‘We’ll take you back any time you want.’ Licht raised his glass again. ‘Come and apply for a job. We always need good researchers.’
‘Thank you.’ Aaron raised his own glass once more. ‘It’s been really fascinating, but I’m not really made for this sort of work. I’m not very good at compartmentalising.’
‘Neither am I,’ said Licht. ‘I quite understand. It’s difficult, isn’t it?’
Bernd handed him a present from all the interns, a framed black-and-white photograph of the Stasi headquarters as they were being stormed by protesters, with shredded files and spools of tape all over the place. Aaron could hardly speak, so surprised was he by this outpouring of goodwill and warmth. They moved on to the bar with the cocktails in those silly teacups, and stayed there until Aaron staggered home in the early morning hours.
When he walked into the kitchen he found a cake covered in clingfilm, a mighty carrot cake with thick icing and marzipan carrots on top, and a card from his flatmates.
Hello Aaron! We hope you had a good LAST DAY AT WORK! Now you are free! Come to our performance tomorrow if you like, we will be dancing on a tightrope in the Tiergarten. Petra & Cem
Gosh, that was unexpected. Had they all co-ordinated this rush of love? Aaron ate one of the marzipan carrots, then some of the icing, then a slice of the actual cake, and then he went to bed.
*
The next morning, bludgeoned by a hangover, Aaron tried to tidy his room. He threw away redundant photocopies of the Valentin papers, stray bits of sticky tape, spent highlighters. Slowly the room returned to its original sparse state – the bare wooden floor, the bed, the glass desk.
On the desk was the page concerning the child Ella Valentin. Damn. He rubbed his face.
When he hazarded a visit to the bathroom – steadying himself against the walls – he caught Petra and Cem on their way out of the flat. They were wearing matching grey harem pants and black T-shirts. He thanked them for the cake and apologised for probably missing their performance. They laughed.
‘There’s a whole box of aspirin in the bathroom cabinet,’ said Cem.
Petra pointed at a half-empty bottle of red on the kitchen table. ‘Forget the aspirin, just have another drink.’
‘I didn’t know you were into tightrope walking.’
‘We told you!’ Petra smiled and shook her head. ‘We even asked you if you wanted to join us, but you just gave us this blank stare and went back to your confetti.’
‘Did you manage to patch it all together?’ asked Cem.
‘Yes. Yes, I did,’ Aaron stammered, startled that they’d noticed. All that effort, for what? He’d have been better off learning to dance on a tightrope.
Later, over more carrot cake and strong coffee, Aaron weighed his options.
There was no way he could sneak back into the archive now and slip the page into the file; he had already handed in his security pass. The question was whether to hang on to it in the hope of returning it another time, or give it to Ella, which he should perhaps have done a long time ago.
He could recite the page almost by heart:
INFORMATION
The following has come to our knowledge through IM Erna:
The child Ella Valentin, b. 4.2.1979, regularly brings objects (toys, colouring books, illustrated art books, crayons) from the capitalist exterior (Federal Republic of Germany) to her primary school, the Clara-Zetkin-Schule in Berlin-Prenzlauer Berg.
Questioned about their provenance by IM Erna after class, the child stated that the objects were gifts from ‘family friends’ in the West. The child’s family live in close proximity to the border, in particular the border crossing at Bornholmer Straße/Bösebrücke. The child appeared unusually interested in this border crossing. She also took an unusually strong interest in incident 4091/5 (attempted flight by a GDR citizen) at the Bösebrücke.
On a separate occasion, IM Erna overheard the child tell her friends that her mother often went to artistic gatherings and exhibitions in the neighbourhood. When pressed, the child revealed to IM Erna that those gatherings took place in attics and private apartments. It can therefore be concluded that the mother is somewhat active in the unregulated art scene. The child’s mother and father are both art his-torians.
