by Ian Andrew
“After that?” asked Heinrich.
“Other than telling her that you have her mentor and friend in custody, I need nothing from you Standartenführer. You and your ilk have done quite enough. My scientists and I shall cope and we shall determine the best way for our team to handle our loss.” Glaring once more at Heinrich, Faber reached for the desk phone and called Leigh.
***
Tears streamed down her face and she sobbed with silent gasps. Her body heaved with each new wave of misery. She tried to process what was happening, what it meant, how it would resolve but all she could hear in her head, pounding, over and over was Heinrich’s last sentence, “We have him in custody.”
Professor Faber patted her on the shoulder and left the room. Heinrich remained. He walked over to her and said quietly, “Leigh.”
***
“Francine?”
“Yes Professor?”
“Can you ask all of your colleagues to be in the briefing room please?”
“Of course Professor, what time for?”
“10:00 please. Although we shan’t start without everyone being there.”
***
She remained bent forward in the chair, almost hugging her knees.
“Leigh.”
“Get away from me Heinrich.”
“Leigh, please, come on.”
She raised her head and looked almost manic. “Come on! Really!” her voice was shrill. “Come on! That’s what you’re going to say to me? Come on! You self-centred prick! How could you do this?” She stood up and faced him almost toe to toe. “How could you do this?” she shouted.
He looked down and said nothing.
“Answer me!” she yelled it.
“I had no choice.”
“Yes you did. You could have warned him, you could have warned me. You could have...” She gasped for air again as more tears fell.
“I couldn’t Leigh. I really couldn’t. You know I couldn’t.”
“But Heinrich,” she gasped a little more shallowly, “he’s my friend.” She wailed the last word in a heartbroken, choked, childlike way. His heart ached for her loss and all he could do was reach out for her and pull her close. She collapsed into him, buried her head into his shoulder and clung to him tightly whilst she continued to weep for Konrad.
***
She knew he was watching her. He sat just under the bus shelter structure but she stood outside of it, wanting to feel anything to take away the numbness. The smoke felt good as it burnt her throat and the slight drizzle stung her face.
“So what now?” her voice sounded flat and she knew that her eyes were still red.
“You have to go into a briefing with Professor Faber and the rest of the team. I think you’re all going to decide how to handle things from here on.”
“Yes I know that Heinrich. I meant about Konrad?”
“Berlin have arranged for transport to pick him up on the weekend. He’ll go to a debrief facility.”
“And when they’ve taken all they can out of that sweet, gentle man?”
“He’ll go to a KZ.”
Leigh was rather surprised that he hadn’t even attempted to sugar-coat it. “What, no SS lies? Not even a lame attempt to make me feel better?”
“What’d be the point? You didn’t ask me because you didn’t know the answer.”
“I assume he’s being held for his homosexuality.”
It was Heinrich’s turn to be surprised, “How do you know that?”
“I told you, he’s my friend Heinrich. For a long time he’s been my friend. He told me.” She finished her cigarette and looked up at the sky, allowing the drizzle to soak her eyes. It was cold and soothing to her still flushed skin.
“Leigh?” Heinrich said her name with a panic in his voice.
She snapped round to him, “What is it?”
“Does he know you’re a Turner?”
“No! No, of course not.” She could see real concern in his face. She knew it was for her safety and that touched her. Rather more gently she said, “It’s okay. No one knows apart from you and me. I almost told him once but to be honest I thought about what might happen if he was ever arrested. So no, he doesn’t know.” She watched him relax a little. “Will he go to Sachsenhausen?”
“Sooner or later.”
She thought about lighting another cigarette but decided against it. “So what happens now?”
“Well you have to go and brief your team with Professor Faber in,” he checked the watch on his ForeFone, “ten minutes.”
“Oh that’s going to be a mess. Especially Franci. She loves Konrad.”
“All your team seems close, he must have been a great boss.”
“No Heinrich, I mean she loves him. Truly, madly, deeply type of love. You may have noticed, she’s not backward at coming forward and at some point, I think it was in Toronto but it might have been even earlier, she propositioned him. He turned her down. Apparently, according to her, he did it in the sweetest and most polite way but it didn’t change the fact that she had fallen for him. The amount of nights she and I have downed bottles of red discussing the whole sorry saga.”
“Did she know he was...”
“eine Tunte?” the words were harsh and her tone was hardening again.
“No Leigh, I’d never use a word like that!”
“It’s what you were thinking, anyway yes of course she did. She never said a word to him or anyone else, apart from me, but, yes of course she knew.”
“Anyone else?”
“Why Heinrich, you planning on taking them in for failure to declare?” she said it too quickly and regretted it as soon as it was out.
“No I’m fucking not!” his reply seethed with anger and as he stood she took a step backwards.
“Hein...”
“Enough Leigh! All I’ve had this morning is people having a fucking go at me. I’m not the bad guy. I actually think the way I handled Konrad’s detention was as gentle and respectful as it could be. I don’t expect a pat on the back but I certainly don’t expect sarcasm and snide remarks from you. We have a chance to do something about this, to negate Konrad’s arrest, Mary’s execution, all of it and all I get is; am I planning on arresting more people? Well, no, I’m not!” He stopped and there was only the faint sound of the drizzle against the ashtrays and chairs.
