The blind side of the heart

With the help of his junior doctor, the professor managed to get the trunk containing the two sisters’ things strapped to the back of his car. The young ladies were invited to climb in at once. During the drive he imparted useful information to the girls at the top of his voice; he was obliged to shout because of the roar of the engine and the other noises on the road. At times like these it was important to invest in durable assets, he said, and a car like his was just the thing. Would they like to drive it too?
Yes, definitely. Martha was the first to take the wheel. After a few metres she steered the vehicle straight towards a ploughed field. The furrows, still black, gave way as it drove into the soil. It stuck fast and stood there steaming. All three had to get out. The water that had collected in the furrows formed a thin skin of ice, which cracked when you trod on it. While Martha rubbed her arm, the professor and Helene pushed the car, bracing themselves against it with all their might until they had it back on the road. After that the professor wouldn’t let either of the sisters drive.
They reached the bridge known as Das Blaue Wunder, the Blue Miracle, before midday. The professor waxed eloquent on the brilliance and magnificence of this structure, but Martha and Helene could see only metal struts rising high in the air outside the car window and its legendary blue was nothing compared to the colour of the river. The Elbe, flooding its banks, seemed to them far more magnificent. The drive through the residential area of villas took longer than expected; once they had to stop and add water to the radiator. But after that it all went very fast. They overtook horse-drawn cabs; there was a lot of traffic. Helene would have liked to see the harbour, but they were short of time. As promised, the professor took the sisters to the Central Railway Station. The clocks on the two towers showed different times; the professor was sure that it would be best to believe the one that was ten minutes in advance of the other. Martha and Helene marvelled at the size of the great steel hall with its three aisles. It was the first time they had seen steel arches used to hold up a vaulted glass roof. The sun gleamed out through grey clouds; it was going to rain. Crowds of people were looking into the magnificent display windows of the shops or making for one of the many station platforms. A basket of lemons fell over and people stooped to snatch up the tumbling yellow fruits as if there were no tomorrow. Helene couldn’t resist stooping too and slipping a lemon into her pocket. Two little boys pestered Martha and Helene to buy a bunch of p-ssy willow. An old woman with a baby in her arms held out one hand. It couldn’t possibly be her own child; Helene thought the mother might have died in childbirth. But what made her think of mothers dying? Before the sisters knew it, a young porter was loading their trunk on to his cart and walking ahead of them, shouting to the crowd to make way. The professor warned Martha and Helene never to lose sight of their luggage and the porter in the crowd. Although they protested, he insisted on seeing the sisters to their train. He accompanied them to the platform, to the luggage van, to their carriage and finally to their seats in the first-class compartment. With a composed smile, he handed Martha a small package of food that his wife had put together that morning. Sausage and hard-boiled eggs, he said quietly. All through the journey the professor had avoided looking at Helene, and he still did. But he was in friendly mood, he shook hands with them both and climbed out of the train. Perhaps he would appear at the window on the platform and wave a white handkerchief? But no, they did not see him again.
The train hissed and moved ponderously out of Dresden station. The rumble of the engine was so deafening that Helene and Martha didn’t talk to each other. Travellers were still pushing and shoving in the corridor, looking for their compartments and their seats. Helene and Martha had been settled in their own velvet-upholstered seats for some time. In all the excitement they had omitted to take off their coats and gloves, but they leaned forward and looked sideways so as not to miss anything that could be seen through the window. They felt sure that a new life was beginning with these elegant seats, this window, this train, a life that would have nothing to do with Bautzen any more, a life that was to make them forget these last weeks with their mother now scolding, now drowsing. On the left, cranes towered to the sky. They must belong to the harbour and the docks, which could not be seen from the train. Mariechen would certainly take good care of Mother; when they said goodbye Martha and Helene had promised to send her enough money on the first of every month. What else was the rent money from Breslau for? Together, they had decided that Mariechen would stay in Tuchmacherstrasse with Mother for the time being. Mariechen was grateful to them for this suggestion. She probably wouldn’t have known where else to go in her old age, after spending twenty-seven years in the service of the Würsich family.
