The Good German (Bestselling Backlist) Page 17

  “I don’t want to make trouble for you. I’m grateful to you.”

  “Huh,” she said, putting out her cigarette. “But I’m still on the couch. Well, let me get my things.”

  When she came back she was in a silk nightgown, her heavy breasts bulging. Hal’s friend.

  “Does it embarrass you?” she said, almost coquettish. “Well, I can’t help that if I’m out here.” She spread a sheet on the couch.

  “Is she still sleeping?”

  Hannelore nodded. “She doesn’t look so good,” she said.

  “How long has she been sick?”

  “A week, maybe two. When she came, I thought she was just tired. You know, everyone looks tired now. I didn’t know. What could I do? There wasn’t much to eat.”

  “I’ll bring some food tomorrow. For both of you.”

  “And some cigarettes maybe?” She had begun wiping her face with a damp cloth, taking off years with the rouge. How old would she be now, twenty-five?

  “Sure.”

  “Herr Geismar,” she said to herself, shaking her head. “Back in Berlin. Who would have thought? Even the old room, eh?”

  “I’ll wait up,” Jake said. “Sleep if you like.”

  “Oh, with a man in the room. Not likely. Maybe just a little rest.”

  But in a little while she was out, her mouth open, the sheet barely covering her breasts, the unconcerned sleep of a child. More waiting, staring out into the eerie darkness of Wittenbergplatz. He made mental lists—food, medicine if he could get it from the dispensary, faking an illness. If not, Gunther, who could get anything. But what medicine? He glanced at his watch. One-thirty. What kind of doctor came at two in the morning?

  He came at three, a little tapping up the stairs, then a skeletal frame in the doorway, clearing his throat as if he were ringing a bell. He was almost grotesquely thin, with sunken concentration camp eyes. Where had Danny found him? A rucksack for a medicine bag.

  “You’re the doctor?”

  “Rosen.” He nodded formally. “Where is she?”

  Jake pointed to the bedroom, watching Rosen take in the sleeping Hannelore on the couch.

  “First, somewhere to wash my hands.”

  Jake assumed it was a euphemism, but in the bathroom Rosen really did wash his hands, then dry them methodically, like a surgeon.

  “Should I boil some water?” Jake said, at a loss.

  “Why? Is she having a baby?”

  In the bedroom, Jake woke her gently, then stepped aside as Rosen felt her throat with his clean hands, presumably testing for swelling. A palm on her forehead instead of a thermometer.

  “How long?”

  “I don’t know. She said a week or so.”

  “Too long. Why didn’t you call before?”

  But that was too complicated to explain, so Jake just stood there, hovering. “Can I do something?”

  “You can make some coffee. I’m not often up at this hour.”

  Jake went to the kitchen, sent off like an expectant father, superfluous. Filling the kettle, a small pop as the gas lit. In the living room, Hannelore moaned and turned over.

  He went back to the bedroom and stopped at the door. Rosen had opened her robe so that she lay naked on the bed, his hands spreading her legs to examine her, an unexpected intimacy. The body Jake had seen so many times, stroking it to life, now being prodded like a slab. She’s not one of Danny’s girls, he wanted to shout, but Rosen had already caught his look of dismay.

  “I’ll call you,” he said curtly. “Go make the coffee.”

  Jake backed out of the doorway. Why examine her there? The only thing Danny’s doctor would know. But who else could he have called? He saw the hands on her white thigh.

  In the kitchen, he stirred the fake coffee in a cup. No sugar, nothing. He heard them talking down the hall, questions, Lena’s faint replies. He picked up the cup to take it in. But Rosen didn’t want him there. Instead he put it on the table and sat watching it grow cold. Hannelore’s hair had come undone, a messy girl even in her sleep.

  When Rosen finally came out, he washed his hands again under the kitchen tap. Jake started for the bedroom.

  “No. I’ve given her something to sleep.” He poured some of the kettle water into another cup and dropped in a syringe needle. “She should be in a hospital. Why did you wait?”

