SATURDAY, JUNE 24, 1922
- Hello?
- Hello?
- Yes?
- Villa Keith?
- Yes, Villa Keith.
- Peter, is that you?
- Helena? Where are you? What time is it?
- I'm back in my apartment, it is ... let me see ... twenty minutes after twelve, and I want to know what is happening over there.
- Over here everybody's asleep. Had a bad evening. I made some Kraut martinis.
- You made what?
- Invented a new drink. They had no gin, we sent Meier down to the bar in Roseneck, only thing he could get there was potato schnapps, so we made a pitcher of martinis with vermouth and schnapps, you see, a Kraut martini- I don't think it will become very popular....
- And you got drunk!
- Helena ... What else was there to do? Christoph was ... he was just beside himself when I got here
- About our visit to his uncle?
- About everything! About his uncle, about Kaspar, about HeIfferich's speech in the Reichstag, about your driving around in Rathenau's car....He was going over to the American embassy to fetch you out.
-Peter, he wasn't!
-Yes he was! I told him you wouldn't come, he'd just make an ass of himself. Then he was going over there to stand in front of the embassy gate to guard you when you came out, but by that time he couldn't stand up himself.... I've never seen him like this, Helena.
- Poor Christoph. I think he loves me.
- Of course he loves you. How was dinner?
- Oh it was a mistake for me to go. They didn't want ladies, they wanted to talk politics. Economics. I spent the whole evening in a corner with Mrs. Houghton and two other women.... Walther Rathenau had Mr. Houghton send for Hugo Stinnes."
- Hugo who?
-You don't know Hugo Stinnes? He is the richest man in Germany now, coal mines and steel mills and factories, and he's made it all out of the inflation. He borrows millions and millions of marks from the banks, he buys these coal mines and factories, then he pays back his debts with money that's worth only a fraction of what it was worth when he borrowed it -or better still he simply borrows more money to repay the debts, and those idiots, they go right on lending to him, supposedly because he employs thousands of workers, he provides work.... I think they have all become a little crazy....
- And Rathenau wanted him at this party?
- Yes, because Stinnes is like HeIfferich, a violent opponent of Rathenau's policies, and they were talking about how to pay our reparations to the French with coal, and Rathenau said "Let us see how Stinnes would do this" and the ambassador called him, he was at the Hotel Esplanade, he came over and they talked and talked and it got so late I said we cannot keep the Houghtons up all night, so we left.
- Who left?
- Well, everybody, the party was over, we took Stinnes in Walther Rathenau's automobile, they dropped me here at my place, and then they went on to the Esplanade to continue talking.
- You think they're still there?
- I don't know, I suppose so. Walther Rathenau keeps trying to convince these people. He was terribly depressed about Helfferich's speech but he felt he was making progress with Stinnes, I think.... Peter, I'm so grateful to you for distracting Christoph, he should not worry so much about me.
-Well, but what about Kaspar? What are we going to do about Kaspar? We've only got two hundred milligrams left, that's about one more day, maybe. Are we going out in the street to hunt for morphine after all? How long can we keep this up?
- I would stop right now, Peter.
- Stop giving him Amytal?
- Yes.
- What happens when he wakes up?
-Who knows? But he must wake up eventually. What is the use of postponing it - and maybe causing an addiction?
- It's not up to me.
-Peter, you are giving the injections!
- Not my brother.
- Oh I know it's not your brother - and it's not your country, it's not your trouble, I just wish we had not dragged you into this!
- Helena ... I can't say this clearly but I want you to know I'm not sorry that you trust me, that Christoph trusts me ... and I feel sort of... like I'm part of your life. In Paris I was nothing, a tourist, I didn't know anybody except some Americans who were tourists too, but here ...I don't know how to say it -
-You say it very well, my dear. Now go to sleep, please. It is already tomorrow.
Christoph was sound asleep on the living room sofa, mouth open, snoring. Kaspar was sound asleep in his bed. My head ached and my mouth was parched. In the bathroom I drank a glass of water. Then I took the box with the remaining Amytal and the hypodermic syringe out of the medicine chest. I went downstairs and turned off all the lights and then I went out into the silent street and walked along the sidewalk under the big old horse chestnuts until I came to a rainwater culvert. I leaned over, carefully dropped the box behind the grating, heard the splash. Then I returned to the Villa Keith and went to bed.
Knock at the door.
Headache.
Another knock. "Mister Ellis!"
Headache. Dry mouth. Faint nausea.
"What do you want, Meier?"
"Telephone, Mister Ellis. Herr Oberleutnant. Very urgent, sir. He told me to wake you, please. He is waiting on the telephone."
"Well, where is he? What time is it?"
"He is at the Bank, sir. It is after eleven o'clock. He says it is very urgent."
"All right, all right, tell him I'm coming."
PROLOGUE - THURSDAY, JUNE 15, 1922
I. HOW I GOT THERE
1. PARIS 1922
2. VERDUN 1916
3. IT'S STEALING MONEY, ISN'T IT
4. WHERE WERE YOU IN 1919?
5. RELIABLE TROOPS
6. AN ISLAND
7. BISMARCK FOUND THEM USEFUL
8. INTRODUCTIONS
9. THE LITTLE HOUSE
10. INDIAN CROSSES
11. ANOTHER PART OF TOWN
12. A VIEW OF THE GENDARMENMARKT
13. TWO FOR TEA
14. ON THE TOWN
15. A VIEW OF THE HAVEL
16. REIGEN
II. WHAT HAPPENED
17. THURSDAY, JUNE 15, 1922
18. MONDAY, JUNE 19, 1922
19. WEDNESDAY, JUNE 21, 1922
20. FRIDAY, JUNE 23, 1922
>21. SATURDAY, JUNE 24, 1922
22. WHAT HAPPENED?
III. THE WITCHES' SABBATH
23. SILENCE WITH VOICES
24. THE JUDGMENT OF PARIS
25. SAME SONGS, DIFFERENT SINGERS
26. THEY'RE ONLY GOING TO HIRE HIS VOICE
27. INFLATION WORKS IN DIFFERENT WAYS
28. SMALL CHANGE
29. WHY NOT PAINT LILI?
30. COLD WIND IN MAY
31. ROLLING THUNDER
32. WALDSTEIN'S VOICE
33. THE MATTER OF A DOWRY
34. A RUSSIAN WORD AND A GERMAN WORD
35. THE MARCH ON BERLIN
36. A PIG LOSES MONEY ALL THE TIME
37. THE ARTISTS' BALL
IV. STRIKE TWELVE ZEROs
38. AMYTAL DREAMS
39. LETTERS
40. PROFESSOR JAFFA'S PROGNOSIS
41. THE OTHER SUBJECT
42. ROLLING HOME