The Passport

THE RED CAR

The wooden hut is a black square. Smoke creeps out of a tin pipe. It creeps into the damp earth. The door of the hut is open. A man in blue overalls is sitting on a wooden bench inside the hut. A tin bowl is lying on the table. It’s steaming. The man’s eyes follow Windisch.

The manhole cover has been pushed aside. A man is standing in the drain. Windisch sees his head with its yellow helmet above ground. Windisch walks past the man’s chin. The man’s eyes follow Windisch.

Windisch puts his hands in his coat pockets. He feels the wad of money in the inside pocket of his jacket.

The greenhouses are on the left side of the courtyard. The panes are misted up. The mist swallows the branches. Roses burn red in the vapour. The red car stands in the middle of the yard. There are logs beside the car. Chopped wood is piled up against the wall of the house. The axe lies beside the car.

Windisch walks slowly. He crushes the tram ticket in his coat pocket. He feels the wet asphalt through his shoes.

Windisch looks round. The woodcutter is not in the courtyard. The head with the yellow helmet looks at Windisch.

The fence ends. Windisch hears voices in the next house. A garden gnome is dragging a hydrangea shrub. It’s wearing a red cap. A snow-white dog is running round in a circle and barking. Windisch looks down the street. The rails run on into emptiness. Grass grows between the rails. The blades of grass are black from oil, small and bent from the creaking tram and the screaming rails.

Windisch turns round. The yellow helmet ducks into the drain. The man in the blue overalls leans a brush against the side of the shed. The garden gnome is wearing a green apron. The hydrangea shrub trembles. The snow-white dog stands silently by the fence. The snow-white dog follows Windisch with its eyes.

Smoke billows out of the hut’s tin pipe. The man in the blue overalls brushes up the mud around the shed. His eyes follow Windisch.

The windows of the house are shut. The white curtains make him blind. Two rows of barbed wire are stretched between rusty hooks along the top of the fence. The stack of wood has white ends. It’s freshly cut. The blade of the axe glints. The red car stands in the middle of the yard. The roses bloom in the misty vapour.

Windisch walks past the chin of the man with the yellow helmet again.

The barbed wire ends. The man in the blue overalls is sitting in the hut. He follows Windisch with his eyes.

Windisch turns round. He stands by the gate.

Windisch opens his mouth. The head with the yellow helmet is above the ground. Windisch shivers. He has no voice in his mouth.

The tramcar rumbles. Its windows are misted up. The conductor follows Windisch with his eyes.

The bell is on the doorpost. It has a white fingertip. Windisch presses it. It rings in his finger. It rings in the yard. It rings far away inside the house. On the far side of the walls, the ringing is muffled as if buried.

Windisch presses the white fingertip fifteen times. Windisch counts. The shrill notes in his finger, the loud notes in the yard, the notes buried in the house all flow into one another.

The gardener is buried in the glass, in the fence, in the walls.

The man in the blue overalls rinses out the tin bowl. He looks. Windisch walks past the chin of the man in the yellow helmet. Windisch follows the rails with the money in his jacket.

Windisch’s feet are sore from the asphalt.