by David Young
Something, though, has gone wrong in my calculations. I have no watch. I have no clock. But this journey was supposed to take just a few hours. I’d managed to glean that information from the Jugendwerkhof library. We have already been at sea for more than a day. My mind can’t be playing that many tricks.
All of a sudden, the rocking of the boat calms completely. The motion now is barely perceptible above the vibrations and hum of the motor. We must have reached Sweden at last. Hope courses through me once more. We’ve made it!
I push at the end of the box above my head, hearing the packing tape tear off. A dim light enters. I want to try to squeeze out before unloading begins, in case this isn’t Sweden, in case it isn’t even the West. I brace my arms and legs against the veneered chipboard panels that form the box walls, and push, sliding forward centimetre by centimetre. I get my head out, my shoulders. By a stroke of good fortune my pallet seems to be at the end of a row, with my head by the open side. I can only imagine what it would have been like if I’d been trapped in the middle of the pile of boxes. It’s another stupid flaw in the plan, I realise, of which Mathias and Beate could be the victims. Trapped, suffocated and starved – all thanks to me.
I push again and get my arms far enough out that I can cling onto the edges of the box. I try to force my head round to see how high up I am in the pile of boxes. More good luck. Just one box away from the bottom of the pile. I wriggle out further and stretch one hand down to the steel floor of the boat’s hold, to support myself as I struggle to free the rest of my body. A thud. Pain in my head from where it hits the floor. But I’m out.
I slowly move myself to a standing position. I have to grab onto the sides of the boxes because my legs feel like jelly. And the smell. I don’t want to think about the smell and my damp clothing.
And then I hear a voice – barely more than a whisper – calling for Beate. It’s Mathias. I see him coming down the gap between the pallets, towards me. I want to cry with joy, I want to hug him, but he pushes me away.
‘I’m worried,’ he says. ‘I can’t find Beate. I’m not sure she’s even here.’
‘She must be. We’ve both made it. Why would her box have been split off from the rest?’
‘You’re right. Let’s look again.’
We split up and check the piles of boxes methodically. The rows go on and on. I realise how lucky we’ve been. This is several days’ output from the Jugendwerkhof that must have been stored out in the yard, or at Sassnitz harbour, before being shipped. That could have been us waiting in a holding area, and slowly starving to death; instead, our boxes were loaded within hours, in less then a day. But what if Beate’s hasn’t been?
I start on another row, whispering Beate’s name, still without any luck. I daren’t raise my voice in case we alert the crew, and in case we’re not in the West after all. I notice the engine motors are still running. There is a very faint rocking motion. For some reason we are still moving.
‘Beate, Beate,’ I whisper up and down the boxes of yet another row. Then I hear something from the top of a pile. ‘Irma, Irma.’ An answering cry. I call back as loudly as I dare: ‘Beate, don’t worry. We’ll have you out in a moment. Just stay calm.’
I run to the edge of the row to try to see Mathias. I hiss at him and gesture. Finally he sees me, and comes running. His breath is as foul as mine, panting in my face. ‘Up there,’ I say, pointing to the top of the pile of boxes. ‘Right at the very top, I think. That’s what it sounds like.’
He finds energy that I know I no longer have, and clambers like a monkey up the side of the boxes. Around twenty of them, stacked in a criss-cross pattern to strengthen the pile. I see him scrabbling with the topmost boxes, trying to move them to one side.
‘She’s under here . . . a couple of boxes down,’ he calls to me. ‘But I can’t lift them on my own. You’ll have to come up and help me.’
I try to follow the same route he used, surprised at my own strength, the urge to save my friend driving me on.
‘Hurry up,’ he whispers, stretching his arm to help pull me the last metre or so. ‘Her voice sounds very weak.’
We crouch on top of the pile. Mathias counts to three and then we both lift the top box, and move it over. Beate’s voice is louder now, and we realise this is her box, the second one down. Mathias rips the cardboard end, flinging the pieces to the floor. After a nerve-wracking wait, Beate’s head slowly appears. But there is no way to get down. No way to get out without falling. She has been face down in her box, whereas I’d been on my back.
