Philippe Claudel - Brodeck

Everything had been turned upside down inside Schloss’s inn. The place was unrecognizable. It was as if it had put on a new skin. We went in on tiptoe, almost not daring to enter at all. Even those ordinarily incapable of keeping their mouths shut remained speechless. Many turned toward Orschwir, apparently under the impression that the mayor was different from them and would show them what was to be done, how they should behave, what to say and not to say. But Orschwir was like everybody else. Not any cleverer, not any wiser.

The tables had been pushed against one wall, covered with clean cloths, and laden with dozens of bottles and glasses, lined up like soldiers before a battle. There were also big platters piled with sliced sausages, pieces of cheese, strips of lean bacon, slices of ham, loaves of bread, and brioches, enough sustenance to nourish a regiment. At first, all eyes were attracted by that array of food and drink, which was lavish to a degree that is rarely seen among us, except at certain weddings where well-to-do peasants unite their progeny and seek to impress their guests. And so it was only later that we noticed the cloths hanging on the walls, covering what appeared to be about twenty picture frames. Members of the company pointed out these objects to one another with quick chin movements, but there was no time to say or do anything else, because the staircase steps began to creak and the Anderer appeared.

He didn’t have on any of the bizarre clothing that people had willy-nilly grown accustomed to — no frilly shirt, no jabot, no frock coat, no stovepipe trousers. He was simply wearing a sort of large, ample robe, which covered his entire body and fell to his feet, baring his big neck in a way that made it look disembodied, as though an executioner had neatly lopped off his head.

The Anderer walked down a few steps. He made an odd impression, for his robe was so long that even his feet were hidden; he seemed to glide along a few inches above the floor, like a ghost. No one who saw him said a word, and he precluded any reaction by beginning to speak himself, in his discreet, slightly reedy voice: “I have long searched for a way to thank you all for your welcome and your hospitality. The conclusion I reached was that I should do what I know how to do: look, listen, and capture the souls of people and things. I have done much traveling, all over the world. Perhaps that is the reason why my eyes see more and my ears hear better. I believe, without presumption, that I have comprehended you yourselves to a great degree, and likewise this landscape which you inhabit. Accept my little works as homages. See nothing more in them. Mr. Schloss, if you please!”

The innkeeper had been standing at attention, awaiting only this signal before going into action. On the double, he sped around the perimeter of his inn’s main room, whipping off the cloths covering the pictures. As if the scene were not yet sufficiently strange, this was the moment when the first thunderclap sounded, loud and sharp, like a whip cracking on an old nag’s rump.

The perfumed card had told the truth: there were portraits , and there were landscapes . They weren’t, properly speaking, paintings, but rather ink drawings, sometimes composed in broad brushstrokes, sometimes in extremely delicate lines jostling, covering, and crossing one another. To see the pictures up close, we passed before them in procession, as though making a strange Way of the Cross. Some in attendance, such as Göbbler and Lawyer Knopf, who were both blind as bats, practically pressed their noses against the pictures; others did the opposite, backing away to take the full measure of a drawing and falling behind the rest of the company. The first cries of surprise and the first nervous laughs came when some of the men recognized themselves or others in the portraits. The Anderer had made his selection. How was not clear, but the portrait subjects he had chosen were Orschwir, Hausorn, Father Peiper, Göbbler, Dorcha, Vurtenhau, Röppel, Ulrich Yackob (the verger), Schloss, and me. The “landscapes” included the church square and the low houses around its perimeter, the Lingen , Orschwir’s farm, the Tizenthal rocks, the Baptisterbrücke with the grove of white willows in the background, Lichmal clearing, and the main room in Schloss’s inn.

What was really curious was that although we recognized faces and places, no one could say that the drawings were perfect likenesses. It was almost as though they elicited familiar echoes, impressions, resonances that came to mind to complete the portraits which were merely suggested in the pictures before us.

Once everyone had completed his little round, things began to get serious. The company turned its back to the drawings as though they had never existed. There was a general movement toward the laden tables. You would have thought that most of the men in the inn had neither eaten nor drunk for days, so savage was their assault on the refreshments. In no time at all, everything that had been put out disappeared, but Schloss must have had orders to provide a steady supply of full bottles and platters because the buffet never seemed to be depleted. Cheeks grew flushed, foreheads began to sweat, words became louder, and the first oaths reverberated off the walls. Many in the group had doubtless already forgotten why they had come, and no one was looking at the pictures anymore. The only thing that counted was what they could get down their throats. As for the Anderer , he had disappeared. It was Diodemus who pointed this out to me: “Right after his little speech, he went back up to his room. What do you think about that?”

“About what?”

“About this whole affair …” Diodemus waved a hand at the exposition on the walls. I believe I shrugged my shoulders. “It’s funny,” he said. “Your portrait, I mean. It doesn’t look very much like you, and yet, it’s completely you. I don’t know how to describe it. Come have a look.”

Not wanting to be disagreeable to Diodemus, I followed him. We slipped past the bodies in our way, with their emanations, their smells, their sweat, their beery or vinous breath. Voices were growing heated and so were heads; many of the company were talking very loud. Orschwir had removed his velour hat. Lawyer Knopf was whistling. Zungfrost , who ordinarily drank only water, had downed three glasses under compulsion and was starting to dance. Three laughing men held back Lulla Carpak, a vagrant with yellow hair and the complexion of a radish, who as soon as he got drunk always felt an absolute need to break someone’s face.

“Take a good look,” Diodemus said. We were standing before my portrait. I did what he suggested. At length. Initially, I didn’t fix my attention too closely on the lines the Anderer had traced there, but then, little by little, and without understanding why or how, I went deeper and deeper into the drawing.

The first time I’d seen it — a few minutes earlier — I hadn’t noticed anything. My name was written under it, and maybe I felt a bit embarrassed about being portrayed, because I’d quickly turned my head away and hurried on to the next picture. But when I saw it again, when I stood in front of it and considered it, it was as if it sucked me in, as if it came alive, and what I saw were no longer lines and curves and points and little blots, but entire pieces of my life. The portrait the Anderer had composed was, so to speak, alive. It was my life. It confronted me with myself, with my sorrows, my follies, my fears, my desires. I saw my extinguished childhood, my long months in the camp. I saw my homecoming. I saw my mute Amelia. I saw everything. The drawing was an opaque mirror that threw back into my face all that I’d been and all that I was. Diodemus, once again, brought me back to reality.