Alone in Berlin (Penguin Modern Classics)

29

Enno’s Eviction

Two hours later, it was all over. The Munich express had rolled out of the departure hall of the Anhalter Bahnhof, with Borkhausen on board in a second-class compartment – an absurdly puffed-up, swaggering Borkhausen, who was travelling second class for the first time in his life. Yes, Frau Haberle had generously bought the spy an upgrade to second class on his request, either to keep him sweet or else because she was so relieved to be rid of him for at least two days.

Now, as the other people who had seen off passengers slowly made their way out past the barriers, she said quietly to Enno, ‘Hold on, Enno, let’s sit down in the waiting room for a minute, and consider what to do next.’

They sat down with the door in view. The waiting room was half empty, and for a long time no one came in after them.

Hetty asked, ‘Did you pay attention to what I said to you? Do you think we were followed?’

And Enno Kluge, with his familiar irresponsibility returning as soon as the greatest danger was over said, ‘Bah! Followed? Do you think anyone would take instructions from an idiot like Borkhausen? No one would be that stupid!’

She had it on the tip of her tongue to say that in her view Borkhausen with his wiliness and suspicion was considerably more intelligent than the feckless little coward seated beside her, but she didn’t. She had sworn to herself while getting dressed this morning that the time for reproaches and criticism was past. All that remained to be done was to get Enno Kluge to safety. Once that was accomplished, she never wanted to see him again.

Full of the envy that had been gnawing at him for the past hour, he said, ‘If I was you, I would never have paid that guy two thousand one hundred marks. And two hundred and fifty in expenses on top of that. And a rail ticket and upgrade. You gave that bastard son of a bitch two and a half thousand marks! I’d never have done that!’

She asked, ‘What would have happened to you if I hadn’t?’

‘If you’d given me the two and a half thousand instead, you should have seen how I handled it! I tell you, Borkhausen would have been happy with five hundred!’

‘But the Gestapo had offered him a thousand!’

‘A thousand – don’t make me laugh! As if the Gestapo tossed around money like that! At a little stoolie like Borkhausen. All they had to do was give him an order, and he’d have had to do just what they wanted, at five marks a day! A thousand here, two and a half there – he really has plucked you, Hetty!’

He laughed mockingly.

His ingratitude upset her, but she didn’t feel like arguing with him. Instead, she said curtly, ‘I don’t want to talk about it any more! Do you understand, I’m done!’ She looked at him until he lowered his pale eyes. ‘Let’s think about what to do with you now.’

‘Ach, there’s plenty of time for that,’ he said. ‘He won’t be back before the day after tomorrow. We can go back to the shop. We’ll think of something before he gets back.’

‘I’m not so sure. I don’t want to take you back to the shop, or if I do, then just to get your things packed. I feel uneasy – do you think we were followed after all?’

‘I tell you we weren’t! I know more about these kind of things than you do! Borkhausen couldn’t afford to pay anyone, he doesn’t have any money!’

‘But the Gestapo could have set someone on him!’

‘And so the Gestapo spy stands and watches while I put Borkhausen on the train to Munich! Don’t be silly, Hetty!’

She had to agree that his objection made sense. But she remained uneasy. She asked, ‘What happened with the cigarettes?’

He couldn’t remember. She had to remind him how as soon as they left the house, Borkhausen had looked around everywhere for cigarettes – he absolutely had to have some. He had asked Hetty and Enno for some, but they were out, Enno having smoked the last of his during the night. Borkhausen had insisted on having some, he couldn’t stand not to, he depended on his early morning puff. He had hurriedly ‘borrowed’ twenty marks from Hetty and called out to a youth who was playing around on the street, making a lot of noise.

‘Hey there, Johnny, would you know somewhere I can get hold of some cigarettes? But I got no tobacco coupons.’

‘I might do. You got ’ny money?’

The boy that Borkhausen had addressed was very blond and blue-eyed, wearing a Hitler Youth uniform, an authentic, alert Berlin face.

‘Well, give us yer twenty then, and I’ll go and get some for you…’

‘And forget to come back! Not likely, I’m coming with you. I won’t be a minute, Frau Haberle!’

With that, the two of them had disappeared inside a nearby building. After a while, Borkhausen had emerged from it alone, and without being asked had returned Hetty’s twenty.

‘They were out. The lout just wanted to cheat me of twenty marks! I clouted him one, and he’s still lying there in the courtyard!’

And they had gone on, first to the post office, and then the travel agent.

‘Well, and what strikes you as odd about that, Hetty? Borkhausen’s just like me: if he wants a smoke he’ll stop a general on the street – and cadge the end of his cigarette off him!’

‘But then he didn’t say another word about cigarettes, even though he didn’t get any! I think that’s strange. Was the boy in on the plan?’

‘What do you mean, was the boy in on the plan? He will have cuffed him, just like he said.’

