by Ken Follett
Jacky said: ‘Does Nelly know about Georgy?’
‘No. And we must keep it that way.’
‘You’re right. Having an illegitimate child is bad enough; a black one could ruin your career.’
‘I know.’
‘Almost as bad as a black wife.’
Greg was so surprised that he came right out with it. ‘Did you think I was going to marry you?’
She looked sour. ‘Hell, no, Greg. If I was given a choice between you and the Acid Bath Murderer, I’d ask for time to think about it.’
She was lying, he knew. For a moment he contemplated the idea of marrying Jacky. Interracial marriages were unusual, and attracted a good deal of hostility from blacks as well as whites, but some people did it and put up with the consequences. He had never met a girl he liked as much as Jacky; not even Margaret Cowdry, whom he had dated for a couple of years, until she got fed up of waiting for him to propose. Jacky was sharp-tongued, but he liked that, maybe because his mother was the same. There was something deeply attractive about the idea of the three of them being together all the time. Georgy would learn to call him Dad. They could buy a house in a neighbourhood where people were broad-minded, some place that had a lot of students and young professors, maybe Georgetown.
Then he saw Georgy’s blonde friend being called away by her parents, a cross white mother wagging a finger in admonition, and he realized that marrying Jacky was the worst idea in the world.
Georgy returned to where Greg and Jacky sat. ‘How’s school?’ Greg asked him.
‘I like it better than I used to,’ the boy said. ‘Math is getting more interesting.’
‘I was good at math,’ Greg said.
Jacky said: ‘Now there’s a coincidence.’
Greg stood up. ‘I have to go.’ He squeezed Georgy’s shoulder. ‘Keep working on the math, buddy.’
‘Sure,’ said Georgy.
Greg waved at Jacky and left.
She had been thinking about marriage at the same time as he, no doubt. She knew that coming out of the army was a decision moment for him. It forced him to think about his future. She could not really have thought he would marry her, but all the same she must have harboured a secret fantasy. Now he had shattered it. Well, that was too bad. Even if she had been white he would not have married her. He was fond of her, and he loved the kid, but he had his whole life ahead of him, and he wanted a wife who would bring him connections and support. Nelly’s father was a powerful man in Republican politics.
He walked to the Napoli, an Italian restaurant a few blocks from the park. Nelly was already there, her copper-red curls escaping from under a little green hat. ‘You look great!’ he said. ‘I hope I’m not late.’ He sat down.
Nelly’s face was stony. ‘I saw you in the park,’ she said.
Greg thought: Oh, shit.
‘I was a little early, so I sat for a while,’ she said. ‘You didn’t notice me. Then I started to feel like a snoop, so I left.’
‘So you saw my godson?’ he said with forced cheerfulness.
‘Is that who he is? You’re a surprising choice for a godfather. You never even go to church.’
‘I’m good to the kid!’
‘What’s his name?’
‘Georgy Jakes.’
‘You’ve never mentioned him before.’
‘Haven’t I?’
‘How old is he?’
‘Twelve.’
‘So you were sixteen when he was born. That’s young to be a godfather.’
‘I guess it is.’
‘What does his mother do for a living?’
‘She’s a waitress. Years ago she was an actress. Her stage name was Jacky Jakes. I met her when she was under contract to my father’s studio.’ That was more or less true, Greg thought uncomfortably.
‘And his father?’
Greg shook his head. ‘Jacky is single.’ A waiter approached. Greg said: ‘How about a cocktail?’ Perhaps it might ease the tension. ‘Two martinis,’ he said to the waiter.
‘Right away, sir.’
As soon as the waiter had left, Nelly said: ‘You’re the boy’s father, aren’t you?’
‘Godfather.’
Her voice became contemptuous. ‘Oh, stop it.’
‘What makes you so sure?’
‘He may be black, but he looks like you. He can’t keep his shoelaces tied or his shirt tucked in, and nor can you. And he was charming the pants off that little blonde girl he was talking to. Of course he’s yours.’
