“You see those ink-stains on the carpet? That’s where Herr Professor Koch used to shake his fountain-pen. I told him of it a hundred times. In the end, I even laid sheets of blotting-paper on the floor around his chair. He was so absent-minded… . Such a dear old gentleman! And so simple. I was very fond of him. If I mended a shirt for him or darned his socks, he’d thank me with the tears in his eyes. He liked a bit of fun, too. Sometimes, when he heard me coming, he’d turn out the light and hide behind the door; and then he’d roar like a lion to frighten me. Just like a child… .”
Frl. Schroeder can go on like this, without repeating herself, by the hour. When I have been listening to her for some time, I find myself relapsing into a curious trance-like state of depression. I begin to feel profoundly unhappy. Where are all those lodgers now? Where, in another ten years, shall I be, myself? Certainly not here. How many seas and frontiers shall I have to cross to reach that distant day; how far shall I have to travel, on foot, on horseback, by car, push-bike, aeroplane, steamer, train, lift, moving-staircase and tram? How much money shall I need for that enormous journey?
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How much food must I gradually, wearily consume on my way? How many pairs of shoes shall I wear out? How many thousands of cigarettes shall I smoke? How many cups of tea shall I drink and how many glasses of beer? What an awful tasteless prospect! And yetto have to die. … A sudden vague pang of apprehension grips my bowels and I have to excuse myself in order to go to the lavatory.
Hearing that I was once a medical student, she confides to me that she is very unhappy because of the size of her bosom. She suffers from palpitations and is sure that these must be caused by the strain on her heart. She wonders if she should have an operation. Some of her acquaintances advise her to, others are against it:
“Oh dear, it’s such a weight to have to carry about with you! And just thinkHerr Issyvoo: I used to be as slim as you are!”
“I suppose you had a great many admirers, Frl. Schroeder?”
Yes, she has had dozens. But only one Friend. He was a married man, living apart from his wife, who would not divorce him.
“We were together eleven years. Then he died of pneumonia. Sometimes I wake up in the night when it’s cold and wish he was there. You never seem to get really warm, sleeping alone.”
There are four other lodgers in this flat. Next door to me, in the big front-room, is Frl. Kost. In the room opposite, overlooking the courtyard, is Frl. Mayr. At the back, beyond the living-room, is Bobby. And behind Bobby’s room, over the bathroom, at the top of a ladder, is a tiny attic which Frl. Schroeder refers to, for some occult reason, as “The Swedish Pavilion.” This she lets, at twenty marks a month, to a commercial traveller who is out all day and most of the night. I occasionally come upon him on Sunday morn-6
ings, in the kitchen, shuffling about in his vest and trousers, apologetically hunting for a box of matches.
Bobby is a mixer at a west-end bar called the Troika. I don’t know his real name. He has adopted this one because English Christian names are fashionable just now in the Berlin demi-monde. He is a pale worried-looking smartly dressed young man with thin sleek black hair. During the early afternoon, just after he has got out of bed, he walks about the flat in shirtsleeves, wearing a hairnet.
Frl. Schroeder and Bobby are on intimate terms. He tickles her and slaps her bottom; she hits him over the head with a frying-pan or a mop. The first time I surprised them scuffling like this, they were both rather embarrassed. Now they take my presence as a matter of course.
Frl. Kost is a blonde florid girl with large silly blue eyes. When we meet, coming to and from the bathroom in our dressing-gowns, she modestly avoids my glance. She is plump but has a good figure.
One day I asked Frl. Schroeder straight out: What was Frl. Kost’s profession?
“Profession? Ha, ha, that’s good! That’s just the word for it! Oh, yes, she’s got a fine profession. Like this–—”
And with the air of doing something extremely comic, she began waddling across the kitchen like a duck, mincingly holding a duster between her finger and thumb. Just by the door, she twirled triumphantly round, flourishing the duster as though it were a silk handkerchief, and kissed her hand to me mockingly:
“Ja, ja, Herr Issyvoo! That’s how they do it!”
“I don’t quite understand, Frl. Schroeder. Do you mean that she’s a tight-rope walker?”
“He, he, he! Very good indeed, Herr Issyvoo! Yes, that’s right! That’s it! She walks along the line for her living. That just describes her!”
One evening, soon after this, I met Frl. Kost on the stairs, with a Japanese. Frl. Schroeder explained to me later that he is one of Frl. Kost’s best customers. She asked Frl. Kost
how they spent the time together when not actually in bed, for the Japanese can speak hardly any German.
“Oh, well,” said Frl. Kost, “we play the gramophone together, you know, and eat chocolates, and then we laugh a lot. He’s very fond of laughing… .”
Frl. Schroeder really quite likes Frl. Kost and certainly hasn’t any moral objections to her trade: nevertheless, when she is angry because Frl. Kost has broken the spout of the teapot or omitted to make crosses for her telephone-calls on the slate in the living-room, then invariably she exclaims:
“But after all, what else can you expect from a woman of that sort, a common prostitute! Why, Herr Issyvoo, do you know what she used to be? A servant girl! And then she got to be on intimate terms with her employer and one fine day, of course, she found herself in certain circumstances… . And when that little difficulty was removed, she had to go trot-trot… .”
Frl. Mayr is a music-hall jodlerinone of the best, so Frl. Schroeder reverently assures me, in the whole of Germany. Frl. Schroeder doesn’t altogether like Frl. Mayr, but she stands in great awe of her; as well she may. Frl. Mayr has a bull-dog jaw, enormous arms and coarse string-coloured hair. She speaks a Bavarian dialect with peculiarly aggressive emphasis. When at home, she sits up like a war-horse at the living-room table, helping Frl. Schroeder to lay cards. They are both adept fortunetellers and neither would dream of beginning the day without consulting the omens. The chief thing they both want to know at present is: when will Frl. Mayr get another engagement? This question interests Frl. Schroeder quite as much as Frl. Mayr, because Frl. Mayr is behind-hand with the rent.
At the corner of the Motzstrasse, when the weather is fine, there stands a shabby pop-eyed man beside a portable canvas booth. On the sides of the booth are pinned astrological diagrams and autographed letters of recommendation from satisfied clients. Frl. Schroeder goes to consult’him whenever she can afford the mark for his fee. In fact, he plays a most
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important part in her life. Her behaviour towards him is a mixture of cajolery and threats. If the good things he promises her come true she will kiss him, she says, invite him to dinner, buy him a gold watch: if they don’t she will throttle him, box his ears, report him to the police. Among other prophecies, the astrologer has told her that she will win some money in the Prussian State Lottery. So far, she has had no luck. But she is always discussing what she will do with her winnings. We are all to have presents, of course. I am to get a hat, because Frl. Schroeder thinks it very improper that a gentleman of my education should go about without one.