Letters From Prague

by Sue Gee

  Bisecting it from west to east, from Ernst Reuter Platz to the mighty Brandenburg Gate, ran the boulevard along which Prussian huntsmen had sounded their horns, where their carriages had taken the air. Charlottenburg Chaussee, it was called then. In the 1930s, when Hitler came to power, it became the East-West Axis, a favourite place for Nazi processions and torchlit rallies; in the Battle of Berlin it was bombed to pieces. Now it had another name, commemorating the summer’s day in 1953 when impoverished workers throughout East Germany came out on strike. The Soviet forces moved in swiftly: in the riots that followed, four hundred people died.

  In their memory, the boulevard became Strasse 17 Juni, and forty years later, on a bright August morning, Hariet and Marsha were walking up from the south side of the Tiergarten towards it, alongside the canal. Behind them was Cornelius Bridge, and the little sculpture commemorating Rosa Luxemburg.

  ‘There’s a demonstration in her memory every year,’ Harriet told Marsha. ‘On the day of her death. She was a communist, she followed Marx, but she believed in freedom and free speech and individual rights. She helped the wall come down, in a way – people put up her words on banners.’

  Leaves blew into the water; ahead were boating lakes, to their left the Zoo, on Hardenbergplatz.

  ‘Can we go?’ asked Marsha, hearing shrieks and roars.

  ‘What about for your birthday? Anyway, I thought you didn’t approve of zoos.’

  ‘I don’t, but –’ She trailed off, watching a family walking ahead of them: two sisters, perhaps six and eight; a little boy of about three, let out of his pushchair, darting. His sisters moved quickly towards him as he neared the water’s edge; behind them, the parents kept an eye, walking arm in arm. Squawks and trumpetings came from the zoo as they drew near; a balloon seller stood at the gate.

  You don’t approve, but you need something for children, Harriet thought, looking at Marsha looking at this little scene. Something more your size, to settle you down in a strange city.

  She said: ‘Have I been going on at you? Too much history?’

  Marsha took her hand. They were together again. ‘A bit. I mean it is interesting, sometimes, the rubble women and things, but –’

  ‘I know. I’m sorry, I’ll shut up. We’ll go to the zoo if you’d really like to.’

  She said she would really like to; they went through an entrance like a pagoda, paying through the nose.

  A zoo is a zoo, at least in Europe, the contentment or despair of its inhabitants dependent on much the same factors in London, Paris or Berlin. This one was spacious, and well laid out, and some of the cages seemed too small and some seemed tolerable. Marsha, anyway, enjoyed it. She and Harriet wandered in and out of the ape house, peered at bushbabies in the nocturnal rooms, enjoyed the penguins. It reminded Harriet of weekends when Marsha was little, and had not learned to disapprove of things: when it had been enough to be together and enjoy a park, a playground, a Sunday afternoon at the zoo.

  ‘Look at him – oh, Mum, quick, do look.’

  They gazed at a vulture, hunched on his perch, lifting and examining scaly grey feet, each horny toe. When he had finished, he stretched out huge clipped wings, flapped and refolded them, and fell asleep.

  ‘Had enough for one day.’

  ‘He’s bored,’ said Marsha, more accurately, and then, ‘I do hope Victor’s all right.’

  ‘I’m sure he is.’

  There was a crowded playground: she broke into a run. And for twenty minutes or more Harriet sat on a bench in the sun, watching her clamber and swing amongst dozens of German schoolchildren, enjoying their summer holidays. It was over a week since Marsha had been with other children. In Brussels, once the ice had melted, that had not seemed to matter at all – she was too busy making the most of Hugh and Susanna. Now, without family, it began to feel as though it might be too much for her. Had she been foolish? Harriet asked herself again. Planning the journey in London it had felt essential to visit Berlin en route. Karel had passed through here, crossing the ‘anti-Fascist protection wall’, a border observed by armed guards in watchtowers, patrolled by dogs: a place of death which had always been, for her, a potent symbol of what had made him go back to Prague and leave her. Now that wall was down, bringing in its wake governments all over Eastern Europe. Berlin, with its violent history, such a passionately beating heart at the heart of the continent, was reunited.

