The Sensualist Page 5

  She wrestled herself back up, moved the teapot to the bedside table, and pulled the box closer. Picking through the stuff again. Not dreaming; here it was. The magnifying glass, the woodcut, the torn-out page, the finger bone, the vials. The page into which the vials were stuck caught her eye again. She ran her finger along the roughened surface of the paper, contemplating the fragments of hearts, picked up one of the flakes of dried medicine from the broken bottle and absently put it in her mouth. When she realized what she had done she tried to scratch it off of her tongue, but her picking only broke it up into smaller fragments. Appalled by her stupidity and hoping that whatever was in the bottle no longer worked, she washed it down with the rest of her tea. The label still clung to one of the remnants of broken glass. Ext. digitalis purpurea. Digitalis. Heart stimulant. As if on cue, her heart started beating crazily. Why hadn’t she read the label before swallowing the stuff? Why had she stuck it in her mouth in the first place? She grabbed the magnifying glass and stared through it—cockeyed sickening sensation in the gut—read the label again, read the notebook page, the appointment with Dr von Ehrlach. Why not go see him after all?

  Resolutions made at ten o’clock at night can seem pretty ridiculous at ten o’clock in the morning. However, at five minutes to the hour she found herself standing in front of a bland, turn-of-the-century building on Türkenstrasse, preparing to keep the rather dubious appointment with Dr L. von Ehrlach and grateful that her reaction to the dried-out old medicine had been nothing but panic.

  A morose doorman sporting dense glasses with heavy translucent sky-blue frames let Helen into the building. While she told him she was there to see Dr von Ehrlach, she couldn’t help but notice his moth-eaten uniform with frayed cuffs, the strands of gold braid trailing from the sleeves, and the holes developing along the seams. He shrugged both to dismiss the poor state of his once dignified clothing—her scrutiny was unmistakable—and to let her know that, although it was none of his business who she was there to see, he would be so kind as to point out the lift to her. As she waited for the car to descend, she watched him walk away, noting that he squirmed and tugged at his shoulders, trying to straighten out the epaulettes which were in bad need of repair. He let himself into a cloakroom just off the lobby, shut the bottom half of the double-dutch door and stood ramrod straight, at attention. Helen punched the button again, but could hear no sound coming from the elevator shaft. She looked inquiringly over towards the doorman. Regarding her with his expressionless face, he held up a schilling coin between gloved finger and thumb, and demonstrated inserting it into a slot. Helen looked around the door of the elevator and located the slot. She found a schilling in her pocket, stuck it in the slot, and immediately heard the sound of the elevator descending. She turned towards the doorman to acknowledge his help, but he was now leaning with his elbows on the shelf, surveying other dimensions of his empty domain.

  Helen’s gaze followed the slow descent of the lit elevator car. Its arrival was punctuated by a whine and bump; the heavy cage door screeched in pain as she slid it back, redoubling its cries of agony when she shut it. She was surprised to see a small man tucked away in the corner hunched on a stool, legs hanging, feet swinging to the beat of imaginary elevator music. He was wearing a uniform identical to that of the doorman.

  “Oh,” exclaimed Helen. “You startled me.”

  “Was?” asked the elevator man.

  “You startled me,” she repeated in German. “Are you the elevator man?” He obviously was, but then why hadn’t he opened the door for her?

  “Ja,” he replied.

  “Dritter Stock, bitte, “ she commanded.

  He pointed to the buttons.

  Helen stared at him for a second and then pressed 3. The elevator began its rise up to the third floor with a terminal slowness that gave Helen the opportunity to scrutinize the cramped interior. The car was dimly but warmly lit with a series of five suspended lamps, delicately shaded with smoky glass made even more opaque with the accumulation of years of dust. The walls were decorated with floor-to-ceiling strips of fretworked brass, alternating with tarnished glass panels. The elevator’s interior had been buffed time and again, and one could see that every crevice was caked with the white powder of dried polish. Helen rubbed her eyes until they watered, as if tears would bring light to the dimness. She then asked the man petulantly, “If you’re the elevator man, then why don’t you do your job?”

