Shadows of Berlin полностью

“I had some influence once, zeisele,” he explains without much sweetness. “But the Fräulein Angelika? She has the Herr Kommandant’s ear. And that means power in this place. Real power. So at least for the time being,” her uncle instructs her, “I suggest that you allow her to be your mother.”

The room is no larger than an oversized closet. Four walls and one tiny window too high up to peer through. But at least there’s a bare mattress with blankets and a flat striped pillow.

“Your new abode,” Fräulein Angelika tells her. “Now, can you say thank you, Bissel?”

At night, the darkness drenches the room. Rashka huddles under the blanket and breathes. Breathes to stop herself from drowning.

Fräulein Angelika is standing at the entrance, leaning against the doorframe as she surveys Rashka’s closet. “So. Not exactly a room at the Adlon, I know. But it’s clean. You won’t catch any diseases from that filthy Jewish trash in the morgue.”

“But. My eema. She is down there still, gnä’ Fräulein,” Rashka points out, causing the Fräulein to frown.

“That’s the gratitude you’re going to show me? I pull you off the dung heap, and all you can do is whine?”

“I’m sorry,” Rashka says heavily, her ears flushing.

“Your mother understands the situation. Why can’t you?”

“You spoke to Eema?” Rashka asks, feeling an odd nip of hope.

“I have,” the gnä’ Fräulein replies. “And she approves.”

Confusion. “Approves of what?”

“Are you stupid, Bissel? Of what I’m doing. For you.”

Rashka opens her mouth, but not a word escapes.

Frustrated, the gnä’ Fräulein hurls down the sack she’s kept tucked under her arm. Two fruit bar rations and a packet of Eckstein cigarettes spill out. “Why does one have children?” she demands to know.

As a sign of her newfound privilege, Rashka has been provided access to a bathtub. An old-­fashioned tub filled with tepid water and suds from a chemical soap. But it feels luxurious. To be clean? To be clean after so long feeling filthy? She might as well be bathing in a golden basin inside a palace. She feels guilt, of course. To be so clean while Eema is left to the grime and muck. But she drowns the guilt in the soapy water. Next, she is dressed. Given better clothing. Nice clothing that is not frayed or nibbled by moths. A pearl-­gray jumper. A crisp white blouse and a knit pullover the color of a pale rose. A black wool skirt with deep pleats, polished shoes that are not disintegrating, gray wool stockings without holes.

She has also been given cosmetics. Face powder with a puff. A tube of lip rouge. An eyebrow pencil and a tortoiseshell hand mirror. Holding the mirror, Rashka uses the pencil to turn the wall in her closet into her canvas. A small self-­portrait rendered in eyebrow pencil. When she is discovered, however, the gnä’ Fräulein is angry. Her face bleached. Her eyes stark.

“What are you doing?”

Rashka does not answer.

“Do you know how valuable a mirror is? A simple hand mirror? I give you things to beautify yourself, so maybe you won’t look like a dirty little Jewess out on the streets. And this is how you waste my gifts?” Bending down, she smears her hand across Rashka’s portrait, leaving it a greasy dark smudge. Then seizing Rashka by the hair, she forces the mirror into her face. “Look!” the gnä’ Fräulein commands her. “Look at yourself! What do you see?”

Rashka gazes into her terrified reflection.

“I’ll tell you what I see. What the world will see. A little kike sow! That’s what!” And she slams Rashka’s forehead into the wall. Her vision explodes into a shower of stars.

Rashka is in the rear of the auto. The shiny French touring car. Up front, the gnä’ Fräulein is cavalierly smoking a cigarette, while behind the wheel is the slim blond man, Emil Cronenberg.

Rashka coughs. The smoke from the cigarette is drifting into the rear. When she coughs again, Angelika gives her a bored look but rolls down the passenger window a crack.

That’s when Cronenberg tosses a glance over his shoulder into the back seat just long enough to leave Rashka with a frown of disapproval. “I don’t know what in the hell you are doing, Lika, towing this bit of baggage!”

“She is my student,” the woman answers him.

“Student?” He seems to be amused.

“I am the teacher. She is the student.”

The man only snorts derisively. “All I have to say is she better not get underfoot. Because if she does, I’ll stomp her. You hear that, little baggage?” he calls out.

She is too frightened to answer, but the gnä’ Fräulein gives Rashka a knowing wink from the passenger seat.

“So where do you wish to start?” the man wants to know. He has lit a cigarette while he is driving from a gold-­plated spirit lighter. “The Kranzler? Mortiz Doblin?”