Vienna Secrets

63

THE DANUBE CANAL WAS bathed in late afternoon sunshine. A shimmer of light played on the gray-green water as Liebermann crossed the Maria-Theresien Bridge and headed off toward the Borse. He did not hail a cab. He wanted to walk, to clear his head and dispel the oppressive atmosphere of the zaddik’s parlor. It clung to him like the scent of mildew, and filled his mind with images of dust, decay, and interment. As he proceeded through the backstreets, Liebermann decided that he needed a very strong coffee. The Cafe Central-the favored haunt of writers, poets, and freethinkers-was just beyond the misshapen old town square, and the prospect of its splendid interior and decadent patrons was irresistible.

Liebermann crossed the open concourse, glancing in passing at the central fountain with its vigilant circle of bronze nymphs, and entered a shadowy street on the other side. Soon he was standing outside his destination, a little flushed but feeling better for having physically exerted himself. He opened the door and entered.

Inside, sturdy columns with ornate capitals rose up to a high vaulted ceiling. The pianist was playing a Brahms waltz, and the cavernous space was resonant with loud conversation and laughter. In the far corner a gaggle of art students (one still wearing his paint-spattered smock) was watching a billiard game.

Liebermann searched for somewhere to sit. He ventured farther into the coffeehouse, passing an inebriated cavalryman and squeezing between tables. Amid the general hubbub, he caught snatches of political debate, jokes, and immoderate language. After completing an unsuccessful circuit, he stopped and surveyed his surroundings. It was hopeless: the place was full. He would have to go somewhere else. But just as he was about to depart, he noticed a man, some distance away, rising from his chair and waving. It was Gabriel Kusevitsky, the young doctor whom he had met at his father’s lodge.

“Excuse me, sir.” A waiter with a full tray was trying to pass.

“I’m sorry,” said Liebermann, veering off in the direction of Kusevitsky’s table.

Kusevitsky stood to greet him.

“Liebermann, how good to see you. Would you like to join us?” He gestured toward his companions. The first was a youth whose physical features duplicated Kusevitsky’s. The second needed no introduction. “My brother, Asher Kusevitsky, and Arthur Schnitzler.” Liebermann bowed. “Herr Dr. Max Liebermann.” Kusevitsky added, “Another devotee of Professor Freud.”

Schnitzler was wearing a large pale hat with a wide brim, tilted at a perilously steep angle. His velvet jacket and embroidered shirt were rather dandified, as was his somewhat overwhelming and sweet-smelling cologne. His substantial mustache was combed out sideways, and his triangular beard was trimmed to a sharp point.

Liebermann sat down.

Schnitzler was in the middle of a story and evidently intended to finish it. “I made a few timid efforts to gain recognition for The Adventure of His Life. First I sent it to Siegwart Friedmann, who ignored it, then to Tewele, who as a friend of the family at least felt he had to say a few pleasant words about it. Director Lautenburg had already had a copy of the script sent to him from Vienna by Eirich. I had heard nothing from him, but when Lothar arrived, a meeting was arranged with Lautenburg at a restaurant-Krziwanek-and Lothar soon found a way to shift the conversation tactfully to my comedy. At first Lautenburg didn’t seem to remember it. I reminded him of a few scenes. Suddenly he knew what we were talking about, gave me a polite, pitying look, shook his head, and said just one word: Terrible.”

Schnitzler grinned.

“What a fool!” said Asher.

“That’s not all,” Schnitzler continued. “A few minutes later, as if to console me, he added, ‘Your first effort, I presume?’ Because I couldn’t even offer him this as an excuse, he apparently gave me up as a hopeless case, and we talked of other things.”

“Well,” said Asher, “I’ll bear that in mind.” He tapped the side of his nose, an odd gesture that suggested some kind of private understanding had been reached.

After a short pause, the conversation became more inclusive, turning to recent theatrical productions, and Liebermann was invited to give his opinion; however, he was painfully aware that he had not been to the theatre very much of late and had little of consequence to say.

