A Good German

by Joseph Kanon

  “You’d find a better signature. I’ll ask.”

  “You’re talking about hiring a German?” Breimer said.

  “Why not? You do,” Jake said.

  Breimer’s head snapped back, as if he’d been slapped. “That’s an entirely different matter.”

  “Yeah, I know, reparations.”

  “You don’t want to get mixed up with Germans,” Breimer said to Shaeffer. “FIAT’s an American operation.”

  “Suit yourself,” Jake said. “Somebody’s got to get to Sikorsky__ he’s the only lead we’ve got.“

  Shaeffer looked at him through the smoke, not saying anything.

  “Well, you guys think it over,” Jake said, moving away from the shelf, impatient. “You wanted me to find Brandt. I found him. At least how to find him. Now the ball’s in your court. Meanwhile, can I borrow some ammo?” He patted the gun. “Liz was fresh out. Same Colt, too,” he said to Shaeffer.

  “I thought press weren’t allowed to carry arms,” Breimer said, missing the look between them.

  “That’s before I started working for FIAT. Now I get nervous. I notice you carry one.” He nodded toward the bulge in Breimer’s pocket.

  “For your information, this is going to a boy’s father in my district.”

  Shaeffer opened the drawer to his nightstand, took out a box, and threw it to Jake.

  “Careful you don’t shoot yourself with it,” Jake said to Breimer. “Hell of a way to lose an election.” He sat on the bed and fit the bullets into the gun, then snapped it closed. “There, that’s better. Now all I have to do is learn how to use it.”

  Shaeffer, who’d been quiet, running the tip of his cigarette around the ashtray, now looked up. “Geismar, this isn’t going to work, you know.”

  “I was kidding. I know how—”

  “No, with Sikorsky. We’re not going to get anywhere with a tail, yours or ours. I know him. If he’s got Brandt stashed away, even his own men aren’t going to know where. He’s careful.”

  “They must have their own Kransberg. Start there.”

  Shaeffer looked down at the ashtray again, avoiding eye contact. “You have to bring her in.”

  “Bring who in?” Breimer said.

  “Geismar’s a friend of the wife’s.”

  “Well, for Christ’s sake—”

  “No,” Jake said. “She’s not going anywhere.”

  “Yes, she is,” Shaeffer said quietly, jaw set. “She’s going to see her husband. And we’ll be right behind her. It’s the only way. We’ve been waiting for Brandt to come to her. Now the fun’s over. We have to give Sikorsky what he wants. It’s the only way to flush him out.“

  “Like hell it is. When did you get this bright idea?”

  “I’ve been thinking it over. There’s a way to work it, but we need her. You set it up with Sikorsky-or get your friend to do it, even better. That might be worth a persil. She goes to visit, we’ll have a team on her the whole time. There’s no danger to her, none. We get them both back. I guarantee it.”

  “You guarantee it. With bullets all over the place. Not a chance. Think again.”

  “No bullets. I said, there’s a way to work it. All she has to do is get us there.”

  “She’s not bait. Got it? Not bait. She won’t do it.”

  “She’d do it if you asked her,” Shaeffer said calmly.

  Jake got up from the bed, looking from one to the other, both sets of eyes fixed on him. “I won’t do that.”

  “Why not?”

  “And risk her? I don’t want him back that much.”

  “But I do,” Shaeffer said. “Look, the best way to do this is nicemakes for a better team effort. But it’s not the only way. If you won’t bring her in, I’ll do it myself.”

  “After you find her.”

  “I know where she is. Right across from KaDeWe. You think we didn’t watch you?” he said, almost smug.

  Jake looked at him, surprised. “You should have watched harder, then. I moved her. I wanted to keep her out of the Russians’ hands. Now it looks like I’ll have to keep her out of yours too. And I will. Nobody touches her, understand? One move and we’re gone again. I can do it, too. I know Berlin.”

  “You used to. Now you’re just a guy in uniform, like the rest of us. People do what they have to do.”

  “Well, she doesn’t have to do this. Get another idea, Shaeffer.” He started moving toward the door. “And by the way, I resign. I don’t want to be a deputy anymore. Go watch someone else.”

