by Joseph Kanon
“I fell.”
Rosen looked at him, dubious. “A long fall.”
“About two stories.” He squinted at the bright afternoon light. “How long have I been out? Did you give me something?”
“No. The body is a good doctor. Sometimes, when it’s too much, it shuts down to rest. Erich, would you check for fever?”
The boy reached up and rested his dry palm on Jake’s forehead, looking at him solemnly. “Normal,” he said finally, his voice as small as his hand.
“You see? An excellent medical man.”
“Yes, and now sleepy,” Lena said, her hands on his shoulders. “He stayed up all night, watching you. To make sure.”
“You mean you did,” Jake said, imagining him slumped next to her in the easy chair.
“Both. He likes you,” she said pointedly.
“Thank you,” Jake said to him.
The boy nodded gravely, pleased.
“So you’ll live,” Rosen said, gathering his bag. “A day in bed, please. In case.”
“You too,” Lena said, moving the boy. “Time to rest. Come, I have coffee for you,” she said to Rosen, busy, organizing them, so that they followed without protest. “And you,” she said to Jake. “I’ll be right back.”
But it was Emil who brought the coffee, closing the door behind him. Back in his own clothes again, a frayed shirt and thin cardigan. He handed Jake the mug stiffly, averting his eyes, his movements shy and prickly at the same time.
“She’s putting the boy to sleep,” he said. “It’s a Jewish child?”
“It’s a child,” Jake said over the mug.
Emil raised his head, bristling a little, then took off his glasses and wiped them.
“You look different.”
“Four years. People change,” Jake said, raising his hand to touch his receding hair, then wincing in surprise.
“Broken?” Emil said, looking at the bruised shoulder.
“No.”
“It’s a terrible color. It hurts?”
“And you call yourself a scientist,” Jake said lightly. “Yes, it hurts.”
Emil nodded. “So I should thank you.”
“I didn’t do it for you. They would have taken her too.”
“And that’s why you changed the clothes,” he said skeptically. “So thank you.” He looked down, still wiping. “It’s awkward, to thank a man who—” He stopped, putting away the handkerchief. “How things turn out. You find your wife, then she’s not your wife. I have you to thank for this too.”
“Listen, Emil—”
“Don’t explain. Lena has told me. This is what happens now in Germany, I think. You hear it many times. A woman alone, the husband dead maybe. An old friend. Food. There’s no one to blame for this. Just to live—”
Was this what she’d told him, or simply what he wanted to believe?
“She’s not here for the rations,” Jake said.
Emil looked at him steadily, then turned away, moving over to sit on the arm of the chair, still toying with the glasses. “And now? What are you going to do?”
“About you? I don’t know yet.”
“You’re not sending me back to Kransberg?”
“Not until I know who took you out in the first place. They might try again.”
“So I’m a prisoner here?”
“It could be worse. You could be in Moscow.”
“With you? With Lena? I can’t stay here.”
“They’d grab you the minute you hit the streets.”
“Not if I’m with the Americans. You don’t trust your own people?”
“Not with you. You trusted them, look where it got you.”
“Yes, I trusted them. How could I know? He was—sympathetic. He was going to take me to her. To Berlin.”
“Where you could pick up some files while you were at it. Von Braun send you this time too?”
Emil looked at him, uncertain, then shook his head. “He thought they were destroyed.”
“But you didn’t.”
“I thought so. But my father—I couldn’t be sure, not with him. And of course I was right. He gave them to you.”
“No. He never gave me anything. I took them. He protected you right to the end. God knows why.”
Emil looked at the floor, embarrassed. “Well, no difference.”
“It is to him.”
Emil took this in for a moment, then let it go. “Anyway, you have them.”
“But Tully didn’t. Now why is that? You tell him about the files and then you don’t tell him where they are.”