  Well, in theory, anyway.

  We are one people.

  So are we.

  There were, of course, a lot more people in Berlin than Berliners, in Germany than Germans. The papers at home this year had been full of the violence meted out to foreign workers and asylum seekers, of the rise to power of disaffected thugs, Hitler’s inheritors, bred in poverty, growing up to a jobless future in the East. What was it really like, the place which for most of her life had been ‘over there’? Perhaps it smacked of voyeurism – the western tourist eyeing up drab streets and grey estates, moving, with a sigh of relief, back to a smart hotel in the Kurfürstendamm? Well – whatever it smacked of, she wanted to go. And anyway, they weren’t exactly staying in a smart hotel.

  ‘Mum! Mum!’

  Marsha was perched at the very top of a climbing frame, a pyramid of steel and bright blue rigging where children swarmed. She waved, pretended to fall and then, as Harriet leapt up, resumed her position, scratching under her arms like a monkey, making horrible faces.

  ‘Very funny!’ Harriet sat down again, relieved. They had done the right thing in spending the morning here, no question. Marsha was now engaged in monkey business with a boy about the same age, chasing him up and down the rigging, making awful noises. He was dark and lean – not unlike how a younger version of Karel might have looked; not unlike Marsha herself, in fact – he could have been her brother.

  Harriet did not allow herself to pursue this thought. She sat in the sunshine watching them play, watching gulls wheel above them, looking down for scraps. It was beginning to get hot. What about the rest of the day? She had planned to take a bus through the Tiergarten down to the Brandenburg Gate, and to walk through to the avenue Unter den Linden beyond it, crossing the old boundary of the wall, going east, going east – a metaphorical further step along her journey.

  But perhaps that was all too much for the first day: perhaps she should postpone it, and keep things simple and untiring. And perhaps, in any case, she should think again about Christopher’s offer to show her these places himself. She felt in her shoulder bag, pulled out her wallet, and his card.

  Christopher Pritchard, Marketing Consultant. An office address in Brussels, phone and fax numbers. Marketing Consultant. In the 1990s they covered a multitude of sins, those little words, usually redundancy. Is that what had happened to him in London, or was it, as it had felt when he mentioned it so casually over dinner at Hugh and Susanna’s, something more?

  Getting my fingers burned – what might that mean?

  She turned the card over. Hotel Scheiber, Prenzlauer Berg. The address and phone number were written in bold fountain pen – a good hand, product of an expensive education. A nice hand, actually, it had to be said. And he was nicer than he had at first appeared. He would make a good companion, showing her round the city.

  And Marsha would hate it.

  ‘Hi.’ She dropped on the bench beside her. ‘What are we going to do now?’

  ‘I was just wondering.’ Harriet looked at her pink cheeks, and general air of cheerful ordinariness. ‘What do you feel like?’

  Marsha shrugged. ‘I don’t know.’ Somewhere a church bell was chiming midday; from beyond the Zoo gates to the south came the roar of traffic. She leaned against Harriet’s shoulder. ‘What do you think Hugh and Susanna are doing now?’

  Harriet put her arm round her. ‘I expect Hugh’s in his office, don’t you, probably on the phone, thinking about lunch …’

  Marsha smiled. ‘What about Susanna?’

  ‘Good question.’ Harriet thought of her, alone in that lovely ap
artment, without work, without a child, and felt, as always, both chilled and full of sympathy. Who knew, if she herself were in such a position, how she might feel, or how she might fill her days? I must talk to Christopher about her, she thought. Is that going to be possible?

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said to Marsha. ‘Perhaps she’s shopping, or meeting someone for lunch …’ It sounded like the life of a woman from decades ago, the kind of woman Marsha knew nothing about, really, amidst the busy, purposeful lives of her mother’s friends. Nonetheless, it was a fact that Marsha had rarely warmed to one of her mother‘s friends so quickly. Perhaps it was simply because Susanna was Hugh’s wife, and therefore family, but it had felt more than that. Perhaps Marsha knew she filled a gap, as Hugh filled a gap for her.

  ‘Are you missing them?’ she asked.

