Night Music, 1933

Trudy Lewis

The classroom glowed with the golden light of late September—too bright, as far as Lotte was concerned. She preferred the gloomy days, when she could sit in the corner and sketch her classmates or read her book undetected. The whole school vibrated with an overabundance of yellow—the pine desks, the jonquil blinds, the fall colors of the lindens outside the window, and the thick blonde braids of Gerta, the Christian girl who had displaced Lotte in Hilde’s affections. There was such a thing as too much clarity, and light could be as confounding as shadow.

Lotte had learned as much when she attempted to draw her stepmother in the parlor and saw the new lines in her face, so distracting that they distorted the emerging profile. Paula had changed since being shouted off the stage at the height of her aria, losing her position at the Municipal Opera House, and being denounced as a Judenschwein in the press. She did not give up, however, and continued to sing in the synagogues and practice her arias at home. She did not sulk, but increased her efforts on behalf of the B’nai B’rith society and the Jewish musicians and artists who appeared in her parlor, day after day, seeking food, clothing, recommendations, and encouragement. Meanwhile, Papa, who’d lost his professorship at Berlin University’s Medical School, found employment at the Jewish hospital. So it was only Lotte who continued to enter the Christian world on a daily basis, forced to observe each new slip in her status, each betrayal and humiliation.

Gerta passed a note to Hilde, and Lotte’s old friend blushed, two crimson streaks emphasizing her high cheekbones and her lustrous black hair. What could Gerta be writing to produce such an effect? The biology teacher drew a chart of racial origins on the board, indicating the inferiority of the Semitic and Roma lines. She did not appear convinced, however, and avoided her pupils’ eyes while mumbling the party line. The girl behind Lotte raised her hand to ask whether it was true that you could identify Jews by smell, and, if so, what was the scientific explanation?

Now it was the teacher who blushed, slapping her forehead in exasperation. “I’m afraid that goes beyond my area of expertise,” she said. “You’ll have to look elsewhere to satisfy your intellectual curiosity.”

Lotte was relieved to go to the gymnasium and change out of her uniform and into her shorts and blouse. She looked forward to a game of ping-pong, the soothing back-and-forth that did not depend on conversation or personality. But when she approached the table, she couldn’t find a partner. She looked with longing at Hilde and remembered the times when they had walked home from school together, just the two of them, the constant tumult of Hilde’s enthusiasms meaning that Lotte rarely had to speak. It was a relief to lose herself in that torrent, always knowing she had a place in the warm boat of Hilde’s affections. But then Gerta began to join them, adding her own babble to the stream, and Lotte’s silence was transformed from the wordless support of a trusted companion to the mute presence of a pitiful person who had nothing to contribute. Then she was always trailing behind the two of them, watching the dark head pressed to the fair one in a display of irresistible affinity. She complained to Paula, who offered to help her work up topics of conversation. But later, she heard her stepmother tell Papa that their Lotchken was only feeling sour because her school crush had found a prettier friend.

Lotte was amazed then, when Hilde approached her and nodded at the ping-pong table, assuming a position at the other end.

“Awful, isn’t it, the way these girls harass our poor teachers? I heard one of them goading Fräulein Gruber to let her put up posters for the Hitler Youth.”

Lotte looked down at the table, preparing her serve, soothed by the matte green surface of the table, an unbroken field of concentration. If she couldn’t reach Hilde with her speech, perhaps she could convey her feelings through the movement of the ball.

Her serve was true and Hilde had to stretch to return it, revealing the dark hair in her armpit, which seemed to have grown denser and springier since the last time Lotte glimpsed it.

“Gerta is not like that, you know. Her parents have lots of Jewish employees in their shop. They say it’s a disgrace, what’s happening in Germany. We have a long tradition of religious freedom. That’s why so many of our ancestors settled here in the first place.”

Lotte did not reply, but only returned the ball, pleased by the way Hilde was forced to contort herself to return it. She gave a little hop, joggling her breast, and Lotte noticed again how her friend had stopped growing upward and begun growing more womanly instead. Hilde had always been shorter than Lotte, but now she barely reached her nose. And although Lotte had been having her monthlies for years now, she remained skinny and unarticulated, a blank form, neither girlish nor boyish, neither pretty nor handsome, not even ugly in a striking and memorable way.

