‘My dear fraulein ... bad news. To my deep regret.’ To another he might have said, ‘Please stay calm.’
The absence of urbanity in his voice froze her heart. Then he startled her by rising, and coming around the desk to stand looking down at her, his hands caressing the air. She thought: My God!
‘The authorities intend to detain you for questioning this evening. Six pm. At your flat. They’ve discovered our plan. They’re listening to my private line!’
Now Herr Wertheim was speaking in a strange voice. It seemed as if she’d been watching a moving picture of herself caught up in a dramatic plot, a climax coming, the interweaved skeins of the Prague solution, the Saxony solution, her father’s quest for a solution. And a minor thread: the inexplicable intervention of Chief Auditor Schmidt. On the physical plane, her life had become unbelievable; yet intellectually it was as clear-cut as this building on its granite foundations. She thought: Please God help me!
‘There’s no time to lose.’ Wertheim spun around and went into an alcove. He came back with an envelope, and gave it to her.
Five thousand: his emergency travel funds.
‘Go to one of your father’s sisters. I can only recommend that. You must leave immediately.’ He knew she’d three aunts in different cities. Years ago, he’d sent flowers to one who’d become widowed. He couldn’t recall which cities. ‘All else being equal, go to the largest city.’ He paused and lightly rubbed his cheek with a veined hand, feeling events closing in, ice freezing around his heart. He became dizzy; his temples had begun to pound. ‘Astonishing, my telephone line! Presumably they can trace calls made to it. To contact me, do so through Herr Schmidt. But be very careful.’ He pursed his lips; the implications went beyond Fräulein Dressler’s case.
She thought: He’s breathing rapidly. Someone else will have to remind him about his pills. But he’d never reveal such agitation to others.
‘We’ll get money to you — through your father.’ He smiled painfully, took her hand and formally shook it. She felt his deep sadness; also, his will to deal with this problem and put it behind him. She knew him too well. Suddenly, he lifted her hand to his lips. Ah, yes, she thought, but we do return, briefly, to the old days.
Ten minutes later, Fräulein Dressler, loyal and irreplaceable private secretary to the general-director of Bankhaus Wertheim & Co AG, quit the bank and the life in which she’d hoped to be grounded for the rest of her working days. Departing by the tradesmen’s entrance, she thought: Now I must really move fast. Stay calm. As she hurried into the street she said to herself: ‘Farewell dear Wertheims. I’ll leave you my ghost.’
~ * ~
16
H
ELGA GLANCED AT her watch: 3.00 pm. On a glass, skylight, rain rattled. Frau Seibert’s operation was in progress somewhere in the bowels of the Dresden hospital. She formulated an image of this, as she sat with Trudi in a waiting room. The child, diverted from her doll by the passing parade of mysterious, white-clad people, the squeak-squeak of trolleys carrying persons of even greater mystery, watched this new world.
Helga was not wholly preoccupied with concern for her mother. She’d spoken by telephone to Franz on two evenings, and had been disturbed by his unusually reserved voice. Was his life-long, seemingly genetically-implanted fascination with the Teutonic Knights moving him to confront the Nazis at the bank? If so, they were in danger. She bit at her lower lip.
‘Well! What a delightful little girl!’
A boomed-out remark, followed by a staccato heel-clicking. It smashed her reverie. The beaming, pink face of an officer of the SS bore down on her. He bowed stiffly; creaking black leather, hip-joints, white shirt, black uniform sprinkled with silver insignia. An apparition superimposed on her anxious thoughts.
As though admiring the first flower of spring, he touched Trudi’s blonde head. ‘This little one would delight the Fuehrer’s heart!’ Abruptly, he saluted, heel-clicked again and left in a quick-strutting gait. Trudi looked at her. Helga stared after him. An odour of new leather remained, subverting the hospital smells. Each day, like fungi cracking the earth, these people were breaking into their lives. Now totally alert, thoughts of the Order gone, her gaze after the departing Nazi became intense, her eyes slightly dilated, as if she feared his destination was the chief auditor’s room on Wertheim & Co’s second floor.
Schmidt left his office to run the icy gauntlet of the back stairs to the first floor. It was 3.02 pm. Since Dietrich’s departure he’d sat immobile, plunged in thought. The anteroom was deserted. Fräulein Dressler’s desk was cleared: evidence of an efficient departure. He stared at it, and in a flash had a notion that from the deck of the Wertheim he was looking at an abandoned lifeboat on a wide sea.
The case clock bled seconds.
He turned on his heel, and went back to his office for his overcoat and hat. That clock was ticking in his brain.
Hurrying through the grey mid-afternoon, he felt a stranger in the streets at this hour. In ten minutes he reached the gloomy, utilitarian building. He climbed the stairway quietly, holding his tension in check. He hesitated, then rapped lightly on the door with his knuckles. A lingering silence — a suspension of life. Iciness from the concrete floor speared up through the soles of his shoes into his bones. Did this building ever get warm, even in summer? He strained to hear; heard his own breathing.
He said, ‘It’s Schmidt.’
