|
Sample Translation
From
A Mysterious Prelude
It was like a fairy-tale night.
Cold, with a sharp frost.
Still air and a starry sky.
As if drawn aside by an invisible hand, the only cloud in that sky revealed the full moon. Its silvery light fell on the castle, which itself was black as night. Everything there was asleep, even Lord Darnley, the black castle cat who wore tartan socks on his paws.
Only one person was awake. Reginald.
If he had been asleep too, if he hadn’t been the first to hear the faint knocking on the door, this story would have had a different beginning and a different end, or it might never have been told at all.
But Reginald wasn’t asleep. In his silent way he hurried through the ancient entrance hall, a steaming cup of tea in his left hand and an oil lamp in his right. The oil lamp dated from the eighteenth century, and Reginald’s father had bought it from a Venetian art dealer after the Second World War. In spite of its amazing age, the lamp still worked perfectly. Its flickering light cast ghostly shadows over the gallery of ancestral portraits on the walls; it touched the shining back of a Chinese porcelain tiger, danced over the Persian rugs on the wooden floorboards, and finally hovered in front of the heavy, dark oak front door. The hesitant knock came again, softly. Reginald stood still, feeling distrustful. Who was here so late at night? Who had found his way to this place at such an hour? Even in daylight it wasn’t easy to find the Castle Hotel, and they weren’t expecting any guests today.
Particularly not at this unearthly hour.
When Reginald opened the door just a crack, he could see nothing but a shadow at first. A thin figure. White vapour in the air in front of its mouth, a length of fabric that looked like a turban wrapped around its head.
Before Reginald could open the door fully he heard the loud click-clack of energetic footsteps behind him.
Petula had heard the knocking too.
‘Leave this to me,’ she said brusquely. She pulled the belt of her check dressing-gown tight, pushed her husband aside, and flung the door open.
A sudden gust of wind blew into the house, so freezing cold that the hairs on Reginald’s legs stood on end.
‘Yes, how can we help you?’
A man. The strange figure was a man. He had travelled a long, long way, he had ridden on donkeys, elephants and camels, he had sat in coaches and trucks, had hidden away in ship’s holds and railway freight cars – and he had always moved on, on and on and on.
His white clothes were tattered, his thin face with its ashen-grey beard was exhausted and emaciated, and the shadows under his eyes were dark as night. But there was a sparkle in those eyes that seemed to come from deep inside him. As if he had a wish burning in his heart, burning so brightly, so desperately that his face couldn’t hide it.
He had been everywhere, this man, he had visited every remote corner of the globe. And now he was here.
But he was not going to get what he wanted.
And what he had with him was to be taken away from him.
On that fairy-tale night when a story that was like a fairy-tale itself had its ominous beginning.
* * * * *
When day dawned, the stranger had disappeared.
And the smile on Reginald’s lips was brighter than the light of the rising sun.
Dizzy Heights and the Threat of Change
Every visitor to New York dreams of seeing the city from above, and that dream could come true in the beauty salon where Cherylin Tilton worked. The salon was called New You, and it was on the forty-eighth floor of a circular skyscraper.
Up here the city lay literally at your feet. The mighty Trump Tower, the steel structure of Brooklyn Bridge, and the angular Empire State Building, which the giant ape King Kong had climbed in the movie, were only some of the sights to be seen through the great glass façade of the rooms on the forty-eighth floor. And on a clear day, when the orange sun was setting west of the city and turning the New York sky to a wild sea of colour, you felt almost like God. Everyone who visited the beauty salon agreed on that – except for Cherylin’s only son Otis.
Since their move to New York Otis had visited his mother many times up in the beauty salon in that airy tower. But he had never yet managed to get close to the big window. There was a simple reason for that: Otis Tilton was afraid of heights.
Some people thought his vertigo had been caused by his birth twelve and a half years earlier. Otis had come into the world in an airplane. The co-pilot personally had helped Cherylin to deliver the baby, the flight stewardess had cut the cord with a dessert knife from first class and wrapped the child in a sky-blue Continental Airlines wool blanket. The grateful Cherylin had given her son Otis the second name of Continental, and she had even appeared on TV with him at the time. Otis Continental’s birth had made headlines all over America, and whenever his mother told the story people thought they remembered her TV appearance.
By now the sturdy seven-pound infant with baby fat on his arms and legs had grown into a strikingly delicate-looking boy with shiny black hair and green cat’s eyes. However, the most striking thing of all about him was his long, curving eyelashes. They gave Otis a definitely girly look. Cherylin said any woman would give half her fortune for lashes like that, but Otis hated them. He once even tried cutting them off, but Cherylin had snatched the scissors from his hand in horror.
After that Otis resigned himself to his eyelashes, but not to his fear of heights – and if only he could have cut that out with some kind of magic scissors, he’d have done it like a shot.
But you can’t cut out your fears.
‘Fears have to be faced,’ Cherylin used to say. And Otis did his best.
Every Friday afternoon, when he went to meet his mother at the end of her day’s work on the forty-eighth floor of the circular skyscraper, he tried to make himself go half an inch closer to the glass façade.
Why did Otis so badly want to see out of the window?
There was a simple reason for that too: the gigantic buildings of the city fascinated him. Of all the places where Otis had lived with his mother – and he’d lived in so many that he could hardly count them, because she was always moving on – he liked New York best.
It was his firm intention to reach the point when he could look down on Brooklyn Bridge from above. He’d do it some day.
Otis knew everything there is to know about Brooklyn Bridge. When it was built and who by. He even knew that after the world-famous building was finished, its architect had sent the Barnum Circus, complete with elephants, across the suspension bridge to check that it would carry the weight.
On nights when Otis couldn’t sleep, he often imagined himself riding over Brooklyn Bridge on a circus elephant and never feeling dizzy with his vertigo. But of course that was a dream.
In reality, Otis would have a hard time just reaching the window of Cherylin’s beauty salon without feeling dizzy. It meant inching along in the literal sense of the word.
Today, on this crisp, cold Friday afternoon in December, he was working on the problem again. Otis entered the elevator on the first floor and pressed the button for Floor 48, taking a deep breath. The door clicked shut, and the elevator rushed upwards. Otis narrowed his eyes, tried to suppress his giddy feeling, and once he had arrived made for his mother’s treatment room.
Cherylin Tilton
said the silver plate beside the door. Before Otis pushed the handle down he took a quick look at the time. Just after four. Cherylin’s final appointment for today would have begun a few moments ago – and the lemony, slightly herbal fragrance drifting out of the door told Otis he was right.
‘Verbena officinalis,’ he murmured, sniffing. Otis had absorbed Cherylin’s love of herbal aromatics almost with his mother’s milk. At home there was always a perfume in the air of the different mysterious, aromatic mixtures that his mother put in the blue containers around her little oil lamp, where their scents could develop fully in the warmth. Cherylin never tired of telling people what they were supposed to do.
Verbena officinalis promoted wealth and prosperity, was good for migraines, and also announced change. To Otis, however, Verbena officinalis meant mainly that he could go into Cherylin’s salon during her Friday afternoon treatment, because she used that aroma exclusively for Scarlett Silverstone, a millionairess as old as the hills who had platinum blonde hair, and suffered from bags under the eyes and bad headaches.
The old lady was sitting there already, her head in Cherylin’s hands, her eyes tight shut, her lips moving.
Without a sound, Otis slipped into Cherylin’s cubicle. It was more of a sizeable room, really: circular, with light-coloured furniture and a huge glazed façade on the window side going all the way down to the floor. The scent of Verbena officinalis filled the whole place – and as usual the old lady was going yackety-yack nineteen to the dozen. Otis couldn’t keep back a grin when he caught what she was saying. Obviously Scarlett Silverstone was back on her favourite subject. ‘And of course I had to visit my little treasure before I left Great Britain,’ she was twittering as Cherylin massaged her temples. ‘Oh, my dear, you don’t know how I suffer, being parted from her.’
