Now all he wanted to do was somehow to metamorphose these close rank streets with their smirking night-dwellers into a sweet-smelling pine forest overarched by distant stars, where all he could hear was the scurrying of furred creatures, the hoot of an owl, the burble of a cool stream.
They had turned a corner and Max was exchanging a few words with a commissaire in a somewhat tarnished uniform. The man beckoned them through a peeling door.
The blare of a saxophone filled Leo’s ears. A scantily clad cloakroom girl whisked away their coats, pointed them with a cocky smile through another door. The reek of a thousand cigarettes riding on the din of voices trampled his senses. He could hardly see through the smoky half-light. He had a momentary panic, a feeling of suffocation. Space was closing in on him.
When he made out his bearings, he realized they were in a crowded but cavernous room, surrounded by slightly raised alcoves. Beyond the clustered tables, heaving with glasses and bottles, there was a small stage, a dance floor, a band. A handful of motley couples danced desultorily, their buttocks gyrating.
‘All right?’ Max’s voice cut through the din.
Leo nodded, put a brave face on. After all anything was better than the family, clutching at him, arguing. Only two weeks more, two weeks and he would be free of them, off forever.
He smiled at Max, followed him to the red and silver bar on the far side of the room, perched on a padded stool, saw the sleek-haired bartender glance at him curiously as he ordered a fruit juice, was happy to have Max deflect him,
‘It’s alright Frank. It’s my little brother’s first night out.’
He bridled a little at that but drank his juice gratefully as Max chatted with the bartender.
It had been noble of Max to come to his room after the rest of them had tried to humiliate him. Perhaps it wasn’t too late for Max, despite all their usual disagreements. He was young, after all, could understand the important role youth had to play in making Germany strong again. Not like the old ones with their weary blinkered pessimism.
He had explained to Max. Had told him it wasn’t true what Anna had said about his father being that Jew. Bettina could confirm that, confirm that his father was Johannes Bahr. But his mother knew he had always hated Bahr as much as the man hated him, so it had been easier to attribute him to Adler.
In any event, his mother didn’t want it to be known that he had been born before her marriage to that decadent. But none of all that mattered anymore. No, really it didn’t. The wrinklies had had their day. As for him, just to prevent any future misunderstandings, he was going to apply to change his name to von Leinsdorf. He would talk to Gerhardt about that. The group, the Party would sort it out.
Max had still had that slightly pitying look of understanding on his face which he couldn’t bear. He hated the thought that he was feeling sorry for him. So, he had told him the good news about the Institute as well. It was then that Max had asked him if he wanted to come out with him.
A loud fanfare interrupted his thoughts. The room grew quieter. A woman came out on the stage, started to move ecstatically, her legs splicing the air. A hot blush rose in Leo’s cheeks. As she lifted her crossed arms he could see she was wearing nothing but tattoos round her breasts, a string round her pelvis. There were catcalls from the audience, hoots. Fat men’s beady eyes glistened. They smacked their lips. He felt sick, turned towards the bar counter, averted his eyes from the mirror, which despite himself, drew his gaze.
What if any of his friends should see him here, Gerhardt, one of the many Party members whose acquaintance he had made of late? He sunk down into his jacket, rivetted his eyes to the floor.
At last the music stopped. There was loud applause and then a voice from the stage. He looked into the mirror, saw a man on the platform, breathed a sigh of relief, turned.
The man was small, dapper, almost dainty, with pointed features. He was telling a story. Leo listened.
‘I was feeling a bit the worse for wear this morning. You know how it is, all these late nights. So I decided to go out for a breath of air. Right outside my door, there was my neighbour, Otto, and his dog, Spitzi. Beautiful dog, all gleaming muscles and well-brushed fur. Except for his face. His face, well… in fact he’s grown to look a lot like Otto.’
The man drew his features into a picture of utter inanity. The audience laughed.
‘Well, I followed them, why not, first along the Freidrichstrasse, then down Unter den Linden. And then right by the Brandenburgtor, the noblest spot in Berlin, site of our historic Reichstag, Spitzi decided to do the necessary. And a lot of necessary, it was, let me tell you. Well, no sooner had Spitzi finished, then another dog came along and followed her example, then another and another. Like an epidemic it was, I tell you. And I got scared.’
