The Valley of Unknowing

by Sington, Philip

  ‘Did I say that? I can’t have been thinking. Anyway, if things worked out at the Humboldt, I could think about an orchestra here. In the East.’ Theresa bit her lip as she looked up at me. (That tiny gesture made me drunk with joy.) ‘What do you think?’

  This time she let me kiss her. It was better news than any I had dared to hope for – better, in fact, than might have seemed credible to any objective observer. Yet I preferred not to examine my good fortune, the range of possible motives that might have brought it about.

  I enfolded her in my arms and held her close, ignoring the tension in her body, the swiftness with which she broke away, even though, at another time, these would have suggested a degree of reluctance, as if she had reached her decision unwillingly, under some undeclared pressure. What I did reflect on later, when I was once more alone, was the compromise in Theresa’s proposal. She had not decided to come and live with me for ever in the Workers’ and Peasants’ State; she had decided to remain within reach for another year, with a view to a final decision at a later date, contingent upon circumstances and the outlook for professional advancement. The moment of truth had merely been postponed.

  ‘Of course, your being in Berlin,’ I said, ‘I suppose I won’t see as much of you as I used to.’

  Theresa put a hand on my knee. ‘That’s just as well. You’ve got a new book to write. A new masterpiece. It wouldn’t be fair to distract you.’

  With the mention of the book, anxiety sank a toecap into the lower reaches of my stomach wall.

  ‘How long do you think it’ll take you, as a matter of interest?’ Theresa said, oblivious to my discomfort.

  ‘I’m not sure. Does it matter?’

  ‘I told Martin roughly a year. Is that all right? I didn’t want to sound clueless.’

  ‘A year is ambitious.’

  ‘Is it?’

  ‘For you certainly. You’re supposed to be studying, remember?’

  Theresa looked over her shoulder. Nobody was within earshot. ‘But if I stay here, then it won’t be so easy getting the manuscript out. You might have to use someone else. That’s all I was thinking. It might be risky.’

  This was true: as a conduit for the publication of unlicensed literature, Theresa was only of any use if she kept one foot in the East and one foot in the West, just as she was proposing to do. Once committed to one side or the other, her role as my alter ego was, in effect, redundant. But, of course, I had promised to write a sequel to The Valley; and a sequel has to have the same author as its precursor; otherwise it is not a sequel at all. It is at best hommage.

  Did such considerations have anything to do with Theresa’s decision? I dismissed the idea without a second thought. As we hurried across the road towards her apartment, my coat pulled over our heads, the storm around us growing wilder and darker, I was buoyed by the euphoria of undeserved success and a conviction that our road together, though haunted and treacherous, would lead us in the end to a place of truth, openness and clear-sighted love.

  PART FOUR

  * * *

  32

  The following September a package arrived at my apartment building by the same mysterious means as Theresa’s other communications. For the preceding two months she had been at home in the West. Her student visa had expired and her studies in East Berlin had not yet commenced. The package contained a hardback book with a glossy black dust jacket, on the front of which, in raised metallic type, was the title: SURVIVORS. Beneath the title was the silhouette of ruined buildings – skyscrapers and tower blocks – against an orange fireball of a sky. In the corner, in italics, was the solitary word: Roman; and along the bottom of the page, reversed out of the ruins in small, widely spaced capitals, was the author’s name in arterial red: EVA ADEN.

  Eva Aden? Who exactly was Eva Aden?

  I stood in the dim light of the hallway, blinking at this strangely terrifying volume. I opened the book and scrabbled my way to the first page of the text: They kept always to the edge of the road, where their shuffling, silent progress was hidden among the shadows of the trees.

