Konrad and Alexandra (PDF) - Rolf Gross

She left the church in panic.In a quiet piazza she found a stone bench in the sun. She leaned against the warm wall and closed her eyes.Paranoia, auditory hallucinations, she analyzed herself with clinical precision. The next step, schizophrenia. She shookher head. What was going on inside her: the bloodbath in East-Prussia, the superstitious train conductor, Clara inHanover, Dahl’s skeptical analysis of her work, her clairvoyance before Kandinsky’s painting of Nina, and now, voices.Were these events related? Maybe the vision of the bloodbath and the voice in the church were products of her owndistressed psyche, but she should not attach mystical meanings to the other happenings, they were ordinarycoincidences.When Dahl had asked her about the meaning of life, she had been flippant. What really did she know about death? Shehad never faced it, death had never before spoken to her.She truly meant what she had told Dahl; death experiences were able to open one’s mind. But to imagine death as herconstant companion was another matter. She had not given much thought to death’s constant presence.A group of children had set up a game of hopscotch on the flagstones of the piazza, their noisy laughter drove the ghostsaway.Clara had given her a copy of Rilke’s Elegies and Claudia a slim volume, Vereinigungen by Musil. She read in both atrandom, drifting between Rilke’s religious visions, Musil’s dissolute characters, the floating seascape, and her new visionof ever-present death.As night descended, the islands dissolved in a haze of blues and purples. Somewhere an orchestra played dance music.She had skipped dinner in favor of remaining on deck in her chair, letting herself be spun into a cocoon by her books andthe night.A man’s voice interrupted her dreams. He spoke Georgian. "Alexandra, would you allow me to dance with you?"The familiar voice startled her. She looked up and closed her eyes in confusion. Dizziness overcame her. Anotherapparition?Dato Ortaladze.He sat down in a chair next to her and silently waited for her to recover.When she looked at him again, he was smiling."Forgive my disturbing you. I saw you already in Venice, and have watched you with confused feelings ever since. But Icould not bring myself to speak to you. You did not recognize me. I finally told Christine, my wife, what happened inShuamta. I had never dared disturb our marriage with these old, adolescent tales. Christine urged me to talk to you andbring you two together. "Silence befell them. Alexandra closed her eyes and sighed. Persephone’s prophecy. Dato had come back to her—withthe woman who would save him.She tried to chase Venice from her mind. For the moment she needed a clear head. Dato had no idea of Persephone’scurse and her expecting him. She looked at him and said very slowly, "Yes, I will dance with you. I once promised to bethere for you whenever you needed me. And take me to Christine. Is she German?""Yes, she is from Hersfeld near Kassel. I met her in Jena and we got married five years ago. Fourteen years is a longtime. I could not wait for a Georgian girl to fall in love with me…."She danced with him once or twice, careful not to rouse his Georgian ardor, and she met Christine.During her morning meditation next day, the same inner voice she had heard in the church spoke to her, this time inGeorgian and with Konrad’s German accent."Alexandra, don’t fear, I am your most trustworthy friend and advisor. You can always find me behind your left shoulder."She opened her eyes. "Yes," she said in Georgian, "yes, I will dance with you."Clara von Bredow received Alexandra like a long-lost sister at the pier in Constantinople. For a week they walked all overthe many-layered city. Alexandra began to appreciate Islamic architecture in Sinan’s exquisite mosques. For the first timeshe was able to see beyond the painful, inherited memories of the loss of the Holy City of Eastern Christendom. Only inthe Hagia Sophia could she not completely relinquish her deep-seated resentments of Islam.Joachim, the skeptical, professional diplomat, was filled with ominous forebodings of things to come. War seemedunavoidable to him, but he refused to be specific. He knew too much which he could not discuss. Kaiser Wilhelm II’sarrogant posturing towards France and Britain was inexcusably stupid. And dangerous. And the enfeebled Sultan wouldhappily join in any adventure Wilhelm suggested.Clara, who had spent their life easing her husband’s rage against the diplomatic blunders of his imperial employer, triedto soften Joachim’s pessimism to no avail.It needed only some minor spark and the European political powder keg would explode—and God have mercy on us ifthat should happen. The largest and most disastrous conflagration the world had ever seen.Alexandra had, as soon as she had disembarked in Batumi, sent a telegram to her parents. When she arrived in Tiflis herfather waited for her at the station. Alone.190