‘You mean the National Socialists’ Party?’ the woman said.
‘Yes. But it’s propaganda, isn’t it? I’m right, aren’t I? I know I’m right.’ She looked down again at the pamphlet and allowed herself to become acquainted with its contents. It was anti-Communist and anti-Jewish all at the same time. Mean, stupid stuff. ‘Don’t let the monsters take over!’ it read. The more she looked at it, the more of a joke it seemed.
‘Yes, it’s propaganda. The important thing for you to know is that he made that pamphlet. Your boyfriend. That very pamphlet you are holding, he made that with his own hands.’
‘I don’t believe you.’
‘Are you beginning to understand why we came to talk to you?’ the woman said.
‘No,’ Monika said. Her assuredness was undimmed. She didn’t want to listen to their reasonings. Her parents had taught her about material like this. It scared her, but she knew Arno couldn’t be mixed up in anything like it.
‘Arno Hiller was once involved in a plot to stir up dissent against enemies of the National Socialists’ Party,’ the woman now said. For the first time, her voice carried a harsher quality. ‘In other words, agitation against Communists and Jews alike.’
‘And we have reason to believe,’ the man continued, ‘that he is presently engaged in a plot to overthrow the government, most likely using violent means to achieve his goals.’
Monika listened. Part of her wanted to laugh. She could hear every word they were saying with absolute clarity, and they sounded absurd. At first, the idea simply bounced off her. Arno was not like that. She knew how people could be; she was not naive to the possibilities of human hatred. But Arno wasn’t that sort of person. She was too wary to let him fool her like that.
‘Why should I believe you?’ she asked.
The woman took out a booklet from her bag and held it up. It was her identity papers. Her name was Hannah Baumer. The booklet said she worked for the Prussian Police.
Monika asked, ‘Why are you here?’
‘We want to keep you safe. That’s our only motivation.’
Monika gave a shrug. She hated the people sat opposite her. They weren’t making her feel safe. Quite the opposite. They had woken her and lured her away from her room. They were making her feel scared and she hated them for it.
And yet, without realising how, she began to feel her resolve weakening. She began to see a slim chance – the slimmest chance – that what they were saying could be true. There was plenty she didn’t know about Arno, she had to admit that. And with the admission, she felt a bolt of fear suddenly rise inside her chest, like a fist moving from her stomach up to her throat.
She wished this moment in time, being sat in this alcove in a hotel she didn’t know, she wished it would disappear. If this was someone’s idea of a tease, then she would gladly laugh along if it meant it would vanish.
She took a deep breath. ‘So you’re watching Arno? You’re spying on him? Is that right? And it would be simpler if I was out of the way?’
As she said this, she saw the two strangers on the other side of the table visibly relax. They were happy to concede to Monika’s assessment if it meant they might win the wider argument. For a fraction of a second, she thought she might cry, but she contained it. Her only thought now was to look after herself.
‘We want to take you back to Berlin. We have a car waiting outside right now.’
‘Back to my parents? No, they mustn’t find out where I’ve been.’
‘Don’t worry. We have a room for you to stay in tonight. If you want. You’ll be comfortable there. You can remain there for as long as you need, in fact. Until things have settled down.’
‘Are you telling me I’m in danger?’
The couple opposite remained silent.
‘Fine. One night. I’ll stay there for one night, until I can go home.’ Then she said instinctively, ‘I still trust him. I trust him with all my heart.’ She felt she wanted to have the last word on the matter. And besides, nobody had the right to tell her how she ought to feel.
Monika got up from the table.
‘Where are you going?’ Baumer asked.
‘If I have to leave, I need to get my clothes.’
‘No. Don’t go back to the room. You must come now.’
‘I’m not dressed properly. And I need my hairbrush.’
‘Someone will collect those for you later.’
‘I don’t want anyone to touch my things.’
‘It’s better this way. You must come now. That is your only choice.’
12
The clothes they provided were plain and ill-fitting. Except, that is, for a black-and-white polka-dot neck scarf that felt silky and reassuring against her skin. Along with the clothes, they’d given her a sweet spongecake to eat for breakfast, which she turned over in her fingers and took tiny nibbles from. She wasn’t hungry.
Already she felt like a stranger to herself. She was travelling in an unfamiliar car, alone but for the driver who had a huge black moustache and wore a cloth cap and said absolutely nothing. Their eyes met every so often in the tiny rear-view mirror; his green pupils stared at her and made no expression whatsoever.
Above all, she felt awfully embarrassed. That was her overwhelming sensation for now. She felt like she was a parcel being delivered back to Berlin. A return-to-sender package. What a failure the weekend was turning out to be.
Had she allowed it to happen? Was some of it her fault?
She sat back in her seat and watched the countryside glide silently by. They passed small-holdings and allotments, farms and factories, distant villages and dense forests. She began to wonder if it was a mistake to leave Arno like that. Or was it the right thing to do? It felt impossible to analyse everything she’d been told and her head began to ache with the thought that she’d been deceived – by someone. Could Arno really be the monster they were painting him to be, the same boy she’d eaten with and laughed with the night before, whom she’d spent the morning gazing at across the pillows? Did he really have the capacity to betray her like that?
