Berlin

by Nick Carter

  I had reached Helga's place and found it was a walk-up and she lived on the fourth floor. I decided to knock. The key had been a gesture more than anything else.

  V

  It seemed everybody was surprised to see me. The utter astonishment in Helga's eyes as she opened the door made Lisa's mild surprise pale into nothingness. But before I could say anything, Helga squealed in joy and grabbed me in a bear hug, her breasts pressing hard into my chest through the soft blouse she had on. When she stepped back, her eyes still held a tinge of wonder.

  "You did give me a key, didn't you?" I said, a little testily, I'm afraid.

  "Yes, but I never thought I'd see you again," she answered, pulling me into the apartment.

  "Why not?" I grumbled.

  "You Americans have a saying, love 'em and leave 'em, I think is the way it goes. I just never expected you'd come back, that's all."

  "You underestimate yourself," I told her. "Besides, you shouldn't put so much stock in old sayings."

  Lisa's blue eyes sparkled and she reached up and nuzzled her head against my shoulder.

  "I'm glad you're back," she said. "Really, I am."

  As she stayed close against me, I looked over her shoulder at the apartment. It was small and very ordinary, almost without character of any kind. It had a furnished flat look to it that surprised me.

  "How long can you stay?" Helga asked, bringing my attention back to her round, full breasts lightly touching my shirt, her somewhat pouty lips.

  "Just tonight," I said.

  "Then we'll have to make the most of it," she answered and her eyes had turned that smoky blue again, as though an invisible film had come over them. Her hands on my arm chopped to my chest and began to rub up and down in slow, semicircular motions.

  "I was just about to eat… bratwurst," she said softly. "I've enough for two. Then we can take care of the other hunger." She moved away and I followed her into a small kitchen and a round table. While we ate, she talked of her day at work and asked what I had done. I told her I'd spent the day seeing various business acquaintances. She served me a beer and then a quarter of a water glass of "schnapps." It was like having a kind of boilermaker and as I watched her down hers, I saw that the top buttons of the blouse had been undone. Her breasts, held down by an overworked brassiere, spilled out in exciting loveliness. Downing her drink, she got up and came over to me.

  "I thought about last night all day," she said, standing with her breasts only inches from my face. She cupped my head in her hands and looked down at me. "You were something special," she went on. "No one else has ever been able to stay with me, ever."

  I could believe that quite easily, I told myself. I reached up, unsnapped the bra and put one hand under her left breast, feeling the soft yet firm flesh. Helga moaned and pressed my hand up.

  "I told myself it was a one-time tiling I had to forget," she breathed. "But seeing you here now has brought every moment rushing back to me. I want you, again… as much as I can have in one night."

  Once again I felt the overpowering, animal sensuality of this girl, that feeling of desires barely under control, of overwhelming inner needs. But this time I wanted to see if it would be different, if I would be making love to her without experiencing that feeling of being an object. I squeezed gently and Helga's hands were moving up and down my torso and her body quivered. She moved backwards, keeping her hands on me, her breast firmly pressed against my palm, guiding us toward a small bedroom. The fight from the living room cast a yellow glow on the bed. Helga flung off her blouse and I felt her skirt fall at my feet. Her tongue darted into my mouth, a thing of wild sensations and feverish circles. Her terrible inner drive was there again, a desperation that swept all else before it. She made love, I found myself thinking, as though she was sure there would be no tomorrow. Ordinarily, that would be a sensation of wonderful abandon, but with Helga that abandon was missing. Only the desperation came through. It bothered me, but her hands reaching into my trousers bothered me more. The hell with the analysis, I told myself. I'd think more about it later.

  I pushed gently against her and she fell back upon the bed. I stepped back, stripped quickly, watching to see if she were observing me. Her eyes were closed and her breasts heaved. I put Wilhelmina and Hugo inside the fold of my clothes and lay down beside her. As my hand caressed her inner being, she cried out, her eyes still closed, pressing herself down upon my fingers, her rounded, cream-white stomach moving convulsively. She turned and rolled onto me, straddling my body, letting her breasts hang like beautiful, ripe pears against my lips. I tasted their sweetness and she pressed down, softly moaning and gasping. She stretched out on top of me, feverish with desire. I rolled her over and came to her, not gently, now, but almost brutally, matching the wild movements and thrust of her body. Suddenly she stiffened and a half-scream rose up from her very inner being. She fell back and I held still, but she clutched at me instantly.

