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.
Musil - Man Without Qualities - v2
"Idiot!
" he barked into the ear of the orderly disguised as a civilian coachman who was driving the ministerial horses, and he rocked helplessly back and forth with the carriage as he clung to the back of the man he was insulting, shouting: "You're taking the long way round!
" The soldier in civvies held his back stiff
1058 · THE MAN WITH0UT QUALITIES
as a board, numb to the General's extramilitary use of his body to save himself from falling, turned his head exactly ninety degrees, so that he could not see either his general or his horses, and smartly reported to a vertical that ended in the air that the shortest route was blocked offby street repairs, but he would soon be back on it. "There you are--so I was right! " Stumm cried as he fell back, glossing over his futile outburst of impatience, partly for the orderly's benefit and partly for Ulrich's. "So now the fellow has to take a detour, when I'm supposed to report to my chief this very afternoon, and he wants to go home at four o'clock, by which time he should have briefed the Minister himself! . . . His Excellency the Minister has sent word to the Tuzzis to expect him in person tonight," he added in a low voice, just for Ulrich's ear.
"You don't say! " Ulrich showed himself properly impressed by this news.
''I've been telling you for a long time there's something in the air. "
Now Ulrich wanted to know what was in the air. "Come out with it, then," he demanded. "What does the Minister want? "
_"He doesn't know himself," Stumm answered genially. "His Ex- cellency has a feeling that the time has come. Old Leinsdorf also has a feeling that the time has come. The Chief of the General Staff like- wise has a feeling that the time has come. When a lot of people have such a feeling, there may be something in it. "
"But the time for what? " Ulrich persisted.
''Well, we don't need to know that yet," the General instructed him. "These are simply reliable indications! By the way," he asked abstractedly, or perhaps thoughtfully, "how many of us will there be today? "
"How would I know? " Ulrich asked in surprise.
"All I meant," Stumm explained, "is how many of us are going to the madhouse? Excuse me! Funny, isn't it, that kind of misunder- standing? There are days when there's too much coming at one from all sides. So: how many are coming? "
"I don't know who else will be coming-somewhere between three and six people. "
''What I meant," the General said earnestly, "was that if there are more than three of us, we'll have to get another cab-you under- stand, because I'm in uniform. "
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 1059
"Oh, of course," Ulrich reassured him.
"I can't very well drive in a sardine can. "
"Of course not. But tell me, what's this about reliable indica-
tions? "
"But will we be able to get a cab out there? " Stumm worried. "It's
so far out you can hear the animals snoring. "
'W e'll pick one up on the way," Ulrich said firmly. "Now will you
please tell me how you have reliable indications that it's time for something to happen? "
"There's nothing to tell," Stumm replied. "When I say about something that that's the way it is and it can't be otherwise, what I'm really saying is that I can't explain it! At most one might add that this Drangsal is one of those pacifists, probably because Feuermaul, who's her protege, writes poems about 'Man is good. ' Lots of people believe that sort of thing now. ''
Ulrich was not convinced. "Didn't you tell me the opposite just a little while ago? That they're now all in favor of taking action, taking a strong line, and all that? "
"True too," the C'. eneral granted. "And influential circles are back- ing Drangsal; she has a great knack for that sort of thing. They expect the patriotic campaign to come up with a humanitarian action. "
"Really? " Ulrich said.
