I thought, of course — Perhaps I am one of them!
Then — But if I were, I suppose I would not know this myself.
In the summer of 1925 I was fifteen and I was for the first time allowed out in the streets on my own: I was aware of the enormous changes that had taken place in Berlin since the days of my earliest memories. I had not noticed much of this going on at the time (change does indeed often seem to take place secretly) but now there were no more left-wing or right-wing militants in the streets; no more men with rifles hanging on to lorries like claws; no more soldiers with their helmets and bedrolls like chickens just out of eggs. There was suddenly an energy, a polish, a surface glitter in the streets: it was as if something garish had broken through a skin: something to do with the sun, perhaps; or with disease, or with cosmetics.
At the school I was going to at the time I had a girlfriend called Trixie and a boyfriend called Bruno: we went around together as a gang. Trixie was blonde with blue eyes and curly hair; Bruno was olive-skinned and Jewish. Bruno was our manager and clown; Trixie was our figurehead. I imagined myself as some sort of charioteer with reins in my fingers in the background.
I said 'My father has the idea that there may be seven or so just men, people, who hold the world together; and they may not even know each other.'
Bruno said Then thank God they are not us!'
I said 'Why not?'
He said 'Do we not know each other?'
Trixie was anxious because she feared that she would still be a virgin at the age of sixteen: she felt this would be a hindrance to her becoming grand and powerful and rich. She said 'It's not that I care about the business of becoming not a virgin, it's just that I think one should start practising how to get what one wants now.'
Bruno said 'Practising what?'
Trixie said 'How should I know? You tell us, Bruno.'
Bruno put a hand to his throat and made out that he was being strangled; he fell against a wall; he sank down on his haunches.
Bruno came from a family who were some sort of high-class Schieber. he seemed always to have cigarettes, new clothes, watches, money. He told us about the night-life of Berlin where there was a whole new world behind the facades of rock-like buildings — of Aladdin's caves that opened up with a dazzle of lights and jewels.
I said 'Well why don't you take us?'
He said 'Because I'd be responsible.'
I said 'Responsible for what?'
He said 'For the poor men, God help them, who might want to make you not virgins.'
At weekends Bruno and Trixie and I would go out to the woods and lakes on the outskirts of Berlin; we would hire a boat and row out on the lakes; we would watch the courting couples who lay under the trees. One of the conventions of our relationship seemed to be that neither Trixie nor I became sexually involved with Bruno: we did not question this: I thought — It just seems to be necessary if our three-sided relationship is to continue.
Trixie said 'I don't believe you know where to take us.'
Bruno said 'It costs money.'
Trixie said 'Then how do we make money?'
Bruno said 'Trixie, Trixie, you want me to tell you how to make money!'
I thought — But none of us are really meaning what we are saying.
Near one of the lakes we visited on the western outskirts of Berlin, the Wannsee, was the grave of the writer Heinrich von Kleist who had shot himself at this spot together with his girlfriend
in 1811. A fence had been put up round a tombstone which was inscribed with Kleist's name and the dates of his birth and death and then the words 4 He lived, sang and suffered in hard and sorrowful times: he sought death on this spot and found immortality/
We were all three passionate admirers of Kleist. We would stand and stare at his grave; we did not know what more to do about it.
I said 'Why did he shoot himself!'
Bruno said 'Because he thought he could see only what was in his own head, and no one understood what he was saying.'
Trixie said 'Why did he shoot his girlfriend?'
Bruno said 'Because she had cancer.'
I thought — You mean, what are the connections between one thing and another?
Trixie and I went on pressing Bruno to take us to see the nightlife of Berlin. He was a year older than us; he was used to going to bars and cafes on his own. Trixie said 'But what exactly do you have to do there?'
Bruno said 'Not much.'
I said 'I mean, what do you let men do to you?'
He said 'Nellie, you are not supposed to know about such things!'
This was a time when people called me Nellie. I have been known at different times as Eleanor, Helena, Elena, Nell, Nellie.
Then Bruno said 'But it is probably true, yes, that you could make money and still be virgins.'
Trixie said 'How?'
Bruno said 'Oh for God's sake, all right, do I have to show you?'
It was arranged that Trixie would tell her parents that she was staying with me for a night and I would tell my father that I was staying with Trixie for a night; Bruno apparently did not have to say anything to his parents. I tried to say what I had to say to my father in such a way that he would both believe and not believe me. He said 'But you will be all right?'
I said'Yes, I'll be all right.'
I thought — This saying of things without saying them — this is the sort of thing we have often talked about, isn't it?
Trixie and Bruno and I met in a cafe. Trixie was wearing high-heeled shoes and stockings and a short skirt. I was wearing flat shoes and socks and a skirt like a kilt. Bruno was wearing a pale grey suit with a waistcoat. He said 'Oh my God, you two, may you suffer for the guilt of your innocent friend!'
Trixie said 'But you keep on telling us nothing will happen.'
Bruno said 'Promise me, nothing will happen!'
I said 'Bruno, stop acting.'
Bruno 'You want me to stop acting? You want nothing to happen even before it has begun?'
Bruno began to explain what it was we had to do. Every now and then he broke off and rolled his eyes and put his head in his hands. I thought — You mean you have to act in order to make things both happen and not happen?
He said 'It's not really very difficult. People are lonely. One of the ways they think they can stop being lonely is by talking to people and giving them money.'
Trixie said 'They just give us money?'
Bruno said 'You won't believe this.'
I said 'But what do we have to do?'
Bruno said 'I keep telling you, there's nothing you have to do. You just sit and be nice for a time and talk, and then people give you their money.'
Trixie said 'Who?'
Bruno said 'English or Americans. Don't sit with German boys, or Frenchmen; they won't give you money.'
Trixie said 'And what do they do when you've got the money?'
Bruno said 'I've told you you won't believe this. You tell them you have to go home. They're quite relieved at this.'
I said 'Is this true?'
Bruno said 'Nellie, you're not allowed a direct question!'
Bruno and Trixie and I got a bus to a part of the town where I had not been before; it was somewhere off the road on the way to my mother's soup-kitchen. There was a traffic jam with bright lights beyond it. I thought — People are queuing up here for some sort of food from a kitchen.
Trixie went on 'We say we want money for — what? — a hotel room or something?'
Bruno said 'Look, let's call this off, shall we?'
I said 'We say we have to go and book a hotel room and then we bugger off somewhere quite different with the money.'
Bruno shouted 'Let me out of here!' He began to stagger along the central aisle of the bus.
I thought — But, of course, this is just the place where we should be getting off the bus anyway.