The Weather in Berlin

by Ward Just

Dix finished his schnitzel, pushed the plate back, and lit a cigarette.

  Willa said, You have a bad look on your face. When he shrugged and did not reply, she changed the subject.

  Did you ever make a film with your wife?

  No. Why do you ask?

  It would be the logical thing. Then you both could be in the same place at the same time.

  He shook his head. Logical, perhaps. Not advisable.

  Why not advisable?

  We have different styles, he said.

  And you, she said after a moment’s pause. You haven’t worked in years.

  Many years, he said.

  Your last two weren’t successful.

  Duds, he said.

  Commercially, she said.

  That, too, he agreed.

  The material was no good?

  It was the usual material, material that had been successful in the past. Who said there are only two plots in fiction? A stranger comes to town. Someone goes on a trip. I made two of one, three of the other. It’s remarkable how far craft can take you, and craft’s not to be despised. It’ll get you around town but it won’t get you to the moon, and maybe after a while you forget where the moon is or what it looks like. Then one of the studios got the idea of a remake of Summer, 1921. A remake or a sequel, they didn’t care which. They wanted to make a buddy movie, the buddies more in love with themselves than they were with the girls. You can guess who they had in mind for the buddies.

  Oh, dear, Willa said.

  They wanted to do it, too. I went to the meetings because I didn’t have anything better to do. Then almost anything was better and I stopped going to the meetings and they lost interest.

  You gave it up, she said.

  I gave it up, it gave me up, I can’t remember which. I remember thinking it was a colossal waste of time, and I had plenty of time to waste. But not with them.

  Yes, she said.

  I can’t go through the motions anymore.

  Well, she began.

  I won’t work just to work.

  You have money, she said.

  I have enough.

  Willa began to rock her beer glass back and forth on the tabletop. She picked up Frau Munn’s cherished photographs, the before and after of the soul of the Third Reich, her eyes moving left and right like a spectator’s at a tennis match. She looked at the photographs as she rocked her beer glass, then put them carefully aside, propped against the saltcellar where they could see them.

  You could if you wanted to, she said.

  Work again? Of course.

  It would have to be the right project, she said. And it’s hard to know what that would be.

  I haven’t seen one in years, he said. I don’t know the world they’re filming, and they have no interest in mine.

  So here you are in Berlin, she said. Everyone says we will be the capital of the twenty-first century.

  Have you asked Beijing about that?

  We all know it is coming, the German renaissance. Germany itself again, its destiny in our own hands. We will be the magnet for European culture. I imagine something will turn up for you. Still, you must feel rusty. So many years since you’ve been on location, telling people, do this, do that. Studying angles. Worrying about point of view. Worrying about language, worrying about score, lighting, sound, worrying about pace. Worried that the end will fail to guarantee the beginning. And so much has changed. The equipment’s improved, you know, new machinery. Stuff you wouldn’t believe.

  He said, It’s still what’s on the page and where you point the lens.

  And the cast, she said. Don’t you miss it?

  Of course I miss it.

  He looked for the waiter, wanting another glass of beer.

  She went on to describe the gear she’s seen at Studio Babelsberg, state-of-the-art film, cameras, microphones, lights. Sound studios wired for everything but weapons of mass destruction. She continued to talk but she did not have his attention. He’d turned away to look at Frau Munn’s trove of photographs. The before photographs were more interesting than the after, young officers standing smartly at attention, their right arms crowbar straight and at a raised angle to the ground, palms down, eager, each officer, to sacrifice life itself for Führer and Fatherland. In the near ranks, Dix noticed an overweight major whose interest seemed to be elsewhere, his salute drooping. He was the one you would write the film about, a Nazi too stupid or nearsighted to grasp the grandeur of the occasion, perhaps some modern Schweik or even a thug too hung over to know where he was; or, less likely, a combat veteran who disapproved of the war strategy of the regime; or, less likely still, a dissident. The rest of them were elated to be there in the presence of the Führer, dressed down in a gray suit with a swastika armband, no hat, a bored expression on his face. Five decades later, no wonder so many Germans wanted to be like Americans, enjoying the blessings of the free market in which to pursue happiness without the inconvenience of memory. They believed Americans forgot things, history mostly; they put unpleasantness behind them, got on with their lives, threw up a memorial, achieved the envied but elusive closure. Americans didn’t have time for revenge! They refused to take responsibility themselves, refused even to assign it elsewhere. What a marvelous state of affairs, stepping cheerfully from one year to the next with scarcely a stumble or a look backward. Who wouldn’t envy such people? Of course there were disadvantages, not one volk but many. Not even a common language that could be spoken with confidence and privacy. One would miss the thickness of the German language and culture, and perhaps the burden also, its weight and originality.

