Child of the Light (12 page)

"I'm afraid neither Prinz Wilhelm nor the Feldmarschall is in a very good mood." Viereck's German was edged with an American accent. "The price of newspapers has gone up again. I remember when a single mark bought a quart of Fauwenhauser."

"Third time this week," the prince said sourly. "All this babbling and squabbling, inflation out of control--" he slapped the paper--"revolutionaries and reactionaries running amok, foreigners and Jews and post-war profiteers stealing the country from under us!"

Stung by the racial slur, Sol looked to Rathenau for guidance. The Foreign Minister flashed him a look that said
stay calm.

"We Germans were like the woman in the Aladdin story, too quick to give away the old lamp." Von Hindenburg cleared his throat huskily and adjusted his purple sash. Four starfish-shaped medals gleamed upon a chest once more massive than his belly.

"The Kaiser's greatest wish is to return and march with the workers against the government," Viereck said.

The American looked from Solomon to von Hindenburg, who drew his bushy brows together in an exaggerated frown. "Can the boy be trusted?" the general asked in a rough voice. "He has the features of a Jew."

You have the jowls of a bloodhound, Sol thought, stiffening.

"He
is
a Jew. Therefore I trust him as I do my own judgment," Rathenau said. "Fully."

"You think too highly of Jews, Herr Foreign Minister," von Hindenburg said.

"Perhaps not highly enough," Rathenau replied in an even tone.

Solomon lowered his gaze. For a while he had felt invisible; now he was certain everyone in the room was staring at him.
 
He pretended to examine one of the massive tapestries hanging on the wall.

For all the times Sol had walked past the Adlon, this was the first time he had been inside. The outside was simple, a plain building with long wrought-iron windows, but the inside--tapestries and floor-to-ceiling shelves filled with leather-bound books, crimson curtains, walls wainscoted in mahogany and vaulted ceilings buttressed by elaborate plaster trellises. Words like
putsch
and
purge
and
anarchy
seemed to float in the air and he would not have been surprised to find the Kaiser walking across the candelabra-lit lounge.

"The Kaiser cannot regain the crown, he knows that," he heard the prince say. "He seeks only
Heldentod,
the hero's death he was previously denied."

So the Kaiser had desired
Heldentod
after all! Sol could hardly wait to tell Erich. Other boys at school had claimed the Kaiser was a coward. At the expense of several black eyes and split lips, Sol and Erich had insisted otherwise.

"Our beloved Wilhelm shall have his wish," von Hindenburg said. "I shall serve as scapegoat for our military humiliations and the sheep shall flock to someone--perhaps Walther here--who will lead Germany if not to higher heights then at least to solidarity."

He snapped his fingers and a waiter appeared with a tray of brandy snifters and a decanter. "Let us drink to solidarity," von Hindenburg said.

The four men drank, and Sol was filled with awe at how calmly and quickly history could be rechanneled.

Within moments he was out on the street, following Rathenau, who moved silently and at an energetic pace.

Sol's notions of a
Spaziergang
underwent a dramatic change. His father's penchant was for leisurely constitutionals along well-worn paths, conversing as he walked or pausing at benches to rest and argue a particular point, while Rathenau hiked wordlessly along Wilhelmstrasse, as if allowing the city's penury and seething anger to be his mouthpiece.

His senses opened by the Adlon luncheon, Sol took in everything with a tourist's unease: the farmers and fishmongers near the Ministry of Justice, hawking wilted wildflowers, lettuce, and oily, overpriced herring; the air, filled with grit and the stench of exhaust; the buildings' gray austerity. The streets seemed more littered with garbage and more asprawl with drunks and other dispossessed than he recalled:
Schieber
--foreign blackmarketeers--worked every street corner; political saviors wearing red cockades or black armbands stood on principles and soap crates, embracing immutable ideals Sol was sure they would be willing to discard for a meal or a few hundred marks; scurrying urchins poked and pleaded, offering shoeshines, sisters, the wisdom of white powders, the serenity of a syringe.

