by Joseph Kanon
She looked at him, then away. “Yes, isn’t it? So now he knows. I’m a whore. Not somebody who would help Sasha. Somebody he’d stay here for. Because he loved her. Who loves a whore? So he thinks I’m innocent,” she said, cocking her head toward where the Russian had been. “That’s how they know if you’re innocent now, if you’re a whore.”
“Irene—”
“Oh, look at your face. You don’t have to— It’s always in your face. You know, when I saw you at the door I thought, my God, he couldn’t help himself, he had to come. Like before. Stay away? You?” She drew on the cigarette. “But that was when you were in love with me. Not now.” She crushed the cigarette on a saucer. “So why did you come? We’re supposed to be so careful.”
“We need to talk.”
“About this?” she said. “You already know. They think maybe I’m hiding Sasha. Now they don’t think it anymore. So that’s good anyway.”
“They’re going to think he defected.”
“Sasha? He would never do that. Why would they think that?”
Alex hesitated for a second.
“What is it? Why do you say that?”
“Because it’s the logic of it. It’s how they think. What else could it be? Now that he’s not holed up somewhere with you.”
“In our love nest. You know the funny thing? I think he did love me. In his way.”
Alex looked at her, disconcerted. “If you say so.”
“You didn’t know him. Anyway, he’d never defect.”
“But they’re going to think so and you’re going to help them.”
She looked up at him.
“They’re going to ask you again. And again. He didn’t want to go back to Moscow. You thought it was because he didn’t want to leave you. But now you know that wasn’t true, because you haven’t seen him. You’ve been thinking. He acted as if he was afraid to go back, that something bad was going to happen.”
“And they’ll believe that?”
“Bad things do happen. That’s the world they live in.” He paused. “Maybe it’ll be your friend again. Asking. He’ll believe you.”
“Don’t.” She turned away. “You don’t know what it’s like.”
Alex said nothing.
“So. That’s what you wanted to tell me? Sasha was afraid of Moscow? That’s why you came?” She looked over, her face softer. “Not to see me?”
“We need to talk about—”
“What?” she said, her voice intimate.
“Erich. I think you should go with him.”
“To the West?” she said, surprised.
“He’ll need somebody. I can get you both out.”
“Oh, like a travel agent. Two tickets, please. Just like that. One way. You can’t come back now if you do that.”
“You’ll be safe.”
“From what?”
“Maybe the next one who questions you isn’t your friend. Maybe it’s someone who wants real answers.”
“Why would they—?”
“Bodies get found. Things happen. You’re not safe here. You have to get out while you can.”
“Leave Berlin? What would I do? My life is here.”
“It won’t be, if they find him. It wouldn’t just be a few questions.”
“I know what they do. You think I’d—?”
“Everyone does. Whether they want to or not.”
She looked at him. “You think I’d tell them about you. You want to send me away to protect yourself.”
“To protect you.”
“You think I would do that? Give them you?”
“You wouldn’t be able to help it.”
“And you? Would you tell them?”
He looked away, not saying anything.
“No, not you. A man of principles. Only a whore would do something like that.”
“I didn’t say—”
She came over to him, reaching up for his arms.
“Don’t you know anything? I would never—”
“It doesn’t matter. You’re not safe here.” He looked down. “It’s not safe.”
“The only one who knows is you.”
He nodded. “I can’t protect you here. Sasha’s gone. You have to get out. Now. It’s not safe.”
“You keep saying that.” She looked up. “There’s something you’re not telling me.”
“You have to trust me.”
“Trust me. When a man says that he’s going to do something you don’t want him to do. Trust me. And then he’s gone.”
“This is different.”
“Yes? And are you coming too?”
“I can’t. I’m not welcome there. You know that.” He paused. “Not yet.”
“Oh, not yet. So I sit and wait for you. And you don’t come. And all we have is our secret.”
“But you’ll be safe. Erich will be safe. He’ll have a life there.”
“So it’s for Erich, all this.”
He looked at her. “It’s for you.”
“No. Once maybe. Not now. I saw it in your face before. Well, I don’t blame you for that. I never get it right. All my men. When I was young, I thought everybody loved me. I just had to pick. And always wrong. Kurt, what did he love? The revolution, whatever that was. Sasha? One call from Moscow and he’s off. Good-byes? He’s so sorry? No. But you. I thought, well, we’ll start over. But it’s never like that, is it? And now you want to send me away. Because you’re afraid I’ll betray you.” She shook her head. “I would never do that. Then what would I have left?”
He looked at her, feeling the heat in his face, ears buzzing. Never betray you. Tell her.
“Trust me,” he said finally. “Just this once.”
6
ORANIENBURG
RIAS ALREADY HAD GROUND rules in place for the interview.
“We’ve had trouble with the Russians—they just pick people up in the street after they’re on the air—so we record now. Half an hour to set it up, see what he’s comfortable with, what we’re going to say. Then maybe an hour for the interview. We can edit later. By the time we air it, he’s gone and the Russians don’t even know he was here. Sound right to you?”
Alex nodded. The cadence of newsroom American with a German accent. Where had Ferber learned his English?