  The man reached first into his breast pocket, dashingly offered her a soiled handkerchief, and then into the palm side of his left-hand glove. A somewhat stained card, creased into the shape of his palm, emerged. “Wilhelm Stukmeyer, Aufyugsfachmann/Elevator Professional,” read Helen dumbstruck. By appointment only. That was ridiculous. Who had ever heard of such a thing? She tried to hand him back the card, but he demurred with lowered eyes and a raised hand. He did, however, accept the return of the handkerchief.

  The elevator finally reached the third floor and groaned to a stop. She opened up the still complaining door, leaving Wilhelm sitting in his corner. “I’m taking the stairs down,” she muttered to herself as she walked down the hall, looking for the doctor’s office.

  Helen knocked on the door that displayed the sign, “Dr. med. L. von Ehrlach.” Not hearing any footsteps or voices inside, she turned the knob, and, finding it unlocked, stepped into a modest, functional waiting room. It was incongruously furnished with five dark green, molded plastic chairs arranged around a heavy polished oak coffee table.

  There was no receptionist, but there was another door with a yellowed, hand-written sign on it that read, in German, “Please have the kindness to wait.”

  She sat down on the edge of one of the chairs, finding little in the room to catch her attention. She glanced at her watch: 9:58. Contemplating the room’s bareness, she noted the pale green of the walls and the absence of windows. The floor was the same as the floor of the hallway—a dark green marble laid in three-foot squares with the veins painstakingly matched from square to square.

  At precisely ten o’clock the inner door opened up, and a tall man in his late fifties or early sixties sporting a long white lab coat over a hairy tweed jacket peered out. His face was thin, almost ravaged, and the brilliant silver and red hairs of his goatee, mustache, and eyebrows added voltage to his rather electric appearance. As this was clearly Dr von Ehrlach, Helen stood up and took a step towards him, reaching out to shake his hand and introduce herself. The doctor took a step forward, both arms outstretched, his eyes and mouth unable to control themselves.

  “Rosa! My dear, how remarkable to see you again,” he exclaimed in German. “How the years have melted you away!” He clasped her in his arms and drew her to him in a massive embrace. The rough wool of his suit coat tickled her nose and cheek.

  “I’m sorry,” answered Helen, flustered, in English. “My name is Helen Martin.” She pushed against his chest to free herself from his grasp.

  Stepping back and releasing her, the doctor gesticulated incoherently and clumsily wrestled a notebook out of his jacket pocket. He flipped to a page and then consulted his watch. “It is ten o’clock, isn’t it?” he asked, continuing the conversation in English.

  “Yes, it is. Is your appointment with Rosa?”

  “Of course. I have here, please take a look for yourself, an appointment with Rosa Kovslovsky at ten o’clock.” He offered his datebook to Helen, staring at her intently. She leaned over to look at his spidery handwriting then showed him the page she’d been given.

  “I don’t know what to say. Your name, your address, this time was written down here, so I just showed up; I don’t know why It seems foolish I guess, but I hoped I might be able to find out something. About her, perhaps.” Her voice trailed off. This was not going well.

  “Yes, yes,” he said. “That’s fine. Please come in and forgive my confusion.” The doctor led the way into his inner office. He pointed to an uncomfortable but authentic looking Empire chair placed in front of a huge office d
esk. Helen removed her coat, set her bag down on the floor, and then sat down. The doctor went to the other side of the desk and stood there for a few moments looking at her. “Are you sure you aren’t Rosa Kovlovsky?” he asked, mystified.

  “Yes, quite sure,” Helen replied. “Besides, you said nice to see you again, or something like that. You must know what she looks like if you’ve seen her before.”

  “Yes, of course. You’re nothing like her, and yet. No, she’s rather, you know… “ he gestured helplessly then sighed, “…large,” he finished. He rubbed his eyebrows till the hair stood out in a static frenzy, then he came back around from behind the desk and stood close. “Yet there is something about you.” Without warning he grabbed her shirt and pulled it out towards him, dipping his neck to give him a bird’s-eye view down her front. Helen stood up quickly, jerked her shirt out of his paws, and pushed him away.

