‘There are no odds to favour us,’ said Walther. ‘There are two guards out there, fully armed, young hoodlums who would enjoy the target practice. There are four of us-two of us old, and one a woman-with no arms but your nonsense.’
‘I’ll take the major risk,’ persisted Craig. ‘I’ll lead the way out. It’s dark. I’ll go towards the guards, block them, divert them, no matter what the consequences. There’ll be time enough for the three of you to make the wharf-or, better, just leap overboard and begin to shout. The noise you make-the gunfire at me-it’ll bring, people down in swarms.’
‘I am not going overboard,’ said Walther with deadly reserve. ‘I do not swim.’
‘You’ll find cork jackets in the cupboard.’
‘And float there-sitting duck for those hoodlums? No. Why risk my life, after all I have been through, when my freedom without danger is only hours off?’
‘But then we can save Max-not only you but Max.’
‘You are telling me how to think about Max?’ Walther bawled, rearing to his feet, lurching against the table. The jolt of his agitated frame against the table overturned the glass and bottle, and sent both rolling to the cabin floor. As the vodka gurgled out of the bottle, Walther shouted, ‘Max is my business, not yours-not any of yours! I have had enough from you and all of your provocateurs! Now get out of here!’
Craig remained stolidly in his place. ‘I’m not getting out.’
Walther strode noisily around the table. ‘Then I will have you thrown out, you capitalist scum-trying to tell me what to do-trying to tell me-a man honoured, revered, looked up to, worshipped-in the most powerful nation on earth-’
Suddenly, Walther cut his heated outburst short. His eyes went from Craig, to Krantz, and back to Craig, to the look of blank astonishment on Krantz’s features, to the look of complete scorn on Craig’s face. Except for their heavy breathing, the ticking of a clock, the creak of hinges off somewhere, the stateroom was a tomb of charged silence.
Craig spoke first. ‘You don’t want to escape, do you, Walther? I never expected you would. But-why not? Because you don’t give a damn about your brother or daughter? Or because you don’t give a damn about freedom? You don’t want freedom-do you, Walther?’
Rage covered Walther’s face like a distorted hood. He reeled towards Craig, lifting a fist as if to hit him. But he did not strike. Instead, he bellowed, ‘Freedom? Freedom? What do you sheep know of freedom-of the true meaning of freedom? You with your holy false words-mouthings dictated by your capitalist hyenas-the provocateurs, the warmongers, and you no better, and Max no better-waiting with your ICBMs to destroy us, to protect your filthy green dollars.’
They were only a few feet apart, but Craig did not flinch. Exultation swept upward through his veins. Reckless confidence, in knowledge of the truth, was his banner. ‘You speak like a Communist, Walther, exactly like a Communist. You’re not even being cautious. You’re one of them-not the decent people there-but the big ones, the cocky ones, so sure of your science and weapons-’
‘You ignorant lout!’ cried Walther. ‘What do you know of our science and our weapons? We are the fighters for peace-working day and night to save the world, keep it alive for you fools, to make one world-’
‘Your world, Walther, not mine,’ interrupted Craig. ‘You want your world on your terms, and it has nothing to do with average people anywhere. You want your world. You’ve been brainwashed-indoctrinated-forgotten the old past-want the new future where you and your adopted comrades will be the royalty.’
‘The workers will be the royalty!’ Walther shouted.
Craig studied the weaving old man, his pose lost, his stature taller, stronger, fanatical, and then Craig said, ‘You never intended to leave that world, Walther. I can see that now. You played along for the sake of the Party-it’s the Party, isn’t it, Walther? It’s the parroting, brainless, robot Party.’
‘Another disrespect against the Party and you’ll pay for it!’ Walther swayed, unbalanced by vodka and outrage. ‘The Party is the best of us-all eight million of the CPSU-and we are the cream, the best, the most decent brains on earth, and your fate is in our hands-remember that, remember-’
‘And so you played along for them, never intending to participate honourably even in blackmail? The bosses said go to Stockholm, suck in Max, get him back to East Berlin for us-so we can use him for evil-and then you come back to us, too. That was the game, wasn’t it?’
