The Underground Man - Part 28

“Is it not right”, started Anna cautiously to open Richard up and make him reflect ion who he was, “when young begin with something, with a free will, I mean the same way that you have started to bring you into your mess?”

Richard took the second tea with lots of sugar offered by Anna finishing his self-rolled cigarette with no filter: “I guess so!”

“So, it is all about our will…then?”

He sat down on the pavement and starred at the opening of the underground pipes: “ The rats down there bring a lot of sickness to us here during our sleep.”

Anna followed his pointed finger with both eyes.
“Down there…down there is where we will end up one day. Time will pass over us, wash our time away for no one more to be seen. Look at me now and…tomorrow my bones will be rotten.”

Richard took her right hand and placed it onto his heart. She was feeling his heart beating. “We are all not the same…but when we are gone we are look alikes…all of us are look alikes!” He laughed stone-faced giving Anna goose bumps all over her body.

“We eventually will all be washed away no matter what happened in our lives. No one, once we are gone, can hold us responsible for anything and beat the devil out of us or praise us…when we are gone the waters will flush over us and wash our sins away.”

“Life is for the gutters only?” opened Anna her eyes wide feeling the pressure of time in her neck to move on to the next stop. She was informed to get ready to leave in five minutes time.

“Few of us will be remembered in the book of history. But for most of us we are like aunts, busy honey bees to hustle for small or big, only for here and now. How much less do I care about anyone following me from my own sperms. They have to care for themselves, that`s why they are made for.”

Anna was scratching her head in surprise and astonishment. She raised up to get ready to leave.

“That means, we all are only responsible for our own thinking and actions, not anybody else?”

“When you are like me living in harmony by the gutters and see rats wanting to eat us, you will understand, only my own will in the end can lift me up and take me to higher places, not a helper that lends his hands to get up and walk.”

Frieda shouted on Anna to get into the car. While Anna obeyed Frieda`s command, Richard shouted after her for many to hear: “Remember the people that had lived in Germany around Concentration Camps. Later when confronted by others of not intervening, they said they had not known anything about what was going on in their neighborhood, before their very eyes. You see, we feel only responsible for what we want to be responsible for and not for what and who we are. Basically this is because no one has ever asked us to life, we were pushed out by our mothers into this world and by our parents decision to start the walk down to our grave, with or without a stone to remember we ever existed.”

Anna closed the door of the car, looked out of the window and saw the sun rising behind the houses. Soon she would have a few hours rest before new people in need for help would knock on their doors again.

Lord David Astor had come over to The Abbey in Sutton Courtenay to meet Professor Fred Blum for afternoon tea. His manor laid just across the street. The Swan, Church and Abbey, a subsidiary of The Abbey in Abingdon three miles on route to Oxford north were the center of the village. The nearest train station was Didcot with trains running from London to Swansea and Bristol. The Lady in waiting to Princess Margarete lived in a house down the road.

“I am very pleased to have sold this place to you, Fred, an no one else”, smiled the Member of the House of Lords, heir of an old British family indeed. “You also got it for a very good price…not much profit for me!” Lord Astor laughed knowing he was socialist orientated, yet a businessman when his own properties were concerned. His family´s fortune was not build on charity but profit. He was interested to hear Princess Diana would come to visit The Abbey one of the coming days. In the office of her counsellor in London Harley Street she got to know The Gandhi Foundation would open its yearly Camp again on the grounds surrounding The Abbey.

“I can still impressed about the good works you have done here as the buildings were really in bad shape.” looked Lord David Astor around the Great Hall before lowering his head to enter Fred`s study, a small room with high windows overlooking the lawn well cut by Anna that had decided to stay away from London and enjoy good time in a beautiful, meditative setting. Along river Thames it was easy to ride her bike to reach Oxford, always a delight.

Fred got some scones from the little pantry opposite his study to serve to the unexpected guest. His old typewriter that had been with him since the time he had to flee from Nazi Germany , leave his parents Villa in Stuttgart behind, a place once used by Nazis for their meetings, before his entire family had to leave the country for Switzerland and finally reach in America where he would lecture at various universities getting married to an American woman with big hips. The got one daughter he loved a lot.

“We had no money…but big, big dreams”, laughed Fred a bid shy while his round glasses slipped up his nose. “After all we came here me a pensioner and my wife wanting to work as a counselor. Our house we had in USA we sold and bought a small apartment for her in London to do her work with people. When I saw The Abbey I knew on the spot it would be the right place for my New Era Center, counselling, teaching people and do my research…my dream since I started as A Professor of Economics to make some young people understand the fundamental change that is needed on earth in all aspects of life.“ Fred followed his guest to the Dove Cot, then walked with him though the Pharmacy Garden just behind.

Lucille Champagne, a nun from French Canada, had planted carrots, garden eggs, herbs and spices to be self-sufficient in many ways.

Lord Astor looked at the vegetables just about to be harvested and enjoyed: “When we had to evacuate the Garden of Eden…”, he laughed astonished about his own thoughts, “we did not know anything about life´s matters, heard only about right and wrong…and now you see what our evacuation from the garden has brought us….food varieties wherever you want to find them, here or from far in our supermarkets.”

Both walked over to the other side of the compound, pushing long branches of mighty trees aside. Six old stones, small with only few words written on them, were unveiled. Generations before dog owners had buried their animals to give them a decent place to rest.

Fred looked up along the long wall leading to the narrow gate inside the old brick wall surrounding the property. “And then I wanted this place so, so much…but with no money“, he lifted up his shoulders, “what can you do?”

“Pray!”
…to be continued