  “How dare you do that!” she exclaimed, not only turning red from anger and mortification but frozen to the spot.

  “Please forgive me,” he muttered. “Professional interest. No, you can’t possibly be Rosa. Yes, there is something about you—your earrings, yes, but more than that, hmm,” he paused, “your hair, is it yours?” Helen nodded, nervously twisting a strand.

  She then sat back down into the chair and burst out crying. Searching for the elevator man’s handkerchief, forgetting that she’d given it back to him, embarrassed by her own behavior, her chagrin increased when all she could find was a tattered length of toilet paper. She blew her nose quickly, the ends of the snotty paper dragging against her sleeve, and hastily reburied the humiliating rag in her pocket. It was all too much; the nightmare of the train hadn’t gone away after all. This Rosa person was back to haunt her only it was worse; now there was Dr von Ehrlach.

  The doctor, unmoved, went back behind the desk, slid into his oak chair, and swiveled rhythmically as he accurately described the woman that Helen met on the train, the woman who had given her the box. Betraying her with details of a certain intimacy, perhaps professional, perhaps not, Helen couldn’t help but wonder why he was confused about her identity. There were no characteristics in common between them: height, weight, hair color, hair style, age, walk, language; it was all as different as could be.

  “I’ve met this woman,” said Helen hesitantly, her equilibrium sufficiently restored, allowing her to speak. “She gave me some things that you should see.” She handed the box over to him and watched as he instinctively swung the oval plaque aside. He knew how this worked. He’d seen the box before. He didn’t comment about how curious the decorations were.

  “Yes, this is Rosa!” he exclaimed, flipping through the book to the page with the finger bone, noticing the ring that had been placed on it. “But where did you get this?” he asked, twirling the ring around the bone. Without waiting for an answer he replaced the finger and picked up the ticket that had been slipped in. “Rosa loves Berlin,” he said, noting the city name marked on the face of the ticket. “Did she show you her wigs?” Still not expecting a reply, he tucked the ticket into the book’s gutter, and then noticed the dog tag that Helen had jammed down the gap between the book and the box. “This dog tag has no name on it,” he murmured. He leaned forward over the desk, looking at Helen’s shoes. “No,” he said to himself, “can’t be the same dog. Those aren’t new.”

  He found the magnifying glass and held it up close to his right eye. “Ha!” he cried out. With serious concentration furrowing his already galvanized brow he glared at the dog tag through the glass. Squinting, he exclaimed, “It is the right dog!” His face puckered up in confusion. “But where did you get those shoes?”

  Helen started to speak, but he interrupted her, “Why is the glass broken?” She hadn’t noticed his attention swing back to the box; he was moving too fast for her.

  “Well,” she said, “the bottle was wedged in too tightly…”

  “And you broke it,” he finished for her.

  “Yes, that’s it exactly.”

  “Did Rosa show you her wigs?” he asked again in an innocent tone.

  Helen shook her head. “No,” she lied.

  “Are you sure that that’s your own hair?” he asked, pointing to her head. “Are you sure that isn’t a wig? How is it you’ve managed to arrive here looking exactly the way Rosa promised she would look? Why are you carrying Rosa’s Vesalius?” He had removed the woodcut. “What does she want you to do?”

  “How do you know this is Rosa’s Vesalius?” she asked, deciding to respond only to the one question.

  “Just look at it,” he said.

  She did. She could see nothing to indicate whose piece of paper it was. She put it back onto his desk.

  He flipped it over and then pointed a long bony finger at a line of writing in the upper right-hand corner: “To Rosa,” she read.

  “Okay, so it’s Rosa’s,” she shrugged. “I only just met her on a train, I know nothing of her except that she gave me this box. We exchanged maybe ten words. Oh yes,” she added, “she seemed to think that I was going to be coming here this morning. And yes, I am sure that this is my own hair.”

