Nightmare in Berlin

by Hans Fallada

  While Doll was thinking these thoughts he had been tidying up his room and getting it into some sort of order. He had also laid out everything for his supper, and brewed up some coffee. Now he knocked softly on Miss Gwenda’s door, which was opened by her mother, and he asked her politely if they had a few newspapers to hand — it didn’t matter if they were out of date. He promised to return them the next morning.

  He was given a whole stack of newspapers, and retired to his room with them. That evening he ate his bread and drank his coffee without even noticing, because he was reading — reading the newspapers, new ones and older ones, totally absorbed in the words on the page, the way he had been as a fifteen-year-old reading his Karl May adventures, without a thought for anything else. He read everything: domestic and foreign politics, letters to the editor and the features section, arts reviews and small ads. He devoured the newspapers from the first page to the last.

  And as he did so, the world in which he had hitherto lived with his eyes closed now opened up before him, and everything became clear to see. He had walked through the streets of this city without once stopping to think who had removed the anti-tank barriers, cleared away the mountains of rubble, and got the transport system running again. He had seen them working in the streets, and his only thought at the time had been that it was a little odd to see people working again — what was the point? Or else he had thought: These people are former Nazis, who are being made to work. The rest of us, who don’t have to work, will just wait and see for now, the situation will change somehow …

  Yet these workers were people in the same situation as himself, no better and no worse; but while he had been lazing around and busily making himself ill, these people, who were just as disillusioned as he was, had got stuck in, and through sheer hard work had overcome their despair and disillusionment.

  He read about theatres that were putting on plays again. About art exhibitions and concerts, about new films from all over the world. He read about the self-help initiatives for fetching timber from the forests, rebuilding homes that had been destroyed, repairing roofs, and getting burnt-out machinery working again. He read small ads where people were offering items for sale that for a long time had simply been unavailable. There weren’t many of these, but at least it was a start — and that’s all that could be expected for now.

  He’d dismissed Berlin as a ‘city of the dead’, a ‘sea of ruins’, in which he would never be able to work: but just look how much work was being done in this city now! Anyone who wasn’t doing their bit should feel ashamed of themselves. They had been living in a state of blind selfishness for the past few months — a parasitic, self-centred existence. All they had done was take, take, never stopping to think how they might give something back.

  When Doll had put down the last newspaper that evening, that night, laid down on the couch and turned out the light, he didn’t need to resort to some pathetic Robinson Crusoe fantasy in order to get off to sleep. Instead, all the things that he had read were going round and round in his head, and the more he went over in his mind all that had been achieved so far, the more incomprehensible it seemed to him that he had stood idly by, resentful and blank, while all this was happening. These reproaches pursued him into his dreams at dead of night.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  A stormy start

  In spite of his tormenting dreams, Doll woke feeling fresh and rested, and, like the day before, he took a great deal of trouble over his toilet so that he wouldn’t be distracted by thoughts about his unkempt appearance. He hoped very much that his planned errand would be successful, and that he wouldn’t have his spirits dashed again by some other petty little tyrant like the one at the housing office.

  Reading the newspaper the night before, Doll kept coming across the name of a man whom he remembered from pre-Nazi times. He had not had a great deal to do with him personally, but as publishing editor for a large publishing house, this man — Völger by name — had overseen the publication of several of his books. Doll now planned to track him down, and hoped that he might even find him at the editorial offices of that very newspaper.

  Doll was just slipping his arms into the sleeves of his borrowed summer coat when the doorbell to his apartment was rung repeatedly, five or six times; and when he opened the door to see who was so impatient to be let in, who should it be but his own wife, Alma! She had a bulging shopping bag in each hand, her arms were festooned with items of clothing — dresses and skirts or something — and it was clear from the expression on her face that she was not in the best of moods.

  Doll, who had been worried the night before that his wife might turn up, was now nonplussed by her sudden appearance. His newspaper reading and his planned visit to the publishing editor Völger had so preoccupied him that he had barely given a thought to his wife this morning, and certainly not to her arrival at the apartment. ‘Alma, it’s you!’ he said, sounding genuinely flabbergasted.

  ‘Yes, it’s me, Alma!’ she said, mimicking him with angry sarcasm. ‘And if it was left to you, I certainly wouldn’t be here — I’d be stuck in hospital for weeks on end! (Can you just shut that door and take some of these things from me? You can see I’ve got my hands full here!) That’s a great way to keep a promise, turning that young doctor against me! And then you go and accept cigarettes from someone like that — well, thanks very much!’

  As she spat out these words, she marched ahead of him into the room. Here she dumped her bags, tossed the armful of clothes over a dining chair, and sat down in an armchair. But she was on her feet again straightaway, dug a pack of cigarettes out of her pocket, and lit one up. Despite her anger, she showed that the spirit of comradeship was not something acquired or artificial with her, because she immediately proffered the pack and invited him to take one: ‘Here!’

