A Choice of Enemies (13 page)

“For peace,” Horton said.

“Peace.” Ernst shook his fist at Horton. “If I ever hear that word again I will scream.”

“I don’t think,” Horton said, “that there’s any need for us to go on with this discussion.”

Norman stepped between Horton and Ernst. “How dare you judge this boy so glibly,” he said.

“Aren’t you Norman
Price?”
Horton asked.

Norman nodded.

“I wonder what your father would think if he saw you defending a little Nazi –”

“I think you’re a bully, Horton. I think you stink.”

“Now we know where
he
stands,” Budd Graves said.

“Oh,” Bob Landis asked drunkenly. “Where?”

“When someone’s argument is indefensible they usually resort to adolescent abuse,” Horton said. “You’ve been drinking.…”

“That’s the most sensible suggestion I’ve heard so far,” Bob Landis said. “Let’s all have another drink.”

“Norman,” Bella said gently, “please.…”

“Look,” Norman said, “you’re all my friends here –”

“That’s news to me,” Budd Graves said.

“– but I’m sorry to say that I’m disappointed in the lot of you. All evening I’ve been hearing second and third hand stories about Ernst. Most of them untrue. Of course he was in the Hitler Youth, but they all were. Sure he talks a lot of nonsense, but why hasn’t one of you – just one of you taken the trouble to treat him like another human being?”

“Everybody,” Bob Landis called, “everybody choose your partner for a Paul Jones.”

“Maybe he
is
a little bastard,” Norman said. “I’m not sure. But at least I’m willing to take the trouble to find out.”

“Now that Billy Graham has spoken,” Budd Graves said, “I –”

“Look,” Norman said, “most of us were on the hot seat at home. Don’t you recognize Horton’s technique of questioning?”

“Really,” Horton said, “this is too much. Are you accusing me of being a McCarthyite?”

“That’s just what I mean. Remarks like that,” Norman said. “Twisting my words to his own purpose.”

“You want us to go around kissing Nazis,” Budd Graves said. “Is that it?”

“No,” Norman said, “and I want them to stop locking up communists. But if I don’t want to see any more Rosenberg cases neither do I want to see any more Slansky trials.”

“That’s a very revealing remark,” Horton said.

“Maybe it is.”

“Excuse me,” Horton said, “I’ll be right back. Tell me if I miss anything.”

“After all he’s suffered from the witch-hunters,” Budd Graves said, “you had no right –”

“Oh, hell,” Norman said, “what’s the use?”

“Take it easy, Norman.” Bob Landis clapped him on the back. “Don’t get so worked up.”

That’s when Horton burst into the room and grabbed Norman by the collar.

“You-you –”

Norman struggled to break free.

“Are you responsible for that foul slander on the toilet mirror?”

Oh, hell, Norman thought. I forgot. “I’m sorry,” he said feebly, “I only meant it as a joke.”

“A joke?
FBI
agents. Is that what you find funny?” Horton turned triumphantly to the others. “He wrote
‘COLIN HORTON IS A SPY FOR THE FBI’
on the toilet mirror.”

Bob Landis howled with laughter, but, responding to a kick in the shins from Zelda, he broke off abruptly.

“Oh, Norman,” Joey said, “how could you have been so childish?”

“How old did you say you were?” Budd Graves asked.

“O.K.
, Budd,” Bob Landis said, “stop pushing him.”

Norman pulled back and swung wild and blind at Horton, Horton crashed to the floor.

“Fascist,” Horton said. “Dirty little fascist.”

Norman stooped to retrieve his glasses. “This is crazy,” he said. “I
don’t hit people.” He tried to help Horton up, but Horton shoved him away. “I’m sorry,” Norman said.

The others turned away from him. Norman took Ernst and Sally home.

“I’m sorry, Ernst. My friends behaved abominably.”

“You weren’t to blame,” Sally said.

“I was, you know. I mean – Come on into my room for a nightcap.”

Norman poured three stiff drinks, but he didn’t talk. He felt miserable and ashamed. “Everything happened so quickly,” he said.

Restless, upset, her bosom rising and falling quickly, Sally paced up and down the room. She stopped at the mantelpiece and took down a photograph of Nicky. The photograph showed Nicky feeding peanuts to the pigeons of Trafalgar Square. “Is this your brother?” Sally asked.

