Chapter Twenty Four – Moller, Schnee und Steuben

Shizuku – Munchen – July 1999

We arrived at the station at about six in the morning. The overnight sleeper always arrived early so that passengers could wake at leisure then take breakfast on the train before going on their way. I remember officially we had to be off the train by nine so breakfast could be taken slowly. Such a civilized way to travel. I think, despite the excitement of flying, traveling by train is better, it's just more stylish, especially these overnight trains, you think you might meet some interesting people in the bar car taking late night drinks. Humphrey Bogart perhaps, or Orson Welles. And of course, unlike a plane, two people can do so much more on an overnight train. Mmm, so romantic don't you think? Which reminds me, I had a lovely dream last night.

I washed and dressed and leaving a scribbled note for him, left him still sleeping. I stepped down onto the platform into that wonderful cool freshness you only get in early daylight. The station had hardly awoken. It was a Saturday so no commuter traffic, and at six thirty there were no regular trains running. Apart from a few staff bustling about the sleeper train, the place was deserted. I checked with someone that they'd let me back on the train, and went outside. A few cars were passing but the city centre was still quiet. There were tall buildings, offices, department stores. I just started walking, up one street, down another. The area around the station seemed to be quite modern but intriguingly a little way east of me I could see older buildings and several church steeples. I knew Munich was an old city but had no idea how much of it had survived the bombing in the war. From what I could see it might still have an old centre, like Cremona. I had brought my maps with me but knew the university and the park I wanted to visit were a long way across the city, on the north side. I came across a park and watched some ducks on a lake. The air was beautifully fresh, nothing like the warm moist air of the Po valley. Munich was a little higher up I think and the weather systems here near the Alps were different. I breathed in deeply and walked hard, making my cheeks pink. It was a lovely way to see the city.

Back at the train he had dressed and packed our stuff, bless him, and the compartment was empty. Warm, I threw off my jacket and went to the restaurant car to find him tucking into a big breakfast of eggs, toast, juice and coffee. No seaweed, rice and miso soup here unfortunately, we were Europeans now and had to change gears on so many things. We didn't talk. In a companionable silence I joined him and stole a piece of his toast, dipping it in his egg.

-oOo-

We left the train in the bright morning. The city was bustling now, it was like I'd strayed onto a movie set earlier, before the cast and stage crew had showed up for work. Now all the walk-on actors were playing their bit parts, passing anonymously on their way, doing unknown tasks with secret intent; only they knew the script. Were we the star parts? I suppose in our story we were. But I'd not read the script in advance, I had no way to tell how the next scenes would unfold.

We had our bags with us, two big suitcases, the dolls in their battered photographic equipment case, the violin, my shoulder bag, his shoulder bag with our traveling supplies in. Quite an expedition. But he had arranged a rental car and yet another new experience awaited us. Our lives had up until now consisted of his bike, of trains, of walking. We'd walked hundreds of miles together I think – around Tama and Tokyo, Cremona, Firenze, Venice and up on the Shimokita peninsular. Over the years we'd probably walked ten miles just within airports. And add to that all the cycling. I couldn't think how far his legs and pedalled us over the years. But the years were passing and now we moved from bike to car. We joined the faceless breed of motorized tourists. It was quite small, the smallest and cheapest the rental company did, a little Volkswagen, but it was new and comfortable enough, and best of all it had a really good radio - nice and loud. Getting the bags in was a problem, we filled the hatchback and the back seat. But we only needed to get the luggage as far as our hotel, a cheap one but as near the city centre as we could find and still be within our budget so that in the evenings we could go out. Staying in the wilds of the wet Shimokita peninsular coast is nice, don't get me wrong, and spending days alone with just him and the forests is perfect but we wanted to experience our first big modern European city – our times in Cremona were all spent in what is essentially a museum; a renaissance city that isn't a real working community – Cremona survives on the arts, its many academies, and tourism. Munich was modern and huge and ugly in the way that all big cities are but we wanted to look around. Munich is best in October apparently when it's host to the most famous beer festival in the world but we'd have to experience that another time.

Considering that everyone drove on the wrong side of the road, Seiji did very well. We unloaded the bags and dumped them in the room, returned to the car and began. This was the start of the journey, it was up to me, he was just the driver now, although I hoped I could infect him with my enthusiasm, that I would draw him in to this fascinating story.

