The Watcher

by Monika Jephcott Thomas

  Dear Husband,

  This is the last letter I am writing to you because on June 24th I am going to marry another man. Then I don’t have to work any longer. I have already been working for three years since you’ve been away from home. All the other men come home for leave, only you POWs never come. Nobody knows how long it will take until you come home. That’s why I am going to have a new husband. I will give the child to the orphanage. I have to. I cannot stomach this life any longer. There is no way to survive with these few pfennig benefits. At work they have a big mouth when it comes to the women. But now I don’t need to go there anymore, my new the other man is going to work for me. All wives whose husbands are POWs will do the same thing and they will all get rid of the children. Three years of work is too much for a woman and 20 Mark for benefit and 10 Mark child benefit is not enough. You cannot live on that. Everything is so expensive now. One pound of bacon costs 8 Mark, a shirt 9 Mark.

  Your wife.

  With every word he remembered, with the recollection of the jaw-clenching, teeth-grinding face of his best friend as he read it, Max’s anger grew. As the mourners slowly dispersed, he marched between the graves towards Eva, who hitched the infant further up into her arms like a shield as she saw him approach.

  ‘Max?’ he heard Erika’s confused voice somewhere in the distance.

  ‘Max!’ Edgar called out, but he marched on oblivious of their concern.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ he snarled at Eva.

  ‘Hello, Max,’ she said wearily.

  ‘I said what—’

  ‘I’m here to pay my respects, that’s all.’

  ‘Pay your respects to a little girl you never knew?’

  ‘I would have liked to have known her.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because she’s your daughter and we used to be friends.’

  ‘Yes, we used to be friends, before you stabbed my brother in the back.’

  ‘I didn’t stab him in the back, Max, I didn’t know if he was alive or dead. I didn’t know if he was ever coming back, I had to do something.’

  ‘Perhaps this conversation is for another time,’ Edgar said over Max’s shoulder as those mourners who had not already left began to turn and watch this unexpected after-show, Isabel, Beltz and Jenny making sure they had front row seats.

  ‘Yes, perhaps,’ Eva agreed, taking a step to leave.

  ‘No, no,’ Max put up his hands to stop her. ‘Now is the perfect time. A funeral. What could be more appropriate?’

  Eva sighed, but made no attempt to leave, as if she thought this was punishment she deserved.

  ‘You see, that letter of yours killed Horst. Quite literally. It destroyed him to hear you giving up on him like that.’

  ‘Times were hard, Max.’

  ‘Times were hard?’ He cackled in a way that chilled Erika as she stood helpless grasping Edgar’s arm, watching the stranger return. ‘Twenty Mark for benefit and ten Mark child benefit, wasn’t it? A pound of bacon for eight Mark, a shirt for nine? My God, woman, how tough that must have been, while your husband lorded it up in the same filthy rags he’d worn every day for three years with nothing but black bread and watery broth to eat every single day.’

  ‘How was I to know that? He never wrote back to tell me.’

  ‘He wrote. He wrote letters all the damn time, but the vicious guards that made our life a misery never sent them on and they never let him see your letters until that last one.’

  ‘Max, can we go back to the house,’ Erika said weakly. ‘Everyone’s waiting.’

  Everyone’s watching, she had wanted to say, as she looked round to see Jenny and Isabel and Beltz, among others, their eyes shining with the drama before them as if it were coming from a cinema screen.

  ‘And how was I to know that?’

  ‘You could have had faith.’

  Eva scoffed at such an insubstantial commodity. ‘How many loaves of bread and pounds of bacon will faith get you these days, Max?’

  ‘She managed it.’ Erika was almost pleasantly stunned to see Max’s finger pointed at her. But then she saw Rodrick shift about in the shadows and she blushed at the thought of Max making her the nonpareil of fidelity.

  ‘Well, no offence, Erika, but you’re a doctor. I had to work in a bloody factory. It was hell.’

  ‘You have no idea what hell is,’ Max seethed. ‘But I can tell you Horst did. He lived in it for three years. And then he tried to escape. He ran for it because he thought if he could just get back here to you, you would forget about that other man. They killed him for trying to escape.’

  ‘And I’m sorry—’

  ‘You killed him.’ Max jabbed his finger at Eva now. ‘If you hadn’t written that letter he would be here right now, right here supporting me on this day when I need him more than ever.’

  Erika felt Edgar, her big tall rock, shrink as the news that he wasn’t friend enough for Max hit home. She tightened her grip on his arm, for her own benefit as well as his.

  ‘I lost a husband too,’ Eva shrieked, unable to take the punishment any more.

  ‘You got yourself a new one,’ Max jeered, ‘and a new child by the looks of it too.’ He gestured at the little boy in Eva’s arms who shrank from the horrible man’s touch and began to bawl in an effort to outdo the rowing adults. ‘So where’s Lisa? Still in the orphanage?’

  Eva blushed, jiggling the child about on her hip in an attempt to quieten him down.

  ‘So, you can afford to have a child by another man, but Horst’s little girl gets thrown on the scrap heap along with his memory, is that it?’

