39
Again, tonight he came, standing outside of Il Bastone. The thing was here for hours.
My bear kept it at bay for a while, but it seems to grow stronger and more sly.
It had my father’s cleaver in its hands. But I’ve been fleeing that voice, that ghastly accent my whole life.
It came as my mother, the old cow. It said I broke her heart and I’ll admit I wept. Her voice undid me, that old song she used to sing to get me to sleep. Shchlaf, kindlein, schlaf. Sleep, little child, sleep. The shepherd’s dog shall come and bite my bad little child.
But then it took a new shape. I do not know his name. I didn’t want to know. I thought it would keep me from remembering his face looking up at me from the slab, the poison—one drop, two drops, three. It pooled in the cracked corner of his lips.
If I had known. If I had only known. This is the refrain I cannot stop hearing. I even thought to go see Nownes, to ask him to pray with me. Would he have laughed or offered me comfort? I’m not sure I could endure his pity.
Hector came to the door. He wants me to go with him to Harkness Tower, to help prepare him. I should have done it. It is my duty as the scholar.
I know that. I know I’ll have to leave Il Bastone eventually. My professors have only so much patience. I cannot plead illness forever. The pantry is empty of food. So why not go now when something might be done, when some plan might be pursued?
I tell myself these things. Then I push the curtains aside and I see the thing across the street, waiting in the lamplight.
I see that old face, his lips still wet with poison.
I cannot go. I cannot face him. So I close the curtains and I crawl beneath the covers and I sing. Sleep, little child, sleep.
—Lethe Days Diary of Rudolph Kittscher (Jonathan Edwards College ’33)