  “What’s wrong with her?”

  “These girls,” Rosen said, shaking his head. “Who did the abortion?”

  “What abortion?” Jake said, stunned.

  “You didn’t know?” He went over to the table and sipped some coffee. “They shouldn’t wait so long.”

  “Is she all right?”

  “Yes, it’s done. But there was an infection. Lack of hygiene, perhaps.”

  Jake sat down, feeling sick. Another bed, hands probing, not washed.

  “What kind of infection?”

  “Don’t worry. Not venereal. She can work again.”

  “You don’t understand. She’s not—”

  Rosen held up his hand. “That’s your affair. I don’t ask. But she’ll need more penicillin. I only had the one dose. Can you make an injection? No, I thought not. I’ll come back. Meanwhile, use these.” He put some tablets on the table. “Not as strong, but you need to bring the fever down. Make her take them, never mind the taste.”

  “Thank you,” Jake said, taking them.

  “They are expensive.”

  “That doesn’t matter.”

  “A valuable girl,” Rosen said wryly.

  “She’s not what you think.”

  “It doesn’t matter what I think. Just give her the tablets.” He glanced toward the couch. “You have two here?”

  Jake turned away, feeling like Danny stung by Sikorsky’s money. But who cared what Rosen thought?

  “Did she tell you she had an abortion?” Jake said.

  “She didn’t have to. That’s what I do.”

  “Are you a real doctor?”

  “You’re a fine one to ask for credentials,” Rosen said, then sighed and took another gulp of coffee. “I was a medical student in Leipzig, but of course I was thrown out. I became a doctor in the camp. No one asked for a degree there. Don’t worry, I know what I’m doing.”

  “And now you work for Danny.”

  “You have to live somehow. You learn that in the camp too.” He put down the coffee cup, ready to go. “So, the tablets, don’t forget,” he said, getting up. “I’ll come tomorrow. You have something on account?”

  Jake handed him some money. “Is this enough?”

  He nodded. “The penicillin will be more.”

  “Anything. Just get it. But she’ll be all right?”

  “If you keep her off the streets. At least no Russians. They’re all diseased.”

  “She’s not a whore.”

  “Well, I’m not a doctor, either. Such niceties.” He turned to go.

  “What time tomorrow?”

  “After dark. But not so late as this, please. Not even for Danny.”

  “I can’t thank you enough.”

  “You don’t have to thank me at all. Just pay me.”

  “You’re wrong about her,” Jake said, wondering why it mattered. “She’s a respectable woman. I love her.”

  Rosen’s face softened, surprised at the words, something from a forgotten language. “Yes?” he said. He turned away again, his eyes weary. “Then don’t ask about the abortion. Just give her the tablets.”

  Jake waited until the steps had died away in the stairwell before he closed the door. Don’t ask. But how could he not? Worth putting your life at risk. A matter of hygiene. He put the cup in the sink, then turned out the light and started down the hall, exhausted.

  She was sleeping, her face smooth in the soft glow of the lamp. The way he had imagined it, the two of them in bed, his bed even, holding each other as if the war hadn’t happened. But not yet. He sank onto the chair and took off his shoes. He’d wait here until it was light, then wake Han
nelore to keep watch. But the chair was springy, poking at him like thoughts. He went over and lay down on his side of the bed, still in uniform. On top of the sheet, so he wouldn’t disturb her. When he reached over to switch off the light, she stirred with a kind of dreamy restlessness. Then, as he lay staring up at the dark, she took his hand and held it.

  “Jacob,” she whispered.

  “Ssh. It’s all right, I’m here.”

  She tossed a little, her head moving in a slow rhythm, so that he realized she was still asleep, that he’d become part of the dream.

  “Don’t tell Emil,” she said, her voice not quite in the room. “About the child. Promise me.”

  “I promise,” he said, and then her body relaxed, her hand still locked in his, peacefully, while he lay staring at the ceiling, wide awake.

