Flight From Berlin: A Novel

by David John

  ‘Now, boys, we need to find some scoops for Eleanor to file—some proper news, mind you. Bill? What about the links between German athletic training and rearmament?’

  Eleanor rolled her eyes at Gallico, the one person she didn’t mind knowing how much this was getting on her nerves.

  ‘It’s okay, Martha,’ she said. ‘There’s an important story for me right here.’ Eleanor turned to the Daily Express reporter. ‘Mr Murphy, tell me more about this kraut lady high jumper who might, in fact, be a man.’

  By morning Denham had a high ringing in his ear from the punch to his head, and a purple contusion across his left cheek.

  He ignored the mess in the apartment, simply returning the table and chair to their place so he could type up the Hindenburg piece from his notes while his courtyard neighbour, a locksmith, changed the lock on the apartment door.

  Denham worked through the day, tapping away at the Underwood in a sleeveless undershirt, an HB hanging from the corner of his mouth. A warm, gritty breeze brought the sounds of the city through the window.

  By late afternoon he was satisfied. He gathered the typewritten sheets, put them in an envelope addressed to Greiser’s press office, and set off by tram to the Friedrichstrasse to deliver it. If he was going to find Hannah Liebermann and tell her story to the world, he’d be wise to play things safe with Greiser in the meantime. Do nothing to upset the bastard.

  Berlin’s transformation was complete—as though a long siege had been lifted. The streets were colourful and welcoming, with garlands hanging from every lamppost and shopfront along the Leipzigerstrasse. The Olympic rings billowed from the flagpoles of the Wertheim department store, and the JEWS NOT WANTED signs had disappeared from shops, cafés, and parks.

  With the state’s sadism hidden from view, the Reich Labour Front had ordered a week of ‘jollity and cheerfulness’ prior to the Games, fearing that foreign visitors might be disheartened by the Berliner Schnauze—the surly local manner. Only in a tyranny, Denham thought, are citizens ordered to be happy.

  He delivered his article at the reception to Greiser’s office and emerged through the glass doors back onto the Friedrichstrasse, thinking he’d walk home. As he made his way along the shopfronts, tilting his hat against the sun, feeling for his matches in his jacket pocket, it was a few moments before he noticed the dark vehicle in the reflection of the windows. A forest green Humber Pullman with fat whitewall tyres was keeping pace alongside him in the street. A British car? He turned to look at it. A blind in the rear side window was pulled down, concealing its passenger. The car pulled over next to him; the back door opened, and a man in a bowler hat got out. He spoke in English.

  ‘Gentleman in the car would like a word, sir.’

  Denham hesitated.

  His expression blank, the man stood to the side of the door and gestured for him to step in.

  With as much curiosity as suspicion he climbed the running board and into the back. There was enough headroom to wear top hats, and such a wide seat that he might have mistaken the tall, bony man sitting to one side for a discarded coat and hat. Another seat faced the rear, like a London cab’s.

  ‘Mr Denham? Get in,’ the tall man said, smiling. ‘Can we give you a lift somewhere?’ A light South Wales accent.

  ‘I was on my way home.’

  Bowler Hat Man got into the backseat facing Denham, and the car purred into the southbound traffic before he’d given his address.

  ‘Sorry to ambush you like that,’ the tall man said, ‘but no one’s going to overhear us if we have a little chat in the car, you see. My name’s Evans. I’m attached to the embassy here.’ He offered Denham his hand across the seat, releasing a faint smell of mints. His long face was framed by white sideburns, and there was something lugubrious about his black homburg and wing collar. He paused, his eyes falling on the darkening wound on Denham’s cheek.

  ‘A chat about what?’ Denham said.

  ‘Yes, of course. You may like to know that your printed articles have been read with satisfaction in our embassy here, and in certain offices of Whitehall.’

  This was news to Denham. ‘But . . . most of my pieces are published in American weekend newspapers and magazines.’ He glanced at Bowler Hat Man, who observed him without expression.

  ‘Quite so, quite so,’ said Evans, ‘which is why Sir Eric Phipps takes an interest in them. It is vital that the wider American public is not kept in the dark about the way things are heading in Europe. Things you capture very well in your features.’

  ‘I see.’