The last buildings in the Old Town were passing by. The train was crossing the Marienbrücke so slowly that you could have walked along beside it. The Elbe meadows were still more black than green; the Elbe itself was in spate, but hardly rose above its banks here in the city. A barge with a load of coal made its way slowly against the current. Helene wondered if it would go as far as Pirna. More houses, streets, squares, the train went through a small station. It was some time before the buildings of the city had all passed by, and the low-built houses and gardens of the suburbs were also behind them. Helene thought she saw the first of the Lusatian Hills rising in the distance. She felt happy excitement and relief when they too disappeared from view, and the train was finally puffing through meadows, woods and fields. Mist hung over the arable fields that they were passing, hardly any green yet showed that spring was on its way, but now and then the sun broke through the hovering mist.
It seemed to Helene as if they had been on their way for weeks. She opened the picnic prepared for them by the professor’s wife and offered Martha something to eat. They ate the sandwiches with boiled sausage, which tasted like blood sausage and had the same fine consistency, devouring the bread and its dark-red filling as if they hadn’t had anything to eat for years, as if blood sausage tasted wonderful. With the sandwiches they drank the tea that they had brought in a flask with a wickerwork cover. Later they felt tired, and their eyes closed even before the train stopped at the next station.
When they woke up again, other travellers were already standing at the windows and out in the corridor. The train’s entry into the city, and soon afterwards into Anhalt Station, brought soft cries of amazement from the girls. Who could have imagined Berlin, its size, all the passers-by, the bicycles, hackney carriages and motor cars? After Dresden station, Martha and Helene had thought they were well prepared for the metropolis, but they held each other’s chilly, sweating hands tight. The deafening noise of the station concourse came in through the open windows. The travellers crowded out of their compartments into the corridor and made for the doors. Outside, Helene could hear the whistling and shouting of the porters, already calling and offering their services out on the platform. Panic seized the girls; they were afraid they wouldn’t get out of the train in time. Martha stumbled as she climbed down and caught her foot in the skirts of her coat, so that she half slipped and half fell off the last step to the platform. She landed on all fours. Helene couldn’t help laughing and was ashamed of herself. She clenched her fist and bit her glove. Next moment she took the handhold by the door herself, accepted an elderly gentleman’s helping hand, and quickly climbed out of the train. She and the elderly gentleman helped Martha up. The station was full of people, some of whom had come to meet their nearest and dearest from the train, but there were also many traders and young women going up and down offering everything from newspapers to flowers to shoe-cleaning for sale, all of them items which Martha and Helene realized only now that they lacked. At the same time they looked at each other, and down at their dirty shoes, where the Saxon soil of the ploughed field out of which they had pushed the professor’s car still clung. And their hands were empty – they ought to have thought before now of taking their aunt a present. Hadn’t the physicist R?ntgen died only the other day? Trying to think of small talk, Helene was searching her memory for world news that she had heard recently. She seldom took her chance of reading any of the newspapers left lying around the hospital. What did she and Martha know of the way of the world in general and Berlin in particular? Perhaps a little bunch of daffodils? Were those real tulips? Helene had never seen tulips so tall and slender.
As Helene tried and failed to pin down any of her fleeting thoughts – they ought to have started printing banknotes in good time, it occurred to her, and then: what nonsense! Then again: who was Cuno? President of the Reich or Chancellor? Then she thought of those fine-sounding names again: Thyssen and France and cash, cash, cash; printing money would have been just the thing, whether it was legal or not. Come on, she told Martha, who was still disentangling her coat and tucking her hair under her hat. She hoped their trunk was still there.
Together, the sisters hurried along the platform to the luggage van. A queue had formed outside it. The girls kept looking over their shoulders. Their aunt had suggested in her last letter that they should take a charabanc or the tram to reach her apartment in Achenbachstrasse. But wasn’t it possible that in spite of this advice she would come to the station to meet them herself?
Do you think Aunt Fanny will recognize us?
She’ll have to. Martha was holding the luggage voucher ready, already counting out the right money, although there was still a dense line of people waiting in front of them.
It won’t be difficult with you. Helene scrutinized Martha. You look like Mother.
The question is whether Aunt Fanny can see that – or wants to. Perhaps she doesn’t remember what her cousin looked like?
She won’t have a photograph of Mother. Mother has only one from before we were born, that photo of her wedding.
