Jonathan Rabb - Rosa

The thirty-seven-year-old Manstein had been on the front lines and had had access to large quantities of Ascomycete 4; his medical background made him the perfect candidate to seek out Wouters and to orchestrate his removal from Sint-Walburga. He might even have had a relationship with the asylum prior to the war: Hoffner made a note to check in with van Acker. More than that, the articles made Manstein a devoted Thulian; and, most important, his wife’s maiden name tied him to the directors of Ganz-Neurath: Hoffner was guessing she was Herr Director Schumpert’s eldest daughter, courted during Manstein’s university days. Hoffner had sent out wires to the registrars of the Munich universities; he had never thought to look in Berlin.

And yet the why remained unclear. Hoffner had all the players in line, but he was no closer to understanding what had prompted them to unleash Wouters on Berlin, or what they hoped to gain by keeping Rosa in the wings. Eisner’s assassination made far more sense.

The train took a sudden jolt, and Lina opened her eyes. She had been asleep for the last two hours. For a moment she seemed unsure where she was.

“Another twenty minutes,” said Hoffner. She stared vacantly at him and then peered out the window as the first lights of Berlin began to appear. She placed her head on his shoulder and went back to sleep.

The news from Munich had brought out a few units of the Guard Fusiliers Regiment, who now patrolled Berlin’s Friedrichstrasse station; the soldiers, however, were doing their best not to cause any alarm as they went about their task.

Sascha stood by one of the station kiosks. He peered down at the evening edition of the Tageblatt and read with passing interest of the day’s events:

Early reports of communist radicals storming the Bavarian Landtag building-followed by equally unreliable stories of a monarchist counterrevolution-had all finally sifted down to one Count Anton Arco-Valley, a young law student with nationalist political leanings who, according to authorities, had acted entirely on his own. Odder still were the rumors that Arco-Valley was of Jewish descent; no one knew what to make of that. Why shoot one of his own? Though rattled, the Social Democrats had reassured everyone that all was well-after all, Eisner had been planning to offer his resignation this very afternoon anyway-and had quickly installed an interim government without so much as a peep of resistance from the opposition.

Smoke and shadows, thought Sascha as he read: some lunatic finds himself a pistol and the entire country has to hold its breath for a few hours. Shame they hadn’t shot him in the process.

Sascha checked his watch for a third time. He then smoothed back his hair. He was wearing his school jacket, this time with the long pants, and had brought a small bouquet of flowers, which he held awkwardly in his hand. Kroll had been good enough to let him meet her on his own. It was meant to be a surprise. Sascha was hoping Geli would find it as marvelous as he did.

Hoffner gently nudged Lina awake. Berlin was slowing all around them, the station just the other side of the river and strangely less formidable after dark. He retrieved their bags and headed out into the corridor. She was behind him, one of her hands playfully lodged in his coat pocket: they had left last night behind them. It would find them soon enough, but Hoffner was guessing that they could manage another few weeks convincing themselves that it wouldn’t. The train pulled in, and Lina stepped down to the platform. Ups and downs were a bit tougher on his ribs, and Hoffner winced as he joined her. For whatever reason-her sense of invincibility growing by the minute, he thought-she placed her hand on his cheek and kissed him. Bags in hand, Hoffner had no choice but to submit.

Sascha moved down the platform, trying to pick her out among the stream of passengers. He felt a wonderful burning in his throat and chest, and found it almost impossible not to smile. He thought he saw her among a swarm of hats and gloves, but the girl there was not nearly pretty enough. He continued to move upstream until he caught sight of something familiar though oddly not: he stopped. It took him another moment to fully process what he was seeing. He felt a strange compression in his head, a numbness where the burning had been. He stood there, unable to turn away. Bodies jostled past him, a station announcement crackled above, but all he could do was to stare at his father and this girl and feel the cold rush of an untapped violence.

Hoffner sensed it before he saw it. He opened his eyes and stared back through the flow of bodies. He must have tensed, because Lina instantly turned to follow his gaze.

There was a dreamlike quality to the next few moments, Hoffner placing the bags on the platform, stepping past her, moving toward the boy. He could see himself doing all of it, but he felt none of it. Lina knew to stay where she was.

Hoffner drew up and said, “Alexander.” The word carried no weight at all, the sound of his own voice almost foreign to him. Hoffner tried again, but all he could manage was a long breath out as Sascha stood unnervingly still. Finally Hoffner said, “This is. .” His words petered out. Is what? he thought. There was no way to see it for anything other than what it was. Hoffner was again struck by his own impotence.

“This is what you are, Father,” said Sascha with quiet hatred.

Hoffner heard the certainty in the tone, the betrayal more wrenching given the last few weeks of goodwill between them. Hoffner’s crime had now stripped away any boundaries: Sascha could accuse without any thought of reprisal. The boy wanted to hear his hatred justified, and Hoffner had no reason to deny him that. “Yes,” said Hoffner. “I suppose it is.”

Confirmation only made things worse. The truth brought Sascha to the edge. His breathing grew forced, as if he might strike his father.

Hoffner tried to calm him. “Look, Sascha-”

It was too late. Sascha glanced over at Lina. He felt shamed to be seen by her: she had no right to know him. Uncoiling his rage, Sascha looked back at his father and thrust the flowers into his chest. “Why don’t you give them to her ?” he said. Hoffner tried to answer, but Sascha pushed past him and ran into the crowd. There was a moment when Hoffner thought to go after the boy, but he had no idea what he was supposed to do if and when he caught up with him. This was a consequence that, perhaps for the first time, he had no hope of meeting.

Hoffner looked back for Lina. She was gone as well, along with her case, leaving his off by itself. Hoffner’s isolation had never felt so stark.

He stood there for several minutes until a voice broke through. “Herr Hoffner?”

Hoffner turned around and saw a pretty face with bright eyes peering up at him. He needed a moment to recall the girl. It was only then that he even considered why Sascha had been here. Coincidence and proximity, he thought: the cosmos was having a go of it tonight. He did his best with a kind smile. “Frulein Geli,” he said. “What a delight to see you again.”

She smiled and said hopefully, “I thought I might have seen Alexander, mein Herr ?”

“Really?” said Hoffner, thinking as he spoke. “I don’t think so,” he said lightly. “He asked me to meet you, and to make sure you got these.” Hoffner handed her the bruised flowers.

Her eyes lit up. “Oh, really! Will I be seeing him tonight, mein Herr ?”

Hoffner picked up her case and said, “Fathers never get the full details, Frulein. I’m simply to bring you to Herr Kroll’s, though I imagine they’re preparing something quite wonderful for you.”