Walther’s mouth was strange, twisting, twisting, saliva-brimmed, with no word being uttered, until at last the hoarse words broke through. ‘Do you think I would come to you in a hundred years? I wanted to help them get Max on the right side, yes. And the girl-Emily-yes, if she would come. I owed it to her-after what I know of Ravensbruck, after what I guess of her life in America-to raise her under my roof, in a decent house, with my family. But to leave my family for the likes of Max or the lot of you? To leave a good Russian wife-my two young children? They are my life, they and my work and our cause.’
He caught his breath, panting out of fever and fury.
‘Dr. Krantz!’ The voice, clear and assured, came from the rear of the stateroom, and it was Emily’s voice.
All of them turned as one, startled, having forgotten her. She stood before the open door of the bedroom cabin, had apparently been standing there for some minutes. Now, shifting her coat from one arm to the other, head high, lips compressed, only her step uneven, she crossed to the group.
‘Dr. Krantz,’ she repeated, ‘should you speak to Dr. Eckart once more, tell him this. Tell him there can be no trade-because there is no one for whom Uncle Max can be traded.’
She considered Craig gravely, her countenance dry-eyed and composed. ‘Thank you, Andrew,’ she said.
Kranz was waiting at the stateroom door. He went first. Emily was the next to go. Then it was Craig who left.
Not one of them looked back at Professor Walther Stratman…
When they had arrived at his single room on the fifth floor of the Grand Hotel, Craig helped Emily inside, switching on the lights as they entered. Emily was heavy against his supporting arm, and twice she stumbled. ‘I’m all right,’ she muttered, ‘I’ll be all right.’
They had emerged from the cabin cruiser at Pålsundet only fifteen minutes before, and the memory of it still hung over them. No sooner had Krantz led them up to the white pine deck than the athletic young Swedish guard had appeared, suspicious and edgy. Krantz had sternly rattled forth his explanation in Swedish, mentioning Walther once, invoking Eckart twice, and then the guard had conceded their passage.
Swiftly, they had made their way along the canal, waiting once when Emily had protested that she was weak. During that interlude, Craig had felt the cool white flakes of snow on his cheeks, as satisfying as Emily’s warm presence leaning against him. Lingering thus, Craig had studied the dark waters of the canal and Långholmen island directly across, almost hidden behind the haze of the low mist, and then the snow came thicker. Where earlier it had seemed menacing, it now seemed a suspension in time, both cheerful and welcome.
After that, they had departed from the desolate embankment, and gone up through the hard, slippery park area, Krantz wheezing, and Craig concerned only for the one on his arm.
When they had come into the lights of Söder Mälarstrand, the traffic was still heavy in the packed snow, and the bright municipal decorations a proper jubilee. At the limousine, speckled with dry snow, Craig had asked Krantz to drive them to the hotel, and he had eagerly assented.
Inside the cosy automobile, as it slid into the traffic, Emily had sat straight and rigid a moment, staring ahead, then suddenly she had closed her eyes and choked forth a sob.
Craig had watched her with deep concern, aware of how depleted were her emotional resources. ‘I’m sorry, Emily. It must be shattering.’
‘No,’ she had said, shaking her head vigorously. ‘I-I almost cried because-only because I’m so relieved, at last. All afternoon, I did not know w
here I was, how to think, what should be done. Now it’s solved. He-he’s not my father at all-at least-not the father I knew. And the thought of having to give up Uncle Max for him or anyone-’ She paused. ‘But thank God for you, Andrew, thank God for you.’
She fumbled for his hand, and he met her hand with his own, and brought her close against him. She dropped her head on his shoulder, eyes wearily closing, and sighed like a little girl who had been lost and was now safely in her sheltering bed again.
‘Andrew-’ she had murmured, and the receding voice was shaded and troubled.
He waited, and he said, ‘Don’t bother to talk. I’m here. I’ll always be here.’
‘No,’ she had said, ‘no, Andrew-’
He had tried to understand this refusal to accept him, and had been about to contend with it, when he saw that she slept. He had sat all through the ride, arm about her rocking with the motion of the limousine, wondering and wondering, until the time when they had drawn up before the canopy of the Grand Hotel.
‘Here we are,’ he had whispered, disengaging himself, and rousing her. The doorman had opened the rear door, but it had been Krantz, skittering around from the driver’s seat, who had shoved the doorman aside to assist Emily and Craig out of the car.
