Tea came in, with much clatter and the moving of little tables. A saucer was dropped by Lisa, who looked about to cry until Frau Curtius remarked, ‘Well it is only a saucer and not even broken, what does it matter?’ There were cakes full of cream, and palmiers from the court confectioners in Charlottenburg that Irene and Gretchen had chosen that morning. Irene looked at her mother-in-law nervously, but Frau Curtius nodded approvingly. ‘What a fine tea. Well, we have an Englishwoman in the family.’
‘I am sure I shall enjoy living in Berlin.’
‘Oh, Berlin, you can say what you like. Berlin pretends to be a great city but really it is a garrison town with the Kaiser stuck on top, like a fairy on a Christmas tree. We’re impressed by absurd things like the new Adlon Hotel – people think it makes Berlin look like Paris. How uncomfortable these chairs are! Thomas insisted. You are better at comfort in England, you must make this flat a thoroughly English, comfortable place.’ She took another palmier. ‘My dear, it will be lonely for you at first, with your husband at the office, he works so hard. When did he come back last night?’ Irene coloured. ‘But we, all of us, are not only your new family but your new friends. If ever you feel unhappy you must come and see me.’
When Thomas came home at half past seven, full of talk about his new scheme, he found a smiling wife sitting at her desk, with sheets of paper in front of her. Irene had pinned up her hair and was wearing a white silk dress with stitching round the neck and arms, and a long string of blue-green beads. She embraced him warmly. ‘I am teaching Gretchen one or two English dishes,’ she said. ‘And I have had some ideas about rearranging the flat.’ He looked surprised.
He did not look at the drawing of an imaginary country house that she had put on the desk. She had thought it might amuse him. She had spent some time over it, consulting his books and creating a house that was partly gingerbread and partly real cottage. He never commented, and after two days she tore it up.
14
Mark wished he were more polished.
He was sitting in a room at the Foreign Office, waiting to be interviewed. There were two other candidates there, a man called Wentworth-Stanley, a man called Scott. He knew them from Scoones. Both were assured specimens of young manhood, handsomely suited Etonians. They chatted familiarly, politely including Mark.
An usher came in and said, ‘Mr Wentworth-Stanley?’ and Mr Wentworth-Stanley went out, raising his eyebrows humorously. The other man, as though exhausted, picked up The Times. After a second he lowered it and said, ‘I say, hope you don’t mind if I look at the paper, a chap gets a bit. . .’
A chap did get a bit, it was true. It was reassuring that this happened even to a chap as perfect as this one.
Beside Wentworth-Stanley and Scott, he felt small and insignificant. He could not believe that, faced with such competition, they would choose Benson.
After a long while the usher returned. ‘Mr Benson?’
Mr Benson stood up, nodded at Scott. ‘Good luck, old chap,’ Scott said with one of those charming smiles.
And Mr Benson went off, through the gilded halls, to meet his destiny.
15
They are on good terms, this afternoon, sitting on the sofa facing piles and piles of boxes.
‘Ah, now this is Alexander.’ Pandora looks puzzled. ‘Alexander Steinbaum, he was a great figure in my childhood, a friend of the house, as they say in Germany. He used to come and visit us in London quite often. He was special, Alexander – passionate, always about to write a great history of Germany, and everyone made jokes because it was never written, and then after all he did write it and it was extremely successful. He ended up in America.’
‘He was Jewish, I suppose?’
‘Yes, yes. Anyway, he and his wife Beate, a very nice woman, they fled to London in 1933, but he didn’t like London, and when he was invited to lecture in the United States he rushed off and that’s where he stayed.’ She looks at the photograph for a long while. ‘Oh dear, this is bringing back so many memories. I think. . . Oh no.’ She stops.
Pandora arranges tulips in a huge vase.
Dorothea shoots a look at her daughter. ‘They’re all dead now, I suppose one can talk about them. I’m sure he was in love with Mother, many people were.’
Pandora turns. ‘And was she in love with him?’
‘Oh no, not at all. No, no.’ She laughs. ‘He was small and ugly, as you can see, not at all what Mother liked. She liked handsome men.’
