by Joseph Kanon
“You’re not at the Adlon?” she said quickly, worried.
“No, they found me a flat. Very nice. Big enough for two.”
“For two?” she said, trying to read his tone.
“If I had a guest. Some day. Bigger than the Adlon. Even a phone. Do you have a pencil? I’ll give you the number.”
“Is everything all right?”
“Yes. Everything. Very lucky to find a flat so soon, don’t you think? To have my own place. Do you have an address for Elsbeth?”
“Elsbeth?”
“Yes, I want to visit her. Say hello. She’s married to a doctor, you said, yes? So useful, having one in the family.”
“Yes, useful,” she said slowly, putting this together.
“She’d be so angry if she knew I was here and didn’t come to see her.”
“Shall I come too?” she said, playing along now.
“No, no. You’re busy. Why don’t you come this evening? See the flat and then we’ll get something to eat.”
“I don’t know when Sasha—”
“Well, just call if you can’t. Nice having a phone, isn’t it? Here’s the number.”
They left separately and sat apart on the tram down to Alexanderplatz and then on the S-Bahn to Savignyplatz. Dr. Mutter was only a few blocks down on Schlüterstrasse, but Erich seemed winded by the walk.
The door was opened by a nurse who seemed to be doing double-duty as a maid.
“You have an appointment?”
“We’re here to see Frau Mutter. Tell her Alex Meier.”
“Meier?” she said, a slight twitch, perhaps reacting to the name. Only Aryan patients still. “Wait here.”
A vestibule with a coatrack, drafty, separated from the hall by another door. Elsbeth came almost at once.
“Alex? It’s you?” she said, forehead wrinkled in disbelief, her hand to her throat, a film gesture. She had become her mother, hair wrapped around her head in a braided crown, her face an old woman’s, pinched. Then she noticed Erich, a sharp intake of breath, now clutching her throat, and her face seemed to dissolve. “Erich?” she said, a whisper. “Erich—?”
He reached over to her, hugging her, both now crying.
“I thought you were dead,” she said, touching him, making sure he was real. “Dead. Back from the dead. Unless maybe it’s me who’s dead. They say that’s when you see them, when you’re dead yourself.”
“Elsbeth,” Erich said, disconcerted by this, something she was saying to herself.
“And you,” she said to Alex. “Back too. I thought I would never see you again. But how is it possible?” she said, turning to Erich. “The POWs don’t come back. They keep them there.”
“They’ve started to release them,” Alex said. “Three weeks ago. It’s taken him that long to get to Berlin. He needs to see a doctor. Is your husband here?”
“Gustav? Seeing patients.” She motioned her head inside the house. “It’s his day at home. From the hospital. Are you ill?” she said to Erich. “What?”
“He’s been in a prison camp,” Alex said. “Somebody needs to look at him.”
“So you brought him to Gustav? I don’t understand,” she said to Alex. “Why are you with him? How did you know where—?”
“He went to see Irene.”
“Oh, Irene,” she said, a slight stiffening. “And she sends him here? She won’t even talk to Gustav.”
“Elsbeth,” Alex said, a willed patience. “Can we come in? He’s very weak. You can see for yourself.”
“Weak. Yes, yes, come in. I’m sorry.” She took Erich’s arm. “You’re all right? Did they make you walk? Is it possible, all the way from Russia?”
Erich touched her hair, a faint smile, familiar. “A truck.”
“And you go to Irene?”
“I didn’t know where you were living. She told me.”
She stared at him again. “Back from the dead. Maybe everyone comes back. Wouldn’t that be—?” She turned, leading them in.
The flat was filled with furniture, almost a prewar feel after the austere rooms he’d seen in the East, some leftover Christmas greens still on the mantel. But there were none of the porcelain knickknacks that must have been here before, the clutter of silver frames on the piano, all sold, he assumed, to the men in long coats in the Tiergarten for PX food tins during the first hard winters. Elsbeth, thinner than before, was buttoned up in a nondescript sweater, her old creamy complexion drained away.
