Ashes (12 page)

“Princeton?” She turned around to look at me. “Very fine university. Lots of fancy people go there.”

“Jews?”

“Not many.” Bewilderment swam in her eyes. “
Schatzi
, darling, what are you . . . oh no!”

“What's wrong?”

“You're reading my copy of
The Sun Also Rises
?”

“Yes, I just started it. I like the way this fellow writes.” I closed the book but kept my finger in the place and looked at the name. “Hemingway.”

“Oh dear!”

“Don't look that way, Baba. Are you scared or something?”

“No,
Schatzi
, it's just that it is a bit . . . sophisticated.”

“Sophisticated? You mean there might be sex or something?”

“Let's just leave it at the ‘or something.' ” Baba sighed.

I laughed.

“Baba, he must be your friend—this Ernest Hemingway. He autographed the book to you. I can see it says, ‘To my dearest Baba,' but what's the rest?”

She picked up the book and read the inscription. “ ‘ To my dearest Baba. More martinis at the Ritz, etc! What a babe! Ernest.' ”

Baba blushed. Then she began to sputter. “I just . . . I just think there might be some things you might not understand in the book.”

“Don't worry, I'll ask you if I have any problems.”

An absolutely pained look crossed her face.

“Yes,
Schatzi
, ask me. Perhaps not your mama.”

“Not to worry. I'm a fast reader. I'll have it finished by the time I leave.”

 

 

It was mid-July, and I was staying at Baba's apartment for a few days. After the terrible event at the Birch Grove beer garden, in which only I among that crowd seemed to have suffered, I came home and went straight to my room. I was supposed to go back to Berlin for a few days with Ulla and Karl that Monday. Mama of course wanted me to have my hair styled, and I was to go to the eye doctor to be fitted for spectacles. Now I couldn't wait to get away. It was even hard for me to get through the rest of the weekend with Ulla and Karl. I tried to call Rosa on the telephone before I left, but there was no answer. I wanted to talk to her about what had happened.

It was as if in a few weeks between the episode in the bakery and the one in the beer garden my idyllic summer world had crashed in on me. It reminded me of what I felt when Rosa and I saw the awful SA man with the crawling insect eyes on the Kurfürstendamm that day we went to the zoo. I felt contaminated by the beer garden, by the people who sang “The Watch on the Rhine,” and more especially by Karl and Ulla. Although Karl did not wear an armband, I could see that there was something not right with him even if she couldn't. But I wasn't sure how to tell her this. And would it help? Perhaps love had made her blind.

The plan had been for me to drive back to Berlin with Karl and Ulla and stay with Baba. But I didn't want to drive in the same car with them, so I pretended to be sick on that Monday morning when they left. I was quite an expert at faking illness. I pretended a sore throat, and the night before I started talking in my scratchy-throat voice. So instead of going back on Monday I was permitted to take the commuter train by myself on Wednesday, once I had “recovered.” It wasn't a long ride—less than an hour. Baba met me at the station in Berlin. I was looking forward to staying with her. I always had fun with Baba, and she said that she would take me to some tea parties and maybe even a luncheon, but first I would have my hair cut and get some proper clothes. I had arrived in a summer pullover top and my culottes with little else in my small valise, much to Baba's horror. But Mama had written a bank draft for Baba so she could buy me some new clothes. I refused to take cash, reminding Mama that this was exactly how Emil in
Emil and the Detectives
had met with disaster when he fell asleep on the train and was robbed. The moral of the story, and the last line of the book, was Emil's grandmother shaking her finger and saying, “Never send cash. Always use a money order.”

 

 

Monsieur Marc at the Salon de Paris, who was no more French than I was but affected an accent that he thought sounded French and claimed to have learned haircutting from some famous Parisian coiffeuse, gave me a wonderful haircut. It felt as if I were wearing a sleek little cap. The best part was my fringe. No longer did my bangs just hang squarely over my eyebrows, but they had been cut at an angle so that they swept to one side.