  “May I touch it?”

  “No!”

  “May I give you something for your box?” he asked brightly. “Something fitting?”

  “Well, I guess,” said Helen, “but, you know, I’m really here in Vienna because I’m looking for my husband, Martin Evans. These other things, like Rosa and this drawing, are incidental.”

  “A drawing! That’s just the thing.” The doctor got up and walked over to a tall, narrow wooden cabinet stacked with flat drawers. One after the other, he wrenched them open and then rapidly slammed them shut. Dust flew about, which he waved away as if swatting at wasps. Helen rushed over, hoping to get a glimpse of the contents inside the drawers, but he shot her such a scowl of disapproval that she stood back. Finally, about two-thirds of the way down the cabinet he drew out a piece of paper and trotted back over to the desk beaming idiotically. It was an engraving of a tooth extraction executed on heavy rag paper. He handed it to Helen and motioned for her to place it in between the pages, to try it for size. To his satisfaction, it fit perfectly.

  Dr von Ehrlach put his arm around Helen’s shoulders and shepherded her towards the door.

  “But, I haven’t had a chance to find out about why you were meeting Rosa this morning. And why she sent me in her place,” she protested, unwinding herself from his clutch. Such nonsense. No one sent her. She came on her own.

  “Please, make another appointment,” he replied, suddenly stiff and distant. “I’ve run out of time. I make appointments for 45 minutes, only. That is how it is done in Vienna.”

  “Do you have a patient waiting now?” Helen asked. “I could come back later today, if that would be more convenient. I’m only here for a few days,” she added desperately.

  “I am so sorry,” he said. “Go see Rosa. She will be able to tell you. I’m afraid that I won’t be able to help you at all.”

  The doctor hustled her into the outer room. Seeing no one else waiting, she said, “Couldn’t I talk to you until your next patient arrives? I don’t need much time and besides, I don’t know how to get in touch with Rosa, Rosa Kov-, Rosa Kovosky.” She was struggling hard to maintain her academic professionalism in the face of this maniac.

  “Kovslovsky,” corrected the doctor as he slammed his office door in her face.

  Helen stood in the empty waiting room at a loss for what to do next. She could hear the doctor stomping about in his office and was startled to hear him bellow out, “Rosa, why have you sent me this imbecile?!”

  Hurt and dismayed, Helen left the office. In a gesture of revenge she neglected to close the door, and as she drifted down the hallway towards the stairs and the elevator she could hear the door slam shut with great force.

  “How dare you do that!” she repeated the words gleefully. How often do you have the chance to say that! “How dare you do that! How dare you do that!” The words sou
nded impressive, and with no doubt the last version was the best. Too bad she hadn’t put the emphasis on the right word in the first place.

  Helen could see from the distance that the door to the elevator car was open. “Nonetheless,” she said to herself, “I’m taking the stairs.” As she got closer she noticed Wilhelm, the elevator man, standing, holding the door open for her. Her resolve weakened in the face of his exertions, and she was lured into the elevator by the little man as if he were a magnet. He closed the door effortlessly and soundlessly, then politely inquired, “Which floor, please?”

  “The ground floor, thank you,” she said.

  Wilhelm pushed the button, turned around, and hoisted himself onto the stool. “So, tell me,” he beamed at her. “What did he give you?”

  “Who?” asked Helen coldly.

  “The doctor. What did the doctor give you? Please tell me. I worked for his father, you know.”

  Helen, who was less certain than ever that her understanding of the language was doing her any service, responded hesitantly, “What does that have to do with anything?”

  “It gives me the right to ask,” was Wilhelm’s reply.

  Helen looked up at the lit number above the elevator door that showed they were still at the third floor. The elevator seemed to be moving more slowly down than it did up.

  “Are we moving?” she asked.

  Wilhelm ignored her question.

  “Oh, all right,” she said. “He gave me a drawing.”

  “What is it of?”

  “A tooth extraction.”

  “Whose?”

  “Do you mean whose drawing? It was the doctor’s drawing.”