Stasi Winter

by David Young

  Holger sees my face cloud over, and thinks it’s because of his skidded stop coming too close.

  ‘Sorry. I rather misjudged that.’

  ‘Ha!’ I say, cheering up. ‘Race you to the bottom of the lift!’

  I set off, facing down the red run, and crouch into a schuss. I feel my skis thundering beneath me, the slope rushing by like I’m in a feature film, the exhilaration of risk. Then my legs start wobbling and I know I should have put in a turn. I’m going too fast. I try to turn but my edge catches and I’m tumbling, falling, feeling I’m never going to stop. Thinking how stupid I’ve been.

  But then I hit deeper snow at the side of the piste, and eventually come to a stop. My mouth is full of ice and snow; it’s down my ski trousers and back.

  ‘What were you doing, Irma?’ shouts Holger as he catches up. ‘Are you OK?’

  I get my breath back, spit out the snow, and shake myself like a dog after a swim in the sea. ‘Sorry. I misjudged the turn.’

  ‘You’re mad,’ he says. ‘Completely bonkers.’ He pulls me to my feet, and kisses me full on the lips. He knows all about me now. He understands I was left with no choice but to work for the Stasi – just seeing what Richter was capable of, was evidence of that. I love him, and I don’t want him ever to let go.

  *

  Our car’s parked at the Kanzelwand valley station. Everyone stares as they drive past in their swanky Mercedes and BMWs. It’s our bit of the Republic which Holger picked up for next to nothing and then got back on the road. A second-hand Trabi that no one this side of the Wall wanted. The locals love it and always wave as we go by – the mad East Germans in their Trabi. I’m sure most people in our situation would have wanted to forget all about the DDR. But my mother’s still there. My grandmother. It helps to remind me of them.

  Holger’s uncle’s kindly lent us his mountain holiday flat for the season while we find our feet in the West. We’ve got money coming in from Holger’s ski lift company work, and my job as a chambermaid and waitress in a three-star hotel. In the DDR, what we’re earning would be considered a fortune. Here, the money goes as fast as it comes in.

  And being a waitress is a real eye-opener, I can tell you. Yesterday, when the ski groups had finished for the day, and the pupils came in with their ski teachers, I witnessed something that sickened me – and again made me think that perhaps Der schwarze Kanal didn’t get it all wrong. They come in, drinking round after round of Obstler – a vile-tasting fruit schnapps – singing their songs. It was the antics of one group that really shook me. At the centre of it was a young English youth – maybe an older schoolboy or student on some sort of exchange. It was obvious he didn’t speak much – if any – German. He was trying to join in and enjoy things without understanding. The middle-aged German men and their Austrian ski instructor started teaching him this song, as I was delivering their schnapps on a tray, and he sang along. They all thought it was hilarious:

  ‘Auf der Heide blüht ein kleines Blümelein

  und das heißt: Erika!’

  He had no idea he was singing a Nazi marching song. I could tell a couple of middle-aged women in the party knew – they looked uncomfortable, wouldn’t sing along, and then started whispering to him.

  But this was the evidence in front of my eyes that not all they told us in the Republic was propaganda. Nazis do live on in the BRD – even as the 1970s draw to a close – and here they were, lustily singing their old tunes. I almost deliberately tipped the tray of schnapps over them. But I knew I couldn’t afford to lose my job.

  *

  As evening falls, we drive the Trabi down the valley to Oberstdorf – the nearest town in West Germany, and the nearest railway station. I can’t contain my excitement. A special visitor is coming, and Holger and I are off to greet her.

  To see her again will be wonderful. It’s hard to believe it’s happening.

  I run down the platform when I see her white hair, her leathery face.

  ‘Oma!’ I shout. ‘Oma!’

  I rush to her and hug the life out of her. Then hold her bony shoulders in my hands. ‘I couldn’t believe they’d let you come. This is a fantastic day.’

  I smother her with kisses and can see she looks a little embarrassed, but there’s a broad grin on her face. She’s as delighted as I am.