“Want to come to the movies on Friday? Mädchen in Uniform is playing again and Greta never got to go.”

“Maybe,” Lotte said. “I’ll ask my stepmother.” But she didn’t think she could bear to see Hilde giggling with Gerta in the dark theater, while Lotte sat apart, trying to keep her eyes focused on the screen.

A girl with a high forehead and a snub nose interrupted their play, saying that she and her friend wanted the table.

“When we finish this game,” Hilde replied, turning on her bossy hip.

But the girl, Eva Becker, persisted. “You know, it just doesn’t seem right, letting mere Israelites hog the tables, when good Aryans are in need of a place.”

Things had certainly changed since the spring, when the students agreed to salute Hitler with their left hands instead of doing so, properly and in good faith, with the right. Now the factions were beginning to appear. The pupils had been forced to bring in their certificates of baptism, proving that they had four Christian grandparents. Some discovered, in this way, that they were actually Jewish, though they’d been practicing Christianity all their lives. Then Jewish students were forbidden to go on field trips to the country cabin or the swimming pool. And although most of the teachers were sympathetic, they were forced by law to observe the regulations of the new regime.

“That’s the kind of thinking that makes you look like a troglodyte,” Hilde said. “You’ve been going to school with Jewish classmates since kindergarten. Don’t you know any better than that by now?”

Lotte smashed the ball so that it shot past Hilde and into the girl’s chest. Was it intentional, or just a reflex of rage? She couldn’t tell. But it brought her one step closer to winning the game.

“So the little mouse has some spirit after all. Come after me, little mouse, and you will feel the kitty cat’s claws.”

Eva threw the ball back at Lotte, who caught it deftly in her right hand. She had to finish the game quickly; there was little pleasure in playing under these circumstances. So her time with Hilde was to be cut short again. There was no avoiding it. She beat Hilde handily, 4 to 1, but felt no satisfaction in the victory. She lifted her damp blouse away from her skin and smelled her sweat with its mix of iron and sulphur—the smell of a Jew or just a generic human adolescent in the midst of play? Hilde’s hair was so damp that it frizzed up in a smoky halo around her pretty face, and her substantial chest heaved with exertion.

Lotte had hardly stepped away from the table when Eva elbowed in, carrying a bucket full of soapy water. She and her friend began scrubbing down the table with exaggerated gestures, creating dark scallops of a deeper green.

“You can’t be too careful these days,” Eva said, loudly enough for the whole gym to hear. “You never know what you will catch from these polluted Jews.”

Lotte felt a dip in her stomach, her internal organs collapsing in on one another. But Hilde remained stalwart. “Looks like you’ve already come down with a bad case of cruelty. Maybe you should go home and stay there until you’ve recovered your humanity.”

There was little chance of that, Lotte thought, as she watched the performance, the two girls mopping the table so vigorously that their blonde curls shook and their backsides waggled with satisfaction.

Hilde seemed more solicitous after school that day, waiting for Lotte at on the sidewalk under the stone bust of Athena, its helmet dappled with sunlight and its breastplate white as shale. In the goddess’s shadow, Hilde appeared even darker, with her heavy eyebrows and her olive skin. For the first time, Lotte felt the other girl’s vulnerability; although Hilde was undoubtedly beautiful, it was a beauty with a particularly alien flavor, evoking the gypsy, the Spaniard, and the Jew. Lotte, as fully Jewish as Hilde, had somehow inherited the physical features of an Aryan. Up until now, her plain appearance had been a disadvantage, but she understood that her invisibility might soon serve as a shield.

When Gerta joined them, Hilde made space for Lotte on the sidewalk between herself and her new friend. She did not tell Gerta the story of the ping-pong table and, when Lotte mentioned it, she set a warm hand on her friend’s arm and said it was better not to dwell on the injuries of the day, as there were certain to be more of them tomorrow.

