Christopher's Ghosts

by Charles McCarry

  Paul reached the western gate of the Tiergarten. He was not far from the lawns where he had caught his first glimpses of Rima only weeks before. He sat down on a bench and tried to think systematically. There was no possibility of his finding either Rima or his parents by wandering the streets. But they might find him in the place where he was likeliest to be, the apartment. He got to his feet and walked home. The black car was gone. He half expected to find that the apartment had been searched and turned upside down in his absence, but everything was just as he had left it. “Ode to Joy” was still on the turntable of the silent Victrola. His father’s manuscripts, a long row of them, were in their usual places on the shelf in rosewood boxes that looked like leather-bound books with titles and the year of writing stamped in gold on the spines. There was no sign of Rima inside the apartment. He examined his room for evidence that she had been there while he was gone, but there was none. He searched the back staircase for her, looking in all the places where she might have left a note. He went outside into the courtyard and searched there. He found nothing.

  Back inside, the telephone rang, a rare event because there was hardly anyone left in Berlin who dared to call the Christophers. Paul picked up the instrument and said hello. The caller hung up without speaking a word. Paul dialed Dr. Kaltenbach’s number. If Rima were there she would answer. If she was not, no one would answer. The Kaltenbach’s number rang ten times before Paul broke the connection. He was thirsty. He had drunk nothing since the night before. He drank nothing now. If he was arrested with full bladder and bowels, he would give his captors an advantage. The silence in the apartment was so deep that it made a sound like the sea in a conch shell. He sat down in a chair in the music room, where he could see his mother’s piano and the photographs on the table beside it. He thought of nothing. For the first time he realized that Schatzi was gone, too. He remembered the car and ran down the back stairs and looked inside the former stable where the Horch was kept. It, too, was gone.

  In another time, in a different country, he would have thought nothing of these missing persons and objects. He would have read a book while he waited for his parents to come back with the car and the dog. In the here and now it was impossible to know what these signs meant. Maybe Hubbard and Lori had left him to make up his own mind about getting aboard the Bremen. If so, it was the first act of cruelty they had ever visited upon him. He knew that there were other, likelier explanations for his parents’ absence, for Rima’s disappearance. He knew that what was happening was almost surely not their fault. That did not change the fact that he had no one to say goodbye to, no one to say goodbye to him. Alone in the hushed apartment, surrounded by objects he had known by sight and touch and smell since infancy, he felt loneliness as he had never felt it before and would not feel it again in his lifetime, not even in prison.

  At ten o’clock Paul took the night train to Bremerhaven. The apprentices, spruced up for the journey and smelling of tooth powder and cologne, were already in his compartment when he got aboard. When they saw his haggard face they smiled knowingly at each other but said nothing to Paul. Nor did he speak to them.

  4

  The voyage to New York lasted four days. Hubbard’s cousin Elliott met Paul outside customs. To be met by Elliott Hubbard was like being met by Hubbard Christopher on a day when he happened to be wearing a wig and false eyebrows. Hubbard and Elliott not only looked like twins, one blond and the other dark, they had the same gestures, the same neighing laugh, the same deep voice—and because they had gone to the same schools and been raised by fathers who had done the same, identical Yankee twangs.

  “How was the voyage?” Elliott asked.

  “Not bad,” Paul said.

  “Cabin all right? Didn’t put you in with a snorer, I hope?”

  “No, I was alone.”

  “What luck! Or was it the pariah treatment?”

  As if he were still in the Reich, Paul felt the sting of suspicion. What did this person know? How did he know it? Whom would he tell? He did not answer the question.

  Elliott had a chauffeur standing by to deal with the luggage—he was a lawyer in a prosperous firm and the Great Depression was still on—but Paul had brought only one small bag.

  In the car, a red Packard like O. G.’s, Elliott said, “O. G. hurried by while I was waiting for you. He said he hadn’t seen you on board.”

