by Jürgen Fauth
“Over the years,” Marty said, “I've seen snippets of Twenty-Twelve everywhere. Your grandfather's last movie anticipated Kubrick, Brakhage, Malick, Lynch. It was a new kind of movie, unfinished, but bigger and truer than anything I'd ever seen. For decades I sat on the suspicion that your grandfather had been on to something marvelous. Cinema promises infinite possibilities, but in reality, it's a factory product. A movie passes through so many hands, and there's so much money at stake, that when you're done you're barely able to remember why you wanted to make it in the first place. Kino tried to stuff something entirely new down our throats. Twenty-Twelve was a movie long before its time, and I've come to see its failure as an inconceivable loss.”
“I would have liked to see it.”
Schnark nodded. “You're not the only one, Mädchen. You're not the only one.”
Mina rubbed her face and took a deep breath. “Thank you for telling me all of this–it's a tragic story. But none of it explains what happened to me. Where did the print of Tulpendiebe in my apartment come from? Who stole it in Berlin? And why are these agents still after me, MPAA, Halliburton, or whatever they are?”
“Well,” Marty said, choosing his words with deliberation. “Within certain circles, Kino's work has taken on something of a reputation. There are people in powerful positions who have first-hand knowledge of the Twenty-Twelve rough cut, people who would be very curious to see it. Katz's nephew is running Paramount now. They know Kino's films would have changed everything. Unconsciously or not, Hollywood has mined your grandfather's final vision ever since. If Twenty-Twelve was released today, it might ruin an industry built on one or two ideas per movie, castrated versions of what's possible. Back then, it could have caused a revolution, mass hysteria, I don't know what.”
“You're talking about that PSYOP stuff.”
Marty cleared his throat and lowered his voice, as if these things could not be spoken of at normal volume, not even in your own home in the dead of night. “There is a lot of renewed interest in mind control and psychological warfare. What they call coercive interrogation techniques. Homeland Security is reopening old files. These are people who are intimately familiar with MK/PSYNEMA and the experiments at Schwarze Sonne, and they would like nothing better than to pick up that research. These people don't want Kino's work to get out. They want to use it for their own horrible ends, in their own secret prisons.”
Mina rubbed her eyes again. The lack of sleep was catching up with her. “But it's all moot because it's lost, right?”
The men exchanged glances again. Marty made a display of checking his watch. “Oh, will you look at that.” He stubbed out the end of his cigar. “Would you like some breakfast?”
They moved to the kitchen and turned off the lights–early dawn was falling in through the wall-length windows. Working in tandem, Schnark and Marty set up an impressive German breakfast at the table in Marty's study while Mina watched, not even offering to help: cold cuts, rolls, brown bread, homemade jellies, cheeses hard and soft, soft-boiled eggs, fresh coffee. It was much more elaborate than what she'd had at Dr. Hanno's place, when was it, two days ago? The day before? Mina couldn't tell anymore. Yesterday, it must have been yesterday. Mina was certain of one thing: she was hungry. She reached for a bite of brie.”Where do you fit in?” Mina asked Schnark.
“Don't talk with your mouth full.”
Mina shook her head. Something about the way he'd said that reminded Mina of her father–who would be arriving soon, she remembered with a sinking feeling. Who was on a plane right now, furious with her.
“Just answer my question,” Mina said, her mouth still full of food. She felt that Schnark was holding something back. Something crucial.
“Well,” Schnark said very slowly. “There's a remote chance that–well, Twenty-Twelve may have survived. You see, my agency is always scanning the Internet against a series of names and keywords related to our mission. Two weeks ago, we came across an alert about a lot of ’movie memorabilia.‘ Sketches, storyboards, and a ’canister containing celluloid of uncertain provenance‘ that went up for auction on eBay. There were photos, including of what were clearly two cans marked MULBERRY ISL. - KINO, with a red border. Marty confirmed that at Paramount, a red border indicated an answer print. Chances are good that this is the director's cut of your grandfather's last movie.”
