by Jana Petken
“Why do you say that, dear?” Freddie asked.
“Well, Papa, it must have been luck. I don’t know how my work came to the notice of the Vice Chancellor’s offices when there are at least fifty other high calibre typists in my pool; they’re all so good, you see.”
“You weren’t lucky, Mein Engel,” Paul told her. “You’re clearly very good at your job, and your superiors thought you deserved the promotion.”
“Who are you going to work for?” Olga asked, beaming with pride.
“I don’t know the person’s name yet, but I’ve been told I’ll be going to the Vice Chancellor’s offices. He has almost an entire floor to himself, so I presume I’ll be working for someone high up. Oh, Mama, imagine me, a proper secretary to someone important, someone who will know my name and personally call for me to do things for him.”
“Wonderful, darling,” Olga said, squeezing her daughter’s hand. “I’m so very proud of you.”
Paul, listening to Valentina tell her parents that she would now have a real desk with a telephone, not just a table with a typewriter on it, felt like the luckiest man alive. It had only been one month since he and Valentina had first met at the Einstein club, but during that short period of time he’d found what every person searches for in their short lives; mutual love between two people and all the heavenly trappings that went with it.
He looked around the table. The Biermanns were grinning, admiring their vivacious daughter while she spoke. Dieter and Laura, both almost as in love with Valentina as Paul was, looked as though they were bursting to receive the news that Paul was about to deliver to Freddie and Olga. He wagged his finger at his mother in mock admonishment. She’d evidently let his father into the secret when he’d asked her not to.
“So, Paul – Paris, eh,” said Freddie Biermann, breaking into his thoughts.
“Yes, sir. I couldn’t have wished for a better posting. I admit, I dreaded the thought of being sent to Russia or elsewhere in the East – not because of the fighting, of course, but I’m sure I wouldn’t like the winter weather when it eventually sets in.”
“I’m delighted for him,” said Dieter, pouring more wine into everyone’s glasses. “To be given a job at the medical facility in the centre of Paris, looking after our soldiers’ health and wellbeing is a great honour considering his junior rank. Dieter waggled his finger at Freddie. “I suspect you might have had a hand in this, Freddie. I know how influential you Gestapo types are.”
Freddie smiled. “Nothing to do me with me. Like Valentina, Paul got his reward through his own hard work.”
“I’m just happy he’ll be safe and won’t see any fighting – not like my poor, Wilmot,” said Laura, a little down at the mouth. Then she seemed to cheer up. “You’ll have a splendid time, won’t you, Son?”
“Not too splendid, I hope,” said Valentina, a small smile touching her lips.
Paul kissed the back of her hand. “No, not too splendid. I can’t possibly enjoy myself if you’re not with me, darling.”
“Oh, my, how lovely,” Laura gushed.
Paul took a deep breath as he continued to gaze at Valentina. Her smile, the memories of her kisses from the previous night, her arms wrapped around his neck, her body pushing against his manhood in a cruel, mischievous manner that had driven him mad with desire – yes, it had only been a month, but a month in wartime was like an eternity, for no one made long-term plans anymore or looked to the future beyond a day, a week or a month at most.
Sighing contentedly, he gazed at his mother. She, the only person complicit in the secret, and now his father, apparently, had urged him to marry as soon as possible. She was not a particularly good conversationalist, guarded with her feelings and restrained in an often cold, English way, but she was intuitive and wise. “You should marry Valentina Biermann before you leave Germany,” Laura had insisted earlier that day. “You’ll be a fool if you abandon her to the officers and Reich officials in the Chancellery. Mark my words, Son, she’s far too attractive to go unnoticed, and if you don’t act she’ll be swamped by invitations and proposals the minute you leave Berlin. You’ll kick yourself for hesitating.”
“Herr Biermann, I wonder if I could have a word with you before our food arrives?” Paul asked.
Freddie smiled. “Yes, of course. I…”
Kurt appeared at the dining room door and the conversation died. “Excuse me, Herr Biermann, a Gestapo Kriminalobersekretär is here. The lieutenant wonders if he might have a word with you. He said it was urgent.”
