If you’re there, she began again, but then she thought of Carl and didn’t know what to say next. Where was Carl now? She heard footsteps behind her and turned. A mother with her small child had come in. Helene bowed her head and laid her forehead on her folded hands. Let me not be here, she whispered. There was no self-pity left; Helene felt only a great desire for release.
Where? she heard the clear voice of the child behind her.
There, said the mother, up there.
Where? I can’t see him. The child was getting impatient, wailing. Where is he? I can’t see him.
No one can see him, said the mother, you can’t see him with your eyes. You have to see with your heart, child.
There was no reply — was the child’s heart seeing something now? Helene stared at the notches in the wooden pew and felt a sense of dread; how could she ask God for something when she had forgotten him so long? Forgive me, she whispered. Carl hadn’t died for her to eat her heart out longing for him. He had died for no reason at all. She would manage to live like this, hoping for an answer that didn’t come. Helene stood up and left the church. On the way out she caught herself still looking for signs, signs of God’s existence and her release. Outside the sun was shining. Was that a sign? Helene thought of her mother. Perhaps all the things she found, the tree roots, the feather dusters, were signs to her? It’s not rubbish, Helene heard her mother’s voice say. God needs nothing but human memory and human doubts, her mother had once said.
The rent of the apartment that Helene looked at, an attic apartment with a bedroom and living room, was too expensive. She didn’t have enough money, and whenever she went to see a landlady she was asked about her husband and her parents. To avoid being a burden on Fanny, the better to avoid Erich, Helene applied for a room in the nurses’ hostel.
She didn’t have all her qualifications yet, said the matron kindly. Helene claimed to have heard from Bautzen that there had been a fire in which the records of her training were destroyed. The matron was sympathetic and let Helene move into a room, but said she must get new papers as soon as possible.
Martha came back from the sanatorium and moved into an apartment with Leontine. They were working so hard that Helene saw Martha and Leontine only every few weeks and sometimes not for months.
The economic crisis was getting worse all the time. No one escaped its effects. People were buying and selling, speculating, grabbing what they could; they all said they were anxious not to make a loss now, but so far no one had found the knack of avoiding it. Fanny gave a party for Erich’s birthday, a big party, celebrating on a large scale. It was to be bigger than her own, a party in his honour grander than any she had ever given before. In the last few months Erich had left Fanny several times, but he had always come back and now he turned up for his own birthday party. Fanny had issued many invitations, to friends of her own and to friends of Erich, and to some people who didn’t even know that she was more than just his tennis partner.
Helene hadn’t wanted to go, but Leontine and Martha made her. Perhaps the two of them had Helene on their conscience because it was so long since they’d been able to do anything for her.
Fanny’s invitation seemed to Helene an attempt at resuscitation, a measure taken to inject and extend life, a pitiful repetition of earlier invitations. The guests were still splendidly dressed, imitation jewellery sparkled, they talked about betting on horses and the stock exchange rates — more than seventy thousand bankruptcies this year and the number of unemployed had just risen above six million. Someone lit an opium pipe. No wonder wages had to fall by up to twenty-five per cent. Views and opinions on the collapse of the Piscator Theatre were exchanged, but Helene didn’t want to listen. Should she feel uneasy because she herself had a job? Life was unthinkable without the metronome of her work at the hospital. Helene didn’t look at the Baron and his Pina either. They had married the year before last and had been at odds ever since, this time not about diamonds and feather boas but about a dress that Pina had bought, without the Baron’s permission and with money they didn’t have. The Baron accused her of borrowing from his friends and deceiving him over their joint property. She denied it all. Soon she was flinging her arms in the air and cried: I confess, I stole the dress! You insisted on knowing, so here’s the truth: I stole it. I’m a thief. From the Kaufhaus des Westens. Now what? Helene looked at the other guests, she looked at her shoes and examined her hands. One fingernail had a black rim. Helene rose from the chaise longue where she had been sitting until now, alone and without being pestered, she crooked her fingers as best she could, curled them up so no one could see the dirty nail, and went out into the corridor, where she had to wait a little while to use the bathroom. As soon as the door was open and the bathroom free, Helene hurried in. She bolted the door. The stove for the water was heated, and Helene turned on the tap. Steaming hot water came out, frothing and white. Helene scrubbed her nails with the nailbrush under running water. The soap lathered, Helene scrubbed, soaped, scrubbed and soaped. Her hands were reddened, her nails became whiter and whiter. She washed her face too, and feeling an itch down her backbone she had to wash her neck as well, as far as she could without undressing. Someone knocked at the door. Helene knew she ought to turn off the tap. Her hands were turning red and hot and clean, then redder and hotter and cleaner, it wasn’t easy for her to turn the tap. Underneath it, the bluish-green tinge of the residue left by the water showed on the sides of the tub. What salts had the water brought in and left there along with the lime in it?
Back among the guests, Helene had just decided to leave — after all, nurses were supposed to be back in the hostel by ten, and the night shift didn’t end until six in the morning — when she found a young man standing beside her, smiling. He kept smiling down at her so persistently that it looked as if he thought he knew her.
Our friend Wilhelm, said Erich, appearing behind the young man.
Now let me guess, said Wilhelm, let me guess her name.
He’s guessing everyone’s names tonight, explained Erich, slapping his friend on the shoulder. Erich laughed. He’s another Hanussen, oh yes, he’s a real clairvoyant.
Wilhelm removed Erich’s hand from his shoulder. Nonsense, I’m no Hanussen.
He’s only once really had it off with anyone, and not even with a lady. Erich’s eyes pierced Helene.
Wilhelm wasn’t letting Erich embarrass him. He looked searchingly at Helene. Don’t worry, it’s only a game. Wilhelm leaned sideways, as if Helene’s name were written on a note attached to her temple. Then he nodded. Alice. Her name is Alice.
Erich laughed. Fanny, who had joined them, mopped her inflamed eyes and asked Erich to get her an absinthe. Erich did not comply with Fanny’s request; his eyes were on Helene’s face, boring into her own eyes, her cheeks, her mouth.
Well, isn’t she a woman after your own heart? Willy here adores blondes. Erich clapped his friend hard on the shoulder as if he had to tenderize him, like a schnitzel. There may not be much else to say for her, but she’s blonde. Erich laughed, in the belief that he had cracked a joke. His glance showed how readily he would grab Helene if they were alone. Suspecting nothing of that, Wilhelm stood with his back to his friend and there was surprise, almost amazement in his eyes.