Exiles in the Garden (8 page)

Do you know Zurich?

Not well, Nikolas said. I have not had much occasion to be there.

Poor Zurich. Nothing happens in Zurich.

Einstein happened in Zurich.

Yes, I'd forgotten.

And Max Frisch.

Who is Max Frisch?

Switzerland's greatest novelist. Also, he writes plays.

I don't know his work.

You have been away a long time.

Not too long. I suppose it's five years. She looked at her watch again, wondering if Max Frisch had been one of those who came to her mother's salon. The name was familiar. She remembered an elderly bald man with heavy round spectacles and an intimidating glare and wondered if that was Max Frisch.

The museum is good, he said.

Yes, she said.

Remember Café Voltaire? Where the Dadaists gathered, Jean Arp and the others. I always thought it funny that Zurich had a Dada scene. But maybe that was the place for it. The birthplace of Dada.

My mother liked to go there, Lucia said.

And I remember a restaurant outside of town. We had to drive. We had a wonderful meal—

She said, Chez George.

Yes, that's the one.

My mother and I often went there for Sunday lunch. Zollikon was the name of the town. The lake is nearby, in the summer filled with boats. Chez George served quail eggs.

You'll be glad to know it's still there. At least it was six months ago. I and a colleague were making a presentation at the university and the rector took us to lunch, three courses with wine. I have never eaten such food before. The dining room was quite formal and I'd neglected to bring a tie. It never occurred to me. The maitre d' lent me one so that I would be properly dressed and not stand out. Not feel like a—the Americans have a word for it.

Yokel, she said.

Yes, yokel.

Lucia said, Once a month we would go to Chez George by the lake, my mother and I. The Sunday treat, she called it. When I was young she always let me have a taste of her pilsner. The chocolate deserts were sublime.

I think you miss it, Nikolas said.

I do, she said. I hadn't realized I did. My mother is gone now.

I'm sorry, he said.

She had terrible cancer, Lucia said. She was very ill. Her death was a blessing to her. Perhaps not to me. I miss her.

My mother is gone also. But she died in the war. The Russians.

How terrible, Lucia said. You must have been very young.

I was three years old, he said.

Only three, she said, my goodness.

I hardly remember her.

Yes, she said. I can imagine.

You can imagine?

Yes. My father, when I was three.

Nazis or Russians?

He went away, and he was lost in the war. I don't know where. I have no idea how he died or where he is buried.

My father never recovered. I think he lost his faith.

My mother, Lucia began, but did not finish her thought. She did not know this boy well enough to speak of her mother's socialism, her salon, and the photograph of her father and the Borsalino hat.

So we have a European history, you and I.

I suppose we do, Lucia said.

Do you like it in America?

I suppose I do, Lucia said. My husband is American. I have a daughter, Mathilde. She is already speaking a little English and sometimes I talk German to her, nursery rhymes at bedtime. She looks Swiss, I think. My husband says she has a banker's face. Big cheeks and already jowls.

Lucia leaned against the iron railing that led to the sidewalk from the d'Ans' stoop. She realized suddenly that both she and Nikolas had been whispering. The street was so quiet, not even a passing car. She had no idea how long she had been there talking to the Hungarian boy, who was not loud as Hungarians often were but quiet and serious, most polite, a shy manner. Lucia tapped her cane on the railing and said it was time for her to go home.

Will we see each other again? he asked.

If you come to the d'Ans', of course.

I have enjoyed talking to you very much, Lucia.

Yes, it has been pleasant. But I forgot to ask. Did you like Zurich?

I did, he said. I like Swiss. I do not care for Austrians.

Nor I, Lucia said. They are very sure of themselves.

They're only Germans of another jurisdiction.

The Germans want everything, even Switzerland.

Well, Nikolas said, that's over now. The Germans are back in their cage.

Lucia smiled. I feel foolish forgetting Einstein.

Everyone forgets Einstein, Nikolas said, and blew her a kiss as he walked away.