At home, Paula was in the parlor with Kurt Singer, her former conductor, the two of them bent over the tea table examining a document. He’d been spending more and more time at the apartment, since he too had lost his job at the Municipal Opera, and now sat drinking tea with Paula while scheming to find employment for his former colleagues. Lotte tried to reach her room without detection. Perhaps she could sneak by under the cover of the phonograph, which was playing Mozart’s Eine Kleine Nachtmusik at high volume. But Paula heard her over the music and called out that she should come and speak with Herr Singer.

So Lotte entered the room, lingering in the alcove where their influence could not reach her. Paula wore a dressing gown over a skirt and sweater and Singer had on a rusty dark waistcoat that emphasized his white hair. They were both flushed with the heat of the rosy room or the brilliance of their plans, and there was a bright smell of apples and spice in the air.

“Here she is, the lucky one, who can still show her face in the world,” Paula said.

Lotte felt her arm trembling and braced it behind her back. She swayed with the advance of the serenade’s first movement, the irresistible progression of the chords.

“Come here and let me look at you, Liebling. Have you been scratching your neck again?”

Lotte felt under her collar for the rash that has plagued her for the last week. Had she been scratching? She hardly knew. But there was a fresh slash in her flesh, and a bit of blood came away on her finger.

“It’s reprehensible, what these children do to… themselves. My daughter has taken to drinking… vinegar to lose weight. And her little… girlfriend has refused to eat for three days.” Again, Lotte felt a stab of annoyance at his affected speech, the irrational pauses that seemed deigned to build up an artificial sense of suspense.

“What do you think, Kurt? Will Lotte make a respectable Fräulein? Once the blemishes simmer down and the figure asserts itself?”

Herr Singer touched his chin and regarded her, turning this way and that, as if examining a painting. “Let me hear her recite… something…. Surely they still teach elocution in school.”

“Maybe you’d like to hear me recite one of the Chancellor’s speeches,” Lotte said. “Since that’s what we have to listen to day after day.”

“Please… spare my delicate… ears,” Herr Singer said. “I’ve been exchanging words with his… puppets all day.”

Lotte gave in and spoke a short poem by Goethe. “It’s my favorite. But now teacher tells me that it is the exclusive property of the German students, and that, as a Jewish pupil, I should look elsewhere for my inspiration.”

Paula bit her lip and turned her eyes to Singer.

“She lacks…”

Lotte held her breath to hear what it was that Herr Singer thought she was in need of. She could provide a lengthy list: friends, talent, hope, purpose, and stamina, to name a few.

“…Projection, though there is definitely feeling in the…phrasing.”

Lotte stared into the cornflower blue eyes that were said to hypnotize women and other vulnerable parties. “It’s only for my own enjoyment, you know.”

“As are all our efforts, under the current regime.”

“You are lucky, Lotchken, that you are too young to have a profession. To build up, stick by stone, a life’s work only to have it collapse at the will of a petty parvenu.”

“At this rate, perhaps I never will.”

“Nonsense,” Herr Singer said. “Only today, we have been putting our… heads together to create a Jewish arts society.”

He pointed to a half-finished document lying on the table. Lotte recognized the tiny precise handwriting that made the letters of the alphabet resemble musical notation. “Proposal for a Jewish-German Kulturbund,” the heading read.

“Herr Singer has made an appointment at the Ministry of Enlightenment and Propaganda.”

He had courage, Lotte had to grant him that. “You’re really going there?”

“If I have to speak with Herr Goebbels himself.”

Paula cut a slice of Sachertorte and handed it to Lotte on a silver-rimmed plate, one of the few remaining reminders of her mother’s tea table. “Herr Singer believes that we can appeal to the inherent prejudices of the Nazis.”

“If they believe that Jews should be… segregated, we respond by segregating… ourselves, creating an artistic society of our own. That way, we can perform whatever we like, in whatever fashion we choose, creating, in effect, a Jewish… Renaissance in times of trouble.”

Lotte bit into the cake and tasted the aching sweetness of the icing. She wished she could believe in Singer’s plan. But after what she witnessed, day after day at the Fürstin Bismarck School, she did not believe that the work of the Jews could ever be tolerated under the rule of the National Socialists.

“Perhaps I could come and work for you,” she said. “I’m getting impatient with the girls at school.”