Cherylin blew Otis a kiss and replied to his grin with an emphatic wink. Yes, she did know – and so did Otis. After all, they heard about it every Friday afternoon.
Scarlett Silverstone’s little treasure was her granddaughter Salome, who had moved to Europe with her parents last year. Scarlett Silverstone adored Salome, and always claimed that Otis would have been a wonderful playmate for her little treasure.
And while Otis crept up on the window at snail’s pace, Scarlet Silverstone went on and on. ‘But at least I had Salome with me for a few days after my trip to Scotland, and guess what, my little treasure wanted me to take her to the Zoo again to see her favourite animals. And what …,’ said Scarlett Silverstone, pausing for effect, “what do you think her favourite animals are?’
‘Maybe the lions?’ suggested Cherylin politely, and Otis found it very difficult not to burst out laughing. It was perfectly clear that this wasn’t the first time his mother had been asked the same question, but Cherylin put up an excellent show of having no idea.
‘Wrong!’ gurgled the old lady happily. She had opened her left eye and batted its eyelashes at Otis in friendly greeting. ‘She likes elephants best – and in particular white elephants, but I’m afraid the Zoo didn’t have any of those. Another sad disappointment for Salome. Just think, Otis honey, my little treasure longs so much to ride on a white elephant’s back. Isn’t that a delightful thing to wish for? But where are white elephants to be found these days?’
The old lady heaved a sympathetic sigh, and Otis, who had now almost reached the middle of the room, stopped. So Salome wanted to ride a white elephant, did she? How strange that he too had a dream just like Scarlett Silverstone’s granddaughter’s!
Of course he had no answer to her grandmother’s question, but the old lady didn’t seem to expect one, and Otis took a hesitant step forward. The big window was still nine feet or more away from him, and the view made him dizzy – with both pleasure and fear.
‘But never mind, Otis dear,’ Scarlett Silverstone went on, ‘at last I’ve brought you a photo of my little Salome. Over there, see my purse?’
Reluctantly, Otis took his eyes off the window and looked the way Scarlett Silverstone’s forefinger was pointing: at her lilac suede handbag, which was hanging on the coat hook by the door. ‘It must be in the very front pocket. Take it out, do, and see my little treasure for yourself. I’m sure you’ve often wondered what she looks like.’
To be honest, such a question had never crossed Otis’s mind, and Salome Silverstone didn’t interest him in the slightest today either. But of course he wasn’t about to upset Cherylin’s best client.
Otis obediently went back to the door and took a photo in a silver frame out of the bag. It showed a little girl of about six with long blonde braids. You could have called her pretty if there hadn’t been a deep and angry frown on her forehead. The little girl was smiling, but it was a nasty, almost malicious smile, more as if she were baring her fangs than anything else. She had a silver brace on her teeth, and she was holding a ballerina doll with twisted legs and its face scribbled all over.
Repelled, Otis put the photo back in the bag.
‘Isn’t she just cute?’ asked Scarlett Silverstone, expecting enthusiasm. Luckily she’d closed her eyes again, so Otis didn’t have to adjust the expression on his face. But with the best will in the world he couldn’t think of anything to say. He bit his lip and cast his mother an imploring glance. Cherylin dipped her fingertips in some kind of oily fluid and began massaging the old lady’s earlobes.
‘You were just saying you visited little Salome after your vacation in Scotland, Mrs Silverstone?’ she said, expertly changing the subject. ‘Where exactly were you in Scotland, if I may ask?’
Scarlett Silverstone sighed pleasurably, and the relieved Otis breathed again. Cherylin had tried out her earlobe massage on him several times, and he didn’t like it, but Scarlett Silverstone obviously enjoyed the sensation. And Cherylin’s diversionary tactics worked splendidly.
‘Oh, I was in the most delightful, charming place,’ replied the old lady with enthusiasm. ‘Forthwick Castle, a hotel in an old castle in the Highlands of Scotland, far from everything, why, you could almost say it’s at the other end of the world. You’d like the building, Otis Continental. Your Mom has told me how interested you are in architecture, and Forthwick Castle is a real gem, an amazing building. We Americans just can’t imagine such a thing here. The great hall of the castle where we ate is one of the oldest in Europe, and there are only thirteen guestrooms in the whole place. My stay there was a real bargain too.’ Scarlett Silverstone gurgled happily. In spite of her millions, Cherylin had told Otis, the old lady was careful not to spend too much money.
‘Just think, even the black castle cat wears tartan socks, isn’t that cute? Now what was his name? Lord something-or-other, a peculiar name.’
‘A black cat, how nice!’ A smile appeared on Cherylin’s lips. Otis’s mother loved cats.
‘Yes, a sweetie-pie!’ gushed Scarlett Silverstone. Otis let all this go in one ear and out of the other as he went on trying to get a little closer to the glass façade. Three more steps, four, five, six and – seven Now he had reached the small, round oil stain that Cherylin had once left on the pale carpet when she was filling her lamp. Otis had registered this stain as marking his record to date. Cautiously, pulse beating fast, he moved his left foot further forward. Quarter of an a inch – half an inch. Done it!
He brought his right foot up beside it, and rejoiced inwardly. He had come closer to his goal, only a tiny bit closer, but all the same, he was making progress!
Holding his breath, Otis raised his head and looked down, to convince himself that this really was his best performance yet. He had seen the top of the Rockefeller Center on his last attempt but one – today, for the first time, he saw the outer corner of the Chrysler Building. The light of the setting sun fell on the façade like liquid gold.
Otis smiled – and sighed. Brooklyn Bridge wasn’t in sight yet. Not by a long way!
Scarlett Silverstone’s voice reached his ears from behind him. The old lady had talked herself into a frenzy, and was still going on about that hotel in the Scottish castle.
‘… and the furnishings!’ she cried. “Magical, my dear, absolutely magical. Of course they have suits of armour, a portrait gallery of ancestors, ancient coats of arms. Not forgetting amazing curios from all over the world. They told me the former owner of the castle travelled far and wide.’
Otis turned and saw Scarlett Silverstone pointing to Cherylin’s little blue lamp. ‘You’d have liked all the valuable oil lamps hanging in the rooms and the corridors, I’m sure you would. It feels just like being in the Arabian Niiiaaaah …’ The old lady interrupted her flow of chat to give herself up entirely to the pleasure of the massage for a moment.
A sparkle had suddenly come into Cherylin’s blue eyes, and Otis noticed a hollow, sinking feeling in the region of his stomach. He knew that feeling – and it had nothing to do with his fear of heights.
‘That sounds just so exciting,’ he heard his mother whisper. ‘A hotel in an old castle, Otis, what do you think of that? What language do they speak in Scotland? Is it French?’
Otis buried his head in his hands. He could never get used to Cherylin’s boundless ignorance of everything outside the United States. A few days ago, when he came home from the library with a lavishly illustrated book about ancient Rome, his mother had asked whether Rome was the capital of Bavaria. She’d been extremely surprised to learn that Rome was in Italy and Bavaria was a German province.
Cherylin was delighted to hear that they didn’t speak French in Scotland, they spoke English, because it was part of Great Britain. ‘I suppose there doesn’t happen to be a beauty salon in this castle hotel?’ she asked as if casually.
Scarlett Silverstone sighed again, but this time unhappily. ‘Oh yes, they have a salon,’ she said gloomily, opening her right eye. ‘But the beautician had left three days before I arrived, and they hadn’t found a replacement yet. That’s why I’m so terribly tensed up now.’
Scarlett Silverstone closed her right eye again and abandoned herself entirely to the effects of the massage. After a while her gentle snoring showed that she had dropped off to sleep. She was smiling as blissfully as a baby.
But there was no mistaking the expression that Otis now saw on Cherylin’s face, Cherylin had itchy feet – that was clear as day. And it meant that their next move was not too far in the future.
