Marek Krajewski: Phantoms of Breslau

“Oh, he’s a very hard-working man, Wohsedt,” replied Ollenborg in answer to Mock’s question about whether the strike was not interfering with the port director’s grand launching. “He’s got to sell the new ship, but he can afford the odd strike. Haven’t you heard of strike insurance, Officer?”

“And tell me, my good man,” Mock said, looking in bewilderment at the shipyard’s ivy-patterned side gate guarded by several Freikorps soldiers, above which hung the non-revolutionary banner “Welcome”. “Who’s going to launch his new ship for him when everyone’s out on strike?”

“Everyone, my foot!” the old sailor said with a toothless grin. “Have you not heard, Officer sir, of non-striking workers? Old Wohsedt has considerable influence over both strikers and scabs. Besides, he persuades them both with the same …”

They had arrived in a square where tables laden with bottles, joints of poultry and rings of sausages had been arranged in a horseshoe. At one table sat a priest with a stoup and around him perched shy port officials, as well as proud-looking businessmen in black suits and top hats. But in the faces of the ladies who accompanied them Mock read nothing other than anticipation of a sign that they could throw themselves upon the victuals. Nobody was eating yet; everybody was waiting for something. The man standing beneath a magnificent parasol selling ice creams and lemonade, however, was not waiting for anyone. He did not have to. Customers weary of the sun stood in a long queue at his cart. Smolorz, Mock and Ollenborg climbed down from the droschka and mingled with the large crowd on the shore where a small passenger ship was moored, carrying the Danzig flag with its two crosses and a crown. Ollenborg started talking to an acquaintance whom he addressed as Klaus, while Mock and Smolorz listened attentively. It soon became clear that the director of the river port and his wife, who was to be the ship’s godmother, had not yet arrived; it was for them that everybody was waiting.

“Maybe old Wohsedt is irrigating his wife before launching the ship,” Klaus laughed, and he used his rotten teeth to lever a porcelain cap off a bottle of beer bearing the seal of Nitschke’s tavern, which was nearby. On seeing the frothy drink, Mock felt alcohol upset the balance of liquids in his body. “It’s an old custom, irrigating the wife or lady friend. Besides, the buyer might even have requested it. I’ve heard of a similar custom when carts are sold. Before sealing a deal, the seller uses the cart to transport whatever the buyer’s going to carry in it. It’s supposed to be good luck …”

“You’re right” said Ollenborg, who could only dream of using his teeth. “Irrigation, in this case, is a must. It’s like baptizing a brothel. After all, that’s what this new ship’s going to be used for …”

“What’s that rubbish you’re saying, old man?” A sailor with a strong Austrian accent had turned to Ollenborg. “What’s this ship supposed to be used for? A brothel? Am I to sail a brothel? Me, Horst Scherelick, a sailor on S.M.S. Breslau ? Say that again, old man.”

Klaus reassured the sailor: “Oh, come, it was a slip of the tongue. My friend meant to say ‘initiate’, not ‘irrigate’. And you, Ollenborg,” he said more quietly, “stop jabbering or somebody’s going to stick a knife in your ribs.”

For a few minutes Mock looked on intently as Scherelick was pacified. Then he shifted his gaze to the huge magnum of champagne carried by a small boy in a sailor’s outfit. As he wondered whether the champagne was cold or warm, he once again felt a pang in his stomach and dry splinters in his throat. He beckoned to Smolorz and Ollenborg.

“I’ve a favour to ask of you, Smolorz,” he whispered. “Find that port director and bring him to the droschka. Discreetly. I’ll question him there. And you, Ollenborg, I’d like to talk to you now.”

Smolorz pressed his way through the throng and went off in search of the head of the river port. Mock distanced himself a little from the crowd, sat down on an old lemon crate and pulled out his cigarette case. Ollenborg squatted down next to him and willingly accepted a cigarette. The march “Under Full Sail” resounded on the quay, and an orchestra approached the ship in step with the music. When the musicians came into view, many of the sailors started cheering and throwing their hats in the air. The priest got to his feet, the businessmen looked about for the master of ceremonies and the ladies waited for the first daredevil to help themselves, uninvited, to the food and drink.

“Listen, sailor,” Mock said. “The moment director Wohsedt appears, you’re to point him out to me.”

“Yes, Officer sir,” Ollenborg replied.

“One more thing.” Mock knew he had to formulate his question skilfully. He did not, however, want to have to think. He wanted to drink. “Do you know, or have you heard of four young men, twenty, twenty-five years of age? Good-looking, bearded sailors? Maybe they came looking for work here? You might have seen them wandering around the port? They wore leather underpants. Here are their photographs — dead.”

“I don’t peer down people’s trousers, Officer sir,” Ollenborg said indignantly as he studied the pictures. “I don’t know what sort of under-pants anyone wears. And how do you know they were sailors?”

“Who’s asking the questions here?” Mock said in a raised voice, arousing the interest of a blonde woman in a blue dress who was walking past.

“I haven’t seen them and I haven’t heard of them,” Ollenborg smiled. “But allow me, Officer sir, to give you one piece of advice. Barba non facit philosophum . †Why are you looking at me like that? Because I’ve studied Latin? Once, on a voyage to Africa, I avidly read Georg Buchmann’s Geflugelte Worte ; ‡I practically know it by heart.”

Mock said nothing. He did not feel like talking. Today it seemed hard to find the right words. Lost in thought, he watched the young blonde woman in the long blue dress and veil. She was on her way to the table but suddenly changed direction, approached the ice-cream and lemonade vendor and smiled at him. As she did so, she stuck out her neck which had been hidden by a high lace collar held in place with hooks; it was covered with dark, scaly patches. The vendor handed the woman some lemonade without her having to queue. “Where have I seen that girl before?” Mock asked himself. “In some brothel, no doubt,” was his own response. Trapped in a tedious existence, between booking prostitutes, alcoholic delirium and the superhuman effort it took to continue to show his father respect, Mock realized that he saw a harlot in every woman. But this is not what horrified him. He was already used to unhappy thoughts and his own partially feigned cynicism, and he was well acquainted with his own demons. But all of a sudden he was afraid for his future. What would he do if he had a wife who, faithful up to now, suddenly started coming home late at night, her lips concealing alcohol fumes, deceit lurking in her eyes, satiation slumbering in her body, and on her breasts the marks of passionate bites? What would this brave conquerer of indifferent prostitutes and venereal pimps do then? Mock did not know how he would behave. How much easier it would be if the entire female kind was made up of harlots! Then nothing would surprise him.

Sergeant Smolorz interrupted these dismal thoughts.

“The port’s director was in his office,” he said loudly, trying to shout above the orchestra which was now playing “Der Prasentiermarsch”, a tune from the time of East African colonization.

“And what, was he irrigating his wife?” Ollenborg said, spitting out his cigarette butt.