by Nir Baram
Carlson’s chef prepared meatballs and other roasted chunks of meat, wrapped in rolls dripping with sauce and embellished with lettuce. There were fine china bowls overflowing with fried potatoes. But, despite the cheer that Thomas tried to inspire in the guests, the atmosphere was gloomy: the Bamberburgs complained the whole time, and Carlson made some venomous remarks to the Dresdener people. Towards the end of the evening, Blum told Thomas that if the Dresdener people promised that, when conditions in Germany improved, the Bamberburgs could buy their bank back, the directors would regard this as a noble gesture and would accept Dresdener’s offer.
Thomas thought this was just another of Blum’s delusions, and mentioned it to Carlson, who backed Blum up. ‘That sounds fair,’ he declared.
At a meeting with the directors of the Dresdener bank he suggested they add a clause to this effect, explaining that in any case it was unenforceable, and could do nothing more than warm the hearts of the Bamberburgs a little. The directors refused even to consider the proposal.
He conveyed their answer to Carlson.
‘Why are you telling me this?’ Carlson muttered. ‘Just take care of it.’
These days Carlson was sending everyone away with the response: decide for yourself. Carlson’s secretary told Thomas that in a letter to his wife he had cursed Fiske and boasted that he hadn’t lifted a finger ‘for that stinking Bamberburg Bank deal’. The days passed. Thomas was running out of ideas. Multitudes of Jews were looking desperately for countries that would accept them—one day they were all talking about Switzerland, and the next about Shanghai. New regulations were published every day, amid an aggravating buzz of whispers and plots, gossip and slander. Rumours circulated about agents who had obtained visas in return for the property of the fleeing Jews, about doctors, scientists and businessmen who had escaped Germany, which was shedding Nobel prize winners like someone who straightens a wrinkle in his cuff, and about embassies whose policies were about to change. But one fact remained: the supply of Jews exceeded the demand by thousands of per cent.
Thomas had another session with Erika Gelber. ‘I feel that my steps have been clumsy,’ he complained to her. ‘They lack my characteristic drive.’ He could feel the odour of failure wafting from his body. ‘You understand, I’m assailed by doubt, I take steps and then regret them, as if I were a foreigner in Berlin. And Frau Tschammer is getting in my way. For ten years I’ve been striving to get rid of that woman, and she’s still there. The trouble is that thousands of people are concentrated on this subject of the Jews: government people, private companies, businessmen, go-betweens, Jewish organisations all over the world. I’m looking for new areas, you understand, where I can act freely, areas that only exist because of me. I’m not one of those mediocre souls who opens another department store or restaurant in a city that already has a hundred like them.’
They would both have to ask Blum directly, he told her. He would host a dinner for them at his house. ‘Blum admires you, Erika. He says that therapy helped him to understand a lot of things.’
In the past Thomas had taken pleasure in sorting out tangled situations. He always believed that his most impressive ability was to grasp lots of strings—the source of a certain organisation’s power, people’s desires (sometimes contradictory), greed and a host of other weaknesses—and to wrap them up in a ball which only he could unravel. But now he was worried: the lack of time was forcing him to make imperfect plans.
…
Clarissa blushed. Too much rouge, he was disappointed to see. This girl—you could give her the most expensive cosmetics in Europe and she’d still look like she was plastered in cheap paint from some discount shop in Wedding. She appeared in the parlour in a blue dress she’d bought with his money especially for the occasion. It was a bit too tight and emphasised the roll of fat on her lower abdomen. Her steps wobbled, and it looked as if she was going to stumble.
‘Dear, do you need help?’ Erika Gelber asked.
‘Thanks, I’m all right,’ Clarissa laughed.
Clarissa poured wine into Blum’s glass. He leaned back in his chair. He was clearly ill at ease. Thomas studied her: rounded face, tufts of blonde hair, tied in a ribbon, curled around it. An expression of gentle puzzlement, trying to look severe and thoughtful, along with the solid evidence of a decent home, respectable parents and a model education. Girls like Clarissa were sheltered by a deeply rooted knowledge that in the end the puzzlement would fade away to their satisfaction, and they would find their place in the world.
