I feel a raging pain in my back, as if knives were probing an open wound. The nurse who cares for me is middle-aged. Her face is flushed. She has whitish-blonde hair, a wisp of which pokes out from beneath her dingy white cap. She is clearly skilled and explains that she is always assigned to the hospitals closest to the front. She takes my pulse, places her hard, rough hand on my forehead with a masculine gesture of someone who never hesitates. Can a person retain such energy and strength of mind amidst such. .? I don’t finish the question. The pain in my back causes me to desist. I grit my teeth and think of Loki. I wonder how long it’s been since I was able to think of her. I’ll escape tonight and search for her. I’m filled with an irrepressible desire to weep, because. . Suddenly I remember that I wanted to go yesterday. I escaped from my bed and jumped out the window. The night was clear, and I could plainly see where I stepped. One kiss from the person I loved would have sufficed. Not a sweet kiss, but passionate, interminable, like those of the last night. In this dreary room I conjure up her presence and speak to her. I was wounded and fell. I couldn’t find your house with the windows for decoration. I know you are without equal and that, like the land where I was born, for me there is no other. You are better than all the women I will never meet. It is impossible to compare you to those I have known. I long to be alone with you, hear your voice when my breath touches yours. I’ll whisper your name, close to your lips that I dare not touch. I’ll speak to you of all the things you cannot comprehend, and your eyes will be agape with understanding. You will mark the days on the calendar with a cross, not for what must come about, but for what must depart. I yearn for your always lively presence, long for the nights that were worth more than all the nights of my life. They have brought me to you. I glimpse your house, the windows, the silence, your footsteps, your eyes in which dreams are born. I want you. I thought these things, and you were mine.
I died at dawn. Wanting to be with Loki, I had ripped off my bandages, and the wound had immediately spread, deepened. I would never have imagined that my body could hold so much blood. The pain in my back lessened. Slowly the light grew dim, the colors paler. I watched as the bullet holes in the wall in front of me — the hospital where I lie had been the town hall, the scene of terrible fighting — began to fade. “Everything flees,” I thought to myself. Soon I will be out of here. If that’s the case, I can go wherever I want. The land is free of obstacles. Not like here, where the legs on the bed keep me from reaching the window, or if it is closed, I run the danger of smashing my head against the walls. Then something strange happens: I lose my feet, then my hands. I hear a drip. Blood sputtering, escaping the prison of my veins. I’m overcome by sleep, a deeper sleep than I have ever felt. I want to keep my eyes open, to see if the light returns, if objects re-materialize. It’s useless. As soon as it occurs to me that perhaps I am dead, I am.
I feel the air passing over me when they cover me with a sheet. I don’t listen to what they say. It holds no interest for me.
They left me then, alone with the dead man that I was. My ears, however, pick up the slightest sounds. One drop of blood remains in my rebellious heart, allowing me to direct my thoughts toward the one place I desire, but they return unaccompanied. The deepest thought of all carried with it the word “Loki,” and the name came back to guide me.
What a dark night!
Suddenly the unmistakable sound of battle. The whistle of projectiles spraying dirt when they explode. A man’s scream as he advances with blind courage to defy the bullets, drawing others with him. The trenches are hollows created by the shells. Machine guns devour the lines. Rifles wear out from overuse. For each soldier that falls, twice as many emerge.
Everything grows silent.
Softly comes the murmur of water flowing downstream. The river is beside me, carrying away all that is useless. It streams into my eyes. Trees float past, the leaves on their branches swaying in the wind. A coolness penetrates my chest as the water rushes over me.
NIGHT AND FOG
If all of us here could return to the womb, half would be trampled to death by those who fight to get in first. A womb is warm, dark, enclosed.
I used to tell myself to play dead. That was before I realized I was a shadow. Now I keep quiet. There is no possible justification for them to have turned me into a shadow. In other countries, the wind still blows, there are still trees, still people. I was filled with a hunger for those people, more than a hunger for food. When that mania came over me, I was ready to smash my head against a wall. The more deaths that occur here, the better I feel. It fills me with such a deep sense of joy, so complex it can’t be described. Meier died some time ago. He stank. All of them do. That’s why I used to have this hunger for people. People sleep, get up, wash their hands, know that roads are for walking, chairs for sitting. People are neat. They do their business in a corner, closing the door so no one will see them. They use a handkerchief, turn off the light to make love. Meier used to piss all the time. “C’est pas de ma faute,” he would say at first with that grotesque accent of his, as a way of excusing himself. Then he stopped talking. He slept in my bed. The first time I felt my thigh damp and warm; a wave of wild anger rose to my head. With all my might I thrust my spoon into his neck. I heard the rattle coming from his throat, right by my ear. Suddenly he kneed me in the stomach. My arms went slack, and I let him go.
They caught me in Bordeaux on 14 March 1943. Six days in a French prison, seven beatings till I bled.
At home, when I was little, we had a fishbowl with three red fish. I would spend hours watching them. They never bumped into the side of the glass. I used to think, “If they don’t see it, how do they manage to sense it and turn at just the right moment?” One afternoon I was alone. Father was working and mother had gone to the hospital to visit a friend who had a tumor on her back. I went over to the fishbowl and grabbed a fish. It struggled frantically in my hand, then opened its mouth, eyes bulging, all shiny and round. (It had a white spot on one side. The other two fish were completely red.) I returned it to the water. When I thought it had recovered, I took it out again. I put it back in the water, then grabbed it again. I continued the experiment until it died. I was playing a game: I wanted to see what the fish would do. I didn’t want it to die.
They dragged me out of my cell, then returned me. They took me out to beat me and sent me back to recover, so they could beat me again.
That’s why here in the camp I was so glad I didn’t have a white spot. Sometimes I was afraid I’d develop one. I would’ve been calmer if I had a mirror. I’d look at myself every morning and wouldn’t have to bother a bunkmate.
“Tu connais?” The guards showed me a picture. It was a young girl with a strand of hair that practically covered one of her eyes. “Connais pas? Connais pas? Salaud!” One of them grabbed my nose and was twisting it like he had some pliers. “Fais pas l’imbécile, voyons. . avoue.” He got all worked up. When I couldn’t stand it any longer, I seized his hand. I felt a terrible wallop to my stomach, followed by many more. “Connais pas la poule? Avoue!”