by Ian Mcewan
As the weather grew warmer in May, the off-duty Americans set up softball games in the rough ground between the warehouse and the perimeter fence. They were under strict instructions to wear the insignia of radar operatives. The Vopos over by the cemetery watched the games through field glasses, and when a long ball sailed over the sector boundary they ran forward willingly and lobbed it back. The players cheered, and the Vopos waved good-naturedly. Leonard sat out with his back to the wall watching the games. One reason he refused to join in was that softball looked like nothing more than rounders for grown-ups. The other reason was that he was useless at any game with a ball. In this one the throws were hard and low and pitilessly accurate, and the catches were all taken in an obligatory offhand manner.
Every day now there were hours of idleness. He often leaned against the wall in the sun below an open window. One of the Army clerks propped a wireless on the sill and broadcast AFN to the players. When a lively song came up, the pitcher might pat out a rhythm on his knees before a throw, and the men out on the bases would snap their fingers and practice little shuffles. Leonard had never seen popular music taken so seriously. Only one performer could temporarily halt the game. If it was Bill Haley and the Comets, and especially if it was “Rock Around the Clock,” there would be shouts for more volume, and players would drift toward the window. For two and a half minutes no one could strike out. To Leonard, the unrestrained exhortation to dance for hours on end seemed puerile. It was a counting song that girls with a skipping rope might chant in the playground. It was “Hickory Dickory Dock,” it was “One potato, two potato, three potato, four….” But with repetition, the thumping rhythm and the virile insistence of the guitar began to stir him, and he moved from hating the song to pretending to hate it.
Soon he was glad when the mail clerk crossed his office at a cue from the announcer and turned up the volume. More than half a dozen players would come and stand around where he was sitting. They were mostly sentries in their late teens, clean and huge, with bristling heads. All of them knew his first name by now, and they were always friendly. For them the song seemed to have more than musical importance. It was an anthem, a rite; it bound these players and separated them from the older men who stood waiting on the field. This state of affairs lasted only three weeks before the song lost its power. It was played loudly, but it did not interrupt the game. Then it was ignored altogether. A replacement was needed, but it did not come until April of the following year.
It was at the height of Bill Haley’s triumph at the warehouse, just as the young Americans were jostling around the open window one afternoon, that John MacNamee came looking for his spy. Leonard saw him walking from the administration offices toward the din. MacNamee had not yet seen him, and there was just time to dissociate himself from what the government scientist was bound to despise. However, he felt a certain defiance, and a degree of loyalty to the group. He was an honorary member. He compromised by standing and pushing his way through to the edge of the crowd, where he waited. As soon as MacNamee saw him, Leonard went toward him, and together they set off for a walk along the perimeter fence.
MacNamee had his lit pipe between his baby teeth. He leaned toward his charge. “I suppose you’ve had no luck.”
“Not really,” Leonard said. “I’ve been in five different offices with time to look around. Nothing. I’ve made approaches to various technical people. They’re all very security-conscious. I couldn’t press too hard.”
The truth was he had had one unsuccessful minute in Glass’s office. He did not find it easy to fall into conversation with strangers. He had tried a couple of locked doors, that was all.
MacNamee said, “Did you have a go at that chap Weinberg?”
Leonard knew the one, a whippet-shaped American with a skullcap who played chess with himself in the canteen. “Yes. He didn’t want to talk.”
They stopped and MacNamee said, “Ah well …” They were looking toward the Schönefelder Chaussee, more or less along the line of the tunnel. “That’s too bad,” MacNamee said. He spoke with an unfamiliar tightness, Leonard thought, a deliberation that seemed more than disappointment.
Leonard said, “I did try.”
MacNamee looked away while he spoke. “We’ve got other possibilities, of course, but you keep trying.” His flat emphasis on this last word, an echo of Leonard’s, suggested skepticism, an accusation of some sort.
