by John Meaney
A part of me was doing just that.
"The man I was playing tennis with? His family come from the North, to what's supposed to be our country, even with the Jews occupying the Elbe Strip. But his parents live alone and poor on a broken farm, unable to till the fields because Jew psychopaths with pickaxe handles and guns cross their own border to form an illegal No Man's Land in our territory. No grazing sheep or cattle, no planting crops, because they're so paranoid they can't let ordinary people live their lives. They're invaders who—"
She stopped, then shook her head.
"I do go on," she added. "Don't I?"
Yes, you fuckin' do.
But I smiled.
"Let's talk only about the good things in life," I said. "Just for tonight."
"That sounds fine to me, Larry Brown."
We kept to that rule for the next two hours, as we ate in a small restaurant near Marienplatz. Afterwards, I walked with Hilde back toward Sendlinger Tor. A tram passed by, clanging its bell. If only Hilde wasn't desperate to rid the world of a non-existent Zionist conspiracy, this would have been a perfect moment.
We smiled, and I took her hand. And we walked like that until we reached her car, a small white Opel.
"This one's mine."
"Very nice," I said.
We kissed, very softly.
"Good night, Larry."
I held the driver's door open for her.
"Drive carefully, Hilde. Can I ring you tomorrow?"
"I want you to. Very much."
"Good."
Then I closed the door and watched as she started the engine, put the car into first gear, and pulled away. She drove steadily, then turned into a side street as I waved, and she was gone.
"Oy vay," I muttered.
But I still felt the connection between me and Hilde, though she was out of sight.
She's out of sight, all right.
It was time to head for the Hauptbahnhof, the main station, to meet Rogers. An easy-paced amble along pretty streets, and an opportunity to wonder about my life.
At the quantum level, according to the weirdest part of physics, two particles can be entangled after a collision, which represents a deep connection between their properties that appears to transcend the speed of light. The equations don't predict the entanglement of complicated groups of particles, like the electrochemical patterns of thought and emotion.
But I seemed to be aware of Fern, half way across the world, and Hilde drawing away from me in her car. It's possible for a particle to be entangled with two partners.
(The Nazis hated quantum mechanics and relativity, because of the theories' Jewish weirdness. Perhaps, for once, they had a point.)
When I reached the station, Rogers was already there, beneath the clock.
"You look like you need a drink, old man."
"Coffee," I said.
"So long as you don't mind me drinking something stronger."
"That's a deal, my friend."
I'd still not checked in to my hotel, so I found a phone booth and rang them, assuring them of my arrival tonight. Then I fetched my case from Left Luggage. Meanwhile, Rogers had found a nearby café-bar, and led the way.
Over caffeine-free Café Hags – Rogers changed his mind about the alcohol – we talked.
"I wasn't sure you'd be here."
"You thought I might be with Hilde."
We don't break a rendezvous if we can help it, but he wouldn't know that.
"Exactly."
I shook my head. "Can't move too fast."
"If you say so. Were you thinking of putting a camera into the lady's flat?"
"Not my first thought. But what kind of equipment do you have?"
Rogers reached over, took my unused teaspoon, and put it into his glass of tonic water.
"See how the spoon appears to bend?"
"I know what refraction is," I said. "And total internal reflection. You have optic fibre?"
"You are up to date, Mr Brown. The answer's yes, plus I have a fish-eye lens and cine camera. And audio equipment."
"Sounds good, but let's hold back until we know where to deploy."
"Maybe Schtüpnagel's office?"
"Well..." A waiter walked past, and we fell silent. Then: "The place is well guarded."
Pinchas had covered this in my briefing. There were twenty-four hour guards, tough young men with firearms. Once a month, technicians swept the building with detectors.
"So why not bug Fräulein Schenck's place?"
"Because it's not her we need to monitor." My voice was tightening. "All right?"
"Ah." Rogers stirred sugar into his coffee, sucked the spoon, then set it down. "If I offered you ten million D-marks, would you sleep with Hilde Schenck?"