He paused for dramatic effect. “Apparently, John Botha, an assistant editor on the film, was a bit of a pack rat and smuggled this stuff out of the studio. Usually, outtakes, dailies, and answer prints are destroyed, but Botha kept this box and stashed it in his attic. He recently died, and now his daughter is hocking everything.”
“What are we doing here, then?” Mina sat up. “You've got to stop them.”
Schnark ignored Mina's urgency. “We called Miss Botha and asked her to return the materials to the German people. She suggested that if the German people were interested in the film, they might want to put up a bid.”
“And did you?”
“In fact, I spoke to your father.”
“You did?” Mina said. How many lies had this man told her? “Why didn't you tell me until now? What did he say?”
Schnark held out his hand as if to shush Mina.
“He shut us down, your father. He doesn't care about Kino's legacy, cinema, or German cultural heritage. He wanted to know if this had anything to do with that movie you'd been sent, and that's how I found out you were in Berlin.”
Mina was processing this. “So who sent me Tulpendiebe, then?”
Marty and Schnark looked at each other and shrugged.
“You don't have any idea?” Mina said. “Not a guess? I don't get it. Even now, you don't trust me.”
“I trusted you with the journal to help you understand what's at stake,” Schnark said. He pointed at her with a piece of Fleischwurst. “What matters now is Twenty-Twelve. The auction was cancelled two days ago. Irene Botha is not returning my calls, and now, your father is on his way to California.”
Mina shook her head. She had lost Tulpendiebe. It had been stolen from her hotel room while she was sleeping, but neither of these men seemed to care. They were all about Twenty-Twelve, a movie that for practical purposes did not exist–except it did, and it was for sale on eBay.
“You understand that we have to retrieve the print before they do,” Marty said.
“I think I get it,” Mina said. “It's the little guys against corporate power and government control, right?” She saluted with her fist. “Down with the man!”
But they weren't in the mood for jokes. Mina felt sheepish, always joking around, going too far. Dr. Hanno had not appreciated Mina's sense of humor, either.
“Show Wilhemina the cans,” Marty said.
“It's just Mina,” Mina said. Her heart was beating fast. What cans?
Schnark left the room and returned with two film canisters that looked exactly like the ones Schnark had described: military green with a red label that said “MULBERRY ISL. - KINO.” Schnark sat the canister on the table, and Mina remembered Dr. Hanno's excitement when he first laid eyes on Tulpendiebe in her hotel room.
“Go ahead,” Schnark said. “Open them.”
Mina popped the latches and pulled the loose end of the film strip from the reel. It was wider than Tulpendiebe and in color. She held the film up into the light. “That's a pirate all right.”
“Yes,” Schnark said. “With Marty's expertise, we created reasonably realistic-looking facsimiles of the cans Botha is selling, and we put a Pirates release print in there. I don't think anybody could tell the difference at first glance.”
“You want to switch this for the real thing. Is that what you want to do?”
Schnark put his hand on her arm. “There is a good chance that your father is coming here for the film. The auction has been taken down, and Mrs. Botha is not answering my phone calls. We may not have much time. Should the opportunity arise, you call me, and we will arrange an exchange.”
“Y
ou want me to help you steal Twenty-Twelve?”
“Find out what your father knows. Can you do that?”
“Of course,” Mina said. “But I don't think he cares about the movies.” These men acted as if Kino meant nothing to her, as if this wasn't her legacy, too. Seeing the facsimile cans here in front of her, holding the celluloid in her hands, all Mina could think about was how badly she wanted to see her grandfather's tripped-out rough cut. How much she hoped it still existed.
The sun had begun to creep up over the ridge of the hills outside of Marty's window, and it was time for Mina to pick up her father.
Chapter 15
“A convertible?” Detlef asked, instead of a greeting. Mina's father was wearing his customary suit and carrying no luggage except for his leather carry-on bag. He looked overtired, and he was rubbing his face irritably. “And what is that you're wearing? Mina, I am going to have a heart attack by the time this is over.”