There were women, too, posing as ladies while promising to raise skirts but not prices, offering heavenly communions to be consummated in the privacy of the nearest alley.

"What this nation needs is a generation of
reasonable
Nationalists--Gentiles
and
Jews--willing to work together for God and good government...the dream of a true democracy," Rathenau said. He slapped his walking stick against his palm. He was walking so fast that Solomon had to run lightly to keep pace with him. "Europe has a history of vesting absolute power in one individual. I intend to position myself to block that sort of thing from happening again."

He halted. Putting his hands on Sol's shoulders, he looked down into the boy's eyes. "As I watched your performance last night, you reminded me so much of myself," he said. "Struggling. Forced to play solo. You are the new generation, Sol. With my help you may not have to accept, as I had to, that, in Germany, Jews will always be second-class citizens."

As suddenly as he had taken hold of Solomon, he let go. "Constant vigilance is exhausting, Solomon," he said, in a tired voice. "There are times I want to lie down and pull Berlin's sidewalks over me."

Sol looked down at his feet. How many weary men's spirits lay beneath the city? Perhaps theirs were the voices he heard, he thought, wondering fleetingly what the Foreign Minister might say about the voices and sounds in the sewer.

"Back in '18, I decided to retire," the Foreign Minister said softly, moving on. "I've a summer house in Bavaria--"

"Papa showed me pictures of it in
Der Weltspiegel
," Sol said.

"I intended to live there, away from all this. Fortunately for Germany--though unfortunately for me, since it thwarted my retirement plans--I decided to have the bedrooms repapered. One afternoon, the paper hanger and I talked as he worked. After listening to him, I realized that, with people like him around, my role in our country's history remained incomplete."

They rounded the corner at the Reichschancellery and headed down Friedrich Ebert Strasse. The cigar store was half a block away.

"The man proposed that Germany depopulate the African island of Madagascar and repopulate it with European Jews," Rathenau went on. "'The solution to the Jewish problem,' he said, 'is to pen them like wild dogs, tame them, and use what assets and abilities they possess for the good of humanity.'"

Until now, Sol had done what he did when his parents spoke Yiddish, a language he only partially understood: he had allowed the conversation to flow around him like a piece of music he had never heard before. Usually, if he relaxed into it that way, the pieces became a cohesive whole. However, what the Foreign Minister was saying now made no sense at all.

"He wanted to send the Jews to Madagascar? He must have been crazy!"

"I thought so too, and had him removed from the premises," the Foreign Minister said. "Shortly after that, I heard that he'd entered politics, and now Bavaria's National-Socialists support his ideas--"

Shouting interrupted him. Sol stared in the direction of the voices. Down the block, Erich was backing out of the shop.

"You may be my son, but your actions are that of an imbecile!" Herr Weisser yelled. He was standing in the doorway of the shop, shaking his fist at Erich.

"Leave me alone, Papa!"

Erich turned, dashed across the street without any regard for traffic, and disappeared into the apartment house.

Herr Weisser, his face red with rage, fell silent. Apparently, Sol thought, he had run out of effective yet moderate epithets to hurl at his son.

"Maybe we should detour through Leipzigerplatz before going inside," Rathenau said.

Solomon shook his head. Once Friedrich and Erich started arguing, it would take longer than a stroll through the plaza for their tempers to cool. "Erich probably tried to sneak another dog into the apartment," he said, wondering why Herr Weisser had gone back into the shop instead of following his son.

"That much trouble over a dog?"