-oOo-

We stood in front of the Academy of Fine Arts. Time had stood still. This was the building Luisa and Shirou would have known. My research told me it had been built in 1887 and wasn't much damaged in the war. I felt strangely at home here and then I realized that was because the thing was built in the Venetian renaissance style. It felt like one side of St Marks Square. Adjacent, a brand new block was being built; as yet unfinished. The university was open and summer students were gathering for classes. In summer they held adult courses and we felt out of place. There was something of a hospital about the place though, some alien smell that Japanese universities don't have. The floor polish perhaps. We followed the signs to the student bar and to my surprise it was at the west end of the block on the ground floor, the same place it had been in the 1930s. Also, to our surprise at this time of the morning, it was open and serving coffees and snacks. We bought drinks and sat by a window. Outside in the car park people and cars came and went. I tried to feel a connection to the place, to him, but there was nothing. It was merely a big school.

"Do you feel anything?" he asked,
"Only the sun."
"Is he here?"
"No, he's not. It's just a place people come to learn."
"OK, let's go."

I didn't feel her either. Strangely enough the bar would have served us a glass of milk if we'd wanted.

-oOo-

The Englischer Garten on the north side of the city was a lovely park. It was huge and on the east side bordered the river. This was the Isar in its semi-youthful state before it ran north and east and met the right bank of the Danube 300 miles away by which time it would become old and slow and brown. This was a famous park I later found, the site of the great Oktoberfest where tens of thousands of people gathered each year to drink tens of thousands of litres of beer.

The place was so big you could walk in it all day and not cover the same ground. The river actually split into several channels on the east side and the parkland between them was linked by many bridges, footpaths and cycleways. My 1930s map showed a café I needed to find but it took us all morning to find it. We crossed a wooden footbridge, came around a large bank of azaleas and rhododendrons and there it was. I knew it was the same café because it was the right location, I was certain. But this wasn't their café, this wasn't the café where the Baron and Baroness had stood on a counter and been seen by two young lovers in 1938. I had no idea if war had taken the old building but probably not, probably it was just time, the wooden summerhouse style café had probably simply got old and needed to be replaced. What we looked at now was foreign. It was an ugly thing. Built of brown brick with a flat roof and ice cream signs, it had a paved area outside with a few tatty aluminium tables and chairs and several wire rubbish bins, overflowing with yesterdays picnic debris. There was a blue and white striped awning but it was plastic, ripped and dirty. A couple of families sat outside, the kids being noisy and brattish.

We stood in silence. I stared at the scene and a wave of unhappiness and depression came over me. Why was I wasting our time and money here? It was all gone, all different now. They weren't here and I began to doubt my sanity in this stupid search across time. I was dragging Seiji uselessly around Germany to no purpose. Was there something wrong with me? Why did I need to do this? He spoke,

"Why are we here, Shizuku?"

Good question, my dear friend, that's a very good question

"Seiji, I'm sorry. I don't know. It's all gone now, all changed. Let's go."
"Are you happy?"
"Doing this? I was. Sorry, I was looking forward to making discoveries, finding them and their past, but it's gone. They were here only a year and the city has gone on sixty years since then. I'm sorry Seiji, no, I'm not happy now. I can feel me wasting our money. It's not like we have much."
"You said sorry three times then."
"I'm s…"
"Don't be. I'm happy. It's a nice city. Even if we find nothing at least we have our answers. We wouldn't have if we'd not come, hm?"

His logic had no flaw. We turned our backs on a place where once love had blossomed. I glanced at the grass, the sloping meadow down to the lake. Once a group of chattering student girls had sat somewhere there and seen a small funny lost man in a brown suit. One of them had stood up and spoken to him. But they were gone now and had left no trace. The dolls' case was heavy, it had a corner that kept rubbing my leg and I regretted bringing it.

We went back to our hotel and left the dolls before returning on foot to the city centre and finding somewhere to eat. At least the old city was quite nice. But it wasn't Cremona, it had no soul and I found myself yearning to be back in Italy. At the Hotel Alfonso, at the Piazza San Giorgio, at the cherub fountain. Was that home to me already? A dull restless feeling came over me that evening and I couldn't shake it off.

-oOo-

The next day I had one more place to look and it was hard to find. My map showed it to be on the east side of the city, across the river and some way out and it quickly became obvious that this had once been an industrial centre. My 1930 map bore little resemblance to the new Michelin Guide I carried. The streets were similar but the buildings were nothing like the ones on my old map. Where there had once been factories and small workshops there were now warehouses and parcel depots, everything built in pre-formed concrete and metal panels. I suppose this place had been bombed heavily. After a confusing drive along streets whose modern warehouses all looked the same, we found Konigin Wilhelmina Strasse but where 171 was we had no idea. The feeling of uselessness and time-wasting from yesterday returned.

"Seiji, stop here."

He pulled over and switched off the engine. I looked up at a couple of company name boards, if I tried to pronounce them it sounded like I was sneezing.

"We're wasting our time."
"Just don't say sorry again, you don't need to. Actually I'm finding this quite fun. My driving is getting better."

I smiled at him.

