The Uncommon Life of Alfred Warner in Six Days

by Juliet Conlin

  It was an effort for Alfred to keep up with the swift pace of the nurse who led us to Brynja’s cubicle. She left us with a few curt, clipped instructions not to touch anything, including the patient, until the doctor had been in to see us. Brynja looked dreadful. She was lying on the bed, which was angled up to prop her up slightly on her back in order to facilitate breathing – so the ICU doctor later told us – should her lungs decide to start working again without the help of the ventilator. The tube coming out of her mouth was pulling the corners of her mouth downwards, so that she looked as though she were on the verge of crying. There was a whitish bandage wrapped around her head and her eyes were large, purplish bruises.

  So there we were, standing in the cubicle, not daring to sit down or even lean up against the wall. For a long while, Alfred just stood there, gazing down at Brynja. Then, disobeying the nurse’s instructions, he took Brynja’s limp hand in his, and placed a trembling index finger on her forehead, ever so gently, just below the bandage.

  ‘I hear them too,’ he said softly.

  Two Thousand and Three

  Yeah, no. You know what I mean. He’s a real – You’re interrupted, laugh into the phone. A full laugh, the kind your mom likes. When you were little, you’d make her laugh by mimicking the newsreaders on TV, you had a real talent for caricature, your mother said. The voice on the other end of the line is clear, human, real. Ayla. Your new best friend from work. You’re holding a conversation like it’s the easiest thing in the world. Which it is.

  C17H19C1N2S

  You’ve looked it up – in your bloodstream, blocking dopamine receptors, making you feel . . . just grand, thank you very much! Eight years of trying and now they think they’ve found the right medication. The one to kill the voices without killing you. You must be fucking kidding me, Ayla, you say. Your friend is in hysterics.

  On your way to see your mother for a coffee before your shift starts at the community centre. Never thought you’d manage to hold a job down, especially not teaching art, but it’s been four months now, and everyone seems pleased with you. You don’t care that it’s only misfits working there, people like you, who are too damaged to do much else. But that’s what qualifies them, says Gregor, the team leader. That’s what qualifies the alkies, the junkies, the schizos, the wife beaters and beaten wives. Ayla’s a victim of child abuse. No, scrap that. She’s a survivor of child abuse. Big difference.

  You turn the corner onto Karl-Marx-Straße. Last night’s rain has washed the street clean. The cobblestones are dark grey and shiny, reminding you of the dolphins you saw when you went to SeaWorld with your mother, Sabine. How many years ago? At least ten. Sabine moaning and bitching about animal rights the whole way through the show, embarrassing you beyond belief. Waving her tanned arms around, bangles jingling, dreadlocks (white woman dreadlocks!!! You still feel a stab of shame in your gut thinking about it now, ten years later) swinging around her angry face. Cut it out, Mom!

  On Karl-Marx-Straße at eight in the morning. Poor but sexy. A couple of punks sit on a bench, waiting to scrounge a cigarette from the next smoker passing by. The Turkish greengrocer on the corner sloshes a bucket of water across the pavement to clear away the dog shit. Two children with enormous satchels on their backs scurry past like white rabbits, late late late for school. A Roma woman, kneeling with a cardboard begging sign. A Späti, a tattoo parlour, both unlit, still too early in the day. Maybe you’ll get a tattoo? Hey, Ayla, d’you think I should get a tattoo? Step: springy. Heart rate: normal. Life: good. Better than it’s been in a long while. But what’s this? You stall. Something wrong with the scene in front of you. Can’t place it immediately. Bye, Ayla, see you later. You say it or think you say it, and switch off your phone and pick up your pace. Yeah, the new meds are good, but there’s still that split-second reaction delay before everything

  ——slides

  ——into

  ——place.

  Before all senses are aligned to make sense of the pungent smell, the bright red truck, the bell ringing, people shouting. Blue lights flashing noiselessly. Take a deep breath.

  Sorry, you can’t come past here. One of the firefighters puts his arm out, holds up his gloved hand, palm facing you. Stay behind the cordon, he says. You look up. The blackest smoke pours from a small window on the second floor. So dense it pours out like liquid. The kitchen window; your mom’s kitchen, where right now, your mom should be sitting with a hangover and a roll-up and a cup of coffee, #1 MOM!, chipped but cherished, a gift for Mother’s Day nineteen eighty-nine. Let me through, you yell, my mother lives there! There! You point to the window.