Paula set her cup down with exaggerated care and touched the silver nightingale pinned to the breast of her sweater. “That’s ridiculous. If Hilde has dumped you, you can always find another friend. It’s just the nature of girls to gossip, backbite, seduce their enemies and torture their friends. It was the same when I was at school. It makes the opera look like a somber little chamber drama. But you can’t let that interfere with your education.”

Lotte pushed her plate away and set her hands on her knees, gaining strength from the connection. “You have quit. Papa has quit. Herr Singer is planning a play party where he and his friends can frolic in artistic freedom without ever having to encounter an Aryan bully or a Nazi snout.”

Paula gave her a level stare. “There is a grave difference, young woman, between quitting and being forced to leave.”

But Lotte did not lower her eyes or deny her claim. “It seems that the difference is growing smaller and more insignificant every day.”

The music was reaching its zenith and Lotte felt its frenzy rise up in her breast. She had not spoken so many consecutive words in weeks. Papa came into the parlor and lifted the needle, removing the cover of music under which they spoke, so that the room vibrated with its absence.

“How is my family?’ he said. “How are my girls? Herr Singer, I trust that you are enjoying good spirits and excellent health.”

“That I am, Sir. I believe that I am about to turn a corner, with the help of your brilliant… spouse. We’ve arranged for her to sing at Yom Kippur again this year.”

“It will be a treat for us all.”“Meanwhile,” Paula said, standing and putting her arm around her husband,

“Your little Lotchken has decided to quit school.”

Papa looked at Lotte, then at Paula again. His face did not change its expression, but his eyes widened and his Adam’s apple wandered aimlessly in his throat. “Not really, Lotte. I thought we agreed you would continue—at least long enough to take your exams.”

Lotte stared at the tea table in confusion, nudging the spoon on her saucer. Had she actually said that she was quitting school? And had she ever agreed to continue long enough to take her exams? She remembered a talk in her father’s study, in which he urged her to take her studies seriously, because, during times of political uncertainty, an education was all that she could rely on in the end. That, at least, no one could take away from her. Yet she couldn’t help thinking of what had been taken away from him—his position as chair of surgery and the professorship of which he’d been so proud. Her grandparents hinted that he had neglected Lotte’s mother, spending long hours working at the hospital then coming home to lock himself up with his books. After all that, did he still believe that he possessed something valuable—a knowledge that could not be altered by political contingencies or destroyed by the raw exercise of power?

As much as she wanted to defy Paula, she couldn’t bear to hurt her father, with his kind, sensitive fingers and his gentle eyes.

“I‘ll try to make it to the exams,” she said. “If you’ll promise to come home early and study with me.”

She stood and pressed her face to his side, smelling the antiseptics of the hospital, and he put a stiff arm around her shoulder. He was not a demonstrative man, and when they stood this way, she realized that it cost him an effort, but that made the connection feel all the more powerful. They were alike, after all, in their fear of interaction and their love of solitude. While others scorned her as diffident pupil and a plain, insignificant girl, she knew that Papa always approved.

“I believe I can arrange it,” he said, squeezing her shoulder before gently pulling away.

Paula was at the phonograph, putting on another record, Kurt Singer standing over her shoulder to read the title. Why had Papa chosen a woman like this to share their life—someone so loud, so public, so bright and beautiful that it hurt Lotte’s eyes to look at her, even though she found the sight so compelling that she couldn’t avert her gaze? Paula had certainly improved Lotte’s life—taking her shopping, treating her to shows and dinners, offering advice and encouragement, and showing her unstinting affection, although her love was always seasoned with a stimulating pinch of cruelty and laced with a lacerating sting of superiority. She even convinced Albert to spend more time with them as a family—at the opera, at a dinner, in the museum—where Lotte could rest her eyes on him for whole minutes at a time. In his presence, Lotte felt her muscles relax and her soul expand. But why did he need Paula to tell him to pay attention to his own daughter?

“Then I will try to stick it out until exams,” she said, and she was rewarded with a short, nervous, but genuine smile, which, in Albert’s case, was only a twitch of the muscles on either side of his mouth.     

