An Interpreter in Vienna is a response to Graham Greene's The Third Man and a psychological thriller serialized on The Matterhorn each Saturday. This prose is a continuation of a letter written by Marie to her (official) employers in anticipation of Josef’s arrival at her door…at the threshold where she believes one of them will die.
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Chapter 11
Life continued seamlessly but now as I write it down, it became very strange, very quickly. I don’t recognize myself in these patterns. If I wasn’t working for Marija or at the UN, I was living a monk-like lifestyle.
These were the days I started wanting it to rain all the time, so I had a good excuse to stay home. I would imagine everyone retreating and becoming like stones, absorbing the dampness in the air and doing those things people do in their own homes. We don’t ask about them.
Sometimes I worried if I did normal things and then I would realize I had spent most of my life trying not to be normal and get confused. How could I know what normal was anyway? Were people truthful on all those surveys from psychology experiments? I think this is when the scopophobia started. Even before my public humiliation to come, I felt a lot more comfortable in the shadows.
Sometimes Marija would invite me for meetings and outings in Vienna as her interpreter, though she didn’t always need one; her English was fine but she enjoyed seeing the world through French. I assumed it was some kind of establishment of status, to bring your interpreter with you, but also perhaps a way to manipulate certain conversations.
There was a dead time between the early autumn wine festivities and the arrival of the Christmas markets in mid-November. It wasn’t long, but it was dark, cold, and wet.
The days of the counterterrorism conference were long and boring. It was incredible the way tech companies were secretly helping governments to find potential criminals. But most of the talk was about the legal aspects of it; how and when they were legally allowed to investigate people’s encrypted emails or other online materials.
Some were arguing that all should be available. That we should live in a world free of fear if we are good people; let the police view all our private ongoings! I thought of that book called The Circle when a Facebook-like company takes over the world with this premise. I thought about pre-empting our world fate and running off the Austrian woods.
The Germans were especially adamant: ‘Do you recall, good sirs and madams, what happens when the government has control over our personal spaces? Perhaps we can remind you of our shameful history.’ The woman representing Germany said this in clear and confident English. I was just as perturbed but couldn’t speak. My only role here was to wait for an untranslatable phrase.
As I wandered home, walking from the U1 metro to avoid the busy U3 and get a bit of fresh November air, I passed by many workers busy putting up metal beams and wooden huts, first near the Ubahn exit, then in the small stone circle where the horse carriages corral outside Hoffburg Palace, then in Museums Quarter, adjacent to the site of Brian’s death, and finally at Spittelgasse. These were the beginning of the Christmas markets. It was only mid-November and Christmas seemed so far away. But I had heard the city took on a new life at this time. People could enjoy each other’s company outside and mix freely before hibernation. Of course, none of us knew how long the hibernation would last that year.
Right now they were just structures. There were no colors from the lights and items for sale nor were there the smells of gluhwein and sausages. I imagined that with snow it would all look more beautiful.
A quick check on my phone told me that they would all open next week. It was an easy way to go out alone without being noticed.
When the snow arrived for the first time, a few weeks later, it was a magical beauty on the rooftops. I had seen snow in all the places I’ve lived, but here it was directly connected to the season. A little bit like New York, but in my old home, as winter continued so did the life of the city. Sometimes a blizzard would totally knock it out, but everyone would slow down and frolic in the snow. Children would have school off and make snowmen and angels, like in that book the children I babysat for showed me: The Snowy Day.
I opened my window closest to the nearby rooftop to see the snow unfiltered. I was in my bathrobe and after a while, a few flakes made their way onto my chest in that V-shape where the bathrobe does not reach. I realized all of a sudden how cold it was. The chill reached through to my heart, and I felt I saw a warning in the wind to not only close my window but also my eyes.
I didn’t realize at the time that in Vienna after the Christmas season had passed and all the markets had been closed up, winter would continue for months — dark and empty. The city would be vide. Many would leave for the mountains, at least on the weekends, and sometimes for the whole season. Those who stayed either stayed home or sat in smoky bars and cafes brooding in the cold. There would never be a huge storm, sometimes a small accumulation of snow, but not more than that. In the mountains, it was a different story, and I got to witness the beauty out there, but it was a different world. Here, your shoes were ruined by the chunky salt and sand placed over all the sidewalks to keep us from slipping.
Sometimes the emptiness was beautiful though. And a small amount of snow on an old tram weaving through preserved buildings looked idyllic.
A sad kind of beauty. A cold kind of solitude.
Later that day, I decided to check out the Spittelgasse Christmas market, not far from my home. I had at that point traveled by it many times and even weaved through it during my morning commute when it was empty.
There was still snow covering the sidewalks. I made tracks over others tracks of clamped-down flakes. Along the way, metal poles, like long tent stakes, had been placed at angles from buildings. I walked under or around them. Later, Akihiro told me they marked how far away from the buildings one should walk in the winter. Once the large icicles formed, they could fall when they were too heavy or the sunlight hit just right.
‘I didn’t think about that. Man, that would really hurt!’
He laughed then added quietly, switching to Japanese: ‘More than that…a few years ago, they found a lady dead on the sidewalk in a pool of water and a hole straight through her body. The icicle had killed her, then completely disappeared. An invisible weapon. Can you imagine how many spies in this city got an idea then?’