  Breimer had been following this like a spectator, but now interrupted, his voice smoothing over, folksy. “Son, I think you forget whose side you’re on. Kind of thing happens when you get your head up some kraut skirt. You need to think again. We’re all Americans here.“

  “Some of us are more American than others.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “It means you haven’t got my vote. No.”

  “Your vote? This isn’t a town meeting. There’s a war going on here.”

  “You fight it.”

  “Well, I intend to. And so will you. What do you think we’re doine here?”

  “I know what you’re doing here. The country’s on its knees, and all you want to do is give favors to the people who put it there and kick everyone else in the balls. That your idea of our side?”

  “Take it easy, Jake,” Shaeffer said.

  “I’ve seen a lot of men die. Years of them. They didn’t do it to keep things fat for I. G. Farben.”

  Breimer flushed. “Just who the hell do you think you are, talking like that?”

  “It’s just his mouth,” Shaeffer said.

  “Who?” Jake said. “An American. I get to say no. That’s what it means. I’m saying no to you, got it? No.”

  “Of all the piss-ant—”

  “Drop it, Jake,” Shaeffer said, his voice like a hand on Jake’s shoulder, pulling him back.

  Jake looked at him, suddenly embarrassed. “Enjoy your dinner,” he said, turning to the door.

  But Breimer was on his feet now, almost knocking over the tray as he got up. “You think I don’t know how to deal with guys like you? You’re a dime a dozen. You don’t want to play ball, I’ll get your ass fired right out of here. Bunch of pinks running around. All mouth, that’s what you are. And they love it, the Russians. Aid and comfort to the enemy, that’s what you’re doing, and you don’t even know it.”

  “Is that why they took a shot at me?” Jake said, turning back. “Funny thing about that, though. An American shot Tully, not Sikorsky. So why did Sikorsky want to kill me? Seems like he might have been doing a favor for someone on our side. The one we’re all on. Who knows? Maybe you.“ Breimer gaped at him. ”But somebody, one of ours. Makes you a little reluctant to take sides. All things considered.“

  “Geismar? See me tomorrow,” Shaeffer said. “We’ll talk.”

  “The answer’s still no.”

  “You don’t want to be alone out there too long. Think about it.”

  “That’s it?” Breimer said. “Man thumbs his nose at the U.S. government and just goes back to his girlfriend and that’s it?”

  “He’ll be back,” Shaeffer said. “We’re all a little hot under the collar here.” He looked at Jake. “Sleep on it.”

  “I’m only thumbing my nose at you,” Jake said to Breimer, ignoring Shaeffer. “Feels good, too-kind of a patriotic gesture.”

  “This is a waste of time,” Breimer said abruptly to Shaeffer. “Go pick her up. She’ll do what she’s told.”

  Jake put his hand on the door, then turned back, his voice icy. “Maybe we should be clear about one thing. You lay a hand on her, one hand, and you won’t know what hit you.”

  “You don’t scare me.”

  “Try this. There’s a big hole in a national magazine waiting for me to fill it. Maybe a father in Utica getting his boy’s gun. There’s a congressman not too busy to run an errand of mercy. Picture them together, it practically brings tea
rs to your eyes. Or maybe the same congressman in Berlin. Not so nice. Lobbying for Nazi war criminals on your tax dollars. While our boys are still dying in the Pacific. Here’s the picture layout. Farben ran a factory at Auschwitz. We get a shot of the Farben board, then right next to it one of the camp. One with a lot of bodies stacked up. I’ll bet we can even find an old one, prewar, of the Farben boys shaking hands with their friends at American Dye. For all I know, you’re in it too. Then a nice one of you-one of Liz’s, she always wanted a credit in Collier’s. I figure FIAT owes her.”

  “Jesus, Geismar,” Shaeffer said.

  “That’s a lie,” Breimer said.

  “But I can write it. I know how to do it. I’ve written lots of lies- for our side. I can fucking write it. And you can spend the next two years denying it. Now leave her alone.”

