Sidney Chambers and The Dangers of Temptation

by James Runcie

  ‘It’s the first time we have been here as a family. Hildegard is keen that Anna should keep in touch with her German heritage.’

  ‘Some exiles would prefer to forget that.’

  ‘I think my wife is of the belief that you can’t ignore history.’

  Günter began to extemporise on a theory of social improvement, in which everyone strived for a future that evolved from the workers up rather than the aristocracy down. ‘You have to work with people who are all planning for a better tomorrow.’ He continued: ‘And this is not always clear. It is not just the politicians but the town planners, the people in construction, the police. We have to be consistent. Ideology is more important than money.’

  ‘Although money does matter, I suppose.’

  Günter clapped him on the back. ‘A typical capitalist response. You must buy the next round of drinks!’

  As the conversation wore on, Günter revealed his plan to take over the Pensionshaus Garni.

  ‘Wasn’t that once Thomas Pietsch’s hotel?’ Sidney asked.

  ‘Not any more.’

  ‘Does his son know?’

  ‘He will find out. He’s over there.’

  Otto Pietsch was a large bleary-eyed man with sloping shoulders who had reached that stage in life when it was too late to reverse the process of letting himself go. He was with his friend Karl Fischer and a female drinking companion in a skimpy cotton dress that was a size too small for her. They were already half-cut, shouting out traditional banter to their friends: ‘Es trinkt der Mensch, es säuft das Pferd, doch heute ist es umgekehrt! Men drink and horses guzzle, but tonight we’re wearing muzzles.’

  After half an hour, another of Günter’s friends, Rolf Müller, pulled up in a two-toned Wartburg police car. Sidney was worried they might have done something wrong, that they had all been too loud or too drunk, but he was quickly informed that they had not been loud enough, and that Rolf, an officer in the criminal investigation department of the Volkspolizei, was determined to enjoy his night off. Günter owed him money, he said, and he could start by paying off his debt in beer.

  ‘Tut den Durst nur immer löschen,’ he began to sing,

  ‘doch mit Wasser das laß sein.

  Wasser das gehört den Fröschen

  doch den Menschen Bier und Wein.’

  Günter translated:

  If quenching thirst is your sole aim

  Then water will do you just fine.

  But water belongs to frogs

  While humans have beer and wine.

  Sidney was uneasy. He could not quite believe the camaraderie that was on display. He felt that everyone was going through the motions of having a good time in order to avoid any true show of feeling; that those around him were willing everything to be all right even though they knew it probably was not.

  He had seen this before, in England and in war-time: the hope that if you pretended that your morale was good then it might become good. There was something desperate about the night. Perhaps, he thought, it was because people worried that if they had stayed at home others might talk about them, report on their activities and arouse suspicion. They felt that they had no choice other than to be part of the show. Their forced conviviality was an attempt to demonstrate that they all belonged, that they were all in this great social project together, no matter what, hiding their terror of being exposed and alone for those rare moments of privacy in which no one could catch them out.

  As he bought a round of drinks, Karl Fischer mumbled something about fate and death. Sidney couldn’t quite make out the sense; he was unable to establish if the man was even talking to him and the volume of noise made comprehension difficult, but he knew the words ‘Tod’ and ‘Schicksal’. He had heard them often enough. A few moments later, Günter leant forward and pronounced with an almost drunken melancholy: ‘Freundschaft ist weit tragischer als Liebe. Sie dauert länger. Friendship is far more tragic than love. It lasts longer.’

  Sidney wasn’t sure these men were really friends: Günter Jansen, Karl Fischer, Otto Pietsch and Rolf Müller may have slapped each other on the back, given out drinking toasts and made their arrangements to see each other at the festival that weekend, but their comradely behaviour felt practised rather than meant, something they hoped might be true while knowing all along that it was no such thing.

  Back at the Villa Friede, the children were incapable of such pretence. Any parental hope that they would play happily together soon proved over-optimistic. There was a valiant attempt at a family game of rounders on the beach, but the sad fact was that Jürgen was uneasy in other children’s company and preferred to construct things on his own with a soldering iron.