The man was running up and down the small stage with a frenetic look on his face.
‘Finally I couldn’t bear it anymore, the sight of all that filth in front of our noblest spot. And I don’t know what came over me. I’m not a very public sort of man, but there I was, turning to the gathering crowd and addressing them, “Ladies and Gentlemen,” I said, “Ladies and Gentlemen, do you realise that very soon we’re going to be this high in shit?” ’ He clicked his heels together and raised his arm abruptly over his head.
The audience burst into roars of laughter.
Only after a moment did it dawn on Leo that the performer was enacting the Party salute.
Max turned to him, his face wreathed in smiles. ‘Good, isn’t he?’
Leo had no need to answer for a voice now blared from the floor rivetting everyone’s attention. ‘Insulting the Führer! How dare you, you dirty Jew!’
There was a hush of nervous anticipation. Tension gathered in the atmosphere. The dapper little entertainer turned slowly in the direction of the outburst and shook his head sadly, ‘I’m afraid you’re mistaken, Sir. I only look this intelligent.’
A spattering of laughter broke from the crowd, an assortment of claps and jeers. Then the band began to play a sprightly tune, drowning the rising hubbub. A slight pink-cheeked woman in an Eton boy suit appeared on stage. Rapturous applause greeted her.
In saucy girlish tones, she began to sing. Her gestures, replete with mischief, were as spiky as the dialect of her song.
Hermann’s ‘is name!
‘Ow, this man can smooch press, kiss.
I know many men of action,
But none make it as quickly as this
Yah, ‘e’s the master.
e’s called Hermann.
Hermann’s ‘is name!
Even took me to a ball
last fall.
‘Ow he can bend, sway, twirl,
Up and down with a girl;
Sometimes makes a pass with ‘is knees,
Hermann, please.
Medals left, medals righter
And his paunch grows ever wide-er
And in Prussia he’s Gauleiter
Hermann, Heil to’m.
It was only with the last stanza that Leo realised the old song had been adapted to refer to Goering, Prime Minister of Prussia, one of the Führer’s nearest and dearest. And the audience was singing along.
Suddenly he was filled with the sense that Max had brought him here for the distinct purpose of shaming him, of making a laughing stock of him, of besmirching him in the eyes of the Party. And if anyone saw him, informed, Max would be to blame. Max with his communist friends. Leo’s thoughts swirled.
But Max was tapping him on the shoulder, smiling genially, waving him towards the dance floor. The band had struck up a lively tune.
‘Let’s find some young ladies, shall we? Anita said she’d be here.’
Leo shook his head. ‘I think I’ll go.’
‘Don’t be shy, Leo. Tell you what, I’ll bring some friends over.’ He winked at the bartender, walked away into the milling crowd.
‘Another juice?’ the bartender was eyeing him dubiously.
Leo stood, unable t
o make up his mind whether to leave or wait for Max. As he thought of the fog swirling through the streets, the long trek home, the family lying in wait, he suddenly felt tired, desperately tired. He leaned heavily against the counter, nodded at the bartender. There was only the music now. He drank down the juice. It tasted a little strange, but it was cool. He closed his eyes for a moment, heard the throbbing rhythm.
‘Another glass?’
Leo nodded again.
The man smiled, slicked his hair back with a tender gesture, winked at him.
‘This is Greta, Leo. And Anita,’ Max was suddenly upon him. ‘They’re just longing to dance,’ he swivelled his hips humorously, put his arm round Anita.
‘You didn’t tell me he was so handsome,’ the woman called Greta looked up at him with dusky laughing eyes.
Leo emptied his glass quickly.
‘Let’s go then, comrade’ she wound her arm through his.
On the dance floor the noise of the band swelled to dizzying heights. Leo had a sense of hundreds of heaving, perspiring bodies, closing in on him. Greta’s full breasts slithered against his jacket. He could feel her breath on his chin. He held himself taut, tried to keep a distance between them, but the crowd pushed them together. Too close. He felt his head beginning to whirl, his hands grow clammy. He thrust her away, excused himself with a mumble, stumbled through the throng. Behind him, he thought he heard Max laughing.