  Evans looked out of the window as the car sped past buildings decked with long white pennants displaying the Olympic rings. ‘With so many of the American press here for the Games, one might hope their eyes would open, although you’ll have noticed that the scale of the cover-up is impressive . . .’

  ‘Yes . . . I’ve noticed.’

  Still looking out of the window, Evans said, ‘Which leads me to the purpose of our little chat.’

  Denham felt himself squirming. ‘May I smoke?’

  Evans looked at him and nodded.

  ‘Mr Denham, we know you’re a discreet sort . . . and one whose sympathies may coincide with the work of certain like-minded people here who render the occasional service in the national interest—’

  Denham cut him off. ‘I’m flattered, Mr Evans, but if you’re talking about passing secrets and so on, that type of work’s not for me.’

  ‘Of course, we may never call, but—’

  ‘I’m happiest when I stay out of trouble.’

  Denham caught himself touching the wound on his cheek.

  ‘That’s quite all right. I understand,’ Evans said primly. ‘Not everyone wants that sort of responsibility, or the risk, indeed.’

  The car glided across the Landwehr Canal at Hallesches Tor. His home was only a few minutes’ walk from here, and he thought of asking the driver to stop.

  Evans was eyeing him carefully now.

  He said, ‘We would, however, ask for your help with one particular matter . . .’ Leaning forwards he closed the sliding glass partition that separated the back of the car from the driver. ‘We’ve received intelligence that a certain German dossier . . . which we believed had been lost or destroyed . . . has resurfaced.’

  Despite Denham’s mentally dismissing Evans, the man had a foot in the door. Denham’s gaze returned to him. ‘And you think someone may try to pass it to a British journalist?’

  ‘To a British journalist with a reputation for writing the truth, yes.’

  ‘What’s significant about this dossier?’

  ‘If you’re given it, you will know. All we ask is that you bring it to us. We’ll see that you’re compensated for your trouble.’ He took a card from his wallet and passed it to Denham. It read DAVID WYN EVANS—PASSPORT OFFICER. Underneath were two telephone numbers, one for the Mitte District of Berlin; the other a Whitehall number.

  ‘Diplomacy’s not going to work, Mr Denham. If there’s any hope for Europe it lies in intelligence . . .’

  They regarded each other in silence for a moment until Evans’s nose caught the waft from the Schultheiss Brewery. He began to wind down the window.

  ‘It’s worse if you let the air in,’ Denham said.

  Bowler Hat Man let him out without a word, and the Humber rolled away. Denham watched it go, staring down the street long after it had disappeared.

  When he turned the corner into Kopischstrasse a small crowd had gathered outside his building. He recognised some of the locals from Chamissoplatz; they were watching a stretcher being carried out by two Orpo men. Strands of fine white hair trailed from beneath a blanket as it passed. Frau Stumpf was holding the front door open.

  ‘What happened?’ he asked her.

  ‘Herr Denham. Oh dear me. Frau Weiss fell.’ The landlady had a tremor in her voice. ‘She’s dead.’

  The men loaded the stretcher roughly into the back of an Orpo wagon. He stood watching, dumb, suppressing in his h
ead the horrible possibilities that were presenting themselves. Frau Weiss had lived in the building all her married life.

  ‘How did she fall?’ he asked.

  Frau Stumpf looked at him with fear in her eyes, shook her head and said nothing.

  ‘On the stairs?’

  The woman seemed to shrink into the door.

  ‘Tell me,’ he said. Faces in the crowd turned to look at him.

  ‘From her window,’ she said breathlessly.

  Someone sniggered.

  Two Jungvolk boys and a girl were watching the scene with interest. One of the boys had a look Denham had never before seen on a child. He was laughing with his tongue out, his eyes narrowed to sharp slits.

  Chapter Eleven

  A pontoon bridge lit with Roman candles connected the shore with the Pfaueninsel—the Peacock Island—in the broad lake of the Wannsee. After days of intermittent rain, the skies had cleared and a warm evening light gilded the tall trees of beech and elm.

  Ambassador Dodd gave Eleanor his hand as she alighted from the embassy car, followed by Martha and her mother.

  Martha had not stopped talking since they’d left the ambassador’s residence on Tiergartenstrasse. She’d been studying a thick booklet that showed them all where to sit.