“Charmante! Charmante!”
Monsieur Marc kept exclaiming, rising on to his tiptoes as he snipped away the final uneven tatters and sculpted what remained into a gleaming golden cap that was snug as a ski hat on my head, but much more stylish. When Baba came back to pick me up, she slapped her hand against her pink cheek exclaiming, “Adorable! You look like a little gamine. Now we must find a suitable dress for the luncheon and the tea tomorrow.”

From the hairdresser we went to Baba's office at the
Vossiche Zeitung
so she could deliver her column. A man with a green visor and black sleeve protectors to keep his sleeves clean from the ink rushed out of his office.

“Baba, a call came in. Can you squeeze in a reception this evening? Countess von der Gröeben's entertaining in Charlottenburg. They say the Empress Hermine will be attending.” He crooked both his index fingers into to the air when he said the word “empress.” Many people, including Baba, referred to Kaiser Wilhelm's second wife, Hermine Reuss, as the Quotation Empress, for as the second wife, who married him after he abdicated, she had never officially been the empress of anything, but she insisted on her title being recognized. Apparently no one liked her much. They felt that she was a fraud.

“
Mein Gott
, Wilfried!” Baba sighed. Wilfried was Baba's editor. “Yes, of course. At least they have a good chef. You'll like the pastries, Gaby.” She turned back to Wilfried. “So, anything else?”

“Rumors that Papen might be laying the groundwork for Hindenburg to receive”—he dropped his voice—“the corporal.”

“Yes, I caught wind of that. Mammi called and said that she's heard Papen might have to start preparing him to meet the Old Gentleman.” Mammi was an old friend of Baba's and an invaluable source for gossip.

“ ‘ Preparing him'?” Wilfried said.

“Yes, Hitler's an uncouth barbarian. His parlor decorum leaves something to be desired. Trying to picture him sipping tea with Hindenburg strains the imagination.”

“Yes, well . . . bound to happen. What with the July thirty-first election coming.” Wilfried sighed and shut his eyes tight. The green visor cast a sickish wedge of light over the top half of his face.

“Well, Gaby.” Baba sighed. “Quite a week you arrived for. We'd better go straightaway and buy you some clothes and get you rigged out. Some social life we have here in Berlin. You might be seeing history in the making.”

“Let's hope not,” Wilfried said. His expression was flat.

 

 

As Baba and I approached the shining brass door of the Wertheim Department Store in Leipziger Platz, I noticed two SA men posted at the entrance. One stepped forward and said to Baba, “Do you know that this is a Jewish-owned business?”

Baba blinked then drew herself up to her full height, which was not much, but she certainly no longer reminded me of a pastry puff.

“Do I know? Of course I know. I dated both the Wertheim brothers.” The SA officers' mouths dropped open. Baba sailed through the door as if she were Field Marshal Hindenburg himself, fresh from the glorious victory at Tannenburg. I cast a glance over my shoulder as I followed her. The SA officers were still looking at her in wonder. I wouldn't have been surprised if they had saluted. You see, they were trained to respond to great displays of authority, and Baba, despite her small stature, had a bearing that could on occasion be considered indisputably authoritarian.

We went immediately to the dress department on the third floor, where a lady in a black dress with an elaborately arranged handkerchief pinned to her bosom glided up to us.

“May I help you ladies?” She seemed pleased and relieved to see us, for the floor was empty of customers. There was an eerie silence.

“Yes, we need a dress or two for this lovely young lady,” Baba said. “She is expected to attend a reception this evening at the Countess von der Groeben's and then tomorrow we shall need something for a luncheon and a tea at the Adlon.” I looked at Baba. “Oh yes, and I nearly forgot, nothing sailorish.” I had warned Baba that at the age of thirteen I was too old for those babyish sailor-suit dresses that people often put their children in beyond a reasonable age.

“She's not in the navy, after all,” Baba said good-naturedly. “We don't even have a navy.” Then, under her breath, she whispered, “God willing.”

I knew what Baba was thinking. After the Great War, one of the most important terms of the Treaty of Versailles was that Germany disarm. No armies, no navies, no air force. Neither the SA nor the SS was in fact considered an army. They were just the staff guard, or
stabswache
, of the Nazi Party.

