Laszlo Krasznahorkai - War & War

There was nothing else the interpreter could do, he being the way he was, which is to say someone who took certain things then gave them back, for that was what had happened, he had taken away something then given it back, which was not, of course, to say that this made everything all right, but at least he’d be receiving six hundred a month for a while, and this was still more than before, the utterly drenched interpreter told the wholly uncomprehending Mexican taxi driver, it was better than nothing, although if there was something he had not foreseen, he said, pointing to Korin who was sleeping in the backseat with his mouth wide open, it was him, indeed there were many things he could anticipate, added the interpreter vigorously shaking his head, but he would never have dreamt that this man would have the gall to ring him up, especially seeing that it was precisely because of him that he had been fired, dropped like a piece of shit, but this guy did not fuck around, no, he went and called him up thinking that because he had given him his damned card it meant that he could just call him up, which he did, begging him to see him and help him, because, the halfwit lummox was completely lost in New York, the interpreter went on, lost, you hear? he asked the Mexican driver, lost, would you believe it, he exclaimed and slapped his knee, as if that mattered to anyone in a town where everyone is utterly lost, and he would have slammed the phone down on him and let the stupid asshole go hang himself, when the guy blurts out that he has a bit of money and he needs accommodation and someone to help him out these first few days, the shithead, that kind of thing, in fact precisely that kind of thing, and something about standing by him, adding the detail that he could pay up to six hundred dollars a month but no more, he apologized on the phone, because he had to spread his money carefully, he said, because, Korin didn’t really know how to put it, Mr. Sárváry, but he was a little exhausted by the journey, and tried to explain how he was not an ordinary passenger, that he wasn’t simply visiting New York but had a mission to accomplish there, and that time was really pressing now and he had need of help, someone to assist him, which, of course, didn’t mean doing a lot, in fact practically nothing, only being a particular someone to whom he could turn in difficulties, that was all really, and if it was at all possible, Korin had asked him, could he come for him now, in person, because he still had no idea what was what, or, to put it another way, he had no idea even where to put himself, that he knew neither the how nor why of anything, though when asked where he actually was, he did at least know the name of the hotel, so what else could he do, for six hundred rotten dollars he dashed straight down to Little Italy, because it was there, by the Bowery, that the guy was hanging out, all for six hundred dollars, the interpreter exclaimed and gazed at the taxi driver in hope of comprehension or sympathy, that was why he got straight onto the subway, yes, he jumped to it for six hundred lousy dollars, not that that was how he had imagined it, no, he hadn’t the faintest inkling, that this was the way he would be spending his time when he arrived in America, that this was how he would end up, that all he could call his own would be an apartment on West 159th paid three years in advance, and that, of all impossible things, it would be this guy who’d get him out of trouble, though that was precisely what had happened, for the guy having asked him the question it came to him in a flash that he had a back room for which six hundred was laughable but every little bit helped, so he told him on the phone he’d be there in an hour and Korin had echoed him, crying out in delight, “An hour!” going on to assure him that he, Mr. Sárváry, had saved his life, then went down into the lobby and paid his bill, which was one hundred and sixty dollars, as he rather bitterly informed him some time later, going out into the street and sitting on the corner of a wooden fence by the wood-paneling store opposite the hotel, and blessed the moment when, after his disturbing encounter at The Sunshine Hotel, he finally realized that he had reached the limit, there was no point in hanging around, and if he wanted to avoid complete and utter failure he had to have immediate assistance, and there was in fact only one person on whom he could call, just one, whose number was somewhere on a business card in one of his pockets, and having found it and read the ornate typography with some care, it turned out to be Mr. Joseph Sárváry, at 212-611-1937.

It might be the first time this has happened in the USA but I haven’t come to start a new life, Korin protested right at the beginning, and not being able to decide whether his companion, who, having consumed his beer, had slumped heavily across the table, had heard him at all or was fast asleep, he put down his glass, leaned over and put his hand on the man’s shoulder, carefully looking around him and adding rather more quietly: I would rather like to finish the old one.