That night, Lotte heard her stepmother humming the Mozart while her father gargled in the bathroom. She listened for the moment when they would exchange their impressions of the day. Sure enough, her father asked about Singer. Wasn’t he worried that his plan would expose him to further persecution? And what about Paula? Was her former suitor going to get her imprisoned or killed? He seemed to have set up shop in their parlor. He wasn’t practicing hypnotism on her, was he? Albert had heard all about his experiments, and even if the conductor called them neurology, there was something of the mesmerist in his approach. Why then, Paula said, there is nothing to concern yourself about, since he will certainly have no trouble mesmerizing that gullible minister. But Albert didn’t have to worry about Paula. Hadn’t she proved her immunity by standing strong against Singer’s marriage proposals, which had been frequent and forceful? Now their Lotchken, that was another story. Such a crush she had on Singer! Paula had never seen anything like it. She couldn’t say a word to her friend in private without her stepdaughter creeping around outside the door.

Lotte bit her lip so that she wouldn’t cry out in frustration. A crush on Singer! How could Paula say it? Did she even believe it was true? Lotte had a visceral dislike of the man, with his ridiculous affectations and his pretentious speech. Every time she saw him, she felt an unpleasant taste in her mouth, a memory of rotting cherries, and a tickling sensation at the back of her neck. Did Paula recognize something in her behavior that Lotte couldn’t see for herself? Lotte was horrified at the thought. Perhaps there was little difference between love and hate, and disgust was a reliable route to attraction.

She turned on the light, picked up a hand mirror, and tilted it so that she could examine the rash on her neck. Yes, she must have been scratching without knowing it. The flesh was suppurating, irritated by the wool of her school sweater and the lace on her nightgown. A few scratch marks extended down to her chest and she wondered how she’d been able to make them with her short, bitten-down nails. The voices down the hall eventually gave way to the soothing sounds of the apartment singing itself to sleep, the windows rattling, the radiator sighing, the pipes ringing like a glass goblet’s vibrating rim. This was the night music that Lotte had grown accustomed to, the substitute for her mother’s lullabies. Usually, it put her right out. But tonight, she couldn’t find her place in the melody and when she did, plummeting down into a deep crevasse of oblivion, she regretted it, because she saw Kurt Singer in her dreams, marching into the Ministry of Enlightenment to the tune of Mozart’s music, only to be decapitated by a violin string.

The next morning, she could barely look at Paula as she spread marmalade on her bread roll and bit into the rubbery flesh of her boiled egg. Her stepmother appeared strangely dowdy in her spotted dressing gown, her bright hair dulled and her makeup removed. Perhaps she, too, had trouble sleeping?

She reached in her pocket for a packet of Reisen chocolate caramels, which she set by Lotte’s plate. “Here. For your friends,” she said.

Lotte stared down at the table. How could Paula think that her classmates, grown girls of sixteen and seventeen, could be bribed with candy? And what made her believe that Lotte was in need of friends? She tore into the packet and ate a caramel with a sudden ravenous hunger, then spit it out again, sticking it to the underside of the dining room table like a wad of gum. The taste reminded her of hot chocolate in the morning with her mother, a milky memory that made her weak in the knees.

She met Hilde in the street and saw that her friend had bluish circles under her dark eyes, emphasizing her sharp cheekbones and her prominent nose. Perhaps no one was sleeping in these times of trouble. Hilde was in an agitated state, speaking very quickly and switching her satchel from one arm to the other, adjusting the straps over her breasts. She’d had bad dreams the night before: She was playing ping-pong with Greta when a long row of Brownshirts filed into the gym. She thought that Greta would protect her. But Greta only took a piece of chalk and drew a Star of David on Hilde’s side of the table. Then the Brownshirts put her in handcuffs and led her away.

Lotte scratched her neck, recognizing the gesture that she must have repeated dozens of time to produce all those scratches. What could she say? As usual, she only listened, waiting for Hilde to reassure herself. The fears came out, one by one, jostling the surface of her friend’s speech: her four Jewish grandparents, placing her in the most persecuted category, her father’s continued unemployment since he lost his job at the University, the many friends who had dropped out of school or moved away. And now she was doubting Greta’s loyalty. What kind of person did that make her? What kind of person couldn’t even trust her own friends?

