H. Adler - Panorama

There is a lot that Josef wants to say in response, he having experienced incidents of what Siegler calls memory intertwined with the present, it also being — as Josef believes — actually intertwined, but he senses that he shouldn’t say anything now, instead choosing to observe Siegler closely, he certainly being one of the oldest of the laborers, while with his noticeably heavy face full of sorrow, perhaps he is sick, Josef then asking him if the work is too hard. Yes, it’s very hard, but he doesn’t want to fall behind the young boys, for you can’t show how hard it is for you, and he works under Sajdl, where it is certainly harder than anywhere else. Siegler smiles when Josef tells him that he works with Sláma. For Sláma is a summer camp in comparison, he being quite a character who loves to slough off while in Najdek, where Rybák rarely goes, he unfairly having a bad reputation because the young ones are so dumb … well, anyway it must feel like paradise with Sláma, for Sajdl is indeed ambitious, being wild for money and having, in addition to the regular take from the work, entered into a contract with the firm that pays per quota achieved, which is why he always gets after his people so much, for he’s paid according to the number of cars that are filled, while in the evening he sits in the bar with Kopřiva and drinks nearly a full bottle of schnapps, his wife drinking nearly as much as he, though he’s not really that awful, all you have to do is convince him that you’re willing and not just sloughing off and you will be allowed to talk now and then, he even having a sense of humor.

Simon says that Siegler gets along well with Sajdl because he has been impressed by him, but for the young people it’s hard, for nothing they do impresses him, and they all have to do whatever he tells them to. Siegler thinks the youths go about it all wrong, telling Sajdl always that they can’t do as much as he wants, and then he gets angry, which is why you shouldn’t cross people like him but instead work quietly and steadily without any breaks and without straining yourself too much, the result being that you can aim to accomplish an immense amount in a reasonable manner, which results in his noticing and appreciating such effort, though if you neglect to do so, then he thinks you are a troublemaker, causing him to of course note that everyone works much too fast when observed, while afterward they stand around with empty shovels and gaze off into the distance. Simon thanks him, saying that he had never thought of this and didn’t know that even with forced labor on the railroad there was a certain psychology involved. Siegler confirms that a great deal or at least much requires a pragmatic psychology, for you always need to properly size up your comrades and your superiors, almost everyone, for example, being afraid of the bookkeeper Podlaha and surmising that he is a slave driver who has no patience with anyone who is sick, for he swears like a sailor whenever anyone requests a sick day, but if Siegler happens not to feel well he quietly goes to him and says that of course you need to work, they need to finish the railroad, but unfortunately he’s not feeling well and needs to see the doctor in order to get better and be back to work soon, he not wanting to be sent to the sick bay by the doctor but instead given some medicine so that he can get back to work by the afternoon, or the next morning at the latest. At this Podlaha turns completely soft and asserts that he’s not a monster, for of course anyone can get sick, he himself having had pleurisy last year, which he wouldn’t wish on his worst enemy, and so Siegler should hurry to Sobolec, nothing being more important than one’s health, as is the case. This is how to handle such people, you just have to know their weaknesses and bring out the best in them.

Now Josef and Simon are ready to go, they have to get back to their room, it being time to worry about the evening meal. Siegler says that he finds this kind of communal arrangement a splendid solution, because it is so easy to do and yet not so obvious to all, though in his room no such arrangement seems possible, there being two roommates who are a problem, for they receive ample packages containing butter, eggs, bacon, and anything you might wish for, but they want to scarf down these goodies by themselves or trade them for cigarettes, he finding such behavior reprehensible when people are thrown together in dire circumstances, and although they are not starving, they end up trading precious foods, which most have to do without, for nothing more than expendable goods. Siegler’s voice rises more than it has before, even revealing some bitterness, while Simon asks whether Siegler ever receives any packages from his wife. No, for where should she bring them, while, on the contrary, it’s he who sends something to her, two months ago he having had some chance contact with a family of millers from Wirschenowitz, whereby he learned that they had a child who suddenly took ill, and because they had no way of getting a doctor a messenger had been sent to the camp, since supposedly every kind of profession was represented among the laborers, and there are even people in the village who envy the laborers and maintain that they have it too good, all of them nothing more than parasites, a little bit of hard work good for their lazy bones, even though that applied to only a few, though nonetheless it was true. In any case, they sent someone for Siegler, he protesting that it was forbidden to have anything to do with the villages, but then the miller began to protest that this was serious, the child was bright red with fever, the doctor had to come for God and the angels’ sake. Then Otto said that he had no problem with it, for such a pressing matter demanded that he go, but he should make it quick, as it was still dangerous. Siegler was able to help, and the child, contrary to all expectations, quickly recovered, and since then Siegler goes to the miller once a week and is given flour and other groceries that he then sends to his wife. At this it’s high time for Simon and Josef to be off, as they thank Siegler and leave.

The two friends consider how they might help Siegler without undermining the needs of their own roommates, but they are unable to come up with any satisfactory answer. They propose going for a walk after lunch on Sunday, the day lovely, sunny and warm, as they bring along a bag with a snack in it, since they plan to be away for a good while, six hours in all, maybe seven. After leaving the camp they walk along paths through the fields and after some minutes they come to the embankment for the new railroad near the gravel mill, it being somewhat hard to scrabble over the loose gravel for the embankment, the rail bed stretching out peaceful and empty and desolate, no guards anywhere, the gravel mill silent, the railcars standing idle, two locomotives from the light train resting quietly, producing no steam, everything asleep. Then the friends cross over the embankment and find a path that climbs uphill through the woods, tall powerful trees all around them with thickets in between, raspberries ripe for picking, a bird hiding within, two squirrels skittering deftly across the branches, though everything else is still, time having forgotten itself, quiet clearings that lie there small and appealing between the mild and clearly demarcated copses, followed by the new-growth forest, which has grown up thick, fungi having shot up within it, a bounty of edible mushrooms quickly stashed in their pockets, along with fly agaric, a logged clearing opening up its silent expanse, tree stumps everywhere, some trunks lying piled up, their branches cut off, the stripped bark a reddish brown next to the logs slowly sinking into the loam, tall wild flowers growing up in their array of colors. The path leads farther on, a peak likely nearby, no doubt the crest that Sláma had called Peperka, Josef translating it somewhat loosely as Pfefferberg, part of a memorable landscape, since it’s a landscape the friends have seen before, Simon having often gone hiking before the war. And at last they reach the peak, a granite cliff looming high and covered with gray-green flecks.