Tyger, Tyger, Burning Bright

by Justine Saracen

  They wandered out of the Gorilla House back along the winding path that led past the big cats.

  Frederica crossed her arms, keeping warmth against her chest. “What is it you didn’t like? The thought of having babies or the sexual whims of Joseph Goebbels?”

  Katja glanced sideways. “Both, I suppose. My fiancé, his family, and my father are all pushing me to have children to ‘carry on the bloodline.’ But it sounds so much like cattle breeding. As for Joseph Goebbels and his sexual tastes, the thought makes me cringe.”

  “Really? Oh, I wouldn’t attribute that much potency to him. Men like him make a big show of their manliness, but they’re pretty easy to lead around. At heart, they’re teenage boys who need to keep proving that they’re wild animals deep inside.”

  “Do you lead him around?” The question was presumptuous, Katja knew.

  “Ah, here we are at the Lion House,” Frederica said, ignoring it. She opened the door and they entered the same warm air as in the Gorilla House, but with the stronger odor of carnivore defecation. They strolled down the central corridor past the smaller cats, to the lion cubs. They cooed at them for a while, but the cubs were curled up asleep close to the lioness, so the spectacle soon lost its interest. A bit farther along, the male lion also lay dozing on his side. They strolled past him to the cage with the tigress.

  “Have you read Nietzsche and Schopenhauer?” Frederica asked suddenly.

  Katja had to think for a moment. “Yes, in my last year in school we had to read Will to Power and a summary of Schopenhauer. You’re not going to quiz me on them, are you?”

  Frederica laughed. “No, of course not. But they explain a lot about the notion that Germans have, that the ‘blond beast’ lives in their souls.”

  “The ‘blond beast’?”

  “It’s from Nietzsche’s Genealogy of Morals. He uses the image of the lion or tiger to refute what he sees as the Christian idea, that nature is evil and must be tamed. Nietzsche says that wild beasts are not evil, merely natural, even noble. I think Nietzsche was just being the philosophical bad boy and would not have wanted to live in a moral jungle himself. But the Nazis jumped on the idea of the ‘blond beast,’ since they fancy themselves as blonds, even the ones who aren’t.”

  Katja was intrigued, but remained silent.

  Frederica continued. “Those 150,000 men on the field, in perfect columns, standing at attention and waiting for the Führer’s command. Didn’t you feel something ominous under that orderly exterior? It seems to me that was the Nazi version of the ‘beast.’”

  They found themselves before the main tiger cage. The big cat, a Sumatran male, stared at them through expressionless eyes, panting, its breath steaming slightly.

  “But is the ‘blond beast’ good or evil? According to you.”

  “According to me, it’s the wrong question. Nietzsche was playing with the difference between ‘evil’ and ‘dangerous,’ and in glorifying the savage urges, the Nazis have overlooked that point completely. Even if you throw away the concept of ‘evil’ you still have something destructive.” She pointed with her chin toward the tiger, who turned and padded to the back of the cage, as if the discussion of Nietzsche bored him.

  “He’s thrilling to look at, but would you like him strolling down the Kurfürstendamm? Of course not. They’re beautiful, but destructive to civilization.”

  “You didn’t answer my question about Joseph Goebbels,” Katja said abruptly.

  Frederica frowned at being thrown off her philosophical track, then looked away. “I told you, I keep him happy because it’s a good job, with good pay, and I need the money.”

  “Your father can’t help you?”

  “No, he died of diphtheria when I was eighteen. But look, I’m freezing. Let’s have something warm at the zoo café and then come back.”

  Katja was a little disappointed by the direction the conversation had gone, or not gone, but the thought of hot wine appealed to her. They fell back on the subject of animal intelligence as they made their way to the café, and in a few moments, they both held cups of steaming Glühwein.

  They clinked cups and Katja took a careful sip, gauged the temperature as safe, and took a long swallow.

  Frederica set her cup down. “Look, I’m sorry if I was a little sharp out there. I just don’t want to talk about the ministry. So tell me more about yourself.”

