‘Soll ich?’ asks the SS officer, nodding at the cake.
‘Bitter sehr!’ his blissful flame answers.
And right away he cuts the cake delicately but without hesitating in equal pieces. Aunty Emma passes round the plates. We eat. No, it’s more like unabashed feasting. Biting into whipped cream and staying polite—not easy. To everyone’s relief none of us are required to say very much. Aunty Emma carries on with an explanation which soon descends into incomprehensibility, interrupted now and then by Gregor’s chortling.
‘Und jetzt Cognac!’
Gregor gently swirls the generously filled balloon glasses before handing them to us.
Mother refuses politely. Father pretends to hesitate briefly before accepting the glass and taking a sip. ‘French, natürlich!’
Hearty laughter from Gregor and Aunty Emma. The German slaps his uniform trousers exuberantly as if it’s the best joke he’s heard in years.
Then he looks at me and says, ‘Sie sind Polizist?’
‘Jawohl,’ I say, ‘und stolz darauf.’ Is it me or Angelo who feels compelled to claim to be proud of my job? Or is it the cognac racing through my veins?’
‘Goodness!’ cries Aunty Emma. ‘Listen to him chattering away in German!’
Mother and Father look at me as if they have just realized they have been sheltering a monster all this time.
Gregor raises his glass high and gives me a droll wink as if I’m his ventriloquist’s dummy.
‘Auf eine brillante Karriere!’
‘Cheers!’ says Father, beating me to it.
The glasses clink against each other.
It’s not long before Meanbeard lets me know how much ‘mein Freund Gregor’ enjoyed our encounter.
‘I knew he had a Mademoiselle tucked away somewhere, but her being a relative of yours… Well, that raises possibilities, possibilities for both of us.’
‘Are you mad? Maybe you’re not quite right in the head?’
‘Toutes les possibilités harmoniques et architecturales s’émouvront autour de ton siège. That’s a quote. From whom?’
‘Rimbaud…’ I guess, sick of his guessing games.
Meanbeard looks at me as if he wants to give me a kiss. ‘Voilà! You see for yourself how the forces are gathering round you. It’s not like that for everyone. The world belongs to the young. They’re the ones who have the opportunities. They’re there for the taking along every young person’s path. But you have to pay attention! Chances are there to be taken. Otherwise you betray the generosity of the universe and are doomed to live a life like any other. And yes, I know, that’s not your intent. You can’t fool me… Ah, who do we have here?’
All present in the White Raven look at the lady whose chestnut curls are peeking out from beneath a jaunty yellow cap, and especially at her legs, which are cheerfully braving the cold under a houndstooth coat and end in shoes with heels you would normally only ever see on cinema screens. Jenny’s here again, her decline almost hidden under a careful layer of putty.
‘You made me a promise,’ she says to Meanbeard without greeting him first.
‘Sweetness, come now! They have Export here, your favourite beer. Isn’t that good news?’
‘Save your jokes for someone else! You know I only drink white port.’
‘Landlord! A white port.’
‘And who’s this young fellow?’
She looks like she came within an inch of pinching me on the cheek.
‘We have met on a previous occasion, Ma Dame.’
‘Get an earful of him. At least some people can still act civilified. Yes, go ahead and laugh… It’s my own private word. I don’t want to be rude, but sometimes I prefer to hear something of my own invention. Our mum had that too. After she found out our hairdresser was the goalie in his pub team she used to call him a nincompkeeper.’
We laugh. Jenny takes a big slug of the port and says she can go on for hours with all her made-up words.
‘She’s right!’ Meanbeard crowed. ‘She can go on for hours!’
‘But I’m not in the mood for that today. So, friend, what’s the story? You make me a promise and then I don’t hear a thing. Or are you too embarrassed in front of your cultured pal here?’
‘I’ll leave you alone then,’ I mutter, a little tetchy.
‘No, don’t,’ Meanbeard hurries to say, ‘no need. I promised our Jenny a little boutique, here close by, on Charlotta Lei…’
‘Boutique is not the right word, eh, lover. The shop in question is a tobacconist’s, as it says so grandly on the facade. Or would you like to turn it into a clothes shop? Then you can call it a boutique and you won’t hear me complaining. I’d much rather have something like that than a smoky hole in the wall where blokes go for their baccy.’ And, gloop, with that Jenny’s port glass is empty. Meanbeard snaps his fingers at the landlord, but that’s something you’re not allowed to do in bars like this, not even when the boss is a friend of yours. The finger-snapping is therefore ignored. But Jenny holds her glass up in the air and the landlord soon trots over with the bottle. He tops her up without a word.
‘A shop,’ I say. ‘Big plans.’
A contemptuous sigh escapes Jenny’s lips, not so very loud, but enough to keep her paramour, her no-account lover, on his toes.
‘It’s a question of timing, not money,’ Meanbeard continues quickly. ‘Mein Freund Gregor and I have to visit the fellow sometime. It seems he has a Jewish shop assistant who doesn’t always wear her star. She has to go, of course. That’s easily fixed, probably next week. And then it’s up to our Jenny, with her beautiful eyes and fine figure, to go in and ask sweetly if the shopkeeper doesn’t happen to have a job for her.’
Jenny raises a gloved hand. ‘The idea is still that I’ll take over, isn’t it? I’ve had enough of all these blokes telling me what to do. I want to be able to stand on my own two feet. I’ve really had enough of it. The things I’ve seen and had to put up with.’
‘Not so fast, butterfly,’ Meanbeard