  “No.”

  “Were you avoiding each other?”

  “I was in second class. He was upstairs in first.”

  “Then you had more interesting company than he did. I invited O. G. to dinner tonight. He thinks you may be mad at him. Are you?”

  “No.”

  “Good. He’s your friend, believe me.” Elliott smiled Hubbard’s toothy smile. He had been watching Paul intently. Now he handed him an unopened telegram and said, “This came for you yesterday.” It was from his parents.

  “SORRY NO GOODBYES. NOT OUR PLAN OR FAULT. PLEASE FORGIVE. MISS YOU TERRIBLY. SO DOES DEAR IRMA. LOVE LOVE LOVE.”

  He handed the telegram to Elliott. He scanned it and handed it back.

  “This sounds like they’re all right,” Elliott said. “O. G. is bearing messages, too, he said. He wants to pass these on before dinner.”

  “I’d like to reply.”

  “You can phone it to the cable company from the house. But talk to O. G. first.”

  Elliott did not ask who Irma was. No doubt O. G. had already told him.

  Paul said, “Have you and my father ever impersonated each other?”

  “Not for years,” Elliott replied. “But maybe there are possibilities for the future. Now come and meet your new second cousin.”

  Elliott’s wife Alice had presented him with a son. The child was now about a year old, and there would never be any doubt about his paternity. His name was Horace, after his mother’s father. Sitting in his high chair, being fed liquefied vegetables, Horace was the small triplet of Hubbard and Elliott. He had their horse face, their all-encompassing grin, their interested eyes. Among friends and family, Alice was noted for her wit. “I never expected to produce a child who resembles Seabiscuit so closely,” she said. “But I had got so used to looking at Elliott that he had begun to seem quite handsome. Long engagements dull the senses.”

  “Horace looks fine to me,” Paul said.

  The child took a liking to Paul. With a glad cry he made a grab for him with spinach-smeared hands, leaving a stripe of green on his sleeve.

  “The mark of Horace,” Alice Hubbard said.

  In his bedroom Paul read his parents’ cable again and again. He understood everything that was written between the lines. They had been taken into custody on the day he departed, and so had Rima, so that nothing would interfere with Paul’s departure from Germany. In some part of his mind, Paul had known this before he left Berlin. He had left Berlin because he knew it and understood it. Even if he remained—especially if he remained—he would not see them again. This situation made no sense. It was designed to make no sense. Senselessness was the point. Here in his cousin’s house three thousand miles away, sirens shrieked outside the windows as if America was the police state, Paul lay down on his bed and forced his brain to stop its inquiries. His brain answered this command by producing images of Rima that were as elusive as her reality was becoming.

  Elliott pounded on the door of Paul’s room, awakening him from a deep sleep. “Awake or starve!” Elliott shouted in his courtroom baritone.

  In the library Elliott and O. G. were drinking fifteen-year-old single-malt scotch whisky. O. G. was a connoisseur of scotch. As Paul entered the room, he was telling Elliott that another war in Europe was inevitable. The German army would be in France before the harvest was in.

  “The experts say the Maginot Line will stop them,” Elliott said.

  “Generals are always preparing for the last war,” O. G. said in French. “The Hun will go around those pillboxes with their Panzers and Stukas and take Paris in a matter of days.” He caught s
ight of Paul. “What do you think, Paul? You know both countries.”

  “The French say that they’ll win because they are stronger than the Germans.”

  “They do, do they? Sit ye down, son.” O. G. had fresh news from Berlin, courtesy of a courier from the State Department who had crossed the Atlantic in a Pan-Am Clipper. “Message from your parents,” he said. “They’re unhappy that they weren’t able to say goodbye to you. They were in custody.”

  Paul waited to hear more.

  O. G. said, “The secret police came around midnight, or so I’m told, after you’d gone to bed. Apparently they weren’t questioned, just held till the following evening, then let go. They’re perfectly all right.”

