by Marcel Beyer
It's still dark outside. I decide to look out my old collection of voices, the recordings too precious to me to be left behind in the archive at Dresden. When we discontinued our research, and again at the end of the war, I packed the most important discs and tapes in boxes. Since then I've taken them with me wherever I go, from one apartment to another, without ever listening to them. I even possess one of the old gramophones, the same model they used for that tea dance in the Bunker on the last day of the war. There's a rough patch on the lid where the death's-head emblem used to be. I erased it years ago with a kitchen knife.
I remove the perished ribbon from around a packet of wax matrices and extract one from its spotty, damp-stained paper sleeve. There's no label, but it must bear some form of identification in the centre: sure enough, I make out some words scratched on the matt black surface in my own handwriting. The wax resembles the high-grade material to which we in the Bunker alone had access at the end of the war. Are these the recordings Stumpfecker instructed me to spirit out of Berlin?
My ears tingle unpleasantly in expectation of the first sound. To my disappointment, I realise at once that the recording isn't one of mine. A wholly unprofessional job. All I can hear, very faintly, is a youthful voice saying 'clip-clap, clip-clap, clip-clap' and 'hick-hack, hick-hack, hick-hack'. A second wax disc, another child's voice. No, these recordings are nothing to do with me, so why do they bear my handwriting?
I've never recorded any children's voices. I don't have any children of my own and have never been around when a child is learning to speak. Those six children were the only ones I've ever been in close contact with, but I never recorded them, much as I always wanted to. I never got the chance, and besides, their father was dead against it: the thought of my possessing such recordings made him uneasy. Even at our very last meeting, shortly before his death, he was so adamantly opposed to it that I abandoned all hope. We had a heated altercation in the passage outside my Bunker cubicle. By then it was far too late: I was so busy assisting Stumpfecker in his desperate endeavours to preserve his last patient's voice for posterity that I didn't have the energy for anything else.
I try a third wax disc. Can that really be Helga? Yes, despite the hiss and although the voice sounds very far away, it's unmistakably hers. All at once, my mind's eye summons up the images that fit the sounds: the children's arrival in the Bunker on 22 April, the day on which they and their parents took refuge there. The very first evening, having renewed my acquaintance with them, I contrived while saying good-night to secrete a recording machine beneath Helga's bed and surreptitiously switched it on. Thereafter I made more such brief recordings every night, eavesdropping on the children before they went to sleep.
VIII
MAMA IS DOING PAPA'S HANDS. IT'S FRIDAY TODAY, AND SHE always gives him a manicure on Fridays now that his secretaries don't have the time. They're working day and night. All you can hear is the snip of the little scissors and the faint, scratchy sound of the nail-file. It always gives me goose-pimples, that sound, like chalk squeaking on a blackboard or a spoon scraping a saucepan. Mama finishes filing Papa's nails and starts massaging his fingers. Is he nervous? Are his hands trembling, or is his blood pumping harder than usual because Mama's fingers are squeezing his as they rub the cream in? Papa's skin is blotchy these days, it looks unhealthy. It's flaking off his face, even though he still uses the sun-lamp. He's run out of cologne, so he doesn't smell as nice either. Mama massages cream into Papa's fingers till the knuckles crack.
Papa will be leaving in a minute; that's why he wants his hands to look good. It's the Führer's birthday, and Papa is taking him our presents. We've all made presents for the Führer, but we can't give them to him ourselves, not this year, it's too dangerous. That's because of the shelling. There are more shells falling on Berlin than ever before. The bangs are the only thing that interrupts Papa's manicure, because they make him jump. He jerks his hands away each time, so the nail-file slips and Mama gets cream on her sleeve. Papa's hands are done at last. We've wrapped our presents. Soon it'll be Hedda's birthday too, she'll be seven on 5 May. We must be sure to make her something in good time, it's only two weeks till then. Another bang, a loud one, but Papa pretends it's nothing, he doesn't even jump this time. We all stay quite still for a second, but the shell wasn't all that close to our house. Papa looks out of the window. 'No,' he says, 'you can't even see the smoke.'