“Dad,” Mina said. “Hi.”
She had given Schnark a ride to the airport so he could rent another car, but they hadn't talked much and Mina welcomed the chance to sort through the layers of stories she'd been told. She still didn't know what to make of any of it, but she felt worse than ever for losing Tulpendiebe, Kino's first movie. If there was a chance to save his last, the original cut of Twenty-Twelve, then she would do whatever was necessary. Marty Wagner's slacks and shirt were just one more reminder of how far she'd already come, to Berlin, into its saunas and over its rooftops, out on the Venice Beach pier and into the depths of her grandmother's murky pool, when all along, she should have stayed in Sam's hospital room. Schnark had taken the fake cans with him and reminded Mina to call as soon as she found out anything about the Twenty-Twelve answer print. Then she'd whipped back to arrivals to pick up her father, who was waiting by the curb.
“You'd think your husband doesn't work for a living,” Detlef said. “A convertible. The way you spend his money. Your mother and I discussed how much you've wasted on airfare alone. You look ridiculous.”
“You're repeating yourself, Dad,” Mina said. “Get in already, I can't stay parked here.”
Mina was nervous. Nervous and angry. She hadn't seen her father since her catastrophic wedding reception, and she dimly recognized that her anger with him was actually with herself. Seeing her father was an unwelcome reminder that New York was still there, waiting. She'd have to go back and face the consequences of what she had done. She hadn't tried to reach Sam since their last call. Mina had told herself it would be easier to talk to him in person once all of this was behind her. On the other hand, of course, Sam could call her. He was not too sick to operate a telephone. If he felt like talking to her, he had her number. Why hadn't he tried to reach her?
Mina popped the trunk for her father. “It's tiny,” he pointed out, appalled. “This car won't even fit my bag!”
A uniformed man signaled Mina to move the car.
“Just put it in the back seat, Dad.”
“My God, Mina,” Detlef said. “What kind of mess have you gotten yourself into this time?”
“We have to go, Dad.”
Detlef did as Mina said, a small victory, and got into the car. He waved his hand, imperious. “Take me to the hospital first.”
Good, Mina thought. The longer they could stay away from Oma's house, the better. She pulled into traffic. She wanted to ask if he'd talked to Sam, but it would provide her father with one more opportunity to criticize her.
At the hospital, Detlef insisted that Mina wait in the hallway while he talked to the doctors about Penny's condition. Ignoring her father, who was interrogating a nurse down the corridor, she slipped into Penny's room. Chester was asleep by the window, in the same kind of uncomfortable plastic chair that Mina had sat in at NYU hospital, in Sam's room. Mina was surprised at the fondness she felt for this bald black man who fed her grandmother illegal drugs. He had stayed all night with Penny, who lay unconscious, surrounded by a web of wires, controls, displays, drips, and catheters. She looked so fragile Mina barely dared to breathe.
She stood by the bed and watched Penny in silence until her father barged into the room, in the middle of a business call. “Tell Miriam to fax it by noon,” he said and snapped his cell shut. Chester grunted in his sleep but didn't wake up.
“Why didn't you ever tell me she was an actress?” Mina asked her father.
Detlef didn't miss a beat.”What good would that have done?”
“You haven't told me anything. I didn't know I shared the name of a man who burned his son's books and manufactured mustard gas! I didn't know my other great-grandfather was killed by the Nazis. It's my history, too.”
Her father was not a man who laughed a lot, a man who rarely even smiled. Now he sneered, the ugliest face in his repertoire.
“Oh, you believe the stories? You don't think those might be convenient fabrications? Koblitz & Söhne was just a paint factory, and Wilhelm Koblitz was a good man. Father had him burn different books every time he told the story about the bonfire. And don't get me started on the Nazis. I have heard enough lies about those years to last me a lifetime.”
Chester stirred in his seat, waking slowly to Detlef's tirade.
