by Rex Baron
“Now, you are going to light that candle… scented with Mandrake, that I’ve placed over there in that metal kitchen pot. And when I say so, throw the short piece of cord with the single knot into the fire of the candle and then slowly burn the paper with Carl-Heinz’s name on it. As you do, say these words:
Ure igne sancti Spiritus renes nostros et cor nostrum.
Then say
By air and earth and water and fire,
So, you be bound as I desire
By three and nine, your power I bind
By moon and sun your will is mine
With knots of love by three times three
With ring of gold pledge marry me,
By red and black your love revealed
Then by my will this bargain sealed.
With a shaking hand, the teenage girl offered first the cord and then the parchment to the flames, as instructed by Helen, all the while chanting the mysterious words that were written down for her to read out loud. When it was finished, she sat folded over on the chaise, leaning her body down close to her legs and stared at the ashes and fragments of charred string that lay before her on the floor. All that remained of the modest ceremony was the strand of cord with the ring tied into it and the smell of burning hair that filled the air. She raised her eyes to engage Helen. A strange look that drained her youthfulness had now overtaken her face. She was like a different girl, years older, tired and somehow lost.
“So, what do I do with the bit of braid with the ring on it?” she asked flatly.
“Ah, that’s the fun part,” Helen answered with a smile. “You slip it into the pocket of something he always wears, like a jacket or a pair of trousers. Then, you just sit back and wait for the romantic fireworks to start.”
She had expected that her teenage maid would be overjoyed to be reassured that her man’s attentions would be guaranteed, but instead, Ilse simply stood up from where she sat and began cleaning up the mess, without speaking a word.
“Well, aren’t you excited, or at least pleased, that your young Aryan’s heart is in the bag?” Helen inquired.
“I suppose so,” Ilse answered with a sigh. “I only wished that he would have wanted to be with me without being forced by magic.”
Helen filled the room with her robust laugh.
“Honey, life is what you’re able to make of it. It has its own ideas about how it’s going to be for you, so you have to use any means you have to make it go your way. Beauty, brains, talent… and even magic are just tools that allow you to get ahead. If you want to dig a hole to plant a geranium you need a shovel. If you want some handsome, confused and idealistic boy to fall in love with you, you use magic. It’s all the same. It’s just a tool. And from what I saw, your dishy boyfriend was never going to pull the trigger unless he got a little help. You slip that in his pocket and within a month, he’ll be begging you to take a walk down the aisle. So, no more crying and mooning around… It’s driving me crazy. Anyway, you’ve got better things to do… like planning your wedding.”
•••
Before that month was out, Carl-Heinz had been called up by the Storm Troopers, and there was no time to plan for anything but an immediate departure to a training station near Stuttgart. At nineteen, he was considered too old to continue as a Youth Group Leader and had been conscripted to join the army. The prospect of losing the father of her unborn child was a shattering blow to Ilse. But when her young man learned that any new recruits that were married received almost twice the pay and came into the service at a higher ranking level, he was more than happy to extend a convincingly heartfelt proposal, and rushed into a wedding at the Bureau of Marriages in town.
Helen and Claxton had been invited to witness the civil ceremony, that Helen preferred to call a travesty of sentimentality, and within three weeks of their night together at Heisses Baby, they stood together as Ilse and Carl signed the papers and became legally man and wife.
Ilse had insisted that Helen stand by her, in the dubious role of Matron of Honor, since she was convinced that the wedding was a direct result of the talisman made of colored thread that she had slipped into her young man’s jacket pocket. Claxton had not been asked to fill in as best man, and for several days before the ceremony had skulked about feeling mildly rejected and betrayed by the young man, who he briefly had in his employ. But when they had arrived at the Rathaus in the center of Bayreuth and made their way to the chamber where the drab little ceremony was to take place, he was surprised to see the handsome young singer, Raoul, from the club, standing next to Carl-Heinz, beaming as if he, rather than Ilse, was the one dressed in white. It was no less of a coincidence, sometime later that morning, when the groom informed Claxton, with a wink and a smile, that it just so happened that young Raoul was planning to move to Stuttgart as well, and they all tittered at what they agreed was just one of those little ironies of life.
Claxton was the only one present who knew the secret of the two handsome young men, but he felt no need to reveal it, because he, of all people, understood that a situation as mired in untruths as this one, in due time, would make itself known with the most disastrous consequences. When it did, he intended to be as far away as possible. He knew that after the wedding, he would smile and wave goodbye, promising to be in touch. But in reality, his true concern was to disengage as quickly as possible, and put as much distance between himself and this deceitful young man as he could. He imagined that he was like a man in a lifeboat, rowing with all his energy to put distance between himself and a sinking ship, knowing that, if he did not act with haste, it would take him down with it.
•••
At afternoon tea, Helen and Claxton sat blessedly alone in the salon of a hotel, enjoying the metered mathematical sanity of a chamber group playing Mozart, and the absence of the agitated energy of emotional youngsters.
“Well, our determined little Ilse finally snagged the elusive Aryan beauty,” Claxton said, breaking the blessed silence. “I must say that I’m amazed, and didn’t think she had it in her to pull that off. I can’t help but think that you might have had something to do with it… but I won’t ask.”
