10 NOVEMBER ’18
It’s all over!
In a sorrowful speech the pastor addresses the staff and patients in the refectory. Every phrase he utters is a dreadful blow. The war is lost. Revolution in Berlin. The Kaiser has abdicated and Germany is a republic! We must put ourselves at the mercy of the victors, and hope they are magnanimous.
I see the relief on the faces of some; others weep bitter tears, myself included. I can scarce believe it. Were all those lives in vain?
There is a commotion and I notice Patient H stumbling among the men, feeling for the walls. The door is opened for him and he gropes his way along the corridor in the direction of the ward. I go after him.
On his bed, his head is buried in the pillows. He is sobbing loudly, hitting the mattress with his fist.
11 NOVEMBER ’18
Like Patient H, I do not sleep. I am exhausted.
The armies are demobilising; soldiers are returning to their homes all over the country. But most of the men in my ward dread the world outside the hospital. They cling to me like a father. Society is in no state to care for them. I continue my duties as if with a fever.
In the long hours of the night I think how hard the peace will be for Patient H. How utterly unsuited he is to a life dependent on the care of others. A life darkened and curtailed, not able to be an architect. Maybe over time he could learn to view the defeat in context, and in the end regain his sight.
On some patients with a hysterical symptom, in particular with mutes, I have used hypnotic suggestion to free their minds from the event that caused the breakdown. But as hypnosis is effected through the eyes, how would I use it to cure Patient H? It just would not work.
Unless…
E leanor had set out for work earlier than usual. Along with most of the embassy staff she was putting in extra hours in preparation for the influx of American press and guests attending the coronation in May.
She was about to turn the corner into Grosvenor Gardens when two figures in the long line of emigres waiting for American visas caught her eye. One had on a suit faded to purple by the elements, and a hat with the rim turned up at the front. He was seated cross-legged on a bashed leather case with his head in a book. The other, leaning against the wall next to him, sported a gorse bush of tangled hair and was whistling with his eyes half closed.
‘Friedl?’
Two thin faces looked her way, alert. A moment’s suspicion, and then Friedl dropped the book and drew her into the arms of his old suit, releasing a heady smell of camphor and stale fish. ‘Eleanor.’
‘You made it out?’ she said, the questions beginning to crowd her mind.
He made an effort to smile. ‘I did. And here I am, bound for America. What can I say? Hollywood needs me. Maybe you remember Nat. From the Nollendorfplatz Theatre?’ He nodded towards his companion, and Eleanor nodded back in response. She recognised him. The youth who’d tried to slip his arm around her at the door.
‘Of course.’
A moment’s hesitation. ‘And Richard? He’s well?’
‘He is well,’ she said, hearing the coolness in her own voice.
‘You’ve heard from him?’
‘Actually, we’re engaged to be married.’
Both men looked surprised. Then Friedl laughed. ‘Congratulations.’
‘He’ll want to talk to you, I’m sure.’
‘Yes,’ he said, colouring. ‘Much has happened since we last met.’
Keeping her eyes on his, she said, ‘They arrested him and questioned him for three days.’
To Friedl’s credit, he looked stricken. She half expected him to make a show of not knowing what she was talking about, but he said nothing.
‘Here, let me have those,’ she said, taking their application forms. ‘Meet me back here at four.’ She opened her purse and gave Friedl a ten-shilling note. ‘Get yourselves something to eat. Then you’re coming home with me.’