Beneath the Wheel (2 page)

Distracted he rose, undecided where to go next. He was startled when he felt a strong hand grasp his shoulder and a deep, friendly voice say: “Hello, Hans, you'll walk a way with me, won't you?”

That was Flaig, the shoemaker, at whose house he used to spend a few hours each evening, though he had neglected him for some time now. Hans joined him presently, however, without paying very close heed to what the devout Pietist was saying.

Flaig spoke of the examination, wished Hans good luck, and offered encouragement, but the real point of his speech was to communicate his firm belief that the examination was only an external and accidental event, which it would be no disgrace to fail. This could happen to the best of us, he said, and if it should happen to Hans he ought to keep in mind that God has a master plan for each and every soul and leads it along a path of His choosing.

Hans felt a bit queer whenever he was with Flaig. He respected him and his self-assured and admirable way of life, but everyone made so much fun of the Pietists that Hans had even joined in the laughter, though frequently against his own better judgment. Besides, he felt ashamed of his cowardice: he had been avoiding the shoemaker for some time, because he asked such pointed questions. Since Hans had become the teachers' pet and grown a bit conceited as a result, Master Flaig had looked at him oddly, as if to humiliate him. Thus the well-intentioned guide had gradually lost his sway over the boy's soul. For Hans was in the full bloom of boyish stubbornness and his antennae were most sensitively attuned to any unloving interference with his image of himself. Now he walked by Flaig's side and listened to him, oblivious of how kindly and anxiously he was being regarded.

In Crown Alley they encountered the pastor. The shoemaker gave him a curt greeting and was suddenly in a hurry. The pastor was one of the “modern” ones. He had the reputation of not even believing in the Resurrection. This man now took Hans by the hand.

“How are things?” he asked. “You must be glad now that everything is almost over and done with.”

“Oh yes, I'm pleased about that.”

“Well, just take care of yourself. You know that we have high hopes for you. Especially in Latin I expect you to do well.”

“But what if I fail?” Hans suggested shyly.

“Fail?” The good man stopped short. “Failing is absolutely out of the question. Completely impossible. What an idea!”

“I just mean it's a possibility. After all…”

“It isn't, Hans. It just isn't. Don't even think of it. And now give my regards to your father and take heart.”

Hans watched him walk off. Then he turned around to see where the shoemaker had gone. What was it he had said? Latin wasn't all that important, provided your heart was in the right place and you trusted in God. A lot of help
he
was. And now the pastor, too, of all people! He couldn't possibly look him in the face again, if he failed.

Feeling depressed, he arrived home and went into their small garden. Here stood a rotting summer-house in which he had once built a rabbit hutch and raised rabbits for three years. Last fall they had been taken from him, on account of the examination. There had been no time left for distractions.

Nor had he been in the garden itself for some time. The empty rabbit cage looked dilapidated, the small wooden water wheel lay bent and broken by the conduit. He thought back to the time when he had built these things and had had fun with them. Even that lay two years back—an eternity. He picked up the small wheel, tried to bend it back into shape, but it broke completely and he flung it over the wall. Away with the stuff—it was all long over and done with. Then he suddenly remembered August, his friend from school, who had helped him build the wheel and cage. Whole afternoons they had played here, hunted with his slingshot, lain in ambush for cats, built tents and eaten raw turnips for supper. Then all the studying had left him no time. August had dropped out of school a year ago and become apprenticed to a mechanic; since then, he had come over to see Hans only twice. Of course, he too had less free time than before.

Cloud shadows hastened across the valley. The sun stood near the mountain edge. For just a second the boy felt like flinging himself to the ground and weeping. Instead he fetched the hatchet from the shed, swung it wildly with his thin arms, and smashed the rabbit hutch. The boards splintered, nails bent with a crunch, and a bit of mildewed rabbit feed from last year fell on the ground. He lashed out at it all as though this would crush his longing for the rabbits and for August and for all the old childish games.

“Now, now. What's going on there?” his father called from an open window.

“Making firewood!”

