I can't wait any longer, I've got to step inside that entry with you and feel your rock-hard lips on mine, says Anna, salivating greedily. You've got it, baby, squelches the traveller, his thought mechanism befogged, I won't be tight-fisted, I may be from Linz but I can be generous when it's called for. Lasses like this are still classed as children in Linz on the Danube and the police are careful to protect them, but here in the capital that smells of corruption you can use them and afterwards send them away when you're through.
Here we are, the entry. In we go. And in goes the hand, shoved under the dress. But here comes the Crime of Robbery personified, too. And just as the fellow from Linz is rummaging about under the Annaskirt, his Linz-head is dealt a hard blow by an unknown fist, one that belongs to a worker at that: Hans. True, the fist does not transport him to Dreamland, but it does interfere notably with the rhythm of Love and knocks him to the ground, which is dirty, sorrows come not single spies and a battalion of them is no better. Hans promptly bounces onto him and leaps up and down on sundry parts of the body, which you can't tell apart in the dark, let's hope some of them are the kind that particularly hurt. Anna bites, scratches and slaps away in true woman's style, all of it aimed at that unfortunate salesman head, women always aim at the head in this kind of situation, any expert will confirm as much. They lack practice at this kind of physical exercise, otherwise they'd know that the skull is especially tough and resistant, because after all it acts as a protective case for Man's brain. The traveller groans out loud with disappointment on finding that instead of loving and banging all he's getting is shoving and bashing. It was a set-up, he realises correctly, but the realisation gets him nowhere. It is no longer possible to yell because Sophie, with great presence of mind and astonishing instinct, has instantly covered his mouth, the bastard had better not bite me shutyertrap, we're prepared for every eventuality and have a knife. Right here. The trader, whose sole familiarity with knives comes from his wife and the kitchen, falls anxiously silent. Where's his wallet. Take it, it's in my inside pocket, my life matters more to me, I prefer it to money. It's the most valuable thing there is. Four to one is cowardly, I'll tell my wife and my boss back home, when I tell them I'll say it was six to one. Ouch. The plump wallet is expropriated and the traveller, who is well and amply fed, is hit, kicked, threatened, abused, spat at and humiliated in every conceivable way, and by girls who could be his own daughters, too, judging by their age, but they are the children of people who have brought them up badly, alas, so that they have become young criminals. Ugh, how nasty, it's enough to make you spit. You don't get this happening in Linz. Shall I pull his prick out and hurt him, asks Anna, in quite a state. No, don't, replies her brother, the leader (who else), keeping a genteel distance and directing the action sensitively. Do you think there's nothing that horrifies me? But in Bataille I read about what you can do with this kind of guy's prick, his sister stubbornly insists, starting to fumble about. We can at least do enough damage to make it useless for a while. And we'll be hurting his wife too, long-distance.
Look, we've got the money so let's get out of here, we don't want to get into danger by taking some ill-considered risk.
But the money was supposed to be the least important thing.
Money is unimportant, but it's reassuring to have it.
But I don't want to be reassured, I'm all worked up, it'll only take me a minute to take it out and spit on it. Keep a hold on him. No sooner said than done. Even Rainer helps with the holding, so Sophie won't think he's only doing it for the dough. You little fucker, you wouldn't have thought this would happen to you, would you, you thought something nice was going to happen to you, you swine. It is yanked out and spat on. That's what this guy was going to foist on me. Me. The fellow won't be foisting his wretched little tool on any women in a hurry. I'll bet he's lost interest today. Hey, come on now!
Hans kicks the salesman from Linz and his pecker, which won't be stirring for at least six months, that's for sure, and to think that at first it looked as if he was going to reap more than he'd sowed. He kicks at his neck and at scraps of underpants that glow white in the dark, making the fellow from Linz tip over sideways, shed a little Linz blood, and fall suddenly silent. He won't have sustained any permanent injuries. Still, he won't forget it.
They shoot back into the dark, out into the street which originally spewed them forth, not even the dark city by night can stand ill-bred adolescents such as these.
Shouldn't we piss on him too, asks Hans, turned on by what Anna did, no, we're not going to do anything else now, we're off, puffs Anna, clawing at him. Suddenly she's in a hurry.
Sophie is wearing a simple dark dress and blends in with the courtyard wall. Shudders keep on passing through her, again and again. These shudders are linked to a strange sensation of urgency in her lower abdomen and they recur with increasing frequency. She is unable to interpret the feeling. But it isn't puppy love or loyal friendship. No doubt it is something on the negative side, as the feeling that she shouldn't obey the sensation indicates, you can never rely on sensations. Come on, Sophie, breathes Rainer, and he takes her in his arms. She shakes him off and darts back into the street like a black thread being pulled very rapidly over a smooth tabletop.
TO INTRODUCE SOME clarity into their fogged lives, Rainer, Anna and Hans dash off to where clarity is present full-time: at Sophie's villa in Hietzing. It is always a radiantly sunny day there, and there are always young folk radiant with youth. The day is radiant to keep them company, as it were. This spring it is already quite warm, giving promise of a hot summer that will scatter the youngsters in many and various directions once they've passed their exams. Some of them are hoping it'll be the same direction as Sophie takes. Presently Sophie's naked feet will be tripping across the promenade, the asphalt is already warm, indeed hot, and the tennis racket is enjoying the view from its Vuitton bag. Mama will be hysterically wrapped up in silken scarves and kerchiefs to guard against the sun, as usual, because the sun is always bad for her, Mama being blonde and her skin extremely white. Mama will direct the entire operation from the cafe, constantly hurtling to the telephone with a display of professional nerves. She will say she is meeting Sophie for tea. Obedience is lodged within Sophie like a coil spring, tensing and relaxing painlessly. Like some beautiful, graceful animaclass="underline" you squeeze its flanks with your commanding thighs but do it no harm or permanent damage. Hans will stay behind in Vienna, clowning around with frisky hairdressers every so often, now that he knows what you can get up to with tarts like that. He is not yet one of those who pine for Sophie and the Riviera because he has never heard of the Riviera. Alas, Rainer and Anna have heard of it. What threatens them is the woods. Which have so often intruded their unpleasant attentions on the siblings. Out where the woods are darkest and most solitary, of all places, Auntie Pussy waits, tempting people with healthy country air, the very people who'd rather be unhealthy than healthy. To think there are so many others who consider health the most important thing in Life. And they can't go. First the body must be revitalised, before university studies replace the revitalisation process and start on their destruction.