‘Stay there,’ shouts Mathias. ‘Don’t try to get out any further. You’ll fall.’ He moves to the neighbouring box, and starts to tear off the cardboard from the top of Beate’s. Together, we lift the headboard and then, centimetre by centimetre, pull Beate out. She slumps into his arms, exhausted. He’s kissing her, cuddling her, telling her he loves her, and I feel an intense stab of jealousy. She’s my friend, it was my plan, and yet he’s making out he’s her saviour. Mathias, the boy who was quite happy to steal my rightful place. I begin to hate him.
Once we’ve slowly helped her down to ground level, I do get my hug from her. I do get my congratulations. And strangely, it makes me feel slightly better that Beate stinks as badly as I do, that she looks a complete mess.
‘Oh Irma,’ she says. ‘I cannot thank you enough. It was horrible, horrible in there. I thought we would never get out alive.’
I stroke her sick-covered hair. ‘I’m sorry I put you through it.’
‘No, no,’ she says. ‘Never be sorry. I will always be grateful to you, Irma, always. You don’t know what they did to me in that place. You don’t want to know, I promise you.’ She begins to sob.
‘Shhh,’ I hush her. ‘Shhh. It’s OK now. It’s OK.’
But as I’m stroking her hair, I realise the motors are still running. We still haven’t reached our destination.
‘Where do you think we are?’ I ask Mathias.
‘I know where we are,’ he says. ‘At least I think I do. There’s an exit from the hold there.’ He points to a red sliding door. ‘I’ve already been up to take a look.’
‘Well, tell us where we are then. It’s not Sweden, is it?’
But he won’t say. He grabs Beate by the hand, like the star-crossed lover he is, and urges me to follow. As we run through the door, I can see daylight coming down the stairwell. We huddle round the first porthole and look out. The daylight blinds my eyes for an instant, and then I adjust. The glass is smeared and dirty and at first I can’t make much out, except that we seem to be travelling up a river or something, because I can see cars and buildings on the bank side. Then I see a factory sign. In German. My heart sinks.
‘We’re not still in the Republic, are we?’ I ask.
‘No, no,’ he shouts over the din of engine noise. ‘Look at the cars.’
I stare. I’m not sure of all the makes. I see Volkswagen Beetles. Bigger luxury cars. But not a Trabant, not a Wartburg in sight.
Then road signs. Rendsburg, Kiel, Hamburg.
The West!
I feel the rush of joy through my whole body.
We have reached the West. Never to see Jugendwerkhof Prora Ost again. No more Richter. No more Neumann.
I turn to Beate and hug her to me. Her smile is as wide as mine. I know we are best friends for life.
34
February 1975. Day Thirteen.
East Berlin.
On their return to the Hauptstadt, Müller had expected to be immediately summoned to either the Stasi or the People’s Police headquarters – but instead the three officers were split up, and Müller was escorted back to her apartment and told to stay there overnight, and not to try to contact anyone. She knew better than to disobey, after her requests to speak to Jäger were met with silence. When she asked to see Gottfried, she received a similar response.
Now she and Tilsner were sitting in two chairs, next to each other, opposite a table in a large room at the Keibelstrass
e police headquarters. Schmidt had no doubt been allowed to return to the forensic lab, safe in the knowledge that – if there had been wrongdoing – he was simply following her orders. Behind the table, arranged in a line, sat five male officers who, from their differing shades of grey-green and olive-green uniforms, looked to Müller to be a mixture of Stasi and People’s Police. They introduced themselves but Müller found her concentration wavering. The only one she knew was the one she recognised: her police superior, Oberst Reiniger, and even he seemed to have a more serious expression than usual. He refused to meet Müller’s eyes.