  “There’s not much to tell. I live with my father now but will move in with my fiancé’s family once we’re married. That will mean going to Nuremberg, which I’m not happy about, but I suppose I have to accept my responsibilities some time. At least that’s what Dietrich says.” She finished her Glühwein and signaled the waiter for two more.

  Frederica ran the tip of her finger around the rim of her cup. “Are you in love with this Dietrich?” The way she said “this Dietrich” seemed faintly contemptuous. But it could have been Katja’s imagination.

  “I suppose so.” She sipped from the new cup, feeling pleasantly light-headed, and giggled. “He’s the only man I’ve slept with, so I can’t really compare.”

  “So it’s the sex then.” Frederica started her second wine.

  “No. You couldn’t say that, exactly. But that will change, I’m sure, once we’re living together. Do you know what I’m talking about?”

  Frederica’s gray-green eyes stared across the table for a moment. “I think so. It sounds like you’re putting up with boring sex hoping it will get better.” Before Katja could reply, Frederica stood up, ending the conversation. “Finish your wine. I want to show you the newest exhibit, something rather nice for a zoo.”

  Outside, Frederica tugged her by the arm toward a small building with a sign over the entrance. NIGHT CREATURES.

  After the heavy entry door, they passed through a wool curtain into a dark corridor. Katja halted, letting her eyes adjust to the diminished light.

  “The exhibit starts with twilight hunters,” Frederica said. “Then, each section we go through gets darker.”

  “How do you know about this place?”

  “I came a few months ago, out of nostalgia, and discovered it. But look, here are the owls. Beautiful, aren’t they?” She tapped softly with a fingertip on the glass covering the chamber that held two owls and both turned their heads.

  “Over on the other side are rodents and ferrets,” she added, urging her along with a gentle hand, and Katja felt a prickle of pleasure at being guided through the darkness.

  The second section of the corridor led past glass-protected displays with other nocturnal mammals, a hedgehog and a slow loris.

  They groped along the wall as the corridor turned at a right angle and they were in almost total darkness. “Just stand for a few moments right here and your eyes will adjust,” Frederica whispered, unnecessarily, for there seemed to be no other person in the exhibit.

  “Oh, I see them now,” Katja said softly. Bats. Four, no, six of them.” They watched together in silence as the creatures furled and unfurled their soft leather wings. “When you see them that way, they’re sort of beautiful.” She could smell Frederica’s perfume again now, or was it her hair?

  “And then there’s this,” Frederica said, touching her elbow and leading her through a final curtain. Katja saw nothing at first, but waited, her heart beating against her breastbone for Frederica’s hand was still on her arm. Then she saw them, fireflies. They did not light all at once, but intermittently, glowing with a soft yellow light, then disappearing, only to glow again a few centimeters away.

  “Lovely,” Katja whispered.

  Frederica did not reply and there was no sound in the darkness. Only Frederica’s fragrance told Katja she was at her side. It was an almost intolerable intimacy, an embrace without contact, a kiss without touch.

  “Mutti, I can’t see!” A child’s voice rent the air and the moment passed.

  The family that came in behind them bumped into them and apologized. “Quite all right,” Frederica muttered, and led Katja by the
arm through the final curtain and the exit.

  In the freezing cold again, Katja turned up her collar and looked toward Frederica for a sign. She was not sure of what. She would have given anything to be back inside in the warmth and the darkness, surrounded by fireflies and Frederica’s sweet smell.

  “I’ll walk you to the Strassenbahn stop,” Frederica said, calling an end to their afternoon. “I go in the opposite direction, unfortunately.”

  Walking, they linked arms again, as they had in the morning, but now it seemed a new sort of trust united them. On the walk back to the stop, they chatted about the animals, the weather, nothing at all.

  “There’s my Strassenbahn already,” Frederica remarked. “So good-bye, then, and thank you for the invitation.” She gazed at Katja for a moment, then seized her face between gloved hands.