Mama packs up her manicure things, Papa straightens his tie. His hands are all red and shiny now. If shells are already landing near by, why did Papa have us brought here from Schwanenwerder two nights ago? It was much safer there. No shells or bombs, just a red glow in the sky every night, far away. The little ones thought there was a storm coming, except that you couldn't hear any thunder. They'd look across the lake and wait for the storm to break over our heads. They wanted it to rain at last, but all you could see were the beams of the searchlights and the glow in the sky.
Now we're in the city ourselves, right in the middle of the war. Mama didn't want to let on, not to any of us, but even the little ones must have taken in what she told us about the refugees: how they had to leave Berlin because it was too dangerous there. Mama once told us that the Russians would never get to Schwanenwerder, so why have we left there and gone closer to them? When Papa's ministry was bombed by Mosquitoes, why didn't anyone there say it would be too dangerous for us to move into the neighbourhood? Anyone would think the Mosquitoes had gone and the war was over, but it isn't: you can tell that from all the shells landing near by. Papa's ready to leave, he smiles and gives me a kiss, then he goes out. If it's dangerous for us to play in the garden, it must be dangerous for Papa to go to see the Führer, but he did his best to smile as if nothing could possibly happen to him.
What are Mama and Papa planning to do with us? Why did Papa insist on getting us up in the middle of the night, when we'd already gone to sleep, and make us join him here at our town house? A little while ago Mama and her secretary made a list of everything at Schwanenwerder, all the crockery, cutlery, bed-linen, tablecloths, and so on. We thought we'd take them with us if we ever left Schwanenwerder, but we didn't. We also thought we'd go to some other place, not Berlin, not where there's fighting. Mama said so herself. 'If things get dangerous,' she told us once, 'we'll leave the war behind us.'
Surely she must realise that the little ones are scared, and that we older ones know she's lying. 'Aren't you pleased, not having to do any more lessons?' she asks, and we all say yes, though the only one who's really happy is Helmut, who grins all over his face because he doesn't have to practise for three hours a day. Hilde and I aren't babies any more. Mama doesn't take us in with all this stuff about no more lessons, but we can't tell her so because the little ones would be even more scared. They mustn't find out what we're in for, all of us. They mustn't find out we'll soon be dead. Dead ... I can't say the word out loud because it makes my throat so tight and my mouth so dry that my tongue won't move. I can't even breathe, just thinking about it.
'Why are you looking so worried, Helga?'
'It's nothing, Mama. Will Papa be back soon?'
'Of course he will. You're afraid something may happen to him, is that it?'
Mama's face is twitching. She still gets those pains of hers; it's ages since they were as bad as they've been these last few days. When she came back from Dresden — that was the last time. The city was completely destroyed by then. Mama stayed at the Weisser Hirsch again, but not for a rest cure, just to say goodbye. She came home in a cigarette lorry. Her coat looked a mess and so did her hair, but she didn't notice, she was too sad and upset. Was it something she'd heard in Dresden that made her so sad? She didn't say, she didn't even look at us properly.
The bangs are getting louder and louder, they hurt my ears. The Russians will be shooting at our house before long. Mama says something to me, but I can't understand, there's too much noise. 'Helga,' she shouts, 'fetch the others. We'd better go down to the shelter.'
There are footprints all over the carpet in the hallway. Dirt everywhere. Nobody cleans the place any more, they're all too busy. You can hear typewriters clattering away behind every door, or meetings going on, or letters being dictated. There are people sitting working in every room now Papa's ministry has been destroyed. The whole house is full of them, not that you'd know it on the stairs or in the passages because nobody makes a noise there, they all talk in whispers. The rooms are getting more and more crowded. A lot of them can't be lived in because their windows have been blown out. Sheets of cardboard have been stuck in the window frames so it doesn't get too cold inside, but the wind comes whistling through the cracks and makes the candles flicker.