  "Again, again," she cried. "Make me come again, now." I stayed with her, and her eyes were closed as I brought her to new peaks again. She would toss her blonde head from side to side as she half-laughed, half-sobbed in a pleasure beyond her ability to completely absorb. With any other girl I'd ever known, I would have felt almost sadistic, but with Helga, I still couldn't shake the feeling that she and not I was causing it all to happen. I was there, in her, hearing her cries of pleasure at what I was doing, and yet I felt there was a point I'd never reached with her. Somehow, for all her moans of delight and pleas for more, there was a core of impersonality about it. I couldn't shake that weird feeling of being an object, as though her physical rapture was somehow entirely apart from Helga Ruten, the person. It was an incompleteness that rubbed off, that transmitted the unsatisfied feeling I could not shake. It was an object lesson that the physical is never complete without the emotional. Helga's inner drive was so great, however, that it almost filled the void. Almost. She heaved, her stomach muscles contracting, her arms clutched around my neck and then, once again, she cried out in a long, breathy half-scream and her body stiffened. This time when she fell back onto the bed she closed her eyes, and went into an almost instant sleep.

  I lay beside her and slept, too. It was much later when I woke to see Helga returning from the kitchen, biting into an apple, her round, full figure outlined in the light from the adjoining room. She glowed with an other-world quality, Eve, eternal Eve, standing with apple in hand. She sat down on the bed beside me.

  "Stay here tomorrow," she said. "I'll only go in half a day and come back."

  "I can't," I answered.

  "What do you have to do tomorrow?" she asked, a hint of a pout in her voice. I raised my leg so she would lean her back against it which she promptly did.

  "I need to go into East Berlin tomorrow," I said. "Got any ideas how I can do it?"

  "You want to go to East Berlin?" she questioned, biting into the apple. "Why?"

  "I must see a man on business, very personal business. But I hear the Russians are being very strict about entering these days."

  "Very," she said, snapping off another piece of the apple. "I could get you into East Berlin."

  I did a good job of sounding impressed rather than too eager.

  "My cousin drives a produce truck into East Berlin every day," she went on casually. "I could call him and tell him to take you instead of his helper. The Russians know he has a helper with him every day. He owes me some favors."

  "That would be great, Helga," I said, and this time my enthusiasm was very real. It was an absolutely perfect setup. She got up and started for the living room.

  "I'll call him," she said.

  "At this hour," I exclaimed. "It's nearly four o'clock in the morning."

  "Hugo gets up early," she answered, her round rear silhouetted against the light. I smiled at the name. I had a friend Hugo and I silently wagered my friend Hugo was thinner and deadlier than her cousin Hugo. It wasn't a wager I expected to lose.

  "I've got to give him time to ca
ll off his helper," she said. I shrugged. It was her cousin. If she wanted to wake the poor guy up it was all right with me. I lay back, listening to her dialing and then the sound of her voice.

  "Hello, is this Hugo?" she asked. "This is Helga… Helga Ruten. Yes, I'll wait." Hugo probably wanted to put on a robe. Central heating was still an uncommon thing in Germany. "Yes, Hugo," I heard her go on. "I'm fine, but I need a favor. I have a friend who wants to go into East Berlin tomorrow. Yes… that's right… he's here with me now. We've been talking about it. I told him you could take him in as the helper in your produce truck."

  There was a prolonged silence as she listened. "It would be perfectly simple," I heard her cut in. "I told him you and your helper crossed into East Berlin every day. Yes… I'll have him look for the truck with Hugo Schmidt on it. Yes… good, I have it. Hell be there. Do you have it all clear? You just take him into East Berlin. Hell go on his own from there, understand? Thank you, Hugo. "Wiedersehen."