Heavy at heart, Otis turned to the glass façade one last, desperate time. But the mere attempt to move his foot another half-inch forward made him break out in a sweat.
So it looked as if his aim of seeing Brooklyn Bridge from above could never be realised now.
When Scarlett Silverstone went over to the huge glass window again at the end of her treatment, to admire the view, she said, beaming with delight, ‘I feel newborn!’
Otis felt anything but. He felt terrible.
Kreuzberg Nights are Long
When Olivia Englert clambered out of the old wardrobe in her bedroom and rubbed her stiff arms and legs, it was so dark that she could hardly see her hand in front of her face. She cautiously switched on the light, put her pet pigeon Columbina on her shoulder, climbed over a stack of books about helicopters piled on her floor, went to the window and flung it open. Nervously, she looked at her watch – and breathed a sigh of relief. The digital display on the dial showed 2.21 hours 50 seconds.
In ten seconds’ time it would be 22.22 hours, and at that moment precisely, today as every day, the roar of the homeless people would echo back from the grey concrete walls of their back yard in the Kreuzberg district of Berlin. Ten, nine, eight, seven, five, four, three, two, one – and there it was, that loud, piercing cry, punctual as ever: ‘I AM A CITIZEN OF BERLIN!’
It was already late, but some children were still playing out in the yard, an old woman laden with heavy Aldi supermarket bags was hobbling along the sidewalk, and two men were quarrelling outside the entrance to one of the buildings. It was a long time since anyone had taken any notice of the homeless people’s cry.
When Olivia heard the words for the first time she’d been four years old, and had no idea what lay behind them. By now, of course, she knew hat they were a world-famous quotation, and the quotation came from a speech made by the equally world-famous American President John F. Kennedy. Olivia even knew that the words came into Kennedy’s speech twice, because she had looked them up in a history book and learnt them by heart.
The first passage ran: ‘Two thousand years ago the proudest boast was “I am a Roman citizen.” Today, in the world of freedom, the proudest boast is: “I am a citizen of Berlin.”’
The second passage was: ‘All free men, wherever they may live, are citizens of Berlin, and, therefore, as a free man, I take pride in the words, “I am a citizen of Berlin.”’
John F. Kennedy had made this speech many years ago outside the Berlin City Hall in the Schöneberg district, and a few months later he was shot in his limousine in the United States.
Olivia knew that too. She forgot who had shot the President and why, but after all, that wasn’t the reason why she knew both passages by heart. It was the bits about freedom that Olivia liked so much.
A free man. In the world of freedom. Those words sounded so powerful, so wonderful. Every time Olivia heard the homeless people’s cry she whispered the passages about freedom and felt her heart beat faster. It was the same even today – perhaps most of all today. Because Olivia firmly intended to remain free. In spite of the circumstances, which on the whole seemed to hold out few prospects of freedom.
Outside, the temperature had sunk to ten degrees below zero. An icy gust of wind swept into the room. Columbina uttered an involuntary coo, and Olivia was quick to close the window. She rubbed her legs, stretched her arms in the air, turned her head first to left and then to right. Her joints cracked and every muscle hurt, but that wasn’t surprising. Crouching in a dark wardrobe without moving for one hour, seventeen minutes and thirty-five seconds is a considerable achievement for a girl of eleven. Or rather a girl of twelve, because Olivia was twelve as of today.
Olivia was a strongly built girl with chestnut-brown eyes, a firm chin and thick, dark blonde hair cut short – but not too short for her to try out all kinds of possible and impossible hairstyles. For her birthday her mother had given her a pack of glitter hair scrunchies, and Olivia had used them to make herself two dozen little braids. They stood out from her head like hedgehog prickles, pointing in all directions of the compass.
That afternoon Olivia and her mother had drunk a toast to her birthday. Olivia had drunk cola and her mother had drunk a can of beer. Then her mother drank two more cans of beer, and then she went shopping. She bought a jar of sausages and a bottle of ketchup for Olivia, and two bottles of mulled wine and a bottle of vodka for herself.
While Olivia was eating cold sausage with ketchup, her mother had finished off the first bottle of mulled wine, meanwhile singing an old Berlin hit song in a rather slurred voice:
‘The nights of Kreuzberg are long,
… but then Olivia’s mother had drunk the second bottle of mulled wine, and when she had drunk half the bottle of vodka too she fell over.
Olivia was used to her mother falling over. She couldn’t actually have set her watch by it, as she could by the homeless people’s cry, but sooner or later her mother was regularly bound to fall over. And the last two times she’d done it, she couldn’t get up again afterwards. So now Olivia had called an ambulance for the second time that month, left the door of their flat unlocked, and hid in the wardrobe with her pigeon Columbina until her mother was taken away.
‘But they won’t get their hands on us,’ Olivia whispered to Columbina. She thought of what Kennedy had said about freedom, and stroked her pigeon’s snow-white feathers. They were wonderfully soft, like silk and velvet. Columbina uttered a few soft, contented cooing sounds. Olivia put her nose on Columbina’s neck where the plumage was softest, and for some mysterious reason always smelled faintly of cinnamon.
‘Those idiots from the Youth Welfare Office aren’t going to take us away,’ she whispered. ‘Not us, Columbina, I promise they won’t. As sure as my name’s Olivia Englert, they’re not shutting us up in a Home.’
But it was going to be difficult this time. Olivia knew that.
Last time the man from the Youth Welfare Office had almost found her hiding-place, and after Olivia’s mother came back he had rung the doorbell every day and stood out in the yard for hours, waiting. And two days ago he had even gone to her school.
‘Too bad. Then I’m just not going to school any more,’ Olivia told her pigeon. ‘I can’t learn anything about flying there anyway. Oh, Columbina, you don’t know how well off you are. You have two wings, all you need to do is spread them and whoosh – you’re queen of the air and flying far, far, far away!’
‘Coorrroo,’ cooed Columbina, and she fluttered up to the kitchen table and pecked up a few bits of sausage left over from Olivia’s birthday meal.
Olivia spread her arms and ran around Columbina, faster and faster until she was dizzy. ‘Get ready to start, we’re taking off!’ she cried, and leaped into the air. Half a second later she was down on the floor again – and then the bell rang. A shrill, piercing, ugly sound.
‘Open the door,’ called a deep male voice. ‘We know you’re there, open up. This is the police.’
‘Oh, bother it!’ whispered Olivia. ‘Come on, Columbina, we must get out of here!’
The pigeon flew up on Olivia’s shoulder. The ringing went on and on, became more piercing, uglier.
‘Olivia Englert!’ thundered the man’s voice. ‘If you don’t open the door we’ll have to break it down!’
Olivia raced to her room. Snatched up her backpack. Reached for a thick sweater, stuffed it in, along with her Discman and the photo of her father who had died eight years ago. Her father had been a pilot, a helicopter pilot. He had left Olivia his computer. She wouldn’t be able to take that, or the little black flight simulator and all the books piled up in her room – on the green plastic stool by her bed, on bookshelves, on the plywood desk. Olivia raced back into the corridor, tore her coat off the coat stand, and her cap and scarf.
Outside, someone was throwing his full weight against the door. Wood splintered.
Olivia dived for the window. It had begun to hail out there.
Their flat was on the first floor. There was a frozen flowerbed outside the window. How far down was it? Nine feet, eleven feet, twelve feet? The front door of the flat flew open.
Columbina fluttered off Olivia’s shoulder. A white shadow in the dark night. But Olivia herself couldn’t fly.
She had to jump.
Don’t Look Like That!
Until now Friday had been Otis’s favourite day of the week. He had always been allowed to choose what he and Cherylin would do after work that day. And easily the best Friday afternoons of his life were those he had spent in New York. They’d visited the architectural exhibition in the Museum of Modern Art together, they’d looked at famous stars in Madame Tussaud’s waxworks show, and they often stopped off at a street stall to eat hot dogs with mustard and pickled gherkins.