"Excuse me?" The café noise faded. "What did you say?"
"What you're supposed to say is yes. Then I reply, now that we've established what you are, all we have to do is—"
"Negotiate the price. Fuck off, Rogers."
"Look, Larry old boy." He leaned forward and touched the back of my hand briefly, the way I might touch a woman's: Hilde, say, or Fern. "Stereotypes are deplorable, don't you think?"
"What the hell?"
"You're not happy. You're a man, so you think you're supposed to feel triumphant, using a woman. Notching up a victory on the bedpost, am I right?"
I had no idea how to answer.
"But any act of physical intimacy," he continued, "is a revelation, dropping our barriers, or we're not even human. You understand what I'm saying?"
"You mean if a woman acted this way she'd be a fuckin' whore, so that's all I am. I think I've got it, old chap."
I was angry, because—
Because he's right.
Rogers waited a moment, then: "Are you married?"
My answer was a total surprise.
"No, I'm in love with another man's wife."
Rogers blinked.
"Life can be a bloody bitch, old thing."
My hotel was small and elegant, a converted rich person's house with seventeen upscale bedrooms, no more. The dining-area was tiny, next to a drawing-room filled with old books, and a bar in one corner.
In my room, I did some stretching exercises, then sat cross-legged, concentrating on my breathing, trying not to think of Hilde or Fern. Trying really hard.
"Oh, balls."
Climbing into bed, I imagined I was on a raft drifting on a warm ocean. Holding that thought, I slipped into sleep.
Early next morning I went for a run. Afterwards, I explored the city by myself – no one was trailing me – then had lunch with Rogers, and eventually phoned Hilde at the FPDA offices. We agreed to meet in a restaurant off Marienplatz, at seven p.m.
"I'm looking forward to it," I said.
From a phone booth in the Hauptbahnhof, I rang the Washington offices of the Atomic Energy Authority and asked for Helen Stanfield, but by the time I'd got the AEA switchboard operator to agree that such a person existed, my coins had run out.
Her real name wasn't Helen Stanfield, but Fern Segal, formerly Fern Avni, and I had no business ringing her.
Shit.
At seven, Hilde Schenck was already waiting in the restaurant's small foyer. Her dress was elegant, ivory silk, and her scent was understated and compelling.
My God.
She'd not wanted to meet me straight after work because she'd wanted to prepare herself. It made me want to cry.
"You're beautiful. I mean absolutely stunning."
"Oh, Larry. Thank you."
The waiter was all smiles as he led us to our table. Other diners smiled also. It was that kind of evening, bathed in a warm atmosphere. Everything was excellent.
For now.
We talked about nonsense, about episodes from our childhoods, and some of what I said was true. My stories were mild distortions, deleting incriminating elements almost in a spirit of love, because the truth would hurt her. After the meal, I escorted her to the parked Opel. As on the pre
vious evening, I held open the driver's door, and gently closed the door shut when she was inside. This time, though, she leaned across the passenger seat, and popped the passenger door open.
She sat back, saying nothing.
Oh, my God.
Blood rush gathered downwards as I climbed into the car.
"You're wonderful," I told her.
"So are you."
She turned the engine on. It was a smooth journey as we travelled along the quiet, clean streets to the five-storey apartment complex where she lived. Dark-green wooden shutters, in the Alpine style, bracketed the windows.
Hilde stopped the car, and we looked at each other in silence, swallowing slightly.
"Come on," she whispered.
We walked together to the main entrance, and climbed the stairs without quite touching. All of this happened carefully, with the precision of ritual: her opening the front door, our going inside, turning to face each other, and the encircling of our arms as we moved close, mouths blending as we sank into a deep, glorious kiss.
The sofa was black leather and steel, but astonishingly soft and warm as I lowered Hilde onto it. Our clothing was coming apart almost without volition as hot attraction overpowered us. My hands were inside her clothing, her fingers moving fast to unbutton my shirt.
