Madonna in a Fur Coat Read online

  We both stood up. We shook the raindrops off our coats. The wet sand crunched under our feet.

  Night was falling, but the street lamps were not yet lit. We walked quickly by the route we had come. This time I linked my arm with hers. Like a little child I snuggled up to her, my head close to hers, my elation tinged with sadness. For as happy as I was that we thought so similarly, and were already so close, I was afraid – that one day she would leave me or hide the truth from me. That we would never, whatever the cost, agree to live a lie. And from somewhere deep inside, I could hear a faint voice warning me: once you have seen someone as she truly is – once you have accepted reality stripped bare – it doesn’t matter who she is: intimacy is no longer possible.

  Whereas I had no desire to see reality stripped bare. Because I knew that I would never be able to bear any truth that might take me away from her. We had found in each other rare treasures. Would it not be more humane to show each other some mercy, turning a blind eye to the details, sacrificing the smaller truths for the greater?

  Here was a woman of sound judgement, offering hard-won advice. She had been through hard times, and seen those around her damaged. Naturally she would think this way. She deeply resented having to live in company she had not chosen, and did not like. A life of forced smiles had made her suspicious. Whereas I had kept my distance from others all my life. I had not bothered them, and they had not bothered me, and so I harboured no anger. It was only my loneliness that ate at me, and it was this same loneliness that led me to betray myself in myriad ways.

  We had come to the city centre. The streets were brightly lit and crowded. Maria Puder was lost in thought and perhaps a little sad. Fearfully I asked: ‘Is something bothering you?’

  ‘No,’ she replied. ‘Nothing happened today that bothered me. In fact I’m happy about this walk we just took. At least, I suppose I’m happy …’

  It was clear that her mind was elsewhere. Her eyes seemed almost to look through me. And her smile had a strange and unnerving edge to it. At one point she stopped in the middle of the street and said: ‘I don’t want to go home. Come on, let’s get something to eat. We can keep talking until it’s time for me to go to work.’

  I jumped at this unexpected offer. Seeing her alarm at my show of enthusiasm, I quickly collected myself. We went on to a sizeable restaurant on the western side of the city. It was not particularly crowded. Playing loudly in a corner was a Bavarian female band dressed in traditional attire. We sat down at a table and ordered food and wine.

  By now my companion’s low spirits had passed on to me. I felt bored and restless without knowing why. Noticing my change in mood, she tried to wrestle free of her thoughts and open up a little. With a smile, she leaned across the table and slapped my hand: ‘Why the glum face? A young man enjoying his first supper with a young woman should make more of an effort!’ The tone of her voice was light, but it was clear that she didn’t believe what she was saying. And soon she had slipped back into her own thoughts. Just to busy herself in some way, she ran her eyes over the other tables. After taking a few sips of wine, she turned around to look at me. ‘What can I do? What? That’s the thing – I just can’t be any other way!’

  What was she trying to say? I could not help interpreting it as something dark. Whatever it was that she couldn’t do, it was what was making me sad. That much I knew. But there my understanding ended.

  Wherever her eyes settled, she seemed to have difficulty prising them away. From time to time I could see a slight shiver passing across her face, which was as pale as mother of pearl. She started to speak again. There was a quivering in her voice now, as if she were trying to hold back her excitement: ‘Whatever you do, don’t take offence. It’s better to be completely open – so much better than losing yourself in empty hopes … But please, don’t take offence … Last night I came over to you … I asked you to walk me home … I invited you to come out with me today … I said, let’s have dinner together … I’ve not left you alone … But I don’t love you. I’ve known this since the beginning … so no, I don’t love you … What can I do? I find you pleasant, even attractive, and I see in you qualities I’ve never seen in another man, but that’s all … Talking to you, talking to you about everything under the sun, bickering and quarrelling … getting cross and then making peace, all these things will make me happy … But love? That’s beyond me … Now you may well ask why I’m saying all this out of the blue … so let me say again that I don’t want you to build up your hopes, only to take offence later on. I need to make it clear to you what I can and cannot give you, because if I don’t you’ll accuse me later of playing games with you. As different as you are, you’re still a man … and all the men that I have ever known have ended up leaving in sorrow or anger once they realize I don’t love them, and can never love them … But why, when they say goodbye, do they assume I am the one to blame? Because I never gave them what I promised I never would, or because they convinced themselves it would be otherwise? Isn’t that unfair? I don’t want you to think the same way about me … You can consider that a point in your favour …’

  Her words shocked me. Trying not to lose my composure, I said: ‘What is the need for all this? It’s you, not me, setting the terms of our friendship. However you want it to be, that’s how it will be.’

