The Things We Cherished (10 page)

Jake caught Sol’s gaze and raised a hand in a wave that was friendlier than their relationship might warrant, designed for the benefit of the other guests. Sol did not return the gesture, but nodded and then looked away. He could remember a time when they had once been, if not close, at least not as distant as they had become since their lives took such different paths.

Sol surveyed the room. The house had always been Dora’s; even when Max was alive, there was little of their father in the floral upholstery, the too-ornate furnishings. Now, with the passage of the years, there was an unmistakable wornness to it all. The wallpaper had faded and the carpets were frayed at the edges and there was a tarnish to the lamps that no amount of polishing could remove.

Sol’s eyes dropped to the mantelpiece. Between the silver candlesticks and the framed photograph of his parents as young newlyweds, now yellow with age, sat a glass-domed clock. It had been a gift from their father to their mother, brought back from a business trip to the south when Sol was a small child. The timepiece was their mother’s most prized possession; not only was it a memento of her long-departed husband, but it was one of the few gifts picked with thought and care during their marriage by the otherwise preoccupied Max. Dora forbade the maid from even dusting it, insisting on doing it herself each week with a special chamois cloth.

His thoughts were interrupted by rising voices across the table and he lowered his gaze to Herr Mittel, who was engaged in heated debate with a guest Sol did not recognize. The conversation had descended into politics, a debate on why Germany lost the war, what would have happened if it had won. Almost four years after
the armistice, it was a popular topic, the speculation seemingly endless.

Inwardly, Sol bristled. Who else here but he had fought and nearly died in the trenches? “If the Jews …” Herr Mittel began. Then he stopped, as though he had forgotten for a moment where he was. Clearing his throat, he continued. “That is, if the foreign populations had fought instead of allying with their interests abroad.”

Sol’s anger rose to full boil. The Jews had fought hard alongside the rest of the German men. One survey he’d read at the Gemeinde said more Jews had fought for Germany than any other minority, that twelve thousand had died. But that report had been buried, not published at the “request” of a government ministry, and so the myth persisted. He looked down the table at Jake, wondering if his brother would correct Herr Mittel. Jake, who worked at the foreign ministry now, knew the older man was wrong. But Jake did not respond. No, of course not—defending the fact that the Jews had served would only point out that he himself had not, make him look cowardly in front of the girl.

Realizing no one else would speak up, Sol opened his mouth to say something, but his mother placed her hand over his, warning him to be silent. It was not politics or even fear on her part—she simply did not want one of her guests to feel unwelcome, or to taint the atmosphere of her party with an awkward moment. Dora Rosenberg loved people and she surrounded herself with company to blunt the force of whatever trauma life threw at her. During the war, she had doggedly persisted, hoarding ration coupons and supplies, holding parties by candlelight when the lighting failed, and starting the dinners in late afternoon when curfews wouldn’t let the guests stay after dark. She clung to them even more fiercely
after her husband died and the shelter he built around her began slowly to erode.

The gathering devolved into smaller conversations. Jake’s voice drifted down the table. “As I told the minister the other day …” His comments, though directed at the girl, were loud enough for everyone to hear.

Tuning his brother out, Sol grew more annoyed. Everyone already knew about Jake’s position. He’d begun working for Walter Rathenau years earlier, long before he became foreign minister. The day he’d gotten the job, he ran home from university, breathless. “He’s amazing,” he told Sol. “He’s going to be the German Disraeli, they say.” Working long days with fervent zeal, Jake had gained Rathenau’s favor and ridden his coattails into office as an appointed aide.

“Anti-Semitism in Europe,” Sol heard Jake saying nonchalantly to the girl now, “is nothing but a passing social phenomenon.”

“Passing for about a thousand years,” Sol muttered under his breath.

“What was that, darling?” his mother asked absently, not looking toward him.