  ‘They don’t care about us oldies,’ she says. ‘It’s easy enough for us to get permission to come to the West. I think they’d secretly like me to stay – then they won’t have to pay my pension any more, never mind the little extra I get for running the campsite.’

  ‘Are you going to stay, Oma? Are you?’ I ask excitedly.

  She shakes her head. ‘No, Irma. My home is in Sellin. On Rügen. But I’m certainly looking forward to this visit. And seeing your new home.’

  Holger’s drawn alongside us now, and I introduce him. He acts the perfect gentleman and asks if he can take her luggage. Then we realise – she hasn’t got any cases with her.

  ‘Where are your bags, Oma?’ I ask, thinking she must have had a senior moment and forgotten them at Augsburg, where she changed trains.

  ‘Oh, someone else is bringing them along in a moment.’ She has a sly grin on her face. I look over her shoulder.

  And then I see her, and I’m running, running, jumping on her, smothering her with kisses as tears stream down my cheeks.

  Now I’m older, it’s almost like looking in a mirror. The same red hair, the same freckly skin, the same angular nose and features.

  ‘Hello, Schatzi,’ she says. ‘My little Schatzi.’

  ‘Mutti,’ I sob. Squeezing her tight. ‘Mutti, Mutti, Mutti.’ That’s all I can get out in between my sobs. She doesn’t know – and I will never tell her – that her latest stint in jail, just a few weeks short of four years, was down to me. Was a result of my report to Hauptmann Steiger. ‘I’ve missed you so much. So, so much.’

  ‘Well, Irma. You don’t have to miss me any more. I’ve been freed.’

  ‘You don’t have to go back?’

  She shakes her head. ‘They bought me out.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The West Germans. They paid for my freedom.’ I don’t ask her how much – it’s an open secret that, to raise much-needed hard currency, the Republic sometimes agrees to free dissidents in return for a West German bounty. To many, that would seem like a disgusting trade in humans. Me? I no longer care. I’m just overjoyed to be reunited with my mother, and her next words answer a burning question without me having to ask it. ‘I’m here for good, Schatzi. I’m a free woman.’

  *

  There’s more hugging all round, I introduce her to Holger, and he lifts up their heavy bags as though they weigh little more than feathers.

  We stroll down the platform, wondering how we’ll fit everything in the Trabi. Mutti and I will probably have to sit in the back with one of the cases on our laps. I’m holding her hand, almost skipping with delight.

  A winter that started with two near death experiences has ended in freedom – for myself and my mother. The winter of 1978/79 might have been the Republic’s ‘catastrophe winter’ – but for Mutti and me it’s something else entirely. It’s our Freedom Winter.

  It’s when we get two thirds of the way down the platform that my blood runs cold.

  I see him sitting on a bench, reading a paper, as though he’s waiting for a train himself. At Lübeck and in Hamburg I’d managed to convince myself he was just a doppelgänger. But it’s clearly the same man, and it’s beyond coincidence that he’s here in Oberstdorf – more than eight hundred kilometres further down the line, in the far south of Germany.

  I try to ignore him. Try to concentrate on Oma and Mutti.

  But as we pass, he drops his newspaper and stares at me, letting me know he’s seen me. That he’s watching me, and watching Mutti.

  ‘Hello, Irma,’ he says.

  I ignore him, but Holger looks at me quizzically. ‘Who was that? You didn’t even reply.’

  ‘Oh, he’s ju
st a guest from the hotel,’ I lie. ‘You know I was telling you about them singing that song? He was one of that group. I don’t want anything to do with him.’ Holger smiles and rolls his eyes. He obviously believes the lie.

  But I know who it was.

  Major Karin Müller – his former wife – is back in the Republic, thinking he’s dead.

  There’s only one explanation for him being here, keeping a watch on me and Mutti.

  He’s been turned. As I was.

  He works for them. The Ministry for State Security. The MfS. The Stasi.

  They’re still watching us, and they always will.