  For a stunned moment, Katja felt Frederica’s lips on hers, slightly open, a tiny hollow of moist warmth between their two chilled faces. Then Frederica broke it off and turned away, just as the Strassenbahn pulled up to the stop.

  Chapter Ten

  Katja typed the last line of promotional text and pulled the page over the platen along with its carbon copy. She perused it briefly, then glanced up to ask for another job to do.

  On the other side of the room, Leni Riefenstahl sat stooped over her cutting table peering at one of the countless film segments to be evaluated and spliced in or set aside. Her posture said, “Don’t bother me now.”

  Katja studied her back, bent from exhaustion.

  Who did Leni Riefenstahl kiss? Katja wondered. Had she ever kissed a woman—that way? Katja imagined Leni Riefenstahl’s kiss and was unmoved. The director of Triumph des Willens was too much of a locomotive, driving relentlessly toward her goals, and she had never shown any emotion but anger. No, Katja wanted to kiss only one woman.

  What did that mean with respect to Dietrich, the stalwart, ever-accommodating man she was about to marry? She loved him, in the simple way she had always, but the kiss befuddled her. It suggested an unknown country, one that was safer not to think about.

  Dietrich had obtained a short leave, in preparation to being shipped with his battalion somewhere in the East, and she would see him that evening. That thought also left her unmoved.

  “Have you spoken with Frederica Brandt?”

  The sudden question came as a shock. It was as if Riefenstahl had been reading her mind.

  “No,” Katja lied. “Why do you ask?”

  Riefenstahl looked up from the eyepiece of her Lytax cutter. “I’ve got to make up the guest list for the reception after the premiere of the film at the UFA Palast. It goes without saying that Herr and Frau Goebbels will be there. But I need to know which of his current entourage of mistresses will also be coming.”

  “Why?”

  “It’s not wise to put his conquests at the same table as his wife. So, if your friend Frederica is one of them now, I need to know.”

  “She’s not. I mean, she couldn’t be. He’s so repulsive.”

  “Not to women who need him. Power is an aphrodisiac, and he’s a very powerful man.”

  Someone knocked at the door.

  “That’s probably Erich,” Riefenstahl said, rubbing her eyes. “He’s bringing some film material I sent to another editor for help. It’s more than I can handle alone.”

  Katja opened the door to Erich Prietschke, dashing as ever, even without his SA costume. He greeted her cordially and dropped a canister of film on a side table.

  Riefenstahl offered a tired smile. “Thank you, Erich. One task done, four thousand remaining.” She glanced toward the empty typewriter. “Katja, do you have the text?”

  “Yes, I finished it just now.” She crossed the room and presented it. Riefenstahl scanned it quickly and nodded approval.

  “Would you please deliver it to the Ministry of Propaganda. Herr Goebbels will be pleased that I’m finally sending him something to judge for its German correctness. I won’t let him touch my documentary, but he’s welcome to poke around with the advertising material. It will make him feel important.”

  Erich stepped forward. “I can take it along, if you’d like. Save you some time.”

  Katja reflexively held the typed page to her chest. “No, I’ll deliver it to the ministry. I know someone there. She’ll see to it that the minister reads it right away.”

  Erich looked perturbed. “You mean Frederica Brandt. I know her too. Perhaps I could accompany you.”

  “That won’t be—”

  “Excellent idea,” Riefenstahl declared. Two of you arriving together will make the message seem important. Now, please get moving, both of you.”

  Disgruntled, Katja gathered the pages and photographs she had been preparing while Erich stood by the door. Once outside and on route to the ministry, he seemed to notice her irritation.

  “Look, I’m sorry if I’m being a nuisance.” He slowed his pace so she could keep up with him. “But the truth is, I’m sort of hooked on Frederica Brandt. I can’t get her out of my mind.”

  Katja felt a stab of jealousy. How dare he.

  Erich plunged the blade in deeper. “Ever since the party rally, I’ve wanted to get to know her better. I think she could be the right person for me.”

