View from the Beach

by JH Fletcher

  She watched her now, talking with Franz — George, she reminded herself — at the other end of the table and wondered if she was exercising the same skill now. Hopefully not. Getz and Vogel. The Jew and the war criminal. It didn’t bear thinking about.

  Hannah was watching the time, as Hannah always did. ‘Let’s clear this lot up,’ she said, ‘then we must have a look at Patterns Of Heroism.’

  ‘Would you mind?’ Ruth asked Barbara. ‘I suppose I really should get down to it.’

  ‘Do what you have to do,’ Barbara told her. ‘George and I are fine.’

  And, it seemed, continued to be so. When Ruth and Hannah came back an hour later they found that the others had carried chairs on to the grass and were sitting side by side watching the sea. Of David and Louise Ruth could see no sign. Then Franz (George) said, ‘I think sometimes that daughter of mine is more seal than human,’ and Ruth saw the two of them cavorting in the waves.

  ‘You’d think they’d be freezing,’ she said. ‘That water’s cold.’

  ‘They are young.’

  Yes, Ruth thought, that was indeed the difference.

  Barbara said, ‘I wouldn’t mind a stroll myself.’ She looked at Ruth. ‘Want to come with me?’

  They walked barefoot along the surf line. The water was indeed cold.

  ‘These articles,’ Barbara said. ‘I’m planning to promote your work by promoting you. Okay?’

  Ruth was dubious. ‘The work should stand alone.’

  ‘Nothing on earth stands alone, honey. You know that.’ She stopped, watched the sea. ‘Would you say you were close to your daughter?’

  Ruth laughed. ‘Sometimes yes, sometimes no. Why?’

  ‘I’d like to talk to her.’

  ‘I’m not sure you’ll be able to. She’s a busy lady nowadays.’

  Again the formidable smile. ‘If you speak to her first I’m sure she’ll agree to see me.’

  ‘What do you want to see her about?’

  ‘Like I said, if I excite interest in the woman I excite interest in the work. I’d like to ask her what it’s like to be the daughter of a famous writer.’

  ‘She won’t like that.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Wrong emphasis. You’ll have to ask her what it’s like to be the famous daughter of a famous writer.’

  They laughed; walked on together. Gulls stalked indignantly away from them.

  ‘Your friend was telling me how he came out to Queensland after the war and made a new life for himself.’

  I should have anticipated this, Ruth thought. I don’t even known what the official version of his life is.

  ‘How did you meet him?’ Barbara asked.

  ‘I don’t remember.’ She tried a laugh; it rang unconvincingly. ‘It seems like I’ve known him forever.’

  ‘My parents wouldn’t talk to a German or buy anything German. Not after what happened.’

  ‘Your parents weren’t involved in —’

  ‘No, thank God. Both sides of my family have been in the States for generations. I guess I wouldn’t be talking to you now if it had been any other way. It left its mark, all the same.’

  ‘These things always do. Like everything that’s happened since.’

  ‘Sure. Now, if one word could sum up your work I guess it would be hope. Doesn’t it hurt you to see that hope so regularly denied?’

  ‘What else can I do? There’s potential for great goodness in humanity. We see flashes of it. Wonderful people who had within them the power to transcend the pogroms and hatreds. The Gautama, Christ, Gandhi.’

  ‘But these were exceptional men,’ Barbara suggested.

  ‘Of course. But they show the way for the rest of us. If we don’t aim constantly at the stars,’ Ruth said, ‘what’s the point of having them?’

  Barbara laughed. ‘It’s a point of view, certainly. And your role, I take it, is to provide the rocket to get us there?’

  ‘My role is to remind people they’re there so they can build a rocket for themselves.’

  They reached the end of the beach, retraced their steps in companionable silence. When they got back to the house they found Franz (George) asleep in the chair. His mouth was open, he looked every one of his seventy-five years. Seventy-five, Ruth thought. We’re not old. We’re ancient.

  ‘Interesting life he’s had,’ Barbara said. ‘There’s a symbol of hope, if you like. A real phoenix from the ashes. Maybe you should write about him.’