  The phone clicked and Helga was beside me. "You must promise that if you come back tomorrow you'll come straight here," she said, her eyes intense. I promised. It was an easy promise. I was feeling really grateful to her. "You are to meet Hugo a block from the Brandenburg Gate checkpoint. His truck will be marked Hugo Schmidt. Wear shirt and trousers or a work jacket if you have one. Ten o'clock tomorrow morning. You can arrange about getting back with Hugo. He comes back in the afternoon."

  I pulled her down to me and rolled over onto her. Instantly, her legs moved apart. "Thanks, honey," I said. "You don't know what a great favor you've just done me. When I come back I'll make love to you like you've never been made love to before."

  There was something in her eyes, a sudden contraction of the pupils and she slid out from under me.

  "I'll sleep in the living room," she said. "The couch folds out into a bed." Her eyes were looking down across my body and her mouth was set, almost grim.

  "It's too bad," she said.

  "What is?"

  "That you must go," she answered, turning on her heel and closing the door behind her. She was a strange creature, I told myself again. There was a churning inside her, some deep disturbance. It was as if she were two people, the sensuously driven one of wild physical desire and someone else, someone cold and distant whom I'd never gotten at all near. The few hours left for sleep gave me no more time to play psychiatric detective. I turned over and went to sleep.

  I'd somehow expected Helga would wake me, but I woke to the loud buzzing of an alarm clock in the next room. I went to shut it off and found I was alone in the apartment. A note on the table simply said, "Have gone to work. Helga." It was curt, impersonal. I shaved and called Howie Prailler at once and told him of my luck. He was as pleased as I was, and he gave me the details I still had to know.

  "Your man lives at 79 Warschau Strasse. His name is Klaus Jungmann. Your code address is simple." I listened intently as he went over the code and fixed it firmly in my mind. "I'll get word to Hawk about this," Howie concluded. "It'll make the old buzzard's morning for him."

  I stowed my jacket in a small tote bag I picked up at a drugstore and hurried to a corner exactly one block from the square outside the Brandenburg Gate, wearing shirt and trousers with shirtsleeves rolled up. It wasn't the greatest transformation, but I could pass as a truckman's helper. I was standing there waiting, feeling grateful to Helga and wondering what made her tick when it was Lisa Huffman's cool, contained face that popped up suddenly in my mind like a refreshing breeze. I hadn't time to think why when I saw the black panel truck pull around the corner with the words HUGO SCHMIDT — PRODUCE stenciled on the sides. True Teutonic punctuality; it was exactly ten o'clock. As I approached the truck, Helga's cousin leaned over and pushed the door open for me. He was a middle-aged man with a gruff, lined face. He wore a peaked cap and blue denim work clothes.

  "I appreciate this very much," I said as openers. Hugo Schmidt merely grunted and nodded. "That Helga," he said. "Always involved in something. I never ask questions. I mind my own business."

  The traffic at the checkpoint had grown heavier and was now backed up a block or two. It was almost entirely commercial traffic and the Vopos, the East German Volkspolizei, checked each vehicle as it approached the gate. I saw the large sign facing us as we neared the gate.

  "Achtung! Sie verlassen jetzt West Berlin?" I translated it in my mind. "Attention! You are now leaving West Berlin!" It has the same ring of finality, of ominousness in both languages. You felt as though you were entering another world, which was more true than it sounded. As Hugo Schmidt's truck approached the gate, he leaned out and waved at the Vopos. They waved back, raised the gate and we moved on through. It had all happened so smoothly and simply I almost laughed.

  "The advantage of crossing every day," Schmidt said grimly. He drove on till he was beyond sight of the gate and then pulled to the curb.

  "Where will I meet you to get back?" I asked. The blank look in his eyes revealed that it was a point he hadn't even thought about.

  "I go back at four o'clock," he finally said. "Meet me at this corner at four."

  "I'll be here," I waved. "And thanks again."