Immediately the door opened; he stepped back. She’d been behind the door. A gesture to enter, but no sign of panic. He took his resolve past the questioning eyes into the flat. The crisis appeared to have brought her a deeper calm; the flat looked stripped. She closed the door behind him.
‘Fräulein, you know?’
‘Tonight. Yes.’ She stared at him.
‘Have you a plan?’
‘Yes.’
‘Herr Wertheims plan?’
‘No. It can’t be used. They’ve found it out. They listen to his phone.’
Another twist. So the techniques of totalitarianism were invading Wertheims. Quite predictable, though apparently not to the general-director. Technology’d never been his strong-point.
Heavily, someone was coming up the stairs. God! Too late? He glanced at his watch: 3.25. They listened, hardly breathing, joined in the danger. The steps trudged past the door, and kept on ascending. Each fading footfall took a weight off his heart.
It was good that she was reticent, but he must test this last-ditch plan. Wertheim & Co had abandoned her! In effect. From the moment he’d gazed at her empty desk, his unfocused concern, his tentative actions, had coalesced into a direct responsibility. His vision had cleared.
‘What is your plan now?’
She began to move, continuing with what he’d interrupted. She’d no time to question his presence here. Yet another move by this auditor ... ‘I’ll go to my father’s sister in ... another city. I’ll leave tomorrow.’ She clearly enunciated the words, the last of which made no sense. He stared, his lips tight. This wasn’t calm and collected.
‘Fräulein, with respect, you must leave this flat immediately. Go to the station. Tomorrow will be too late.’
‘I will leave the flat, but I must meet my father. I’ve not been able to contact him.’
‘Your father’s flat will be the next place they’ll go to. A hotel is out of the question.’
She turned to him with a perplexed but obdurate expression. The telephone shrilled in the hall. She started, hesitated, then went to it. She came back, her eyes suddenly glittering with nerves. ‘They hung up.’
Schmidt thought: They’re on their way. He glanced around the room. ‘Three suitcases?’
‘Yes.’ She closed the lid of one, and lifted it to where the others waited. ‘O God,’ she intoned softly. It sounded like an amen.
Schmidt thought: We must go now. Get clear of the locality. He visualised a black car on its way from Gestapo headquarters. He had, in the last minute of concentrated mental effort, thought where to t
ake her, where he could bring her father to meet her, if he couldn’t persuade her to go direct to the station.
She was putting on her overcoat, her hat. He’d not taken his hat off. The compulsion on him to get out was now tremendous. But were they already waiting? He moved to look down into the street, stopped: learning from Wagner. He stepped back from the panes, black as photographic plates, flecked with raindrops. ’Leave the lights on,’ he said. ’Is there a back way out?’
She shook her head.
There was nothing to do but to walk out of the building carrying the suitcases. Commit themselves to the streets. Streets murky as the Fuehrer’s mind.
They were out ... his heart seemed to be tapping like a hammer on ice. Perspiration soaked his shirt.
An act of deliverance! A solitary taxi waited at the corner. Once they were in, and away from the area, he began to whisper in her ear, brushing the fragrant hair with his lips.
Frau Bertha was shocked. In the open door, faded blue eyes staring, her mistress’s commanding voice at her back, she gazed at Schmidt, the woman and the heap of luggage, as if they’d arrived from a foreign clime.
Warm air flowed out from the apartment to the chilled arrivals; Schmidt had discharged the taxi two blocks away, and was breathing audibly from hauling Fräulein Dressler’s packed-up life. He smiled tightly, ushered her into the hall past Frau Bertha, the sightless bust of the Great Man, and returned to bring in the luggage.
In her plush salon, Frau Schmidt, her pince-nez elegantly held aloft, inspected them. Then she concentrated on her son’s face. Schmidt drew in a silent breath, and made formal introductions. At first, he’d thought to leave her in the hall while he spoke to his mother. He’d changed his mind. He was now deciding things on the run.
‘Mother, Fräulein Dressler, is a colleague at the bank. She’s leaving tomorrow, for ... another city. She needs your hospitality for tonight.’ He went forward, leaned close. ‘I’m afraid the fräulein’s in some difficulty. She’s Herr Wertheim’s secretary. Her mother was Jewish, and the situation has changed at the bank.’ Would this old patrician lady understand the implications, the danger? Frau Schmidt glanced at her son. A meagre smile played on her age-marked face. She spoke up, a nuance of triumph in her voice, as if gratified to confirm her opinion of what she had once called his ‘unstable teutonic romanticism’. ‘You are very welcome here, Fräulein.’ Her remark, ignoring Schmidt, was woman-to-woman.
‘I’m sorry to impose on you, but I seem to have no other choice,’ Fräulein Dressler said with a fleeting smile.
What business had his daughter here? Number 178 Friedrichstrasse. For Senior Detective Dressler, a single upward glance was enough to transmit the building’s history and status. He took it in automatically. Only three kilometres from the district of his patrol but a world away. Yet many decrees issuing from the ministries in Berlin were now falling on each with equal weight.