  ‘Maybe I will,’ Ruth said.

  Barbara and Hannah left. Ruth had repeated her invitation to stay overnight but Hannah, a true child of the city, would have none of it. Ruth and Franz had a cup of tea companionably together, looking silently at the sea. Ruth would have thought there’d be insufficient words for everything they had to say to each other yet it seemed that for the moment words were unnecessary. It was enough to sit side by side, knowing that after so many years each of them was there.

  All my life he has been there, Ruth told herself.

  In one sense it was an idiotic thing to say. He had left for Germany in 1934. Since then, until today, she had seen him twice. For a month in 1938, two days in Schwarzbruchen after the war. Twice in forty-nine years. It wasn’t much. In that time she would have said she had barely thought of him yet now knew that a part of him had never gone away at all.

  She remembered how he had shown her the armband with its hooked cross. A symbol of violence and hatred; even then she had been conscious of its aura of evil yet to him it had meant resurrection. He should not have believed, she thought now. He’d had all the advantages; an upbringing in a free country far from Europe’s claustrophobic hatreds, a good brain and education. How could he have been so beguiled?

  She saw now that in sharing the swastika he had been opening to her his heart. It had been no good; the terms he had demanded had been too high and he, sensing her rejection, had been quick to shut away the symbol and so himself.

  Arrogance, she thought. That was what had led him astray. Arrogance and romanticism. Ruthlessness, too, perhaps. A lethal mixture that had poisoned many besides Franz. Even today she had sensed it in him. It made her uncomfortable, it always had, yet had been his salvation, perhaps. It had helped him rebuild his life.

  She wondered what she felt about him, this stranger who was no stranger, returned so unexpectedly into her life. It was too soon to know. But was glad she might now have the opportunity to find out.

  It was beginning to grow dark when David Clark found them. ‘I’m off.’

  Ruth walked with him to his car.

  He smiled up at her through the driver’s window. ‘Louise and her dad staying on a few days?’

  ‘Yes. Why?’

  ‘I thought maybe I’d show Louise around a bit. Take her off your hands,’ he suggested. ‘If you like?’

  Ruth felt a smile but suppressed it. ‘That would be very kind. If you’re sure it wouldn’t be too much trouble?’

  ‘Oh no. No trouble.’

  She watched until his car had disappeared behind the dunes then walked back to the house. It had been a busy day, possibly even a momentous day, depending on what Barbara Getz had to say in her articles, and Ruth was weary. A bath and bed, she thought, that’s what I want.

  First, though, she had her guests.

  Barbara Getz had caught her on the hop during their walk.

  ‘How did you meet him?’

  The innocent question had left Ruth floundering. Barbara wasn’t the sort to have missed it. I’d better warn him, she thought, although there’s not much we can do about it now. And I’ve barely spoken to Louise since she arrived. I ought to have a word with her, too.

  She found them watching the sunset. Another day ending. Another, beyond the eastern horizon, beginning. She remembered Louise frolicking in the surf with David. The way the world turned. Franz to Louise. Patty to Ellen, that poor child, and to Ellen’s child David. Bob and Mary to herself, to Boyd and Roberta. To Andrew. Oh dear. She wished she liked he
r grandson better but could not; Andrew was not a likeable man. I must phone Sally tomorrow, she thought, find out how he is doing. And that poor girl.

  The sun dipped. The sky flared crimson, turned slowly to pearl. Waves ran landwards out of the darkening sea.

  Ruth shivered, hands about her bare arms. ‘Let’s go in.’

  Louise went to have a bath. Ruth and Franz sat and looked at each other.

  ‘I shall never think of you as George,’ she said.

  ‘You’d better. I don’t want to start explaining things to my daughter at my time of life.’

  ‘How did you explain knowing me?’

  ‘I said we’d met in Germany after the war.’

  ‘Barbara Getz asked me the same thing. I said I couldn’t remember. Very feeble, I’m afraid.’

  ‘She also asked me. I told her the same, that we’d met in Schwarzbruchen when you were promoting your first book. Of course. One must always stick to the same story.’

  Ruth hesitated. ‘You’ve never told Louise the truth?’