But as Otis followed Cherylin into the elevator this particular Friday he couldn’t have cared less where they went. Ever since Mrs Silverstone told them about the vacant post for a beautician at that Scottish castle, Cherylin’s blue eyes hadn’t stopped shining. She had made no comment at all on what the old lady said, but it was as clear as day to Otis what would come of it.
Friday – his lucky day? How could he have been so wrong!
‘If you can’t make up your mind where we go today, then I’ll have to decide,’ said Cherylin cheerfully. ‘They switched on the lights of the Christmas tree in the Rockefeller Center yesterday. It must look lovely.’
It did, too.
When Otis stepped out into the open air with his mother, the first snowflakes were falling as if to order. The evening star was already sparkling in the sky, and beside the ice rink of the Rockefeller Center a fir tree seventy-five feet tall was illuminated by thirty thousand lights. It was indeed as beautiful as something in a fairy tale, but when Otis saw the skaters turning pretty pirouettes on the gleaming icy surface, hot tears rose to his eyes. I was here for the first time last year, he thought. And this year will be my last time.
‘Well, come on, Tom Kitten, don’t look like that.’ Cherylin ruffled her son’s hair and led him off with her to hire skates. The grumpy face of the man behind the counter broke into a radiant smile when it was Cherylin and Otis’s turn. Otis was used to the effect his mother had on people. Cherylin was a remarkably good-looking woman. Her shining black hair came down to her well-shaped hips, and as for her face, even her women colleagues in the beauty salon couldn’t help noticing that Cherylin looked as if she were her own best customer.
Today Cherylin was wearing a bright red wool coat, a dark green velvet scarf, and a white imitation fur forage cap. Big silver earrings like Christmas-tree baubles dangled from her ears, reflecting the lights of New York.
As soon as they were on the rink Cherylin took Otis by the hands and whirled him across the ice. She was beaming all over her face. After a while Otis had to smile too, and the longer they skated round in circles, the more the magical place cast its spell over him.
By the time he was sitting, red-cheeked, in a restaurant with his Mom, devouring a turkey-burger and French fries, he had almost forgotten his gloomy fears for the future.
But as soon as they were home Cherylin started in on her plans.
And then it all went so fast that Otis felt quite dizzy.
Still in her coat and scarf, Cherylin crouched over the computer, uttering little cries of enthusiasm once she had discovered the Forthwick Castle Hotel on the Internet.
Otis went away to his room, put on a CD by his favourite singer Eminem, and turned the music up loud so that he wouldn’t have to hear Cherylin’s squeals. Then he opened his illustrated book about historical churches and monasteries all over the world, and immersed himself in their comfortingly familiar ground-plans.
Two CDs later his mother was standing in the doorway, and the inevitable broke over Otis.
‘Otis, we’re going to Scotland,’ announced Cherylin, handing him a piece of paper. ‘We’ll celebrate our next Christmas at Forthwick Castle.’
Distraught, Otis stared at the article, which showed a photo of a castle enthroned on a steep cliff. It looked at least a thousand miles from any trace of civilisation. Otis gasped for breath, but Cherylin just twinkled at him and left the room, whistling happily.
It took Otis a moment to pull himself together. Then he read the article:
A Castle Hotel at the End of the World
The wind howls around the lonely lakes, steep mountains and mysterious castles typical of the dramatic landscape of the Highlands of Scotland. One such place is Forthwick Castle.
Thanks to rich businessman Wilbert Winter the building, which dates from 1443, has become a real find for tourists. He visited Forthwick Castle on his world-wide travels, and discovered a rundown hotel managed by the widowed mistress of the castle. Winter fell in love with her – and restored the ruins. Besides the impressive architecture, the place has another fascinating attraction: the collection of antiquities from all over the world brought to Forthwick Castle by Wilbert Winter, a passionate collector. His collection of valuable oil lamps is said to have no equal. According to the castle staff, there are exactly a thousand and one lamps, and many of them are rumoured to come straight from the fairy-tale land of Princess Scheherazade.
Today Forthwick Castle Hotel is run by the next generation of Wilbert Winter’s family. With the hotel’s excellent cuisine, thirteen guestrooms, and a beauty salon in the cellars, the staff at Forthwick Castle know how to please their guests. So discover this very special vacation spot – in an enchanted castle at the other end of the world.
Otis let the article drop. Cherylin’s words a moment ago were still ringing in his ears. They now came together in fragments, like the pieces of a porcelain figure that has fallen to the floor and been badly glued back in place. Going to Scotland … our next Christmas … Forthwick Castle.
With a wild leap, Otis jumped up and stumbled to the tiny kitchen, where his mother was just making hot chocolate.
‘Our n-n-next Christmas?’ Otis was so horrified he could hardly speak. ‘You don’t mean we’re moving this year, do you?’
‘That’s just what I mean, Tom Kitten.’ Cherylin poured the chocolate into two cups, sprinkled a pinch of cinnamon over them, and put one on the table in front of Otis. ‘I’ve fixed it all. In a bit of a hurry, maybe, but if I hadn’t worked on it fast the job would have been gone, and we don’t want that.’
Otis ignored the we and stared, stunned, at his cup, which had the words I love NEW YORK on it in big red letters.
‘It went just amazingly well!’ cried Cherylin, bubbling over. ‘My first job application by transatlantic phone! And it paid off right away. Petula – that’s my new boss, by the way – must have checked with Scarlett Silverstone after we first spoke. And she called right back offering me the job. I start in ten days’ time. Well, what do you say?’
Otis said nothing at all. He felt he was in a dream, and one that he’d like to wake up from as quickly as possible.
‘But,’ he whispered at last, ‘but what about our furniture, and my school, and …’ His voice failed him.
‘All fixed!’ replied Cherylin. ‘We can put the furniture in store, like we did when we moved from Las Vegas to Texas, remember?’ Cherylin blew on her hot chocolate. ‘We don’t have all that much of it. And if we decide to stay in Scotland we can think again. For now I need just one travelling bag. I leave next week, and you’ll follow before Christmas. I’ll have found you a new school by then. And we don’t have to worry about an apartment. We’ll be living in the castle!’ Cherylin beamed at Otis as if she had just opened her first Christmas present.
Otis closed his eyes.
‘There are two wonderful rooms for us,’ he heard his mother say enthusiastically. ‘They’re in one of the towers, right under the roof. And I’ve fixed where you spend that week in New York before you come on to Scotland; you’ll be staying with Duncan Stomp. His mother came to me for treatment a little while back. I removed a hairy wart from her chin, and when I called just now and asked if you could stay with them for a few days she didn’t hesitate for a moment. Well, don’t you think I’ve outshone myself? I’d like to see anyone else change their lives in two hours flat!’
Otis had opened his eyes wide again.
Cherylin was looking as if she’d just earned an entry in the Guinness Book of Records, but Otis hadn’t been listening to the last bit. He jumped up so suddenly that his chocolate slopped over the rim of his cup. ‘Staying with DUNCAN STOMP?”
This really was the end! Otis was used to his inability to make lasting friendships because he changed schools so often. But he’d never made enemies until his New York school – and Duncan Stomp was the worst of them all. The list of mean things he did was endless. Putting liquid glue on Otis’s sandwich at break, sticking photos of naked women in his biology book, painting the back of his head with pink graffiti spray – those were only a few of the tricks Duncan had played on him. Suddenly Otis bitterly regretted never having told Cherylin about Duncan’s bullying. He’d always been afraid she would wade in and only make matters even worse. And now it was too late. If Otis told her at this point, Cherylin would think he was just trying to talk himself out of it.
Otis sank back on the kitchen chair. All of a sudden he felt like a punctured balloon.
‘Oh, come on, Tom Kitten, don’t make it so difficult for us.’ Cherylin put her hand out to Otis’s shoulder. ‘You wait and see, it’s going to be great. Just think of all the wonderful buildings you’ll be able to explore. They say Scotland is full of castles and strongholds dating from the Stone Age. And isn’t the Eiffel Tower in Scotland too?’
