by Ben Pastor
Bora was confused. He’d taken Olbertz for a friend of his uncle’s, and here he was, carrying an olive branch from a Nazi physician. “It does not change my opinion of the Wirths,” he said. The signature on the second page presented him with another surprise. “This is your name, Dr Olbertz!”
“So it is. When I ran into you at the funeral – not to mention when I was called to perform the autopsy – I had no idea you’d be investigating Niemeyer’s death. You will find no significant discrepancy between the two accounts: two devastating shots … The first fired while the victim stood face to face with his killer, having been caught unawares in his own home … Falling on his face, he struck a small table, bruising himself … The second shot reached him when he was already lying on the floor, possibly already dead.” While Bora browsed the text, Olbertz slipped another paper out from under the leather flap, which he lay face up on his knees. “The real surprise – which, given the Prophet’s public role, had best stay untold – is that he was circumcised.”
Bora had barely time to glimpse the photo before the physician put it away again. “I thought … an eyewitness spoke of an old episode when Niemeyer was exposed by two Jewish members of the audience, and found to be, well, ‘whole’. How do you think …? And why?”
Olbertz buckled the flap of his bag. “Well, there are a few reasons why circumcision is performed for medical reasons. Barring these, some research suggests that exceedingly promiscuous males run a lower risk of contracting social diseases if they ‘streamline their tool’. In this case, I believe the operation was carried out in adulthood, clearly after the episode you mentioned.”
“Who was Niemeyer’s attending physician?”
“I believe it was Dr Karl von Eicken, a throat specialist – the best for singers and public speakers. He even treated the Führer once. But circumcision … Such an unpopular surgical practice must have been performed outside the Fatherland, during one of the victim’s extended tours abroad. Italy, Greece or Turkey come to mind.”
The specifics did not appreciably change things, save the unlikely case of an anti-Semite mistaking the naked Niemeyer for a Jew in the privacy of his own home. Bora credited such official censorship to the clairvoyant’s popularity in high circles.
“Any details you wish to add, Doctor?”
“Yes, but not to my report.” After a quick scan of the room (no one was minding them), Olbertz placed a morocco key case in front of Bora. “Here is the key to your uncle’s office in Dahlem. Although he entrusted it to me, I don’t care to keep it.” He waited until Bora pocketed it, before adding, “If there’s anything you’d like to salvage, I urge you to be there before half past six tomorrow morning.”
Bora swallowed an angry question, whose political implications would surely fall on deaf ears. “The clinic is changing hands, I take it.”
“You could say that.”
It was to be expected. The stress of the day threatened to undo the punctilious control Bora exercised on his temper. He counted to ten, and then to twenty, breathing slowly. When a sad-looking waitress came to take his order, he asked her straightaway what was available, other than beer, to spare her a series of “I’m sorry, we don’t have …” or “We no longer have …” followed by whatever drink he’d ask about. “Fanta,” she said, and he declined. Olbertz emptied his mug. He meticulously set it in the middle of its cardboard coaster.
When a fly landed on a dab of foam along the glass rim, he seemed about to chase it away, but didn’t. Under his breath, his eyes on the greedy insect, he told Bora, “You’d be wise to mind whom you frequent.”
Bora found the advice of little use after meeting people of all kinds and persuasions in the last few days. Resentful of warnings in general, he replied, “The same may be said for you, Doctor.” He meant Wirth and other politicized physicians, nothing more, yet Olbertz was startled. He tried to hide his reaction, but to no avail: Bora noticed it. Not that Germans lacked reasons to fear indiscretion in those days. Perhaps Olbertz regretted whispering those few words at the state funeral about a forced suicide.
8:33 P.M.
Walking back to the hotel did him good. There was always a moment, for him, when the accumulation of anxiety met an invisible ceiling. Like the smoke he’d seen rising from the burning farm, it could only spread horizontally, finding its level. As long as he had pressing issues to resolve, fear took second place. The thing to do was not to look ahead beyond the immediate future, hoping for a welcome diversion now and then.