  Dix continued to contemplate the overweight officer—too young for a captain, too thick-witted for a colonel, major would be his rank—his tiny eyes and full jaw, his sideways glance. He didn’t look like the sort of man who would volunteer for line duty, the Eastern Front or North Africa or manning the Atlantic Wall. The major would have made a decent staff officer, good with maps and logistics, an order taker, good with follow-through. He had the look of a survivor, and if that were the case it was conceivable that he was still alive and in good health, a grateful pensioner living out his retirement in some picturesque village in the southern mountains, hiking for exercise, perhaps sculling on the nearby lake, a fond grandfather, proud of his exemplary postwar life, proud of the industry and discipline of his fellow citizens, Germany a prosperous member of the family of nations. If Frau Munn showed the major this photograph, he probably wouldn’t recognize himself; or if he did, he would look away and smile, take another sip of beer, trying to remember the occasion of the visit of the Führer and his suite. It was an awards ceremony, six officers recognized for services to the Fatherland, everyone so proud, though the services were unspecified. All in all, things hadn’t turned out so badly. When mischievous Frau Munn showed him the after picture, the one from 1945, the old man would glance at it without apparent interest and return to his beer. He remembered those days, the hunger and the filth, the disorder under the heel of the enemy’s boot. What a long way the nation had come!

  Dixon?

  Yes.

  You must come with me sometime.

  Where?

  To Babelsberg and the movie museum at Potsdam, wonderful stills and artifacts, old posters of Murnau’s films, Schreck as Nosferatu, von Stroheim, even Dietrich. All the materials from the great period of German cinema, Weimar and a few years after Weimar. Before everyone went to Hollywood.

  One of these days, Dix said. He looked at his watch, wondering if Claire had called. Wondering also where she was and with whom and what her plans were. Wondering if the airplane had landed at last at Pago Pago or some flyblown thousand-dollar-a-night resort in Malaysia, perhaps someone’s sloop anchored off Panang or Surabaya, far from home, far from the set, under Asian skies.

  I have an idea, Willa said, putting her hand on the check as Dix reached for his wallet. He said, Let me. She shook her head firmly, No, this one is mine. It’s business, isn’t it? I have a business account.


  Dix pointed to the before picture. What do you think of this? What comes to mind?

  Nothing much, she said. Gestapo hoods.

  Look at the officer toward the rear, under the window. The overweight one.

  What about him?

  Look at him. What does he suggest to you?

  Willa thought a moment. He eats too much wurst, she said.

  He’s the story, Dix said.

  Why is he the story?

  He stands out. Look at his eyes, his posture. His uniform’s too big, his hair’s unkempt. He doesn’t fit in.

  He fits in, Dixon. They all do.

  What do you suppose he did before the war?

  She gave him a sidelong glance and answered, Actor. Not very successful. He felt conspired against. The Jews conspired against him, so he never got the good parts. He got the small parts in bad pictures, all because the Jews saved the good parts for themselves. So he did the logical thing for an actor without much talent or presence. He became a Nazi, broke a few shop windows, kicked people around, and in due course—he had friends in high places—got himself promoted to major and joined the Gestapo, the unit that harassed the entertainment industry, theater and films. Goebbels liked him. He became a censor. And dabbled in pornography on the side, definitely. How’s that?