‘You don’t think the kid was there to watch us?’

For a moment, even Enno Kluge paused. But then he went on, with his customary ease, ‘You have a vivid imagination! I only wish I had your worries!’

She said nothing. But her unease remained with her, and so she insisted that they go into the shop very quickly to fetch his things. Then, using every conceivable care, she would take him to a friend’s.

He wasn’t at all happy with the plan. He could sense she wanted to shake him off, and he didn’t want to go. She offered him security and good food and no more work than he could handle. And love and warmth and comfort. And then, on top of that: there was abundant wool waiting to be fleeced: Borkhausen had just taken her for two and a half thou, and now it was his turn!

‘Your friend!’ he said unhappily. ‘What friend? A man or a woman? I don’t like going to strangers.’

Hetty could have told him that the lady in question was an old comrade of her husband’s who was still discreetly working for the cause and would take in any refugee. But now she was suspicious of Enno. She had witnessed his cowardice a couple of times now, and it was better for him not to know too much.

‘My friend?’ she said. ‘A woman like me. Similar sort of age. Maybe a year or two younger.’

‘And what does she do? What does she live off?’ he asked.

‘I’m not exactly sure. I expect she works as a secretary somewhere. She’s unmarried, by the way.’

‘Well, if she’s your sort of age, she’s leaving it a bit late,’ he said sarcastically.

She winced, but made no reply.

‘Nah, Hetty,’ he said, giving his voice a more tender inflection. ‘What will I do at your friend’s? The two of us, alone together, that’s the best. Let me stay at yours – Borkhausen’ll be back the day after tomorrow – at least until then!’

‘No, Enno!’ she said. ‘I want you to do what I say now. I’ll go into the flat myself and pack. You can wait for me in a bar. Then we’ll go to my friend’s together.’

He still had many objections, but in the end he gave in. He gave in when – not without some calculation on her side – she said: ‘You’ll be needing money. I’ll put some money in your suitcase, enough to see you through the beginning, at least.’

The prospect of finding money in his suitcase – and she couldn’t possibly give him less than she had given Borkhausen! – that prospect tempted him, and finally convinced him. If he stayed with her till the day after tomorrow, then there wouldn’t be money till the day after tomorrow. But he wanted to know right away how much she was giving him.

She noticed with sadness what had caused him to relent. He himself was responsible for destroying the last elements of love and respect in her. But she adjusted silently. She had known for a long time that you had to pay for everything in life, and usually more than it was worth. The most important thing now was that he did what she told him.

When Frau Hetty Haberle approached her flat, she noticed the blond, blue-eyed boy that she had seen before. He was playing on the street with a crowd of other boys. She flinched. Then she waved him over: ‘What are you still doing here?’ she asked. ‘Do you have to do your running around here on my doorstep?’

‘I live here!’ he said. ‘Where else am I going to run around?’

She scanned his face for the red mark of a slap, but didn’t see one. Clearly, the brat hadn’t recognized her. He probably hadn’t paid any attention before; he’d been too busy talking with Borkhausen. That would argue against his being a spy.

‘You live here, do you?’ she asked. ‘Funny, I’ve never seen you before.’

‘It’s not my fault if you’re short-sighted!’ he retorted cheekily. He whistled piercingly on two fingers, and yelled up the housefront: ‘Ma, ma, look out the window! There’s a woman here who doesn’t believe you’ve got a squint! Ma, show her your squint, will you!’

Laughing, Hetty went into her shop, now quite convinced that as far as this boy was concerned, she was imagining things.

But while packing she grew serious again. She wondered if it was right for her to take Enno to her friend Anna Schönlein. Of course, Anna was forever risking her life by taking in unknowns and giving them shelter. But Hetty felt that by leaving Enno Kluge with her, she was taking her a cuckoo’s egg. To be sure, Enno was a bona fide political rather than a common criminal – Borkhausen had corroborated that, but all the same…

He wasn’t so much thoughtless as utterly indifferent as to what happened to his fellow humans. He simply didn’t care. All he thought about was himself, and he was perfectly capable of running to her, Hetty, twice a day, claiming that he was missing her, and so plunging Anna into danger. But she, Hetty, had some control over him that Anna didn’t have.

With a heavy sigh, Hetty Haberle puts three hundred marks in an envelope and lays it on top of his things in the suitcase. On this one day she has got through more money than she has put aside in two years. But she is prepared for further sacrifice: she’s prepared to offer Enno a hundred marks for every day he stays in Anna’s apartment. Unfortunately, he’s the type of man who is receptive to such a proposition. He won’t be offended; at most, he will put on a show of being offended to begin with. But at least it should keep him there, since he is so greedy for money.

Hetty leaves her house with the suitcase in her hand. The fair-haired boy is no longer playing on the street – perhaps he’s gone in to his squinting mother. She makes for the pub on the Alex where she’s arranged to meet Enno.