  Doll, who the evening before, to his own annoyance, had not declined the offer of a cigarette from the young doctor, chose to do so now — another mistake! — with his wife, and said angrily: ‘I didn’t turn the doctor against you! And anyway, I didn’t ask for cigarettes from him; he pressed them upon me and I took one, just one, just to be polite!’

  ‘Is that so?’ she replied angrily. ‘But you won’t take one from me? Then again, why be polite to your own wife? That makes it easier to go behind her back and persuade the doctor, contrary to a solemn promise, to keep me in hospital for God knows how long!’

  ‘I didn’t promise anything of the kind! But you promised me solemnly that you wouldn’t leave there until you’d spoken to the senior consultant!’

  ‘See — you’ve said it yourself: we were going to talk to the consultant, but you go and hide behind the ward doctor! Typical! All you were interested in was making sure I stayed there! Presumably you don’t need me here!’

  ‘Alma!’ said Doll quietly. ‘Alma, let’s not quarrel. Let’s think about the future instead. And I can’t imagine a future without you. But you need to get well again first, that’s all I care about here. I was reading the newspapers last night — Alma, there’s so much been happening in the world during the two months we were lying around here doing nothing! From now on we need to do our bit again. When you arrived, I was just about to go and see Völger, my former editor, who always spoke up for my books. They’ve discharged you, all right; what’s done is done. But now you need to lie down and look after that leg …’

  Her face had relaxed and become friendly, now that he had dropped the combative tone. But at his last suggestion she shook her head like a sulky child, and replied: ‘I can’t see why I shouldn’t come with you. My leg is fine — or nearly. I don’t want to lie around here and get bored!’

  When he answered, his tone was still gentle: ‘It’s because we don’t want to end up lying around again the whole time that I’m asking you to take care of yourself. If we go back to a life of idleness, there’ll be no more getting out of bed in the mornings and going to work — or only to go and fetch m
orphine, and then Mrs. Schulz and Dorle will be running our lives again. Have a care, my dear, and look after yourself, before we end up like that again!’

  But she shook her head and repeated stubbornly: ‘I’ve looked after myself for long enough; now I want to do my bit again, too. Whatever you’re doing, I want to be part of it!’

  ‘You’ve been confined to bed the whole time until just this morning — you can’t just start running around again as if nothing has happened!’ he persisted. ‘You’ve no idea how scared I am that we’ll fall back into our old ways. And this time we have no reserves, no more diamond rings to sell. You’ve got to get used to the idea that we are poor now, Alma, and that there are lots of things we can no longer afford, such as doctors and expensive American cigarettes, and maybe not even white bread, which gets eaten much too quickly and doesn’t fill you up anything like brown bread.’

  ‘Is that so?’ she cried, growing more heated herself. ‘Is that why you wouldn’t take a cigarette from me just now? So now you want to play the pauper? And then I won’t be allowed to smoke cigarettes either, and I’ll have to eat brown bread all the time, when you know it always plays havoc with my gall bladder! If that’s how you want to live, be my guest, but you can count me out! For a start, I’ve still got lots of things I can sell, and when they’re all gone I can still think of a better way out than rotting away in misery.’

  He was now equally fired up with anger: ‘Oh yes, it’s easy to say you’re not prepared to make any sacrifices and threaten to run away every time the going gets a little bit tough. But I’m not going to be threatened, even by you, and if you want to run away, then the sooner the better! I’ll go my own way, on my own!’

  ‘See!’ she cried triumphantly. ‘That’s just what I thought — there was a reason why you tried to persuade me and the young doctor that I should stay in hospital as long as possible! I’m just a burden to you, and you want to get rid of me. Well, fine, I don’t want to make things difficult for you, I can go whenever you like! I’ll get on much better without you!’

  ‘What rubbish you talk!’ he cried. ‘I haven’t said anything about you being a burden and me being better off without you! You brought the subject up, not me! But that’s not what it’s all about! The question is simply whether you’re prepared to be reasonable now and look after your health. Yes or no?’

  ‘No — obviously!’ she replied scornfully. ‘If you’d asked me nicely, I might have done it. But not like that!’

  ‘I asked you nicely enough at the beginning, but you just don’t want to. So if you really don’t want to …’

  He looked at her expectantly, but her anger, if anything, was mounting.

  ‘How many times do I have to tell you that I don’t want to! And I’m certainly not going to be bullied by you! See, I’m lighting up another cigarette now, just to annoy you!’

  And she lit a fresh cigarette.

  ‘Fine, fine!’ he said. ‘At least I know now where we stand!’

  And with that he walked straight past her. Her eyes had grown black with anger; but he walked out of the room, shut the door behind him, put on his coat in the hallway, put on his hat, and left the apartment.

  It wasn’t blowing a gale outside today, and it wasn’t raining either, but never had the street they lived in, with its burnt-out ruins and huge piles of rubble, seemed to him so dark and menacing. Which is just what his life looked like: the war had destroyed everything, and all that was left to him were ruins and the ugly, incinerated detritus of former memories. And that’s how it would probably always be; in this respect, it might even be that she was right: there was no escape from this scene of devastation. What he had just been through with his wife was enough to discourage anyone from going on. And he was right, but she was wrong. Reason was on his side, and everything she’d just been saying about not being prepared to do without was utter nonsense!

