The Pegnitz Junction (6 page)

The woman found her ticket and got rid of the apple.

My husband said that if the President got in for a Fourth Term he would jump in deep water. That was an expression they used for suicide where he came from, because they had a world-famous trout stream. Not deep, though. Where he came from everybody was too poor to buy rope, so they said the thing about jumping. That was all the saying amounted to
.

To be truthful, said Christine to herself, all three of them seem to be thinking of rape. She wondered if the victim could be the pregnant young woman – a girl really, not as old as Christine – who was running along beside the tracks, making straight for the first-class carriage. Probably not; she was unmistakably an American army wife, and you could have counted on one hand the American wives raped by German men. There existed, in fact, a mutual antipathy, which was not the case when the sexes were reversed.
But
– here Christine imitated Herbert explaining something – we are not going to explore the attraction between German girls, famous for their docility, and American men, perhaps unjustly celebrated for
theirs. We are going to learn something more about Herbert.

Christine suddenly wondered if her lips had moved – if it was plain to anyone that her mind was speaking. At that second she noticed a fair, rosy, curly, simpering, stupid-looking child, whose bald and puffy papa kept punching the crossing barrier. Julchen Knopp was her name. Her skirt, as short as a tutu, revealed rows of ruffled lace running across her fat bottom.

They brought up the heiress Carol Ann American style – the parents were chauffeur and maid. The mother couldn’t be chauffeur because she never learned to drive. My husband was crazy about Carol Ann. He called her Shirley Temple. I called her Shirley Bimbo, but not to her face
.

At some distance from the smirking Julchen, agape with admiration but not daring to speak, stood four future conscripts of the new anti-authoritarian army: they were Dietchen Klingebiel, who later became a failed priest; Ferdinandchen Mickefett, who was to open the first chic drugstore at Wuppertal; Peter Sutitt, arrested for doping racehorses in Ireland; and Fritz Förster, who was sent to Africa to count giraffes for the United Nations and became a mercenary.

What she had just seen now was the decline of the next generation. What could prevent it? A new broom? A strong hand? The example of China? There was no limit to mediocrity, even today: the conductor had lied too easily; this was nothing like a flag stop. They had been standing still for at least seven minutes. Punctilious Herbert was far too besotted with Julchen Knopp to notice or protest. She felt an urgent need to make him pay for this, and tried to recall what it was he had said he hated most, along with the smell of food in
railway compartments. As soon as they were moving again and the conductor had left off staring and gone away, she turned to the Norwegian and said, “Do please show us your yoga breathing method, and do let us hear you sing.”

“Some people imagine that yoga is a joke,” said the Norwegian. “Some others don’t care about singing.” Nevertheless he seemed willing to perform for Herbert and little Bert and the insatiable passenger in the corner. He shut the door, which instantly made the compartment a furnace, sat down where little Bert should have been, pinched his nostrils between thumb and forefinger and produced the puffing bullfrog sounds Christine had already heard. He let his nose go and said in a normal voice, “I sing in five languages. First, a Finnish folk song, the title of which means ‘Do Not Leave,’ or ‘Stay,’ or ‘Do Not Depart.’ “ He looked at Herbert. Perhaps he knew that Herbert had been teasing Christine, calling the Norwegian “your bearded cavalier.”

The Norwegian pulled out the drop leaf at his end of the window and beat a rhythm upon it. His eyes all but vanished as he sang. His mouth was like a fish. As for Herbert, he suddenly resembled little Bert – eyes circled and tired, skin over the temples like tissue paper. She thought that he must be exhausted by the heat and by his worry over the child, and she remembered that although he hated the smell of food he had not said a word about it. The singing was tiring, finally; it filled the compartment and seemed to leave everyone short of breath. She got up and crossed to Herbert’s side, and he, with the Norwegian’s eyes fixed upon him, began stroking her arm with his fingertips, kissing her ear – things he never did in
public and certainly not in front of little Bert. She sat quite still until the voice fell silent.