  I was kidding myself if I thought this was my ‘freedom winter’.

  It’s not that at all.

  Jäger, Steiger and now Müller. Gottfried Müller, my former teacher. A man I thought was my friend.

  But he’s like all the rest. Never letting us escape. Never letting us be truly free.

  Ensuring that I’ll only ever be able to remember these past few months as one thing, and one thing alone.

  My ‘Stasi Winter’.

  Epilogue

  April 1979

  East Berlin

  Müller and Tilsner’s new assignments had come through after more than three months in limbo – they’d both find out what they were later today. Reiniger had agreed to extend the lease on Muller’s Strausberger Platz apartment until the new job was confirmed, in case Müller was going to be moving from the Hauptstadt. Even Reiniger thought two house moves in the space of a couple of weeks would be unreasonable, despite the fact that Müller’s reassignment was a disciplinary measure.

  She and Tilsner had gone out drinking together at the bar in Dircksenstraße – the same one they’d been to the night before the start of the graveyard girl case. For old times’ sake, Müller had found herself agreeing to Tilsner’s suggestion of a bottle of ‘blue strangler’ – not the weaker, branded version, but the forty per cent crystal vodka.

  She knew it had been the real thing because, now – as she tried to force herself awake in Tilsner’s bed – the pain throbbed violently inside her skull – like a roadworks gang trying to hammer its way out. This really was a reprise of four years ago. Except that time, she’d been so drunk she wasn’t sure how far they’d gone. This time, she’d drunk as much – half a bottle of vodka, matching Tilsner shot for shot. Yet she’d let him take her to bed, and she had clear memories of what had happened between the sheets. Now he was fast asleep, snoring like a steam train.

  Müller grabbed her clothes, and rushed to the toilet, out of the corner of her eye noticing something else was different in the bedroom scene. Photos of Tilsner’s children were still on the dressing table, but none of his wife, Koletta. She’d moved in with a new man, taking the children with her.

  She wasn’t sure if she was going to be sick or not. Hanging her head over the toilet bowl, she tried to let the waves of nausea pass. She took a drink from the cold tap, before cupping her hands under the rushing water and splashing her face, attempting to clear her brain.

  Müller took a deep breath, sat on the toilet seat, and tried to think of something other than being sick. She remembered the letter she’d picked up when she’d been to Keibelstraße the previous afternoon, when Reiniger had told her that the decision on the new job would be revealed later today.

  She grabbed it out of her jacket pocket, and looked at the postmark. It was franked ‘Hirschegg, Kleinwalsertal’. She had no idea where that was, other than it must be in Austria, because of the postage stamp.

  She tore open the envelope, then waited a few seconds to stop that tearing sound echoing around her pounding head. Inside was a newspaper cutting and a letter. She looked at the cutting first. It was a report from a BRD newspaper of her and Tilsner’s rescue from the ice back in January. She smiled. It would make a nice keepsake to show Jannika and Johannes when they were older: how their mother nearly died out on the ice.

  Then she read the letter.

  Dear Frau Müller,

  (I hope it’s OK to call you that – after all, I’m not in the Republic now!)

  I wanted to write to you to let you know that Holger and I did safely get to the West. We’re together – that might be a surprise to you. But I realised out there on the ice that he cared for me and loved me, whereas Dieter – God rest his soul – cared more for adventure and excitement. I hope you don’t think badly of me for that.

  Anyway, we’re living in his uncle’s holiday chalet in Kleinwalsertal, in the Vorarlberg in Austria. It’s a beautiful valley, surrounded by the Alps, but cut off from the rest of Austria – so you can only get to it from Germany. It makes it feel very special. The BRD, as you can probably imagine, is a little overwhelming. I was surprised to find that at least some of what we were told in Der schwarze Kanal was correct! It’s a world obsessed with money.

  But here in the valley things are calmer. Holger’s even bought and repaired an old Trabi, so we drive around in that, much to the locals’ amusement. He’s working on the ski lifts, and I’m chambermaiding and waitressing – so we’re getting by quite nicely.