The saleslady began to bring out dresses. In a fancy store like Wertheim one did not simply shop off the racks.

“Too dirndl-ish,” I said when she held up one with lacings up the front and a frilly, square-neck collar. “No pinafores!” I announced as she brought out the next. “But it's very pretty,” I added when Baba gave me a sharp look. “I don't want bows, either,” I leaned over and whispered to Baba when the lady went back to fetch more dresses.

Finally the saleslady seemed to understand my taste. She came out with a soft gray dress in what Baba called a “crepe georgette” fabric. It was cut on the bias, at an angle to the grain of the fabric. I could tell this immediately by the drape, for the skirt fell beautifully, at least on the hanger. And luckily when I tried it on in the dressing room, it fit perfectly. It was the most grown-up dress I had ever worn. I just loved it, and both Baba and the saleslady marveled at how becoming it looked on me.

“All right! That is perfect for the reception this evening at Countess von der Groeben's. Now for tomorrow, something transitional. Perhaps a little suit with a jacket to be worn at luncheon and then the jacket removed for the tea.”

“I have just the thing, Madame,” the saleslady said.

This time it only took one try. The saleslady was back with a slim, willowy blue dress with what was called a gored skirt that flared just slightly and a cropped jacket. “Cropped” apparently meant chopped, as in chopped off just above the waistline. Baba worried that it was a bit too old-looking for me. But the saleslady kept saying, “
Nein nein
. . . look at that chic hairdo she's got.” Then another saleslady came over and clapped her hands together and said,
“Oh la la!”
So Baba succumbed. I was so excited. I couldn't wait to get home to change into my new clothes for the reception.

As soon as we walked in the door of Baba's apartment, the telephone was ringing. Baba rushed to answer it.

“Ah, Rosa! She will be thrilled to hear from you. . . . Yes . . . she's right here.”

I
was
thrilled.

“What? Your grandmother? Is she all right? . . . Did you get my letter? You'll read it when it gets there, but I have so much to tell you!” I lowered my voice so Baba wouldn't hear.

Rosa and I made a plan. I would stay over at her apartment on Saturday, when her mother stayed upstairs with her grandmother, and then she would return to Caputh with me the following day.

 

 

The newspaper sent a driver to pick up Baba and me for the reception at the Countess's home in Charlottenburg, one of the very fancy suburbs west of the city center. In the car Baba reviewed with me the cast of characters I was about to meet.

“Now, I'll introduce you as my best friend's daughter, and how about I say you are my summer assistant as well? You'll meet everyone, since everyone wants to get their name in my column. Be prepared to look and listen. I'll need descriptions of what they wear, where they've been, fashionable spas they've visited, cabarets they've attended, and the like. So you must be my extra eyes and ears, Gaby. You remember the pictures I showed you at the news office today?”

I nodded.

“Well the countess is obvious. She's eighty-five, but her wits are as sharp as anyone's. She has impeccable manners. Her hair is an unfortunate tint of violet, but that aside she is charming. The Quotation Empress is really quite vile. She will do anything to get her husband reinstated as kaiser. Let's see now, who else? Well, I showed you the news clippings with the pictures of Magda Goebbels—a real beauty, but she doesn't know how to dress. Let's hope her husband's not there. Really an obnoxious man. Oh, but the Americans! Let's hope there are lots of Americans—they are wonderful. Percy Black and Sherwood Eddy. Wonderful sportsman, Percy, very handsome. And the latter, Sherwood, a wonderful humanitarian. Brilliant speaker. Slightly bald.” Baba's running commentary on the beautiful, the powerful, the rich, the mighty, the fakes and the imposters, the greedy and the stupid went on nonstop until we arrived. I was so excited. I was going to a very sophisticated party in a very sophisticated dress. I didn't feel thirteen, I felt at least fifteen and maybe even sixteen!

 

 

The countess's house was grand. It looked like a palace. With its gray stucco, which matched my dress, and all sorts of decorative plaster, it reminded me of a wedding cake, except of course for the color. As soon as we walked in, people rushed to say hello to Baba. She led me over to meet the countess.