Helen responded to his suspicion with a little grin that she quickly hid behind her teacup, as she brought it to her lips to take a sip.
“Our little Ilse, as you insist on calling her, is as much of a fool this minute as she was the night when we went out to that club, and she got sick in the car on the way home. All I can say is that I’m glad to be rid of her before she starts blowing up and waddling around like a big fat blonde walrus.”
She took a drag on a cigarette that she held between her fingers and blew out the smoke, as if ridding herself of the unpleasant thought. Claxton watched her in amused disbelief.
“Your total lack of any feminine quality that resembles nurturing, and the complete absence of anything that might even remotely pass for a maternal instinct is fascinating to me,” Claxton observed. “You honestly haven’t a motherly bone in your body.”
“My body has better things to do than to push out fat, little screaming humans. I wouldn’t want me for a mother, so why would I inflict that unfortunate circumstance on somebody else?”
Claxton nodded at the wisdom and dubiously inverted generosity of her response.
“So, what do we do now?” he asked rhetorically. “We haven’t heard a word from the Prince or the director of the Opera in weeks now, and it looks like they have both cut us loose. We have no prospects and no friends… over the age of nineteen. So, where does that leave us?”
Helen took another drag on her cigarette and breathed out the grey smoke, examining it, as if she were reading the oracle at Delphi, gauging its height and the configuration into which it flowed, looking for a message… some direction from the gods.
“We still have some money and I have mostly new clothes. That means that we can go anywhere and show our faces without looking like we don’t belong. The way I see it, we’ve got nowhere to go but forward. We can�
��t go back to New York or California. There is nothing there for us.”
“We’d fairly suffocate from the smell of burnt bridges,” Claxton quipped.
“Germany is where our future lies,” Helen mused aloud, as her eyes traveled up toward the ceiling to follow a wisp of used smoke. “There are big changes going on in this country, and that means big opportunities. Like someone I met here once told me… there is a new Germany coming, a Germany that in a few years we will scarcely recognize. I don’t know about you, but I’m casting my lot with that future. For me there is no going back.”
At that moment, she thought of the time when she had stolen the farm woman’s handbag and lay in a gulley near the house. She had realized then too, that there was no turning back. She had found that all she had to begin a new life was a handkerchief monogrammed with someone else’s initial and a pot of lip rouge. And yet, it had been enough to give her a new identity and a new start. At this moment in time, she had far more at her disposal to make a new beginning, and she knew that, once again, she could rely on no one but herself. She sighed with a kind of mental exhaustion.
“I think I want to go back and rest a while before we change for dinner,” she said to her companion. “I believe it would be a good idea if we went somewhere very expensive tonight, where all the swells are. I feel lucky. Who knows, maybe we’ll meet someone who fancies themselves a patron of the arts and we can form a profitable relationship. What time is it anyway? It’s got to be well past four.”
Claxton brought his arm up to read his wristwatch and burst into a gale of laughter, drawing disgusted looks from the peaceful dining room patrons.
“That son of a bitch,” he said in a loud voice. “When Carl-Heinz gave me that lingering embrace that I found so engaging, when he said goodbye… the little bastard stole my watch.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
1937 Berlin, Germany
The tennis ball held their attention for fourteen volleys before plummeting into the right-hand corner of the court, setting off a little explosion of chalk. A pretty, olive-skinned woman retrieved the ball and tossed it to her opponent to serve.
“My mother once said that the only way they could tell there was a depression on was that we had to use tennis balls twice. So here we are again in the same place, in the middle of another depression.” A portly woman, who sat rouged and painted under her sun hat, passed the remark to Helen with a sigh. She only half expected a reply.
“That must have been very hard on you,” Helen answered with mock sympathy.
Claxton gave her a sharp jab with his elbow.
“Oh, you have no idea,” the woman continued, turning to what she happily appraised as a receptive ear. “I was meant to have my coming out during those years after the crash. All my friends had theirs, but by the time it was my turn, money was not being spent for such things, and even though we had it, it wasn't considered appropriate.” She sighed a weighty sigh. “A young woman can be scarred for life from such a disappointment.”
“You hide your scars well,” Helen smiled cynically.
The young women on the court once again served the ball into play.
“That dark-haired girl looks very familiar to me,” Helen said. “Do you know her?” She turned to Claxton, who only shook his head and stared off into the crowd, trying to catch the eye of some defenseless young thing.
The robust woman next to her supplied the answer.
“That's Lexi Paycok. She plays here at the club at least twice a week. She could be at Wimbledon, if she wasn’t already all taken up with her sculpture. She is one of the elite few chosen to compete for the position of protégé to Adolph Ziegler.”
“You certainly seem to know everything about everyone around here,” Helen said smiling, now more authentically, at the woman.
“I'm Theodora Hessler. My husband is the Secretary of Propaganda for the Socialist Democrats.”
Claxton leaned forward in his seat.
“I thought someone named Goebbels was the head of Propaganda.”
“Oh he is, but my husband is the man behind the man, if you know what I mean. Poor Heinzy is not appreciated, I'm afraid.”
