White Lies

by Rudolph Bader

  Their parents talked about the good air of Karlsbad, the healing power of its waters, the efficiency of the doctor and the nurses, and eventually the boys were sent on an errand to fetch the German paper from the Sanatorium’s reception area, an errand they knew was just a pretext to get them out of the way while their parents were discussing things the boys weren’t meant to hear.

  When the boys returned with the paper, Manfred had the impression that their father looked more earnest. They handed him the paper, and while Mother was chatting to Thomas about his progress at school, Manfred was observing their father. As he was turning the pages of the paper, the frown on his face was getting deeper by the minute.

  “The Führer really seems to have lost his mind,” he said, shaking his head.

  “Father! How can you say such a thing?” Thomas countered.

  “Well, just read the papers. His new legislation–”

  “Oh, please, stop it!” Mother begged, “I don’t want any arguments between you, and I don’t want to hear about politics. Everyone seems to go on and on about things the Führer is going to do, especially the Czech nurses.”

  Although they respected their mother’s wishes, Manfred could hear his brother mumbling under his breath, “And they’ve certainly got their reasons.”

  It was difficult to open another topic, so their visit drew towards its end. The boys said their good-byes and their parents embraced in a controlled manner.

  So, what could be the matter with Mother now? Manfred, sitting over his English grammar, alone in their big house, found it hard to concentrate on his homework. He hoped his father would return from work soon, so he could tell them what the doctor had told him about Mother’s health. It could very well be good news. Mother might be released and come home, a healthy woman again.

  The front door opened, and Father stepped in. His manner was brisk and business-like. He didn’t lose a lot of words, but merely informed Manfred that he’d come home earlier because he had to drive to Karlsbad.

  “It’s about Mother. I’ll leave the shop in Herrn Wachtveitl’s hands while I’m away.” Herr Wachtveitl was his Bavarian office clerk, an able man with a funny accent and a ruddy face. “He can look after things in my absence. Now, be a good boy and tell Thomas when he gets home. Frau Müller can cook for you, I arranged it with her.” Frau Müller was their neighbour in the dark green house behind the tall fir-tree. This wasn’t the first time she was helping the Weidmanns in an emergency.

  After a very quick good-bye, Father was out of the door again, and Manfred could hear the engine of the Adler being revved up. Looking out of the kitchen window, he could see the car reversing into the street and then shooting forward in the direction of the broader street leading down to Berliner Strasse.

  The house was very quiet. Manfred could hear the ticking of the hall clock.

  It was in the evening three days later when Frau Müller came over with a saucepan full of carrot soup, two pairs of Viennese sausages and a chunk of dark bread for the Weidmann boys. She placed the food on the table, where the boys had already laid out their water glasses, their plates and cutlery. She heaved a deep sigh which told Manfred that she had something to say to them.

  “Well, well, my boys, it’s a sad business,” she began. “I don’t know how to tell you.”

  Thomas looked up from his soup and demanded, “What is it, Frau Müller?” But Manfred didn’t need to ask, he already knew.

  “It’s your dear mother. I’m so sorry to be the one to tell you. You see, she passed away peacefully this afternoon. I had a phone call from your poor father. He begged me to tell you immediately, tonight.” She slowly walked round the table while she told them, and when she had delivered the bad news she stood behind the boys and placed her heavy hands on their shoulders for comfort.

  Thomas looked down, staring at his bowl of soup as if he could see their mother in the food. Manfred couldn’t help himself; the tears ran down his cheeks and he couldn’t keep his jerking left shoulder under control. He tried to be brave. After all, bravery was one of the virtues that education had been trying to breed in boys of his generation. But he just couldn’t help himself. He felt embarrassed in front of Thomas, who managed to take it so bravely. Not a sound emerged from him, not a single sign of emotion. He just stared down. Manfred stood up and climbed up the stairs, reached his room and closed the door behind him.

  Through the rest of the evening and through the whole night, he had the impression that the house was particularly quiet. He listened carefully from time to time. There was nothing but complete silence. For Manfred, this was the silence of the angel of death, a notion he had picked up from one of their old aunts the year before, when there was a distant death among her acquaintances. He had no idea what or who the angel of death was. Now he imagined it to be some kind of ghost that visited every living being who had known the deceased person. So naturally, it was also visiting them now.

  He couldn’t go to sleep because his head was full of memories and conflicting emotions. He remembered the comforting warmth of his mother’s embraces, her blue eyes, her smiling face, her gentle voice and her serving attitude, especially towards her husband. Manfred didn’t know if he should blame his father for his mother’s sad life. But then he wasn’t so sure if her life had really been so sad, after all. Didn’t she love her husband? He had never seen his parents exchanging caresses or other tokens of love. The kisses that they exchanged were more perfunctory than tender, and he thought he couldn’t remember them ever looking at each other with any degree of true affection.

