The Great Wall of China Read online

  In the morning he is awakened by the charwoman’s knocking; with a sigh of relief he welcomes the gentle tap on the door, whose inaudibility has in the past always been one of his sources of complaint, and is about to shout ‘Come in!’ when he hears another lively, faint, yet all but belligerent knocking. It’s the balls under the bed. Have they woken up? Have they, unlike him, gathered new strength overnight? ‘Just a moment,’ shouts Blumfeld to the charwoman, jumps out of bed and, taking great care to keep the balls behind him, throws himself on the floor, his back still towards them; then, twisting his head over his shoulder, he glances at the balls and – nearly lets out a curse. Like children pushing away blankets that annoy them at night, the balls have apparently spent all night pushing the rugs, with tiny twitching movements, so far away from under the bed that they are now once more on the parquet, where they can continue making their noise. ‘Back on to the rugs!’ says Blumfeld with an angry face, and only when the balls, thanks to the rugs, have become quiet again does he call in the charwoman. While she – a fat, dull-witted, stiff-backed woman – is laying the breakfast on the table and doing the few necessary chores, Blumfeld stands motionless in his dressing-gown by his bed so as to keep the balls in their place. With his eyes he follows the charwoman to see whether she notices anything. This, since she is hard of hearing, is very unlikely, and the fact that Blumfeld thinks he sees the charwoman stopping here and there, holding on to some furniture and listening with raised eyebrows, he puts down to his overwrought condition caused by a bad night’s sleep. It would relieve him if he could persuade the charwoman to speed up her work, but if anything she is slower than usual. She loads herself laboriously with Blumfeld’s clothes and shuffles out with them into the corridor, stays away a long time, and the din she makes beating the clothes echoes in his ears with slow, monotonous thuds. And during all this time Blumfeld has to remain on the bed, cannot move for fear of drawing the balls behind him, has to let the coffee – which he likes to drink as hot as possible – get cold, and can do nothing but stare at the drawn blinds beyond which the day is dimly dawning. At last the charwoman has finished, bids him good-morning, and is about to leave; but before she actually goes she hesitates by the door, moves her lips a little, and takes a long look at Blumfeld. Blumfeld is about to remonstrate when she at last departs. Blumfeld longs to fling the door open and shout after her that she is a stupid, idiotic old woman. However, when he reflects on what he actually has against her, he can only think of the paradox of her having clearly noticed nothing and yet trying to give the impression that she has. How confused his thoughts have become! And all on account of a bad night. Some explanation for his poor sleep he finds in the fact that last night he deviated from his usual habits by not smoking or drinking any kirsch. When for once I don’t smoke or drink kirsch – and this is the result of his reflections – I sleep badly.

  From now on he is going to take better care of his health, and he begins by fetching some cotton wool from his medicine chest which hangs over his bedside table and putting two little wads of it into his ears. Then he stands up and takes a trial step. Although the balls do follow he can hardly hear them; the addition of another wad makes them quite inaudible. Blumfeld takes a few more steps; nothing particularly unpleasant happens. Everyone for himself, Blumfeld as well as the balls, and although they are bound to one another they don’t disturb each other. Only once, when Blumfeld turns round rather suddenly and one ball fails to make the counter-movement fast enough, does he touch it with his knee. But this is the only incident. Otherwise Blumfeld calmly drinks his coffee; he is as hungry as though, instead of sleeping last night, he had gone for a long walk; he washes in cold, exceptionally refreshing water, and puts on his clothes. He still hasn’t pulled up the blinds; rather, as a precaution, he has preferred to remain in semi-darkness; he has no wish for the balls to be seen by other eyes. But now that he is ready to go he has somehow to provide for the balls in case they should dare – not that he thinks they will – to follow him into the street. He thinks of a good solution, opens the large wardrobe, and places himself with his back to it. As though divining his intentions, the balls steer clear of the wardrobe’s interior, taking advantage of every inch of space between Blumfeld and the wardrobe; when there’s no other alternative they jump into the wardrobe for a moment, but when faced by the dark, out they promptly jump again. Rather than be lured over the edge further into the wardrobe, they neglect their duty and stay by Blumfeld’s side. But their little ruses avail them nothing, for now Blumfeld himself climbs backwards into the wardrobe and they have to follow him. And with this their fate has been sealed, for on the floor of the wardrobe lie various smallish objects such as boots, boxes, small trunks which, although carefully arranged – Blumfeld now regrets this – nevertheless considerably hamper the balls. And when Blumfeld, having now pulled the door almost to, jumps out of it with an enormous leap such as he has not made for years, slams the door and turns the key, the balls are imprisoned. ‘Well, that worked,’ thinks Blumfeld, wiping the sweat from his face. What a din the balls are making in the wardrobe! It sounds as though they are desperate. Blumfeld, on the other hand, is very contented. He leaves the room and already the deserted corridor has a soothing effect on him. He takes the wool out of his ears and is enchanted by the countless sounds of the waking house. Few people are to be seen, it’s still very early.