Otis helplessly shook his head. ‘The Eiffel Tower is in Paris, Mom. And the castles and strongholds of Scotland date from the Middle Ages. There weren’t any castles in the Stone Age.’
‘Well, what difference does it make?’ Cherylin squeezed Otis’s arm and put on her happiest smile. ‘Anyway I’m sure you’ll love our mediaeval fairy-tale castle. And if not, then we’ll simply …’
‘… move again,’ Otis ended her sentence for her. Then he got up from his chair, trailed off to his room with his head bent, and buried himself under his quilt. But he couldn’t sleep.
One last black thought had taken up residence in his head. When they moved from place to place in the United States, Cherylin had always done it by car because of his fear of heights. But you couldn’t get to Scotland by car. And no one has yet invented a method of beaming people across the ocean.
Otis would have to fly. And all by himself at that.
The Girl with the Dove
Olivia thought the most beautiful place in Berlin was Tegel Airport. Standing in the departures hall to watch airplanes taking off or helicopters landing was one of her favourite things to do, and she’d met the few people who meant anything to her here.
Until two years ago it was where René had worked. He’d been a colleague of her father’s. For Olivia’s tenth birthday, René had given her a voucher for ten helicopter flights. Olivia had spent ten wonderful Friday afternoons in René’s Robinson R22 Beta II, the smallest helicopter in the world and a best-seller. She had flying lessons above the roofs of Berlin, and learned everything she didn’t yet know about helicopters – which in fact was vanishingly little, considering that Olivia had learnt to read from her father’s books on flying. She had been six and a half when she began running her little forefinger along technical terms like tail rotor diameter, collective aerofoil adjustment lever and coaxial rotor system. She first began reading English books about flying when she was nine.
René was greatly impressed by Olivia’s knowledge. He even let her take the controls of the helicopter a couple of times. ‘You’re a natural for it, did you know?’ he told her. ‘Your father would have been proud of you.’
A year ago René had moved to France, and since then Olivia had seen helicopters only from a distance. But the airport was still her second home.
So it was no wonder that today Olivia fled for refuge to Tegel Airport. Shaking off the police had been easier than she’d feared, but now her anxiety was weighing her down. After all, she wasn’t coming here today to watch airplanes or helicopters taking off. She had to find somewhere to stay overnight.
‘Okay, Columbina,’ said Olivia firmly. ‘Here goes.’
She marched purposefully through the big revolving door of the departures hall, and steered her way towards the Condor Airlines check-in desk. This was where Olivia’s best friend Carlos Almadovar worked. Carlos had moved to Germany four years ago. Olivia first met him in the airport restaurant, and after that she visited him as often as she could. Carlos was in his mid-twenties, with black shoulder-length hair and warm brown eyes, and there was always a smile on his lips. Particularly for Olivia, whom he called the girl with the dove. That was also the name of a picture by the famous Spanish painter Pablo Picasso. And since Carlos came from Spain too, he usually called Olivia his niña con paloma, which was the title of the picture in Spanish.
On Fridays Carlos worked a late shift. When Olivia came up to his desk with Columbina, he was just checking in passengers for the last flight to New York City. Frowning, he looked from the airport clock to Olivia. By now it was 23.15 hours, and it wasn’t difficult to work out what Carlos’s glance at her said. Isn’t this rather late for a little girl with a dove to be out? But next moment he was giving Olivia a reassuring smile, and a small wave telling her to wait patiently for a while. Normally that was no trouble to her, but today her heart was in her mouth. Would Carlos agree to her desperate plea?
‘Cross your claws, Columbina,’ she whispered to her pigeon. Columbina’s little white head was peeping out from Olivia’s red coat. ‘We need a guardian angel to bring us luck now.’
Columbina cooed softly, and when Olivia looked up she saw that they were being watched. By a stranger in jeans and a leather jacket standing at the end of the line. He had dark hair combed back from his forehead, and large grey-blue eyes that suddenly developed a nervous tic around them. For a split second Olivia was frozen with shock. Had they been followed after all? Had the Youth Welfare people been lying in wait for her? Or an undercover policeman? She uneasily examined the stranger.
‘You have a pretty friend there,’ said the man, with a friendly smile. Then the nervous tic came again, and Olivia took a suspicious step backwards.
‘Is it a carrier pigeon?’ asked the man. He had a deep, warm voice, and he sounded genuinely interested.
‘Her mother was,’ replied Olivia shyly ‘Her mother was a carrier pigeon, but Columbina can’t quite do it yet.’
‘Columbina?’ The man pushed his suitcase a little further forward and smiled. ‘A little explorer, then – like Christopher Columbus. A lovely name, Columbina. Was she a present from someone?’
He looked at Columbina’s little head with such warmth that Olivia forgot her suspicions. This man was obviously a passenger, and anyway there was something about him that she liked. Something in his face and his eyes. In spite of the nervous tic, they had a kind of sadness in them.
‘I hatched Columbina out,’ Olivia explained, and now her voice was full of pride. She remembered every detail of the warm spring day before Easter when she had seen the solitary egg in a nest on a school visit to the Berlin Pigeon Breeders’ Association. She thought the mother bird had abandoned it. Only later did she find out that pigeons always lay two eggs, and don’t begin hatching them out until the clutch is complete. Anyway, Olivia had taken the egg, wrapped it carefully in her scarf, and she went home with it as soon as the expedition was over.
But of course she wasn’t going to tell the stranger that. ‘I found the egg,’ she said instead. ‘And then I made a nest in my room and kept it warm until Columbina hatched out.’
There was such a beaming smile on the man’s face now that it warmed Olivia’s heart.
She glanced at the information board, which showed that he was going to board a flight for America. ‘Do you live in New York?’ she asked curiously.
The man shook his head. ‘I’m going on holiday for the first time in five years. New York in the Advent season. I’ve always wanted to see that.’
Me too, thought Olivia. The line of waiting passengers had moved forward again. It would be the man’s turn next.
‘What about you?’ he asked. ‘Are you flying to New York too?’
Olivia shook her head. She swallowed. For a brief, crazy moment she felt like asking the strange man to take her with him. But of course she wouldn’t.
‘Well, it was nice meeting you anyway,’ said the man. ‘You and your little explorer. My name is Nicolas, by the way. ‘
So saying, he turned and heaved his case on to the conveyor belt. Carlos took his ticket, and quarter of an hour later Olivia was sitting in the airport restaurant with her best friend, staring at a little brown package done up with a red bow.
‘Many happy returns of your birthday,’ Carlos said. ‘Is today, right? You look good with your hedgehog thorns.’
Carlos tugged one of Olivia’s braids, and she had to laugh. ‘You mean hedgehog prickles,’ she told him. Then she unwrapped the paper. There was a framed postcard inside, showing a little girl in a white dress. The girl’s hair was cut short, a ball lay at her feet, and her hands, which she held in front of her breast, were closed around a white pigeon. Olivia smiled. Pablo Picasso’s picture.
‘For my niña con paloma on her birthday,’ said Carlos affectionately.
‘Oh, thank you,’ said Olivia. ‘Th … thank you, and I want to ask you something, please. The fact is … I mean … my mother …’
Carlos put his hand on Olivia’s arm. ‘Your mother?’ he asked gently. ‘Did she have too much to drink again?’
Olivia nodded. And then she began crying so bitterly that Carlos sat her on his lap. ‘You know I’d take you to stay with me if I could,’ he said. ‘But is impossible, niña, I live on my own in a tiny flat and I don’t have a wife, I work irregular hours, the Youth Welfare Office would never allow it.’
‘Please,’ whispered Olivia. ‘Please, just for a night or so, just until my mother is home again. Please. This is my birthday, Carlos!’ Then she began sobbing again. Columbina cooed, and an elderly lady at the next table turned to look at them sympathetically.