Dieter and Paul rose to their feet, sitting again after Freddie had left the room.
“My husband never gets a moment’s peace,” Olga lamented. “There are enemy secret agents in Germany. They’re everywhere, apparently. Did you know that?” she asked. “The cheek of them, thinking they can come into our country and spy on us. It never fails to amaze me how…”
“Mother, should you be talking about Papa’s work?” Valentina scolded her.
“Oh, for goodness sake, everyone knows there is a spy world out there. It’s all part and parcel of war.” Olga leant in as though she were about to impart a great secret. “We weren’t supposed to, but Freddie and I watched a spy movie a couple of years ago. Don’t ask me how my Freddie got hold of the reel because I have no idea. It was by Alfred Hitchcock and called, The 39 Steps. It was very disturbing, naturally, but I couldn’t help being a tad thrilled by it.”
“So, you think there are spies in Berlin, do you?” Dieter chuckled.
“Most definitely. Freddie has people going around the city in detection vans all the time. That’s what his Section E does.”
“Mother!” shouted Valentina, horrified at Olga’s indiscretions.
“Oh, don’t be silly, Valentina, dear. We’re all friends on the same side here.”
When Freddie returned his brow was furrowed. Nevertheless, he sat down and said, “I’m sorry about that. Paul, what did you want to ask me?”
Chapter Fifty-Seven
Dieter got off the tram, glanced over his shoulder, and, satisfied he wasn’t being followed, set off along the street. In this working-class district, a man like him would be forgiven for not knowing the lay of the land, but he knew this area well and had been there on numerous occasions.
“I will have a Scotch, especially as you say my Max brought it for you. Thank you, Ernst,” said Dieter, as he relaxed on Herr Brandt’s couch. “Any news from my boy?”
“Yes, but we agreed not to discuss Mirror – he’s fine, safe, that’s all you need to know. How is your other son? I admit, he worried me. He seemed naïve to me, like a babe lost in a world he doesn’t understand. I’d keep my eye on that one if I were you.”
Dieter decided not to tell Brandt about Paul’s posting to Paris. “Paul is well. He’s getting married on Saturday, and to be honest, his big day is the only reason my wife and I are still in Berlin.”
“I had a feeling this wasn’t a social call,” said Brandt, reaching into a cabinet for the whisky.
“When is it ever social, Ernst?” sighed Dieter with a rare bout of melancholy, as he watched Brandt pour whisky from the bottle of Scotch that Max had given him. Not hearing from Max, Hannah and Frank was a hard pill to swallow. Laura had announced only a few weeks earlier that they were being punished for remaining in Germany after Hitler had come to power. “Had we moved back to England as I suggested years ago, we’d still have our children,” she’d scolded him. He’d rarely lost his temper with Laura, but he’d taken her to task over that issue. “And what about Paul and Willie? Are they not our children as well? Or do you not care about them?” he’d blasted her. He’d had to eat a lot of humble pie later that day.
Heller had frequently written a specific code known only to them into his transmissions, letting Dieter know that Max, Hannah and Frank were well. Through Heller, Dieter had learnt that he and Laura were grandparents to a baby boy, but unless Hannah contacted he and Laura directly, he couldn’t tell his wife and German family the
wonderful news. Lying and harbouring secrets was the price he had to pay to keep Laura and his children safe, and he wouldn’t apologise for his deceit.
“What about our mutual friend?” Brandt handed Dieter the Scotch and sat in the chair beside the sofa.
Knowing he meant Heller, Dieter replied, “He’s one of the reasons why I’m here. Last night I held a dinner party for a Gestapo Kriminaldirektor…”
“Ah, a wolf at your dinner table then.”
Dieter shrugged. “Not for the first time, Ernst. The point is, he received a message while we were eating. Radio detector vans were in the area and had picked up a signal.”
“Yours?”
“Possibly – probably – don’t look at me like that. I’ve been very careful. I don’t transmit from home anymore. I took greater precautions after I learnt from my Gestapo friend that he was going to purge my area. I transmitted from the woods about two kilometres from my home. There’s a signal tower over there.”