A diversion was coming his way. Leaving Karlsbadstrasse for Potsdamer Strasse, opposite the Elizabeth clinic, from the corner of his eye he glimpsed a girl at the tram stop who reminded him of Emmy Pletsch. It was not her, but the very fact of mistaking someone for her was indicative of something.
It’s because I like her smell, he thought out of the blue.
What? Her smell? He had no idea where that impression might have originated. She used no perfume, as far he’d been able to tell; she seemed scrupulously clean, and besides, they’d never stood close enough. Could it be the same as for young animals, who scent each other out, and according to that scent choose and mate with each other? As always in his life, layers of self-control and observance of rules intervened (co-workers, secretaries and other men’s women were always off limits). Motionless on the pavement, Bora noticed how the young woman at the tram stop cast a shadow that reached halfway across the pavement.
Just then, upon closer scrutiny, he was surprised to recognize that it was Emmy, after all, waiting for the tram, alone. It was after work hours; she was in civvies, and her hair was down. In a high-waisted, persimmon-coloured dress (Bora had heard Dikta call it a low-cut ‘pinafore dress’, something like a modern dirndl), a short-sleeved white blouse, and sandals with cork soles. All was prim, there was nothing vain about her.
*
Bora impulsively crossed the street to the tram stop, just as the tram arrived. From behind, as she reached for the pole to step up, the clasp of her bra under the light cloth of her blouse formed a small knobby ridge between Emmy’s shoulders. I bet she wears cotton underwear, and the summer season allows her to go about without stockings when she is not on duty.
Wherever she was bound, Bora climbed after her. The wide-hipped housewife blocking his way was unceremoniously pushed aside, an elderly couple holding hands separated as he pressed through the crowd towards her. This late on a weekday, every seat was occupied by a weary Berliner. Emmy stood wedged in the sweaty crush, her left hand circumspectly placed across the flap of her handbag. When Bora addressed her, she darted a surprised glance up at him and then looked away.
“Staff Leader Pletsch, I really must insist on securing an interview with your commander.”
“My commander’s schedule is taken up for the rest of the week, sir.”
Once again, her uncompromising tone and words betrayed specific instructions in that regard. Bora ignored the hurdle. “Well then, it should be possible to meet him outside work hours.”
“I am certain of the contrary, Colonel.”
The packed floor and a jolty ride forced the standing passengers to cluster and bump, a trial for the senses in days of bad diet and scarce hygiene. The whiteness of Emmy’s blouse seemed misplaced and oddly intact, like a patch of snow in a reeking broth. Bora could imagine, given the chronic lack of water and soap, the effort required to keep hair, nails and clothes in order. Being a head taller than most, he dominated his space and partially shielded her from the pressing mob.
Emmy testily kept her eyes on her handbag. “I assure you,” she continued, “a meeting would be extremely difficult. Ninety-nine per cent impossible.”
Ninety-nine per cent impossible is not appreciably better than one hundred per cent. A screeching halt unsteadied the crowd, allowing him to catch a passing whiff, or so he thought, of sweet almonds in her hair. Was that the smell he’d been thinking of?
They were now somewhere in the neighbourhood of Barbarossaplatz, not far from
Max Kolowrat’s flat. No one left the tram; if anything, a number of sweaty drudges heading for the Innsbrucker Platz train station crammed themselves in with their parcels and bags to catch the evening train.
Bora was seriously tempted to hop off as soon as possible. “Staff Leader Pletsch,” he said quietly in her ear, a resolute closeness that might have seemed cheeky but for his words, “is it necessary for me to lie across the doorstep of the Reserve Army to meet him? I will if I have to.”
She pushed away from him a little, lifting her right shoulder as if to reject him, but in so doing a wisp of her blonde hair actually grazed his lips.
“I will if I have to,” Bora repeated.
Emmy wiggled to free her right arm enough to take a small notebook out of her handbag.
“Where are you billeted, Colonel?” she asked, and when Bora told her she wrote it down. “It’s highly unlikely and I promise nothing, but I will be in touch if there should be news. Goodnight, sir.” At the following stop, she left in a stream of other travellers, quickly, but not so quickly that Bora could not get off before the tram resumed its route.