Carlos sighed. A long, deep sigh. ‘I must be crazy,’ he murmured. And out loud he said, ‘Come on, then, niña con paloma. We go back to my place, and the first thing I do is run you a hot bath. Your hands are cold as ice.’
As Olivia walked through the airport hall holding Carlos’s hand, they passed the big neon poster showing the American Statue of Liberty, and Olivia immediately thought of Kennedy’s speech again. A free man. Today, in the world of freedom.
Otis on the Hook
The Statue of Liberty grew larger and larger as Otis and the rest of his class went out to the little island in New York harbour on the ferry.
It was a sunny Monday morning, and Otis’s history teacher Mr Pommeroy was beaming as if he personally had ordered fine weather for this occasion. The class outing to the city’s famous emblem had been planned long ago, and Mr Pommeroy had prepared his pupils thoroughly. Most of the kids in Otis’s class knew that the gigantic stone lady was a symbol of freedom all over the world. But a number of them hadn’t realised that the statue was erected mainly to promise a new life in a new city to the countless immigrants into the United States.
Otis sighed. A new life in a new place was about to begin for him too – but no Statue of Liberty would welcome him on his arrival.
Cherylin’s flight had taken off from John F. Kennedy Airport in New York the evening before, and Otis had already spent one night with Duncan Stomp. Duncan’s mother had made him hot milk and honey for the cold that he’d had for the last week, and he owed it to Duncan’s strict father, a policeman, that Duncan Stomp himself had left him alone most of the time. In fact Duncan had been unusually inoffensive, apart from making the silly remark that boys had to wear skirts in Scotland.
Now Duncan was sitting at the other end of the ferry, picking his nose.
It had snowed again overnight. New York wore its most festive winter outfit, and the sight of the mighty goddess of liberty almost took Otis’s breath away. She proudly held the torch with its gilded flame so high in the air that it almost looked as if it would touch the sky. The statue wore a crown with seven rays on her head, and there were twenty-five windows in the rays. Otis knew that the rays of the crown symbolised the seven seas and continents, while the window stood for the twenty-five gemstones of the world. He also knew that the copper-clad steel structure of the statue had been designed by Gustave Eiffel, the French builder of the Eiffel Tower. On their tour, which was to last an hour, he would get a glimpse of the interior of the goddess of freedom and learn all the exciting facts about the history of its building.
Otis coughed. If only Duncan’s mother’s hot milk and honey had at least worked! But his voice still wasn’t much more than a whisper, and he felt tired too. He’d hardly been able to sleep at all on the creaking folding bed in Duncan’s room.
‘You see a poem engraved on the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty,’ said Mr Pommeroy, as they stood in front of the statue. ‘It’s called “The New Colossus”. Duncan, would you be kind enough to read it aloud to us?’
Duncan, who was just wiping a bit of snot from his nose off on a girl’s jacket, looked up in alarm and reluctantly began to read:
Give me your tired, your poor,
A few of the kids giggled, perhaps at the peculiar words or perhaps because it took Duncan forever to stammer his way through the lines. Otis couldn’t suppress a hoarse chuckle either – something he was soon to regret bitterly.
‘I’ll do you in, you stupid dung-beetle,’ Duncan hissed in his ear. ‘If you think I’m sharing my room with you for the next few days, you can think again.’
By now Mr Pommeroy had herded the class into the big entrance hall in the stone pedestal of the statue. This was where they would look round the museum about the history of immigration to the USA. Later they’d go up to the observation platform to see the view of the Manhattan skyscrapers. Otis looked at the time. The tour didn’t begin for another twenty-five minutes, and Mr Pommeroy had his hands full trying to keep the class together. As so often, the history teacher wore his green and yellow check suit, and black shoes polished to a high gloss. With his red hair and fat nose, he looked like a clown who had missed his vocation.
The voices of all the children running about rang through the museum, echoed back from the walls, and mingled in an indeterminate jumble of sounds and words. There was giggling, muttering, screeching, complaining, shoving and pushing – in fact it was just like any class outing. Mr Pommeroy was desperately trying to hand out the questionnaires he was so fond of setting, but few of the kids bothered with them. Otis glanced at the sheet of paper. Basically, their teacher was asking them about the gigantic lady’s dimensions:
1. How high is the pedestal?
2. How tall is the Goddess of Freedom?
3. How high is the entire structure from the bottom of the pedestal to the tip of the torch?
4. How much does the statue weigh?
5. What is the statue’s waist measurement?
6. How wide is her mouth?
7. How long is her right arm holding the torch?
8. How long is her forefinger?
‘Everyone visit the lavatory before we go into the museum,’ shouted Mr Pommeroy when he had finally given out all the questionnaires. ‘I don’t want you running off all the time during our tour of the exhibition. And hurry up, it begins in a few minutes’ time!’
Some of the kids giggled again. Mr Pommeroy’s weak bladder was famous. It sent him out of the classroom at least twice an hour during lessons. Obviously he thought everyone else was the same, and he was the first to disappear into the men’s room. Otis and Duncan were among the last in the line. When it came to their turn Otis was about to escape into the first cubicle, but Duncan had already pushed into it with him, closed the door and bolted it. Soft music was playing from a loudspeaker somewhere, and it took Otis a moment to realise that it came from his own mini-radio. The radio hung from a string around his neck, and Duncan’s big chest must have pressed the Start button as he braced himself against Otis. The sounds of the other boys’ voices in the other cubicles reached Otis’s ears. He opened his mouth to scream, but all that came out was a miserable croak.
With a nasty grin, Duncan pointed to the little hook inside the door of the cubicle where you could hang your coat or jacket before using the lavatory.
‘Now we’ll see if that hook stands up to a flyweight like you,’ hissed Duncan, pushing Otis up against the wall. Otis had put on his new fur-lined leather jacket that morning, to keep out the cold. A present from Cherylin. The jacket had a belt, and there was a broad loop firmly attached to the collar on the outside. ‘That’s so chic!’ Cherylin had said. ‘You look really cool in that jacket, Tom Kitten. The girls in Scotland will all stare. And you won’t need a coat hanger to put it on. Who knows if they have coat hangers in Scotland at all?’
Otis had no doubt at all that they did, but the possibilities of that loop had not escaped Duncan Stomp either. ‘Comes in very useful, a loop like that,’ he whispered nastily. ‘I can hang you up on the hook like a horrid old purse. There we are!’ Duncan was junior weight-lifting champion, and it was easy as pie for him to lift a lightweight like Otis up to a coat hook. It all happened so fast that Otis didn’t have time even to think of defending himself. And then the belt of his jacket came into use too. In seconds, Duncan had pulled it out of its belt-loops and tied up Otis’s hands into a small, tight packet with it. While Otis felt tears of shock and rage come to his eyes, Duncan stroked his fair hair back behind his ears. ‘Make yourself at home, and don’t look so ungrateful,’ he said. ‘You can hang up here all nice and quiet while the rest of us have to look at that silly exhibition. Isn’t that nice of kind Uncle Duncan?’
But kind Uncle Duncan didn’t seem to expect a reply, for next moment he had crumpled up Otis’s questionnaire into a ball and was stuffing it into his mouth.
The other boys had left the men’s room long ago, and when Duncan left the little cubicle, whistling, Otis was alone.
He hung there helplessly, suspended from the wall by the loop on his new jacket. Trapped in the Statue of Liberty.
Mr Pommeroy will notice I’m missing, he tried to reassure himself after spitting the now wet questionnaire out on the floor of the cubicle. He’ll look for me, and if he doesn’t think of the men’s room, then someone else in the class is sure to remind him. Maybe Oliver, or Ben, or Lizzy Thompson. Or else Mr Pommeroy’s weak bladder will bring him back here, and then I can shout and he’ll set me free.
But Mr Pommeroy didn’t come. No one came. And in his heart Otis knew very well why no one seemed to have noticed that he was missing. There were kids like Duncan who were noticed everywhere – even when they were conspicuous by their absence. And there were kids like him, Otis, who were overlooked even in the smallest space.