Thomas waved his wine glass—a cheap purchase, he grumbled to himself. At least she had remembered to remove the labels. He was seized by the urge to explain to the guests that these common articles had entered his house after it was trashed by the savages who had killed Frau Stein, their beloved Jewish housekeeper. But he clung tightly to that card, their shared fate, to be played only if there was no choice. He hadn’t told Erika about Frau Stein’s death.
‘This morning I accompanied Wohlthat to a meeting with some Japanese businessmen,’ Thomas said. ‘I reported to him that the negotiations for the sale of the Bamberburg Bank were proceeding with great purpose and would soon conclude.’
Blum sipped his wine and nodded. He was a broad man whose body terminated in a huge skull, which was now jutting out of a rough, grey sweater. Carlson once said that Blum ‘dressed like a Communist’.
‘I believe the decision is close,’ Blum said. ‘We also spoke with Wohlthat yesterday. Naturally he once again expressed reservations about the role he is required to play.’
‘What impression did Dresdener’s latest offer make on the bank’s board?’ Thomas asked. If Blum wanted to flaunt his connections with Wohlthat, let him. ‘We worked hard to convince them to raise the price.’ ‘The offers we are examining are very similar,’ Blum answered. ‘I watched our colleagues from the Warburg Bank sell their splendid institution for pennies. We’re smaller, and we have no illusions. After the tax and all the government’s other tricks, we’ll be left with less than fifteen per cent of its real value.’
Clearly Thomas was not the person to whom such complaints should be addressed. Blum was stuck in a world where his bank was worth another eighty-five per cent. Some people hovered between this world and another one that once existed or that they imagined, and afterwards they bargained with this world with the logic of their imagination.
‘No, that’s definitely not enough,’ Thomas agreed. Restrained anger grated in his voice. Once again, as in Carlson’s office, it was incumbent on him to convey the spirit of the time.
‘Some people on the board argue that it would be better not to sell the bank at that price.’ Blum’s right shoulder leaped up, and he pinched it with the fingers of his left hand. ‘If Germany wants it so much—let her confiscate it.’
‘Listen, Blum,’ said Thomas. It annoyed him that Blum had hissed the word ‘Germany’ like a curse. ‘To be honest, the country is in trouble. And, aside from that, there isn’t a single Germany. Germany is this way now, and once it was different, and in a few years maybe it will be something else. The company I work for is taking a heroic stand against the pressure to leave Germany. The economy is moving away from the world, and I believe that this is bad for all of us.’
Now he looked at Erika Gelber for the first time in some minutes. She gave him a puzzled look in return. Blum sipped again and exhaled a gloomy breath.
Clarissa’s approach interrupted his thoughts. A plate of cutlets sprinkled with silver grains of salt and breadcrumbs was laid on the table. ‘Please, veal cutlets such as are served only in the finest restaurants in Germany…’ Her clear voice filled the parlour.
‘Fräulein Engelhardt is from the educated bourgeoisie of Hamburg. In my opinion, they produce the most remarkable young women in the country,’ said Thomas.
‘Young lady, it looks delicious,’ said Blum, waiting impatiently for Clarissa to serve him. Blum liked cutlets.
Clarissa minced around the table, returned to Blu
m, and topped up his glass. Thomas wondered whether she might be laying it on too thick. She had told him that she excelled at every task she took on, and stuck to her agreement to play the role of cook and waitress even after he let her know that the guests would be Jews. But they knew that she wasn’t a servant, and hamming it up might give them the impression they were being made fun of. Jews were on the lookout day and night for changes in every glance from a friend or acquaintance. That was completely logical: the shattering of their status as Jews had modified all their human connections. They were forced to scurry about to discover how everyone they knew was responding to the new spirit. Clarissa hummed a tune when she leaned over them, withdrew and straightened up. Now he was reconciled to her little exaggerations—the thick make-up, the clumsy movements, the twisted collar of her dress—the play-acting of a young thing who had disguised herself as a servant and as a woman.
