The Girl Behind The Curtain (Hidden Women) (12 page)

While Otto was talking to a waiter who had previously worked at the Boom Boom, I cast my eye around the room again. I had not noticed before that each of the exotic beauties in the restaurant that evening had accessorised her outfit with an umbrella. Most strange, I thought. The weather had been magnificent all week. It was so sunny and warm, in fact, that there had been murmurings of forest fires outside the city. But every single one of the women had an umbrella next to her chair.

I soon found out why. The Rhine room was so realistic it was as though there was no roof above us, only the vast blue sky. Well, the painted firmament suddenly darkened. The cowbells were silenced and in their place came a rumble of thunder. I looked at Otto in confusion. His eyes were crinkling in amusement.

‘What’s going on?’ I asked, as a drop of water darkened a spot on my napkin.

‘Now!’ someone shouted. And suddenly a hundred umbrellas were unfurled. I opened my mouth in horror as the rain began to fall. But Otto was right beside me, opening an umbrella over my head.

The delighted customers whooped and cheered as the rain came down. The waiters, now garbed in waterproofs, continued to serve drinks and entrées. It rained for a full five minutes.

‘Do you like it?’ Otto asked.

‘It’s amazing,’ I told him.

‘Good. Because it happens three times a night. It’s incredibly popular. It’s a guaranteed way to get close to your girl. When the rain falls and she has to share your umbrella. A great excuse.’

Otto sneaked his arm round my back.

‘You don’t need an excuse,’ I said. ‘I want to be close to you all the time.’

As we kissed beneath the umbrella, the rain stopped. Just a few drips dropped onto our table and into our wine. The lighting changed so that it appeared as though the sun was coming out again and the band started to play ‘Blue Skies’.

I sang along.

‘I didn’t know you were a singer,’ said Otto.

‘You make me feel like singing,’ I said.

‘Then sing. Sing some more.’

I belted out another little snatch of ‘Blue Skies’, which was a song my mother used to sing to me when I was small and refusing to sleep. It was one of her favourites.

‘You shouldn’t be waiting tables at the Boom Boom,’ said Otto. ‘You should be on stage.’

I blushed.

‘I couldn’t,’ I said. ‘I haven’t the courage.’

‘You had the courage to come to Berlin all on your own. I don’t believe for one moment that you don’t have the courage to get up on stage at the club.’

‘After a star like Marlene?’

‘I would like to see you in the spotlight,’ said Otto, kissing me again. ‘Though at the same time, the thought of all those men seeing you up there and realising how beautiful you are? It would drive me mad with jealousy.’

‘I’ll never make you jealous,’ I promised.

He continued to kiss me until the waiter, who had just appeared with our dinner, cleared his throat to draw our attention to his presence. We broke apart, laughing.

Though it had been hot and sunny all day, when we came out of the Haus Vaterland, we discovered that it had clouded over and the air was heavy with the crackling feeling that foretold a real summer storm. I held on tight to Otto as he guided me through the streets. As I suspected, our trip to the Haus had wiped him out. We didn’t have enough between us to get a taxi and neither of us wanted to push our way onto a tram with all the other sweaty punters making their way home. Instead, we walked. I didn’t mind. I preferred it and I relished the opportunity to spend a little more time with my love.

As we walked, we talked. He told me more about himself. He told me about his ambitions. He had embarked upon his training as a lawyer not so much because he had a passion for the law but because it was the best-paid job he was qualified for and he needed to earn as much money as possible to support his mother and his sister now that his father was dead.

‘But,’ Otto continued, ‘I found that when I actually started my studies, I was fascinated. I want to be a lawyer for people who cannot afford to pay for representation. I want to help society’s lowest to get the justice they deserve.’

‘You’re very noble, Otto,’ I said. ‘And very handsome too. If I were on a jury, I would believe whatever you said.’

‘My dear heart, I hope you would only believe the truth.’

