The Other Einstein

by Marie Benedict

  “And I can still taste the marzipan and crème from the Sardegnatorte,” Ružica countered.

  “I shouldn’t have had that second Milchkaffee,” I said, referring to the rich, milky coffee I adored. “I’m so full that I might need to unlace my corset when we get back to the pension.”

  We giggled at the notion of appearing for one of Mrs. Engelbrecht’s dinner with undone corsets.

  “You think you need to unlace your corset? What about me? I’m the one who ordered the second dessert. But I couldn’t resist the look of the Luxemburgerli,” Ružica said. The exquisite macaroon-style confections came in a variety of flavors, and Ružica claimed they were so airy and light they simply melted on her tongue. “Maybe it’s a good thing that there’s nothing like Conditorei Schober at home in Šabac. I would have arrived here in Zürich for my studies quite the dumpling.”

  Laughing again, we strolled down the Napfgasse, admiring the newfangled ladies’ suits that the affluent Zürich women had begun to wear. We approved of the fresh style of the fitted jacket over the trumpetlike skirt shape but decided that the cinched nature of the jacket on top of the mandatory corsets would make us uncomfortable for long hours of studying. No, we would remain with the more practical full-sleeved blouses tucked into bell-shaped skirts, always in somber colors to ensure that we were taken seriously by our professors and classmates.

  After fifteen minutes of chatter, we lapsed into companionable silence, enjoying the rare unstructured moments. I thought, not for the first time, how unexpected my life in Zürich was. When I set out from Zagreb, I never could have imagined that I’d be sauntering down a boulevard, arm in arm with a girlfriend, after enjoying afternoon tea together in a fanciful café. Chatting about fashion, nonetheless.

  “Let’s walk over to Rämistrasse,” Ružica suddenly said.

  “What?” I asked, certain that I hadn’t heard her correctly.

  “Rämistrasse. Isn’t that the street with all those cafés that Mr. Einstein frequents with his friends?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “Didn’t Mr. Einstein invite us to join him and his friends when he was at the pension playing Bach with us last night?”

  “Yes, but I don’t think it’s a good idea, Ružica.”

  “Come on, Mileva, what are you afraid of?” Ružica taunted and began pulling me in the direction of Rämistrasse. “We won’t seek him out or anything so inappropriate. We will simply walk down the street like any other passerby, and if Mr. Einstein and his friends should happen to spot us, then so be it.”

  I could have insisted that we return to the pension. I could have spun around in the other direction and marched off. But in truth, I yearned to join in the café culture all around me. Ružica was the external source of confidence I needed to take that step.

  Emboldened, I nodded in agreement. Still arm in arm, an arrangement that grew harder as the streets grew more crowded, we took a few lefts and rights before reaching Rämistrasse. As if we had planned it but without a word between us, we slowed our pace and ambled down the boulevard.

  My grip on Ružica’s arm grew tighter as we neared Café Metropole, a favorite of Mr. Einstein’s. I didn’t dare turn my head to the right to see if he or his friends sat in the coveted outside tables. I noticed that, despite all her bravado, Ružica didn’t shift her glance either.

  “Miss Marić! Miss Dražić!” I heard a voice call out. I knew precisely who it was: Mr. Einstein.

  Ružica continued apace, and at first, I wasn’t certain that she had heard the call. But then she shot me a furtive glance, and I realized that she was pretending not to hear. To force Mr. Einstein to seek us out again. I had no experience with guile, so I took Ružica’s lead and kept strolling. Only when Mr. Einstein cried out our names again and Ružica glanced in the direction of his voice did I allow my eyes to follow.

  Mr. Einstein nearly sprinted across the boulevard from Café Metropole to the sidewalk upon which we stood. “Ladies,” he yelled, “what a delightful surprise! I insist that you join me and my friends. We are deep in debate over J. J. Thomson’s demonstration that cathode rays contained particles called electrons, and we could use some fresh opinions.”

  Releasing our grip on each other, Ružica and I followed Mr. Einstein to the café. The tables were packed elbow-to-elbow with male students, and we wove through the throngs to reach Mr. Einstein’s group of three jammed into a back corner. How had he seen us from this awkward vantage point? His gaze must have been fixed on the street.