  ‘That I was in the Wehrmacht. Nothing more.’

  ‘Is that wise?’

  A flash of what might have been anger. ‘You think I would let her go through what I did?’

  ‘Was it really so bad? After the war, I mean?’

  ‘I was always afraid they might trace me, you see. It’s something that is always there, waiting to pounce out at you. Look at that old Ukrainian they dug out last year. It makes you wonder if you’ll be next. I do not feel guilty about what happened but I could not allow Louise to suffer the same fears that I did.’

  It was strange, talking like this with a man she had never expected to see again. They had been like trains running on parallel rails, she thought. Against all probability the trains had now rejoined the same track. She should have been pleased yet doubt remained. Remember what happens when real trains do that, she told herself. They crash.

  ‘You’ve told me nothing of your life since I saw you last,’ she said.

  ‘I don’t like talking about the past,’ he told her. ‘Louise will tell you what you want to know.’

  It was Ruth’s turn to be angry. ‘You think I want to be involved in your lies?’

  ‘You were involved as soon as you invited us to stay with you,’ he said calmly. ‘I told you my name was George Frey. How could you have imagined Louise knew any different?’

  His words set her back on her heels. He was right, of course. She was implicated in the lie, had been since she had met him after the war.

  Ruth let it go. ‘I’ll go and have a talk with her,’ she said.

  Louise was in her room watching the moonlit sea through the open window.

  ‘May I come in?’

  Louise turned but did not speak; Ruth took silence for consent. She sat on the edge of the bed. ‘I’m sorry I neglected you today. I didn’t mean to but that was the way things worked out.’

  ‘David took care of me.’

  ‘David is one of my favourite people,’ Ruth said.

  ‘He’s very nice.’ The words were fenced, shutting Ruth out, the blue eyes guarded. Ruth did not know why Louise should be defensive but she was, the air stiff between them.

  ‘I find it incredible that I’m actually talking to you,’ she attempted, smiling.

  Do you? the watchful eyes said. Why should I care about that?

  ‘Your father and I lost touch, you see,’ Ruth blundered on. ‘I was never much of a correspondent —’

  The words, excuses, petered out. They looked at each other.

  ‘I ask myself what’s going on here,’ Louise said. ‘You say you’re old friends but you only met once, after the war. You’re just acquaintances. Not even that, really. Unless there’s something I don’t know.’

  Damn.

  ‘Like I said, we lost touch —’

  ‘Why should he want to see you again after such a long time? Someone he hardly knew? Why did you invite us here?’

  ‘I suppose we just … took to each other.’

  It was flimsy, terrible. It was the best she could do.

  Ruth said, ‘When he phoned the other day I thought it would be nice to see him again. And you, too, of course.’

  ‘We were watching television in the motel,’ Louise said. ‘There was that story about you, what happened in the Whitsundays. All of a sudden he said, “That’s it, this has gone on long enough,” and the next thing I knew he was ringing directory enquiries for your number.’

  ‘I see.’ Cautiously.

  ‘I don’t know anything about his past. I know he came out in the fifties, got a job, started his own company. Met Mummy. All that. But nothing before. He told me he drove a staff car in the war but that’s all. Not where he was, who his friends were. A year ago, when they arrested that war criminal in Adelaide, he didn’t speak for a week. Why? What had it got to do with him? Something happened in the war,’ Louise burst out. ‘I’m sure of it. And I think you know what it is. Can you imagine how I feel when a complete stranger knows more about my own father than I do?’

  Her eyes were hot, her voice hot. Until this matter was cleared up they would be enemies. It was the last thing Ruth wanted but could say nothing. It was for Franz to tell her or no one.

  ‘I shall find out,’ Louise threatened. ‘You know that, don’t you?

  Ruth smiled helplessly.

  Silence between them. In the darkness Ruth heard the steady voice of the waves breaking along the beach.

  Louise sighed. The shutters came down over her eyes. ‘I’d like to go to bed now.’

  Ruth went thoughtfully into the living room. Franz smiled up at her. For an instant the forty years since they had last seen each other vanished and she saw the old Franz. The instant passed, time moved and the old man’s face returned.

