Memoirs Found in a Bathtub Page 8

  The razor. Strange I hadn’t thought of it till now. Meant for me? Perhaps. But I was too agitated to think that through. I took the staircase down, feeling dizzy. The fifth level. The fourth. Third. The corridor was white, extremely clean and straight—3887, 3886, 3885, 3884, 3883. My heart in my throat, I resolved to take a peek inside. If anybody would ask, I could say I was looking for Major Erms and happened to open the wrong door. They wouldn’t grab the folder from my hands by force—would they? These were my instructions. I’d demand that they phone the Department of Instructions, Major Erms… But then, they would know all that, so why should I worry myself to death? Quickly I tried to review the whole chain of events, to prepare my report according to procedure. I couldn’t contradict myself; that would be fatal. But I was so confused. For example, did that whole affair with the little old man take place before or after they arrested my first guide in the hall? I took a deep breath and turned the doorknob.

  There wasn’t a soul in the large, gloomy office, only cabinets and catalogs of all sizes and descriptions, huge ledgers, piles of papers tied with string, jars of glue, scissors, blotters, rubber stamps and all sorts of office debris all over the big desks along the walls. I heard feet shuffling; in a doorway off to the side there appeared an old, disheveled man in a uniform full of ink spots.

  “You came to see us?” he croaked. “A rare guest indeed! Welcome, welcome! What can we do for you? Something to be checked out, no doubt?”

  But before I could say a word, the old man rattled on, vigorously sniffing as he talked, trying to sniff back the disgusting drop that hung at the tip of his nose.

  “Civilian clothes, you’re in civilian clothes, that means you want something from the catalog … just a minute, it’s all right here…”

  He hobbled over to a huge card file and began to pull out one drawer after another. I looked around the room again. There were piles of junk all over the floor, in the corners, under the chairs; the air was thick with dust and the smell of molding paper. The old geezer rasped in explanation:

  “Chief Archive Custodian Glouble ain’t here. He’s at a meeting, don’t you know. The Underclerk ain’t here either, he didn’t give a reason, he just left. So you see, sir, here I am all by my lonesome to watch the store. It’s Antheus Kappril at your service, sir, Custodian Ninth Degree, ready for retirement after forty-eight years of faithful service, believe it or not. Oh yes, it’s the life of leisure for me all right, that’s what they tell me! But on the other hand, sir, as you can see for yourself, I’m indispensable here! Indispensable! But here I am talking away and you’re in a frightful hurry, I bet. Business, business. You place your call slips in this little old box here and lean on the buzzer when you’re ready; I come in a jiffy, find what you need even quicker, and if you want to read it here, no problem, and if you don’t, then put your serial number here, under the fifth column, IV-B, and that’s all there is to it.”

  He concluded this gravelly monologue with an odd little dance intended as a bow—or else his legs were giving way—and he pointed invitingly at the card file, gave an ingratiating smile, then began to back away.

  “Kappril,” I suddenly asked, afraid to look him in the eye, “is—is the Department of Investigation on this floor?”

  “Come again?” He cupped his ear with his hand. “Department of what? Didn’t hear you, didn’t hear you.”

  “Or the Prosecution Bureau?” I went on, ignoring the possible consequences of such open inquiry.

  “Prosecution Bureau?…” He seemed genuinely perplexed. “Never heard of it, sir, we’re the only department here, I never heard of that other…”

  “These are the Archives?”

  “That’s us. The Archives, Records, the Library… Anything else we can do for you?”

  “Not right now, thank you.”

  “No need to thank me, it’s my job, it’s my job. Here’s the buzzer, don’t forget to buzz.”

  He shuffled out, then I heard a fit of violent coughing from the next room. Or was someone trying to strangle him? But the sound faded, and I was alone with endless rows of drawers, their labels framed in brass.

  What did this mean? Were they trying to learn my interests? What could they possibly gain from that? My eyes wandered over the labels. The catalog was arranged by subject, not alphabetically—ESCHATOSCOPY, THEOLOGY, PONTIFICES AND ARTIFICES, APPLIED CADAVEROLOGY. I tried THEOLOGY. The cards were in no apparent order:

  ANGELS—see Communicants, Communiqués. Air power. Also see Daily orders (Give us this day our—).

  LOVE—see Diversion. Also see Treason (But hate the traitor).

  RESURRECTION—see Cadaverology. Corpse Corps.

  COMMUNION WITH THE SAINTS—see Contact.