  ‘If you ask me, Mother, you’re on the most prestigious table.’ She held the seating plan to Mrs Dodd’s face. ‘Sir Robert Vansittart, Dr Goebbels, Mrs William Dodd, Lady Aberdare, Count Baillet-Latour, Countess Szembek, Ambassador François-Poncet, the Prinz von Liechtenstein, and General Ernst Udet. Do we know him?’

  ‘A flying ace, dear,’ said Mrs Dodd. ‘Just your type.’

  ‘Daddy, I declare you’ve been snubbed. I should mention it to the State Department. You’re the second-ranking diplomat here—’

  ‘Please, Martha,’ the ambassador said drily. ‘I shall greatly dislike shaking our host’s hand. If I am not required to sit at his table, I count myself fortunate indeed.’

  ‘Try to smile at him this time, dear,’ said Mrs Dodd.

  ‘You know what they say, Daddy,’ Martha said. ‘If you’re not at the table, you’re on the menu.’

  Ambassador Dodd’s friendship with Eleanor’s father made him a dear, if somewhat forbidding, figure to her. The two men were colleagues years ago at the University of Chicago, where Dodd had been a professor of history. He was given the ambassadorship, Martha told her, for being a Jeffersonian Democrat and a liberal—qualities the president said would be powerful charms against Nazi sorcery.

  ‘Now, where is Eleanor seated? I can’t see her table,’ continued Martha, turning the pages. ‘Oh, ha-ha, here it is. They’ve seated you with the athletes. Lord, what a gaffe.’

  ‘That suits me just dandy, thank you, Martha,’ said Eleanor. She was ready to staple that booklet to Martha’s head.

  Again her stomach knotted at the thought of what she had to do. If there was any hope of being reinstated she would have to face Brundage this evening and say something. Show her repentance. Anything. She wasn’t sure how. She doubted her pride would allow her to plead.

  A steward in a powdered wig and knee breeches escorted them over the bridge, past an honour guard of naval cadets who snapped to attention and presented their oars.

  The ambassador, hunched in his tailcoat, walked in front, mustering all his forbearance for the handshake ahead, while Eleanor, Martha, and her mother glided behind him in a whishing of taffeta and silk.

  Eleanor felt the eyes of the cadets passing over her figure and decided she’d chosen well this evening: a midnight blue cocktail gown of light silk with transparent sleeves and a narrowed waist. It was set off with a corsage of white orchids and the pearl necklace she’d been given for her twenty-first. In heels she towered over the two other women. Martha teetered along just in front of her, her tight satin dress riding up her hips. Satin’s such an unforgiving fabric, Eleanor thought.

  They entered a grove of trees glowing with coloured lanterns in the shapes of butterflies. Page girls in plaits and dirndl skirts lined the way, beckoning them along a bend in the path as though into an enchanted wood. A sound of violins mingled with the breeze in the trees.

  At the top of a small rise, the wooded path gave onto a broad lawn where the Reichsminister’s guests were mingling in front of a Gothic folly—a fantastical medieval keep, all white turrets and machicolations.

  Barring their way, however, was the welcoming party.

  While the ambassador presented his wife and daughter, Eleanor gaped at their host with wonder. He was a diminutive, club-footed man with a large head, rodent ears, and eyes she thought far from benign. In white tie and tails he looked bang out of place. It was like seeing Al Capone in a mortarboard and college gown.

  Beside him stood his wife, Magda, a handsome, fearless-looking blonde, who, Mrs Dodd whispered, was effectively Germany’s First Lady, as Hitler was unmarried.

  Ambassador Dodd introduced Eleanor last, and Dr Goebbels bowed to kiss her hand. He said a few words of welcome in German, and the depth of his voice surprised her. As he looked up, his dark eyes flared and the tip of a red tongue flicked across his lower lip.

  ‘Jesus,’ said Eleanor, when they’d moved onto the lawn. ‘His wife saw that.’

  About two dozen groups of people were talking in the rich evening light, with more guests arriving. A fine roasting smell was coming from a kitchen marquee on the far right of the lawn, mingling oddly with the colognes concocted by the barbershops of the Savoy and the Hôtel Ritz.