With a farewell grunt, MacNamee set off for the administration section. There came to Leonard an image of Maria walking away from him too, across the rough ground. Maria and MacNamee, showing him their backs. Across the grass the Americans were already back at their game. He felt his failure as a weakness in his legs. He had been about to walk back to his place by the window, but for the moment he did not feel like it, and remained where he was, out by the wire.
Eleven
Leonard stepped out of the lift onto his landing the following evening and found Maria waiting for him by his door. She was standing in the corner, her coat buttoned up, both hands on the strap of her handbag, which hung down in front of her, covering her knees. It might have been an attitude of contrition, but she held her head up and her eyes were on his. She defied him to assume that by seeking him out she had forgiven him. It was almost dusk, and very little natural light reached the landing through the east-facing window. Leonard had pushed the timed light switch at his elbow, and it had begun to tick. The sound resembled the panicked heartbeat of a minute creature. The doors slid shut behind him and the lift sank away. He said her name, but he made no move toward her. The single overhead light made deep shadows under her eyes and nose and gave her face a hard appearance. She had not spoken yet, she had not moved. She was staring at him, waiting for whatever he had to say. The buttoned coat and formal grip on the handbag hinted that she was ready to leave if she was not satisfied.
Leonard was flustered. Too many half-sentences were crowding before him. He had been handed a gift he could easily destroy in the unwrapping. The light-switch mechanism by him raced softly, making it harder to settle on a coherent thought. He said her name again—the sound simply left his throat—and took a half-step toward her. From the shaft came the rumble of the cables hauling their burden upward, the sigh of the lift settling on the floor below, then the doors opening and Mr. Blake’s voice, urgent and muted. It was abruptly cut off by the sound of his front door closing.
Nothing in her expression had changed. Finally he said, “Did you get those letters?”
She blinked in acknowledgment. The three letters of love and breathless apology and the chocolates and the flowers were not to be considered here. He said, “What I did was very stupid.” She blinked again. This time the lashes touched for a fraction longer, suggesting a softening, a form of encouragement. He had his tone now, simplicity. It was not so difficult. “I ruined everything. I’ve been desperate since you went. I wanted to come and find you in Spandau, but I was ashamed. I didn’t know how you would ever be able to forgive me. I was ashamed of approaching you in the street. I love you very much, I’ve been thinking about you all the time. I’ll understand if you can’t forgive me. It was a horrible and stupid thing …”
Leonard had never in his life spoken about himself and his feelings in such a way. Nor had he even thought in this manner. Quite simply, he had never acknowledged in himself a serious emotion. He had never gone much further than saying he quite liked last night’s film, or hated the taste of lukewarm milk. In fact, until now, it was as though he had never really had any serious feelings. Only now, as he came to name them—shame, desperation, love—could he really claim them for his own and experience them. His love for the woman standing by his door was brought into relief by the word, and sharpened the shame he felt for assaulting her. As he gave it a name, the unhappiness of the past three weeks was clarified. He was enlarged, unburdened. Now that he could name the fog he had been moving through, he was at last visible to himself.
But he was not in the clear. Maria ha
d not shifted her position or her gaze. He said, after a pause, “Please forgive me.” At that moment the time mechanism clicked and the light went out. He heard Maria breathe in sharply. When his eyes had adjusted he could see the gleam of the window behind him reflected on the clasp of her handbag and in the whites of her eyes as she seemed to glance away. He took a risk and came away from the light switch without pressing it. His elation gave him confidence. He had behaved badly; now he was going to put things right. What was demanded of him was truth and simplicity. He would no longer sleepwalk through his misery, he would name it accurately and in that way dispel it. And with the opportunity provided by this near darkness, he was about to re-establish by means of touch the old bond between them, the simple, truthful bond. The words could come later. For now, all that was required, he was convinced, was that they should hold hands, perhaps even kiss lightly.