Going past the worried Krantz, Craig had remembered that he represented unfinished business. A decision must be made. Requesting Emily to wait, and the doorman to look after her, Craig had returned to Krantz. Wordlessly, they had walked several yards from the car.
Krantz, distractedly brushing the snowflakes from his face, had gazed up at Craig. ‘What are you going to do?’
Studying the servile physicist, Craig had known that there was only one thing he could do. From the beginning, when Daranyi had indicted the physicist, Craig had looked upon Krantz as Rumpelstilzchen, the evil dwarf, but now, hunched and drooping, he was only the pathetic dwarf. Craig could see how one so small had, in some way, to become big, and any witchery was worth it if the goal was reached. Craig could see that Nature had punished him from birth, punished him with lack of stature and discontent, and that more than this need not be done.
Craig had studied the pale little Swede. ‘I keep thinking of Jacobsson-Ingrid Påhl-the hundreds of others-decent people-who work hard to make the Nobel awards mean something-in a world where so little means anything-and I tell myself all that would be lost with one rotten scandal. Because you fear the scandal as much as I hate it, you’ve tried to make up for it. You took me to the boat. You took us off the boat. So-as long as I can know you’ll never get caught up in anything like this again-’
‘Never-never. My pledge-’
‘-and as long as I know you’ll square things with Daranyi-’
‘At once-tomorrow.’
‘-I’m not going to say a thing, Krantz, only make a record of it, in case you should ever get out of line.’
Krantz had been almost tearful. ‘Thank you-thank you.’
‘You don’t have to thank me. You can be grateful to your colleagues… Now beat it.’
Briefly, he had watched Krantz hurry back to the limousine. Then, when the car was gone, he had returned to the canopy, where Emily rested against an upright. He could see that she was but half awake. He had grasped her firmly under the arch of the back, and led her up the stairs, and through the lobby to the elevator.
Now they were in his room. He removed her coat, and settled her on the double bed, and bent to pull off her shoes. As he did so, she forced her eyes open. ‘The sedation is wearing off, Andrew. But I’m still sort of-slowed down.’ She took in the room, disoriented. ‘This room. Is this your room?’
‘Yes… Now, stretch out. You’ll be yourself in a little while.’
She nodded, pushed herself to the centre of the bed, falling backwards to the pillow. She lifted her slim legs, making one gesture towards her skirt, trying, and failing, to cover her knees, then letting her arm drop limply to the quilt.
Craig turned down two of the three lamps, poked at his valise, removed his jacket and tie, tried to busy himself in every way, hoping that she would sleep. At the telephone, he considered calling the Concert Hall and leaving a message for Jacobsson, explaining that he would be late. But then, as he weighed the necessity of the call, he realized that Emily was still awake, her eyes following his every movement.
‘Can’t you sleep?’ he asked.
‘No.’ Feebly, she touched the bed beside her. ‘Come, sit close to me.’
‘Yes.’ He stood over her. Her silken black hair, and green eyes and serious crimson lips, had never been more beautiful to his sight. He bent over her face, and she closed her eyes, and he kissed her.
At last, with one weak hand against his shoulder, she asked for release, and he granted it.
‘Andrew-’
‘Yes, darling.’
‘What are we going to do?’
‘Very simple. We’ll wait for the drug to wear off, and then we’ll change and go.’
‘That’s not what I meant,’ she said. ‘I meant-’ But then it was difficult to know what she meant under the sedation, and her brain was slow. ‘How did you find me?’
He told her how hopeful he had been after receiving her message, and how he had waited for the telephone call and for her understanding. Then he related how he had gone to her suite, and received the tape recorder, and made up his mind not to burden her uncle with the terrible dilemma, but to see what he could do by himself. He told her about Gottling, and how they had gone to Daranyi, and what had happened there, and then he told her, in lesser detail, of his showdown with Krantz that had led him to the meeting with Walther in the stateroom.
She had listened without comment, but now she said, ‘You are good.’
‘I’m in love,’ he said simply.
She avoided the declaration. Instead, she said, ‘I keep thinking-what if it had been Uncle Max they had reached before you? He would have gone over to their side without hesitation-remembering my father only as he had last seen him in another age-forgetting, as we all do, people are different people at different times.’
‘That is true.’
‘Uncle Max would have been lost to me-and I’d be alone. How did you ever think you could-?’