  Angrily she protested: ‘No, no, that won’t do at all. Look, don’t you understand? You’re acting like all the other men – acting as if you accept my terms, so as to gain approval. No, my friend! You can’t talk this away with fine words. Think about it. I’ve tried to be open and candid, even if it works against me, even if it works against others. But I am getting nowhere. Men and women have such a hard time understanding what we want from each other, and our emotions are so foggy that we hardly know what we are doing. We get lost in the current. I don’t want that. If I have to do things that seem to me to be unnecessary and unsatisfying, I end up hating myself … But what I hate most is women always having to be passive … Why? Why are we always the ones running away and you are the ones chasing after us? Why is it always that we surrender and you take the spoils? Why is it that even in the way you beg, there is dominance, and pity in the way we refuse? I’ve been challenging this since childhood. I’ve never accepted it, ever. Why am I like that? Why is it so important to me, when other women hardly seem to notice? I’ve thought about this a lot. I’ve often asked myself if I was abnormal. But no, on the contrary, I’ve come to think that I’m the normal one. Simply because I grew up far removed from the influences that make most women come to accept their fate. My father died when I was still very young. It was just me and my mother at home. She was the quintessential submissive woman. She had lost the ability to go through life alone, or rather she had never acquired it in the first place. From the age of seven, I was the one in charge. I was the one who guided, advised and supported her. There was no man standing over us. And so naturally I was repulsed by my classmates’ idle fantasies. I never learned – or wanted to learn – how to make boys like me. I never blushed when I was around them or fished for compliments. This caused me to become hideously isolated. My girlfriends had a hard time finding things in common with me. They had no interest in being real people: they preferred to be objects of desire and act like dolls. I couldn’t make friends with boys either. They’d look for a soft centre and when they saw it wasn’t there, when they saw I was a match for them, they’d run away. That’s how I understand only too well where men get their strength and ambition; there is no other creature on this earth that races after such easy success, and no other creature as proud, arrogant and egotistical, yet at the same time cowardly and set in his ways. Once I became aware of all of this, it was impossible for me to truly love men. Even the ones I liked the most, and with whom I had the most in common – the moment would arrive when some minor provocation had them baring their wolfish teeth; after being together, and giving each other an equal amount of pleasure, they’d sidle up to me, sighing idiotically, and
either apologize or offer to protect me, making it clear that in their eyes, they had vanquished me … But they were in fact the ones who had exposed just how pitiful and miserable they really were. There is no woman as pitiful and ridiculous as a man swept away by his passions. At the same time they take huge pride in them, seeing them as proof of their virility. My God, it’s enough to drive a person crazy … Although I know that there is in me no tendency towards the unnatural, I would rather fall in love with a woman.’

  She stopped and looked into my face. Then she drank a little wine. Her monologue seemed to have chased away her dark mood.

  ‘Why do you look so surprised?’ she asked. ‘Don’t worry. It’s not what you think. Though I wish I could be like that. Certainly I could have done something that cheapened the soul less … It’s just that I’m a artist, as you know … I have my own standards of beauty … I don’t think it would be beautiful to make love to a woman … How can I put it … the aesthetics would be all wrong … and then, I am a lover of the natural world … I have always been reluctant to behave in a way that goes against the natural world … This is why I believe that I definitely need to love a man … but a real man … a man who could sweep me off my feet without resorting to brute strength … without asking anything of me, without controlling me, or degrading me, a man who could love me and walk by my side … In other words, a truly powerful man, a real man … Now do you see why I can’t love you? In any case it hasn’t been long enough for that, but you’re not the person I’m looking for … the truth is you have none of the pride I was just talking about … you are so much like a child, or rather a woman. A woman like my mother – you need someone to look after you … I could be that person … if you wanted … but nothing more … We could be wonderful friends … you are the first man who hasn’t interrupted me, or tried to pull me away from my ideas, or tried to bring me round. What I mean is, you’re the first man who’s listened to what I have to say, without once trying to discipline me … I can see in your eyes that you understand me … Like I said, we could be great friends. In the same way that I am speaking to you so openly, you can tell me everything too. Is that not enough? Is it worth losing that, simply because we want more? That’s the last thing I want. I told you last night that I can have violent mood swings … but this shouldn’t drive you to the wrong conclusion … On the main points, I shall never change … So tell me. Will you be my friend?’

  I was reeling after all this … The last thing I wanted was to pass some kind of final verdict, and I sensed that anything I said would be off the mark. I had just one desire: to stay close to her, no matter what the cost … nothing else mattered … I was not accustomed to ever asking a person for more than they were willing to give. Nevertheless, my heart felt strangely heavy. Fixing my gaze on her dark, clouded and imploring eyes, I prepared my words: ‘Maria, I understand you perfectly … I can see why in the past you found yourself obliged to offer such explanations and I am happy with the idea that you are doing this so as not jeopardize our future relationship. This means that for you our friendship is precious …’

  She nodded in approval. I went on: ‘There may be no need for you to say any of this. But how can you know? We have only just met. It’s better to be careful … I don’t have as much experience as you. I am limited in my acquaintance and have always lived alone. Now I see that we have ended up at the same place but on different roads: we are both looking for someone, someone we can call our own … How wonderful it would be if we could find that in each other … That is the most important thing, everything else comes after that … As for what you said about relationships between men and women, you can be sure that I am nothing like the kind of person you fear. Truth is, I have had no adventures, but I have never thought that I could love someone unless I felt in her the same respect and strength I find in myself. You just mentioned being degraded. In my opinion, any man who allows that to happen is denying his own person, and indeed degrading himself. I, too, love the natural world; in fact, I might even say that the more I stay away from people, the closer I feel to nature. My country is one of the most beautiful places in the world. Reading our history, we learn of all the civilizations that rose and fell in those lands. Lying under olive trees that go back ten or fifteen centuries, I think about the people who collected their fruits through the ages. On mountains studded with pine trees – slopes that seem untouched by man – I would come across marble bridges and carved columns. These are my childhood memories. These are what fed my dreams. Nature’s logic holds a higher place in my estimation than anything else. So let’s forget all this and just allow our friendship to take its natural course. Let’s not try to set it on the false path or tie it up with decisions made in advance.’

