Self's punishment - By Bernhard Schlink & Walter Popp Page 0,87

where Heinrich’s urn is at rest now, too. It’s looking nice, the grave. Will you come and see?’ She looked at me shyly from her narrow, careworn face. She was wearing an old-fashioned black winter coat, black button-up boots, a black fur hat over her grey hair pinned in a bun, and was carrying an imitation-leather handbag that made one wince with pity. In my generation there are female figures, the sight of whom rouses in me a belief in all the pronouncements of all the prophets of the women’s lib movement. Not that I’ve ever read them.

‘Are you still living in the old compound at the Works?’ I asked her on the way.

‘No, I had to get out, it’s all torn down. The Works found me somewhere on Pfingstweide. The apartment’s fine and everything, very modern, but you know, it is hard after so many years. It takes me a full hour to get to the grave of my Heinrich. Later today my son, thank God, will pick me up in his car.’

We were standing in front of the family grave. It was heaped high with snow. The ribbon from the wreath bequeathed by the Works, and long since decomposed, was fixed to a cane and rose up like a standard by the gravestone. Widow Schmalz put down the watering can and let the trowel drop. ‘I can’t do anything today with this load of snow.’ We stood there, both thinking of old Schmalz. ‘These days I hardly get to see my little Richard either. I live too far out. What do you think, is it right that the Works . . . Oh God, now that Heinrich’s no longer around I’m always thinking such things. He never let me, never let anybody question the Works.’

‘How much warning did you have that you had to leave?’

‘A good six months. They wrote to us. But then everything went so quickly.’

‘Didn’t Korten make a point of talking to your husband four weeks before your move, so that it wouldn’t be too hard on you?’

‘Did he? He never told me about it. He did have a close relationship with the general, you know. From the war, when the SS assigned him to the Works. Since then it was right what they said at the funeral, the Works was his life. He didn’t get much out of it, but I was never allowed to say that either. Whether SS officer or security officer, the fight goes on, he used to say.’

‘What became of his workshop?’

‘He set it up with such love. And he really cared for those vans and trucks. Then it was all got rid of very quickly during the demolition, my son could scarcely retrieve a thing. I think they scrapped it all. I didn’t think that was right either. Oh, God.’ She bit her lips and made a face as though she’d committed a mortal sin. ‘Forgive me, I didn’t mean to say anything bad about the Works.’ She grasped my arm appeasingly. She held on tightly for a while, staring at the grave. Thoughtfully, she continued, ‘But perhaps at the end Heinrich himself didn’t think it was right the way the Works was treating us. On his deathbed he wanted to say something to the general about the garage and the vans. I couldn’t understand him properly.’

‘You’ll permit an old man a question, Frau Schmalz. Were you happy in your marriage with Heinrich?’

She gathered up the watering can and trowel. ‘That’s the sort of thing people ask nowadays. I never thought about it. He was my husband.’

We walked to the parking lot. Young Schmalz was pulling in. He was happy to see me. ‘The good doctor . . . met Mum at Dad’s grave.’ I told him about my friend’s funeral.

‘I’m grieved to hear that. Painful, taking leave of a friend. I’ve been there too. I remain grateful for your help with our little Richard. And one day my wife and I would like to have that coffee with you. Mum can come along, too. Any particular cake your favourite?’

‘My absolute favourite is sweet damson shortcake.’ I didn’t say it to be mean. It really is my favourite cake.

Schmalz handled it well. ‘Ah, plum with floury-butter crumble. My wife can bake it like no other woman. Coffee maybe in the quiet lull between the impending holiday and New Year?’

I said yes. We’d telephone regarding the exact date.

The evening with Philipp and Eberhard was one of melancholic gaiety. We remembered