Adam and Evelyn (29 page)

“And why is this palace so cheap?” Adam asked.

“Actually not that cheap. We have their parents to thank. They want reliable people living with their daughters,” Katja said.

“And we’re reliable people?”

“Why sure, no drugs, no counterculture, refugees from Communism, studying to better yourselves, hard workers, and good looking to boot—those are the folks that need to be helped. Besides, Evi will be teaching them Russian.”

“You?” Adam stopped in his tracks.

Evelyn shrugged and pulled him along.

“You’re lucky,” Marek said. “You’ve all had great luck, nothing but a clear road ahead.”

“How old are they?”

“Around twenty-two, twenty-three, but still studying. Michaela knows a lot about music and Gabriela all there is to know about politics. Two brains. Gabriela’s already working on her dissertation, something to do with the Near East. She wants to become an ambassador, and I’ll bet anything she makes it. I won my first bet with you, too.” She leaned forward to cast Adam a glance.

“Can you study politics?” Adam asked.

“Sure, you can study anything here,” Marek said. “But they look like they’re barely out of high school. But then I never can tell a woman’s age here.”

They stopped at the pastry shop. The line was out the door.

“You can get your rolls here every morning, or apple strudel with vanilla sauce,” Katja said.

“Fresh manna daily,” Adam said.

“They promised they would bake something,” Evelyn said. She didn’t want to wait in line. She felt sure of herself only when they were walking.

“I haven’t even told you that Frau Angyal called,” Katja said.

“Frau Angyal?” Adam exclaimed. “Where did she get your number?”

“Probably from Michael.”

“Isn’t that grand! Hasn’t he paid his bill yet?”

“She just wanted to know how we are all doing.”

“And what did she have to say?”

“Nothing much—other than that you should get in touch sometime.”

Adam had to make way for two women exiting and carrying a large package of pastries.

“Let’s go, this is going to take forever,” Evelyn said.

“But then we won’t have anything to bring,” Katja said.

“So what? We’ll be punctual at least.” Evelyn tugged Adam on ahead. The other two followed.

“And what if all of a sudden you decide to come back to your villa?” Adam asked and waited until Katja had linked arms with Evelyn again.

“But I won’t want to,” she said and gave Marek a kiss.

“Well then, come on everybody,” Evelyn said.

“Once Adam has really made a start of things,” Katja said, “and once you make a start of things too, you’ll be able to live anywhere, or almost anywhere.”

“What are you talking about? How am I supposed to make a start of things? It works differently here, very differently. Until a few days ago I still thought we had the choice—but that’s over. Don’t you understand?”

“No, why’s that?” Katja asked.

“Adam’s caught on,” Marek said. “He knows it’s all going to be ‘the same old same old’ everywhere—that’s the phrase, isn’t it?”

“Yep, ‘the same old same old,’ ” Adam said.

“It wouldn’t help Adam if he took off to Poland now,” Marek said. “But a bowl of the same old still tastes better here.”

“That’s if there’s something in the bowl,” Adam said.

“Now that’s enough,” Katja said. “Sounds like somebody’s funeral. Do you guys believe in any of it?”

“You mean, does the number thirteen bother us, our new address?” Adam asked.

“No, I mean whether you believe—in God or whatever?”

“Where did that come from?”

“I’m just asking.”

“What about you?”

Katja shook her head. “I’ve been asked a couple of times here if I’m Catholic or Protestant. At least I’ve got me a Catholic now.”

“Oh no, no, I’m not one anymore, please, no way,” Marek said and raised his free arm as if in self-defense.

“Hopefully my Persian won’t ask me,” Adam said.

“Oh, no problem.”

“Evi was baptized, to make her elegant grandma happy. Right?”

“Yes,” Evelyn said, “but that was the end of that.”

“Looks like I need to play catch-up—anyway, they’re gonna hold a mass baptism here shortly,” Adam said.

“Oh, I should never have brought it up.”

“Look at the mess they’ve made for the last two thousand years. And then they get upset over our lunkheads because they believe the means of production should no longer be in private hands—”

“Please don’t,” Katja suddenly said in full earnest. “If there’s something I never want to hear again, then it’s that.”

“But that’s not my point—I can still follow that argument somehow. But I just don’t get this other stuff, how a grown adult can actually believe in eternity, sin, hell, and the whole whoop-de-do.”