Has? Martha smiled. She had it, rather. At least I brought the photo with me. We want a souvenir, don’t we?
A souvenir? Helene looked at Martha blankly. She thought of saying: Not me, I don’t, but then decided not to.
Need a place to stay? Nice hostel, young ladies? Someone was plucking at Helene’s coat from behind. Or a private room with a landlady? Helene turned. A young man in shabby clothes stood behind her.
Running water and electric light? a second man asked, pushing the first aside.
I can tell you a good place. Those hostels for strangers are full of lice, and who can afford a hotel? You just come with me! An elderly woman took Helene’s arm.
Let go! Helene’s voice cracked with alarm. No thank you, no thank you, we don’t need anywhere, Martha was saying to all the people crowding around them.
We have an aunt in Berlin, Helene added, and now she did up the top button of her coat.
I’m sure they didn’t get on because Aunt Fanny thought she’d risen higher in the world than Mother, Martha whispered in Helene’s ear. She had, too!
You think so? I don’t. Helene often felt uncomfortable when Martha said something spiteful about their mother. Much as she too feared her and often as she had quarrelled with her, she hated it, couldn’t bear it when Martha expressed her poor opinion of Selma for no reason at all. Martha enjoyed saying such things, taking a kind of delight in exposing their mother that Helene shared only occasionally and to a lesser extent.
Aunt Fanny stole from Mother, Helene claimed now. She remembered their mother saying so on the evening when they had first told her about their correspondence with Aunt Fanny.
And you believe that? mocked Martha. What would she have stolen? A dried toadstool, maybe? If you ask me she just made it up. Maybe it was the other way round. Aunt Fanny would never have needed to do such a thing.
She’ll be a fine lady, I feel sure she will. Helene looked ahead of her. The queue was not so long now and, deep in conversation, the sisters had missed hearing the man ahead of them by the big door of the luggage van calling their number for the fourth time. Now he called their names too.
Petitions from the Democratic parties rejected! a man was shouting at the top of his voice, brandishing a newspaper; a whole stack of them threatened to slip from under his arm. The National Socialist Party’s Sturmabteilung forges ahead!
That’s all old hat, shouted another newspaper boy derisively, and he too began bellowing at the top of his voice. Earthquake! He was waving a paper himself and Helene wondered if he had just thought up this news item to sell more papers. In any case, people were snatching newspapers from his hand. Huge earthquake in China!
Calling for the last time! Number four hundred and thirty-seven, first class, Würsich!
That’s us, that’s us! Helene shouted back as loudly as she could, and hurried the short way forward to the man who, in the absence of anyone to take their trunk, was just about to put it on the big truck for unclaimed items.
Rote Fahne! shouted a thin girl with a small handcart of newspapers. Rote Fahne!
Die Vossische!
Der V?lkische Beobachter! Helene recognized the young paper boy who had been shouting just now. How old would he be? Ten? Twelve? Occupation of the Ruhr goes on! No coal for France! Earthquake in China! He too was now shouting the headline about the earthquake, although it was doubtful that the paper he was selling had any news of it.
Buy the Weltbühne, ladies and gents, fresh off the press, the Weltbühne! A strikingly tall man in a hat, suit and glasses was striding along the platform. Although he spoke in a strange accent, which Helene immediately assumed to be Russian, his small red magazines were selling well. Soon after he had passed Martha and Helene, an elegantly dressed lady bought his last copy.
Only when someone called: Vorw?rts! Vorw?rts! Vorw?rts! did Helene come to the bold decision to take a wad of banknotes out of her coat pocket. The lemon was still in the pocket too and the notes were now lemon-scented. After all, she knew Vorw?rts, the Socialist weekly paper, and she hoped it would give an impression of elegance and culture if they arrived at their aunt’s carrying a newspaper.