The first hint of a smile, oddly superior. “I didn’t have to. He thought he knew. He said, I know where they are, all the files. Where the Americans have them. He was going to help, if you can imagine such a thing. He said only an American could get them. So I let him think that. He was going to get them for me,” he said, shaking his head.
“Out of the kindness of his heart?” Collecting twice.
“Of course for money. I said yes. I knew they weren’t there—I would never have to pay. And if he could take me out—So I was the clever one. Then he delivered me to the Russians.”
“Quite a pair. Why the hell did you tell him in the first place?”
“I never had a head for drink. It was—a despair. How can I explain it? All those weeks, waiting, why didn’t they send us to America? Then we heard about the trials, how the Americans were looking for Nazis everywhere, and I thought, we’ll never get out, they won’t send us. And maybe I said something like that, that the Americans would call us Nazis, us, because in the war we had to do things, and how would it look now? There were files, everything we did. What files? SS, I said, they kept everything. I don’t know, I was a little drunk maybe, to say that much. And he said it was only the Jews who were doing that, hunting Nazis—the Americans wanted us. To continue our work. He understood how important that was.” His voice firmer now, sure of something at last. “And it’s right, you know. To stop now, for this—”
Jake put down the mug and reached for a cigarette. “And the next thing you knew, you were off to Berlin. Tell me how that worked.”
“It’s another debriefing?” Emil said, annoyed.
“You’ve got the time. Have a seat. Don’t leave anything out.”
Emil sank back onto the armrest, rubbing his temples as if he were trying to arrange his memory. But the story he had to tell was the one Jake already knew, without surprises. No other Americans, the secret of Tully’s partner still safe with Sikorsky. Only a few new details of the border crossing. The guards, apparently, had been courteous. “Even then, I didn’t know,” Emil said. “Not until Berlin. Then I knew it was finished for me.”
“But not for Tully,” Jake said, thinking aloud. “Now he had some other fish to fry, thanks to your little talk. Lots of possibilities there. Did the others at Kransberg know about this, by the way?”
“My group? Of course not. They wouldn’t—” He stopped, nervous.
“What? Be as understanding as Tully was? They’d have a mess on their hands, wouldn’t they? Explaining things.”
“I didn’t know he would have this idea. I thought the files were destroyed. I would never betray them. Never,” he said, louder, aroused. “You understand, we are a team. It’s how we work. Von Braun did everything to keep us together, everything. You can’t know what it was like. Once they even arrested him—a man like that. But together, all through the war. When you share that—no one else knows what it was like. What we had to do.”
“What you had to do. Christ, Emil. I read the file.”
“Yes, what we had to do. What do you think? I’m SS too? Me?”
“I don’t know. People change.”
Emil stood up. “I don’t have to answer to you. You, of all people.”
“You’ll have to answer to someone,” Jake said calmly. “You might as well start with me.”
“So it’s a trial now. Ha, in this whorehouse.”
“The girls weren’t a
t Nordhausen. You were.”
“Nordhausen. You read something in a file—”
“I was there. In the camps. I saw your workers.”
“My workers? You want us to answer for that? That was SS, not us. We had nothing to do with that.”
“Except to let it happen.”
“And what should we do? File a complaint? You don’t know what it was like.”
“Then tell me.”
“Tell you what? What is it you want to know? What?”
Jake looked at him, suddenly at a loss. The same glasses and soft eyes, now wide and defiant, besieged. What, finally?
“I guess, what happened to you,” he said quietly. “I used to know you.”
Emil’s face trembled, as if he’d been stung. “Yes, we used to know each other. It seems, both wrong. Lena’s friend.” He held Jake’s eyes for a second, then retreated to the chair, subdued. “What happened. You ask that? You were here. You know what it was like in Germany. Do you think I wanted that?”
“No.”
“No. But then what? Turn my back, like my father, until it was over? When was that? Maybe never. My life was then, not when it was over. All my training. You don’t wait until the politics are convenient. We were just at the beginning. How could we wait?”