“Come by U-Bahn. Innsbrucker Platz. That what you did today?”
Alex nodded again.
“And no trouble, right? So do that. Then after I’ll have a station car get you to Tempelhof. He’s flying out right afterward, yes? Good. The important thing is that they have no idea until it’s too late. I’ll set up a recording studio. Any night. I’m always here nights. Last-minute, no leaks in between. Sound good?”
“Perfect.”
“You tell him what we’re looking for?”
“Personal story—what the work is like. Treating POWs like slaves. Everyone getting sick. Not the politics of it, just the human side. Don’t worry, he wants to do this. He thinks it might help.”
“The Russians won’t like it.”
“That’s the idea.”
“I mean, they’ll have a marker out on him. As long as he’s here anyway. Any idea when?”
“I’ll call you. Need a code word? How about ‘canary’?”
Ferber looked puzzled.
“The bird. They used to send them down into the mines. To see if there was gas.”
Ferber smiled. “Erich will be fine.”
* * *
Dieter must have been watching at the window because he was in the park before Alex had finished the first cigarette.
“How is he?”
“He sleeps mostly. To stay warm. There’s no coal, so it’s easier in bed. No more fever, but the medicine is gone. You’ll need to move him soon.”
“He’s well enough for the interview?”
“Mm. He talks about it. He wants to do it. Give the finger to Ulbricht, he says.” Dieter smiled faintly. “He’s a young man.”
“We’re almost there. Are we squared a
way at the airport?”
“Howley’s been away. Back tomorrow. Just let me know when and Campbell will make the call. Don’t worry, you have some time. They have better things to do in Karlshorst than look for POWs. Since the news.”
“What news?”
“You haven’t heard? I thought your friend might— It’s Markovsky. We’ve got him. He’s defected.”
“What?”
“Your friend doesn’t know?”
“I haven’t seen her.”
“See her, then. Interesting to hear what she knows.”
“Where is he?”
“Wiesbaden. Very comfortable from what I hear. It’s usually like that, isn’t it?”
“But why? What made him do it?”
“They sent him a ticket, for Moscow, and he started wondering whether he should make the trip. Not that I blame him. People go back and—” Campbell’s version, the one everybody must have now.
“Quite a catch.”
“We’ll see. But meanwhile Karlshorst—it’s a sight to warm the heart. So don’t worry about your young friend—he’s got a little time.” He looked over. “Except the medicine’s gone. So you don’t want to wait either.”
He walked along Greifswalder Strasse, past the cemetery, then turned up the hill toward the water tower. The planes were back, humming across the sky the minute the fog had cleared last night. Unload, three minutes, take off to the West. With Erich on board. Irene, if she’d go. He saw her eyes in the candlelight, the Russian coming toward them. I’d never betray you. After she had.
Roberta Kleinbard was waiting by the courtyard door in Rykestrasse, hands nervous, fidgeting.
“Thank God. I thought maybe you’d gone away. All night— anyway, thank God. Please. I need your help. I need somebody to talk for me.” Her voice quavering, matching the shaking hands.
“What’s the matter? What’s happened?”
“Herb. They’ve arrested him.”
“For what?”
“I don’t know. They just came and—took him. What is it, I kept asking and of course they’d answer in German and—”
“Okay, okay,” he said, calming her.
“And they wouldn’t let Herb talk—just took him. No explanation. So I went to the Kulturbund and nobody wants to touch it. I got somebody to make a call, at least find out what happened and you’d think I had the plague or something. He wasn’t the only one, that’s the thing. They’re all scared there. The Party hasn’t said anything. How can they not say anything? People just—taken like that. You’ve got to help me. Please. I don’t know what to do. You’ve got a phone—”
“Come up,” he said, opening the door.
“Oh God, finally. I didn’t know what to do.”
“Regular policemen?”
“I don’t know. I guess.”
“Uniforms?”
“No, clothes. Is that bad?”
“Let me try the police first.”
“I’ll never forget this. I swear. What do I say to Danny? Your father’s a criminal? It has to be a mistake. I mean, Herb, he’s been a Party member since—they can’t just do that. It has to be a mistake.”
It took a few minutes to be put through to the desk, a little longer to explain why he was calling, Roberta hovering, hands in her coat pockets, clenched.
“He’s in Oranienburg,” he said finally, hanging up.
“Oranienburg?” Her voice dropped, almost a whisper. “That’s Sachsenhausen. A concentration camp. He’s in a concentration camp?”
“Not like that—for political prisoners. If you want to see him you have to apply to the commandant. In person. That’s all they’d say. Do you know someone in the Party you could—?”
“My God, a concentration camp. Come with me. Please. I have to see him. I’ll never ask another thing as long as I live. Oh my God,” she said, breaking down now. “How could he be a political prisoner? What does that mean? He came to be with them, the Party. It’s a mistake.” She put a hand on his arm. “I have to know if he’s all right. Please speak for me. You’re an American—I can trust you. The others, at the Kulturbund, it’s like I had the plague.”
