The Sins of the Father Read online

  In the first years of their marriage, when they lived in London, in a flat on the east side of Charlotte Street, his daytime confidence had irritated many, especially Gentiles, who saw him as a cocky pushing Jew, and who could not forgive him for not showing the marks of his suffering. Some of his Jewish friends were equally displeased by his determination to live in the present, to make something of himself. They were almost all in fact doing the same thing, but they had moments when they felt paralysed by guilt simply because they were alive, and their families and communities were dead. Eli seemed to brush this guilt off. “I am not responsible for the crimes of others, or the misfortunes of others. I have nothing with which to reproach myself, neither my attempts to avert calamity, nor the failure of my efforts, nor what happened to me subsequently, nor my survival. Indeed I glory in my survival.” That was the message conveyed by every inflection of his voice, by the brisk social manner, by the thickset shoulder-swaying walk. Everything seemed calculated to deny his knowledge that there were Jews who distrusted him, who could not accept that his sojourn in Hell cancelled out the ambiguity of his earlier record, his time as Schacht’s adviser, his contribution to Germany’s economic recovery under Hitler.

  He had friends in London, economists and men in government service, who he expected would be ready to help him. But somehow – Nell never understood just why – the offers of help never materialised. He was received well, it seemed, returned from meetings with reports of enthusiastic responses, keen discussions, fruitful consultations. Academic posts hovered on the horizon, then dipped behind the clouds. He contributed a few pieces to The Economist, wrote an article for The Times on “Problems of Liquidity in Reconstructional Conditions”, which attracted favourable attention, even though its Keynesianism was dismissed as being of an immature variety by those more aware than Eli could be of the last developments of the Master’s theories. Nevertheless, even this article didn’t lead to the sort of regular commissions which he had anticipated when it was accepted. He did not repine; he set himself to write a book, justifying his own history. It was never completed.

  Nell found the balance shifting between them. Eli needed her, something she hadn’t expected. At first she was gratified. Only she knew at what a cost his public optimism was maintained. He could not bring himself to describe the nightmares, but he didn’t need to. She had seen the photographs, as everyone had, of the piles of corpses discovered at Belsen and Buchenwald; she had worked with refugees. There was nothing she didn’t know, she sometimes thought, about the camps, except what mattered: what it felt like actually to have been there.

  She knew something else, she alone. She knew why Eli refused to follow what seemed to many people his obvious course, and settle in Israel. She got tired of hearing him say, “Too many bloody Jews”, even though she knew that in one sense he spoke the truth. He really did think that. But, more important, he was afraid. In Israel he would have been confronted by the reality of his failure, of his terrible misjudgement, of his arrogance. She remembered how, in the Berlin days, he had combined his contempt for the Nazis with his happy confidence that he could influence them, even lead them by the nose, save himself and his people by making himself useful. She didn’t know what the Jewish term for an “Uncle Tom” was, but there must be one; and she knew Eli was afraid and ashamed. She had read an entry in his journal: “If I made a mistake, and it seems I did, then it was because I acted by reason; that I had lost my sureness of instinct. And yet at the time it felt as if I was acting instinctively; if I was, then I made no mistake. Now, reason tells me to go to Israel; instinct says no. ‘All that is good is instinct – and hence easy, necessary, free.’ So: I act thus.”

  To the surprise of everyone except Nell, he accepted an invitation, secured for him by an admirer, to lecture in economics at the University of Buenos Aires. “Why not?” he said, “I understand that the Argentine is a country where we Germans feel at home.”

  He said this often: many who heard it shivered at the irony, little understanding that, like all who are ironists by instinct, Eli found both sides of the coin equally true. “I act; therefore it is,” he said with a smile that frightened.

  Nell reproached herself when she found her love transmuted to dislike. Her reproach was the keener because she found nothing for which to reproach Eli. He was a model husband, faithful, honourable, in his manner loving. That side of things was all right. He was a doting father when Becky was little; nevertheless one who was firm when firmness was needed. All that was fine. She could see too that he was admirable. He worked hard, provided for them.

  She went over these things in her head again and again. When they made love, it was still all right, and almost what it had been. And yet of course she reproached him, if only to justify the dislike she was forming, experiencing indeed, the way you experience the beauty of a view or the cold of a winter morning. She told herself: it was his cynicism. He would talk of “the morality of sympathy as the symptom of a weak age”. Then the rebellious thought struck her: he is spouting the poison with which they tried to kill him. When he said, “It is absurd to suppose that reconciliation is possible between Jew and Arab,” she wondered at his indifference. For really he didn’t seem to care. “I observe things, that’s all,” he boasted, “and state what I see. It’s not a matter of drawing conclusions.”

  Nell experienced the cynicism as aridity, and found wastes of sand extending in every direction from the point where she had made her life. Kinsky was her only confidant; even to him, she did not dare confess the profundity of Eli’s cynicism. After all, Kinsky in a lighter manner was a cynic himself. What shocked her was that Eli seemed every day to confront the question “Why go on?” and then shrug it off.

  “You don’t need to worry,” Kinsky said, “he has got beyond suicide. So have we all, unless we are corrupted by guilt and pity.”

