Audrey Magee - The Undertaking

‘We didn’t start well, did we?’

‘No.’

‘So what do we do now?’

‘I don’t know.’

He sat up.

‘I’m hungry, Katharina.’

‘I’ll go and see what there is.’

He lit a cigarette and looked through the dawn light at the room, at the sagging curtains and the cheap, functional dressing table. His parents’ furniture was old and ornate, passed from one generation to the next.

She returned with a hot drink and bread.

‘It’s not the real coffee. Father must have taken it to his room. He’s very protective of anything given by Dr Weinart.’

‘Who is Dr Weinart?’

‘I’m not really sure. I know they were together in the last war. I haven’t met him.’

Faber drank.

‘My God, Katharina. It’s disgusting.’

‘They say that if you think of it as coffee, then it tastes like coffee.’

‘I’m not that bloody mad. Not yet anyway. We get better than this on the front.’

‘I suppose that’s a good thing. You need it more than we do.’

‘It is until I get leave.’

He set down the cup and plate and pulled her to him.

‘So, you were telling me what you were like as a girl.’

‘Yes, and I was so interesting that you fell asleep.’

He nuzzled his face into her hair.

‘I am so sorry, Katharina Spinell. I will not fall asleep again. Now, tell me what were you like?’

‘I don’t know. I was always good, but my mother adores my brother.’

He dropped his head onto the pillow and snored. She laughed and slapped him on the arm.

‘You’re so unfair to me,’ she said.

He kissed her.

‘So you were a daddy’s girl?’

‘I suppose so. And you?’

‘I was never a daddy’s girl.’

They laughed, and he kissed her on the cheeks and lips, moving to her neck.

‘And you, Peter Faber?’

‘All I have done is march. Left right, left right. Youth movement, war, pack on my back – it’s all I have done so far in my life.’

She kissed his lips, his cheeks.

‘You must have done something else,’ she said.

He slipped his hand under her nightdress.

‘Let me see if there is anything else I can remember.’

He ran his hands over her bottom, stomach and breasts.

‘I’m remembering,’ he said.

She opened the buttons of her brother’s pyjamas and fingered his chest.

‘We need to fatten you up a bit, Mr Faber.’

He took off the pyjamas and pushed up her nightdress.

‘You do that, Katharina Spinell. Turn me into a doctor’s fat son.’

They giggled and she parted her legs.

‘Next time I’ll bring you flowers and chocolates,’ he said.

‘I only like dark chocolate. And white flowers.’

‘You’re a very fussy woman, Mrs Faber.’

‘I’m very particular, Mr Faber.’

When it was fully bright outside, she pulled a robe over her nakedness and went to the kitchen.

‘Katharina, you should dress for breakfast,’ said Mrs Spinell.

‘I’m not staying.’

‘You have to eat breakfast.’

‘I’ll take food back to Peter.’

‘Sit down and have yours first.’

‘No, I’ll take mine too. Is there any ham?’

‘Hopefully later today.’

Her father put down his newspaper.

‘Be a good girl, Katharina, and do as your mother asks.’

She moved towards the hob.

‘How did you sleep, Mother?’

‘Not very well. Your bed is very small.’

‘I’ve been saying that for years. It’s a child’s bed, Mother.’

‘You’re still my child, Katharina.’

‘For God’s sake, Mother.’

Mr Spinell rustled the newspaper.

‘Fetch Peter and have breakfast with us,’ said Mr Spinell.

‘He would rather eat in the room, Father.’

‘Your mother has set the table for you both.’

‘I’ll take the tray.’

She hummed to discourage further interference, loaded coffee, cheese and bread onto the tray and went back to the room. Faber was waiting for her, smiling, tugging at her robe as she set down the tray, sliding it off her as she poured coffee. Dr Weinart’s coffee. He buried himself in her.

He sat again on the chair under the light and she, humming, picked lice from his hair.

‘I should cut it,’ she said.

‘Are you any good?’

‘Would you notice?’

She cut the fringe dangling from his receding hairline, and sheared the back of his head with her father’s clippers. She wiped the loose hairs from his neck and face, kissed him and left the room. She returned with a basin of steaming water.

‘You will want for nothing,’ he said.

‘All I want is to be away from my parents.’

‘I’ll buy a big house with a garden.’

‘How, as a teacher?’

‘I’ll find a way.’

She knelt in front of him, lifted and lowered his right foot, then his left, into the water, splashing his shins and calves, rubbing her hands over his ankles and heels, over his bruises and calluses, squeezing and releasing the flesh of each toe until she could feel the weight of his fatigue. She dried each foot and led him to bed, tucking him between the still-damp sheets. She went back to the kitchen.

‘He’s exhausted,’ she said.

‘I’m sure.’

‘What’s wrong, Mother?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Fine, then.’

Mrs Spinell stabbed at a potato with her rusting peeler.

‘This is not a hotel, Katharina.’

‘I’m aware of that.’

‘Fine, then.’

‘Fine, what?’

‘A little more decorum and respect for your parents would be appreciated.’

‘Yes, Mother.’

‘Dinner will be at six, Katharina.’

‘Yes, Mother.’

At dinner, they held hands beneath the table, tangled feet and answered any questions put to them. When it was over, he undressed her under the bedroom light and gently unpicked the pins from her hair, watching as each lock fell the length of her unblemished back.

The following evening, after dinner, Mr Spinell insisted that Faber accompany him to the city centre.

‘Dr Weinart will be there.’

‘But we had plans, Father.’

‘Peter needs to meet the doctor before he goes back, Katharina.’

Faber took her brother’s coat, but walked a little behind her father through silent, shuttered streets. Mr Spinell halted in front of the opera house, its damage almost fully repaired.

‘You see, Faber, we are invincible. Anything they bomb, we fix.’

They walked down steps into a fuggy warmth of men. Faber stood at the edge of the crowd, envying its drunkenness. Mr Spinell disappeared for some time and returned with four tankards of beer.

‘Get stuck in, Faber.’

They toasted Katharina, and Faber was soon surrounded by men in brown uniform, all older than he, lauding his efforts at Kiev.

‘You remind us of ourselves,’ said Mr Spinell, ‘only we want you to do better. To hammer them all this time.’

‘I can’t do any worse.’

They laughed, raised their glasses and drank. Dr Weinart joined them.

‘Your father-in-law has told me all about you, Mr Faber. It’s an honourable thing you have done.’

‘What is?’

‘Marrying Miss Spinell. Securing the future of our nation.’

‘We are very happy, Dr Weinart.’

‘Of course you are.’

The doctor sipped from his small glass of beer.

‘You have chosen a good family, Mr Faber. Mr Spinell works very hard for me, and I hugely appreciate his support.’

‘I’m glad.’

‘So the next thing, Mr Faber, is to find you some work. Good, useful work.’

‘Like what?’

‘What are your interests?’

‘I’m a teacher.’

‘I know that, just like your father.’

‘And my grandfather.’