Though it was dark outside and the construction, which was apparently going to be a new shopping mall, gave the quaint streets a harsh look, he still felt perfectly at home: every corner, shop, and restaurant reminded him of his previous stay, which he now saw in a magical light. Could I really have been happier then, he wondered, or was it just the combination of snow, sleep, and music? He felt a sudden urge to revisit the beer cellar where he and the legal adviser had spent their last night, found it easily, and descended to the large hall, which was even more hideous when empty, its cold walls smelling of stale tobacco. Paying no attention to the dozen or so waiters eating at a long table in a corner, he strode silently among the tables set with fresh red cloths. “You killed her,” she had said to him with a squirrelly look, sitting over there. “Yes,” he had answered suavely, keeping his wits about him, “but in that case, so did you.” “Perhaps, but not in the same way,” she had retorted. He should have had a comeback for that too. She never gave me a chance, he thought. It was much too soon after my wife’s death. Today I’d think of something that would put her in her place. “No, thank you,” he said to an approaching waiter who was about to show him to a table, “I’m only looking for a friend.”
He returned to the hotel, hoping to find his little Russian. But the key was still in its cubbyhole, his note a white feather sticking out of the dove-shaped holder. He tore it up, took the keys to both rooms, debated which to make his own, and climbed to the second floor, passing his first opera-bound Indian of the evening. From the room he tried placing a long-distance call to his mother-in-law, who was out again, after which he called his Haifa apartment. The high school boy answered, his voice indistinct. “It’s Dad,” shouted Molkho. “It’s Dad. How is everything?” The boy ran to turn off the television and returned. “Where are you?” he asked. “I’m in Berlin, Gabi, in West Berlin,” Molkho said. “I’m trying to cross her over from here. Why isn’t there any answer at Grandma’s? I’ve been trying to get her for days.”
The boy didn’t know why there wasn’t any answer, because his brother and sister were with their sick grandmother right now. “Sick?” Why couldn’t he be less vague! “Yes,” said Gabi. “She broke her arm and caught a bad cold.” “She broke her arm? Which? When? How?” asked Molkho excitedly. But the boy only knew that his grandmother was in a cast and had been in bed for several days—how many he couldn’t say. Afraid to run up the bill, Molkho hung up and paced worriedly about the room; then, hastily putting some things in his suitcase, he went down with it to the little room on the first floor and proceeded from there to the lobby. The gaily lit bar was deserted. Exhaustedly he leaned against the counter, sorry he hadn’t gone to the opera instead of waiting on tenterhooks here.
Through the open door of the kitchen he watched the German family eat dinner, ladling some sort of dumpling soup out of a large bowl. In a corner flickered the spectral blue light of a television, on which an announcer was reading a weather forecast from a map crisscrossed with arrows. Would he like to join them for a bowl of Schwemmele? asked the proprietor, noticing him and pointing to the doughy gray dumplings. Tempted, Molkho declined. “Thank you,” he replied warmly. Everything looked delicious, but he did not wish to spoil his appetite, for his lady friend would soon arrive and go out with him to eat. He had simply been trying to make out the forecast. “It could be worse,” said the German. “Lots of rain.” “But no snow?” smiled Molkho. “No snow,” the German laughed, remembering Molkho’s last visit. He translated for his family, which broke out laughing too. Oh no! No snow! Not yet! They must think I’m some sort of eccentric, Molkho thought as he stepped out into the street. First I bring them a sleeper and then a vanisher, although the truth is that the sleeper brought me.
A thin rain was falling again, and he walked down the block through the yellow fog, hoping his Russian might appear. Could she be lost in it somewhere, wandering between East and West? He recalled his last glimpse of her, sobbing childishly while a crowd formed around her as the pale East German officer arrived. Or was she perhaps crying for joy? Not everyone keeps his emotions under wraps like me, he thought, stepping into his working-class restaurant. Though he considered ordering Schwemmele, he dutifully asked for wurst and fries, as if determined to make up for all the sausage meat denied him as a child by his mother, who claimed it was made from offal. He returned to the hotel, wrote a new note that said, “I am in Room 1,” and entered his dwarflike cell. Leaving his suitcase unopened, he took off his shoes and lay down to wait in his clothes with the light on.