  What could I lose? I filled out a call slip for one of the daily orders under ANGELS. But then there were so many headings which made little or no sense: INFERNALISTICS, SCUTTLENAUTICS, DECEREBRATION, BODY-AND-SOULGUARDS, RETROCARNATION. I couldn’t bother with them all; the card file was much too big, its wooden pillars reached the ceiling. Even the most superficial survey would take weeks, months. By now I had removed quite a pile of green, pink and white cards from the drawers; some had fallen to the floor. I started to put them back, one at a time. It seemed to take forever. With a glance over my shoulder to see if anyone was watching, I began to stuff the cards in any which way.

  Could it be that the catalog was in such disorder precisely because others had wandered in here, just as I did? On one desk nearby stood a row of bulky black volumes, apparently an encyclopedia of some kind. I opened the volume marked S to look up SCUTTLENAUTICS. “SCRAMBLED EGGS—the best breakfast against interception.” No, that wasn’t it. “SCUTTLENAUTICS—the science of nonnavigation. See also Abortive Sailing, Mock Docking.” I tried volume A. Under AGENT (SUB, SUPER, PROVOCATEUR) was a long paragraph and underneath that, an article entitled “AGENTS AND THEIR AGENCIES FROM EARLIEST TIMES TO THE PRESENT DAY.”

  Another volume lay open on the desk, and I read: “ORIGINAL SIN—the division of the world into Information and Misinformation.” I skipped from page to page, volume to volume, reading wherever my eye fell on an interesting definition. “RETROCARNATION—1) a Red that goes back on his word; 2) disembodiment, dematerialization—see THIN AIR, POWDER, LAMB.” Then there was a whole list of odd items under DECEREBRATION: persuasion by quartering, screws for screws, breaking codes without bones, fundamental flaying, and so forth. But I was tired of leafing through these dusty tomes; I wanted to see Major Erms. Yes, Erms would help me, I’d tell him everything! Suddenly there was a shuffling—the old man had returned. He eyed me sharply from the doorway, smiled and raised his spectacles to the top of his bald head. It was only now that I noticed he was cross-eyed. That is, one eye watched me while the other wandered up, as if seeking inspiration from above.

  “Find what you wanted?”

  He squinted, whistled under his breath. (A signal?) Then he saw a card on the floor, one I’d missed, looked at it and said:

  “Ah … that too?” He clucked appreciatively as he picked it up with grimy fingers. “In that case, won’t you come this way, sir? It’s hard for an old codger like me to carry out such heavy volumes. Of course, they’re not all heavy, but … you’ve been cleared, haven’t you? You look like one of General Mlassgrack’s men, you do. Professional secrecy, confidential, top security, don’t I know, heh-heh! Follow me, follow me, watch yourself, don’t get dirty … the dust, you know!”

  Rambling on in this way, he led me down a narrow, winding passage into the stacks. I kept bumping into atlases and folios as we went deeper into that murky labyrinth.

  “Here!” my guide exclaimed at last in triumph. A bright, naked bulb lit up a fairly roomy alcove. We were surrounded by shelves that sagged beneath the weight of gray, crumbling books.

  “Cake!” he snorted, waving the card in front of my nose. That was indeed the word on the card. “Cake, sir, help yourself to a slice … heh-heh! It’s all here—there’s your Splanchn
ology, Innardry, Disemboweling and Reembowelment, Viscerators and Eviscerators. An original edition over here, De crucificatione modo primario divino, second-century, the only copy in existence, wonderfully preserved, and with illustrations. Look at those shackles, will you, and here’s flaying alive, there’s playing dead, hamstringing, stringing up, tests of personal endurance… Now, on the next shelf—no, that’s Physical Tortures. I’m sorry, we’re in this section here—Bruises on the left, and on the right, Juices.”

  “Juices?” I couldn’t help asking.

  “Juices, juices. For example, a spit, an open fire, and you have juices, don’t you? Yes, and on the next shelf—Empaling. Mahagony, birch, oak, ash. And Bruises, they’re easy—but you must know all about it! Ah, nobody ever drops in any more, one gets so lonely… It’s so nice to have a little company, sir, if you know what I mean… They say this is all old-fashioned, obsolete.”

  “Obsolete?”

  “Oh, yes. Leave it to the butchers, they say. Top secret sirloin, tenderized—Lieutenant Pirpitschek likes to joke. But things are picking up again, it seems, in our department… The dust here, the dust is just awful!”

