The Savage Detectives

The next day, after breakfast, they let us go. The guard who spoke Spanish walked my good friend Ulises to the bus stop for the bus to Jerusalem. They talked. The guard told stories and my good friend Ulises listened, then Ulises told a story. The guard bought a lemon ice cream for Ulises and an orange ice cream for himself. Then he looked at me and asked me whether I wanted an ice cream too. Do you want an ice cream too, poor bastard? he asked. Chocolate, I said. When I had the ice cream in my hand I felt in my pockets for coins. I felt in my left-hand pockets with my left hand, and in my right-hand pockets with my right hand. I handed him a few coins. The Jew looked at them. The sun was melting the tip of his orange ice cream. I went back the way I'd come. I walked away from the bus stop. I walked away from the road and the desert café. It was a little farther to my rock. Quickly. Quickly. When I got there I leaned on my rock and took a breath. I looked for my maps and my drawings and I couldn't find anything. There was only the heat and the noise the scorpions make in their holes. Bzzzz. I dropped to the ground and kneeled. There wasn't a cloud in the sky. Or a bird. What could I do but watch? I hid among the rocks and listened for the sounds of Beersheba, but all I could hear was the sound of the air, a puff of hot dust that burned my face. And then I heard my good friend Ulises's voice calling me, Heimito, Heimito, where are you, Heimito? And I knew I couldn't hide. Not even if I wanted to. And I came out of the rocks, with my backpack in one hand, and I followed my good friend Ulises, who was calling me to the path that fate had determined for me. Villages. Vacant lots. Jerusalem. In Jerusalem I sent a telegram to Vie

I told my good friend Ulises what I'd seen. About the Jews' diabolical plans. He said: sleep, Heimito. Then my money came. We bought two airplane tickets and then we didn't have any money left. That was all the money I had. Lies. I wrote a postcard from Tel Aviv and demanded it all. We flew. From up above I saw the sea. The surface of the sea is a trick, I thought. The only real mirage. Fata morgana, said my good friend Ulises. In Vie

We lived in Vie

The next day we bought sausages and ham and pâté and more bread. We went out every day. We took the subway. In the Rossauer Lände station I ran into Udo Möller. He was having a beer and he looked at me like I was a scorpion. Who is this, he said, pointing to my good friend Ulises. He's a friend, I said. Where did you find him? said Udo Möller. In Beersheba, I said. We took one train to Heiligenstadt and then we took the Schnellbahn to Hernals. Is he Jewish? said Udo Möller. He isn't Jewish, he's not circumcised, I said. We walked in the rain. We were walking to the garage of some guy called Rudi. Udo Möller talked to me in German, but he never took his eyes off my good friend Ulises. It struck me that we were walking into a trap and I stopped. Only then did I see clearly that they wanted to kill my good friend Ulises. And I stopped. I said that I had just realized we had things to do. What things? said Udo Möller. Things, I said. Shopping. We're almost there, said Udo Möller. No, I said, we have things to do. It will just be a minute, said Udo Möller. No! I said. The rain was ru

That week we pawned the television and a clock that used to belong to my mother. We took the subway at Neubaugasse, walked along Stephansplatz, and went out on Vorgartenstrasse or the Donauinsel. We spent hours watching the river. The surface of the river. Sometimes we saw cardboard boxes floating on the water. Which brought back terrible memories for me. Sometimes we got off the train in Praterstern and walked around the station. We followed people. We never did anything. It's too dangerous, said my good friend Ulises, it isn't worth the risk. We were hungry. There were days when we didn't leave the house. I did push-ups: ten, twenty, thirty. My good friend Ulises watched, still in his sleeping bag, a book in his hands. But mostly I looked out the window. The gray sky. And sometimes I looked toward Israel. One night, as I was drawing in my notebook, my good friend Ulises asked me: what were you doing in Israel, Heimito? I told him. Searching, searching. The word searching alongside the house and the elephant that I had drawn. And what were you doing, my good friend Ulises? Nothing, he said.

When it stopped raining we went out again. We found a man in the Stadtpark station and followed him. On the Joha