“If they drum it into you from early on, you end up believing it.”

“But that’s no excuse,” Marek said.

“Listen to the man. My uncle, my mother’s brother, was in the
Party too and believed it all. But after sixty-eight he had had it—after Dubček that was it, for good and all,” Adam said.

Evelyn could see the house by now. There was light in most of the windows, it looked downright festive.

“That’s no comparison,” Katja said. “There’s something religious stuck inside every human being, you can’t make any headway against that.”

“Is what I’m saying wrong? Tell me, is it wrong?”

“Dammit, Adam, don’t get so upset,” Katja said. “What people here believe shouldn’t matter to you. It’s all baloney.”

“Baloney,” Marek repeated. “Baloney!”

“Those two windows on the second floor, those are yours.”

“Are those Christmas decorations?” Adam asked.

“Next week is the first Sunday in Advent. You’ll be having a birthday here soon, are there to be some invitations?”

“If our two angels haven’t tossed me out by then … or if Evi hasn’t.”

“And then we’ll dine on baloney,” Marek said.

“You do it,” Katja said, handing her bundle of keys to Evelyn. “The big jaggedy one.”

What were words, any words, compared with this key? Evelyn thought.

The gate opened with a soft click.

“THEY’RE REALLY VERY NICE
—nice, and sharp as tacks too,” Evelyn said as she entered the room, waving a Polaroid picture. “And we have the small toilet practically to ourselves.” She walked over to Adam, who with one hand on the window handle was pressing his forehead to the pane. Next to him was the magic cube, each of its sides all one color.

“What were you doing?”

“We were setting up quarters for Elfriede in the vegetable bin, works perfectly, exactly six degrees Celsius.”

“Are you sure she isn’t dead?”

“Gabriela pricked her leg with a toothpick, she responded but didn’t wake up. No need to worry. Besides—if she was dead she would have dried out and feel a lot lighter.”

“But it won’t be quiet enough for her in the vegetable bin.”

“Why’s that? In March or April we’ll take her out again. Have you seen the CD collection? Michaela is writing a paper on Haydn’s
Creation
.”

“I know it—quite well in fact.”

“Do we have it?”

“We had it, with Peter Schreier and Theo Adam.”

“About this time day after tomorrow,” Evelyn said, putting her arm around Adam’s shoulder, “you’ll have your first working day under your belt.”

“At the patch-and-cobble shop.”

“I’ve heard you say that alterations are the hardest thing to do.” She removed her arm from his shoulder. “Katja wants you to sew something for her, and Michaela is already thinking it over …”

The wind yanked at the last chestnut leaves. Piles of raked leaves were being strewn across the lawn, to be caught again in the rose bushes and hedge.

“What a spectacular view, and come spring—”

“Where’d you get that sweater?”

“It’s practically new.”

“Must have been knitted for somebody on a mountain rescue team.”

“Orange looks good on me. See, here I am.” Evelyn showed him the Polaroid. “You have a pretty wife, don’t you think? So far no one’s noticed a thing.” She passed her hand across her belly.

“It’s a little early, I’d say.”

“All the same, from the face or just general look, with some women you can tell right off. This is a present for you.”

“Thanks,” Adam said as he took the photo.

A magpie landed on a branch just outside the window.

“Don’t you like it here?”

“Depends on what you mean by ‘like.’ ”

“What time is it?”

“Three after four.”

“Should I make some tea? Or coffee? When we have a little money I’ll buy us a real tea service, maybe something Chinese, like the one Marek gave Katja.” Evelyn gave Adam’s cheek a peck and sat down at the table. “I’m going to buy another couple of albums.”

“What for?”

“Who knows how long they’ll be such a bargain. Gabriela would lend us her camera. Sharp down to the last detail. And when our snookums comes—”

“Please don’t say ‘snookums,’ ‘snookums’ is ghastly.”

“When our baby comes I’ll start an album, one for each year.”

“Plenty of time for that. You need to worry more about school. Don’t you ever have any homework?”

“I work at the library.” Evelyn paged through the album with Adam’s models. “It was a really great idea to gather up all these photographs. I don’t know if I could have done it. I might have just run away. Why they went to the trouble of tearing them up—think of the effort it took. Flogging would be too good for the bastards! Makes my head swim just thinking about it. But you know, if they do actually manage to pull it off over there, we might consider, in a couple of years maybe, whether—”

“Go back? To the neighbors who stole my bike, robbed us of everything that they didn’t smash to smithereens.”

