Kingdom of Twilight

by Steven Uhly

  “The worst thing,” she said, “is that things repeat themselves and there’s nothing I can do about it, Lisa. Nothing at all.” She turned around, drawer, cutlery. She put a pot on the table, took a ladle.

  “It’s just a soup, but it’s delicious.”

  A hotpot like my grandmother might have made. With beans, carrots and potatoes. She served me. When she noticed me watching her she smiled.

  “Although you’ve grown big,” she said, “I recognized you straightaway.” She nodded. “That’s good, you remained true to yourself.”

  “Have you changed so much since you were a child, then?”

  “I don’t have photos anymore.” Of course, this was something I was familiar with. Who in my family had any photos of their family? She took off the apron and hung it over the back of the third chair. Then she sat down.

  We sat there, two lost souls, eating our hotpot. Eating really was the best thing I could do, for although I’d had all these questions in my head before, now that I was with her I couldn’t think of a single one. I felt trapped by her aura, she seemed to be the only person in the world with her own unique pace. This hypnotized me, and it would take some getting used to.

  After a while she said, “I had another child five years later.”

  I was confused briefly, but then understood. Five years later.

  “How wonderful!” I said.

  She nodded, then slowly shook her head, but said nothing. She looked into her soup, then at me, and said, “For Lana it’s wonderful. For me it was more like a necessity.”

  I didn’t dare ask direct questions, and she must have been able to tell by looking at me. She gave me a friendly smile.

  “I like you, Lisa. You are how you are. You don’t hide anything and you don’t pretend. That’s lovely.” She was embarrassing me.

  “When I look at you,” she continued, “I see myself as I may once have been. But perhaps I’m mistaken and I was never like you, perhaps I was always . . .” she was searching for words, she looked at her dish and said, “like this hotpot.”

  I couldn’t help laughing, she laughed too, and so the two of us sat in her kitchen laughing at Anna Sarfati’s comparison of herself to a soup. Without thinking I said, “I reckon you’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.”

  She laughed and waved her hand dismissively. Then she said something I’ll never forget.

  “Beauty is like candlelight. It attracts the moths too.”

  “But surely only when it’s dark?”

  She gazed at me intensely with her shining green eyes, I could not interpret her look. All of a sudden I thought my words had been naïve and silly, as if I’d offended her with my thoughtlessness. I wanted to say something, apologize, but she beat me to it.

  “You’re quite right,” she said. Then she continued to eat her soup, and I did the same, to avoid making any other mistakes.

  After a while I could not bear the tension anymore and said, “Anna, I came looking for you for a completely different reason.”

  She nodded slowly, she looked at me, she waited. Then I talked about Piotr, whose name we only know through Anna and who doesn’t have a surname, but perhaps she knows it because she saw him that time with Karl Treitz, didn’t she? At the same time I felt like someone having to feel their way through a dark room. She didn’t help me, she sat there, waiting, giving me such an intense stare that I became increasingly uncertain as I spoke. When I was finished she took a deep breath.

  “Finished with your soup?” she said. I nodded, she took my plate and hers, got up and put both of them in the sink. Then she turned and put her hands on the dresser to support herself, looking all of a sudden like a young girl, barely older than me, rather than a middle-aged woman. She was not smiling, she had an expression I’d never seen on anyone’s face before.

  “So this is how I have to repay my debt,” she said softly, so softly I could hardly hear her. It was as if she’d been talking to herself, and when I asked her what she meant she snapped out of it and looked at me as if she were the one who’d come from far away. I didn’t understand the situation and felt uncomfortable.

  “We can talk another time,” I said.

  She shook her head vigorously, her hair swirled briefly.

  “No, we won’t be able to when Shimon comes back and I’ve got to pick Lana up from school soon. It has to be now.”

  “What debt?”

  “Isn’t that obvious, Lisa? Your grandmother saved my life, and she did it so skillfully that I didn’t become infertile. But I left and never got back in touch with her. All these years I thought about you time and again. But I was so tied up with my own life that I did nothing. I could have come to Germany, at any time! I could have tended my daughter’s grave.”

