The Lily in the Snow

by Jackie French

  And yet Sophie had the feeling that tonight’s darkness hid a cliff and, once she slept, she would slip over the edge and life would never be the same.

  ‘Sophie?’ She rolled into his arms. She felt his hands on her breasts, hips, along her thighs, as if memorising every inch of her and, finally, between her legs. When at last she could breathe again she touched him tentatively. He kissed her gently, whispered, ‘No,’ and moved her hand to his shoulders. ‘It hurts you?’

  ‘A little,’ he admitted.

  She suspected it was more than that. She felt so warm in his arms.

  ‘Do you feel it too?’ she asked.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Change.’

  ‘Things always change.’

  ‘You are evading my question.’

  ‘And you know me well.’ He kissed her hair. ‘Yes, I feel there will be . . . changes.’

  ‘What kind? Do you think Herr Hitler will really convert us to Nazism?’

  ‘He doesn’t need to. He only needs to persuade us to give an attractive account of it to David. Or an account that intrigues him enough to want to know more.’ Sophie felt Nigel’s shrug in the darkness. ‘Besides, I think David had already made up his mind. Herr Hitler advocates all David believes, too. I suspect David, and possibly Herr Hitler, want us — and Lily — as go-betweens, to liaise when he cannot.’

  ‘But even if David were king — when he is king — it will be of Britain, not Germany. David has no influence in Germany.’ She reconsidered. ‘Well, a very little, perhaps, with his relatives, but not enough to matter much. Certainly not enough to help Herr Hitler gain power. And fascism in England has even less support than bolshevism.’

  ‘I think this is just one small block in a far vaster structure, to be built over years, not days or months.’

  ‘Then why do we both feel things are going to change soon?’

  He stroked her hair. ‘Herr Hitler is not the centre of the world, darling. Not even important in our world, except as the excuse that brought us to this. Many, many other things might change.’

  ‘In Elizabat’s house? In Berlin?’

  He kissed her instead of answering. ‘Sleep, my darling,’ he said. And in his arms Sophie found that she could.

  Chapter 50

  A girl selling her body is decadence to one onlooker, an opportunity for another, lust for a third. For the woman herself, the act may come of anguish, boredom, acceptance, pleasure, enjoyment of what little power she has, or desperation.

  Miss Lily, 1913

  Breakfast was served in a breakfast room and in clothes. Even Elizabat was conventionally dressed, presumably to meet Ruffi, though Sophie was sure her body was not confined by a corset below the lilac silk of her simple shift; nor did she wear stockings, though her brown legs — as brown as her sun-soaked arms — disguised the fact.

  Sophie helped herself to porridge. Nuts seemed to have been added to the oats, and the ‘milk’ served with it was a nut cream, with pots of honey or maple syrup instead of sugar. Fresh peaches sat red-cheeked in a china bowl next to jugs of orange juice and something muddy green, like a waterhole in drought.

  ‘Vegetable juice,’ said Hannelore, already seated with her own bowl of porridge in front of her. ‘Tomato, parsley, celery.’

  ‘Is it good?’

  ‘I think you would like the orange and passionfruit juice better. It has pineapple in it today as well, I think.’

  Nigel served both Sophie and himself with juice, and then served his own porridge. The table held neither toast nor tea and coffee, though a pot on a small burner contained something vaguely brown and bland smelling, possibly dandelion ‘coffee’ or the American Sanka.

  ‘Ruffi telephoned. He will be here in half an hour.’ Elizabat grinned. ‘You have made quite an impression on him. Usually he does not rise until midday.’

  ‘It is very good of him,’ said Nigel noncommittally.

  ‘You will enjoy our luncheon with Dr Hirschfeld more, I am thinking. But it is good you see more of Berlin. It is the greatest city in Europe now.’ Elizabat said it matter of factly, as though it was well-known, not boasting. ‘I hope you do not mind, but I have arranged the room next to mine for your sister. I am so looking forward to seeing her tonight. Will she be joining us for dinner?’

  ‘Not till afterwards, I think. We should not wait for her, in any case.’