She trusted she would be back in the confines of her family home soon enough. She could think more objectively then. Her parents were expecting her tomorrow. Return too soon and they’d have too many questions: What went wrong? Did camping not suit you? Did someone say something to you? Did someone do something to you?
It was easier this way, she thought. Easier to stay wherever these strange people had in mind for her. She hoped it would be comfortable. The police would look after her, wouldn’t they? She hoped the bed would be warm and the food would be palatable. She presumed they were going to give her food. Did they know she had no money with her? Did they know that Arno had lost it… if he had indeed lost it?
The road signs began to read Berlin, which was a relief. But she could be mistaken. She felt she could be mistaken about everything that was happening to her. The man and woman who had put her into the car had not come with her. They’d stayed back in the village and let her travel alone with the driver in the cloth cap. Why was he so silent? Perhaps he had no authority to speak, she thought. Was that how these people worked, according to rules and hierarchy, permission to speak or else silence?
After another hour, she was thankful to see the silhouette of her home city coming into view. She was watching more closely now, watching for the car to turn around or take a junction that might hint that they were taking her somewhere else after all. Instead, the car kept to the road straight ahead. Back into Berlin. She had been restored. Her inner feelings about the boy had been disproved, undone. Her wisdom had been repudiated and the love she had to offer stopped, denied, turned around and sent home. She felt embarrassed, bitter, and coolly relieved all at the same time.
She got out of the car and went into a building. It had a brass door handle the shape of a lion’s head with its tongue sticking out, like a cat about to lick a bowl of milk. She was shown into a room with a double bed and embroidered linen. There w
as a large chest of drawers with a green vase on top. She was pleased to see a lamp in the corner. It was set on a table next to the bed. She thought she would ask for a book to read, or maybe if they had a library to look at. It was probably unlikely they had a library, but she would ask anyway – she would need something to pass the time and perhaps a book with a good story could be a surprise pleasure. Life was like that, she was beginning to discover, that even in the worst situations, pleasures could spring up and delight.
There was a woman with her now. She was small and old. She seemed to be in charge of the room and perhaps other rooms like it in the building. Do you work for the police too? Monika wanted to ask. But it seemed naive to do so, so she stayed quiet.
Where was she? It was not a hotel but it was similar. Something like a boarding house. It was hard to say, and for some reason, she felt too proud to ask.
Could she have a drink? That was a question she did ask. And something to eat? She was hungry now. She’d eaten the sweet-cake almost without noticing.
The old lady obliged and brought her a glass of water. Later there would be food, the old women said. The driver of the car was gone now. Monika sat on the edge of the bed and drank three-quarters of the glass in gulps, watched on attentively by the old woman. Shortly after, the woman hobbled out of the room and came back with a bowl of vegetable soup and a thick piece of bread on a tray. She left the food on the bedside table next to the lamp and told Monika to eat it while it was still hot. Then, as she turned, she pointed to a narrow door in the wall which Monika had assumed was a wardrobe. ‘Toilet,’ she said, and promptly left the room.
And then Monika noticed it. Every time the woman went out of the room, she locked the door behind her.
Monika got up from the bed and went to the door. She shook the handle. She could see the key was still in the lock. At first she thought it was for her own protection. If this was a boarding house, there could be all sorts of other people staying here. Misfits, drifters, low-lives. She would be pleased to be locked behind a door in that case. Except that couldn’t be right. The key was on the outside. Anyone could turn it. The only person who couldn’t was her.
She sat back down on the bed and thought about eating the soup. It looked thick and flavoursome. Steam rose from its surface like a dancing spirit and made the window above mist up. Only now, since she’d noticed the locked door, she’d lost her appetite. She went back to the door again and knocked on it. She called out and knocked again, louder. Eventually, the key turned and the door opened gently.
‘What is it?’ the old woman said. She spoke softly. She had a kindly sort of face. Monika noticed that one of her eyes had clouded over to a blue-grey fog and was probably blind. It was like she had the moon inside her eye.
‘Why is the door locked?’
‘We have to lock all the doors,’ the woman said. ‘That’s the rules for everyone.’
‘Why? I’m not going to run away.’
The old woman came inside and urged Monika to sit back down on the bed. Then she sat down beside her. She must have weighed next-to-nothing as the bed hardly moved under her weight.
‘The locks on the doors are to keep everyone in their rooms,’ she said, as if to explain without actually saying very much.
‘It doesn’t make sense,’ Monika said. ‘If I agreed to come here, why should I be locked inside?’
The old lady scratched the tip of her nose. Her fingers were thin and long like tree twigs. ‘You may feel that way today,’ she said, ‘but tomorrow you may feel differently.’
Monika had the sense that she was trying her best to be honest but was unable – for whatever reason – to be completely truthful.
‘What is your name?’ Monika asked. She had always felt comfortable speaking directly with older people.
‘My name is Frau Lange,’ the woman said.
‘Do you work here?’
‘Yes, of course. I’m here to look after you. I look after everybody here. I’ll bring you a meal later, and in the morning, a wash-basin and some breakfast.’