  Breimer stood for a moment without breathing, his eyes fixed on Jake. When he spoke, his voice was hard, not even a trace of back home. “You just burned one hell of a bridge for some German pussy.”

  Jake opened the door, then looked back over his shoulder at Shaeffer. “Thanks for the ammo. Tell you what, if I do find him, I’ll send up a flare.”

  Shaeffer was looking down at the floor as if someone had made a mess, but raised his head as Jake walked out.

  “Geismar?” he said. “Bring her in.”

  Jake walked past the GI guard and the nurse coming down the hallway for the trays. Then he was out in Gelferstrasse again, even more alone than before. Contents — Previous Chapter / Next Chapter

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Gunther refused the job, agreeing, ironically, with Shaeffer.

  “It would never work. He’s careful. And you know, this is not police work. This is—”

  “I know what it is. I didn’t realize you were so choosy.”

  “A question more of resources,” Gunther said blandly.

  “We know he met Tally,” Jake said.

  “So Vassily’s the paymaster, but who else did Tully meet? Not Herr Brandt, I think. With an American bullet.”

  “The one leads to the other. And Sikorsky knows where Emil is.”

  “Evidently. But you keep confusing the cases. Who is it exactly you wish to find, Herr Brandt or the man who killed Tully?”

  “Both.”

  Gunther looked at him. “Sikorsky won’t lead us to Herr Brandt, but he may lead us to the other. If he doesn’t suspect we know. You see, it’s a question of resources.”

  “So what do you intend to do, just leave Emil with the Russians?”

  Gunther shrugged. “My friend, I don’t care who makes the rockets. We already made ours. You can see with what results.” He got up from his chair to pour more coffee. “For now, let’s just solve our case. Herr Brandt, I’m afraid, will have to wait.”

  “He can’t wait,” Jake said, frustrated.

  Gunther looked over the edge of his cup. “Then read the files.”

  “I read the files.”

  “Read again. They’re complete?”

  “Everything he handed over.”

  “Then it must be there-what Vassily wants. You see, it’s the interesting point. Why did Tully have to die at all? The deal was a success. Vassily got what he wanted, Tully got paid. A success. So why? Unless it wasn’t finished. There must be something else Vassily wants.”

  “Besides Lena.”

  Gunther shook his head, dismissing this. “Herr Brandt wants her. Vassily is just the good host. No, something else. In the files. Why else would Tully read them? So go read.” He wriggled his fingers, a schoolmaster shooing Jake away.

  Jake checked his watch. “All right. Later. First I have to do some work.”

  “The journalist. More black market?”

  Jake glanced up, sorry now that he had mentioned it. “No. Actually, Renate. An interview.”

  “Ah,” Gunther said, walking back to the chair with his cup, avoiding it. “By the way,” he said, sitting down, “did you check the motor pool?”

  “No, I assumed Sikorsky drove—”

  “All the way to Zehlendorf? Well, maybe so. But I like to be neat. Cross the t’s.”

  “Okay. Later.”

  Gunther picked up the cup, half hiding his face. “Herr Geismar? Ask her something for me.” Jake waited. “Ask her how it felt.”

  At the detention center near the Alex he was shown into a small room as plain as the makeshift court-a single table, two chairs, a picture of Stalin. The escort, with elaborate courtesy, offered coffee and then left him alone to wait. Nothing to look at but the ceiling fixture, a frosted glass bowl that might once have been lighted with gas, a Wilhelmine leftover. Renate was led in through the opposite door by two guards, who left her at the table and positioned themselves against the wall, still as sconces.

  “Hello, Jake,” she said, her smile so tentative that her face seemed not to move at all. The same pale gray smock and roughly cut hair.

  “Renate.”

  “Give me a cigarette-they’ll think you have permission,” she said in English, sitting down.

  “You want to do this in English?”

  “Some, so they won’t suspect anything. One of them speaks German. Thank you,” she said, switching now to German as she took the light and inhaled. “My god, it’s better than food. You never lose your taste for it. I’m not allowed to smoke, back there. Where is your notebook?”