  I was about to say something, but she put up her hand.

  “I know your grandmother promised to look after it. But it’s my child lying there. I just ran away, like a little girl.”

  Her face changed, she now looked like a stooped old woman, gazing full of bitterness back at the past.

  “And now you’ve come.” She paused, pushed herself away from the dresser, held out a hand to me and said, “Come on, let’s go for a walk! It’s easier to talk about these things in the open air.”

  It was even hotter now, but perhaps it just felt hotter because the old house was so cool. We walked down a street with low houses on either side, some with new façades, others looked ancient. A little further on was a new house, box-like and twice as tall as the others. Anna told me that old houses were increasingly being torn down because people wanted more space and didn’t always appreciate the old ones.

  “Particularly those Jews who come from Arab countries, they don’t see the point in keeping these houses.” She shrugged as we continued on our way, still heading toward the sea.

  Now I was able to savor the view for the first time. Anna Sarfati had journeyed across this sea twice to get here. I’d just jumped on a plane and then landed in Israel a few hours later. Mind you, I’d done that twice too.

  132

  Out of the blue Anna said, “Shimon is Josef Ranzner’s son.”

  Lisa stared at her. Anna returned her gaze, now with entirely expressionless eyes, as if what she had said had nothing to do with her, as if she were an oracle speaking the truth. Then something cracked in her face, in her entire body, she bowed her head and closed her eyes.

  “Or he’s the son of one of the four adjutants who took their turn after Ranzner,” she said quietly.

  She felt a sudden pain in her belly, she bent double, leaning so far forward that she toppled over, Lisa just managed to catch her before she hit her head on the pavement. Anna felt pain, as if about to give birth, as if five men were penetrating her at once. She was amazed that for all these years she had been able to walk upright at all, a clear voice said, I never imagined it would be like this, where are the tears of release, have they dried up, did I wait too long, has all my sorrow fermented into this searing pain?

  After a while the pain subsided, Lisa helped Anna to her feet, Anna held her belly, a door opened and a woman came out with a chair and a glass of water, she helped Lisa sit Anna down on the chair, she tipped the water into her mouth. She was wearing a headscarf, Anna turned and recognized the Arab house that Peretz had once showed her. She smiled at the woman, middle-aged like herself.

  When Anna had finished the water, the woman said, “Just leave the chair over there when you’ve finished with it.” She pointed to the wrought-iron gate. Anna thanked her, the woman nodded and went back into her house.

  All of a sudden Anna grabbed Lisa’s shoulders and pulled her down so that the tips of their noses were almost touching.

  “Nobody knows, Lisa, nobody! Promise it’ll stay that way, promise me!”

  “What about Shimon?”

  She shook her head forcefully. “Nobody, do you understand? Nobody!”

  “But why not? Surely the truth is better than . . .”

 
Anna shook her head again, so violently this time it was as if she were trying to efface Lisa’s words.

  “Shimon thinks that Peretz is his father. What else can I tell him? That his father is one of five men who raped me and left me lying on the ground? Should I tell him that?”

  “But isn’t it the truth?”

  “No! It’s madness! And Shimon’s got enough problems as it is. He . . .” She broke off, she searched for words, then she said, “He’s complicated, he and Peretz don’t get on particularly well, and he’s been quite distant from me for ages.”

  “But maybe it would help him if he knew . . .”

  “No! Absolutely not. It would destroy him. Promise me, Lisa, here and now! Promise me!”

  She held Lisa so tightly that it hurt, staring at her with such intensity that Lisa began to get anxious.

  She wrenched herself free and stood up straight, Anna stared at her uncomprehendingly and slowly she let her arms drop.

  “I’m the wrong person, Anna. I’m really sorry. You should have told your son, he needs the truth to understand where he comes from. It’s the same reason I came to see you. I didn’t want to find out about Shimon’s father, it’s none of my business.”