The woman in the corner and little Bert applauded for a long time. Herbert said, “Well. Thank you very much. That was generous of you. Yes, I think that was generous …”

Having said what he thought, Herbert got up and left abruptly, but nobody minded. All of them, except for the woman, departed regularly in search of a drink, a conductor, or an unlocked washroom. Little Bert curled up with his face to the wall and began to breathe slowly and deeply. The Norwegian, still in little Bert’s seat, tucked his head in the corner. His hands relaxed; his mouth came open. His breathing was louder and slower than the child’s. From the corner facing his came
First the block around us got Catholic then it got black. That’s the way it usually goes. I can tell you when it got Catholic – around the time of Lend-Lease. We remained in the neighbourhood because there was a Lutheran school for the child. Good school. Some Germans, some Swiss, Swedes, Norwegians, Alsatians, the odd Protestant Pole from Silesia – Rose of Sharon was one. Seven other girls were called Carol Ann – most popular name. Later Carol Ann threw the school up to us, said it was ghetto, said she had to go to speech classes at the age of twenty to learn to pronounce “th.” Much good did “th” do our little society queen – first husband a bigamist, second a rent collector. Th. Th. Th
.

This was followed by a dead silence. Herbert beckoned Christine from the corridor. She thought he wanted to stand at the window and talk and smoke, but he smiled and edged her along to one of the empty compartments at the end of their carriage. They sat down close together out of the sun and
in a pleasant draught, for there was no one here who could ask them to shut the window. But then Herbert slid the door to, and undid the plushy useless curtains held back by broad ties. The curtains were too narrow to meet and would serve only to attract attention to the compartment.

“Someone might look in,” Christine said.

“Who might?”

“Anybody going by.”

“The whole train is asleep.”

“Or if we stop at a station …”

“No scheduled stops. You know we’ve been rerouted.”

It reminded her of the joke about Lenin saying, “Stop worrying, the train’s sealed!” She wondered if this was a good time to tell it.

Herbert said, “Now that we’re alone, tell me something.”

“What?”

“Isn’t it a bit of a pose, your reading? Why did you say you were reading for an exam?”

“I didn’t say it was my exam,” she said.

“You said that it was in two days’ time.”

“Yes. Well, I imagine that will be for students of theology who have failed their year.”

“Of course,” said Herbert. “That accounts for the Bonhoeffer. Well. Our Little Christian. What good does it do him if
you
read?”

“It may do me good, and what is good for me is good for both of you. Isn’t that so?” For the second time that day her vision was shaken by tears.

“Chris.”

“I do love you,” she said. “But there has been too much interference.”

“What, poor little Bert?” No, she had not meant interference of that kind. “You mean from
him
, then?” Sometimes Herbert tried to find out how much she lied to her official fiancé and whether she felt the least guilt. “What did you tell him about Paris?” he said.

“Nothing. It’s got nothing to do with him.”

“Does he think you love him?” said Herbert, blotting up her tears as though she were little Bert.

“I think that I could live with him,” said Christine. “Perhaps there is more to living than what I have with you.” She was annoyed because he was doing exactly what her fiancé always did – veering off into talk and analysis.

“It is easy to love two people at once,” said Herbert, more sure of her than ever now. “But it can be a habit, a pattern of living; before it becomes too much a habit you ought to choose.” He had seen the theology student and did not take him seriously as a rival. She glanced out to the empty corridor. “Don’t look there,” said Herbert.

“What if we are arrested?”

Perhaps he would not mind. Perhaps he saw himself the subject of a sensational case, baying out in a police court the social criticism he saved up to send to newspapers. She remembered the elaborate lies and stories she had needed for the week in Paris and wondered if they were part of the pattern he had mentioned. Suddenly Herbert begged her to marry him – tomorrow, today. He would put little Bert in boarding school; he could not live without her; there would never again
be interference. Herbert did not hear what he was saying and his words did not come back to him, not even as an echo. He did not forget the promise; he had not heard it. Seconds later it was as if nothing had been said. The corridor was empty, and outside were the same plain of dried grass and the blind, hot, grey stucco box-houses they had been seeing all afternoon. She felt angry with Herbert, hateful even, because he had an unfailing hold on her and used it.

