The Karnau Tapes Read Online Free PDF Page A

yesterday evening, after his birthday party, and spent the night there. The nursemaid calls to me across the dark landing: 'Finished, Helga? Then comb your hair neatly and go down to the drawing-room, the gentleman's waiting for you in there. Say how do you do and tell him the others will be down right away.'
    Papa's bound to be downstairs, waiting to say goodbye to us and chatting with his friend. I stop to listen on the stairs, but I can't hear any voices from the drawing-room, only plates clattering in the kitchen. Perhaps they're speaking quietly.
    It's very dark in the drawing-room, only one light on, the one on the coffee table. I can see someone's head over the back of the armchair. It's in shadow, but Papa's head is smaller and his neck is thinner, it must be his friend. I pause in the doorway: he doesn't move, he hasn't heard me sneaking down the stairs. I'm just about to turn round and tiptoe off to the kitchen when he stands up and looks at me, so he must have heard me after all. He says how do you do and introduces himself. His name is Herr Karnau. I thought he'd be much older, this friend of our parents. How will such a young man manage to look after the five of us? He's looking very tired, too. He smiles at me in the gloom and says, 'You're Helga, the eldest, right?'
    I just nod and shake hands, then I go to the kitchen. I've never seen the man before, and Mama and Papa have never mentioned having such a young friend. The others appear in the kitchen one by one, last of all the nursemaid with Hedda, who's all clean and tidy. There's cocoa and bread and jam, but none of us can eat anything as early as this. We don't finish our cocoa and leave half-eaten slices of bread on our plates. The nursemaid fetches Herr Karnau from the drawing-room. He says hello to us all, but the others just stare at him and say nothing.
    Now we're standing in the hall with our coats and scarves — on. The nursemaid tells Herr Karnau a few things to look out for, like we're not allowed to play on the floor or sit in a draught because we catch cold so easily — if one of us gets it the others do too, she says. Herr Karnau looks at us all in turn, then picks up Hedda and walks on ahead, out into the street. Papa's chauffeur has already loaded the suitcases. It isn't anything like as cold as the nursemaid thought, but it's drizzling, the rain is almost like mist, it glistens in the beam of the masked headlights. Papa hasn't come to say goodbye, and I'd have liked to ask him about Herr Karnau. A few cars are already driving along Hermann Goring Strasse. The air smells funny, like autumn leaves rotting, like porridge when the milk catches.
    Papa's chauffeur opens the door for us. We fit in the back, all five of us. Hedda and Holde share the fold-down seat, they lie there and go on sleeping under a big woollen rug. Holde's head is propped against the cold window-pane; her hair quivers whenever the car goes over a bump. Herr Karnau looks back at us from the passenger seat and talks to Hilde and me in a low voice. We're sitting on the back seat with Helmut between us, he's resting his head on my lap and dozing with his eyes open. The rain is pattering on the roof, the windscreen wipers are squeaking. The chauffeur doesn't speak, he's staring straight ahead through the windscreen, which keeps steaming up. Herr Karnau has a dog at home, he says it's looking forward to seeing us. How did Herr Karnau know that Hilde loves animals more than anything in the world? Did he ask Mama and Papa about us? Quietly, so as not to wake the two little ones, he says: 'Coco has black fur, it's specially soft on his neck, that's where he loves being tickled.'
    Hilde's wide awake in a flash. 'Coco?' She giggles. 'That's not a dog's name. Have you ever heard of a dog called Coco, Helga? We've had a red setter since the summer, but he's out at Schwanenwerder, not in town. His name is Treff, that's a proper dog's name.'
    But Hilde says she's sure Coco is a darling in