  “You don’t know anything about her,” Katja snapped.

  “I know enough. She’s beautiful and clever, and she showed a real interest in me in Nuremberg. Of course, she has to be pure Aryan, but if she is, I could get real serious about her.”

  Katja fell silent, hoping Frederica would find him a fool and reject him. But another, more authoritative voice reminded her that a single wild kiss on the street was nothing against the full-frontal courtship of a confident, attractive man.

  *

  A different set of SS guards was on duty when they arrived, but obviously Riefenstahl had called ahead and they were admitted with little delay to the outer office of the Reichsminister.

  The minister himself received them, and Katja handed over the document for his perusal. Frederica, alas, was absent. Erich, too, seemed disappointed and inquired whether Fräulein Brandt was in the office. “She is tied up at the moment,” Goebbels replied brusquely. “Please tell Frau Riefenstahl I will contact her tomorrow with my judgment of the text.” He twitched in a faint suggestion of clicked heels and turned away without further acknowledgement of them.

  Rebuffed, they turned to leave, unsatisfied. But a bit farther down the corridor, Erich stopped in front of another door. “I know the layout of this ministry. That’s the door to his actual office. I wonder if it’s open.”

  “Give it a try.” The minister’s rudeness had momentarily united them in resentment.

  Erich turned the handle quietly but firmly. The door was open only a crack before he stopped and they both peered in. The heavy door had made no sound and so Frederica, standing at the window with her back to the room, had no idea she was watched. Nor did Joseph Goebbels, who went to her side and whispered something in her ear. He faced toward the window as well, and his hand touched her back, then slipped down slowly to caress her buttocks.

  Erich recoiled. “That’s it. He’s had her,” he whispered. “The pig,” he said louder, and stormed away alone down the corridor.

  Katja drew the door gently closed again. Yes, he is, she murmured to herself and left the ministry stunned. She felt like a complete fool.

  *

  Katja opened the door and embraced Dietrich as he entered. “I’m sorry I don’t have long, darling,” he said, kissing her.

  “That’s all right. I’ve made a nice dinner for us. It’s on the table now.” Guiding him by the arm, she drew him into the kitchen where her father was just setting down a wide wooden trencher with a roasted goose.

  “Welcome, Dietrich. Good that you could get leave for a few hours.” Karl Sommer shook his hand. “Katja has made you a festive meal this evening, though she hasn’t said why. Maybe she’ll tell us while we’re eating.” He drew out a chair and gestured f
or his guest to sit down.

  “It’s always a pleasure to be here,” Dietrich replied, sitting next to Katja and taking her hand. “Unfortunately I can’t stay long past dinner. I guess Katja told you, my battalion is being sent east in three days, so I have to be back at the barracks tonight.”

  Karl turned the corkscrew into a bottle of Riesling Spätlese and tugged out the cork. He poured first into his own glass, tested, then served them. “Let’s drink to friends and family, then,” he said, raising his glass.

  “No, Vati, I have a better toast,” Katja said, standing up. “Let’s drink to our wedding. I have decided to accept Dietrich’s proposal and want us to get married right away, before he leaves Berlin.”

  Chapter Eleven

  March 28, 1935

  It was the night of the world premiere of Triumph des Willens at the UFA-Palast theater. Dietrich Kurtz, in the dress uniform of an Obergefreiter, descended from the Strassenbahn car and reached back to offer his hand to his wife. Katja took it and stepped down carefully in her evening gown. As soon as she touched the sidewalk, she recognized the Strassenbahn stop and her knees went slightly weak. How stupid of her not to remember. Of course, the UFA-Palast-Zoo was also the Strassenbahn stop for the zoo, the place where Frederica had kissed her.

  She tightened her grip on her husband’s hand and turned her attention to the façade in front of them. The UFA-Palast, the largest movie theater in Germany, was lit up garishly. A spotlight illuminated the circular arch above the marquee with the film title Triumph des Willens, while block letters the size of a man ran along the marquee edge forming the word TRIUMPH.