'Then who the hell is it aimed at?'
'That's what Molotov asked. The Ambassador told him there was no point in dwelling on the past. One of the Soviets leaked this to our guy because he couldn't believe his ears, and wanted a second opinion.'
'No government statement here?'
'Not a word. They're playing this close to their chests.'
'Sounds serious.'
Slaney grunted. 'The British and French don't seem to think so. Their delegation left for Moscow yesterday. Guess how they're getting there?'
'They can't have gone by train?'
'Worse. They've taken a boat, and the slowest one they could find. Some obsolete warship with a top speed of twelve knots. They should be in Moscow by the middle of the month.'
'It would be quicker to walk,' Russell observed.
'Jim Danvers came up with a good line,' Normanton said. 'He said the British and French had missed the boat by catching it.'
'Not bad at all,' Slaney agreed. 'Remind me to steal it.'
Two hours later and several marks poorer, Russell drove back through the wet and empty streets to Neuenburger Strasse. Would Hitler and Stalin really do a deal, he wondered? Both would have a mountain of words to eat, but the advantages were obvious. A free hand for Hitler, time for Stalin. Poland kaput.
The only message by the unhooked telephone was for Dagmar, the blonde waitress on the third floor. 'Siggi is desperate,' Frau Heidegger had written. 'He must see you tomorrow.' Dagmar was obviously not at home, and probably sleeping with Klaus. He would get an update from Frau Heidegger in the morning.
The stairs seemed endless. It was less than twenty-four hours since the sand dryer, but it seemed a lot longer. After taking off his jacket he extracted the slip of paper with Hornak's suggested contact details from his wallet. How long before they were safe to use, he wondered, now that the local Gestapo had come calling?
Friday morning was grey as Berlin stone, and the giant swastikas on Wilhelmstrasse hung limp in the humid air. In the Kranzler Cafe the waiters seemed more interested in arguing with each other than in serving their customers, and Russell's coffee was lukewarm. The newspapers lauded the imprisonment of a Wittenberge worker for laziness, but conspicuously failed to mention either Danzig or Soviet-German relations.
Time to earn your living, Russell told himself. The Bristol Hotel had a convenient bank of public telephones, and while the booths lacked the luxurious fittings of those in the Adlon, they were much less frequented by his fellow journalists. He settled down on a cushioned seat to make his calls.
Over his years in Berlin, Russell had met a lot of influential people in government, arts and the media. Most leaned to the left politically, and many had lost their jobs when the Nazis came to power; some had even left the country. But a surprising number were still in the same positions, keeping their heads down and waiting for the whole shocking business to blow over. Self-preservation was an obvious priority, and precluded open criticism, but briefings off the record were another matter. The urge to stick spokes in the Nazi wheel was surprisingly widespread.
Sometimes, though, there was no dirt to dish. After speaking to a dozen people, Russell was no nearer to knowing how likely a Nazi-Soviet agreement might be. Some of his contacts had laughed at the idea, others had thought it possible, but only one man - an economist who worked for the Trade Ministry - had anything definite to tell him. A trade agreement between the two countries was a racing certainty, the man said, but there was no guarantee that a political deal would follow.
He dropped in on the Adlon Bar to make sure no official briefings were imminent, and checked his wire service. A three word message had arrived the previous night from San Francisco: 'How about Silesia?'
'How about it?' Russell muttered to himself, but he saw his editor's point. As far as the international community was concerned, Danzig looked like a soluble problem. The Poles might not like it, but Danzig was, in the last resort, a German city. A bilateral deal that included its peaceful absorption into the Reich would not involve the Poles in giving up any of their own territory.
Upper Silesia was a different matter. Poland had been reformed in 1918 from the debris of the German, Austrian and Russian Empires, and any reversal of that process could only be seen as a national death-knell. If Hitler went for Upper Silesia - or for any of the other so-called 'lost territories' - his intent would be crystal-clear. So what was happening down there? Was the border between the two Silesias as tense as Poland's border with Danzig? It would be worth a trip to find out.