Otis desperately tried to free his hands from the belt, but he wasn’t feeling very strong after his sleepless night, and Duncan had done a thorough job. At least the collar of Otis’s jacket had a soft lining, so it wasn’t choking him. But his position was far from comfortable. By now exhaustion was beginning to affect him. Otis closed his eyes. Sounds from his mini-radio reached his ears. The reception was terrible, all hissing and crackling, so Otis heard only fragments of what the newsreader on the four o’clock news bulletin was saying. Two buildings disappeared … world-famous … the Great Sphinx of Giza in Egypt …the Eiffel Tower in Paris …whirlwind … mist …swallowed up by the earth … terrorists … extra-terrestrials …
For heaven’s sake, didn’t anyone need to go to the men’s room?
With this despairing question in his mind, Otis fell asleep.
Olivia in Flight
Olivia had been on the loo in Carlos’s flat for fifteen minutes. Not because she needed it, but because there was so much to see in here. Carlos called the smallest room in his flat his Spanish museum. It was easy to work out why. All the walls were covered with framed postcards, showing the most beautiful sights in Spain: the palace of La Granja in Castile, the Poblet monastery in Tarragona, the Altamira caves in Calabria with their Stone Age paintings, the cathedral of the Sagrada Familia in Barcelona. Carlos had proudly told Olivia the history of all the buildings, especially the Sagrada Familia, which looked to Olivia like a gigantic fairy-tale castle. A famous Spanish architect had designed it, but Olivia had forgotten his name again, although it sounded kind of colourful. She did remember that this magnificent cathedral had taken well over a hundred years to build. You could well believe it, because even the tall cranes on construction sites in the city had to compete with its towers for their place in the sun. When the architect died only one of the towers in his plans had been completed, said Carlos. Now Olivia could count eight towers in the large photograph, and under one of them a miniature Carlos was waving to her from a stone balcony.
‘My uncle took that photo. Whenever I’m in Barcelona I go to visit the cathedral,’ he said, sounding nostalgic. ‘I’ll be there again in two weeks’ time. I’m counting the days, I can hardly wait to see my home again. One of these days I build a hotel on my plot of land.’
Carlos’s plot of land hung on the wall too, in a gilt-framed photograph. It was on a wild, high plateau overgrown with plants and olive trees, not far from the sea.
Carlos had inherited it from his grandmother, but of course he didn’t have the money to build a hotel. So he had come to Berlin to find well-paid work and save up for his dream. Then he would go home for good.
Olivia’s home for the last ten days had been Carlos’s tiny flat in Berlin. It was in the north of the city, and Olivia had never felt so happy in her life. Every day she called to see if her mother was back from hospital yet, and every day she found her guilty conscience fighting her hope that no one would answer the phone.
‘You can stay until your mother’s back, not a day longer,’ Carlos had said, and Olivia had to send her class teacher a message saying she was fine and in good hands.
And so she was. Carlos, who had first trained as a chef, spoilt her in his free time the way her mother hadn’t done for years. He made her Spanish paella, and roast chicken with the crispy potatoes that were called patatas fritas in Spain, and the Spanish caramel puddings he conjured up for dessert were so delicious that Olivia closed her eyes as she ate them.
Now the phone rang, and Olivia got off the loo.
‘We’re having ropa vieja this evening,’ Carlos announced. ‘Is a one-pot dish. The Spanish means old clothes, is just the thing for this lizzy weather.’
Olivia giggled. ‘Lousy weather,’ she corrected her Spanish friend. ‘We say lousy weather.’
‘Lizzy weather, lousy weather, who cares? Anyway I’ll be home soon, cook the most warming stew in the world. Lay the table, will you, niña con paloma? And how about bananas baked in honey for afters?’
Olivia smiled. ‘Wonderful. See you soon!’
Then she rang off and went into the kitchen. Carlos’s kitchen was not only the warmest but also the best-equipped room in the flat. There were stacks of cookery books on the shelves, there were pots and pans of all sizes, you could spend half a day sniffing all the herbs and spices on the dresser and still you’d never tire of them. Carlos always laid the table for meals with his grandmother’s good silver cutlery, and Olivia did that now. She put out large white china plates for herself and Carlos. Columbina had her birdseed in a pretty crystal dish. Her place was near the radiator, where Carlos had made her a little nest out of a soft blanket.
When Olivia’s best friend came home with a heavy shopping bag, and a rolled-up newspaper under his arm, Olivia had just put her Discman over her ears and was dancing about the kitchen, singing along to Eminem. Eminem was her favourite singer, although unfortunately she had only one of his CDs. ‘Every day,’ she sang, ‘every single day, the world keeps turning …’
When she saw Carlos she took off her headphones and beamed all over her face. ‘Here you are at last!’
‘You can say that again,’ Carlos grunted. He took his red forage cap with the bull printed on it off his dark curls and rubbed his frozen hands. ‘Madre Maria, is cold in Germany! Here, how’s this for your lizzy German – I mean your lousy German weather!’ Carlos put his cold hand on Olivia’s arm, and when she squealed he had to laugh. But next moment his face was suddenly serious again. ‘You’ll never believe what happened today. Or have you listened to the news?’
News? Confused and slightly alarmed, Olivia shook her head. Carlos had no TV, but he often switched the radio on in the morning. However, he’d been in a hurry today, and Olivia had spent all day in bed or looking through his cookery books and photo albums.
‘The Sphinx,’ said Carlos. ‘The Great Sphinx of Giza and the Eiffel Tower in Paris – they disappeared.’
‘Disappeared?’ Olivia wrinkled her brow. ‘What do you mean, disappeared?’
‘What I say.’ Carlos shook his head. ‘Those buildings, they just disappeared – overnight, like in seconds. Whoosh – gone. Everyone was talking about it at the airport. A lot of passengers even wanting to cancel flights. I haven’t had a free moment, have to read all about it in the paper now. But first,’ said Carlos, putting his shopping down on the dresser, ‘first I take a hot shower. I feel like an iceman.’
‘Snowman,’ said Olivia, laughing. ‘We say snowman in Germany, if that’s what you mean.’
‘Is exactly what I mean, little niña.’ Carlos pulled one of Olivia’s braids. ‘You’ll be my German teacher, si?’
‘No!’ Olivia energetically contradicted her best friend. ‘First I think it’s much cooler to speak English, and second I’m going to be a helicopter pilot, so there!’
Carlos grinned. Of course he knew about Olivia’s passion for helicopters. ‘But you’ve picked the most difficult method of transport there is. Why not train as an airplane pilot? That’s much simpler.’
‘Simpler, yes,’ said Olivia. ‘But not half as exciting. If you’re in an emergency somewhere a plane can only fly over you and throw flowers. But a helicopter can land and save your life.’
Carlos put the rolled-up newspaper on the table. ‘That’s clever, little niña. ’
Olivia nodded. ‘I didn’t make it up. It was said by Igor Sikorsky, the pioneer of helicopter technique. My father underlined it in red in his book.’
Carlos put his forefinger under Olivia’s chin and looked at her affectionately. ‘I’m sure you’ll be a wonderful helicopter pilot.’
Olivia smiled, and Columbina cooed where she sat in her nest near the radiator.
‘Right, now I take a quick shower.’ Carlos went out of the kitchen, and soon he could be heard singing out loud under the shower.
Olivia bent over Carlos’s shopping bag. It wasn’t an Aldi supermarket plastic bag, the kind they had in dozens at home. And it didn’t contain bottles of beer or rum, jars of sausages or part-baked plastic-wrapped rolls. The crisp baguette that Olivia fished out of the bag was fresh. So were the juicy tomatoes on the vine and the dark purple aubergines that had recently become one of Olivia’s favourite vegetables. She dismissed the thoughts of her mother that surfaced in her mind and broke off a piece of baguette for herself and Columbina. Then she picked up the newspaper. It was cold as ice and perfectly smooth, obviously unread so far. But it wasn’t the headlines about the mysterious disappearance of the Sphinx from Egypt and the Eiffel Tower from Paris that made Olivia catch her breath. It was the tiny story at the very bottom of the fourth page.
