The Girl from Berlin: Gruppenführer's Mistress

by Ellie Midwood

  Lost in my thoughts I didn’t even notice how we pulled up at one of the buildings until Heinrich opened my door and offered me a hand to help me out of the car.

  “Are you sleeping with your eyes open?” He smiled at my confused look.

  “No, I was just thinking.”

  “About what?”

  “About how lucky I am to have a husband like you.”

  “You can express your gratitude when we get home.” He grinned at me. “But now let’s solve our little problem first.”

  He motioned me to follow him inside the dark hallway of the building. On the fourth floor my husband stopped by one of the apartments and knocked on the door using a certain pattern. It opened surprisingly fast, and an unshaved man with messy hair stuck his head through the opening. We obviously woke him up.

  “Hello, Schtolz.”

  “Has something happened, sir?” The man immediately let us in and closed the door behind so no neighbors could overhear our conversation.

  “Yes, something did happen. We need to find Josef and find him fast. Can you help us with his whereabouts?”

  “Josef? Josef who?”

  “The Underground leader Josef. Do you know where we can find him? We don’t have much time.”

  The man slowly shook his head with a pensive look.

  “I’m not sure, sir. I deal with some people from his circle, but never with him. Maybe you should ask Mark?”

  “Who’s Mark?”

  “Mark the Bulldog, the one with the funny face, who used to help the Jews with passports.”

  “I’ve never met him directly, but I think my wife did.”

  I nodded. I didn’t know his name back then, but I knew who they were talking about very well; at the very beginning of the war, when the repressions against the German Jews only started gaining their full force, I used to deliver him passports secretly stamped by Heinrich in his office, which allowed their Jewish owners to freely cross the border with Switzerland and escape an arrest or even forced deportation to the labor camps.

  “He’s the one who lives in the former Jewish area, right? Next to the market?” I asked just to make sure.

  “Yes, that’s him. He still lives there and might know where to find your friend Josef. He helps him with ‘U-boats’ now.”

  ‘U-boats’ or Jews in hiding with fake papers were probably the only ones who were left in Berlin now. Underground people were helping them with getting those fake papers (exactly what my father used to do using his position as a lawyer), getting job placements that didn’t require thorough papers checking, and sometimes providing housing or food. The jobs that didn’t require paper checking were obviously not the top paid ones, and most of the families were struggling.

  Heinrich shook the man’s hand and opened the door for me.

  “Thank you, Schtolz. You helped us a lot. Of course in case if anybody asks…”

  “You were never here, sir. I know.”

  Heinrich smiled at his ‘connection.’

  “You’re a good man, Schtolz.”

  “Good luck, sir. Frau.”

  I nodded at him and followed my husband out of the building and into our car. As soon as we got inside, he pressed the accelerator and we started making our way to the former Jewish area, hoping that Mark would be more helpful than Schtolz.

  Mark was quite surprised to say the least to see us on his doorstep in the middle of the night, but nevertheless confirmed that he did know Josef personally and dealt with him on a regular basis, however, Josef’s current address was unknown to him.

  “You have to understand, he’s the Resistance leader and he doesn’t really list his name in the address book. I actually think he constantly moves from one place to another to avoid being captured.”

  “When is the next time you’re supposed to see him?” Heinrich asked.

  “Next week, around Wednesday. He lets me know through his men when and where.”

  Heinrich shook his head.

  “Too long. They will definitely get him by then. Does he have any relatives who he might stay with?”

  “Not that I know of.”

  “Close friends? A girlfriend, maybe?”

  Mark finally nodded.

  “He does have a girlfriend, she delivers me messages from him sometimes, and she’s a member of the Resistance herself. Her name is Rebekah, and she lives somewhere around here as well, I see her at the market quite often.”

  “You don’t know her exact address? A house or an apartment building at least?”

  “No, sir, I’m sorry. I would have told you if I did.”

  “But you must have an emergency way of contacting him, don’t you? If something suddenly goes down, you should have a way to get to him.”

  “Not really, sir. You should know better than the others how that goddamn Gestapo loves to kidnap people, pose as them and trick the others into revealing themselves. No, sir, Josef is smart in that sense, he only tells me where and when we’re meeting. I’m sorry, but that’s all I can help you with.”

  Heinrich remained silent for a moment, staring at the floor with a thoughtful look on his face, and then extended his hand to Mark.

  “Alright. Well, thank you, Mark, it’s still something.”

  “I’m sorry, sir.”

  After he closed the door behind us and we got back into the car, I looked at my husband.

  “Now what?”

  Heinrich shrugged.

  “We can try a couple more of my people, but I’m starting to think that the result will be the same. Our Josef is definitely not stupid, I guess that’s how he was able to stay alive for so long. That girlfriend of his, Rebekah, she’s our main clue. If we find her, we’ll find him.”

  “But how can we find her?”

  “That’s exactly what I’m trying to figure out now.”

  We both went quiet. I had no idea how to track people down, and was just desperately hoping that my husband would come up with something good. After all, that was a part of his profession. The worst part was that there was only two of us and a whole bunch of Gestapo agents against us. Time was quickly running out. Speaking of the Gestapo…

  For a second I was blinded by the lights of a car unhurriedly approaching ours from the back. Heinrich lowered my head to the seat and covered me with his body as the black car passed us by and proceeded around the corner. Heinrich and I exchanged looks.

