You assure me that it’ll be a straightforward descent, no more complicated than many other things in life, then all will return to normal at the bottom of the slope, say a quick hello to the new comrades, a kiss on the lips and then it all starts up again, so you’ll want to go first, you’ll try to push off gracefully, a straightforward descent, and there’ll be only me who’ll know, and I’ll certainly not let on, that during the night the great slide iced up completely.
Lilstein looks the Minister straight in the eye:
‘Comrade Minister, let us take steps to ensure we do not have an incident, at least let me sound out Kappler’s intentions.’
And the Minister says:
‘We must act quickly, you have your orders.’
He added nothing further. Correction: as he escorted Lilstein to the door he put one final question to him, keeping his tone formaclass="underline"
‘Are you for or against?’
‘Against,’ said Lilstein.
The Minister opened the door:
‘All the same, those are your orders, and those orders express the will of the Politburo and Comrade Walter Ulbricht!’
The Minister had not needed to make him say ‘Against’, he did it for the benefit of his microphones and he took the opportunity to mention Ulbricht’s name at least once.
Hans Kappler appeared to be in as much of a hurry as the Minister. To Lilstein’s first message he replied that he didn’t need time to think: in ten days he’d be in Berlin at the checkpoint on Friedrichstrasse.
At which Lilstein quickly arranged a meeting, in the greatest secrecy, at Waltenberg, to finalise the details.
‘Do you like the Konditorei, Herr Kappler? Next Thursday, late morning? Shall we say eleven?’
Lilstein likes the Konditorei too, a kind of general emporium, groceries, hardware, ironmongery, confectionery, tobacco, bread and a few tables and chairs in the back to serve as a Weinstube. Low ceiling, narrow windows, gentle shadow, the smell of leather, specifically of harness and straps, the fragrance of bread and the tang of metal, nails are sold by the dozen, and all transactions are entered by hand in a great grey ledger, everyone who walks in says Grüss Gott!
What approach is he going to adopt with Kappler? The man’s gone mad. Less than a year ago, he signed a piece in Preuves, for the people of the Congress for the Freedom of Culture who are anticommunists, which makes him a self-confessed anticommunist, and now he wants to go over to the socialist bloc, it’s crazy. Or else, Kappler has turned into a lost soul floating on ideals as the current wafts him, frankly you’d be a lot more use to the cause of progress if you stayed in the West, Herr Kappler, representing us to the West, rather than coming back here spouting ideas which will be identified as Western.
It’s all airy talk, and Kappler is very sensitive to how things are put, if it can’t be said in ten words, then it’s not true, not in fiction of course, the Kappler of old would point out, but true of life, of the way things are decided and action is initiated. You must learn, young Lilstein, speak last, use no more than ten words per sentence and utter only a few sentences.
Kappler, the master of the meandering sentence, my sentences are like centipedes he would say laughing; in 1929 Kappler gave Lilstein advice on the use of the incisive sentence in his undertakings, as if he were trying to relive his youth through Lilstein, but today he acts like anybody because he has begun to write like no one in particular.
Don’t tell Kappler what he should do, destabilise him instead, why do you want to go back so badly? Lilstein also has another question to ask but he keeps it up his sleeve, because he doesn’t know where it might lead them, he doesn’t know how far this question he holds in reserve might take him, still it’s what this is really all about, Rosmar is the idea of a man for whom everything’s finished. Kappler is not a politician, his craziness is of a different order, so ask him the question: ‘Did you ever see her again, Herr Kappler?’
No, not that question, if I ask him that more than likely I’ll start shaking as I ask it, best water it down:
‘Have you seen any of the people you knew in the good old days?’ Fool, it’s the same question and it’s not so upsetting to say.
‘Have you seen her again?’
Make it just ‘her’, but my voice is bound to crack and he is quite capable of answering:
‘How about you? Have you seen her? When was that?’
It would be a laugh to tell him, Lilstein thought, I’m sure that sooner or later, somehow over the next few years, Max will tell him, at least the parts he knows, a tale of cloak and dagger, I bumped into her, I almost bumped into her, our paths crossed but I never saw her again, it wasn’t long ago, last August. Don’t tell this to Kappler.
It might make him give up the idea of going back to Rosmar, but don’t tell him, she comes out of the Budapest Academy of Music, the mood of the city is restless, end of August, they all reckon that 1956 will mark a new beginning, she has just done five hours’ straight teaching, a master-class, I wonder what Max will make of her masterclass, he’ll not pick up on it and pass directly to what comes next, or else he’ll use it as an excuse to try and talk about the music he loves.
It’s after nine in the evening, she’s happy, her Hungarian students are bright, a whole afternoon of Schubert, she has come up with new expressions to use on them, new ideas for exercises, a good singing teacher doesn’t say:
‘Put your whole soul into it!’
No, the good teacher finds graduated exercises which mobilise the multifarious moods of the soul, as a cover it was impeccable, very complete, it would have made the subject of a most interesting report, Lena’s singing class in the Academy of Music, from an analysis of the Lied to her work on the perineum and ‘when you sing keep thinking of your role, which is to inspire’, the verb most frequently on her lips is denken, her classes in German, like in the good old days of the Hapsburgs, and in French, she speaks very good French, she is a genuine European, had a father who was mad about Henry James, in front of her class of young Hungarians she can try exercises, angles, snatches of interpretation.
She’s just found one new phrase, she tells them not to try to express everything, your interpretation must leave the public wanting more, the audience must not receive passively, it must be drawn towards what you are singing, it’s not hesitation, there’s no mystery about it, it’s a tension, you are offering an interpretation and the audience is thinking that something more is about to materialise, so don’t obscure the message.
It is good to come up with new solutions and not simply be a rememberer of old inventions.
Night is falling slowly, there’s a taxi free, she does not want it, she’s walking to stretch her legs, one of her pupils has said, Madame, I’ll walk with you, crossing from one bank to the next, towards Buda, the residential quarter, and her hotel in the middle of a park.
A lovely walk, a fit young pupil, sensitive too, they walk beside the Danube then cross Elisabeth Bridge. I love wandering through towns as it gets dark, crossing bridges, the mist, which blurs the outline of the monuments, when I was singing I had to take care, I was always pretty healthy but night mist is a little menace, you can easily wake up next day croaking. Lena puts her hand through the young man’s arm, turns, forces him to do the same, look, that fantastic pile, it’s the Parliament building, quite magnificent, they resume walking, her hand is still through her pupil’s arm.