by Peter Rimmer
“It will likely get worse. The Americans are developing an atomic bomb.”
“So are the Germans.”
“God help us.”
“He never does in war. Whose prayers should he answer? Ours or the Germans’?”
When Katherine, Harry’s secretary, came in with a fresh pot of tea with two cups they sat back separately looking into their pasts. Katherine always brought in a fresh pot of tea when Harry had a guest. It was the nearest he got in London to domesticity.
“Went round to have a cup of tea with Sarah Coombes last night. Fred was there. Like old times. Why do we bind much better in adversity? When everything goes smoothly again we’re back at each other’s throats. Arguing. Sometimes being rude to each other.”
“She still doesn’t know you have money?”
“Would spoil it all. People don’t like the other person to have more than them. Makes them feel uncomfortable. Why do possessions make so much difference to our perception of people? Most rich people have stolen their money, inherited it like me or got lucky.”
“You had to work hard at holding on to your money. You had to come over and run Colonial Shipping.”
“That I did. Strange, isn’t it, everyone wants to get rich. All I wanted was to be a tobacco farmer in Rhodesia. Live in the bush among nature. Subsist off the farm if necessary. The old African has the right answer. A hut by a river. Patch of vegetables watered by the river. Couple of cows and some goats and three wives to look after him. Now that’s living. You don’t get your knickers in a twist living that kind of life. Peace and quiet in the African tranquillity. Now that’s a perfect life. All this bustle and scheming is for the birds. We all want too much. Strange part is, when we get it we don’t want that either. A river full of Zambezi bream, a cow to give you milk and as much meat as you can eat on both sides of the river when the game comes down at night for water. You don’t live so long in Africa without modern medicine but the years you do live are sweet.
“I envy Sarah Coombes and Fred. Both of them are happy with their lot. Look forward to those cups of tea. Like this one with an old friend, Vic. Both times war brought us together. As it did with me and Klaus von Lieberman. I hope they all make it through our bombing. At least Anthony out of action won’t be asked to drop fire bombs on women and children. Get me a full report on that leg from the doctor when you can. Anthony doesn’t like me visiting the hospital too often. With luck, they’ll invalid him out of the RAF. He can stay with me at Hastings Court or go back to his mother in South Africa. Probably South Africa. He has a girl there he’s been writing to. Eleanor Botha. They met on Clifton Beach when Ant was on his way down from flying training in Gwelo. First loves can stick. Become permanent.”
“The youngsters build up love in letters.”
“What does an old bachelor know about love, Vic Bell?”
“You’d be surprised. We were all young once. Idyllic. Full of hope. Full of optimism.”
“What was her name?”
“I forget now.”
“What was her name?”
“Sandy. We wrote for three years when I was in France.”
“What happened?”
“Married another guy. Last I heard of Sandy she had two kids by him. Married him the day he was demobilised from the army. Hope she’s been happy.”
“No one else?”
“Not really. You know how I am. How I look. Some say it’s better to grow old alone than with a bickering wife.”
“Next time I visit Sarah Coombes you’re coming with me.”
“Don’t be bloody silly. Why?”
“Because you are both nice people.”
“What happened to Mr Coombes?”
“Like Phillip Crookshank, he was killed at Dunkirk. They couldn’t have children. When the war’s over I’m going across to the Isle of Wight to see Mavis Crookshank and the children. They spent Christmas with us at Hastings Court in 1939. Their Paul and my Frank had a fist fight. Phillip and his wife were so happy together. So often the good marriages end in tragedy when one of them dies prematurely.”
“How old is this Sarah?”
“Why don’t you ask her? Just be humble.”
“Haven’t got much else to be.”
“Another cup of tea?”
“Always a pleasure. I’ll lift my cup to old friends. Present and departed.”
“So many faces from 33 Squadron have faded from my mind. Sometimes I can’t recall their names. When I do, I can’t see their faces anymore. That’s how we all die out in the end. Fade out of the memories of everyone we know on earth. Do you think they are all right in Cape Town without me?”