Russell went back to the Hanomag, collected the The Good Soldier Schweik from under the seat, and walked round the southern side of Pariser Platz to the new American Embassy. As usual, a long line of anxious-looking Jews stretched around the corner from the front entrance on Herman Goering Strasse. They were queuing, if Russell's memory served him right, for the right to enter America in 1944.
Once inside, he gave his name and asked to see someone about an American passport for his son. The receptionist gave him a quick worried look and disappeared through a door behind her desk. She returned a minute or so later with the sort of smiling young man that Russell imagined was found on Californian beaches. His blond hair was almost bleached, his tan a tribute to Berlin's summer. 'This way,' he said, beckoning Russell through the door. 'I've been expecting you. My name's Michael Brown,' he added.
They climbed to an office on the second floor. 'This was Blucher's palace,' the young man said. 'You know, the guy at Waterloo.'
'Before my time,' Russell told him.
'So, do you have anything for me?'
Russell explained what had happened in Prague, and handed over The Good Soldier Schweik. 'I've written the contact name and address on the flyleaf, so all you have to do is get it to the department in Washington.'
'Of course.' Brown was leafing through the book with the air of someone searching for secrets.
'Do you have any messages for me?'
Brown looked surprised. 'None.'
'So, for German consumption, you're being difficult about giving my son a passport, and you've told me to come back in a couple of weeks. All right?'
'Sure.'
Russell got to his feet. 'Nice to meet you.'
A neatly-uniformed maid answered the door on Altonaer Strasse. Was Frau Umbach expecting him?
'Frau Grostein is,' Russell said, wondering who the hell Frau Umbach was.
'Wait there,' the maid said, shutting the door in his face.
She returned a few moments later to beckon him in. 'This way,' she said, leading him down a hallway, through a very modern-looking kitchen, and out into a small, secluded courtyard garden. Sarah Grostein was sitting at an iron table, under a pergola draped in deep red roses. She was wearing a simple blouse and slacks, smoking what smelt like a Turkish cigarette, and halfway through writing a letter. Her mass of wavy brown hair certainly looked feminine, but in all other respects she fell lamentably short of the official ideal of Nazi womanhood.
'Mr Russell,' she said, offering him a chair.
'Frau Umbach?' he asked.
She grimaced. 'I should have told you. My friend has decided I should use my maiden name. For obvious reasons.'
'I got your message.'
'Good. Freya wants to meet you. And so does Wilhelm, come to that.'
'Why?'
She smiled. 'I think he's looking for some publicity, but...'
'For what?'
'He can tell you that. Are you busy this evening, around six o'clock? That was one of the times they offered me.'
He hated giving up precious time with Effi , but she would understand. 'I'm free.'
'I'll confirm it with them this afternoon. You have a car?'
'Of a sort.'
'You can pick me up then. Say five-thirty.'
'Fine.' He considered telling her about Gorodnikov, but decided it would be safer to have that conversation in the car.
As she led him back to the front door, he cau
ght a glimpse of a Kandinsky on the living room wall. 'Doesn't your friend object to the painting?' he asked.
'He likes it,' she said simply, and opened the door.
'Five-thirty,' he reiterated over his shoulder.
The Hanomag looked particularly down-at-heel in its current surroundings. The luxury models which usually lined Altonaer Strasse were nowhere to be seen, but not, Russell suspected, because they were out on military manoeuvres with the Wehrmacht. Those cars would have been hidden away for the duration at their owners' country homes.
A tap on the fuel gauge revealed that the Hanomag was running low on petrol. The big garage on Muller-Strasse was almost on his way to Kuzorra's, and had a public telephone he could use to call the studio.
The garage was open, but would only sell him five litres of petrol. There was a shortage, the manager told him, with the air of someone explaining something for the umpteenth time. The military had first claim on what there was, and everyone was running short. All over Berlin regular customers were getting ten litres, strangers five. He should go to his local garage, and not waste too much time about it - the autobahn service stations had already run dry.
