Daniel Kehlmann - F

A young man yawned as he checked their tickets. They had good seats, close to the front, in the third row. The orchestra was almost full, but there was no one up in any of the circles. Ivan looked up at the heavily decorated ceiling and wondered how anyone could paint that. The artist had used skilled trompe l’oeil effects to conjure up a nonexistent barrel vault. How did you draw this when you wanted to show that there really was both no second space there and simply the illusion of one? There was nothing about it in any book.

No one to help you. No book, no teacher. You had to figure out everything important for yourself, and if you didn’t, you had failed your life’s purpose. Ivan often wondered how people with no particular gifts put up with their existence. He saw that his mother wished some other life for herself and that his father was always somewhere else in his thoughts. He saw that his schoolteachers were sad little souls, and naturally he knew about the apparitions that tormented Eric. Whenever he got caught up in one of Eric’s dreams, he found himself in a dark, sticky place where no one would want to be. He also saw Martin, who was too weak and spent too much time alone with his mother. Ivan sighed. Hypnotism didn’t interest him, he’d rather have been at home again, so that he could draw. Just keep drawing until you finally get better at it, that was all that counted, it was the only thing he wanted.

The light dimmed and the murmur of conversation died away. The curtain opened. Lindemann was standing on the stage.

He was plump and had a bald spot that was made all the more noticeable by the few sparse hairs combed over the nakedness of his skull, and he was wearing black horn-rimmed glasses. His suit was gray, and there was a little green handkerchief in the breast pocket. Without preamble, without so much as a bow, he softly began to speak.

Hypnosis, he said, was not the same as sleep, but rather a state of inner wakefulness, not submission, but self-empowerment. The audience would witness astonishing things today, but nobody need have cause for concern, for nobody could knowingly be hypnotized against their will, and nobody could be made to perform some act that in the depths of their soul they were not ready to perform. He then paused for a moment, and smiled as if he’d just delivered some rather abstruse joke.

A narrow set of steps led down from the stage into the audience. Lindemann descended them, touched his glasses, looked around, and walked up the center aisle. Obviously he was now deciding which people to take back up onto the stage. Ivan, Eric, and Martin lowered their heads.

“Don’t worry,” said Arthur. “He only takes grown-ups.”

“So maybe it’ll be you.”

“It doesn’t work on me.”

They were about to see something big, said Lindemann. Anyone who didn’t want to participate mustn’t worry, he wouldn’t come too close, the person would be excused. He reached the last row, ran back surprisingly nimbly, and jumped up onto the stage. For starters, he said, something light, just a joke, a little something. Everyone in the first row, please come up here!

A murmur ran through the theater.

Yes, said Lindemann, the first row. All of you. Please be quick!

“What does he do if someone says no?” whispered Martin. “If someone just stays in his seat, then what?”

Everyone in the first row stood up. They whispered to one another and looked around unwillingly, but they obeyed and climbed up onto the stage.

“Stand in a line,” Lindemann ordered. “And hold hands.”

Hesitantly, they did so.

No one was to let go of anyone else, said Lindemann as he walked along the line, no one would want to, so no one would do it, and because no one would want to, no one would be able to, and because no one would be able to, it wouldn’t be wrong to declare that everyone was literally sticking to one another. As he was talking, he reached out here and there to touch people’s hands. Tight, he said, hold hands tight, really tight, nobody step out of the line, nobody let go, really tight, indissoluble. Anyone who wanted to should try and see what happened now.

Nobody let go. Lindemann turned to the audience, and there was some timid applause. Ivan leaned forward to get a better look at the people onstage. They looked uncertain, absentminded, somehow frozen. A little man was clenching his jaws, the hands of a lady with hair pulled into a bun were shaking, as if she wanted to tear free but was finding that her neighbor’s grip, just like her own, was too strong.

He would count to three, said Lindemann, then everyone’s hands would let go. “So one. And two. And …,” he slowly lifted his hand. “Three!” and snapped his fingers.

Uncertainly, almost unwillingly, they let go, looking at their hands in embarrassment.

“Now go sit down again quick,” said Lindemann. “Down. Quick. Quick.” He clapped his hands.

The woman with the bun was pale and swayed as she walked. Lindemann took her gently by the elbow, led her to the steps, and spoke to her quietly. When he let go, she was more sure-footed, went down the steps, and reached her seat.

That had been a little experiment, said Lindemann, an opening trick. Now for something serious. He went to the front of the stage, took off his glasses, and squinted with his eyes scrunched up. “The gentleman in front over there in the pullover and the gentleman right behind him, and you, young lady, please come up.”

Smiling awkwardly, the trio climbed onto the stage. The woman waved at someone, Lindemann shook his head in reproof, and she stopped. He positioned himself next to the first of them, a tall, heavyset man with a beard, and held his hand in front of the man’s eyes. He spoke into his ear for a while, then suddenly called, “Sleep!” The man fell over, Lindemann caught him and laid him down on the floor. Then he stepped over to the woman next to him and the same thing happened. And then again with the other man. They all lay there motionless.

“And now be happy!”

He must explain, he said. Lindemann turned toward the audience, removed his horn-rims, pulled the green handkerchief out of his breast pocket, and began to polish them. They were all only too familiar, were they not, with the stupid suggestions that mediocre hypnotists — pretentious and untalented incompetents of the sort you encounter by the dozen in any profession — love to instill in their guinea pigs: freezing cold or boiling heat, bodily stiffness, sensations of flying or falling, not to mention the universally beloved forgetting of your own name. He paused and stared thoughtfully into the air. It was hot in here, wasn’t it? Terribly hot. So what could be going on? He mopped his brow. Such idiocies were familiar to everyone and he would skip them without further ado. My God, wasn’t it hot!

Ivan pushed his wet hair back off his forehead. The heat seemed to be rising off the floor in waves, the air was damp. Eric’s face was all shiny too. Programs were flapping the air all over the audience.

But something could surely be done to fix it, said Lindemann. Not to worry, the theater had capable technicians. Someone would turn on the excellent air-conditioning at any moment. In fact, it had already been done. Up here you could already hear the humming of the machinery. You could feel the rush of air. He turned up his collar. But now it really was blowing terribly. The equipment was astonishingly powerful. He blew on his hands and shifted from foot to foot. It was cold in here, very cold, really very, very cold indeed.

“What’s going on?” said Arthur.

“Haven’t you noticed?” whispered Ivan. His breath was rising in clouds, his feet had turned numb, and he was having trouble inhaling. Martin’s teeth were chattering. Eric sneezed.