The mother of the child is Regine Valentin, b. 6.1.1947, employed as a lecturer in art history at the Humboldt Universität, ID no. —
The father of the child is Jochen Valentin, b. 21.11.1944, employed as a professor of art history at the Humboldt Universität, ID no. —
This situation bears certain similarities to the recent case of Professor Heiner Laut, an art historian in Leipzig who used his position to broker deals with foreign buyers and eventually absconded to the West on a research trip (report 676/5).
It is possible that the ‘family friends’ mentioned by the child Ella Valentin are West German art experts or dealers. If this is the case, Regine and Jochen Valentin may be selling works of art to West Berlin, possibly to build up a reserve of foreign currency. Combined with the child’s strong interest in the border, presumably sparked by conversations overheard between her parents, this raises the possibility that the family may be preparing to flee the Republic.
With a view to this evidence, I recommend adding Jochen and Regine Valentin to the central registry of personal surveillance. Given the couple’s professional renown, special care must be taken not to invite them in for questioning before sufficient evidence has been assembled.
Unit 7
Lieutenant —
Aaron cut off another slice of carrot cake. It would be easy enough to get rid of the page; paper was not stone. But even if he did, it would still be on his mind, and getting it out of there would be much trickier. And was it not a bit patronising to assume that Ella was better off not knowing this fact about her past? She trusted him, she would expect him to show this to her. What if she saw it and shrugged it off, quite rightly concluding that she hardly ought to feel guilty for bringing a toy to school as a child? He licked the icing off his fingers. Too much cake. He felt a bit sick. Or maybe it was still the booze.
The thing was, Ella would torture herself over something like this. Wouldn’t see it with the right sense of distance and perspective. Ah, it was difficult. And with a head like this, he wasn’t going to decide on it any time soon.
III
A More Permanent Obstacle
Our Spelling Book, Volk und Wissen Verlag, 1968 (Courtesy of the Baltzer family)
34
Ella
Homecoming
Berlin 2010
IT WAS A SUNNY afternoon and Aaron and I were walking along the Landwehrkanal, past cafes where people drank beer and Apfelschorle in the shade of big trees. Berlin was so spacious compared to London, as if someone had taken the city and stretched it out like dough.
‘I would be pleased if someone spat at something I made,’ I said. ‘It would show they cared.’
‘I’d prefer quiet disapproval.’ Aaron took off his jacket and slung it over his shoulder. ‘Or false praise. False praise is so underrated.’
‘The point is that it’s a visceral, physical reaction, and it doesn’t actually matter whether it’s positive or negative. The strength of the reaction alone is a good thing.’
‘Not for the cleaning lady.’ He stopped to drop a coin into the hat of a busker playing Pachelbel’s Canon in D. Aaron was the only person I knew who always gave money to buskers. We stayed there for a while, listening to the music.
‘When the Expressionists had their very first show at a gallery in Munich, they had to wipe down their paintings every night after closing time,’ I said. ‘Every night.’
‘And you think they liked that?’
‘I think they knew they were on to something very powerful.’
We walked on.
‘I haven’t made anything in a long time,’ I continued. ‘I used to think that it was all the art market’s fault, that my work wasn’t taking off because it didn’t
cater to trendy ideas of boldness or wall power or whatever. But to be honest, it probably just wasn’t very good.’
‘Wall power?’
‘It’s something gallerists say. When a work of art is so compelling that you walk into a room and are transfixed by it.’
‘What’s the worst that could happen if you started making something again?’
‘It could be shit?’
‘Fair enough.’
We laughed, and suddenly the idea of making things didn’t seem quite so frightening anymore. People had made bad art in the past. People would make bad art in the future. What was wrong with contributing to that particular creative tradition?
We sat down by the canal. A cyclist with a trailer full of children passed us on the wide pavement, and a man with a pig on a leash. The water sparkled in the sunlight. Around us, people in shorts and T-shirts were eating ice cream from a van on the corner. It felt like all of Berlin was on holiday.
I began to hum a tune I remembered from Oma, and to my surprise, Aaron recognised it and sang along: ‘In einer kleinen Konditorei, da saßen wir zwei, bei Kuchen und Tee…’
When he’d finished, I asked: ‘Did you learn this from your Berliner granny?’