Russell took his five litres and pulled over beside the telephone to call the studio. The woman who answered seemed only half-there, but managed to repeat Russell's name and message back to him. 'That's for Effi Koenen,' he repeated. 'Oh,' she said, as if it was the first time she'd heard the name.
He drove on to Kuzorra's, wondering whether he'd even reach his local garage with this much petrol in the tank. Maybe the SD had stores set aside for their best agents. He couldn't imagine the Gestapo running dry - cruising up and down streets looking ominous was what made them happy.
Frau Kuzorra's welcome seemed chillier than before, and her husband, en-sconced in his usual chair, could only manage the wryest of smiles. The man looked older, Russell thought, as he refused Frau Kuzorra's half-hearted offer of coffee.
'I won't waste your time,' Kuzorra said once Russell was seated. 'I have to give up this enquiry.'
'Why?' Russell asked simply.
'I will tell you, but I ask you not to repeat any of this. Except to Herr Schade, of course. And please ask him not to repeat it to anyone else.'
'I will.'
Kuzorra leant back in his chair. 'A few days ago I received a visit from an old colleague - a man whom I disliked intensely when we worked out of the same office. He is still on the job, a Kriminalinspektor now. He was always a brown-noser - an old term, and one that gained a double meaning when Hitler's thugs started running things on the streets.'
Frau Kuzorra muttered something under her breath.
'In my own home I will speak the truth,' Kuzorra told her. He turned back to Russell. 'I won't tell you the man's name because it's not relevant. Anyway, he came to see me last Sunday - he was waiting outside when we returned from church. He told me there had been complaints from railway staff at Silesian Station - and from some of the stall-owners - that I had been harassing them. He wanted to know why I was trying to cause trouble over some miserable Jewish girl. Her disappearance - if she really had disappeared - was police business, and I should keep out of it. I argued with him, said the police had done nothing. He just smiled and said they had done everything that needed doing, and that there was no need for a retired private detective to waste his time on such a business. I said it was my time to waste, and my living to earn. He said not anymore, that my license to operate as a private detective had been withdrawn. I tell you, the bastard was really enjoying himself. And there was more. If I carried on with the investigation I would be putting our pensions at risk. Our pensions, you understand. Not just my police pension, but both our pensions from the state. We could not live without them. So...' He spread his hands in a gesture of resignation. 'I am sorry.'
'So am I,' Russell said. He was wondering whether Thomas had also been leaned on. 'The last message you left for me - you said Miriam had been seen with a man.'
'I have been told to tell you I discovered nothing,' Kuzorra said, 'so please, be careful how you use what I tell you. The witness...it wouldn't help you to know who he is. This witness thought he recognized Miriam from the picture you gave me.' He took it out of his wallet and gave it back to Russell. 'He wasn't absolutely sure, but he thought it was her. And he saw her talking to a man. A man he has seen before at Silesian Station. He's about fifty, average height, a little overweight perhaps. He has closely-cropped grey hair, a little like mine, the man said.' The detective ran a hand across his grey stubble. 'And eyebrows which are darker than his hair. He was wearing some sort of dark blue uniform - my witness thought it might be a chauffeur's.
'I spent a couple of hours at the station on the Thursday evening, but no one of that description met the train which Miriam had taken. So I went back on the Friday. More in hope than expectation, but there he was. At least, I think so. My witness doesn't work on Fridays, so I had no way of confirming that this was the man he saw with Miriam. But this man matched the description, except for the fact that he wasn't wearing a uniform. He did spend a long time on the concourse, scanning all the arriving passengers as if he was looking for someone. He didn't speak to anyone though, and there were several attractive young women whom he might have approached. After the passengers from the 9pm arrival had all gone through, he simply turned on his heel and walked out through the main entrance. He had a car - a big one - parked on Stralauer Platz, and I managed to see the number plate as he drove off.' Kuzorra looked sheepish. 'But by the time I'd dug out a pencil I'd forgotten most of it - my memory isn't what it was, I'm afraid. I am sure the number ended in thirty-three - that's not a number I'm likely to forget.'