‘Do you think she was killed by one of them?’
‘Who knows? She was just a random old lady. But everyone has secrets here. Maybe she knew something. Anyway, make sure you walk on the edge of the sidewalk.’
‘I’m going to walk looking up at the rooftops!’
‘Ok, that’ll work when you’re hit by a tram,’ he laughed again. Somehow the morbid blended easily with the humorous here.
There were no icicles yet on my way to the market but there was a Christmas spirit like I had never seen. We had these markets back in France but nothing like this. I heard that Alsace also took them quite seriously. Here, there was no pretending that some people might not celebrate Christmas.
I arrived at the first streets of the maze-like market and tried to just let go of everything else. I wandered slowly. There were already large crowds and it was just dusk. I stopped soon at a Gluhwein stand to have some hot spiced wine in a little festive cup. I took my mug to a tall table top and sipped whilst watching the world go by: families attempting to corral their children, old couples using slippery canes, women with several bags on a buying mission, small groups of men carrying sausages. They all wandered down the stone hill or weaved over to reach the parallel street from a secret passageway.
I’m not sure how long passed but I felt a lot warmer and as if I had become a part of the scene, as if I had been painted somewhere and our bodies were blurring into moments of history. We moved in harmonious rhythms. I bought several ornaments for my mother from a lady who claimed to have painted them herself. There were many bulbs with glossy finishes and hand-painted patterns of dots and zig zags. Others were in the shapes of angels, camels, trees, and snowmen.
I then refilled my mug with more glühwein for a mere two euros. After a few sips so it wouldn’t spill, this time I wandered and drank. My body was melting into the moment. With the elixir’s effect, I stopped to talk freely with several shopkeepers and bought a pom-pom hat, a candle, and a wooden toy for a child I imagined I would have one day.
After turning the corner, I began weaving up the second main street of the market. In my direct view was a stall that seemed to be glowing an aura of God’s light. For a moment, forgetting that I did not believe in God, I thought I was witnessing the true magic of Christmas.
Then my vision sharpened and I could make out all the tiny glass globes — as well as quite large ones — with little figures or scenes inside. I moved toward the image with tunnel vision.
An old man at the stall began an opening speech in Viennese dialect to tell me that snow globes originally came from Vienna and they were still made at Perzy in Hernals, where his stall’s all came from. He gave me a pamphlet and told me I was free to take a look and try any of them out.
I first held a skiing snowman. As I moved the little globe upside down, the white particles suspended in water moved blissfully, surrounding the figure, making the scene come to life. I was transported to childhood and recalled a globe my father had given me that held a fisherman inside. It had broken in my suitcase on the airplane to Japan, soaking all my clothes and damaging a framed photograph of my parents.
I decided to buy myself a new one and continued to look through the possibilities. Finally, one caught my eye. It was the Ferris wheel at Prater. It looked so sweet and iconic.
‘Wonderful choice! If you would like another, I will give you a little discount.’
I hadn’t realized this was a bargaining kind of fair and was egged on by the alcohol to purchase another.
‘Ok, vielen dank, I’ll also take the doughnuts.’ They were a bit random, and that was why I liked them: a pile of donuts carefully balanced on a plate. The Ferris wheel would be for Frau Grüber. I hoped it would make her smile through the sadness she carried with her everywhere.
A second - or was it third? - refill of my mug ensued and I wandered up the hill, ping-ponging into stalls. I say into although there was no place to enter; yet, somehow when you faced the shopkeeper and the wares, you felt as if you had entered a different space.
I noticed a circle forming toward the top of the hill near the tiny square. There were some flames of candlelight and some strange noises.
As if drawn magnetically, I arrived at the circle as well, just in time to witness the entrance of the demon, Krampus1. The horned figure danced and an entourage, also masked, that followed him into the circle carried flaming torches. In his attempt to terrify us, the glows of fire exposed faces in awe.
This was the manifestation of shame. I imagined being raised as an Austrian child with fear of this monster entering your soul if you didn’t do exactly what you were supposed to. Control with fear.
I realized that the adult faces I witnessed here were recalling some kind of trauma they were compelled to revisit each December. Some of them looked as if they were releasing their sins into the circle. One woman entered, danced with the devil figure himself, and eventually raised her arms in triumphant glory.
To be continued…
Find all the published chapters in the Table of Contents. I’m in Istria for two weeks with very spotty wifi, so apologies for not getting back to your comments sooner. I’ll get there eventually!
You can read about Krampus and its origins on The Smithsonian or Wandering Germany.
"Even before my public humiliation to come, I felt a lot more comfortable in the shadows." ...!!!
Just stopping here momentarily to add those exclamations!
You painted a fantastic image here of the sense of loneliness that swings from a feeling of isolation to independent exploration and self-reflection and discovery that really worked for me. Also, really how like the pacing of the story picks up as Marie swallows down more drinks as she moves through the markets. And the Krampus enters the picture at the right moment to raise the tension for her and bring myth and legend into focus, and offer the potential for a type of salvation through experiencing and embracing the past and coming traumas. Always a joy to read your work DKW!