  ‘Another family took her,’ Eva mumbled, ‘before I got back on my feet again.’

  ‘Before you got back on your feet again,’ he mocked. ‘Before you found yourself another man to bleed dry, more like.’

  ‘Do you not think, Max,’ Eva said with an exhausted urgency, ‘that if Horst had come back, that I would have ever so much as looked at another man?’

  Max had known Eva for almost as long as he’d known Horst and he couldn’t argue with that.

  ‘Do you not think,’ she continued, ‘that if I had Horst back, like Erika had you, that I wouldn’t drop everything to be with him again? He was the love of my life, you know that. But he’s not here anymore. He’s gone forever. And I wish every day that he wasn’t. I wish I was as lucky as you, Max,’ she spat, jerking her head in the direction of his wife.

  Max turned to look at the prize Eva envied and instead saw Jenny standing with her friend, who was leaning against a gravestone, agape, and his own hypocrisy hit him in the face with all the grazing coldness a shovel full of earth would, should he be lying in his daughter’s grave right now as the gravediggers got to work. After an excruciating silence mocked by the cawing of the crows in the trees, he eventually muttered to the earth.

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  Eva didn’t believe the words were directed at her. Erika prayed they were for her. Edgar pretended they were for him. And Jenny was sure that they would somehow affect her new life negatively in the days to come.

  As for Netta…

  Netta was positive that the words weren’t for her, because no one had said a word to her all day, apart from brush your hair properly, and don’t get that dress dirty.

  No one had even looked at her apart from Josef who’d looked back and smiled at her nervously as they began the long walk from the house. She was the last one then and she was the last one now as everyone trudged back through the town to have coffee and sandwiches at the house. She wondered, if she just stayed here in the graveyard, if anyone would even notice she wasn’t there as they all sat round nibbling bits of cake and saying the kind of pointless things adults do when they don’t feel comfortable with silence. She looked around at the gaping grave of her sister, the ancient tombstones going a mouldy green, the gathering crows on the gate, and she hurried off behind Father Egger who was talking to the policeman Netta remembered from the first time she and her papa ever wen
t to the island. The silly old policeman didn’t even know their car was red. He had called it some colour that no one had ever heard of: clarinet or something.

  ‘You’ve known the Portners for some time then, Father?’ the policeman was saying.

  ‘Yes indeed. Max used to be one of my altar boys when he was young.’

  ‘Do you know what that was all about just now?’

  ‘I do.’

  ‘Care to enlighten me, Father?’

  ‘Are we just having a chat or is this official police business now?’

  ‘I hope we can just keep this unofficial, Father. But that’s up to you.’

  There was a pause in the conversation and Netta was mesmerised by the priest’s cassock swishing about him as he walked, until he said, ‘Horst was Max’s best friend ever since they were children. He was an altar boy too. They were thick as thieves. A mischievous pair, but devoted to each other. A rarity to see in young boys these days, don’t you think?’

  ‘Mmm.’

  ‘They both became doctors and were both captured by the Russians in Breslau. Both taken to a labour camp in Siberia where Horst was killed when he tried to escape. He was trying to get back home to Eva, the woman Max was upset with, because she had written him a letter saying she couldn’t wait for him any longer. Ironically, all the prisoners were freed less than a year after that. Max lost his best friend, his brother and he blames Eva for it. I didn’t realise that or the extent of his resentment until today. But of course the man has just buried his baby, I think we can all forgive him for letting off a little steam, don’t you?’

  ‘Of course.’

  Netta watched as the policeman took off his hat and tucked it under his arm. She was curious to see his bald patch which matched the priest’s, except the priest’s was trimmed with grey hair and the officer’s trimmed with a light brown. Like two eggs walking down the street, she giggled to herself.

  ‘But what about the family in general. What kind of family are they?’

  ‘Pillars of the community,’ Father Egger said quickly. ‘Karl is an esteemed teacher, Martha too before she retired. Max and Erika doctors—’

  ‘Yes, yes, but I’m not talking about what they do for a living, Father, I’m more concerned with the kind of personalities and temperaments involved.’

  ‘You mean, are they the kind of people that would kill their housekeeper? I assume that’s what we’re talking about, Officer? Still, after all these months.’

  Netta watched the policeman scratch at his head just like she did when she couldn’t work out a sum in Maths, which was often.

  ‘I mean are they the kind of people that would kill anyone?’

  ‘I do hope you’re not referring to the death of little Emmy too?’

  The policeman shrugged.

  ‘Did you not see the distress both those parents were under? Did you see the face of a murderer carrying that tiny coffin today?’

  ‘I’m not accusing either of them.’

  ‘Well, the child died when they were on holiday on the Isle of Sylt. Martha and Karl were not there, nor was their new housekeeper… unless you’re accusing young Netta?’

  Netta felt as if someone had opened two holes in her feet and all the blood had drained out of her body in a flash. She held back a little so she could be sure the men had not noticed her, but kept close enough to hear more of their conversation.

  ‘No, no,’ the policeman was grumbling.

