Faith and Beauty

by Jane Thynne

  Suddenly, the trees cleared and an expanse of lake lay ahead. On the far bank it was possible to see a large white villa, modelled in old Tyrolean style with red roofs and formal, well-cultivated gardens. Adler dismounted, tethered his horse to a low-hanging branch and Clara followed suit.

  ‘That’s my home.’

  ‘It’s beautiful. And very isolated.’

  ‘There’s no one there apart from my housekeeper and my dogs.’

  ‘Were you ever married?’

  ‘More questions, Clara.’

  ‘You’re quite happy to question me.’

  ‘No, then.’

  ‘Don’t you get lonely?’

  ‘I like it that way.’

  He turned towards her and reached out.

  ‘Perhaps you’d like to see it someday.’

  He leaned to kiss her but she averted her face so that his lips merely brushed her cheek. Undeterred, he put his hands round her waist, pulled her roughly towards him and tipped her face up to his.

  ‘Don’t tell me some part of you doesn’t desire this.’

  Shock made her laugh, but there was a bubble of fear beneath.

  ‘I can’t imagine why you would think that.’

  ‘Can’t you? I thought you were different from the others. Do you want me to play some complicated game, to court you with flowers and violins?’

  ‘Not at all.’

  ‘Good. Because I’m not like that. If something pleases me, if it gives me pleasure to look at, then I say so. If I like it, I make that clear. I may be much older than you, but I sense we’re both realists. We’re both capable of taking what we want.’

  ‘This is not what I want.’

  He frowned, as if her refusal was some ancient philosophical problem that he was determined to solve.

  ‘There must be someone else then. But he’s not in evidence. Let me think. He must be married to another woman. Are you one of those actresses who have to make do with the scraps of a married man’s attention? Or delude themselves that he will ever leave his Frau and his kleine Kinder. Who live out their lives waiting for the telephone to ring, losing out on their own hopes of happiness? Take a lesson from Frau Goebbels. You’ve heard the gossip. A woman is capable of making her own romantic decisions.’

  ‘This man isn’t married.’

  ‘But he’s not here, is he?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘And nor, I assume, is he married to you?’

  Clara passionately did not want to tell him any more. She was mad to give away any information about her personal life. She felt a ripple of nerves. Any scrap of information was enough for the Gestapo to work on. Like a single drop of blood to a hungry predator, the smallest detail was enough for them to work with.

  Adler was staring down at her, arms crossed, eyes drilling into hers.

  ‘I’m not sure I believe in this phantom lover of yours. I don’t believe in ghosts.’

  ‘He does exist.’

  ‘What’s his name then?’

  Leo. His name leapt into her mouth but she could not give it breath.

  ‘It doesn’t matter.’

  ‘You don’t swallow that nonsense about there only being one person, one soul mate, do you? It’s a delusion, you know.’

  ‘Not to me.’

  ‘You’re far too intelligent. That kind of thing is only fit for the script of Love Strictly Forbidden. You know as well as I do that’s not for adults. Human emotions are entirely untrustworthy. I, for one, have never been in love and I don’t intend to start now.’

  He was smiling, yet she could see from the bruised eyes and the way his fingers flicked, that her refusal had bothered him.

  As if struck by a sudden thought, he took her hand.

  ‘Perhaps I could think of a bargain,’ he said lightly. ‘If you become my mistress, no one would need to know that you were Jewish.’

  Suddenly all Clara’s fear was turned to a churning anger. Any attraction he had ever roused in her evaporated. She wrenched her hand away.

  ‘If that’s what you think I am, why would you want a Jewish mistress?’

  He looked at her impatiently.

  ‘I told you. I don’t care about race. Pedigree. I thought you realized.’

  ‘What would that relationship be worth, if you bought it at a price?’

  ‘Everything comes at a price. Even the greatest art is traded in the marketplace like bread or eggs.’

  ‘And you think human beings have a price?’

