In a Strange Room: Three Journeys Page 0,3

crosses to sit beside him on the low wall. There is silence for a while and then, as if answering a question that has just been put to him, Reiner says softly that he has come here to think about a woman.

The sun has gone now, the first stars are showing through.

A woman.

Yes. There is this woman in Berlin. She wants to marry me. I don’t want to get married, but she won’t see me any more if I don’t marry her.

This is your problem.

Yes.

And have you decided.

Not yet. But I don’t think I will get married.

The town is built on a slope that continues gently downward for a kilometre or two and then flattens into the plain that runs on to the sea. Where the plain begins is the railway line that brought him here and that will take him away tomorrow and on which, at this moment, a train is distantly passing, its carriages lit from inside by a yellow glow. He watches the train pass. I’m also here because of someone else, he says. But I’m not trying to decide, just to forget.

I thought so.

This person is not a woman.

Reiner makes a gesture on the air, as if he is throwing something away. A man or a woman, he says, it makes no difference to me.

This seems to mean one thing, but may mean another. Later that night in the little room, when they are preparing for bed, he strips down to his underpants, as he did earlier in the day on the rock, then rolls quickly into his sleeping bag. It is very cold tonight. Reiner takes a long time to get ready, folding up his shirt and socks and putting them into his bag. Then he takes off his pants. He does this with a certain sense of ceremony, standing in the centre of the room, folding the pants. Then in his underwear, which isn’t black, he crosses to the other bed, the one in which I am lying, and sits down on the edge. Would you like some, he says, holding out an apple, I found this in my bag. The two of them pass it between them, solemnly biting and chewing, the one lying propped up on an elbow, the other sitting with his knees drawn up, all it will take is a tiny movement from one of them, a hand extended, or the edge of the sleeping bag lifted, would you like to get in, but neither makes the move, one is too scared and the other too proud, then the apple is finished, the moment is past, Reiner gets up, rubbing his shoulders, it’s cold in here, he goes back to his own bed.

The light is still on. After a moment he gets up to put it off. Then he crosses the dark room to the other bed and sits down next to Reiner. He doesn’t have an apple to offer and both of them wait in silence, breathing, for the gesture that neither of them will make, then he gets up and goes back to his own bed. He finds that he is trembling.

In the morning they are formal and correct with each other again. They pack their bags. Would you like my address, Reiner says, maybe you will come to Germany one day. He writes it into the little book himself, the tight letters precisely inscribed, then asks, could I have your address too. I don’t have an address, I don’t have a place, but I’ll give you the name of a friend, this he writes down for the other man, then the exchange is complete. They walk together along the main street out of town, down the long slope to the railway station. Their trains are leaving minutes apart, going in different directions. The railway station is a single room and a concrete platform at the edge of the endless green plain, they are the only passengers waiting, a single official behind a dirty window sells them tickets and then comes out himself when the first train appears, to blow his whistle. The South African gets on and goes to the window. Goodbye, he says, I’m glad I met you.

Me too.

Listen.

Yes.

Why do you always wear black.

The German smiles. Because I like it, he says.

The train starts to move.

I will see you again, Reiner says and raises a hand, and then he is disappearing slowly into distance, the solid landscape turning liquid as it pours.

He goes to Sparta, he