  Sophie kept her eyes on her porridge. Nigel had refused to tell her how he planned to deal with this. Perhaps he was still not entirely sure himself. If this Herr Hitler proved to be impossible, maybe he would say he would not let his sister see her. But Hannelore would surely never follow someone so totally unacceptable.

  And tonight? It might be just feasible for Nigel to retire early to bed, then for Miss Lily to appear; for her to breakfast, pretending that Nigel had an early appointment, with Ruffi perhaps. It might even be enough to fool Elizabat.

  But Hannelore would know exactly why the two were not seen together, and why Miss Lily — the same Miss Lily who had given her students books of Japanese woodcuts to teach them sexual positions — would refuse to bathe naked with other women. And she would leave very sure that Nigel and Sophie knew that she knew.

  The doorbell rang. Elizabat rose to greet the caller while Sophie drained the last of her extremely good juice.

  The car that awaited them had a female driver. Sophie took her to be an unconventional chauffeur till she alighted, showing jazz garters just above her knees, and ran to kiss Hannelore.

  ‘Cousin Hanne! You are looking beautiful!’

  ‘And you have a nightclub tan and your eyes are far too bright. Cocaine is not good for you.’

  ‘Cocaine is very good for me, as you would find out if you ever tried it. So much energy!’ She turned to Sophie. ‘I am Elizabat-Marie . . . our family is most frugal with its names. You are much too young to be shut up here with dowagers!’

  ‘It suits Hannelore.’ Sophie smiled at her friend.

  ‘My dear.’ Elizabat-Marie waved jewelled fingers. ‘Poof! Hannelore is always too serious. You must come and stay with me at Wannsee.’

  ‘Your family lives there?’

  Elizabat-Marie’s laughter was delicious. ‘My family? Of course not. It is my own house. Today, in Germany,’ she shrugged, ‘and in England too, I am thinking, there are too few men and many of those do not want wives or families. Wannsee is a place where women can live their own lives. There is the Women’s Automobile Club. Do you drive?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Excellent! And sail? It is quite the fashion now to have a small yacht on the lake, or even a paddleboat.’

  ‘Bare knees,’ said Ruffi dreamily from the back seat of the car. ‘So many bare knees. With dimples.’

  Elizabat-Marie ignored him. ‘And golf of course. You must play golf.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Sophie, who never had and profoundly hoped she never would have to. Occupations designed to fill in empty parts of life had never appealed to her.

  ‘The course is perfect. Somebody said the grounds look just like a woodcut from above — the slopes, the grass, the future trees, the colourful trousers of the caddies.’ Elizabat-Marie gave Sophie a sidelong glance. ‘Quite handsome caddies. But come, I am sure you are longing for a coffee after Aunt Elizabat’s most healthy food.’

  ‘And sausage,’ said Ruffi. ‘We will take you first for coffee, and much sausage.’

  It was an old-fashioned beer hall, with a carved, wood-panelled ceiling and painted wooden posts, and shelves high up around a room that displayed every possible container to drink beer from, from pottery steins with lids to porcelain, stoneware and glass from every era. The waitresses wore Bavarian dress, the walls were painted with presumably authentic mountain scenes, and an almost authentic thunderstorm played every half-hour, followed by Rheinish girls doing a jig below the wax grapes hanging from the vine-clad ceiling.

  Sophie had refused the wild west bar next door, which came complete with cowboys, on the
grounds that she would rather see ‘the true Berlin’.

  Ruffi smiled around his beer stein. Despite his offer of coffee he did not drink it himself. ‘Ah the true Berlin. Drink up and I will show it to you.’

  ‘Try the cheeses,’ said Elizabat-Marie, pushing the plate of sausages and cheeses towards her. ‘They are most good.’

  It was a bit like being fattened for an agricultural show. Sophie nibbled on a slice of cheese, tried to move the cream aside on her coffee, then wiped off the cream moustache. Nigel had not touched his, nor eaten either. He reached for her hand under the table and kept hold of it while Ruffi chattered.

  ‘And this is Friedrichstrasse,’ said Ruffi half an hour later, as proudly as if he had cobbled the street himself. ‘In the old days, ah, I wish you had seen it then. The centre of all that was fascinating about Berlin. The girls, ah, the pretty girls, each one a different price, according to their speciality! They seemed to walk on silk, with feathers in their hats as opulent as any countess.’