  ‘Don’t be a fool, Clara. Of course they do. I’m proposing a bargain. We all make bargains in our lives. I’m not a savage. I don’t want to force you into something against your will. That would be beneath my dignity.’

  ‘So is making threats against me.’

  He lifted a hand to touch her cheek and she jerked away.

  ‘You can’t want a woman under these circumstances. What about love, or affection?’

  He shrugged. ‘Just words.’

  An image flickered through her mind. Something old, something she had not thought of for years. Her brother Kenneth’s collection of butterflies. Ken was mad about butterflies. He collected them all through one summer in Cornwall; Red Admiral, Cabbage White, Purple Emperor, and once they had expired he stuck them with a pin into a frame. As a girl Clara had hated to see those tiny fragments of beauty, designed to be seen only in a transitory flutter, fixed forever. The dust scalloped on their intricate wings offered up to any passing gaze. That was what she meant to the bored, cultured Conrad Adler. A pretty specimen to be studied and admired, imprisoned by compromise and circumstance.

  Ducking out of his arms, she sprang back onto her horse, turned his head sharply and spurred him to a canter. The horse responded willingly, flying much too fast through the difficult forest terrain until a bird whirring up from the brushwood caused him to startle, and he shied forcefully to one side, throwing Clara out of the saddle and pitching her painfully into the undergrowth.

  Instantly Adler was at her side. He hauled her up with one hand and held her shoulder. The sardonic, jousting manner was gone. His eyes were serious and concerned.

  ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘Yes. I think so.’

  He caught her horse’s reins and slung them across a branch, then came down to squat beside her.

  ‘Rest a minute. Lean against my arm. You need a moment to recover.’

  He was right. The shock of the fall had momentarily dazed her. She leant back against him and when he touched a tentative hand to her forehead, she did not resist.

  He had lean hands, the hands of a pianist or an artist or a surgeon. Hardly the hands of a member of Himmler’s élite. But then, what were the hands of an Obersturmbannführer supposed to look like? Once the blood had returned to Clara’s head, she sprang up, brushed herself down, and patted her hair back into place.

  Adler helped her back into the saddle, the old, sardonic smile back in place.

  ‘You should think about it, Clara. After all, I’m not a ghost. I do have the great advantage of being flesh and blood.’

  Chapter Twenty-six

  She had lived all her life in Berlin, yet Hedwig had never set foot in the Admiralspalast, even though it was everything she loved. With its scrolly, Expressionist façade, it was the biggest and brashest of the fantasy palaces which lit up Friedrichstrasse’s theatre land. The Admiralspalast was a great, baroque barn of a place seating twenty thousand people for a repertoire that included dance acts, operetta, magicians, and every aspect of light entertainment. It was probably the last place on earth that Jochen would want to visit, so it was with a mixture of astonishment and delight that she heard he had tickets for the Saturday evening show.

  That night an eager queue wound along the street. Theatre audiences were up this summer. Everyone was trying to escape the worries of the present – the continual daily niggles of what the next meal might resemble, and after they’d eaten it, how to look presentable enough to go out. And once they’d got there, whethe
r the gaudy signs and blinking neon billboards of the theatre might be plunged into darkness when war arrived in a few months’ time. Just then, all anyone wanted was to lose themselves in a few hours of romantic nonsense and that evening’s variety performance perfectly fitted the bill.

  Standing beneath the pillared entrance, her face dappled emerald and ruby in the flashing light, Hedwig shuffled her feet and hoped Jochen would not be much longer. Her legs ached. All day they had been practising waltzes for Minister Goering’s ball. Their own ball dresses – white taffeta and silk with blue sashes – were not yet finished, so they were wearing gym kit, which only seemed to make the waltz practice more ridiculous, and the routine was being supervised by Fräulein von Essen, whose hefty form was more at home on an alpine hike than pirouetting around a dance floor.

