Shadow and Light

by Jonathan Rabb

“The boot he wears. It’s from before the war. The old leather and wood. Used to see them all the time. They’ve improved on them since then. Had to, really. Too many boys coming back without legs. I imagine Herr Goebbels was born with his leg that way.”

  The boy’s tone, like his gaze, remained unchanged. “You really are a piece of work, aren’t you?” Sascha waited on the silence and then said, “What is it that you do? Spend your life with murderers and thieves, tinker about trying to figure out why they do what they do, see things they can’t see? And so arrogant that you even get your own wife killed.” There was nothing but precision in the eyes, no loss, no venom, not even contempt. “But you saw they were going to do that, didn’t you? You picked out that little detail that made sure you knew you were right. She’s dead, boys without a mother, but you had it. And now you’ve noticed this. A boot. I won’t even pretend to question your expert eye. Bravo.”

  Hoffner slapped Sascha across the face. The boy hardly flinched.

  There was a sudden booing from the auditorium, followed by shouts of “Bloodhound!” “Murderer of the workers!” Sascha continued to stare at his father before checking his watch. He turned to a man by the curtain. “He’s in the hall. Go out and announce him.” He looked back at Hoffner. “You’re welcome to stay for the speech, if you like. There are seats out front.” He turned to Georg. “I’ve a place for you onstage. I was hoping you’d want to sit with me.”

  Georg nodded quietly. He was unable to look at his father.

  From the stage, the man announced the meeting, and a single jeering cry rose up from somewhere in the hall, “The meeting will come to order!” Almost at once the entire crowd took up the chant, “The meeting will come to order! The meeting will come to order!”

  Sascha, the first sign of concern in his eyes, moved to the edge of the stage. “It’s time,” he shouted to the man at the podium. “Send the boys out and get rid of the Reds.”

  Hoffner noticed Goebbels now onstage. His coat was disheveled and his hat was missing, but there was a glow in his face as if this was what he had been waiting for. A glass of beer flew up, the liquid catching Goebbels’s face before it shattered behind him. The next moment, the entire place erupted.

  “Georg!” Hoffner shouted over the noise. “This way.” He motioned to the alleyway door.

  Georg stared back, his eyes all but empty. He then turned and walked to his brother.

  Hoffner imagined himself moving to him, but there was nothing in that. All he had now was the silence beyond the door, and the gray hope of distance between them.

  HOURS LATER, a pair of elevator doors opened and Hoffner stood convinced he was smelling flowers—lilies or roses—although he might just have been tasting the whiskey in his throat.

  He had found a bar somewhere near the hall, another closer into town, the last a dingy hole off Linienstrasse. Naturally, there had been a girl along the way, a few choice words with her rather fat man—the threat of something in an alley—and then a cab and a tram, the last half hour spent on his feet. Surprisingly, the walk had done him good.

  Everything before that had grown dull—the purpose of it all, he imagined—so at least he had accomplished something tonight.

  He drew up to the door and knocked. He waited, then knocked again. He heard footsteps.

  “Yes?” The voice was hesitant.

  “It’s me,” he said. “Nikolai.”

  The door opened, and Leni stood in a long dressing gown tied at the waist. The room behind her was lit by a single lamp.

  “I’ve brought you some cigarettes,” he said, patting at his coat for a pack.

  “Have you? Looks like a coffee would have been a better bet.”

  “Yah,” he said, then nodded slowly.

  She continued to stare at him. “Not terribly romantic, is it?”

  “Not really about romance.”

  She waited, then pulled back the door and invited him in.

  CHAPTER THREE

  PHOEBUS

  LAMPLIGHT SKIRTED THE EDGE of the curtains, and Hoffner felt a soreness at the base of his neck. His back was damp from the goose-feather comforter around his waist, but the pillow remained cool. It was his breath that was giving the silk its particularly stale tang. He tried a swallow, but his throat had no room for it.

