The Empire of the Senses (2 page)

Now the Lord had prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights
. The verse sprung to mind, as if the overwhelming foliage sprinting past him padded the insides of a monstrous whale that would spit them out at the end of the journey. But as far as he could see, there was no end. Only a cyclical green and brown interrupted by flashes of white birches. As he glanced upward, his eyes watered from the sharp blueness of the sky that had shed off the mistiness of dawn. Man is always trying to get away from nature, for nature is wind, rain, sleet, scorching sun, and she cares nothing if we suffer, Lev thought. We’re traveling deeper into her inhospitable womb. He blinked, trying to decipher this shade of blue. He had not seen it before; it was harsher, lacking the softness and civility of a Berlin sky.

The arches of his feet itched inside the hot boots and his feet had
swelled, along with his hands. His wedding band dug into his flesh. He realized he might easily die with it on and wondered if a Russian would cut it off for the gold. Melt it down into a lump. The train stalled. The man across from him, a portly bar owner, woke up alarmed. Thick heat pressed down on them, and the lack of movement roused the other men, intuitively fearing stillness. Gnats and flies buzzed, attracted to the sweat and salt of their ripe bodies. Another man greedily drank from his mud-colored canteen, draining the last bits of water. His Adam’s apple worked up and down, the odd bump accentuated by his thin red neck.

The bar owner stood up unsteadily and barked, “Why are we stopped?” His eyes bulged. Someone grunted. The engineer sniffed and glanced away. Last night, Lev had shared a bottle of whiskey with this bar owner, who was now pacing the small length of the train car. Between sips they had reminisced of home. It had been a comfort to say the name of his street out loud—Charlottenstrasse—and to picture the front door of his house, recently painted midnight blue, with its brass handle, and to learn that this man lived on the other side of the park, a mere ten-minute stroll away. But watching him strut back and forth in his sweat-stained fatigues, his eyes jumping at the slightest snap in the woods, Lev realized he disliked him intensely, that he was a hysteric and a troublemaker. He decided to stay clear of him. He had to protect himself from this kind of man because this kind of man, Lev thought, often took the first bullet, as if a metal spitzer could sense calamity and direct its pointed tip toward it.

The train lurched forward and back, sending the man into a defensive crouch. His stubby fingers searched for something to grip.

Lev closed his eyes, moving his tongue over his teeth, the metallic coating a result of little water and too much tobacco. The blueness of the sky vibrated behind his closed lids. He had not slept well last night, occupied with rereading the letter that Josephine had slipped into his satchel, along with the blood sausages and an orange. Using the flame of his lighter to decipher her neat and tiny scrawl, he had thought the letter would contain a necessary revelation, an outpouring of emotion that had been concealed by the hum of their quiet domesticity. His
hands had trembled as he opened the letter, the cream paper appearing so white in contrast to his ashen fingertips. He read greedily, without pause.

Dear Lev
,

My only hope is that you will return by Christmas. The children will miss you terribly, even though as I am writing this you are still here, in the next room, packing your things. Especially Vicki; it will be very hard on her while you’re away. Try to come home safely even though I know you want to prove yourself. But you mustn’t think of impressing my mother or getting the Blue Max. To me, you are a true German, regardless. I have such faith in this. Write regularly and protect yourself
.

With love
,

Josephine

The letter was dull. He had hoped she would return to the language of her girlhood, eight years ago when they had strolled through Schiller Park, protected by the velvety shade of the oak trees, and she had rested her head on his shoulder, her white neck outstretched, a sheen of sweat upon it, and she had whispered urgently about the physical need for him, how she felt a resolute tightness that must be this need and gestured to her pelvis shielded by white lace and starched cotton, her mouth finding his; the pressure of her palm against the back of his neck could still be felt if Lev concentrated hard enough to retrieve the moment. The letters then had been such grand explosions of feeling, of unearthed confessions, and yes, shame too. But the shame was rich and dark and full of the possibility for redemption. He folded her letter away.

