Kathleen Spivack - Unspeakable Things

Only the fingers of the Tolstoi Quartet remained intractable and scratched at the sides of their jars impatiently as Felix approached with his brew. “Good,” Felix said. “So you can still play, my pretty ones, hmm?” The fingers drummed madly in response. “Gut.” He passed quickly on to his own preserved scrap of scrotum. “Was it growing bigger?” he wondered. Felix fed it an extra drop of the mixture, even as he felt guilty for doing so. This was something he had never written to Helmut about.

“This is strange,” he told Schatzie as he carefully put the rest of his mixture away again. “I have not heard from Helmut for almost a month.” Schatzie looked sympathetic but offered no response. “Strange,” murmured Felix. He wondered how things were with his old friend. But Felix didn’t really worry. The experiments were still going on, he knew, and Helmut was no doubt too busy just at the moment. It had been nearly a month since Felix had received a new shipment of test tubes from the great drug companies of Germany. But such delays were common nowadays. “Here, Schatzie, come here,” said Felix, tightening his monocle. The dog approached, and Felix carefully caught a bit of the dog’s saliva onto a slide. He put the cover on it and inserted it under his microscope. “Would you like to see?” Felix picked up the squirming dog and held her near the microscope. Schatzie’s eyes looked wide and terrified, but she adored her master and would let him do almost anything with her. “This is what your spit looks like, Schatzie,” Felix told her, holding her toward the eyepiece of the microscope. Schatzie wiggled and finally Felix put her down. “Hmmm, interesting,” he said, taking a look himself.

How he regretted not having taken more of Marthe with him to this new world. She had been a beauty. But stupid, he reminded himself. What other part would he have taken if he had thought of it in time? Not her nose, that definitely Jewish nose. Maybe a piece of her ear? Her hair? Her breast? Felix felt a bit revolted.

He picked up a scrap of paper with Herbert’s writing on it and let it drift down into a waiting formaldehyde-filled jar. But the writing did not grow bigger or more clarified to his gaze. The ink ran; the letters were more inscrutable than ever. “Aaach!” he said in disgust.

It was eight o’clock in the morning. The doorbell rang. The first patient of the morning waited upon Felix’s ministrations. Doctor and dachshund moved toward the entryway, past the photographs of beautiful children in white pants and dresses, with dark beseeching eyes. The doorbell rang a second time.

Felix opened the door. There Maria stood, heart heavy, holding the hand of the Rat. “The child’s mother could not come,” said Anna meekly. “So, my old friend, here I am.”

Felix’s heart stopped. He made no move.

“My friend,” said Anna sadly, “do you not recognize me?” She stood in front of him, her eyes downcast, her spine bowed into a complete question mark.

Anna entered humbly, and Maria, shrinking, followed. This was not her idea, this visit. Her mother had gratefully allotted to the Rat all the tasks she really had no time for. One of these was the visits to her children’s doctor so early on Saturday morning. Ilse was already out at the grocery store, doing the shopping, the haggling for the family for the week. It was her only day to try to catch up with their lives. She had had no time to think during the week, not of the children, nor of her husband. She and David were working in parallel, working so the family could survive. Ilse pushed all further thoughts of him from her mind.

“I won’t go!” Maria had protested.

But her mother, impatient — what is wrong with this child? — pushed her toward the door. So oversensitive. So selfish. “Nonsense. Auntie will go with you. Mummy is too busy.” Maria tried to resist. “Come,” said Ilse, trying not to let her impatience show. “After all, you are a big girl now; Mummy cannot always go with you everywhere.”

“Come, my darling,” said the Rat, grasping Maria’s hand in her own firm small one. “It is early, and your mother must do the shopping. Afterward, we will come back and I will teach you a card game. A special card game,” she promised. “It was taught to me by the Tsar’s valet himself.” Maria could not resist the efficiency of the two women.

Now Doktor Felix did not even notice the presence of the little girl. Which annoyed Maria further. She removed herself from the scene, wafted up near the ceiling, where, along with the hypocritical photographs of angelic children, she could survey with superiority the adult scene below.

“Can it be?” asked Felix in a hushed voice. Schatzie padded in from the examining room and stood silently behind her master. Felix’s voice rose. “After all these years?”

“Yes.” The Rat nodded.

Felix seized her little hands. “My dearest Countess,” he murmured, pressing her hands to his lips. Felix loved nobility. Imagine, the Countess in his own New York office. “Come in,” he said, gesturing. “You see, I am quite installed in the New World.” Felix was beside himself. “May I offer you a cup of tea? I was just finishing breakfast myself.”

“We just had breakfast, but thank you,” replied the Rat, hastily surveying, from her bent position, the parquet floors and worn carpet of Felix’s rooms. “Ah, Schatzie!” she cried with delight. Upon hearing her name, the dog wagged all parts of her body and shuffled forward, licking Anna’s right foot. “Can it be the same Schatzie that I knew? Is she still with you?”

“The same!” replied Felix proudly. “She was permitted to escape with me. Special permission,” he whispered in a conspiratorial way. “Special permission, hmm?” He crooned to the dog, grasping the rolls of flesh about her neck. Schatzie appeared ecstatic and drooled happily. “But she’s old now,” he told Anna.

“Who is not?” the Rat said, sighing in response. She looked at Felix sharply. “And Marthe?”

Felix shook his head.

“My dear, forgive me,” said Anna, taking his hand in hers. “I am so sorry.”

Maria tugged impatiently on Anna’s hand, but neither of the adults noticed her.

Felix shook his head again. “And the Count?” he responded in a low, hoarse voice.

Now it was Anna’s turn to shake her head. “Gone,” she said. “And the boys also.”

“Both boys?” echoed Felix in a low, horrified voice. The Rat looked away. She squeezed Maria’s hand more tightly.

“Alas, dear lady,” said Felix, “we must speak no more of such sad things.” He could not stop looking at Anna’s curved spine. It entered his mind like a huge force field and drew all his attention toward it. He tried to pull his mind from its magnetic field, but his mind instantly slid toward it again, attaching with an almost audible click.

Felix bent down, putting his face close to Maria’s. “And what of this bad girl, hmm? How has my bad girl been?” Maria shrank from Felix’s bushy face. “Have you been eating your porridge for Uncle Felix, hmm?” Maria did not answer. She pressed her body more closely into itself. “Has she been eating her oatmeal like a good girl?” Maria was tongue-tied, as usual, before the two adults.

“Look at this, my girl,” Felix growled, pulling his eyebrow up and down with the string. The bushy eyebrow wiggled like a centipede on his face. “Look at this!” Maria did not dare raise her eyes. “This is a bad girl,” Felix told Anna. “Have you been doing everything Uncle Felix told you to do? Everything?” he demanded angrily.

“Don’t be afraid,” whispered the Rat hastily. “He is making a little joke, that is all.” The two adults laughed in a condescending manner.