Letters From Prague (19 page)

They looked at each other and then away.

‘You know the joke,' he said, ‘about this unified city?'

‘What?'

‘
East to West
“We are one people.”
West to East:
“So are we.”‘

This time Harriet did laugh. ‘Where are you staying?' she asked him, fiddling with a packet of sugar. ‘What are you doing in Berlin, anyway?'

‘Leave that thing alone, why don't you?' he said, and took the packet from her, dropping it back in the bowl between them. ‘Sugar's bad for you. Like cigarettes.' He lit another, carefully blowing the smoke away from her. ‘I have one or two business contacts, manufacturers from west Berlin who've bought up cheap factory premises out in the eastern suburbs. And I stay in a place called Prenzlauer Berg, if that means anything, which it probably doesn't. It's in the north-east – full of character, feels a bit pre-war, like me. The wall used to run right past it. Before '89, they flew white ribbons from their car aerials to show they'd applied for visas. Now, like most of the East, it's changing by the hour.' He pulled out a card from his inside pocket and scribbled a number on the back. ‘What we should do is meet up, so I can show you around a bit.' He passed her the card. ‘Give me a ring. What about you – where are you staying?'

Harriet hesitated, thinking of Marsha's reaction to all this.

‘I'm sorry,' he said at once. ‘I'm rushing you, aren't I? I always put my foot in it.'

‘No, you don't.' She felt in her bag and pulled out her wallet, searching in her notebook for the address of their hotel, booked through the German Tourist Office last month. ‘It's in Schöneberg,' she said, copying it down on a page at the back of the notebook. ‘The Hotel Kloster.'

‘The Hotel Kloster I know not, but Schöneberg's a good place to stay – lots of visitors end up there. It's down in the south; a bit rundown, but interesting: full of Turks and nightlife. Thanks.' He took the page she had torn out, and folded it carefully into his wallet. There was something about the way he did this which she found touching. ‘And what are you doing to do when you get there?'

She spread her hands. ‘Look around, explore, get the feel. What does one do in a strange city? I've read quite a bit …'

‘I can imagine.'

‘Don't you read?'

‘Not if I can help it.' He smiled at her. ‘Isn't that the worst thing you ever heard in your life?'

‘Shut up.' She smiled back at him, beginning, now, to relax, and then she became aware of something needing her attention and looked up to see Marsha, her face flushed from sleep, coming down the aisle towards them. She was frowning, trying to see who her mother was talking to. Then she saw, and her face fell.

The landscape became open and flat low land, the German plain,

dotted with lakes and crisscrossed by rivers – the Rhine, the Elbe, the Weser, the Spree, which flowed through Berlin – all following the northwards slope towards the Baltic or the North Sea. It had grown much darker, rain was falling steadily now, and the small town stations they passed through at speed were lit up with neon strips along the platform, so that the rain on the windows briefly shone. The lights in the train, too, had been switched on, and people in the bar were drinking spirits, as if to fortify themselves for the city.

Harriet and Marsha had left Christopher there, and returned to their own carriage. Marsha had pulled on a raspberry-coloured cardigan over her white T-shirt and striped dungarees. She sat with it pulled close round her, hunched up in the corner, watching the rain, not speaking.

‘Please,' said Harriet, for the third time.

Marsha did not answer. Her hair fell across her face; she pushed it back impatiently, then rummaged in an outer pocket of her holdall, producing, after studied exasperation, a tortoiseshell hairslide. This she fastened in on the offending side, and leaned back again against the window, chin in her hand. She looked casually exquisite – Harriet thought that perhaps she had, undetected, suddenly grown in Brussels, as children were supposed to do in the summer holidays, under adult attention. Well, she had certainly had plenty of that. She tried once more, venturing: ‘You look very nice.' No response. She gave up, and looked at her watch.

Half an hour. Again, she felt her stomach churning, but now it was from feelings more complicated than simply the prospect of the unknown. She had envisaged herself and Marsha, alone in the city: that had its own anxieties – possible loneliness, possible dangers. Now, there was the possibility of an unlooked-for companion, someone who knew the realities of Berlin, while she knew only a little history; someone about whom she was still ambivalent, or at least uncertain, whom she hardly, in any case, knew; and the prospect of getting to know him was, it was clear, about to be blighted.