The younger ones are scared of all the noise, they're huddled together in the passage on the ground floor. Helmut sees me coming. 'Are they firing at us, Helga?' he calls. 'Have they hit the upstairs yet?'
'No, everything's fine, but we're going down to the shelter with Mama. We'll be really safe down there.'
But they're too scared to move. They don't get up till Mama appears. We always went down in the lift before, but now we use the stairs. We'd be stuck half-way down if the electricity failed, and no one would get us out, they're all too busy. Mama and us are the only ones in the shelter: the others have to stay upstairs and go on working.
Everything down here looks the way it always did. You can't hear the noises overhead. We know the pictures on the walls by heart. There isn't one we haven't looked at a hundred times while waiting for an air raid to end in the middle of the night, unable to get back to sleep even though we each have a bed of our own down here. Yes, we know every line and speck of colour in these pictures. We also know the patterns on the carpets and the embroidery on the chair covers. There's no need to be so scared down here, but it's boring all the same. We don't feel like playing, we simply want the guns to stop. Mama can't think of anything for us to do. We'll just have to wait.
*
The guns went on and on, but we didn't care to spend all night in the shelter. Mama didn't either. After a while we went back upstairs and slept in our own beds. We're all sleeping in one room because the others are full. It's our old nursery, but it doesn't look half as nice as it used to. All our clothes and toys are packed up in boxes. The water that's leaking from the broken pipes has left brown patches on the flowery wallpaper. That wouldn't have happened in the old days. In the old days the pipes would have been mended right away. At least we've still got our own beds. The other people in the house have to sleep on uncomfortable camp beds without any mattresses. At least we've got our own beds and bedclothes, our nice warm duvets. It's cold in the nursery because it doesn't have any window-panes either, just squares of cardboard. At night the cardboard looks black and the wind makes the curtains bulge. The little ones get scared when that happens, they think someone's trying to get in, but nobody did, not last night. The guns went on firing, that's all.
We see Papa at breakfast, but not for long. He shouldn't go away so often. He goes out nearly every day, makes regular trips to the front line to take the soldiers food and schnapps, but it's dangerous there.
'Papa, you won't go away so often, will you?'
'No, sweetheart.'
'Let's stay together from now on.'
'Mm?'
'I said let's stay together — all of us, the whole family.'
'Yes, you're right.'
But he isn't really listening to me, he's bolting his bread and butter and thinking about his work. It's so dismal here. Being at Schwanenwerder was much nicer. Papa used to come home in the evenings and spend some time with us, even when he was very busy or feeling ill. It was spring-time at Schwanenwerder; here you wouldn't know it for the dust and filth. At Schwanenwerder we could play in the garden, almost like before the war; here we're only in the way.
'Can we watch a film?'
'Afraid not, the cinema's being used as a conference-room.'
'When, then?'
'Maybe tonight, if the Russians don't launch another attack.'
'How much longer will they go on attacking?'
'Not much longer. It'll all be over soon.'
Hedda pretends to be satisfied with Papa's answer, but he and Mama have told us the same thing heaps of times, and the war isn't over yet.
*
It's on fire, the whole garden's on fire. The smoke is drifting into our room. We've taken out the sheets of cardboard. The flames are on a level with our first-floor windows. Papa's staff are standing outside, pouring petrol on the bonfires and lighting them one after another. It's paper they're burning. They go on throwing files into the flames. How easily the paper catches fire, how the flames crackle and roar! Papa isn't down there, he's in his room, recording a speech on tape. It's supposed to be broadcast this afternoon. Are there any radios left in Berlin, I wonder. Another shell bursts. Everyone forgets about the bonfires and makes a dash for the house. Now they're crouching against the wall just below us. Where's Mama? More bangs, lots of them, the guns must be getting quite close. We crawl into a corner between the beds. I wonder if Papa's somewhere safe — if he's stopped recording his speech, with all this noise. Mama comes rushing in: 'Out you come, children, time to go down to the shelter.'