  ‘A bit. It’s okay.’

  ‘Why don’t we send them a card? And then the rest of the day –’ Harriet outlined her original plans. She said cautiously: ‘But I did think, as Christopher Pritchard knows Berlin, and is staying in the east, perhaps we might ask him to –’

  Marsha gave her a look. ‘We were going to do it all on our own before,’ she said. ‘Weren’t we? Before we met him?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Well, then. Don’t be so wet.’ She got off the bench. ‘Can we buy a card from the shop? I want to send Hugh an animal.’

  Harriet followed meekly.

  In the end, they spent the rest of the day getting hot. Marsha said she wanted to wander – just look about a bit, round here, and not take in too much at once. They bought cards, and some overpriced bread and Wurst from a stall, and walked back through the Zoo munching it, coming out near the station where they’d arrived last night. As then, the roads around felt fast and furious. They crossed to the top of the Kurfürstendamm, by the Kaiser-Wilhelm- Gedächtniskirche, with its ruined, bombed-out spire.

  ‘Why don’t they mend it?’

  ‘I think it’s left like that deliberately – so people don’t forget the war.’

  A tower block of shimmering glass, a shopping centre, was grafted on to the northern side of the church. At the foot of this bizarre conjunction sprawled post-punk adolescents, much as in Piccadilly Circus. They wore grubby dark clothes, earrings in ears and noses; an air of apathy and aggression hung about them. As often in London, Harriet realised that few of them were much older than her pupils; here, she wondered how many of them were from the east, coming up in hope of a quick touch from well-heeled westerners and tourists. Hard to blame them, but after yesterday evening’s encounter outside the station she still felt uneasy, with Marsha to protect, and walked with relief on to the main thoroughfare.

  This relief was short-lived. Spring, or late autumn, with plenty of money, were probably what was needed to enjoy the Ku’damm, with its endless shops and bars and hotels. Now, the midday heat was powerful, with a clamminess which slowed them down. Petrol fumes rose from the traffic, and the pavements were crowded with shoppers and tourists. Music blared from hot boutiques, the smell of fast food hung in the air, everyone looked indifferent, or in a hurry.

  ‘Oh, God.’ Harriet bumped into a hard-faced woman hung about with glossy carrier bags and apologised, moving on. ‘This isn’t much fun.’

  ‘I’m thirsty.’ Marsha was looking at a kiosk offering violently coloured fizzy drinks.

  ‘Those look foul.’

  ‘It’s hot.‘

  ‘I know it is.’

  They walked on, gazing at the windows of department stores. Businessmen hurried from hotel lobbies, office blocks claimed the skyline.

  ‘Can’t we stop?’

  They should, thought Harriet, have stayed right where they were, on a bench in the sun in the Tiergarten, watching the boats on the lake, taking a boat out, even, taking their time. Poor Marsha – how could you expect a child to enjoy trailing round foreign cities, with heat and history lectures and no one to play with?

  If Harriet had followed this train of thought much further she might herself, just then, have succumbed to exhausted misery. As it was, she saw, when they reached a corner, a shady side street, and a café with tables set out upon it. They made a beeline.

  And sitting over iced coffee and the tallest glass of ice-filled lemonade Marsha had ever seen, writing postcards to London and Brussels – Just arrived, all is well, thank you for everything – they both calmed down.

  ‘We must be sensible,’ said Harriet, draining her glass. ‘We must take it bit by bit.’

  Marsha completed a row of kisses to Brussels. ‘You’re telling me?’

  For a while they sat watching the world go by.

  ‘What do you want to do for your birthday?’

  Marsha shook her head. ‘I don’t know. I’ve never had a birthday in Berlin.’

  ‘Darling.’ Harriet leaned across and kissed her.

  ‘We should really have had it in Brussels, shouldn’t we? With our family. That wasn’t very well planned, was it?’

  ‘I –’ Harriet floundered. It was true.

  ‘Especially,’ Marsha went on, ‘as I haven’t got a brother or sister.’

  ‘Oh, Marsha –’

  ‘Or a father,’ she concluded flatly.

  Harriet drew a breath. ‘We’ve talked about all this –’

  ‘Not for a long time.’