  Günter gave his son the usual communist greeting on his return home: ‘Seid bereit.’

  ‘Immer bereit.’

  Jürgen told his father that Karl Fischer had paid a visit earlier.

  ‘He didn’t mention that when I saw him.’

  ‘He came with a new transistor for the radio I am making. Then he talked to Mother. They told me to leave them alone. I asked Uncle Karl to help with my tape recorder but Mother wouldn’t let me so I watched them without them noticing. Mother likes Uncle Karl . . .’

  ‘We all like Uncle Karl, Jürgen. He is a very good electrician.’

  ‘Mother smiles when he comes and is sad when he leaves. I wrote it in my book. It’s like the one you have.’

  ‘Let me see it,’ said Günter. He turned to his wife. ‘I didn’t know Karl was here, Maria. Why didn’t you tell me?’

  ‘Because I didn’t know he was coming either.’

  ‘You were alone with him?’

  ‘Not for long. I am never alone. There is always somebody watching or wanting something.’ Her husband looked as if he might hit her, but before he could do anything Maria added, ‘And I never smile. You know that.’

  ‘Perhaps you should be flattered by the attentions of men at your age.’

  ‘I’d rather be on my own.’

  She had just managed to settle the children down to bread, onions and Bratwurst and was not in the mood for a fight. As far as she was concerned, there were still nine days to go of this overpopulated intrusion. She just had to live through them.

  ‘Jürgen has been trying to record all our conversations on his cassette recorder,’ Hildegard announced in an attempt both to explain the situation and deflect from its seriousness. ‘It’ll be you next, Sidney. Anna’s bedtime story. He’ll probably want to record that too. Just you wait.’

  ‘Am I reading to her?’

  ‘You promised, remember? Every day of the holiday.’

  Anna was at an open window, looking through her telescope at the night sky. Sidney watched as she began an imaginary conversation.

  ‘Hello, Mr Moon, how are you today?’

  She answered herself in as low and booming a voice as she could muster. ‘I am very well. But what are you doing walking all over me?’

  ‘I wanted to see if you were made of cheese.’

  ‘I AM made of cheese.’

  ‘Can I eat you up?’

  ‘That would take a very long time.’

  ‘If I start eating you will I turn into cheese?’

  Anna noticed her father was in the room but didn’t seem to mind. Glad of an audience, she carried on with the moon’s low voice. ‘Do you have a cat, little girl?’

  ‘No, I have a dog.’

  ‘Does he like cheese?’

  ‘I think he does.’

  ‘Does he want to eat me too?’

  ‘He’s not here at the moment. He’s in England.’

  ‘And where are you?’

  ‘I’m in Germany.’

  ‘Do you like Germany?’

  ‘I don’t think I do. I think I’d rather be with you, Mr Moon.’

  Sidney said it was time for bed. Anna asked for his story and her father then made up a fairy tale about how the moon shone and moved through the heavens, how it was accompanied by individual spirits to keep it cle
an and how those spirits pulled travellers up into the night sky in their sleep, letting them dream the most beautiful dreams.

  It seemed astonishing to be part of a time when you could look up at the moon and know, as you did so, that two American men were walking on its surface.

  ‘Are the astronauts there now, Daddy? Can we see them?’

  ‘It’s too far away.’

  ‘Can they see us?’

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘And will they see God?’

  ‘Perhaps, my darling. If they wait long enough.’

  ‘How long will that be?’

  ‘As long as a good night’s sleep. Close your eyes now.’

  ‘I don’t want to.’ Anna looked towards the doorway. ‘What’s he doing?’

  Jürgen had been listening. He was holding out a microphone. He had not been able to understand the English (he learned Russian at school) and asked them what the story was about. When Sidney told him, he replied simply:

  ‘I’ve been to the moon,’ he said. ‘When I lived before.’ Then he turned and walked away.

