“You disappoint me,” Ernst said to her.
“What’s that?” Father cried to him. “What did you say to her?”
“He said I disappointed him, Pop,” Franny said.
“She disappoints you!” Father cried. “My daughter disappoints you!” Father shouted at Ernst.
“Calm down,” Ernst said to Father, calmly.
“You fuck my daughter and then tell her she disappoints you!” Father said.
Father grabbed the baseball bat from Freud. He did this very quickly. He picked up that Louisville Slugger as if it had lived a lifetime in his hands, and he swung it levelly, getting his shoulders and hips into the swing, and following through with the swing—it was a perfect line drive sort of swing, a level low liner that would still have been rising when it cleared the infield. And Ernst the pornographer, who ducked too slowly, put his head in the position of a perfect letter-high fast ball to my father’s fine swing of the bat. Crack! Harder than any ground ball Franny or I could have handled. My father caught Ernst the pornographer with the Louisville Slugger flat on the forehead and smack between the eyes. The first thing to strike the floor was the back of Ernst’s head, his heels plopping down one at a time; it seemed like a full second after the head had hit the floor that Ernst’s body settled down. A purple swelling the size of a baseball rose up between Ernst’s eyes, and a little blood ran out of one of his ears, as if something vital but small—like his brain, like his heart—had exploded inside him. His eyes were open wide, and we knew that Ernst the pornographer could now see everything that Freud could see. He had gone out the open window with one swift crack of the bat.
“Is he dead?” Freud cried. I think if Freud hadn’t cried out, Arbeiter would have pulled the trigger and killed my father; Freud’s cry seemed to change Arbeiter’s slow-moving mind. He stuck the barrel of the gun in my little sister Lilly’s ear; Lilly trembled—she had nothing more to throw up.
“Please don’t,” Franny whispered to Arbeiter. Father held the baseball bat tightly, but he held it still. Arbeiter had the big weapon now, and my father had to wait for the right pitch.
“Everyone stay calm,” Arbeiter said. Schraubenschlüssel could not take his eyes off the purple baseball on Ernst’s forehead, but Schwanger kept smiling—at everyone.
“Calm, calm,” she crooned. “Let’s stay calm.”
“What are you going to do now?” Father asked Arbeiter, calmly. He asked him in English; Frank had to translate.
For the next few minutes, Frank would be kept busy as a translator because Father wanted to know everything that was going on. He was a hero; he was on the dock at the old Arbuthnot-by-the-Sea, except he was the man in the white dinner jacket—he was in charge.
“Give the bat back to Freud,” Arbeiter told my father.
“Freud needs his bat back,” Schwanger said to my father, stupidly.
“Give the bat up, Pop,” said Frank.
Father gave the Louisville Slugger back to Freud and sat down beside him; he put his arm around Freud and said to him, “You don’t have to drive that car.”
“Schraubenschlüssel,” Schwanger said. “You’re going to do it just the way we planned. Take Freud with you and get going,” she said.
“But I’m not at the Opera!” Arbeiter said, in a panic. “I’m not there yet—to see if it’s intermission, or to make sure it’s not. Schraubenschlüssel has to see me walk out of the Opera so he knows it’s okay, so he knows it’s the right time.”
The radicals stared at their dead leader as if he would tell them what to do; they needed him.
“You go to the Opera,” Arbeiter told Schwanger. “I’m better with the gun,” he said. “I’ll stay here, and you go to the Opera,” Arbeiter advised her. “When you’re sure it’s not intermission, walk out of the Opera and let Schraubenschlüssel see you.”
“But I’m not dressed for the Opera,” Schwanger said. “You’re dressed for it,” she told Arbeiter.
“You don’t have to be dressed for it to ask someone if it’s intermission!” Arbeiter yelled at her. “You look good enough to get in the door, and you can see for yourself if it’s intermission. You’re just an old lady—nobody hassles an old lady for how she’s dressed, for Christ’s sake.”
“Stay calm,” Schraubenschlüssel advised, mechanically.
“Well,” our gentle Schwanger said, “I’m not exactly an ‘old lady.’”
