I Am Jakob Miller

by Galen Gower

On the plane, I forgot who I was again. I should have asked Dr. Nussbaum to go over what to expect one more time before I left.

“It’s fine, Jakob,” he kept telling me. “Confusion is just a normal part of this life.”

I was skeptical, but I’ve learned to stay calm and remind myself of the things I know.

I’m Jakob Miller. I’m on an assignment for Gardening International. I’ve been all over the world to document the lives of elite socialites. This job is the same as all the others.

It didn’t help as much as it used to, but the outside-myself-feeling dissipated. I still longed to close my eyes, to let sleep take me, but the plane ride was too bumpy, my seat too cramped.

The warm dark calls me home.

“Ladies and gentlemen, we’re making our final approach to Buenos Aires. The weather outside is a comfortable twenty-three degrees Celsius, or about seventy-four degrees for the Americans on board.” The people in the seats around me chuckle dutifully. “We’ll be landing at four PM local time, and on behalf of all of us here at South American Air, thanks for flying with us today. Flight attendants, please prepare for landing.”

I am Jakob Miller. I’m going to Buenos Aires to interview Burke Schnell, renowned art collector and philanthropist.

I returned my seat to its full upright position and closed my tray table. I shut my eyes and breathed in through my nose and out through my mouth, like Dr. Nussbaum suggested when the anxiety starts pecking me. That time, it was like an eagle eating my liver, but perhaps I’m being dramatic.

#

“Oh, Liebchen, you look like you need a rest. Please, let’s take tea in the garden and then we can get started. Do you need a lie down?” Ms. Schnell told me to call her Burke when we shook hands, and despite my best professional effort, I liked her immediately. Her unassuming manner put me at ease; I had grown used to the aloof rich after being in their homes so often. So many of them were bored because they were boring, but not Burke. Everything I’d read about her said she was engaging, earnest, and never left anything to others if she could do it herself. She greeted me wearing gardening clogs, but not gloves. There was dirt on her hands, and she’d pulled her striking silver hair into a messy bun. Her smile came naturally and it lit up her patrician features handsomely.

“I think I’m just suffering a bit of jet lag, but tea sounds wonderful, thank you.” Lying down and letting the darkness hold me again, even for a little while, was really what I wanted, but I still had a job to do.

I am Jakob Miller. I’ve got an essay to complete. After the job is done, I can sleep for as long as I want.

Her staff served tea and crustless cucumber, onion, and mayonnaise sandwiches at a stained-glass table in the shade of a Japanese maple. I made it through most of the meal before I realized the table depicted a golden eagle. I hoped my liver was safe and finished my sandwich to be polite, though I usually don’t eat anything abroad, no matter how innocuous it seems.

“I’ve read many of your profiles, you know. Your photographs of the labyrinth at Lord Barrymore’s Brookwood Manor were absolutely enchanting.”

“Wow, you have done your research. That was one of my first assignments. I’m glad you enjoyed that piece; I was proud of my work on that one.” I hadn’t thought of Lord Barrymore in decades. That profile was nearly thirty years ago, and my work had grown much more sophisticated since. Or maybe it had just grown more confusing? The whole world had.

“Our labyrinth simply cannot compare to something that grand, though our statuary garden is second to none.” Burke waved her arm expansively at the garden some hundred yards away. “We brought so many of the sculptures over at such a great expense after the war. You know, to avoid the troubles, but I don’t think you could do that now.”

“From Italy and Germany both? I can only imagine what that would cost now. I was hoping to tour your collection of paint—” My stomach seized up. I should have known it was a risk eating, but I didn’t want to be rude. The sandwich curdled inside me.

“Oh, dear, you’ve gone completely pale. Come, I’ll have Esme prepare a room for you so you can rest, and we’ll continue our discussion tomorrow. I’ve set aside the whole day for you.” Burke waved to an unobtrusive woman and placed a hand on my shoulder, concern etching her fine brow. “I do hope you recover quickly, Mr. Miller. I’m somewhat anxious for you to tour our collections!”

Before I knew it, I was ensconced in the most comfortable bed I’ve ever touched. Heavy brocade curtains covered the windows, blocking out the sun completely. The uncertainty that had clouded my thoughts on the plane was back, though I’d kept the sandwich down at least.

I am Jakob Miller.

I was made from mud.

No, I am Jakob Miller and I work for Harper’s Bazaar. Vanity Fair. Gardening International. 

I needed to go back to the darkness.

This is who I am. I must hold onto who I am.

I closed my eyes and the darkness took me at once.

