The Passport by Herta Müller Read Free Book Online Page A

says. “Our weather comes from Austria, not from Bucharest.”
    The water lingers on the streets. Windisch’s wife sniffles away a last small tear. “The old people say that anyone whose coffin it rains into was a good person,” she says to the room.
    There are bunches of hydrangea above Widow Kroner’s coffin. They are wilting, heavy and violet. Death, skin and bones, lying in the coffin is taking them. And the prayer of the rain is taking them.
    The fly crawls into the scentless hydrangea buds.
    The priest comes through the door. His step is heavy, as if his body was full of water. The priest gives the altar boy the black umbrella and says, “Jesus Christ be praised.” The women hum, and the fly hums.
    The joiner brings the coffin lid into the room.
    A hydrangea leaf trembles. Half violet, half dead, it falls onto the praying hands joined by the white cord. The joiner lays the coffin lid on the coffin. He nails the coffin shut with black nails and short hammer blows.
    The hearse gleams. The horse looks at the trees. The coachman lays the grey blanket across the horse’s back. “The horse will catch cold,” he says to the joiner.
    The altar boy holds the large umbrella over the priest’s head. The priest has no legs. The hem of his black cassock trails in the mud.
    Windisch feels the water gurgling in his shoes. He knows the nail in the sacristy. He knows the long nail on which the cassock hangs. The joiner steps in a puddle. Windisch watches his laces drown.
    “The black cassock has already seen a lot,” thinks Windisch. “It has seen the priest looking for baptismal certificates on the iron bed with women.” The joiner asks something. Windisch hears his voice. Windisch doesn’t understand what the joiner is saying. Windisch hears the clarinet and the big drum behind him.
    Rain fringes the brim of the night watchman’s hat. The shroud flaps on the hearse. The bunches of hydrangea quiver in the pot holes. They strew leaves in the mud. The mud glistens under the wheels. The hearse turns in the glass puddle.
    The music is cold. The big drum sounds dull and wet. Above the village, the roofs are leaning towards the water.
    The cemetery glows with white crosses. The bell hangsover the village with its stuttering tongue. Windisch sees his hat in the puddle. “The pond will grow,” he thinks. “The rain will pull the militiaman’s sacks into the water.”
    There’s water in the grave. The water is yellow like tea. “Widow Kroner can drink now,” whispers Skinny Wilma.
    The prayer leader steps on a marguerite lying on the path between the graves. The altar boy holds the umbrella at an angle. The incense is drawn into the earth.
    The priest lets a handful of mud drip onto the coffin. “Earth, take what is thine. God takes what is his,” he says. The altar boy sings a long wet “Amen”. Windisch can see his back teeth.
    Water eats at the shroud. The night watchman is holding his hat against his chest. He’s crushing the brim in his hand. The hat is wrinkled. The hat is rolled up like a black rose.
    The priest closes his prayerbook. “We shall meet again on the other side,” he says.
    The grave digger is a Romanian. He leans the shovel against his stomach. He makes the sign of the cross on his shoulders. He spits in his hands. He shovels.
    The band plays a cold funeral song. The song has no end. The tailor’s apprentice blows into his French horn. He has white spots on his blue fingers. He glides into the song. The big yellow horn is by his ear. It shines like the horn of a gramophone. The funeral song explodes as it tumbles out of the horn.
    The big drum booms. The prayer leader’s throat hangs between the ends of her headscarf. The grave fills with earth.
    Windisch closes his eyes. They hurt from the wet, white marble crosses. They hurt from the rain.
    Skinny Wilma goes out by the churchyard gate. Bunches of hydrangea lie broken in Widow Kroner’s grave. The joiner stands at his mother’s grave and