“Would you like some tea?” she said, an almost surreal politeness.
“Elsbeth, is your husband—?” Leading her back.
“Yes, I’ll tell him. I hate to interrupt when he has patients. Oh, but what am I saying? It’s you, isn’t it? Come back. But Erich,” she said, a new thought, “did you want to live here? It’s only a flat, as you see, and Gustav—”
“He’s staying with friends of Irene’s,” Alex interrupted. “He doesn’t need a bed. Just a doctor.”
“Yes. Let me get Gustav. Oh, look at you, so thin. You came back. You know father’s dead?”
Erich nodded. Something that had happened years ago.
“And the boys. Both. I was doing volunteer work at the hospital. So many people—the raids. So I wasn’t here. I saw them later, when they dug them out. Both. You can’t imagine how they looked. At first I didn’t recognize them, just the size, so small, so it had to be them. If I had been here—well, Gustav says, don’t think that, but he didn’t see them. All smashed. Like dolls.” She stopped, catching herself. “I’ll get him.”
Erich looked at Alex, not saying anything. Back from the dead.
“Well, Erich,” Dr. Mutter said, coming in and clapping him on the shoulder, a public family welcome. “Thank God. We thought—you know, so many stories.” Tall, with thinning blond hair, a long Nordic face. He turned to Alex, waiting.
“This is Alex Meier,” Elsbeth said. “A friend of the family. A long time ago. Before you knew me.”
“And now here again,” Mutter said, nodding, pointedly not offering his hand. “With Erich.”
“He’s sick,” Alex said plainly. “He needs you to examine him. See what’s wrong.”
“Why didn’t he go to the hospital? We’re not supposed to—”
“He lost his papers,” Alex said, looking at him.
“Lost or never had? Elsbeth said he was released but I haven’t heard they’re doing that. If he’s here illegally, you know it’s against the law to—”
Alex stared at him, his head swimming. The kind of unforgiving precise face that might have been at his parents’ selection. Able to work, over here. The others, there.
“Really, Gustav—” Elsbeth began.
“And if I lose my license?” he said to her. “What happens to us then? I don’t understand why you come here. Or you,” he said to Alex. “Meier, it’s Jewish, yes? Many Jews have tried to make trouble for me. Maybe you want to report me.”
“I couldn’t do that,” Alex said smoothly. “I’ve never been here. Neither has Erich. And you never treated him or gave him medicine. None of that happened, all right?”
Mutter said nothing.
“He’s sick. I want to know with what. What to do.”
“You want to know.”
“Alex was close to us,” Elsbeth said, explaining. “Like cousins.”
“A Jewish cousin. And you come back to Germany? Why? To gloat over us?”
“Just tell me what’s wrong with him. It shouldn’t take long.”
“For God’s sake, Gustav, he’s my brother,” Elsbeth said.
“And what does he say if they catch him? He implicates us.”
“They’re not going to catch him,” Alex said.
“I have never broken the law.”
“That must be a comfort.”
“Alex,” Elsbeth said, alert to his tone. “You don’t know how difficult it’s been for Gustav. Such accusations. Lies.”
“All of them?” Alex said, looking at Mutter.
&nb
sp; Mutter said nothing, then turned to Erich. “Come.”
Alex started to follow.
“No. You stay here.”
“Do you mind if I sit on your furniture?”
“Alex,” Elsbeth said, disapproving. “You mustn’t talk that way.”
Mutter left, taking Erich to a back room.
“Sit. I’ll have Greta bring some tea,” Elsbeth said.
“No, don’t bother.”
“It’s been a difficult time for Gustav,” she said, her voice apologetic. “You know, these things he did, all legal—he was asked to do them—and then after they try to make him a criminal. Gustav a criminal, imagine. Of course he was exonerated, but the experience, so unpleasant.”
“What things did he do?”
“Medical things. All legal,” she said again, clinging to it. “But of course difficult to explain after.”
“Yes.”
