Her children exchanged a look behind her back, but when their father raised his eyebrows at them in warning, they obediently murmured consent.
As the days passed, Sara followed the story in the press, looking for Natan’s name in the byline and, despite the harrowing events, feeling a stir of pride at his new title. She was shocked to learn that none of the roughly three hundred protesters had been arrested, less surprised to read that most of the windows broken belonged to businesses owned by Jews.
And though there was not a word of truth to it, the National Socialist press spread the rumor that the Communists had started the riot. They proclaimed the lie so often and so emphatically that those who had not seen the riot for themselves could not distinguish truth from falsehood.
Chapter Four
October 1930–August 1931
Mildred
When Mildred transferred to the University of Berlin in the autumn of 1930, she went alone.
Earlier that summer, Arvid had received his PhD in economics, summa cum laude, and had applied to the University of Berlin to complete hisHabilitationsarbeit, the postdoctorate research and publishing essential for acquiring a professorship. When he was assured that the position was all but certain, Mildred arranged to accompany him, but just as her transfer to the university was complete, Arvid’s application was declined due to budget cuts and faculty reductions. The only offer he received was from the University of Marburg, about five hundred kilometers southwest of Berlin.
“To think I’ve crossed an ocean to be with you, only to part from you again,” Mildred had lamented after her frantic last-minute attempts to find a position at Marburg failed.
“It will only be for a little while,” he had assured her, cupping her face in his hands and gently raising it to meet his kiss. “I’ll see you almost every weekend, and you won’t be lonely with Inge and the boys. She’ll be glad for your company too.”
In the aftermath of Inge’s recent divorce from the sculptor Johannes Auerbach, she had moved with their two sons from their home in Paris to an apartment in Berlin. “Stay with me until Arvid can join you here,” she had offered when she learned of Arvid and Mildred’s impending separation. “I have the space, and we’ll be less lonely if we’re together.”
Mildred had accepted gratefully. She adored Inge and the boys, and she and Arvid could barely afford one monthly rent payment, much less two leases in separate cities. But even knowing that she would have Inge for company, she had dreaded parting from Arvid. They had promised to write daily, letters so rich in detail and expression that they would feel as if they had spent every moment together. They were each other’s most devoted advocate and most insightful critic, partners in all things, colleagues as well as lovers. A mere five hundred kilometers could not change that.
Once in Berlin, Mildred had settled into Inge’s spare room, and, almost as easily, into her roles as graduate student and lecturer. She filled her hours with both duties and pleasures—studying, teaching, attending concerts and theater performances—and playing with her young nephews. Arvid visited when he could. One morning a few days after the October 13 riot, he and Mildred took his nephews to the zoo in the Tiergarten. Mildred marveled at how quickly the broken glass had been swept up, the scrawled graffiti painted over. One could almost pretend the new Reichstag had opened to utter tranquility.
Wulf and Claus seemed to have forgotten the uproar entirely, if they had ever been aware of it. Mildred and Arvid shared smiles as the boys darted from one exhibit to the next, imitating a family of baboons, marveling at the enormity of the elephants. Someday, Mildred hoped, she and Arvid would bring their own children there.
Even when Arvid could not be with her in Berlin, Mildred found much to love about the city—the museums, the opera, the parks, the theaters, and above all, the renowned university. Some of her new colleagues expressed surprise that a woman from Wisconsin would come to Germany to study for a doctorate in American literature, but she explained that studying American literature from a European perspective helped her to see it more objectively, to better understand her country’s place in the world.
Berlin also provided some respite from the steadily increasing popularity of the Nazis in Jena and Giessen where she had previously taught. While teaching at the latter, Mildred had been shocked and dismayed when, in response to a university newspaper poll about political preferences, nearly half of the students said they supported the National Socialists. On several unsettling occasions she had witnessed hostile students openly confronting faculty members they suspected of being socialists or pacifists. At the University of Berlin, although increasing numbers of Mildred’s students wore Brownshirt uniforms or Nazi lapel pins to class, they kept their outrage at a simmer rather than a full boil, which was less than ideal but still better than elsewhere.