“Neighbors? Why the neighbors?”

“I saw it at the Kaufmanns’, leaning against the wall. It was my bike.”

“You mean they tore up the pictures? I don’t believe it.”

“Or watched and did nothing.”

“What about selling it?”

“The house? What am I going to get for it? The whole shebang isn’t worth anything. You’ve been watching too—one West to ten East, in two weeks it’ll be fifteen, and it’ll just keep going like that. If I hadn’t exchanged my money it’d soon be worth nothing.”

“You need to buy up stuff there and sell it again here. Jewelry and china, old coins and chests, anything antique.”

“Especially jewelry—my best wishes, but for that you’re going to have to look for another man.”

“It wouldn’t take all that much effort.”

“I’ll be putting in my time at the patch-and-cobble shop.”

Adam stared out at the garden. Evelyn looked through the photos.

“You could make one outfit after the other and I’d wear them. I’d be your model. That’d work, once people get a look at it.”

“It’s a matter of body type, the walk, the figure—”

“Wouldn’t matter, once you present it and if I come along. Or you
can create a whole new collection just for me, for me with my big belly. You’ve never done something like that, have you?”

“Oh Evi, what’s all this?”

“Just picture it, early June, sunshine, blue sky, everything green, the mountains—our baby will be coming into the most beautiful world there ever was.”

“You think so?”

“Well, then tell me one that’s ever been better. Is there a time you’d want to go back to?”

“And Michael will help us make it to two hundred, and after that we can become immortal.”

“Not a bad idea. And nobody needs to be scared of war anymore. They can put all that money to a sensible use, not just here but around the world. Pretty soon there’ll be a thirty-hour workweek, and instead of a year and a half in the army, it’ll be a year of everybody doing something useful.”

“And the lion shall lie down with the lamb.”

“Why do you have to say that?” She tried to catch his reflection in the window, but he was standing too close. “Do you really believe it will all just go on like before? That would be absurd.”

Adam shrugged. The Polaroid shot had slid off the windowsill and now lay backside up in front of the radiator. Evelyn tore off a piece of cellophane tape and taped her picture to the window.

“So that you’ll look at me again once in a while. Do you want tea or coffee?”

“Doesn’t matter.”

“Tea or coffee?”

“Whatever you want.”

“Okay, tea,” Evelyn said.

Gabriela was in the kitchen peeling apples, dough still clinging to her fingernails. “For tomorrow,” she said, “Sunday breakfast.”

“Can I lick the bowl?” Evelyn asked. “I haven’t done that for ages.”

Gabriela shoved the blue plastic bowl across the table, reached
to pull the utensil drawer open with her pinkie, and handed her a teaspoon.

“Thanks.” Evelyn started scraping the bottom of the bowl. Gabriela spread slices of apple across dough rolled out on a cookie sheet.

“Want some?” she asked, pushing a strand of hair from her forehead with the back of her hand and offering Evelyn two leftover slices of apple. “Would you like to help me peel?”

“There’s more?”

“Those go in the oven after the strudel.”

“Baked apples?”

“More like a casserole, with cinnamon and topped with vanilla sauce.”

“Aha,” Evelyn said. She set the well-scraped bowl in the sink and held the kettle under the tap.

When she had finished with the apples and the teapot, and glass cups stood ready on the tray, Gabriela took off her apron and offered Evelyn a cigarette. They sat at the table and smoked.

“You can’t imagine how much I’m enjoying all this,” said Evelyn. “As if I had never lived anywhere else.”

But after only a few puffs she stubbed her cigarette out again.

Adam wasn’t in the room. Evelyn set the table, with the sugar bowl and a saucer of apple slices in the middle, and poured the tea. It wasn’t until she heard Adam’s voice and laughter coming from the garden that she noticed one of the windows had been tipped open. There was a smell of fire.

The first thing she saw was her straw hat on his head. Adam was holding the opened album in front of him like a musical score. He pulled one of the large reassembled photographs of his women out and dropped it into the flames. He did this without haste. He turned the page, pulled the next one out, tossed it on the fire. One page fluttered up again, only half burned, curled up, and perished in the heat.
What frightened Evelyn the most was the symmetry and calmness of his movements.