They took a cab with several seats in it; perhaps this was what Aunt Fanny meant by a charabanc. The buildings and advertising columns were already casting long shadows. On Sch?neberger Ufer the cab stopped; it looked as if the horse were leaning forward; it went down on its knees, its forelegs gave way, there was a loud cracking of wood and the horse slumped sideways in its harness. The driver jumped up. He shouted something, climbed down and patted the recumbent horse on the neck. Walking round the cab, he took the bucket off its hook and went away without a word of explanation. Helene realized that he was going to a pump, where he had to wait until someone else had filled a bucket and it was his turn. The lanterns along the street were lit. There was shining and sparkling everywhere. So many lights. Helene stood up and turned round. A motor car with a funny chequered pattern like a border all round it stopped beside them. Did they need help? asked the driver, leaning out of his window. Maybe they could do with a taxi? But Martha and Helene shook their heads, and looked in the direction their cab driver had gone. The taxi driver didn’t ask again. A young man was hailing him at the crossing ahead.
Perhaps we ought to have changed into that motor cab. Helene looked around. Their driver was coming back with a bucket of water. He sprayed the horse, then tipped the whole bucketful over it, but the horse didn’t move. The sun had set, the birds were still twittering, it felt chilly.
Got much further to go? It was the first remark the driver had addressed to them.
Martha and Helene shrugged their shoulders, not sure.
Hm, yes, Achenbach, that’s a good stretch, can’t make it, there’s your baggage too. The driver looked worried.
A policeman strolled up. The trunk was unloaded, and Martha and Helene had to get out. Another cab was hailed for them. The sky was dark blue by the time they finally arrived outside the building in Achenbachstrasse. The porch of the four-storey apartment house was lit, a broad flight of five stone steps led up to the elegant front door of wood and glass. A servant was waiting at the doorway to welcome them; he went over to the cab to take their trunk. Martha and Helene climbed the broad steps to the first floor. Was that marble, genuine Italian marble?
So here you are at last! cried a tall woman. She reached out to Martha and Helene with hands in long gloves that covered her elbows. Bare shoulders gleamed above them. Martha didn’t hesitate for long; she took one of the lady’s hands, bent her head and kissed it.
Goodness me, no, are we at a royal court? My nieces. Aunt Fanny turned on her heel and her long scarf floated into Helene’s face. Some of the ladies and gentlemen standing around nodded in greeting, raised their glasses to welcome the sisters and drank to each other. The ladies wore flimsy dresses without any visible waistline, and with cords and scarves round their hips; the skirts only just covered their knees, and their shoes had little straps and small heels. Many of them had cut their hair as short as Leontine had once cut hers, to just above their earlobes, and even shorter at the nape of the neck. One woman seemed to have her hair crimped close to her head in waves. Helene looked curiously at these hairstyles and wondered how you achieved them. Just the sight all those necks confused her, some rising from straight, prominent shoulders, others from shoulders that sloped delicately, always leading the eye to the heads of the girls, young women and ladies as if heads and no longer hips were the crown of creation, the hips had been on show quite long enough. The gentlemen wore elegant suits and were smoking pipes; they looked at the sisters who had just arrived with expressions of avid benevolence. One stout gentlemen gazed into Helene’s face in a friendly manner, then let his glance move over her and her coat, which was now opening to show what to him must certainly look like a dress in an old-fashioned country fashion. With a kind, avuncular nod he turned, took a glass from a tray being carried round by a young lady and immersed himself in conversation with a small woman whose feather boa came right down to the backs of her knees.
What pretty children! A friend of Aunt Fanny’s took her arm, swaying tipsily, her head thrust forward like the head of a bull with red curls to look at Helene. Her large, sequin-covered bosom glittered as she straightened up to her full height right in front of Helene’s eyes. Why have you been hiding these bewitching creatures from us so long, my dear?
Lucinde, meet my nieces.
A gentleman leaned curiously over Aunt Fanny’s bare shoulders to look from Helene to Martha and back again. Obviously the guests filled every nook and cranny of the first floor of this building. The front door was still open behind them. Helene looked around, feeling she would like to escape. When she felt something touch her calf and looked down, she saw a coal-black poodle, newly clipped. The sight of the poodle helped her to breathe more easily.
A housemaid and a manservant took the sisters’ bags and helped them out of their coats. Helene’s newspaper was taken away – no one had noticed it – and two more menservants came up the steps with their trunk. Helene hurried a few steps after the girl carrying her coat and took the lemon out of its pocket.
A lemon, how delightful! screeched Lucinde the red-headed bull, but in as quiet a screech as possible.