  Two gentlemen rose and stood alongside Mr. Einstein for the introductions. I realized that I knew one of the men quite well, by sight at least. It was Mr. Grossman, one of my five other classmates. Other than general greetings and necessary classroom exchanges, he and I had never really spoken. The other man was the Mr. Besso that Mr. Einstein had mentioned to me. Dark-haired with brown eyes bearing a humorous spark, he smiled easily.

  The men busied themselves borrowing the few free chairs from other café patrons and arranging them around the table for us. As we settled into our seats, Mr. Besso offered to pour us some coffee and order some pastries.

  Ružica and I glanced at each other and burst into laughter at the mere thought of another morsel of food or drink. With quizzical expressions, the men stared at us, forcing me to explain. “We just came from Conditorei Schober.”

  “Ah,” Mr. Grossman said knowingly, “I completely understand. My mother visited from Geneva last week, and we spent a long afternoon there. I don’t think I ate for two days afterward.” These words were the most Mr. Grossman had spoken to me since we became classmates and were most agreeable. For the first time, I wondered whether the fault in our communication was mine.

  The men launched back into their discussion of J. J. Thomson’s experiment, and Ružica and I grew quiet. This situation was new to me. Should we voice opinions, I wondered, or wait until asked. I worried that Mr. Grossman and Mr. Besso would misinterpret my shyness for sullenness or ignorance, but I didn’t want to be overbold either.

  “Miss Marić, what do you think?” Mr. Einstein asked, as if he could hear my thoughts aloud.

  With his encouragement and invitation, I said, “I wonder whether the particles Mr. Thomson found with his cathode rays might be the key to understanding matter.”

  The men were quiet, and immediately, I recoiled. Had I said too much? Had I said something stupid?

  “Well said,” Mr. Besso said.

  Mr. Grossman nodded along. “I quite agree.”

  The three men catapulted back into the debate about the existence of atoms that had obviously started before Ružica and I arrived, and I grew silent again. But not for long. When the next break in the conversation occurred, I began to interject my opinions. Once it became evident that I would not recede into my shell like a mollusk, the others sought out my thoughts as we moved into a discussion about experiments from around Europe, in particular Wilhelm Röntgen’s discovery of X-rays. Even though I tried to solicit from her a political science perspective on these developments, Ružica remained uncharacteristically quiet throughout. Did the company of Mr. Einstein and his friends disappoint? Had she hoped for a more traditionally structured exchange, with the regular pleasantries instead of this scientific conversation?

  Perhaps this adventure had not developed precisely as Ružica hoped, but for me, this inclusion, this discussion, Mr. Einstein’s confidence in me, made me feel alive, as electric as the currents running throughout Zürich. I tried not to think what Mr. Einstein’s encouragement might mean beyond this.

  • • •

  “Is that you, Mileva? You missed the Mozart!” I heard Milana call out from the gaming room.

  Oh no. The Mozart. Two times this week alone, I had missed my musical appointments with the girls. My cheeks were now flushed with more than exhilaration over my afternoon at Café Metropole.

  I crept into th
e back parlor, not bothering to hide my nervousness over their reception or my own sheepishness at my behavior. Why should I? I deserved blame; these girls had offered me affection and emotional shelter in a new place, and I could not even keep my meetings with them. At the first distraction, I was off. I was a poor friend indeed.

  Ružica, Milana, and Helene sat around the gaming table, china tea cups emptied and instruments strewn about. The musical interlude was plainly finished—or perhaps never even begun due to my absence—and undoubtedly they were stewing over me. For once, their expressions matched the sternness of their attire.

  “It wasn’t the same without you on tamburitza,” Ružica scolded, but I could see the affection and teasing behind her disappointment. She would be hard-pressed to berate me further; after all, she was the one who had practically dragged me into the coffeehouse culture, even though she’d declined to join in our discussions since. Too scientific, she’d labeled them.

  “Yes, Mileva,” Milana concurred, “the piece sounded hollow. Rather thin.”

  Helene said nothing. Her silence was worse than any overt condemnation. It was like the flash of lightning before the thunderclap.