Liebermann recalled reading something about Schnitzler only the previous week in the Wiener Tagblatt. His latest publication, the text of a dramatic work called Riegen, had been dubbed pornography. Liebermann had not read Riegen, but he had seen one of Schnitzler’s plays, Paracelsus, at the Court Theatre, and had once come across an interesting academic paper by Schnitzler (who was also a doctor) on the treatment of functional aphonia using hypnotic suggestion.

As the conversation progressed, Liebermann gleaned that Asher Kusevitsky was a burgeoning playwright and was in some way connected with Schnitzler’s circle. The famous author was nodding vigorously; however, Liebermann noticed that he was somewhat distracted. He kept looking over at a pretty young woman seated at an adjacent table. She was smoking a thin black cigarette and sipping red wine. Asher Kusevitsky, in the throes of an impassioned speech about the hammy excesses of an actor called Obermoser, was oblivious to his companion’s lapses of concentration.

A waiter arrived, and Liebermann ordered a large, very strong schwarzer.

When the conversation started up again, an invisible curtain seemed to have been drawn across the table, separating Gabriel Kusevitsky and Liebermann on one side from Asher Kusevitsky and Schnitzler on the other. The two literary gentlemen clearly had some business to discuss.

“So,” said Liebermann, addressing Kusevitsky, “how is your research progressing?”

“Very well,” Kusevitsky replied, straightening his stylish purple necktie. He was looking much smarter. Liebermann observed a small pearl in the tie knot. “I have already collected a considerable amount of fascinating material. I am now utterly convinced of Nietzsche’s assertion that in dreams some primeval relic of humanity is at work.”

“Have you reported your preliminary findings to Professor Freud?”

“Of course, and he was delighted with my results.” Kusevitsky smiled, though the contraction and release of facial muscles was so brief that it was more like a twitch. “Through such research, Professor Freud believes that psychoanalysis may claim an elevated position among the historical sciences, superseding even archaeology. The mental antiquities that lie buried in the deepest stratum of the mind will be aeons older than anything excavated in Egypt.”

The waiter returned with Liebermann’s coffee.

A fragment of Asher’s conversation intruded: “… A secondary purpose of The Dybbuk… to raise Jewish consciousness.” The sentence was drowned by applause as the pianist began a sentimental Landler. It obviously had special significance to some of the regulars.

Kusevitsky described several dreams in which he identified the presence of universal symbols: kings, queens, sages and devils, towers, skeletons, and stars. All of them were supposed to have a specific meaning, each being an inherited residue resulting from generations of repeated human experience.

Liebermann remained unconvinced. He could accept that dreams contained symbols. That much was incontrovertible. But the idea that dreams could be understood in terms of fixed representations and that these representations were invariant from generation to generation seemed faintly preposterous. Adopting such a view made psychoanalysis seem indistinguishable from fortune-telling. A doctor became no different from the charlatan mystics on the Prater, reading off the meaning of dreams as if they were nothing more than the psychological equivalent of a pack of tarot cards.

“I wonder,” said Liebermann, his eyes sparkling with mischief, “what you will make of this, then, Kusevitsky-a dream reported to me by one of my patients.” He paused in order to recollect his own dream of Miss Lydgate in the tropical garden. “Let us, for reasons of confidentiality, call my patient Herr D, a professional gentleman in his twenties suffering from…” Again Liebermann paused before adding, “Obsessional indecision and doubting.”

Kusevitsky gave his tacit consent.

“The dream,” Liebermann continued, “was as follows: Herr D found himself in a vast garden of exotic flowers and high trees. A woman, with whom he had become acquainted through his work and whom I shall call Fraulein Lisa, appeared beside him, naked. She then spoke to him, saying something like, ‘I won’t lie below you. I am your equal.’ Consequently they began to argue. During the course of this argument, Fraulein Lisa pronounced the name of Herr D’s father, who then appeared, sitting on a throne.”