On weekends when Arvid could not visit her in Berlin, Mildred went to him in Marburg if she could. She found the city’s Gothic character enchanting, especially after she learned that the Brothers Grimm had collected many of their fairy tales there. Throughout the autumn and into the winter, she and Arvid strolled through the narrow, twisting streets of the medieval district, occasionally accompanied by Arvid’s new friend Egmont Zechlin, a history lecturer at the university. Until the first heavy snowfalls made the trek too difficult, the three enjoyed hiking along the Lahn River or making strenuous climbs up Frauenberg to see the castle ruins, debating politics, the economic crisis, and whether the Soviets were on to something with their Five-Year Plan. Capitalism certainly seemed to have failed both the United States and Germany. Perhaps another economic system entirely would be required to pull them out of the Great Depression.
Mildred and Arvid spent the Christmas holidays with the extended Harnack clan in Jena, nearly inseparable for a blissful fortnight filled with love and laughter, family and friends. When they parted early in the New Year to return to their separate campuses in far-flung cities, Mildred’s heart ached with loneliness despite the comfort of Inge’s friendship and the distraction of work. And yet as the new term got under way, she glimpsed promising signs that better days were just ahead. In February, quite unexpectedly, the university invited her to present a special lecture on American literature to faculty and students. She chose as her topic “Romantic and Married Love in the Works of Hawthorne,” and she was gratified—and relieved—by the audience’s overwhelmingly positive response.
More lecture requests followed. “Don’t they know I’m only a graduate student?” she asked Inge over breakfast the morning after her third lecture, still glowing from the unusual honor. “Some people wait their entire careers to lecture at Berlin University, and many more never get the chance.”
“Who better to lecture on American literature than an American?” said Inge, eyes dancing with their shared happiness.
To Mildred, both her university and Arvid’s were islands of peace and rationality compared to the roiling sea of unrest surrounding them. Germany seemed more volatile by the day, with street fights between Communist Reds and Nazi Browns erupting frequently.
“I’m almost not surprised anymore when I read about these brawls in the papers,” she told Arvid one Saturday afternoon in early spring as they strolled down a cobblestone street in Marburg.
Arvid stopped short and touched her cheek with the backs of his fingers. “Darling, you must never become accustomed to the extraordinary and the outrageous. If you do, little by little, you’ll learn to accept anything.”
She took his advice to heart, and as spring passed and summer came, and as Nazi belligerence toward women, Communists, and Jews became a daily occurrence, she refused to pretend it was not happening, to let it become background noise like so much passing traffic.
On August 7, Mildred and Arvid celebrated their fifth anniversary with a two-day excursion to the Black Forest. They hiked through lovely pine and beech forests to a mountain cabin, where they celebrated with flowers and a cake that had survived the journey rather well considering that it had been packed in Arvid’s knapsack. When they discovered two narrow cots where they had expected a bed for two, they laughed, spread blankets on the floor, and made love to the sounds of nightbirds and wind in the trees.
Afterward, as they lay close together, contented and deliciously fatigued, Arvid took her hand and laced his fingers through hers. “These have been the most wonderful five years of my life.”
“Mine too,” said Mildred, resting her head on his shoulder, thoroughly content.
“I have an anniversary gift for you—for us both, really.” He stroked her hair, his fingertips brushing her cheek. “I’ve found a temporary job doing legal work in Berlin beginning in late September. We’ll be together again.”
She gasped, delighted. “But what about yourHabilitationsarbeit?”
“I’m mostly working on my own at this stage. I can do that in Berlin as easily as in Marburg. I’ll ply my trade by day, write in the evenings, and return to the university once a month to consult with my professors.” He kissed her tenderly. “Are you happy?”
