Part 13 (1/2)

He had meant to. He had intended to write to them the day after the party.

”I'll tell them when I'm home.”

Before he did, he would have to believe it again himself. He would have to get back to that moment when they were climbing the stairs to her place after their supper, or to the time when her words reached him like silver drops falling in slow motion, before he had discerned their sense.

He said, ”Did you give your notice?”

She laughed, and she seemed to hesitate. ”Yes, and the major was not at all pleased. 'Who's going to boil my egg now? Who can I trust with cutting the soldiers?'”

They laughed. They were being merry because they were about to part, which was what engaged couples did.

”Do you know,” she said, ”he tried to talk me out of it.”

”What did you say?”

She wiggled her ring finger in the air. She said mock naughtily, ”I told him I'd think about it.”

It took half an hour to get close to the counter. They were almost there and still holding hands. After a silence he said, ”I don't know why we haven't heard anything by now.”

She said immediately, ”It means we never will.”

Then there was another silence. The refugee family was checking in its cases and bundles. Maria said, ”What do you want to do? Where do you want to be?”

”I don't know,” he said in a movie sort of voice. ”It's your place or mine.”

She laughed loudly. There was something quite wild in her manner. The British European Airlines official looked up. Maria was being so free in her movements, almost wanton. Perhaps it was joy. The Frenchmen had long since stopped talking to each other. Leonard did not know if that was because they were all watching her. He was thinking he really did love her as he lifted the bags onto the scales. Nothing at all-barely thirty-five pounds together. When his tickets had been checked, they went to the cafeteria. There was a queue here too, and it did not seem worth joining it. There were only ten minutes left.

They sat at a Formica table cluttered with dirty teacups and plates smeared with yellow cake that had been used as ashtrays. She pulled her chair nearer to him and linked her arm with his and leaned her head on his shoulder.

”You won't forget that I love you,” she said. ”We did what we had to and we are going to be all right now.”

Whenever she told him that everything was going to be all right he felt uneasy. It was like asking for trouble. Nevertheless, he said, ”I love you too.”

They were announcing the flight.

She walked with him to the newsstand, where he bought a Daily Express Daily Express, flown in that day. They stopped by the barrier.

”I'll come to London,” she said. ”We can talk about everything there. Here there's too much ...”

He knew what she meant. They kissed, though hardly the way they used to. He kissed her lovely forehead. He was going to go. She took his hand and held on with both of hers.

”Oh G.o.d, Leonard!” she cried. ”If only I could tell you. It's all right. It really is.”

That again. There were three military policemen on the gate who looked away when he kissed her for the last time.

”I'll go up on the roof and wave,” she said, and hurried off.

The pa.s.sengers had fifty yards of pavement to cross. As soon as he was clear of the terminal building he looked around. She was up on the flat roof, leaning on the parapet at the front of the observation deck. When she saw him she made a merry little dance and blew him a kiss. The Frenchmen looked enviously at him as they pa.s.sed. He waved at her and walked on until he arrived at the foot of the aircraft steps, where he stopped and turned. He had his right hand half raised to wave. There was a man at her side, a man with a beard. It was Gla.s.s. He had his hand on Maria's shoulder. Or was it his arm around her shoulder? They both waved, like parents to a departing child. Maria blew him a kiss, she dared to blow him the same kiss. Gla.s.s was saying something to her, and she laughed and they waved again.

Leonard let his hand drop and hurried up the steps into the plane. He had a window seat on the terminal side. He fussed with his seatbelt, trying not to look out. It was irresistible. They seemed to know just which little round window was his. They were looking right at him and continuing to wave their insulting goodbye. He looked away. He took his paper and snapped it open and pretended to read. He felt such shame. He longed for the plane to move. She should have told him just now, she should have confronted him, but she had wanted to avoid a scene. It was a humiliation. He blushed with it and pretended to read. Then he did read. It was the story of ”Buster” Crabbe, a naval frogman who had been spying on a Russian battles.h.i.+p moored in Portsmouth harbor. Crabbe's headless body had been retrieved by fishermen. Khrushchev had made an angry statement; something was expected that afternoon in the House of Commons. The propellers were spinning to a blur. The ground crew was hurrying away. As the plane edged forward, Leonard took one last look. They were standing close together. Perhaps she could not really see his face, because she raised one hand as if to wave and let it fall.

