You are the child’s father, Wilhelm.
So you say. Wilhelm pushed his plate and saucer aside; he didn’t look at her. There was more indignation and self-righteousness in his voice than dismay. Suddenly an idea occurred to him. A look of contempt came into his face. Although who’s to say you aren’t sleeping with other men again, you, you…? Wilhelm was on his feet now and couldn’t find a suitable term of abuse to hurl at her. Bitch — could he really not think of that? His lips were firm and you could see his teeth in straight rows. He was angry, just angry. I’ll tell you something, Alice. It’s my right, do you hear, it’s my right to sleep with you. And you enjoyed it too, admit it. But no one told you to go and get pregnant.
No, said Helene quietly, shaking her head. No one told me to do that.
Well, there you are. Wilhelm clasped his hands behind his back and paced up and down. You’d better start thinking how you’re going to feed and keep your brat. I’m not prepared to provide for you and your baby on my own.
This was not unwelcome news to Helene. Over these last few months she had so often asked his permission to get a job — she would have loved to work in a hospital again. She missed her patients, the knowledge that what she did helped other human beings, that she was useful. But Helene had no time to go into that now. There was something else she must say, it would make trouble for her but she had to say it. Helene looked up at him. I know why you don’t inform on me. Because you forged those papers, because you can’t inform on me without giving yourself away too.
Wilhelm lunged at her. She raised her hands over her head to protect herself, but he seized her arms, held them tightly and forced her up from the chair. It crashed to the ground. Wilhelm pushed her through the kitchen and up against the wall. He held her there, let go with one hand just to press her head against the wall with the flat of that hand so hard that it hurt. Never say that again, never, do you hear? You serpent. I forged nothing, nothing. Your name was Alice when I met you. It’s no business of mine how you got those papers. No one will believe you, just get that into your head. I’ll say you lied to me, Helene Würsich.
Sehmisch, my name is Sehmisch, I’m your wife. Helene couldn’t move her head, writhe as she might in Wilhelm’s strong grip.
He put his hand over her mouth; his eyes were blazing. Hold your tongue. He waited, but she couldn’t say anything with his hand pressed to her mouth. You’ll keep quiet, is that clear? I won’t say it a second time.
One September evening, Wilhelm had invited two colleagues with whom he was working on the great construction projects in Pölitz to supper. Helene was not supposed to know about their plans for rebuilding, she had only picked up a few things in passing and was careful not to ask Wilhelm any questions. He was probably planning the new design of the whole site with his colleagues. Workers had to be accommodated, the camp on the building site had to have space for whole columns of them. The hydrogenation works needed a building plan which, over and above the chemical processing plant, called for good logistics in the matter of traffic and supplies. Wilhelm introduced Helene to his two colleagues as his wife. At his request she had cooked fresh eel and was now serving the three men sitting at the table.
Beer, called Wilhelm, holding up his empty bottle without turning to Helene. The bottle almost hit Helene’s belly. She took it from him. And you gentlemen?
One of them still had some in his glass, the other nodded. Go on, can’t have too much beer.
My word, Wilhelm, your wife can certainly cook.
Fresh eel, that was my mother’s speciality, the other man said appreciatively.
Everyone’s good at something. Wilhelm laughed and took a good gulp from his bottle. His eyes passed fleetingly over Helene’s apron. Something growing in there, eh? He laughed, and in high spirits reached with one hand for her breast. Helene retreated. Had his colleagues seen and heard? She turned; she didn’t want anyone to see her blushing.
When is it due? His young colleague looked down at his plate as if asking the eel for an answer.
Alice, when is it due? Wilhelm was in a good mood. Well pleased with himself, he looked round for Helene, who was putting the last steaming potatoes in a dish and setting it down on the table.
In six weeks’ time. Helene wiped her hands on her apron and took the spoon to help the men to potatoes.
Six weeks, as soon as that? It wasn’t clear whether Wilhelm was really surprised or putting on an act. How time flies!
And you’re applying for posts in Berlin? His older colleague sounded startled. Helene knew nothing about Wilhelm’s making any such application.
These days people are needed everywhere, Königsberg, Berlin, Frankfurt. Wilhelm drank to his colleagues. We’ll soon be through with Pölitz, then we’ll have to see what’s to be done next.
Right, said his younger colleague and drank some beer.