  Anna said that she was afraid of the boy. She didn’t like it in Germany. ‘You don’t either, Daddy, do you?’

  ‘I’m not sure. I think I am waiting to find out more.’

  ‘I’m worried all the time here, Daddy.’

  ‘It’s because you are not at home, my darling.’

  ‘Mummy says this is her home.’

  ‘She doesn’t mean that.’

  ‘What does she mean then?’

  ‘She is thinking what it was like for her when she was your age. It’s hard for you to understand.’

  ‘No it isn’t!’

  ‘It doesn’t matter.’

  ‘It does, Daddy. I’m frightened. It’s that boy. I don’t like him.’

  ‘Jürgen means no harm.’

  ‘But he’s scary, Daddy.’

  Sidney gave his daughter a cuddle. ‘Don’t you worry. I will look after you.’ His daughter smelled of wool and warmth and milk. He remembered her as a baby. How much longer would she have such trust, such innocence?

  Anna held on tightly to him. ‘I don’t like his dog either. Do you think a wolf will come out of the forest and eat him?’

  ‘I’m afraid not.’

  ‘But if a wolf did come and eat him you would be happy?’

  ‘I wouldn’t like to see that,’ said Sidney. ‘But I wouldn’t mind if that dog Franzi ran into the forest and never came back.’

  ‘But you won’t go into the forest, will you?’

  ‘I’ll only go if you come with me; and you must only go if I am with you. Is that fair?’

  ‘And when you tell me a story tomorrow night can it just be you and me?’

  ‘Of course it can,’ said Sidney, tucking his daughter in and realising, as he said this, that tomorrow they would all be at the Friendship Festival.

  It took place at the northern end of the small town of Prora, the site of one of the most ambitious examples of Nazi architecture ever built; a three-mile-long series of hotel buildings erected between a long beach and a large pine forest. It had been designed to give twenty thousand workers a holiday every year but the war had put a stop to its construction and the project had never been completed. Two central blocks were currently used by the police and the East German army, but the bulk of the site had been left unfinished amidst the sand dunes, a Nazi white elephant that now served as a powerful demonstration of the folly of political grandstanding and social engineering.

  Sidney and Hildegard walked through the areas that had not been sealed off by the authorities while Maria took the children to the beach to eat ice creams and build sandcastles.

  ‘Why don’t they convert all this and use it for holidays today?’ Sidney asked.

  ‘It would be too expensive,’ Hildegard answered. ‘It might even require a large amount of investment – or even private ownership – and that’s far too capitalist a concept for this country. You could talk to Günter about it. As an upstanding member of the Socialist Unity Party, he has the philosophy of collectivisation written on his heart.’

  She explained that in 1953 there had been a concerted attack on private property during Aktion Rose, a government initiative to nationalise hotels and holiday homes.

  ‘One February night a total of four hundred police set off in buses from Rostock to arrest the biggest landlords. It was a deliberate attempt to scare off anybody with money or individual ambition.’

  ‘So how did Günter survive? He still has a hotel,’ Sidney asked.

  ‘Technically he doesn’t own it.’

  ‘It looks like he does. How does he manage that?’

  ‘Collusion,’ Hildegard answered. ‘You know the saying, “Wasser predigen und Wein trinken”: someone who preaches water but drinks wine? That is Günter for you. And he was lucky. There were snowstorms at the time of the raids. They slowed down the police’s progress and cut off the roads. Günter and his father were able to hide evidence and make their defence. Others were not so fortunate. But it is not a good idea to speak too much about this. You can observe everything that’s going on, but keep your thoughts to yourself.’

  ‘I’ll bear that in mind,’ said Sidney.

  ‘This building may be a relic of the past, but people in the East only replaced one form of dictatorship with another. Many of the judges under National Socialism remained in their posts. Only the laws changed. Günter may laugh and joke and tell you all sorts of things but he’s a dangerous man.’

  ‘Really?’

