Steppenwolf
a face it might adorn? Good God, though we did play the brigand we
might at least emulate the illustrious and spare pretty women. Gustav,
however, had already fired. The driver shuddered and collapsed. The car
leapt against the perpendicular cliff, fell back and overturned, wheels
uppermost. Its engine was still running and the wheels turned absurdly
in the air; but suddenly with a frightful explosion it burst into
flames.
“A Ford,” said Gustav. “We must get down and clear the road.”
We climbed down and watched the burning heap. It soon burnt out.
Meanwhile we made levers of green wood and hoisted it to the side
of the road and over the wall into the abyss, where for a long time
it went crashing through the undergrowth. Two of the dead bodies had
fallen out as we turned the car over and lay on the road with their
clothing partly burnt. One wore a pretty good coat. I searched the
pockets to see who he was. A leather case came to hand with some cards
in it. I took one and read: Tat Twam Asi.
“Very witty,” said Gustav. “Though, as a matter of fact, it is all one
what our victims are called. They’re poor devils just as we are. Their
names don’t matter. This world is done for and so are we. The least
painful solution would be to hold it under water for ten minutes. Now
to work--”
We threw the bodies after the car. Already another one was tooting. We
shot it down with a volley where we stood. It made a drunken swerve
and reeled on for a stretch, then turned over and lay gasping. One
passenger was still sitting inside, but a pretty young girl got out
uninjured, though she was white and trembling violently. We greeted her
politely and offered our assistance. She was too much shaken to speak
and stared at us for a while quite dazed.
“Well, first let us look after the old boy,” said Gustav and turned
to the occupant of the car who still clung to his seat behind the
chauffeur. He was a gentleman with short grey hair. His intelligent,
clear grey eyes were open, but he seemed to be seriously hurt; at
least, blood flowed from his mouth and he held his neck askew and rigid.
“Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Gustav. We have taken the
liberty of shooting your chauffeur. May we inquire whom we have the
honour to address?”
The old man looked at us coolly and sadly out of his small grey eyes.
“I am the Attorney-General Loering,” he said slowly. “You have not only
killed my poor chauffeur, but me too, I fancy. Why did you shoot on us?”
“For exceeding the speed limit.”
“We were not travelling at more than normal speed.”
“What was normal yesterday is no longer normal to-day, Mr.
Attorney-General. We are of the opinion that whatever speed a motor-car
travels is too great. We are destroying all motor-cars and all other
machines also.”
“Your rifles too?”
“Their turn will come, granted we have the time. Presumably by
to-morrow or the day after we shall all be done for. You know, of
course, that this part of the world was shockingly overpopulated.
Well, now we are going to let in a little air.”
“Are you shooting every one, without distinction?”
“Certainly. In many cases it may no doubt be a pity. I’m sorry, for
example, about this charming young lady. Your daughter, I presume.”
“No. She is my stenographer.”
“So much the better. And now will you please get out, or let us carry
you out, as the car is to be destroyed.”
“I prefer to be destroyed with it.”
“As you wish. But allow me to ask you one more question. You are a
public prosecutor. I never could understand how a man could be a public
prosecutor. You make your living by bringing other men, poor devils
mostly, to trial and passing sentence on them. Isn’t that so?”
“It is. I do my duty. It was my office. Exactly as it is the office of
the hangman to hang those whom I condemn to death. You too have assumed
a like office. You kill people also.”
“Quite true. Only we do not kill from duty, but pleasure, or much more,
rather, from displeasure and despair of the world. For this reason we
find a certain amusement in killing people. Has it never amused you?”
“You bore me. Be so kind as to do your work. Since the conception of
duty is unknown to you--”
He was silent and made a movement of his lips as though to spit. Only a
little blood came, however, and clung to his chin.
“One moment!” said Gustav politely. “The conception of duty is
certainly unknown to me--now. Formerly I had a great deal of official
concern with it. I was a professor of theology. Besides that, I was
a soldier and went through the war. What seemed to me to be duty
and what the authorities and my superior officers from time to time
enjoined upon me was not by any means good. I would rather have done
the opposite. But granting that the conception of duty is no longer
known to me, I still know the conception of guilt--perhaps they are the
same thing. In so far as a mother bore me, I am guilty. I am condemned
to live. I am obliged to belong to a State, to serve as a soldier, to
kill and to pay taxes for armaments. And now at this moment the guilt
of life has brought me once more to the necessity of killing people as
it did in the war. And this time I have no repugnance. I am resigned to
the guilt. I have no objection to this stupid congested world going to
bits. I am glad to help and glad to perish with it.”
The public prosecutor made an effort to smile a little with his lips on
which the blood had coagulated. He did not succeed very well, though
the good intention was manifest.
“Good,” said he. “So we are colleagues. Well, as such, please do your
duty.”
The pretty girl had meanwhile sat down by the side of the road and
fainted.
At this moment there was again the tooting of a car coming down the
road at full speed. We drew the girl a little to one side and, standing
close against the cliff, let the approaching car run into the ruins of
the other. The brakes were applied violently and the car reared up in
the air. It came to a standstill undamaged. We seized our rifles and
quickly had the newcomers covered.