They took the S-Bahn north to the edges of Berlin, Alex feeling his chest tighten as they approached the last stop. In the street he looked at a passing truck, the way he’d come here before, packed in the back, standing. Then hit with clubs, climbing out. People watching. An ordinary suburb. But his prison was gone. He stood on the curb, unable to move, disoriented.
“What’s wrong?”
“It was here. An old brewery. People could see in. They leased us out in work parties.”
He asked an old man waiting for a bus.
“They closed that one in ’34. Then they built the new camp. Over there.” He jerked his head east. “The bus, you have to wait forever. You’re young. It’s not far, fifteen-, twenty-minute walk. Down there and then left at the corner.”
On the walk they were quiet, Roberta finally silenced by fear. A place she’d never thought she’d see, something in a nightmare.
They turned down a street lined with trees, the walls of the camp on their left, barracks for the guards on the right. Where the SS used to devise new tortures, boot testing, the prisoners walking endlessly around a track until their feet were crippled. What did the guards say to each other at night, stories over schnapps?
“Oh God,” Roberta said, faltering, grasping Alex’s arm for support. “I can’t.”
Ahead of them, the camp gate with a wrought iron “Arbeit macht frei,” beyond it acres of barracks arranged in a semicircle, the open roll call field, electric wire fences and guards, men shuffling in the distance. For one surreal moment, Alex felt as if they had entered a newsreel. All of it still here. Russian now. They had changed nothing, except the guards’ uniforms. His throat closed. He’d never get out. Fritz was gone. His father’s money. Nobody would buy him out this time.
A guard pointed them toward a large building in the outer courtyard. “Administration Offices,” as if the camp beyond were a factory and the white-collar bosses had to be kept away from the soot.
The clerk, a thin stubble of hair over a broad Slavic face, had only rudimentary German.
“Kleinbard?” he said, a sneer in his voice that said “Jew,” a sound as familiar to Alex as breathing. Nothing had changed. New uniforms.
The guard consulted a log. “Counterrevolutionary activities. Do you want to apply to visit?” He held out a flimsy paper form. “You can fill it out over there.” He pointed to a table where a woman, white-faced, with the tight, forced calm before hysteria, was scribbling on a similar paper.
“Counterrevolutionary? What are you talking about?” Roberta said. “He’s a good Communist.”
The clerk handed her the form again, nodding to the writing table.
“I want to see the commandant. You can’t do this. I’m an American citizen.”
The clerk looked at her, his face a sullen blank. “It’s not you in prison.”
“Did Herb keep his passport?” Alex said.
Roberta shook her head. “He had to choose. He said, what difference did it make? The State Department was revoking it anyway. So he’s German.” She stopped midstream and turned to the clerk. “But where is he? My husband.”
The clerk cocked his head toward the camp, his only answer, then pushed the form toward her again. “If you want to apply—”
“How long does it take?” Alex asked. “Usually.”
The clerk shrugged.
“It’s in German,” Roberta said, looking at it. “German and Russian.”
“I’ll do it,” Alex said.
The woman at the table looked up. “They lose them. This is my fourth.” Her eyes cloudy, distant. “But they tell you if he’s dead.”
“Oh God,” Roberta said. “He’ll die here.”
“No he won’t,” said Alex calmly. “Here, help me with this.”
“What’s the use?”
“Then it’s on file. If
you get somebody in the Party to intervene, he can say, we’re moving up your application. Like any office. Otherwise you’ll start over.”
“They lose them,” the woman at the table said.
On the way back they were quiet until they were out of the camp.
“Look at them all. Living right next door. All this time. Down the street. I said to Herb, how can you go to Germany? And he said, it’s Socialist now, it’s all different. But nothing’s different. My God, a concentration camp. But why?”
“Something going on in the Party.”
“But he’s in the party. It’s his whole life.” She kept walking, brooding. “My father warned me. How can you do such a crazy thing? But he’s not married to Herb, is he? So what do I do now? Take Danny and go home? And leave Herb? But what happens if I stay? What if they don’t let him out? What kind of job could I get, with a husband in jail. The Party would never—” She stopped, as if not saying it would make it go away. “I can’t go back and I can’t stay.”
“No,” Alex said, just a sound. He looked around. Modest suburban houses, just a short walk from the barbed wire, the sky a heavy gray again, the color of lead.
On the S-Bahn they stared out the window, not talking. Finally Alex turned to her. “But you kept your American passport? It might be a good time to leave. For a while anyway. Until we know what this is. In case—”
“What?”
“In case they make trouble for you too. His wife. If anything happened, the boy would be on his own.”
Her eyes grew moist. “But nobody’s done anything. What did we do? He just wanted to be—part of it.”
At Rykestrasse, she asked him in for tea.
“I can’t really.”
“Please. I’ll go out of my mind alone. I’ll be all right after Danny gets home. What do I say to him? My God, what do I say?”
She busied herself with the kettle and cups, the familiar ritual.
“They don’t even say what you’re charged with. Just ‘Come with us.’ I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t seen it myself. Like Nazis. Well, in the movies anyway.”
“What are these?” Alex said, trying to distract her, leafing through some architectural drawings on the table behind the couch.
“Schematics for the project. In Friedrichshain. You know it, that part of town?”
