by Celia Rees
“CCG, or Military Government, every one of them,” Jack said. “Living like kings, they are.” He shook his head. “That’s where we’re heading.” He indicated a house above the bend of the lake. Bright, freshly-painted, the pillared portico, window frames and stonework carefully picked out in white against primrose-yellow stucco. The grounds ran uninterrupted down to the shore. “Belonged to some rich industrialist, requisitioned for the use of British personnel. Officers’ Club. Too busy arsing about choosing the paint to find homes for them poor bastards’ back there, ’scuse my French. Don’t get me wrong, I ain’t soft on them, I seen what they’ve done, but when you see little kiddies with no shoes, clammed with cold, babbies living in cellars. That’s not right.”
Jack was making no secret of where his sympathies and politics lay. Adeline sat in the back taking it all in to write up later, no doubt.
Jack drew up outside the club and opened the door for Edith. A slender army officer was coming down the steps toward them, his uniform immaculately tailored. Jack stood by the car and saluted. The officer barely touched a finger to his cap.
“Miss Graham? I’m Bill Adams.” He stood very erect, a head shorter than Hunter and slightly built. Small hands and feet. Dapper would be the word for it. His head tilted back so he looked down his snubbed nose. “And this is?”
“My friend, Adeline Croft.”
“Hi.” Adeline extended a hand to him.
“American?”
Adeline nodded. “I’m a journalist.”
“Ahh.” Captain Adams smoothed his fair mustache.
“I’m covering the trials in Nuremberg.”
Adams gave a yelping laugh. “Rather a distance, isn’t it?”
“The court doesn’t sit on the weekends,” Adeline replied coolly. “I’m doing a piece on the destruction of German cities. Thought I’d see what the RAF had done up here.”
“Righto. Good show.” Adams turned away from Adeline. “Going somewhere, Hunter?”
“Yes, sir. I . . .”
“Not now you’re not. Take Miss Croft back to wherever she wants to go and then come back here and wait for Miss Graham.” He turned away. “Shall we?”
Edith stayed to say a quick goodbye to Adeline. They hugged tightly.
“You stay safe, honey,” Adeline whispered as she kissed her cheek. “Look after yourself.”
Edith went to join Adams, who was waiting impatiently at the top of the steps.
“Keep an eye on your driver.” He nodded toward the departing Humber. “Not a fully paid-up member of the awkward squad but not far off it. A bit of a maverick. Useful man in a tight spot, but give him an inch and he’ll take a mile.”
“You speak as if you know him well.”
“Oh, Jack and I go way back.”
A German attendant sprang forward to open the door for them; another relieved Adams of his cap. A female attendant came to take Edith’s coat. Adams stopped in front of an Art Deco mirror and smoothed his neatly parted creamy-blond hair. He ushered Edith into a long sitting room, taking a table by the window.
“Let’s make ourselves comfortable, shall we?” He twitched his sleeve to expose a thin gold watch. “Drink before lunch? What’ll you have?”
“A whisky and soda.”
“Make that two.” He didn’t look at the waiter who had arrived to serve them. “Nice view from here,” he said as they sipped their drinks. “Very nice spot. Skating in the winter. Sailing in the summer. One of my favorite clubs.” He glanced at the menu. “Not much choice, but they do a good roast beef. I hope you’re hungry.”
The dining room was crowded.
“Sunday lunch bit of an institution,” Adams said as they were shown to their table. A waiter brought up a cart. A domed silver dish revealed a roast fore rib of beef. “I like mine bloody and plenty of it. The Yorkshires are hopeless, and they mess about with the potatoes.”
Despite his complaining, he accepted large helpings of everything. For a slender man, he had a good appetite.
“What’s that?” Adams recoiled as the waiter prepared to spoon a thick, pale sauce onto his slices of beef.
“Semmelkren,” the waiter answered.
“Horseradish,” Edith supplied.
“No thank you.” Adams put his hand out to protect his beef. “Not in my book it isn’t. Looks all bready. Ugh!”
The waiter offered the sauceboat to Edith.
“Ich danke Ihnen sehr, es sieht köstlich.”
