The Sixth Key Read Free

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?
    ‘Perhaps I should say something about the
state of Germany at that time. Your character had arrived back in his homeland
when there was a general feeling of enthusiasm for the promise of a new life
and for the return of German pride. After all, the re-arming of Germany had
been achieved without conflict, and the endless political wrangling of Weimar
was over. These events were like the herald of a new age.
    ‘The supposed Nazi vision of cultural rebirth
should have fitted quite nicely with your character’s own idealistic views, had
he been a man of his times. But he was not a man