  It was true.

  ‘Go on,’ said Harriet, and waited.

  ‘Go on, what? It’s just a fact, isn’t it? I’m an only child, I’m almost ten, and my father might as well not exist. He never writes, I never see him, I don’t suppose he even knows I’m here.’ She looked at Harriet. ‘Does he?’

  ‘I – no.’ Harriet tried to take Marsha’s hand; Marsha withdrew it. Harriet said hesitantly, ‘I didn’t think it worried you …’

  ‘Well, it does. It does at the moment, anyway.’ She looked away. ‘Being ten is supposed to be special …’

  ‘Oh, Marsha.’ Harriet felt quite helpless. ‘I’m so terribly sorry.’

  ‘It’s okay.’ Marsha’s foot beneath the table swung back and forth; she turned her postcard over and over.

  Harriet sat watching her, holding herself back from more words, another gesture. It obviously wasn’t okay. Another child might have been in tears by now, but Marsha so rarely cried. Perhaps that was a bad thing. Perhaps Harriet hadn’t allowed her to cry enough, or to talk about Martin enough – useless, abandoning, selfish Martin, she thought with a wave of anger, having given him so little thought for so long.

  The foot, after a while, stopped swinging, and the postcard lay back on the table. Harriet said carefully: ‘We can talk about it again. Now, or whenever. Whatever you want.’

  Marsha shook her head. ‘Let’s leave it.’

  ‘Would you like something else to drink?’

  ‘No, thanks.’

  ‘Shall we go back to the hotel? We could have a rest, and change, and go out for a look round, find somewhere nice for supper … Or would you like to eat in the same place as last night?’

  Last night’s place had been a Turkish café two blocks along from the hotel where they’d eaten kebabs and pitta, much as if they were in London, because that was what Marsha had wanted: something she knew. Now, she said:

  ‘I think I feel a bit like you do sometimes, at the end of term. I’m tired and I don’t know.’

  ‘I know the feeling exactly. Let’s go and have a rest and take it from there. And Marsha –’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You’re wonderful.’

  ‘I know.’

  By the time they got back to the Hotel Kloster the sun was going down. The street, after the newness of everything else in the day, had a known quality about it which felt pleasing.

  ‘Let’s have a shower, and a rest,’ said Harriet, ‘and then go out and explore.’

  The glass doors of the hotel were open now, and late afternoon sunlight fell on to the floral carpet. A different girl was at the desk: she had long dark hair and smiled at them, and when Ha
rriet asked for their key she turned to the metal pigeonholes above the key rack and said there was a message.

  Harriet took the envelope, recognising the writing at once:

  Greetings from the east. An interesting choice of hotel. I’m chez moi this evening; give me a ring if you like. Hope all’s well. C.P.

  Chapter Three

  They took a yellow double-decker through the Bergarten, travelling along the Strasse des 17 Juni towards the Brandenburg Gate. The morning was clear and bright, and the park stretching away on either side of them beyond the trees was full of tourists and students on holiday, taking the sun in deckchairs or wandering along the little tributaries of the Spree. There were statues – to Bismarck, to Wagner and Goethe and to the lesser known, but Harriet forbore from pointing them out to Marsha, who knew none of them, and who was, in any case, accompanying her with a show of reluctance.

  ‘I’ve told you a million times – I don’t like him.’

  ‘You have,’ said Harriet. ‘You most certainly have. And all I can say is that I didn’t like him either, at first, but I think perhaps I misjudged him, and I can’t see what’s wrong with letting him show us round a bit.’

  This was over breakfast, where Harriet, who last night had waited until Marsha was asleep before phoning Christopher, had broken the news.

  ‘He says there’s a swimming pool near his hotel. Would you like that?’

  ‘I don’t particularly want to go swimming with him.’

  ‘He says he thinks we might like his hotel – it’s small and old-fashioned, and apparently there’s a hotel cat.’ Harriet paused. ‘Apparently she’s had kittens.’

  Marsha was making a sandwich from slices of sausage and cheese in alternate layers. She balanced a slice of sausage studiedly on top.

  ‘How many?’