrary! " Stumm protested. 'We're not against it! W e take pacifism very seriously! But we must get our artillery bud- get through. And ifwe could do that hand in hand with pacifism, so to speak, it would be the best safeguard against all those imperialistic misunderstandings that are so quick to assert that we're endangering world peace! It's true, ifyou like, that we're in bed with La Drangsal, just a little. But we also have to proceed with caution because her opposition, the nationalist movements, who now have their people inside the Campaign too, are against pacifism and in favor of getting our army up to scratch! "
The General had to cut himself short, with an expression of bitter- ness, for they had almost reached the top of the incline, where Dr. Friedenthal was awaiting his troop. The angels' gathering place turned out to be lightly fenced in; their guide crossed it without pay- ing it much attention, as a mere prelude. "A 'quiet' ward," he ex- plained.
They were all women; their hair hung loose down to their shoul- ders, and their faces were repellent, with fat, blurred, puffy features. One of them came rushing up to the doctor and forced a letter on him. "It's always the same thing," Dr. Friedenthal explained to his visitors and read aloud: " 'Adolf, my love! When are you coming to see me? Have you forgotten me? ' " The woman, about sixty, stood there with an apathetic face and listened. "You'll send it out right away, won't you? '' she begged. "Of course! " Dr. Friedenthal prom- ised, then he tore the letter into pieces in front of her eyes and smiled at the nurse. Clarisse instantly challenged him: "How could you do this? " she asked. "These patients must be taken seriously! "
"Come along," Dr. Friedenthal said. "There's no point in wasting our time here. Ifyou like, I'll show you hundreds ofsuch letters later. You must have noticed that the old woman didn't react at all when I tore it up? "
Clarisse was disconcerted, because what Dr. Friedenthal said was true, but it confused her thoughts. And before she could straighten them out again, they were further disturbed when, on their way out,
1o66 · THE MAN WITH0UT QUALITIES
another old woman, who had been lying in wait for them, lifted up her skirt and exposed to the passing gentlemen her ugly old-woman's thighs up to her belly, above coarse woolen stockings.
"The old sow," Stumm von Bordwehr muttered, sufficiently out- raged and disgusted to forget politics for a while.
But Clarisse had discovered a resemblance between the thigh and the face. The thigh probably showed the same stigmata offatty physi- cal degeneration as the face, but this gave Clarisse for the first time an impression of strange correspondences and a world that worked differently from what one could grasp with the usual categories. She also now realized that she had not noticed the transformation of the white angels into these women, and indeed that even while walking through their midst she had not been able to distinguish the patients from the nurses. She turned around and looked back, but because the path had curved behind a building, she could no longer see any- thing and stumbled after the others like a child that turns its head away. From this point on, her impressions no longer formed the transparent flow of events that one accepts life to be, but became a foaming torrent with only occasional smooth patches that stuck in the memory.
"Another quiet ward, this time for men," Dr. Friedenthal an- nounced, gathering his flock at the entrance to a building, and when they paused at the first bed he presented its occupant to them in a considerately lowered voice as a case of "depressive dementia paralytica. "
"An old syphilitic. Delusions ofsin and nihilistic obsessions," Sieg- mund whispered, translating the terms for his sister. Clarisse found herself face-to-face with an old gentleman who, to all appearances, had once belonged to the upper reaches of society. He sat upright in bed, was perhaps in his late fifties, and had a very white skin. His well-cared-for and highly intelligent face was framed in thick white hair and looked as improbably distinguished as the faces one finds described only in the cheapest novels.
"Couldn't one do a portrait ofhim? " Stumm von Bordwehr asked. "The very model ofintellectual beauty! I'd love to give the portrait to your cousin! " he said to Ulrich.
Dr. Friedenthal gave a sad smile and commented: "The noble ex- pression is caused by a slackening of tension in the facial muscles. "
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · zo67
He demonstrated with a quick movement the unresponsive fixity of the man's pupils, then led them onward. 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-
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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.