  I flung open the door, just so I could examine the cover in daylight. The artwork was striking, but ineffably vulgar by the usual literary standards. The title was completely new to me. Theresa had once told me that ‘the Bernheim people’ weren’t happy with The Valley, but the subject had never come up again. It seemed a decision had been made in my absence, but that wasn’t what angered me. What angered me was the name underneath: Eva Aden. Eva was my mother’s name, a fact Theresa knew very well. Without any thought of consulting me, she had stamped it on this fraudulent volume – a work, to all intents and purposes, stolen from the dead – where it would remain for ever, guilty by association. What right had she to do that? Had I asked her to intrude on my past, to play games with my mother’s memory? I turned and hurled the book across the hallway. It smacked against the banisters and fell to the floor, the dust jacket flapping like a broken sail. Why couldn’t Theresa have used her own name? Why the sudden need for anonymity?

  On one of the floors above a door opened. The noise had made somebody curious. As I closed the front door, I noticed a piece of paper lying on the floor. I realised that it must have fallen out of the book when I opened it. It was a note from Theresa. It said only:

  Dear B,

  By the time this book reaches you it’ll be in all the shops. Survivors was Herr Falkner’s idea. Should I have said no?

  There’s a lot I have to tell you, but now isn’t the time. In the meantime, let’s keep our fingers crossed.

  I hope you’re happy.

  With love,

  T

  PS Eva Aden was my idea. I wanted there to be something of you in this book, some element of the Krug name. This was the only thing I could think of. I hope you don’t mind.

  I went and picked up the book, carefully replacing the buckled dust jacket, smoothing out the creases. I sat down on the stairs and hugged it to my chest, feeling ashamed and not a little disgusted. I wanted there to be something of you in this book, some element of the Krug name. How could I have mistaken Theresa’s act of tenderness for intrusion? Why was I so anxious to assume the worst? What was wrong with me?

  I think I even asked the last of these questions out loud. For once, I didn’t care who was listening.

  33

  A few days later I was riding a tram through the Altstadt. Evening sunlight was seeping through the dirty windows, gilding the static bodies and pallid faces of my fellow passengers, so that for a few seconds they looked like works of art. It was then that I spotted Claudia Witt sitting halfway down, a book open on her lap.

  Until a copy of Survivors had turned up at my apartment, I had been taking the latest of Theresa’s absences well. Her decision to study in the East for another year, together with the success of our literary collaboration, reassured me that I was on solid ground, that I had only to be patient and everything would fall into place. At a propitious moment, I had decided, I would ask Theresa to marry me, though this idea had less significance than might appear, divorce being quicker and easier to obtain in the Workers’ and Peasants’ State than almost anywhere else. I was in good spirits, which was why, in spite of previous chilly encounters, I went over to Claudia and said hello.

  She had been reading with great concentration, furtively chewing a thumbnail as she frowned at the pages of a hardback book. Her hair was longer than before, collar-length but lank, and she was wearing a lot of eye make-up, which lent her a self-consciously mournful air, like the tragic clown in Pagliacci. She greeted me with a smile and an unusual absence of satire. Perhaps with Theresa gone (from her life, if not mine), I was no longer an irritation. I sat down on the opposite side of the aisle.

  ‘What are you reading?’

  Carefully replacing her bookmark, she handed me the volume. It turned out to be Survivors. I hadn’t recognised the book without the dust jacket. But there was no mistaking the title and Theresa’s half-pseudonym punched in gold lett
ers on to the spine. Seeing this counterfeit out and about in the world – above all here, where Wolfgang Richter had lived and died – made me shudder.

  ‘Where did you get this?’

  ‘Where do you think?’

  ‘Not a bookshop, I shouldn’t think.’

  ‘Look in the front.’

  On the title page, where traders in first editions like them, was Theresa’s signature – or rather, her new signature – together with the following inscription: To Claudia, my collaborator in art and life, with love and thanks!

  Theresa had left my copy unsigned and it was clear enough why. A signature, by its very nature, is a mark of authenticity. A signature says: this book is mine. But we both knew this book, whatever its title, was not hers. To send me a signed copy, then, would have been thoroughly inappropriate. The same considerations did not apply where third parties were concerned. Theresa had to maintain the masquerade for them, I reminded myself, and that included signing copies on request.

