The Berlin Stories

by Christopher Isherwood

  “What exactly did he tell Kuno about me?”

  “He seems to have suggested, not to put too fine a point upon it, that you were an accomplice in my nefarious crimes.”

  “Well, I’m damned.”

  “I need hardly add that he painted us both as Bolsheviks of the deepest crimson.”

  “He flattered me there, I’m afraid.”

  “Well — er — yes. That’s one way of looking at it, of course. Unfortunately, revolutionary ardour is no recommendation to the Baron’s favour. His view of the members of the Left Wing is somewhat primitive. He imagines us with pockets full of bombs.”

  “And yet, in spite of all this, he’s ready to have dinner with us next Thursday?”

  “Oh, our relations are very different now, I’m glad to say. I’ve seen him several times since my return to Berlin. Considerable diplomacy was required, of course; but I think I’ve more or less convinced him of the absurdity of Schmidt’s accusation. By a piece of good luck, I was able to be of service in a little matter. Pregnitz is essentially a reasonable man; he’s always open to conviction.”

  I smiled: “You seem to have put yourself to a good deal of trouble on his account. I hope it’ll prove to have been worth while.”

  “One of my characteristics, William, you may call it a weakness if you like, is that I can never bear to lose a friend, if it can possibly be avoided.”

  “And you’re anxious that I shan’t lose a friend either?”

  “Well, yes, I must say, if I thought I had been the cause, even indirectly, of a permanent estrangement between Pregnitz and yourself, it would make me very unhappy. If any little doubts or resentments do still exist on either side, I sincerely hope that this meeting will put an end to them.”

  “There’s no ill feeling as far as I’m concerned.”

  “I’m glad to hear you say that, dear boy. Very glad. It’s so stupid to bear grudges. In this life one’s apt to lose a great deal through a mistaken sense of pride.”

  “A great deal of money, certainly.”

  “Yes . . . that too.” Arthur pinched his chin and looked thoughtful. “Although I was speaking, just then, more from the spiritual point of view than the material.”

  His tone implied a gentle rebuke.

  “By the way,” I asked, “what’s Schmidt doing now?”

  “My dear William,” Arthur looked pained, “how in the world should I know?”

  “I thought he might have been bothering you.”

  “During my first month in Paris, he wrote me a number of letters full of the most preposterous threats and demands for money. I simply disregarded them. Since then, I’ve heard nothing more.”

  “He’s never turned up at Frl. Schroeder’s?”

  “Thank God, no. Not up to now. It’s one of my nightmares that he’ll somehow discover the address.”

  “I suppose he’s more or less bound to, sooner or later?”

  “Don’t say that, William. Don’t say that, please . . . I have enough to worry me as it is. The cup of my afflictions would indeed be full.”

  As we walked to the restaurant on the evening of the dinner-party, Arthur primed me with final instructions. “You will be most careful, won’t you, dear boy, not to let drop any reference to Bayer or to our political beliefs?”

  “I’m not completely mad.”

  “Of course not, William. Please don’t think I meant anything offensive. But even the most cautious of us betray ourselves at times . . . Just one other little point perhaps, at this stage of the proceedings, it would be more politic not to address

  Pregnitz by his Christian name. It’s as well to preserve one’s distance. That sort of thing’s so easily misunderstood.”

  “Don’t you worry. I’ll be as stiff as a poker.”

  “Not stiff, dear boy, I do beg. Perfectly easy, perfectly natural. A shade formal, perhaps, just at first. Let him make the advances. A little polite reserve, that’s all.”

  “If you go on much longer you’ll get me into such a state that I shan’t be able to open my mouth.”

  We arrived at the restaurant to find Kuno already seated at the table Arthur had reserved. The cigarette between his fingers was burnt down almost to the end; his face wore an expression of well-bred boredom. At the sight of him Arthur positively gasped with horror.

  “My dear Baron, do forgive me, please. I wouldn’t have had this happen for the world. Did I say half past? I did? And you’ve been waiting a quarter of an hour? You overwhelm me with shame. Really, I don’t know how to apologize enough.”

  Arthur’s fulsomeness seemed to embarrass the Baron as much as it did himself. He made a faint, distasteful gesture with his fin-like hand and murmured something which I couldn’t hear.

