Somewhere Over England (10 page)

Herr Weber clasped his hands together. He was still leaning forward. ‘Because according to our noble leader God was a Jew, and so one does not allow a faith which worships such as he. But also because Christians owe an allegiance to something apart from our dear and glorious Führer. We Germans, the master race, must ignore such superstition. We must follow the Nordic beliefs.’ He lowered his head. ‘I feel such disgust with myself. I did not protest soon enough. I looked at the promises he had fulfilled. The orderly streets, the employment, the national pride and then I saw Herr Weissen beaten to death
and his small son too, on the street, and people laughed and I did nothing then. I was too frightened.’

His voice was so steady, Helen thought. So cold and steady, and her hands were steady too, because she and Heine had lived with the knowledge for years now. But always, inside, the anguish coiled and lashed.

‘The Nazis had such a glorious party in November, my dear. It was far more spectacular than, what do you call it – ?’ He paused. ‘Ah yes, your Guy Fawkes Night. We called ours
Kristallnacht
. Such flames, such delightful bonfires, such sharp glass, such ruin. Such disgrace.’ His voice became tight and hard. ‘And now the officials are angry because the insurance companies have to buy imported glass with precious foreign currency to replace the damage the verminous Jews brought upon themselves.’

Helen could not listen to any more of the words which were pouring from this old man in the small dark room and she rose, but before she left the two men together she went to Herr Weber and said, ‘
Ich leide seelisch
,’ and kissed him. Knowing that he also was ‘sick in his soul’.

When Heine came to bed he held her and said that his father had saved some people already and would save others too with the camera, with his courage, and she asked him if he were not afraid for him.

‘It is his gesture,’ he said. ‘What more can he do?’

When Helen rose in the morning snow was falling from the dark sky, big flakes which fell faster and faster, settling on the already white earth. The room was light, everything was quiet. A cart passed but it could not be heard as it ground through the soft clinging snow. She could see the horse’s breath, its shaking head and then she heard Chris and took him out into the snow, dressed in his grandfather’s fur hat and his father’s old fur boots. Heine found a sledge and as the snow stopped falling he pulled his son along and there were deep fresh grooves carved in the cold whiteness.

Then Hans came and shovelled the path and so they helped, nodding and smiling, and wondering if, one day, he would betray Herr Weber. Ilse came with ashes, salt and sand and scattered them on the ice which had been beneath the snow and in moments it became soft and brown and ugly and Helen
turned from it, watching the sundial far out across the garden near the orchard. Children passed behind the hedge which looked foreshortened against the depth of the snow and Helen listened to their laughter and made herself ignore the ugliness of the path.

Later they drove to the forest on roads cleared of snow and chose the Christmas tree and took the toboggan down a thirty metre slope again and again. The snow clumped in Helen’s hair and scarf and trickled down her neck but all she could feel and hear was the laughter of her husband as he watched, his leg too stiff to participate, and that of her son mingling with her own. On and on they went until the sky turned pink and the sun lost its weak warmth. She and Chris took the last run together. Chris in front, then Helen, and as the wind caught her cheeks and the toboggan jarred and flew, she held Chris tightly and did not want the slope to ever end because now, this minute, she had her family safe and close.

That night they watched a torchlit procession from the window and Chris thought it was pretty, like a moving Christmas tree but his father said that sometimes things were not as they seemed and then Chris saw that they were soldiers.

On Christmas Eve Chris went with Helen and Oma to the attic and she showed him the decorations, the electric candles, the crib and its figures, the provisions. They carried boxes down and decorated the tree so that it was ready for the evening, for it was tonight that they would have their presents, Helen told him. Frau Weber smiled and said that it was because it was the German way and, after all, he was half German.

Chris looked at her and then at Helen. ‘I can’t say that at school,’ he said.

Helen looked away and then at Mutti who touched her shoulder. ‘I know. I know,’ was all she said.

