But why, despite thinking so carefully about all of this, could I never bring myself to adapt to events? Why did I hesitate so much to step onto every new path life put before me, and greet every approaching person with such anxiety, as if they were coming to do me harm? Sometimes I’d manage to forget myself for a while, finding something in another person that felt close to me. But then that dreadful verdict, lodged irretrievably in my mind, would surface at once and summon me back to reality: “Don’t forget—don’t forget that she was closer to you than this… And she still did what she did…” Whenever I saw someone drawing near to me, one step away, and let myself hope, I’d pull myself together at once: “No, no—she came much closer than that… There wasn’t even any distance left between us… Yet look at the end result!” I’d tell myself. Not to believe, to be unable to believe… I felt the horror of that every single day, every moment. Every attempt I made to escape that feeling came to nothing… I got married… But from the very first day, I understood that my wife was more distant from me than anyone else. I had children… I loved them, even knowing that they could never give me back what I had lost in life…
My work never interested me. I worked like a machine, without knowing what I was doing. I let myself be fooled, and even took a kind of pleasure in it. My brothers-in-law made a fool of me, and I didn’t care. My debts, the interest on my debts, and the costs of marriage ate up the few possessions I still had. The olive groves earned nothing. People who had money had gotten used to buying property from state holdings for next to nothing. A tree that could yield seven or eight liras of produce a year couldn’t find a buyer for its roots at half a lira. My brothers-in-law paid off my debts and took over my olive groves, purely to rescue me from my difficulties and prevent the family fortune from being scattered… All I had left was the dilapidated fourteen-room house and a few pieces of furniture. My wife’s father was still alive—he was a civil servant in Balıkesir. Through his connections, I became a clerk at a company in the provincial capital. I stayed there for years. As the family burden grew, my connection to life weakened, and the effort that should have increased instead disappeared entirely. My father-in-law died, and my sister-in-law and brothers-in-law became my responsibility. It was impossible to support all of them on the forty liras I earned. A distant relative of my wife got me a job in Ankara, at the bank where I now work. She hoped that because I knew foreign languages, I’d advance quickly despite my timid nature. It didn’t work out at all as she expected. Wherever I was, my presence or absence made no difference to those around me. Opportunities arose everywhere, and many people gave me brief hope of spending the affection I knew I had in abundance within me, of starting to live again. But I could never rid myself of that doubt: “What’s the point? If I’m only going to end up deceived and disappointed again, what’s the point?” I’d ask myself. I had believed in one single person in the world. I had believed so much that being deceived in that belief had left me with no capacity to believe anymore. I wasn’t angry at her. I felt it was impossible to be angry at her, to resent her, or to think ill of her. But I had been broken once. That hurt, felt toward the person I trusted most in life, had somehow spread to all humanity—because she had been the embodiment of all humankind to me. And then, as I saw that even after years had passed, I was still bound to her, I felt an even greater indignation in my soul. She must have forgotten me long ago. Who knows who she was living with now, who she was going around with. In the evenings at home, listening to the noise of the children, the slap of my wife’s slippers as she washed dishes, the clatter of plates, and the quarrels between my sister-in-law and brothers-in-law, I’d close my eyes and imagine where Maria might be at that moment. Maybe she was with a kindred spirit again, watching the red-leafed trees in the Botanical Garden, or in a dim-lit exhibition, under the sun’s rays streaming through the windows, admiring the immortal works of master brushes. One evening, on my way home, I stopped at the neighborhood grocer’s to pick up a few things. Just as I was about to step out, the radio in the bachelor’s rented room across the street began playing the overture to Weber’s opera Oberon. I nearly dropped the packages. That was one of the few operas I’d attended with Maria, and I knew she had a special fondness for Weber. She used to whistle that overture on the street. I felt a longing as fresh as if I had parted from her only yesterday. The pain of losing the most precious possessions, wealth, every kind of worldly happiness fades with time. Only missed opportunities never leave the mind, and each recollection stabs the heart. The reason, I suppose, is the thought, “It didn’t have to be this way!”—otherwise, people are always ready to accept what they consider fate.
