John Berger - G.

Impossible, said von Hartmann.

Very well, she cried again, one thousand crowns. No, there is a better wager. If I win, the young Italian is released. I go to the governor myself and ask him. If I lose, if we are not at war by next Sunday, I will pay you one thousand crowns.

I can only conclude this young Italian must be your lover! said von Hartmann.

She turned her back, as though to look at the books on the top shelf, and said bitterly in German: In the end like all Germans you are ordinär .

Von Hartmann replied in dulcet Italian. There is no need to be angry, I have the greatest respect for your feelings. Since he was leaving the country, I doubt very much whether he would have returned. Since he was leaving, your interest in him is both generous and disinterested.

What happened next, happened so quickly that none of the three people in the room would later be able to recount more than a single impression. Their three impressions would, however, confirm one another. Marika jumped from the ladder. Neither she nor either of the two men ever considered the possibility of her having fallen. Undoubtedly she leaped. Perhaps she had intended to land with her feet on the seat of a large leather arm-chair near by and below. In any case the chair was knocked over and she lay on the floor. Yet despite the speed with which it all happened and the impossibility of recording the exact sequence of events afterwards, the moment when she was in mid-air seemed at the time interminable.

Tomorrow morning G. will meet Dr Donato and Raffaele (he has never met either of them singly) in the café off the Piazza Ponterosso. They will ask him about Marco. If he tells them that Marco may be released within the week, they will suspect he is an Austrian agent. If he tells them he has failed to do anything for Marco, they may try to force him to leave Trieste. He will tell them there is a reasonable chance of Marco being released by the twentieth. They will say that that is too late, by then the two countries may be at war. They will insist that G. tries to have something done sooner. He will tell them they are absurdly unrealistic. He will ask them how they expect an Italian businessman to intervene in a question of Austro-Hungarian law. Raffaele, resentful of being told that he is unrealistic, will be on the point of shouting out that they already know G. is an Austrian agent and if he were not, how could he get Marco released even by the twentieth? But Dr Donato will interrupt Raffaele. He only allows Raffaele to blunder when it doesn’t matter. He will suggest a walk along the sea front. They will stroll beside the aborted canal until they reach the Molo. All the time Dr Donato will be talking. He will talk about Voltaire. By the waterfront on the fourth side of the Piazza Grande they will see a goods train slowly coming towards them along the quay. Let us watch the train, Dr Donato will say. The wheels of the engine will be taller than the three men who stare up at it. After the locomotive will come the trucks, black, with wheels which appear to be loose after the solemnity of the locomotive’s. In the brief spaces between the trucks above the rusty heavy couplings, the three men will glimpse the sea. Dr Donato, having stopped talking, will suddenly take hold of G.’s arm with both hands at the same time. Raffaele will fling an arm round G.’s back and together they will force him forward until his face is a few inches from the blackened boards of the slow-passing truck. G. will try to hurl himself backwards. Dr Donato will kick G.’s heels towards the lines. The right heel and the left. After a brief, interminable moment they will let him break free. You almost tripped, Raffaele will say, you want to be careful in a city like Trieste, there are a lot of accidents here. You see, the lawyer will say, we have very little time.

Let us say Marika was ascending, not falling. Let us say that the floor and everything else in the room was also ascending, but that there was a very slight difference in the speed of ascent, the floor mounting a little quicker than she. That is how it seemed. She leaped upwards. She never seemed to move downwards. Rather, she seemed to hang in the air like a white and damson fuchsia. Her dress lifted a little to disclose white stockings and knees. Her mouth opened but there was no sound. Perhaps the moment was too brief for sound to register. Nevertheless the silence was one of the things which made the moment seem interminable. Suspended there like a fuchsia, she was still herself. She was the woman who had been lying in bed that morning when Wolfgang gazed down at her. She was the woman in every particularity of her physical being whom G. desired. Her very substantiality, there in mid-air, was more far-reaching than any idea. Then she lay in a heap on the floor.

Neither man moved immediately. She made a sound which might have been a laugh. Her husband ran towards her more quickly than he intended. The sight of physical violence always disturbed him. By the time he reached her, she had begun to get to her feet and brush down her dress.

What did you do? he asked. If he had asked: Why did you do it? she might have taken advantage of him.

I misjudged the distance. I am not hurt. Do you accept my bet?

Some brandy, said von Hartmann.

G. noticed that as soon as she took a step she had to disguise a limp.

Your wife has hurt her foot, please allow me to carry her. Before von Hartmann had time to reply, G., leering outrageously, had picked her up. Frau von Hartmann made no protest but laid her cheek against the chest of the man who was her imminent lover.

The trio proceeded down the length of the room.

When the brandy had been served, von Hartmann began to speak softly but distinctly, looking most of the time at his wife who had been laid on the sofa with her legs up.

I will not say that you look like a couple, the two of you, but you look well together side by side. I hope you will not misunderstand my reason for saying that.

He lay back in his arm-chair, holding the large glass in his two hands like a chalice.

Do you remember Anna Karenina ? I have never been able to believe that Karenin was the successful statesman Tolstoy wanted us to believe he was. The contrast between his well-managed public life and his ill-managed private life was quite unnecessary. Karenin lacked the consistent clarity of mind which a proper administrator needs to have. He probably married the wrong woman, but having married her, he certainly treated her in the wrong way. Why did he not face the truth about her infidelity before it was too late? Because he took it far too seriously. If she was unfaithful it meant the end of the world, and so time after time he postponed the day of reckoning. And what did he do when he could no longer avoid the truth — do you remember, Marika? Anna tells him on their way back from the races.

He held the glass so that the brandy was level with his eyes. His gaze was focussed on the horizon within the glass.

You remember? Karenin went away to think about it and he came to the conclusion that they must both go on living as before. The end of the world when it comes is softer than a whisper. Nobody must see it or hear it. But both of them suffered it silently day and night. Karenin made a tragedy. He made it. There was no need for a tragedy, there probably never is. Anna had to leave him although she knew it would be her undoing. If she had stayed, in the end she would have become as deranged as Karenin. Now, I’m not Karenin, that is what I want you to understand.

He put the glass down on a table, and dabbed once at his lips with a folded handkerchief with his monogram embroidered upon it.

I apply the same realism to my private life as to my public life. It has been obvious to me for some time that you would like to seduce my wife, and it has been equally obvious that she would like to become your mistress. Doubtless this is what, under normal circumstances, might have happened without a word from me. But the circumstances are not normal. Time is running out for all of us. This is why I am raising the matter. I want to tell you that you can count, both of you, on my co-operation.