Shadows of Berlin полностью

The Metropolitan is a sanctuary. A refuge. At the Met, Rachel settles down in front of a Vermeer. The magician of light. Seated on a leather cushioned bench, before her is Young Woman with a Water Pitcher. She gazes into the painting as if gazing through an open window into a quiet home. The purity of the light descending. The purity of the silence. This woman on display, her privacy exposed without her knowledge. Bathed in Vermeer’s tranquil balance of colors. Yellow, red, blue defining the fall of light on the woman’s stillness. Rachel longs to experience that same stillness.

She thinks of her uncle. She has been angered by Feter’s talk of advancing her work, not merely because it made her feel used but because it was so ludicrous! So impossible to believe! As if she could possibly be of curiosity to the House of Glass. An absurdity among absurdities! But even if it could be true, which it can’t be. Even if it might be true in the realm of some dreamworld where her talent is valued? Sought after? Even if this could be possible, it’s too false. Too dishonest an aspiration to accommodate. Of course, she is incensed with Feter. How selfish of him to flatter! How cruel of him to tempt her with potential. The scene she precipitated with him? If nothing else, she was simply defending herself from the obscenity of hope.

She stares into Vermeer’s painting on the wall. She would like to step into it. She would like to enter all that quiet light and take shelter in it.

***

In May 1933, the National Socialists are still new to power, still blustering like amateurs when the book burnings commence. At night, the Hitler Youth join nationalist fraternities in building a bonfire in the Franz-­Josef Platz across from the university. A fire to rid Germany of all un-­German spirit. The newly anointed minister of public enlightenment and propaganda makes an appearance, speaking to youth. “The old past lies in flames; the new times will arise from the flame that burns in our hearts. Wherever we stand together,” he shouts into the microphone, “wherever we march together, we want to dedicate ourselves to the Reich and its future!”

The newsreels record it all for the cinemas. Rashka sits beside Eema, shrinking into her seat in the newsreel house in the Ku’damm, bombarded by the singing and salutes as books are heaved into the flames. The hooked-cross banners borne by the S.A. men and the fraternity youths poke into the night. “We join together in the vow that we so often promised to the nightly sky,” the Herr Reichsminister crows. “Illuminated by many flames, let it be an oath! The Reich and the nation and our Führer Adolf Hitler! Heil!”

Artwork is included along with the books. Eema has heard that two of her paintings were consigned to the pyre as well. The portrait of Rathenau that had hung unfinished as a kind of memorial in the Jüdische Bibliothek and the portrait of Fritz Elsas filched from the Red Town Hall. The first to be reduced to ashes.

***

Campbell’s tomato soup, thirty-­three cents for three cans, still cheaper than a single tin of SPAM. Aaron likes a bowl of soup for lunch before a Wednesday matinee shift at the restaurant. A bowl of soup with two slices of buttered bread and a glass of milk. At the moment, Rachel can hear him in the bathroom, clunking about. Flushing. Playing with the squeaky taps. She has lit a cigarette but is letting it burn away, the smoke rising into the air and arcing. When Aaron arrives dressed in his slacks and shirtsleeves, he tucks into the table in a businesslike fashion, buttoning his cuffs. “So how’s it going with the thing, anyhow?” he asks, picking up his soup spoon.

She butters two slices from the sack of Silvercup bread on the bread board and cuts both in half on the diagonal. “What thing?”

“You know,” he tells her as if she’s being willfully dense. Slurps soup lightly. “The thing. The doctor. What’s-­his-­name.”

She pours his glass of milk from the bottle. “Solomon.”

“Yeah. Him.” Slurp. “How’s it going? What’s he think?”

A small shrug. He thinks what he thinks.

“He still got you on the pills?” She knows that Aaron is ambivalent about his wife on tranquilizers. He doesn’t like to be the guy at the drugstore who has to have the pharmacist fill an order of crazy pills for his missus. But. Neither does he want any repeat of the Episode. So.

“I take them, yes,” she tells him.

“Because they’re helping?”

“Yes. Because they’re helping,” she repeats, then adds, “Why else?”

And now maybe he’s getting a little steamed. “I don’t know, Rach. I guess that’s the only reason. I’m just asking ’cause you’re very closed-­mouth about it, ya’ know?” Slurp. “Very closed-­mouth.” The spoon pauses before his lips. “I don’t hear a word.” Slurp.

She ferries the glass of milk and the plate of bread to the table. “I’m seeing him this afternoon.”

“Okay. Great. But that still doesn’t answer my question. What’s he think?”