He gave no further reply but tossed the hatchet aside, ran through the yard to the street and then upstream along the river. Outside town, near the brewery, two rafts lay moored. He used to untie them and drift downstream for hours on warm Sunday afternoons, excited and lulled by the sound of water splashing between the loosely tied logs. He leaped across to the rafts, lay down on a heap of willows and tried to imagine the raft untied, rushing forward, slowing down in calmer waters along the meadows, coasting along fields, villages and cool forest edges, underneath bridges and through open locks, bearing him along and everything the way it used to be when he fetched rabbit feed along the Kapferberg, fished along the shore by the tanneries, without headaches and worries.

Tired and moody, he returned home for supper. Because of the imminent trip to Stuttgart, his father was wrought up and asked him at least a dozen times whether his books were packed, and his black suit laid out, and if he didn't want to read a grammar on the trip, and if he felt well. Hans gave terse, biting replies, ate little and soon bade his father good night.

“Good night now, Hans. Make sure you sleep well. I'll get you up at six. You haven't forgotten to pack your word book, have you?”

“No, I haven't forgotten to pack my dictionary. Good night, Father.”

In the dark, he sat for a long time in his room. That was the only solace the whole examination business had brought him—a small room of his own. Here he was his own master, undisturbed. Here—obstinately, ambitiously—he had battled weariness, sleep and headaches, brooding many hours over Caesar, Xenophon, grammars, dictionaries and mathematics. But he had also experienced those few hours more valuable than all lost boyhood joys, those few rare, dreamlike hours filled with the pride, intoxication and certainty of victory; hours during which he had dreamed himself beyond school and examinations into the elect circle of higher beings. He had been seized by a bold and marvelous premonition that he was really something special, superior to his fat-cheeked, good-natured companions on whom he would one day look down from distant heights. At this very moment, he breathed a sigh of relief, as though simply being in this room meant breathing a freer and cooler air, and he sat down on his bed and passed a few twilight hours with dreams, wishes and anticipation. Slowly his eyelids slipped over his big overworked eyes, opened once more, blinked and fell shut again. The boy's pale head dropped between his thin shoulders and his thin arms stretched out, exhausted. He had fallen asleep with his clothes on. The gentle, motherly hand of sleep soothed the tempest in his heart and smoothed the light wrinkles on his brow.

*   *   *

It was unheard of. The principal had taken the trouble of coming to the station at such an early hour. Herr Giebenrath in his black dress suit could hardly stand still with excitement, happiness and pride; he tiptoed nervously around the principal and Hans, accepted the stationmaster's and railroad men's best wishes for the trip and his son's examination, and kept switching a small suitcase from right hand to left. His umbrella was held under his right arm, but he clamped it between his knees when switching the suitcase and it dropped a few times; whenever this happened, he set his suitcase down so he could pick up the umbrella. You would have thought he was an emigrant about to leave for America rather than the holder of round-trip tickets to Stuttgart for him and his son. Hans looked relaxed, though his throat was tight with apprehension.

The train pulled into the station, the two passengers mounted, the principal waved his hand to them, Hans' father lighted a cigar, and the little town and river gradually disappeared. The trip was sheer agony for both of them.

When they arrived at Stuttgart, his father suddenly came alive and seemed cheerful, affable and very much the man of the world. He was inspired by the excitement the man from a small town feels when he comes to the capital for a few days. Hans, however, became more afraid and quiet. He felt deeply intimidated by the sight of the city, the unfamiliar faces, the high, pompously ornate buildings, the long, tiring streets. The horse trams and the street noises frightened him. They were staying with an aunt, and the unfamiliarity of the rooms, her friendliness and loquacity, the endless sitting around and the never-ending remarks of encouragement directed at him by his father crushed the boy completely. Feeling lost and out of place, he sat in the room. When he looked at the unfamiliar surroundings, the aunt in her fashionable getup, the large-patterned wallpaper, the clock on the mantelpiece, the pictures on the walls, or when he gazed through the window onto the noisy bustling street, he felt completely betrayed. It seemed to him as though he had left home ages ago, and had forgotten everything he had learned with so much effort.