  I felt a familiar unsteadiness in my belly, a gastro-intestinal inkling of trouble. How much did Claudia know, Theresa’s collaborator in art and life? Was it more than I thought? The insouciance of the girl suggested a degree of secret knowledge.

  ‘What do you think of it?’ I asked.

  ‘Amazing. She came up with all that. I still can’t believe it.’

  Reluctantly, I handed back the book. ‘She’s a very talented girl.’

  ‘She certainly is. You’re really impressed, though?’

  ‘Very.’

  ‘Jealous?’

  ‘Exceedingly.’

  Claudia laughed. ‘I thought so. Writers can’t help being jealous. It stems from their insecurity.’

  ‘I didn’t know that.’

  ‘All writers are insecure, the male ones especially. It’s well known. Why else would they spend so much time on make-believe? They’re only happy in their imaginary worlds, because that’s where they’re in charge – where they’re God. Did you know that Hemingway’s mother dressed him as a girl until he was six years old?’

  I was not offended by Claudia’s glib psychological theory. Like many glib psychological theories, it struck me as fundamentally correct. But it wasn’t me I wanted to talk about.

  ‘If that’s true of all writers, it must be true of Theresa,’ I said. ‘She must be insecure too.’

  ‘She is.’ Claudia opened up her book, her eyes returning to the page. ‘She’s basically uncomfortable with herself. Certainly she’s uncomfortable with her talent – her musical talent.’

  ‘She said something like that once.’

  Claudia put her head on one side. ‘It’s like she doesn’t really deserve it; as if she stole it from someone else. Maybe her dead twin or something.’

  With a squealing of brakes the tram drew near a stop. The conversation was suspended for a minute as a procession of people nudged their way towards the door.

  ‘Have you any plans to see her?’ I asked. ‘It would be a shame to lose touch.’

  Claudia closed the book and placed it inside her denim handbag. ‘I should be seeing her the day after tomorrow, with any luck. Though she won’t be seeing me.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  Claudia got to her feet, a look of amusement on her face. ‘Didn’t she tell you? She’s doing an interview on ZDF. Freizeit-Forum, nine o’clock.’ ZDF was a Western channel, impossible to pick up across most of the city. ‘I’d invite you along, but I’m going out of town.’

  The doors opened. Claudia gave me a childish little wave and stepped down on to the pavement.

  Watching Western television had not been a crime in the Workers’ and Peasants’ State since 1972. The days were long gone when the Free German Youth would organise anti-propaganda sorties, noting the location and address of any aerial displaying a non-socialist orientation and passing the information to the police. But among my acquaintances in the valley there was only one who had no trouble picking up television transmissions from the other side of the inner German border, thanks to the hills that encircled us. Rudi Hartl was a printworks supervisor and aspiring artist, who spent most of his spare cash on paint and canvases, and experimented disastrously with abstractionism. An old friend of Michael Schilling’s (in his youth, Schilling too had tried his hand at the graphic arts), he lived on the upper floor of an old farmhouse in the village of Elbersdorf, five miles east of the city. Elbersdorf and the surrounding hamlets were on high ground and enjoyed relatively good reception as well as good views, although in both cases atmospheric conditions regularly conspired to spoil them. This I knew because Schilling sometimes went out there to watch West German sports broadcasts, tennis being his particular fascination.

  Hartl was a jovial man, whose boyish face wore a default expression of pleasant surprise. He was not clever, but his lack of acumen served him well. He believed what people told him – their excuses and evasions – and was therefore immune to the creeping affliction of cynicism. He even believed what he read in the newspapers, enough at any rate to sustain an optimistic view of life. I would happily have spent more time with him, but getting to Elbersdorf involved an inconvenient journey and his printworks were on the other side of town.

  I telephoned him as soon as I could and proposed that we meet.

  ‘I don’t suppose you’re free this Friday evening? I’ve been given some remarkable plum schnapps, which I’m eager to share.’

  Understandably Hartl sounded surprised to hear from me after what must have been at least a year. ‘How kind of you to think of me,’ he said. ‘And what a remarkable memory you have.’