  What she couldn’t say was that the thought of Eli’s suicide drifted into her mind as a means of escape for her.

  But now at last she was angry. His refusal to meet Franz was wounding Becky. She told him he was a coward, that he was afraid of the memories which meeting Franz would stir. Then she accused him of jealousy. He smiled, and admitted it.

  “And I don’t see the point of it,” she said, “since they are in love, and will certainly marry.”

  She was sure of that herself now, since her tea with Ilse. Indeed, though Ilse was a silly woman, they were on the way to being friends. Her kindness was irresistible. She even suggested that her husband, the General, could put himself about to improve Eli’s pension position: it was wrong that such a distinguished man should suffer even genteel poverty. And she looked at Nell as though she thought she could do with a new pair of shoes.

  “But I understand,” Eli said, “that the young man hasn’t yet spoken to his own father.”

  “I’m sure he has.”

  “No, my dear, you know he hasn’t. I have asked Becky. When he does, then things will be on a different footing.”

  “Very well,” Nell said, “Becky will see to it.”

  “So what?” Luis said. “Everyone’s afraid of his father. That’s life. Father is like God.”

  “Oh you make a joke of everything,” Franz said.

  They were in the little bar on the Florida again. Luis ordered more beer.

  “So I make a joke of everything?” he said. “What else can you do here in Argentina, in the year of our Lord 1964?”

  “Even Perón?”

  Luis drank some beer, licking the foam from his lips. “Especially Perón. Perón is one big joke. That is why I believe in him, in his necessary return. He is the prince of jokes.”

  “Was Kennedy a joke?”

  “Of course. Ich bin ein Berliner – in a Boston accent. Didn’t you tell me a Berliner is a kind of bread roll? Let’s go to Rosita’s…”

  “No, but wait. I can’t see my father as a joke. You don’t know him. He has never even raised his voice to me…”

  “That girl
who looks like the Sainted One, I tell you, mon vieux, she is one hot cookie, as they say in Boston. A veritable Berliner. So what? So he doesn’t raise his voice. Does that make him less of a joke? I bet he wears dark glasses inside. He does? Right, you can stand me the girl like the Sainted One. Or we could have her together. How would that be? I get a stand thinking of it. Look.”

  He swung back on the chair to make the truth of his words visible. Franz shook his head.

  “No,” he said, “I have promised Becky.”

  “What? That you won’t come to Rosita’s with me? Really, old chap, you shouldn’t talk of such things with your fiancée, it isn’t nice.”

  “No, not that, fool.” Franz smiled at his friend. “I don’t know what I would do without you, Luis. No, I’m going to tell my father tomorrow. And that will be hard enough, without a night in your company at Rosita’s.”

  “Pity,” Luis said. “I liked the idea. But have it your own way. So why should your father object?”

  “I’ve told you a thousand times.”

  “And I still can’t believe you. Tell me again.”

  Franz paused. He looked across the room, soft red mouth a little open. Luis, catching that profile, felt the urge to hurt. Franz had that effect on him, often. He was a victim, Luis thought, but a victim who should be in uniform, and on his knees, crying for mercy.

  “Tell me again…”

  “Because her father is a Jew. It sounds silly, now, doesn’t it?”

  “No,” Luis said, “it’s only a sick joke: that a German should still dare to object to a Jew. Come to Rosita’s. I’ll even pay for you.”

  “Oh very well, but I’ll pay for myself.”

  “Well, we’ll have her together. Have you ever done that?”

  “No,” Franz blushed.

  “Of course, I was forgetting. You’re in love with Becky, and true to her, despite being a queer at heart.” He put his arm round Franz’s shoulder and hugged him. “I adore you. You know that. Now let’s go get our balls swallowed. We’ll make a man of you yet.”

  “Of course I know of the girl’s father,” Rudi said. “He’s a distinguished man, even if he has been unfortunate. I am only disappointed you didn’t speak to me sooner. You have obviously been wondering about the matter. Remember, son, all I am interested in is your happiness. It has not been easy being a good father, in the circumstances…”

  He took off his dark glasses and rubbed his knuckles into his eyes. He rubbed hard, and when he took his hands away, Franz saw that the eyes were a little bloodshot.

  “Everything I’ve done has been done for you,” Rudi said.

  He beckoned the waiter, asked him to bring them a bottle of champagne.

  “I’m a man with few friends,” he said. “I live for my work and my family, which is indeed reduced to you, Franz. Now you are going to add to it. Of course I am pleased.”

  Franz was suffused with guilt, love and pity: inextricable emotions. He had been wrong to doubt his father, right to love him. What he had thought of as a frightening self-sufficiency was revealed as loneliness. Rudi lifted his glass: “Your health, and the young lady’s.” The wrong picture flashed before Franz’s eyes: the young girl, with the puffy lips, Isabellita, lowering her mouth towards him … he felt himself blush.

  “Ah, I can see that you are in love,” Rudi said, and drank his champagne. “There’s a lot I could tell you about marriage, but as for now, all that is necessary is to express my happiness and wish you well…”

  If Luis had been there, he would no doubt have found his father’s formal archaic manner of speaking yet another joke. But Franz was overcome with relief. I need Becky, he told himself, trying to slide her image on to the screen. But it was still the wrong face that he saw.