“We were in the American sector then. For the denazification hearing. And you know the lawyers, the translators were all Jews. Who else knows German there? People from here. Jews who left. That’s why he said that to you. He thinks they came back for revenge. To make trouble for him. So when you come here—”
“With your brother.”
“Yes, well, he sees only the other thing. He’s suspicious. After all that happened.” She paused. “He’s a good man. A wonderful father. You should know that. And you know, some of them did make trouble. Jews are like that.” She caught herself. “Not you—”
“Just all the others.”
“I didn’t say all. Excuse me, but you don’t know what it’s been like here. Oh, let’s not talk about these things. I’m so surprised to see you. And Erich. From the dead. I never thought— Where are you living? Are your parents—?”
He shook his head. “Dead. Both.”
She sighed. “That whole generation. Gone now. I think of my father all the time.”
Alex stared at her, at a loss. As if the deaths were remotely comparable, a quiet passing, not murder.
“You know he’s in the Französischer Friedhof now? At first he was buried on the farm, of course, as he wanted, but when the Communists gave it away in the land reform, well, they call it reform, not theft, which is what it was. Anyway, Irene had him moved. She knew someone who could arrange that. So now he’s in Berlin. But I don’t like to go to the Russian sector, so I don’t visit the grave the way I should. Funny, isn’t it, his ending up in Berlin. He never really liked it here.”
“But don’t you go to the Russian sector to see Irene?”
“I don’t like to,” she said, suddenly prim. “Russians. Those first few weeks, after the war. You’ve heard the stories? I’m afraid, even now. Just to see them. So she comes here. Ah, Greta, thank you.” A tray with teapot and cups was put before them. “And honey cake, yes?” She put a slice on a plate and handed it to him. “Such a treat, since the blockade, even a little sugar. POM they send, dried potatoes, not even like real food. Of course, Irene, it’s different for her,” she said, switching back, confiding. “You know she goes with them, the Russians. At first I thought for her work—they own the studios now. But Gustav says no, someone high up. A protector. What kind of protection? People who steal your land. Of course, Kurt Engel was a Communist too, but that’s different.”
“How?”
“He was German.” She stopped for a minute, some vague, disturbing thought, then looked at him. “It’s like a miracle to see you again. But to come back—after everything. How was it in America? You didn’t like it? Everyone dreams of going there now.”
“They offered me a position here.”
“A position?”
“A publisher. A stipend. And—Berlin.”
“Oh, father always said there was never a Berliner like you. How you liked it.” She looked up. “But you know that’s all gone. How do you bring that back? Bring the people back? So many in the raids. Night after night—” Her voice trailed off.
“I’m sorry about the boys.”
“Rolf would have been twelve now. Tall, I think, like Gustav. The same stubbornness too.” She smiled to herself, then looked up. “He says I shouldn’t think about them. That it will make me sick, living in the past. Where else can I live? That’s where they are. Not here. How can I leave them?” Her eyes had begun to shine, moist and pleading. “I don’t care if it makes me sick.” She lowered her voice. “I don’t care if I die. Maybe I’ll see them again then. It’s possible, no? We don’t know—”
“What’s possible?” Gustav said, coming in.
Elsbeth looked up, startled, somehow caught out. A scene they’d had before.
“To visit her father’s grave,” Alex said. “Now that he’s in Berlin. The Französischer Friedhof, yes?” he said to Elsbeth, who nodded quickly, grateful.
“Such morbid thoughts,” Gustav said, looking at her, really asking something else.
“No, I was fond of Fritz. I’d like to pay my respects.”
Gustav had nothing to say to this, just another stern look at Elsbeth, and Alex saw, in one awful second, that all the bullying, the righteous will that used to exorcise itself in rallies now had nowhere to go and had become domestic, Elsbeth’s grief a sign of weakness, something to be overcome.
Erich sat down next to Elsbeth. “Cake. My God, I haven’t seen cake—”
“So?” Elsbeth said, fussing over Erich, touching him. “And what does Gustav say? You’re all right?”
“I’m not dying yet,” Erich said, a forced casualness. “So it’s better than I expected. Can I have some—”
“Come with me,” Gustav said to Alex.