He followed her discreetly, curious to see where she went. It’s just professional habit, he told himself, nothing else. In her persimmon dress, Emmy Pletsch hastened on without looking back. Now that she was alone the burden of worry rested once more on her shoulders, stooping her but not slowing her down. She crossed Lauterplatz to Niedstrasse, where she turned right.
As Bora had expected, her destination was a former girls’ school where auxiliaries quartered together.
Through the open windows, in the mild evening air, you could perceive bunk beds; ropes stretched wall-to-wall, items of women’s clothes hung up to dry. Behind the ornate Wilhelmine façade the sky stretched bright pink, like watery blood.
Bora waited until she entered the building before resuming his way home.
LEIPZIGER HOF, 9:34 P.M.
Bora chose to dine at a corner table in view of the bar, with its giant turn-of-the-century photograph of the Pauliner church and the Café Français in Leipzig. He felt feverish and very thirsty. Mineral water not being available, he drank tap water, “carefully boiled”, as the waiter explained.
Whatever his stepfather said about things accelerating during a war, the present day seemed to have gone on for ever.
Had it really begun with a tender recollection of Uncle Reinhardt-Thoma, and an early air raid? Like stills from a silent film, Kupinsky’s rooms faded into the bloody-nosed man nabbed by the Gestapo, and this into Niemeyer’s spooky letter to a dead lawyer, the Russian prisoners burning alive, Willy from Hamburg, Lattmann and Olbertz with their unnerving revelations … And then the image became Emmy Pletsch, Staff Leader Emmy Pletsch.
Bora was just in the state of mind he didn’t like being in.
For weeks on the Gothic Line with the regiment, the sole feminine presence had been a pinch of farm girls, the occasional Italian refugee from the city, mares and she-mules. Having spent long periods of his life with other men, he was used to the lack of female voices and female glances, but missed them nonetheless.
With Nora Murphy in Rome – well, with Nora Murphy there had been nothing, he hadn’t even tried. He’d fallen for her like a schoolboy, for whom a married woman (and an American to boot) was totally out of reach. He’d desired her and censored his desire for her. After Rome came the frantic German retreat to the north and weeks of bloody mountain fighting.
Bora contemplated the sepia outlines of long-dead customers outside the Café Français, and thought of the last time he’d taken a woman to bed. Late March. Alcohol had played a role then. He did not recall her face, her body or her name. Yet the gap between the careful, elaborate uniqueness of his longing for Dikta and that mercenary fuck at the edge of unconsciousness allowed him to long for Mrs Murphy and now entertain an untimely, improvised interest for the girl with the strange eyes. We exchanged glances when she left the car, as if we suddenly desired each other. Whether or not things accelerate, we’re both lonely, and I’m in deep trouble. Lattmann was right: not taking advantage of these few days in Berlin was madness. Well? Here in Berlin you only had to look around, like in Paris in 1940, or in Rome three months ago. The women who stayed behind all seemed ready for it. What other purpose did the two leggy brunettes now entering the bar have in mind?
Not so easy for an introvert, even less easy for a finicky, very sober introvert.
Once in his room, Bora made sure Niemeyer’s letter was still where he’d hidden it. Lights off and windows open, he sat sipping water out of the bathroom tap from his toothbrush mug.
The race of thoughts in his head (a crime to solve, finding Salomon and securing a talk with Stauffenberg, preparing for the worst at his uncle’s clinic in the morning) needed to be stilled before it triggered a new surge of anxiety.
Whoever said that water has no taste? Bora could taste the iron pipes in his stoneware mug, brick dust and the shame of Berlin under the bombs. He finished his drink and went to sit by the window: fully dressed, monitoring his overwrought senses.
Fever made him feel, with a raw intensity. Like many things that have a greater significance than they apparently deserve, even the condoms Lattmann stuck in his breast pocket (top-quality Blausiegel) seemed to take up more space than their size suggested, like a weight on his heart. He pulled them out and fingered their flat, unromantic wrappers.