“Get out!” commanded Gustav. “Hands up!”
Three men got out of the car and obediently held up their hands.
“Is any one of you a doctor?” Gustav asked.
They shook their heads.
“Then be so good as to remove this gentleman. He is seriously hurt.
Take him in your car to the nearest town. Forward, and get on with it.”
The old gentleman was soon lying in the other car. Gustav gave the word
and off they went.
The stenographer meanwhile had come to herself and had been watching
these proceedings. I was glad we had made so fair a prize.
“Madam,” said Gustav, “you have lost your employer. I hope you were not
bound to the old gentleman by other ties. You are now in my service.
So be our good comrade. So much for that; and now time presses. It will
be uncomfortable here before long. Can you climb, Madam? Yes? Then go
ahead and we’ll help you up between us.”
We all climbed up to our hut in the tree as fast as we could. The lady
did not feel very well up there, but we gave her some brandy, and she
was soon so much recovered that she was able to admire the wonderful
view over lake and mountains and to tell us also that her name was Dora.
Immediately after this, there was another car below us. It steered
carefully past the overturned one without stopping and then gathered
speed.
“Poltroon!” laughed Gustav and shot the driver. The car zig-zagged and
dashing into the wall stove it in and hung suspended over the abyss.
“Dora,” I said, “can you use firearms?”
She could not, but we taught her how to load. She was clumsy at first
and hurt her finger and cried and wanted court-plaster. But Gustav told
her it was war and that she must show her courage. Then it went better.
“But what’s going to become of us?” she asked.
“Don’t know,” said Gustav. “My friend Harry is fond of pretty girls.
He’ll look after you.”
“But the police and the soldiers will come and kill us.”
“There aren’t any police and such like any more. We can choose, Dora.
Either we stay quietly up here and shoot down every car that tries to
pass, or else we can take a car and drive off in it and let others
shoot at us. It’s all the same which side we take. I’m for staying
here.”
And now there was the loud tooting of another car beneath us. It was
soon accounted for and lay there wheels uppermost.
Gustav smiled. “Yes, there are indeed too many men in the world. In
earlier days it wasn’t so noticeable. But now that every one wants air
to breathe, and a car to drive as well, one does notice it. Of course,
what we are doing isn’t rational. It’s childishness, just as war is
childishness on a gigantic scale. In time, mankind will learn to keep
its numbers in check by rational means. Meanwhile, we are meeting
an intolerable situation in a rather irrational way. However, the
principle’s correct--we eliminate.”
“Yes,” said I, “what we are doing is probably mad, and probably it
is good and necessary all the same. It is not a good thing when man
overstrains his reason and tries to reduce to rational order matters
that are not susceptible of rational treatment. Then there arise
ideals such as those of the Americans or of the Bolsheviks. Both are
extraordinarily rational, and both lead to a frightful oppression
and impoverishment of life, because they simplify it so crudely.
The likeness of man, once a high ideal, is in process of becoming a
machine-made article. It is for madmen like us, perhaps, to ennoble it
again.”
With a laugh Gustav replied: “You talk like a book, my boy. It is
a pleasure and a privilege to drink at such a fount of wisdom. And
perhaps there is even something in what you say. But now kindly re-load
your piece. You are rather too dreamy for my taste. Any moment may
bring a few buck, and we cannot kill them with philosophy. We must have
ball in our barrels.”
A car came and was dropped at once. The road was blocked. A survivor, a
stout red-faced man, gesticulated wildly over the ruins. Then he stared
up and down and, discovering our hiding place, came for us bellowing
and shooting up at us with a revolver.
“Get off with you or I’ll shoot,” Gustav shouted down. The man took aim
at him and fired again. Then we shot him.
After this two more came and were bagged. Then the road was silent and
deserted. Apparently the news had got about that it was dangerous. We
had time to enjoy the beauty of the view. On the far side of the lake a
small town lay in the valley. Smoke rose from it and soon we saw fire
leaping from roof to roof. Shooting could be heard. Dora cried a little
and I stroked her wet cheeks.
“Have we all got to die then?” she asked. There was no reply. Meanwhile
a man on foot went past below. He saw the smashed-up motor-cars and
began nosing round them. Leaning over into one of them he pulled out a
gay parasol, a ladies’ hand-bag and a bottle of wine. Then he sat down
contentedly on the wall, took a drink from the bottle and ate something
wrapped in tinfoil out of the hand-bag. After emptying the bottle he
went on, well pleased, with the parasol clasped under his arm; and I
said to Gustav: “Could you find it in you to shoot at this good fellow
and make a hole in his head? God knows, I couldn’t.”
“You’re not asked to,” my friend growled. But he did not feel very
comfortable either. We had no sooner caught sight of a man whose
behaviour was harmless and peaceable and childlike and who was still
in a state of innocence than all our praiseworthy and most necessary
activities became stupid and repulsive. Pah--all that blood! We were
ashamed of ourselves. But in the war there must have been Generals even
who felt the same.
“Don’t let us stay here any longer,” Dora implored. “Let’s go down. We