They went into Gustav’s consulting office, a desk and a console dispensary, health posters on the walls, food groups and the circulatory system.
“He’s not dying yet. But he will be. Unless he can get treatment.”
“For what?”
“A guess only? I need to see X-rays to be sure. We don’t have such equipment here.” He looked around the spare office. “I can listen with this,” he said, touching a stethoscope, “but I can’t take X-rays, so I can’t say for sure. Maybe simple pneumonia—which is never simple, of course. Or cancer. It’s possible. But more likely, tuberculosis. A feeling only, but tuberculosis takes its time, and he hasn’t been well for months.” He paused, hesitant. “He is also maybe a little erratic in his mind, I think. Maybe just the fever, maybe— It was common with soldiers. Especially on the eastern front. But that—that’s something you heal yourself. A question of time. The lungs are the problem now. So.”
“But it’s not radiation poisoning.”
“Radiation poisoning?” Gustav said, surprised. “Why would you think such a thing? Where would he be exposed to radiation? Do you think the Soviets are exploding bombs? That would be news.”
“What about the lesions on his legs?”
“Rat bites,” he said, matter of fact. “He said they were forced to work in wet conditions. It’s easy to infect a puncture in the skin.”
“The wet conditions were pitchblende waste. Uranium. They’d be radioactive.”
Gustav looked up. “You’re sure about this? Where? You should go to the authorities with such information.”
“Yes, but first let’s get him well. If it is radiation—”
Gustav shook his head. “It doesn’t work that way. Everything depends on the exposure—how much, how far away you are. A bomb, of course, death. But other exposures, a matter of weeks, no more. A big exposure, you vomit the first week, less than that the second week, and so on, but almost never more than four. He’s been sick longer than that. So poisoning, no.” He stopped. “Of course, a continued exposure, even a low dose, can lead to cancer. Maybe the case here, I can’t say.”
“What would that mean?”
“Lung cancer? There is no cure for lung cancer.”
“It’s the lungs?”
Gustav nodded. “That’s why I think tuberculosis. He hasn’t been coughing blood. Yet. Otherwise, the sig
ns are there. But I need—”
“An X-ray, I know. So where can we get one?”
“A hospital. But without papers? An escaped prisoner? We are obliged to hand such a person over.”
Alex started to say something, then stopped, pressing the edge of the desk to stay calm. The only doctor they could see.
“And if it is TB? What do we do?”
“Do? Well, in the old days, a sanitarium. Lots of eggs and mountain air. Like Thomas Mann.” A nod to Alex, as if this were a writer’s joke. “Now streptomycin. If you could get it. It’s effective. They’ve only been making it since ’44 but the results with tuberculosis are good.”
“Can you get some? At the hospital?”
“In Berlin? My friend, even penicillin is difficult. We keep asking for more. Streptomycin?”
“So where—?”
“The Americans would have it. Their hospital, down in Dahlem. But that’s only for the military. If you really want to do this, start this treatment, you have to get him to the West.”
“The West?”
“Herr Meier, the Russians think aspirin is a miracle drug. There is nothing over there. The American hospital won’t treat civilians. You have to take him west. The hospitals there—”
“Now? Through the blockade.”
“Yes, thanks to your new friends.” He raised his eyebrows. “Erich told me, you’re a guest of the Soviets. And what will they think, your hosts, of you helping a fugitive?”
Alex looked at him. “Who would tell them? And implicate himself?”
Mutter said nothing, turning this over.
“And meanwhile he’s sick. He’s family.”
“Not yours.”
“No, yours.”
“Let me say again. I can’t help him and neither will the Soviets. You need to get him west.” He looked over, almost pleased. “An interesting dilemma for you.”
“There must be something you could give him. He’s shivering. Even I can hear it when he talks, all the congestion, maybe it’s pleurisy, pneumonia, I don’t know. You’re the doctor.” He stopped. “He won’t have to wait for TB to get him if he doesn’t get through this.”
“You understand, it’s illegal, what you’re asking.”