“Yes.” Norman turned to Ernst. “I’d like to help you.”

“I have come between you and your friends,” Ernst said. “I’m sorry.”

“Maybe I can get you some work translating. I’ll see.”

“You are very kind.”

Suddenly Norman burst out laughing. “I’ve been meaning to hit Horton for years,” he said.

Ernst grinned. “Next time,” he said, “we’ll take them all on together.”

“That suits me fine,” Norman said.

“Hard as nails,” Sally said, sitting down beside Ernst, the photograph of Nicky still in her hand, “the both of you.”

Norman exploded with laughter again. He slapped his knees. “Jesus,” he said, “did you see the expression on Horton’s face when he hit the floor?”

“Fascist,” Sally said, mimicking Horton, “dirty little fascist.”

Ernst leaped up and, adopting the posture of an inquisitor, shook his finger at Norman. “Are you responsible for that foul slander on the toilet mirror?” he demanded.

Sally began to sway drunkenly. “Everybody,” she said, “everybody choose your partner for a Paul Jones.”

All three began to laugh helplessly. Ernst doubled over, holding his sides. Sally collapsed on the bed. Norman slapped his knees; he rubbed his eyes. As they quietened down again Norman attempted to drink his whisky, laughed as he swallowed, coughed, wiped his mouth, and started them off on another paroxysm of laughter.

When they recovered again at last Sally wiped her eyes and, discovering that she still held Nicky’s photograph in her hand, passed it to Ernst. “Look,” she said, “Norman’s brother.”

All at once Ernst looked as though the blood had been sucked out of his face. “How did he die,” he asked, “exactly?”

“On manoeuvres, I think,” Norman said more soberly. “There were no details.”

Ernst got up, his body soaked in sweat, and put the photograph down on the desk. “I think we ought to go to bed,” he said to Sally.

“Come,” Norman said, “stay for another drink.”

“I don’t mind,” Sally said.

“No,” Ernst said, “I am too tired.”

Sally rose, displeased, and a little embarrassed. “Maybe it would be best,” she said.

Ernst took her arm.

“Good night,” Norman said.

At the door Sally kissed Norman on the cheek, held him tightly for an instant, and then broke free. “Good night,” she said, “and thanks.”

“All right,” Sally said, as soon as they were in their own room again, “now will you please tell me why we couldn’t stay for another drink?”

“I was too tired.”

“You were very rude to Norman.”

“I don’t need Norman to defend me.”

“He put himself out for you before his friends. I think you should be grateful.”

“I don’t want his favours.”

“He’s already done you an awfully big one. I thought you wanted to be his friend.”

“You don’t understand. We could never be friends.”

“Why?”

“Norman is dangerous, he – I’ve had dealings with his kind before. They are the first to crack up. They are –”

“Good?”

“Yes,” he said. “How I hate a good man.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I didn’t expect you to. But Karp would understand. Karp knows.”

“I don’t have to ask Karp. It’s good enough for me to know that you hate a good man. That’s what you said, isn’t it?”

“You don’t understand.”

“I don’t understand. You said that too. If I don’t understand I don’t understand. Are you satisfied?”

Ernst struck her with the flat of his hand, knocking her back on the bed.

“Sally …?”

She crouched silently there, her head drooping, her face splashed with hair.

“Did I hurt you, Sally?”

She hid her face with her hands.

“I’m sorry if I hurt you,” he said.

Her eyes, when she took her hands away, were not tear-filled. They were dry with shock.

“I forgot myself,” he said.

Sally got up, cleared the table, and began to undress, folding her clothes with fantastic care.

“Are you angry?” he asked.

“Let’s go to bed. You’re tired.”

He watched sullenly, and not without excitement, as one by one she shed her underwear, hung them on the back of a chair, and got into her pyjamas.

He sat down on the edge of the bed. “Forgive me,” he said.

Sally continued to brush her teeth.

“I didn’t know what I was doing.”

She came to him at last, forcing his head against her flat warm stomach, his scalp a pressure just under her breasts. Her fingers, running like roots through his hair, discovered the running scar in his neck. “What about this,” she asked. “Where did you get this scar?”

“In a fight with another boy.”

“And the other boy?”

“He’s dead.”

She drew away from him.

“I had no idea that you had actually.…”

“The first boy I killed was a Werewolf. Do you know what a Werewolf is?”

