The Berlin Escape

by Warren Court

  “There have been some. I’ve loved and lost.”

  “Like me?”

  Aubrey thought for a moment of that day in Iowa. The crash, the smouldering wreck, and the burnt, twisted body of the man she had loved, however briefly. Loved with all her heart. They had never really gotten started, never took off, as he would have said. She would have been happy with him. She had had her own crash not long after that. Those months in the hospital recuperating, she had mourned his loss. And there was more than one occasion when she had reflected on her own brush with death. Had it been deliberate? Nonsense, she always told herself. The downdraft that had caught her was more powerful than any she had ever experienced. Any pilot would have been put in the dirt by that.

  “No,” she said to the count. “No, not like you.”

  “Here’s hoping you never will. Tell me, that man I saw you with, the reporter from the Berliner morning paper—how do you know him?”

  “We met just before I met you, at the entrance to the exhibition.”

  “I see. What do you know of him?”

  “Not much. He’s a journalist.”

  “I was told that you were seen with him, just as the riot broke out.”

  “We were having a coffee, a chat.”

  “They said he appeared to be quite drunk.”

  “Was he arrested as well?”

  “No, I don’t think so.”

  “Then how would they know?”

  The count tilted his head, winked.

  “Because I was being followed. Right.”

  “Or maybe he was?”

  “Why?”

  “He’s a reporter who works for what was once a radical left newspaper. It should have in reality been shut down. He was one of their leading exponents of anti-Hitlerism.”

  “Is that a real word?”

  “I’m not sure, but it fits. He could be classified as an enemy of the state. He may still be yet, if he doesn’t learn a proper attitude.”

  “This doesn’t sound like you.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “I mean you’re sounding more and more like that bastard who tried to kill me. Do you have one of those black uniforms in your closet?”

  “No. I am a party member, of course, but I am not in the SS. They tried to offer me an honorary rank. I turned them down.”

  “Really? I’ll bet that didn’t go over well.”

  “They’ll come back to me for sure. I can only resist for so long. It will cause offense eventually.”

  “So, one day you will be strutting around like that animal in Berlin?”

  “Perhaps. But that is enough of this subject. I will not be berated for my views in my own home by an outsider, a foreigner, a…”

  “Woman?”

  The count stood up. He went over to a desk and spun a yellow-coloured globe around and around. “What do you really think of me, Aubrey Endeavours?”

  “I think you’re a fascinating man, certainly very handsome, caught up in a new wave of optimism. And ambition, like you said.”

  He spun the globe one final time, and it teetered on its stand but did not fall over. He came across the room to her and grasped her so hard she almost dropped her drink.

  “I am developing feelings about you, ones I haven’t had for a long time.”

  She could only gulp and stare up at him.

  “I don’t want you to go back home. Not even to Berlin. We can stay here. I know it’s a fantasy, but I want it to be true, at least for tonight. And perhaps tomorrow.”

  “Fine. It is true, for tonight, then. Perhaps tomorrow.”

  22

  Aubrey retired to the master bedroom alone. Helmut had explained that there were customs, appearances that must be maintained. Protocol. This had been his wife’s domicile, after all, and the memory of her tragic death still permeated the place. He assured Aubrey that there would be a knock on her door later, when everyone else was asleep.

  She found it all terribly romantic but admitted the large, comfortable bed was heaven to be in alone. She stared at the door for an hour, anticipating that knock, but eventually the wine and the fresh mountain air overcame her, and she fell into a deep sleep. She only roused when Helmut sat on the bed and put a hand on her shoulder. She rose to embrace him.

  In the early morning hours before the sun came over the eastern mountains, Helmut slipped away. Aubrey was exhausted and filled with a warm glow of exhaustion and love. She had made a half-hearted attempted to keep him in her bed, but those damn appearances had to be maintained.

  One of the servants knocked and came into Aubrey’s room at seven. She had clothes folded over her arm, trousers of thick cotton and warm turtleneck sweaters. The girl spoke only German and from what Aubrey could gather, they were compliments of the count. The clothes were feminine in design despite their rugged functionality, and Aubrey surmised they were further remnants of the countess’s wardrobe.

  The maid gathered up the clothes Aubrey had had on since her coffee with Richard Fuchs and the awful encounter with the street thugs and took them away to be washed. Aubrey tried on the loaners; they were comfortable and worn in and appropriate for the climate. She went down to breakfast and found the servants preparing a table. There was singing coming from outside, and she went to investigate.

  Reinhardt was sitting on the railing of the lodge’s enormous front porch, singing to the songbirds perched here and there in the trees. They seemed content to sit there and listen to him; he must have them trained, she thought. But upon Aubrey’s emergence onto the porch, they startled and flew away.

  “Ahh, good morning, Fraulein. I trust you slept the sleep of queens and princesses last night?”