As time went on, Alec and Lucia accepted only about one in three invitations to the garden next door. The ambiance had changed, many of the evenings marked by malaise owing to the stalemate in central Europe and the American preoccupation with Indochina. And there had been other unwelcome displacements. Madame Brun had died of a heart attack, the writer Koch of injuries suffered in a road accident. Ambassador Kryg had retired to Sardinia and General Symjon to Madagascar. There were new ambassadors and military men and a fresh parade of hopeful second-tier intellectuals. Nikolas was sometimes present, sometimes not. Everyone seemed to drink more, but the drinking did not bring hilarity. Even the arguments were muted, as if in recognition of their essential irrelevance. Frequently Lucia went without Alec, staying on for a nightcap with Paul and Marie after everyone else had left. It was there, one evening in the summer of 1967, that they told her they were leaving Washington and returning home. It was time. They felt they had outstayed their welcome. The assassination of the president had ruined everything and now there was a war growing more desperate each day. The war would surely end badly. How could America have gotten itself into such a mess? The French had warned them. The British and the Germans had warned them. But Lyndon Johnson and his cohort had refused to listen to anyone outside the charmed circle of advisers. They thought the war in Vietnam was a replica of the European war and it wasn't. There would never again be another war like the European war. Probably there was nostalgia for that war because so many of the senior American generals had fought in it. Hard to believe war nostalgia if you were a European, but that is what it is.

We have learned that Washington is a one-subject town, Paul said.

This war is not our subject, Marie added.

Next month it will still be the war, Paul said, but another facet of it. This war is like a diamond, many-faceted. It has the fascination of a diamond, too. The war will go on for years. That's what you have to look forward to, you and Alec. Even little Mathilde.

Alec's paper wanted him to go, Lucia said. He refused.

Good judgment, Paul said. I suppose they were disappointed in him.

He didn't say, Lucia said. I imagine they were.

She looked up then, above the stake fence to the second floor of her house. Mathilde's night light glowed dimly. In the sudden silence she thought she heard the crowd noise of a baseball game, Alec's evening television habit. She wondered if they were disappointed in him at the newspaper office. Alec said little about his daily routine except occasionally to point out one of his photographs in the newspaper, often complaining about how it had been cropped. He thought the photo editors had no sense of balance. The butchers, he called them, slicing up his photographs as they would slice up a side of beef. She did not believe he cared greatly for his work, yet he devoted long hours to it. Alec said he had respect for the craft.

So we are returning to our house in Kleinwalsertal, Marie said. No war in Kleinwalsertal. There will not be another European war in our lifetime unless the Americans and the Russians have one, in which case the field of battle will be central Europe, bad luck for us.

It's hard to stay apart in Washington, Paul said. You become complicit whether you want to be or not.

It was fun in the beginning, Marie said.

Washington was full of charm, Paul said. Gaiety, too, in the White House and the embassies. That was because everyone was so young.

We hope you will visit us, Marie said.

Yes, Lucia said. I will.

You have enjoyed our parties, Marie said.

Very much, Lucia said. I will miss you both.

You brought spark to our garden, Paul said. But now it's finished.

So many friends have passed on this year, Marie said. Died, moved away. It isn't the same as it was. Did you hear Ronald diAntonio was ill? I couldn't believe it. I always thought of Ronald as Peter Pan, never grew old, never grew up. But still, we were a part of things for a while. We couldn't have done it without our Charles. We asked him to come to Kleinwalsertal with us but he said he preferred Washington. He's going to work for the Argentines. We doubt he will fit in with the Argentines. Charles is very much fastidious.

You and Paul were the perfect hosts, Lucia said.

Paul refilled their glasses and turned to look directly at Lucia. He said, I know the things they used to say about us. Me. That I was a fugitive from somewhere, living on Marie's money, Nazi loot, a tin mine in Bolivia. Fantastic stories. They amused us so we did nothing to correct them—not that we could have. These stories have their own oxygen and are eternal, like Nosferatu. Washington prefers the speculation to the fact, is that not so? The facts are too prosaic for them. We came here because we thought Washington would be exciting. With Mr. Kennedy we thought, At last! Something of the modern world. A fresh start, as art had a fresh start in Vienna in 1910 and Berlin in 1921, a new generation in charge. We saw a kind of renaissance, not only in America but in the West, and we wanted to be part of it or at least in the vicinity because Washington would lead the way. That's why we came.