She said, “Herbert, that Norwegian is not interested in me; he is interested in you. And you know it.”

Herbert accepted the accusation as though he were used to every kind of homage. He was tall, intelligent, brave and good-looking. He was generous and truthful. A good parent, a loyal friend. Never bore grudges. His family was worthy of him, on both sides. His distinguished officer father had performed his duty, nothing worse; his mother had defended her faith to the extreme limit. He was thirty-one and had made only one error in a lifetime: he had married a girl who ran away. He sat still and did not protest uselessly or say, “Unhealthy imagination. Projecting your own morbid desires. Insane jealousy,” though he may have been thinking it. He accepted the Norwegian as a compliment.

She plunged on recklessly, just as she had kept the window open when there could have been fires, and said, “If it’s men you want, you needn’t think I am going to be a screen for you.” He turned slightly and said, “Only one thing matters now – this train, which is running all over the map.”

She did not wish to lose him. She
was
afraid of choosing – that was true – and she was not certain about little Bert. When
he kept his head turned the other way, she quickly told the story about Lenin. He smiled, no more. There was a way out of their last exchange, but where? She had tried telling her joke with a Russian accent, but of course it didn’t come off. She knew nothing about him. One thing she had noticed: when he had to speak on the telephone sometimes he would say “Berlin speaking,” like a television announcer, or imitate some political figure, or talk broad Bavarian, which he did well, but it took seconds to get the real conversation moving, which was strange for a man as busy and practical as Herbert. She looked round for a change of subject – the landscape was hopeless – and said, “These seats aren’t reserved. Why not move our things here?”

“No point, we’ve nearly arrived,” said Herbert, and he opened the door and walked out, as if there were no reason for their being alone now. He strode along the rattling corridor with Christine behind him.

Interference came out to meet her halfway:

During the conflict we were enemy aliens. Went to be registered in a post office with spit all over the floor. From there to the police. Just as dirty. The jails must be really something once you
’
re in them. Police had orders, had to tell us we couldn
’
t go to the beaches any more. Big joke on them – we never went anyway, didn
’
t even own bathing suits! Were given our territorial limits: could go into Jackson Heights as far as the corner of Northern and 81st. Never went, never wanted to. We could take the train from Woodside to Corona, or from Woodside to Rego Park, we had the choice, and ride back and forth as much as we liked. Never did, never cared to. We could walk as far as Mount Zion Cemetery but never did – didn
’
t
know anyone in it. Could ride the subway from Woodside to Junction Boulevard and back as much as we wanted, or Rego Park to 65th and back. Never did it once that I remember. The men could take the train to Flushing, they still worked at the same place, closely watched to see they didn’t sabotage the submarine galley units. They had three stations from home to work, were warned not to get
off
at the wrong one. They never did. The thing was we never wanted to go anywhere except the three blocks between our two homes. The only thing we missed was the fresh bratwurst. We never went anywhere because we never wanted to! The joke was on the whole USA!

They were a happy party in the compartment now. Herbert seemed to feel he had put something over on the universe, and Christine felt she had an edge on both the Norwegian and little Bert. The other three were feeling splendid because they had slept. All were filled with optimism and energy, as if it were early morning. The Norwegian in particular was lively and refreshed and extremely talkative. Inevitably, being a foreigner, he began to do what Herbert called “opening up the dossier.”

“On the subject of German reparations I remain open-minded,” the Norwegian said amiably. “Some accepted the money and invested it, some refused even to apply. I knew of a lawyer whose entire career consisted of handling reparations cases, from the time he left law school until he retired after a heart attack.”

“I am open-minded too,” said Herbert, every bit as amiable as the Norwegian.

The woman in the corner spoke up: “What I keep asking myself is where does the money come from?” She looked at
Herbert, as if he should know. “And these payments go on! And on! Where does it all come from?”

“Don’t worry,” said Herbert. “The beneficiaries die younger than most other people. They die early for their age groups. Actuarial studies are reassuring on that point.”