  “There’s a glass of water on the side table,” Leni said. She was seated in an armchair at the end of the bed, her robe pulled to her neck, her knees cradled up to her chest. She blew into a cup of something hot.

  “What time is it?” he asked.

  “Five something. Why?”

  “You don’t like sleeping?”

  “Never been very good at it.”

  Hoffner might have said the same—he was a notorious insomniac—but he could feel the heaviness in his legs and back. He had slept hard. “What time did I get here last night?”

  “It might do to get yourself a watch.”

  “It might.”

  She sipped at the cup. “Around midnight. Somewhere in there.”

  He had managed a little more than four hours. He always liked to know the number. It gave him a sense of his limitations. Four gave him another fifteen. By nine tonight, he would be useless. He sat up and took the glass.

  “You’re not at all what I imagined,” she said.

  He drank and tried a nod, but his neck strained against it. He was never terribly skilled with this: best to continue drinking.

  “No interest at all?” she asked.

  He set the glass down. “I’m very pleased you were surprised. Probably better if I don’t know which way. That wouldn’t be coffee, would it?”

  “Hot water,” she said. “The Chinese call it white tea. Very restorative.”

  “Do they? I didn’t know.”

  “I don’t sleep with everyone,” she said. “Despite the published reports.”

  He saw his pants on the carpet by the bathroom door: no chance of getting to them anytime soon. “Well, I hardly sleep with anyone,” he said, “so I suppose that puts us somewhere in the middle.”

  She smiled through another sip. “It’s the politics that don’t really fit, but I’ve never been a very good judge of that.”

  Hoffner ran through this last bit to make sure he had heard correctly. “What?”

  “The Jew-baiting. Not my business. Not that I really care. But it just seems odd.”

  “The Jew . . . ?” He watched as she picked up a pamphlet from the armrest. It was the one from Sascha’s meeting last night. She glanced at its back page and said, “Even in the dark it makes for some fascinating reading.”

  “It’s not mine,” he said as he swung his legs to the floor. He was relieved to find himself not completely naked. She reached down for his pants and tossed them over. She said, “Just to save you the asking.”

  “It’s my son’s, if that makes any difference.” He began to slide his legs through. “Not the one out at Ufa. The one who blames me for his mother’s death, although they both might be doing that now. Evidently, he also hates Jews. Do you have my cigarettes?”

  Her smile reappeared above the cup. “They say they learn it at home.”

  “He’s been away from home for a very long time.” Hoffner was looking for his shirt.

  She tossed over the pack. “So you’re a great defender of the Jews?”

  “I didn’t know they needed defending.” He lit up and spotted his shirt under her chair.

  “There’s a razor and cream in the bathroom. I had them send one up.”

  “But no coffee?”

  “I didn’t know when you’d be up.”

  It might have been nothing, but little acts of thoughtfulness always struck him. She had waited on the coffee so as not to have it go cold.

  He went down on his knees and pulled out the shirt, only to find her staring at him. There was nothing plaintive in her gaze, no sudden warmth. For some reason he placed a hand on her cheek and drew his thumb across. It was enough for both of them, and he stood and
headed into the bathroom.

  “Aren’t the Communists mostly Jews?” she said from her chair.

  He stared at himself in the mirror. There was something soft to him now. With a woman like Maria, he had been able to dismiss it without a thought. Here, it made him feel raggedy. “Makes it worse for them,” he said. “Being tied in with the Reds.” He found the cream and turned on the faucet. “Most Jews are nice little burghers running their nice little businesses and trying not to get in anyone’s way.” He lathered up as she appeared in the doorway. “But if you couldn’t trust them before . . .”

  “So you actually take this seriously?”

  “Not really.”

  “Then I’m very relieved.”

  He rinsed the blade and started in on his neck. “Well, I’d be careful there.” He found a particularly rough patch under his chin and rubbed in a bit more cream. “Hating Jews is something we Germans never get too far from. We’re addicted to it in the same way Americans are addicted to arrogance. The only difference, no one has ever been stupid enough to make arrogance a political ideology.”