A toilet. He closed the door, leaned against tiled coldness. The relief of quiet.
Two sleek men in rakish suits were murmuring by the urinals. Startled, they stared up at him. One of them puckered his lips lasciviously. Then they retreated, brushing past him with little smiles on their faces.
On the floor near the urinals, Leo heard something crunch beneath his foot. He looked down, saw a broken syringe. That too! With a sense of helpless rage, he beat his fist against the cold tile wall. Communists, Jews, Addicts, all the debauched scum the party had to eradicate. And he was in the midst of them.
When he re-emerged, he saw Max waving him towards a crowded table. He shook his head bluntly.
He would have one more drink to calm himself down and then leave. Awkwardly, he made his way towards the bar. It felt as if all the eyes in the room had honed in on him.
His stool had been taken by a fat man, all stomach, sallow skin and double chins. He found another perch, ordered. If he concentrated all his attention on the sensation of the cool liquid in his throat, he could almost imagine he was elsewhere. He closed his eyes. He was outdoors, the rain thundering down on him, cleansing him, battering the jagged mountain top, the roof of his tent. The rain would swallow up the city’s squalid streets, all the filthy two-legged vermin, cover the polluted rooftops. He lifted his head to the skies, opened his mouth. Cool. Pure.
The tap on his arm had become a tug before he became aware of it. The bartender pointed to the phone he had placed before him. Leo looked up at him in bewilderment.
‘From one of the tables,’ the man grinned.
Leo glanced behind him. He hadn’t noticed the phones on the tables before. Max, it must be Max, too idle to make his way through the raucous crowd. Leo picked up the receiver.
‘Hello handsome,’ he could barely make out the deep voice that purred at him. ‘I like those shoulders of yours. And that tight little butt.’ There was a coy laugh.
Leo gripped the phone in disbelief. Could it be Max playing a joke on him?
‘You do things for me,’ the voice drawled, insinuated, ‘And I could do things for you. Such things. In your mouth, between those angelic little teeth. Or in the devil’s gateway. Just meet me outside…’
Leo slammed down the receiver. Confusion rioted through him, a herd of wild beasts. He raced blindly from the room, bumped into people, found himself stopped by the saucy hat-check girl, fumbled for his ticket, tripped on the stair.
Finally, he was out through the door. His heart was pounding madly. He stopped to breathe, looked up and down the narrow, darkened street, uncertain which way to turn, walked a few steps to the right.
Suddenly a hand tapped him on the shoulder, an arm found its way through his. He turned to see a tall, striking blond, swathed in furs, at his side.
‘Hello handsome,’ she smiled, her tongue playing over her lips. ‘Yes, it’s little old me. Like what you see?’
He tried to shake her off, but her arm gripped him with surprising strength and she kept pace with him.
‘I think you’ll like it,’ her voice was sultry. She stepped in front of him, turned to confront him. Her coat fell open to reveal a short silver shift of a dress, long stockinged legs. ‘Yes, I’m sure you will,’ she murmured.
She took his hand and brought it to her groin, closing her gloved fingers round his, moving against him.
Hard, taut flesh. Straining. Straining. Hot. Leo shuddered, the blood clamouring in his ears, creating havoc with his thoughts. Not a woman. Not a woman, but a man. A man. Not even a man. One of those creatures. The horror of it.
He gripped the creature by the shoulders, rammed him against the wall, shook him, shook him hard, heard the welcome thud of bone on brick, the cry, brought his knee to his groin, started to punch, to batter, to flail. The creature fell to the ground and he launched himself on top of her, on top of him, hitting, hitting.
Pervert, scum, swine, Jew, communist filth, the words poured through him in time to his blows. He felt the warm blood trickling from that nose onto his own fist. He met the creature’s eyes. A woman’s face, tears. He punched again and again. But not a woman. No. He hit out. It felt good. So good. He was cleansing the nation of its filth.
‘Stop it, Leo, stop,’ he heard Max’s voice dimly in the distance. This was Max’s friend, Max’s fault. He pummelled that silvery chest as if he would never stop.