Blum didn’t look at or speak to Erika Gelber. Thomas, though he wanted nothing more than to bring the evening to an end, was drawn to Erika. She seemed so lost, with her dishevelled cinnamon hair, her light make-up emphasising her dark eyes: here was Erika Gelber, greeting the night. The same woman but not exactly.
Both of them were looking at him now: Blum was waiting for an explanation of why he had been invited, and Erika for her signal to speak to Blum.
But perhaps they were demanding something more. What were they demanding? That he would take responsibility, curse the homeland, explain to them how it had all happened? Blum coughed, Erika said something to him in such a self-effacing tone that it didn’t even sound like German. As if she were trying to curl up in his lap like a little girl.
Clarissa wasn’t the only one in disguise tonight.
He decided to address them both together to strengthen the closeness between them: ‘Herr Blum, Frau Gelber,’ he said, ‘I understand that these are difficult times for you. I don’t believe that it’s really possible to console someone whose world has changed so much for the worse. With all sincerity I’ll tell you that even in the hard times that I have endured recently, like the horrible night a few weeks ago when, in this parlour, our devoted and beloved housekeeper, Hannah Stein, was cruelly murdered—even then I clung to the faith that Hegel was right, that in the end history and reason progress, despite the most dreadful events. Naturally, of course, being trapped in the moment, we cannot judge its future purpose, but sometimes what’s rational hides its highest qualities inside irrational mischief.’
‘That’s small consolation, to see our suffering as a tool in the hand of reason.’ Erika gave a twisted smile. She showed no surprise at the news of Frau Stein’s death, and was entirely concentrated on Blum.
Blum nodded gloomily to show he’d heard her, but he was leaning away from Erika, revealing his reservations about being bound up in the same group as her. Unlike Erika, who was regarded as completely Jewish, Blum was defined by the regime as a mischling of the first degree. Blum had never seen himself as Jewish. His father had converted to Christianity after the war, and his mother came from a Protestant family in Heidelberg. Blum hoped to assimilate into the German nation. He was exempt from most restrictions, but he still complained that his senior position in a Jewish-owned bank was driving him into the bosom of Judaism and ‘all those Jewish organisations’.
‘I’m not a big expert in the irrational!’ Blum hissed, and the creases on his forehead deepened and turned red like cuts. ‘I’ve worked in the bank for forty years. We built up an excellent institution from zero, an institution that has garnered nothing but praise, and now they’re robbing us of it!’
The smile faded from Erika’s face. Thomas gave Blum a warning look. How dumb could the man be, to shout nonsense like that at eight in the evening in a private home, in an apartment that SS people had recently destroyed?
‘Herr Blum, a little patience.’ He couldn’t restrain himself. ‘We’ve all taken a risk to get together here. It would be a shame to allow bitterness to lead us to a dead end.’
Blum fixed his eyes on his plate.
Clarissa appeared again and cleared the table. Now her movements were stiff, and her cheerfulness was gone. If the things she had heard here were not supposed to be said, she might tell her parents about the dinner, or her friends at the university, or the NSP, the National Socialist welfare organisation where she volunteered. But she wasn’t the informing type. Thomas had already ascertained that.
‘Despite recent events, I expect, indeed I demand, that you regard me as exactly the same friend I have always been to you,’ Thomas declared solemnly.
‘Don’t you like cutlets?’ Blum said to Erika Gelber, staring at the meat on her plate.
‘If you want it, please.’ She returned the cutlet to the platter.
‘We’ll share it,’ Blum concluded.