  Eleanor was offered champagne by a footman. Then, with irritating whispers and tugs on her elbow, Martha directed her eyes towards dozens of people she had never heard of: Himmler, the chief of police, waddling among groups like a country curate out of his depth; Lída Baarová, a stunning Czech movie siren and the current object of their host’s affections; a conceited knucklehead called von Ribbentrop, whom Hitler had just appointed ambassador to Britain; and the Mitford sisters Diana and Unity. ‘They’re a pair of English roses who’ve caught the Nazi bug real bad.’

  ‘Like blackfly,’ suggested Eleanor.

  Eventually dinner was announced by a bugle. Eleanor excused herself and went in search of her table, which she found beneath an oak tree hung with lanterns. It was seated with young women athletes, all in team uniforms of different nations, and she realised then that only the females had been invited, which, given her brief experience of their host, kind of figured. The girls eyed her gown, perhaps thinking she had the wrong table.

  ‘Eleanor, over here,’ came a husky voice she knew, and the gentle, giant figure of Helen Stephens unfolded to its full height, beckoning her over. ‘Sit with me.’ They hugged, and for a precarious moment Eleanor felt all the raw hurt that had made her weep in the stadium.

  ‘You won’t believe my day,’ Helen said, banging the table so that the cutlery bounced. A childhood operation on her throat had left her sounding like a longshoreman with a hundred-a-day cigarette habit. ‘I won. I won the hundred metre. I beat that damned Polack, Stella Walsh . . .’

  ‘Sis, that’s wonderful. You were the only woman man enough to beat Stella the Fella.’

  Waiters placed a selection of wines in the centre of the table and served panini and small Italian delicacies as a tenor serenaded the tables with a tub-thumping aria. None of the girls touched the wines, and for once Eleanor decided she’d enjoy herself sober.

  The surface of the Wannsee reflected a crimson sky. Soon, candles were placed on the table and tiny electric lights turned the trees into sparkling candelabra.

  Later as the plates were cleared away couples got up to dance on the terrace in front of the Gothic folly. The string orchestra had withdrawn and was replaced with a large, black-tie dance band that immediately swung into a foxtrot.

  ‘Oh, ha-ha, there you are.’

  Martha was gliding towards her through the crowd, her eyes lit with champagne. Once again, Eleanor got the faint impression that she’d been made the butt of some joke and noticed,
not without some satisfaction, that the shorter woman had lipstick on her teeth, giving a carnivorous leer to her smile.

  ‘Lord, what a head we’ll have tomorrow,’ Martha trilled, taking Eleanor’s arm. ‘Over here, there’s a fascinating man I know you’ll be dying to meet.’

  ‘Okay, but I’m married, remember?’ Eleanor muttered.

  She was led between clusters of people until they reached a group of men with their backs towards them. With an instant dread she recognised the broad shoulders and bolt-upright posture of the man addressing the group. He was winding up some story with booming emphases and hand gestures.

  ‘Some joke, Martha.’

  ‘You said you had to talk to him.’

  Martha tapped his elbow. He swung around, and Eleanor was faced with Avery Brundage.

  The man’s nostrils flared.

  ‘Mr Brundage,’ Martha cooed, sliding a glance at Eleanor. ‘Look who I’ve found.’

  ‘Hello, sir,’ Eleanor said, trying her best smile.

  For two seconds his indignation visibly battled self-control.

  ‘Good evening, Mrs Emerson,’ he managed. There was perspiration on his brow.

  ‘There, ha-ha, you’ve made up. A diplomatic coup on my part, I think. Mr Brundage, Eleanor is our guest during the Games.’

  ‘Sir,’ Eleanor continued, ‘would you be kind enough to spare me a minute of your—’

  But before she could finish, a British voice was saying, ‘My word, who have we here?’

  Brundage stepped aside to allow the women into the circle. A short, dapper gentleman with a monocle and a pencil moustache was observing Eleanor with a poker face. His chest was heavy with medals and decorations.

  Martha said, ‘Eleanor, dear, this is Sir Eric Phipps, the British ambassador.’

  ‘Delighted,’ he said, his face giving nothing away, but she noticed his monocle casting a miniature spotlight up and down her body.