  Lena slept through most of the next day, as if his being there had finally allowed her to be really sick, not to have to make the effort to get up. He took the time out to get things: the jeep, miraculously still there; money from his army account; supplies at the PX, goods bulging on the shelves and piled high on the floor; a change of clothes at Gelferstrasse. Life errands. He threw his battered portable into the bag with his clothes, then told the old couple he’d be away for a day or two and was there any food he could take? More cans. The old man handed him something wrapped in paper, about the size of a bar of soap.

  “Nobody in Germany has had butter for a long time,” he said, and Jake nodded, a conspirator.

  At the press camp, where he went to collect messages, there were sandwiches and doughnuts. He filled another bag.

  “Well, somebody got lucky, I see,” Ron said, handing him a press release. “Today’s schedule, if you care. And details on the U.S. dinner—a good time was had by all. It was, too. I hear Churchill got pissed. Take the ham sandwiches, it’s what they like. Can’t get enough ham, the fräuleins. Need any rubbers?”

  “Somebody ought to spank you.”

  Ron grinned. “You’ll thank me later, believe me. You don’t want to go home with pus between your legs. By the way, they loved you in the newsreel. Maybe they’ll use it.”

  Jake looked at him, puzzled, then shrugged it off, not wanting to talk.

  “Don’t be a stranger,” Ron said as he hurried out.

  But he already was. Potsdam, even tiddly Churchill, felt a million miles away. When he passed the flags in front of the headquarters building, he felt he was leaving a foreign country, saluting itself, a provider of tins. He glanced at the full sacks on the seat beside him. They’d eat out of cans, but they’d eat. In the bright sunshine, the villas and trees in Grunewald were as lovely as ever. Why hadn’t he noticed before? He didn’t see the rubble as he sped up the Kurfürstendamm, just the happy morning light. For a moment it seemed still lined with shops. The important thing was to get fluids into her to prevent dehydration. Soup, every mother’s remedy.

  As Ron had predicted, Hannelore fell on the sandwiches.

  “Ham, my god. And white bread. No wonder you won the war, to eat like this. We were starving.”

  “Save one, okay?” he said, watching her gobble it down. “How’s Lena?”

  “Sleeping. How she can sleep, that one. What’s that?”

  “Soup,” he said, putting the pot on the ring.

  “Soup,” she said, a child at Christmas. “Is there another tin, maybe? My friend Annemarie, she would be so grateful.”

  The thought of getting her out of the house made him generous. He handed her two cans, then a pack of cigarettes.

  “These are for you.”

  “Luckies,” she said in English. “You’re not a bad sort.”

  When he took the soup in, Lena was awake, looking out the window. Still pale. He felt her forehead. Not as bad as before, but still feverish. He began to spoon soup for her, but she took it from him, sitting up.

  “No, I can feed myself.”

  “I like doing it.”

  “You’ll make me an invalid. I feel so lazy.”

  “Never mind. I’ve got nothing better to do.”

  “You should work,” she said, and he laughed—a sign of life, the way she used to scold him back to the typewriter.

  “Would you like anything?”

  “A bath, but there’s no hot water. It’s terrible, how we all smell.”

  “I hadn’t noticed,” he said, kissing her forehead. “Let me see what I can do.”

  It took forever. The boiling water seemed to turn cold the minute it touched the porcelain, so he had to carry more pots from the gas ring like a slow conveyor belt, until finally he had a shallow bath, not really hot but a little better than tepid. He thought of Gelferstrasse and its steaming tub.

  “Soap,” she said. “Where did you get it?”

  “U.S. Army. Come on, hop in.”

  But she hesitated, the old self-consciousness. “You don’t mind?” she said, indicating the door.

  “You didn’t use to be so shy.”

  In the same tub, bubbles covering her breasts, laughing at him when he patted her dry, getting himself wet.

  “Please. I’m so thin.”

  He nodded and closed the door behind him, then went into the bedroom. Musty, despite the open window; rumpled sheets Hannelore probably hadn’t changed in weeks. But how could she have washed them? The smallest household task had become an ordeal. He found another set in the closet and changed the bed while he listened to the splashing next door. Hospital corners, everything stretched tightly.