Her head was bowed and her shoulders hunched in defence against his words. She looked up at him and said, “I’m sorry.”
They stood in silence and she decided to light another smoke. By about halfway through he had calmed and said, “I’m sorry too.” She looked at him and smiled contritely.
Exhaling a long stream of smoke into the drizzle she asked quietly, “Mary’s being executed?”
“Yes. Dawn, Sunday.”
“We need to talk about what she said.”
“I want to do more than talk.”
She stepped a little closer and looked at him. “But Heinrich, I’ve told you over and over there is no way to do what you’re thinking about. Even if we knew where to go and when, even if we could determine what to say and how to say it and even if it meant that faith became disjointed like Mary wants and the Reich never rose, even if all of that was possible we can’t do it. Berlin has the ultimate off switch.”
“Not anymore.”
“What?”
“There’s a way around it.”
“How?” she was incredulous.
“Look, we need time to talk about this and time to plan what to do and time to act but, we can’t do it here. You’re due inside in minutes.”
“Right, well I reckon the rest of today’s going to be a mess. Not much work’s going to get done but I suspect a lot of energy will be spent talking things through. People are going to need time to come to terms with Konrad’s arrest. But, I’m going to suggest to Wolfgang that we stand the whole team down for tomorrow. Give them a long weekend to get their heads around what’s happened.”
“So we can talk tomorrow?”
“Yes we could, but I was thinking about dinner tonight?”
“Okay,” he said it hesitantly.
“You don’t want to?”
“No. I mean yes, I do. It’s just I’d have thought being in my company would have been the last thing you would have wanted.”
“Heinrich, I’m mad and angry and upset but not really with you. You’re the first person I’ve been able to talk to properly since my parents passed. I’d like to spend time with you, if it’s alright?”
“I’d like to as well. Do you want to go out somewhere?”
“Mmmm, I’m not sure I’d feel right going out but I guess we’ll have to. You said it would raise suspicions if you came to mine.”
“No it’s fine,” he said rather too quickly. “I mean, I’ll take you out but going to yours is okay. It would have been weird on Sunday if I’d just dropped round but that was because we hadn’t even met before. We’re colleagues now.”
“That’s all it’s been?”
“Pardon?”
“Sunday night. We met on Sunday. It’s not even a week.”
“A lot can happen in a week.” He said, smiling at her.
She held his gaze. Once more she felt the reactions that she had each and every time she made eye contact with him. Her stomach jumped again and she felt the frisson of a tingle running down her spine. She forced herself to breathe deeply. Her emotions were shredded and it wasn’t even ten in the morning. “Yes, I suppose it can.” She checked her own ForeFone watch display, “I’ve got to get back in,” she turned and began to walk quickly toward the entrance steps. “I’ll see you at 7:30 tonight.” she called over her shoulder.
“No Leigh. Hang on.”
She stopped and turned back, “What?”
“Bring Francine over to my office when you knock off for the day.”
“Why?”
“So I can get both of you into see Konrad.”
She bit hard on her lip to stop from crying again, nodded at him and walked away.
Chapter 42
19:25 Thursday 21st May 2020 – London
“Hi,” he said a little breathless.
“Hi, come in.” She stood back and opened the door, “You ok?”
“Yes, I think so. That’s quite a staircase.” He walked past her down the small hallway to the living room.
“You’re meant to be a SS Officer.”
“You’re meant to have a lift.”
“Oh, it’s not that bad,” she said mockingly.
“Didn’t notice you coming down to walk me up.”
“Now, now! I had to press a button to open the door for you so fair’s fair.”
“I hope you like this?” he turned and offered her the bottle of wine he had brought. As she reached for it he silently thanked himself that he had gone home, had a shower and put on a decent pair of trousers, an open necked shirt and a casual jacket. At least he looked reasonably attired. Leigh on the other hand looked simply stunning to him. She wore a cream coloured knitted tee-shirt over a pair of almost faded to white in places, blue jeans and a pair of low-heeled suede boots. A plain gold necklace with a small golden Celtic knot pendant and matching stud earrings was the only jewellery she wore.
“Oh, Cabernet Mitos, very nice, yes I like it very much, thank you. Please, sit.” She gestured towards the sofa, “I’ll just open this, back in a sec.”
He looked about the tastefully furnished apartment. The room he was in had been split into two by clever placement of furniture and formed a dining area and a living room. There were two small hallways off to either side that he assumed led to bathrooms and bedrooms. Beyond the dining area, where Leigh had disappeared to, was the kitchen. He slipped his jacket off and wandered across to the bookshelf. He saw a lot of academic volumes with titles that he struggled to understand, a few biographies, a couple of fiction classics and a half-shelf full of Katrin Lieberman novels. Picking out one of the mathematic textbooks he flicked through it hoping to recognise at least something familiar.
“See anything you’d like to borrow?”