And then he could see her no longer.

Twenty-Three.

In June 1987 Leonard Marnham, the owner of a small company supplying components to the hearing-aid industry, returned to Berlin. It took him no more than the taxi ride from Tegel airport to the hotel to become accustomed to the absence of ruins. There were more people, it was greener, there were no trams. Then these sharp differences faded and it was a European city like any other a businessman might visit. Its dominant feature was traffic.

Even as he was paying the driver, he knew he had made a mistake in choosing to stay on the Kurfurstendamm. He had taken a certain pleasure in being knowing and specific with his secretary. The Hotel am Zoo had been the only place he could name. There was now a transparent structure sloping against the facade. Inside a gla.s.s lift slid across the surface of a mural. He unpacked his bag, swallowed his heart pill with a gla.s.s of water and went out for a stroll.

In fact it was not quite possible to stroll, the crowd was so dense. He got his bearings from the Gedachtniskirche and the hideous new structure at its side. He pa.s.sed Burger King, Spielcenter, Videoclips, Das Steak-Restaurant, Unis.e.x Jeans. The store windows were filled with clothes of babyish pastel pinks, blues and yellows. He became caught up in a surge of Scandinavian children wearing McDonald's cardboard visors, pressing forward to buy giant silver balloons from a street vendor. It was hot and the traffic roar was continuous. Disco music and the smell of burning fat were everywhere.

He went down a side street, thinking to walk around in front of the Zoo station and the entrance to the gardens, but soon he was lost. There was a confluence of major roads he did not remember. He decided to sit down outside one of the big cafes. He pa.s.sed three, and every last bright plastic chair was taken. The crowds moved aimlessly up and down, squeezing by each other wherever the pavement s.p.a.ce was taken up by cafe tables. There was a crowd of French teenagers all wearing pink T-s.h.i.+rts with f.u.c.k YOU f.u.c.k YOU! printed front and back. He was amazed to find himself lost. When he looked around for someone to ask, he could find no one who did not look like a foreigner. Eventually he approached a young couple on a corner buying a pancake with a creme de menthe filling. They were Dutch, and friendly enough, but they had never heard of the Hotel am Zoo, nor were they entirely certain of the Kurfurstendamm.

He found his hotel by accident and sat in his room for half an hour sipping an orange juice from the minibar. He was trying to resist irritable reminiscence. In my day In my day. If he was going to take a walk down Adalbertstra.s.se, he preferred to remain calm. He took from his briefcase the airmail letter he had been rereading on the plane and put it in his pocket. He was not yet sure what he wanted from all this. He was eyeing the bed. The experience on the Ku'damm had drained him. He could happily have slept the afternoon away. But he forced himself up and out once more.

In the lobby he hesitated as he handed in his key. He wanted to try out his German on the receptionist, a young chap in a black suit who looked like a student of some sort. The Wall had gone up five years after Leonard had left Berlin. He wanted to have a look while he was here. Where should he go? What was the best place? He was conscious of making elementary errors. But his understanding was good. The young man showed him on a map. Potsdamerplatz was best. There was a good viewing platform and postcard and souvenir shops.

Leonard was about to thank him and cross the lobby, but the young man said, ”You should go soon.”

”Why's that?”

”A little while ago the students were demonstrating in East Berlin. Do you know what they were shouting? The name of the Soviet leader. And the police hit them and chased them with water cannon.”

”I read about that,” Leonard said.

The receptionist was in his stride. This seemed to be a pet theme. He was in his mid-twenties, Leonard decided.

”Who would have thought that the name of the Soviet general secretary would be a provocation in East Berlin? It's amazing!”