The Dower House (32 page)

It was an upper-middle-class apartment, instantly recognizable from dozens of French movies – polished wooden floors, silk-brocade wall hangings, and a mixture of Louis
XVI
and Art Nouveau furniture. Angela guessed it was mostly inherited and that their true taste was displayed in the pictures and sculpture and bric-a-brac, which were all uncompromisingly twentieth century, from Expressionist to abstract to
objèts trouvés
. Including . . .

‘Ah!' Felix cried out in delight as his eyes fell on the six rescued masterpieces – not a difficult achievement, since they were all assembled on a low table near the porcelain stove. ‘I had forgotten these – truly.' He picked them up, restlessly, one by one . . . put them down . . . picked them up again. ‘I mean, I knew I had abandoned
some
sculptures here, but I couldn't remember which ones.' He handed one to Angela. ‘I wasn't bad in those days, eh!'

She would have taken it for a rather artistic dumb-bell. ‘It feels beautiful,' she said. ‘Granite?'

He nodded. ‘Black . . . African – from Nigeria, I think. Ha – the egg I did for Fogel was not the first, after all! I had completely forgotten this one. Cararra marble, too! But actually, it's just any old spheroid . . . Fogel's is a real
egg
.'

True?
Angela wondered, or was he preserving the memory that the egg idea had come to him when he and she were lunching at Schmidt's?

She became aware that Mme T. was surveying – indeed scrutinizing – her. She and her husband were much of an age with Felix but their relationship was clearly protective toward him. ‘We have a friend who works on
Le Figaro
,' she said. ‘He told us you survived the Nazi camp and had landed on your feet in England. I wanted to let you know about the sculptures but Pierre said no, you would surely come back one day and he wanted to see your face when he told you.'

Pierre laughed. ‘And it was worth it!'

‘But our journalist friend said nothing of a fiancée?'

Angela said, ‘That's because he wasn't at the top of the Eiffel Tower yesterday afternoon.'

‘Oh!' Mme T gave a cry of delight and clapped her hands. ‘How perfect – Paris, the Eiffel Tower! It's why you have no ring – yet.'

Angela could not help laughing at this acute juxtaposition of Gallic romanticism and practicality.

Felix explained that they were on their way to Germany, to Kiel, to see his aunt-by-courtesy, who might have all his mother's rings still. And for that reason he begged that they would retain the sculptures until their return in a week or so's time – and in any case he would be delighted if they would choose two of them to keep.

Mme T prepared a light lunch, after which the four of them spent the afternoon walking to Père Lachaise to see the Epstein sculpture at the tomb of Oscar Wilde and the mausoleum of Abélard and Héloïse. It was there that Felix suddenly dodged behind one of the columns, saying, ‘Go on talking, act innocent!'

After a full minute he relaxed and said, ‘That was close!' Then, to Angela: ‘We should gently make our way toward the station.'

‘What was close?' she asked.

‘I'm sure that was André Breton.'

‘Ah!' The Tesnières were disappointed.

‘You know him?' Felix asked.

‘No, but he's a great man.'

‘He was. But surrealism is dead – aesthetic monkey-gland stuff kept alive by clowns like Dali.'

At the cemetery gates Felix pointed out that the first tomb was for a family named Adam and he wondered if Breton's fertile mind had ever made anything of that.

They wandered back toward the centre until they reached that parting of their ways – a low-key parting since they'd be together again in a week or so. As he and Angela continued toward the station, Felix said, ‘I wonder if it really was Breton back there – or did I imagine him because he was in my mind the night before last?'

When he explained the circumstances she asked what the two of them were doing in the countryside around Fontainebleau at night, anyway?

‘I don't know why he chose Fontainebleau,' Felix replied. ‘Maybe some association with
François premier
or maybe Leonardo, who designed the great staircase there? Anyway, he wanted to show me surrealism in action – that it was an entire politico-cultural
process
not just a wayward style of painting and poetry and stuff. So what we did was knock on people's doors and offer to sell them a cow – or he'd offer to buy a cow if they said they already had one. And it had to be done in that total darkness you get in French villages at night.'