  “Do you think…?”

  “Yes.” He nodded at me. “I think our friends know where to find Rebekah. Let’s follow them.”

  Unnoticed by the Secret Police, we got out of the car and walked in the direction in which their car disappeared. We couldn’t see it yet, but heard the noise of the motor running somewhere far in the distance. Trying to stay as close to the walls of the nearby buildings, we were slowly approaching the house by which they parked their car. Finally Heinrich motioned me to stop, and pressed me even closer to the wall behind his back.

  “Stay here, I’ll try to see what our colleagues from Amt IV are up to.”

  “Be careful!” I whispered back at him, and watched him disappear around the corner.

  In less than a minute he came back, and motioned me to follow him.

  “Don’t make a sound and keep your head low, we’ll hide behind that tree over there, see it?”

  “Yes.”

  We quickly made it to the tree, the thick base of which happened to be the perfect hiding place to spy on the Gestapo. I chuckled at the thought: we were actually spying on the Secret Police, whose job was to spy on everybody in the Reich. Heinrich turned around and shushed me.

  “Sorry. It’s the nerves,” I explained. He just shook his head at me.

  Completely covered by the darkness of the moonless night, we crouched in our hiding spot and watched the two men leaving the private house. The third, who was smoking outside the whole time, finished his cigarette and got behind the wheel. In less than a minute they were gone.

  “Why haven’t they arrested
her? Aren’t they supposed to take her in for interrogation?” I whispered at Heinrich.

  “I don’t know. Maybe it’s not her house. Or she isn’t at home.”

  “What shall we do now?”

  “Well, they’re gone, so let’s try and ask the owners of the house what did the Gestapo want from them.”

  Still staying as much in the shadow as possible, we quietly approached the private house and knocked on the door. An older man opened it and looked at us in surprise.

  “Yes?”

  “Hello.” Heinrich smiled at him. “Can we come in for a second?”

  “Who are you?”

  My husband didn’t wait for the man’s permission and basically pushed him aside with his body, pulled me inside and closed the door behind us.

  “We don’t want those other people to see us talk, do we?” He raised his eyebrow at the owner of the house.

  “What other people?” The old man sounded a little unsure.

  “You don’t have to pretend with me. I’m on your side. Mark told us that Rebekah lives somewhere around here. You wouldn’t be the one by chance to know her, would you?”

  The owner of the house eyed Heinrich for a moment, then shifted his eyes to me and back to Heinrich.

  “Who are you two?”

  “We aren’t from the Gestapo, and that’s all you need to know. Rebekah’s boyfriend Josef is in big danger as you probably figured out by now, and we need to find her to help him out.”

  Seeing that the man still wasn’t convinced, but definitely knew something, I decided to step in.

  “Please, sir, tell us where to find them. I’m Jewish myself, my father used to work closely with Josef before both my parents had to leave the country because of those Gestapo bastards. Please, help us help him before it’s too late!”

  The shade of uncertainty on the man’s face became slighter.

  “You know Josef?”

  “Yes, I saw him by my father’s house when he was picking up papers from him. He’ll recognize me when he sees me. Please, just tell us where to find him.”

  The old man finally smiled. “They searched the house, the Gestapo. They knew that my daughter lives here with me, but I told them that she is currently in Poland with her relatives. You see, I’m a German myself, so they don’t bother me too much. But my wife was Jewish and they killed her during the Kristallnacht. My daughter joined the Resistance right after. That’s how she met Josef. Wait here, please. I’ll bring her up from the basement.”

  “They didn’t search the basement?”

  “Of course they did. They always do. But they never find my hiding spot.”

  The owner of the house winked at us from under his bushy eyebrows and left us alone in the hallway. In less than a minute he came back with a young full figured girl who resembled him greatly, minus the beard of course. I couldn’t help but notice that she was holding something behind her back, probably some kind of a weapon. She frowned at us.

  “Who are you and what do you need Josef for?”

  “I know Josef personally,” I answered before Heinrich. I thought that the girl would be more inclined to trust another girl more than a man. “My father used to help him with getting different kinds of papers when he was a lawyer, but he had to leave the country soon after. We know that the Gestapo is looking for Josef and we’re trying to find him before they can. We want to help him escape.”

  Those last words of mine almost got stuck in my throat. I was lying to the face of that girl just because I wanted to help my parents and Adam, because I wanted to save people dear to me. Only now that I met Rebekah face to face, I realized that Josef was a man dear to her, and I was going to get him killed; take away the man she loved to let the two men I loved live. Was that fair? Not at all. I felt absolutely horrible under her hopeful stare.

  “He won’t run. Not at least for a long time.” Rebekah finally shook her head. “He’s a fighter, not a coward. There’s no way he’ll leave the country.”

  I could hear pride in her voice when she said that. My father wasn’t a coward either; I was. I made both him and Mama go to Switzerland because I was afraid for their lives.

