H. Adler - The Wall

People back then were used to all types, therefore I didn’t stand out. It was hard to distinguish between murderers and the murdered. Wherever I showed up and was soon asked something or was drawn into the everyday buzzing chatter, I was completely unknown. A cold disengagement was almost everywhere buried beneath the hectic pace of a destroyed world that fed upon itself through a kind of empty jubilation in which the walking dead were discussed in a matter-of-fact tone, as if they were standing right there. I joined in the cozy warmth, and it felt good. The day of the new powers seemed to have dawned, the fanfare of freedom boiling over into explosive noise. I was spared having to prove that my heart was still beating. You just spit out your name without anything to back it up — documents and witnesses were not called for — and before you knew it a civil servant was warmly extending his unwitting hand to you. That was all that was needed for the superficial passing of any given day; you just waved a piece of paper and everything was fine, a smile accompanying it, though no one bothered to actually look. Soon the scrap of paper was no longer any good, but I wasn’t worried at all, for you were either forgotten or forgiven. I traveled through distant lands, not needing any money, and yet I always ate and drank well, a bed with warm blankets always waiting for me. The borders were passable; all I had to do was say, “It’s me!” and immediately the guard would acknowledge me and let me through. Helping hands pointed the way. Whenever I asked to ride along in someone’s car, he just invited me in with a wave and was happy to have the company.

Thus I arrived late one afternoon in my old city. It had changed very little during the war, the old stonework, massive and dignified, had survived the years well, only the paint and plaster having suffered here and there. The streets were also grayer than earlier, while, unexpectedly, in the public parks a network of graves spread out among the dug-up earth. The grass, which it used to be forbidden to walk on, was worn away, broad tents erected in which people camped beneath the tarps as if it had always been so, the people looking satisfied and at ease. I had left my knapsack at the train station, an unrelenting desire to look around pressing me up and down the streets, which didn’t mind that I was there, though they no longer seemed to recognize me, since my steps in stiff boots struck the patterned cobbles in a half-confident, half-unfamiliar manner. Many people moved back and forth, both residents and newcomers, all of them caught up in their fates, whether large or small, yet each so certain, as if they knew just what was going to happen to them. Children romped around, grabbing one another’s hands, chasing after balls, raising a real ruckus, though no one got into any trouble. Soon I was caught up in it, swept away by it all, as if death had never once had an eye on me.

With bated breath, a tired back, but my legs still strong and my eyes full of curiosity, I turned a corner where people moved about more energetically. Here no children dared to jump into the heaving noise of the rumbling traffic, as cars rushed by in earnest, a policeman directing traffic in a silent fashion. I looked around me with harmless pressing glances at the many faces. How clueless they all seemed whenever I tried to decipher my own obliterated memories within them. All were strangers. Also, when they noticed my curiosity they didn’t stop, for they hadn’t expected me. Whether they thought anything of it I couldn’t tell, since it wasn’t possible for me to turn around and look back at them, for fresh faces continued to flow toward me which I gazed at with ever more pressing questions. And yet these were strangers as well, nor did I learn anything more from them than I did from their predecessors, who had already been swallowed up in the flow of traffic. Once you were late and were no longer expected, your arrival in the past doesn’t go well. That I had to realize.

But why despair as long as there is another corner to turn? Another one approached that was more familiar than most. Sleepily I walked along hunched over, slowing my steps warily, since I wanted to be ready in case I encountered my father. I was almost afraid to be surprised by him too suddenly. Indeed, I had no knowledge of what had happened to him other than that he had been murdered. That also happened in the war, but way off, as I wasn’t there, murder having occurred in too many places. But that just couldn’t be; perhaps I was only the victim of a frightful rumor, and therefore could still hope that my father had survived and, just like me, was gazing at the people streaming by, looking for those who recognized him and could help. But there was no father in this street where papers were hawked, cigarettes were sold, brash sweets were wrapped up in garish colors, and sausages reeked of garlic, the uncooked ones hanging in the open air on a rack, while the cooked ones looked much more appealing as they waited for customers on a wide griddle covered in grease. The vendors didn’t wait on me at all; in fact, they didn’t even notice that I was there, letting me pass by coldheartedly, I myself eagerly searching for some kind of response in their yellowish sullen eyes. My father was nowhere to be found; no one was there to greet him as they used to when he hurried by without a hat and coat. There was no father, nor any longer the vendors that once knew him and loved to chat with him. So I passed by the booths, dazed, my legs heavy, my feet hurting and schlepping along, the ground resisting more and more, until my feet were held fast in thick muck. Also, dense fumes, thick and creeping, surrounded my ears, such that I couldn’t hear, while far-off calls gradually managed to penetrate the distance between, myself hardly perceiving that they were meant for me. But after they continued to pound into my head like hammer blows, I finally had to note that without a doubt someone was calling my name: “Herr Landau!”

I stood there frozen to the spot, not moving a single limb, waiting, the name repeated again and again, yet even stronger, it supposedly directed at me, or maybe not, for how could that be possible? It was my good father they meant, he having for decades occupied the Reitergasse, Haberdashery Albert Landau, or HAL for short, adored and known throughout the city as a solid brand, the brand name appliquéd on soft linen shirts and bright silk ties. Once again, the Reitergasse welcomed back old Herr Landau, who had disappeared. From all the booths and opened doors of the shops, from office and apartment windows, one could hear “Herr Landau!” being called. Although I couldn’t move, such joy couldn’t help but make me think that he was nearby. I also tried to press the words with a half-injured tongue through my lips and called out, barely audible, “Herr Landau!” It wasn’t loud enough, but I hoped that my father would be able to distinguish the voice of his son amid the chaotic babble. I actually managed to turn my head in order to look around, searching here and there for the face of my father among the many faces around me. Yet in vain! I was struck blind and cursed the fact that his beloved features no longer existed in my memory. Wire-rimmed glasses, I told myself, glasses and a tall stance, though no doubt somewhat bent over by the years and the worries. But what good was it if I couldn’t remember him any better than that? All I could do was believe that my father would notice me if I kept waving. I lifted my hand, then my entire arm, though I looked tentative and foolish. Yet nothing happened that I could perceive. Only his name continued to be called out in a continuously audible chain, hanging damp and heavy in the air, as I slumped out of sadness that no one paid any attention to me, the one returning home. With a weak voice, I said, “My name is also Landau, and I am his son.” After which I feebly pointed a finger at myself.