‘Ha, no, she’s more into Chopin. She’s coming to Berlin next month, have I told you? The director of the zoo is giving her a private tour. She was a big fan of the zoo as a child.’
‘That’s nice. I’m assuming the director didn’t just send her that letter out of the blue?’
‘I may have encouraged him a bit.’ He said it with a sweet note of pride. It reminded me of the time we went to that Kneipe in Mitte, and he told me about his work on the file. He’s someone who likes to fix things, I thought.
He opened two bottles of beer and passed me one. I took a sip.
‘I’m going to see Kuboweit tomorrow.’
‘Tomorrow? Have you spoken to him?’
‘No. Look, that was the problem with Frau Jankowitz and Frau Benedikt and even your beloved Dr Licht. I did what they expected me to do. I gave them plenty of advance warning, and all they had to do was prepare their version of the story and stick to it.’
He coughed. ‘You think they were dishonest with you?’
‘Not dishonest, not exactly. But they were on-message, if you want. They knew what they were going to say. They’d had time to think about it.’
Aaron had the kind of face that was completely open, like a screen displaying his thoughts. Right now, he looked distinctly shifty.
‘What’s the matter?’
‘Nothing, nothing.’ He coughed again. ‘Do you want me to come with you?’
‘Thank you, but I should probably meet him alone.’
I did feel nervous about meeting Kuboweit. Not because I thought he would be dangerous, but because he might tell me things I was better off not knowing. Aaron seemed to be nervous, too, as if he was withholding something.
‘Seriously, what’s on your mind?’
‘Nothing,’ he repeated. ‘Maybe I’m a bit worried for you, that’s all. What if he slams the door in your face?’
‘I’ve thought of that,’ I said. ‘I’m going to tell him I’m doing a survey. And then, when we’re sitting down and he’s feeling comfortable, I’m going to tell him who I am.’
‘A survey.’ Aaron looked unconvinced.
‘Well, something along those lines. I’ll play it by ear.’
We finished our beers, and I got up to buy us ice creams from the van.
35
KUBOWEIT LIVED IN MARZAHN, a neighbourhood of prefab tower blocks on the eastern fringes of Berlin. The streets were named after Communist resistance fighters and Russian space explorers: Martha-Arendsee-Straße, Allee der Kosmonauten. The atmosphere reminded me of the Berlin of my childhood. Women with tired perms were smoking outside darkly curtained pubs with names like Imma Uff (‘Always Open’). The supermarkets advertised strawberries and asparagus, but the people inside were stocking up on beer and cigarettes. Nobody smiled at me, nobody wished me an excellent day. I felt at home.
I left the prefab high-rises behind and entered a quieter part of the neighbourhood, where whitewashed family homes with red-shingled roofs showed off their perfect front gardens. Here the streets were named after apple varieties: Jonathanweg, Herbstgoldweg, Honigrotstraße. And the houses and gardens were in fact a little like apples – wholesome, neat and glossy. I walked past elaborate displays of plastic windmills, bird baths, garden gnomes, or a combination of all three: a garden gnome sitting on the edge of a bird bath in the shape of a mill.
Kuboweit’s house looked like all the others, same bird bath, same red roof. A cat-shaped mat in front of the door. I wanted it to look more threatening, but it was just an ordinary house, and the man living inside it was probably just an ordinary man who remembered only rather dimly (if at all) where he had been and what he had done in the summer, autumn and winter of 1987.
When I rang the doorbell, a grey security camera zoomed in on me from above with a quiet whirring sound. The door opened, and a stocky little man of about sixty stepped out onto the mat, dressed in a cable-knit jumper and grey corduroy trousers.
‘Kuboweit.’ He stretched out his hand. ‘And you must be Ella. I’ve been expecting you.’
I stared at him, speechless.
‘You look very much like your mother,’ he said. He took my hand and shook it.