"You know, you really don't seem to care about anything anymore! The rest of us are worried. Let me remind you, for instance, that the fratricidal Austro-German war of 1866 only happened because all the Germans in the Frankfurt Parliament declared themselves to be brothers. Not,ofcourse,thatI'msuggestingthattheWarMinisteror the Chief of the General Staff might be worrying along those lines; that would be nonsense. But one thing does lead to another. That's how it is! See what I mean? "
It was not clear, but it made sense. And the General went on to make a very wise observation:
"Look, you're always wanting things to be clear and logical," he remonstrated with his seatmate. "And I do admire you for it, but you must for once try to think in historical terms. How can those directly involved in what's happening know beforehand whether it will tum out to be a great event? All they can do is pretend to themselves that it is! Ifl may indulge in a paradox, I'd say that the history ofthe world
1060 · THE MAN WITHOUT QUALITIES
is written before it happens; it always starts off as a kind of gossip. So that people who have the energy to act are faced with a very serious problem. "
"You have a point," Ulrich said appreciatively. "But now tell me all about it. "
Although the General wanted to expand on it, there was so much on his mind in these moments, when the horse's hooves had begun to hit softer ground, that he was suddenly seized by other anxieties.
"Here I am, decked out like a Christmas tree in case the Minister calls for me," he cried, underlining it by pointing to his light-blue tunic and the medals hanging from it. "Don't you think it could lead to awkward incidents if I appear like this, in full dress, in front of loonies? What do I do, for instance, if one of them decides to insult the Emperor's uniform? I can hardly draw my sword, but it would be really dangerous for me not to say anything, either! "
Ulrich calmed him down by pointing out that he would be likely to wear a doctor's white coat over his uniform. But before Stumm had time to declare himselffully satisfied with this solution they met Cla- risse, impatiently coming to meet them in a smart summer dress, es- corted by Siegmund. She told Ulrich that Walter and Meingast had refused to join them. And after they had managed to find a second carriage, the General was pleased to say to Clarisse: "As you were coming down the road toward us, my dear young lady, you looked positively like an angel! "
But by the time he left the carriage at the hospital gate, Stumm von Bordwehr appeared rather flushed and ill at ease.
33
THE LUNATICS GREET CLARISSE
Clarisse was twisting her gloves in her hands, looking up at the win- dows, and fidgeting constantly while Ulrich paid for the cab. Stumm von Bordwehr protested Ulrich's doing this, and the cabbie sat on his box with a flattered smile as the two gentlemen kept each other back. Siegmund brushed specks off his coat with his fingertips, as usual, or stared into space.
In a low voice, the General said to Ulrich: "There's something odd about your lady friend. She lectured me the whole way about what will is. I didn't understand a word! "
"That's the way she is," Ulrich said.
"Pretty, though," the General whispered. "Like a fourteen-year- old ballerina. But why does she say that we came here in order to follow our 'hallucination'? The world is 'too free of hallucinations,' she says. D'you know anything about that? It was so distressing, I simply couldn't think of a word to say. "
The General was obviously holding up the departure of the cab only because he wanted to ask these questions, but before Ulrich could answer he was relieved of the responsibility by an emissary who welcomed the visitors in the name of the director of the clinic, and apologizing to the General for having to keep them waiting be- cause ofsome urgent business, he led the company upstairs to a wait- ing room. Clarisse took in every inch of the staircase and the corridors with her eyes, and even in the little waiting room, with its chairs upholstered in threadbare green velvet so reminiscent of an old-fashioned first-class waiting room in a railway station, her gaze roved about slowly almost the whole time. There the four of them sat, after the emissary had left, and found nothing to say until Ulrich, to break the silence, teased Clarisse by asking her whether the thought of meeting Moosbrugger face-to-face wasn't making her blood run cold.
1061
1062 • THE MAN WITH0UT QUALITIES
"Bah! " Clarisse said. "He's only known ersatz women; it had to come to this. "
The General had come up with a face-saving idea, something hav- ing belatedly occurred to him: "The will is now very up-to-date," he said. 'W e're very much concerned with this problem in our patriotic action too! "
Clarisse gave him a smile and stretched her arms to ease the ten- sion in them. "Having to wait like this, one can feel what's coming in one's arms and legs, as ifone were looking through a telescope," she replied.