"Stay here, I just want to walk up and down the road a little, my intuition may wake up. It's been rubbish since we got here but you never know."
"Maybe it doesn't speak German."
"Good point. Italian is closer, I'll stop trying to intuit in Japanese then."
"Actually I think English is closer to German, try that."
"Thanks, you're a big help."

I grinned at him and got out. It was warm and I left my jacket in the car. I was even warm wearing just the thin sweater. I chose a direction at random and went. I passed several completely faceless buildings and another parcel depot. How many idiot parcels did the Germans need to send each other? The problem was my old map showed the street to be lined with little buildings, many of them probably small family run workshops or local factories producing small amounts of things. Today the storage facilities here were huge and one building might take up the frontage of twenty old ones so I was hopelessly lost as to where the street numbering might be. I didn't even know which side of the road it was or which end the low-numbers started. It was impossible. A grey depression came over me. I was late coming on this month and last night had probably been the start of it. Great, that was all I needed.

"Just one sign. That's all I need. Just one number, then I can work away from there."

I went past a small office. Two young women were outside. That was odd, seeing as it was Sunday, maybe they were doing overtime or perhaps this company needed round the clock staffing. They were smoking by a doorway. I knew absolutely no German except very basic things. I looked back down the street. Our red Volkswagen was parked where I'd got out. I could see the black outline of his head and shoulders, could feel him watching me. I lifted an arm to him and went onto the office forecourt. They watched me approach.

"Uh, bitte? Ein Seiben Ein, bitte?"
"Fabrik?" answered the older girl.
"Ja, fabrik, factory."

They looked at each other.

"Ein moment."

The girl went in the doorway and screeched something to a person who must have been twenty miles away judging by how loud she yelled. Or perhaps she'd stepped on a couple of cats dozing just inside the doorway. Moments later a big fat older woman came out. As soon as she stepped through the door she lit a cigarette. Maybe this was the compulsory smoking area and they were going to force me to have one. The big woman came over to me. She looked like she'd been a tank driver before she worked here. I don't think she had used a razor in her life. She started talking in rapid German but I looked helpless and interrupted with,

"Ich verstehe nicht. Ich spreche nicht Deutsches."
"Ah! OK. Rechts. Ja? Rechts."

She indicated a right turn back toward our car.

"Eine kleine strasse auf dem rechts."

I looked blank,

"Ich bin traurig."
"Komm, bitte."

She went to the gateway and gestured for me to follow. She pointed towards our car, then gestured right.

"Hier, ja, hier. Rechts, kleine strasse."

Small street, go right. Her hand signals indicated the turn was close by.

"Ah, danke, vielen danke."

I gestured my thanks and made my way back the way I'd come. I hoped the cats would survive their trauma. A few yards down, perhaps half way back to our car was an opening between two storehouses. I'd not noticed it before, I'd assumed it was a factory entrance but there was a tiny narrow pavement on one side, a public road. I waved to Seiji, gesturing him to come. I went down the alley, for that's what it was, no wider. After forty yards the corrugated metal buildings either side ended and I found myself on a bombsite. I was a little disconcerted. There was no-one here and I had a sudden scary feeling that the German tank driver and her friends might come out of a doorway and drag me in and subject me to the same fate as the two cats. I looked around and was reassured to see the red of our Volkswagen appear between the buildings. It nosed carefully down the alley and stopped just behind me. The derelict plot was fenced off from the alley by sheets of corrugated tin. I stood on tip toe and peered over the fence. Nothing but rubble and grass. Certainly no parts of half made cat dolls. Damn, this was another stupid dead end.

The car horn beeped right behind me and I nearly jumped out of my skin! Baka! I turned on him, breathing fire, intending to let rip. Yes, this was definitely PMT, just what I bloody well didn't need today. I opened my mouth to tear into him and saw he was grinning and gesturing, pointing upwards through the car roof, to one side. Baka! What was he doing? I glared at him. He rolled his eyes and got out.

"There. Look."

He pointed above my head. I followed his pointing finger and looked up. A rusty metal post was right next to me about ten or twelve feet high. Fixed to the top was a cast iron notice plate. It was black with age, blistered with rust spores and bore white lettering, very faded:

... ... ... ... ... ... ...
Kgn. Whma. Str.
.. ..171 - 175.. ..
... ... ... ... ... ... ...

"There you go! This is it!"

I looked around. My heart sank. This bombsite was all that remained of 171 to 175 Konigin Wilhelmina Strasse? Shit!

"Well, you found it! But it ain't here. Courtesy of the United States Air Force."

He was grinning. I wasn't. He could do that as crookedly as he liked today but I felt like crap now and it wasn't just my gut that hurt, making me short tempered. He saw my face and his smile left at once.