  On the way from Lübeck, I saw this report in the newspaper. I thought I would send it to you as a little souvenir of our ‘adventure’ just in case it wasn’t reported in newspapers in the Republic.

  Müller laid the letter on the sink for a moment, and took a few deep breaths. Reading about Irma’s successful escape gladdened her heart, although she was surprised it hadn’t been censored. A letter from a successful Republikflüchtling was surely something the Stasi would normally intercept and destroy, wasn’t it?

  When she turned the page, and read on, she realised why. The Stasi wanted her to see this – they wanted her to know they would always win. She felt the nausea rise in her gullet as she read the words.

  That’s the main reason for this letter. To give you my news and send you the cutting. However, there is one other rather strange thing I think you deserve to know.

  When I mentioned your husband when you came to see me in Sellin, you said he had died. I didn’t really think it was my place to ask you questions about how or when.

  I have some rather shocking news for you, I’m afraid. Your husband is very much alive. I have seen him with my own eyes. At first I thought it was just someone who looked exactly like him, but then he greeted me by name.

  The news was a sickening jolt to Müller, literally. She stood up, turned, and vomited into the toilet, again and again, until there was nothing left in her stomach. Still she retched – and she knew it wasn’t her hangover. It was what she’d learnt.

  The Stasi were toying with her – probably with Irma, too. Jäger had taken Müller to the site in the forest where Gottfried had supposedly been executed. Yet here – in black and white – was the proof of their lies, unless Irma herself was lying. And surely the young woman had no reason to?

  She calmed herself with more deep breaths, and read on.

  I can’t explain what he was doing. All I can tell you is that my own mother has just been released from jail, apparently after the BRD paid for her to be freed and sent over the state border. As you can imagine, this was an incredible – joyful – surprise for me. It was tempered somewhat by the thought that Herr Müller was watching us.

  Anyway, I’m not sure if this letter will ever reach you. But I thought I should make the attempt to let you know.

  I’m not going to let this spoil my happiness in the West. Maybe one day, if things ever change, you might be able to come and visit us. I know you were an excellent skier and ski-jumper as a schoolgirl. I am sure you would love it here.

  With warmest regards,

  Irma (Behrendt)

  Müller continued to breathe deeply, trying to calm herself down. Did it really change anything? Gottfried and she had already decided to split up anyway. And she was well aware of the Stasi’s tactics. But it was another piece of her belief in the system this side of the Wall that had been chipped away.

  There! She�
�d said it – if only to herself. The Wall. Not the Anti-Fascist Protection Barrier. She’d always felt she was on the right side of it – working with others for a fairer, more equal society, a better future for herself and her twin children.

  Now she wasn’t so sure.

  Out on the ice, she couldn’t have decided – as Tilsner obviously had, before changing his mind and coming back to save her – to escape to the West, even though it had been less than a kilometre away. She knew she had to stay to be with the twins and Helga, her family.

  But as to what the future held, she had a horrible feeling that Irma and Holger were on the right side of the divide. They had their freedom, even if it was a freedom governed by the rules of capitalism.

  For the first time, she felt that she, Jannika, Johannes and Helga might be in the wrong place after all. She would have to do all in her power to make sure their future was as good as it could be, despite the Wall around them.

  Glossary

  Anti-Fascist Protection Barrier/Rampart

  The euphemistic official East German term for the Berlin Wall

  Bezirk

  District

  BRD

  Bundesrepublik Deutschland. West Germany

  Deutsche Demokratische Republik (DDR)

  The German Democratic Republic, or DDR for short, the official name for East Germany

  Der schwarze Kanal

  The Black Channel. Weekly propaganda current affairs show on East German television

  Fallschirmjäger

  Paratroopers

  Hauptmann

  Captain

  Hauptstadt

  Capital city (in this book, East Berlin)

  Interhotel

  East German chain of luxury hotels

  Jugendwerkhof

  Severe reform school dedicated to socialist re-education

  Keibelstraße