"Herr Weisser has agreed to let Erich keep a small dog in the apartment, but Erich says the little ones are toys. It's worse since he's joined the Freikorps-Youth--"

Sol stopped and, with a sick feeling, glanced up at Rathenau. During the waning months of the war, the Foreign Minister had financed a Freikorps unit, a movement that had begun before the war with Wandervögel--birds of passage--boys and girls who enjoyed outdoor activities. Some of those young men had been part of Rathenau's corps, but the years of fighting had hardened their idealism into hatred. In Sol's opinion, the post-war Freikorps-Youth was a step further down. A big step. Many of the boys were homeless ruffians, easily influenced; and the leaders, Jew-haters.

Judging by the set look on his face, the Foreign Minister had heard all right--and taken note. Sol practiced the truth in his head:
It just slipped out. I didn't mean to kill your chances with Miriam.
At least he had not told Herr Rathenau that his friend talked to dogs. This was bad enough, but that would really have done it!

"Anyway, they fight about dogs," he said weakly as they entered the shop.

"Calm down, Friedrich, for God's sake," his papa was saying. "Why make a national tragedy out of it? They're just children."

They?
Sol thought, wondering what Papa meant. Then he saw Miriam seated in the corner, her hands demurely folded on the table. He could see her face clearly now. She was even more beautiful than he had thought at first, and younger, nearer to fifteen than seventeen. Her eyes were a startling violet, and though her chignon was almost black, her skin had the bone-china delicacy that usually went with auburn hair.

"Miriam! What's going on? What are you doing here?" Rathenau looked from her to Herr Weisser, who was glaring at her as if she had two heads.

Jumping up, she ran over to him and threw her arms around his waist. "They're making such a fuss, Uncle Walther!" The action pulled up her tennis skirt; Sol tried not to stare too hard at her tanned legs.

"Fuss? Smoking, kissing!" Friedrich spun around toward her uncle. "Is that what they taught your niece in America?"

"I asked Konnie to bring me along when he told me you wanted him to pick you up here," Miriam said. "I wanted to surprise you. Erich was here, and we talked--"

"Talked?" Friedrich looked flushed. "You two broke into our shop!"

"Erich was showing me his lock picks," Miriam said.

"Showing
off,
you mean, and you encouraged him! And what did you two do once you were in?" Friedrich pointed at her. "For shame!"

Rathenau took hold of Weisser's hand and, looking less than amused, drew down the man's arm. "Such a small matter, Herr Weisser. Don't upset yourself so. We should all remember that when the trivial becomes important, the important becomes trivial. Why don't we go to your parlor, have coffee and a cigar, and talk this out like gentlemen."

"Talk! That's all you Jews are good at."

Sol saw Papa pale as he stepped in front of Herr Weisser and silenced his partner with an ominous glare. Rathenau's face hardened, and his knuckles tightened around his walking stick as if he wanted to thrash Friedrich Weisser. Taking Miriam by the arm, he said softly, "I guess this is a family matter after all. Come, child."

"At least let me call a taxi for you." Sol's father did not take his gaze off Weisser.

"My chauffeur will be here momentarily." Rathenau reached out and shook Sol's father's hand. "Things will work out. We'll get together...another day."

"So! He's gone!" Jacob Freund said to his partner after Rathenau stepped outside. "Shame on you, Friedrich! They say he may become Germany's president, and you treat him like dirt. What the children did was foolish, but--"

"You're an imbecile yourself if you think such behavior trivial. If you had seen them, behaving like that in my shop!"

"Our shop, Friedrich," Jacob said.

Sol watched his father carefully. His voice was gentle, yet it clearly indicated that Herr Weisser had overstepped both business and personal propriety. The business, begun by his father a dozen years before the war, involved a seventy-thirty split between the two men. Herr Weisser had been a bicycling
hamster
--an impoverished peddler who went out to the countryside each morning for produce to hawk--before Papa took him into the business, first as
Shabbas
help, and permanently when Papa had volunteered to fight for his country and needed someone to run the shop.

"Why don't we do as Herr Rathenau suggested? Let's go home--your home if you prefer. We'll drink a good strong cup of coffee. Talk."

"For all the good it will do," Friedrich said, but he began locking up the store.