"Oh, Shizuku, I'm sorry."
"No you're not, you're laughing at me."
"OK, I apologize, I just…"
"Seiji, I don't want to hear it. What day is it?"
"Sunday."
"Yes, I know it's a Sunday. What's the date?"
"The twenty fifth. Oh…"
"Yes, Oh."
"Ah. I'm sorry, I forgot. It's late this month isn't it?"
"It is and it feels like it's making up for lost time fast. I feel like crap. And this is not the time to be funny, so please do not mess about with me."
"Shizuku, it's all gone. There's nothing here. Why don't we go back? I'll run you a nice bath and you can relax."

I had to give him a small smile. Even after I'd just chewed him out for no reason he came up with nice considerate suggestions. Had I married the right guy? You bet. I shrugged. Then a really stupid idea came to me. It had been hovering in my thoughts since yesterday when I'd seen the Fine Arts Academy which reminded me of St Marks Square. My mind went back to Venice four years ago. The metal post stood by an old blackened brick pillar. The bricks looked like they might have been one side of a wide door or archway, maybe an entrance where lorries had gone through to a courtyard. I faced the pillar. I lifted my hand, palm forwards.

"Shizuku, I know what you're thinking. Is this a good idea?"

I turned to look at him.

"Er…look, in your condition... you're not well."
"Seiji! I am not ill, or sick, I'm just a woman, so back off!"

I'd hate myself some months, he never deserved this but I could never help it. He stood watching, an unhappy look on his face.

"I would rather you just didn't."

Baka! That made me want to even more, just to spite him. When my body was like this I just liked to be nasty. Damn, I hated myself for five days every twenty eight. Our eyes were locked together. I moved my hand to the bricks, hovered it in front of them an inch away. He took a step closer; I could feel him pleading with his eyes. That just made me angrier. How dare he care about me? I was grown up, why didn't he back off? Go away and have a period Seiji, see how much you like it! I looked at my hand, pale hand. The bricks, black bricks. I pressed the one to the other. Pale hand, black bricks. Hand bricks. Bricks hand. Pale bricks, black hand.

Nothing.

The bricks were cold. They were dirty. Now my hand was dirty as well. Damn.

"Anything?"

I stared at my feet.

"No. Nothing."
"Shizuku?"
"What?"
"Please let me take you home. I love you."
"I know you do, and at these times I don't know why. I don't deserve you."
"Come on, let's go."

I could hardly bear to admit defeat. It was on this spot that the Steuben factory had stood and it was behind this pillar, somewhere among that rubble, that grass, that the Baron and Baroness had come into existence, some time in the years just before 1938, made by the hand of an unknown craftsman. I was so close. It would have helped my pain if I could just get over the fence and walk the ground. If I could just have picked up a piece of stone, a piece of brick, some silly memento. I pushed against the sheet of corrugated tin. It was secure, riveted to its neighbour. I. Couldn't. Get. In. In sheer frustration with each word I kicked it and got a sore toe for my efforts. I rested my forehead against the fence. Then his hands were on my shoulders, squeezing gently.

"Shizuku, leave it. Please. There's nothing here for you. Let's go."

So we did.

And that was the end of our useless and fruitless search in Munich. We stayed in that evening. He ran that bath for me and I had a lovely long soak. When I got out, he asked me to lie on the bed, on my front with nothing on and he gave me a lovely back massage. Then he asked me to turn over and I lay there for a whole hour while he gently stroked my stomach and massaged the places I hurt, his warm hands moving in tender circles, soothing my ache. He asked me exactly where it hurt and each place I indicated with my finger he touched with his lips. He made me feel nice. I decided one of my nipples was sore and he kissed there too. And my throat, another kiss. My lips were really painful, I said, and he spent ages kissing them. I asked him if he hurt anywhere but he smiled and said no, he was fine. I wasn't in a fit state to take things to a conclusion anyway, the bleeding had started. Later he called room service and we ate dinner in our room. He put me to bed and then he sat up reading with the small lamp on while I dozed and watched him and loved him with my eyes and with a warm satisfaction in my heart. What a lovely man.

But Munich was a waste of time and money that we couldn't afford to throw away. The car was costing us 4,600 Yen a day, and the room nearly 10,000. This was a stupid, stupid idea. But he never once complained. Maybe that's a fault of his: too soft, too nice, too accommodating. Hm, maybe too much in love.

But there was more I had to do in Germany. We checked out the next day, our three day intended stay had lasted two days. At this rate we might be able to reduce our two weeks in Germany to just one. We drove out of the city on Monday morning pushing slowly through the rush hour traffic, heading west toward a small provincial Bavarian town called Sonthofen.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

5th and 8th - 9th January 2007, with detail additions on the 11th and some fine tuning on the 13th

For author notes about chapter 24 see my forum (click on my pen name)