Free The History of History by Ida Hattemer-Higgins Page B

a night. He knew when she came in (as he knew when everyone came in) and he knew when she went out (he could see these things from his garden house in the courtyard), and he also had a good view of when her lights were on and when they were off. Unless she was reading with a flashlight, there was no way around it: the girl slept extremely long hours. This was one of the benedictions of the winter for Erich, when the sun in Berlin rises so late and sets so early—he had an unusually profound insight into the sleeping habits of the building’s tenants.
    Still, he considered the possibility that the American, this Margaret, had found some way to fool him. It seemed like her, somehow. Maybe she was awake in some invisible corner of the flat. He had had certain outrageous experiences with her in the past that would support this. On one occasion when her lights were
on
, Erich went and rang her bell in order to discuss with her the new basement allotments, and she did not come to the door. Even after repeated ringing of the bell. He went back downstairs and looked up at her windows again and saw the lights were certainly on and a shadow was moving behind the curtains. He went up and rang the bell more forcefully. Still, she did not come to the door. He watched from his house in the courtyard as her bathroom window went from open to shut, and he fumed. Erich would not have minded helping the girl, back at the beginning. She was not unsympathetic. But she had been so morose toward the community for several years now, he had lost his goodwill.
    After the incident with the door, Erich even considered not saying
Guten Tag
to her. If he wanted, he could certainly pull this off. When angered with another fellow who lived in the building, he had done exactly this—for twenty-five years. Even after repeated pleas from third parties to relent. But Erich believed in an apology. When, after twenty-six years and three months, the man did apologize, Erich hadbeen more than willing to drink a beer with him. But he did like to hear that someone was sorry. It was worth the wait.
    His general aggravation with the girl had led him to do something he would normally
never
do: he had read the contents of some of her discarded mail. He learned that she worked as a guide, gave historical walking tours, and although she considered herself an intellectual and read a great deal (or made a great deal of photocopies) of Foucault and Stephen Greenblatt, and for a while took a close interest in Rosa Luxemburg, otherwise, for the most part, she was merely interested in the Third Reich. You know: who was guilty here, and who was guilty there; the Auschwitz trials; how many died here, how many died there. To judge by the papers that went into the recycling, she seemed to make all sorts of photocopies related to gossip about whores like Magda Goebbels, Geli Raubal, and Eva Braun, and he had once peeked through her door as she went in and seen a bookshelf with the complete diaries of Joseph Goebbels, with their distinctive spines. Erich thought it was a most unpleasant business—foreigners who sensationalize or even think they can call Germany to task. Where had she been when he had taken a stand against his own father, the old Nazi who didn’t like his (Erich’s) leather pants (that was a laugh!), been partially disowned and had to make a new life for himself? Not even a glimmer in her
grandfather’s
eye, that’s where.
    That Margaret Taub!—she was so sympathetic at first glance, such a soft-looking girl, almost clownish, as if she were ready to be touched, ready to feel pain over anything. After a while, though, you saw that she was soft enough, but so dreamy as to be almost criminally oblivious. All in all, Erich thought, the impression was of a poisonous cobra that believes itself, very genuinely, to be a small dog.
    But Erich kept saying
Guten Tag
. The trouble was this: although she never seemed surprised at his presence in the courtyard, she never