Greg gave in. He sighed and said: ‘I was going to tell you.’
‘When?’
‘I was waiting for the right moment.’
‘Before you proposed would have been a good time.’
‘I’m sorry.’ He was embarrassed, but not really contrite: he thought she was making an unnecessary fuss.
The waiter brought menus and they both looked at them. ‘The spaghetti bolognese is great,’ said Greg.
‘I’m going to get a salad.’
Their martinis arrived. Greg raised his glass and said: ‘To forgiveness in marriage.’
Nelly did not pick up her drink. ‘I can’t marry you,’ she said.
‘Honey, come on, don’t overreact. I’ve apologized.’
She shook her head. ‘You don’t get it, do you?’
‘What don’t I get?’
‘That woman sitting on the park bench with you – she loves you.’
‘Does she?’ Greg would have denied it yesterday, but after today’s conversation he was not sure.
‘Of course she does. Why hasn’t she married? She’s pretty enough. By now she could have found a man willing to take on a stepson, if she’d really been trying. But she’s in love with you, you rotter.’
‘I’m not so sure.’
‘And the boy adores you, too.’
‘I’m his favourite uncle.’
‘Except that you’re not.’ She pushed her glass across the table. ‘You have my drink.’
‘Honey, please relax.’
‘I’m leaving.’ She stood up.
Greg was not used to girls walking out on him. He found it unnerving. Was he losing his allure?
‘I want to marry you!’ he said. He sounded desperate even to himself.
‘You can’t marry me, Greg,’ she said. She slipped the diamond ring off her finger and put it down on the red checked tablecloth. ‘You already have a family.’
She walked out of the restaurant.
(iii)
The world crisis came to a head in June, and Carla and her family were at the centre of it.
The Marshall Plan had been signed into law by President Truman, and the first shipments of aid were arriving in Europe, to the fury of the Kremlin.
On Friday 18 June the Western Allies alerted Germans that they would make an important announcement at eight o’clock that evening. Carla’s family gathered around the radio in the kitchen, tuned to Radio Frankfurt, and waited anxiously. The war had been over for three years, yet still they did not know what the future held: capitalism or Communism, unity or fragmentation, freedom or subjugation, prosperity or destitution.
Werner sat beside Carla with Walli, now two and a half, on his knee. They had married quietly a year ago. Carla was working as a nurse again. She was also a Berlin city councillor for the Social Democrats. So was Frieda’s husband, Heinrich.
In East Germany the Russians had banned the Social Democratic Party, but Berlin was an oasis in the Soviet sector, ruled by a council of the four main Allies called the Kommandatura, which had vetoed the ban. As a result, the Social Democrats had won, and the Communists had come a poor third after the conservative Christian Democrats. The Russians were incensed and did everything they could to obstruct the elected council. Carla found it frustrating, but she could not give up the hope of independence from the Soviets.
Werner had managed to start a small business. He had searched through the ruins of his father’s factory and scavenged a small horde of ele
ctrical supplies and radio parts. Germans could not afford to buy new radios, but everyone wanted their old ones repaired. Werner had found some engineers formerly employed at the factory and set them to work fixing broken wireless sets. He was the manager and salesman, going to houses and apartment buildings, knocking on doors, drumming up business.
Maud, also at the kitchen table this evening, worked as an interpreter for the Americans. She was one of the best, and often translated at meetings of the Kommandatura.
Carla’s brother Erik was wearing the uniform of a policeman. Having joined the Communist Party – to the dismay of his family – he had got a job as a police officer in the new East German force organized by the Russian occupiers. Erik said the Western Allies were trying to split Germany in two. ‘You Social Democrats are secessionists,’ he said, quoting the Communist line in the same way he had parroted Nazi propaganda.
‘The Western Allies haven’t divided anything,’ Carla retorted. ‘They’ve opened the borders between their zones. Why don’t the Soviets do the same? Then we would be one country again.’ He seemed not to hear her.
Rebecca was almost seventeen. Carla and Werner had legally adopted her. She was doing well at school, and good at languages.
