A Man Lies Dreaming (29 page)

Wolf’s Diary, 16th November 1939 –
contd
.

In my dream I was in a cold, bright place and it was snowing. The earth was hard, frosted over. Men, skeletal men, shuffled all around me. They wore striped pyjamas, and wooden clogs on their feet. I had never seen such men before. They were grotesque, caricatures of men. There were watchtowers and fences holding us in. Blocks of housing squatted on the frozen ground. I saw a bird soar overhead. It was shot by a sniper in one of the towers and dropped to earth, its wings clipped, feathers flying. It plummeted to hit the ground with a splat of blood and tiny breaking bones. I saw one of the men hurry to it, scoop it up and attempt to hide it under his tattered coat. The gun barked again and the man dropped to the snow and lay there. No one came to him. The bird had fallen from out of the shelter of his coat and lay there beside him, a single drop of red blood decorating its tiny crushed head.

Though I knew it was cold I did not feel it. I walked through the throng of inmates like a spirit. They did not see me and I could not interact with them. The light was very strong. The skies were blue and clear. The sun shone in the sky but it was small and a long way away. It was a cold brightness, it provided only stark illumination. It eradicated shadows. I don’t know how long I spent in that place. I lost track of time. The sun never seemed to set. The snow hung suspended in the air. The men were frozen in their places, in the act of lifting a weary leg or bending down to dig, bony fingers wrapped round the handle of a shovel.

I thought it must be a model village, populated by waxwork figures. The snow wasn’t real at all; it was paper, thousands and thousands of tiny balls of paper all suspended by strings. The sky was painted over canvas, the sun was a splash of yellow paint. I walked through the exhibits marvelling at it all, the amount of detail that must have been required to create all that was staggering. I saw black smoke in the distance. I realised I had been breathing it all along. It rose from a set of chimneys in the distance and suffused the air. It got into my eyes and my nose and my ears. It coated the inside of my lungs. The black smoke was everywhere, rank and yet strangely sweet, but it never left, it clung to me, to my clothes, my skin, my hair. I ran my tongue around my mouth and my gums were raw and painful. I felt a loose tooth. I prodded it with my tongue and it came away entirely and I spat it out. I was suddenly frightened and I didn’t know why. I knew it was only a bad dream but even so, I couldn’t wake up. When I looked at the back of my hands I did not recognise them. They were like an old man’s hands and the skin hung loose, in folds. My clothes felt heavy on me, and I was terribly weary, they pressed me down, they didn’t fit me any more. Then I realised I wasn’t even wearing them. I was wearing dirty striped pyjamas and wooden clogs that opened the sores on my feet. A band struck a rousing martial tune. I heard a shrill whistle. A man in uniform came to me, shouting. He asked me where I thought I was going. I tried to explain to him it was all just a terrible mistake, that I didn’t belong here, but he just laughed. I was so hungry. He began to lead me towards the source of the black smoke. There had been a mistake, I kept saying. There had been a mistake. I didn’t want to go. I kept saying no, no, I don’t want to go there. We walked and walked, into the black smoke. There had been a mistake, I kept saying. There had been a mistake. It became very dark. I need to open the blinds, I told him, desperately. But he wasn’t even there.

Wolf’s Diary, 17th November 1939

I woke up and proceeded to retch violently, the rancid contents of my stomach burning my lips and tongue, leaving a disgusting puddle on the floor. Light was seeping in through the windows. The blinds were drawn. The room was clean and impersonal. It smelled of disinfectant and my puke. A voice above me said, ‘Settle down, now.’

Hands pressed me back down onto the bed. ‘You’ve had a nasty accident.’ I blinked as a face came into view, hovering over me like a vision. Her blonde hair framed her pale face. ‘I didn’t have an accident,’ I said, petulantly. ‘I was beaten up.’

‘I know.’ She plumped my pillows. ‘I’m so sorry, Mr Wolfson.’

‘Wolfson?’

‘We found your identity card in your pocket,’ she said.

‘Wolfson!’ I said. ‘Of course. I am …’ what in all hell was it? ‘Moshe Wolfson,’ I said.

‘Do you know who hit you?’ she said.

‘No.’

‘They were probably Blackshirts,’ she said. ‘We’ve been treating so many of your people recently, Mr Wolfson. It’s best that you rest now.’ I saw her reaching for a syringe.

‘Wait!’ I said.

‘Yes?’

‘Where am I?’

‘Guy’s Hospital.’

‘Guy’s?’ That meant I was on the south side of the river, by London Bridge. ‘How did I get here?’

She shrugged. ‘You need to rest now, Mr Wolfson.’ She primed the syringe and I saw the tiny bubble of liquid at the needle’s end. ‘Wait! My name isn’t Wolfson, it’s—’

The needle penetrated my skin. A sense of great relief and of peace washed over me, and I sank into the mattress and in seconds I was asleep again.

Wolf’s Diary, 18th November 1939

‘We’re being overrun with the damn Jews,’ a male voice said. I could smell pipe-tobacco in the room. ‘I keep telling them, we need more staff, we can’t cope, they should rein in the bloody Mosley boys until after the elections, at least.’

I opened my eyes. He was about my age, with ample facial hair, round glasses. He left his pipe smoking by the window and approached me. ‘Let’s have a look at you,’ he said. His hand went to the back of my head and I nearly screamed. ‘Yes, yes,’ he said. ‘That’s a nasty wound you’ve got there, Mr …’

‘Wolfson,’ the nurse said. It was a different nurse.

‘A nasty wound. It’s a good thing you came to us,’ the doctor said. At last he released my head. ‘We need to keep you for a few days. Is there anyone you wish to call?’

‘No,’ I said. Then, ‘Yes.’