We were foolish, Marie said.

Not foolish, Paul said. Perhaps naive.

You have not one ounce of naivete, Paul.

He laughed and gave a signature raised eyebrow. He waved in the direction of the long hall and said, We thought we were getting Kandinsky but instead we got Caspar David Friedrich. Perhaps naive is the wrong word. At any event, we were disappointed.

Lucia had been listening carefully, moving her eyes from Paul to Marie like a spectator at a tennis match. She said, Kennedy was only a politician, not an artist or a writer. He didn't want to build a new house, only to live prudently in the house he was given. Also, you didn't fit in. That's all. I don't either.

Paul smiled and gave a halfhearted shrug.

Marie said, Do you think you spent too much time with us?

Oh, no, Lucia said. This—she swept her hand in a wide arc—was my lifeline. From the beginning, I think. Something moved in Lucia's memory, elusive as a shadow. She couldn't grasp it and then she did and began to laugh. She said, Tell me one thing. Who was Leisl?

Paul said, Why are you asking about Leisl?

Yes, you never knew Leisl, Marie said.

I'm almost embarrassed to say, Lucia said. I was eavesdropping one night, before we even knew each other. Sitting in my garden and listening to the conversations and envious because I wanted to be there, too. And I heard two women talking about Washington. Washington's vulgarity. That was the word they used but what they meant was anti-Semitism. Leisl was the one who liked Washington and did not think it vulgar. Her friend disagreed.

That was her sister, Hana, Marie said.

You shouldn't eavesdrop, Lucia.

I know. But I did. It was hard not to. We are right next door after all.

Hana went back to Israel, a kibbutz near the Sea of Galilee. She said Israel was where she felt safe. Leisl remained in Washington. She was gifted in languages and I believe she worked for the Israeli embassy. Maybe one of the other embassies, I don't remember. We lost track of her. Paul took a cigarette from his pocket and lit it, the smoke curling into the night air. A year ago we heard some boys tried to hold her up. It was early evening, not far from here. One of the boys had a knife. Leisl handed them her purse, urging them to take it and not to hurt her. But the effort was too great for her. She dropped dead of a heart attack. The boys ran away and the purse was later found in a trash bin. All this was reported by a neighbor who saw it all from her living room window. The neighbor saw Leisl hand over the purse and drop to the ground. The boys never touched her. The neighbor believed she was frightened to death.

Leisl was a gentle soul, Marie said. She always wanted to believe the best.

I'm so sorry, Lucia said.

The sisters were very close, Marie said, but as different as chalk from cheese. If Hana saw an abyss she'd spit into it. Leisl would say a prayer as she balanced on the edge of it.

Paul said, Washington may not be vulgar but it is unspeakably violent. And not only on the streets.

They were silent then, Paul pensively smoking and Marie and Lucia looking into the darkness. At last Paul reached for the champagne and poured the last of it into their glasses. He had fetched a bottle of Dom Perignon for their final evening together.

We had hoped to see Alec tonight, Paul said.

Working late, Lucia said.

He likes his newspaper, doesn't he?

He loves the office, Lucia said.

A Washington dilemma, Paul said, and they all smiled. Leisl was still with them.

I think he likes making photographs and the office is where they go to.

At least he isn't chasing women, Paul said.

No, he isn't chasing women.

I think Alec is a little bored with us, Paul said. I don't blame him. Our milieu is most particular, not for everyone. A milieu of misfits.

I hope everything is all right between you and Alec, Marie said.

Oh, yes, Lucia said offhandedly, as if she were replying to a question about the weather.

Good, Marie said. That's good.

Let's hope we meet again very soon, Paul said.

They walked her to the door, pausing to look again at the preposterous stag's head; it would fit in nicely at the ancestral
schloss
or whatever it was in Kleinwalsertal. They kissed goodbye at the door.

Take care of yourself, Lucia, Paul said.