by John Altman
He was not in the field anymore, however, and there was nothing here at the villa that seemed to merit such extreme caution. After a moment, he made himself relax. The transition from the field to the bureaucracy was not an easy one to make. But he was back in Germany now, and so his role as Einsatzgruppen leader needed to be put aside. It was time to don again the mantle he had worn for so many years before—Kriminal Inspektor of the Gestapo, and agent of the SD.
Yet the mantle did not fit quite as well as it once had. Frick had seen things in the field, and done things in the field, that had forever changed his nature. The old role felt awkward, too small, as if he had outgrown it. The laws of National Socialism were big and brave and new, and the old ideas, the old ways of doing things, had little place today.
After a few moments, he gave his head a shake and moved out of the sunshine. Once inside the villa, he paused to straighten the cuffs of his shirt and square his jacket’s shoulders. Then he proceeded down the shadowed hall until he reached Hagen’s office. The door was ajar. He presented himself with a stiff-armed salute.
“Herr Hagen,” he said. “Heil Hitler!”
Hagen looked up from his desk.
“Herr Inspektor,” he said, leaning back in his chair. “Come in. Let me have a look at you.”
Frick entered the office. He stood proudly under Hagen’s gaze, thinking that the experience he had picked up in the field must show in his bearing. And Hagen, looking him over, seemed impressed.
“You look well,” he said at last. “Have a seat, Herr Inspektor. We have much to discuss.”
Frick took a seat. Hagen opened a silver cigarette case and offered it across the desk. Frick shook his head. From elsewhere in the villa came a soft trickle of music: the “Beer Barrel Polka” by Will Glahe, cheery and somehow surreal.
Hagen took a cigarette for himself, shook off Frick’s silver lighter as he held it forward—Frick, who had no taste for tobacco, had found other uses for the lighter on the front—struck a match, and began to speak.
He spoke with oratorical grandness, like a man, Frick thought, who had grown overly accustomed to making speeches. Six years ago, Hagen said, they had planted Frick in the Gestapo as an undercover agent. Frick’s purpose there had been to report back to Hagen on Gestapo Chief Müller’s machinations, to keep the SD’s secret security files up to date. The Sicherheitsdienst, which had been formed in 1932 for the purpose of ferreting out disloyalty within the Nazi organization, had since expanded their purview, becoming the intelligence arm of the secret police. But their original purpose had been to spy on other German spies, and they continued to give this duty top priority.
Frick had done better at the Gestapo, Hagen was saying now, than anyone had assumed he would, rising quickly to the position of Kriminal Inspektor. Now that he had returned from the front, it was time to take advantage of this development. Hagen would like to see him begin to assemble his own network of men within the Gestapo, right under Müller’s nose. A logical first step …
Frick tried to listen, but his mind kept wandering. The cozy warmth of the office, the sound of the radio, and Hagen’s lulling monotone conspired to remove him from the here and now. In Poland he had overseen the disposal of a half-dozen difficult Jews. He had forced the women to dig the ditch into which they had then been executed. The experience had been unlike anything else in his life.
It would be difficult, very difficult indeed, to return to the bureaucratic ways of life back in Germany.
But perhaps Hagen realized this. The direction he was leading, Frick came to understand, was intended to liberate Frick from his original duties. Hagen had something else in mind for him.
Presently Hagen finished outlining his plan for placing SD agents, under Frick’s supervision, in low-ranking positions throughout the Gestapo. He paused, stabbed out his cigarette, shifted some papers on his desk, and then said:
“It must have been glorious … your time spent in the field.”
Frick brightened. “Unlike anything I’ve experienced in my life, Herr Hagen.”
“I envy you, Herr Inspektor. I’ve spent too much time behind this desk. Far too much time.”
Frick, who secretly agreed, only shrugged. “Somebody must make the sacrifice.”