  ‘And now?’ Sophie could tell Nigel was feigning interest.

  ‘A few girls. See the Kunstkeller there? The cellar has a nude sculpture gallery, quite a good one, and sometimes the most sophisticated dancers. But no touching, so what is the fun of that? Some of the bars still sell wheat beer with raspberry juice. They are almost the only place you can buy it now.’

  ‘Sounds revolting,’ said Sophie frankly, gazing at the Kunstkeller window. Its glass seemed stained with dust no amount of washing could ever remove. ‘No wonder nowhere else sells it.’

  Ruffi looked pained. ‘It is traditional.’

  ‘So are cannibalism, starvation and walking in the snow with no shoes. Thankfully civilisation moves on.’ Sophie gazed along the street. The next shop sold . . . knick-knacks? Something that looked like a musical toilet roll holder, liqueur glasses in the shape of ivory skulls, but also ordinary milk bottles . . . ‘What does that sign mean?’ she asked Ruffi.

  ‘You must learn German, my dear. It says, The Association of Former Nurslings. A joke, you see, for the bottle will be filled with schnapps, but not good schnapps, not here. And that sign says Useful and hygienic underpants.’

  ‘Made of rubber, by the look of them,’ murmured Sophie, as Elizabat-Marie turned a corner, past a shop selling amber and then another full of anatomically correct glass statues of women with their organs, from heart to spleen to ovaries, floating inside them. Tables and chairs appeared now, a café opening onto the narrow footpath and yet another sign she could not read.

  ‘Strictly kosher,’ translated Ruffi. ‘Everyone, you see, comes here, even the Chosen People. And that is the most convenient portrait gallery in town. Bring your photograph in and by the end of the day our footman can collect your portrait.’ He glanced at Sophie, who was looking instead at the next window, where girls, dressed only in stockings, garters and camisoles, busied themselves creating original etchings. ‘You are bored.’

  ‘My dear Ruffi, you are so kind, but bored is not quite what I feel . . .’

  ‘Where we go next,’ said Ruffi, ‘you will not be bored.’

  It was a cellar, a small door on the street leading to narrow steps down below.

  ‘Three marks.’ The man — if he was a man — held out a bored hand.

  Sophie stared around inside. It must still be only ten in the morning, and yet here it could be midnight, and perhaps the dancers had been there since then.

  The room was large. One wall was made entirely of glass and painted with a scene of alps and flowers, even lit gently from behind with an alpine glow. The other mirrored walls made the room seem even bigger.

  A woman dressed only in a man’s swimming trunks danced past, her arms around a man-sized teddy bear, correctly dressed in full white tie. On the other side of the room two women in Spanish dress, marred only by the length of their waxed moustaches, gazed into each other’s eyes.

  The orchestra, mostly wind instruments, were dressed only in underpants and suspenders, which at least made their genders clear, apart from some who might be small-breasted women or bosom-endowed men.

  Two bearded nuns in full habits that ended at their gartered thighs danced cheek-to-cheek beside her. Up on stage, bathing-suited young men with oiled muscles hit each other on the head with beer tankards, in a display that presumably meant something.

  ‘Sit,’ said Ruffi, ushering them to a table. He picked up a slightly greasy sheet of cardboard. ‘This is the menu.’

  ‘I’m not hungry,’ said Sophie apologetically.

  Ruffi and Elizabat-Marie laughed. ‘Not for food! For the companions,’ said Ruffi. ‘You may have an Amazonian — a bigthighed woman, built for other women, not for men. Or perhaps a minette, a boy who has not yet grown hair, dressed in a ballet skirt perhaps. But if you do not want a change of sex,’ he smiled, ‘you may have a racehorse — they love to be whipped — or dominas, if you prefer the lash yourself. We are too early for my favourites, I’m afraid.’

  ‘And those are?’ asked Sophie evenly, as two men clad in pink silk knickers and extremely small camisoles tangoed past, though the tired-looking orchestra played a waltz.