  “. . . too stupid of me. I simply can’t conceive how I can have been so foolish . . .”

  We all sat down. Arthur prattled on and on; his apologies developed like an air with variations. He blamed his memory and recalled other instances when it had failed him. (“I’m reminded of a most unfortunate occasion in Washington on which I entirely forgot to attend an important diplomatic function at the house of the Spanish Ambassador.”) He found fault with his watch; lately, he told us, it had been gaining. (“I usually make a point, about this time of year, of sending it to the makers in Zürich to be overhauled.”) And he assured the Baron, at least five times, that I had no responsibility whatever for the mistake. I wished I could sink through the floor. Arthur, I could see, was nervous and unaware of himself; the variations wavered uneasily and threatened, at every moment, to collapse into discords. I had seldom known him to be so verbose and never so boring. Kuno had retired behind his monocle. His face was as discreet as the menu, and as unintelligible.

  By the middle of the fish, Arthur had talked himself out. A silence followed which was even more uncomfortable than his chatter. We sat round the elegant little dinner-table like three people absorbed in a difficult chess problem. Arthur manipulated his chin and cast furtive, despairing glances in my direction, signalling for help. I declined to respond. I was sulky and resentful. I’d come here this evening on the understanding that Arthur had already more or less patched things up with Kuno; that the way was paved to a general reconciliation. Nothing of the kind. Kuno was still suspicious of Arthur, and no wonder, considering the way he was behaving now. I felt his eye questioningly upon me from time to time and went on eating, looking neither to right nor to left.

  “Mr Bradshaw’s just returned from England.” It was as though Arthur had given me a violent push into the middle of the stage. His tone implored me to play my part. They were both looking at me now. Kuno was interested but cautious; Arthur frankly abject. They were so funny in their different ways that I had to smile.

  “Yes,” I said, “at the beginning of the month.”

  “Excuse me, you were in London?”

  “Part of the time, yes.”

  “Indeed?” Kuno’s eyes lit up with a tender gleam. “And how was it there, may I ask?”

  “We had lovely weather in September.”

  “Yes, I see . . .” A faint, fishy smile played over his lips; he seemed to savour delicious memories. His monocle shone with a dreamy light. His distinguished, preserved profile became pensive and maudlin and sad.

  “I shall always maintain,” put in the incorrigible Arthur, “that London in September has a charm all its own. I remember one exceptionally beautiful autumn — in nineteen hundred and five. I used to stroll down to Waterloo Bridge before breakfast and admire St Paul’s. At that time I had a suite at the Savoy Hotel . . .”

  Kuno appeared not to have heard him.

  “And, excuse me, how are the Horse Guards?”

  “Still sitting there.”

  “Yes? I am glad to hear this, you see. Very glad . . .”

  I grinned. Kuno smiled, fishy and subtle. Arthur uttered a surprisingly coarse snigger which he instantly checked with his hand. Then Kuno threw back his head and laughed out loud: “Ho! Ho! Ho!” I
had never heard him really laugh before. His laugh was a curiosity, an heirloom; something handed down from the dinner-tables of the last century; aristocratic, manly and sham, scarcely to be heard nowadays except on the legitimate stage. He seemed a little ashamed of it himself, for, recovering, he added, in a tone of apology:

  “You see, excuse me, I can remember them very well.”

  “I’m reminded,” Arthur leaned forward across the table; his tone became spicy, “of a story which used to be told about a certain peer of the realm . . . let’s call him Lord X. I can vouch for it, because I met him once in Cairo, a most eccentric man . . .”

  There was no doubt about it, the party had been saved. I began to breathe more freely. Kuno relaxed by imperceptible stages, from polite suspicion to positive jollity. Arthur, recovering his nerve, was naughty and funny. We drank a good deal of brandy and three whole bottles of Pommard. I told an extremely stupid story about the two Scotsmen who went into a synagogue. Kuno started to nudge me with his foot. In an absurdly short space of time I looked at the clock and saw it was eleven.

  “Good gracious!” exclaimed Arthur. “If you’ll forgive me, I must fly. A little engagement . . .”

