Jacob's Oath (32 page)

“Oh, please, call me Gerti.”
He needs a shave.

“Of course, thank you, and you can call me Trudi. All right, Hans? Show Gertie around
the hotel and then we can have a nice glass of wine and we can talk things over. All
right, my dear?”

“That would be lovely.”

Over Sarah’s head, Hans raised an eyebrow to his mother. She nodded back with a smile.

Sarah tried to maintain her composure as she followed the Rat. It was too strange.
His ears were just as Jacob had described, but otherwise … it was impossible to put
this man in an SS uniform with jackboots and … and all the rest. She had come to hate,
but he looked so … ordinary. His words were a bit slurred, he was clearly tired and
must have been drinking. He smelled of beer and cigarettes.

They were in the dining room and he was telling her about the big ceramic stove. Its
carved tiles were glazed green and blue and had been in the family for two hundred
years. Like most of the antiques hanging from the ceiling or on the walls—musical
instruments, hunting tools, kitchen utensils, and antlers and horns—it came from an
earlier family restaurant that had to close because the building was so old it could
have fallen down at any moment and had to be demolished. The first restaurant there
had been in 1786 and the building itself was even older. There had been a students’
drinking club upstairs where they cleared the chairs, sprinkled sawdust, and fought
duels. But those were the good old days. That’s all forbidden now.

The stairs were added with the new floors in 1912, just before the Great War, they’re
narrow and they creak, be careful, and he stood aside so that she could go first.

As she mounted the stairs Sarah could feel the heat of her cheeks. She could feel
his gaze through her clothes. Hating herself, she swayed upstairs and he followed
four steps behind, and she knew his eyes never left her haunch. If he grabbed her
bottom, what would she do?

“This is the first floor, five single rooms, I’ll show you one.” He knocked on the
first door, and when there was no answer he turned a key in the lock and pushed the
door open. “After you. Just so you can see what we have to offer.” She peered in and
he put his hand against her back and gave a little push. “Nothing to be afraid of.
See. Quite small but cozy.”

It was. A double bed with a fluffy white feather bed and two large white pillows,
a carved wooden wardrobe, antique water jug in its glazed white bowl, a pretty Bavarian-style
dressing table and chair. Sarah nodded. Simple and tasteful.

“It’s a nice view from the window,” Hans said, pointing.

“Oh, I’m sure, it’s a very nice room,” Sarah said, and backed out into the corridor.

“There are two shared bathrooms on this floor. Upstairs, three rooms share one bathroom
and there are two suites with their own bathrooms. I’ll show you one of those.”

They turned at the mezzanine and again, as she climbed the stairs, she could feel
Hans’s eyes boring into her bottom. Ever so gently she swung her hips.

“Suite nine,” he said. “This is where I’m staying for the time being. Let me show
you, it’s our best room. I can even offer you a schnapps, the best.”

“Oh, no, thank you, I hardly drink and certainly not in the afternoon. And not just
before I talk to your mother,” she laughed. “I’m hoping she’ll give me a job here.”

“Oh, I think you don’t have much to fear about that. Here, please, sit down, I’ll
pour a small glass.”

Sarah sank into the soft sofa, and made herself smile.

He sat on the chair, poured himself a glass, said “Prost!” and drained it in one,
filled it again, and half-filled a second glass, which he placed in front of Sarah.
She looked around. “What a nice room,” she said, “and what a nice hotel.”

“You think?” Hans said, rolling his eyes. “I’ll drink to that,” and he drank again,
banging the glass down on the table. It was closer than he thought.

He stood up and went to the window. “Good view of the street from here, not noisy
at all. Very few cars.” He stood over the sofa. “I’m tired.”

Sarah looked up with a sweet smile. Their eyes met and hers widened just a touch.
She saw his chest rise and fall, his trousers twitch.

She shot up. “Well, thank you, Hans, you’re so kind, I’d better go and talk to your
mother.”

“No hurry, no hurry, she’ll be glad that we’re talking.” He fell down into the sofa
and patted it. “Sit back down, we have time.”

“You’re sweet. But really, I should be getting along. Maybe another time…”

Hans took her hand and pulled her down. “This is another time.” He snorted and his
head fell back against the high back. Sarah jumped up as if she’d had an electric
shock. He lay back, his eyes were closing.