  I watched the truck roll off and then cut across to the main thoroughfare of the Unter den Linden. The once-magnificent thoroughfare was shabby and dismal, with huge piles of rubble still standing about after all these years. I saw that the entire East section of Berlin wore a mantle of sordidness. I thought of a grand lady who now appeared only in shoddy, worn clothes. Compared to the sparkling vitality of West Berlin, it was a contrast that was as saddening as it was vivid. I hailed a cab and directed him to Warschau Strasse, one of the many streets in East Berlin the Russians had renamed. I got out as we reached the street and walked along the rows of dingy gray tenements that would have fitted comfortably into any slum in the States. I found number 79 and the name Klaus Jungmann on a ground-floor door. A small sign beneath the name said: Photo-Retouching.

  I rang the bell and waited. I could hear shuffling around inside. Hawk had said that Jungmann was a "sleeper," an agent who is often left unused and dormant for years, contacted only for certain purposes. Unlike international operatives such as myself, sleepers were valuable because of their complete anonymity. When the door finally opened I saw a tall, thin, sad-faced man with deep, brown eyes. He wore a faded blue smock and held a thin retouching brush in one hand. Beyond him, I took in a room cluttered with lamps, drawing table, paint cans and books. To one side I saw an air-brush motor.

  "Yes?" Klaus Jungmann said. "May I help you?"

  "I think so," I answered. "You are Klaus Jungmann, I take it."

  He nodded, wariness creeping into the deep eyes.

  "I want a photo of a very important man retouched," I said, going into the code Howie Prailler had given me. "His name is Dreissig. You have heard of him?"

  "Heinrich Dreissig?" Jungmann asked cautiously.

  "Dreissig, Dreissig, Dreissig," I said. "Three times stranger than anyone else."

  Klaus Jungmann sighed and his shoulders lowered. He half-sat down on a high stool before the drawing table.

  "Who are you?" he asked. When I told him his eyes widened. "I'm honored," he said sincerely. "But your coming here can only mean that something happened to Dennison."

  "They got to him before I did," I replied. "Do you know what he was to pass on to me?"

  Jungmann was nodding when we heard the sound of a car breaking to a screeching halt, followed by another and still another. There was the thump of car doors being slammed and feet pounding on pavement. Jungmann's eyes were wide, fastened on me. I shrugged and bolted for the window. Peering around the drawn shade, I saw two men in suits, one with a Tommy gun in hand, moving toward the entrance.

  "Son of a bitch!" I exploded. "How the hell do they do it? Goddamn but they must be psychic!" The men weren't uniformed vopos. They were plainly some of Dreissig's boys and I interrupted swearing at the inexplicability of it to shout at Jungmann.

  "Is ther
e another way out of here?" I yelled.

  "In the back, the rear door." I flung open the door, looked back to make sure he was following me, and raced down a long hallway to the rear of the tenement. The back door opened just as I neared it. There were two of them, each with an automatic rifle. I hit the floor, pulling Jungmann down with me as they opened fire. Wilhelmina was in my hand instantly and I let fly. I saw one double up as the big 9mm slug tore into him. The other one dived backwards out the door, but I knew he'd be waiting outside to blast us as we came out. I turned and started back down the long hallway.

  "The roof," I called to Jungmann who was on my heels. We were almost at the staircase, just opposite Jungmann's apartment, when the two with the Tommy gun burst into the entranceway, spraying shots wildly. I dived sideways, back into the apartment, knocking Jungmann in ahead of me. I kicked the door shut with my foot and heard the automatic lock snap. They'd blast it open in a few seconds, but a few seconds could mean a lot. I spun around as I heard the smash of glass, saw the black snout of the automatic rifle poking through the ground-floor window. I yelled at Jungmann to hit the floor, but he hesitated, wide-eyed. The rifle chattered, spraying its deadly message in a wide arc. I saw Jungmann shudder, spin around, one hand clutching his throat where a shower of red burst forth. As he sank to the floor, I pegged a shot through the window, aiming just over and to the right of the rifle barrel. I heard the gasp of pain, heard the sound of the rifle clatter to the pavement. A burst of lead splintered the lock on the door, but I was ready and waiting as they burst in. I got off two shots that sounded like one. They pitched forward together to lay face down in the room. I waited a moment, listening, but there was no sound. There was still one of them waiting outside the rear door, I knew. I hadn't forgotten about him but I also knew the shooting would bring the vopos in a hurry. It had been fast, furious and noisy. By now there were probably 50 calls to the East German police.