  “Maybe he’ll just hide away till they lose his track?” Heinrich suggested. “Wait out for several weeks and then go back to his work if he wants to.”

  “But why do you want to help him anyway? Why do you care so much what happens to him?”

  I felt my heart skip a beat when she asked us that. Another pinch of shame made me lower my eyes to the floor. My husband, however, was a much better liar than I.

  “If the Gestapo gets Josef, the Resistance will be basically beheaded. You understand that he is the only one who ties all those different people into one big net, and without him we’ll all be no better than just a bunch of stranded blind kittens.” He was not just a good liar, but a great psychologist. “We want to help him help the others to stay in this fight. That’s why we care. We care for the sake of Germany.”

  Rebekah finally nodded.

  “Do you know the old church around the corner from the market?”

  “Yes,” we both answered at the same time.

  “Go over there and tell the priest who’s hiding him that you are Gunter’s sister’s caretakers. She said that she’s feeling better, but he still can’t come visit her because the measles are still contagious. However, you can take him to the house nearby where he’ll be absolutely safe. That’s the code. He’ll know that I sent you and that he should go with you.”

  “Thank you, Rebekah.” Heinrich shook hers and then her father’s hand. “We’ll try our best to help him out.”

  “Please, do.”

  As soon as we got back to our car, I covered my face with my hands and moaned.

  “Heinrich, this is so wrong, what we’re going to do! We really, really shouldn’t! What if we just leave everything as it is?”

  “I’ll tell you exactly what will happen if we leave everything as it is. Josef, he’ll still die. The Gestapo won’t sentence him to hard labor in one of the camps as a minor criminal, they’ll most definitely execute him, just to put the picture of his hanging body on the front pages. They will certainly execute Adam for giving false information, and also they’ll most definitely send a message to their undercover agents in Switzerland to get your parents as well. But before that not only they will get from Josef the names of all his closest connections, they will get the names of the ones who work with us as well. And those people in their turn under torture will most likely testify that a certain SD officer and his lovely wife have been doing very shady business lately. And even if we’ll be lucky enough to die an easy death from cyanide, they’ll start checking all of our friends and close acquaintances, which will lead them to Ingrid and Rudolf. They will prefer committing suicide to talking of course, but the two best American counterintelligence agents will still be dead. Now think about it, isn’t saving all those lives justified by taking one man’s life who won’t get to live anyway?”

  Heinrich was right. He was right through and through. I sighed and finally nodded at him.

  _______________

  We were driving outside Berlin for quite some time already. Well, actually it was Josef who was driving, because Heinrich told him that that’s the way it should be. Josef hesitated for a moment but agreed, as my husband and I got in the back seat. Even I wasn’t sure why Heinrich made such a request, hoping deep inside that he at least wouldn’t shoot Josef right in our car.

  “I thought the hideout was in Berlin?” The leader of the Resistance looked at us in the rearview mirror. The further we were getting from the German capital, the more suspicious he was getting, even though just half an hour ago he so willingly followed us to the car, right after he recognized me and even asked me how my father was doing.

  “No, it’s actually not,” Heinrich replied. “It’s a hut in the woods, the best place for you to wait out, because it’s exactly in Berlin where they’re looking for you.”

  �
��How are we going to find it now? The night is pitch black and they don’t have any lampposts in the forest, you know.”

  “Don’t worry about it, we have a flashlight.”

  “So what exactly shall I be looking out for along the road? I mean, how do you know where to enter the forest to get to the hut?”

  I noticed how Heinrich frowned. Josef started to get nervous and was asking more and more questions.

  “Just stop where I tell you to stop, alright?”

  “No, it’s not alright.” Josef suddenly hit the brakes and turned around to face us. “I’m not going anywhere until you tell me where the hell you’re taking me.”

  I saw how he put his hand in the right pocket as he was saying that. Heinrich saw it too. I pulled to a side a little, just in case.

  “Josef, listen to me.” Heinrich reassuringly put his gloved hand to Josef’s left shoulder, slightly pulling him back to his seat. “You know us. Well, at least you know my wife. We’re your friends, and you have to trust us. Just drive a little further until you see a road sign and the big tree sticking out to the road, that’s where we should enter. We can’t do this if we don’t trust each other, right?”

  Josef shifted his eyes from my husband to me, and I forced myself to smile at him. Finally he nodded, however his hand remained in his pocket.

  “Alright. But you drive this time, and I’ll sit in the back.”

  Heinrich wasn’t moving for several seconds, and I could sense the tension growing between the two men. Suddenly, Heinrich smiled and patted Josef’s other shoulder with his right hand.

  “Deal. But don’t flirt with my wife too much!”

  The Resistance leader chuckled and turned away for a moment to open the driver’s door, when all of a sudden Heinrich reached both hands across the man’s throat and pulled him backwards with a thin cord that I had no idea he was holding this whole time. I yelped and jumped to the opposite side of the back seat, pressing my legs to my chest. Josef was struggling with the cord with his hands, trying to somehow release the grip on his neck, but Heinrich kept tightening it more and more, with a deadly determination on his stern face. I never saw him like that before and that frightened me even more than what he was doing to his victim.