Ingo Schulze - New Lives

I didn’t even suspect anything when I saw the list of names on the letterhead. I read the “in Re,” the salutation, moved on to the name of our newspaper, and the all-too-familiar generalization: “swinish business”…read ever more quickly, skimming sentences until I drew up short at the number 20,000 followed by the symbol DM, plus the words “twenty thousand” spelled out in parenthesis. This was soon followed by a “forty thousand” in numbers and words and, after a skipped line, a “Best Regards” and a signature with two big loops that tied up the name like the ribbon on a present.

I reread it from the top and, after a moment, a third time. A law firm was suing us for libel on behalf of their clients and threatened that if we were to make public such assertions yet again (that is, part two of our article on the hog farm), a fine of forty thousand D-marks would be assessed.

When I got to the door I had to go back, because I still had Ilona’s letter opener in my hand. I drove to Jörg’s place. No one answered. When I tried again a half hour later, a neighbor woman told me that they and the girls would be in Gotha until tomorrow, visiting grandma and grandpa. No one at the Wenzel knew when Barrista would be back, but he had booked his room for another week.

Why for just one week? And why had Georg thrown in the towel on account of that article? It seemed to me that everyone but me had seen this turn of affairs coming. I envied Jörg and Marion for their ignorant bliss, for an evening with their parents and children. In the crazy hope that I would see the baron’s car standing at the door, I headed for the new building — but then drove on past. I spotted Ilona at the window. I felt like crying.

If they had at least written marks and not D-marks !

Luckily Anna, the author of the article, was at home.

“Our further existence,” I said, “is in your hands.”

While she read the lawyers’ letter, I took a deep breath for the first time. When she said she would swear that she had reported everything exactly as it was told to her, and that her people were reliable, absolutely reliable, I found myself feeling almost cheerful. She fulfilled my deepest wish by emphatically repeating “absolutely, absolutely reliable.” With tears in her eyes she promised to reconfirm everything — I needn’t worry.

No sooner was I back in the car than my angst welled up again.

When I woke up Sunday morning at four, I realized I still had that damned letter in my pocket, that the goddamn thing had spent the night here with me, so to speak.

It took every bit of energy not to drive to the Wenzel right then — or at six, or seven, or eight o’clock. I had set my goal at ten o’clock, or nine thirty… 158

Herr von Barrista had left the hotel shortly after nine…Was there anything else they could do for me?

I shook my head, I was fighting back tears. I looked for the baron in the line of people waiting to buy a Bild tabloid at the train station. I reconnoitered the neighboring streets. I returned to the Wenzel. I wrote the baron a few quick lines, fervently begging him to stop by the office. The file with the mail was still lying on the desk. I folded the letter up and shoved it in. When Georg appeared to say that Franka wanted to know if I would be staying through the noonday meal, I declined the invitation. In a burst of chivalry, I told myself that he no longer had anything to do with it — spare him the worry.

Yielding to sudden inspiration, I drove to the building where — as the baron had pointed out to me — Manuela, the blond waitress, lives. She’s now working at Referees’ Retreat. But no one answered the door.

Around seven I returned home. I could hear music even from outside the door. When I entered Astrid the wolf was lying under the mirror console. She didn’t even raise her head. The baron had presented Robert with a CD player plus speakers, which they were trying to place to best effect. In their baseball caps they looked like professional installers. Michaela had a performance.

“And where were you?” the baron asked. He had missed me at the opening of the exhibition at the Lindenau Museum. So many local VIPs! It’s called working your contacts.

“And? Are they right?” he asked after I had poured out my heart to him — and then calmed me down at once. Anyone who sent something like that in the mail was not to be taken seriously in the first place. But shouldn’t we respond all the same? I asked.

“Yes,” he said, “by ripping up that piece of trash and forgetting it. Who’s to say you ever even got it?” And might there not be some other solution?

“If you like,” he said, “I’ll take care of it.” That’s exactly what I wanted to hear.

“But that always costs money, a letterhead like that unfortunately costs one hell of a lot of real money.”

I asked him about part two, whether we should print it or not. “Of course,” he said, “if it’s good. Otherwise don’t.”

So now we have our little scandal issue, because Jörg’s article about a teacher named Offermann is on page three. If we go under, it will be with flying colors.

Hugs, E.

Maundy Thursday, April 12, ’90

Verotchka, 159

I have to calm Mamus down every couple of days. Even with a hundred dead, the chance something has happened to you isn’t even one in a thousand. Mamus will be here for Easter.

Once the telephone is connected in our new offices, we won’t have to worry about imposing. 160It’s strange, but I find it difficult to leave the old one behind. It’s been with me for so many hours, filled with so many hopes. The dial, the spiral cord, even the receiver, they all belong to your voice, your breath, to everything that you and I have said.

Verotchka, it won’t be long and I shall lay the world at your feet. At least some little piece of it. Your friend, the baron, has dropped a couple of hints, and I’ve responded accordingly — it’s quite possible that we, you and I, will soon be going on a trip. I don’t want to let the cat out of the bag yet, it sounds crazy and absurd, but I’ve learned to believe things for that very reason. You’ll see, it’ll all work out!

I’m so grateful to you for remembering Robert. He even wears the jacket in the apartment, it hangs on his bedpost at night.

Michaela attributes his “unimaginative” desire for money to my influence. What else is Robert supposed to wish for? He knows that within a few months he’ll be able to fulfill entirely different wishes.

A couple of days ago, Michaela admitted that she has been carrying around a letter from Robert’s father. She recognized his handwriting on the envelope.

I met him just once, that is to say, I saw him at the theater when he came to pick up his Christmas pyramid and his old candelabra. At the time it was beyond me how Michaela could have fallen for a man like him. The incarnation of the wannabe artist — gray ponytail, flashy ring, three-day beard. He was forever going on about Pablo or Rainer or Hanna, 161and if someone asked him about it, he took offense in the name of his gods. Robert would wait until ten or eleven at night in the theater canteen, 162until Michaela had removed her makeup. His father never had any time for him, because he was hot on the trail of another one of his inspirations or chasing some high school girl. All the same Robert was very attached to him.

But now Robert didn’t even want to read the letter. He cursed his father and cried. But at some point he’ll make the trip to see him. And I’ll have to let him, if not in fact encourage him.

Last night Michaela joined me at the Wenzel. We just now got home.

On the way there she claimed that by now half the town is making fun of Barrista, and that I should protect Robert from him. She’d put it euphemistically and called my nobleman a pushy, funny duck who’s so ambitious that he can hardly walk in those silly boots of his.