‘I don't want him anywhere
near
us,' Marsha had hissed as they left him queueing up at the bar. ‘How dare he come too?' Harriet ushered her onwards. ‘Don't
push!
‘

‘I'm not pushing. Behave yourself.'

And the sulks began. Six hours away from Hugh and Susanna's soothing generosity and they had relapsed into the kind of atmosphere usually reserved for the direst of wet weekends in London, when all Marsha's schoolfriends had something to do and Harriet, two-thirds through the term, had a mountain of marking.

Now what?

The train slowed; she looked past her daughter and saw a sign flash past Potsdam. They really were almost there: she saw the lights of the town – shop windows, tower blocks, street lamps – and then they were rounding a bend and passing a great stretch of water, the Wannsee, before moving into the suburbs. They slowed, stopped for signals, moved on. She said:

‘We come into Zoo Station. That's where we get off.'

‘I know,' said Marsha. ‘You told me.'

‘Marsha –'

‘What?'

‘Please don't be so difficult.'

‘I'm not, I'm just saying you told me, that's all.'

Movement behind them. Christopher, bearing his luggage. He said: ‘Another ten minutes or so. We come into Zoo Station. I expect you know.'

‘Yes,' said Harriet, and as Marsha turned exaggeratedly back to the window she thought: actually, I wish he'd just go away, I can't be doing with all this, we were quite all right as we were.

Bahnhof Zoo. The train drew in under a great glass roof and for a moment, as they looked out of the windows, Marsha forgot to sulk.

‘We're really high up!'

They were. The station was set storeys above street level, and even through the rain and the lights of the platform they could see, far to their right below them, the buildings of the Berlin Zoo, the landscaped gardens, stretching away.

‘Can we go there?'

‘If you like.'

The engine stopped, the doors were opening. They heaved their luggage out on to the platform, listening to announcements in unfamiliar German. The train emptied: everyone seemed to know where they were going. Christopher found a trolley, and loaded it up; they made their way to the ticket barrier, and came out on to the concourse: florists, lingerie and chocolate shops were closed but lit up; an
Imbiss
kiosk sold coffee and
Wurst.
Everything looked clean and well-kept: Harriet remarked on it, as they took the escalator to street level.

‘It's a different story down here, I can tell you.' Christopher kicked in his bag as someone came past them.

‘What do you mean?'

They reached the bottom, and stepped off into another open area which did, at once, feel different: dingier, with a sour smell in the air. He nodded towards a rear entrance. ‘Not the kind of place to hang around – it's full of down-and-outs and drug pushers.'

Marsha looked at him scornfully. ‘What do you mean, down-and-outs? They might just be homeless, like in London.'

‘Marsha –'

‘Like mother, like daughter.' Christopher was feeling in his pocket: he fished out coins. ‘I have to make a couple of calls, check on my hotel and all that, so I'll say goodbye.' He nodded towards a cluster of phone boxes. ‘You all right for cash? There's a money exchange over the road, in the Europa Centre. Not far from the Kaiser-Wilhelm church. It's a bit grim round there, too.'

‘We're fine, thanks. Hugh organised all that.'

‘I'm sure. Well …'

They both hesitated. Harriet looked out through the front entrance towards the U-Bahn sign. She must find a map. She looked back at Christopher.

‘I'm here for a few days,' he said. ‘You've got my number. If you need anything –'

‘Thanks.' Harriet was aware of Marsha, stony-faced, as they smiled at each other. He came forward, put a hand on her shoulder, they kissed on both cheeks.

‘Have a good time.'

‘And you.'

He shrugged. ‘I'll be working. Wheeling and dealing. Wheeling, anyway.' He nodded to Marsha, who was fiddling with the strap of her holdall. ‘I shall follow your career in social work with interest.' Then he picked up his cases and walked away.

‘Thank God for that,' said Marsha.

