‘I would thank the caller for saving my life.’
‘Ah, but perhaps you wouldn’t have been killed at all? Perhaps during the course of events you would have met someone of great importance, someone who would have led you to a different fork in your path, a fork that would have led to another and another? In any event, imagine that because you did not take that train you are now crossing the road at the exact time that a car’s brakes fail and it ploughs into you, killing you. Karma was the caller – but the choice was yours to take the call. Freedom lives in that choice. One can’t imagine how many choices one makes in the course of a day, choices that affect not only one’s future, but the collective future of all humanity. No, you are here because you have made a choice to be here.’
I looked at him, trying to see where he was going with this, but his face betrayed nothing. ‘But what about you – you also made a choice when you invited me to come here?’
‘Did I?’ he said.
‘Aren’t you also free to create your own forking paths?’
‘Sometimes we do things not out of our own need, but out of a desire to further the evolution of the world.’
‘A sacrifice, you mean?’
He nodded. ‘Take the sniper who had Hitler in his sights and who decided, at the last moment, to let him live. Imagine how different the world would be now: how many writers, artists, poets, musicians, scientists, mothers, fathers and children would have contributed to the world had it not been for one man’s poor choice. Perhaps when that sniper died he had to relive that moment over and over again, until he realised that his own personal goodness was a puny concern, in comparison to the many lives he could have saved.’
I sat forwards and set down my cup. ‘You are saying that if the sniper had pulled the trigger and killed Hitler, he could have secured a different destiny for the world, even if it meant sacrificing his own personal karma?’
‘Precisely. That soldier was there to kill Hitler, that was his karma, you see? He chose not to follow it.’
I had to smile. This strange man intrigued me.
‘You find this interesting?’
‘Yes, I do.’
‘The moment that lies between what drives us from the past and what pulls us towards the future is the one moment in which we are completely free, completely conscious and completely alive. So, imagine we are in this moment. If this were a novel as yet to be written by you, and I were your character, poised in that moment, what would you have me do?’
‘I would have you tell me why I’m here.’
‘Touché!’ He was pleased. ‘I would say you’re here because you want to know how it begins.’
‘How what begins?’
‘Your new novel.’
‘And how does it begin?’
‘It begins with a telegram, an invitation to meet someone mysterious. Now, let’s say your character guesses the invitation must be from a fan of his work, because the telegram offers the prospect of a patronage. Let’s assume that the message could not have arrived at a better time. His last book isn’t selling well, and he needs funds to research another book. Let’s imagine that in the meantime, he is surviving by the barest margin, living hand-to-mouth. So when the offer comes to meet a generous benefactor in an apartment in Berlin, well, he does the only logical thing a man in those circumstances could have done – he finds himself in Prinz Albrechstrasse.
‘The street has changed little since his childhood, except these days it houses the Gestapo and the headquarters of the SS, and everywhere on shop front doors and on walls two words are written: “Juden Unerwünscht” – Jews Unwelcome.
‘When your protagonist arrives at the fashionable apartment building, he checks the address against the telegram and the time against his pocket watch and looks up. The sky is steel blue and the sun is cold. He stands like that, in his rather shabby double-breasted suit that does little to keep off the swift breeze, trying to resist the impulse to turn around. But where could he go? The financial embarrassment that led to his rather hasty expulsion from France meant he couldn’t return. At least not until his circumstances had improved enough for him to pay his creditors. It’s no wonder the poor are all Communists! He sighs, looking again at the telegram.
YOUR BOOK SUPERIOR WORK STOP A THOUSAND MARKS A
MONTH FOR SECOND STOP FURTHER SUM TO SETTLE AFFAIRSSTOP BERLIN FEB 18 15:00 7 PRINZ ALBRECHTSTRASSE STOP
‘Shortly after receiving this telegram, a small fortune in deutschmarks was wired to him and a letter followed, containing a first-class train ticket from Paris to Berlin. How could he resist such a generous offer? It was a balm to know that someone appreciated his work enough to pay for it. Still, he was full of misgivings. Why had the publisher or benefactor not given his name? Why did he want to meet in an apartment? Could he be one of those Jewish publishers that had been shut down by the Nazis?