Otto is unlike any English boy I’ve met. Perhaps it is his being German that makes him so serious. Perhaps it is that he has lost his father. Whatever the reason, I find his seriousness quite refreshing. He has integrity and I trust him absolutely. I feel safe whenever he is around.

We kissed again at the door of the hotel, of course. My insides were positively molten with desire for him but I knew he would not come in if I asked him. And I know I should be patient, like a good girl, and enjoy the kisses without wanting anything more. But oh! This is worse than a month of Christmas Eves!

Chapter 15

Berlin, last October

How much Berlin has changed. After reading about Kitty’s evening at the Haus Vaterland, I decided I ought to go and see where the Vegas-style palace of fun once stood. It was on the Potsdamer Platz. The address still existed, but how different it was eighty years later. There was no sign of the Kempinski-owned nightclub. It had long since been destroyed. In its place were a variety of buildings that owed nothing to history. They were as modern as it is possible to be, like a little corner of Tokyo in Germany.

Kitty had mentioned a couple of other clubs too. Heaven and Hell, where once doormen dressed as St Peter and Satan had prodded revellers in the direction of their tables and their fate for the evening, was now a branch of H & M. Where once stood the Kakadu – the glamorous Kakadu, Berlin’s own little piece of the South Pacific – was now a branch of Subway, the sandwich chain. Seeing tourists stuffing their faces with soggy bread rolls, it was very hard to believe that the Ku’damm had once been the centre of Berlin’s vibrant and decadent nightlife. You needed a very creative imagination to be able to dream up a Saturday night in 1932. It made me feel more than a little sad. Doubtless far more important things had been lost since, but I wondered what Kitty would think were she suddenly to find herself teleported into this desert of grey sixties buildings and international retail chains.

Kitty would probably need a drink. Fortunately, that was on my agenda.

I was meeting Clare and Harry in a beer garden by the zoo, but since I had a little time to myself, I decided to drop into the nearby memorial church with its broken spire. I had read about the cross of nails, the symbol of forgiveness that originated when someone created a cross of nails in the ruins of Coventry Cathedral. Since then it had spread around the world, including to Berlin, a city equally broken by Hitler’s ambition. It struck me that the constant message that beat from the heart of Berlin was one of forgiveness. Forgive the past. Forgive them. Forgive me.

I thought about Marco’s last letter to me, in which he asked me not only to forget him but to forgive him too. And then I thought about his email. His chilly, lazy email. ‘I think I owe you an apology.’ Think harder, I thought. Tell me something I don’t know.

I crossed the ugly courtyard to the new church. An octagonal monstrosity from the outside, inside it was a magical place, with the sunlight streaming in through the blue glass windows making it seem as though you were under the ocean when you stepped through the doors.

Though I have never considered myself to be especially religious, I felt the urge to light a candle. I exchanged a euro for a votive in a plastic cup printed with an apple – the emblem of the new church. My mind was still on Marco. I could have forgiven him anything. I still would. But in truth, I wasn’t sure that would make any difference. Not unless Marco was prepared to forgive himself first. Until he did that, we could only continue to dance around one another, with him drawing closer and running away according to how he was feeling about himself in that moment. I wanted an end to that, one way or another. That was what I prayed for. That Marco would make peace with whatever was troubling his heart and that my heart at last could be free.

I bumped into Harry as I was coming out of the church.

‘What were you doing in there?’ he asked. ‘Praying for God to send you a man?’

‘Something like that,’ I told him.

Harry didn’t pry any further, thank goodness. He was too excited at the prospect of telling me about the answer to his own prayers. A couple of nights earlier, he had picked up a new man of his own. His animated retelling of the way it had happened reminded me of Kitty Hazleton, writing in her diaries, breathless with excitement every time a young man paid her some attention. First Matthew Spencer, then Cord Von Cord, now Otto. I hoped that, as I continued to read her diaries, her enthusiasm for Otto would not turn out to be misplaced.