‘Like your father.’
‘Yes. Of course, there was. . . but that’s old history.’
16
Irene sat wondering what to do – she could not face writing any more letters and it was raining – when Lisa announced that a gentleman had called. On hearing his name, Irene flew into the hall. ‘Lisa, this is Herr Steinbaum,’ she cried. ‘He is Herr Curtius’s oldest friend, he is always to be admitted.’
They embraced warmly, tea was ordered, she stood back to inspect him closely. He looked tired, but that was normal.
‘I was so sorry to miss the wedding. I have heard about it, but as you know, I had so many deadlines. . . I hope you enjoyed it.’
‘Yes, yes, it was wonderful, we were very sorry you could not come.’ She and Thomas had been surprised, they’d wondered whether the thought of a big church wedding and having to wear morning dress and the ranks of Thomas’s family (not to say hers) had intimidated him.
‘I have not seen you for so long,’ he went on. ‘And the honeymoon, your months and months in Rome, was that perfection?’
‘Have you seen the flat?’ she asked.
‘Yes, Thomas showed it to me before he left. Of course a wealthy man like your husband can create a handsome residence, and he has fine taste as well, that essential adornment of the haut bourgeois. He has everything a man could want, including the most beautiful wife in the world. But then he is rich, that is what he deserves.’
‘And may I visit you in your flat?’ she asked.
‘Oh, I invite nobody, it’s a miserable place. Tell me about yourself. Will you become a society lady? Will you devote yourself to entertaining? Or to Kinder, Kirche, Küche, as our Kaiser enjoins?’
‘I–’ she said, but he rattled on.
‘Or will you work on your art, as I hope? Many people can do those other things, but only you can develop your talent.’ He was not handsome, indeed he could be quite ugly, but at times he had an extraordinary sweetness of expression.
She was pleased; so few men believed women could create anything worthwhile. Even her husband seemed to have forgotten she had been one of the Slade’s best students.
‘And you, what are you writing, Alexander?’
He puffed out his cheeks. ‘Oh, I am writing a critique of life in contemporary Germany. I am addressing the problem of reconciling a developing parliamentary state with the survival of autocratic power. I consider the contribution that a highly organised modern trade union movement could make to the development of the state. The current status of the armed forces, I analyse in relation to the theories of Professor Freud, who plays an important part in my approach.’ He laughed. ‘A good deal of material, as you see. The book will make people angry, I hope. Of course, I examine the role of Jews in modern Germany, but lightly. I think we are seeing progress in the attitude of the state and the people to the Jewish population.’
‘And when will this work be published?’
He looked despondent. ‘To tell you the truth, I have only written the first chapter. I have many ideas but no time to put them down. I have to be writing articles all night and all day or looking for stories. It’s hard, being a journalist.’
‘I thought you chose to be a journalist.’
‘Did I never tell you? At the university I studied Germanistik. At the end of my studies my Doktorvater took me aside and said, “Herr Steinbaum, you have written an outstanding thesis, but you will never be promoted here. It is a pity you did not study a subject like botany, where being a Jew does not ma
tter.” So I threw my books out of the window and found work with the Berliner Tageblatt, where being a Jew is an advantage.’
‘I am glad you have so much work, anyway.’
‘Yes, but no full-time position. Well, at least I am becoming a little known – perhaps one day I shall be the Social Democratic Chancellor of the German Republic, and known to everybody. . .’ He allowed himself to gaze at her for a moment. ‘But my life will be cheered by your presence in Berlin. If you are ever lonely, telephone me and I will rush to your side with gossip, soulful thoughts, Moselwein, whichever suits you. I’ve brought you a wedding present.’ He extracted a parcel from his case. ‘A present for my dearest friends.’ He blinked hard.
‘Shall I unwrap it and do it up again for Thomas?’
‘It’s nothing very precious, I wish I could give you a Dürer.’ It was a little painting, showing a landscape at sunset, blue hills disappearing into the dusk, and in the foreground a woman standing alone on a hill, staring into the distance. ‘It’s anonymous, but German I’m sure, from the early nineteenth century. It reminded me of you.’
