WALTER ABISH
77
a line. My brain, my body, had stopped functioning. Everything
around me seemed at a standstill. On one of my walks I had picked up
Victor Segalen's
Rene Leys.
I began reading the book one afternoon in
a cafe on the rue de Rhone. Somehow, it seemed to me that the narrator
in the book, a Frenchman living in Peking in 1911, was contemplating
an action that in many respects paralleled or, at any rate, appeared
analogous to my own endeavor in Geneva. At a time when the
Forbidden City was still closed
to
all foreigners, the Frenchman's one
overwhelming desire-in order to understand what he kept referring to
as the "Within" of the Chinese Empire-was to enter (penetrate would
be the right term) the Imperial Palace and see what had been withheld
from him all along. Clearly, in my case, the city of Geneva did not
withhold anything as tangible as the Imperial Chinese Palace, some–
thing one could assess from the outside. No. By drawing this somewhat
specious comparison
to
the Frenchman in
Rene Leys
I was simply
indulging in a favorite habit of mine-namely, attempting to view and
place my personal affairs in a literary context, as if this would endow
them with a clearer and richer meaning.
But why had Daphne left for Geneva?
22.
The day Klude died it was in all the French, Swiss, and German
newspapers. Lengthy obituaries. Germany's greatest thinker since
Hegel. Photographs of Klude in his log cabin that was only a twenty–
minute drive from the country house my brother had designed for
himself. An entire page listing Klude's philosophical achievements. To
my surprise the editors had not omitted mention of Klude's somewhat
ridiculous role during the coming to power of the Nazis. Later that
day, in a quarter of Geneva I didn't know, I spotted a small bookstore. I
was pleased to discover that they had several of Klude's books in French
and German. After some hesitation I chose
Jetzt Zum Letzten Mahl
and
Ohne Grund,
an early work written in 1936. Upon leaving the store I
caught a brief but unmistakable glimpse of Daphne in the passenger
seat of a passing bright yellow Porsche. I called out, shouted her name
at the top of my lungs, frantically waving my hand as I ran after the
car, but probably she did not see me. Hours later, when I returned to
my hotel, the desk clerk handed me a note that had been left for me.
It
was from Paula.
It
simply stated: You have taken enough. Leave us
alone.
Leave us alone.