  With a start, she realized Helmut was there as well, sitting in a wooden chair close in design to an Adirondack, reading a newspaper. He peered over the top of it at Aubrey’s response.

  “Yes. I hope my snoring didn’t shake the timbers,” Aubrey said.

  The count smiled. He had not let her fall into too deep of a sleep for that to happen, of course. He snapped the papers. “Uncle, did you read here about the British fleet in the Baltic Sea? They’re paying a call in to Poland and the little countries. With an aircraft carrier, no less. Very provocative.”

  “They want to tell us who still owns the oceans, any ocean, even ours,” Reinhardt said.

  “What shall we do today, gentlemen?” Aubrey asked. A maid appeared with a cup of steaming coffee for her.

  “I thought we might take in some skiing,” Helmut said.

  “Wonderful! Downhill?”

  “Of course. Are you experienced?”

  “We took trips to Colorado when I was younger, with my mother. She always insisted we learn to ski. Part of her Quebec upbringing.”

  “I see you found the clothes I sent up.”

  Aubrey rubbed her arms and the warm sweater felt good against her skin.

  “We’ll have our breakfast, grab the gear and go,” the count said, “Uncle Reinhardt, what do you say—those legs of yours still strong enough to handle the slopes?”

  “I’ll stay here, keep watch on things. You two go.”

  After a scrumptious, hearty breakfast of black sausage and eggs, the count and Aubrey headed out to the Mercedes. The chauffeur appeared from nowhere but the count waved him off.

  “I’ll take it, Wilbur; you have the time to yourself.”

  The driver did not speak; he simply nodded once and then turned, his nose stuck up at the same angle of the nearest mountain, and stalked off.

  “He doesn’t like me,” Aubrey said.

  “He doesn’t like me, I’m afraid. Barely tolerates Uncle Reinhardt. I would sack him, but he’s been with our family for decades. We’ve put his children through school.”

  “You think he’d show some gratitude.”

  “Old attitudes die hard. Let’s go, my dear.”

  The two of them retrieved a large wooden contraption from a nearby shed and affixed it to the generous roof of the Me
rcedes.

  “You going to let me drive this big beast someday?” she asked as they got underway.

  “Not on your life, Fraulein, especially on these treacherous mountain roads.”

  “Fair enough. Besides, if I’m going to go flying over the edge, I’d prefer to have wings on either side of me.”

  “We never did take that flight.”

  “Yes, that is a pity. Can we still make that happen?”

  “I’m afraid not, Aubrey. Tomorrow I must deposit you back at your hotel in Berlin. Something has come up.”

  So much for his dream of her never leaving the mountain, she mused. That ended pretty quickly. “But that was where the fighters were!” she protested. “Just a few minutes up in one, that’s all I would need.” She realized what she had said. “To fulfill a craving in me,” she quickly added. “I haven’t been in a plane in a long time.”

  “No dice, sweetheart, as your American gangsters would say. After I drop you at your hotel, I have urgent business in the capital.”

  “I thought your factory was in Czechoslovakia.”

  “I rarely spend any time there. All my work is spent stalking the halls of the Reich Chancellery and the offices of the Air Ministry. I have to constantly grease the outstretched palms if I’m going to sell the Luftwaffe any of my wares.”

  “I see.”

  “Besides, the 109s are stationed miles away, up north at an airfield in Kesselberg at the Luftwaffe proving ground.”

  “The exhibition is over, so I have no real reason to stay in Germany. My editors will want my story for their publications.”

  “I understand. We will have to make today and this evening something special, then.”

  Aubrey stared out at the twisting white roads, thin strips that wrapped around hills and the bases of mountains. Mountains so tall she could not see the peaks from within the confines of the mighty Mercedes. After driving for an hour, steadily climbing in altitude, they reached a chalet perched on the side of a mountain in the valley between two enormous peaks.

  “This is it; we have arrived,” the count said. “Mount Tidemoroff. I learned to ski here. My family owned this chalet for centuries.”

  “They lost this too in the revolution?”

  “Afraid so, although I’m still given the run of the place. They treat my guests and me very well. Come and see,” he joked.

  They removed the skis from the roof, stacked them with some others and looked out over the ski hills. There was a chairlift hauling skiers slowly up to an unseen platform. Several more were zig-zagging down a fine blanket of snow. Aubrey worried about her skills; she had never really done the big slopes and hadn’t skied since her mother died. That had been a long time ago.

  “Helmut, my ski legs might be a little rusty. Can we do something smaller?”

  “This is the smallest, least challenging hill. It’s like riding a bicycle—don’t worry. First, we’ll get a hot drink and some schnapps and you’ll relax.”

  The count was right. The château was cavernous and warm, and there were more people inside, sitting around a large fire drinking, than there were on the slopes.