Sol did not answer. He had once believed, as Jake did, that they could be counted among their non-Jewish brethren, more alike than different. As a teenager, he’d been as secular as his brother. When the war broke out, he gamely enlisted with his friend Albert, caught up with everyone else in the Spirit of 1914, convinced that Germany was right and would swiftly prevail. Only then was Sol made aware for the first time in his life that he was not like the others. The lone Jew in his unit, he was hazed with a barbarism that he could not have imagined. They pissed in his water canteen and spat in his rations, which he ate anyway because he was close to starving by then and there was no other food to be had. They stole his extra
pair of socks and he had gotten frostbite and trench foot and lost two toes on his right foot as a result.

But perhaps worst of all was the isolation. Shunned by the other soldiers, Sol found himself alone in the most desolate place on earth. Even Albert turned his back out of fear, avoiding his childhood friend until the day Sol cradled his head as he died in the trenches of the Ardennes.

And then he’d returned home. He didn’t expect a hero’s welcome—the civilians did not know how valiantly they had fought or the hardships they had suffered. But Sol was unprepared for the bile and recriminations: the Jews, the papers said, had not fought for their country. They had allied themselves with foreign interests, surrendered willingly and stabbed the German soldiers, who had treated them like brethren, in the back. Jewish factory owners were supposedly responsible for the shortages of munitions, food, and other supplies that had resulted in the defeat of Germany. Four years later, idiots like Herr Mittel were still repeating those same insidious lies propagated by the media and politicians in order to further their own interests.

Soon the coffee cups were drained and there seemed to be an unspoken cue for the guests to stand and start for their coats, despite his mother’s protestations that they should stay a bit longer. “We’re going down to hear some jazz,” Jake announced as he reached Sol’s end of the table, already a “we” with the girl at his side.

“Hello,” Sol said to the girl, a shade too loudly, as she started past. “I’m Jake’s brother, Sol.”

“Miriam,” she offered, extending her hand in the modern custom, and Sol, fighting his natural tendencies, shook it.

“You look familiar,” he began and a look of confusion crossed her face, as if their paths could not possibly have intersected. “A sister, perhaps?”

“Leah,” she said, and her voice carried the same dismissive note with which Sol had heard his brother speak about him. “She’s older, works at the KaDeWe.”

“Yes,” he replied quickly. “Will she be joining—”

But before Sol could finish the question, Jake was at Miriam’s side, taking her arm. He clapped Sol on the back a shade too hard. “How’s work at the Gemeinde?” he asked in a way that was meant to illustrate to Miriam the difference between Jake’s important position at the ministry and his brother’s clerical job.

Sol’s mind raced as he tried to think of something interesting to say about his work but found nothing. “We should go,” Miriam said, looking up at Jake.

Sol watched as his brother’s expression changed, and there was a submissiveness there he had never seen before. “Yes, of course.”

He held his breath, waiting for an invitation to join them. He would make an exception, go out on the Sabbath just this once, in hopes that Miriam’s sister might be there. It was worth risking the wrath of God if it meant finding her, for the privilege of basking in the light of those brown eyes. But the invitation did not come—Jake and the girl were already brushing past him, making their way to the door, and in that instant Sol was instantly reminded of the vast gulf between his brother’s world and his own, the places he could never belong, even if he wanted to.

The next morning, Sol set out for shul once more. On the street, he sniffled, his nose tickled by the acrid odor of the ersatz coal everyone burned to keep warm these days. He had slept poorly, dreaming of the evening in the jazz café that had not taken place, a smiling Leah taking his arm the way Miriam had Jake’s, and had awoken strangely warm and empty and exhausted at the same time. His boots scuffed noisily against the cobblestones, carving tracks in the fresh coating of snow that covered the ground.

It was not until he reached the main thoroughfare that he noticed the difference: the street seemed eerily quiet, with a lack of activity more reminiscent of the last few weeks of August, when those Berliners who could fled the city for holiday to the seaside or the mountains, than early March. Inside the synagogue, the change was even more noticeable—the men did not call out to one another as they usually did but clustered in the corners, talking in low voices as if afraid someone might overhear. He stood awkwardly to one side of the room for several minutes, wanting to join in the conversations but not sure how. Nine o’clock, the starting time for worship, came and went, yet the men did not take their seats.

Finally, Herz Stempel broke away from the circle and came to the spot where Sol stood alone. At fifty-four, Herz was one of the younger congregants, less closed off and suspicious of outsiders. “What is it?” Sol asked.