Lev stretched his legs and drank some tepid water. Yes, she had let him inside her on that last night. But granting permission was very different from wanting him. He’d encountered her unyielding body and remembered the way she turned her head to the side when he entered
her, the way she breathed a sigh of relief when he’d finished, how much happier she appeared after it was done, rosy-cheeked and safely encased in her silk robe, pulling the sash tighter around her narrow waist while he lay there naked, legs spread apart, an affront to her.

Feeling the resentment swell in his breast, Lev felt guilty. He might not ever see her again, and here he was enumerating her flaws, forgetting her attributes. And she had many attributes. She managed the household with searing practicality: she purchased the finest linens and employed the most competent housemaid and cook; she knew which flowers would bloom in the garden depending on the season and arranged the bouquets, expertly cut, into long glass vases so that every room contained fresh flowers straining toward the light. She kept the children clean and well looked after, clipping their nails and starching their shirt collars bright white—his own mother had failed at this.

Most important, she gave shape to his life, providing Lev with a foothold in the mossy overgrowth of his work and social position, which otherwise would have felt slippery. Effortlessly, she put twenty overweight men from Stuttgart—potential buyers of the tricots and canvas Lev’s firm Bremer Woll-Kammerei produced—at ease as they sat at her dining table and ate from her impeccable china. The men, their eyes trained on her, laughed heartily when she joked about the ineffectiveness of lace garters or how her father had known Peter Ulff, founder of the Berlin ribbon factory that supplied the royal regiments of the Austro-Hungarian empire. “When I saw those silky blue ribbons fluttering on the breast of every soldier during flag day or some such parade, all I could think of was little Herr Ulff asking me which shade of violet did I prefer at one of the many family gatherings he attended at our home.” Her eyes shone in the candlelight as she spoke, and her forceful command of the table allowed Lev to sink into the wine-infused darkness and admire how she animated the room with a charged energy that enlivened even the dullest of men, bringing color to their cheeks. Lev too would grow entranced with her performance, marveling at her ability to keep up the light, happy mood, stirring the blood of these stolid men, who by the end of the night agreed to purchase meters and
meters of canvas from Bremer Woll-Kammerei for the production of their signature rucksacks.

After these business dinners, her performance continued in the bedroom. The exaltation she felt at being useful to him, at being admired and gazed upon for so many hours by a tableful of men, fueled Josephine to reveal more of herself than she normally would. Cupping her breasts with both hands, she requested that Lev undress her, bit by bit, until only her plain naked body lay before him on the silk duvet cover. The silk of her skin against the silk of the fabric, the silkiness of their bodies twining together once they were both undressed felt natural and unimpeded. She did not wince or tense her legs when he slipped into her. Her body: angular, lean, taut tendons that quivered under his touch, sensitive to the slightest movement of his fingertips grazing her hip bone, the curve of her torso, the indented nape of her neck. It always seemed to Lev as if she barely had enough skin to cover her knees, her elbows, her cheekbones, creating an economy in her form, which became even more visible when she slid off her Oriental robe and slipped into bed beside him, her long cool body nestled against his stockier, rougher build.

In these moments, their marriage felt full of blood and heat, pulsing with possibilities even they couldn’t name. The risk of having wed a gentile woman, a woman so outside the realm of his family, his neighborhood, his known world, was swallowed up by having Josephine. It was rare, and in some circles unthinkable, that Lev, an Eastern European Jew from Galicia, would come into contact with Josephine, let alone marry her. Her aristocratic German blood, the long line of military men in her family, the castles and estates her relatives had enjoyed for centuries, the horses and fox hunts—such things reflected nothing of Lev’s life. No matter that Lev’s parents had given him music and art lessons, an English governess from Bristol, a Latin tutor, admission into the best schools. This was not enough to skim the world of Josephine. So when he chanced upon her at the Ice Palace and she spoke to him freely, as if there wasn’t any difference between them, as if he had not grown up in the Jewish section of Berlin, a yeshiva student with trousers that were
sometimes too short, it seemed as if a pale white light seeped through the cracks of a stone wall he had always thought impenetrable. The light expanded, deepening into that rich golden afternoon when he took her hand, touched her wrist, and she said yes with her eyes, yes through her fingertips, a yes that meant more than coffee under the watchful gaze of her chaperone.