  Not bad, Dix said.

  I said this was a business lunch, Willa said.

  Yes, you did.

  I have an idea. A good idea. An idea you should think about.

  I’m thinking about the overweight major.

  You could work if you wanted to, Willa said.

  I know that, he said.

  I mean now. You could work now.

  Dix looked at her and nodded.

  Yes, she said. She fished in her purse and came up with a sheaf of banknotes, counting them out and placing them next to the check. Next week, she said. You could begin work next week. You could discover in a day whether you still have the desire. You’d know at once whether you want to do it as opposed to thinking about doing it, which you do all the time, whether it’s a boar in a forest or an overweight major in a Gestapo lineup, Frau Munn with her smile or the Vietnamese waiter with his bad manners. Everything you see and hear you convert into film and don’t bother to deny it, I know I’m right.

  It’s my life, he said.

  I know that. It’s transparent. I don’t think you have any other life, much as you might think you do. You look at what’s in front of your eyes and convert it to film. The world is one great screenplay as far as you’re concerned, and it doesn’t matter where you are or who you’re with. Berlin excites you, doesn’t it?

  Berlin appalls me.

  It’s the same thing, Willa said. So, this has possibilities, no?

  No, Dix said.

  Liar, Willa said.

  He finished off his beer and reached for his coat.

  Besides, she said, you’d be doing me a favor. Promise me you’ll think about it. That you won’t say no just because that’s what you’ve been doing for years and years and it’s comfortable. No rolls nicely off your tongue, no no no no no. This is what I have in mind. I want you to direct an episode of Wannsee 1899.

  What restrictions? he said after a moment.

  The usual, she said.

  Forget it, he said.

  There are no restrictions, Dixon.

  15

  THE S-BAHN was uncrowded in midafternoon, the commuters silent except for the shabby old party in the seat across the aisle. He was unshaven. He wore a leather cap and a canvas jacket and muttered to himself between swallows from the can of beer in his jacket pocket. Greenwood sat listlessly looking out the window, Willa’s script in his lap. Pockets of snow lingered here and there in the streets and on the station platforms. The city slowly gave way to suburbs, Lichterfelde, Zehlendorf, Schlachtensee, a thin skin of ice on the pond. The houses grew higher and the lawns wider as the train retreated from the city center, the iron logic of the metropolis; Evanston, Wilmette, Winnetka. The sidewalks were vacant, circular Mexikoplatz all but deserted. Suburban life did not flourish in the daylight. The beer can clattered to the floor, the old party dozed. At Nikolassee he roused himself and stood, swaying. He tipped his hat and said something unintelligible to Greenwood, then stepped off the train and settled on a bench in the cold. He began to speak again, louder now; no one on the platform paid attention. Greenwood watched him as the train moved off. He guessed the old party’s age at seventy-five, perhaps a little less. In Germany, with men of a certain age, you always tried to calculate the year of birth.

  There was no telephone message from Claire when he returned to Mommsen House, and nothing in the mail, either. He put Willa’s script on his desk and went back downstairs to see if Werner would brew him a cup of tea. The chef was cutting up rabbit, legs in one greasy bundle, thighs in another, viscera in the sink. His hands were bloody so he wiped them on his apron before putting the kettle on. They would be but four at dinner, the Kessels and Anya Ryan besides Greenwood. The others were sightseeing, the concentration camp at Sachsenhausen. They had hired a van for the journey, Sachsenhausen being at the northern limits of the city, in Oranienburg. At least two hours were required for the complete tour, the barracks, the ovens, the brick pit where the firing squads assembled, the hospital where the experiments were conducted.

  They hired a guide, Werner said.

  They intended to dine out somewhere in Mitte, probably the overpriced restaurant down the street from the Adlon. If they wanted to spend their money in that way, who was he to stop them? Werner continued to work as he talked, separating the limbs of rabbits, blood dripping from his fingers. He was not in the mood to discuss tourism at Lager Sachsenhausen, preoccupied as he was with Majorca.