  Wait here, the firefighter says and turns to talk to one of his colleagues. And then one appears from inside the building, appears from a cloud of smoke like some magician, wearing full protective gear and breathing apparatus – no, not a magician, a Martian disembarking from the mother ship. You suddenly want to cry, but the meds have dried you up. The Martian is carrying a body. Covered in a blanket or sheet, drawn up to the face. Unambiguous gesture. One arm hangs loose. The skin is red-raw and black.

  1934

  Up until the day his parents were killed, Alfred had had very little contact with Fritz von Markstein. This was primarily due to von Markstein’s open dislike of children, and accordingly, Karl and Freyja Werner had kept theirs well out of sight on the rare occasions whenever von Markstein visited their cottage. When he came, it was usually to show off to Karl some new agricultural technology he’d purchased or read about – the wonders of commercial fertiliser, or the fanciful idea of artificially inseminating dairy cows – and was more often drunk than not. The few times Alfred had seen him, he had reminded him uncomfortably of the tailor in Emil’s favourite storybook, Struwwelpeter. However, when he came to visit the cottage on the evening of Karl and Freyja’s death, von Markstein was perfectly sober.

  Emil and Alfred had been brought home earlier that afternoon – mute and uncomprehending – by the local police constable. They were greeted at the cottage by a local villager, Frau Kühnel, who had been called on to look after Johanna and Marie until the youth welfare authorities had been informed of the children’s sudden status as orphans. Childless herself, Frau Kühnel had only the vaguest of ideas of how to handle the children, especially under such exceptional circumstances, and so she clucked and fussed around them, insisting they eat the stodgy porridge she cooked for them, although not one of them – not even Marie, who refused to leave Johanna’s lap – had the stomach for it. They sat pale and wordless around the kitchen table, while Frau Kühnel circled the table behind them, wringing her hands.

  ‘You poor children. Oh goodness, look at you. Oh little Alfred,’ she stopped behind the boy and awkwardly ruffled his hair, ‘and Marie! Poor little Marie!’

  Alfred stared down at his bowl of cold porridge. He felt numb. And frightened, the way he used to feel when he was younger and woke in the night-time to a bad dream, awake in the dark and yet still trapped inside the nightmare, before he had the voice-women to comfort and soothe him. Since they arrived, he’d never feared the dark because they were always there with him. But now, years before he learned to call them, it seemed as though they’d deserted him, and he felt unbearably lonely.

  Suddenly, Frau Kühnel made a grab for Marie, who was grizzling quietly on Johanna’s lap. ‘Let me have the poor baby,’ she said. ‘She’s cold – look, she has goose bumps on her legs.’

  Johanna twisted the child out of Frau Kühnel’s reach. ‘No! Leave her alone. She belongs with me.’

  Frau Kühnel looked at first shocked, and then indignant. She wasn’t used to dealing with children, and certainly not with disobedient ones. ‘Give the child to me at once! She does not belong with you, you silly girl.’

  Johanna jumped to her feet, struggling to keep her balance with Marie in her arms. ‘Leave us alone, you horrible woman!’

  Frau Kühnel pulled her arm back to strike Johanna, but Emil was quicker. He was almost as tall as his father
, though with the gangliness of a thirteen-year-old, and he caught Frau Kühnel’s arm by the sleeve.

  ‘Please,’ he said, ‘she didn’t mean it.’

  Frau Kühnel pulled her sleeve from his grip and shook her head, and then Emil took Marie from his sister’s arms and handed her to Frau Kühnel. Johanna let herself fall back onto her chair, weeping loudly. Through the commotion, Alfred heard a voice.

  Alfred, you must eat something. You must keep up your strength.

  It was barely above a whisper, but he heard it clearly. His heart began thumping in his chest and he had to suppress the urge to respond aloud. He waited, hardly daring to breathe, terrified he would hear nothing more, but then

  Oh little one. So sad and lonely. Please don’t despair, the pain will pass, I promise.