That evening they opened their presents before they ate. They were set on low tables either side of the tree which shimmered with silver strips, baubles and electric candles. Set before the tree was the crib. Hans and Ilse came to receive their gifts and there was the sound of paper crackling and laughter until Hans turned on the radio for the Government’s Christmas Eve broadcast and Helen heard in this room, so full of gifts and light, the voice which had changed so many lives.

She looked at the tree and counted the candles, she breathed deeply ten times and then counted the candles again because she wouldn’t listen. No, she would never listen, not even to the sound since the words would escape her anyway. She looked at the Advent wreath of fir branches which was hung from plaited blue, green and red ribbons suspended from the ceiling in the dining-room. Christoph had lit it before they started to open the presents, his arm steady as he reached forward, held up by Heine, his face red from the cold of the day. She had kissed him when Heine lowered him and he said that she smelt of ginger. She laughed because she had baked ginger biscuits most of the morning, cutting him out a Hansel and Gretel for his stocking which she would put on his bed tonight because he was also half English.

Before dinner, before they left the tree, Herr Weber went to the piano which stood in the corner of the room and played carols for them and when he came to ‘Silent Night’ Helen sang it half in German half in English as her present to the Webers. Her voice was pure and strong and there was silence for a moment when she finished.

During dinner the smell of ginger and honey mixed with the cool white wine and took away the strong taste of the carp and horseradish which Helen had found strange and Chris could not eat. She smiled, doubting if he could have eaten even his favourite food, bacon and eggs, after the tea of toast and honey and the cakes, and she felt the flush in her own cheeks from the afternoon’s tobogganing. Talk flowed gently and quietly and for now there was peace for each of them.

Herr Weber told Christoph of the Opera House in Hanover where Heine had been taken as a child to see the children’s play. How the chandeliers had sparkled and the seats had pricked him so that he wriggled all the way through. How the gilt boxes full of officials and their families had glistened. He told him how his father had taken the toboggan out one day with his friends and come back so late that there were icicles on his mittens, his hat, even his nose. He laughed gently when Christoph said that today he had gone down on the sledge with his mother because his father was an old man with a stiff leg who could only watch.

Helen did not laugh at the words which dropped from
Chris’s mouth, wondering if Heine felt the pain of them as she did, but he looked at her with his eyebrows raised.

‘This is how you bring up your son is it, Frau Weber? To show such scant respect for his father?’ He was laughing, his blue eyes clear and without hurt.

Helen laughed then and lifted her glass to him, to the man he now was, looking from him to their son. So like Heine except for those eyes and she looked up at the Advent candles. One, lit on the first Advent Sunday was burnt almost to a stub. The wax from today’s was burning with a strong firm flame. She could smell the pine and the honey.

She could not remember a Christmas with her father. Would he have laughed? Would he have sat on a toboggan? She thought so. Would her mother? She knew she would not.

She thought of her mother on Christmas day when they walked through Hanover. She had left presents and cards with her but her mother had sent none out to Germany in the car.

Frau Weber had said this morning that she sent a card each year but never heard in return. As they walked in the air which was so cold it hurt her lungs, Helen felt the tension knot in her shoulders but pushed it away because it was Christmas and she was happy. She kicked at the ice which had chipped and protruded up into the road. Frau Weber took her arm.

‘Come, Helen. Do not be left behind, they miss you.’

Helen looked up and waved as Heine and Chris called.

‘Yes, I was just thinking,’ she said, smiling at Frau Weber.

‘There is much to think of these days,’ Frau Weber said as they walked along down the alley into the centre. Heine and Chris carried the red ball which had been in his stocking from Father Christmas. It showed up clear and shining against the snow, the grey buildings with icicles hanging like witches’ fingers from the eaves. Would her own mother have wanted to hurry to join with everyone else? She knew she would not. She would have tried to hold her back and would not forgive her when she pulled away. But that was all in the past. She could not hurt her ever again. This was Christmas and she was far from England.

