The next day we bought sausages and ham and pâté and more bread. We went out every day. We took the subway. In the Rossauer Lände station I ran into Udo Möller. He was having a beer and he looked at me like I was a scorpion. Who is this, he said, pointing to my good friend Ulises. He's a friend, I said. Where did you find him? said Udo Möller. In Beersheba, I said. We took one train to Heiligenstadt and then we took the Schnellbahn to Hernals. Is he Jewish? said Udo Möller. He isn't Jewish, he's not circumcised, I said. We walked in the rain. We were walking to the garage of some guy called Rudi. Udo Möller talked to me in German, but he never took his eyes off my good friend Ulises. It struck me that we were walking into a trap and I stopped. Only then did I see clearly that they wanted to kill my good friend Ulises. And I stopped. I said that I had just realized we had things to do. What things? said Udo Möller. Things, I said. Shopping. We're almost there, said Udo Möller. No, I said, we have things to do. It will just be a minute, said Udo Möller. No! I said. The rain was running down my nose and into my eyes. With the tip of my tongue I licked the rain and said no. Then I turned around and told my good friend Ulises to follow me and Udo Möller started to follow us. Come on, we're almost there, come with me, Heimito, it'll just be a minute. No!
That week we pawned the television and a clock that used to belong to my mother. We took the subway at Neubaugasse, walked along Stephansplatz, and went out on Vorgartenstrasse or the Donauinsel. We spent hours watching the river. The surface of the river. Sometimes we saw cardboard boxes floating on the water. Which brought back terrible memories for me. Sometimes we got off the train in Praterstern and walked around the station. We followed people. We never did anything. It's too dangerous, said my good friend Ulises, it isn't worth the risk. We were hungry. There were days when we didn't leave the house. I did push-ups: ten, twenty, thirty. My good friend Ulises watched, still in his sleeping bag, a book in his hands. But mostly I looked out the window. The gray sky. And sometimes I looked toward Israel. One night, as I was drawing in my notebook, my good friend Ulises asked me: what were you doing in Israel, Heimito? I told him. Searching, searching. The word searching alongside the house and the elephant that I had drawn. And what were you doing, my good friend Ulises? Nothing, he said.
When it stopped raining we went out again. We found a man in the Stadtpark station and followed him. On the Johannesgasse, my good friend Ulises grabbed his arm and as the man looked to see who was grabbing him I slammed my fist into the back of his neck. Sometimes we would go to the Neubaugasse post office, close to home, so my good friend Ulises could mail his letters. On the way back we would pass the Rembrandt Theater and my good friend Ulises could spend five minutes looking at it. Sometimes I would leave him in front of the theater and go make phone calls from a bar! The same answer! They wouldn't give me my money! When I came back my good friend Ulises would be there, looking at the Rembrandt Theater. Then I would sigh in relief and we would go home to eat. Once we ran into three of my friends. We were walking along the Franz-Josefs-Kai toward Julius-Raab-Platz, and all of a sudden, there they were. As if they had been invisible up until then. Trackers. Beaters. They said hello to me. They said my name. One of them stepped in front of me. Gunther, the strongest one. Another one moved to my left. Another moved to my good friend Ulises's right. We couldn't walk. We could turn around and run, but we couldn't move forward. It's been a long time, Heimito, said Gunther. It's been a long time, Heimito, they all said. No! We don't have time. But there was nowhere for us to run.
We strolled. We walked. We went to see Julius the policeman. They asked whether my good friend Ulises understood German. Whether he knew the secret. He doesn't understand German, I said, he doesn't know any secrets. But he's smart, they said. He isn't smart, I said, he's nice, he only sleeps and reads and he doesn't exercise. We wanted to leave. There's nothing to say! We're busy! I said. My good friend Ulises looked at them and nodded. Now I was the one standing still like a statue. My good friend Ulises looked around Julius's room, walking around and looking at everything. He wouldn't stay still. Drawings. Gunther was getting more and more nervous. We're busy and we want to leave! I said. Then Gunther grabbed Ulises by the shoulders and said why are you scuttling around like a crab? Stop it! And Julius said: the rat is nervous. My good friend Ulises moved away and Gunther pulled out his brass knuckles. Don't touch him, I said, I'll be getting my inheritance in a week. And Gunther put his brass knuckles back in his pocket and pushed my good friend Ulises into a corner. Then we talked about propaganda. They showed me papers and photographs. I was in one of the photographs, from behind. It's me, I said, this is an old picture. They showed me new pictures, new papers. A photograph of a forest, a cabin in the forest, a gentle slope. I know this place, I said. Of course you know it, Heimito, said Julius. Then came more words and more words and more papers and more photographs. All old! Silence, cunning. I didn't say a thing. Then we left and went walking home. Gunther and Peter walked along with us for a while. But my good friend Ulises and I were silent. Cunning. We walked and walked. Gunther and Peter got on the subway and my good friend Ulises and I walked and walked. Without talking. Before we got home we went into a church. The Ulrichkirche on the Burggasse. I went into a church and my good friend Ulises followed me, keeping watch over me!
I tried to pray. I tried to stop thinking about the photographs. That night we ate bread and my good friend Ulises asked me about my father, my friends, my travels. The next day we didn't go out. But the day after that we did go out because my good friend Ulises had to go to the post office, and once we were out we decided not to go home but to walk. Are you nervous, Heimito? said my good friend Ulises. No, I'm not nervous, I said. Why do you keep looking over your shoulder? Why are you looking from side to side? It never hurts to stay alert, I answered. We didn't have any money. We found an old man in Esterhazy Park. He was feeding the pigeons, but the pigeons were ignoring his crumbs. I came up behind him and punched him in the head. My good friend Ulises went through his pockets but he didn't find any money, only coins and breadcrumbs and a wallet that we took. There was a photograph in the wallet. The old man looks like my father, I said. We tossed the wallet into a mailbox. Then for two days we didn't leave the house, until all we had left were crumbs. So we went to visit Julius the policeman. We went out with him. We went to a bar on the Favoritenstrasse and listened to him talk. I looked at the table, the surface of the table and the drops of spilled Coca-Cola. Ulises spoke English with Julius the policeman and told him that there were more pyramids in Mexico than in Egypt, and bigger ones. When I lifted my eyes from the table I saw Gunther and Peter near the door. I blinked and they disappeared. But half an hour later they came by our table and sat down with us.
That night I talked to my good friend Ulises and told him I knew of a house in the country, a wooden cabin at the foot of a gentle hill covered in pine trees. I told him that I never wanted to see my friends again. Then we talked about Israel, about the jail in Beersheba, about the desert, about the yellow rocks, and about the scorpions that only came out at night, when they couldn't be seen by the human eye. Maybe we should go back, said my good friend Ulises. The Jews would kill me for sure, I said. They wouldn't do anything to you, said my good friend Ulises. The Jews would kill me, I said. Then my good friend Ulises put a dirty towel over his head, but he still seemed to be looking out the window. I sat there watching him for a while and wondering how he knew they wouldn't do anything to me. I got down on my knees and crossed my arms. Ten, fifteen, twenty squats. Until I got bored and started to draw.