  Downstairs in the hall in front of the low door leading to the charwoman’s basement apartment stands that woman’s ten-year-old son. The image of his mother, not one feature of the woman has been omitted in this child’s face. Bandy-legged, hands in his trouser pockets, he stands there wheezing, for he already has a goitre and can breathe only with difficulty. But whereas Blumfeld, whenever the boy crosses his path, usually quickens his step to spare himself the spectacle, today he almost feels like pausing for a moment. Even if the boy has been brought into the world by this woman and shows every sign of his origin, he is nevertheless a child, the thoughts of a child still dwell in this shapeless head, and if one were to speak to him sensibly and ask him something, he would very likely answer in a bright voice, innocent and reverential, and after some inner struggle one could bring oneself to pat these cheeks. Although this is what Blumfeld thinks, he nevertheless passes him by. In the street he realizes that the weather is pleasanter than he had suspected from his room. The morning mist has dispersed and patches of blue sky have appeared, brushed by a strong wind. Blumfeld has the balls to thank for his having left his room much earlier than usual; even the paper he has left unread on the table; in any case he has saved a great deal of time and can now afford to walk slowly. It is remarkable how little he worries about the balls now that he is separated from them. So long as they were following him they could have been considered as something belonging to him, something which, in passing judgement on his person, had somehow to be taken into consideration. Now, however, they were mere toys in his wardrobe at home. And it occurs to Blumfeld that the best way of rendering the balls harmless would be to put them to their original use. There in the hall stands the boy; Blumfeld will give him the balls, not lend them, but actually present them to him, which is surely tantamount to ordering their destruction. And even if they were to remain intact they would mean even less in the boy’s hands than in the wardrobe, the whole house would watch the boy playing with them, other children would join in, and the general opinion that the balls are things to play with and in no way life companions of Blumfeld would be firmly and irrefutably established. Blumfeld runs back into the house. The boy has just gone down the basement stairs and is about to open the door. So Blumfeld has to call the boy and pronounce his name, a name that to him seems as ludicrous as everything else connected with the child. He does so. ‘Alfred! Alfred!’ he shouts. The boy hesitates for a long time. ‘Come here!’ shouts Blumfeld. ‘I’ve got something for you.’ The janitor’s two little girls appear from the door opposite and, full of curiosity, take up positions on either side of Blumfeld. They
grasp the situation much more quickly than the boy and cannot understand why he doesn’t come at once. Without taking their eyes off Blumfeld they beckon to the boy, but cannot fathom what kind of present is awaiting Alfred. Tortured with curiosity, they hop from one foot to the other. Blumfeld laughs at them as well as at the boy. The latter seems to have figured it all out and climbs stiffly, clumsily up the steps. Not even in his gait can he manage to belie his mother, who, incidentally, has appeared in the basement doorway. To make sure that the charwoman also understands and in the hope that she will supervise the carrying out of his instructions, should it be necessary, Blumfeld shouts excessively loud. ‘Up in my room,’ says Blumfeld, ‘I have two lovely balls. Would you like to have them?’ Not knowing how to behave, the boy simply screws up his mouth, turns round and looks inquiringly down at his mother. The girls, however, promptly begin to jump around Blumfeld and ask him for the balls. ‘You will be allowed to play with them too,’ Blumfeld tells them, but waits for the boy’s answer. He could of course give the balls to the girls, but they strike him as too unreliable and for the moment he has more confidence in the boy. Meanwhile the latter, without having exchanged a word, has taken counsel with his mother and nods his assent to Blumfeld’s repeated question. ‘Then listen,’ says Blumfeld, who is quite prepared to receive no thanks for his gift. ‘Your mother has the key of my door, you must borrow it from her. But here is the key to my wardrobe, and in the wardrobe you will find the balls. Take good care to lock the wardrobe and the room again. But with the balls you can do what you like and you don’t have to bring them back. Have you understood me?’ Unfortunately, the boy has not understood. Blumfeld has tried to make everything particularly clear to this hopelessly dense creature, but for this very reason has repeated everything too often, has in turn too often mentioned keys, room, and wardrobe, and as a result the boy stares at him as though he were rather a seducer than his benefactor. The girls, on the other hand, have understood everything immediately, press against Blumfeld, and stretch out their hands for the key. ‘Wait a moment,’ says Blumfeld, by now annoyed with them all. Time, moreover, is passing, he can’t stand about much longer. If only the mother would say that she has understood him and take matters in hand for the boy! Instead of which she still stands down by the door, smiles with the affection of the bashful deaf, and is probably under the impression that Blumfeld up there has suddenly fallen for the boy and is hearing him his lessons. Blumfeld on the other hand can’t very well climb down the basement stairs and shout into the charwoman’s ear to make her son for God’s sake relieve him of the balls! It had required enough of his self-control as it was to entrust the key of his wardrobe for a whole day to this family. It is certainly not in order to save himself trouble that he is handing the key to the boy rather than himself leading the boy up and there giving him the balls. But he can’t very well first give the balls away and then immediately deprive the boy of them by – as would be bound to happen – drawing them after him as his followers. ‘Don’t you understand me then?’ asks Blumfeld almost wistfully after having started a fresh explanation which, however, he immediately interrupts at sight of the boy’s vacant stare. So vacant a stare renders one helpless. It could tempt one into saying more than one intends, if only to fill the vacancy with sense.

  Whereupon ‘We’ll fetch the balls for him!’ shout the girls. They are shrewd and have realized that they can obtain the balls only through using the boy as an intermediary, but that they themselves have to bring about this mediation. From the janitor’s room a clock strikes, warning Blumfeld to hurry. ‘Well, then, take the key,’ says Blumfeld, and the key is more snatched from his hand than given by him. He would have handed it to the boy with infinitely more confidence. ‘The key to the room you’ll have to get from the woman,’ Blumfeld adds. ‘And when you return with the balls you must hand both keys to her.’ ‘Yes, yes!’ shout the girls and run down the steps. They know everything, absolutely everything; and as though Blumfeld were infected by the boy’s denseness, he is unable to understand how they could have grasped everything so quickly from his explanations.

  Now they are already tugging at the charwoman’s skirt but, tempting as it would be, Blumfeld cannot afford to watch them carrying out their task, not only because it’s already late, but also because he has no desire to be present at the liberation of the balls. He would in fact prefer to be several streets away when the girls first open the door of his room. After all, how does he know what else he might have to expect from the balls! And so for the second time this morning he leaves the house. He has one last glimpse of the charwoman defending herself against the girls, and of the boy stirring his bandy legs to come to his mother’s assistance. It’s beyond Blumfeld’s comprehension why a creature like this servant should prosper and propagate in this world.