“Well, you know the old saying: know thine enemy,” said Brandt. “You certainly know yours. Doesn’t your friendship with that Gestapo fellow go back to the first war?”
“Friendship,” Dieter sniggered. “I’m afraid that ship sailed years ago for us both. It ended the day Freddie joined the Gestapo’s section E and began persecuting Germans who spoke out against Hitler’s policies. I tried to talk him out of it. We had a blazing row over a bottle of Scotch. He was determined to make a difference, get Germany back on its feet by expediting Hitler’s laws and ideology to the letter. I warned him that our friendship would become superficial, that I’d never trust a Gestapo officer with my secrets or thoughts. He said he’d always be the same old Freddie – same old Freddie, my arse, he thrives on torturing people, notching up his victims’ names in his little black book.”
“Why are you complaining? You’ve used him for years, and you get the better of him every time,” Brandt reminded Dieter.
“Yes, I have. So far. I’ve taken every loose comment and inadvertent piece of intelligence that’s come out his, or his wife’s mouth and passed it on to London, and if I need to kill him to protect my wife and family, I’ll not think twice about putting a bullet in his head – I would have died for that man in 1916, but now I don’t even remember why I liked him.”
“Where is the radio now?” Brandt asked.
“It’s safe.” Dieter swallowed, reflecting how close Kurt and he had come to being caught the previous afternoon. He’d transmitted a radio message to Heller only one hour before the Biermanns arrived at his house. The Gestapo consistently kept tabs on their senior officers, but he’d thought that the detection vans wouldn’t operate in areas where their superiors were going for fear of corrupting some top-secret operation, but he’d been wrong. Kurt had listened in on the conversation between Freddie and the Gestapo officer who’d interrupted the dinner party, and had distinctly heard Freddie ask how far the signal was from the Vogel’s house.
Biermann had been euphoric upon hearing that his daughter wanted to marry the son of his closest friend, and after celebratory champagne and brandy, he’d continued to let slip his suspicions about spies being in the centre of Berlin; perhaps even in the Reich Chancellery itself. He’d been like a leaky tap dripping intelligence and revelling in the power he believed he held; no one was infallible, it seemed to Dieter, not even the fearsome Gestapo. In fact, Biermann was a stupid man.
“What now for you, Dieter?” Brandt asked.
Dieter cleared his throat. “I have orders, but first, I’m getting my wife out straight after my son’s wedding.”
“Out of Germany?” Brandt stood and went to the window. He moved the dirty white net curtains aside with his index finger and thumb and peered through a corner of the window pane into the street.
“Oh, do sit down, Ernst,” Dieter said. “Do you think I’d be stupid enough to come up here if I thought I’d been followed?”
“People who are followed don’t generally know they have a tail on them,” Brandt warned, then sat down again. “All right, I’m listening.”
“Good, because this is important. Two of our agents have been captured in Hamburg, and we’ve been instructed to shut our radios down.”
“London said nothing about that when I reported in last week,” Brandt snapped. “Why am I always the last to know about these things?”
“You weren’t informed because the men were only captured two days ago. Look, Ernst, we knew it was only a matter of time before the Abwehr strengthened in manpower and resources. They were late to the spy game, but by God, they’re beginning to catch up with a vengeance, and that means we have to be much more careful.” Dieter wagged his finger at Brandt. “And you’ve got to stop taking things personally, you’re like an old Frau at times.”
“And has this old Frau to be left to his own devices from now on?”
Dieter, regretting his harsh words to a man who had dedicated the last five years of his life to help political dissidents escape Hitler’s Germany, said in a softer tone, “The British haven’t forgotten you. My replacement will arrive within the next two weeks. He’ll contact you as soon as he gets his feet on the ground.”
“What’s his code name?”
“The Barber. He’ll be based in Switzerland but will slip in and out of Germany using a cover, much like Mirror did before the war started. Just sit tight until he arrives, Ernst.”
“I will. Unlike your boy, Max, I don’t have a death wish,” said Brandt, getting up to fetch the bottle of Scotch.