  “You know you’re in a very vulnerable position.” She was standing next to him, watching the blade slide down his throat. “And if you think arrogance isn’t an ideology—”

  “Yah, but they haven’t put it in a pamphlet just yet.” He set the cigarette on the edge of the sink, scooped up a handful of water, and swirled some in his mouth. He then rinsed his face. She handed him a towel.

  “So, are you going to find the girl?” she asked.

  He reached past her for his shirt and felt the silk of her robe cross his back. “We shall see.”

  “You probably won’t want my help now, but—”

  “No—I won’t.” He tucked the shirt into his pants and stepped out into the room. There was still the jacket and coat and hat . . .

  She remained in the doorway leaning against the jamb: she had kept her cigarette for longer than usual. “So you wanted me to be the helpless girl from the start. Honest but useless. I don’t think that would have been as attractive.”

  “Oh, I don’t think you were ever that helpless. And you’re certainly not helpless now.”

  “You’re sure of that?”

  He picked up a blanket and discovered his coat. Pimm’s flask was peeking out from the pocket.

  She said, “That, by the way, is dreadful stuff. Unless you’re planning on selling ladies’ underwear. Then it’s absolutely perfect.”

  He picked up both. “It’s not mine.”

  “The theme of the day.”

  He found his jacket underneath and put it on. He said, “So what do you do now?”

  She laughed quietly to herself. “Yes, I can tell you’re very concerned.” She stepped over and held open his coat as he slipped his arms through. “Why, I suppose I just wait in my room for you to call.”

  He turned to her. It was still early, he thought. Why was he already dressed?

  She said, “You’re not going to hold me desperately now, are you?” She was staring up at him, the fullness of her neck freed from the robe.

  “I wasn’t planning on it.”

  “No, I don’t think you were.”

  He brought his hand to the small of her back and drew her up into him. Her lips tasted of powder and mint, and he let go.

  She said, “I knew you were a liar.”

  His hat was on the rack by the door. Somehow it had managed to find its way to safety in all the stripping and tossing of clothes. “There’s a new Aschinger’s up on Friedrichstrasse,” he said. “I usually stop in for a bite around one.”

  “Do you?”

  He took his hat.

  “Bit far from my room,” she said.

  Hoffner finished buttoning his coat. “Everything’s a bit far from this.”

  He then pulled open the door and stepped out into the bright white of the hall.

  . . .

  THE MAN AT THE FRONT DESK dismissed him with a thin smile. The only kindness to be found in the lobby lay hidden behind the tired eyes of the doorman, a concern for anyone venturing out this early. Berlin before sunrise was infamous for its chill. Even in summer there was something unforgiving to that first slap of air, as if the night had a right to defend its solitude. By February the wind was downright spiteful.

  Hoffner took it willingly enough, his eyes tearing up before he felt a sharp twinge in his mouth. There was nothing for it now except perhaps scalding coffee—he had always placed great faith in severe heat as an answer to pain—but aside from the kitchen at the Adlon, he knew he was unlikely to find a cup anytime soon. His stomach made booze an impossibility.

  He stood on the street, alone, certain that a car or the sound of voices would find him, but everything remained unnervingly still. He had walked through silences like this before, deep in the west and the rarified air of Schöneberg or Charlottenburg. The sleeping rich, however, offered a kind of comfort in their dark houses and neat-cropped lawns. Murder and rape might appear more brutal in their midst—the novelty of it all, he imagined—but the quiet beyond the searching police lights and the parlor-room interrogations always dulled the terror and disbelief within. Tenement rooms in the east, on the other hand, had a tendency to kindle fear and self-loathing until, like a brushfire, they would leap unnoticed from one hovel to the next, erasing even the hope of breath.

  There were no such distractions outside the Adlon. Comfort and despair waited on the distant fringes of the avenue, while here the line of leafless trees seemed to take life down to its very minimum. Everything was numbed except, of course, for the tooth, and Hoffner did what he could to soothe it with his tongue. By the time he found a cab, he was tasting blood.