Her nipples were small and sweet and hard. After a while I allowed my kisses to travel downwards. When I tugged her panties down and entered her softness with my tongue, she arched her back and gave a tiny scream.
"No. In me. Now."
And she had my trousers off and I was inside her, surrounded by a tight velvet grip as we rode towards a nova blaze of white as the world exploded, everything blew apart, and we both sobbed out in the moment of obliteration. Then we were done, for now.
"Oh, my God, Larry."
The ordinary world crystallized into new detail around us.
"Hilde. You are so beautiful."
"You, too."
After a while we stood up and, trailing garments, walked hand in hand into her bedroom. There, we gently stripped each other naked, and climbed into bed. We clasped our bodies together, making tiny motions, bathing in sensation, and surprisingly soon we were in the dance again, deep and powerful, until the universe exploded once more.
Still holding each other close, as if our skins were one, we slipped together downwards into sleep.
And we woke in the same position, with early morning sun shining yellow through the window. This time we made love with sweet, exquisite slowness. Afterwards, we got up to rejoin everyday life, in a world that was newly made and different.
Dressed, sitting at Hilde's kitchen bar with coffee in my hand, I sipped the too-hot liquid, enjoying the slight bruise in my lip.
"Larry..." Hilde kissed me. "I'm not going into work today—"
"That's wonderful."
"—but I do have to go somewhere. I'm very sorry."
"Me too. We could do with a sleep in."
"Maybe not just sleeping."
I took hold of her hand and kissed her fingers. "Maybe not."
Hilde laughed.
"Sorry." She kissed me again. "I've got to finish getting ready."
"You already look beautiful."
"Only in your eyes, lover. It's the rest of the world I have to convince."
I shook my head. "Then they're blind."
"Ah. You are perfect, you know that?"
"No." I shook my head. "Really... No."
Hilde looked at the diamond-bright world outside the window, then turned back to me with a new light dancing in her flecked grey eyes.
"You could come along. If you're ready to meet my family, that is."
This is moving too fast.
"Are you saying... You want me to meet your parents?"
"No, my brother Jürgen."
After a moment, I said: "I'd like that."
Hilde slipped her arms around my waist.
"And he'll like you because" – she gave me a quick popping kiss – "you're just perfect, Larry Brown."
"You said that before."
"It's still true."
We hugged again, then Hilde glanced up at the clock and said: "Oh, no. We'll be late."
"Where are we going?"
"For a drive in the countryside." Hilde gave a captivating girlish smile. "It'll be wonderful."
"With you? Of course it will be."
An hour later we were driving with the windows down, heading out along the autobahn signposted Nürnberg. Hilde kept smiling at me. Smiling back, I told her to keep her eyes on the road.
I cannot be in love with you.
It was a hard thought to sustain, as the fresh spring air blew through the Opel's interior, and Hilde continued to look over at me, grinning at every opportunity. After a while, I turned on the radio, and Surfin' USA came to life, blown away by the wind.
I switched the radio off.
At the exit for Ingolstadt, we turned off the autobahn and drove into town. There, I drank two coffees to Hilde's one, and we refuelled the Opel before continuing the journey. But Hilde did not take the direct route back to the autobahn. Instead, we drove to a small industrial area at the edge of town, and parked in front of a blackened, half-ruined factory.
Its roof was open to the sky. It was the place, she told me, where her father had worked, but the owners could not sustain the business.
"The entire area's like this," I said.
We were practically in Switzerland, and New Jerusalem was far to the northwest – where my countrymen have illegally cleared out lands on this side of the border, for the sake of security, forming a No Man's Land that shows on no official maps. But even this far from New Jerusalem, locals still felt its disheartening presence. Our disheartening presence.
"Dieses Ort," muttered Hilde, "ist ja eine Bude."
Literally, she'd said this place was a booth or stall – eine Bude – but colloquially the word means a real dump.
