Wednesday dawned wet and foggy, and though the drizzle soon turned to mist, visibility remained poor. When Russell and Paul took a train from Kentish Town shortly before noon, they were still hoping that conditions would improve, but the world further east was every bit as murky, and they made the long trek up Tottenham High Road expecting disappointment.
The game was still on. The queues were shorter than Russell had expected, but he soon discovered the reason — most of the fans were already inside. The crowd seemed thinner higher up, but as Paul pointed out, the further they were from the action the less they would probably see. Even close to the touchline the opposite grandstand was only a blur.
They squeezed in behind two school truants waving hammer and sickle flags, and sat themselves down on the damp concrete. There were still almost two hours until kick-off. Russell had initially hoped they would talk during the wait, but Paul had come armed with a book, and he was left alone with his newspapers.
The game in prospect got plenty of coverage, and a win was expected from Arsenal, particularly as several ‘guests’ — including Blackpool’s formidable Stanleys, Matthews and Mortensen — had been drafted in for the day. This was an England XI in everything but name, and national pride was clearly at stake.
Away from the back pages, nothing much caught his attention until an item in The Times almost took his breath away. He read the piece twice to be sure, then stared straight ahead for several seconds, stunned by the enormity of what had been decided. Over the next six months, six and a half million Germans would be taken from their homes in the eastern regions of the old Reich, and forcibly relocated in the newly shrunken Germany. Six and half million! How were they going to be fed and sheltered? Or weren’t they? Stupid or callous, it beggared belief.
What sort of Germany were he and Effi going back to?
As he sat there, the local brass band began playing on the far side of the pitch. Drifting out of the fog, the tunes sounded even more mournful than usual.
At 1.45 the Dynamos emerged for their strange warm-up ritual. The conditions might be improving, Russell thought — the players on the far touchline were clearly visible, and the welcoming red flags on the West Stand roof occasionally fluttered into view. The Dynamos went back in, more minutes dragged by, before at last the two teams walked out together, the Russians surveying their surroundings with a breezy confidence, the Arsenal players looking grimly introspective.
The latter’s apprehension soon proved justified, the Russians scoring in the very first minute, and threatening another only seconds later. Soon the fog grew denser again, and the opposite stand faded from sight. The furthest players were vague apparitions at best, the linesman’s luminous flag an almost spectral presence. Stanley Matthews was playing on that side, and playing well if the roars from the opposite stand were anything to go by. But there seemed no end-product until the still-visible Dynamo keeper was suddenly seen diving in vain. 1–1.
The play surged from end to end, the action moving in and out of focus as the fog swirled across the pitch. Unlike the last match, the spirit seemed anything but friendly. Tackles were flying in from all directions, one savage lunge theatrically lit by the blaze of a magnesium flash bulb. Arsenal gradually got on top, and as half time approached they scored twice in as many minutes. There was an almost instant reply from the Russians, but Dynamo were still 3–2 down when the teams went in.
Intervals usually lasted five minutes, but this one had stretched to fifteen before the players re-emerged. The fog had thinned during the break, but now thickened with a vengeance, leaving Russell and his son with only the faintest view of Dynamo’s equaliser. They could see that the Arsenal players were livid, but had no idea why. Tempers frayed further, and a fist-fight erupted in the Dynamo penalty area. The referee seemed to send off an Arsenal player, but the man in question just ambled off into a dense patch of fog.
The fog thickened further, until only a quarter of the pitch was visible. Why the game had not been abandoned was anyone’s guess, but there was something highly satisfying about the whole business. It felt almost magical. Glancing sideways, Russell saw a look of utter enchantment on Paul’s face, the same one he’d seen at the boy’s first Hertha game, all those years ago.
Dynamo went ahead with another invisible goal, and Arsenal finally wilted. Much of the crowd was already heading for the exits by this time, but Russell and Paul hung on until the final whistle blew, and the last of the players had been swallowed by the mist.
‘That was incredible,’ Paul said, as they emerged onto the High Road. The buses and trolleybuses were all stuck in the stationary traffic, so they joined the stream heading south, stopping halfway down for a bag of soggy chips.
A train steamed out across the road bridge as they neared the station, and their platform was almost empty when they reached it. Russell expected Paul to pull out his book, but he didn’t. ‘Do you want to go back home?’ he asked his son. ‘Eventually, I mean.’
Paul stared out into the fog for several moments. ‘I don’t know,’ he said at last. ‘I like it here,’ he added almost reluctantly after another long pause, ‘but perhaps that’s only because it’s easier to hide from the past here. I don’t know. What would I do in Berlin? There’s no work there. No paid work anyway. Here I can fill up my day, and earn some money.’ He looked at his father.
‘I’m happy here,’ he said, sounding almost surprised that he was.
‘I don’t know how long I’ll be gone,’ Russell told him.
Paul smiled. ‘You don’t have to worry about me, Dad. Really. I only had one nightmare this last week — did you notice?’
‘Yes,’ Russell said. Effi had pointed it out.
‘It’s like a poison,’ Paul said. ‘It has to work its way out of your system — that’s the way I see it. And you have to let it. But not by pretending that everything’s fine. Do you remember telling me once how important it was to keep your mind and your emotions turned on?’
‘I remember.’ He’d been trying to explain what he’d learnt fighting in the First War.
‘Well I’ve tried to do that, and I think it works. It’s like an antidote.’
Russell winced inside as he thought of the pain his son had been through, was still going through. ‘You don’t think talking helps?’
‘I do talk to people,’ Paul said. ‘Just not the family.’
‘Who then?’ Russell asked, feeling hurt and knowing he shouldn’t be.
‘Solly’s a great listener. And Marisa is too. It would be hard talking to you, Dad. Or to Effi.’
‘I suppose it would,’ Russell conceded reluctantly. He had never been able to talk to his own parents about the trenches.
A train was audible in the distance, and two fuzzy lights soon swam into view. ‘And the talking does help,’ Paul said.
‘Good,’ Russell told him. Crammed inside the suburban carriage compartment for the journey home, he felt a huge sense of relief. He might be going back into hell, but his son was going to be all right.
On Thursday afternoon Russell collected their tickets from Embassy reception, and had a long talk with Solly Bernstein about the sort of freelance articles which the latter would be able to sell, always assuming that Russell could find some way of getting them back to London. According to Solly, no one was interested in the hardships of ordinary Germans, and not many more in the fate of Europe’s surviving Jews. Though there might be some mileage in the growing number of those intent on breaching the British wall around Palestine.
Arriving home around six, Russell walked into a wonderful aroma — Zarah had used all their newly surplus rations for a farewell family dinner. But the cheerful mood seemed forced, and he and Effi were relieved to escape for a few minutes’ packing. There was, in truth, not much to take — they had left Germany with next to nothing, and had bought little in London. ‘I’m sure actresses are supposed to have more clothes than this,’ was Effi’s conclusion as she closed her battered suitcase.
In the morning she walked Rosa to school for the last time. When they said their goodbyes the girl seemed determined not to cry, but Effi’s tears broke down her resistance. Walking back to the flat alone, Effi couldn’t remember when she’d last felt so wretched.
An hour or so later, she and Russell climbed into a taxi and waved goodbye to Zarah. Sitting in the back, they watched London slide by, all the drab buildings and overgrown bombsites, faces still etched by the hardship of war. Berlin, they knew, would be a hundred times worse.
Their boat train left on time, rattling out across the dark grey Thames, and over the long brick viaducts