  It was early morning when he finally dropped off into a troubled sleep.

  * * *

  Elfriede’s death marked the end of the Weidmann family as it had existed in their grey house on the Galgenberg. It affected her widower as well as her two sons, each in different ways.

  The widower, Thomas Weidmann, delicatessen merchant and shop-owner, liberal-minded free-spirit and romantic, admirer and sponsor of the arts and head of the respected Weidmann family on the Galgenberg, a true man of substance in many respects, was so shattered by his beloved wife’s untimely death that he seemed to lose his hold on things. He no longer uttered any of his former romantic notions, he no longer opposed his sons’ ideas of a proud and new Germany about to rise from former humility, and he no longer avoided any dealings with the Staatsbeauftragte and with the Nazi mayor of Gera. When a large order came from the town offices, an order of exquisite delicacies for one of the official functions of the NSDAP to celebrate the Führer’s birthday, he accepted it without comment and even went so far as to come along with Mr Wachtveitl to deliver the goods to the town hall and help him set up the sumptuous buffet in the great hall with the old oak parquet floor, the dark paintings of German battles on two of the four walls and the long red wall-hangings with their swastikas all around. It was as if he had suddenly surrendered his former misgivings about the Lumpenpack and decided to go along with them, at least to profit from them if they wanted to become his most lucrative customers.

  To cope with his new widowhood, he felt it was good for him to travel to Berlin every three weeks or so. It took his mind off the many places in Gera that reminded him of his happy times with Elfriede. They had only been to Berlin a few times, and now that the capital of the new Germany was undergoing so many changes under the guidance of the Führer’s architect, Albert Speer, the Reichshauptstadt had nothing to remind him of happier days. He would drive up in his blue Adler, park it near Unter den Linden and then walk through the Brandenburger Tor and into the parkland to the west of it. He liked to watch mothers with their children and stared with an empty mind at groups of young men in uniforms. In the evening, he liked to go to the theatre. The new developments that the Staatstheater had undergone recently seemed to justify his newly-found laissez-faire attitude towards the Nazi régime. After all, the Nazis had not only reopened the thea
tre under its old name, Schiller-Theater, but also appointed Heinrich George, one of the most popular actors, as its new director. Thomas Weidmann remembered how the stocky George with his Berlin accent had originally been a Communist and opposed the budding NSDAP only a few years ago when he worked with people like Brecht and Piscator. But within a very short period George - Georg August Friedrich Schulz with his real name - had accepted the leadership of the Nazis and even played in one of their propaganda films, Hitler Youth Quex, which Thomas had seen in Gera. At the time, he had found himself quite surprised that the great George should lend his talent to the Nazi cause, but now it served as an excuse for his own change of attitude. Also, the great name that George replaced as the director of the Schiller-Theater served as a similar model. Gustaf Gründgens, who only ten years earlier had been connected with Max Reinhardt and with the family of the celebrated novelist Thomas Mann - working with his son Klaus Mann and marrying his sister Erika Mann - had also been taken in by the Nazis and joined some powerful arts councils set up by Hermann Goering, Hitler’s right hand. So, if such important figures in the arts - among them Wilhelm Furtwängler, the gifted conductor of the outstanding Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra - accepted and even served the leadership of Hitler and his Party, Thomas argued for himself, he could very well acknowledge that at least the Nazis supported the arts and gave new impulses to the literary and musical life of Germany. And this was enough to give up one’s opposition to them. Wasn’t it possible that some of the awful things about the Nazis that were being rumoured would prove to be just that: rumours? Perhaps some Jews really deserved the bad treatment that they were given these days?

  Like that, Thomas Weidmann’s regular visits to the Reichshauptstadt helped him not only to cope with his bereavement but equally strengthened his decision to go along with the Nazis and to deal with them in his professional capacity. His change of mind came just in time, because the Nazis had found out that he wasn’t a Party member and demanded that he should prove his allegiance to the great cause of the new Germany. They sent for him, and he had to appear for an interview at the town hall.

  “Now, Herr Weidmann,” the young official behind the desk asked him, smiling benevolently, “how do you justify the fact that you refuse to become a Party member and at the same time you profit from your business connections with the Party?”

  Thomas Weidmann managed to hide his nervousness and hesitated for a short moment. “Well,” he answered, “in fact, I was a member only a few years ago. But when my dear wife’s health declined I fell behind in my membership fees and decided it was more honest to quit.”

  “Aha!”

  “Yes. I felt it was a matter of honour. How could I profit from something without paying for it?”

  “I see. German honour.”

  “Yes. I have always believed in the importance of German honour.”

  “All right,” the young man smiled. Thomas was relieved. The magic word “honour” had saved him. He hoped this was the end of the interview, but the official cleared his throat and looked at him in a questioning way.

  “How do you intend to prove your allegiance to the Party now and in future?”

  “What options do I have?”