The year Hitler got a proper job, Russell thought. The year Kuzorra lost his. 'Why do you think your colleague came to lean on you?' he asked.
'I don't know. Just spite, perhaps. He heard about the investigation - may-be someone at Silesian Station really did complain - and he felt like making a point. Police detectives get very territorial, even the best of them, and this one's scum. Maybe he just couldn't bear the thought that someone was trying to help a Jew. Or he's been holding a grudge against me for heaven knows what reason and finally found a way of getting his own back. Who knows?
'The other possibility is more worrying, at least as far as you're concerned. Let's say that the man I followed to his car really did have something to do with the girl's disappearance. If he noticed my interest... I mean, I have no idea how he could have found out who I am, but if he had friends in high places, or he works for someone who does, then my old Kripo colleague could simply be the messenger. One who enjoyed delivering the message of course, but not the instigator.'
Russell considered this possibility, and didn't like where it took him. 'Thank you,' he said, getting to his feet. 'You've sent your bill to Schade & Co?'
'No. I...'
'Send it. You've done the work.'
'It's here,' Frau Kuzorra said, appearing beside him with a neatly-typed invoice.
'I'll pass it on to Herr Schade,' Russell told her.
Kuzorra was also on his feet, offering his hand. 'If you ever find her, I'd like to know,' he said.
'You will.'
Back in the car Russell took out the Rosenfeld family photograph and looked at Miriam. 'What kind of a mess are you in?' he asked her.
It was a little after three-thirty - time for a short stop-off at the Adlon before picking up Sarah Grostein. None of his friends were in the bar when he arrived, sparking fears that he was missing a major story, but another journalist told him that boredom had driven them upstairs for a poker session.
After some deliberation, Russell phoned Schade & Co from a booth in the lobby. Thomas was out of his office, but his secretary managed to track him down.
Russell asked him if he'd had any visits from the authorities.
'No. Why?'
'Because they resent your interference in what is clearly a police matter. And I must say, I tend to agree
with them.'
Thomas was never slow on the uptake. 'I suppose you're right.'
'Well, they've certainly convinced Kuzorra.'
'I take it he's quit.'
'He has. And I think we should give up on it too. We're not even certain the girl ever reached Berlin.'
'That's true. All right. What else can we do, anyway?'
'Good. We're agreed. Now, about that fishing trip we were going to take - we need to talk about it. Can I come over tomorrow lunchtime?'
'Yes. Good. I'll get the maps out.'
'Okay. Bye.' Russell clicked the line dead and burst out laughing.
Sarah Grostein was waiting for his knock. 'I must be back by eight,' she said as they walked to the car. She had changed since the morning, and was now wearing what Russell's English aunt called a sensible skirt. Her hair was tied back, and her face bore no signs of make-up. She was wearing low-heeled shoes, which only seemed to emphasise how tall she was.
'Where are we going?' Russell asked, starting the car.
'Didn't I tell you? Friedrichshain. The park. The cafe near the Konigsthor entrance - do you know it?'
'I once took Albert Wiesner there for a coffee and a fatherly chat.'
She laughed. 'Did he listen?'
'No, not really. He enjoyed his cream cake though.'
'He's in Palestine now.'
'I know. I had a letter from his sisters a few weeks ago. They're doing well.'
'Thanks to you.'
'They earned it.'
'Yes, but...' She fell silent as Russell squeezed the Hanomag between a tram and a parked car, then changed the subject. 'Was it you knocked on my door last night?' she asked.
'Yes, I'm sorry. I misunderstood your message. I hope it didn't...'
'No. I told him someone was knocking on the neighbour's door. '
'He looked out of the window.'
'Yes, he saw your car.' She took out a cigarette.
They were on Invalidenstrasse in the Friday rush-hour, and the miserly number of motorists could hardly believe their luck. Russell wondered what the Wehrmacht was doing with all the cars. There weren't that many generals to drive around.
Silesian Station (2008) Page 17