As he crossed toward her she moved at last, back into the corner of the landing, deeper into the shadows. When he came close he put out his hand, but she was not quite there. He had brushed her sleeve. Again, he caught sight of the whites of her eyes as her head appeared to duck away. He found her elbow and held it gently. He whispered her name. Her arm was crooked tight and unyielding, and through the material of her coat he could feel her trembling. Now he was close, he was aware of her breathing fast and shallow. There was a sweaty taste in the air. For an instant he thought that she had mounted swiftly to the extremities of sexual arousal, a thought rendered instantly blasphemous when he moved his hand to her shoulder and she half called out, half screamed an inarticulate sound, followed by “Mach das Licht an. Bitte! Turn on the light!” and then, “Please, please.” He placed a second hand on her shoulder. He shook her gently, reassuringly. All he wanted to do was wake her from this nightmare. He had to remind her who he was really, the young innocent she had sweetly coaxed and brought on. She screamed again, this time at full strength and piercingly. He backed off. A door opened on the floor below. There were rapid footsteps on the stairs that ran around the lift shaft.
Leonard pressed the light switch just as Mr. Blake rounded the corner of the half-landing. He took the final flight of stairs three at a time. He was in shirtsleeves and without a tie, and he had silver armbands around his biceps. His face was hard, emanating ferocious military competence, and his hands were tensed and open at the ready. He was prepared to do someone a lot of harm. When he arrived at the top of the stairs and took in Leonard, his face did not relax. Maria had let her handbag drop to the floor and had raised her hands to cover her nose and mouth. Blake took up a position between Leonard and Maria. His hands were on his hips. He already knew he was not going to have to hit anyone, and this added to his ferocity.
“What’s going on here?” he demanded of Leonard, and without waiting for a reply he turned away impatiently and confronted Maria. His voice was kindly. “Are you hurt? Has he tried to hurt you?”
“Of course I haven’t,” Leonard said.
Blake called over his shoulder, “Shut up!” and turned back to Maria. His voice was immediately kind again. “Well?”
He was like an actor in a wireless comedy, Leonard thought, doing all the voices. Because he did not like Blake standing between them like a referee, Leonard crossed the landing, pressing the light switch on his way to give them another ninety seconds. Blake was waiting for Maria to speak, but he seemed to know that Leonard was coming up behind. He put out an arm to stop Leonard walking around him and going to Maria. She had said something Leonard had not caught, and Blake was replying in competent German. Leonard disliked him more. Was it out of loyalty to Leonard that Maria answered in English?
“I’m sorry to make this noise and bring you from your house. It’s something between us, that’s all. We can make it better.” She had taken her hands from her face. She picked up her handbag. Having it in her hands seemed to restore her. She spoke around Blake, though not quite to Leonard. “I’ll go inside now.”
Leonard took out his key and stepped around Maria’s savior to open the door. He leaned in and turned on his hall light.
Blake had not moved. He was not satisfied. “I could phone a taxi for you. You could sit with my wife and me until it comes.”
Maria crossed the threshold and turned to thank him. “You’re very kind. I’m okay now, see. Thank you.” She walked confidently along the hall of the apartment she had never visited, stepped into the bathroom and closed the door.
Blake stood at the head of the stairs with his hands in his pockets. Leonard felt too vulnerable, and too irritated by his neighbor, to offer further explanations. He stood irresolutely by his door, restrained from going indoors until the other man had gone away.
Blake said, “Women generally scream like that when they think they’re about to be raped.”
The ludicrous knowingness of the remark called for an elegant rebuttal. Leonard thought hard for several seconds. What impeded him was that he was being mistaken for a rapist when in fact he had almost been one. In the end he said, “Not in this case.” Blake shrugged to indicate his skepticism and descended the stairs. From then on, whenever the two men met by the lift, they did so in cold silence.
