David Gillham - City of Women

It’s as if she can feel herself rooting to the spot. She does not move, and neither does he.

The No. 14 Elektrischetram hums up the Uhlandstrasse in the opposite direction, and after it passes, no one is standing across the street. No one at all.

IN THE CINEMA’S BALCONY, Sigrid finds the father of the BdM girl whose nose Ericha bloodied. He’s a nervous bureaucrat, with multiple chins that ripple when he frowns. Opening an envelope, he exhibits the contraband he’s brought to market. In the light from the screen Sigrid can read the title on the cardboard document cover. BOMBENPASS. A passbook for bombing victims. Tensely, she slides him the paper parcel in exchange. The bureaucrat yanks open the parcel wrapping and thumbs through the marks. Then he nods curtly. Transaction completed.

The bureaucrat scurries away, but Sigrid stays. She breathes deeply. The film assaults her ears with music. It rushes sharp gray-white light past her eyes. But she is concentrating on the darkness. Is he out there? Waiting for her? Buried in a row of seats, an escapee from the solitary prison of her memory? She searches the blackness. Waits. But then the house lights are raised. A scattered collection of Berliners, thickly wrapped in coats and scarves, are on their feet, milling toward the exits like somnambulists as the porters herd them down the aisles.

No one buried in the seats. No one waiting. No man. No ghost.

The last time she acted as Egon’s bagman, she was carrying a tin of Malzkaffee in her purse. She was posted in the spot by the stairs as instructed, and was waiting on the skinny Berliner with the homburg once more. But she was looking at her wristwatch, because the man had not yet arrived, and she would soon be late in returning to the office. She tried not to appear anxious or out of place. But then a Sipo agent in a raincoat turned up on the platform, with a uniformed Orpo officer trailing. When the Sipo man started stopping women—women only—and asking for their papers, she felt a burn of nausea in her belly. Her eyes darted back and forth. No sign of the skinny Berliner or his black homburg. Perhaps he had spotted the Sipo men before her. Perhaps he had been tipped off. Perhaps they had already arrested him and were now searching for his accomplice.

A train whooshed into the station. It was headed the wrong direction, but Sigrid turned and stepped onto it anyway. She tried to keep her breathing level. It seemed to take a lifetime for the train to get under way, and when at last it rumbled forward, she had lost sight of the Sipo agent. Had he boarded the train as well? She stood tightly clutching the handrail when someone touched her on the shoulder, and she spun around with sparks in her eyes.

“ Excuse me ,” a young boy in a Hitler Youth uniform said, obviously startled by her reaction to his touch. “But I thought… I thought you might like to sit down.”

She glared at him, and then glared at the vacant seat he was offering her. “Ah,” she breathed finally. “Thank you.”

Your instincts are good. You made the right decision.

She had clamped the tin of Malzkaffee onto the table that afternoon, and announced to Egon that she was through with being his bagman. “Look at my hands, how they are shaking just talking about it. I could barely get through my work for the rest of the day. I’m sorry, I’m simply not cut out for this, Egon.”

He took her hands in his and settled her onto the bed opposite him. “Don’t worry. Your instincts are good. You made the right decision.”

“Don’t try to charm me.”

“I’m not.”

“I can’t do it any longer. I’m just a hausfrau. That’s all.”

He took a deep breath and expelled it. She knew what he was doing. He was calculating how to handle this. How to handle her . “Let me get you a drink,” he said, and left her slumped on the bed as he headed for the bottle in the cabinet. She picked up his cigarette smoldering in the ashtray and took a puff. Its bitterness bit into the back of her throat.

“Here. Take this.”

“I shouldn’t,” she said, accepting the glass. “I’ll smell of alcohol when I get home.” But she took a swallow anyway, and closed her eyes as the heat flowed down to her belly. He flopped down on the bed, with a jangle of springs, leaning his head against the wall, and picking up his cigarette. “I’ll get someone else,” he said.

She looked over at him. “Will you?”

A shrug. “Of course I will.” And then he looks away from her, examining the rising smoke. “What else can I do?”

When Ericha appears in the cinema seat beside her, she jumps.

“You did it,” the girl whispers.

“What?”

“You did it. You made the exchange.”

“Yes.” Sigrid frowns. “Yes, I did it. A bombing passbook.”

“A blank bombing passbook. We can type any name we like on it.”

“Now all we need is a typewriter.”

“You have a typewriter at your job.”

“I see. So I am to be the secret agent at the Reich Patent Office. I have a typewriter, yes, but I also have a supervisor standing at my back.”

“Never mind, then. There are other typewriters,” Ericha tells her. “You’re upset.”

“No. I just can’t stand to sit here any longer. Please, let’s go.”

The old usher opens the door for them, but also blocks it, clearing his throat with intention. “Evening, gnädige Frauen. Enjoy the film?”

“Give him some money,” Ericha instructs in a whisper. “Ten marks.”

Sigrid obeys, digging the money from her purse.

The old man grunts his thanks and clears the way for them with ersatz gallantry.

“You pay him off?” she asks Ericha as they hurry down the steps.

“Not me. You ,” she answers, but then says, “It’s a good spot for transactions. It’s worth a bit of wire to protect,” she says, then asks, “What’s the matter?”

“Nothing.”

“You’re lying,” Ericha tells her as they reach the bottom of the steps, but leaves it at that.

The trip back down the Uhlandstrasse is filled with silence. The silence of the images inside Sigrid’s head. His face. The weight of his eyes. The lightness of his fingers on her cheek. But as they enter the building, they are overrun by Frau Granzinger and her brood. “Fräulein! Where have you been?” Granzinger demands. Sigrid sees something in Ericha freeze up, and she is abruptly reminded of the girl’s youth. “I told you, did I not ,” Granzinger is blaring, “that I had an appointment tonight?! And look at me! Here I am dragging all these children with me, because you , my duty girl, were nowhere to be found as usual .”

“Frau Granzinger,” Sigrid starts to intercede, but the woman sharply waves off her interruption.

“Please, Frau Schröder. Don’t defend her. I realize you have taken an interest in this muddleheaded thing, and I won’t ask why. But, please , tonight keep your explanations to yourself. Now upstairs . All of you!” she booms at her brood. Then to Ericha she adds with a glower, “And that includes you , Fräulein.” Stuffing her hausfrau’s bag, the size of a serving platter, under her arm, she finishes with Sigrid. “And to you, Frau Schröder. Good night .”

Climbing the stairs to the flat, she discovers Mother Schröder smoking in her chair, listening to the Italian Air Force Orchestra in concert on the Telefunken. The frequency band glows amber. “So. You’ve found your way back again. Lucky me,” the old woman says, and tips back a swallow from her glass. A fruity schnapps is her favorite, but sometimes she resorts to cooking sherry.

“Lucky you, lucky me,” Sigrid replies, and begins to unbutton her coat when the music is suddenly interrupted by a sharp, syncopated beeping.