  He beat the dust off his sleeves and went on:

  “Allusions to cake, revolutions for cake—let them eat cake, wasn’t it? Ninety entries, all in all, a regular bakery, like our General says—oh, there’s a real man, the head of something terribly important, don’t you know! ‘Custodian Kappril, at your service, sir!’ I say. But he, does he give me the book number right off? Not on your life! He hums a little tune—hum hum, hum hum—and I know exactly what he wants. Every time!… Dr. Mrayznorl is in charge here—what’s this? De strangulatione systematica occulta. Somebody must have put it here by mistake, that’s physical—and Mummification too, tsk-tsk. Excuse me, that’s Cryptanalysis over there, you don’t want that—or do you? Take a look if you like, by all means… We have some very interesting books. That one you’re holding, allow me, I’ll wipe it off for you—it’s wipe off or be wiped out, like our General says. Heh-heh! He’s wonderful with words, oh yes… What’s that you’re holding—ah, The Universe in a Drawer—what’s his name again? Hyde, yes. A bit old-fashioned, but not bad. The Subcustodian of Archives spoke highly of it, and he’s an expert in the field. Life in a Lavatory? Why would you want that?”

  I put the book back hastily and pulled out another. My head was beginning to spin; an unbearable smell, overwhelming but unidentifiable, perhaps a little like mildew, or even sandpaper—this heavy, nauseating breath of the moldering centuries seemed to pervade everything.

  I should have settled for anything, taken the first book that came to hand and left. But I kept browsing, as if I were really looking for something. It certainly wasn’t The Deontology of Treason, nor the small, dog-eared In Imitation of Nothing, nor the black handbook Updating the Transcendental, which for some reason was shelved in the Espionage section. Around a comer was a row of thick tomes, their bindings brittle with age and the paper spotted and yellow. The illustrations were woodcuts, as was the frontispiece of The Compleat Spye, or, Everyman’s Handbooke of Espyonage yn Three Partes, Prolegomena & Paralipomena by the Author-Nugator Jonahberry O. Paupus. Between these bulky works were several incunabula, their covers tom and barely legible: Cloak-and-Dagger without Guesswork, Anarchy by Remote Control, The Bribe—a Spy’s Best Friend, Snooping in Theory and Practice. There was a bibliography of scopological and scopognostic literature, including scoposcopy. Machina Speculatrix, or, The Tactics of Counterespionage. Cohabitation and Collaboration. The Fine Art of Treachery and The Constant Traitor. Do-it-yourself Denunciation. Favorite Blunders and Slip-ups with full diagrams. Traps and Taps. There were even artistic items—a musical score with the title carefully written in violet, The Walls Have Ears, a Divertimento for Four Trombones and Hidden Mike, and a collection of sonnets entitled Microdots.

  Someone groaned. It was a terrible, heartrending groan that came from behind a partition. I grabbed the old man’s sleeve and asked:

  “What was that?”

  “Ah yes, the recruits are listening to records. It’s a seminar on Applied Agony, Simulthanasia, or something like that. Tombsters, we call them,” he muttered.

  And indeed, that same groan was being played over and over again. I was ready to leave. But the old geezer fell into a fever of activity; he bustled about the shelves, jumped up on tiptoe, moved the rusty ladders here and there, darted up the rungs, threw books down, and in general raised a thick cloud of dust—all this to regale me with yet another exhibit, some decrepit rarity or other. And he never ceased his ranting and raving, almost to the rhythm of the howling behind the partition. The glistening drop at the tip of his nose swung wildly but never fell. Somehow, his cross-eyed gaze never left me, so I had to be very careful—he might discover I was here under false pretenses, an impostor. But no, he continued his frantic inspection, eager to show me still another dusty volume. Basic Cryptology was pressed into my hands and fell open to these words: “The human body consists of the following places of concealment…”

  “Ah, here is Homo Sapiens As a Corpus Delicti, a splendid work, splendid … and this is Incendiaries Then and Now, and here’s a list of the experts in the field—listen: Meern, Birdhoove, Fishmi, Cantovo, Karck, and we’re in it too of course, there’s our Professor Barbeliese, Klauderlaut, Grumpf—imagine that, Grumpf! This? The Morbitron by Glauble. Yes, he’s an author as well … heh-heh! Now this pamphlet—”

  He pulled out a stack of disintegrating cards.