27
HE MUST HAVE switched off the light in his sleep, because it was dark when he awoke hours later. At first, he couldn’t remember where he was. When he did, his first thought was of his mother-in-law. So now she’s broken her arm, he thought. That’s a bad business. At her age the bones don’t knit, which means I’ll have a cripple on my hands. Thank God it’s just an arm. Or is it? His son had sounded as if he were hiding something. His wife had been right to insist the old woman move to the home. Not that there couldn’t be problems there too. Why, just look how she had gone and fallen the minute his back was turned!
He could feel his anger at her growing. She had bitten off more than she could chew this time, and he was the one who would pay for it. He rose and descended to the lobby, where the only light came from the little bulbs lighting the cabinets of swords and maps. The clock showed after two. Behind the desk the student was asleep on his mattress. A lone dove nested in its cubbyhole. Beside it was his note, which he took and read. “I am in Room 1.” Then they must have taken her after all! Could it really have gone so smoothly? Or had they simply locked her up for disorderly conduct? And I didn’t even say good-bye, he mused sadly, missing his little rabbit. Why hadn’t he touched or kissed her plump breasts, which now seemed such an overture to pleasure? Returning to his room, he switched on the night-light and sat guiltily on the edge of the bed. It was irresponsible, even cowardly, to have left her, he thought, studying his passport, which the East Germans hadn’t bothered to stamp. Why couldn’t he have waited to see what happened to her, the two old women would ask, not fathoming his fear of being trapped in the East himself. The tiny room made him feel claustrophobic. He returned to the lobby, took the last key, went back to Room 1, packed a few things, and ascended with them to Room 9. If I’m paying for two rooms, I may as well sleep in both, he thought.
28
HE SLEPT LATE and saw by the luggage in the lobby when he came down for breakfast that most of the guests were checking out. A young girl was waxing the furniture and a thorough cleaning was under way.
He spent the morning buying a few last presents, sticking close to the hotel in the hope that his little Russian might give some sign of life, and then returned to the checkpost after lunch. “I crossed yesterday,” he told the East German policeman he handed his passport to, “and I liked it so much I’ve come back. Is that all right?” “Of course,” said the policeman without looking up. “Come back all you like. There’s no problem as long as you cross back before midnight.” He received his visa, ascended to the street, and strolled down Unter den Linden to the old opera house, from which he surveyed the War Memorial across the street. Then, joining a group of tourists, he filed past the glass-enclosed flame and the honor guard. Who knows, he thought, perhaps it really worked. Back on the boulevard he asked some East Germans for the Soviet embassy, but no one seemed to know where it was, and so he proceeded to the Alexanderplatz and walked about among the shops, watching some carefree teenagers who looked like youngsters anywhere. We project our fears and fantasies on the world, he thought, but the world just shrugs them off. He glanced at his map, in the margin of which his mother-in-law’s old address was still written, trying to orient himself.
Perhaps he should ask directions, he thought, debating whether to strike out for some low buildings to the east on which the autumn sun shone mildly. In the end he turned to an elderly woman, showing her the writing on the map. “Taxi?”
he asked. She stopped to think. “No taxi,” she replied, pointing toward an entrance to the underground. “Metro?” inquired Molkho. “Metro,” she agreed, happy to find a word in common. He looked at her closely. She had a trustworthy, proletarian face with gray hair pulled straight back and glasses that she removed to study the map. “Magdalenastrasse,” she said, pointing to the underground again and ticking off seven stations on her fingers. He nodded gratefully, trying to memorize the name, but seeing it was hard for him, she took a pen and wrote it on the map. Then, as if assisting a foreigner were a privilege that she was determined to make the most of, she turned and climbed down the stairs to the underground, motioning to him to follow.