He paid for everything: the hot meal at the Chinese, the vast amounts of beer they consumed, the cigarettes that followed, and even for the taxi that took them to the Upper West Side, absolutely everything, and, what’s more, with a joyful equanimity that was the sign of an inexpressible lightening of spirit, for, as he kept saying, he had seen no light at the end of the tunnel, the ground beneath his feet had begun remorselessly to shift, until the interpreter reappeared, and he could only thank him, and thank him again, for minutes on end, which made the whole thing even more intolerable, said the interpreter in the kitchen, for after that the words started pouring from his mouth and he told him everything in the smallest detail from A through to Z, from the point of leaving the airport, in such fine detail he practically described every step, the way he put one foot in front of the other, and the mind-blowing tedium! that was no exaggeration, he said, it really did take hours, because he started with the guy who allegedly knocked him flat before he had even reached the arrivals hall, then how he failed to find a bus that would have taken him downtown, but how he had found a taxi instead and who the driver was, and how his hand was on his groin all the way into Manhattan, and then some strange business about something he should have seen through the window on the journey but didn’t, and so they proceeded, no joking, yard by yard, missing nothing on the way, into Manhattan, and then what it was like at the hotel, seriously, going through each item of furniture and every little thing he did through the days he spent there, how he didn’t dare leave the room though he eventually did so in order to buy some bananas, and that’s no joke either, laughed the interpreter leaning on the kitchen table, though it sounds like a joke, but believe me, it wasn’t, that’s the kind of guy this guy really was, and he managed to find his way into some kind of prison too, telling me about iron bars, and how he escaped from there, in other words he is utterly screwed up, his head’s screwed up, you can see it in his eyes, he’s some kind of word nut, an absolute blabbermouth, and, what’s more, he has a constant theme, to which he keeps returning, that he has come here to die, and because of this, he says, though it’s an innocent enough matter, he has started to feel a bit uncomfortable with it, because though this spiel about dying is probably part shit, it is, in the end, not altogether to be ignored, because even though the guy looks innocent you have to take such things seriously, so that even she, he said pointing to his lover across the table, has to keep her eyes on him all the time, which is not to say there is any cause for anxiety for if there were he wouldn’t have allowed the guy in, no, there isn’t, for this guy was simply — and he would, said the interpreter, swear on it if he had to — talking out of his ass and you couldn’t take anything he said seriously, though one could never be too careful, there’s always that chance in a thousand, and what happens then, what if the guy happens to do it here at his place, the interpreter sucked his teeth, that wouldn’t be nice, but what the fuck else was he to do, for just this morning everything had looked hopeless, he couldn’t get a hundred together for the evening, and now, if you please, it’s not even three o’clock yet and here are six sweet hundred-dollar bills, a full Chinese meal, plus fifteen beers, a pack of Marlboros, not at all bad going given his black mood that morning, seeing that it had all dropped into his lap, just like that, this guy with his six hundred, this little moneybags, grinned the interpreter, that’s six hundred dollars a month, which is nothing to sneeze at, not a sum you can just say No to, because, after all, what’s the situation, the guy crashes here, said the interpreter, giving a wide yawn and leaning back in his chair, and it’ll be all right, he’ll survive, and this guy, Korin, is not going to get under his feet, since his needs seemed to be minimal, meaning a table to work at, a chair, a bed to sleep on, a sink, and a few common household items, that was all he wanted, no more, and he knows he has been provided with all these things, and he can’t thank him enough for them, or stop telling him how he has relieved him of a great burden, and you can have enough of this shit, he said, he had no wish to hear it all again, so he had left Korin in the back room, which is where he had stayed, alone, running his eyes over and over the place, this back room, his room, he had said aloud, but not too loud, not so that Mr. Sárváry and his partner should hear him, for, really, he didn’t want to be a nuisance to anyone, nor would he, he decided, be a nuisance, then sat down on the bed, got up again, went over to the window, then sat back down on the bed once more, before getting up again, and so it went on for several minutes, since the feeling of joy continued welling up in him, overwhelming him, so time and again he had to sit down or stand up and eventually achieved complete happiness by pulling the table ever so gently over to the window, turning it so the light should fall fully on it, drew up the chair, then sat on the bed and stared at the table, at the arrangement of it, stared and stared, gauging whether the light was falling on it in the best possible way, then turning the chair a little so that it was at a different angle to the table, so it should fit better, staring at that now, and it was plain that the happiness was almost too much for him, for he now had somewhere to live, a place with a table and a chair, because he was happy that Mr. Sárváry existed in the first place, and that he should have this apartment on the top floor of 547 West 159th Street, right next to the stairs to the attic, and without the resident’s name on the door.