  Waltzes were what the Führer loved best, due to his Austrian heritage, and not only would the Führer actually be present, there was a chance that one of the Faith and Beauty girls would be asked to dance with him. Even the thought of that made Hedwig rigid with horror. If the Führer’s gaze fell on her, would she have the courage to go through with it, or would her legs simply give way beneath her? She consoled herself with the knowledge that Fräulein von Essen would regard the partnering of Hedwig and Hitler with precisely the same horror, and would ensure that if there was any line of female partners for the Führer, Hedwig would be at the back of it.

  Especially after that morning’s practice. Hedwig had been partnering Hilde, one of the prettiest and most graceful of the Faith and Beauty girls, with a doll’s delicate, creamy complexion and a glossy crown of braids. It was bad enough that Hedwig had two left feet, but Hilde’s skill made everything worse. A couple of Kripo detectives, part of the investigation team for Lotti’s murder, loitered at the doorway, ogling and making ribald remarks, and the sensation of the policemen’s eyes on her made Hedwig trip on Hilde’s feet and even from the other side of the room she could hear their snorts of laughter.

  She gazed anxiously up the street. Friedrichstrasse was thronged with people. The crowds flowed seamlessly between those returning from work and others setting out for an evening’s entertainment. Trams screeched, people jostled and neon dazzled all around them. The show was due to start in less than five minutes and Jochen was nowhere to be seen.

  I was going to ask you something.

  Every night since he had said that, she had lain awake, puzzling over it, cherishing it like some delicious secret, wondering what it might be. Or, more precisely, what her decision would be, because she had guessed already what Jochen was going to ask.

  He was planning for them to elope. The idea sent a thrill through her, even as she mentally shied away from the daring it would entail. How would she pluck up the courage to leave the home she had known all her life? There would be more work for her mother without help in the kitchen, let alone with all the boys. Yet also there would be one less mouth to feed, and with the apartment so crowded, they could use the extra space. But how could she leave the children? How would darling Kurt, with his sleepy smile and milky breath, cope without her? Kurt was more like her own child than her brother. What would it do to him if she suddenly disappeared?

  Despite these dilemmas, Jochen’s proposition had come as a welcome distraction. It was the only thing diverting her from endless brooding about Lotti’s death.

  ‘Sorry I’m late, Hedy. Work.’

  He broke into her dreams with a gust of cold air and a rough kiss on the cheek. He had his briefcase in one hand, and with the other he took hers and tugged her through the throng. ‘We have precisely two minutes.’

  They edged their way in through the crowds and settled in a row at the front of the stalls, waiting for the luxurious swags of purple velvet to rise and reveal the stage.

  ‘What have you been doing?’ he whispered.

  ‘Practising for Reichsminister Goering’s ball.’

  ‘Sounds interesting.’

  He was being polite. That was another change. Jochen had been in a difficult mood lately and much as she tended to attribute all problems to her own deficiencies, she knew it was more likely down to the stress of work. His company had been working overtime making anniversary editions of Mein Kampf and Jochen was an important part of that, crafting the elaborate, mediaeval-style frontispiece for each edition in Gothic writing, replete with swirls of black ink, oak leaf swags and fat little cherubs at the margins.

  ‘It’s not just dancing. We’re having to practise conversation. They say it’s important that the Prince of Yugoslavia gets a good impression of Germany.’

  Most girls could barely lift their thoughts above their families and their favourite movies, but Faith and Beauty girls needed to understand the currents that motivated world affairs.

  ‘Apparently Russia holds a Bolshevik dagger at Germany’s throat but Prince Paul can help the Führer restore balance to Europe.’

  ‘And how exactly will he manage that?’

  ‘I can’t remember.’

  Hedwig was sketchy on the details because she had lost all ability to concentrate. Every visit to the Faith and Beauty home these days filled her with apprehension. Everything had changed. The place was buzzing with policemen, shouldering their way through the corridors, building a picture of Lotti’s last hours. A pair of detectives had even come into the art class and hauled Herr Fritzl out for questioning. Hedwig couldn’t help thinking that his face, chalky with fright, had resembled one of the pieces of Degenerate Art he was so keen to condemn.