He did. After all, he smiled to himself, even if she was once a secret agent, she’s past retirement age. They came to a gate with a machine that sold tickets and a smaller one that stamped them, though in the absence of guards or ticket takers anyone could have walked right in. Fancy an underground honor system! thought Molkho, who nevertheless feared losing his way in the subterranean labyrinth. But it was too late to change his mind, for his elderly guide had already bought him a ticket and was leading him onto the platform.
Once aboard, he sat beside her and counted the stations, feeling one with the motion of the train, which was quite modern and not at all noisy, though the tunnel it sped through seemed rather crudely hacked out. Bad finish, that’s the trouble with Communism, he thought, postponing further consideration of the subject until his return to Israel, because meanwhile here he was in East Berlin, traveling the underground with ordinary people like himself. At the fifth stop his guide got off, holding up two fingers to indicate the stations that were left as if unsure whether foreigners could count. The other passengers now watched him for her. He wondered what they would think if they knew he was looking for his dead wife’s first home.
He got off at Magdalenastrasse, the whole car making sure that he didn’t miss his stop. Climbing some stairs to ground level, he saw that he was in an old residential area, far from the tourist sites and shops. He had barely taken a few steps when he noticed a sign with the name of his wife’s street, which a quick glance revealed to be only a few shabby blocks long. He smiled wryly, thinking of his mother-in-law. So you were right after all. There was nothing here to come back to. Nothing that has to do with you or her.
29
AND YET, suppose, Molkho thought, that his wife had wanted to come back—suppose she had—would she have recognized anything in this dreary street or only imagined that she had? That playground, for instance, with its little green gate made for children that led to a battered seesaw and some old trees with metal guards that stood sullenly stripped of their leaves. And yet it was here that her mother must have wheeled her in her carriage and here that she first began to crawl, memories that should have moved her as the thought of them moved him. Or that grocery over there—was it as drab before the War too, the few unappetizing tins of crackers, bottles of bilious oil, and bars of soap in its window suggestive of a trading post in some provincial backwater? Slowly he walked down the street, fingering his passport with its East German visa in his pocket. I’ve seen so many spy movies that I can’t help thinking I’m being followed, he thought, though turning around to look will just make me seem more suspicious. I’d better walk slowly enough for any tail to have to pass me, though not so slowly as to be conspicuous. Not as though I were looking for something, but more like someone out for a stroll, someone who isn’t quite well. Yes, that’s it, he thought eagerly—like someone who hasn’t been well and is just getting over it!
His mother-in-law hadn’t told him the house number, nor had he thought of asking her, never imagining he would return to Berlin so soon, a notion that would have seemed preposterous; yet now, trying to guess which house had been hers, he felt sure his wife would have approved of him despite all her principles. Yes, sometimes she had wanted him to resist her, not to be so afraid. Because I was afraid of you, he murmured.
A fine, lacy rain had begun to fall and Molkho quickened his steps until he came to a fish store that seemed in such an unlikely location that the only explanation for its being there was that it always had been. Somber gray swordfish lay on beds of crushed ice, and a woman sitting by a large tiled tub stared out the window at him, perhaps hoping he might buy a fish. Did she share in the store’s profits or was she simply a state employee who didn’t care if there were any? Once more regretting his mother-in-law’s vagueness, he walked as far as a large apartment building at the street’s end, crossed to its other side, and headed back at a convalescent pace, passing the fish store again and noticing old bullet holes in the walls of some of the houses. Enough! he scolded himself, worried that his leisurely promenade would be noticed from a window. Be glad you found the street. What does the house matter? Don’t be a worse perfectionist than she was! And yet the desire to know where she had lived persisted. For a whole year she’s run my life by remote control, he thought bitterly. It’s as though I’ve gone right on looking after her. How can I stop now?