I received no more interest from my wife, my children, or the household in general; but I knew I had no right to expect it. That feeling of uselessness, which I had first experienced on that strange New Year’s Eve in Berlin, had become fully rooted in me. What need did these people have of me? Could they tolerate me just for a few pennies of bread money? People don’t need each other’s material help and money—they need each other’s love and interest. Without that, having a family is really just “supporting a bunch of strangers.” I longed for the moment when that would end, when they would no longer depend on me in any way. Gradually my whole life became a yearning for that day, still far off. I was like a prisoner waiting for his sentence to be served. The days had value only insofar as they brought me closer to that end. I lived on like a plant—without complaint, without consciousness, without will. My feelings slowly grew numb. Nothing affected me, nothing pleased me.
It was impossible to be angry at people, because the most valuable, the best, the most beloved person had done me the greatest wrong. Could I expect anything else from the rest? It was also impossible to love people or approach them again, because I had been deceived by the person I believed in and trusted most. Could I trust anyone else?
So the years would pass, the day I awaited would come, and everything would end. I wanted nothing else. Life had played a cruel trick on me. Fine. I blamed neither myself nor others now, accepted things as they were, and bore it silently. But there was no need for it to go on. I was bored—simply bored. I had no other complaint.
Then one day… That is, yesterday, Saturday, I came home around noon and changed. My wife said we needed a few things. “Tomorrow the shops will be closed,” she said. “Go to the market and do this one more errand.” I got dressed reluctantly and walked to the central square. It was quite warm. There were many people strolling aimlessly through the streets, seeking a bit of evening coolness in the dusty air. After finishing my shopping, I tucked the packages under my arm and walked toward the statue. I wanted to return home not by the usual crooked streets but by the asphalt road, even if it meant going a bit out of my way. A huge clock hanging outside one of the shops showed six o’clock. Suddenly I felt someone grab my arm. A woman’s voice, almost shouting, sounded right in my ear:
“Herr Raif!”
I was terribly startled by that German address. I nearly shook myself loose and ran away. But the woman held me tight.
“No, I’m not mistaken—you really are Herr Raif! My goodness, how one can change!” she cried, and passersby stared at us.
I slowly raised my head. Even before I saw her face, I recognized her from her massive figure. Her voice, too, hadn’t changed a bit.
“Ah, Frau van Tiedemann—who would have thought of seeing you in Ankara?” I said.
“No, not Frau van Tiedemann… Just Frau Döppke now! I sacrificed a ‘van’ for a husband, but I’m not too much the worse for it!”
“Congratulations… so you…”
“Yes, yes, just as you guessed. Not long after you left, we also left the pension… together, of course… We went to Prague.”
The moment she said Prague, my heart ached. Now I couldn’t suppress the thing I had been trying to keep out of my mind. But what was I going to ask? She didn’t know about my relationship with Maria—what would she make of my question? Wouldn’t she ask how I knew her? And then what she might say… Wouldn’t it be better not to learn any of it? What was the use of finding out after so many years—ten full years, even a little more?
I realized we were still standing in the middle of the street.
“Let’s sit down somewhere,” I said. “There are things we ought to ask each other… I’m still amazed to see you in Ankara!”
“Yes, it would be nice to sit somewhere, but our train is almost due—less than an hour left… We mustn’t miss it… If I’d known you were in Ankara, I’d have certainly looked you up. We arrived last night, and we’re leaving this evening.”
Only then did I notice the silent, sallow-faced girl of eight or nine standing beside the woman. I smiled.
“Your daughter?” I asked.
“No,” she said, “a relative… My son is finishing his law degree!”
“Still recommending books to him?”
She couldn’t remember for a moment, then laughed.
“Yes, you’re right, but he doesn’t listen to my recommendations anymore. He was so small back then… about twelve… Good Lord, how fast the years go by!”
“Yes… but you haven’t changed at all!”
“Neither have you!”
I remembered she had been more sincere a moment ago, and I said nothing.
We walked downhill. I still didn’t know how to begin asking about Maria Puder. I kept circling around irrelevant topics that didn’t concern me.
“You still haven’t told me why you came to Ankara.”
“Oh, yes—let me tell you that. We didn’t come to Ankara; we’re just passing through… We stopped on the way.”
She agreed to sit for five minutes at a lemonade stand, and there she continued her story.
“My husband is in Baghdad now. You know, he’s a colonial goods merchant!”
“But Baghdad isn’t a German colony, I believe.”
“I know, dear—but my husband specializes in tropical products. He does business with dates in Baghdad.”
“Was he also in the date trade in Cameroon?”
She looked at me as if to say, “You’re very impertinent.”
“I don’t know—write and ask him. He doesn’t involve women in business matters!”
“Where are you going now?”