  Maria tapped my hand with her index finger. ‘You are not as much of a child as I thought,’ she said. With apprehensive eyes, she looked me over. Her plump lower lip was pushed out more than usual, making her look like a girl who was about to cry. But her eyes were thoughtful and probing. It amazed me to see how fast and dramatically her expression could change.

  ‘You can teach me all sorts of things about your life and your country, not to mention those olive trees,’ she began. ‘And I can tell you a few things about my childhood and what I can remember about my father. I don’t suppose we’ll have any trouble finding things to talk about … but there’s such an echo in here. It must be because there are so few customers … and that poor band over there … they’re hoping the noise they make will impress their boss, if no one else. Oh, if only you knew what bosses are like in places like this!’

  ‘Are they very rude?’

  ‘Oh yes, very much so. You get to see men close up in these places. Our boss at the Atlantic, for instance. He is a very courteous man. Not just with customers – but with women with whom he is not doing business … There is no doubt that if I wasn’t working in his cabaret he would flirt with me like a baron, until I was swooning over his fine manners. But if money is involved, he becomes a different man, and I suppose he would call this a “work ethic”. It would be better to call it an “earning ethic”. Because with us his rudeness borders on cruelty, even impropriety. It stems more from a fear of being cheated than any desire to preserve the seriousness of his establishment. Most probably, he is a good father and an honest citizen, but if you could see how he tries to sell us – not just our voices and our smiles and our bodies, but our humanity – your skin would crawl …’

  This struck a distant chord. ‘What did your father do?’ I asked.

  ‘Didn’t I tell you? He was a lawyer. Why do you ask? Are you wondering how I ended up like this?’

  I said nothing.

  ‘It seems you still don’t know Germany very well. There is nothing unusual about my situation. The money Father left us put me through school. We weren’t that badly off. I was a nurse during the war. Then I continued at the academy. What savings we had left vanished with inflation. I had to earn money. I’m not complaining about that. There’s nothing wrong with working. So long as it isn’t demeaning. What bothered me was having no choice but to work with people who were always drunk and hungry for meat. They’d give such looks … I wouldn’t just call it animalistic … because that in itself would still be natural … this was something beneath that … a bestiality fed by cruelty, hypocrisy and deceit … disgusting …’

  She looked around the room. The orchestra was playing even louder than before. A woman dressed in a traditional Bavarian outfit and with hair like corn tassels was belting out a cheerful mountain folk song as she twirled about.

  ‘Come on, let’s go and sit somewhere quiet … it’s still early,’ Maria said. Then, looking at me intently, she added: ‘Or am I boring you? I’ve been dragging you around all day now and talking your ears off. It’s not good for a woman to be that friendly … I’m serious. I’ll let you go if you’re bored.’

  I took her hands. I paused before answering.

  I wasn’t looking her in the face. Neverthele
ss there came a point when I was sure that she understood how I was feeling and I said: ‘I’m so grateful to you.’

  ‘I feel the same way,’ she said, and she pulled away her hands.

  As we stepped out onto the street, she said: ‘Come on, we can go to a café not far from here. It’s a wonderful place. Full of mad souls.’

  ‘Romanisches Café?’

  ‘Yes, do you know it? Have you been there?’

  ‘No, I’ve only ever heard about it.’

  She smiled. ‘From friends who run out of money at the end of the month?’

  I smiled and looked away.

  The café was normally frequented by artists, but after eleven o’clock it would fill up with rich women hunting younger men, and I’d heard that this was when gigolos of all different ages would come and seek their fortunes.

  It was early, so the place was still filled with young artists. They were sitting in small groups, locked in heated discussions. Passing through the colonnades, we went up to the second floor, where we were only just able to find a free table.

  Around us were young painters imitating the French with their long hair and pipes and their broad-brimmed black hats, and long-nailed writers leafing through their pages.

  A tall blond young man with sideburns down to his lips waved from across the room and came over to our table.

  ‘My greetings to the Madonna in a Fur Coat!’ he cried. Taking Maria’s face in his hands, he kissed her on the forehead and then the cheeks.

  I cast my eyes down and waited while they chatted about this and that. I gathered that they had work in the same exhibition. Then, after giving Maria a vigorous handshake, he turned to me and, with what he must have thought to be a bohemian flourish, said: ‘Adieu, my young sir.’ With that, he left.

  My eyes were still downcast when she said: ‘What are you thinking?’