  ‘They read out an address from Reichsführer Himmler. He says he wants us to be Hohe Frauen, Sublime Women. We’re going to be trained in several languages, as well as debating and chess.’

  ‘So I’m taking out a sublime woman, eh? I don’t need Heini Himmler to tell me that.’

  She could feel the undercurrent of laughter in Jochen’s voice. Not derisive mockery, like the Kripo men, but affectionate amusement.

  The lights darkened and she shuffled down in her seat as the chorus line came on. A variety show always started with the chorus, before the individual acts got going. The orchestra struck up Dein ist mein ganzes Herz, the song that Richard Tauber had sung to Marlene Dietrich in The Land of Smiles. You Are My Heart’s Delight. It could hardly be more perfect. She reached across to Jochen and felt his warm fingers stroke the back of her hand.

  Even though they were dressed in feathers and tulle, the girls performed with as much military discipline as any stormtrooper on the Führer’s birthday parade. When they goose-stepped, turned, bent and regarded the audience through their parted legs, Hedwig expected to feel Jochen stiffen with distaste, but instead he was transfixed. It was a revelation to her that he might like dancing. She hoped he never wanted to dance with her.

  The girls changed costumes and returned dressed as Red Indians with strategically placed feathers preserving what little modesty they possessed. Watching Jochen more closely out of the corner of her eye, Hedwig realized that despite their shapely legs and high kicks, it was not the dancers that had captured his attention but the orchestra. And in particular, one member of the orchestra. Following his gaze, she saw a stunningly lovely brunette playing lead violin, her instrument clenched beneath her chin and her bow sawing the air with febrile energy. She must have been in her early twenties, her thick chestnut hair bundled up like ballerina’s from a face that acted as a mirror to the passions of the music, by turns grave and joyful. Jochen seemed entirely captivated by her, as though all the dancers, musicians, the theatre audience and even Hedwig herself simply did not exist.

  A blind surge of jealousy rose in her. Early in their relationship she had coaxed out of Jochen the dismaying news that he preferred brunettes to blondes, except in her case. Now, she guessed, he was reverting to type.

  It had rained again during the show and when they emerged from the theatre two hours later Friedrichstrasse was glinting with a thin sheen of water, the puddles rippling with speckled light. People jostled for cabs and flung
up their umbrellas. Others huddled into their fur collars and turned down the brim of their hats. To her surprise Jochen seized her hand and ushered her around the corner down the dank alley to the theatre’s stage door.

  ‘I just need to see someone for a moment. Don’t mind, do you? It’s work.’

  ‘Work?’

  His face shuttered in the way that brooked no argument.

  ‘I’ll be out in a moment.’

  Hedwig stood mutely beneath the misty light of the stage door, trying to keep out of the rain and to prevent herself being engulfed in a wave of misery and outrage. How could Jochen bring her to the theatre if his true interest was a brunette who played the violin? Did he imagine she wouldn’t notice, or did he think she was the kind of doormat to tolerate some amorous adventure when he was supposed to be on a date with her? She heard her mother’s voice again, with its knowing, cynical ring.

  That boy is not to be trusted.

  Less than two minutes later Jochen was back, briefcase under one arm.

  Hedwig walked stiffly, trying to transmit her unhappiness through silence, but Jochen actually preferred walking without conversation, so eventually she said, ‘What was all that about?’

  ‘All what?’

  His mouth was a tight line and his jaw was set like rock. As they dodged the crowds pouring out of theatres and cinemas, he increased his stride.

  ‘The girl in the orchestra. I saw you watching her. Then you went to meet her, didn’t you?’

  He gave a little humourless laugh.

  ‘You’re not jealous, surely.’

  He was walking fast. Hedwig had to do a little skip to keep up.

  ‘Why did you see her?’

  There was an even longer silence so that she feared he was furious, and part of her longed to abandon the matter entirely, though another part insisted that she discover everything. After a while he said, fiercely, ‘You don’t want to ask these questions. You won’t like the answers.’