  “I don’t need one,” Jake said, confused. Suspect what?

  “No, please, I want you to write things down. You have it?”

  He pulled the pad out of his pocket, noticing for the first time that her hand was trembling, nervous under the sure voice. The cigarette shook a little as she lowered it to the ashtray.

  He busied himself with his pen, at a loss. Ask her how it felt, Gunther said, but what could she possibly say? A hundred nods, watching people being bundled into cars.

  “It’s so difficult to look at me?”

  Reluctantly he raised his head and met her eyes, still familiar under the jagged hair.

  “I don’t know how to talk to you,” he said simply.

  She nodded. “The worst person in the world. I know-that’s what you see. Worse than anybody.”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “But you don’t look, either. Worse than anybody. How could she do those things? That’s the first question?”

  “If you like.”

  “Do you know the answer? She didn’t-somebody else did. In here.” She tapped her chest. “Two people. One is the monster. The other is the same person you used to know. The same. Look at that one. Can you do that? Just for now. They don’t even know she exists,” she said, tilting her head slightly toward the guards. “But you do.”

  Jake said nothing, waiting.

  “Write something, please. We don’t have much time.” Another jerky pull on the cigarette, anxious.

  “Why did you ask to see me?”

  “Because you know me. Not this other person. You remember those days?” She looked up from the ashtray. “You wanted to sleep with me once. Yes, don’t deny it. And you know, I would have said yes. In those days, the Americans, they were all glamorous to us. Like people in the films. Everyone wanted to go there. I would have said yes. Isn’t it funny, how things turn out.”

  Jake looked at her, appalled; her voice was wavering like her hand, edgy and intimate at the same time, the desperate energy of a crazy person.

  He glanced down at the notebook, anchoring himself. “Is that what you want? To talk about old times?”

  “Yes, a little,” she said in English. “Please. It’s important for them.” Her eyes moved to the guards again, then fixed back on him, steady, not crazy. A girl getting away with something. “So,” she said in her German voice, “what happened to everybody? Do you know?”

  When he didn’t answer, still disconcerted, she reached over to touch his hand. “Tell me.”

  “Hal went back to the States,” he began, confused, watching her. “At least, he was on his way the l
ast time I saw him.” She nodded, encouraging him to go on. “Remember Hannelore? She’s here, in Berlin. I saw her. Thinner. She kept his flat.” The small talk of catching up. What did the guards make of it, standing under Stalin?

  Renate nodded, taking another cigarette. “They were lovers.”

  “So she said. I never knew.”

  “Well, I was a better reporter.”

  “The best,” he said, smiling a little, involuntarily drawn back with her. “Nothing escaped you.” He stopped, embarrassed, in the room again.

  “No. It’s a talent,” she said, looking away. “And you? What happened to you?”

  “I write for magazines.”

  “No more radio. And your voice was so good.”

  “Renate, we need to—”

  “And Lena?” she said, ignoring him. “She’s alive?”

  Jake nodded. “She’s here. With me.”

  Her face softened. “I’m happy for you. So many years. She left the husband?”

  “She will, when they find him. He’s missing.”

  “When who finds him?”

  “The Americans want him to work for them-a scientist. He’s a valuable piece of property.”

  “Is he?” she said to herself, intrigued by this. “And always so quiet. How things turn out.” She looked back at him. “So they’re all still alive.”

  “Well, I haven’t heard from Nanny Wendt.”

  “Nanny Wendt,” she said, her voice distant, in a kind of reverie. “I used to think about all of you. From that time. You know, I was happy. I loved the work. You did that for me. No German would do that, not then. Even off the books. I wondered, sometimes, why you did. Not even Jewish. You could have been arrested.”

  “Maybe I was too dumb to know any better.”

  “When I saw you in the court—” She lowered her head, her voice trailing off. “Now he knows too, I thought. Now he’ll only see her.” She tapped the right side of her chest. “The greifer.”

  “But you still asked to see me.”

  “There’s no one else. You helped me once. You remember who was.

  Jake shifted in his chair, awkward. “Renate, I can’t help you. I have nothing to do with the court.”