Maria had locked the bathroom door and washed her face. She lowered the lid on the toilet and sat there. She had surprised herself by her scream. She did not really believe that Leonard had wanted to assault her again. His awkward and sincere apologies had been adequate guarantee. But the sudden darkness and his quiet approach, the possibilities, the associations, had been too much for her. The delicate equilibrium she had developed during three weeks in her parents’ stuffy apartment in Pankow had come apart at the touch of Leonard’s hand. It was like a madness, this fear that someone pretending affection should want to do her harm. Or that a malice she could barely comprehend should take on the outer forms of sexual intimacy. Otto’s occasional assaults, dreadful as they were, did not inspire anything like this sickness of fear. His violence was an aspect of his impersonal hatred and sodden helplessness. He did not wish to do her harm and long for her. He wanted to intimidate her and take her money. He did not want to get inside her, he did not ask her to trust him.
The trembling in her arms and legs had ceased. She felt foolish. The neighbor would despise her. In Pankow she had come slowly to the decision that Leonard was not malicious or brutal, and that it was an innocent stupidity that had made him behave the way he had. He lived so intensely within himself that he was barely aware of how his actions appeared to others. This was the benign judgment she had reached by way of much harsher evaluations and emphatic resolutions never to see him again. Now, with her scream in the dark, her instincts seemed to have overriden her forgiveness. If she could no longer trust him, and even if her mistrust was irrational, what was she doing in his bathroom? Why had she not accepted the neighbor’s offer of a taxi? She still wanted Leonard; she had realized that in Pankow. But what kind of man was it who crept up in the dark to apologize for a rape?
By the time she emerged ten minutes later, she had decided to talk to Leonard one more time and see what happened. She was not committed either way. She kept her coat on, buttoned up. He was in the living room. The overhead lights were on, and so were the Army issue standard and table lamps. He had taken up a position in the center of the room and looked, she thought as she came in, like a boy who had just had his backside thrashed. He gestured toward a chair. Maria shook her head. Someone was going to have to speak first. Maria did not see why it should be her, and Leonard was wary of making another mistake. She came further into the room and he took a couple of steps back, unconsciously granting her more space and light.
Leonard had the outlines of a speech in mind, but he was not certain how it would go down. If Maria were to absolve him of the responsibility for further explanation by turning on her heel and slamming the front door on her way out, he would be relieved, at least initially. When he was alone, there was a sense in which he ceased to exist. Here, now, he had to take control of a situation with
out destroying it. Maria was watching him expectantly. She was offering another chance. Her eyes were bright. He wondered if she had been crying in the bathroom.
He said, “I didn’t mean to frighten you.” He was tentative; it was almost a question. But she did not have an answer for him, yet. In all this time she had not spoken a word to him. She had spoken only to Mr. Blake. Leonard said, “I wasn’t going to … to do anything. I only wanted …” He was sounding implausible. He fumbled. To get up close in the dark and hold her hand, that was all he had wanted, to illuminate with the old terms of touch. It was his unexamined assumption that he was safer under cover. He could not tell her, he hardly knew it himself, that the chance darkness on the landing was one with the gloom under the covers in the coldest week of winter, back in the old familiarity when everything had been new. The blade of calluses on her toe, the mole with two hairs, the minuscule dents on her lobes. If she went, what was he going to do with all these loving facts, these torturing details? If she wasn’t with him, how would he bear all this knowledge of her alone? The force of these considerations drove the words out of him, they came as easily as breath. “I love you,” he said, and then he said it again, and repeated it in German until he had expunged the last traces of self-consciousness, the wincing foolishness of the formula, until it was clean and resonant, as though no one in life or in films had ever uttered it before.
Then he told her how miserable he had been without her, how he had thought about her, how happy he had been before she went away, how happy he thought they both had been, how precious and beautiful she was, and what an idiot, a selfish, ignorant fool, he had been to frighten her. He had never said so much in one go. In the pauses, when he was searching for the unfamiliar, intimate phrases, he pushed his glasses up his nose, or took them off, examined them closely and replaced them. His height seemed to work against him. He would have sat down if only she had.