She bent down and kissed his cheek. “Hans, would you like to see me tomorrow?”

His eyes flickered wider and wider. Sarah’s face was centimeters from his. Her lips
so close. He strained his neck toward her. “Yes, I would, here, will you come back?”

“That wouldn’t be right, would it, Hans? I mean, your mother … I know. Let’s meet
by the river, we can go for a walk.”

Hans stood and took Sarah’s hand. He went to kiss her but she stepped back. “Hans,
no, please, I’ve just met you. I’m not like that. But, tomorrow. Let’s meet tomorrow
by the river. Would you like that?”

Hans nodded. He was breathing fast. “Yes, yes. What time?”

“Well, I will be busy during the day. How about, um, let’s say eight o’clock? That
will give us an hour and a half before curfew. Then you can walk me home.” She looked
down, shyly. “Does it get dark about then? Am I being a bit forward? I don’t mean
to be, but…”

“No, you’re not, not at all. Yes, let’s meet at eight o’clock by the river. Between
the two bridges there’s a small wharf with some benches. We can meet down there. You
know it? Below the road, it’s nice and … quiet there.”

“Yes, I know it, Hans. That’s where I was going to say. It’s perfect for us. Eight
o’clock, then. But don’t be late, we won’t have much time.”

“I’ll be early! Yes. And I’ll walk you home afterwards.”

“You’re such a gentleman.”

“My home.”

Sarah threw her head back and laughed. “Hansi!”

THIRTY-TWO

Heidelberg,
June 11, 1945

Jacob paced in their small room with growing nausea. He wiped his clammy forehead
and pulled off his sticky shirt to splash himself with cold water.

And then he paced again. He held the steel rod in his right hand, and thwacked it
into the palm of his left. It was thirty centimeters long and three fingers thick.
He’d bought it in the hardware store, it was some kind of construction tool. He balanced
it in the middle on one finger to find its central point. He practiced smashing it
down from above his head. Swinging it in from the side. Up sharply from below if he
had to crush his balls. But with all the will in the world, and egged on by the baying
spirits of six million Jews … Six million? No way. But that’s the number on the radio …
still he could not bring any power to the blow.

He stood above the bed and arranged the two pillows. He held the club above his head
and wanted to obliterate them but brought it down like he was dusting a carpet. Harder,
man, harder! He tried again, but he knew at that rate he wouldn’t swat a fly.

He could not bring himself to unleash his hatred. The terrible fury in his belly only
made him want to vomit. He rushed to the sink, but nothing happened.

Jacob looked at his sweaty face in the mirror and down at the club in his hand as
if at a mirage, for he was sure of two things. He was not a killer. Yet when the time
came, when the Rat passed by, when it was Maxie’s moment, he would do what he had
to do. Hell, yes. Jacob hefted the club as he paced in the room, taking himself back
to that hateful place, summoning up all the demons that howled for revenge.

When the time comes, he promised them, watch me.

Just in time, he looked out the window to see Sarah approaching. She’s all dolled
up, he thought, as he kneeled at the bed and hid the club underneath.

“Why so smart, darling? You look gorgeous.” He kissed her on the cheek and sat down.
“Where have you been?”

“A job interview, it went well, I think. I have to go back tomorrow evening.”

“Really? Why? You didn’t tell me. Where?”

“A restaurant in Weststadt. I heard they had a vacancy and I thought, Why not? I can’t
depend on you forever.”

“Oh yes, you can. Why would you want to work? We have plenty of money. You should
stay at home.”

“And look after you?”

“Exactly. And I’ll look after you, too.”

“Oh, I see. You go out all day and have fun while I stay at home all day and…”

“You can go for a short walk in the morning.”

“… ha ha … and clean, cook, and … I don’t think so. My mother, I am not.”

“What’s the job?”

“Waitress.”

“What do you know about being a waitress?”

“Nothing.”

“Oh, you should get it, then.”

“What’s so hard about being a waitress? Anyway, I don’t mind either way, it was a
good excuse to put on my best clothes.”

“Well, you look beautiful. Come here.”

“Stop bossing me about. You come here.”