  “And you know her father’s Jewish?”

  “Are you apologising for that? You must not do so. They are a remarkable race. Consider what they have achieved in Israel.”

  It was the moment to ask what he had always desired, and feared, to know. The sensation of intimacy was such as to suggest that Rudi might answer. Yet he dared not risk shattering it. He picked up his glass.

  “I’m so grateful,” he said.

  “And your mother approves?”

  “Oh yes, she has quite taken to Becky. I’m sure you will too.”

  “I’m sure I shall. But up country, of course, it’s a different type of girl that I am accustomed to.”

  Franz telephoned Becky as soon as he had said goodbye to his father.

  “It’s fine. He approves. It’s amazing. He’s going to get in touch with your father himself. I can’t believe it was so easy. I can’t think what we have been worrying about. I love you.”

  “I love you too. Oh, what a relief.”

  “Isn’t life marvellous?”

  Nell read the letter from Franz’s father to Eli. He listened without interrupting. She sipped her tea, which was almost cold. Eli took his napkin and wiped egg from his face. He had become a messy eater, something which displeased her because he had once been fastidious.

  “It’s a good letter,” she said. “He writes well.”

  “A bureaucrat’s style, and he misused the subjunctive in the third sentence.”

  “I don’t suppose he writes many letters,” she said, “except business ones. Anyway, the main point is that he says the right things.”

  “Oh yes, he says the right things.”

  “And we shall of course accept his invitation.”

  Rudi had invited them to lunch with him, en famille as he put it, at the Engineers’ Club the following Sunday; he would fly down specially for the occasion, though it wasn’t, as he remarked, a weekend when he would customarily find himself in the city; nevertheless he was eager to enjoy the pleasure of meeting the parents of the girl his dear Franz so wished to marry.

  “Wouldn’t it be better if he came here?” Eli said.

  They were sitting at the table where they took all their meals, except for the more and more numerous ones which Eli preferred to have served on a tray, which was then fixed on to the armrest of the high-backed wooden chair where he passed most of his days. Nell’s eye took in the faded cushions, the stains on the carpet, especially in the vicinity of Eli’s chair. It was raining that morning, slanting on a brisk southeasterly, and the windows of the apartment were closed, as Eli anyway preferred that they should be. The light was murky in their living-room, and the air rank with the smell of Eli’s cigars and the myriad unpleasant odours of a room that is almost permanently inhabited.

  “No,” she said, “he has invited us. It would be rude to suggest that he change his plans to fit us.”

  Besides, she thought, if that is what you preferred, you shouldn’t have been so reluctant to make the first move.

  A little later, Nell left to do the shopping. She was glad to be out in the streets. The rain had stopped, but most of the women were dressed in raincoats, or carried umbrellas. She supposed they had domestic problems of their own, but there was something reassuring in their manner of going about their business. There was an air of subdued opulence to this part of the city. People grumbled about the inflation, but half the women she saw were carrying plastic bags which proclaimed that they had made purchases at the sort of stores which Nell scarcely ever entered now. She wondered if she should buy a new dress for Sunday, decided her grey with the white collar would have to do. There would be enough – too much – more than they could afford – to be spent on the wedding.

  She telephoned Ilse from a coffee shop, to tell her about the letter.

  “Are you to be there?”

  “No,” Ilse said, “at least I haven’t been asked, and wouldn’t expect to be.”

  “Oh, I had hoped you might lend me moral support.”

  “Darling, you won’t need it. Rudi can be difficult and unpredictable, but he’s not an ogre. Besides, from what Franz says, he’s determined to do everything correctly. He’ll be the soul of politeness.”

  Eli had grum
bled at being forced into a suit, made to wear a tie. Now that he could no longer see how others were dressed, he had grown contemptuous of the whole business. It was as if he wished to force notice of his disability and his poverty on everyone, as if he took pleasure in making others uncomfortable. No, there was no “as if” about it; he definitely did. But Becky had coaxed him into acquiescence. He complained that the trousers were too tight – he hadn’t worn them for a year; and Nell was surprised to find that she hadn’t noticed he had put on weight.

  Franz and his father were waiting for them in an anteroom, a dingy place with heavy black furniture and bad, dark, late nineteenth-century oils depicting mythological scenes in a self-indulgent manner. There was a “Judgement of Paris”, remarkable only for the manner in which the light fell on Paris, to whose charms the eye was therefore directed to the exclusion of those of the three goddesses, doubtless an unintentional manifestation of the painter’s own interests. Paris looked rather like Franz actually, as Becky later pointed out, to his embarrassment.

  Nell’s first thought was that Franz’s father was quite unremarkable. From Becky’s account of the guarded, even fearful, respect with which Franz viewed him, and also from what Ilse had said, she had built up the image of someone who would be formidable from the start. Instead she saw a small man, a slight man, with thin, black, receding hair, high cheekbones and a prim mouth; he wore dark glasses even in the gloom of that dismal chamber, and, though he had first wiped his hand on the back of his trousers, the palm that enclosed hers felt damp.