  This was more than Alfred could take. He started to cry, setting off Marie in the process. Indeed, the room was so full of sniffles and weeping, as well as an angry and overwhelmed Frau Kühnel, that nobody heard the car pull up outside the cottage.

  Von Markstein entered without knocking.

  ‘Heil Hitler!’ he said, and the room fell silent. He took a few steps forward and removed his cap. ‘My condolences.’

  Frau Kühnel placed Marie on the floor and put her hands to her hair, pinning back a few strands that had come loose in the commotion. ‘Herr von Markstein,’ she said, in a slightly breathless voice. ‘It’s good of you to . . . ’

  Von Markstein held up a hand and she fell silent. He glanced quickly around the room, while everyone waited for him to speak. Alfred had never seen him up close in his uniform. He recognised the boots; the ones his mother had cleaned, leaving her fingers stained with black shoe polish.

  Von Markstein pointed at Emil. ‘You, what’s your name?’

  ‘Emil.’ His voice was strained but polite.

  ‘Age?’

  ‘I’ll be fourteen in March.’

  Von Markstein gave a clipped nod. Then he turned to Frau Kühnel. ‘And the girl?’ he asked.

  ‘Which one?’ Frau Kühnel asked nervously.

  Von Markstein tipped his head in Johanna’s direction without taking his eyes off Frau Kühnel.

  ‘Do you mean me?’ Johanna asked, an unmistakeable note of defiance in her voice. ‘My name is Johanna.’

  Von Markstein turned his head slowly to look at her. At twelve years of age, Johanna Werner was already quite beautiful, despite her red and puffy eyes. She had her mother’s fair skin and her father’s dark hair and straight back, and was assumed by many to be older by three or four years.

  ‘The girl’s apron is filthy,’ von Markstein said. ‘Make sure she’s cleaned up before she comes to the house.’ Then he clicked his heels together and raised his right forearm. ‘Heil Hitler.’ He strode across the room and out of the front door.

  ‘Heil Hitler,’ Frau Kühnel echoed, and then turned to the children and shrugged. ‘Then I suppose we’d better get all of you washed if you’re to go up to the house. Not that I should be responsible. I’m not his skivvy,’ she added, quietly.

  Nevertheless, she heated a large pan of water in the kitchen, got Emil to carry the tin bath to the living room, and began washing the children, youngest first, in front of the fire. When they were all sufficiently clean (Johanna and Emil insisted on washing themselves), Frau Kühnel lit the petroleum lamps and cooked some fresh porridge. She ordered the children back to the table. None of their appetites had increased much, but Alfred did as the voice had earlier instructed and managed to eat a few spoonfuls. It was thick and lumpy, and very sweet. It was an effort to swallow. Just then, a pair of car headlights swept the room, and a minute later, there was a loud knock at the door.

  ‘Oh look,’ Frau Kühnel said. ‘He’s come to fetch you in the car. You are a lucky lot.’ She attempted a smile and then went to the front door and opened it. But it wasn’t von Markstein. Instead, a young man, well over six feet tall and with huge square shoulders, stepped in.

  ‘Anno Schmidt,’ he said. ‘Youth welfare. I’ve come for the children.’

  Frau Kühnel frowned, looked at the children and then back at the man. ‘But Herr von Markstein is . . . ’

  The man cut her off. ‘He’s taking the older two. A boy – ’ he took a sheet of folded paper out of his jacket pocket, ‘Emil Werner, and a girl, Johanna. The young ones are coming with me. I’m to take them to the orphanage in Tempelhof.’

  ‘But . . . ’ Frau Kühnel was shaking her head. ‘But that’s in Berlin.’

  The man nodded.

  ‘But Herr von Markstein said . . . ’ she trailed off.

  Johanna and Emil got to their feet and went to stand behind Frau Kühnel.

  ‘What’s going on?’ Johanna asked.

  The man shrugged. ‘All I know is that a call was made to the youth welfare office, putting in an adoption application for Emil and Johanna Werner.’

  ‘But von Markstein has no wife!’ Frau Kühnel’s voice was raised.

  ‘I reckon Ortsgruppenleiter von Markstein doesn’t need a wife in order to adopt. Also, without children, he has no heir.’ He rubbed his chin. ‘That’s what I reckon, anyway.’