  The man behind the wheel was less than happy to be taking him east. The late-night sex clubs—at least those whose clients arrived by taxi—were back in the west, on the Kufu and Kleiststrasse. They were a hair more daring than The Trap and The Cozy Corner, but even then, every cabbie in town knew which tourists could stomach the downgrade. The transvestites strutted a bit more freely, the oral sex was more public—under a table or perhaps up on a banquette—but the prostitutes outside still flaunted their pigtails and leather strops with a disregard for taste and temperament. Any of them might turn out to be a man, but as they said, the prettiest girl on the street was invariably Conrad Veidt.

  East was an entirely different matter. Charming visitors to the city never knew of the attic rooms on Fröbel and Moll Strassen. It had always seemed strange to Hoffner that the vilest acts in Berlin took place not in candlelit grottoes or dank basements but high above where their practitioners could gaze out at the city from behind gauze-thin curtains, as if to shower her with their own decay. Violence and narcoma, masquerading as pleasure and escape, invited the dead as much as the living, the morgue at the Alex never shy on room for one more used-up woman or rail-thin boy not much past the age of eleven. Bleeding or asphyxiation was usually the cause of death, the bodies placed in alleyways in the hope that someone might find enough humanity in the dead to get them underground.

  The climb up at this hour was littered with empty vials and half-conscious faces. By seven, everything would be swept away by a landlord not all that far removed from his tenants. For now, though, the night still had a last half hour to work with: there was always the chance that some of these might not be making it back at all.

  The last door on the hall showed a strip of light at its bottom, the sounds beyond a shuffling of feet under whispered, halting conversation. Choked laughter and groaned release rarely issued from these places: no one had the energy for them. The only link to something—anything—more tame was the crackling of a phonograph needle caged within the limits of its grooves.

  Hoffner pushed open the door and was at once struck by the smell of formaldehyde, a common enough base among the low-grade narcotics. Along the far wall, loose, unclothed flesh—men or women, it was hard to say—lay propped up on couches and divans with a kind of pained drowsiness th
at seemed desperate to ward off sleep. Hoffner could only imagine the dreams awaiting them. Better to grasp at consciousness—dying as it was—than to surrender to the terror beyond. Still, it was the formaldehyde that stayed with him. These were closer to it than they knew.

  He stepped inside and nearly kicked out the crutch of a man hunched against the wall. Hoffner had barely sensed him, let alone seen him. Shadeless lamps provided what light there was, the current strong enough only to inspire dim streaks of filament. For a moment, Hoffner expected the man to strike out or speak, but there was no movement save for the slow retreat of the rubber pad along the floor: evidently the crutch had a life all its own.

  It was only when he peered more closely that Hoffner saw the single eye staring back at him. It took another moment to realize that the man was in fact asleep, his face the victim of grenade fragments. They had left him with only half a lid, enough to protect the eye but never hide it. Worse was the suturing of the mouth, now a gaping hole that curled to the upper reaches of the cheek and tucked itself under the gum in a stretching of lip and skin. The few lower teeth—chipped though remarkably preserved—added the last detail to the demonic stare, a cruel touch to make even pity seem disdained. There was no price to induce the girls on the Kufu to sleep with this.

  The eye suddenly opened full and peered back at Hoffner. It was clear that the man had grown used to waking to such stares. He slowly raised the crutch and placed it on Hoffner’s chest, then gently pushed him to the side. The man continued to look past him as he nodded his head twice before lowering the crutch. Hoffner followed the gaze and saw a trio of women seated on one of the couches along the wall. The tallest and thinnest—her ribs in plain view around small yet sagging breasts—stood and began to make her way over. She wore nothing but stockings to the thighs, although it was anyone’s guess how she was managing to keep them up with barely any thickness in her legs. Her shoes had kept a deep blue—to match the bows in her braids—and though chipped at the toe, they still had enough height to give her back something of an arc.