‘A wife, a friend?’

‘Call Oswald Mosley,’ I said, and he laughed.

‘Call Oswald! Tell him it’s Wolf.’

The doctor sighed. ‘Why do they do this,’ he said. Again it wasn’t clear who the ‘they’ referred to. ‘Keep him sedated for the time being. He needs time to recover.’

‘Wait, listen to me! You don’t understand!’

But the doctor had moved on to the next bed. I looked up at the nurse. My head hurt terribly. ‘Please, call him. Tell him it’s Wolf.’

‘I thought your name was Wolfson,’ she said. She primed the syringe. ‘Don’t do that,’ I said, ‘don’t—’

Again, the cold touch of the needle. Again, that near-immediate relief. I smiled up at her goofily. ‘Call him, tell him I’m—’

‘Sleep well,’ she said.

Wolf’s Diary, 19th November 1939

‘Mr Wolf?’

It was dark. In the beds beside mine men were snoring and crying and farting in their sleep. My visitor perched on a chair beside me, an unremarkable young man in an unremarkable grey suit. His face was pleasant, plump, and shiny with a thin film of sweat. ‘Who the hell are you?’ I said.

‘I’m Alderman, sir? Thomas Alderman? We met at Sir Oswald’s … party? And we spoke on the phone, more recently.’

‘Alderman? Who the hell are you, Alderman? Where is Oswald?’

‘
Sir
Oswald is on the campaign trail, sir. As the Americans say. He is unavailable but he of course sends his best regards. There seems to have been a mishap, if you don’t mind me saying, sir, but you appear to be registered here as a Jew named Wolfson.’

‘Don’t you worry about that. What was that about the Americans? Did they get to him? Is he cutting a deal? I demand to know!’

‘Sir Oswald is of course speaking to many different factions—’

‘I knew it! The dirty worm has cut a deal! The man has no moral fibre, he has the spine of a snail!’

‘Snails … don’t have spines, sir.’

‘That’s what I said!’

The young man looked pained. ‘I hate to see you like this, Mr Wolf.’

‘Like this? Like how!’

‘All frail, like.’

‘Frail! How dare you! What did you say your name was?’

‘Alderman, sir. Thomas Alderman? We met at Sir Oswald’s party—’

‘I know who you are! Do you think I have no eyes? Do you think I’m crazy? You tell that slimy Englishman this is Wolf, Wolf he’s talking to! Where is Oswald?’

‘He’s … electioneering, sir.’

‘Why is he not here? Who the hell are you?’

‘I think I should call a nurse, sir. You seem agitated.’

‘Agitated?
Agitated
? I could have ruled the world, you know!’

‘I know, sir. Let me just say, Mr Wolf, I have the utmost admiration for you. I …’

I stared at him, dumbfounded. The young man reached into the breast pocket of his suit and brought out a tattered little book and presented it to me. ‘I know this is hardly the right time, but … would you sign this for me?’

It was my book.

My Struggle
.

I took it from him; held it in my hands. It was the British first – and, if I were being honest, only – edition, published by Hurst & Blackett, useless asses that they were.
It was in a plain yellow dustjacket, like the books published by that Jew, Victor Gollancz
.

‘I’m … touched,’ I said. I blinked; my vision had become blurry. A single drop fell on the open title page. ‘Do you have a pen?’

‘Here,’ he said. I accepted it from him.

‘What was your name again?’

‘Alderman, sir. Thomas Alderman.’

‘A good name. You’re a good man, Alderman. A good man. We need more like you in this world.’

‘Thank you, sir. That means a lot.’

To Thomas Alderman
, I wrote. My hand was shaky.
Best wishes
– and I added my signature with a weak flourish.

‘Here,’ I said, thrusting the book back into his hands. ‘Thank you, young man.’

‘Thank you, sir. Thank you so much.’

‘This is a time of war, Alderman,’ I said, sinking back into the sheets. I felt so weary. ‘And we’re all soldiers, whether we know it yet or not.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Come and see me some time.’

‘I’d like that, sir.’

‘You tell that Oswald Mosley …’ I said. But I was too tired. My eyes closed. I felt almost weepy. Like a woman – like a weak woman! ‘You tell him …’

From a long way away I heard him get up, the scrape of the chair legs on the floor. ‘Sleep now, sir.

‘You tell him …’

Wolf’s Diary, 20th November 1939

On her sickbed in Urfahr my mother lay dying
.

I was eighteen. My sister, Paula, was eleven years old.
I had been residing in Vienna at that time, attempting to enrol in the Academy of Fine Arts
. I had hurried back home when I received the news from her physician. I returned in October. Dr Bloch, her doctor, was a Jew. I remember him sitting us down, Paula and I. ‘Your mother’s condition is hopeless,’ he said. Paula cried. I myself cried. I am not ashamed to admit it. I only cried like this again when I thought I had lost my sight, in the war. I remember most strongly the smell in her room. Death has a special smell, that slow wasting of a human body. It is a sickly, sweet smell, a special odour that comes off the sick body, a rotting from within. That and, mixed with bodily waste, the smell of constant cleaning, of old carpets, of my mother’s perfume which she insisted on wearing to her last day. I slept beside her, in a cot in the corner of the room. The windows were kept closed, as my mother was always cold. The air in the room was stifling. I had to hold her naked body in my arms, washing her, washing her and trying not to cry. The cancer was in her breasts and it had spread: there was no cure. Her hospital stay at the start of the year had cost one hundred Kronen. Leaving her – going to Vienna – was the hardest thing I had ever done. Returning, I could do nothing but watch her die slowly. For two more months she lingered, becoming light as air; time seemed suspended, each particle and mote of dust froze in the everlasting air; in my mother’s eyes I saw past and future meet.