“German speaker, then.” Adams looked up. “You were a schoolteacher, I hear. Now with the Education Branch?”
Edith nodded.
“Did Leo tell you much?”
“Not really,” Edith said. “Just to look out for bad hats.”
“That’s old Leo.” He cut into his bloody beef. “Nail on the head. That’s all it is, essentially.” Adams chewed and swallowed. “The men we’re looking for have been devilishly difficult to spot, right from the start.” He sawed off another portion. “Ditched their uniforms pretty sharpish. Found Himmler disguised as a sergeant with a patch over one eye. Minus the mustache, of course. Spotted by a sharp-eyed squaddie. That’s what you need, Miss Graham. A sharp eye.” He put down his knife and rested his forefinger lightly on one high cheekbone. “As time goes on, it becomes harder to spot ’em. Melting back into the population. We have too few dedicated officers. There’s only so much territory they can cover. So much they can do. That’s why we need people like you from different branches of the Occupation: Education, Housing, Displaced Persons, interacting with the German population, keeping an eye out, an ear open. Like listening stations, if you like, each one a single beacon. Together, they create a web that covers the entire zone. Clever, what?”
Edith agreed. It was clever.
“Some of our best pickups have come from people like yourself.” He mopped up gravy and bloody juices with a piece of bread. “Close to the ground, meeting all sorts—Germans, displaced persons, expellees—they’ve all got children. They’ve also got wives. Leo’s Find the Fraus is already bearing fruit.” He looked up from his plate. “Spot something, hear anything, tell us. We do the rest.”
“What is ‘the rest’?”
“Get ’em in, sweat ’em. See what they know.” He picked up his glass, swirling and tasting. “Not a bad red. We’re having difficulty, quite frankly. This business depends on informers. They should be coming forward in droves, the Germans, selling their own mothers for a packet of Players, but they’re not. We need to know why that is.” He leaned back as the waiter cleared their plates.
“Any ideas?”
“Albemarle pudding, I think. How about you?”
“I meant any ideas as to why the Germans aren’t coming forward in droves.”
“Oh, got you. It could be they don’t trust us, which is understandable, given everything, but it could be something else.”
“Oh? Like what?”
“Like they’re afraid of something.” He frowned. “It’s as though the people we are looking for, the Nazi bigwigs, the SS, still have influence, power over them.” He glanced toward the German waiter gliding over to take their order. “I wouldn’t trust any of them as far as I could throw them.”
“That far?”
Adams laughed. “Pudding?”
Edith shook her head.
“You work for me. Find anything, this is the number.” He put his card on the table then addressed his pudding. A light, lemony steamed sponge, studded with raisins, served with a pale sauce. “You’re missing a treat. This really is delicious. At least someone in the kitchen knows what he’s doing.” He ate in large bites, scraping together the last crumbs and custard. He let his spoon clatter into his dish. He stood up, straightening his uniform. “Due in Herford. Time to love you and leave you. Welcome aboard, Miss Graham.” He shook her hand as if to seal the deal. “Hunter will take you back to your hotel. Oh, and word to the wise.” He leaned in closer. “We have to be careful who we talk to about this, who our friends are.
Careless talk and all that.”
The last delivered with almost a purr. He stepped back, smiling slightly, passing a hand over his thick, pale hair. His high, wide cheekbones and narrow jaw, blunt nose, and smoky, slanted blue eyes reminded her of Miss Lambert’s blue-point Siamese. Edith had a feeling he had just shown his claws.
Hunter was waiting outside on the drive. He scowled after Adams folding himself into a Mercedes roadster.
“Gave me a rocket for not wearing uniform. Arsehole!”
Edith stared out of the window as they drove back to the Atlantic. The evening yawned. She half thought of asking the sergeant in for a drink, but it probably wasn’t the done thing.
He must have seen her look in the rearview mirror. He shook his big head.
“Other ranks not allowed past the foyer. You can come with me if you like. I’m off to meet my wench, Kay. She’s a nurse with the Alexandra’s. Teaching me to Lindy Hop.”
“Thank you, Sergeant.” Edith smiled. “But I think I’ll have an early night.”