Rain fell from a heavy sky on to high-rise buildings and soaking pavements; unfamiliar makes of small car, which Harriet dimly guessed were Trabants from the east, screeched in and out of dense traffic; a bright yellow bus with its wipers going hooted impatiently at a couple of jaywalkers at the lights. Everything looked bright and wet and fast and foreign – the shop fronts, the neon signs, the hurrying people beneath umbrellas – and as Harriet and Marsha stood sheltering at the station entrance, trying to take it all in, someone touched Harriet's arm, and spoke in German.

‘Hast du Wechselgeld?'

‘What?'

She turned to see a young man with matted hair and yellow-grey skin, holding out his hand. He wore black – the kind of loose, dirty, sweatshirt fabric Harriet was used to seeing on the neo-punk beggars in London, stretched out on the pavement with their dogs on a string and their rings through their noses, holding out a hand, as he was. But the beggars in London never frightened her: they were undemanding, unaggressive, familiar – she quite often gave them change, coming out of the supermarket or the bank. This young man's face was hard, insistent. She clutched at her bag.

‘Du Wechselgeld,' he said again.

‘Mum?' said Marsha.

‘It's okay.' She turned quickly away from him. ‘Come on.' He tugged at her sleeve; she yanked it back and grabbed Marsha's hand. ‘Come
on!
‘ They ran through the rain, panting with the luggage, towards the U-Bahn, and down into the subway. Harriet scanned the queue at the ticket office, the people idling round a news-stand: did the
Polizei
hang about down here? Was there, somewhere, a friendly face? She turned round cautiously, looking up the steps. He had gone.

‘Mum?'

‘It's okay,' she said again. ‘Let's have a look at the map.' She was shaking as they stood by the wall between the ticket booths, gazing at the unfamiliar grid.

‘What did he want?'

‘Only money.' Her fingers travelled south-west, trembling. She took a breath. ‘Here we are … two stops to Nollendorfplatz, then change. Think we can manage that?'

Marsha took her arm and hugged it. ‘Are you all right?'

‘Yes, I think so.' Harriet drew another breath. ‘You?'

She nodded, burying her face in her mother's sleeve.

‘Come on.' Harriet stroked the glossy hair. ‘Your hairslide's coming undone.' She clipped it back again. ‘There.'

Marsha mumbled: ‘I'm sorry.'

‘Thank you. Let's go.' They picked up their bags and looked about them for the right line. ‘The thing is,' said Harriet, as they followed a sign, ‘in London I'd be able to cope with that. I wouldn't like it, but I'd cope. But here –' she stopped. No point in making a meal of their situation, as they travelled to an unknown hotel.

‘Sorry,' said Marsha again.

‘See what Christopher Pritchard meant? It is a bit tough here.'

Silence.

‘He's not
so
bad.' They were walking through an arm of the subway, following the flow. Ahead, they could hear a guitar, and somebody singing.

‘Like London,' said Marsha, cheering up.

‘Like London.' Harriet shifted her bag to the other hand. ‘Now, which is our platform?'

When they came out of the station at Bayerischer Platz they found the sky emptied of rain. The station was on a tree-lined road running through a square: Schöneberg was a residential district. A few blocks away to the north-east, off Nollendorfplatz, stood the house where Christopher Isherwood had lived in the years before the war, the Weimar years of cabaret and hunger, where he had written
Goodbye to Berlin.
Here, in an area bombed to bits in the war and rebuilt in the Fifties and Sixties, Turkish workers had settled, opening shops and cafés alongside streets of middle-class housing. Harriet looked about her, and looked at her map.

‘I'm cold,' said Marsha.

‘Darling, I'm sorry. You should be wearing your jacket'

They dug it out of her holdall and zipped it up. ‘That's better. Now then …' She turned the map in her hands. ‘North-west across the square – come on.'

Carrying their bags, they walked beneath dripping trees, past tall houses whose bells and labels by the door indicated an endless division into flats and bedsits. Sunday evening hung in the air: they looked into windows where people were ironing, watching television, reading the papers. They came into their own street, which at once felt different: faster, more alive. Late-night shops had fruit and vegetable stalls out on the pavement; there were cafés, traffic, the neon signs of hotels.

‘Which one's ours?'

‘The Kloster. Can you see it?'

‘No. I'm hungry.'