Quick, go and freshen yourselves up and change for dinner, we dine in an hour’s time. Aunt Fanny was beaming at them. Her face, thin and regular, was like a painting with her cheeks so dark with rouge, while her eyelids shimmered green and gold. Long lashes rose and fell like black veils over her big black eyes. A young man passed Aunt Fanny and stopped beside her with his back to Martha and Helene. He kissed her bare shoulder, then laid his hand briefly against her cheek and went on to another lady who was obviously waiting for him. Fanny mimed clapping her hands. She looked so distinguished, elegant, graceful – words to describe her tumbled over themselves in Helene’s head – she looked so charming as her long hands touched but never actually made any clapping sound. Fantastic, she said. My treasure here will show you everything. Otta?
The housemaid Otta, white-haired and smooth-skinned, made her way through the throng of guests and led the sisters to a small room at the far end of the apartment. It smelled of violets. Two narrow beds had been made up, and in a niche in the wall stood a washstand with a big mirror. There was a lily pattern engraved on the rim of the glass. Candles in a five-branched silver candleholder gave a soft light, like the candlelight on an altar. The housemaid showed them towels, chamber pots, a wardrobe. And there was a bathroom and lavatory, a water closet, at the front of the apartment near the entrance door, the housemaid whispered. Then she excused herself, saying she had to open the door to other guests.
Is this a party? Martha looked in astonishment at the door that had closed behind the housemaid.
Change for dinner? Helene threw the lemon on the bed and put her hands on her hips. I’m already wearing my best dress.
She can’t know that, little angel. She won’t have looked closely.
Did you see her lips? Did you see all that make-up she’s wearing?
Vermilion. And her hair, cut to just above the earlobes – it’s the style in town, little angel. I’ll cut your blonde locks for you tomorrow, said Martha, laughing nervously as she opened the trunk. She rummaged around in it with both hands and sighed with relief when she found her little bag. Turning her back to Helene, she shook out its contents on the washstand. Helene sat down cautiously on one of the two beds. She stroked the throw arranged over it; it was so soft. The word cashmere came into her mind, although she had no idea what cashmere felt like. Ducking to look under Martha’s arms, Helene saw her open a small bottle and fill the syringe with liquid. Her hands were shaking. She rolled up the sleeve of her dress, tied her large handkerchief round her arm with an expert gesture and plunged the needle into the skin.
Helene was surprised to see how openly Martha let her watch all this. She had never used the syringe in front of her sister before. Helene rose and went over to the window. It looked out on a shady courtyard with maple trees, a carpet-beating frame and a small fountain. At this blue twilight hour, daffodils were in bloom.
Why are you doing that now?
Martha did not answer this question asked behind her back. Slowly, she pressed the contents of the syringe into her vein and sank back on to the bed.
Little angel, there could be no finer moment than this! We’ve arrived. We’re here. Martha stretched out on the bed and reached one arm towards Helene. Berlin, she said softly, as if her voice were dying of happiness, drowning in it. We’re in Berlin now.
Don’t say such things. Helene took a step towards the trunk, found her brushes in its side pocket and let down her hair.
The poison is sweet, little angel. Don’t look at me as if I were a damned soul. So I’m going to die some day – what about it? I suppose one’s allowed to live a little first? Martha chuckled in a way that, just for a moment, reminded Helene of their mother, left behind at home in her deranged state of mind.
Lying on her back, Martha kicked off her shoes – she had obviously undone their long laces already – undid the buttons of her dress and, as if it were perfectly natural, placed one hand on her bare breast. Her skin was white, thin and delicate, so delicate that Helene could see the veins shimmering underneath it.
Helene combed her hair. She sat down at the washstand and poured some water into the basin from the silver jug, she picked up the fragrant soap, smelling of southern lavender, and washed. Now and then Martha sighed.
Will you sing me a song, little angel?
What shall I sing? Helene’s voice had dried up. In spite of her long afternoon nap in the train, she felt tired, and could not find in herself the joy and happiness that she had expected to feel on arriving in Berlin, that she had in fact felt on the station.
Do you love me, dear heart, my golden girl?