‘Why?'

‘Well, he had a point in a way. He thought the world had become too organized, too bureaucratic – too predictable. People needed to get back to the irrational – which, of course, comes at you out of the darkness of the mind.'

‘By buying and selling cows? The Führer had a much darker way than that.'

Felix laughed grimly. ‘There was a lawyer who got the better of him that night, though. Breton introduced himself as Mister Corpse-Divine and offered to sell the man a cow and the lawyer said, “What shall I do with it then?” “Sell it back to me,” Breton explained, “at a profit, of course. Then I can sell it back to you for an even greater profit . . . and so on. And in no time at all our combined profits will be in the milliards and we can take all our promissory notes to the banks and take out loans for at least a couple of million.” And the lawyer asked why should the banks do that? And Breton said, “Because it's no different from what they're doing anyway – all day, every day!” So this lawyer promised to think it over. And when Breton and I were halfway back to the gate, he called after us, “We don't even need a real cow.” And when we reached the gate, the fellow added, “
Enchanté, Monsieur Breton!
” He knew all along, you see. But even then, Breton had the last word: “I lied to you,” he called back. “It wasn't a cow – it was an ambulance!”'

The sleeping and dining cars were Pullmans and the standard was almost back to pre-war levels. Dinner was cordon bleu and the table wine – as always on France's railways – was Châteauneuf du Pape, because, at its peak it never throws a deposit. They dined slowly and downed rather more wine than they might have done on any other night.

Felix told her about the nuns at the convent in Manresa Road, Chelsea, who had commissioned a sculpture by him. ‘They want a Madonna and Child,' he said. ‘We discussed something in stone, a pale, fine-textured granite with no obvious grain, but now I'm thinking more of doing something very fluid, very plastic, in bronze.'

‘When did you change your mind?' Angela asked.

‘At the top of the Eiffel Tower.'

‘Because of what happened there?'

‘It must be. That was a liberation of . . . so much more than . . . I mean of my whole spirit. To be able to say “I love you” and—'

‘You can say that as often as you like!'

‘I love you. Everything around you is so . . . alive. And special. Stone can be rather static and
pure
– only someone like Bernini can persuade it to look like butter frozen after melting. Anyway – that's marble as nature never intended it to look. If
I
want something as vibrant as that, it'll have to be bronze. I know my limitations.'

‘That's the second time you've mentioned Bernini to me, d'you realize?'

His eyes narrowed. ‘When was the first?'

‘At the midsummer party, or the day after, when we went for a walk in the walled garden and . . . did you ever put pigs in that comfrey?'

‘Oh –
that
day!'

‘Yes –
that
day! When I saw you stroking the apple-tree wood like that I wanted you to stroke me instead. I longed to throw my arms around you and say, “Let's . . .” you know.'

‘Well, I'll say it for you now: “Let's . . . you know!”'

They kissed and caressed and undressed each other without embarrassment, languorously at first and finally with hasty abandon, so that they fell awkwardly between the sheets, which were tucked in so firmly that he could not rise above her without an angry struggle.

‘Here!' As he was about to settle upon her she fished up his underpants from the floor.

‘What . . . why . . . ?' he asked.

‘For when you finish like a gentleman.'

‘Oh.'

‘What were you going to . . . have you got a . . . an
FL
?'

‘Don't you want a baby?'

After a silence she said, ‘Do you?'

‘Yes. I think you'd make a wonderful mother – the best any child could ask for.'

‘Whew!' She pulled a little away from him and lay back into the pillow, hands interwoven behind her head. ‘But I have a career.'

‘It wouldn't interfere too much with that. You can work up to the eighth month – and go back to the job as soon as you like afterwards.'

‘And the baby?'

‘We can find a German girl who wants to learn English – or a French girl – during this visit. Maybe Tante Uschi knows of one. The French have this custom they call
au pair
—'

She started to laugh. ‘Pasha Breit with his Anglo-German-French harem!'