  Hildegard looked round to check who was near them and warned that it was possible they were being followed. ‘That man over to the right behind us.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Don’t look now.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘It’s the shoes that give him away. He was watching us back in Binz. Now he’s tying his shoelaces. That has to be a message to another operative.’

  ‘Perhaps his laces have simply come undone.’

  ‘I don’t think so. There’s a man ahead who has just raised his hat. He’s probably going to take over. Günter could have arranged all this. He’s probably bugged the whole hotel.’

  ‘Including our room?’ Sidney asked.

  ‘And even his own. Why do you think Maria has the radio on all the time? Günter is an informer. He’s probably spying on his own wife. That’s why she answers him so provocatively. She is perfectly aware that other people can hear her, and she wants them to know just what she thinks about it all. Nowhere is safe to talk. Trust no one. Not even me.’

  ‘That’s ridiculous.’

  ‘Everything in this country is absurd, Sidney.’

  ‘So that’s why Günter has done so well for himself.’

  ‘As a good communist, he helped his father when private property was taken into public ownership. Even now, he must have the police in his pocket. But you must act as if you know nothing, and you cannot be too curious. In England, a question may be a form of politeness or a statement of interest. Here it is a form of attack. You need to be very careful what you say, Sidney. Don’t push it any more than you have already. I’ve got you out of prison in this country once before; don’t make me do it again.’

  The Friendship Festival began with a parade of Young Pioneers paying tribute to their founder Ernst Thälmann and raising banners depicting a hammer and compass surrounded by a ring of rye. Jürgen sang a song about a little trumpet player who had communism in his blood and kept everyone’s spirits up with his socialist belief and his ready smile.

  There was a gymnastic display, some track and field events, a family obstacle race, a tug of war and what appeared to be a showdown between a group of tractors designed to demonstrate the superiority of East German engineering. More bizarre, however, was a mass mock baptism during which groups of boys and girls were taken into the sea by a man dressed as the figure of Neptune. He was painted green, wore a fake beard and held a trident.

 
‘I don’t think you’d find this in the Church of England,’ said Hildegard.

  ‘Some priests do use the sea. But they draw the line at fake beards.’

  ‘The Bishop of Ely can be a bit of a show-off.’

  ‘I think he stops short of painting himself green.’

  Jürgen recited a poem, ‘Neptune’s Prayer’, before he was dunked in the sea and christened Schleimige Seegurke, ‘Slimy Sea Cucumber’, which everyone found amusing. His mother and father applauded loudly when their son was presented with a certificate to celebrate a healthy initiation into the mysteries of folk tradition. Günter then left for celebratory drinks in the home of his great friend in the Volkspolizei.

  Rolf Müller lived in a block on the resort grounds that had been originally designed as staff accommodation but now housed the police, officers of the National People’s Army and several local civil servants. In the early evening he took ‘the usual gang’ of Günter, Otto Pietsch and Karl Fischer back to his house for a carefully orchestrated celebration with schnapps and a crystal vodka known as ‘the blue strangler’. Despite a half-hearted invitation to include Sidney and Hildegard, it was pretty clear that this was not a night for outsiders, and the visitors were relieved to escape another evening of enforced jollity.

  Günter was clearly in festive mood and told them not to wait up. He was planning to make a night of it and wouldn’t be back before dawn.

  ‘Will you be careful on the way home?’ his wife asked.

  ‘Don’t be so anxious.’

  ‘You are lucky to have someone to care.’

  ‘I always take the road along the railway line,’ Günter told Sidney. ‘It is completely straight. All you have to do is rev it up and keep on until morning. The motorbike does all the work. It knows where to go. There is no need for anyone to worry about me. The bike will get me home.’

  * * *

  The next morning they were woken with the news that Günter was dead. He had either driven off the road or been hit by a car that had not stopped. It was an accident, Rolf Müller informed the family. Every year there was some kind of fatality. It was tragic that this time the victim had been Günter. He may have been a big man but he had a very thin skull. He had not been wearing a crash helmet.