The stream of Hilde’s speech burbled on unrestrained, bringing Lotte’s breakfast back up into her throat. She reached in her pocket and handed Hilde a chocolate caramel, hating herself for following her stepmother’s advice. Still it was a relief to have some kind of comfort, however insignificant, to offer. She unwrapped another candy in sympathy and the two girls chewed in unison, the regular motion bringing on a kind of calm as they approached the school. Hilde even set an arm on Lotte’s shoulder as they reached the final block.

There, a crowd of students gathered at the gate, laughing and whistling. Had the teachers forgotten to open the building? Or had some emergency made them decide the students shouldn’t enter the school? When she got closer, Lotte saw that her classmates were clustered under  the bust of Athena. Overnight, someone had vandalized the mascot, and the pale goddess now wore a Nazi flag like a flower in her helmet. A charcoal mustache appeared over her full lips, and on her noble breastplate, someone had drawn two swastikas in the position of nipples, their dark arms creeping over the stone.

Lotte’s own breasts ached in sympathy, and she poked the corner of her book into her chest to drive the sensation away. Hilde had dropped her satchel and was sitting on the ground with her head on her knees. Lotte knelt over her, wanting to provide some comfort. But she was afraid that her touch would only add to her friend’s pain.

“She is the goddess of war, after all,” said Eva, who stood with her arms crossed in front of her, smirking.

“Who would do that?” Lotte asked, not addressing anyone in particular.

Greta, who had walked up behind them, ducked down to touch Hilde on the shoulder and give her the reassurance that Lotte could not provide. “ Maybe just a random vandal,” she said. “But more likely, a person with a point to prove. They could be saying that our school has been taken over by Nazis. Or they could be threatening us, saying that, if we haven’t been overrun yet, we soon will be.” As she spoke, she stood and pulled one blonde plait over the front of her sweater where it shone like the braid on a uniform. Lotte, reminded of her stepmother’s golden hair, felt an irrational anger at the sight. It was the color of privilege, of sunshine, and of visibility. It was the sign of favor and praise.

“But which do you think it is?” Hilde asked, from her position on the pavement.

Greta began stroking her braid, only adding to Lotte’s agitation. “Does it matter? We are under attack.”

“Some of us more than others,” Lotte said. “It should really make a person think about their choice of friends.”

Hilde looked up over her shoulder with an injured expression and Lotte felt immediately sorry, as if she’d reveled her friend’s deepest secrets and fears. After all, Greta hadn’t actually betrayed anyone, although, in Lotte’s imagination, she was already on a par with Eva and her friends.

That afternoon, Lotte went home and announced that she was quitting school.

“But you promised your father,” Paula objected. She was alone for once, sorting clothes for out-of-work musicians and actors. Lotte recognized one of her stepmother’s blouses, a low-cut magenta silk, and the blue dress she’d worn at her own Bat Mitzvah.

“It’s different now.”

“What can have changed, in a single day?”

Lotte didn’t have the heart to tell the story. “I just can’t go there anymore. Besides, you are the one who brought up the idea.”

“What will you do, then, my stubborn Lotchken?”

“Maybe I will take up the arts, like the rest of you.”

“There’s not much profit in that, as you can see,” said Paula, holding up a muslin dress decorated with red and gold embroidery. The afternoon light went right through it, and Lotte wondered if she was just as transparent to her stepmother.

“Yes, but I can draw in private. I don’t need an audience or a patron. I won’t have to parade myself in front of the Aryans or suffer the attacks of bullies and fools.”

“Then you are serious?” she said. “It’s not just a spat with your friend?”

 “I will not go back there, not if you pull out my fingernails or burn me in hot oil.”

“Ach, they always told me you were difficult on your governesses. But I thought I would be equal to the job.”

There was a break in Lotte’s anger and she leaned over to kiss her stepmother on the cheek. “Moo, you are doing beautifully,” she said. The jasmine of Paula’s perfume stung in her nostrils, and she felt dizzy with the possibility of its tenderness.  Perhaps they could learn to be mother and daughter after all.