Carla was pregnant again, though she had not told Werner. She was thrilled. He had an adopted daughter and a stepson, but now he would have a child of his own as well. She knew he would be delighted when she told him. She was waiting a little longer to be sure.
But she yearned to know in what kind of country her three children were going to live.
An American officer called Robert Lochner came on the air. He had been raised in Germany and spoke the language effortlessly. Beginning at seven o’clock on Monday morning, he explained, West Germany would have a new currency, the Deutsche Mark.
Carla was not surprised. The Reichsmark was worth less every day. Most people were paid in Reichsmarks, if they had a job at all, and the currency could be used for basics such as food rations and bus fares, but everyone preferred to get groceries or cigarettes. Werner in his business charged people in Reichsmarks but offered overnight service for five cigarettes and delivery anywhere in the city for three eggs.
Carla knew from Maud that the new currency had been discussed at the Kommandatura. The Russians had demanded plates so that they could print it. But they had debased the old currency by printing too much, and there was no point in a new currency if the same thing was going to happen. Consequently the West refused and the Soviets sulked.
Now the West had decided to go ahead without the co-operation of the Soviets. Carla was pleased, for the new currency would be good for Germany, but she felt apprehensive about the Soviet reaction.
People in West Germany could exchange sixty inflated old Reichsmarks for three Deutsche Marks and ninety new pennies, said Lochner.
Then he said that none of this would apply in Berlin, at least at first, whereupon there was a collective groan in the kitchen.
Carla went to bed wondering what the Soviets would do. She lay beside Werner, part of her brain listening in case Walli in the next room should cry. The Soviet occupiers had been getting angrier for the last few months. A journalist called Dieter Friede had been kidnapped in the American zone by the Soviet secret police, then held captive: the Soviets at first denied all knowledge, then said they had arrested him as a spy. Three students had been expelled from university for criticizing the Russians in a magazine. Worst of all, a Soviet fighter aircraft buzzed a British European Airways passenger plane landing at Gatow airport and clipped its wing, causing both planes to crash, killing four BEA crew, ten passengers and the Soviet pilot. When the Russians got angry, someone else always suffered.
Next morning the Soviets announced it would be a crime to import Deutsche Marks into East Germany. This included Berlin, the statement said, ‘which is part of the Soviet zone’. The Americans immediately denounced this phrase and affirmed that Berlin was an international city, but the temperature was rising, and Carla remained anxious.
On Monday, West Germany got the new currency.
On Tuesday, a Red Army courier came to Carla’s house and summoned her to city hall.
She had been summoned this way before, but all the same she was fearful as she left home. There was nothing to stop the Soviets imprisoning her. The Communists had all the same arbitrary powers the Nazis had assumed. They were even using the old concentration camps.
The famous Red City Hall had been damaged by bombing, and the city government was based in the New City Hall in Parochial Strasse. Both buildings were in the Mitte district where Carla lived, which was in the Soviet zone.
When she got there she found that Acting Mayor Louise Schroeder and others had also been called for a meeting with the Soviet liaison officer, Major Otshkin. He informed them that the East German currency was to be reformed, and in future only the new Ostmark would be legal in the Soviet zone.
Acting Mayor Schroeder immediately saw the crucial point. ‘Are you telling us that this will apply in all sectors of Berlin?’
‘Yes.’
Frau Schroeder was not easily intimidated. ‘Under the city constitution, the Soviet occupying power cannot make such a rule for the other sectors,’ she said firmly. ‘The other Allies must be consulted.’
‘They will not object.’ He handed over a sheet of paper. ‘This is Marshal Sokolovsky’s decree. You will bring it before the city council tomorrow.’
Later that evening, as Carla got into bed with Werner, she said: ‘You can see what the Soviet tactic is. If the city council were to pass the decree, it would be difficult for the democratically minded Western Allies to overturn it.’
‘But the council won’t pass it. The Communists are a minority, and no one else will want the Ostmark.’