Dieter looked at the shabby cushions on the couch. He hadn’t been in Brandt’s flat for more than a year, for on the rare occasions they had met, both men had preferred to conduct their get-togethers in the park or at a workingman’s beer hall next to the nearby factory.
Whenever Dieter had gone to Zum Nussbaum, a smelly den of alcohol and sweat where men played dominoes and poker for matchsticks, he’d donned old clothes that his gardener had previously worn.
Brandt had informed Dieter, through Kurt, that the bar had been infiltrated by the Gestapo’s secret police. They’d hung around the bar area, asking people if they’d had trouble with interference on their radios at home, if they’d seen strangers or heard anything that insulted or threatened the Führer. Secret police, my arse, Dieter had mocked. They were as undisciplined and as unguarded as Freddie and his wife had been a few nights earlier.
“So, have the Gestapo been spotted again in Zum Nussbaum since we last spoke?” Dieter asked.
Brandt topped Dieter’s glass up. “Yes, a Sohn einer Hündin, son of a bitch, as the Americans would say, was in there three nights ago. Nobody answered his questions, not one person – foolish people, the Gestapo. They think we can’t recognise them when they all wear the same black clothes and hats, the bloody arschlochs.”
Dieter chuckled at the way Brandt screwed up his face when agitated. “I was just thinking the same thing. Ach, they’re over confident, Ernst.”
“I remember a time when the average working man could enjoy a beer and speak his mind without getting shot,” Brandt continued. “But in these dark days, beer halls are no longer sanctuaries, and households are terrified of a knock on their front doors. Every person who lives under the Nazi yoke is afraid of the Gestapo, Dieter, and you should be afraid of your Kriminaldirektor friend as well.” Brandt gulped down the whisky, went for the bottle again and asked, “What will happen to your boys if you disappear. Two of them are still in Germany, are they not?”
“The boys will be fine. I’ve accounted for the fallout.”
“You won’t tell me what your mission is, will you?”
“No.”
Brandt exhaled a long breath, then lifted the tumbler to his mouth. After a large, noisy glug, as though he were drinking water, he wiped his mouth and sighed again. “I don’t blame you for getting out, Dieter. You’ll probably be more useful to the British in London than you are here. Things are getting worse rather than better, and there’s nothing we can do abo
ut it. The Gestapo’s warped philosophy, their master plan for total social control over everything and everybody is driving people underground. Control of thoughts and actions, and Christ forbid, what we say. Who would have imagined it, eh?”
“That’s what Hitler wants from the Gestapo,” Dieter said, recognising that Brandt was tipsy. “You don’t think he’d have got this far were it not for his instruments of terror, do you, Ernst? He knew exactly what he was doing when he forged that sword.”
“Let me ask you something, Dieter,” Brandt leant in. “How can you live from day to day knowing that your best friend, the Kriminaldirektor, might suspect you of being a secret agent?”
“I might ask you the same thing,” Dieter answered.
“Ah, but I count myself infinitely more fortunate than you.”
“How so?”
“Well, I’m an insignificant fellow, an old dithering fool to most people. I live alone without a wife or offspring to care for me. I dress in my pyjamas most days, go out only for bread and other sundries because I can’t afford to eat in fancy restaurants or have a cook to make me elaborate dinners. I keep my thoughts to myself and I don’t mention politics or war to anyone apart from my neighbour, a floor down, and even then I’m guarded.”
Brandt went to pour some more scotch for Dieter, but the latter held up his hand. “Funny, Dieter, I’ve left Max’s bottle alone for a year, hadn’t touched a drop of it since your other son was here,” said Brandt, pouring more into his own tumbler. “I suppose I was waiting for the right occasion – ach, I don’t think it’ll do me any harm to finish it off now. It tastes better when I have company.”
“You were saying about the Gestapo,” Dieter interrupted, looking at his watch.
“Ah, yes, unlike me, Dieter, you deal with the Wehrmacht High Command on a regular basis. It must be exhausting to put on an act in front of those people, day after day, and betray the country we once fought for – you and I both know how hard it is to do our jobs – loving our country yet working against its interests.”