“You haven’t heard?” Sol shook his head. “Rathenau’s dead.”

Sol scanned the congregation in his mind, trying to recall which of the men in the sea of gray hair and beards was Rathenau. Then he realized that Herz was not talking about one of their own but rather about the foreign minister, for whom Jake worked. Walter Rathenau was also a Jew. “How?”

“Shot with machine guns.” A rock pressed against Sol’s chest as the image crystallized in his mind. “Men ambushed his car. That’s all we know so far.”

Jake sometimes rode along with the foreign minister, Sol recalled anxiously. “When?”

“Last night about nine.” Sol inhaled, relaxing slightly. Jake was with Miriam then, on his way to the jazz club.

The rabbi finally signaled the call to worship and Herz retreated. As Sol took his seat, he thought again of his brother. Jake idolized Rathenau, who had mentored him and brought him on board. It
was more than just admiration for a single man, though. To Jake, the fact that one of the highest posts in the cabinet was occupied by a Jew was proof that they were fully accepted into German society, that despite the insults and struggles they really were accepted as equals. Did he know yet what had happened?

After the morning service had ended, Sol hurried toward home, his mind still racing. The news of Rathenau’s murder, while surprising, was not entirely a shock. Politics had grown more virulent in recent years and assassinations of politicians, either by the ultranationalists on the right or the extreme socialists on the left, were not uncommon. He remembered Jake describing how the esteemed Doktor Einstein and another man had called on Rathenau and begged him not to take the job as foreign minister on peril of his life. But Rathenau insisted, refusing the bodyguards that would encumber his movements and his ability to do his job. And now he was dead.

As Sol rounded the corner onto Rosenthaler Strasse, an arm shot out of a doorway and grabbed him by the shoulder, dragging him into an alley. He froze, certain that he was being attacked. Frantically, he tried to remember the grappling techniques he’d been taught in military training, but his mind was blank.

“It’s me, Jake.” His brother’s voice broke through the haze.

Sol relaxed slightly. “Rathenau’s dead,” he replied by way of a greeting. The words sounded smug, as if they confirmed everything he had ever believed about assimilation, and his own observant lifestyle choice had been vindicated.

Jake did not answer, but released Sol from his grasp. Sol noticed then the way his brother’s hand shook as he lit a cigarette, the paleness of his face. “I’m sorry,” he added, softening. “I know you liked Rathenau, respected him.”

“It’s not that,” Jake replied, his voice a hoarse whisper. He took
a drag from the cigarette and exhaled, letting the smoke unfurl above them. “I think it’s my fault.”

“Your fault?” Sol stared wide-eyed at his brother. “How could you possibly—”

“I was out at a club a few weeks ago. Miri, the girl who was at dinner last night, introduced me to some friends of hers. From the university, she said. We were drinking, talking. I think they asked me questions about the minister, his schedule …”

Sol could instantly picture the scene: Jake, his tongue loosened by too much liquor, boasting about his position, saying more than he should. His stomach twisted. “What about Miri?” he asked, picturing the attractive brunette. “Have you asked her?”

“Gone. I tried to find her this morning but her flat is deserted.” Jake buried his head in his hands and leaned against the doorway. “There will be an inquiry. With the information that was given, it’s only a matter of time before they figure out it was me. What am I going to do?”

Sol summoned his big brotherness, all four and a half minutes of it. “You don’t know that.” But even as he spoke, he realized Jake was right. The government would be looking for someone to blame and the police force was notoriously anti-Semitic. A Jew betraying Rathenau would be a convenient story; Jake, portrayed as a disgruntled subordinate, would make the perfect scapegoat. “You need to get out of the country,” Sol said finally, surprised at his own decisiveness, the certainty in his voice.

A light appeared in Jake’s eyes and Sol could tell he was thinking of the salons of Paris and London and other grand cities, images gleaned from the boyhood stories their father had told of his travels. “East,” Sol added authoritatively.

“East?” Jake’s shoulders slumped as the visions of cafés and social halls evaporated from his mind.