*
I followed him into a room at the back of the house, feeling rather stunned. The room was furnished sparsely with a desk, a sofa and a glass cabinet filled with Meissen figurines. On the window sill, a drab plant gathered dust. I could hear a clock ticking in the corridor.
‘Water?’ He opened a bottle of Selters. I thought of Frau Jankowitz and her biscuits. Perhaps this was a known technique, giving people food and water so they forgot to be hostile. He screwed the bottle top back on very slowly and carefully and placed the bottle in a drinks cabinet by his desk.
‘Your mother came to see me a couple of years ago,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry about your loss.’
I was about to ask him how he knew, then realised that was exactly what he wanted me to do. No, I would not give him the satisfaction. He handed me my glass, and I caught his scent. Not Privileg, of course not, they no longer manufactured it. A light, modern scent.
I studied Kuboweit’s face, trying to see the younger, stronger man who had interrogated my mother. Smoother skin, fuller hair. Angular glasses. Perhaps a military side parting. Dressed in a grey Stasi uniform, the type I had seen for sale in hipster antique shops here – with braided golden epaulettes, a hammer-and-sickle badge, a wide grey cap, a brown leather belt. He would have exuded a sense of unchallengeable authority, not only personal authority but the authority of an entire state.
When we are done with you, there will be no corner of your mind we won’t know. We will be completely at home in your mind, we will be there always.
He looked at me with open curiosity. ‘You’re much calmer than I thought, you know? Your mother wasn’t calm. I didn’t expect you to be calm.’
‘I don’t know how else to be,’ I said and felt a strange sense of embarrassment, as if he had diagnosed a crucial flaw in my character.
‘No, you don’t, do you?’ He studied my face. His voice was pleasant, deep and unhurried. This was the only voice my mother had heard during her months of solitary confinement, when even her guards had not been allowed to communicate with her. He had bullied her, he had charmed her. He had told her about her little darlings, Ella, Tobi and Heiko, and what they were all up to. How little Heiko was being force-fed by his carers.
Kuboweit leaned against his desk. ‘Do sit down.’
‘I’d rather stand.’
‘As you wish. At least you came through the front door. Your mother climbed over the garden fence. My wife and I were having lunch outside. She needn’t have bothered, there was nothing I could tell her that she didn’t know already.’
‘Did she…’ I b
egan.
‘I’ll have to tell you the same thing I told her. I have no idea where your brother is.’ He took a sip of water.
‘You must know. You were the one who told her that all of us would be taken away.’
He snorted. ‘So they’ve put the file back together, have they? I suppose it’s one way to pass the time. Is Licht still there?’
I nodded, and didn’t quite dare ask how they knew each other. Licht, who always kept his door open, just like my mother. Who had been in the shower when they came to arrest him. Who was no doubt still hoping to discover his own file one day.
Kuboweit continued: ‘Poor man. He’ll still be there in thirty years’ time, hooked up to an oxygen tank, going through the shredded files at night. Did you know he does that, stays in there overnight? He locks himself into the store room after everyone else has left for the day, and then he burrows through the paper bags. And I thought our work was tedious.’
Tedious. Could he not show at least a little remorse? I thought of Katia, with her little boy in the crawl space that smelled of fuel. How she didn’t even run to him when they pulled him out of the car; how she waited in her flat until they came for her.
Men like Kuboweit had owned our lives; we had obeyed them even when they had been nowhere near us. And we obeyed them still; we kept that instinct not to stand out, not to attract the wrong sort of attention, not to ask the wrong kind of questions. His pleasant voice had been the one that my mother heard when she screamed at night, when she fell out of her bed, when she wet her bed and then had to hose down the mattress in the morning, telling us she had spilled juice on it, because she felt so ashamed.
Shame was one of the most noble human feelings, I thought. It was a really important feeling. The fact that I felt ashamed now – ashamed of our failure to keep Heiko, ashamed of my fear, ashamed of all our embarrassing secrets – should be a source of strength, not weakness.
Confession with Blue Horses Page 23