Two Brothers

‘Let us go!’ a middle-aged woman was protesting. ‘You don’t want us. You hate us. For God’s sake, why don’t you let us go?’

There was much anguish at the border that day, as indeed there had been every day for years. Some of the older guards missed the days when theirs had been a happy job. Wishing people well as they went off on their holidays. Contented was the world when borders had been things that travellers crossed for fun.

There was a knocking at the door. More like blows, in fact, than knocks, as if the beautiful wooden panelling was being punched.

‘Are these bloody people incapable of doing anything without turning it into some sort of violent assault?’ Silke hissed sotto voce, running a brush through her hair. ‘Tea time at Gestapo headquarters must be a nightmare. Breaking the crockery, spilling the milk. If they put on a ballet they’d do it in bloody jackboots.’

Otto laughed.

‘Hey, I went to Napola! I’ve had three years of it. You stand to attention when you take a crap.’

‘Actually I rather think that would be anatomically impossible.’

‘Nothing is impossible to the German soldier!’

Another rattling bang on the door.

‘Einen moment, bitte,’ Silke called out.

Having slipped on her shoes, she opened the door of their compartment. There were three of them outside. A plainclothes officer and two Wehrmacht soldiers in steel helmets. Steel helmets in order to ask people on trains if they had visas. Even after six years of living under the Nazis, three at an elite school, Otto had still not got used to their deep psychological need to militarize everything.

‘Papers,’ the Gestapo man demanded. He was of course dressed in the usual gangster get-up, black leather trenchcoat and Homburg hat. All he needed was a Thompson sub-machine gun tucked under his arm in a violin case and he could have been in an American movie.

Silke handed over her passport and exit visa, while Otto sat up and reached for his in the jacket he had put at the other end of his bunk.

‘What is your business abroad?’ the officer snapped, having gone through the documents, a task made difficult by the fact that he wore leather gloves.

‘Just a little Dutch holiday before my Otto goes into the Wehrmacht,’ Silke said. ‘We will be back in a day or two.’

‘We couldn’t bear to be out of the Fatherland any longer,’ Otto added. ‘We might miss a parade.’

The Gestapo man clearly did not much like Otto’s tone, nor did he think much of two such young people having the wherewithal to travel first class. However, their papers were in order and so, having thrust them back, he left them in peace. Or at least as much peace as could be had with the officer and his soldiers stamping and banging their way along the carriage to the compartments beyond.

‘Well. Looks like that’s it. You made it. You’re out.’

‘Yes,’ Otto replied. ‘I’m out.’

Through the window they could see those for whom departure had been denied being herded together on the platform under armed guard.

Together they began to put their compartment back into daytime order. Both selfconsciously aware of their proximity as their hips touched while they folded up the top bunk into its wall cavity and turned the bottom one back into a seat.

‘Seems funny to be coy now,’ Otto said, ‘after—’

‘We were drunk,’ Silke said quickly. ‘We’re not drunk now. And it was dark. Makes rather a big difference.’

‘The attendant is supposed to do this while we go and eat a huge breakfast,’ Otto said.

‘I’d rather do it myself,’ Silke said, reddening.

Hurriedly she gathered up her undersheet, screwed it into a ball and pushed it out of sight.

Afterwards they sat together on the seat and Otto gave Silke his passport and ID, the ones he had shown to the Gestapo man.

‘So,’ he said, ‘you take these back then.’

‘Yes.’ Silke buried the documents deep in her handbag. ‘I take them back and give them to Pauly. He’s got someone who can change the photograph.’

Then Otto reached to the bottom of his own bag and produced a second set of papers.

‘And here’s Pauly’s, with the photo already changed. He’s bloody efficient, isn’t he, my bro.’

Otto stared at the documents.

‘Paulus Israel Stengel,’ he said. ‘Fuck. They know how to twist the knife, don’t they?’

The train was pulling away, rolling slowly past the failed fugitives. All silent now, desperate figures, every protest stilled. Faces blank and cold with anguish as they watched their last hope of freedom leaving the station without them.

Otto looked down at the papers in his hand, at the large ‘J’ stamped across them, the letter that had condemned every yearning face they passed.

‘Come on,’ he said, ‘let’s go and have breakfast. We’ve paid a fortune for it, we should eat it.’

They got up and made their way down the very same corridor along which they had stumbled tipsily only a few hours earlier.

‘First and last time I’ll ever travel first class, I imagine,’ Silke said.

Otto did not reply. That privacy which they’d paid for had taken such a very unexpected turn.

Why did he feel as if he’d betrayed Dagmar?

It was so stupid. After all, she’d rejected him for his brother, and it was very possible that he would never see her again anyway. He didn’t intend to remain a monk for the rest of his life, so what did it matter who he made love to?

Even someone as unexpected as Silke. A friend. A dear old friend.

But still he felt deflated. Wretched almost. As if he’d despoiled something fine and noble.

Because he loved Dagmar. His first and only passion. He had told her so at the cafe at the Lehrter Bahnhof.

And then just a few hours later he had been in bed with another girl. What was that, if not a betrayal?

At the door to the restaurant car Silke stopped and turned to look at him.

‘Don’t feel bad about it,’ she said.

Otto was completely taken aback. How had she known what he was thinking?

It was that woman thing again, they always seemed to know.

‘I wasn’t! Really, Silke,’ he protested.

But she interrupted him.

‘You were and you know it. You were feeling bad about last night. But please don’t. For my sake. I’d hate it so much if you did. It was my idea… I wanted to, you see… Dagmar said I get what I want but I don’t think I do at all… but last night, for just a moment, I did.’ Now she reached out her arms to hold him. ‘The thing is, I might never see you again and the whole world’s about to go to hell and…’

‘Silke.’ Otto tried gently to pull himself away. ‘Don’t.’

‘I know. I know you love Dagmar,’ she said hurriedly. ‘Of course I know. But it wasn’t you last night anyway, was it? That’s the point. It wasn’t you.’

Otto was surprised. ‘Who was it then?’

‘Why that new fellow!’ Silke said with a big broad smile that did nothing to disguise the tears standing in her eyes. ‘Mister Stengel, of course. That very new, very handsome, freshly minted, soon-to-be Englishman. It was him.’

‘Of course,’ Otto said quietly, ‘that’s right, it was just Mister Stengel.’

‘So that’s all right then. No need to feel bad on his behalf, eh!’

For a moment they faced each other. There was a longing in Silke’s pale blue eyes.

‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Eggs. Eggs and fresh rolls.’