He had wanted to take a last look at his Greek particles in the afternoon, but his aunt suggested going for a walk. For a brief moment Hans envisioned something like green meadows and a forest in the wind and he cheerfully said yes. However, in no time at all he realized what a very different pleasure it is to take a walk in the city.

He and his aunt went walking without his father, who had gone to visit some acquaintances in town. Hans' misery began on the way downstairs. On the first floor they encountered a fat, overdressed lady to whom his aunt curtsied and who immediately broke into a stream of chatter. This pause lasted more than fifteen minutes. Hans stood to the side, pinned to the banister, was sniffed and growled at by the lady's lap dog, and vaguely comprehended that they also discussed him—the fat lady inspected him repeatedly through her lorgnette. They had hardly stepped into the street when his aunt entered a store and considerable time passed before she reemerged. Meanwhile Hans stood timidly by the curb, was jostled by passers-by and called names by the street boys. Upon returning, his aunt handed him a chocolate bar and he thanked her politely even though he couldn't stand chocolate. At the next corner they mounted a horse tram and now they chugged in the overcrowded car through streets and more streets until they finally reached a broad avenue. A fountain was splashing, formal flower-beds were blossoming, goldfish swam in a small pond, an artificial one. You walked up and down, back and forth, and in a circle among swarms of other walkers. You saw masses of faces, elegant dresses, less elegant ones, bicycles, wheelchairs and perambulators, heard a babble of voices and inhaled warm dusty air. Finally you sat down on a bench next to other people. The aunt had been chattering away; now she sighed, smiled kindly at the boy and asked him to eat his chocolate. He didn't want to.

“My God, it doesn't embarrass you, does it? Go ahead, eat it.”

Thereupon he pulled the little chocolate bar out of his pocket, tugged at the silver foil for a while and finally bit off a very small piece. He simply didn't care for chocolate but he dared not tell his aunt. While he was trying to swallow the piece, his aunt recognized someone in the crowd and rushed off.

“Just stay here. I'll be back in a jiffy.…”

Hans used the opportunity to fling the chocolate on the lawn. Then he dangled his legs back and forth, stared at the crowd and felt unlucky. Finally he could think of nothing better to do than recite his irregular verbs but was horrified to discover that he had forgotten practically all of them. He had clean forgotten them! And tomorrow was the examination!

His aunt returned, having picked up the news that 118 boys would take the state examination this year and that only 36 could pass. At this point the boy's heart hit absolute rock bottom and he refused to say another word all the way back. At home his headache returned. He refused to eat anything and behaved so strangely that his father gave him a sharp talking to and even his aunt found him impossible. That night he slept deeply but badly, haunted by horrid nightmares: he saw himself sitting in a room with the other 117 candidates; the examiner, who sometimes resembled his pastor at home and then his aunt, kept piling heaps of chocolate in front of him which he was ordered to eat; as he ate, bathed in tears, he saw one candidate after the other get up and leave; they had all eaten their chocolate mountains while his kept growing before his eyes as if it wanted to smother him.

Next morning, while Hans sipped his coffee without letting the clock out of sight, he was the object of many people's thoughts in his home town. Shoemaker Flaig was the first to think of him. Before breakfast he said his prayers. The entire family, including the journeymen and the two apprentices, stood in a circle around the table, and to the usual morning prayer Flaig added the words: “Oh Lord, protect Hans Giebenrath, who is taking the state examination today. Bless and strengthen him so that he will become a righteous and sturdy proclaimer of your name.”

Although the pastor did not offer a prayer in his behalf he said to his wife at breakfast: “Little Giebenrath is just about to start his exam. He's going to become someone very important one day, and it won't have hurt that I helped him with his Latin.”

His classroom teacher before beginning the day's first lesson said to the other pupils: “So, the examination in Stuttgart is about to begin and we want to wish Giebenrath the best of luck. Not that he needs it. He's as smart as ten of you lazybones put together.” And most of the pupils too turned their thoughts to the absent Hans, especially those who had placed bets on his failing or passing.