Before dessert Thomas offered Blum a cigar, and Erika saw her chance. She turned to Blum, and told him that she wanted to talk to him about something. Blum shrank into his chair. Erika told him that her husband had been arrested in November, had been detained in Buchenwald, and now he had been released. He had been ordered to emigrate without delay. Her two children, Max and Eva, had been expelled from school. They were sitting at home now, after some hooligans had forced Max to weed the football pitch with his teeth. They were being evicted from their apartment. They were looking feverishly for a country to take them but there was nowhere. No one was helping them.
Blum nodded from time to time, and puffed smoke. Thomas wondered whether he should leave them; after all, Blum had been in analysis with Erika, and maybe he was keeping his distance from her because there were three people in the room. In any event, Thomas was tired of hearing about their distress.
Blum peered down the hallway, as though expecting dessert. Really, where was Clarissa with the cake?
Erika said something about the United States, that because of the children there was no point waiting until things changed here. Blum nodded again, a sign that significant things had been said, and closed his eyes.
‘It’s cold…’ Thomas rubbed his hands together and hurried over to stoke the fire.
As its heat warmed them, he realised that Blum wouldn’t help Erika. He couldn’t understand how he hadn’t admitted his failure earlier. Maybe Blum couldn’t help. He had obligations to many people, his partners would be likely to reject the idea and maybe—a hair-raising suspicion—they had already decided to sell to Deutsche Bank instead. One thing was clear: Blum wasn’t going to help Erika.
The statement tormented him, yet he could not stop repeating it to himself, as though wanting to have his punishment at once. His head hurt, and he closed his eyes. A minute or ten passed. The wind howled outside, and he imagined it surrounding the house, ripping down the walls and the ceiling as though they were made of paper. When he shook off these visions, Erika was still talking to Blum in the same caressing tone, and Thomas was horrified: how could she not understand that all was lost? He apologised and announced that he had to check the dessert.
‘At such a late hour?’ Blum said, looking at the front door.
‘We were supposed to have had, as it were, a cake,’ Thomas said, babbling.
Where was Clarissa?
Erika gave him a pleading look not to leave her alone with Blum. But he couldn’t stay and watch her clinging to a vain hope that he himself had planted in her. He gaped at a blank spot on the wall, announced that they would be serving dessert immediately and hurried out.
As he wandered among the rooms, half-listening to Erika’s voice, he realised how fateful this struggle to get her out of Germany was for him: in part he was struggling to erase the things he had said to her about ‘losing the magic touch’, seeking desperately for proof that Thomas Heiselberg was still a master tactician in the corridors of Berlin. Maybe not like in the past, but he still knew how to arrange deals and astonish people with his ability to cut through the most complicated issues.
Erika was saying something about her driver’s licence and a
law that forbade her to walk in certain streets. How many damned stories did she have left? All he wanted now was to escape her voice. In the background Blum was cursing the Jews from Eastern Europe. From the moment they had began to show up here, en masse, something bad was going to happen.
Clarissa wasn’t in his room or anywhere else. Now he understood where she was. He rushed back to the parlour again, taking care not to look at Blum and Erika, and walked through it and then down the corridor to that room. A freezing wind blew through the broken window. Clarissa lay in her dress and shoes on his mother’s bed. A heavy blanket was spread over her lower body. How many times had he spread that blanket over his mother, exactly there? There was the sound of hoarse breathing, and he saw the slow movement of her chest. The dress was pressing on her. Maybe he should undo a button or two. And if she woke up? To his surprise, he was not irritated by her disappearance or her invasion of his mother’s bed. He was not the kind of man to build a shrine to a dead woman. Every time he heard women gushing over the rumour that Göring had built a temple for his first wife, he felt shame that a man like that could rise so high in Germany.
Maybe Clarissa’s boldness promised a change for the better. If his most alarming capacity, the quality that defined him during an attack, was to snuff the life out of things, perhaps this young woman would lead him in another direction. Even in a room containing only a bed and a shattered window she made a youthful spirit glow in him. He suddenly wanted this sleeping beauty, wanted to have her, to keep her in his possession. It appeared that he had finally met with something that he couldn’t dispatch to death with a single gesture.