‘I didn’t think, Emily,’ he said. ‘I felt. I felt, and I acted on feeling-something I have not done in years. That’s all I did. I felt Max must not be given away. I felt your father must be reasoned with. Most of all, I felt alive-but for a while, as dead as before I met you-and I knew I could be alive again, and stay alive, only by being with you… Emily, stop ignoring it, denying it. I love you, and accept this from me.’
‘I can’t. Won’t you understand? I’m unable to-I can’t.’
‘But why not?’ His mind went to a word, and he wondered if it might hold her secret. ‘Emily, I don’t know what is wrong-I can only guess it must be something in your past. I’ve heard one word over and over again. From you. From your Uncle Max. From Daranyi. Even from your-from Walther.’ She was watching him with frightened eyes, but he went on. ‘The word is Ravensbruck,’ he said. ‘It’s the only other thing I don’t understand, besides your rejection of me. I know-you told me once-Ravensbruck was a women’s concentration camp in Germany during the war. But I still don’t understand its-’
‘Andrew,’ she said, ‘I was going to tell you about that at noon-it was the important thing I had to tell you.’
‘Do you still want to tell me?’
‘I don’t know, except it is now all that matters again. It has never stopped mattering. I suppose if you know the truth about that, you will know me and have some understanding-of why I treated you the way I did that first night we met in the palace, of-of the way I’ve been withdrawn and strange, I’m sure you’ve seen that-of the real reason I sent you away.’ She paused. ‘It wasn’t Lilly, you see. It was me.’ Her green eyes studied his features for long silent seconds. ‘And finally-finally-it’s why I cannot marry you or see you again.’
‘Emily-’
> ‘I want to talk,’ she persisted tiredly, and her speech had thickened. ‘I have to, sooner or later, so that you’ll know why this is our last time together. You deserve to know, because of what you’ve expected of me. And besides-I guess-my poor brain-I’m so lightheaded now-besides, I think, for once I’m drugged enough to be uninhibited.’
‘Emily, I’d rather you rest, and then-’
‘Now, Andrew, it’s got to be now. It is more important to me than anything in the world.’
‘All right, Emily,’ he said, and he pondered what might come, and for some unknown reason he felt fear.
‘You won’t mind if I don’t look at you while I talk?’ For a moment, she was quiet again, as if rummaging through her opiate-scattered brain. ‘Ravensbruck,’ she said, ‘that is where it began and ended. They called it, in German, the woman’s hell, but it was not nearly so pleasant as that.’
Her thoughts had wandered again, but her determination was strong, and she went on. ‘My mother and I were sent there, you know, fifty miles north of Berlin, and were to be kept alive as long as my father and Uncle Max worked for the government in Berlin.’
‘I know,’ he said.
‘I was thirteen and fourteen and fifteen in Ravensbruck. When I was first put there, I was a scrawny girl just out of puberty, but the next year I began to mature, and before my fifteenth birthday, I was a woman-much more attractive than I am today-a woman with a serious child’s head. We lived like animals, deprived, ragged, filthy, and always in our fear of being Jews. But no one whipped or beat us or made us stand in the naked inspections, my mother and myself, because of my father and Uncle Max. And for me, most of the first two years, it was not such hell, because I had only then become a woman, and before I had been a child, and so this was almost the only life I knew well, and I had no real standard I would allow myself to compare it with. It seemed natural to me-as if it had always been-to wear a stinking and vermin-covered dress and underwear and to wear wooden shoes, to wake at five-thirty and have one cup of ersatz coffee for breakfast, and one tin can of cabbage soup for lunch, and one more for dinner, and to steal potato peelings from the garbage, to work eleven hours every day digging a road, to use a four-gallon drum for a toilet, to sleep with lice and my mother and one other on straw with one blanket for all three of us. I repeat, I refused to remember any other life, so I managed. It was my mother who suffered worse, but no matter about that. The real horror of the camp was not so much the indignities and punishments and suffering we saw-but the worse things we did not see. As the veterans in the Atlanta hospital where I work are often saying, there were constant latrine rumours. Some I could even verify, because I knew the French women and the Czech women. Our friends disappeared, and we knew it was true that fifty women a day were shot in the back of the neck and cremated. To speed up the liquidation, many of our friends were pressed to build a gas chamber, so we knew that existed. Then there were the scientific experiments, medical experiments-;’
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