Prinzmetal, looking surprised, straightened up from the basin where he had begun washing his hands. “Oh - there it is, on the table. The Zeitung. On the third page. There’s a story about a baby in Buenos Aires that understands what you say to it in French, Spanish and German. Three months old.”
“Yes.”
“And the curious thing-what struck my attention-”
“Is that child’s French nurse maid underwent an attack of amentia at the same time,” said Wenzl, biting his words.
“Yes,” Prinzmetal said, forgetting to wash.
“She is incontinent,” said Wenzl.
“Yes.”
“She understands nothing, must be fed, can only make childish sounds. But the child understands French, German and Spanish.”
“So, you saw the paper,” said Prinzmetal.
“And you, did you see this in the Tageblatt?” Wenzl asked, almost unwillingly. He took a folded newspaper from his breast pocket. “A man and his wife in Tasmania each claims to be the other.”
“I heard also, on the television, that while laying a cornerstone in Aberdeen, the mayor changed into a naked young girl, who ran away crying,” said Prinzmetal “But who knows what those fellows make up and what is true?”
“Supposing it should all be true?” Wenzl asked, folding his paper neatly and putting it away.
“It would be interesting,” said Prinzmetal, turning his attention to his soft, hairy hands, which he began to scrub with care.
“And?”
“It is our duty to report to the Director anything that might he of importance to the work of the Zoo,” said Prinzmetal, as if reciting a lesson.
“On the other hand,” said Wenzl deliberately, “It is useless, and even has a harmful effect, to take up the Herr Doktor’s time with baseless newspaper scandal.”
The two men looked at each other for a moment with complete understanding in their eyes. “After all,” said Prinzmetal, drying his hands, “what would be the good of it?”
“Exactly,” said Wenzl, and folding his newspaper precisely lengthwise, he dropped it into the waste can.
VIII
WHEN the young man woke up, he was in a narrow bed in a white-tiled room. Wires that came out of the bed were stuck to his head, arms and legs with sticky elastic bands. He plucked at them irritably, but they would not come off.
He looked around. There was a doorway, open, but no window. In the corner, behind a single wall that half concealed it, was a W.C. In the other corner was a flimsy plastic chair and a reading light, but nothing to read.
The young man tried to get up, pulling at the wires, and discovered they had silvery joints that would break apart. He got out of bed, trailing the wires.
After a moment a stout woman in nurse’s uniform came in, and clucked her tongue at him. “Up, are you? Who told you you could?”
“I want to use the W.C.,” he told her plaintively.
“Well, go ahead, then back into bed with you. Herr Doktor Holderlein hasn’t seen you yet.” To his mild surprise, she stood with hands folded in front of her and watched while he used the toilet. Then she pushed him back and made him lie down, while she snicked the silvery joints of the wires together again, all around the bed. “Lie still,” she told him. “No more nonsense. Here is the bell - ring if you want anything.”
She showed him a plastic knob on the end of a flex cord, and went away, “Am I sick?” he called after her, but she did not come back.
The young man tried once more to pull off the elastic bands, then gave it up. His last memories were confused. He could remember falling into the net, and being held down while he struggled. Then a feeling of being carried, a glimpse of many legs walking. … Then nothing, until he found himself in a whitewalled tiny room with bars instead of a door. His clothes were gone, and he was wearing gray pajamas. No one had come in answer to his calling, until he began to bang on the bars with a steel pot he found in the room, and then a man came and squirted water on him from a spray-gun. So he did not bang any more, but sat and shivered.
He remembered falling asleep and waking up at least twice in that room. Once he had been fed. Then two men had come to fetch him, and they had given him his own clothes again, and coffee to drink, which he liked. Then they had taken him down a long corridor into a crowded room, and told him to wait. At the end of the room, behind a high counter, was a man in red robes, with a red floppy hat. The young man knew from his watching of television that this man was a judge, and that he was going to be sentenced …
Now, here he was in still another place. Time passed. The young man was growing hungry, but did not dare ring the bell. At last an orderly came in with a cart, and he was allowed to sit up and eat. It was almost like the Zoo. Then the orderly came back for his plate, and hooked him up to the wires again; and for a long time nothing else happened.
The young man was bewildered. Why was he here? What had the judge and that other man been whispering about, down at the end of the room, and why had the judge looked so annoyed when he glanced his way?
This place was better than the jail, it would not do to complain -but if he was not sick, then why was he here?
Bells tinkled outside. Every now and then people passed his doorway, walking rapidly, with soft soles that swished and squeaked on the tile floor.
Then the nurse came in again. “You are in luck,” she told him. “Herr Doktor Holderlein says you may see Herr Doktor Boehmer today.” She yanked his wires apart briskly, then helped him up. “Come, don’t keep the doctor waiting!”
SHE took his elbow and led him down the hall, where messages in colored letters rippled silently along the walls, to an office where a man with a bushy mustache sat behind a desk. On the desk was a card that said Hr. Dr. Boehmer.
The doctor gave the young man a long measuring look, and unscrewed a thick old-fashioned tacrograph slowly. “Sit down, please.” He began writing on a pad. “Now then. Can you tell me your name?”
The young man hesitated only a moment. If he said Fritz, he knew very well they would send him back to the Zoo. “Martin Naumchik, Herr Doktor, he said.
“Occupation?”
“Journalist.”
The doctor nodded slowly, writing. “And your address?”
“Gastnerstrasse.”
“And the number?”
The young man tried to remember, but could not.
Doktor Boehmer pursed his heavy lips. “You seem a little confused. How long is it since you were in your apartment in Gastnerstrasse?”
The young man shifted uncomfortably. “I think, three-or, no, four days.”
“You really don’t remember.” Doktor Boehmer wrote something slowly, in his thick black handwriting, across the ruled pad. The young man watched him with apprehension.
“Well then, perhaps you can tell me the date?”
“June 10th, Herr Doktor … or perhaps the 11th.”
Boehmer’s bushy eyebrows went up a trifle. “Very good. And who is the president of the High Council, can you tell me that?”
“Herr Professor Onderdonck … is that right?”
“No, not quite right. He was president last year.” Bohmer wrote something else slowly on the pad. “Well now.” He folded his heavy arms across the pad, holding the big black tacrograph as if it were a cigar. “Tell me, do you remember being in the department store?”
“Oh, yes, Herr Doktor.”
“And hiding upstairs, and coming down during the day?”
“Yes, Herr Doktor.”
“And why did you do that?” The young man hesitated, opening and closing his mouth several times.
“You can tell me, Herr Naumchik. Go ahead. Why did you do it?”
The young man said helplessly, “Because I had nowhere else to go, Herr Doktor.”