  I looked at Arthur questioningly. I had never known him to make appointments at this hour of the night; besides, it wasn’t Anni’s evening. Kuno didn’t seem at all put out, however. He was most gracious.

  “Don’t mention it, my dear fellow . . . We quite understand.” His foot pressed mine under the table.

  “You know,” I said when Arthur had left us, “I really ought to be getting home, too.”

  “Oh, surely not.”

  “I think so,” I said firmly, smiling and moving my foot away. He was squeezing a com.

  “You see, I should like so very much to show you my new flat. We can be there in the car in ten minutes,”

  “I should love to see it; some other time.”

  He smiled faintly.

  “Then may I perhaps, give you a lift home?”

  “Thank you very much.”

  The remarkably handsome chauffeur saluted pertly, tucked us into the depths of the vast black limousine. As we slid forward along the Kurfürstendamm, Kuno took my hand under the fur rug.

  “You’re still angry with me,” he murmured reproachfully.

  “Why should I be?”

  “Oh, yes, excuse me, you are.”

  “Really, I’m not.”

  Kuno gave my hand a limp squeeze.

  “May I ask you something?”

  “Ask away.”

  “You see, I don’t wish to be personal. Do you believe in Platonic friendship?”

  “I expect so,” I said, guardedly.

  The answer seemed to satisfy him. His tone became more confidential: “You’re sure you won’t come up and see my flat? Not for five minutes?”

  “Not tonight.”

  “Quite sure?” He squeezed.

  “Quite, quite sure.”

  “Some other evening?” Another squeeze.

  I laughed: “I think I should see it better in the daytime, shouldn’t I?”

  Kuno sighed gently, but did not pursue the subject. A few moments later the limousine stopped outside my door. Glancing up at Arthur’s window, I saw that the light was burning. I didn’t remark on this to Kuno, however.

  “Well, good night, and thank you for the lift.”

  “Do not mention it, please.”

  I nodded towards the chauffeur: “Shall I tell him to take you home?”

  “No, thank you.” Kuno spoke rather sadly, but with an attempt at a smile. “I’m afraid not. Not just yet.”

  He sank back upon the cushions, the smile still frozen on his face, his monocle catching a ghostly glassy gleam from the street lamp as he was driven away.

  As I entered the flat Arthur appeared, in shirtsleeves, at his bedroom doorway. He seemed rather perturbed.

  “Back already, William?”

  I grinned: “Aren’t you pleased to see me, Arthur?”

  “Of course, dear boy. What a question! I didn’t expect you quite so soon, that’s all.”

  “I know you didn’t. Your appointment doesn’t seem to have kept you very long either.”

  “It — er — fell through.” Arthur yawned. He was too sleepy even to tell lies.

  I laughed: “You meant well, I know. Don’t worry. We parted on the best of terms.”

  He brightened at once: “You did? Oh, I’m so very glad. For the moment I was afraid some little hitch might have occurred. Now I can go to sleep with a mind relieved. Once again, William, I must thank you for your invaluable support.”

  “Always glad to oblige,” I said. “Good night.”

  Chapter Eleven

  The first week in November came and the traffic strike was declared. It was ghastly, sopping weather. Everything out of doors was covered with a layer of greasy, fallen dirt. A few trams were running, policemen posted fore and aft. Some of these were attacked, the windows smashed, and the passengers forced to get out. The streets were deserted, wet, raw, and grey. Von Papen’s Government was expected to proclaim martial law. Berlin seemed profoundly indifferent. Proclamations, shootings, arrests; they were all nothing new. Helen Pratt was putting her money on Schleicher: “He’s the foxiest of the lot,” she told me. “Look here, Bill, I’ll bet you five marks he’s in before Christmas. Like to take me on?” I declined.

  Hitler’s negotiations with the Right had broken down; the Hakenkreuz was even flirting mildly with the Hammer and Sickle. Telephone conversations, so Arthur told me, had already taken place between the enemy camps. Nazi storm-troopers joined with communists in the crowds which jeered at the blacklegs and pelted them with stones. Meanwhile, on the soaked advertisement pillars, Nazi posters represented the K.P.D. as a bogey skeleton in Red Army uniform. In a few days there would be another election; our fourth this year. Political meetings were well attended; they were cheaper than going to the movies or getting drunk. Elderly people sat indoors, in the damp, shabby houses, brewing malt coffee or weak tea and talking without animation of the Smash.

