Moving Parts Read Online Free Page B

The soil inside and out, on our side and on the other, would be equally rocky. Such an operation too would be pointless: For worms and moles a fence is no obstacle, while hobos can vault over it when no one’s watching. Clouds at least, once set loose, float off wherever the wind drives them and don’t come back, which unfortunately cannot be said of the questions buried in the barren sands of stories. The very thought of their monotonous drifting evokes tedium. The narrator cannot see a good way out for himself, since the actual way out – the stylish revolving glass door beneath the gleaming inscription – is not meant for him. The freedom with which hobos jump over fences stirs a longing for open spaces in the narrator. The hobo, who in the meantime has taken shelter from the rain under a torn shopping bag, casts an indifferent glance at the letters over the entrance, which form into a name, let’s say, Universum. Any name is as good as any other, so long as it contains sufficient luster to gild the letters. And indeed, though they can’t be seen from inside the lobby, in this case one can be sure they’re gold. The narrator imagines that if he could, he’d set off without hesitation on the trail of the faded army surplus jacket that is presently growing wetter on the hobo’s back. Where wouldit lead him by the end of the day? How far to the east, west, north, or south, how deeply into the clefts of the past tense? The hobo stares through the panes of glass at the cigarette butts in the ashtrays; he’d clearly like to light up, but he doesn’t have anything to smoke: The butts from the sidewalk are presently swimming in puddles. In his ear there glitters an earring, a reminder of a better past life and a conventional sign of freedom. Yet freedom has its limits, inflexible as a sheet of glass, though just as invisible. The glass doorway is not meant for the hobo, and so he’ll stare for a while and move on. By chance he is passed by an elderly gentleman, a retiree perhaps, with a small boy. The tramp, always prepared for rejection and accustomed to receiving it without anger, might have accosted him and asked for a cigarette, but he abandons the idea in time. A refusal would have been inevitable, because the boy is wiping tears from his cheeks and wailing in despair. The elderly gentleman is growing impatient. He’s dragging the boy along behind him and carrying an umbrella, and in addition he has to bear his own body. This body, tormented by shortness of breath, sinks under its own weight. From time to time his old rheumatism, a reminder of certain damp trenches, makes itself felt in his knee or his shoulder. The past weighs the most; it fills the body like a boulder. But the body ought not to complain; it is neither hungry nor cold. It’s dressed in good-quality gray woolens, and everything the body might find useful has been placed solicitously in the pockets in advance: disposable paper tissues, acomb, mint pastilles in a small tin. Nevertheless, the body is filled with resentment: It demands the respect owed to age and the weight of the past, and it especially insists on consideration for those immemorial trenches, which here are thoroughly irrelevant. The elderly gentleman in gray woolens believes that the commonplace tale of his long life is here a leading theme of the greatest importance, while in reality this tired body will always be floating on the fringes of the actual story, occupying only episodes. There’s no lack of stories. They’re all over the place; thanks to unlimited supplies, they can be had for a song in any quantity. Yet no one wants them; the narrator also would rather steer clear of them. If in spite of this an episode such as the present one captures his attention, it’s only because of certain additional possibilities concealed within it. If these possibilities are given a say, they’ll inescapably alter the course of all