HAVE YOU SEE THIS GIRL? asked the words in black capital letters above a small photo. And when, with a huge lump in her throat, Olivia bent over the picture, she was looking at her own face. It took her only a few seconds to realise that the photo had been taken from her class register at school – and the end of the piece was enough to show her how serious the situation was. ‘The girl, who may have been abducted, is now being sought by the police. Information can be given at any police station. The girl can also be recognised by her pet, a white pigeon. She takes it almost everywhere with her.’
The water had stopped running in the bathroom. ‘Nearly ready, then we make Carlos’s ropa vieja,’ sang out the voice behind the bathroom door.
But Olivia was already out in the corridor. Hugging Columbina to her chest. Putting her coat on. Looking back at the kitchen. She’d left the newspaper lying there. Open on the table. Never mind! It was only a question of time before Carlos found out that the police were looking for her, anyway. And then he’d take her to the Youth Welfare office.
Olivia reached for her backpack. Raced to the door. Down the stairs and out into the street. Away. She must get away. Yet again.
It had been raining all afternoon, and outside it was so cold that Olivia’s tears froze to her eyelashes. The streets were smooth as glass, and a pale half-moon showed behind grey clouds like a coin cut in two.
Olivia ran. Slipped, fell over, struggled up and ran on, while Columbina dug her claws in and clung to her chest. She ran without any idea where she was going, just on and on over the sand-sprinkled pavements to the Kurfürstendamm, that famous Berlin avenue, where she had to make her way past pedestrians, tourists and street traders. On and on, right at the corner of Bayreuth Street, right again at Wittenberg Square, on to Tauentzien Street, where she was so blind with desperation by now that she ran across the road on a red light. Brakes squealed, horns hooted, and the next thing Olivia saw was the green and white door of a police car stopping just in front of her. She was shocked rigid for a fraction of a second, and then she raced on again – but this time with the enemy breathing down her neck. The other policeman in the car with the driver had got out and was running after her. Olivia heard his footsteps, his voice. ‘Stop! Stay where you are, young lady, this is …’
Where could she go? For heaven’s sake, where? Olivia raced across Wittenberg Square, looked frantically to right and left, and saw a large, sandstone-coloured building. She took a deep, relieved breath. The Kaufhaus des Westens, the huge and famous Berlin department store. She must get inside!
As she arrived at the entrance, out of breath, a doorman barred her way.
‘We’re about to close,’ he rasped, but Olivia raced past him, quick as an arrow, into the festively decorated main concourse of the store. A sea of Christmas lights was flashing there, but Olivia had no eyes for them, or for the gigantic Christmas tree with glittering baubles and packages hanging from its branches. She mustn’t look round, not even to see if the policeman was following. She must just go on, plunge into the crowd so that she could vanish there, be swallowed up by it, invisible.
A babble of voices surrounded Olivia, speaking German, French, Russian. Smells of perfume and hairspray, smoked bacon and sweet cakes rose to her nostrils. Olivia thrust her way through the torrent of shoppers. With her hands held in front of Columbina to protect her, she raced to the glazed lift, almost knocking over an elderly lady coming her way loaded down with heavy shopping bags. ‘The shocking behaviour of young girls these days! The police ought to …’
On! She must go on.
A man dressed up as a Christmas angel was standing outside the glazed lift, handing out silver balloons to the children. A woman’s voice came over the loudspeakers, saying the store was about to close and asking customers to go to the checkouts.
Olivia forced her way with the crowd through the glass door of the lift, which closed behind her. She was just in time to catch sight of the police officer’s furious face. He was standing beside the Christmas angel, out of breath and looking around. Had he spotted her? Obviously not. His eyes were searching the crowd, then he turned away, shaking his head, and marched off to the exit. Olivia breathed a sigh of relief. She’d done it, just in time.
But now she couldn’t leave the store. Who knew, the policeman might be lying in wait for her outside. Had he any idea who it was he’d been chasing? Would he inform his colleagues? Her heart was in her mouth, and even Columbina, who hadn’t uttered a sound, was trembling under her coat.
The glazed lift was going up, but Olivia didn’t so much as glance at the magnificently furnished shopping floors that she’d often admired on earlier visits. She pressed back into a corner of the lift. Even though closing time had been announced, the glass box was still full of people.
‘Incredible,’ an elderly man was just saying to a younger one. ‘The disappearance of the Sphinx and the Eiffel Tower – no, really quite extraordinary. Personally I suspect some kind of practical joke on the part of the Press.’
The young man shrugged his shoulders, and as the lift reached the third floor a little boy near Olivia began screaming because he wanted to go into the wonderful toy department. Olivia felt like putting her hands over her ears. The air in the lift was stale, and her hands were beginning to tingle in the sudden warmth as if thousands of ants were crawling through her veins. All that running had made Olivia hot too. Now her sweater, damp with perspiration, was clinging to her back, the worn wool collar of her coat felt scratchy at the back of her neck, and the little boy’s howling was more than she could take. But she dared not open her coat. The girl can also be recognised by her pet, a white pigeon … No one must see so much as a feather of Columbina!
‘I wanna, I wanna, I wanna!’ the little boy was screeching. A young woman with red hair and a penetrating smell of garlic bent down to him, sounding cross. ‘Who wants never gets!’ she hissed. For a moment the little boy held his breath. Then he screeched at his mother, ‘Mami, that lady stinks!’
On the fourth floor, where Olivia cast a fleeting glance through the glass wall of the lift at TV sets, stereo systems and computers, the red-haired woman got out, and Olivia herself left the lift on the fifth floor. Calmly, moving at a leisurely pace, to attract no attention. Past stacks of bed linen, pillows and quilts, rolled-up carpets and brightly coloured furnishing fabrics. Oh, for heaven’s sake, wasn’t there any furniture here? The loudspeakers were announcing closing time again, and if Olivia didn’t find a good place to hide very soon she’d have to leave the store.
She was just hurrying down a corridor full of lamps and chandeliers when a saleswoman came towards her. Go on. Walk fast but keep calm, perfectly calm.
There – another department ahead of her!
Travel Centre it said in large lettering on a large notice, and Olivia’s heart beat twice as fast as before. Three tables, several shelves, no saleswoman in sight now – but instead, right in the corner, there was a large cupboard. Three disconnected terms shot through Olivia’s mind. Mama. Ambulance. Youth Welfare Office. The cupboard had a large photographic poster of the Colosseum in Rome on the door, which was locked, but the key was in the lock. Inside! Inside, quick!
A second later Olivia was in darkness. There were only a few coat hangers on a rail above her head. The cupboard smelled of newly varnished wood.
Olivia huddled into the furthest corner of the cupboard and listened. Listened to the painful thumping of her heart and the announcements of the loudspeaker lady, telling shoppers for the last time to leave the store.
But even now, when all was quiet and nothing moved, Olivia dared not open the cupboard door. As quietly as she could, she fished about in her backpack for her Discman. Oh no! It was still on Carlos’s kitchen table. But the photo – her searching hands suddenly moved frantically. Her father’s photo! There it was, it was in the backpack all right. Olivia took it out and hugged it to her chest. With her free hand she stroked Columbina, who was sitting on her knee and still didn’t make a sound.
Not until half an hour or perhaps a whole hour later did Olivia hesitantly open the door. Half an inch, an inch, then wide open.
The place was empty.
All was still.
Olivia was alone.
Shut up inside the biggest department store in Europe.
Perhaps for her last night ever in freedom.
Opening chapters of Forbidden World, by Isabel Abedi, pp. 9–61 of German text
Translation by Anthea Bell
|
