The Berlin Stories (32 page)

From the first, the letter left a nasty taste in my mouth. Its whole tone was egotistical and a bit patronising. Klaus didn’t like London, he said. He felt lonely there. The food disagreed with him. And the people at the studio treated him with lack of consideration. He wished Sally were with him: she could have helped him in many ways. However, now that he was in England, he would try to make the best of it. He would work hard and earn money; and Sally was to work hard too. Work would cheer her up and keep her from getting depressed. At the end of the letter came various endearments, rather too slickly applied. Reading them, one felt: he’s written this kind of thing several times before.

Sally was delighted, however. Klaus’ exhortation made such an impression upon her that she at once rang up several film companies, a theatrical agency and half a dozen of her “business” acquaintances. Nothing definite came of all this, it is true; but she remained very optimistic throughout the next twenty-four hours—even her dreams, she told me, had been full of contracts and four-figure cheques: “It’s the most marvellous feeling, Chris. I know I’m going right ahead now and going to become the most wonderful actress in the world.”

One morning, about a week after this, I went into Sally’s room and found her holding a letter in her hand. I recognised Klaus’ handwriting at once.

“Good morning, Chris darling.”

“Good morning, Sally.”

“How did you sleep?” Her tone was unnaturally bright and chatty.

“All right, thanks. How did you?”

“Fairly all right… Filthy weather, isn’t it?”

“Yes.” I walked over to the window to look. It was.

Sally smiled conversationally: “Do you know what this swine’s gone and done?”

“What swine?” I wasn’t going to be caught out.

“Oh Chris! For God’s sake, don’t be so dense!”

“I’m very sorry. I’m afraid I’m a bit slow in the uptake this morning.”

“I can’t be bothered to explain, darling.” Sally held out the letter. “Here, read this, will you? Of all the blasted impudence! Read it aloud. I want to hear how it sounds.”

“Mein liebes, armes Kind,” the letter began. Klaus called Sally his poor dear child because, as he explained, he was afraid that what he had to tell her would make her terribly unhappy. Nevertheless, he must say it: he must tell her that he had come to a decision. She mustn’t imagine that this had been easy for him: it had been very difficult and painful. All the same, he knew he was right. In a word, they must part.

“I see now,” wrote Klaus, “that I behaved very selfishly. I thought only of my own pleasure. But now I realise that I must have had a bad influence on you. My dear little girl, you have adored me too much. If we should continue to be together, you would soon have no will and no mind of your own.” Klaus went on to advise Sally to live for her work. “Work is the only thing which matters, as I myself have found.” He was very much concerned that Sally shouldn’t upset herself unduly: “You must be brave, Sally, my poor darling child.”

Right at the end of the letter, it all came out: “I was invited a few nights ago to a party at the house of Lady Klein, a leader of the English aristocracy. I met there a very beautiful and intelligent young English girl named Miss Gore-Eckersley. She is related to an English lord whose name I couldn’t quite hear—you will probably know which one I mean. We have met twice since then and had wonderful conversations about many things. I do not think I have ever met a girl who could understand my mind so well as she does-T-“

“That’s a new one on me,” broke in Sally bitterly, with a short laugh: “I never suspected the boy of having a mind at all.”

At this moment we were interrupted by Frl. Schroeder who had come, sniffing secrets, to ask if Sally would like a bath. I left them together to make the most of the occasion.

“I can’t be angry with the fool,” said Sally, later in the day, pacing up and down the room and furiously smoking: “I just feel sorry for him in a motherly sort of way. But what on earth’ll happen to his work, if he chucks himself at these women’s heads, I can’t imagine.”

She made another turn of the room: “I think if he’d been having a proper affair with another woman, and had only told me about it after it’d been going on for a long time, I’d have minded more. But this girl! Why, I don’t suppose she’s even his mistress.”

“Obviously not,” I agreed. “I say, shall we have a Prairie Oyster?”

“How marvellous you are, Chris! You always think of just the right thing. I wish I could fall in love with you. Klaus isn’t worth your little finger.”

