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Back The Woman on the Stairs Save as PDF
Chapters (83)
  1. Cover
  2. Also by Bernhard Schlink
  3. Title Page
  4. Copyright
  5. Part One
  6. 1
  7. 2
  8. 3
  9. 4
  10. 5
  11. 6
  12. 7
  13. 8
  14. 9
  15. 10
  16. 11
  17. 12
  18. 13
  19. 14
  20. 15
  21. 16
  22. 17
  23. 18
  24. 19
  25. 20
  26. 21
  27. 22
  28. 23
  29. 24
  30. 25
  31. 26
  32. Part Two
  33. 1
  34. 2
  35. 3
  36. 4
  37. 5
  38. 6
  39. 7
  40. 8
  41. 9
  42. 10
  43. 11
  44. 12
  45. 13
  46. 14
  47. 15
  48. 16
  49. 17
  50. 18
  51. 19
  52. 20
  53. 21
  54. 22
  55. 23
  56. 24
  57. 25
  58. Part Three
  59. 1
  60. 2
  61. 3
  62. 4
  63. 5
  64. 6
  65. 7
  66. 8
  67. 9
  68. 10
  69. 11
  70. 12
  71. 13
  72. 14
  73. 15
  74. 16
  75. 17
  76. 18
  77. 19
  78. 20
  79. 21
  80. 22
  81. Author’s Note
  82. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
  83. What’s next onyour reading list?

Whenever I’m in a foreign country, I ask myself if I’d be happier there. When I walk down a street and see people standing on a corner, talking and laughing, I imagine that if I lived there, I might stand happily on that corner, talking and laughing. When I walk past an outdoor café and a man walks up to a woman seated at a table, and they greet each other warmly, I think, here I would meet a woman once more who would be happy to see me, as I would be happy to see her. And when the evening lights in the windows go on! Every window promises freedom and safety, freedom from the old life, and safety in a new one. Now, even the simple act of reading awoke a yearning for a different life, in a different world.

Not that I had ever felt shackled to my life. My wife and I made a good team, yet each of us had our freedom. Had she wanted to, she could have worked. We could have afforded a nanny. But she did not want to and, without her, the children would not have turned out as they did; perhaps I would not have either. When she decided to go into local politics, she would not have got as far as she did were it not for my influence. No, I was not shackled. I could never have abandoned everything overnight – house, family, firm – and started out elsewhere. And the colleagues and friends who abandoned marriages and careers, and found a new, younger wife, or a different, more modern job, a thirty-two-year-old event manager replacing a fifty-year-old housewife, a position as a therapist or mediator instead of as a lawyer – after a few years they were back where they’d started: quarreling at home and fed up at work. No, I was not shackled to my life, rather I had chosen it with care, and held on to it with care. It is not as if I couldn’t have found a new, younger wife. I do not turn heads, but I keep in shape, and can afford things, I have something to offer a young woman. But I didn’t want that.

Odd, how what happened in my life seems both inevitable and to have happened by chance. My choice of career, of wife, of having one child then another and another, my choice of a big law firm – one thing led to the next. I chose my career out of spite; I married because there was no good reason not to. The first decision led to the big law firm; the second, to three children.

23

The head of the detective agency called me on Monday. He asked if I was still in Sydney and if I wanted to drop by. It was better, he said, to talk in person.