  She paused, she looked around. The sun burned down on her, the sea below, the old and new houses of Jaffa, nothing was important anymore. She felt as if she were standing on a stage, the broiling heat, a cobbled street, in the middle of which sat a madwoman on a chair belonging to a Palestinian, and she herself, what role was she playing? The role of the character who appears in the wrong play and gives the wrong answer? Lisa shook her head.

  “I’ll go back now, I’ll pack my things and fly to Germany. My grandmother needs me.”

  She turned away. Anna watched her, a faint pain still tugging at her belly. But she hauled herself out of the chair and followed Lisa with slow steps. She did not see the Palestinian woman come out of the house and remove the chair from the street.

  133

  By the time Anna got home Lisa was standing outside with her case, waiting for her. Anna felt like a routed army, What have I been defeated by? This young woman? She knew the answer. Exhausted, she moved to the metal fence that separated the front garden from the street and leaned on it for support. There was so much she wanted to say to modify the tone their conversation had taken, but realized that with all the things she could say there would have been one sole aim: Lisa’s silence. She looked at Lisa, Lisa with her youthful clarity stood before her like a magic mirror, she would always answer truthfully. And me, she asked herself, have I become so lost in my own labyrinth that I cannot even tell the truth when I want to? She sighed.

  “I’m sorry, Lisa. You’re right, I shouldn’t have told you.”

  She hesitated, the truth was what she wanted to keep hidden, but she could use it as a compass.

  “I used you,” she said.

  Lisa nodded. “Yes, you did.”

  “I wanted to unburden myself, without having to fear the consequences. I’m so very sorry. Please forgive me.”

  Lisa relaxed slightly. Not a madwoman after all. She nodded again, faintly at first then more firmly.

  “Of course I forgive you, Anna. What happened to you must have been horrible.”

  Anna paused. She was struggling to retain her composure.

  “The worst thing is that as it was happening I felt something. I’m sorry, Lisa, I shouldn’t be telling you any more. But I can’t say it to anybody else.”

  Lisa said nothing.

  Anna bent forward, the pain in her belly was still there.

  “It was as if that meant they couldn’t destroy me. Because I fought back with something, because I didn’t just let them have their way with me.”

  She broke off. Lisa put her case on the ground, she went to Anna and gently took her in her arms. Anna held her tight as if she were a little girl. Lisa pressed her cheek to Anna’s head, she gently stroked her hair.

  “I will never tell a soul, Anna. Nobody, I promise,” she said softly. Anna raised her head, she smiled through the tears.

  “Thank you, Lisa,” she whispered.

  They stood there for a while, then Anna said, “Don’t go yet. I’d like you to see Shimon and Lana.” Lisa hesitated, Anna looked at her in supplication and said, “You can say what you like, anything, I don’t care.”

  “Alright, I’ll stay. But only until tomorrow.”

  Anna smiled, now looking like a young girl again. She nodded bravely.

  “Only until tomorrow,” she said. Lisa picked up her case and they went inside.

  134

  The name had not yet been uttered. They continued from where they had left off. But this time they had not gone home. They rang at the door, Ben said, It’s me, then it buzzed, Ben pushed the heavy door, took Gudrun’s hand and the two of them went up the broad wooden staircase together, as far as the open door and the slim man with inquisitive eyes standing beside it, This is my father, Dad, this is Gudrun.

  They had sat with the parents, Esther had come from Rosenheim to be there too, now they were in the kitchen and there was no cholent, but Wiener schnitzel with fried potatoes and cranberries. As they ate Ben started talking.

  “Mum, Dad, Esther, what I’m about to say won’t be easy, not for you nor for Gudrun and me. But I’ve got to say it all the same because it’s important.”

  Esther was about to crack a joke but a gesture from her mother kept her silent. Ben took Gudrun’s hand, now their hands were firmly clasped on the table, a sign for everybody.