  “Were they together all that time?”

  O. G. paused before answering. “They were separated, I believe. Isn’t that standard procedure?”

  “Not always,” Paul said. “What time did they let them go?”

  “Soon after the Bremen sailed, apparently.”

  “They were released together, at the same time?”

  Another tiny hesitation—this time, Paul thought, intended as a reproof. “So it seems.” O. G. replied. His tone was neutral, his eyes vague. Hardly ever did he make an unqualified statement. Paul suspected that O. G. knew as well as he did what had really happened. Heydrich had abducted Lori for the night and locked up her husband to keep him out of the way. He had done this often enough in the past.

  Paul said, “So now they’re back at Gutenbergstrasse?”

  O. G. cleared his throat. “At last report, yes. There’s a footnote. Your young friend was also taken into custody, but they let her go.”

  Paul had only one young friend in Berlin. He said, “Alexa Kaltenbach?”

  “Yes. Your mother saw her leaving Prinz-Albrechtstrasse at about the same time that she and your father were released.”

  “Did they speak?”

  “I don’t know. In the circumstances they might have thought it unwise,” O. G. said, “I’m sorry to bring you such news, though on the whole it’s good news. All hands appear to be all right.”

  “You have no other information about Alexa?”

  O. G. shook his head no. Behind the lenses of the pince-nez, his eyes were locked to Paul’s. Then they dropped to Paul’s hands, which trembled. Paul realized what his body was doing and stopped it from doing it. Obviously all was lost, just as he had warned Lori that all would be lost if he left the Reich. If this truth had been written in fire in the sky, it could not have been more evident.

  “Thank you, O. G.,” he said. “It’s very kind of you to bring me up to date.”

  O. G. leaned forward and took Paul by the knee. He was surprisingly strong. He said, “I can’t begin to imagine how this is for you, Paul, but just let events take their course and all will be well, I promise you.”

  Paul acknowledged the advice and the absurd promise with a nod. His eyes grew cold.

  “Call on me for anything, anytime,” O. G. said. “Your father said to tell you to see Sebastian Laux if you need funds. And of course you have Elliott.”

  Later, O. G. said to Elliott, “By George, that look that Paul gave me would freeze your tongue to your sled.”

  The next morning Paul rose early and read the shipping news in the Herald Tribune. He then put on one of his suits with a white shirt and a school tie, packed his bag, and left the house. He took the subway to Wall Street, checked his bag in a locker in the station, and walked through narrow streets to a low handsome building tucked between two tall ugly ones. A small bronze sign beside the door identified it as D. & D. Laux & Company. There was no indication on the sign of what sort of business was done inside—if you had to ask, you didn’t belong here. A doorman admitted him.

  The receptionist, a bald expressionless man in a morning coat who had last seen Paul when he was five or six years younger, asked if he had an appointment. Paul said, “No. But please tell Mr. Sebastian Laux that Paul Christopher is here.”

  “Very well, sir,” said the receptionist.

  Paul was ushered by another solemn man—there were no women here—into the office of the chairman and president of this private bank. Sebastian Laux was a small person. As Paul entered he rose from his chair and dashed across the Persian carpet that had apparently been specially woven to fit this room to the last square inch.

  “What a nice surprise,” Sebastian said, shaking Paul’s hand. “I had no idea that you were in New York. Your father and mother are with you, I hope.”

  “No, sir. They’re in Berlin.”

  Sebastian’s smile vanished. “I see,” he said. “But they will be following soon?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “I see. Please sit down and tell me the rest of the news.”

  Paul did as he was asked. All his life he had been told—or had overheard his parents telling each other—that Sebastian Laux could be trusted with any secret. Therefore Paul told him everything, down to the smallest detail, omitting only his deductions about the relationship between his mother and Reinhard Heydrich. Sebastian did not interrupt. When Paul finished, he gazed for a long moment at a large portrait in oils of another elfin man, one of the two D. Lauxes who were his father and grandfather. The one in the picture looked remarkably like a much older Sebastian.