‘No. Which is why I’m wondering what Marshal Sokolovsky has up his sleeve.’
The next morning’s newspapers announced that from Friday there would be two competing currencies in Berlin, the Ostmark and the Deutsche Mark. It turned out that the Americans had secretly flown in 250 million in the new currency in wooden boxes marked ‘Clay’ and ‘Bird Dog’ which were now stashed all over Berlin.
During the day Carla began to hear rumours from West Germany. The new money had brought about a miracle there. Overnight, more goods had appeared in shop windows: baskets of cherries and neatly tied bundles of carrots from the surrounding countryside, butter and eggs and pastries, and long-hoarded luxuries such as new shoes, handbags, and even stockings at four Deutsche Marks the pair. People had been waiting until they could sell things for real money.
That afternoon Carla set off for City Hall to attend the council meeting scheduled for four o’clock. As she drew near she saw dozens of Red Army trucks parked in the streets around the building, their drivers lounging around, smoking. They were mostly American vehicles that must have been given to the USSR as Lend-Lease aid during the war. She got an inkling of their purpose when she began to hear the sound of an unruly mob. What the Soviet governor had up his sleeve, she suspected, was a truncheon.
In front of City Hall, red flags fluttered above a crowd of several thousand, most of them wearing Communist Party badges. Loudspeaker trucks blared angry speeches, and the crowd chanted: ‘Down with the secessionists.’
Carla did not see how she was going to reach the building. A handful of policemen looked on uninterestedly, making no attempt to help councillors get through. It reminded Carla painfully of the attitude of police on the day the Brownshirts had trashed her mother’s office, fifteen years ago. She was quite sure the Communist councillors were already inside, and that if Social Democrats did not get into the building the minority would pass the decree and claim it to be valid.
She took a deep breath and began to push through the crowd.
For a few steps she made progress unnoticed. Then someone recognized her. ‘American whore!’ he yelled, pointing at her. She pressed on determinedly. Someone else spat at her, and a gob of saliva smeare
d her dress. She kept going, but she felt panicky. She was surrounded by people who hated her, something she had never experienced, and it made her want to run away. She was shoved, but managed to keep her feet. A hand grasped her dress, and she pulled free with a tearing sound. She wanted to scream. What would they do, rip all her clothes off?
Someone else was fighting his way through the crowd behind her, she realized, and she looked back and saw Heinrich von Kessel, Frieda’s husband. He drew level with her and they barrelled on together. Heinrich was more aggressive, stamping on toes and vigorously elbowing everyone within range, and together they moved faster, and at last reached the door and went in.
But their ordeal was not over. There were Communist demonstrators inside too, hundreds of them. They had to fight through the corridors. In the meeting hall the demonstrators were everywhere – not just in the visitors’ gallery but on the floor of the chamber. Their behaviour here was just as aggressive as outside.
Some Social Democrats were here, and others arrived after Carla. Somehow most of the sixty-three had been able to fight their way through the mob. She was relieved. The enemy had not managed to scare them off.
When the speaker of the assembly called for order, a Communist assemblyman standing on a bench urged the demonstrators to stay. When he saw Carla he yelled: ‘Traitors stay outside!’
It was all grimly reminiscent of 1933: bullying, intimidation, and democracy being undermined by rowdyism. Carla was in despair.
Glancing up to the gallery, she was appalled to see her brother, Erik, among the yelling mob. ‘You’re German!’ she screamed at him. ‘You lived under the Nazis. Have you learned nothing?’
He seemed not to hear her.
Frau Schroeder stood on the platform, calling for calm. She was jeered and booed by the demonstrators. Raising her voice to a shout, she said: ‘If the city council cannot hold an orderly debate in this building, I will move the meeting to the American sector.’
There was renewed abuse, but the twenty-six Communist councillors saw that this move would not suit their purpose. If the council met outside the Soviet zone once, it might do so again, and even move permanently out of the range of Communist intimidation. After a short discussion, one of them stood up and told the demonstrators to leave. They filed out, singing the ‘Internationale’.