“To Berlin… to visit the old country, and also…” She gestured to the pale child beside her. “And also for this child. She was a bit thin, so she spent the winter with us. Now I’m taking her back.”
“So you travel to Berlin frequently?”
“Twice a year!”
“Herr Döppke’s business seems to be doing well.”
She laughed and preened.
I still couldn’t ask. I now realized myself that my hesitation came not from not knowing how to ask, but from fear of what I might learn. But wasn’t everything the same to me? There was no living feeling left inside me. What was I afraid of? Maria could have found her own Herr Döppke by now. Maybe she was still single, chasing from man to man, looking for “someone to believe in.” Surely she must have even forgotten the lines of my face.
When I thought about it, I couldn’t remember her face either, and for the first time in ten years, I realized that neither of us had a photograph of the other… I was amazed. How had we never thought of that when we parted? Even if we had counted on meeting again soon and trusted the strength of our memories, how was it that I had only now noticed? Had I never felt the need to summon her face before my eyes?
I remembered that in the first months, I had preserved every contour of her face in my memory and could easily visualize it at any moment… Then later… once I understood that everything was over, I had carefully avoided seeing or imagining that face. I knew I couldn’t bear it. The face of the Madonna in a Fur Coat—even if only in my imagination—was so powerful and affecting that it could shatter all my composure.
But now, when I wanted to recall all those old days and memories, confident that I would feel no excitement, I searched for her face—and couldn’t find it… And I didn’t even have a photograph of her…
What was the point?
Frau Döppke looked at her watch and stood up. We walked together toward the station.
The woman was very pleased with Ankara and Turkey.
“I’ve never seen a country where foreigners are treated with such respect!” she said. “Even Switzerland, though it owes its prosperity to foreign tourists, isn’t like this. People there look at every foreigner almost as if he’s forced his way into their home… But here in Turkey, everyone seems to be waiting for a chance to do a foreigner a favor. And I find Ankara very charming!”
The elderly woman kept talking. The little girl walked about fifteen feet ahead, touching the trees along the side of the road with her hand. After we had come quite close to the station, I made a final decision and began to speak, trying to sound as indifferent as possible.
“Do you have many relatives in Berlin?”
“No, not very many… I’m originally from Prague, a Czech German… My first husband was Dutch… Why do you ask?”
“While I was there, I saw a woman who said she was your relative…”
“Where?”
“In Berlin… I happened upon her at an art exhibition… I think she was a painter…”
The woman suddenly became interested.
“And then?” she said.
I hesitated.
“Then… I don’t know… We spoke once or twice, I think. She had a beautiful painting… and on that occasion…”
“Do you remember her name?”
“I think it was Puder… Yes, Maria Puder. Her signature was on the painting… and in the catalog too.”
The woman didn’t answer. I pulled myself together again.
“Do you know her?” I asked.
“Yes. Why did she tell you she was my relative?”
“I don’t know… I think I mentioned the pension where I was staying, and she said she had a relative there… Or something like that… I can’t remember exactly, of course. It was ten years ago.”
“Yes… no small amount of time… Her mother once told me that her daughter talked constantly about a Turk—all day long, she said. I wondered if it was you. But isn’t it strange? The woman never even saw that Turk her daughter was so taken with… She went to Prague that year, and she learned from her daughter that the Turkish student had already left Berlin!”
We had reached the station. The woman walked toward the train. I was afraid that if I changed the subject, I would never get back to it and would never learn what I really wanted to know. So I looked into her eyes with keen interest, waiting for her to continue.
After dismissing the hotel porter who had loaded her luggage into the compartment, she turned to me.
“Why are you asking?” she said. “You said you barely knew Maria.”
“Yes… but she must have left a very strong impression on me… I liked her painting very much.”
“She was a good painter.”
With a sudden anxiety I felt rising inside me but couldn’t identify, I asked:
“Did you say ‘was’? Not anymore?”
The woman looked around, searched for the little girl, and seeing that she had already climbed into the compartment and sat down, she leaned her head toward me.
“No, of course not,” she said. “Because she’s no longer alive.”
“What?”
I heard the word come out of my mouth like a whistle. People around us turned to look, and the child in the compartment stuck her head out the window and stared at me in surprise.
The woman’s eyes moved over me carefully.
“Why are you so startled?” she said. “Why did you go pale? You said you barely knew her.”
“All the same,” I said, “an unexpected death—it’s the last thing you’d imagine.”