Then hands were dragging him off the body, Max, the commissaire, others. He flailed out at them. Perverts, all of them, like that creature at his feet. Red scum. He landed a punch on Max’s jaw, saw the startled look on his face, and hit him again. That felt good too.
The jab that came then, the upper-cut, took him by surprise. He fell backward, tripped onto the ground, saw, from the corner of his eye, Max lifting the creature; the Commissaire, half dragging him towards the door, saw the look of pity Max directed at him. Him, Leo. Saw the contempt in the faces of his cloth-capped friends and the women, Greta, Anita.
Leo leapt to his feet, brushed the dirt from his coat. Then, raising his shoulders proudly, he spat at Max’s feet, and strode away.
At the corner of the street, he turned back, ‘I’ll get you for this. You and all your Commie pervert friends. You’ll pay for this,’ he shouted wildly. Then lifting his collar against the night, he made his way into he didn’t know what distance.
A week later, Anna sat listlessly staring out of the window of Bettina’s spacious salon. It was snowing, thick drowsy flakes falling from a slate grey sky and covering the earth in a solid blanket.
Seven days and Leo had still not come home. She conjured up a solitary figure from the snow, a solitary figure trekking along the path towards her, his head high, his eyes staring directly in front of him. She held her breath, willing the doorbell to ring. But there was no one.
Anna paced the room, placed a new log on the fire, watched the flames curl and leap. Then with a restless movement, she sat down at the piano. Her fingers picked out a melody, longing, mournful. With sudden realisation, she slammed her hands down in a jarring chord. The Kindertotenlieder.
‘He’s not dead, Anna,’ Johannes had stolen upon her softly. Believe me. Or trust Max, if that’s more comfort to you.’
Anna rested her head on his chest. Max had told them on Christmas Day. Had guiltily recounted how he had taken Leo to a cabaret with him to cheer him up, how there had been a brawl, how Leo had gone off. Had assured them that he hadn’t been injured. Had made light of the whole thing initially, a case of boyish pique.
Then as two days of absence had grown into three
and four, he had set out to look for Leo, had promised that he and his friends would find him. Anna had wanted to call in the police, but Bettina and Klaus and Johannes had dissuaded her of that, had told her it would be anathema to have anyone looking into their affairs. And heaven only knew, it might put a black mark on Leo’s pristine record. They had advised her to leave it to Max.
She and Max had talked more since then, privately, so she thought she now had the whole story. It had increased her anxiety rather than allayed it. She had had no inkling that Leo had been speculating about his paternity, had somehow decided that Johannes was his father. She could almost smell his confusion, that explosive adolescent mixture of alarm, righteous indignation, ruptured pride, and humiliation which could engender either vindictiveness or despair.
She had urged Max to go and see the few of Leo’s friends he knew of, to alert his youth group headquarters, make discreet enquiries, leave messages. All so far had been of no avail.
Her imaginings about where Leo was, about what had happened to him, grew ever more dismal, no matter how much she sought to control them with the voice of common sense. And waiting, with its enforced passivity, was like slow death.
‘You said you’d come for a walk this morning,’ Johannes stroked her hair gently.
‘Yes, of course,’ Anna followed him to the hall, pulled on boots, coat, hat, scarf, gloves, the endless apparel of winter.
Looking at her, he smiled, kissed her lightly on the lips. ‘Ready?’
She nodded.
A blast of cold engulfed them, bringing the blood to their cheeks. They plodded through the heavy snow, their hands entwined, then walked more quickly when they reached the road. It was almost empty, the parked cars heaped with powdery hats, a lone dog walking slowly, leaving ghostly prints in the pristine whiteness.
They had been out like this together every day, walking, jumping on buses or trams, exploring a new quarter of the city on each trek, almost like tourists. For her, it was a way of forgetting her waiting. For Johannes, Anna sensed, it was a journey of rediscovery, a tracing out of the map of his memory. He was strangely tender towards her, solicitous, almost as if she were a convalescent. But he was also absent, both of them as tightly wrapped in their separate thoughts as they were in their coats.
Dreams of Innocence Page 45