Stumm von Bordwehr gave it some thought, careful not to put a foot wrong again. "That's true! " he said. "It may have something to do with the current cult of exercise and bodybuilding. We're con- cerned with that also. "
At this point the Medical Director swept in with his cavalcade of assistants and nurses and a gracious word for everyone, especially Stumm; mumbled about something pressing, which would, regretta- bly, prevent him from taking them around himself, as he had in- tended; and introduced Dr. Friedenthal, who would take good care of them in his stead.
Dr. Friedenthal was a tall, slender man with a somewhat effemi- nate body and a thick mop of hair, who smiled at them, as he was introduced, like an acrobat climbing a ladder for a death-defying per- formance. When the director had gone, the white lab coats were brought in. 'W e don't want to get the patients excited," Dr. Frieden- thal explained.
As Clarisse slipped into hers she experienced a strange surge of power. She stood there like a little doctor. She felt very much a man, and very white.
The General looked around for a mirror. It was hard to find a lab coat to fit his idiosyncratic proportion of girth to height; when they finally managed to get him into something that covered him com- pletely, he looked like a child in an adult's nightshirt. "Don't you think I should take my spurs off? " he asked Dr. Friedenthal.
"Army doctors wear spurs too," Ulrich pointed out.
Stumm made one last feeble and laborious effort to see what he looked like from behind, where the medical coverall was caught up
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 1 o63
in heavy folds above his spurs. Then they set out. Dr. Friedenthal enjoined them to keep calm no matter what they might see.
"So far so good! " Stumm whispered to his friend. "But I'm not really interested in any of this. Could use the time much better to talk with you about tonight's meeting. Now look, you said you wanted me to tell you frankly what's going on. It's quite simple: the whole world is arming. The Russians have a brand-new field artillery. Are you listening? The French are using their two-year conscription law to build up an enormous army. The Italians . . . "
They had descended the same old-fashioned princely staircase they had climbed before and, after somehow turning off the main corridor, found themselves in a maze of small rooms and twisting passages with whitewashed beams protruding from the ceiling. These were mostly utility rooms and offices, cramped and dreary be- cause of a shortage of space in the ancient building. Sinister figures, only some of whom wore institutional uniforms, populated them. One door bore the inscription "Reception"; another, "Men. " The General's talk dried up. 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.
1058 · THE MAN WITH0UT QUALITIES
as a board, numb to the General's extramilitary use of his body to save himself from falling, turned his head exactly ninety degrees, so that he could not see either his general or his horses, and smartly reported to a vertical that ended in the air that the shortest route was blocked offby street repairs, but he would soon be back on it. "There you are--so I was right! " Stumm cried as he fell back, glossing over his futile outburst of impatience, partly for the orderly's benefit and partly for Ulrich's. "So now the fellow has to take a detour, when I'm supposed to report to my chief this very afternoon, and he wants to go home at four o'clock, by which time he should have briefed the Minister himself! . . . His Excellency the Minister has sent word to the Tuzzis to expect him in person tonight," he added in a low voice, just for Ulrich's ear.
"You don't say! " Ulrich showed himself properly impressed by this news.
''I've been telling you for a long time there's something in the air. "
Now Ulrich wanted to know what was in the air. "Come out with it, then," he demanded. "What does the Minister want? "
_"He doesn't know himself," Stumm answered genially. "His Ex- cellency has a feeling that the time has come. Old Leinsdorf also has a feeling that the time has come. The Chief of the General Staff like- wise has a feeling that the time has come. When a lot of people have such a feeling, there may be something in it. "
"But the time for what? " Ulrich persisted.
''Well, we don't need to know that yet," the General instructed him. "These are simply reliable indications! By the way," he asked abstractedly, or perhaps thoughtfully, "how many of us will there be today? "
"How would I know? " Ulrich asked in surprise.
"All I meant," Stumm explained, "is how many of us are going to the madhouse? Excuse me! Funny, isn't it, that kind of misunder- standing? There are days when there's too much coming at one from all sides. So: how many are coming? "
"I don't know who else will be coming-somewhere between three and six people. "
''What I meant," the General said earnestly, "was that if there are more than three of us, we'll have to get another cab-you under- stand, because I'm in uniform. "
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 1059
"Oh, of course," Ulrich reassured him.