  On November 7th the election results were out. The Nazis had lost two million votes. The communists had gained eleven seats. They had a majority of over 100,000 in Berlin. “You see,” I told Frl. Schroeder, “it’s all your doing.” We had persuaded her to go down to the beer-shop at the corner and vote, for the first time in her life. And now she was as delighted as if she’d backed a winner: “Herr Norris! Herr Norris! Only think! I did just what you told me; and it’s all come out as you said! The porter’s wife’s ever so cross. She’s followed the elections for years, and she would have it that the Nazis were going to win another million this time. I had a good laugh at her, I can tell you. ‘Aha, Frau Schneider!’ I said to her, ‘I understand something about politics, too, you see!’ ”

  During the morning Arthur and I went round to the Wilhelmstrasse to Bayer’s office, “for a little taste,” as he put it, “of the fruits of victory.” Several hundred others seemed to have the same idea. There was such a crowd of people coming and going on the stairs that we had difficulty in getting into the building at all. Everybody was in the best of spirits, shouting to each other, greeting, whistling, singing. As we struggled upwards we met Otto on his way down. He nearly wrung my hand off in his excitement.

  “Mensch! Willi! Jetzt geht’s los! Just let them talk about forbidding the party now! If they do, we’ll fight! The old Nazis are done for, that’s certain. In six months Hitler won’t have any storm-troops left!”

  Half a dozen of his friends were with him. They all shook my hand with the warmth of long-lost brothers. Meanwhile, Otto had flung himself upon Arthur like a young bear. “What, Arthur, you old sow, you here too? Isn’t it fine? Isn’t it grand? Why, I’m so pleased I could knock you into the middle of next week!”

  He dealt Arthur an affectionate hook in the ribs which made him squirm. Several of the bystanders laughed sympathetically. “Good old Arthur!” exclaimed one of Otto’s
friends loudly. The name was overheard, taken up, passed from mouth to mouth. “Arthur . . . who’s Arthur? Why, man, don’t you know who Arthur is?” No, they didn’t know. Equally they didn’t care. It was a name, a focus-point for the enthusiasm of all these excited young people; it served its purpose. “Arthur! Arthur!” was caught up on all sides. People were shouting it on the floor above us; in the hallway below. “Arthur’s here!” “Arthur for ever!” “We want Arthur!” The storm of voices had risen in a moment. A mighty cheer, exuberant, half-humorous, burst spontaneously from a hundred throats. Another followed it, and another. The crazy old staircase shook; a tiny flake of plaster was dislodged from the ceiling. In this confined space, the reverberation was terrific; the crowd was excited to find what a noise it could make. There was a powerful, convulsive, surging movement inwards, towards the unseen object of admiration. A wave of admirers elbowed their way up the stairs, to collide with another wave, cascading down from above. Everybody wanted to touch Arthur. A rain of hand-claps descended on his wincing shoulders. An ill-timed attempt to hoist him into the air nearly resulted in his being pitched headlong over the banisters. His hat had been knocked off. I had managed to save it and was fully expecting to have to rescue his wig as well. Gasping for breath, Arthur tried, in a muddled way, to rise to the occasion: “Thank you . . .” he managed to articulate. “Most kind . . . really don’t deserve . . . good gracious! Oh dear!”

  He might have been quite seriously injured had not Otto and his friends forced a way for him to the top of the staircase. We scrambled in the wake of their powerful, barging bodies. Arthur clutched my arm, half scared, half shyly pleased. “Fancy their knowing me, William,” he panted into my ear.

  But the crowd hadn’t done with him yet. Now that we had reached the office door, we occupied a position of vantage and could be seen by the mass of struggling people wedged in the staircase below. At the sight of Arthur, another terrific cheer shook the building. “Speech!” yelled somebody. And the cry was echoed: “Speech! Speech! Speech!” Those on the stairs began a rhythmical stamping and shouting; the heavy tread of their boots was as formidable as the stroke of a giant piston. If Arthur didn’t do something to stop it, it seemed probable that the entire staircase would collapse.