When he had gone, Irene wandered into Thomas’s study, and considered how it might be used as a studio. After all, there was nowhere else for her to work. And work she would.
17
On Sunday they attended the family ceremony of Mittageßen. Irene had not visited her parents-in-law’s new apartment before. ‘It is large, twelve rooms or so,’ Thomas said. ‘I cannot persuade them to live in a modern way, they say they have a position to maintain – though I convinced my mother to have a new style of bedroom, at least.’
They walked through the orderly streets. ‘Bleibtreustraße,’ she said. ‘Does that mean “Stay True Street”?’
‘No, no, Bleibtreu was a general. I can remember when Charlottenburg was all market gardens and villas, and Berliners came here for their summer holidays. The villas were charming, with gardens and fountains. But the city expands so fast, we must always be building and rebuilding and pushing further out. Menzel painted the edge of the city so well, little scraps of countryside with the buildings marching ever onwards.’
‘I find it very pleasant,’ said Irene. ‘The regular height of the buildings, and the tree-lined streets.’
‘At least here in Charlottenburg the houses are of good quality. But you should see the buildings going up in Kreuzberg, the entrepreneurs piling people into tiny spaces.’
‘You must show me, I’d be interested.’ She remembered, she’d once found this sort of discussion impossibly boring.
‘Well, if I take you there, you’ll see why my work is important. In Charlottenburg we think we are superior to the vulgar people of Berlin, even if a little dull.’ He looked up and down the solid street. ‘Here in the Pestalozzistraße I can’t see a single person who is not obviously going to church. But then dullness is the price you pay for respectability, you know.’ He liked to pretend she’d once led a life of debauchery.
They arrived in a square surrounded by new apartment buildings, with a red-brick church in the middle. ‘There you are,’ said Thomas, ‘that is the Trinitätskirche, a monster of a church, Neo-Romanesque if you please. Was ever anything so stupid? The Kaiserin opened it, and the crowds applauded, just because the imperial couple was there.’ He scowled at the church. ‘If people are unable to see how unsuitable such buildings are for our life today, what hope is there for our society?’
What I feel for him, she told herself, is a mature love, unlike my love for Julian. Julian had been infuriating, he’d tease and tease until it was painful. But she’d missed him cruelly, hugged the thought of him when she could not hug his body, held imaginary conversations with him, breathed his pet names to the air. When things were going well with Julian, she’d been a whole and happy woman, most of all during their long hours of intimacy. Well, she mustn’t be sentimental. She must remember that Julian ‘would just not do’, as her mother put it. It was not so much his hopelessness about arrangements or money, it was his roving eye. Always he said, ‘But she doesn’t mean anything to me, only you do, Irene.’ But how could she believe him? These thoughts were so familiar that meanwhile she could go on asking questions about the development of public parks, Thomas’s current topic. Thomas would be true to her, she was sure of that, he would treu bleiben. She smiled faintly.
Thomas noticed her smile – private, unconnected to anything he was saying. He continually found himself watching her. In Italy, they’d been so happy. In Berlin he felt himself on trial, and everything around him, his family, his friends, his work, their apartment. Was Irene happy? Was this the life she wanted? Did she love him wholly, for ever? When these thoughts overwhelmed him, he immersed himself in work and indeed the office piled business on him: as soon as he’d returned from their honeymoon, the head of the practice, rubbing his hands, had said there were two projects for his immediate attention. But even at work, the thought of his wife tugged at him, so that though at times he was brilliantly happy, raising his eyes from his desk and looking out of the window as if the view would contain his beautiful Irene, this happiness never lasted. He could not ask her why she smiled because the true answer might be – what? That she despised him, found his explanations tedious, disliked Germany? Yet he knew she did not think like that. And all the time he must remain civilised, suppress anger. Only at night, holding her in his arms, was he at peace.
She said, ‘I feel I hardly know your parents, at least not your father.’
Thomas laughed. ‘He is a dear man, he loves pretty girls and gossip, he giggles a good deal. I think you will like him.’