Dikta objected to their use during and before their marriage, which was how she had become pregnant three times. Bora remembered insisting on using a prophylactic before leaving for Russia, because the front was dangerous, and making a child at that point too risky. Yet during his first furlough they’d reverted to the old freedom of making love without precautions. Away from his wife, he never allowed himself a reason to use a condom. And now, contrary to official propaganda, it was not a good time for fathering a child, and possibly an unwise time to bed a girl.
It’s not a matter of missing sex in general – at the front, I am used to that. I miss sex with her, with my wife. How can she not miss me? I know she misses me. It is a matter of size, rhythm, flesh and mutual need. We can stand being apart from each other, but not going without it. After meeting Willy Osterloh, the idea of living without it was once again unbearable. All the more so that he should not see or hear from Dikta. He couldn’t. He didn’t want to know where she might be (safely in Lisbon, he’d last heard, with her mother), and yet she was the only barrier between him and wanting somebody else.
He, who never wept, had wept in Rome for his unborn sons, for his brother lost in Russia, for the war that never ended, and – he was ashamed of it – for feeling so bereft, after Dikta. For a hundred things he’d found reason to grieve, but not for himself. He hadn’t been able to feel pity for himself until he’d left Rome at night with his men, a month and a half earlier.
It seemed like a life ago already.
Preparing to update his diary, he emptied his pockets before removing his tunic. The morocco key case to his uncle’s office came to rest on the table side by side with Peter’s lighter, the condoms and the steel fountain pen with the gold nib Dikta had given him. Then came wallet and change, the keys to the Olympia, the tram ticket … Bora tidily placed everything in the drawer, except for the pen and Uncle Reinhardt-Thoma’s key.
Thursday, 13 July, 11:07 p.m. The key my uncle touched every day for years, and the visit I will make to his clinic early in the morning, bring back to mind the childhood memory I woke up with today. I report it below, not from self-absorption (I don’t like myself that much), but because it shows the kind of man he was, and why we loved him.
Erotic dreams, and the concept of Eros itself, were unknown in our house. When I was twelve, I at most fantasized over The Goose Girl in my grandparents’ summer parlour, a sort of Arthurian painting, or Ophelia’s Drowning, in the style of Burne-Jones. I couldn’t make up my mind between the sinking beauty and the naked girl turning into a feathered creature, but the extent of my reverie di
d not go past the possibility of kissing them. After all, we were still a month away from the day my playmate Waldo Preger and I would spy on the Polish girl, the seasonal worker breastfeeding her newborn in East Prussia.
Oh, yes. Communion every Sunday, and studying for Confirmation. They kept us boys so ignorant, that scary morning I’d at first thought I’d wet my bed, and then that I was ill. In my distress, I wouldn’t get out of bed. It was Sunday, I recall, and my parents were out in the country with Peter. The General’s orderly was worried enough to phone my grandmother, who phoned Uncle Alfred, at the time the head of surgery at St Jakob’s hospital on Liebigstrasse. Kind as he was, he immediately motored to Lindenau, and soon I heard his voice downstairs, asking in his baritone, “Where’s the patient?”
I think it took him seconds to understand what the matter was with me. Having started his practice in the barracks of nearby Gohlis, he knew enough of youngsters’ reticence to say, in all seriousness: “You won’t go blind if you do it.” And because I protested that I hadn’t done anything (it was true), he sat at my bedside and said, “Let’s take a look.”
I wouldn’t let him, which of course confirmed his diagnosis.
Odd, how certain scenes stay with you in the smallest detail. It’s as if I had the two of us in front of me, as we were then. Uncle Alfred wore a musketeer’s beard those days, which in my eyes gave him a swashbuckling air. “Is it wet and sticky?” he asked. “Yes? Well, you’re not ill, and won’t die of it. It’s called sperm, or seminal fluid. Feels dirty but isn’t, and if you were female, it’d be blood.” (Not what I wanted to hear – the entire thing was unnerving). “As I see it, Martin, you have two possibilities before you: you cultivate the practice with moderation, or else you leave no time for it, by playing sports and other healthy pursuits. Whatever you do, don’t use it in a girl, because she might become pregnant.”