  The latter remark I did not understand.

  He suggested meeting in town, but I objected. ‘I was hoping to get a look at your latest work. I trust you’ve been hard at it.’

  ‘Not as hard as I’d like. You know how it is. But I have been making progress with the studio. It’s almost finished.’

  ‘Well, that I have to see. I’ve always thought you needed a proper space to work – and to show your work.’

  There was no need for further persuasion. Hartl agreed to pick me up after work and drive me out to Elbersdorf. ‘I’ve a new car now,’ he said. ‘Well, a new old car. A gift from my uncle Rolf.’

  It was then I remembered that the only thing worse than Rudi Hartl’s painting was Rudi Hartl’s driving. But to behold my beautiful Theresa on camera, to see her playing the role I had created for her, a role I had never yet been privileged to witness; to see her, in effect, playing me (though I, in turn, was playing Wolfgang Richter, authorially speaking), that was something I simply could not miss. That was a spectacle worth any amount of shredded nerves. The fact that Theresa had omitted to tell me about it, for whatever reason, had no bearing on the matter.

  34

  Hartl’s new old car turned out to be an improvement on his previous vehicle in that the passenger door could be opened and closed, and was not attached to the rest of the chassis with twelve metres of duct tape. The chances of being trapped and incinerated in burning wreckage were therefore happily reduced. It also boasted a radio, which picked up the electrical discharges of the engine over frequent bursts of unintelligible short wave, and which could be neither tuned nor switched off. Our journey to Elbersdorf, during which Hartl enthusiastically updated me on his latest artistic direction, was accompanied by a frenzy of radiophonic wolf-whistling and electro-mechanical raspberries. My contribution was confined to pointing in mute terror at the oncoming traffic and occasionally smacking the radio with the heel of my shoe.

  My intention was to converse with Rudi on cultural and aesthetic subjects for an hour, then casually bring up the subject of Freizeit-Forum, a segue natural enough not to seem premeditated. I could have come straight out and asked if we could watch the programme on his set. Perhaps no harm would have come of it. But a burning desire to watch broadcasts from over the anti-fascist frontier – even an innocuous arts programme – was not the kind of thing people willingly confessed to in
the Workers’ and Peasants’ State. Watching Western television was, like masturbation, a strictly private activity, frequently done but rarely acknowledged, let alone discussed over the telephone.

  It was dark by the time we left the road, turning on to a dirt track that snaked its way through woodland towards the house. We were far enough from the infernal glow of the city for stars to shine brightly through ragged tears in the cloud. Unlike their dim urban counterparts, these stars shimmered at immeasurable distance and in immeasurable numbers, so that the world beneath us seemed shrunken and solitary. As the beam of our headlamps swept round the last bend, I thought I glimpsed a spray of golden light among the trees, and I wondered idly if there were fireflies in those woods and if their season could really be this late in the year.

  We pulled up outside the house, black and massive against the starry sky. It stood flanked on two sides by dilapidated outhouses that had once provided shelter for chickens and pigs, and which still tainted the air with a faint ammoniacal whiff. I was starting to get a sick, nervous feeling in my stomach. Theresa would soon be on air. What was she going to say? What was she going to reveal? Suppose she chose this moment to tell the truth? What then?

  Hartl jangled his keys. ‘Looks like Vera’s gone to her mother’s.’

  This at least was good news. Frau Hartl, a plump and uneducated woman who, by common consent, did not deserve her husband, might easily have had her own viewing plans for the evening; and they were unlikely to have included anything devoted to the arts.

  ‘What a shame. I was hoping to see her. Still,’ – I gently clanked the schnapps bottles together – ‘it’s not like we’re short of company.’

  We reached the door. Waiting for Hartl to open it, I was struck by the depth of the silence. To a city dweller there is nothing so unnerving as the absence of ambient noise. It feels unnatural, as if the world all around is deliberately holding its breath. He waits instinctively for an exhalation, or for the trap to be sprung.