  He was in the kitchen, washing up, when she came out, toweling her hair. She looked brighter, as if the dark circles under her eyes had been merely dirt.

  “I’ll do that,” she said.

  “No, you get into bed. I’m going to spoil you for a few days.”

  “Your typewriter,” she said, moving to the table and touching the keys.

  “Not the same one, though. That’s still in Africa somewhere. I had a hell of a time getting this one.”

  She touched the keys again. He saw that her shoulders were shaking, and he went over to her, turning her around.

  “So silly,” she said, crying, “a typewriter.” Then she fell against his shoulder, holding him, so that his face was in her hair, a fresh smell now, and he burrowed into it.

  “Lena,” he said, feeling her shudder, still crying, the way it should have been at the train station, some involuntary release.

  Her head nodded against him and they stood that way for a minute, just holding each other, until he felt the heat through her hair and pulled away, brushing tears from the corners of her eyes with his fingers.

  “Maybe some rest, huh?”

  She nodded again. “It’s the fever, this,” she said, wiping her eyes, collecting herself. “So silly.”

  “That’s what it is,” he said.

  “Just hold me,” she said, “like you used to.”

  And for a moment he didn’t want to do anything else, so happy the room around him seemed to melt away. But her hair was damp with sweat again and he could feel her sag against him.

  “Come on, we’ll put you to bed,” he said, his arm around her as he walked her down the hall. “Clean sheets,” he said, pleased with himself, but she didn’t seem to notice. She slipped into bed and closed her eyes.

  “I’ll let you sleep.”

  “No, talk to me. It’s like medicine. Tell me about Africa. Not the war. What it was like.”

  “Egypt?”

  “Yes, Egypt.”

  He sat on the bed, brushing back her hair. “On the river it’s beautiful. You know, sailboats.”

  She frowned, as if trying to see it. “Boats? In the desert?”

  “And temples. Huge. I’ll take you someday,” he said, and when she didn’t respond, he went on, describing Cairo and the old souk, the pyramids of spices, until he saw that she had finally drifted off, another sailboat.

  He finished washing up, then out of habit sat down at the typewriter. Lena was right; he should work, they’d expect somethi
ng in a day or two, and here was the old table, where he used to type out the broadcasts, looking into the busy square. The street was almost deserted now, just the usual thin stream of army trucks and refugees, but the spell had caught him, all the familiar props. When he started typing, the clicking sound filled the room like an old phonograph record, found at the bottom of the pile.

  “Potsdam Up Close,” something he could make up from hearsay and pictures, but with a chance to put himself on the spot, face-to-face with the Big Three, almost as if he’d been at the baize table too, talking to them, the only journalist there, something Collier’s would like. Maybe even a cover line. Dressed up with eyewitness details—the red star of geraniums, the chimneys, the patrolling Russians. Then the contrast to central Berlin, his trip that first day, Churchill at the Chancellery, putting himself in Brian Stanley’s place, who wouldn’t mind and who probably wouldn’t see it anyway. Our man in Berlin. Not what had really happened—a squalid murder, getting his life back—but what mattered to Collier’s, enough to keep the contract going. The football game as a finish, building the peace even while the Big Three negotiated. When he finished, it was a thousand words too long, but Collier’s could worry about that. He was back in business. Let them cut Quent Reynolds.

  Rosen came before dinner, not furtive this time, even apologetic.

  “Mr. Alford explained the situation. Forgive me if I—”

  “Never mind. You’re here, that’s what matters. She’s been sleeping.”

  “Yes, good. You didn’t say anything—what I told you? Sometimes it’s a little sensitive, even after everything. Their sweethearts come back, they think everyone waits. It’s difficult.”

  “I don’t care.”

  “No? It’s not always the case.”

  Another Berlin story that didn’t make the piece, arguments and tears. He thought of the soldiers crossing the Landwehrkanal that day, almost home.