He turned with book in hand and watched as she came back in from the kitchen with two glasses of the Cabernet. “Eh, would it offend you if I passed?”
“What, on the wine?”
“No, on the offer of the book loan.” He returned the book to the shelf and took the glass offered.
“You could get into this,” she gestured to the academic volumes, “you’re not a stupid man.”
“Thanks for the compliment but each to their own.”
He sat on the sofa and she took the small matching chair that faced it at an offset angle. They both sipped the wine and waited for the other to talk.
“I just...” they both started at the same time. Heinrich held his hand out for her to proceed.
“I just wanted to say thank you,” she said softly.
He placed his finger to his lips and then pointed to the ceiling. He retrieved his jacket, reached into the inside pocket and took a small, thin device out and set it on the table. It looked like a mobile phone and he reached down and depressed the centrally mounted button on its facia. After watching the LED display for a few seconds he pressed the button again and put the box back in his pocket.
“We’re good. I wouldn’t have imagined your apartment was bugged but I thought it would be wise to check. I borrowed that little gadget from work,” he said as matter-of-factly as he could but he hoped she would be impressed at his forethought. When he looked up she just looked amused and he felt foolish. “You knew it was bug free didn’t you?” he said.
“Mhmm,” she hummed and nodded to emphasise the point, “I work in one of the most sophisticated scientific labs in the Reich. Right next door to Oscar is the best equipped electronics lab anywhere outside of the Japanese Islands. So yeah, I might have managed to make a simple detector that runs a continuous bug sweep for me.” She paused and he looked quite sheepishly at her.
“Is that how you got your hands on a taser as well?” he frowned in mock anger.
“Yeah. And it worked, didn’t it? No cameras, no recordings.” She smiled at him before continuing, “But, seriously Heinrich, thank you. It’s quite sweet that you went to that trouble,” she said it with no hint of sarcasm but he looked sceptical. “I mean it, thank you for that and thank you for getting Franci and me into see Konrad. It meant an awful lot for us, and him. It was a kind thing to do.”
“You’re welcome, as was Franci. I also meant what I said to her. I’ll try to get her into see him again on Saturday.” He paused a beat. “If we’re all still here on Saturday.” He leant forward and his face became serious. He was about to launch into a discussion about Mary and all that she had said.
Leigh waved her hand at him, “Not yet Heinrich, let’s not talk about that just yet. Let’s eat first?”
“Okay, yeah sure, that’s good.” He relaxed back into the sofa, “What are we having?”
“Well, glad you asked. I looked up roast fillet of new season lamb with fennel and liquorice sauce.”
“Wow, that sounds amazing.”
“Yes it does!” she nodded emphatically and then shook her head slowly, “Except it turns out it takes quite a lot of time and effort and needs a lot of things I didn’t have, like lamb, fennel, liquorice,’ she paused for effect, ‘culinary skills.”
He laughed out loud. “Okay then, so we’re having...?”
“Bratwurst sausage simmered in beer and onions accompanied by oven chips and instant gravy,” she said enthusiastically.
“Love it. Sounds even better than that bad idea of lamb and liquorice. Can I help?”
“Come talk to me while I cook.”
They spoke of normal things and laughed and drank more wine, burnt some of the Bratwurst and laughed again. She wanted to know more about him. He told her that he used to play football and after a lot of pressing him for details he begrudgingly admitted that he had been selected for the Waffen-SS national team. Unfortunately his playing d
ays had ended after the stabbing. She told him about her love for dancing and how, whilst her love for it remained, her dancing days had ended with the damage to her leg. She discovered he was an avid reader and he was surprised to learn that although she could sing, she had never played an instrument despite her mother’s talent. They talked and laughed and ate and drank and forgot the day that had been and the day that was coming.
***
She set the two coffees on the small table and sat beside him on the sofa. “Tell me your thoughts Heinrich?”
“About?”
“About Mary Reid.”
He reached forward and took a sip of his coffee. “Now?”
“Yes, now.”
He thought for a moment, hesitant because of the enormity of the conversation they were about to have.
“I thought she was insane at first. On reflection and I’ve done a lot of that in the last few days, I think she was still in shock. I know she was really confused over how we’d identified her so quickly. The incident with the Turner prisoners pushed her over an edge that I think she’d been on for a while. But as for the ideas about the religions, well,” he hesitated, “I thought it was brilliant. I mean, I know she was only talking hypothetically and she doesn’t know what we have access to but,” he paused again.
“Go on, say what you’re thinking,” she encouraged.
“Your parents taught me that we don’t force things.”
“I know,” she agreed, “they taught you what they taught me; the wheel turns at its own pace. God places you where you need to be and sends the people he needs to send.” Leigh repeated the sentence they had first said together on Sunday night in the Todt cafeteria.
“Exactly, so I thought about what Mary did and what happened to her mind and how, in the midst of her confusion, she came up with an idea that on face-value seems insane. But, like I said, she doesn’t know what we have access to. What if we’re in the right place now? What if the wheel has turned to where it’s meant to be and Mary is the person that’s been sent?”
