Back in Magdeburg, in the house where Lena’s grandfather lived with his ageing mother, there was a knock on the door one morning. It was the same two men who had gone through Professor Glückstein’s documents at the house by the lake. They now came into the library and began searching through the shelves where I was kept undercover inside Effi Briest. I felt the security of her cloak around me as well as the respect of other classics. I was placed right next to Woyzeck, that great figure of human jealousy and natural destruction, the unfinished drama about a soldier who kills his lover after she sleeps with a drum major. Perhaps the barrel organ player should have done the same when his wife Katharina called him a useless cripple and began to seek the affections of a police officer with two legs, but he merely turns his sorrow like a knife on himself.
As the men were searching through the shelves, book by book, they asked Lena’s grandfather why he had written to his old professor in Berlin. He no longer had any connection with the Humboldt University. Lena’s grandfather said it was a courtesy, nothing more, just to see how his former literature professor was doing. They accused him of belonging to a degenerate group of academics who were conspiring against the state. They sat him down and began to question him more thoroughly. One of them took his wristwatch off and placed it on the table to show they had all the time in the world.
My author would have described the chief interrogator as a man with a beige-coloured face like unrisen dough, thin lips that hardly covered his teeth and yellow ears that were translucent against the light coming from the window.
We know you have it.
What?
You were his favourite student.
He’s a brilliant lecturer.
You became friends.
It was the classic interrogation scene in which each party gives away as little as possible. The person under questioning pretends to know nothing. The interrogator pretends to know everything.
Lena’s grandfather responded to their questions by saying he had no idea what they were talking about.
All this time, I was worried that Effi might open her cloak and let out the faintest sound of the barrel organ.
Nobody mentioned the title, but it was clear as daylight that they were looking for the book with a map at the back. The map led to untold rewards. Everyone was aware that David Glückstein was the sole heir of a paper industrialist and that, like many family traits that skip a generation, he had little interest in the wealth that had fallen into his hands, preferring to devote himself to the pursuit of literature and art. The father produced raw paper – the son became the end user. He was more interested in what could be printed on it, particularly those books written by new revolutionary authors like mine who defended characters with no wealth.
The chief interrogator told him not to waste their time. It was another one of those well-worn interrogation strategies in which the person under questioning is reminded that there is a limit to politeness. It led to a moment of confusion in which Lena’s grandfather said he had no idea what book they were referring to.
The interrogator smiled.
What makes you think we’re looking for a book?
Why else would you be searching the bookshelves?
The innocence of that answer displeased them. Still refusing to mention the title, the interrogator simply said in a voice that was now depleted of all patience – you know the book I’m talking about.
Tell the truth, the other man shouted.
At that point, Lena’s grandfather became aware of how little the truth mattered to them as long as they got what they wanted. He could avoid a lot of trouble by handing over what they were looking for. He decided there was no way out but to be perfectly honest with them, even going so far as to mention the book in question.
You mean – Rebellion, by Joseph Roth.
Exactly, the chief interrogator said.
Lena’s grandfather began to explain how the book had come into his possession. On the night of the book-burning, he told them, a copy of that banned book had been given to him for safekeeping by the professor. He had wrestled with his conscience, he explained, not knowing what he should do with it. He didn’t want to be seen with the book and so carried it under his coat out of the university. As he emerged onto the opera house square and saw the crowd standing around the fire, he told himself to do what every good German would do under the circumstances.
Of course, the interrogator said eagerly.
I had to do the right thing.
What’s that?
I threw it into the fire.
It was one of those moments in police questioning when the lie sounds just right. Not only plausible but politically fitting. The interrogator clearly found the words hard to disbelieve. It was impossible to argue with a double bluff.
The interview was brought to a conclusion. Perhaps the men were already thinking of other ways in which the information could be attained. The interrogator picked up his watch and put it back on his wrist in a feigned gesture of satisfaction. Just to be certain, they carried out another search through the bookshelves, and for one moment they picked Effi Briest out as a suspect. But they were not readers. They failed to see what she was hiding and left empty-handed.