While Liebermann was recounting the dream, he was unnerved by changes in Kusevitsky’s expression. The young man’s eyes were opening wider and wider. His initial interest had undergone a strange metamorphosis, becoming, with its final transition, something closer to shock or fear.

Liebermann pressed on. “The old gentleman said to his son, ‘It isn’t good for you to be alone.’ Herr D pointed toward where he thought Fraulein Lisa was still standing, but she had in fact vanished. There. What do you make of that?”

“Extraordinary!” said Kusevitsky, his voice sounding slightly strangulated. “Quite, quite extraordinary! I must see this patient.”

“I’m afraid you can’t.”

“Surely you would have no objection? And it would not be so onerous for him to sit with me for an hour or two. Could he not be persuaded if told, for example, that he would be helping to advance scientific knowledge? You did say he was a professional gentleman.”

“I’m afraid that’s not possible, Kusevitsky. He has left the country.”

“Do you have his address?”

“I can look, but why?”

“He is Jewish, of course-this patient.”

“Yes, he is, but he’s not very religious.”

“Even better. I don’t suppose you’d know whether or not he was familiar with Hebrew creation myths?”

“Well, because you ask,” said Liebermann tentatively, “I think I can say with some confidence that the answer to that question would be no.”

“In which case, Herr D’s dream is a remarkable example of an archaic remnant. Its elements correspond exactly with the legend of Lilith, as recounted in The Alphabet of Ben Sira. Herr D is Adam, his father is God, and Fraulein Lisa is Lilith.”

“And who, may I ask, is Lilith?”

“Adam’s first wife.”

“I thought he was married to Eve.”

“He was. But according to many Jewish sources, Adam had another wife before her: Lilith. She was a fiery and rebellious woman, refusing to obey her husband and God. Her fate was to become the queen of demons. She was much feared in ancient times, and is still feared today by the Hasidim. Some believe she makes infernal off-spring by stealing wasted seed, a belief that might explain the origin of the taboo against masturbation.” Kusevitsky sat back in his chair, recovering from his excitement. “Extraordinary. Quite extraordinary. Please promise me that you’ll look for Herr D’s address. I would be most indebted.”

“Of course,” said Liebermann. “I’ll do my best.”

Liebermann was perplexed. He could not-would not-accept that his dream had been shaped by a racial memory, a narrative template buried deep in his own unconscious. The only other explanation was cryptomnesia, the spontaneous recall of something forgotten without any memory of having learned it. But this was hardly a compelling alternative. Where would he have encountered the Lilith legend before? And why should it have been so powerfully repressed? Kusevitsky, now less agitated, extracted a further assurance from Liebermann that he would look for Herr D’s address; they exchanged visiting cards, and the subject was allowed to drop from their conversation.

“And how are things at the General Hospital?” asked Kusevitsky.

Liebermann sighed. “Actually at present not very good. I’ve run into some difficulties.”

Once again, he was obliged to provide a summary of the events surrounding the death of the young Baron von Kortig.

“My dear fellow, I am so sorry,” said Kusevitsky. “If there’s anything I can do?”

Liebermann shook his head. “No, but thank you for your kind offer.”

He became aware that the conversation on the other side of the table had stopped. Asher Kusevitsky and Schnitzler had been listening.

“They won’t be happy,” said Asher bitterly, “until they’ve got us out of the theatres, out of the hospitals, and, in the end, out of Vienna altogether! That’s what they really want. They want a purge. They treat us like a plague…”

“Mmmm…” Schnitzler hummed, the note rising and falling. “Very interesting. Very interesting indeed.” He did not look sympathetic, like Gabriel, or angered, like Asher-merely curious. In fact, Liebermann thought he saw the author’s lips twisting to form a sardonic smile. “A story with definite potential,” Schnitzler added. “Yes, definite potential. Now, if you wouldn’t mind, Liebermann, could you tell it again, starting from the very beginning.”