David John - Flight from Berlin

I see the relief on the faces of some; others weep bitter tears, myself included. I can scarce believe it. Were all those lives in vain?

There is a commotion and I notice Patient H stumbling among the men, feeling for the walls. The door is opened for him and he gropes his way along the corridor in the direction of the ward. I go after him.

On his bed, his head is buried in the pillows. He is sobbing loudly, hitting the mattress with his fist.

11 NOVEMBER ’18

Like Patient H, I do not sleep. I am exhausted.

The armies are demobilising; soldiers are returning to their homes all over the country. But most of the men in my ward dread the world outside the hospital. They cling to me like a father. Society is in no state to care for them. I continue my duties as if with a fever.

In the long hours of the night I think how hard the peace will be for Patient H. How utterly unsuited he is to a life dependent on the care of others. A life darkened and curtailed, not able to be an architect. Maybe over time he could learn to view the defeat in context, and in the end regain his sight.

On some patients with a hysterical symptom, in particular with mutes, I have used hypnotic suggestion to free their minds from the event that caused the breakdown. But as hypnosis is effected through the eyes, how would I use it to cure Patient H? It just would not work.

Unless…

E leanor had set out for work earlier than usual. Along with most of the embassy staff she was putting in extra hours in preparation for the influx of American press and guests attending the coronation in May.

She was about to turn the corner into Grosvenor Gardens when two figures in the long line of emigres waiting for American visas caught her eye. One had on a suit faded to purple by the elements, and a hat with the rim turned up at the front. He was seated cross-legged on a bashed leather case with his head in a book. The other, leaning against the wall next to him, sported a gorse bush of tangled hair and was whistling with his eyes half closed.

‘Friedl?’

Two thin faces looked her way, alert. A moment’s suspicion, and then Friedl dropped the book and drew her into the arms of his old suit, releasing a heady smell of camphor and stale fish. ‘Eleanor.’

‘You made it out?’ she said, the questions beginning to crowd her mind.

He made an effort to smile. ‘I did. And here I am, bound for America. What can I say? Hollywood needs me. Maybe you remember Nat. From the Nollendorfplatz Theatre?’ He nodded towards his companion, and Eleanor nodded back in response. She recognised him. The youth who’d tried to slip his arm around her at the door.

‘Of course.’

A moment’s hesitation. ‘And Richard? He’s well?’

‘He is well,’ she said, hearing the coolness in her own voice.

‘You’ve heard from him?’

‘Actually, we’re engaged to be married.’

Both men looked surprised. Then Friedl laughed. ‘Congratulations.’

‘He’ll want to talk to you, I’m sure.’

‘Yes,’ he said, colouring. ‘Much has happened since we last met.’

Keeping her eyes on his, she said, ‘They arrested him and questioned him for three days.’

To Friedl’s credit, he looked stricken. She half expected him to make a show of not knowing what she was talking about, but he said nothing.

‘Here, let me have those,’ she said, taking their application forms. ‘Meet me back here at four.’ She opened her purse and gave Friedl a ten-shilling note. ‘Get yourselves something to eat. Then you’re coming home with me.’

12 NOVEMBER ’18

I am restless with energy, nervous at what I am about to attempt. Before breakfast I send for him.

He enters; he is wary and sullen. I guide him to the chair. Through the window the dawn is beginning to light the room.

My intention is to master his subconscious… with an overwhelming Idea.

I make a long pretence of examining his eyes once more. I tell him that, on this more careful examination, I can indeed discern physical injury caused by the gas.

He nods and clasps the iron cross pinned to his tunic, as if to tell me that he would never feign blindness to avoid duty.

I allow a long silence to intervene. Now, dropping my voice in the manner I use to put patients into a hypnotic trance, I speak slowly, telling him that no doctor in the world can help him now. There is no cure for blindness.

I watch his face fall into dejection, but I continue.

Rare indeed is the man who might overcome such an affliction, I tell him. But wonders do happen in nature, maybe only once or twice in the Age of Man-to those whom Providence shows especial grace, to truly exceptional men whose destinies she throws open to greatness. Ordinary men she does not see, I tell him, but you are no ordinary man.

He looks taken completely by surprise. As though I have voiced a profound truth about him, a truth known only to himself.

‘Yes.’ His voice is a whisper.

‘What need have you of medicine if you possess this rare essence, the will to rise to the call of Providence and all the power she bestows? To overcome the damage in your eyes, and use this power to see…’

Perspiration breaks out under the hair on his brow.

‘How?’

‘Trust in yourself absolutely. In your will. You alone can achieve this. See the sun in front of your eyes!’

His hands are agitated in his lap. He stands up; I take his elbow and turn him towards the window, where the first rays of the sun are shining through the bare trees.

‘Do it. See the brightness in front of you.’

He is in turmoil.

‘I see nothing,’ he says.

‘Open your mind,’ I say, raising my voice. ‘See everything. Let your will triumph. There is no limit to your will! ’

His breath quickens, and now I see that he might do it. So I shout at the top of my voice, ‘ Now, see it now! ’

The tension on his face is tremendous. Then his eyes flare like an animal’s exposed to bright light. The room is filling with light.

‘Yes… I see it,’ he says, his voice tight. ‘I see it.’ He turns quickly. He is seeing the desk, the books, the room.

I breathe with relief. He has done it! I have done it.

Laughing, I throw my hands in the air. I want to shake his hand and say well done.

But he is not smiling. He seems stunned, shaken to the core. His face has turned a dead white.

The large eyes focus on me now for the first time, as if I am a creature in an aquarium. They have a most unsettling effect. I wait for him to speak but he says nothing.

‘You have your sight,’ I say. ‘You’ll be an architect.’

My words seem to travel across a great chasm to reach him. ‘An architect,’ he whispers. ‘You think after this total… unpardonable betrayal, I would be an architect?’

I know he is speaking of the war. Standing in the light he begins to tremble all over, as if from extreme cold, and his breath comes in short gasps; then he covers his face with his hands and lets out a low cry, as though he is being reborn into the world.

Too surprised to speak, I wait until he is more composed.

Go back to the ward, I say.

Without thanking me, or uttering another word, he pulls open the door and leaves.

In those few moments I was more frightened of him than of my own father.

It all began when I met Captain Kurt Rogel,’ Friedl said.

He was on the sofa in the sitting room, across from a fire Denham had made from the last of the winter’s wood. After getting over the shock of finding Friedl and Nat at his door, after a dinner over which the young men had recounted the tale of their escape-on a Danish herring trawler from Warnemunde on the Baltic coast-Denham stood at the mantelpiece listening, with Eleanor next to him in the armchair. Nat had gone to bed.