#

When I woke, the darkness in the room was complete; no light slipped in at the edges. But I knew who I was, at least, and where. This was Burke Schnell’s house and she’d let me sleep in a guestroom when I felt ill.

I slipped out of bed unsteadily and drew the curtain back to reveal stars blanketing the ink-black night. That emptiness above, devoid of heat, of air, of even dust, called to me. I yearned to wrap myself in it, like an embrace from a best friend.

After this job is done, I promised the void. I longed to be empty, but not until I’d done what I came here to do. I’d promised Dr. Nussbaum I’d follow through, even if this was the last job I did. I don’t think I could bear to see disappointment on his wizened face. No, I’d keep my promise. I padded out of my room to wander my hostess’s halls. 

I turned whichever direction seemed the most interesting and found myself in a gallery. Enormous frames adorned the walls, interspersed with smaller, more intimate paintings. The overall effect was a maximalist’s dream; art sprung forth at every turn.

This is not what you are. 

I focused my thoughts on my surroundings.

The first painting to catch my eye was at the opposite end of the hall, an enormous, twisted tree dug into the side of a mountain. Life abounded on the tree’s limbs, twisting through its leaves, and swimming among its roots. Yggdrasil and the Wellspring of Urd. The thought came unbidden to my mind, but I felt a kinship to the well of life depicted in the scene. Fish, women, and fantastical beasts swam and frolicked in the scene, all of them brought to life by the power of another.

How much of my own fate am I given to control versus the demands of this life? 

I wanted to reach up, or rather into the painting to see if I could divine an answer from the goddess depicted therein. Would I find a deeper purpose? I decided I didn’t want to know. 

Down the hallways I went, stopping to peruse one piece or another whenever something caught my eye.

To be honest, I’ve never been terribly interested in art for its own sake. Paintings and their depicted scenes—pastoral landscapes or lustful nymphs—have always failed to stir a spark in my soul.

A singular canvas at the end of the hallway called to me, however. 

The entire surface was uniformly black but textured in intricate detail. There were rough sweeps in one corner, placid pools in the center, and every kind of ripple and wave and surge and swell throughout the rest. I wept as I stared into its monochrome depths. It was one of the degenerates, like Chagall, Kandinsky, Dix and their contemporaries they suppressed and stockpiled. Burke’s forebears had stolen these pieces of history, despising them in their day, but she displayed it proudly now. Generations of stolen art.

Dr. Nussbaum insisted despair was normal to feel sometimes.

“What you’ve described, Jakob, is the human condition. All living things are tortured with the knowledge of their existence. That it will one day end. Did you expect you’d feel differently?” He was always the voice of wisdom. I’ll go and see him when this job is done. I already feel the need to explain myself to him again, to try and make him understand the depth of this pain.

None of the rest of Burke’s paintings made any impression on me. I’d already selected the painting depicting the tree of life as the featured image for this job. It would tie in nicely to the sculpture garden, and it wouldn’t take a lot of explaining to bridge the connection between her Germanic roots and the Viking beliefs her forebears had co-opted.

I’d keep the memory of the stunning black scene all for myself.

How many of these paintings used to belong to someone else? I didn’t have time, or the answers, for that kind of question. I stalked her halls a bit longer and retired to my room again when I grew bored with brushstrokes and composition.

#

“Did you rest well? I was so concerned for you.” Burke dressed impeccably for the day in a silk blouse and dark slacks. She wore minimal makeup, letting her years present themselves with a dignified set of her jaw.

“I’m feeling much better; thank you for the wonderful hospitality.” I had refused breakfast, not wishing for a repeat of yesterday’s queasiness. Impatience to finish the job and get back home gnawed on me.

Back to the darkness that waits for you there.

I despaired to see Dr. Nussbaum, convince him it would be better for me not to be here, alive, anymore. 

“Well, I suppose you’ve assembled your questions in advance? Or do you prefer it to be conversational? I was once interviewed by Truman Capote, did you know?” She tossed her hair off her shoulder when she said this, mischief twinkling in her grey eyes. She posed in front of a tall, golden-framed rococo mirror. I suspect she knew how glamorous she looked in front of it, her wealth and privilege reflected quite literally.

“I’m definitely no Capote, though I do have my questions ready in advance.” Her laughter was disarming, but I’d already stopped considering her in those terms; I was here to work after all. “The first one came to me last night, though, when I took an unauthorized tour of your gallery.”

She grinned at me under her aquiline nose. “Oh, you sneaked a peek, eh? That’s fine, I hope you enjoyed the thematic elements. I took great pains in curating my collection. The struggle of man in all its glory and tragedy.”

