The End of Autumn

Many years later, as he faced the jury trying him for war-time crimes and later as he faced the firing squad Major Paul Himmler was to remember the day he met Ilsa.

He was walking on a snow paved street, enduring a biting chill and a strong wind that cut into his face as he walked on. He had walked a long way and was completely bereft of energy. It was then that he saw the heavily lighted board, symbolizing the end of his journey. He pushed the wooden door open, with the bar and the snow accumulated on it sending chills down his spine. A woody and musky whiff of alcohol along with the aroma of barbequed meat welcomed him. Upon entering, he was greeted by the officers seated at the table near the door. They were new recruits, full of indignation at not being given a chance soon. He greeted them back warmly with a smile. He removed and put the heavy woolen overcoat on the stand, exposing himself to a chill even inside the wooden saloon.

He looked around, seeing the usual faces, drunkards whose loyalties were as ambiguous as making out a silhouette in the cold outside.  It was then that destiny played its part in his life. His life. But who was he, if not a shadow? He went to the restroom and looked at himself in the mirror. He looked at his neatly side-parted dark hair. He remembered how his mother had used to comb his hair like that when he was a kid. He looked at his face. It was a famous face in this part of Germany, famous for being ruthless even though it looked young beyond imagination.

Looking at his face right now, he couldn’t believe that he was 30. He didn’t look anywhere near that age. He was of medium built, the kind that you see every day on the street. He was short, at least he thought so. He was five feet eight or nine inches which he considered short. He looked at himself, and felt a kind of remorse, a sadness which he couldn’t shake off. He had tried everything, he had drunk copious amounts of alcohol, and he had bedded three women, but was unable to shake off the feeling. It was like a huge void had been created. He used to get up late in the night and wasn’t able to sleep again.

He felt a deep sense of loneliness, something which had always haunted him, but never to this measure. But he somehow kept himself afloat, if only to wallow in the pain one more day. He somehow always seemed to manage, to keep himself sane, even with the utter lack of love in his life. He had often heard how night can be a haunting time for lonely people, when loneliness came out and took grasp of people. For loneliness only took away the strong people, people with nothing to lose and with courage.

He was walking towards the door and was set to leave when destiny played its part. He would realize on that cold and unforgiving night when loneliness was digging its claws in him that if he had not turned his head to the side and kept on walking, if only he had left five minutes earlier and not gone to the toilet, if he hadn’t moved his eyes towards the corner of the bar, he would never have seen Ilsa.

When he saw her, he was in love with her; there was no question about it. Something he had never known to exist acted inside him and he knew that trouble was waiting.  It was like suddenly the light from her face had banished the demon of loneliness, if only for some time. He knew he loved her right this moment and he loved her before and was going to love her all his life, but sadly he only saw her that day. She was standing at the bar, the light still shining reaffirming that the moon may not always be the one that rises to give off lights to us mortal beings. He was stunned and entranced, entranced by the soft mischief of her eyes,  the nonchalance of her laughter as she sat talking with the bartender, the smooth falling of her hair on her face.  He couldn’t help but ask himself, ‘Did my heart love till now.’  She was tall, being of a rather formidable height, the kind he had rarely seen and was holding a glass of whisky. Her slender fingers traced the rim of the glass slowly, as if her eyes traced something in a distance. She had her reddish-brown hair tied in a messy bun without a care in the world with a freckle falling on her face.

He walked to the bar and ordered a whisky, with lots of ice, the only way he liked it. It always put him in a pensive mood. He was good and he knew it, even the fact that he was going to hell. He needed something strong to silence all the voices he did not want to hear, some which came from inside him, like something turned inside him and some which came from people he did not want to see the face and hear the voices off. From his left he heard a soft voice, almost a whisper as if it was telling the most important and unknown secret of the world, the kind that every man wants to hear from the mouth of a woman, like the words were put there just for him.

‘I always thought I would fall in love with a man who drinks his scotch like that.’

He responded in his trademark nonchalance, for he was indifferent, he had been with pretty girls in the past but they always proved to be too much of a task, one which he was neither prepared for nor have the patience to go over.

‘Perhaps it is best for love to exist in books. Perhaps it can’t exist anywhere else.’

It was then that he faced her. And he heard and saw laughter different from anything he had ever seen. He heard an honest laugh, one that was not possessed by the various women he had known over the years. A laugh which would reverberate in his ears, many years later as the bullets would pierce his skin as Berlin would be taken by the Allied forces and he would be forced to go to trial only to plead to being guilty in the first minute of the trial. She laughed without any inhibitions, she laughed with an unforeseen freedom, and she laughed with genuine happiness. He couldn’t help but smile, one akin to her laughter, genuine. His smile was in stark contrast to the one he had put on for so many women over the years.  It was not because of an aversion to being pleased or humored but because of his skeptical outlook toward people. He did not subscribe to the school of thought which publicized of the innate goodness of people. It was also due to the world he lived in; the dark and portentous atmosphere of these tumultuous times was taking a toll on him. He had to look deep inside him to find humanity in his heart, if there was any left.

‘Ilsa Flynn’ she said extending her hand.

‘Paul Himmler’, he said taking the hand.

‘So, Mr. Himmler, what is your deepest, darkest secret?’She asked as if it was the most normal and right thing to ask.

‘I’m sorry?’ he asked, not sure if he had heard her right the first time around.

‘I asked you, what is your deepest, darkest secret?’

He was visibly taken aback but it was this unabashedness that he was to fall in love with. A love which was to loom, take him out of his deep internal hell, a place to which he was accustomed that he began considering it home.

