THE CAFE IS a typical grammar school kids' cafe. So a large number of grammar school kids are there. They are discussing religious or philosophical topics. Schoolgirls go to mass with jazz music, throw their first parties, and after a lovely concert of church music bestow their first kiss. A grammar school boy seated at a marble-topped table tells the person sitting opposite him that the time may be right for their friendship, their first fleeting acquaintance, to become something else – the grammar school girl still describes the two of them as chums, which strikes the grammar school boy as reticence of an incomprehensible order. Somehow he senses that that is exactly what might endow their relationship with a quality of permanence, though, and he says it out loud. At that party last Thursday he was aware of it, too, the schoolboy says in low, soft tones. And so the pleasure he takes in symbols that can express with such marvellous directness what words can never say is all the greater.
Hans listens to this foreign-language dialogue and scans the pastel-coloured ice creams, squeezed-out tea-bags and pots of hot chocolate. But he promptly withdraws his gaze in alarm on realising that no one wants it.
Presently the schoolboy says to the schoolgirclass="underline" Not even the canniest of historians will ever find out who it was that kissed whom on that 27.3.
Hans wonders: What does 'canniest' mean, and what's this 'whom' anyway, and what is a historian?
The schoolgirl says that she is looking forward to the holidays and that the great day of her first ball must have been under a lucky star because it was such an exciting evening, I have good memories of it from the start to the very last moment. We were dancing and everything seemed so sparkling and beautiful. The two young pupils confuse the various past tenses; and though they constantly have to make use of them, they still remain as new in their mouths.
Hans also hears that the fellow at the next table, who doubtless has no idea what a real man has to be capable of, went skiing in the Otztal Alps. His thoughts were with the schoolgirl beside him a great deal, as they always are when he is in the mountains. The connection may not be apparent at first glance: the thing is that whenever I see lofty mountains I have profound thoughts, and aren't friendship and love -and fidelity – profound human experiences? demands the schoolboy, and the schoolgirl answers that she too went skiing, but somewhere else. And once again all that passed between them was written words. And a telegram that never reached you: Happy Easter and baci mille. Brigitte.
Hans wants to order a beer and another one later and yet another, but Sophie has already ordered a coffee and a cognac for him. Sophie's soft silence nestless into her dark pleated skirt and dark pullover. Hans is silent too, in her brother's expensive gear. All around him Innocence is talking, sons and daughters are talking away as if they were being paid to do so, about things and doings and goings-on that are as innocent as they themselves. Hans is neither a son nor a daughter because he is the son of a nobody.
Prater Park dappled with sunshine in the first light of day, the wet grass, the wet leaves, the thrill of getting up really early for once, the horse's neck nodding, a fine spray of powder snow, the swish of steel runners in glacial snow, shrieks of merriment when someone takes a tumble, and then a jolly evening in the log cabin, with punch or gluhwein, ditties to guitar and accordion accompaniments, and then that notorious step outside the door of the cabin, gazing into the starry winter heavens, the first kiss, and someone to catch a star.
Hans wants to try a huge gateau with buttercream like that some time, but Sophie imposes her veto. He is not allowed to booze and then sing hollodero or spit at people either.
Thrilling car trips with elder siblings acting as chauffeur, Father gave them a little car as a present when they passed their school-leaving exams and later he'll give you one too. Evenings of music played en famille in a wood-panelled room, Father playing cello, Mother (who is a doctor) playing piano, the siblings playing flute or violin, loved silly by their parents. New Year's Eve at the Semmering house, the youngsters laughing and giggling and kissing as the provisions the merry party need are lugged up to the house, which has about as much in common with work as a carwash has with a blast furnace, how dearly, how very dearly Hans would like to carry loads far heavier still, so heavy that everyone would marvel at him. The itch to travel. To head off to the romantic old monastery and take part in spiritual exercises at Whitsuntide, to find what you have lost, and subsequently say it is impossible to describe that Whitsun atmosphere. They often say it is impossible to convey an atmosphere in words but they use an incredible lot of words to say so, words you wouldn't think anybody had ever heard of, but they are familiar with every one of them. Whitsuntide, says the youth, who is already a student, Pentecost, it suggests strength, the Holy Spirit – or is there perhaps something else to it?
Hans pricks up his ears and lays them back because there is undoubtedly something else to it.
Love of a young girl, for instance? Judging by the sheer radiant power of the experience, it cannot be anything else! After breakfast there are discussions of fidelity and such matters, and then they join forces to cook up something for lunch, followed by another discussion, of duty and affection. Some masses are beautiful and profound yet low-key too, which really gets to you.
Now Hans is permitted an ice cream after all, and he splats about excitedly with his spoon in the unfamiliar pinkgreenandbrown slush, piggy that he is. Aren't I a mucky pup, demands Hans, and Sophie smiles. And now I'd really like a piece of chocolate cake. You'll be sick (Sophie). Nobody has ever seen Sophie eat, but she must do so because she still carries herself upright and walks about and uses up calories.
Birthday parties where everyone loves everyone else and minor quarrels only serve to make that love even deeper, rather than eating it away like nitric acid. A cool church, words spoken freely but not too freely, the sounds of guitars playing, the togetherness of a group of people that are as one, afterwards we have to take our leave of Father Clemens. Alas! Slide shows that are both interesting and fun. Walks on clear starry evenings, on your own land or on land adjoining your own. Something that represents a new beginning, a new bud set to blossom. Eternity is silence and sounds are transience, gets written into the appropriate diary. Sunshine and parents who get on well, visits to castles, farewells, sadness (though with a twinkle of merriment in one eye because it is perfectly likely that we'll meet again), siblings who help you cope by playing amusing parlour games, siblings who squabble and laugh as they do so, the piano, Debussy, Impressionist paintings, a lake, sheep, the miller in the forest, golden clouds, rambles with a rucksack on your back. Minor rendezvous and major plans, the chapel of the Hofburg, jazz clubs, lemonade, swimming baths, leaving the slopes, not enough snow, alas, skiing injuries that heal, jokes that make you forget you're confined to a sickbed. The feelings you have, birthday surprises, evenings spent listening to Fischer-Dieskau singing lieder. Being confined to your bed, a passing fever, visiting art galleries, 'satisfactory' for your Latin homework (a grade that calls for a celebration). Visiting Grandma. Rain, a dark sky, street lamps, the back seat of the car, wurst rolls, skin creased by laughter, photos, a silk headscarf, integral calculus, translating Cicero, debating whether it is right to cause other people unhappiness for the sake of truth. What is truth, what is dishonesty, and what is hypocrisy? Listening to records, discussions by candlelight. Beautiful dresses, your first evening gown, which you promptly wear to the Burgtheater, which you enjoy immensely. Don Giovanni at the opera house, which you enjoy immensely. The boy you only knew as a tennis partner with a powerful service suddenly slips off your coat at the cloakroom, it is as if he had been transformed, and later he kisses you in the park. In doing so he has crossed the borderline dividing childhood from adulthood. A serious matter, which the family celebrates. A point when everything seems empty, faces are revealed as masks with nothing behind them, you are on the brink of a deep abyss, you cannot see any way out (etc.) and you are suffering. There are a lot of expressions that describe this state precisely. As you find out when the problem is discussed among a small circle of friends. The problem ends in mutual understanding and thus automatically ceases to exist. Love. Only ignorant people grow angry, the Wise Man understands, or some other maxim to the effect that Man is the dearest object of God's love. Something or other is sealed with a long kiss and ends in peace. Holding conversations in French and English.