  While on his way to the linen factory, where Blumfeld is employed, thoughts about his work gradually get the upper hand. He quickens his step and, despite the delay caused by the boy, he is the first to arrive in his office. The office is a glass-enclosed room containing a writing-desk for Blumfeld and two standing desks for the two assistants subordinate to him. Although these standing desks are so small and narrow as to suggest they are meant for schoolchildren, this office is very crowded and the assistants cannot sit down, for then there would be no place for Blumfeld’s chair. As a result they stand all day, pressed against their desks. For them of course this is very uncomfortable, but it also makes it very difficult for Blumfeld to keep an eye on them. They often press eagerly against their desks not so much in order to work as to whisper to one another or even to take forty winks. They give Blumfeld a great deal of trouble; they don’t help him sufficiently with the enormous amount of work that is imposed on him. This work involves supervising the whole distribution of fabrics and cash among the women home-workers who are employed by the factory for the manufacture of certain fancy commodities. To appreciate the magnitude of this task an intimate knowledge of the general conditions is necessary. But since Blumfeld’s immediate superior has died some years ago, no one any longer possesses this knowledge, which is also why Blumfeld cannot grant anyone the right to pronounce an opinion on his work. The manufacturer, Herr Ottomar, for instance, clearly underestimates Blumfeld’s work; no doubt he recognizes that in the course of twenty years Blumfeld has deserved well of the factory, and this he acknowledges not only because he is obliged to, but also because he respects Blumfeld as a loyal, trustworthy person – he underestimates his work, nevertheless, for he believes it could be conducted by methods more simple and therefore in every respect more profitable than those employed by Blumfeld. It is said, and it is probably not incorrect, that Ottomar shows himself so rarely in Blumfeld’s department simply to spare himself the annoyance which the sight of Blumfeld’s working methods causes him. To be so unappreciated is undoubtedly sad for Blumfeld, but there is no remedy, for he cannot very well compel Ottomar to spend let us say a whole month on end in Blumfeld’s department in order to study the great variety of work being accomplished there, to apply his own allegedly better methods, and to let himself be convinced of Blumfeld’s soundness by the collapse of the department – which would be the inevitable result. And so Blumfeld carries on his work undeterred as before, gives a little start whenever Ottomar appears after a long absence, then with the subordinate’s sense of duty makes a feeble effort to explain to Ottomar this or that arrangement, whereupon the latter, his eyes lowered and giving a silent nod, passes on. But what worries Blumfeld more than this lack of appreciation is the thought that one day he will be compelled to leave his job, the immediate consequence of which will be pandemonium, a confusion no one will be able to straighten out because so far as he knows there isn’t a single soul in the factory capable of replacing him and of carrying on his job in a manner that could be relied upon to prevent months of the most serious interruptions. Needless to say, if the boss underestimates an employee the latter’s colleagues try their best to surpass him in this res
pect. In consequence everyone underestimates Blumfeld’s work; no one considers it necessary to spend any time training in Blumfeld’s department, and when new employees are hired not one of them is ever assigned to Blumfeld. As a result Blumfeld’s department lacks a younger generation to carry on. When Blumfeld, who up to then had been managing the entire department with the help of only one servant, demanded an assistant, weeks of bitter fighting ensued. Almost every day Blumfeld appeared in Ottomar’s office and explained to him calmly and in minute detail why an assistant was needed in his department. He was needed not by any means because Blumfeld wished to spare himself, Blumfeld had no intention of sparing himself, he was doing more than his share of work and this he had no desire to change, but would Herr Ottomar please consider how in the course of time the business had grown, how every department had been correspondingly enlarged, with the exception of Blumfeld’s department, which was invariably forgotten! And would he consider too how the work had increased just there! When Blumfeld had entered the firm, a time Herr Ottomar could probably not remember, they had employed some ten seamstresses, today the number varied between fifty and sixty. Such a job requires great energy; Blumfeld could guarantee that he was completely wearing himself out in this work, but that he will continue to master it completely he can henceforth no longer guarantee. True, Herr Ottomar had never flatly refused Blumfeld’s requests, this was something he could not do to an old employee, but the manner in which he hardly listened, in which he talked to others over Blumfeld’s head, made half-hearted promises and had forgotten everything in a few days – this behaviour was insulting to say the least. Not actually to Blumfeld. Blumfeld is no romantic; pleasant as honour and recognition may be, Blumfeld can do without them; in spite of everything he will stick to his desk as long as it is at all possible, in any case he is in the right, and right, even though on occasion it may take a long time, must prevail in the