“I know he isn’t.”

“The blasted cheek,” exclaimed Sally, gulping the Worcester sauce and licking her upper lip, “of his saying I adored him!… The worst of it is, I did!”

That evening I went into her room and found her with pen and paper before her: “I’ve written about a million letters to him and torn them all up.”

“It’s no good, Sally. Let’s go to the cinema.”

“Right you are, Chris darling.” Sally wiped her eyes with the corner of her tiny handkerchief: “It’s no use bothering, is it?”

“Not a bit of use.”

“And now I jolly well will be a great actress—just to show him!”

“That’s the spirit!”

We went to a little cinema in the Bülowstrasse, where they were showing a film about a girl who sacrificed her stage career for the sake of a Great Love, Home and Children. We laughed so much that we had to’ leave before the end.

“I feel ever so much better now,” said Sally, as we were coming away.

“I’m glad.”

“Perhaps, after all, I can’t have been properly in love with him… What do you think?”

“It’s rather difficult for me to say.”

“I’ve often thought I was in love with a man, and then I found I wasn’t. But this time,” Sally’s voice was regretful, “I really did feel sure of it… And now, somehow, everything seems to have got a bit confused….”

“Perhaps you’re suffering from shock,” I suggested.

Sally was very pleased with this idea: “Do you know, I expect I am!… You know, Chris, you do understand women most marvellously: better than any man I’ve ever met… I’m sure that some day you’ll write the most marvellous novel which’ll sell simply millions of copies.”

“Thank you for believing in me, Sally!”

“Do you believe in me, too, Chris?”

“Of course I do.”

“No, but honestly?”

“Well… I’m quite certain you’ll make a terrific success at something—only I’m not sure what it’ll be… I mean, there’s so many things you could do if you tried, aren’t there?”

“I suppose there are.” Sally became thoughtful. “At least, sometimes I feel like that… And sometimes I feel I’m no damn’ use at anything… Why, I can’t even keep a man faithful to me for the inside of a month.”

“Oh, Sally, don’t let’s start all that again!”

“All right, Chris—we won’t start all that. Let’s go and have a drink.”

During the weeks that followed, Sally and I were together most of the day. Curled up on the sofa in the big dingy room, she smoked, drank Prairie Oysters, talked endlessly of the future. When the weather was fine, and I hadn’t any lessons to give, we strolled as far as the Wittenbergplatz and sat on a bench in the sunshine, discussing the people who went past. Everybody stared at Sally, in her canary yellow beret and shabby fur coat, like the skin of a mangy old dog.

“I wonder,” she was fond of remarking, “what they’d say if they knew that we two old tramps were going to be the most marvellous novelist and the greatest actress in the world.”

“They’d probably be very much surprised.”

“I expect we shall look back on this time when we’re driving about in our Mercedes, and think: After all, it wasn’t such bad fun!”

“It wouldn’t be such bad fun if we had that Mercedes now.”

We talked continually about wealth, fame, huge contracts for Sally, record-breaking sales for the novels I should one day write. “I think,” said Sally, “it must be marvellous to be a novelist. You’re frightfully dreamy and unpractical and unbusinesslike, and people imagine they can fairly swindle you as much as they want—and then you sit down and write a book about them which fairly shows them what swine they all are, and it’s the most terrifie success and you make pots of money.”

“I expect the trouble with me is that I’m not quite dreamy enough….”

“… if only I could get a really rich man as my lover. Let’s see… I shouldn’t want more than three thousand a year, and a flat and a decent car. I’d do anything, just now, to get rich. If you’re rich you can afford to stand out for a really good contract; you don’t have to snap up the first offer you get… Of course, I’d be absolutely faithful to the man who kept me—”

Sally said things like this very seriously and evidently believed she meant them. She was in a curious state of mind, restless and nervy. Often she flew into a temper for no special reason. She talked incessantly about getting work, but made no effort to do so. Her allowance hadn’t been stopped, so far, however, and we were living very cheaply, since Sally no longer cared to go out in the evenings or to see other people at all. Once, Fritz came to tea. I left them alone together afterwards to go and write a letter. When I came back Fritz had gone and Sally was in tears: “That man bores me so!” she sobbed. “I hate him! I should like to kill him!”