As they reached the men, Helen smiled and looked at her mother-in-law; the daylight showed up the lines around the eyes, the hair which was almost white. She looked fragile, strained, her skin almost translucent. Did she know of Herr
Weber’s activities? It never seemed safe to ask. There were many people in the city centre, walking, nodding, and Helen moved to look into the window of the toy shop where the shelves were now half empty. She turned to call to Chris and saw an old man slip and fall in amongst the milling crowd. She moved to help but Heine caught her arm.

‘Leave him,’ he said, pulling her round, back to the shop.

His hand was tight on her arm and she stared at him and then twisted round again. Chris was staring as the old man struggled on the unsanded ice near the road. He was still on the ground, his black coat and hat smudged with white. His earlocks too.

‘Are you mad?’ Helen said. ‘Let me help him.’

Chris was looking across at her now, his face puzzled. Helen looked at Herr Weber, at his wife. They did not move to help but turned away as though they had not seen, but they had seen because Herr Weber’s face was white. Those in the square did not help either but passed either side. Still the old man could not rise.

‘He is a Jew. If we help him Father could be in danger. There is too much to lose, too much work yet to be done.’

Again Helen looked at the old man and then at Heine. She looked at Chris then and saw him move to help but he was only six and not strong enough.

‘Let go of me, at once,’ she said to Heine. ‘I do not bring up my child to pass an old man who has fallen, or is he just a fragment?’ Helen turned to Herr and Frau Weber who were standing with their backs to them, looking in the window. ‘Move on, don’t be seen with us. I shall try to protect you.’ Her voice was quiet but firm.

She followed Chris, lengthening her stride, holding his arm, talking, and then Heine saw him nod and throw his mother the ball which she missed. He saw its redness against the black of the old man’s coat, saw it land by his leg, saw Helen’s hand reach for the ball, saw Chris stand on his other side, shouting for his ball. And then the man was up, walking away quickly. Too quickly for him or anyone else to have seen what had happened in the crush. The Webers had no need to fear.

Helen held her son’s hand as they walked towards him but she could still feel the thin arm, the smell of poverty, the
cultured voice which had said, ‘
Danke
,’ while she had said, ‘I’m so sorry. So sorry.’

She stood before Heine now, her face gentle. ‘I was the only one who could go. Chris and I were the only ones who could go and there was no possible way we could have walked on. It was our gesture. Do you understand?’ She didn’t touch, just stood there and waited, still feeling that thin arm.

‘I love you,’ Heine said and kissed her, turning from her only when Chris called.

‘Catch,’ and the ball hit his arm.

Heine had wanted to help too.

Her mother’s telegram arrived the next day.

‘Return immediately. Stop. I am unwell. Stop. Mother.’

They arrived in the Avenue at midday on the 30 December having travelled almost without stopping. It was cold. A heavy mist coated the trees, the last few skeletal leaves hung like rags and the houses looked grey.

Her mother was sitting up in bed eating a lightly boiled egg, which, she said, a neighbour had kindly cooked just a moment ago. Helen just looked at her, at her pink cheeks bearing no trace of illness, at her permed hair tucked into a hairnet.

‘Just a touch of flu, after all,’ her mother said and her smile was the same as it had been when Helen came out from the cupboard.

Helen turned, and left the room, straightened the pictures on the stair wall, placing her feet carefully on each stair, concentrating on this, not on her anger which was so intense that she felt sick. She walked into the kitchen where Heine was lighting the gas under the kettle. There was a smell of sulphur from the match, a smell of gas from the front ring.

‘Stay in here,’ she said. ‘Whatever you hear, stay in the warm.’ She smiled at Heine, at Chris, but did not stop and explain.

She returned upstairs, made up the spare bed in that bleak room and then told her mother that she would stay for three days so that the neighbours did not have to boil eggs for her and watched the smile increase.

‘Heine will stay with me and you will move to the spare room, as you felt Father should. There is no room for Heine unless we use your bed.’

The smile disappeared, the eyes were dark, and Helen was glad. She took her arm and led her without speaking, without listening to the harsh voice. She helped her into the bed and now she spoke again.

‘Should I hang a damp blanket to contain the germs?’ she asked. ‘Would that be wise, Mother?’