"I think I know whose fault it is," I said.
"Wirklikch ist es" – Hilde gave a strange smile – "eine Budenfrage."
Then I did one of the hardest things I've ever attempted, almost as hard as keeping my composure in Schtüpnagel's office with that damned lampshade staring at me.
I laughed at Hilde's pun.
It was hard because Budenfrage rhymes with Judenfrage – the Jewish Question or Jewish Problem, with a Final Solution that required the taking of six million lives, each one a living, breathing human being with fears and dreams, childhood memories and adult struggles, the billion everyday moments defining a lifetime, an existence, a universe.
But I laughed, and the sound was almost natural.
Hilde drove on.
TWENTY-TWO:
BAVARIA, March 1963
After a time, Hilde turned the Opel onto a slate-grey stony path and drove into dark-green forest. The path stretched and curved, following the contours of the land, until we came out onto a wide, flat area where half a dozen cars were already parked.
Beyond the vehicles, a single-storey wooden building stood alone, against a backdrop of more dark forest, and a rising mountain slope.
"This is it," said Hilde, switching the engine off.
"It's a wonderful setting. Your brother doesn't live here, does he?"
"Oh, no. Of course not."
"But you're not going to tell me what's inside?"
"I know you can hold back until the correct moment, my darling."
"Hilde, Hilde, Hilde."
And the thing was, I enjoyed simply saying her name, even though she and her colleagues were dedicated to destroying the kind of vermin that I belong to. Insane.
I'm Larry Brown, obsessive anti-Semite.
As we climbed out of the car, a strange metallic clash sounded inside the building, floating through the clear forest air.
Larry Brown. Remember that.
"The air is so clean," said Hilde. "Don't you think?"
"Because it's Judenrein."
The jo
ke wasn't as clever as hers, but she gave a small giggle. The Nazis' stated goal initially was to make Germany Judenrein, and while the books translate the term as 'Jew-free', they miss the overtones, because reinigen means 'to clean'.
We held hands as we approached the door.
Danger. Here.
It was that subliminal warning, like the gym in Paris, or even the basement of Berlin Central: the sense of adrenaline upon the air, the unmistakeable trace of violence, both past and imminent. The biochemical signature of fear.
The door opened, and a shaven-headed man recognized Hilde, then brought his heels together in a gesture that was not theatrical but serious.
"Guten Tag, Fräulein Schenk."
When he looked at me, Hilde clasped my arm and said: "This is my good friend Larry Brown."
"Please." The man's English was ponderous. "Come inside."
I kept my tone formal: "Vielen dank, mein Herr."
"Bitte."
Electric prickling swept my skin as we went inside.
Oh, dear God.
There were two more thugs in suits watching us, but it was the main hall that took hold of my attention. On the polished parquet floor stood some thirty swordsmen, walking around, making informal practice cuts through the air with their sabres. They were different from normal fencers.
Each man wore a tunic of heavy black leather, plus steel-rimmed goggles that included a prominent angled beak to protect the nose. It made sense because the sabre blades were longer and heavier than normal, and the edges were clearly sharp.
Imagine those blades swinging fast if they knew a Jew was in their midst—
Then Hilde was introducing me to someone, a stocky man with cropped grey hair. He'd been her tennis opponent in the sports hall.
"Klaus Eisenmenger, this is Larry Brown."
I said: "Es freut mich Sie kennenzulernen, Herr Eisenmenger."
"Likewise, Mr Brown. You've never seen a Mensur exchange, I presume?"
His face bore narrow silver scars.
"No, I haven't."
"It's exciting." Hilde's fingers were tight around my biceps. "You'll see."
A fit-looking man in a dark suit walked from a door at the rear of the hall. There were two other men with him, one of them bald, but the man in the middle was radiating charisma. In the East they call it chi, an aura that I'm sure is biochemical, including the fear-pheromones broadcast by everyone else in reaction to a predator's presence.