But in a few minutes she was quite calm again. I started to mix the inevitable Prairie Oyster. Sally, curled up on the sofa, was thoughtfully smoking: “I wonder,” she said suddenly, “if I’m going to have a baby.”

“Good God!” I nearly dropped the glass: “Do you really think you are?”

“I don’t know. With me it’s so difficult to tell: I’m so irregular… I’ve felt sick sometimes. It’s probably something I’ve eaten….”

“But hadn’t you better see a doctor?”

“Oh, I suppose so.” Sally yawned listlessly. “There’s no hurry.”

“Of course there’s a hurry! You’ll go and see a doctor tomorrow!”

“Look here, Chris, who the hell do you think you’re ordering about? I wish now I hadn’t said anything about it at all!” Sally was on the point of bursting into tears again.

“Oh, all right! All right!” I hastily tried to calm her. “Do just what you like. It’s no business of mine.”

“Sorry, darling. I didn’t mean to be snappy. Ill see how I feel in the morning. Perhaps I will go and see that doctor, after all.”

But of course, she didn’t. Next day, indeed, she seemed much brighter: “Let’s go out this evening, Chris. I’m getting sick of this room. Let’s go and see some life!”

“Right you are, Sally. Where would you like to go?”

“Let’s go to the Troika and talk to that old idiot Bobby. Perhaps he’ll stand us a drink—you never know!”

Bobby didn’t stand us any drinks; but Sally’s suggestion proved to have been a good one, nevertheless. For it was while sitting at the bar of the Troika that we first got into conversation with Clive.

From that moment onwards we were with him almost continuously; either separately or together. I never once saw him sober. Clive told us that he drank half a bottle of whisky before breakfast, and I had no reason to disbelieve him. He often began to explain to us why he drank so much—it was because he was very unhappy. But why he was so unhappy I never found out, because Sally always interrupted to say that it was time to be going out or moving on to the next place or smoking a cigarette or having another glass of whisky. She was drinking nearly as much whisky as Clive himself. It never seemed to make her really drunk, but sometimes her eyes looked awful, as though they had been boiled. Every day the layer of make-up on her face seemed to get thicker.

Clive was a very big man, goodlooking in a heavy Roman way, and just beginning to get fat. He had about him that sad, American air of vagueness which is always attractive; doubly attractive in one who possessed so much money. He was vague, wistful, a bit lost: dimly anxious to have a good time and uncertain how to set about getting it. He seemed never to be quite sure whether he was really enjoying himself, whether what we were doing was really fun. He had constantly to be reassured. Was this the genuine article? Was this the real guaranteed height of a Good Time? It was? Yes, yes, of course—it was marvellous! It was ‘great! Ha, ha, ha! His big school-boyish laugh rolled out, re-echoed, became rather forced and died away abruptly on that puzzled note of enquiry. He couldn’t venture a step without our support. Yet, even as he appealed to us, I thought I could sometimes detect odd sly flashes of sarcasm. What did he really think of us?

Every morning, Clive sent round a hired car to fetch us to the hotel where he was staying. The chauffeur always brought with him a wonderful bouquet of flowers, ordered from the most expensive flower-shop in the Linden. One morning I had a lesson to give and arranged with Sally to join them later. On arriving at the hotel, I found that Clive and Sally had left early to fly to Dresden. There was a note from Clive, apologising profusely and inviting me to lunch at the hotel restaurant, by myself, as his guest. But I didn’t. I was afraid of that look in the head waiter’s eye. In the evening, when Clive and Sally returned, Clive had brought me a present: it was a parcel of six silk shirts. “He wanted to get you a gold cigarette case,” Sally whispered in my ear, “but I told him shirts would be better. Yours are in such a state… Besides, we’ve got to go slow at present. We don’t want him to think we’re gold-diggers….”