‘Marianne's getting a Swedish girl to live
au pair
and look after Siri so that she can go back to the drawing board. And Sally's thinking of doing the same. There's an unmarried mother in the village – a jilted
GI
bride-without-a-wedding-ring. She could look after both . . .'

‘Well! They'd have a fit in Germany but maybe it's possible. But still I'd like to be in our own home and our own bed – and preferably with rings on our fingers – before we even think of starting babies.' She groped down into the bed and giggled. ‘You won't be starting many babies with
that
!'

‘I know . . . but if you just . . . yes, leave your hand there.'

‘Oo-ooh!'

‘Miraculous, eh? Oh! That's fantastic . . . yes! Yes!' He levered himself over her and she spread her thighs and let out a long, low moan . . . and . . .

A sudden shiver passed over her.

‘What's wrong?' he asked.

‘We just crossed the border into Germany. I know it.'

He gave a baffled laugh. ‘So? We're not going to stop. They already checked our—'

‘No! I just
know
it. I felt it.' She shivered again.

He lay beside her. ‘You'd rather not?'

For a moment she was silent, breathing forcefully, panting.

‘It's all right,' he assured her. ‘I'm the insensitive one. I should have realized . . .'

‘What's
wrong
with me?'

‘Nothing. Is this your first time?'

‘No! Well . . . yes . . . I suppose it is . . . in a way.'

‘Oh, Angela!' He lay tight against her side, folding her in his arms. ‘Angela! Dear sweet darling love. You should have said.'

She burst into tears, folding her face into his chest, sobbing with great, almost silent heavings of her body.

‘It's going to be all right,' he murmured. ‘Just don't take it to heart.'

When her crying had run its course she gave a huge, glutinous sniff and whispered, ‘Sorry!'

‘Nothing to be sorry for.'

‘I thought it would all be just . . . so natural.'

‘And it will be.' He began planting little kisses all over her face.

‘Do “Sand in the right eye . . .” that thing Willard . . .'

‘Sand in the right eye,' he said, raising himself on one elbow to perform the ritual. ‘Sand in the left eye. Shed a little tear – here's mud in your eye! She sniffed heavily a couple of times and – at last – relaxed.

Thursday, 2 October 1947

At Hamburg Hauptbahnhof they saw a man standing by the ticket barrier, holding up a placard saying: Wirth/Breit.

He introduced himself: ‘Hermann Treite.'

Angela was taken aback. ‘Oh, but when I phoned you this morning . . . I didn't mean you to . . .' She held out her hand to shake his. But he raised it to within an inch of his lips and made a kiss, murmuring, ‘
Ich küsse ihren Hand, gnädiges Fraülein
.'

She laughed. ‘Not exactly the greeting of a communist!'

‘And Herr Breit?'

They shook hands. Felix took an immediate liking to him – a man at ease with himself and not above a little self-mockery. The New German, perhaps?

‘You had to ring off, Miss Wirth, before I could—'

‘The train was just leaving.'

‘I know. But I wanted to tell you . . . that is, to invite you to stay with me while you're in Hamburg. I hope you haven't booked a hotel?'

Angela said that Felix knew a pension in St-Pauli and—

‘Good!' he interrupted. ‘Then you can stay with me. I don't know how the British government expects its people to survive abroad on just five pounds. I have a villa on the Elbchaussée.'

He mentioned the name nonchalantly but they both knew that was the most elite quarter of the city, an area of stately villas each in its own parkland. They thanked him kindly enough – although at a pension they could have shared a bed.

He picked up her suitcase and led the way out to a drophead Mercedes Sedanca de Ville of the kind favoured by the Führer for his triumphal cavalcades through conquered cities. He piled their cases on the front passenger seat and ushered them into the back. ‘I must say,' Angela told him as they set off, ‘Marianne von Ritter's description did not lead me to expect anything like this. She said you work in the docks. Are you still a communist?'

‘That was true when she knew me – I did work in the docks. And still do. The day after the British army drove into Hamburg I saw my chance. I was a civilian clerk in the military docks – the old U-boat pens. So I just walked away from that and I bought a horse and cart and started carrying rubble from the docks. I thought if I'm doing something useful, they won't move me away from it.'