“So you worked for them.”
“No, we survived them. Their stupid interference. The demands, always crazy. Reports. All of it. They took away Dornberger, our leader, and we survived that too. So the work would survive, even after the war. Do you understand what it means? To leave the earth? To make something new. But difficult, expensive. How else could we do it? They gave us the money, not enough, but enough to keep going, to survive them.”
“By building their weapons.”
“Yes, weapons. It was the war by then. Do you think I’m ashamed of that?” He looked down. “It’s my homeland. What I am. Lena too,” he said, glancing up. “The same blood. You do things in wartime—” He trailed off.
“I saw it, Emil,” Jake said. “That wasn’t war, not in Nordhausen. That was something else. You saw it.”
“They said it was the only way. There was a schedule. They needed the workers.”
“And killed them. To meet your schedule.”
“Ours, no. Their schedule. Impossible, crazy, like everything else. Was it crazy to mistreat the workers? Yes, everything was crazy. When I saw it, I couldn’t believe it, what they were doing. In Germany. But by then we were living in a madhouse. You become crazy yourself, living like that. How can it be, one sane person in the asylum? No, all crazy. All normal. They ask for estimates, crazy estimates, but you are crazy if you refuse. And they do terrible things to you, your family, so you become crazy too. We knew it was hopeless, all of us in the program. Even their numbers. Even numbers they made crazy. You don’t believe me? Listen to this. A little mathematical exercise,” he said, getting up to pace, the boy who could do numbers in his head.
“The original plan, you know, was for nine hundred rockets a month, thirty tons of explosives per day for England. This was 1943. Hitler wanted two thousand rockets per month, an impossible target, we could never come close. But that was the target, so we needed more workers, more workers for this crazy number. Never close. And if we had done it? That would mean sixty-six tons per day. Sixty-six. In 1944, the Allies were dropping three thousand tons a day on Germany. Sixty-six against three thousand, that is the mathematics they were working with. And to do this, forty thousand prisoners finally. More and more for this number. You want me to explain what happened? They were crazy. They made us crazy. I don’t know what else to tell you. How can I answer this?” He stopped pacing, turning his hands up in question.
“I wish somebody could. Everybody in Germany has an explanation. And no answer.”
“To what?”
“Eleven hundred calories a day. Another number.”
Emil looked away. “And you think I did that?”
“No, you just did the numbers.”
Emil was still for a moment, then came over to the bedside table and picked up the cup. “You’ve finished your coffee?” He stood near the bed, staring down at the cup. “So now I’m to blame. That makes it easy for you? To take my wife.”
“I’m not blaming you for anything,” Jake said, looking up into his glasses. “You do it.”
Emil nodded to himself. “Our new judges. You blame us, then you go home, so we can accuse each other. That’s what you want. So it’s never over.”
“Except for you. You go to the States with the rest of your group and go on with your fine work. That’s the idea, isn’t it? You and von Braun and the rest of them. No questions there. All forgotten. No files.”
Emil peered over his glasses. “You’re so sure the Americans want these files?”
“Some of them do.”
“And the others at Kransberg? You would do this to them too? It’s not enough to accuse me?”
“This isn’t just about you.”
“No? I think so, yes. For Lena.”
“You’re wrong. About that, too.”
“You think it would make her happy? To send me to jail?”
Jake said nothing.
Emil raised his head, letting out a breath. “Then do it. I can’t stay here. They’re looking for me, she told me this. So send me. What difference where I’m a prisoner?”
“Don’t be too anxious to go. You’re a liability now, undelivered goods. He’ll have to do something.”
“Who?”
“Tully’s partner.”
“I told you, there was no one else.”
“Yes, there was.” Jake looked up, a new idea. “You talk to anyone else at Kransberg?”
“Americans? No. Just Tully,” Emil said absently, not interested.
“And Shaeffer. The debriefing,” Jake said, explaining. “Ever meet his friend Breimer?”