It was only then that Monika took note of Frau Lange’s comment from a minute before. ‘What did you mean, that I may feel differently tomorrow? I’ll be going home tomorrow.’
Frau Lange sighed, as if she’d heard this all before. She lifted herself up from the bed and walked slowly to the door.
Monika called after her. ‘I don’t want to stay here any longer than that.’
The old woman turned and smiled, saying nothing, only pointing to the soup on the table. Then she left the room and locked the door behind her. Monika still wasn’t hungry. She lifted her feet up and lay back on the bed. She didn’t know whether to take the old lady seriously or not. She was too tired to press the question any further, and within ten minutes she was fast asleep.
At around five o’clock later that day, the door opened again and Frau Lange came in carrying a folded white tablecloth beneath her arm. She went to the bedside table, removed the lamp from it and pulled the table to the middle of the floor. She draped the cloth over the table, then from a pocket in her apron, took out a knife and fork and arranged them on the table. Then she left the room, only to return a minute later with an omelette on a plate and a side dish of buttered potatoes.
‘Spinach and onion. No ham,’ she said as she set the omelette down on the table. A three-legged stool in the corner of the room was dragged over. She patted the seat to indicate where Monika should sit, saying ‘Eat up.’
Frau Lange left the room and once again locked the door behind her. Monika went to the table. This time, she ate the food eagerly. The omelette was soft and oily and to her hungry mouth tasted good. After eating, feeling somewhat revived, she began to look around the room, though for exactly what, she wasn’t sure. She went to the windows. There were two of them, looking out onto the backs of several other brick buildings. One floor below was a courtyard with laundry drying on a line. She tried to open each window in turn, but both of them were sealed shut.
She checked the drawers of the big chest with the vase on top. They were all empty. She looked beneath the bed – there was nothing but an old brass bed-pan with a layer of dust covering it. She checked the bedclothes and found a nightgown neatly folded and a hand-towel tucked under the covers.
She waited for an hour, expecting someone to come and instruct her on what she should do next, but no-one came. She tried knocking on the door again, only half-heartedly this time. There was only silence from the corridor outside. She climbed into bed. There was nothing to do. Not even a Bible. The light outside was darkening, so she pulled the window curtains closed. After a while, she fell asleep, waking and turning over in the folds of her bedclothes, never once knowing what time it was.
Sometime after dawn, an hour or two perhaps, Frau Lange came in carrying the same white tablecloth as before. Monika watched her from the bed. This time, instead of laying the table herself, the old woman left the tablecloth on the edge of the table and said, ‘You can do it this time.’
Monika got out of bed and did what she was told. Now it was morning, she didn’t know how she should feel, whether to be relieved or hard-done-by. She expected to go home today – but then, something told her that her expectations were mistaken.
Frau Lange brought a breakfast of onion quiche with buttered bread on the side. There was also a small saucer of honey with a tiny silver spoon in it.
‘Thank you,’ Monika said, as she sat at the table to eat.
‘How was your sleep?’
‘I don’t know. Broken.’
‘Tonight will be better.’
Monika smiled. She thought of her bed at home, and her candles and writing desk. Tonight would be better, that was true. ‘When will they take me home?’ she asked.
‘When you are ready.’
‘I’m ready now.’
‘What I mean to say is, when they are ready.’
‘How long will that be? And where are my clothes? I should have them before I go back
. And my hairbrush.’
‘Trust me when I say this,’ Frau Lange said, coming closer, her voice changing by a register. ‘Nothing that might happen to you is a result of anything that you have done.’
Monika looked up. ‘What do you mean by that? Will I not get my clothes back today?’
She thought about her parents, the suspicions that might be stirred if she came back without her belongings.
‘Frankly,’ Frau Lange said, ‘I don’t know anything about your clothes. What I do know is that you’re are going to stay here longer than you realise. Tonight. Tomorrow night. Probably the night after that too. I don’t know how much longer.’
‘Where am I?’ Monika responded, realising it was the first time she’d dared to ask the question. She’d wanted to keep it hidden as if it was irrelevant, but now she began to see that it was no longer inconsequential. ‘Am I in Berlin?’
‘Yes. But Berlin is a big city.’
‘Where am I?’
‘I can’t tell you that.’
‘Can you let me go? I don’t need to be taken home. I can go by myself. I don’t need an escort.’
‘I can’t do that.’
‘Why not? Please.’
‘I am not in charge.’
Monika looked over to the open door with the key in the lock. There was nothing stopping her from dashing through that door right now. Frau Lange couldn’t hope to catch her.
‘Come with me,’ Frau Lange said, noticing the direction of Monika’s gaze. ‘I can see that you want to know what’s on the other side of that door.’
‘Yes.’
The old woman gestured for Monika to follow. She led her along a corridor with doors on either side. The floor was wooden and dark and had a narrow rug running the entire length. They went past a small kitchen, inside of which Monika saw a stack of white plates, a large frying pan and an enormous tray of eggs.
‘How many people are staying here?’
Frau Lange replied, ‘Not many. They come and go every day.’
Vanished in Berlin: Kidnap suspense mystery set in 1930s Berlin (Berlin Tales Book 2) Page 7