Clare was waiting for us by the beer garden. We three linked arms and walked on in. When Clare greeted me and told me that I looked a little preoccupied, I half wished that I was meeting only her that evening. Perhaps I would have told her about Marco’s email. Perhaps she might have had some useful advice. As it was, there was no chance that anyone would be able to get a word in edgeways until Harry was tired of telling his tale. Clare and I made all the right noises, though when Harry went to fetch the first round of drinks, Clare commented, ‘I’d be amazed if it lasts more than a week. Every new guy he meets, he is convinced he’s in love.’

The atmosphere in the beer garden was raucous. Unlike Harry and Clare, who had been in training for years, I was completely unable to drink more than one stein of the heavy German beer before it started to affect my perception.

Under the autumn canopy, saying goodbye to the last of summer, I found myself imagining Kitty at the Haus Vaterland, dancing in the arms of her beau. I was back in time, when the horror of the First World War was almost forgotten and the idea of a second world war seemed impossible and everyone lived as fast as they could in honour of those who had died. I thought about the bench in the Peggy Guggenheim museum in Venice, with its inscription: ‘Savor kindness because cruelty is always possible later.’

Was I being cruel to Marco by leaving his message unanswered? Had he meant to be cruel to me by sending his half-hearted apology?

I got back to my rooms around one o’clock in the morning. The house was dark; Herr Schmidt had already gone to bed. I opened my laptop. Marco had written again. I did not open his email right away. I made some tea and sat by the bedroom window, watching the street below, but I was just torturing myself. I held out for three minutes before I returned to my laptop and opened his new note.

Sarah,

I hoped I might have heard from you before now. Please at least let me know that you have received my email. As long as I don’t know that you have read it, I will be in torment, wondering if I will ever track you down again. But if you have read it and decided that you no longer want to hear from me, just say. That way I can give up on you altogether and continue my solitary life.

Marco

That last line made me angry. I barely hesitated before I pressed reply and began to write my response. The fury Marco had aroused in me made me type quickly and passionately. Everything I said came straight from my heart.

Give up on me? It is you who has given up. On yourself. Unless that’s changed, I don’t have time to listen to your self-pity. There are people in the world with far greater reason to feel angry than you have. Far greater reason to believe that the only way to survive is to cut themselves off from the rest of humanity.

You know what? When I first looked at those photographs of you online, I didn’t just see a handsome young man, I saw a spoilt young man who never had to work for what he wanted. I saw a young man with all the advantages Mother Nature and rich parents can bestow. Your decision to cut yourself off is just another symptom of how far your privilege has warped you. You don’t have to engage with the world because you can afford not to. You can send your manservant out there instead. Your reclusive lifestyle is just another luxury choice.

Your body is damaged, Marco, but you are still alive. How can you choose not to make the most of every day you have left to you when the other guy in your car doesn’t have that choice? If you don’t want to help yourself, I certainly can’t help you. You can’t make me responsible for this decision. And you can’t expect me to entertain you in your self-made cage. I’ve had enough.

I felt sick as I read my email back to myself. Who was I to tell Marco that he was being self-indulgent? On the other hand, who was he to keep yanking my chain? It was as though he could sense me moving away from him and every time I did he reached out to me again. Enough.

But my subconscious did not seem to think that was enough at all. I went to bed. Of course, I dreamed that I was in Venice again.

I was in the library, sitting at the desk where I had spent so many hours. In front of me was a diary. I didn’t recognise it. It wasn’t Luciana’s. It wasn’t Augustine’s. It wasn’t Kitty’s. The writing was familiar, however and I turned the pages quickly as though I knew what I was looking for. Eventually, I came to the place I wanted but when I tried to read what was written there, the words swam in front of my eyes, rearranging themselves into incomprehensible patterns of squiggles and swirls. I stared and stared but the words would make no sense to me. I turned over more pages. Not only were the words moving, they were starting to disappear. They were fading even as I watched them, until at last, all the pages in this diary that was clearly so important to me were suddenly completely blank.