Helene turned to Martha. Martha had difficulty concentrating her eyes on Helene; they kept sliding away from her and they looked as if the pupils filled them entirely.
Martha, do you need help? Helene looked at her sister, wondering if she was always like this just afterwards.
Martha hummed a tune that sounded very odd to Helene’s ears, winding its way between F sharp major and B flat minor. I wonder if Aunt Fanny has a piano?
You haven’t played for ages.
It’s not too late. Martha giggled in that strange way again and smacked her lips slightly, as if she were having difficulty in suppressing her giggles. She retched. Next moment Martha sat up, reached for one of the little red glasses standing on the glass-fronted cupboard and spat into it.
Very elegant, a little spittoon like this. Our fine aunt thinks of everything.
Martha, what is all this? Helene gathered up her hair, twisted it to the sides of her head and pinned it up. We have to be out there in half an hour’s time. Will you be able to manage that? Can you pull yourself together?
Why so worried, little angel? Haven’t I managed everything so far? Everything.
Perhaps I’d better open the window.
Everything, little angel, what choice did I have but to manage everything? But now we’re here, my golden girl.
Why do you call me your golden girl? That’s what Father used to call me. Helene wanted to wrinkle her brow in a frown, but the dip between her forehead and her strikingly small nose was so shallow that only a few fine lines formed above her nose.
I know, I know. And did the pet name die with him, little angel?
Helene handed Martha a glass of water. Drink this. I hope that’ll disperse the mists.
Tut, tut, tut, mists, dear heart. Martha shook her head. This is spring’s awakening, little angel.
Please get dressed. I’ll help you. And before Martha could turn down Helene’s offer she was buttoning up her sister’s dress.
And I thought you wanted to kiss me, dear heart. You didn’t answer my question. Do you remember what I asked?
Helene was kneeling in front of Martha now to help her get her shoes on. Martha dropped back on the bed and whispered: Dear heart, dear heart, you will answer me.
When Helene had tied her sister’s laces, she tugged at her arm to make her sit up. Martha’s long torso was heavy and swayed. She sank back once more.
Oh, my poor foot, it’s too light to stay on this floor, please hold it. Martha saw Helene stretch both legs out stiffly in front of her so that they reached over the edge of the bed. At the same time she breathed deeply and raised her shoulders.
Can you stand up?
Easy, couldn’t be easier. Martha stood up, leaning on Helene’s arm, and raised her head. She was only a little taller than Helene now. Her words came out sharply and distinctly, with a hiss on every ‘s’, although the intervals between the words were noticeably long. Perhaps Martha thought she had to speak like that to sound clear and sober.
Someone knocked at the door.
Yes? Helene opened it, and the housemaid Otta took a small step aside and bobbed a curtsy. Her cap was perched on her hair, looking as white and starched as if she had made no effort at all this evening.
Can I help the young ladies?
Thank you very much, we’ll be all right. Helene plucked a hair off Martha’s dress. How did you speak to housemaids in Berlin, she wondered?
You’ll hear the gong for dinner in a minute. If you would like to come and sit down?
By all means, said Martha with dignity, and she walked past the housemaid with her head held high and into the long corridor. You could hardly see her swaying.
There were place cards at the dinner table. As soon as the party was seated a gentleman at the head of the table rose to his feet. He wore a ring on every finger, each more magnificent than the last. Bonsoir, mes amis, copains et copines, cousin et cousine. He raised his glass courteously to the company. His oily, combed-back hair rested on the collar of his shirt, his white face looked as if he were wearing make-up. He laughed out loud and now began speaking German with a French accent. It is an honour for me to wish my dear cousine . . . ah, why don’t we throw the lies overboard today and devote ourselves to other vices? Let me say it’s a joy to me to wish my young lover here good health and a long life. To Fanny, to our dear friend!
Astonished, Helene looked around. Could he have meant their Fanny, Aunt Fanny? How could the speaker call her his young lover when she might be in her mid-forties and he wasn’t yet thirty? Fanny thanked him; her black eyes smiled under heavy lashes. Stars sparkled in her hair. She placed her hand on her long neck, and it looked as if she were caressing herself here at the dinner table in front of her guests. There was a net over her short dark hair that must be sprinkled with diamonds. Or perhaps they were just imitation gemstones, but she wore them like diamonds. The ladies and gentlemen raised their glasses and cried enchanté, and à votre santé, ma chère, and à mon amie to Aunt Fanny.
