I got almost no sleep. But I fell in love with the Carpet Bar. Everywhere else, I’d suffer like an animal. Think strange contradictory thoughts. Get carried away by strong emotions. Just generally be bizarre. But not at Teppich Bar. I’d follow the carpets’ strings and threads as they intertwined in ornamental patterns and then went on to vanish into the inscrutable underside. The top, which was what I could see, was covered with beasts and birds and flowers and people. All gathered together in dazzling colors, and nothing disturbed their peaceful presence. Riders on horseback, falcons on their outstretched arms. An eagle on high. Waiting. Musicians holding their breath, not sending it into their barbaric instruments of twisted wood, a princess in midstride, prepared to dance, prepared to please her beloved, standing full of love, not even stirring. I saw it, it was in the carpet.
But then I started to suffer again. I saw that woman. It was love at first sight. Her pale fragile face framed in thick black hair. And every bone in that face! She touched her companion’s elbow gently: Now you may lead me where you will, but only as long as I grant you permission, I may take wing at any moment …
I knew I loved her strides, and the way they made the air swish along the edge of her dress … the way she would fix her little finger, for an imperceptible instant, at some point in space, space which until she entered it merely existed … uncharged … empty and desolate … I could’ve loved that space alone, preserving it in a silver-trimmed ivory case till the end of my time … naturally, though, I’d’ve rather had her. They settled in a few steps away. The native snapped his fingers, and terrifying the waiter with his crude, vulgar voice, forced him to take their ridiculous order. I cleared my throat … she looked at me … I had to lean on the table. I felt extreme psychophysical desire. I glanced in her direction. She was still sitting there. All of a sudden I felt sick. My genes were going crazy. Those tiny little beasts that everyone’s got inside them were regrouping their ranks. My biorhythm began a new chapter of living. I’m a sensitive guy.
But then … I tried to be reasonable. I studied her escort. In times of turmoil it’s best to hone in on the adversary, render him an object of hatred. But he was … I had to admit, a likable guy … tall … after all, my woman wouldn’t spend the evening with just any old bum, that’s obvious, I set my mind at ease … he was dressed normal, didn’t overdo it, shoes, pants, somethin underneath, somethin on top … yeah, he’s alright … an me? All kindsa stuff under my nails, in my hair, yeah right, whores an spittoons … I was a spitboy, a Kanak … but if she could’ve seen through my rumpled warmup jacket into my wild red heart, she would’ve seen herself in there, reflected as if in venetian glass … she didn’t know about my tender, hungry, crooked arms … yet … I scoped the room and ducked under the table, the carpets blurred into a motley jumble … calm quiet colors melting into chaos … I struck out under the tables … cautiously, like a long-tailed monkey … eluding prying eyes … I got in there and listened … back home, on Charles Bridge … she’s some kina hat seller, one of us, I rejoiced, and then suddenly I froze: Sir! She called him sir! Since when does any Kanak woman, daughter of a free people, have a master, I just about lost it … and then I heard: cir, cus … oh I get it! Circus! She’s tellin him bout the Kludskys, from the good old First Republic, they must be pitchin their tent in the Pearl again … great … and then he let loose, speaking Kanak, but in reverse, he was learning her tongue! He loves her, it’s obvious, there’s no other possible reason, I let out a howl, they jumped … but then went on … he was feedin her all this talk about huge tours, unreal concert halls, rabid fans, schedules and stripteases … then I overheard … translatsion, reductsion … and so forth … I gotta remind her what happened to Švanda the Bagpiper,* I realized … sůstaň tady, ztay here, the man told her, you wir mate for sis citty … sis citty iss at yor fit … every city’s gonna be at her feet, but with me, dammit, I mumbled to myself under the table, I’ll arrange it somehow … or maybe just that one city, hers, the city of her mother tongue, that wicked stepmother … just hope she doesn’t have a screw loose, I mean it’d be curtains here for a girl like her … I gotta rescue her somehow, by force if necessary … but not like this, some creepy Kanak under the table, what I gotta do’s I gotta … disguise myself, yeah, an take her by storm … I knew I shouldn’t cause a rift right off the bat, but I couldn’t resist … licked her knee, she slapped him in the face. It worked! I scurried off. That knee tasted good.
I hopped on my bike. Not a minute to lose! Instead of cooling me off, the night air drove me into a frenzy. I’ll kidnap her. An marry her on the spot so she can’t run away. Kopic can fill in for the priest. I flew through Berlun like King Kong himself.
On your feet, Kanaks! I burst into the lair. Quick, everyone, gimme all you got! I gotta get duded up for a rendezvous, amour is here, big coucher avec ma femme, ma princesse, sheez grozz beeyutifull! I dragged some threads out of boxes and the Kanaks out of bed. Berlun’s the capital of bohemianism and hit parades. Subkulchur. It’s gotta work! I went for the alternative look. Kopic had a tie. That’s for the market, he protested. We tugged back and forth till the choker tore in half. I’ll fix it up somehow, where’s the sewing kit. There! You owe me 60 DM, Kopic pouted. I took his blazer, it was the only one we had, he swept in it. Lend me your Pi Beta Kappa hat, I pleaded. But he was pissed off. I took his kids’ ice skating cap, it was a good color. Wait, no, Chiharu, vayk op, help an merci, hilfe! Where’s that chic headgear a hers … she was in the shower … Shimako was eating snakes … they didn’t wanna be disturbed … they were always takin showers or eatin snakes or flyin kites. Chirina! Chirina! In Kanak that means: Hurry! Hurry! But it’s understandable in other tongues too … lend me your mikado … be a sweetie, sweetie, be muta, mutasana san, honto? Daivak! Iamb, dact. Hai? Hai! In the end I wore them down. They laughed pretty hard. But I didn’t care. I took Agent Šiška’s handgun … just to be safe … and he had the perfect suspenders! I put em on right away, my leggings were sagging. Jumped on my bike … shit, no socks or shoes … but off I rode … pedestrians stopped an stared … I called attention to my indigence … picked up a couple cigars an some change, that’ll get me off to a good start … snatched a robe off a clothesline an put it on … took the clothesline too, in case she put up a fight … people gawked … so what, assholes … gawkin at my multiculti garb … the hell with em … I rode like the wind, like a tempest, pedals squeaking … here comes the prince of the Kanaks! Burst into Teppich Bar, there she was! But … everyone was lookin at me … uh-oh, total silence … jaws dropped … an oh boy … maybe … I was bright red … mikado red … an my loved one … my loved one smiled as the others roared with laughter … just smiled … my heart ached … waiters came over, chefs … Have you any maté, mate? I got tangled up in Kanak … I was sweating, dripping, ran outside, the bike was gone. I had to walk, it was awful.