Росс Макдональд: Dark Tunnel

“What happened?” Curiosity shrank Hunter’s small eyes to raisins.

“He was killed. But there’s more to it than that, it’s a long story. When we get together sometime, remind me to tell you about Ruth Esch–”

“Ruth Esch? Do you know Ruth Esch?”

“Do you know her, Hunt? We were engaged to be married – years ago. If she’s alive, we still are, as far as I’m concerned.”

“I didn’t know. You shouldn’t be so secretive. No, I don’t know her, but she’s coming here.”

“Coming here? ” My heart hit me under the chin. “When?”

“This week, I think. If it’s the same Ruth Esch–”

“Is the woman who’s coming here an actress? Tall? Red-haired?”

“I wouldn’t know, but Schneider can tell you about her. She’s been given a special instructorship in his department to teach German conversation.”

“You don’t know where Schneider is now, do you?”

“I was just talking to him in his office. If you hurry you should catch him.”

“Thanks. I want to talk to him,” I said, and opened the door.

Hunter called after me, “I hope it’s the right girl.” As I climbed the stairs to the second floor, my brain pounded out the words over and over like somebody practising on a typewriter in my head.

Schneider was just about to leave when I reached the German Department office on which his private office opened. He was standing with his topcoat on and a grey Homburg in his hand, giving last-minute instructions to the departmental secretary.

Dr. Herman Schneider’s appearance was as impressive as his reputation, which was awesome. Until 1934 he was the greatest Shakespearean scholar in Germany. It was generally acknowledged that he knew more about the First Folio than Heminge and Condell, and that some of his footnotes were as valuable as whole books by other men. As the President of the University said when Schneider came to Midwestern to become head of the Department of German: “With the advent of Dr. Schneider, we may say with some assurance that the cultural centre of gravity of the earth has shifted perceptibly towards the American Middle West.” This was printed in the newspapers, and print never lies.

I stood behind him and waited for him to finish talking to the secretary, not realizing that our conversation was going to shift the cultural centre of the earth again. It’s not that it wasn’t an impressive conversation, to me at least. When he finally turned and gave me the full benefit of his beard, I was quite overpowered.

He was a huge man with large brown eyes, deepset under a bald dome for which his black beard compensated. He would have stood about five feet kneeling in prayer, if such a Jupiter of a man could ever feel the need of prayer. His belly, once the pride of the Hofbrauhaus, was a cenotaph to thousands of perished liters of beer.

“What can I do for you, Dr. Branch?” He spoke with the slightly exaggerated and aggressive courtesy of many Germans. His English was better than my German, but it seemed to rumble in his belly and lollop around in his throat.

“I was just talking with Hunter, Dr. Schneider.” Schneider called all college teachers doctor and expected the same in return: his beard demanded it.

“Oh, yes, he and I had a very pleasant conversation a few minutes ago.”

“He mentioned a certain Ruth Esch, who is coming to teach in your department.”

“Yes,” Schneider said. “Yes, that is so. A very talented young woman. Why do you ask?” A hardness that may have been suspicion made the mellowness of his voice seem suddenly shallow.

“Is she an actress, a tall, red-haired girl?”

“Why, yes. I hadn’t realized that her fame had penetrated to America. I must tell her.”

“It hasn’t so far as I know. I knew her in Munich.”

“You did?” He seemed astonished and his eyebrows jumped like black mice. “She played a season with the Schauspielhaus in München. You saw her on the stage, perhaps?”

“Yes, I did. But I knew her personally as well. We were very good friends, in fact.”

The black mice had convulsions and even the beard was perturbed. “Is that so? I didn’t know you had ever visited Germany, Dr. Branch.”

“I was there for a month in 1937, studying the influence of English romanticism on the continental garden.” On a travelling fellowship you have to study something that justifies travel. “I don’t often talk of my visit to Germany. It ended unpleasantly.”

“Unpleasantly?”

“Very. I was arrested and ordered to leave the country. I have an irrational prejudice against Jew-baiting.”

“It is a commendable prejudice, Dr. Branch.” He spoke as if he meant it. “And it was in 1937, then, that you met Ruth Esch?”

“Yes.”

“You were close friends, you say? Wunderbar! ” The enthusiasm seemed a little forced. “Fräulein Esch was a pupil of mine, you know. A charming and talented girl. I am greatly looking forward to seeing her again. Dr. Branch, you must make one of the party at our reunion.”

“Thank you,” I said. “I should like to very much. When will she arrive?”

“When? Will you excuse me for a moment? I must make a telephone call.”

“Certainly.”

He unlocked his office and closed the heavy oak door behind him. I sat on the edge of the secretary’s desk and thought about Ruth. I remembered her every time Germany was bombed and many times between, but I had been afraid she was dead or in some way lost to me for good. Now coincidence had reached across an ocean and she was coming to Arbana. For the first time in six years, I felt the ambiguous bittersweet ache of being in love. Would she be the same? Would I seem the same to her? Six years of Hitler’s Europe are like a century.

When Schneider opened the door five minutes later, he woke me from a day-dream thronging with bright, possible futures. He closed the door carefully behind him and said, “Dr. Branch, it is late to ask you, but will you have dinner with me to-night?”

His beard loomed benignantly and the amiability of his expression surprised me. To a full professor, especially a German one, an Assistant Professor is an arriviste, just up from the purgatory of an instructorship. Besides, I was in the Department of English, and the greatest Shakespearean scholar of Germany knew what American departments of English are. Hell, yes.

Schneider had never gone out of his way to be friendly to me before, but now he was smiling at me like a father and saying, “It would be so pleasant to talk with you about Fräulein Esch, and about old times in München. She was my favorite pupil, and to think that she is a common friend!”

Scratch a bronze statue of Jupiter made in Germany and you get a sentimental ooze, or so I thought. I resented his emotionalism, perhaps because enthusiasm over a wom – Fräulein an’ resents competition. After all, he was a widower.

But I didn’t refuse the invitation: I wanted to find out more about Ruth Esch, and he could tell me. I also wanted to find out more about Dr. Schneider.

“I’d be delighted,” I said.

“Will seven suit you?”

“Perfectly. When is Ruth to arrive?”

“She will arrive on the nine o’clock train from Detroit tonight. Perhaps you will come with me to the station.”

“I certainly will.”

He ushered me into the corridor and locked the door of the German office. Before we separated, he patted my shoulder clumsily and said, “My boy, it will be a charming reunion. Charming.”

As he strode off, I felt a little like a matador to whom a bull has been making advances: interested but dubious.

He turned and bellowed, “Seven, don’t forget. Just a family party.”

I hope I smiled as urbanely as any matador. I felt like a character in Ernest Hemingway.