  Did you have a pleasant day, Herr Greenwood?

  I had lunch at Munn Café.

  That dreadful woman, Werner said.

  She’s very nice, Greenwood said. She has a trove of photographs. She shows them to her customers, the before and after of Berlin. She has one of Hitler reviewing the troops at Gestapo headquarters.

  She lives in the past, that one. She doesn’t know that Germany and the world have moved on and no one cares about the war. And there are some questions of the authenticity of the photographs. Munn Café survived the war, God knows how. Frau Munn is a mystery.

  Food’s good, Greenwood said. We had schnitzel.

  It’s ordinary schnitzel, Werner said. Everyone knows that she uses a microwave. The food is prepared beforehand and she uses a microwave to stimulate the meat before it’s served. She uses Chinese waiters also.

  Vietnamese, Greenwood said.

  Asiatics, Werner agreed, dealing a vicious blow to a rabbit’s joint and adding the leg to the greasy bundle. I don’t know what it is about my country that attracts Asiatics, perhaps the Russians told them about our schnitzel and beer. The Russians ruined this country. Don’t you find it a puzzle, Herr Greenwood? We only wish to be ourselves, and that is difficult when we are diluted by the Asiatics.

  Greenwood stood in the doorway watching Werner work. When the kettle began to steam, he fetched it and poured two cups of tea, putting pots of sugar and milk and a lemon wedge next to the tea.

  He said, Werner? Have you ever watched a television program called Wannsee 1899?

  Of course, Werner said. Everyone watches Wannsee 1899. They film it here, only down the street a little ways.

  So you like it?

  It’s authentic, Werner said. Absolutely. He paused then and turned away, spooning sugar into his tea, adding milk, stirring rapidly. It’s excellent, he said after a moment. It’s the story of old Prussia. It’s our story told by ourselves. As we would wish it told, Herr Greenwood. It’s the curse of the twentieth century that outsiders come and tell us not only what to believe now but what we believed then. They are trying to tell us how to think! These strangers that come into our country and think they understand our history better than we do and that we are so lamebrained we cannot b
e trusted with our own facts. They believe that we will accept them as our doppelgangers, what shit. You yourself would wonder—and here he paused, searching for the most contemptible nationality—if some Frenchman came to your country and told you how to interpret your revolution. You would say, Who is this schwein? I tell you, Herr Greenwood, this is the worst thing that can happen to a nation. You lose control of history. You lose control of your memory, no less. And it is not only the lectures in books. It is happening now in our Potsdamer Platz, which daily comes to resemble your city, Los Angeles. And who are the architects? Italians, Americans, and English. It’s insulting. It’s a terrible situation.

  I can see, Greenwood said.

  And it gets worse, Werner said.

  And that’s why everyone watches Wannsee 1899.

  Of course, Werner said. It’s us talking to ourselves.

  Well, Greenwood said doubtfully. I’m not sure—

  Of course you wouldn’t understand! How could you understand, your country is so large and—self-possessed. Everyone believes they are a little bit American, whether they want to be or not. You are in charge of your own myths. Why was Marx hated so? Why did the world have fifty years of Cold War? Because you felt insulted. Marx challenged your history, your view of yourself. Marx looked at your history and said it was bunk. Bunk, propaganda, and illusion. So you did with him what you do to anyone who takes the contrary view. You tell him to bugger off. You deport him. You assemble a Senate committee and hold him in contempt, and if he doesn’t cooperate, you blacklist him. He doesn’t have a place at your table!

  Red-faced with anger, Werner took a vicious swipe at a rabbit’s thigh, sending it slithering across the cutting board and into the sink. He fetched the thigh and rinsed it in cold water.

  He said, I have been reading.

  I can see that, Werner.

  I have been reading about the blacklist. Other things.

  Dreadful, the blacklist.

  I did not mean to offend you, Herr Greenwood.

  You haven’t, Werner.

  There are many who believe as I do, he said.

  Who want to be in charge of their own history?