  ‘Look, Officer, if you really want to know what I think, I think you’re looking in the wrong place if you’re looking for a murderer among the Portners.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yes. Since the occupation of Germany there have been countless reports of Allied soldiers raping young women.’

  ‘Most of them completely unsubstantiated,’ the policeman said. ‘The rest committed by the Soviets in the East.’

  ‘Are you saying the British and American soldiers have never committed such crimes on this side?’

  ‘Well, I’ve never heard about it.’

  ‘Really? Now that does disturb me,’ the priest sighed, ‘because a number of women have reported such crimes to me.’

  ‘Well, they should report it to the police, not the clergy, with all due respect, Father.’

  ‘With all due respect, Officer Hummel, the women probably feel uncomfortable enough reporting it to me, let alone a male police officer like yourself.’ The policeman didn’t speak for a moment, just sniffed a few times, so the priest went on, ‘And I have, of course, passed on the reports of these terrible crimes to the police and yet you say you’ve never heard of such reports.’

  ‘Well,’ he scratched his head, harder this time, ‘I am not the only policeman in Mengede, Father. We are a small force, but not that small.’

  ‘Well, given what I have heard from women around here, and from my colleagues in other parishes around Dortmund and beyond, the abuse of German women by British and American soldiers is significant. And I’m afraid it wouldn’t surprise me in the least if the person you seek for the murder of Karin Kranz wore the uniform of the British army.’

  Netta frowned as she tried to make sense of what she heard. She remembered running home, frightened, convinced someone was following her and convinced that that someone was wearing boots like a soldier would… Oh, no! She hushed herself. She wasn’t sure that the person following her had boots on at all. She had only said that to her papa because he suggested it and because he looked worried and she wanted to keep him interested in her and worried about her for a little bit longer that evening. Before Karin came in snivelling and ruined it all.

  Erika’s soul was shattered and the sharp pieces weighed so heavily on her chest she could barely take a decent breath. She longed to be on the Isle of Sylt again. Before Emmy became ill. Just the four of them under a sky so blue it seemed unreal, her heart so light she felt she could float up into the arm-spreading space around them. Yet here she was in a room too small for all these people drably dressed, the sky outside the colour of corrosion.

  She sat holding a coffee she would never drink, Edgar by her side, a protective hand on her back and she wished that hand was Max’s. But he was standing by the door, his eyes fixed on Jenny, who was clearly aware of this and was shifting about into various poses as she pretended to be engrossed in conversation with Isabel by the mantelpiece. One hand kept tapping vainly at her hat and tugging at the neckline on her dress, she even pouted her red lips in his direction.

  Once a whore, always a whore, Erika thought, resenting her own bitterness, then instantly transferring that resentment to Max for giving her something to be resentful for.

  Father Egger arrived then, the white of his cassock a welcome swathe of brightness among the sombre costumes, and gave her something else to focus on – being polite. She made to put down her cup and rise to greet him, but Martha was there first.

  ‘Welcome, Father,’ she fussed and Erika was glad of it. ‘Please come and sit down.’ Martha looked around for a seat that wasn’t taken. All were full, so Herr Ritter shooed Josef from his chair near Erika to make way for the priest. ‘There you go, take a seat there.’

  Far from being indignant at this ousting, Josef seized the opportunity to go outside and play with Netta, who had arrived just behind Egger and loitered at the door as if she was unsure whether she was invited to this gathering or not.

  ‘Can I get you something to drink?’ Martha asked the priest. ‘A coffee or something a little stronger perhaps.’

  ‘Ooh, well now.’ Father Egger’s eyes lit up and he used this opportunity to try and lighten the mood in the room. ‘What do you have in mind when you say something a little stronger, Martha?’

  ‘We have some wine or perhaps a cognac.’ Karl took over, glad of something to talk about other than how the day had gone so far.

  ‘Ah, a cognac would be delightful, if it’s not too much trouble.’ He grinned a grin which gave everyone in the room permission to laugh a polite, but relieving laug
h.

  ‘And who are you now?’ Bertel said from the other side of the room, propped up in the wing-back chair.

  ‘Oh, Bertel,’ Martha tutted and fluttered embarrassed eyes at the priest, ‘you know who this is, it’s Father Egger from the church, remember?’

  ‘Of course I remember,’ Bertel croaked, ‘I wasn’t talking about him, was I? I was talking to you, girl.’ She focused her sharp eyes unequivocally on Erika.

  Erika looked about the room awkwardly for a moment, hoping Martha would come to her rescue as she did to the priest’s, but since Martha thought selecting sandwiches for Father Egger was more important, she answered the senile old aunt for herself. ‘Bertel, I’m Erika,’ she smiled, then realised she’d just been given the perfect opportunity to remind that hussy by the mantelpiece just who she was. ‘Erika, Max’s wife,’ she announced slowly, deliberately.

  Bertel tutted now and sighed with irritation. ‘I know you’re Erika! Why does everybody always treat me like I’m stupid or something? I wasn’t asking what your name is, I was asking you who you are now.’