“Fuck off!” Arbeiter cried at her. “Get going. Walk up there, fast! We’ll give you ten minutes. Then Freud and Schraubenschlüssel are on their way.”
Schwanger stood there as if she were trying to decide whether to write another pregnancy or another abortion book.
“Get going, you cunt!” Arbeiter yelled at her. “Remember to cross the Kärntnerstrasse. And look for our car before you cross the street.”
Schwanger left the Hotel New Hampshire, composing herself—actually arranging her face in as motherly an expression as she could muster for the occasion. We would never see her again. I suppose she went to Germany; she might author a whole new book of symbols, one day. She might mother a new movement, somewhere else.
“You don’t have to do this, Freud,” my father whispered.
“Of course I have to do it, Win Berry!” Freud said, cheerfully. He got up; he tapped his way with the baseball bat toward the door. He knew his way around pretty well, considering his total darkness.
“Sit down, you old fool,” Arbeiter told him. “We’ve got ten minutes. Don’t forget to get out of the car, you idiot,” Arbeiter told Schraubenschlüssel, but Wrench was still staring at the dead quarterback on the floor. I stared at him, too. For ten minutes. I realized what a terrorist is. A terrorist, I think, is simply another kind of pornographer. The pornographer pretends he is disgusted by his work; the terrorist pretends he is uninterested in the means. The ends, they say, are what they care about. But they are both lying. Ernst loved his pornography; Ernst worshiped the means. It is never the ends that matter—it is only the means that matter. The terrorist and the pornographer are in it for the means. The means is everything to them. The blast of the bomb, the elephant position, the Schlagobers and blood—they love it all. Their intellectual detachment is a fraud; their indifference is feigned. They both tell lies about having “higher purposes.” A terrorist is a pornographer.
For ten minutes Frank tried to change Arbeiter’s mind, but Arbeiter didn’t have enough of a mind to experience a change. I think Frank only succeeded in confusing Arbeiter.
Frank was certainly confusing to me.
“You know what’s at the Opera tonight, Arbeiter?” Frank asked.
“Music,” Arbeiter said, “music and singing.”
“But it matters—which opera,” Frank lied. “I mean, it’s not exactly a full-house performance tonight—I hope you know that. It’s not as if the Viennese have come in droves. It’s not as if it’s Mozart, or Strauss. It’s not even Wagner,” Frank said.
“I don’t care what it is,” Arbeiter said. “The front rows will be full. The front rows are always full. And the dumb singers will be onstage. And the orchestra has to show up.”
“It’s Lucia,” Frank said. “Practically an empty house. You don’t have to be a Wagnerian to know that Donizetti’s not worth listening to. I confess to being something of a Wagnerian,” Frank confessed, “but you don’t have to share the Germanic opinion of Italian opera to know that Donizetti is simply insipid. Stale harmonies, lack of any dramatism appropriate to the music,” Frank said.
“Shut up,” Arbeiter said.
“Organ-grinder tunes!” Frank said. “God, I wonder if anyone will show up.”
“They’ll show up,” Arbeiter said.
“Better to wait for a big shot,” Frank said. “Blow the place another night. Wait for an important opera. If you blow up Lucia,” Frank reasoned, “the Viennese will applaud! They’ll think your target was Donizetti, or, even better—Italian opera! You’ll be a kind of cultural hero,” Frank argued, “not the villain you want to be.”
“And when you get your audience,” Susie the bear told Arbeiter, “who’s going to do the talking?”
“Your talker is dead,” Franny said to Arbeiter.
“You don’t think you can hold an audience, do you, Arbeiter?” Susie the bear asked him.
“Shut Up,” Arbeiter said. “It’s possible to have a bear ride in the car with Freud. Everyone knows Freud’s got a thing for bears. It might be a nice idea to have a bear ride with him—on his last trip.”
“No change in the plan, not now,” said Schraubenschlüssel, nervously. “According to plan,” he said, looking at his watch. “Two minutes.”
“Go now,” Arbeiter said. “It will take a while to get the blind man out the door and in the car.”