“Of course they are. You had to make a choice. If those bombs had hit Hastings Court in a stick you could have lost your entire family. They are safe in Cape Town. When the war comes to an end they will still be there safe and sound to live through their own lives. To have their own families.”
“There’ll be another war.”
“I hope not.”
“There always is.”
4
The whole building had gone that morning when Melina von Lieberman had come up from the Nazi Party shelter close to her flat. She had gone to work in the clothes she had tried to sleep in. All night long the Royal Air Force had crossed and recrossed Berlin dropping high explosive bombs. Everything she owned had gone up in the attack.
“Where was the Luftwaffe?” she screamed at her Cousin Henning von Lieberman who had placed her in the secretarial college in 1941 when she left home. Afterwards he had given her a job in the Party Headquarters. “The ack-ack was only intermittent. The English were flying over Germany at will.”
“Most of them were shot down on the way home.”
“Why not before they blew my flat to pieces! I haven’t got any clothes other than these.”
“Many were shot down on the way to Germany.”
“Didn’t sound like it to me.”
“Keep your voice down, Melina. You know I don’t like it.”
“The door’s closed. They can’t hear outside. I know what you do like, Henning. I know just what you do like. Are we by any chance going to lose this war? Around about lunchtime the Americans will come over dropping more bombs. In broad daylight. For God’s sake, their bombers shoot down our fighters, they have so many gun turrets. Box formations. We can’t get inside the American box formations, according to Erwin. What happened? We were winning!”
“The Americans came into the war,” said Henning almost under his breath. “It’s better. You can stay with me. I’ll buy you some more clothes.”
“I’m going home to Bavaria. That’s what I’m going to do. How can I work here with no clothes and nowhere to stay?”
“I’ve said. You can stay with me.”
“And my father finds out? You’re his first cousin. He’ll kill you, Party or no Party.”
“Calm down.”
“How can I? The damn British have demolished my home. It was fun in Berlin in the beginning. All the parties. All the lovely attention. This now is a nightmare. I’m going before I have to walk. Before the RAF take out our railway marshalling yards and the trains stop running. You got me into this. You must get me out of it. Please, Henning. Your dream of a master race running a disciplined world full of law and order sounded so wonderful at the beginning. Let me go. Please let me go. I won’t say a word. Promise. Not to anyone. Not a word to my father or mother. Not a word to Erwin.”
“So you want to run away when the going gets tough?”
“It’s going to get tougher. The Russians have liberated Stalingrad. Some say they are advancing through Poland. The Americans have invaded Italy, deposing Mussolini. The British are back in control of most of North Africa. They almost murdered Erwin’s godfather. General Rommel wasn’t at his headquarters for some lucky reason. How many times can we be lucky? There’s talk of France being invaded from across the English Channel. The Japanese are being pushed back into the South Pacific. What’s
going to happen to us? Working here in intelligence, I know what I hear is right. That’s what frightens me. I can’t believe in the propaganda anymore. I don’t believe we shot down the British air force last night. Get me a rail pass. I want to go home. Please. You owe me that much for what I’ve done for you. I’m only twenty years old. I don’t want to die! My whole life is still ahead of me!”
Without a word, Henning slapped her face. Twice. Hard.
“You’re getting hysterical. Shut up. I am a senior member of the Party. Have some respect. I’m not frightened of your father. You will move into my underground apartment and officially become my mistress. That’s an order, Melina!”
“I’ll tell your father.”
“He knows. Getting you under my thumb was his idea. The same way the Party took control of your brother Erwin. A fine pilot. A fine officer. A fine member of the Nazi Party. We shall still rule the world.”
“I don’t think so. Go on, hit me again. Only cowards hit defenceless women.”
“Where are you going, Melina?”