“Probably wise. I’ll be along to pick you up Monday morning, ma’am. 0800 hours.”
9
Außenalster Café, Hamburg
6th January 1946
Lebkuchen
A biscuit traditionally eaten at Christmas, baked with ginger and other spices. Similar to gingerbread.
Williamsbirne
A delicate fruit spirit made exclusively with Williams Pears.
Edith went to bed early and slept late. The day stretched before her. Being alone didn’t really bother her. She needed to think.
She took the path round the Außenalster. Across the lake, tall spires showed thin and ghostly, spiking up from the city through an icy haze. There were few people out. Those she met passed by with their heads down, hunched deep into their scarves and collars, unwilling to meet her eyes. A man in a long overcoat and black homburg raised his hat to her, his face sunk and leaden, crosshatched with deep lines of pain and grief. She nodded her own greeting and went on. Perpetrator or victim? Innocent or guilty? Impossible to tell. They were a beaten people. All victims now.
She stopped at a café and ordered a coffee and schnapps to warm up. The windows were steamed, the interior cloudy with smoke. Most of the customers were British. RAF men, a few soldiers, plying German girls with cigarettes, coffee, patisserie. The girls sipped delicately and ate greedily, staining cups and napkins with their red lipstick. The men sat back, smoke curling from their cigarettes, watching with a different kind of greed.
The coffee came with a little plate of Lebkuchen. She bit into one. Soft, spiced with clove and cinnamon, so different from British gingernuts. The schnapps was Williamsbirne. Its sharp, pear-drop perfume caught in her throat and in her memory, taking her back to August 1938, to Schloss Steinhof and the von Stavenows. Lebkuchen and Williamsbirne. As potent as Proust’s madeleine dipped in tea . . .
Edith hadn’t known she’d be seeing Kurt, much less his wife. Leo had sprung it on her. They were holidaying together, a Baltic cruise (the family assuming she was going with Stella). Leo never said anything, and Edith didn’t ask, but she’d suspected, even then, that these jaunts were more than mere holidays. Leo took photographs as they steamed in and out of different Baltic ports, as ready with his camera as Adeline, as Kurt. Ships, docks, marshaling yards. It all made sense now. When the steamer reached Danzig, Leo suggested that they jump ship; he’d seen all he wanted to see.
“Thought we’d drop in on von Stavenow,” he said with elaborate casualness. “He lives in this neck of the woods. Knew he was married, did you? Got a son, so I hear. Thought we might go down to Berlin after. Have a sniff around.”
Yes, Edith did know he was married. Her name was Elisabeth. Kurt had talked about her at their last meeting. Leo went off to call ahead, highly pleased with himself. Why did he do that? His cruel streak again. That awful meeting in ’33. He knew what the outcome of that had been. He knew she didn’t want to think about it, let alone talk about it. Leo came back. Von Stavenow and his wife would be delighted. Train to Königsberg then a local service to a tiny village, no more than a halt. A coachman was waiting.
“I am Andreas,” he said with careful formality. Leo’s inquiry about the von Stavenow Estate brought a smile. They were to be guests at Schloss Steinhof, the Gräfin was expecting them.
“The Countess, eh?” Leo leaned toward Edith as the wheels of the carriage rattled over cobblestones. “Wouldn’t be surprised if it wasn’t her family. That’d explain a thing or two. Not least why you lost out, old girl. How do you feel now? Still carrying a torch?”
Edith ignored this fresh jibe, just stared down at the wheels turning in the dusty road. They were passing through rich farming country. White wheat fields, splashed red and blue with poppies and cornflowers, went on for miles, giving way to green fields and cropping cattle; emerald paddocks with horses standing off at a distance. Beyond the fields, forest covered the rising ground, spreading toward the blue haze of the horizon, texturing the distance like darkly woven tapestry. “Alle,” the driver announced, “Die länder der Gräfin.”
The carriage turned sharply through a high stone gateway. A narrower, graveled road led into open, undulating parkland dotted about with large trees. The carriage took a slight rise then slowed for the passengers to better appreciate the scene. A lake, surrounded by dark fir trees, made a glittering silver mirror framed in Hooker’s green, the better to reflect the house beyond.