“I don’t know the name. They were all the same to us.”
“Big man, government, not a soldier?”
“That one? Yes, he was there. To meet the group. He was interested in the program.”
“I’ll bet. He talk to you?”
“No, only von Braun. The Americans, they like a von,” he said, shrugging a little.
Jake sat back for a moment, thinking. But how could it be? Another column that wouldn’t add up.
Emil took his silence for an answer and moved toward the door, carrying the mug. “You’ll at least send word to Kransberg? My colleagues will worry—”
“They’ll keep. I want you missing a little while longer. A little bait.”
“Bait?”
“That’s right. Like Lena was for you. Now you can be the bait. We’ll see who bites.”
Emil turned at the door, blinking behind his glasses. “It’s no good, talking. The way you are now. What is it, some idea of justice? For whom, I wonder. Not for Lena. You think I ask for myself—for her too. Think what it means for her.”
“I see. For her.”
“Yes, for her. You think she wants this trouble for me?” He opened his hand, taking in not just the room but the files, the whole clouded future.
“No, she thinks she owes you something.”
“Maybe it’s you who owes something.”
Jake looked up at him. “Maybe,” he said. “But she doesn’t.”
Emil shook his head. “How things turn out. To think I left Kransberg for her. And now this—all our work. So you can prove something to her. Wave these files in my face. ‘You see what kind of man he is. Leave him.’”
“She has left you,” Jake said.
“For you,” Emil said, shaking his head at the implausibility of it, drawing his round shoulders back, upright, the way they must have looked in uniform. “But how different you are. Not the same man. I thought you would understand how it was here—leave me my work, that much. No, you want that too. Your pound of flesh. Make all of us Nazis. She won’t thank you for this. Does she even know, how different you are?”
&n
bsp; Jake stared at him for a minute, the same man on the station platform, no longer blurry, as if the train had slowed so he could really see.
“But you’re not,” he said, suddenly weary, the dull ache in his shoulder spreading to his voice. “I just didn’t know you. Your father did. Some missing piece, he called it.”
“My father—”
“You never had anything in your head but numbers. Not her. She was your excuse. Even Tully bought it. Maybe you believe it yourself. The way you think Nordhausen just happened. All by itself. But that doesn’t make it true. Owes you something? You didn’t come to Berlin for her—you came to get the files again.”
“No.”
“Just like the first time. She thinks you risked your life to get her. It wasn’t for her. Von Braun sent you. It was his car, his assignment. To keep the work going. No embarrassing pieces of paper. You never even tried to get her, just save your own sorry skin.”
“You weren’t there,” Emil said angrily. “Get through that hell? How could I do that? I had the other men to think of. There was only one bridge left—”
“And you drove right out with them. I don’t blame you. But you don’t blame yourself either. Why not? You were in charge. It was your party. How long did it take you to get the files? That was your priority. Passengers? Well, if there was time. And then there wasn’t.”
“She was at the hospital,” Emil said, raising his voice. “Safe.”
“She was raped. She almost died. She tell you that?”
“No,” he said, looking down.
“But you got what you really came for. You left her and saved the team. And now you want to do it again, even make her help this time, because she thinks she owes you something. She’s lucky she got the phone call.”
“It’s a lie,” Emil said.
“Is it? Then why didn’t you tell von Braun you were leaving Kransberg with Tully? You couldn’t, could you? Not the real reason. He thought you’d already taken care of the files. But you had to be sure. That’s why you came. It’s always been about the files. Not her.”
Emil kept staring at the floor. “You’d do anything to turn her against me,” he said, his tone aggrieved, closed off. He looked up. “You’ve told her this?”
“You tell her,” Jake said steadily. “I wasn’t there, remember? You were. Tell her how it was.” He watched Emil stand there, shaking his head numbly in the sudden stillness, and sank back against the pillow. “Then maybe she’ll figure it out for herself.”