After the introductions, the middle officer of the five, a grey-haired man in his late fifties with black-rimmed spectacles, was the first to speak. ‘We’ve summoned you here to make it clear to you that you are both being removed from the missing person’s inquiry into the girl found dead in St Elisabeth’s cemetery. Oberst Reiniger –’ the officer gestured to his left, towards the end of the table, ‘– fully approves of this decision.’ Reiniger gave a small nod, as the more senior officer continued. ‘That means you are to make no further inquiries about the girl. You have in any case already exceeded the agreed remit, putting the People’s Police and Ministry for State Security in a position of some embarrassment. This is a serious matter, and will be investigated, and the outcome will be made known to you in due course. In the meantime, Unterleutnant Tilsner, as you were acting under the authority of Oberleutnant Müller here, you may return to your official duties and await further instructions. Oberleutnant, for the moment you will remain here.’
Müller looked across at her deputy. He’d made no move to stand, and instead cleared his throat, and looked to be about to launch into a speech in their defence. Reiniger pulled him up short.
‘That means now, Comrade Tilsner.’
‘But Comrade Oberst, we were given the authority to do what we did by –’
‘Now, Tilsner,’ barked Reiniger, his face turning red.
Tilsner scraped his chair back, gave an apologetic shrug towards Müller, and then marched out of the room, slamming the door behind him.
Müller ignored Reiniger’s warning look. ‘What Unterleutnant Tilsner was about to say was that we were given the authority to ask the questions we did, and go where we did, by Ministry for State Security Oberstleutnant Klaus Jäger.’
‘We have no record of that,’ said the officer in the centre of the table. ‘And Oberstleutnant Jäger has been removed from the case too.’ Müller tried to disguise her shock at this news. ‘And for you, Oberleutnant, things are more complicated. As well as exceeding your authority, I gather you’re aware by now that your husband stands accused of anti-state –’
‘I haven’t been allowed to see my husband.’
‘We will see about rectifying that.’
The chairman of her inquisitors gave a questioning glance to his right, the opposite side to Reiniger, where an officer in the olive-green uniform of the Stasi gave a small nod. ‘You will be allowed an accompanied visit to your husband. But you have to understand that his activities – if proven – are incompatible with the husband of an officer of the People’s Police. So, should you be allowed to continue with your career once our inquiry is over, it will be on the understanding that you obtain a divorce. In the meantime, you too may return to your office, and wait for Oberst Reiniger to assign you new duties.’
‘So I’m being removed from the Mitte Murder Commission?’
‘No. Not for the time being. But – as I said – the missing person’s inquiry in connection with the body of the girl at St Elisabeth cemetery is being taken away from you. You should do nothing – I repeat nothing – more in connection with the case. Do you understand, Comrade Oberleutnant?’
Müller nodded. She felt numbed. Was this the beginning of the end of her police career? Perhaps – back at the graveyard when this had all started – Tilsner had been right. They never should have become involved in this case. But Jäger hadn’t really given them any choice.
‘You can go back to the office now, Oberleutnant,’ said Reiniger. ‘I will speak to you later today about your new duties, and about arranging a visit to your husband.’
Müller stood and saluted, then turned on her heels. All she could think of was the poor girl in the cemetery, her eyeless sockets and the pathetic black nail ‘varnish’. As she closed the door on the five officers, she wondered if anyone would bother – or dare – to challenge the official account of the girl’s death, now that she and Jäger had been conveniently removed from the equation.
35
Day Thirteen.
East Berlin.
Müller stared up at the grim buildings that housed the Stasi headquarters, after being summoned there from the office in Marx-Engels-Platz just an hour after leaving the meeting in Keibelstrasse. On all sides, pebble-dash beige concrete walls towered above her, with darker bands of brown highlighting some of the floors – at least twice as high as Prora, maybe more. Was Gottfried being held in one of these rooms? That’s what she’d perhaps naively assumed. But she was wrong: the tall, sharp-faced Stasi captain who’d met her at the checkpoint – Hauptmann Schiller – was planning on taking her on a car journey.
She followed the Stasi officer to rows of parked cars in the central courtyard. He went to one of them, and opened the door for her. It was a Volvo. Of course. Müller ducked inside. Leather seats, the smell not unlike the Mercedes they’d used to go to West Berlin. She hunched herself into the seat as Schiller opened the driver’s door and climbed in.