“None of your business. Keep your hands off me. Whatever you were, I always thought you a gentleman. The Party has twisted your mind.”
“Careful, Melina.”
“What are you going to do now? Shoot me, Cousin Henning?”
For the first time since Melina left the family estate, Henning von Lieberman was speechless. The more he tried, the less he was able to utter a word. The impediment he thought Janet Wakefield had cured before the war was back with a vengeance. His face contorted. A tic appeared in his left eye. The man now looked his age. Not the ten years younger that people congratulated him upon. The black uniform looked sinister. No longer romantic to Melina. Drawing upon every ounce of her strength not to burst into tears, she controlled her fear and let herself out of his office. Quietly. Looking back over her shoulder before closing the door, she looked into his contorted face, the larynx trying to perform its task. The eyes spoke more than any words. She doubted her cousin had ever hit a woman before. She felt sorry for him, no longer afraid of him or the Party. In that mutual look of understanding, they both knew it was the beginning of the end of the Third Reich. Of Henning von Lieberman’s dream of an ordered world without war or argument. Where the Party told the people what was good for them instead of the mess they made of running their own lives.
Two hours later, when the rail pass was put on her desk by a clerk, she heard the warning siren blaring outside the windows. Picking up the rail pass, she prepared to go down into the air-raid shelter deep under the building where they were safe from the bombs. It was almost lunchtime. Far away to the west of the city she could hear the American aircraft. The menacing sound of multiple engines. The ack-ack fired sporadically. There was the sound of distant machine gun fire as she went down the stairs. She felt much older than her twenty years.
Before the RAF came over in the night, Melina was safely on a train out of Berlin, headed for her family estate in Bavaria. They had not even said goodbye. She wondered if she would ever see him again as she sat looking at the black curtain over the window from the dim light inside the railway carriage. Her rail pass let her travel first class. In the carriage were three old men and a girl. No one said a word as the steam engine slowly pulled the line of carriages through the darkness away from Berlin. Later, Melina could hear aircraft overhead.
“Every night,” said one of the old men.
“And every day,” said one of the others.
It was cold in the carriage. Melina pulled the rug she had found on her seat up to her chin. The rug was the last expression of first class travel. She was still wearing the same clothes from the previous day. She felt dirty, the smell of her perfume too strong. Deliberately she had splashed on too much. Closing her eyes, she tried to go to sleep. Somewhere in her dreams far away she heard the bombs dropping. When she briefly woke all she could hear was the rhythmic clack of the wheels on the rails.
They would be surprised to see her. All she wanted to do was bury her head in her father’s chest. Feel his arms round her tight. Making her safe, as he always had done when she was growing up as a child. In those days people were always smiling. The little girl was asleep, rolled up in the opposite corner. Melina wondered which one of the old men in the carriage was the girl’s grandfather. They were far too old to be her father. She was hungry but did not care. She had got away. Smiling with hope, Melina went back to sleep. She slept through the night, her young body exhausted from the tension of the previous day.
When she woke there was a thin light in the carriage from the breaking dawn. One of the old men or the young girl had pulled aside the blackout curtain. Outside the fields and trees looked normal. The girl gave Melina a shy smile. Not wanting to talk, Melina looked away, out at the countryside running slowly past the train window. The wind was pushing white smoke from the engine back over the line of carriages. There were too many carriages for the one engine which was why they were going so slowly. Her mouth was dry and her stomach empty. She tried to go back to sleep.
“No luggage?” said the old man next to the girl, now awake huddled in the corner.
“Bombed out. All I have.” She moved her hands to include what she was wearing.
“You have a rail pass?”
“Yes, I have a rail pass.”
“That is all you need. Hilda is my great-niece. My name is Hillier. Hillier, not Hitler. Are you going home?”
“Yes. I hope so. My last stop is Ravensburg but I have to change trains. I’m not sure how many times.”