“Indeed,” Hagen said. He thought for a moment, then blinked. “In any case,” he said, “I have an opportunity for you, if you are interested. It would enable you to avoid a return to such drudgery. And it would take advantage of your connections with the Gestapo. You are uniquely qualified, I would venture, for this operation … if you are interested.”
Frick leaned forward. “Go on,” he said.
“There is a man—an Engländer—who was used by this office as an asset. A traitor who had experience with MI6. You may remember him. William Hobbs.”
Frick shrugged again. Most of his memories from before his time in Poland were washed-out, sepia-toned. “Perhaps,” he said.
“He came to Germany nearly five months ago. When the debriefing was finished, he was informed that he must stay in Berlin for the foreseeable future. This seems not to have agreed with him.” Hagen paused. “I received word this morning,” he said carefully, “that Hobbs has murdered his case officer—an unfortunate fellow named Borg—and vanished. Borg’s corpse was found in the apartment they shared on Leipziger Strasse. His throat had been slit.”
Frick nodded, blank-faced.
“Hobbs cannot have gotten far, of course. No doubt he’s still in Berlin, in hiding somewhere. Yet until now we have not been able to track him down. It makes me suspect that perhaps he was not truly a traitor, Herr Inspektor. It makes me suspect that he had planned for this eventuality.”
“I see.”
“Perhaps MI6 arranged all this in advance—his treachery, the kidnapping—on the assumption that we would not allow him to leave. If that is the case, I’m afraid we have been outmaneuvered. He has been successfully planted in Germany.”
Frick thinned his lips. He would not have put it past the shrewd, conniving British. They had been practicing the game of espionage for centuries upon centuries, and had become masters at it.
“I want this man back in my custody,” Hagen said. “He must have a contact here in Berlin—someone who is sheltering him.”
“Of course.”
“I would very much like you to find him for me.”
“Of course,” Frick said again.
Hagen reached into the drawer of his desk and withdrew a file. He passed it over. “William Hobbs,” he repeated. “Do not hesitate to come to me with any questions you may have. And move quickly. I would prefer to have him alive—but I would settle for having him.”
“I understand, Herr Hagen.”
Hagen looked at him for another moment. Something in his face softened. “Tell me,” he said then. “I have heard reports about the conduct of the Einsatzgruppen. They have taken matters into their own hands, I have been told, on the Polish front. It makes the Christians very nervous.”
Frick smiled.
“It is a new age, Herr Hagen. New methods are required to produce results.”
“How I envy you,” Hagen said wistfully.
“Perhaps next time you can join me. When we move West.”
“Perhaps,” Hagen said. “Perhaps.” His eyes turned momentarily inward, then sharpened again. He stood. “Have a look at the file,” he said. “Keep me informed.”
Frick stood opposite him. “I will have results shortly.”
“I trust you will.”
“Heil Hitler,” Frick said.
“Heil Hitler,” Hagen answered. “And Herr Inspektor—welcome home.”
3
CHARLOTTENBURG, BERLIN
The More You Work The Better Sleep You Need, Eva Bernhardt read. Make a nightcup of Bourn-Vita a regular habit—it will soothe you, help digestion and calm your whole body.
Eva, slumped over her desk with her chin propped in one hand, had to read the advertisement twice to get the sense fr
om it. Good sleep was not something with which she had been intimately acquainted in recent nights. But now would be no time to slack off at work and risk drawing attention. No, everything must continue by the usual routine.
The usual routine, in its dull and quiet way, was torturous.
She took lunch alone at her desk: cold red cabbage with vinegar and boiled potatoes. The meal did not sit well in her stomach. For the rest of the day, she felt vaguely, insistently nauseous.
Afternoon turned on its sleepy axis; she felt herself nodding. She sat up straight, pinched the soft flesh inside her forearm, and tried to concentrate. Her work—supplying ammunition for the radio propagandists based in the Rundfunk—involved divining profound things from seemingly innocuous materials smuggled out of England. The work was tedious, and often absurd. But Propaganda Minister Goebbels, who rarely hesitated to invent outlandish claims for his broadcasts, liked to spice his lies with an occasional fact—so her position continued to exist, regardless of the quality of her results.