"I can't very well drive in a sardine can. "
"Of course not. But tell me, what's this about reliable indica-
tions? "
"But will we be able to get a cab out there? " Stumm worried. "It's
so far out you can hear the animals snoring. "
'W e'll pick one up on the way," Ulrich said firmly. "Now will you
please tell me how you have reliable indications that it's time for something to happen? "
"There's nothing to tell," Stumm replied. "When I say about something that that's the way it is and it can't be otherwise, what I'm really saying is that I can't explain it! At most one might add that this Drangsal is one of those pacifists, probably because Feuermaul, who's her protege, writes poems about 'Man is good. ' Lots of people believe that sort of thing now. ''
Ulrich was not convinced. "Didn't you tell me the opposite just a little while ago? That they're now all in favor of taking action, taking a strong line, and all that? "
"True too," the C'. eneral granted. "And influential circles are back- ing Drangsal; she has a great knack for that sort of thing. They expect the patriotic campaign to come up with a humanitarian action. "
"Really? " Ulrich said.
"You know, you really don't seem to care about anything anymore! The rest of us are worried. Let me remind you, for instance, that the fratricidal Austro-German war of 1866 only happened because all the Germans in the Frankfurt Parliament declared themselves to be brothers. Not,ofcourse,thatI'msuggestingthattheWarMinisteror the Chief of the General Staff might be worrying along those lines; that would be nonsense. But one thing does lead to another. That's how it is! See what I mean? "
It was not clear, but it made sense. And the General went on to make a very wise observation:
"Look, you're always wanting things to be clear and logical," he remonstrated with his seatmate. "And I do admire you for it, but you must for once try to think in historical terms. How can those directly involved in what's happening know beforehand whether it will tum out to be a great event? All they can do is pretend to themselves that it is! Ifl may indulge in a paradox, I'd say that the history ofthe world
1060 · THE MAN WITHOUT QUALITIES
is written before it happens; it always starts off as a kind of gossip. So that people who have the energy to act are faced with a very serious problem. "
"You have a point," Ulrich said appreciatively. "But now tell me all about it. "
Although the General wanted to expand on it, there was so much on his mind in these moments, when the horse's hooves had begun to hit softer ground, that he was suddenly seized by other anxieties.
"Here I am, decked out like a Christmas tree in case the Minister calls for me," he cried, underlining it by pointing to his light-blue tunic and the medals hanging from it. "Don't you think it could lead to awkward incidents if I appear like this, in full dress, in front of loonies? What do I do, for instance, if one of them decides to insult the Emperor's uniform? I can hardly draw my sword, but it would be really dangerous for me not to say anything, either! "
Ulrich calmed him down by pointing out that he would be likely to wear a doctor's white coat over his uniform. But before Stumm had time to declare himselffully satisfied with this solution they met Cla- risse, impatiently coming to meet them in a smart summer dress, es- corted by Siegmund. She told Ulrich that Walter and Meingast had refused to join them. And after they had managed to find a second carriage, the General was pleased to say to Clarisse: "As you were coming down the road toward us, my dear young lady, you looked positively like an angel! "
But by the time he left the carriage at the hospital gate, Stumm von Bordwehr appeared rather flushed and ill at ease.
33
THE LUNATICS GREET CLARISSE
Clarisse was twisting her gloves in her hands, looking up at the win- dows, and fidgeting constantly while Ulrich paid for the cab. Stumm von Bordwehr protested Ulrich's doing this, and the cabbie sat on his box with a flattered smile as the two gentlemen kept each other back. Siegmund brushed specks off his coat with his fingertips, as usual, or stared into space.
In a low voice, the General said to Ulrich: "There's something odd about your lady friend. She lectured me the whole way about what will is. I didn't understand a word! "
"That's the way she is," Ulrich said.