The guns keep firing all day long. We're not allowed back into our room. We sit around, either in the shelter or the passage downstairs. Papa's staff are also down there now. It's impossible to talk, the noise is too bad, just a word or two now and then. Nobody feels like lunch. Things can't go on this way, we won't be able to stand it much longer. Papa goes out, even though he promised we'd stay together for once. The first thing he does when he comes back is have a quick word with Mama, who takes us up to our room. 'Get the children ready,' she tells the nursemaid. I wonder what she means. Then she says, 'We're going to join the Führer.'
'Will we get some cakes at the Führer's?' asks Hedda.
'The Führer is bound to have some,' Holde says.
'You're talking rubbish,' I tell them. 'Why would he have any cakes?'
'Because he's the Führer.'
'Nobody has any cakes these days. How would they get here?'
'By plane, maybe.'
'Nonsense.'
'Why nonsense? Planes keep landing here all the time.'
'Yes, but they don't fly all the way to Berlin to deliver cakes for us.'
'Not even for the Führer?' Hedda turns to Mama. 'Will we get some cakes, Mama?'
'Anyone would think you were starving,' Mama says.
The nursemaid starts packing our things. She lets me help her to get it done more quickly. Should we only take summer things or warm things as well? 'Night things too?' the nursemaid asks Mama.
'No, they won't be needing them any more.'
What does she mean by that? She looks at us. 'You can take some toys with you, but only one each, do you hear?'
Heide searches desperately for her rag doll, but it's nowhere to be found, neither in her bed nor in the toy box. Did she leave it behind in the shelter? Is it downstairs in the passage? No.
The nursemaid shrugs her shoulders. 'Can't be helped,' she says.
But Heide absolutely insists on taking her old rag doll.
Mama gets a little impatient. 'Put in another doll for her,' she tells the nursemaid.
Heide is almost in tears by now. Mama picks her up and gives her a little cuddle. 'What do you expect us to do?' she says. 'We've got to leave here right away, and your doll has simply vanished.'
Heide pretends to be happy with the other doll, but she isn't really, you can tell from the look on her face when the nursemaid puts it in the suitcase. Then we go downstairs. Papa comes downstairs too, looking very pale and walking very slowly. What will become of us now, I wonder.
There are two cars parked outside. Mama says, 'Helga, you come with us in the first car. The others can go with Herr Schwagermann.'
We get into the limousine the Führer gave Papa for Christmas one time. It's armoured and the windows are bulletproof, so
nothing can happen to us, but what about the others? Their car doesn't have bulletproof windows. Mama sits beside me, crying softly. Papa doesn't say anything, neither does the chauffeur. We haven't been outside once since we got to Berlin three nights ago. At last we can see what a mess it's in. Just ruins, walls with great big holes in them, shattered buildings on the point of collapse, mounds of rubble everywhere, shell craters in the middle of the road. 'What's that over there — a dead body?' Mama doesn't answer. Is it really a dead body, that lifeless bundle of clothes? How can you tell when you've never seen one before? We've passed it already.
We turn into Voss Strasse. We always walked here in the old days, it isn't far. The cars pull up. Lucky we didn't get shot at on the way. Papa goes on ahead, the chauffeurs take our bags. The little ones come tumbling out of the car behind. They look as if they've been crying. Little Heide comes running up to me.
'What were all those holes in the road and those heaps of stones? Are they building something?'
'Could be.'
'But where are all the workmen?'
'They've finished for the day. It's gone five o'clock, and anyway, it's Sunday.'
Heide takes my hand and won't let go of it. We follow Papa. There's rubble everywhere. We find the entrance and set off down the stairs to the cellar. The Bunker, I mean.