The houses in the Schloßstraße were handsomely self-confident. Each elaborately planted front garden was protected by a neat iron fence, and in the centre of the street rows of trees sheltered a sand path for riders. At the end stood the interminable yellow Schloß Charlottenburg, under its bronze-green dome. ‘The people who live in this street like to think they are members of the court, though there’s been no court here for years.’ He pressed her arm tenderly, realising perhaps how nervous she was. ‘They will be so pleased to see you. On Sunday mornings neighbours and relations call for a glass of port, but they leave at twelve. Look, we are punctual, it is two minutes past.’
Along the path they went, through the double street doors flanked by Renaissance columns with iron gargoyles protecting the bases, up a broad flight of stairs carpeted in deep red with lamps supported by golden arms and a mirror on the half-landing. The door was held open by a parlourmaid, who smiled and stared. Thomas took the maid by the hand and introduced her as ‘Unsere liebe Mathilde’.
Mathilde smiled even more broadly and said, ‘Ach, die Dame ist so schön, gnädiger Herr.’
Through lofty double doors bustled Frau Mamma, propelling her husband by the arm. ‘My dear Irene, this is the first of many visits, we are all so happy.’
‘Indeed we are,’ chorused her husband, planting an enthusiastic kiss on Irene’s cheek. She felt like an exhibit in a fair.
Frau Mamma walked Irene up and down the rooms with their high, moulded ceilings, and parquet floors, and tall windows looking onto the trees. Her Salon opened on one side into the smoking room. The opposite door led to the dining room, with the music room beyond, and then to a smaller room filled with flowers. ‘My winter garden, obligatory in Berlin.’ The focus of the Salon was a round table with a velvet cloth, surrounded by chairs and a long sofa. The green-papered walls were thickly hung with paintings in gold frames: pastels of early nineteenth-century ladies and gentlemen, watercolours of the Black Forest, a signed photograph of a personage in a gold frame topped with a crown. The low bookshelves were surmounted by gilded vases and busts of German philosophers and musicians, and piece after piece of Meissen.
‘Family things,’ said Frau Mamma. ‘You might like to see the paintings I have bought. Come into the music room.’ Off they went, followed by Mathilde, busily pretending to tidy the room.
‘We like French painting very much, the
Barbizon school particularly. This is Daubigny, do you like his work? You know, our director at the Nationalgalerie is trying to introduce us to these new Impressionists – I don’t know what I think. Mathilde, the room is quite tidy, please go and help Bettina.’
‘It is terrible what he is doing, buying this French rubbish,’ said her husband. ‘An insult to the public.’
‘So the Kaiser thinks, though in my view the Kaiser should concentrate on battleships. This little still life is by Fantin-Latour – beautiful, don’t you think? Herr Thoma here, in his paintings you see the soul of the country. . . Of course, we have our own shocking artists who use horrid strident colours. Though when Herr Steinbaum insisted I go and look at the new galleries, I did begin to understand a little why he and Thomas like the new artists. One must strive to remain open-minded as one grows older.’
‘I am not at all open-minded about modern art,’ remarked Herr Papa, and smiled happily at Irene. ‘What I am open-minded about is female beauty, that is the best beauty to my mind. Hang Kant, for me women win the prizes every day.’
‘Hush, Christian. So these are my pictures, and soon my other jewels will be here. Today it is just our children and their children. Usually some old aunts and cousins come, but I thought meeting the whole Ahnengalerie at your first lunch. . . Would you like to see my bedroom? It’s been redesigned with the advice of a fine young architect.’
They went down a long corridor to a large bedroom. The room was white, with a few touches of green. ‘He chose green,’ said Thomas’s mother, ‘because he said I was evergreen. Was that not foolish of him? Naturally, I was flattered. He said we had to dispose of our great neo-Gothic bed with its tapestry hangings. We married into it but Thomas said it was absurd. Then we had a disagreement. I like Jugendstil furniture. Thomas told me that it was yesterday’s fashion, but I said I’ll be modern but only up to a point.’ She laughed. ‘When I gave away the old bed my husband was indignant, but now he’s proud of the new room. Yes, our Thomas, your Thomas, can do anything.’
The Iron Necklace Page 6