  “Where were you?” Milana asked me.

  Before I could respond, Helene shot me an indignant glance. The resentment and ill will that began the first night Mr. Einstein played with us was obviously festering. On the evening of his first visit, Helene greeted him with a disgruntled, “Who simply appears on a classmate’s doorstep uninvited?” When Milana and Ružica included him in our Bach concerto, despite Helene’s obvious displeasure, Helene stopped our playing several times to criticize his technique, an unusual act for usually kind Helene. This behavior had continued on the three other times he had joined us—without notice or explicit invitation—for our nightly music.

  Helene finally unleashed her thunder. “Let me hazard a guess. You were discussing science at Café Metropole. With Mr. Einstein and his friends.”

  I did not answer. Helene was right, and the girls knew it. I had no justifiable excuse. What could I say? How could I explain to the girls how exhilarated I felt at the Café Metropole? What would it mean about how I felt with them? Especially when I’d repeatedly chosen Mr. Einstein and his café friends over our musical interludes.

  Tears welled in the corners of my eyes; I was angry at myself. Nothing was worth the disappointment of these girls. They had rekindled my dreams of a fulfilling future, and together, we had fashioned a refuge from the world, where we could be our true intellectual yet sometimes silly selves. Mr. Einstein, for all his insinuation into my life over the past two months, for all the excitement I felt around him, was not deserving.

  I gingerly sat down on the one empty chair, wiping a tear away. “I can offer nothing but my apology.”

  Ružica and Milana reached across the table to clasp my hand. “Of course, Mileva,” Milana offered, and Ružica nodded.

  Helene did not move. “I sincerely hope this will not become a pattern, Mitza. We count on you.”

  Her words were about more than the failed concerts or her feelings about my actions. They were a sort of ultimatum. Helene was offering me another chance, but only if I committed to making our group paramount. To keeping our pact.

  I reached across the table to take her hand. “I promise you that forgetting about our plans and staying too long at Café Metropole will not become a pattern.”

  She smiled that same warm, inviting grin from our first encounter. An audible sigh of relief passed over the gaming room.

  “Anyway, what could be the possible lure of Mr. Einstein other than a boring old physics discussion?” Milana offered a bit of levity. “Certainly not his wild hair.”

  We burst into laughter. Mr. Einstein’s unruly curls were fast becoming legendary among us. In the carefully coiffed world of Zürich, Mr. Einstein’s hairdo had no equal. It was as if he did not even own a comb.

  “Certainly, she is not lured by his fastidious dress,” Ružica chimed in. “Did you see his rumpled suit jacket when he was last here? For the Bach? It looked as if he stored his clothes on the floor.”

  Our laughter deepened, and suddenly everyone wanted a shot at Mr. Einstein. Even Helene.

  “And then there’s his pipe! Does he think that it adds years to those pudgy childish cheeks? Or makes him look professorial?” She did a wicked imitation of Mr. Einstein loading tobacco into his yard-long pipe and puffing on it thoughtfully.

  Just as we squealed at the impersonation, the dinner bell rang. Composing ourselves, we rose for the meal.

  • • •

  Later that evening, back in my room, I wrapped around my shoulders the rose-embroidered shawl Mama had given me. The June night was pleasantly cool, and though I could have warmed my room by keeping the window closed, I needed the fresh air on my face. I had mountains of homework, physics chapters to read, and mathematical calculations to make. I longed for a bracing Milchkaffee, but none was to be found at the pension.

  I heard a knock on my door and jumped. No one ever came to my room at this hour. I cracked my door open a sliver so I could see who it was.

  Helene stood in the hallway.

  “Please come in.” I hurried to welcome her.

  Gesturing for her to settle at the foot of my bed, the only place to sit other than my single desk chair, I felt anxious. Was she here to discuss Café Metropole? I thought the issue had been resolved. The lighthearted mood from the gaming room had carried on throughout dinner.

  “Do you remember the first time you realized that you were different from other girls? Smarter perhaps?” Helene asked.