"Pretty, though," the General whispered. "Like a fourteen-year- old ballerina. But why does she say that we came here in order to follow our 'hallucination'? The world is 'too free of hallucinations,' she says. D'you know anything about that? It was so distressing, I simply couldn't think of a word to say. "
The General was obviously holding up the departure of the cab only because he wanted to ask these questions, but before Ulrich could answer he was relieved of the responsibility by an emissary who welcomed the visitors in the name of the director of the clinic, and apologizing to the General for having to keep them waiting be- cause ofsome urgent business, he led the company upstairs to a wait- ing room. Clarisse took in every inch of the staircase and the corridors with her eyes, and even in the little waiting room, with its chairs upholstered in threadbare green velvet so reminiscent of an old-fashioned first-class waiting room in a railway station, her gaze roved about slowly almost the whole time. There the four of them sat, after the emissary had left, and found nothing to say until Ulrich, to break the silence, teased Clarisse by asking her whether the thought of meeting Moosbrugger face-to-face wasn't making her blood run cold.
1061
1062 • THE MAN WITH0UT QUALITIES
"Bah! " Clarisse said. "He's only known ersatz women; it had to come to this. "
The General had come up with a face-saving idea, something hav- ing belatedly occurred to him: "The will is now very up-to-date," he said. 'W e're very much concerned with this problem in our patriotic action too! "
Clarisse gave him a smile and stretched her arms to ease the ten- sion in them. "Having to wait like this, one can feel what's coming in one's arms and legs, as ifone were looking through a telescope," she replied.
Stumm von Bordwehr gave it some thought, careful not to put a foot wrong again. "That's true! " he said. "It may have something to do with the current cult of exercise and bodybuilding. We're con- cerned with that also. "
At this point the Medical Director swept in with his cavalcade of assistants and nurses and a gracious word for everyone, especially Stumm; mumbled about something pressing, which would, regretta- bly, prevent him from taking them around himself, as he had in- tended; and introduced Dr. Friedenthal, who would take good care of them in his stead.
Dr. Friedenthal was a tall, slender man with a somewhat effemi- nate body and a thick mop of hair, who smiled at them, as he was introduced, like an acrobat climbing a ladder for a death-defying per- formance. When the director had gone, the white lab coats were brought in. 'W e don't want to get the patients excited," Dr. Frieden- thal explained.
As Clarisse slipped into hers she experienced a strange surge of power. She stood there like a little doctor. She felt very much a man, and very white.
The General looked around for a mirror. It was hard to find a lab coat to fit his idiosyncratic proportion of girth to height; when they finally managed to get him into something that covered him com- pletely, he looked like a child in an adult's nightshirt. "Don't you think I should take my spurs off? " he asked Dr. Friedenthal.
"Army doctors wear spurs too," Ulrich pointed out.
Stumm made one last feeble and laborious effort to see what he looked like from behind, where the medical coverall was caught up
Into the Millennium (The Criminals) · 1 o63
in heavy folds above his spurs. Then they set out. Dr. Friedenthal enjoined them to keep calm no matter what they might see.
"So far so good! " Stumm whispered to his friend. "But I'm not really interested in any of this. Could use the time much better to talk with you about tonight's meeting. Now look, you said you wanted me to tell you frankly what's going on. It's quite simple: the whole world is arming. The Russians have a brand-new field artillery. Are you listening? The French are using their two-year conscription law to build up an enormous army. The Italians . . . "
They had descended the same old-fashioned princely staircase they had climbed before and, after somehow turning off the main corridor, found themselves in a maze of small rooms and twisting passages with whitewashed beams protruding from the ceiling. These were mostly utility rooms and offices, cramped and dreary be- cause of a shortage of space in the ancient building. Sinister figures, only some of whom wore institutional uniforms, populated them. One door bore the inscription "Reception"; another, "Men. " The General's talk dried up. 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.