And why, Lev often wondered, had Josephine chosen him? At the start, he kept waiting for her to discover the error in her ways and apologetically, gently, end their relations. The opposite occurred. She grew more insistent, clinging to him with a fierce determination, as if Lev was her savior from the monotonous line of suitors who all reminded her of her brother, Karl, in their slim-fitting military uniforms, expert at making lighthearted quips while twisting the ends of their mustaches into fine points. “I don’t want to sit under a parasol at a fox hunt and clap breathlessly for my husband,” she would cry. “I’ve been doing that all my life.”

“What do you want then?” Lev would ask, bewildered by her impassioned speech.

“You,” she would murmur, lowering her eyes, suddenly aware of her need for him, which felt ungovernable, reckless. “I want to be where you are.”

But potential, Lev realized, was a treacherous thing, because promises—her hope for a music career, his desire to paint, her plan to sever herself from her family—made in the semidarkness of their bedroom had turned into disappointment, regret, the sense of having overlooked some vital piece of information.

The phrase
a vital piece of information
echoed in Lev’s head, the cadence of it taunting and sardonic. His boss, Herr Friedlaender, had employed that exact phrasing. The day war was announced, he had called Lev into his office and said all he needed to do was pass on that vital piece of information to the right government officials indicating how much he needed Lev in Berlin, at the textile plant, to ensure the production of woolen blankets for each soldier. When Lev replied that
he was joining up to fight, Herr Friedlaender looked confused. He smoothed down his shiny silver hair, parted expertly to the side, and inhaled deeply.

“Why would you go to war, perhaps even to your death, when you have
everything
here?” Before Lev could answer, Herr Friedlaender exclaimed he would happily increase Lev’s salary, and if the title of production manager was no longer satisfactory, he would even consider promoting Lev to vice president. He moved around the perimeter of his large walnut desk, picking up paperweights, putting them down, opening and closing his cigarette case, touching his silver hair. Lev had seen him perform these same fluid movements during client meetings, all the while talking and talking until, as if mesmerized by such a dance, the clients agreed to Herr Friedlaender’s terms, which were always slightly tipped in his favor. But this hypnotic dance did not work on Lev, who remained seated, stoically staring out the large window, which looked out onto other buildings with similar large windows.

Herr Friedlaender readjusted his suspenders and smoothed down the front pockets of his trousers. “You’re listening, yes? I’ll pass along that vital piece of information regarding your usefulness to the firm, which will enable you to remain here. Josephine will be indebted to me—perhaps she’ll even come to like me.”

With the mention of Josephine’s name, Lev started. “She wants me to join up. In fact, she said so herself. It’s important to her that I fight for Germany, that I prove myself.” Catching Herr Friedlaender’s frown, Lev added, “Almost all the men in her family have fought, at one point or another.” The part about Josephine saying it was important to fight was untrue, but Lev was certain she felt this way. It would allow her to feel proudly patriotic when her mother, the church ladies, the baker’s wife, the seamstress at the tailor’s shop, the teachers at Franz’s school, or even the mail carrier asked after Lev. Josephine could then announce with the appropriate quiver in her voice, “He’s fighting for Germany.” But underneath this, what she really meant was:
Yes, I married a Jew
,
but look how loyal he is to Germany, how good
, erasing any question of his Jewishness surmounting his Germanness. German, only German. This was what Lev wanted and what he believed Josephine wanted: to escape
the faint doubt, the shadowy presence of another past, another history, he kept trying to outrun.

Friedlaender stopped what he was doing, holding an unlit cigarette in midair. “If she thinks this, she’s a shortsighted woman—the most important thing is survival,
personal
survival. If you haven’t learned that yet, I don’t know what else to say.”

And then Friedlaender added, “I’ll save your place here, for when you come home.” He paused, observing Lev, his sharp dark eyes running over the contours of Lev’s face as if he might be seeing him for the last time. Then the question of Lev’s loyalties, how German he really was, would no longer matter to anyone.