After driving through unfamiliar eastern parts of the Hauptstadt, they came to another checkpoint, and Schiller again flashed his ID as a guard peered in through the window.
Once they were waved through, Schiller finally broke the silence. ‘You’re privileged, Oberleutnant,’ he said. ‘This is a restricted zone. Even for a Kriminalpolizei officer like yourself. You won’t find it on any street maps of the Hauptstadt.’
On their right, she saw a watchtower at the corner of a four-metre high wall, topped with barbed wire. It looked like a section of the protection barrier, although this was several kilometres further east. ‘Here we are,’ said Schiller.
The Stasi captain again showed his pass and the gates to the compound opened. Schiller parked the Volvo in the courtyard, turned the engine off and then gestured to Müller to follow him inside.
Their footsteps echoed down a series of corridors – a labyrinth she knew she would have no way of negotiating without someone to guide her. Every few metres there were gates of steel bars, with some sort of control lighting system. Green on, red off. Müller wondered what it meant when the lights were switched the other way.
Towards the end of a particularly long corridor, Schiller stopped at a door on the left and knocked. A male voice commanded them to enter.
A middle-aged man with a round face and too obviously dyed black hair stood up as they entered, rubbing his eyes and then replacing his spectacles. Schiller performed the introductions.
‘Oberleutnant Müller, this is Major Hunsberger. He’s in charge of the investigation into your husband, Gottfried.’
The Stasi major ushered them to sit. ‘I’m pleased to meet you, Oberleutnant Müller, though I wish the circumstances were more pleasant. In a moment we will bring your husband in to see you, but there are a few things we need you to look at first.’
Müller nodded, but said nothing.
Hunsberger reached into the pile of papers on his desk, and drew out a selection, which he placed in front of him, smoothing out the pages. He pushed his glasses back up his nose again, and brandished one of the documents between his thumb and forefinger. ‘What we have here is a signed request from your husband Gottfried to terminate your marriage.’
‘He wants to divorce me?’
‘That’s correct,’ said Hunsberger. ‘I believe you have already been briefed about our surveillance pictures showing you with your deputy, Werner Tilsner. We, of course, had to show those to your husband.’
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Müller felt a sudden coldness inside. She breathed, slowly, deeply. Struggling for air.
‘He requests a divorce on the grounds of your adultery.’
She held the Stasi officer’s gaze. ‘I didn’t commit adultery. Those photographs are not what they seem. This is outrageous!’
Hunsberger ignored her denial, but paused a moment. ‘However,’ he continued, placing the document to one side, and instead picking up a photograph, ‘it doesn’t suit our purposes for the divorce to be initiated by him. We simply wanted to demonstrate to you that your marriage has no future. I think you’d agree with me there. And while you were away in Rügen, we received new evidence. This.’ Hunsberger thrust the photograph under her nose.
Müller recoiled in shock. She immediately recognised the girl in the photo from the pictures reluctantly supplied by the Jugendwerkhof deputy director: it was Beate Ewert. Here she was with her eyes closed, the back of a man’s head in view, his hand on her teenaged breast. Hunsberger handed her a second photo, from a slightly different angle. Now, from the side of the man’s face, she could clearly see it was Gottfried, kissing the girl on the mouth. No! This couldn’t be true. These photos had to be fakes. She swallowed repeatedly, fighting the urge to be sick. Hands shaking, she turned the photos face down.
Now it was Schiller’s turn to speak. ‘I’m sorry we had to show you these, Comrade Oberleutnant. The girl is only fifteen. You know what that means from your police legal training?’
Müller nodded. ‘Section 149 of the Republic’s criminal code,’ she said in a quiet voice.
‘Exactly, Oberleutnant Müller,’ said Hunsberger. ‘In the event a victim’s moral immaturity is exploited, then the perpetrator is guilty of a criminal act. But irrespective of the criminality or not, is this really the sort of man to whom you wish to be married?’
Schiller joined the fray now. ‘If so, Oberleutnant, I’m afraid you will have to resign from the force immediately.’