  “Umbilicomurology and, yes, the breeding and care of coypus—there isn’t anything we don’t have here… What you’re holding there, that’s Fashion. You know, the cut of the straitjacket, things like that… Here are some other items: The ABC’s of Self-surveillance, Automated Self-immolation…”

  I backed away, trying to defend myself against this flood of talk and dust and decay, this barrage of strange terminology—triple tails, coded leaks, spotted caches, exposed plants, strategic lays, integrated risks, sensitive channels, high-grade rendezvous entrapment…

  Unable to take any more, I told the old man I had to leave. He glanced at his watch, a large silver onion.

  “Is that a secret watch?” I asked.

  “Of course it’s a secret watch, what do you think?”

  He put it back in his pocket and frowned as I mumbled some excuse about dropping in another time to pick out what I needed… He didn’t seem to hear, he kept wanting to take me to other sections. Naked bulbs lit up the crowded shelves and cabinets like low-hung stars. Even at the exit he tried to show me another book, pointing out special pages, praising the work as if I were a potential buyer and he a half-mad bibliopole or bibliophile.

  “But you took nothing, sir! You took nothing!” he pestered me all the way back to the catalog room. To get rid of him, I asked for the book on angels and a handbook of astronomy. I signed for them illegibly and left, a thick manuscript under my arm—the book on angels, as it turned out, had never been published. I took a deep breath of fresh air out in the corridor. What a relief! But my clothes still carried the smell of rotting leather, bookbinder’s glue and parchment. I felt like I’d just stepped out of a slaughterhouse.

  6

  I had hardly left the Archives when a thought hit me. I returned and compared the door number with the one scribbled on my card: sure enough, I had made a mistake, I had taken the second digit for an eight instead of a three. So my real destination was 3383.

  The fact that I had made a mistake and misread a number was a tremendous comfort to me. Until now, everything had seemed accidental but in reality had gone according to some plan. But this visit to the Archives, that was a genuine accident. And the Building was responsible for it: the room number had been written in too carelessly. Human error, then, still operated here; mystery and freedom were still in the realm of possibility.

  Then too, the examining magistrate was as much to blame as I, the defendant—we would have a good laugh together and the matt
er would be dismissed. I headed for 3383 confidently.

  Judging from the great number of phones on every desk, 3383 was not just another office. I went straight to the head official’s door—but found no knob to turn. The receptionist asked if she could be of any help. My explanation grew involved and complicated because I couldn’t tell her the truth.

  “But you have no appointment,” she repeated over and over again. I demanded an appointment. But that was out of the question, she said; I would have to submit my petition in triplicate through the proper channels, then get the necessary signatures. But my Mission was Special, Top Secret. I tried to explain without raising my voice; it could only be discussed in absolute privacy. But she was busy with the phones—answering with a word or two here, pressing a button or two there, putting some people on hold, cutting off others—and hardly seemed to be aware of my existence.

  After an hour of this I swallowed my pride and began to plead with her. But pleading didn’t have the least effect, so I showed her the contents of my folder, the blueprint of the Building, the outline for Operation Shovel. I might have been showing her old newspapers for all the response this produced. She was the perfect secretary; nothing existed beyond the narrow limits of her routine. Driven to desperate measures, I let out a stream of terrible confessions—I told her about the open safe, about how I had unwittingly caused the suicide of the little old man, and as none of this made the least impression on her, I began to invent things, I confessed to treason, high treason, anything, if only she would let me in. I demanded the worst—arrest, dishonor—I screamed in her ear. But she waved me away as if I were a fly, and continued to answer the phones with complete indifference. Finally, bathed in sweat, weak and trembling, I collapsed into a chair in the comer. Very well, I would wait. The examining magistrate, the prosecutor, whoever was hiding behind that office door had to come out sooner or later. To pass the time, I leafed through the manuscript I had with me. But I was too confused and wrought-up to concentrate. It said something about the sighting of angels. The astronomy handbook wasn’t any easier to follow—there were long paragraphs on galactic camouflage, nebulae prototypes, relocation of planets, cosmic sabotage… I read the same page ten times without understanding a thing. The hours passed. Surely, this nightmare was worse than any torture I could have ever imagined. Countless times I got up to ask the receptionist questions in a feeble voice. Could she please tell me what time it was? When did her boss go out for lunch? Were there any other investigative offices or prosecution departments nearby? She advised me to try Information. And where was Information, I asked. Room 1593, she said and picked up another phone. So I gathered up my papers, the folder and the book, and walked out, totally crushed. There was nothing left of my earlier confidence, the calm I had achieved that morning, absolutely nothing. My watch informed me that I had spent practically an entire day in that office. Or an entire night, since time was relative in the Building.