  I nodded, although her question surprised me. I remembered well the day in Miss Stanojević’s class when I realized I wasn’t like everyone else. I was seven years old, and I was terribly bored. The other students—all girls—looked flummoxed by the teacher’s explanation of the basic principles of multiplication, an easy concept I had taught myself by the age of four. I had the vague sense that I could make the girls understand. If only I could take Miss Stanojević’s place at the chalkboard, I believed I could show the girls the ease of the numbers, the effortless way one could see through and around them, combining them in endless groups and making elegant connections. But I didn’t dare. A student at the chalkboard would be unprecedented in the Volksschule. Order and strata reigned in all regions of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, no matter how remote. Instead of getting up and taking charge of the chalkboard as I wanted, I had stared down at the ugly black boots Mama made me wear each day—in the hopes that they’d lessen my limp—and compared them unfavorably to the delicate, ivory lace-up shoes that my classmate, the sweet, blond-ringleted Maria, always wore.

  “Can you tell me about it?” Helene asked.

  I told her about that day as a frustrated seven-year-old.

  “Did you ever act on your suspicion that you were a better math teacher than Miss Stanojević?” She laughed.

  “Actually, yes.” It felt strange to be sharing this incident.

  “What happened?”

  “For some reason, the teacher was called away from the classroom. She was gone a long time, and the girls began to chatter and wander away from their seats. Seriously disobeying the class rules, of course.”

  “Of course.”

  “One of the girls, Agata I think her name was, walked over to me. I wondered what she wanted. It wasn’t like I was friends with her or any of the other girls for that matter. I thought maybe she was going to make fun of me, you know?”

  “I do know.”

  “Instead, she leaned over my desk and asked me to explain multiplication to her. So using my own methodology, I started to explain Miss Stanojević’s lesson. As I talked, more and more girls drifted over to my desk, until nearly the whole classroom was gathered around me. Finally, even though it was risky, I limped up to the chalkboard. I did it to help them as much as
to help myself. If I made the lesson easy for all of them, then maybe Miss Stanojević would be able to move on to something more interesting. Like division.”

  “What was the methodology you showed them?”

  “Instead of reviewing the tables Miss Stanojević had written on the board, I took a single equation: six times three. I told the girls not to memorize the equation but to think of it using addition, which they’d already started to understand. I explained that all six times three really meant was this: to add the number six three times. When I heard ‘eighteen’ called out a few times, I realized that I helped at least a couple of my classmates.”

  “So that was the moment.”

  “Actually, the moment came just after that. I turned away from the chalkboard and saw that Miss Stanojević had returned. She stood in the doorway with another teacher, Miss Kleine, at her side. Their jaws had dropped at the sight of a student at the chalkboard.”

  We giggled, thinking of the bold little Mileva and her scandalized teacher.

  “I froze, thinking that my knuckles would be rapped for my audacity. But incredibly, after the longest minute of my young life, Miss Stanojević smiled. She turned to Miss Kleine, and after they conferred for a moment, she said, ‘Well done, Miss Marić. Will you kindly show us that lesson again?’” I paused. “That’s when I knew.”

  “Knew that you were different? More clever?”

  “Knew that my life wouldn’t be like the other girls’.” My voice dropped to a whisper. “The girls made sure that I understood that too, that I would never be one of them.”

  I told Helene my secret story. How, later that same day, when I was walking home from school and carefully avoiding the scrubby field where the students played, Radmila, one of my classmates, walked over and invited me to join their games for the very first time. Even though I was suspicious and I wanted to look into Radmila’s muddy brown eyes and decline, part of me wanted a friend. So I said yes. The girls, who had already linked hands in a circle, opened their closed ranks to admit me and Radmila to their game. I joined in the games’ rhythmic swaying and silly chants, bobbing to and fro on the waves of the children’s hands, dust swirling around us. Then, suddenly, the rules changed. The pace increased furiously, and I was whipped around wildly. When my legs buckled beneath me, the children dragged me around the circle, chanting all the while. They then released my hands, tossed me in the circle’s center, dusty and bruised, and stood by laughing while I struggled to stand. Crying, I pushed myself to standing and hobbled down the dusty road toward home. I didn’t care if they laughed as I lurched down the road; they had already cut into me as deeply as they could go. Humiliation for my audacity in leading the classroom and for being different had been their goal all along.