Martha was sitting very upright on the opposite side of the table, her eyes shining as she talked to her neighbours, laughing her clear laughter again and again, and letting them pour more champagne into her glass. Helene kept an eye on her; she intended to take care of her sister. Martha hardly touched the delicious food, now and then she put her fork into her vol-au-vent and later she kept blowing on her soufflé as if it were too hot. There was a grating, crackling noise from a large brass-coloured funnel, a voice croaked in song: In fifty years we’ll all be gone. When the party moved from the table to sit on chaises longues, Martha gratefully took the arm of the man who had been sitting beside her at dinner listening to her chatter. Once Helene thought that Martha was crying. But as soon as she had made her way across the salon to her sister Martha was laughing, dabbing tears of delight from her face with the handkerchief that she had tied round her arm earlier. In the course of the evening Martha accepted cigarettes and smoked them through a holder that Helene had never seen in her sister’s hands before. Later Fanny’s lover, whose name was Bernard pronounced in the French way, had a pipe lit. Nothing less than opium could be offered in tribute to her, he opined. Her friends clapped.
Martha once called out, raising her voice: Oh, aunt, what a wonderful party – and Helene could hardly believe her ears, because she had never before heard Martha raise her voice like that, laughing, in such company. Aunt Fanny replied, also with laughter, from the other end of the big room: Aunt? Darling, is that what you’re going to call me? I feel a hundred years older right away. An old lady – aren’t aunts all old ladies? Fanny, darling, just Fanny!
No one offered Helene a pipe or cigarettes; she supposed word had gone round quickly that she was still under sixteen and came from Lusatia. Two gentlemen looked after the flapper, as they called her, pouring champagne for Helene and later on water, and obviously enjoying reminding each other that Helene was still a child. What a pretty flapper! It was charming to see her drink water from her glass. Was she always so thirsty? The two gentlemen were amusing themselves, while Helene took care never to lose sight of Martha. Martha was laughing with everyone, pouting prettily as if to kiss a young gentleman who hadn’t taken his cap off. But next moment she put her arm round a half-naked woman who wore a sleeveless dress like Aunt Fanny’s, and whose cries of ooh-la-la reached Helene’s ears over all those heads, so shrill a sound that it hurt. Ooh-la-la, the woman kept crying, putting her own arm round Martha, and Helene clearly saw her hand fall on Martha’s shoulder and later move to her waist, until it seemed as if the woman would never let go of her again. Was that a pipe Martha was smoking? Perhaps Helene was mistaken.
A little more water? One of the two gentlemen leaned forward to pour Helene water from the crystal carafe.
Late in the evening the party broke up. But not to go home, as Helene thought at first; they were all going on to a club together.
Help my niece into her coat, Fanny told one of her admirers, a tall blond man, her glance indicating Martha. She told Helene in kindly tones that she must make herself entirely at home and wished her sweet dreams.
But the sweet dreams were elusive and Helene couldn’t sleep. Left alone with the servants, she had gone straight back to her room, but she couldn’t help waiting up until the first light of dawn. Only when morning light came falling through the stone-grey curtains did she hear sounds in the apartment. A door closed. There were voices, laughter, steps approaching down the long corridor. Their bedroom door opened and Martha, half stumbling, half staggering, was helped into the room, where she immediately dropped on to Helene’s bed. The door closed again. Out in the corridor, Helene heard Fanny laughing with her French lover and a woman friend, perhaps Lucinde. Helene got up, pushed the second bed up to hers and undressed Martha, who couldn’t move anything but her lips now.
Little angel, we’re here. The forfeit is a kiss. You only have to open the gates of heaven and you can go through. But Martha couldn’t giggle any more; she snuffled and fell asleep, her head sinking to one side.
Helene got Martha into her nightdress, unpinned her hair and laid her big sister down beside her. Martha smelled of wine and smoke, and a heavy scent that Helene couldn’t place, both flowery and resinous. Helene put her arms firmly round Martha, and she was still staring into the dim light by the time Martha was snoring softly.