His rubber soles squeaked on the marble stairs. His breath whined in his throat. Her brief phone call had been guarded, but he knew the blow had fallen. His huge gloved hand reached for the bell-push. Before he could touch it, the door opened. The detective regarded the small, soberly-suited man standing there. Blond hair, bright blue eyes; smooth, almost feminine skin. He didn’t recognise Schmidt — an unusual failure of his memory. But he did decide instantly that here was an individual who could blend into the background, like a person fitted for a life of crime.
Schmidt did remember Herr Dressler — from the café a few weeks ago, and a Christmas party five years back; his size. He looked up at the huge, cautious face, and thought he saw a family resemblance. Another vague memory was hazy in his brain.
He said, ‘I’m Herr Schmidt, a colleague of your daughter’s. Please come in.’
The detective stepped lightly onto the highly-polished parquet floor, full of wonder and confusion. Schmidt closed the door, and led the way into a room on the right.
Fräulein Dressler waited before the fireplace. The Dresslers stared at each other, then she moved to him and was enfolded in the overcoated arms. ‘O Papa!’With a shock Schmidt saw that she was trembling. He left the room, closing the door. He settled down to wait in the hall. The room he’d left was his late father’s study; his father’s cannonade of a reply to his mother’s salon. She’d kept it so.
He paced the hall. His mother had retired with a cryptic look, though still tinged with her triumph. He sighed. Frau Bertha, doubtless, was in her room smoking a clandestine cigarette, listening to her wireless, worrying about this singular and dangerous event.
Still pacing, managing his own nerves, it occurred to him that he was face-to-face with his childhood. Here had been the beginning; the first visits to the study, the light turned on in his brain, precursor of his inner life. His father’s room was a museum of the Order of the Teutonic Knights. Its entanglements, chronicles - fables. A museum unknown to its mysterious headquarters in Vienna, which over the centuries had shrunk, he understood, to a church and archives.
He’d never divulged his passion to school or university friends — not that he’d had many. In his younger days it’d seemed like a sacred secret. A wonderful one to be held close. And he’d been imitating his father’s reticence on the subject. In adulthood, the secrecy had been ingrained in him. He’d told no-one at the bank, not even Wagner. Of course, Helga knew.
Abruptly Fräulein Dressler appeared. He saw that she’d regained her calm. He rejoined father and daughter. Senior Detective Dressler, still in his coat, the electric light gleaming on his massive head, leaned slightly forward, like an oak balanced against a high wind. It struck the auditor thus. He moved efficiently despite his size. Did his mind match his physical competence?
The detective cleared his throat. ‘Herr Schmidt, I wish to thank you for the assistance you’ve rendered my daughter. For the risk you are taking. Your deed, your mother’s, allows one a little hope for the future. We’ve decided which of my sisters she will go to. I will return at 7.00 am with a motor car, and drive her out of town to join the train to her destination.’ Schmidt thought: They’ll avoid the barrier checkpoint.
‘It will be a temporary arrangement. We hope to find a better solution.’ Herr Dressler’s heavy accents lingered in the wood-panelled room.
Schmidt nodded. He’d nothing to offer these counsels. Yes, he was putting his mother’s household in hazard. The degree of it depended on the efficiency of the Reich security agencies. It was strange how sanguine he felt about it.
‘I am on duty,’ Herr Dressler said. He took his daughter’s hand, carried it to his lips, looked down into her fondly watchful eyes. Full of concern for him! He could hardly stand it. Abruptly, looking aside, he offered his other hand to Schmidt in an uncharacteristic, throwaway gesture.
~ * ~
17
O
TTO WERTHEIM LOUNGED in a chair in Dietrich’s room smoking one of the Nazi’s cigarettes. They’d been having quite a session: the room was thick with bluish smoke, the odour of tobacco; a bottle of cognac which Otto had brought was nearly empty. The engines of Wertheims had quietened to a murmur; only a few lights remained on, in the foreign department.
Otto was very satisfied with the atmosphere of this informal little celebration of his Party membership. Dietrich might not be of his class, but he was a superior example of his type, and on the way up in the Reich. One had to move with the times, adjust one’s social circle, manage it like a portfolio of investments. As his uncle had so astutely, albeit surprisingly, recognised: a fortune was there for the taking; thousands of businesses were gearing-up to a plethora of exciting opportunities, and Wertheims had entered the traffic!
Enough of business, it’d still be there at 9.00 am tomorrow. Inevitably, a surfeit of brandy, the late hour, had turned his thoughts to women.
Dietrich, equally as relaxed in his disciplined way, watched the young director with a tolerant but sardonic look. The majority of the things that the Nazi did in his life had a specific ob
jective. Sitting here at this hour, drinking brandy, having the kind of conversation that Otto Wertheim was capable of, wasn’t a stimulating experience; but it was a correct investment of his time. The sum of Otto wasn’t much, but his privileged position in the bank’s condensed world counted. A rarefied world, which the Party had sent him into. And tonight he’d gleaned more information on that slippery old fox, Herr Wertheim.
‘How about coming on to a club,’ Otto said. His eyes shone like glass, his fleshy face, soft as wax, had fallen into lustful anticipation. ‘Girls who’re plump, juicy, and willing.’ He laughed. ‘And you don’t have to talk to ‘em in the morning. Or, at any time.’
The Eye of the Abyss - [Franz Schmidt 01] Page 11