Helene served Wilhelm’s potatoes last. They were still steaming; perhaps it was too cold in the kitchen. She’d have to add coal to the stove. Since she had been expecting her baby Helene didn’t feel the cold as she used to, and was slow to notice when the apartment was getting chilly.
Never mind that, Alice, we can look after ourselves. You can leave us now. Wilhelm rubbed his hands above his steaming plate.
It was true, the men had their food and Wilhelm knew where the beer was. He could get up himself to find fresh supplies. As Helene was leaving the kitchen she heard him say to his friends: Do you two know the one about Renate-Rosalinde with the barbed-wire fence?
His colleagues were roaring with laughter before Wilhelm could go on.
She asks the holidaymaker: What do you think of my new dress? Fabulous, says the lance-corporal, reminds me of a barbed-wire fence.
The men roared again. Helene put up the ironing board in the bedroom next door.
Barbed-wire fence, says our beauty, how do you mean? Why, says the lance-corporal, grinning and rolling his eyes, it protects the front without keeping it out of sight.
More laughter. Helene heard bottles clinking, and knocking on the table. Very neat reply, said one of his colleagues, probably the older one.
Wilhelm’s laughter outdid the mirth of the others.
Helene took the shirt that Wilhelm would be wearing next day out of the basket and ironed it. A few weeks earlier Wilhelm had given her an electric iron for her birthday. The electric iron was amazingly light in weight. Helene could glide it over the fabric so quickly that she had to tell herself to iron more slowly. There was still loud laughter next door and Helene kept hearing the clink of bottles. The child inside her was kicking, it struck a rib on the right, her liver hurt, and Helene put a hand to her belly to feel how hard the bump inside it was. It was probably the coccyx there, turning with difficulty from left to right, with the bump pressing against her abdominal wall. The little head inside her sometimes rested on her bladder so painfully that she kept having to go out to the lavatory on the landing. Wilhelm didn’t like her to keep using the chamber pot in the night, so she had to go out to relieve herself. He must find the slow trickle into which her flow of urine had turned in the last few weeks intolerable; perhaps she disgusted him now. Since their altercation in the spring, Wilhelm hadn’t touched her again, not once. At first Helene thought he was just angry and his desire would revive. She knew him, she knew only too well how often that desire, that unassuageable lust overcame him. But as days and weeks passed by, she realized it was not directed at her any more. Helene seldom asked herself whether it was because she was pregnant and he didn’t want to sleep with a pregnant woman, not wishing to disturb the child in her and feeling increasing distaste for her body, or whether it was simply that the outcome of his lust, the awareness that a child had been conceived, filled him with alarm and dismay. Once, towards morning, she had woken to hear his shallow breathing on the other side of the bed in the dark. His blanket was moving rhythmically, until a point came when the hint of a high squeal could be heard as he let out his breath. Helene had pretended to be asleep, and it was not the only time she had heard him doing that during the night. She didn’t feel sorry for him, nor was she disappointed. A pleasant indifference towards her husband had taken hold of Helene. On other nights he stayed out very late, and she smelled sweet perfume so strongly when he staggered into the bedroom early in the morning, drunk, and collapsed on the bed, that she knew he had been with another woman. She pretended to be asleep on those nights too. It was as well for them to leave each other in peace. In the daytime, when Helene came back from shopping, had cleaned the apartment and put the washing to soak and then to boil, she liked to read for half an hour. Everyone needs a break now and then, she told herself. She was reading a book by a young man who had been to a training school for servants in Berlin. It was called Institute Benjamenta. Think well, mean well. The total eradication of your own will was the idea of the training, what a wonderful idea. Helene often had to laugh out loud to herself. She had hardly ever found a book so entertaining. When she laughed her belly went firm and hard, her uterus contracted, its huge muscle protected the baby from any violent movement. She had borrowed the book from the Rosengarten library, where she wasn’t supposed to go, because there were no books from this particular publisher now in the People’s Library. Helene thought of Leontine’s dark and magical smile, the sweet tenderness of Carl’s lips, his eyes, his body. It wasn’t so easy to reach past her big belly with her arm, nor could she, as she had once liked to do, put a pillow between her thighs, lie on her stomach, and try to make those movements; her belly was too big for her to lie on it, so now Helene just stroked herself and thought of nothing.