They keep meeting in the forthcoming days, with the frequency of the visits increasing. They came to know each other intimately through their many conversations, conversations which would sometimes spawn hours and which they would have beneath the stars, with Ilsa remarking,

‘How lovely to lie here in the starlight, thinking of nothing but of love, with you, forever.’

Once in his home, digging deep through his trunks and bags while he sat on his bed completing some documents she discovered an old book of poems that he had written, with the last entry dating back to the day he had left for Berlin. She brought it to him and handed it over. A puzzled expression appeared on his face while she positioned her hand on his lap and took his left hand in hers enveloping it in her warmth.

‘Recite some for me’, she said in her usual chirpy, spirited tone.

‘No I just write as a means of blowing off steam. It’s not made for recital. No one’s read it.’, he said.

‘Well let’s change that’, she said closing her eyes and awaited the poetry to start.

‘Never until the mankind making
Bird beast and flower
Fathering and all humbling darkness
Tells with silence the last light breaking
And the still hour
Is come of the sea tumbling in harness

And I must enter again the round
Zion of the water bead
And the synagogue of the ear of corn
Shall I let pray the shadow of a sound
Or sow my salt seed
In the least valley of sackcloth to mourn’

He dared not look into her eyes as his poetry was something that he was deeply unsure of and hence did not want any reactions. He suddenly felt her hands cupping his face and drawing his eyes level with hers. Without saying a word, she moved in and met his lips with hers; he felt her soft hands caressing his cheeks. When their lips parted she looked at him and smiled a smile which he was yet to fully understand.

He confided in her like hadn’t dared to in anyone. He told her things about himself that he had meant to take to his grave. He told her about his past, a facet of his life that he had never discussed with anyone.  One night after making love in the candlelight for the first time, Ilsa suddenly had tears in her eyes. She said that she was reminded of home because of all his warmth and the safety that she felt with him.

He told her, ‘My father used to tell me that I would never amount to anything. He used to come home drunk and beat my mother and me. He used to break the china dishes that my mother loved. But he once said something that has always stayed with me, no matter where I go. He said, “Greatness does not come to those who wait idly and in oblivion for greatness is like a fine lady, you’ve got to pursue her and hound her to obtain her.” There was no other way to it. SO that’s what I did and yes I had to do a lot of things that I did not want to because of this.’

He looked, unable to bear all those experiences and pain but the Ilsa slowly took his hand and kissed it lightly, as if a gentle breeze and said, ‘I love you forever.’ It was after she had slept that he thought to himself, ‘How beautiful’, he thought, ‘to love someone without a care in the world, to hold them in the dark of the night and see their face and their eyes and give them a tender kiss, a kiss for the night.’ Often people like to be alone. They are alone and are envious for their partners for their time alone. But they were never like that. They were alone, but together, they were alone against the world.

Their closeness was moving at a rate as fast as the deterioration of the conditions in Berlin. The war was going to come to an end, with their defeat being the general consensus. It was widely covered in the papers and a strict crackdown was initiated to kill all Jews. They were by the riverside on a sunny day with his head on her lap, watching Ilsa’s beautiful tresses falling on her face.

‘It is only going to get worse. I don’t think there is anything that can save Jews now.’

‘Paul I need to tell you something.’ Said Ilsa in a tone that was completely unlike her, even though she did get melancholic, she seldom sounded upset.

‘Yes, what is it?’ he said in a reassuring manner getting up knowing that it was something important.

‘My parents came from Paris after it was taken as we would have been killed. They were caught and put in a concentration camp but I was able to escape. I am a Jew, Paul.’

It was then that it dawned upon him, what he had done, who he had fallen in love with, the dangers of such an affair. He kept silent, thinking. He remembered what his mother used to say to him,

‘What are we born to do if not love and be loved? Never give up on the people you love.’

It was then that he made a decision.

He made her move into his house. He knew if there was any chance of her safety it was there. But he had underestimated the Gestapo’s determination. When a crackdown was initiated at the houses of the officers’ he realized that Ilsa was in terrible danger and one day when he came home unusually drunk he mentioned it to her without meaning to. The next morning as he woke up he saw Ilsa’s bags packed and she sat at the foot of the bed. As soon as he woke up she moved towards him and ran her hands through his hair. She slowly caressed his cheeks and kissed him. She said,

‘Paul I have never known anyone who has given me so much love, so selflessly. I will never forget all that you have done for me. And it is for this reason that I can’t put you and your life in danger. I beg you not to try to find me and waste your time doing so. I am going away, far away.’

‘But, Ilsa, I don’t live without you, that is not something I’ve come to know. I am for you. You are for me.’, he said without a clot forming in his throat.

‘Paul please don’t. Promise me you’ll always be happy. Promise you you’ll fall in love.’, she said turning her face away.

‘But I already have. I can only fall in love with you, all over again and be ruined.’, he said holding her hand.

‘I should go.’ She said and left and he could only watch as he felt his insides being kicked out and the life draining from him. He could say nothing. He could only think about the impending war as he heard the door close.

‘This is what we get for love. For trying to do something better. War, blood and death. Perhaps they were right about war. Perhaps the world can only have one, love or war, for although they exist in contradiction for one instant they can unite and create havoc in the lives of people.’

Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, the executioners would remember him for time immemorial and forever more as the only man they’d seen smile as the sentence was carried as it was known that people having seen solitude and love in the same life often die brave, courageous for the world did not break them, as they were already broken and the world did not sadden them as they were already melancholy and the world did not kill them as they died the day they were separated from their loves.

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