Jacob was half lying on the bed, one leg hanging to the floor. Sarah was standing
by the kettle, which was just beginning to whistle. Jacob patted the bed and made
a leering face. Sarah turned away, shaking her head.

“You have no right to deny me my conjugal rights,” Jacob said. “You only earn that
right after we have been married for six months.”

“Three.”

“Five.”

They settled on four and a half but Sarah had another idea. “Guess what. The cinema’s
open again. Let’s go. Guess what the first film is?”

“How should I know? Anyway, we’ll never get tickets. The whole town will want to go.”

Sarah smiled and raised her eyebrows as in, aren’t I a clever girl? She put her hand
in her top pocket and came out with two bits of paper. “Two tickets for tonight’s
showing of
The Gold Rush
.” She spoke like an announcer: “The sound version of Charlie Chaplin’s 1925 hit film.
And guess what?”

“You keep asking me to guess what. What is there to guess? Come here at once.” He
patted the bed furiously.

“
The Gold Rush
is the only silent film to be nominated for an Oscar for best sound production.”

“What time?”

“Six thirty. At the Schloss Kino. We should leave here at six, we’ll be in plenty
of time.”

“So the interview went well?”

“Yes, I think so, the owner was nice. About sixty years old. He needs help because
his wife is sick. What have you been doing?”

“Nothing much. The usual.”

They drank tea, chatted over a sandwich, and strolled to the cinema, where they sat
in the middle of one of the back rows. When the lights went out they held hands and
settled in for the film. Jacob looked at Sarah, at her expectant upturned face, and
marveled. She glanced at him and smiled. “I know,” she said, leaning toward him and
pecking him on the nose. “We’re so normal.”

They shook with laughter as Charlie Chaplin stuck two forks into two bread rolls like
legs and feet and danced them across the table and back, a ballet of bread, kicking
their legs and twirling their feet, his eyelashes and mustache twitching in time with
the music, and all the while the silent genius smiled and nodded in glee. The audience
loved it with more than just a shade of desperation. Weeks could go by in most people’s
lives without a smile.

The audience tittered nervously when Charlie began to boil his black leather shoe
in the pot for Thanksgiving dinner, and when he said, “We have something to be thankful
for,” a knowing murmur passed through the theater. But if there was a damping shudder
of recognition among the Germans it passed into hilarity when Charlie twirled the
boiled shoelace on his fork like an extralong strand of spaghetti and chewed it with
a beatific face.

Sarah laughed so much, Jacob looked at her. Is she hysterical? He looked at the screen
and back to Sarah. Is it that funny? Am I missing something? When Charlie said, boiling
his shoe, “Not quite done yet. Give it another two minutes,” she went into such a
paroxysm that Jacob tried to shush her. When Charlie delicately pulled the leather
from the sole, exposing the skeleton of nails, like pulling the meat from a fish,
and sucked on the nails as if on fishbones, and held a bent nail in the crook of his
little finger as if wanting to pull a wishbone, Sarah seemed to be banging her head
on the seat in front.

Jacob looked at her in alarm, although he was chortling himself. But as Charlie took
his first tentative bite from the leather sole, and chewed cautiously, as if the shoe
might bite him back, Jacob fell silent and stared at the screen. Sarah sensed his
tension and stopped giggling. “What is it, Jacob?” she whispered in his ear.

His eyes still fixed on the screen, his hand began to crush hers. She struggled to
pull it away, and held his arm. “Darling, what is it? It’s just a film.”

“Maxie and I ate a shoe once,” he said. “You just have to keep chewing.”

Afterward they agreed it was a hilarious film, the little American was a genius, and
they hoped the Schloss Kino would stay open. They felt like staying out for a drink
but they had to get home to beat the curfew. Most of the way they walked in silence,
a loving and companionable quiet. But their thoughts could not have been more opposed.

When Larsen hit Big Jim over the head with a shovel, Jacob sniffed. If only it was
so easy. A fight, a shovel, The End. How hard do you have to hit someone, he wondered?
How many times? And where is the best place to hit them anyway? On the back of the
head? The top? The front? The side? Isn’t the temple the most vulnerable spot? He
should have found out. Too late now. All he needed was for the Rat to be found dead,
his head caved in, he the prime suspect, and somebody to say, “Oh yes, the Jew was
asking just today where is the best place to hit someone on the head.”