  “Gudrun’s brother, Heinrich—do you remember?” he continued. “He was my classmate, and when he got together with Lena he moved into our apartment and then Gudrun moved in too.” He smiled at Gudrun, then turned back to his family.

  “Some time ago Heinrich found out that his father had taken part in the murder of Jews in the Third Reich.” Ben took a deep breath, he shot a glance at Gudrun, who was sitting there, holding on to him tightly with her hand, her eyes, her heart.

  A pause.

  “I’m so sorry for you,” David Schwimmer said, looking sympathetically at Gudrun.

  Judith Schwimmer stood up, walked around the table, bent over to Gudrun and put an arm around her.

  Esther Schwimmer said nothing and did nothing. She looked from Gudrun to Ben, and back to Gudrun.

  Later on Gudrun talked, and as she was talking she regretted not having talked in greater detail with her brother, she had no idea where her father had been stationed, where he had murdered. The only thing she knew were her father’s lies.

  “What are we going to do now?” Esther asked all of a sudden.

  “What are you talking about?” Ben said, confused.

  Looking Gudrun in the eye, Esther said, “Your father murdered Jews and evidently he lives here in Munich. Are we—Jews—going to keep our mouths shut and make sure he’s not brought to justice just because he’s the father of Ben’s new girlfriend?” There was a silence. Everyone looked at Gudrun. Gudrun searched inside herself, she knew the only acceptable answer, Take him, he’s yours, there was no way around it, but still she searched inside herself for a No. A No would now be like love itself.

  All she found was pity. For him, for the Schwimmers, for herself, for everybody. She shook her head, No, Jews must not cover up for a Jew murderer, this poison must not continue to flow, she declared open season on her father from now.

  “What’s your father’s real name? Do you know?” Esther said.

  Gudrun told her.

  When the name was uttered there was a multiple echo, as if she had called out in a ravine.

  135

  The two women sat on a stone bench in the front garden beside the wall of the house. They drank tea. The bougainvilleas shielded them from the street, occasionally they heard people go past. It was late, countless stars studded the sky above them, like a thick white snake the Milky Way ran from one end to the other. The heat of the day had given way to a pleasant warmth.

  “We
ll, what do you think of Lana?”

  “Very sweet, she looks just like you.”

  “Yes, that’s what everyone says. Peretz doesn’t like it. But he would have preferred a son anyway.”

  “Did he say that?”

  “Not in so many words, but I know him well enough.”

  “I was at the grave of your eldest daughter in Lübeck, the same name was written there. Why did you do that?”

  “Oh, when she was born I felt it was the same person, but this time she was alive.”

  “The same person?”

  “Yes. As if she’d been born a second time. Maybe I was just kidding myself to make everything better again. But as far as I’m concerned there’s only one Lana with two bodies. One’s buried in Lübeck, the other’s sleeping in the nursery. Do you think that’s crazy?”

  “No, I completely understand, but I find it hard to believe that it’s true.”

  “Josef Ranzner believed in reincarnation. He tried to make me believe that Nazis keep coming back.”

  “He talked to you about that?”

  “Once. At the time I thought he was a coward—and that he most certainly was. But now I sometimes think there was a grain of truth in what he said, a very tiny one.”

  “I’m definitely not coming back.”

  “How can you be so sure?”

  “I don’t know. I wouldn’t even like to live a second time.”

  “You’ve got the whole of your life ahead of you.”

  Lisa nodded and said nothing. Secretly Anna understood her.

  There was no chance of seeing Peretz, he was on a military exercise in the Negev. And Anna had no idea where Shimon was. Lisa noticed that whenever Anna spoke about her son a deep furrow appeared above the bridge of her nose.

  At around twelve the two women said goodnight and went to bed. Lisa wrote in her diary. She tried to capture everything, but she was too tired and could not finish. She lay on her back, staring at the dark ceiling, with the feeling that already she knew too much about these people. She began to think about things psychologically, it felt claustrophobic inside her head.