“I don’t want to know.”

“During the last days of the war the cream of the Hitler Youth was organized into special battalions for a last ditch defence of Berlin. I got into a fight with one of these boys several days after the end had come.”

“Why are you trying to frighten me?”

It’s true, he thought. I’m trying to frighten her.

“What will become of us, Ernst?”

“I don’t know.”

“We could get married.”

“The others would say I did it for your passport.”

“But it wouldn’t be true.”

“Why not,” he said, “you have a passport.”

“But you love me,” she said. “You’ve said so.”

“You have a passport. Maybe that’s one reason why I love you.”

“Do you believe in God?” Sally asked suddenly.

“Who?”

“GOD.”

“I don’t know. I never thought about it. Is it important?”

“I was brought up not to believe. My parents are socialists. But I believe in God.”

“So you believe in God,” he said, “so what?”

“It’s no use. You don’t understand.”

“Yeah. That’s right,” Ernst said, slipping into his jacket, “but we will never be able to understand each other. Our lives have been too different.”

“Where are you going?”

“For a walk,” he said. “I don’t feel well.”

“Ernst!”

But he was gone.

When she woke the morning after their first night together Sally, although they had not made love, was overcome by shame. Ernst was a pick-up. Ernst had awakened that first morning with a feeling of rejection. He had not really expected Sally to allow him to spend the whole night on the floor.

“My shirt isn’t dry yet,” he had said. “I’ll go when it’s dry.”

“I thought you had a little suitcase. I thought you were going to bring it.”

“You don’t want me to stay.”

“Yes,” she had lied. “I do.”

Ernst had washed and polished her floor as he had promised and that afternoon Sally had arranged with Karp for him to occupy the vacant room down the hall.

When they made love for the first time three days later Ernst had employed so much technique that, even if he had with one gesture succeeded in expunging from her memory the two or three hasty boys
who had preceded him, he had also aroused the fear in her. She had been startled to discover that she had been able to shout imprecations and whisper endearments to a man who was not only a stranger but a stranger who probably didn’t care. But after he had begun to yield to her in little things, after they had given up the farce of separate rooms, she had recognized that his claims on her were larger than sexual. Those first few weeks, however, had been too taut with terror and pleasure and pain. Each day she had resolved to tell Ernst to go and each night they had made love more violently than the last. At times her fear of Ernst had made her physically ill. Yet there had always been the inner assurance that this could never last. This was an adventure: no more.

A week after he had moved in Ernst had come to an arrangement with Karp about doing work around the house. Two weeks after he had moved in he was doing odd jobs for other people on the street and, once again, he had been able to send money to his parents. When he had begun to share Sally’s room he had contributed two pounds weekly to their living expenses.

Yet he remained an enigma. Games fascinated him, he collected stamps haphazardly, and he was an addict of Westerns and the most sentimental Hollywood musicals.
Scaramouche
was his favourite novel. His insights, however, were alarming.

Once, when she had been ill with the flu, Sally had discovered something else about him. This child of violence could sing to make you weep. Somehow, somewhere, between theft and brawl and flight, Ernst had picked up the songs of Mozart and Schubert. But as the snake, perhaps, is ashamed of its beautiful colours, so Ernst was loath to admit to his gift. He made her promise not to tell anybody. But when she bought him a guitar he was hard put to conceal his delight. He sung for her almost every evening.

“You ought to take lessons,” she said.

“I can’t,” he said. “It’s impossible.”

In order to survive Ernst had seemingly drawn the line nowhere. But his one beautiful possession he would not exploit. Sally understood. She stopped pushing him.

And there followed for the two of them a loud time of pleasure, discovery, foolery, and dream-castles. A time when Sally had always run the last block home from school and begun to discard her coat, unzip her skirt and quake inside, even before she had thrust the door open to kick off her shoes one-two-three and leap into his arms. A time when she had pitied the sodden unlit faces of the others in the tube. When to touch was more than she could rightly have asked of life. A time of endless, talkative nights filled with loving and shared cigarettes and fantasies and wines. A time when she embarrassed the other girls at school with sudden and unaccountable gifts of laughter that sprang from heated memories. Yet she knew it was temporary. The joy that was his and hers would have to be swiftly harvested. He was a night person, a doomed one.