  Yes, she was young, yes, she was pampered and spoilt, and he needn’t have come down on her so hard; his comments about the cigarettes and the white bread would have kept until later. He could have been a bit more patient and circumspect. But he was only human, for heaven’s sake, and these troubled times weighed heavily upon him, more heavily than they did on her, who lived free as a bird and forgot all her cares from one day to the next! Why did he always have to show consideration for everybody else, when nobody ever showed consideration for him?

  No, it was probably just as well, the way things had turned out. The manner of their parting just now showed how things really stood between them, when infatuation didn’t make them blind to their differences: at odds about everything; strangers, complete strangers; apart and alone. And now he would go his own way, alone; he wouldn’t be telling her what to do any more — she could smoke and sell things off to her heart’s content! Not another word! But nor would he be telling her anything about the outcome of his visit to the publishing editor Völger.

  Absorbed in these thoughts, he had reached the underground station, bought a ticket, and was waiting for the train with other travellers. The train arrived, and the alighting passengers elbowed their way through the narrow gap grudgingly created for them by the people waiting on the platform. Then he squeezed into the overfilled carriage with the others.

  Suddenly a voice beside him inquired in a mocking tone: ‘Perhaps you’d care for a cigarette now?’

  He spun round and gazed with bewilderment into the face of his wife, who eyed him with cool disdain. He didn’t answer, but declined the proffered pack with an ill-tempered shake of his head. This was the last straw, and anger rose within him again. To have her follow him in secret after such a quarrel and now make fun of him in public — it was more than he could bear.

  He was furious that she was coming along with him to what might be a crucial meeting, as if she really belonged there. She was a distraction. He wanted to reflect on what he needed to say to the publishing editor Völger, but all he could think about now was this wretched woman!

  He had to change trains from the underground to the local commuter network, and then take a tram, but there was no shaking her off. He had to admit that his behaviour was not exactly gallant — as when he jumped onto the tram at the very last moment, when it was already moving. But she wasn’t going to be caught out, and managed to jump aboard after him; enjoying her triumph at his expense, she even paid his fare. He put up a feeble protest, but neither she nor the conductor took any notice.

  But it wasn’t just about schadenfreude for her. Twice she had tried to let bygones be bygones and engage him in harmless conversation. But he had remained tight-lipped, and refused to say a single word.

  Now that they had alighted from the tram and had to walk the last part of the way, she tried a third time. They were just crossing a temporary wooden bridge; alongside it, the broad iron bridge with its tarmac-covered carriageway lay in the water, dynamited by Hitler’s minions in a futile gesture of defiance. She looked intently at the smooth roadway, which, still in one piece, dropped down steeply from the river bank to the water — which covered it to a depth of less than half a metre — and then rose steeply again to the other bank. Dreamily she said: ‘It’s a pity I’m not a child any more: I’d slide down there on the seat of my pants! I’d still do it now — you could do it on a sledge or a bike, too. Tell you what — for a hundred American cigarettes, I’d give it a go here and now!’

  Her last words spoiled the impression made by her initial remark, at which he found himself smiling inwardly, despite himself. He could clearly picture her sliding down the slope, laughing and flashing her white teeth, her strawberry-blonde hair streaming out behind her. And she would have done it, too — she was quite capable of something like that. But her last remark about the American cigarettes promptly soured the mood of levity.

  But her words had had the opposite effect on her. She took the pack of Chesterfields from her pocket, looked inside, and offered it to him: ‘
Well, how about it? The last chance! There are just two left — shall we share?’

  He pressed his lips more tightly together and shook his head, even though his fingers were itching to reach out and take one, so badly did he crave a smoke.

  ‘Have it your own way’, she said evenly, and took out a cigarette for herself. As she lit it, she went on: ‘If you insist on being silly and stubborn like a little child, be my guest! But I’m still going to enjoy my cigarette!’

  She had drawn the smoke deep into her lungs with a sensual relish, and blew it out again in his direction, doubtless not entirely unintentionally. With the same mocking superiority as before, she said: ‘You’ll come round. You’ll introduce me to your editor fellow, and you’ll have to talk to me, however silly you’re acting now!’

  The whole time he had been thinking that her remark had struck home at the heart of his frustration. Stung by her words, he now broke his silence and said angrily: ‘Instead of trotting along beside me and distracting me when I need to think, you’d have done better to get down to the housing office and the ration card office! You were full of talk about how you could get it all sorted out in no time! But it never occurs to you to take the initiative, of course — it’s so much easier just to leave it all to me!’

  She replied scornfully: ‘Don’t you worry about the apartment or the ration cards! You think, because you didn’t get anywhere, I won’t do any better. Well, I’ll go down there myself this afternoon, and I’ll see that we get what we need!’

  Full of feigned pity for her preening ignorance, he said: ‘The offices are closed in the afternoons.’