  Finally Sebastian nodded, as if the situation Paul described had now been put into proper order inside his own head and he was grateful for this. He said, “Tell me why you’re here, Paul.”

  Paul said, “I want to withdraw all the money from my account.” Since birth Paul’s money—birthday and Christmas checks, a small inheritance or two—had been deposited in this bank in his name.

  “All of it?” Sebastian asked.

  “Yes.”

  “May I ask why?”

  “I am returning to Germany. Today, if possible. The Bremen sails at four o’clock.”

  Sebastian nodded as if this were the most reasonable answer in the world, then moved his left foot in its gleaming shoe and rang what Paul knew to be a hidden floor bell. The solemn man appeared instantly.

  Sebastian said, “Mr. Paul Christopher’s balance?”

  Evidently the man had already looked it up. He handed Sebastian a slip of paper.

  “Two thousand nine hundred seventy-six dollars and eighty-seven cents,” Sebastian said. “I suggest you take five hundred in cash, two thousand in a letter of credit and leave the rest to keep the account open. Is that agreeable?”

  Paul nodded. Sebastian said, “Five hundred in cash, if you please, Mr. Wilson, and the usual letter.” The man disappeared. In a moment he was back with an envelope containing Paul’s money in crisp new bills, together with a creamy sheet of paper. Sebastian took these. The man withdrew.

  Sebastian said to Paul, “Why the Bremen?”

  “It’s the only ship sailing to Bremerhaven this week.”

  “Have you told Elliott about your plans? Or your parents?”

  “No. Only you.”

  “I see. This is because of the girl?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Very well. The bank can make your booking if you wish. It will save you some time and perhaps will attract less attention.”

  “That’s very kind of you.”

  Sebastian rang again and gave Wilson new instructions.

  “It should only take minutes to book a place for you,” Sebastian said. “Not much demand for tickets to the Reich these days. Our travel agent will send a messenger.”

  “Thank you,” Paul said.

  “Your parents may not thank me when you reappear in a country about to start a war,” Sebastian said. “But it’s obvious that you will do what you’ve decided to do with my help or without it and it’s better for you to have a little money in your pocket. It’s the girl you’re worried about, I take it?”

  “All of them. But yes, her especially. She has no one else to help her, nowhere to go.”

  “I understand. For what it’s worth, you’re doing the right th
ing by standing by her, whatever it costs. You’ll find it easier to live with yourself afterward.”

  Sebastian uncapped a fountain pen—a much smaller and plainer one than Paul was used to seeing in the hand of Major Stutzer—and signed the paper that Wilson had brought to him. He blotted it, folded it, and handed it to Paul.

  “This is a letter of credit for five thousand dollars,” he said. “You understand how it works?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. Your mother, your father, and you may all draw on it. It instructs the banks to disregard your age. If you require more money or anything else, the bank’s cable address is LAUXBANK. Mark the telegram for my attention.” Paul started to speak. Sebastian held up a small manicured hand to forestall thanks. He said, “Shall I inform Elliott or your parents of your plans?”

  “I’ll call Elliott from the pier. It’s best not to cable my parents.”

  “Your ticket should be here shortly,” Sebastian said. “Would you like some tea?”

  Before Paul could remonstrate, a young man in a double-breasted striped waistcoat under his morning coat appeared with a tray. He seemed to be in training to become as solemn as Sebastian’s older employees.

  Sebastian prepared the tea himself, explaining where it had come from in Japan and the history of its cultivation. It was a green tea called Sencha Hiki, from Wakayama Province. “It’s sweeter than the last green tea you tried. I hope you like it better than the last time,” Sebastian said, handing Paul a cup. As a child, Paul had tasted this bitter stuff while visiting with his father and had spat it out into Hubbard’s handkerchief.