Mrs. Brown has organized a gardening corps. At the end of a hard day she goes home to tea and a good wash with Knight’s Castile soap. The kindly luxurious lather of Knight’s Castile soothes away that feeling of exhaustion, tones up the skin and keeps the complexion youthfully clear.…
A shadow fell across her desk. When Eva looked up, she saw Gretl Koch smiling down at her.
“You look tired,” Gretl said.
Eva returned the smile as best she could. Gretl was one of the nicer girls at the Rundfunk—a social butterfly, with no lack of wealthy older boyfriends.
“What you need,” Gretl went on, “is some fun. My friend Joseph made a killing last week. Some big naval contract. Tonight he wants to splurge. We’re going dancing.”
Eva felt a tug of envy. Even before she had found herself in her current situation, she had not been the type to go out dancing. She had always been the outsider, the girl who ended up waiting in vain to be asked for a turn on the floor.
“Come with us,” Gretl said. “It’ll do you good.”
“That’s nice of you,” Eva said. “I can’t tonight. Next time?”
“Now, why does that sound so familiar?”
“I appreciate the offer, Gretl.”
“He’s got a brother. We could give him a ring, and all do the town together.”
“Next time,” Eva promised.
“You know,” Gretl said gloomily, “you’re not getting any younger.” But she said it with a grin, and then left Eva alone, her skirt swishing busily as she moved back to her own desk.
By half past four, Eva had reached the end of her rope. Two advertisements for menstrual aids were spread on her desk, one for A-K tablets (“war will not wait on any woman’s weakness”) and one for Rendells Feminine Hygiene (“a product of intimate importance”). She sighed heavily and set down her pen. Her brain was hardly working anymore. Her stomach felt turgid and sour.
It was time to go home.
She had just finished her bath and was regarding herself desultorily in the mirror above the sink—there were wrinkles around her eyes and her mouth; when had those appeared?—when the rapping came on her door.
The rapping was steady and insistent, the kind of sound that might attract the wrong sort of attention from the neighbors. Eva pushed down the first feathery stirrings of panic and rushed to answer it quickly.
She was wearing a loose robe; as she crossed the tiny basement apartment she held it tightly closed against her breast. She reached the door and then wavered before opening it. It was past nine, and she was not expecting a visitor. It could not be good news. If the Gestapo were to come for her, in fact, this was how it might happen. For a moment, she considered not answering the door at all. She considered going into the bedroom, pulling the blankets up above her head, and waiting to be left alone—as if that childish trick might actually have a chance of thwarting the Gestapo.
Then the rapping started again. She swallowed once, with a click. Her fingers moved smoothly over the three locks on the door, worked the mechanisms, dropped to the knob and twisted it.
Klinger was there, his eyes sparkling with dark mirth. “Surprise!” he crowed.
He staggered past her with the smell of schnapps following in a thick cloud. Once inside the flat, he paused, swayed, and turned.
“You,” he said. His finger wagged in her face. “You …”
Eva waited.
“You … must have been … a beautiful … baby …”
He turned away, singing louder. “You must have been … a beautiful … girl …”
She shut the door, took a moment to compose her face, and then followed him into the apartment. He had moved to the wireless radio on the bookshelf. Now he switched it on and began to tune through the stations.
After looking at Klinger’s back for a few seconds, Eva went to put on a kettle, wondering if any of the neighbors had seen him. What did he expect from her tonight? He had probably gotten drunk and then started feeling romantic. But he seemed more interested in the radio, for the moment, than in her.
He settled on a broadcast by Lord Haw-Haw. Lord Haw-Haw was in unusually good form, his nasal voice describing Germany’s good intentions toward a pacifistic Britain with an unmistakable sneer. Klinger listened for a moment, his head bent, his eyes closed. “Feh,” he said then. He switched off the radio, moved to the threadbare sofa, and. collapsed onto it heavily.