  ‘She knows,’ she said.

  The smile was ripped away. ‘You told her?’

  ‘Of course not. She’s convinced there’s something you haven’t told her, though.’

  He shrugged, as dismissive of his daughter’s feelings as he had always been of others. ‘What she doesn’t know can’t hurt her.’

  ‘I wouldn’t be so sure of that.’

  ‘You must allow me to be the judge.’

  ‘I do. But she knows there’s something. And intends to find out.’

  ‘There is no way she can do that.’

  Impasse.

  ‘You want a whisky?’

  ‘Thank you.’

  She poured the spirit into two cut-glass tumblers, fetched water and ice, carried them across to him. ‘There’s soda if you’d prefer.’

  They drank companionably together. He put his glass down, smiled at her. ‘I ask myself what happens to one’s life.’

  ‘It goes. The same as everyone else’s.’

  ‘And ours have almost gone.’

  She laughed. ‘Speak for yourself. I’ve got a dozen more books to write.’

  ‘You are lucky,’ he said. ‘So lucky.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Your life has had a focus. I envy you.’

  ‘You built a business, found a new life. A family. That would be enough for most men.’

  ‘There are times when I wonder.’

  ‘Do you still dream about the tree?’ Ruth asked.

  ‘Not for years now.’ He frowned. ‘During the retreat from France I thought of it.’

  ‘And?’ she prompted him.

  ‘I had always thought of it as a symbol of life. Of hope.’ He shrugged. ‘In a retreat you forget all that nonsense.’

  ‘Is that how you thought of it? As nonsense?’

  ‘I remember telling myself that if my survival had depended on it I would have cut it down for firewood.’

  Ruth was shocked. ‘Betrayal …’

  He smiled cynically. ‘Of what? A tree?’

  ‘Of life.’

  He shrugged. ‘I am still here.’

  But no longer the man he had been.

  Ruth said, ‘You never used to have an
accent …’

  ‘You must remember I spoke the language for many years.’

  She knew that was not the reason. He had put on the accent when he came back to Australia. For forty years his life has been a lie, she thought. Not surprising he wonders what the point of it all has been. Impulsively she took his hands in her own, the bony, old man’s knuckles, the dried-up skin, and felt a brief spasm of regret for everything that had passed her by. ‘Franz —’

  Felt him grow still beneath her touch. ‘My name is George.’

  ‘With others, perhaps. Between ourselves I shall never think of you as anything but Franz.’

  ‘Franz is dead.’

  His rejection stung her. ‘Then why do you go on regretting what Franz did?’

  It was brutal; his face blanched. ‘Franz is dead,’ he repeated stubbornly. He had to hold on to that; without Franz there could be no guilt, no blame. No self-blame either, perhaps. Agitated, he got to his feet, walked to the curtained windows beyond which lay the vast and liberating expanse of the sea. With all his soul he longed to be out there, away from this room with its bright and probing lights, its bright and probing questions. ‘I should not have come,’ he told Ruth and himself. ‘No good comes from resurrecting the past.’

  ‘My dear.’ She was beside him, her hand on his arm. Offering comfort, understanding. ‘At our age the past is all we’ve got.’

  He would not accept it. ‘There is so much I would obliterate if I could.’

  ‘That firing squad. It was terrible, I know. But as you said, you had no choice.’

  It was not true. Everyone, the commander of the firing squad, the prisoner herded naked into the gas chamber, was free to choose the manner of their living, their dying. It was a thought best left unsaid.

  He muttered something, the words forced between teeth clenched upon the past and its pain.

  ‘What?’

  ‘It was not the shooting.’ He turned, eyes passionate. ‘That was an … incident. One of the things that happen in war.’ His clenched fist pounded his palm. ‘I thought they were gods but they were only men. Evil, little men.’ His face was corrupted by anger and regret. ‘I have wasted my life. That is what I cannot forgive.’

  Ruth was having none of that. ‘You had the guts to follow something you believed in, you’ve built another life, your daughter is here in this house. How can you say you’ve wasted your life?’