The Kindly Ones полностью

It took a little more time for me to connect these fragmentary impressions and to understand that I had fallen into the hands of representatives of the medical profession. I had to be patient and learn to let myself be manhandled: not only did women, the nurses, take unheard-of liberties with my body, but doctors, solemn, serious men with paternal voices, entered at any moment, surrounded by a horde of young people, all wearing lab coats; lifting me up shamelessly, they moved my head and discoursed about my case, as if I were a mannequin. I found it all extremely disagreeable, but I couldn’t protest: the articulation of sounds, like my other faculties, still failed me. But the day when I was finally able distinctly to call one of these gentlemen a swine, he didn’t get angry; on the contrary, he smiled and applauded: “Bravo, bravo.” Encouraged, I grew bolder and went on during their next visits: “Piece of filth, bastard, stinker, Jew, asshole.” The doctors gravely shook their heads, the young people took notes on clipboards; finally, a nurse scolded me: “You could be a little more polite, really.”—“Yes, that’s true, you’re right. Should I call you meine Dame?” She waved a pretty ringless hand in front of my eyes: “Mein Fräulein,” she replied lightly, and slipped away. For a young woman, this nurse had a firm, skillful grip: when I had to relieve myself, she turned me over, helped me, then wiped me clean with a thoughtful efficiency, her gestures sure and pleasant, free of all disgust, like those of a mother cleaning her child; as if she, still a virgin perhaps, had done this all her life. I probably took pleasure in it, and delighted in asking her for this service. She or others also fed me, slipping spoonfuls of broth into my lips; I would have preferred a rare steak, but didn’t dare ask, it wasn’t a hotel, after all, but, I had finally understood, a hospital: and to be a patient means precisely what it says.

Thus, clearly, I had had some sort of health problem, in circumstances that still escaped me; and judging from the freshness of the sheets and the calm and cleanliness of the premises, I must no longer be in Stalingrad; or else things had changed quite a bit. And indeed, I no longer was in Stalingrad but, as I finally learned, in Hohenlychen, north of Berlin, at the German Red Cross hospital. How I had gotten there, no one could tell me; I had been delivered in a van, they had been told to look after me, they didn’t ask any questions, they looked after me, and as for me, I didn’t have to ask any questions, either: I had to get back on my feet again.

One day, there was a commotion: the door opened, my little room filled with people, most of them, this time, not in white but in black. I recognized the shortest of them after some effort, my memory was slowly coming back to me: he was the Reichsführer-SS, Heinrich Himmler. He was surrounded by other SS officers; next to him stood a giant whom I didn’t know, with a rough-hewn, horselike face slashed with scars. Himmler planted himself next to me and gave a brief speech with his nasal, professorial voice; on the other side of the bed, men were photographing and filming the scene. I didn’t understand much of what the Reichsführer said: isolated phrases bubbled to the surface of his words, heroic officer, honor of the SS, lucid reports, courageous, but they certainly didn’t form a narration in which I could recognize myself, I had trouble applying these words to myself; and yet the meaning of the scene was clear, I was indeed the person being discussed, it was because of me that all these officers and these gleaming dignitaries were gathered in this tiny room. In the crowd, in back, I recognized Thomas; he made a friendly gesture toward me, but alas I couldn’t speak to him. His speech over, the Reichsführer turned to an officer in round, thick glasses with black rims, who eagerly handed him something; then he leaned toward me, and with an increasing panic I saw his pincenez, his grotesque moustache, his fat, short, dirty-nailed fingers approach; he wanted to put something on my chest, I saw a pin, I was terrified at the thought of it pricking me; then his face descended even lower, he was paying no attention whatsoever to my anguish, his verbena-smelling breath was stifling me, and he deposited a wet kiss on my face. He straightened himself and launched his arm into the air, bellowing; the entire audience imitated him, and my bed was surrounded with a forest of raised arms, black, white, brown; timidly, so as not to be singled out, I too raised my arm; that had its effect, since everyone turned around and hurried to the door; the crowd quickly flowed out, and I was left alone, exhausted, incapable of removing this curious cold thing that was weighing on my chest.