Italians who wriggled dog-fashion.
“Yes,” she answered. In the Census-Taker’s disturbed sleep, the white
handkerchief, recently blown into, fluttered down like a child’s parachute to the
ground.
“You must get him back to the rooms. Be careful not to fall. Get some sleep,
you look tired. I’ll come and see you in the morning after it’s done, and remember, there’s
no danger.” She smelled a breath of tobacco as my cheek touched her forehead for a moment,
and I stepped off, no longer recognized, among the grey masqueraders. Alone, Jutta followed
the length of three walls, past outstretched thick feet,past bodies
hanging arm in arm, until she found where the Census-Taker was sitting, the last in a row of
tallow girls. Gently, holding beneath one arm, she made him rise until his strong breath
fumed about her throat, until his red eyes were narrowed full on her face, and speaking
softly, she propelled him along. Feeling the narrow doorway, they found themselves out in
the night air, alone. In the receding storehouse, the dancers massed together in the cold
tart atmosphere to perform, couple by couple all night, some distasteful ritual, whereby
those with uncovered bellies and tousled hair walked in their midst as easily and unnoticed
as the most infected and sparkling damsel.
Jutta’s son, the fairy, fled for his life, his knees the size of
finger-joints whirling in every direction like the un-coordinated thrashings of a young and
frightened fox.
The Duke continued to prod and tap with the gleaming cane, drew the coat
tighter about his chest.
Jutta’s daughter watched in the window, her golden curls tight like a wig
about the narrow face.
Jutta herself, with the Census-Taker heavily against her shoulders, started
down the cinder path, while over all the town and sty-covered outskirts hung a somber,
early, Pentecostal chill. She moved slowly because the man mumbled thickly in her ear and
his feet caught against the half-buried bricks that lined the path. Finally she could no
longer hear the music and was quickly back in the thick deserted kingdom of crumbling
buildings and roosting birds, the asylum all about her. She wanted to get home to sleep.
I followed, far ahead of them, the clay contours of the railroad tracks,
crossed the wooden scaffoldover the canal, smelled the rivulets of fog,
heard the slapping of deflated, flat rubber boats against the rocks, made my way across ruts
and pieces of shattered wood. I knew that soon the American on the motorcycle, the only
Allied overseer in this part of Germany, would be passing through the town, shivering with
cold, mud-covered and trembling, hunched forward over the handle bars, straining with
difficulty to see the chopped-up road in the darkness. The main highway, cracked badly from
armored convoys, crossed the town at a sharp bend where the low wet fields faced the abrupt
end of a few parallel streets of shapeless brick houses. A log lay across the road, heavy
and invisible. For a moment, I remembered my true love, and then I was following the rough
line of the log, leaving the town behind, and slipping in haste, I dropped down beside the
two soft murmuring voices and leaned against the steep embankment.
“He’ll be here soon.”
“Ja, der Tod
.”
Backs to the road, we looked out across the endless grey fields and almost
expected to see barrels of smoke and the red glare of shooting flares through the twisted
stunted trees.
Jutta could not believe that I was in danger, but some dull warning voice
seemed to try to speak from the leaning buildings, and the Census-Taker babbled in her ear;
some voice, a consideration, tried to force its way through her blunted journey. As she
passed the building where Balamir had once been kept, she felt this new twist in things and
did not want to lose me. Years before she would have seen the face pressed to the window and
would have heard
“Yes,” she answered. In the Census-Taker’s disturbed sleep, the white
handkerchief, recently blown into, fluttered down like a child’s parachute to the
ground.
“You must get him back to the rooms. Be careful not to fall. Get some sleep,
you look tired. I’ll come and see you in the morning after it’s done, and remember, there’s
no danger.” She smelled a breath of tobacco as my cheek touched her forehead for a moment,
and I stepped off, no longer recognized, among the grey masqueraders. Alone, Jutta followed
the length of three walls, past outstretched thick feet,past bodies
hanging arm in arm, until she found where the Census-Taker was sitting, the last in a row of
tallow girls. Gently, holding beneath one arm, she made him rise until his strong breath
fumed about her throat, until his red eyes were narrowed full on her face, and speaking
softly, she propelled him along. Feeling the narrow doorway, they found themselves out in
the night air, alone. In the receding storehouse, the dancers massed together in the cold
tart atmosphere to perform, couple by couple all night, some distasteful ritual, whereby
those with uncovered bellies and tousled hair walked in their midst as easily and unnoticed
as the most infected and sparkling damsel.
Jutta’s son, the fairy, fled for his life, his knees the size of
finger-joints whirling in every direction like the un-coordinated thrashings of a young and
frightened fox.
The Duke continued to prod and tap with the gleaming cane, drew the coat
tighter about his chest.
Jutta’s daughter watched in the window, her golden curls tight like a wig
about the narrow face.
Jutta herself, with the Census-Taker heavily against her shoulders, started
down the cinder path, while over all the town and sty-covered outskirts hung a somber,
early, Pentecostal chill. She moved slowly because the man mumbled thickly in her ear and
his feet caught against the half-buried bricks that lined the path. Finally she could no
longer hear the music and was quickly back in the thick deserted kingdom of crumbling
buildings and roosting birds, the asylum all about her. She wanted to get home to sleep.
I followed, far ahead of them, the clay contours of the railroad tracks,
crossed the wooden scaffoldover the canal, smelled the rivulets of fog,
heard the slapping of deflated, flat rubber boats against the rocks, made my way across ruts
and pieces of shattered wood. I knew that soon the American on the motorcycle, the only
Allied overseer in this part of Germany, would be passing through the town, shivering with
cold, mud-covered and trembling, hunched forward over the handle bars, straining with
difficulty to see the chopped-up road in the darkness. The main highway, cracked badly from
armored convoys, crossed the town at a sharp bend where the low wet fields faced the abrupt
end of a few parallel streets of shapeless brick houses. A log lay across the road, heavy
and invisible. For a moment, I remembered my true love, and then I was following the rough
line of the log, leaving the town behind, and slipping in haste, I dropped down beside the
two soft murmuring voices and leaned against the steep embankment.
“He’ll be here soon.”
“Ja, der Tod
.”
Backs to the road, we looked out across the endless grey fields and almost
expected to see barrels of smoke and the red glare of shooting flares through the twisted
stunted trees.
Jutta could not believe that I was in danger, but some dull warning voice
seemed to try to speak from the leaning buildings, and the Census-Taker babbled in her ear;
some voice, a consideration, tried to force its way through her blunted journey. As she
passed the building where Balamir had once been kept, she felt this new twist in things and
did not want to lose me. Years before she would have seen the face pressed to the window and
would have heard
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