end. True, Blumfeld has at last been given two assistants, but what assistants! One might have thought Ottomar had realized he could express his contempt for the department even better by granting rather than by refusing it these assistants. It was even possible that Ottomar had kept Blumfeld waiting so long because he was looking for two assistants just like these, and – as may be imagined – took a long time to find them. And now of course Blumfeld could no longer complain; if he did, the answer could easily be foreseen: after all, he had asked for one assistant and had been given two, that’s how cleverly Ottomar had arranged things. Needless to say, Blumfeld complained just the same, but only because his predicament all but forced him to do so, not because he still hoped for any redress. Nor did he complain emphatically, but only by the way, whenever the occasion arose. Nevertheless, among his spiteful colleagues the rumour soon spread that someone had asked Ottomar if it were really possible that Blumfeld, who after all had been given such unusual aid, was still complaining. To which Ottomar answered that this was correct. Blumfeld was still complaining, and rightly so. He, Ottomar, had at last realized this and he intended gradually to assign to Blumfeld one assistant for each seamstress, in other words some sixty in all. In case this number should prove insufficient, however, he would let him have even more and would not cease until the bedlam, which had been developing for years in Blumfeld’s department, was complete. Now it cannot be denied that in this remark Ottomar’s manner of speech had been cleverly imitated, but Blumfeld had no doubts whatever that Ottomar would not dream of speaking about him in such a way. The whole thing was a fabrication of the loafers in the offices on the first floor. Blumfeld ignored it – if only he could as calmly have ignored the presence of the assistants! But there they stood, and could not be spirited away. Pale, weak children. According to their credentials they had already passed school age, but in reality this was difficult to believe. In fact their rightful place was so clearly at their mother’s knee that one would hardly have dared to entrust them to a teacher. They still couldn’t even move properly; standing up for any length of time tired them inordinately, especially when they first arrived. When left to themselves they promptly doubled up in their weakness, standing hunched and crooked in their corner. Blumfeld tried to point out to them that if they went on giving in to their indolence they would become cripples for life. To ask the assistants to make the slightest move was to take a risk; once when one of them had been ordered to carry something a short distance, he had run so eagerly that he had banged his knee against a desk. The room had been full of seamstresses, the desks covered in merchandise, but Blumfeld had been obliged to neglect everything and take the sobbing assistant into the office and there bandage his wound. Yet even this zeal on the part of the assistant was superficial; like actual children they tried once in a while to excel, but far more often – indeed almost always – they tried to divert their superior’s attention and to cheat him. Once, at a time of the most intensive work, Blumfeld had rushed past them, dripping with sweat, and had observed them secretly swapping stamps among the bales of merchandise. He had felt like banging them on the head with his fists, it would have been the only possible punishment for such behaviour, but they were after all only children and Blumfeld could not very well knock children down. And so he continued to put up with them. Originally he had imagined that the assistants would help him with the essential chores which at the moment of the distribution of goods required so much effort and vigilance. He had imagined himself standing in the centre behind his desk, keeping an eye on everything and making the entries in the books while the assistants ran to and fro, distributing everything according to his orders. He had imagined that his supervision which, sharp as it was, could not cope with such a crowd, would be complemented by the assistants’ attention; he had hoped that these assistants would gradually acquire experience, cease depending entirely on his orders, and finally learn to discriminate on their own between the seamstresses as to their trustworthiness and requirements. Blumfeld soon realized that all these hopes had been in vain and that he could not afford to let them even talk to the seamstresses. From the beginning they had ignored some of the seamstresses, either from fear or dislike; others to whom they felt partial they would sometimes run to meet at the door. To them the assistants would bring whatever the women wanted, pressing it almost secretly into their hands, although the seamstresses were perfectly entitled to receive it, would collect on a bare shelf for these favourites various cuttings, worthless remnants, but also a few still useful odds and ends, waving them blissfully at the women behind Blumfeld’s back and in return having sweets popped into their mouths. Blumfeld of course soon put an end to this mischief and the moment the seamstresses arrived he ordered the assistants back into their glass-enclosed cubicles. But for a long time they considered this to be a grave injustice, they sulked, wilfully broke their nibs, and sometimes, although not daring to raise their heads, even knocked loudly against the glass panes in order to attract the seamstresses’ attention to the bad treatment which in their opinion they were suffering at Blumfeld’s hands.