“I can help you. You were not at home when you were bombed out?” The old man was very polite. Melina kept on her guard. There was something sinister about him. The girl did not touch him with any part of her body.
“In the air-raid shelter.”
“It was during the day. They were all killed except Hilda here. She was under the stairs. I am taking her to my sister. My sister is her grandmother. She will be safe until the war is over. The Americans. They come over during the day. Where do you stay in Ravensburg?”
“Ten miles away. The von Lieberman Estate.”
“You work there? I have heard of the place. Fifty, maybe sixty miles from my sister.”
“I am a von Lieberman.”
“But you don’t have any luggage?”
“I was bombed out yesterday, as I said. Left my job with the Party. No time to buy anything.”
“Of course. The rail pass. The von Liebermans are powerful. General Werner von Lieberman. Very powerful. I am also a member of the Party. Heil Hitler.”
To Melina’s surprise the old man stood up and gave a stiff-armed salute, almost touching the naked light bulb in the ceiling of the carriage that was still burning with a soft red light. When the girl caught her eye she was giggling. Melina managed to stop herself from giggling. Hillier had a big pot belly that stuck out when he gave the Nazi salute.
“I will tell you when to change trains,” he said when he sat down. The girl instinctively gave him more room. Melina, attuned to the atmosphere in the Party Headquarters, thought the girl’s giggle had come more from fear.
“You are very kind,” said Melina.
“I am honoured. May I offer you a sandwich? That big wicker basket on the luggage rack is full of food and flasks of coffee. We are all friends in Germany. What is mine shall belong to everyone.” The old man was being magnanimous.
“You are most kind.”
“I am honoured to give food to a von Lieberman. Are you by any chance related to General Werner von Lieberman? He is a personal friend of Field Marshal Rommel.”
“So is my father. From when they were boys. General von Lieberman is my father’s uncle.”
“You will have some coffee?”
“It will be an honour.”
“Maybe now is the time for everyone to introduce themselves. If these other two gentlemen are going as far as we are we all have a long journey to complete. The dining car is not available on this train. We all
have to make sacrifices for the Fatherland. Heil Hitler.”
Again, the old man stood up though he did not salute. The girl whose name was Hilda giggled out loud nervously and put her hand over her mouth. It seemed everyone was afraid of her great-uncle Werner. The girl seemed to know his name. Melina thought the old man knew she was a relation of the General right from the start. There was always a list in the new Germany. A list of everyone. On or off the train. No one was anonymous. Everyone had a name known to the Party to keep them all under control. The sandwich when it came was delicious, she was so hungry. So was the coffee. It was still hot from the flask and served by the old man in a paper cup. Melina and the young girl smiled at each other as if they were friends.
Melina was lucky the bomb had come during the night. The idea of going on to Switzerland and her schoolfriend Françoise came to mind. They could go sailing on the lake in Monsieur Montpellier’s yacht and stay at the Romanshorn Hotel. The Swiss had been sensible and stayed out of the war. She would be out of danger. Monsieur Montpellier would not mind. Most men did not mind if she stayed close to them. All three of the old men had given her the look. Each in their turn. Men did not change whatever their age.
Later, she found the small ladies toilet on the train and had a wash. Every clack of the wheels took her further from Berlin. She felt better. The fear had gone. Back in the carriage she smiled at each of the old men in turn. It was going to be a jolly journey thanks to the young girl. Together, neither of them had anything to be afraid of.
5
Melina had been in the same clothes for three days when the train pulled into Ravensburg Station. With the old man’s help the journey ended without mishap. There were taxis at the station but no petrol. Like her brother Erwin, when he stormed out of the house in 1937, she had to walk. She had been wearing her walking shoes in the air-raid shelter when the bombs hit and the sun was shining. The contrast of the birds singing and the bombs falling made her want to run home to her parents. It was better to walk in on them. Give them a surprise. She had no luggage to carry. She could see the snow on the Alps in the distance across in Switzerland.