  “I thought we did this after skiing,” Aubrey said.

  “Nonsense. This is Germany. One always starts an adventure with a schnapps.”

  Several men greeted Helmut as he approached the bar. He spoke warmly with the staff and came back to her with two steaming mugs. The added schnaps did the trick; the coffee and booze warmed her and she felt giddy. Maybe she shouldn’t be skiing right now, she thought. She needed her wits about her. It would do her no good to travel back to the States with her leg in a cast.

  Helmut introduced her to some of his friends, and after a few blistering conversations in German, he and Aubrey finished their drinks and headed out. They had a chair all to themselves and held hands as it took them higher and higher. Aubrey gasped at the height and space of it all.

  “What’s the matter? You’ve flown a plane through the Rocky Mountains. What’s a little chair?”

  “I feel naked up here. This is too much of it.”

  “Don’t worry; in a minute you’ll be flying down the slope, and I’ll bet you’ll want to do it over and over again.”

  “If you say so.”

  They jumped off the lift and slid to the top of the hill. Aubrey ignored the view and concentrated on what she was doing. The count flew off, calling back over his shoulder for her to join him.

  “Here goes nothing,” Aubrey said, and launched herself forward. She took the first couple of hundred feet easily, moving in long lateral passages and turning in large arcs to keep her speed down. She used her poles to add drag. The count zipped ahead of her. There was a stretch of moguls to one side, and he steered towards them. After a few moments, Aubrey’s old moves and confidence on the slopes started to come back. She would never catch him, but that was alright. She was admiring his form, and they would be together at the bottom.

  She thought about what he had told her, how this was their last night. He’d made no mention of trying to persuade her to stay, or of coming to see her. He was a busy man, she knew. But the thought of it ending tomorrow, on some train platform or in the lobby of the hotel, seemed so cold and so wrong.

  Then she chided herself again: You’re in love with a German, Aubrey. Admit it. She felt butterflies in her stomach as she finally acknowledged it: she did love him. Then a new voice spoke in her head. You’re in love with a Nazi, Aubrey, it said, and those butterflies became confused. Some settled down, and the fluttering of their wings dissipated. A few banged against her insides and jolted her out of her dreamlike state.

  You’re in love with a wonderful man, Aubrey. Rich and successful. He can give you anything in life you want. Like a career flying? That whole Nazi thing—we can work on that, she said to herself. With a laugh, she turned sharply left and pointed her skis straight down the slope, straight at the count, who was near the bottom. With a mighty push on her poles, she was off after him.

  23

  After their skiing, Aubrey and Helmut skipped the traditional drinks at the lodge. There had been something erotic about the whole adventure: sitting in the lift, hardly speaking, the sun warming their faces, holding hands... A few words at the top of the mountain and then down again. The count had been content to stay with this same hill, though the more challenging ones beckoned. Aubrey mentioned that she felt she was ready for something steeper but they ran out of time.

  Instead of the warm confines of the chalet with Helmut’s friends and more schnapps, they went to the car. After the skis were affixed to the roof and they had climbed in, their passion overwhelmed them and for ten minutes they embraced and kissed in full view of everyone coming and going from the chalet. When they finally separated, Aubrey straightened her clothes, embarrassed.

  “I think we had a bit of an audience.”

  “We’re still dressed. They probably want their money back.”

  Aubrey slapped him playfully on the arm with her gloves.

  “Home, James,” she commanded. “Home for supper.”

  “Are you hungry?”

  “I am, but maybe we’ll skip the meal?”

  “I don’t know, Fraulein; I have worked up quite an appetite.”

  “Yeah.” She smirked. “Me too. Onward, good sir.”

  When they arrived back at Helmut’s family lodge, Reinhardt came out to help with the skis and the roof rack. The sky had clouded over and there was a low-hanging blanket covering the surrounding peaks. It had grown decidedly chillier.

  “I hope you have a fire going, Uncle,” Helmut said as they made their way inside. Aubrey didn’t realize how cold she was until she started stripping off her outer garments. One of the servant girls who worked for Reinhardt’s mistress came hurrying out of the kitchen to help.

  Drinks were poured and the two alpinists collapsed into the loungers surrounding the fire. Aubrey still stirred inside for Helmut, and he gave her a long, desirous look that only stoked the fires wit
hin her. But it would have to wait. It would be impolite to leave Reinhardt to go upstairs for a roll in the deep duvets of her bedroom. There would be plenty of time for that later.

  “Aubrey, this arrived for you while you were out,” Reinhardt said. It was a telegram with German markings on it.

  “Telegram? Who knows I’m here?”

  “I left word at your hotel, in case your editors had to get in touch with you.”

  She opened it. It was not from her editor. The note said Where are you? Need to talk. Richard.