The Other Einstein(78)

The document would indeed turn me into Albert’s chattel.

I felt Helene standing alongside me in solidarity, emboldening me to say, “What on earth makes you think that I would agree to this? That I would sink further down than I’ve already let you bury me?”

“I will not stay in this apartment with you otherwise,” he said with a certain aplomb. I then realized that he won, whether I agreed or not. Whether I stayed or not.

I shoved the paper back into his hands. It saddened me to think that I already met most of these conditions. How low I had plummeted.

I took a deep breath and calmly announced, “You needn’t worry.”

He looked incredulous. “You will agree to the terms?”

“Oh no, I would never agree to those terms, Albert. You don’t have to worry about staying in the apartment with us, because we will leave.”





Chapter 40


July 29, 1914

Berlin, Germany

The train whistle cried out, and Tete clapped at the sound. He didn’t understand the magnitude of this leave-taking. For him, it was just one more trip to one more destination. There had been so many.

For me, this train ride back to Zürich was an entirely different sort of journey. Zürich represented old friends, my years of education, possible work, a healthy climate and steady political situation for the boys, and the best chance at a happy life without Albert.

Albert stood near us as the train prepared to admit passengers. After hugging Tete, he tried to embrace Hans Albert several times, but my eldest son wriggled free from his grasp. Hans Albert was not nearly as unaware—or as forgiving—as his brother.

The train doors opened, and both boys clasped onto my hands. Albert kneeled down to say one last good-bye to them, and tears glinted in the corners of his eyes. It was the first sign of remorse or sadness I’d seen since we arrived in Berlin.

“Why so sad, Papa?” Tete asked, leaning forward to touch Albert’s eyes with his free hand.

The gentle caress unleashed something dammed up in Albert. He sobbed to the boys, “I will miss you both.”

I had only seen Albert cry once before, on the death of his father.

Was Albert finally regretting his actions? Perhaps time apart would make him appreciate us, although I doubted Albert was truly capable of change. Stop, I told myself. I couldn’t afford to think this way; it opened the door to weakness. And I could no longer accept his tyranny. This was farewell to our marriage.

Tete released my hand and hugged his father. “Don’t worry, Papa. We will see you soon.”

Hans Albert was unmoved by Albert’s rare display of anguish. Instead, he tightened his grip on me. He made no move toward Albert.

“All aboard for Zürich!” The engineer called out from the train window.

“Come, Tete,” I said to him. “We must go.”

I took him by the hand and, without looking back at Albert, led both boys onto the train. We secured an empty car, and as I settled the boys into their seats with snacks to eat and books to read and the attendant loaded our luggage onto the racks, I saw Albert still standing on the platform. Tears were streaming down his face.

Where had those tears been all this time? I’d spent years without empathy or compassion for myself or the boys or Lieserl. Even in our separation these past weeks, I’d seen no evidence of melancholy over our failed marriage or his parting from his sons. Poor Fritz Haber, a chemistry professor acquaintance of ours, had been enlisted to memorialize the terms of separation we had painfully agreed upon. Custody with me. A yearly sum for the boys’ care. Vacations with Albert, but never in Elsa’s company. Household furnishing sent to me in Zürich. Proceeds of any future Nobel Prize to me, an honor that seemed likely, given that he’d been nominated four of the past five years. Negotiating this last term had given rise to the only real show of emotion in our separation, but it was anger, not sadness. Albert had initially resisted the notion of parting with the Nobel Prize monetary proceeds—which he expected from any one of our four 1905 papers—but I insisted. Since he’d unilaterally removed my name from those papers, thereby putting the actual award out of my reach, the least I deserved was the money.

No tears flowed down my cheeks. I was numb.

I smiled over at my anxious boys, trying to assuage their fears. The train car, although brimming with our belongings and ornately decorated in red velvet, felt strangely empty. Was something missing? Our trunks and luggage were stored safely in the racks over our heads, and our handbags and backpacks sat nearby on the benches. It couldn’t be the absence of Albert; the boys and I had grown accustomed to traveling without him, to living without him, really. What was the source of this sensation then? Could the missing something be Lieserl? No, she was here with me, the guiding shadow in my life, absent yet somehow always present. Perhaps the something unaccounted for was the old self I was leaving behind. For the first time in a very long time, I felt like Mitza again.

The train’s whistle blew, and I peered out the window. There Albert stood. Clacking and roaring, the train began to pick up speed as it exited the station. It sped away faster and faster, making Albert grow smaller and smaller. Like a quanta. Or an atom. Until he disappeared entirely into the ether.





Epilogue


August 4, 1948

62 Huttenstrasse