“That's what I hear,” Claxton said, sliding his sunglasses down his nose and peering at her over the top conspiratorially. “I work for a radio station and that is precisely what I hear the whole day long.”
Helen wanted to laugh, but she thought better of it. Claxton was not one to needlessly ingratiate himself unless there was something to gain, and it seemed evident that regardless of Heinzy's true worth, he was in a position, as second in command of the Party's propaganda machine, to be able to offer a substantial rise in the world for Claxton.
“I'm Helen Claxton.” Helen extended her hand to the woman in the hat. “My husband Philip and I used to be in the film business in America, and I, for a time, was at the Metropolitan in New York.”
Claxton stared at Helen in disbelief, stunned at the unaccustomed word she had used to describe him.
“You're Helen Liluth, the singer,” the woman sniffed, her interest cooling slightly. “I seem to remember hearing about you, or perhaps reading in the paper years ago. But you're not working with us here or I would have heard about it.”
Helen sensed the undercurrent of intolerance in the woman's voice, as if she disapproved of anyone having any discernible talent and not using it for the advancement of the Party ideology.
“I don't sing much anymore,” Helen said quietly, hoping to put an end to it.
Theodora's reply seemed filled with renewed enthusiasm.
“I don't blame you,” she said. “The Fuhrer doesn't have much respect for theatrical people, the little Schauspieleren who act, as he calls them. They're useful, of course, but the real power lies in the hands of the builders and the artisans. After all, the Chancellor Hitler himself is the Great Architect of the New Reich.”
Her round face shone with the light of a Wagnerian heroine. Her cornflower, Aryan eyes fixed on a legendary world that lay just ahead, out of reach, a master plan, laid down in storybook watercolors.
“That girl out there, Lexi… now there is someone to be reckoned with,” the woman continued. “If she gets that appointment as the assistant to Professor Ziegler, the President of the Reich’s Chamber of Visual Arts, she will be making all the decisions about the rebuilding of most of Europe when the Democratic Socialist are in full power. She would have the ear of master builder Albert Speer and even the Fuhrer himself. No little actress has that power.”
Helen silently nodded her head in agreement. She watched the subject of their conversation on the tennis court. The woman was pretty enough and agile, yet, there was something in the far reaches of Helen's mind that set off a warning signal. There was something about the tennis player that struck a familiar chord. Then, it came to her. It had been in Bayreuth, nearly ten years before, when she and Claxton had arrived at the Prince's invitation for her ignominious debut in Tristan and Isolde. She had been rehearsing one evening during pre-production, at a time when all the set designers and technical people were at the height of their work. She was sure this woman had been among them. The girl was placing a piece of scenery, instructing others where it should go, when Helen noticed she wore a beautifully intricate bracelet, fashioned of woven gold and inlaid with stones of a modest size but flawless clarity. She was surprised to see such an expensive piece of jewelry worn so casually by one in a profession that seemed to deny such rewards.
She had been curious and spoke to the girl. She did not remember ever hearing or asking her name, but was certain it was the same woman playing tennis here on the clay.
What she did remember was that as she walked to her dressing room, one of the theater crew wagged his finger at her and warned her.
“If I were you, I wouldn't get too friendly with that Jewess,” he said ominously. “A time will come when it may not be such a good idea to have friends like that.”
Ten years later that time had certainly come.
“She isn't Jewish is she?” Helen asked bluntly.
Theodora's eyes narrowed and surveyed Helen's face. Then, she broke into an echoing laugh. “Oh you are terrible,” she chortled. “My husband said I have a frightful sense of humor and never know when someone is fooling me.”
She placed her hand on Helen's arm and wiped at a tear of amusement in the corner of her eye.
“Oh my dear, you are awful. This club would never let anyone like that be a member. It has always been restricted.”
Claxton watched Helen silently, as one might watch a ticking bomb, knowing full well that it would not only go off but would destroy anyone in the vicinity when it did. He held his breath and waited.
Their eyes collectively followed the ball as it volleyed back and forth across the net. At last, Lexi had won the set and match. The spectators applauded as she shook hands with her opponent, but Helen did not applaud. She excused herself and rose from her seat. As she started off in the direction of the clubhouse, Claxton stopped her.
“Where are you going?” he asked.
“To the ladies’ locker room. I have to powder my nose... any objection to that, hubby dear?”
Claxton withered, letting his hand drop from her arm.
“Of course not, my dear, only... I wish you hadn't told Gertrude, or whatever our fat friend's name is, that we were married.”
“We need to be married, so now we are,” she said coolly, fixing her eyes on him like a cobra. “These kind of people don't understand our sort. So, we are going to be respectable, at least on the surface, and make some new and important friends.”
Claxton's face flooded with color.
“Are you saying that you'll marry me?”
Helen sniggered, her mouth curling into a cruel smile.
“Why would I ever want to do that?” she said, patting his face as if he were a small pet. “I don't need to marry you. I decided we were married. That's what we'll tell these people, and that's all we ever need to do about it. Now I suggest you go over to our fat friend, as you call her, and start being friendly. I have an old friend of my own I'm just longing to speak to.”