Castles in Germany could be anything, Edith knew, from lowering fortresses and fairy-tale confections perched on impossible pinnacles, to a solid manor house. This was a grand country house built in the Palladian manner. The approach was along a wide avenue of limes. The interlocking branches shaded and dappled the road in front of them. To right and left more horses grazed, the sun turning their bright flanks to satin. Mares with foals lifted their heads at the sound of the passing carriage, flicking their ears and skittering away from the road. All this belonged to Elisabeth. Kurt, too, but only through her. Leo’s summation, bald as always, was as accurate as ever.
The carriage stopped in front of the wide, porticoed entrance and a curving flight of steps. The great front door stood open. At the sound of their approach, dogs of all shapes and sizes had come spilling out, yapping and barking, pouring down the steps and surrounding the carriage. They were followed by Kurt in boots and breeches, laughing, trying to call them all to heel.
“Damn dogs,” he called up to them. “No discipline! Welcome!”
He was as handsome as she remembered. His smile as dazzling as ever. Edith fought an impulse to look away.
The coachman opened the carriage door as Kurt tried to marshal the excited dogs. A piercing whistle quieted them. They trooped back up the steps to sit in a row ranging in size from Great Dane to dachshund, obedient to the command of a young woman in a white open-necked shirt, jodhpurs, and riding boots. She swept her blond hair back from her face and smiled.
“My wife, Elisabeth.” Kurt waved a hand toward her. “She has a way with animals.” He laughed again. “I, as you see, have not. Come. Come and meet her properly. Welcome to our home.”
The coachman set their luggage down on the marble tiles of the hall. A butler directed it to be taken upstairs. Kurt had made no secret of his aristocratic background, but this was beyond anything Edith could have imagined. She looked to right and left. Rooms led off, enfilades opening onto a series of diminishing interiors, rather in the way that a pair of mirrors set opposite each other give the illusion of infinite extending distance. She’d never been anywhere that remotely compared, only glimpsed stately homes from the road, never passed through their ornamental gates. She felt small, dwarfed by the grandness of it all, at a hopeless social disadvantage. A complete ingénue.
At the rear of the hallway, a tall door stood open, and beyond that further wide doors led out to a terrace. Edith glimpsed splashes of color, different hues of greens, grass and trees in what must be the gardens stretching awa
y into the distance, a vista so intriguing and lovely, that she instinctively moved in its direction, and going outside would allow her to escape the oppressive opulence of the house.
Elisabeth stepped to her side. “Come. Let me show you around.”
They walked through the open door into a light, airy room with white-painted walls and pale, polished wooden floors covered with Persian rugs. A large ceramic stove stood in one corner. A long room, elegantly but comfortably furnished with a piano at one end, a chaise longue, various chairs, a sofa scattered with cushions. A low table held piles of books and magazines.
“This is the Garden Room. The one we use most.”
Elisabeth led Edith onto the terrace. They both gazed out. Edith studied the formal garden rather than her hostess. With that long, silky, honey-colored hair parted on the side, the large, slate-blue eyes under finely arched brows, the high cheekbones, straight nose, and wide, well-modeled mouth, she looked disconcertingly like Greta Garbo. The temptation was to stare, safer instead to fix on the pattern of the flowerbeds arranged round pools and fountains, admire the way that the eye was drawn to a sweep of wide lawns then redirected by bordering hedges and trees, guided toward a tiny gap filled with the glitter of water.
“We sit out here on fine evenings,” Elisabeth said to break the silence. “My great-great-grandfather laid out the gardens. They say he never got over a visit to Versailles.”
There were cushioned chairs along the terrace arranged to look out. A drink and this view would be pleasant indeed.
At a little distance, a nurse sat next to a pram. The sun was warm, and she was dozing, her knitting slipping from her knee.
“And this,” Elisabeth introduced the occupant of the pram, “this is Wolfgang.”
At the sound of her mistress’s voice, the nurse rose hastily. “Madam! I’m sorry!”