But the bell rang and Paula rose, brushing off her dress and snatching up her compact to check her face and hair.

“Not Herr Singer,” Lotte said. Why did Paula primp and posture for a man she had repeatedly rejected?

“He’s been to the Ministry today.”

Lotte thought back to her stepmother’s disheveled appearance that morning, her worried expression, the telltale signs of a sleepless night. Perhaps she worried whether Singer would actually return. The Ministry was no place for a Jewish conductor, that was certain. And Singer, in spite of his bravery, would have been sorely tested there.

Paula dabbed her cheeks and forehead with powder, took a visible breath, as if preparing for a performance, then headed down the hallway. Meanwhile, Lotte stayed in the parlor, sifting through the discarded clothes, remembering this outing and that performance, a slight, an argument, and an unpleasant conversation. She heard Singer whistling. It was Eine Kleine Nachtmusik, surely a good sign.

“You are in high spirits,” Paula said.

“The Minister has agreed to consider my… request. We will have you singing Carmen again in no time. Still, I believe I need something stronger than… tea… this afternoon.”

Paula walked to the side table and poured two glasses of brandy, then, upon  consideration, filled a third.

“My Lotchken will drink with us, since she has left school and declared herself an adult.”

“Oh?” he said, letting his eyes settle on Lotte’s with a sharp, inquisitive stare. Then she remembered Paula’s comment about her crush, and searched her body for any response to the man. He was handsome, or so people said, with a striking profile, broad shoulders, and excellent teeth. Even his wrinkles were distinguished, like highly-wrought designs engraved on his forehead and beside his eyes. But Lotte felt an irritation at his confidence, a dislike of anything so certain and self-satisfied, a hatred of his sharp outlines and his cloying speech.

“I am emancipated,” she told him, although she still dreaded telling her father and the principal at her school.

“To emancipation, then,” he said, and tipped the brandy toward his lips.

Paula nodded, and drank too. Then Lotte lifted the glass to her lips. She had often been allowed wine at dinner, but had never tasted brandy, and was surprised at the taste, a burning sensation over a warm, buttery base.

“And how did you find things, at the Ministry?” Paula asked.

Singer seemed to collapse then, his face falling out of its careful composition so that Lotte could make out the skull underneath. He pulled a silk handkerchief out of his pocket and began dabbing at his eyes.

“The minister received me with some… warmth,” he said, sitting down in his usual spot. “But the general tenor of the place was terrifying. The fellow who took my name commented that he could hardly breathe, with the crowds of Jews in the streets. ‘Lucky thing we don’t get many like… you… in here,’ he told me. As for Goebbels, he seemed interested in the idea of a Jewish Kulturbund. He knew about my work with the Municipal Opera. He offered me a cigar, asked my opinion on the pictures in his office, and declared I was a… gentleman. I was certainly the right fellow for the job. He would make me an honorary Aryan, if he could.”

Then he held his face in his hands and made a sound in between laughing and crying.

“An honorary Aryan, what have I done?”

“Kurt, you are looking after your people. You are doing what you can.”

He did not speak, but began singing instead. Now it wasn’t Mozart, but something more obscure: “Dopo tante tante peine.” After so much pain… His voice was not a clean and soaring one like Paula’s, and it strained and cracked under the pressure of emotion. All the same, it had a kind of beauty, a crushed masculinity that reveled in the sweetness of its own ruin. It was the first time that Lotte had seen him doubt his own actions, and it made her like him more.

“We must work, after all, or what are we?” Paula said. “Just human statues watching history parade before our glazed eyes.”

Lotte thought of the bust of Athena, the powerful warrior incapable of defending herself. The horrible sight of this most venerated goddess marked as a victim and desecrated like a prostitute, swastikas sprouting from her nipples like the tassels of a dancer in a cabaret. Her very solidity made her a target. But Lotte, though she was weak, was, nevertheless mobile, invisible, and alive. She would not stay where she was bullied. Even if she was plain and insignificant, she would not become the background music for another person’s song. The brandy burned on her tongue and she pulled out a sheet of paper to begin drawing: a head, a hand, a breast, an eye, an arm.