He started back toward the underground, yet something in him would not admit defeat, and turning into another gray side street that was full of children on their way home from school, he stepped into a small stationery store with an old-fashioned bell that tinkled each time someone entered. Here, he felt sure, his wife had once bought her school supplies. There was no display window, all the merchandise being ranged behind the counter, and Molkho took out a ten-mark note, mentally chose a pencil and a notebook as mementos, and awaited his turn in the line of quiet children. Behind him the bell tinkled again and a new band of youngsters entered the store, among them a tall blond girl with large glasses and a wistful stare.
Molkho pointed in silence to the items on a shelf, smiling sagely to confirm the storeowner’s selection. He received a handful of change, stepped back out into the street, waited for the girl to emerge, and set out after her at a safe distance with a quicker though still ruminative gait. The girl, who had on an old gray raincoat, walked as far as the corner and turned familiarly into his wife’s deserted street. This is as far as I go, he told himself, a shiver running down his spine. I’ve done all I could, I cared for her to the end, and even if she still expects me to follow her, it’s time I thought of myself. I have children who need me, an old mother in Jerusalem, and a mother-in-law with a broken arm. Even in a free country a middle-aged man trailing a strange girl down an empty, rainy street would seem suspicious. And, indeed, the girl now turned around to look, her glasses glinting in the gray light. With a show of unconcern, he watched her disappear through a doorway. Suppose I say that’s the house, then, he told himself. Suppose I do. Isn’t that enough?
30
AFTER ALL, he thought, it’s not me who lived there or lay there having dead babies. It’s no concern of mine—why stand here with my heart in my throat? And yet he kept on toward it down the unpronounceable street, which swerved oddly at that point, as if badly rebuilt from a wartime bombing. Barely half an hour had passed since his descent into the underground, yet he was so wet to the bones from the driving rain that he felt he had to get out of it and so took shelter in the entrance to the house, a prewar apartment building that appeared to have seen better days. Several mailboxes lined a small vestibule that was too dark for him to read the names on them, and he opened a door that led to a dimly lit staircase, beside which stood the small red cage of an elevator. Then this really is it! he exulted, staring at the ancient box, which suddenly rose with an animal wheeze in response to a call from above, malignantly dragging its dark tail of cables behind it.
He waited in vain for it to return, its caller having apparently vanished. At last, he pressed the button himself. With a jerk and a wheeze the gray tail slid past, followed by the red cage. Molkho opened the two doors of ancient grillwork, entered the malignant cell, and pressed a button, watching the apartment slip by. Once, long ago, her faith in life already shattered, a young girl had stepped forth from one of those
doors on her way to Jerusalem. But did I really kill her? he wondered. The elevator stopped, letting him out in a hallway, where he first looked for a door without a name and then knocked on one that had several. There was silence, followed by the scrape of a chair across a floor. A child clambered up to reach the high lock and opened the door a crack, peering earnestly out at the stranger. “Doctor Starkmann?” Molkho asked the wide-eyed little boy, who was apparently all alone. “Doctor Starkmann?” The boy frowned adorably, as if trying to recall the man who had killed himself here fifty years ago, and made a move to shut the door. For a second Molkho tried stopping him, flattening himself sideways as if to slip through the crack; then, with a quick backward step, he turned and dashed down the stairs and into the rainy street to the underground, by which he returned to the Alexanderplatz, which now seemed safely familiar, despite the falling night.
31
IF YOU’RE NOT OUT TO CHANGE THE WORLD, even East Berlin can be home, Molkho thought, passing the War Memorial again, where the tongues of flame flared up in the darkness with a stark beauty. Maybe I should take one last look inside so that I can say I tried everything. Attaching himself to some tourists, he was delighted to discover that they were French and that he finally could understand what the guide was saying. Karl Friedrich Schinkel, it appeared, was the name of the architect of the building, a neoclassical structure with Doric steps and columns that was built in 1816–1818. A guardhouse during the nineteenth century, it was converted into a war memorial after World War I and rededicated to the victims of militarism and fascism after World War II. Molkho listened with interest to the lively questions of the French tourists and then followed them across the boulevard to the old Berlin Opera House, which they were allowed to enter, despite the renovation underway.
Five Seasons Page 37