  Frau Kühnel narrowed her eyes. ‘Do you have any identification?’

  The man reached inside his jacket and presented his papers. Then he handed her another document. ‘My orders,’ he said.

  Frau Kühnel inspected all the papers and sighed. She turned to the children.

  ‘Well,’ she said. ‘I don’t know what to say. But if the man says he is to take you, then you must go.’

  Johanna folded her arms across her chest. ‘If the little ones go, we all go,’ she said. Then she rushed to the table and took Marie from her chair, holding her tight and away from Frau Kühnel. ‘She’s not going anywhere without me.’

  ‘Don’t be silly, girl,’ the man said, moving forwards. Johanna took several steps backwards until she was standing with her back to the wall.

  The man shook his head. ‘Talk some sense into her, will you?’ he said, addressing Frau Kühnel. ‘I don’t want to have to use force.’

  ‘Emil, help me,’ Johanna cried. ‘They can’t do this. They can’t!’

  Emil remained where he was standing, white-faced. ‘It’s no use, Johanna,’ he said, his voice cracking. ‘Just do as they say.’

  But Johanna pressed her lips together and held Marie even tighter, so tight that the child began to cry. ‘Mama!’ she wailed, over and over again. ‘Mama! Mama!’

  ‘Right,’ the man said, ‘I’m sorry, but orders are orders. Take it up with von Markstein if you want.’ He walked over to Johanna, his boots thumping loudly on the wooden floor, and began to wrestle the child from her arms. After a moment’s hesitation, Frau Kühnel joined him, and between them they managed to get hold of Marie, who by now was screaming at the top of her lungs. The man took her and pressed her head gently to his chest.

  ‘Shhh, baby girl,’ he said, with a tenderness that seemed at odds with his huge physique. ‘It’s all right, shhh.’

  Marie’s screams turned into a quiet whimpering.

  ‘Now, Alfred,’ Frau Kühnel said, turning to the boy. ‘You go with Herr Schmidt. It’s no use protesting. The man has official orders.’

  Alfred sat motionless at the table, still clutching his spoon, willing with all his might that this be nothing but a bad dream. Then the voice-women came back.

  Don’t worry, little one.

  Go with the man. He will take care of you.

  ‘But I don’t want to!’ Alfred said out loud.

  Johanna walked over to him and cupped his face with her hands. ‘Don’t worry, Alfred,’ she said. Her voice was shaking. ‘I’ll speak with von Markstein. I’ll make him let us join you. Just you wait. We’ll be together in a couple of days.’

  The man opened the front door. ‘You can send any of their belongings to the orphanage,’ he told Frau Kühnel, before ushering Alfred out of the cottage and into the waiting car.

  The journey to Berlin led th
em through the dark countryside. There was a fine rain falling from the sky, and the wipers squeaked noisily across the windshield. Alfred sat huddled with Marie on the back seat of the car, dizzy with shock, while Anno Schmidt drove silently. Only once, shortly after they had set off, did he turn to them and speak.

  ‘I’m sorry for your loss,’ he said quietly. Then he took a small parcel from the passenger seat and handed it to Alfred.

  ‘Here. Eat something. And make sure the little girl eats, too.’

  Alfred mumbled his thanks and unwrapped the parcel. It contained two meat sandwiches. He gave one to Marie and realised only when he brought the bread to his lips how ravenous he was. Marie gnawed on the hard crust for a while, but then became overwhelmed by tiredness and put her head on Alfred’s lap, falling asleep in an instant. Alfred took the remains of her sandwich and ate this as well. Then he lay his head back on his seat and closed his eyes. Before long, the sound and vibration of the engine mingled with the sound of singing coming from his left, close by and hushed, as though she were singing directly into his ear:

  Sofðu unga ástin mín,

  Úti regnið grætur.

  Mamma geymir gullin þín,

  gamla leggi og völuskrín.

  Við skulum ekki vaka um dimmar nætur.

  It was a lullaby he recognised from his mother. He felt the tears gather behind his eyes and let them come silently, let them roll down his face, to hang quivering on his chin for a moment before they landed on his coat. Soon enough, he was asleep, too.