Eva left the kettle to boil and went back into the living room. “Otto,” she said. “You shouldn’t be here.”
His eyes had closed again. He was nodding rhythmically, as if following some tune playing in his head.
“It’s late,” she said gently. “You ought to go home.”
“My wife’s at home,” he said. His eyes opened. “Did you know I have a wife, Liebling?”
She shook her head.
“Well, it’s true. A wonderful woman, my wife. You should meet her sometime. You have something in common, you know. Me.” He shook his head, then began to sing again. “I married an angel …”
The kettle whistled. Eva returned to the kitchen, found two cups, set them on a tray beside a teapot, and went to join Klinger on the couch.
But Klinger was back before the bookcase. His finger traveled unsteadily over the spines. It paused before a book Eva had never read: Deutsche Mathematik. The book was only for show. She had long since purged her collection of anything that might be considered suspicious reading material, filling it instead with books that had been sanctioned by the propaganda ministry.
Klinger took down the book and began to page through it.
“Ah!” he said. “Look here—listen. ‘The proposition that mathematics can be considered without a racial perspective’”—the words came out slurred: The proposhition that mathematics can be conshidered without a racial pershpective—“‘carries within itself the germs of destruction of German science.’”
Eva set down the tray in her hands, and made no comment.
“Huh,” Klinger said thickly. He returned to the couch, shaking the book in his hand. “Do you know,” he asked, “that my father was once an honored professor at the University of Berlin?”
She sat beside him, poured the tea. “No,” she said. “I didn’t know that.”
“Of course not. Why would you? I’ve taken great pains, little one, to keep it a secret. If you look at the official records, in fact, you’d discover that my father is not my father at all.” He laughed—a brittle laugh. “I’m a simple man, dear Eva. A simple man with simple tastes. Why should I invite trouble?”
She shook her head helplessly.
“Feh,” Klinger said. “I know what some might say to that. He is your father; you are his son. You have a duty, Otto—that’s what they would say. But we are very different, my father and I. He cared for ideas, Eva.” He looked at her with sudden intensity. “Ideas.”
She reached for a cup of tea and pressed it into his hands. He set it down again immediately.
&n
bsp; “When it came time to join the Teachers’ League, my father refused. He wouldn’t take the oath. Wouldn’t even hear of it. Do you know the oath? All teachers were forced to take it, from the lowest kindergarten to the highest university. ‘To be loyal and obedient to Adolf Hitler.’ Well, he wouldn’t have it. Racial science, indeed. Feh. Centuries of learning … out the window. He wouldn’t have it.”
His voice was climbing now, in volume and in timbre.
“He was a man of ideas, my father. And he paid the price. So I am not his son! I am the son of some other Herr Klinger, if you read my official records. A farmer from the east. Why should I invite that sort of scrutiny, that my father’s son would have to face?”
“Otto …”
“I don’t need that. Dear, darling Eva. Would you blame me—”
“Keep your voice down,” she said.
He trailed off, then looked at her cannily.
“Yes,” he said after a moment. “We wouldn’t want to attract attention to ourselves, would we?”
That same dark humor danced in his eyes, feverishly.
“Not us,” he said. “A traitor and a spy.”
Cool shock took Eva, chilling her, making her stomach twist.
Klinger raised the cup again, drank, ran the back of his hand over his lips, and belched. “Don’t look that way,” he said. “I’m only joking. Dear, darling Eva.”
She looked away.
“You’re no spy, of course. You’re only the latest in a long string of beautiful women to throw themselves at me. Why, it happens every day. Several times a day. My tremendous natural charm.” He laughed. “Why should I suspect that you have any ulterior motive? That would be foolish of me. Worse than foolish. Paranoid. Eh?”
She reached for her tea. Her hand was shaking. She steadied it with her other hand and forced herself to bring the cup to her mouth.
“So nervous!” he said wonderingly.
When she spoke again, her voice was thin. “Otto, you shouldn’t say things like that.”
