Gregor von Rezzori - An Ermine in Czernopol

Blanche had the tacit permission to withdraw or occupy herself with other things whenever “nonsense time” was declared — for instance, when Solly jumped up in the middle of the class and called out, “Madame, I know what! Why not let’s have nonsense time?”

“What, Solly?”

“I can act out how Papa had another row with Mama because of Bubi.”

“No, Solly. We know your family by heart. They’re beginning to bore us.”

“All right. Fine. I know something else. I learned a new song, a real hit.”

“Which one? We’ve heard ‘Die süsse Klingelfee’ as much as we’ve heard Papa Brill. And that goes for ‘Salomé’ as well.”

“Not ‘Klingelfee’ and not ‘Salomé,’ nothing like that. It’s the brand-newest of the new, not even Bubi knows it from Schorodok.”

“And how do you know it?”

“Record collection. I got it yesterday. Shall I sing it?”

“All right, if the others want to hear it as well …”

“Yes, please!” we called out in a chorus.

“Fine. Ten minutes nonsense time,” said Madame Aritonovich.

“I think the words might be even better than with the other two.

I’ll say it more than sing it. We can practice the melody later on, it’s a foxtrot. So here we go:

“You pretty girl,

it’s pretty mean,

to be as pretty as you!”

“It’s pretty clear

that’s not enough

And pretty true I’m more than pretty — oooh no

— with you”

Solly started to sing:

“Every lady

likes-to-be-invited to the thé dansant,

but every lady

thinks-that-she’s-the-only girl who’s élégante

whenever trying on a dress

she causes tailors great distress.

Every lady

wants-a-look-that’s one of a kind,

she won’t be happy

unless-the-other-girls go out of their mind …”

We cheered like mad. When Solly came to the part—

“Buy the girl a dress,

she will climb right in,

and run-home-very-happy indeed.

But for a fancy hat

she’ll climb … right out again …”

—we already knew the rhythm and enough of the melody that we could sing the second verse ourselves, with Solly conducting.

I turned to Blanche and found her sitting by herself on the last bench, apart from all the others, as usual. She returned my glance, which undoubtedly revealed how much I was enjoying the triviality of the satirical song, with a brave smile that was clearly pained, but also confident and illuminated, and signaled that she had something to tell us.

An hour later we went to see her. “I brought you something. It’s a poem written by one of my father’s patients. I should tell you that the man who wrote it — or, more precisely, whose words were written down, because he can barely write — is insane. My father is a doctor for the insane. This is a fantastic discovery. The poet is completely uneducated; his German is very bad, like with all the uneducated people here, and still he’s created something incredibly beautiful. My father says if it were any more amazing it would be a religious experience. You want to read it?”

“Read it to us,” we requested.

“It’s called ‘The Young Dancer,’” said Blanche, warmed and glowing with joy. Then she read:

Eine groβe Glockenblume

wehte fort vom Frühlingsbaum

lichtem Frühlingstag zum Ruhme

tanzt sie sich in sanften Traum.

Eine Wolke weiβer Seide

spiegelt rauschend jeden Schritt:

mystisch wandeln unterm Kleide

Blut und Haut und Atem mit.

An des Körpers Blüten-Stengel

schwingt des Rockes Glocke sie ,

und der Beine Doppel-Schwengel

läutet leise Melodie.

Eine groβe Glockenblume

wehte fort vom Frühlingsbaum:

lichtem Frühlingstag zum Ruhme

tanzt sie sich in sanften Traum … [1]

“It’s wonderful,” said Blanche, when she reached the end. “The circumstances are just as remarkable: another patient, who is in the institution just for observation, heard it from the lips of the poor sick man. They aren’t even in the same ward. The man who composed it is a former locksmith named Karl Piehowicz. He’s been in the asylum for years and works in the garden, and the other, who is likely not even sick, offered to help with the garden work, in order to have something to do. He is an officer …”

“Is his name Tildy?” we asked, utterly beside ourselves with excitement.

“Yes. How do you know that? Do you know him?”

We tried to tell Blanche who Tildy was, at least who he was for us. We barraged her with stories about his wife, Tamara Tildy, about old

Paşcanu, about Widow Morar, the dogs that always ran with his horse and about how one of them always limped out of sheer hysteria and how they had all been poisoned. We told her how he had been sent to the asylum, all the people he had challenged to a duel, and how he had smacked Herr Alexianu in the face …

Blanche looked at us with wide eyes and listened patiently. “You have to understand what a miracle it is that a mentally disturbed person can produce something with such beautiful order,” she said. “My father told me that it isn’t unusual for the mentally disturbed to find some wonderful form of expression, whether they are writing or drawing or painting — but that usually starts off beautifully and quickly turns confused and ends all twisted up in a painful muddle. There’s hardly ever anything that’s complete and can stand on its own, so full of light and clarity, so immaculate as this here. But the most amazing thing about Karl Piehowicz is that everything he composes is just like this, as clear as day. I have another poem here, called ‘Springtime.’”

She wanted to recite it. We interrupted her, paying no attention to the pain in her eyes. We besieged her with questions about Tildy, and didn’t let up until we discovered she didn’t know any more than what she’d already told us, at which point we were disappointed, and even a little embittered. All at once a distance grew between us, and we were immediately tempted to attribute this sudden inability to understand each other to a more fundamental difference — precisely the one that purports to separate the Jewish and Christian “races.” Was it not significant? We wanted to tell her all about our hussar, and she went on about a crazy locksmith who wrote poems. During those days we felt more inclined to stay at home than we usually did, as if we had ignored all the well-intended warnings about the weather and stayed outside too long, and now, frozen through and sopping wet, were grateful for the comfortable warmth of our parents’ home.

It was at that time that Aunt Paulette brought Herr Adamowski to our house for the first time.

When she announced that she had invited Herr Adamowski to tea, no one said a word — a clear refusal to take any stand on the extravagant invitation — and so the decision either to disapprove or else to quietly acquiesce was left up to the mistress of the house, in other words, to our mother.

“I hear that Herr Adamowski has been looking after Tamara Tildy in a very commendable way,” our mother said. “We should all feel a little ashamed that she has to turn so far for help.”

No one chose to reply. So Herr Adamowski came to tea. No one — with the exception of Aunt Paulette, of course — had any idea that he was Tamara Tildy’s lover.

It happened that on the same day some relatives had come from the country, on very short notice. They had come to town just for the day, so there was no way to avoid their visit. No one said anything more about the unexpected meeting, although it was to be feared that our relatives — an older couple given to country pursuits — and the editor would have very little to say to one another. On the other hand, their presence would also prevent it from becoming all too obvious how little anyone had to say to Herr Adamowski.