  ‘I like the demi-castors — girls of good family who work here only after school. And table ladies! From the best families only — I have known some of their brothers at school — and so expensive. But exquisite, I assure you, and quite well trained.’

  ‘How efficient,’ said Sophie coldly. Suddenly she was tired of pretence. Was this outing designed by Hannelore too, to show Nigel that transvestism was accepted in Berlin or, if not accepted, so well understood that it would easily be detected? She looked at the small jewelled watch on her wrist. ‘I am afraid we are due back for luncheon.’

  ‘But you have seen nothing!’ protested Ruffi.

  ‘And it has been enough. Thank you,’ said Sophie.

  Chapter 51

  Shakespeare said imitate the action of the tiger. I find considering strategy as far in advance as possible far more advisable.

  Miss Lily, 1913

  VIOLETTE

  Violette and her parents had breakfasted with the servants, on porridge, brown bread and apples, but the cherry jam was good and she enjoyed the linden tea. Grandmère had made linden tea.

  Violette did not admit to anyone how much she missed Grandmère — sometimes not even to herself — but each sip made her long for the old woman, her strength, her courage, her determination that what should be done would be done, despite Germans, the law or others’ opinions.

  She and Green sewed, and after that they lunched on a thick vegetable stew with barley, which she did not like, and more of the brown bread, then had tea — or rather a mid-afternoon meal with a drink that was not tea — then downstairs again with the servants, who only spoke German but did not realise that she did too.

  She hated them, of course. She hated all Germans. But she smiled and ate even more brown bread and cherry jam, and drank her linden tea. As they reached the top of the servants’ stairs afterwards, Green hesitated. ‘I’ll meet you in our room. Your father and I need to discuss something with you.’

  ‘Is it the telegram that came from James Lorrimer to his lordship late last night?’

  Green stilled. ‘How do you know about that?’

  ‘I saw the boy arrive on his bicycle. I saw my father take it and bring it to his lordship. Then I went to his lordship’s room late last night and read it.’

  Green stared at her. ‘How dare you? You had no right!’

  Violette shrugged. ‘I know something is happening. And I know that her ladyship does not know.’

  ‘Shh. Very well, come in here.’ Green hauled Violette by the arm, unnecessarily and far too hard, as Violette had every intention of joining her.

  Her father was dressed as a gentleman, not the valet he had been for the past summer. He looked most handsome.

  ‘She has read the telegram,’ said Green shortly. ‘Stole into their room to read it.’

  Jones regarded Violette. ‘Di
d it tell you anything?’

  ‘It said, Glad you are enjoying your holiday old chap stop all well here stop business concluded just as you wished stop happy holiday stop.’

  ‘And his lordship is having a happy holiday.’ Jones turned back to the arrangement of his tie.

  ‘And that is not what it was about.’ Violette looked at him impatiently. ‘I’m not a fool. Grandmère was in La Dame Blanche. I know that telegrams like that mean something different from what they seem to be saying. Why send a telegram so . . . so unimportant? Besides, I used the spy hole at the castle.’

  Jones turned to her slowly. ‘So what do you think is happening?’

  ‘I do not know,’ said Violette frankly. ‘But I think it will begin tonight. And I wish to be part of it.’

  Green began to say something. Jones gestured gently for her to be quiet. He turned to his daughter again. ‘Why do you wish to be part of it?’

  ‘Because. Perhaps, I am bored. Perhaps, because I like his lordship and he is worried.’ She considered. ‘More than worried, despairing even. Her ladyship is worried too but you said back at the castle she does not know, so there is more for her to be worried about. But mostly — you say I am your daughter. If I am truly your daughter then prove it by letting me join you in this, not,’ she gestured in disgust at the black serge dress, ‘by playing maid and sewing.’

  ‘It is because you are our daughter that we don’t want you to be in danger,’ said Jones quietly.

  Violette snorted. ‘Of course it is not that.’ She regarded him. ‘Well, maybe partly that. But mostly you do not trust me. You do not trust me to keep a secret. You do not trust me to be able to act as it is necessary.’

  ‘To obey orders?’ replied Jones.

  She met his eyes. ‘I obey orders well if I need to. I did with Grandmère.’

  ‘You were younger then. Perhaps less . . . angry.’