“Yes, the struggle of man to overcome. The ubermensch is a common theme for your people. You can’t help yourselves, can you?” Her expression changed. Her eyelids drooped the slightest bit, and she clamped her teeth together involuntarily. She squinted then, probably weighing how much caution she needed. It must have been a jagged pill for one so used to buying security. “Can you tell me how many innocent lives your collection cost?”

“I’m not sure what you’re implying.” Her spine straightened and her shoulders squared to me. She flared with indignation, ready to fight. Like all the others who’d profited, she needed to leave the past where it was. Hidden. Gone. But I was the voice of that past, here to collect what was owed.

“You know exactly what I’m implying, but the paintings, the sculptures, that’s not the worst of it, is it? Your father escaped justice. He fled down here and found sanctuary, sure, but all of this, your wealth, your little castle you want me to tour and gasp over…this was all built on the suffering of others, wasn’t it?” Dr. Nussbaum’s list flashes in my memory. So many names crossed off and still so many to go. “Did you think you could hide forever?”

“I think you should leave. Karl! Our guest needs to be escorted out.” She turned away from me. Dismissed.

Karl was beside me in the space of a heartbeat. I could admire someone who does his job well. There was more art in a job well done than in any painting or sculpture. I considered telling Karl my thoughts, to commiserate with another man purpose-made for the task at hand, but I was here to do a job, too. My beautiful, terrible work.

“Come, sir, I’ll have your bag delivered to the gatehouse.” Karl’s hand closed around my upper arm, strong and dry. He must not have expected my skin to be so loose. His confusion painted a question mark over his fine Germanic features. Blond hair and blue eyes. How fitting.

My arm-skin separated at the shoulder, the way Dr, Nussbaum intended. The mud beneath it was hard packed and featureless. Now that my real arm, my true flesh, was free, I grabbed Karl by his throat. The gurk noise he made caught Burke’s attention, and she whirled back to face us, eyes popping wide open. She was just in time to see me crush Karl’s throat in my fist. Burke’s mouth opened and closed, but she only squeaked; too shocked to even scream, maybe.

I dropped him to the floor with a dull thud and stalked toward her, shedding my skin. A sharp tug on my chest and the rest of the stitches popped. My human veneer sloughed off, landing in a pile near Karl. I’d sew it back together later, slip Jakob Miller back on, pretend I was a man with a name and a life. I’d even write the article.

“What are you? Who sent you?” Fear replaced her confident control. Her eyes widened, nostrils flaring, and she tried to run. They all tried to run. I caught her by the arm, but even if I hadn’t, I would have followed her until I did. That’s the lesson I taught; they couldn’t escape justice.

“I am the wrath of six million.” I spoke the pronouncement with a voice like thunder called up from ancient suffering. Immutable. Righteous.  She flinched from the echo of it off her marble floor and cavernous ceiling. I wrapped my hands around her head, feeling no more sympathy than one does in disposing of something spoiled. Rotten. She didn’t struggle, instead only drew in a last, calming breath and closed her eyes. I squeezed and her skull gave a satisfying crunch, like shelling a giant walnut. She died, though it took several moments for her nervous system to catch up; her body twitched and flopped as the signals fell quiet.

I never spent long explaining things to them. I never had to. That last look, the dawning relief in their eyes and the relaxed, docile cast they all adopted said they understood. The bill came due, at last, for all of them.

“I know what I’m doing will not bring any of them back, you understand. I created you for justice.” Dr. Nussbaum spoke while he sewed a layer of humanity onto me, one stitch at a time to make Jakob Miller, to hide my awful truth. “Long overdue. I couldn’t save anyone, but I will not stand by while the ones who escaped live fat and happy off the backs of our people they murdered.” Dr. Nussbaum’s sorrow imbued me with life. And the faceless, ingrained rage of our people, the scapegoats of history the world over.

My whole existence has been one of heartbroken misery. My reflection showed no artistry. I was dusty brown, smooth, and bloody to the elbows. I still held Burke by her head.

The symbol Chayim glowed on my forehead. Dr. Nussbaum said I represented all the lives cut short at the hands of Burke’s father and his fellow Nazis. “The symbol is not only life. It’s the plural. Your life is not lived alone, my friend,” he told me. He’d have a new job for me when I returned to him. So many names were left on his list. 

The same as Prometheus, I’d begin anew. Refreshed, but never whole, in my endless, repeating cycle.

Burke paid for her father’s sins. I didn’t know whether that was right; I wasn’t brought to life to consider the rightness of the justice I wrought. I laid her down gently, crossing her arms over her chest to make her look peaceful in her death, all the while jealous of whatever oblivion she found on the other side of this life.

My name is Jakob Miller. I still have more work to do.