  “Naturally, your most obvious move is to join the Party again.”

  “Or else?”

  “Well, you could serve the Party in other ways. If you choose this option,” the man winked at him, “I will make a note on this form, which you will sign, and I will refer your business to Standartenführer Obermayer, who will in turn contact you. There are many ways in which you can be useful to us. And if you want to keep your business, you will be wise to cooperate. There’s just one condition, though. Do you employ, or have you ever employed, any Jews in your business?”

  Thomas hesitated. Young Salomon Feigenbaum had run some errands for the shop, but that had been more than two years ago, and he’d never been properly employed, just a boy doing small jobs for pocket money. Besides, the Feigenbaums had left a while ago.

  “No.”

  “Fine, Herr Weidmann. A true German man of honour, as you say. You will hear from us in due course.”

  When, a few days later, he was contacted by Standartenführer Obermayer’s office, he had to agree to spy on his customers. It was understood that housewives would exchange gossip while doing their shopping, and if they ever mentioned anything suspicious - like feeding more mouths than could reasonably be wanting food in their homes or listening to foreign radio stations - Thomas Weidmann was expected to make a note and report such instances to the same office, which he came to understand was an office working in liaison with the Gestapo, the Geheime Staats-Polizei, the secret police. He was to report regularly every fortnight.

  As for his older son Thomas, the loss of his mother made him harder. He turned his back on his family. Often, he would not come home after school, but spend the rest of the day at the local headquarters of the Hitlerjugend, where he took over a range of new duties. One day he declared over breakfast that he wouldn’t be home in the evening, and from that day on he became a rare presence in the house on the Galgenberg.

  Manfred was affected in a different way. Instead of shutting himself off and presenting a hardened face to the world like his brother, he suffered terribly and was nearly crushed by his need for comfort and emotional warmth. He was under enormous pressure during the funeral. Instead of giving him comfort, the ceremony merely served the purpose of showing off to the people of Gera. The message was clear: Weidmann’s Delicatessen was a thriving business employing and serving only Aryans, its wealth and its success were reflected in the sumptuous decoration in church and around the grave. The mourners were valued customers, business connections and a few distant relatives that Manfred didn’t even know existed. It was obvious they weren’t here for mourning, commiseration or comfort, but for the display of their latest fashions in black clothing and for the marking of their social territory, the affirmation of their social standing as citizens who could afford to shop at Weidmann’s Delicatessen in the Sorge. Not everyone could boast to be a customer of the town’s finest retail business. One had to let the world see who was who.

  Manfred felt lost.

  Two weeks after the funeral, a Tuesday, Anna approached him after school. She had such a look of compassion that Manfred’s heart went out to her, and tears began to roll down his cheeks.

  “Oh dear! Can I walk home with you?” she asked in a gentle voice. “Will you let me be with you? We don’t have to talk. Just walk together. Will this be any good for you?”

  Manfred was too overwhelmed to utter a word. He just nodded. Her voice was so good for him, so clear and honest, so free of pretence and melodrama, quite the opposite of those hypocritical mourners at the funeral.

  “It’s a sad business. You must be lost.” This statement was such a comfort. It was just a statement, but it was the truth.

  “It will take time,” she added.

  They walked along the banks of the Elster. When they were alone they stopped, and Anna hugged him tenderly. She laid her head on his shoulder, which for once did not twitch. There was no need for words, the rippling sound of the Elster was enough. They remained like this for several minutes. Manfred didn’t even hear the loud croaking of the crows as they were flying past, he just wanted to be like this, to be held by Anna for the rest of his life. His tears dried off while he felt her heartbeat against his own chest. The softness of her body against his, the sweet smell of her hair near his nostrils, her warmth, her proximity, the mere fact of her being here: all this was so good. He didn’t want it to end. Ever.

  After a while, Anna loosened her hold and gently drew back. For a split second, he was disappointed, but then he spotted some people approaching them on the footpath. It was an elderly couple.

  “Good afternoon,” Anna said in a clear voice. Manfred merely muttered some undefined greetin
g. He didn’t want these people to see his tears. But the elderly couple just mumbled their greetings and walked past them. When they were about five metres away the woman looked back and gave them a strange nod.

  “Let’s walk on,” Anna suggested. “That is, if you are ready.”

  They looked at each other for a few seconds, and their eye contact gave him courage. So, they began to walk on along the river bank.

  Soon, their mood changed, and Manfred spoke his first words. “She was such a good mother. But she was never a happy woman.”

  This was the beginning of an unhurried and unrestrained conversation between them as they were walking along the bank and then up towards the Galgenberg. Anna didn’t press him, she just responded to his statements, went along with his opinions and musings, and like this she gave him the very support that he needed most in this hour. When they reached the grey house in Ypernstrasse it was the most natural thing in the world for Anna to come into the house with him. In the hallway, she hesitated and looked around. It was her first time in this house.