“Don't you get it, Mina? Your grandfather was a liar and a coward. He didn't leave the country when Hitler took over. What does that say about him? He was a drunk, in and out of mental hospitals for as long as I can remember.”
“I didn't say he was a good father,” Mina said. “It's just–”
“They were terrible parents. I grew up hearing them say ‘Let's kill ourselves.’ They talked about suicide as if it were a big joke. Mom would put her knife down at breakfast and ask him, ‘How about today? Do we want to kill ourselves today?’“
“That's awful,” Mina murmured. She could believe it, could hear Penny saying those words.
“I believed her. Every day, I came home from school worried I'd find them dead. That was my childhood. It was like growing up the child of Holocaust survivors, except that they were on the wrong side. And finally, when all seemed lost, your grandfather got plastered one last time and stuck a barrel down his throat. I was at boarding school, glad to be as far away from them as possible. Mom sent a telegram telling me not to bother coming home, and believe me, I didn't.”
“You should have gone,” Chester broke in, rubbing his eyes. “She's your mother. She was suffering. You're her only son.”
“Excuse me. I am talking to my daughter. Who exactly are you?”
“My name is Chester Burwell. I am Mrs. Koblitz's personal nurse.” He stood up, but Detlef didn't shake his hand.
“I just talked to her nurse,” Detlef said. “The nurses here wear uniforms.”
“Chester and Oma live together, Dad. He takes care of her. Be nice.”
The men glared at each other.
Oma Penny's machines pinged into the silence.
“I want you to explain to me exactly what happened at the house, before she collapsed.” Detlef looked from Chester to Mina and back.
Mina nodded. “Yes, Dad. Of course. I will.”
“The doctors believe that she could be in this state permanently. If she doesn't improve soon, we have to transfer her to a nursing home.”
“You can't do that,” Chester said.
“Oh yes,” Detlef said. “I can. It's the only sensible course of action.”
“You never worried about taking care of her before,” Chester said.
“The doctors say there were controlled substances involved. If any of this is true, you might be in for some very serious trouble, Mr. Burwell.”
“I'm not going anywhere. I'm staying here with my Penny.”
“Do as you please,” Detlef said. “But my daughter and I are flying back to New York tonight. And now, we have some business to attend to.”
Mina was still thinking about the possibility that Penny would never wake up again, and it took her a moment to process what her father had said. “We are? We do?”
And without so much as another glance at Chester or his comatose mother, Detlef took Mina by the arm and led her out of the room.
“Drive. I'll tell you where to go. We've had too many shenanigans and this is where it ends.”
“Where are we going?”
“You'll see.”
“I'd like to know.”
“Don't push it, Mina.”
“I'm not pushing anything. I'm asking a question.”
There was no answer. Her father gave her directions, and she grudgingly complied. They seemed to be headed downtown. The sun had begun to heat up the day. Detlef got out of his suit jacket. Mina was sweating in Marty's cotton shirt. She realized that except for the short nap during Pirates, she hadn't slept all night, hadn't slept since the airplane. All of a sudden, going home to New York didn't seem like the worst thing. She wanted to rest, go out for dinner with Sam, relax. Eat pizza, drink a glass of wine, breathe. Wear her own clothes.
“Pull up here.”
They had reached a sprawling adobe-style building with a clock tower surrounded by palm trees and a parking lot. A church? A mall? No–there was a sign over the arched entrance: a train station. Mina found a spot and moved to get out of the car, but her father put a hand on her leg.
“You can call Sam while I take care of this.”
“What are we doing here?”
“Wait in the car and call your sick husband.”
“I don't appreciate your telling me what to do.”
Detlef shook his head. “You are always fighting me. Mina, the boy's heart is broken.” He held out his hand to stop Mina's protests. “I am going in here by myself, so use the time to call him. Tell him you'll be home tomorrow.”
Had he said heartbroken? Did he say tomorrow? Mina watched her father cross the parking lot and disappear into the station. She massaged her shoulders and temples and tried to work up the courage to dial Sam's number. There was no answer when she did. She tried the hospital.