From the Ashes

by Marion Kummerow

  He kind of liked Böhm, who – although a staunch communist – always tried to stick to facts and reason. The last time they’d had a short conversation was at the horrible two-year anniversary of the capitulation in Karlshorst. He wondered what the Moscow stooge could possibly want this early in the morning.

  “Good morning, Herr Kommandant,” Böhm said, standing in the doorframe, nervously scanning the room. He looked like he hadn’t slept all night with dark shadows beneath his alert eyes. “Do you have a minute to talk…in private?”

  Dean was thoroughly intrigued and pointed to the chair in front of his desk, “Close the door and take a seat, please.”

  “Herr Kommandant,” Böhm said in flawless English. “I have an unusual request, but first I must ask you for complete confidentiality. Nobody can know about our conversation.”

  Dean cocked his head. Things were getting stranger by the minute and he wondered what kind of top-secret mission Böhm was on. Did he bring a peace offering from Sokolov on the matter of the Lord Mayor? Unlikely. The Soviets didn’t send German communists to negotiate with the other Allies.

  Or did Böhm know something about the four hundred abducted German engineers, whisked away to the Soviet Union during a cloak-and-dagger operation to work for their new masters? But why would he come to him? What did he want in return?

  “Nobody will learn about this conversation from me,” Dean said and leaned back, quietly observing how Böhm nodded and fidgeted with his hands while taking a seat. The man was supremely nervous. For a moment Dean feared the German might plan something stupid and felt for the pistol he always kept in the open drawer of his desk.

  During his two years in Berlin he’d received countless anonymous death threats, but he’d never actually considered someone coming into his office to kill him. Germans weren’t allowed to carry weapons, either. Not even the police. He relaxed again and shoved the frightening thought aside.

  “This might sound rather strange to you, but…” Böhm inhaled deeply before he continued. “…I’m seeking your help to leave Berlin.”

  Dean was stunned into silence, while the wheels in his brain set in motion and connected the dots. After long moments of silence, he asked, “You want to defect?”

  Böhm buried his face in his hands before he looked up again and responded, “Yes. I…I have witnessed such awful things that I simply cannot stay loyal to the Soviets anymore. And…I’m afraid they will find out about my critical opinion and make me disappear forever. I got to know you as an honorable and upright man, therefore I’m coming here laying my fate in your hands.” Böhm bowed his head, as if waiting for Dean to slay his neck with a sharp blade.

  Dean was speechless. Sure, there had been cases of defectors, mostly from the Soviet occupied zone, but nobody as high-up in the hierarchy as Böhm. He was a big fish. One that Dean could possibly exploit for anti-Soviet propaganda, maybe even use his intricate knowledge of the Soviet workings to coax Sokolov into agreeing to some of the disputed points at the Kommandatura. But…how could he know this wasn’t a ploy? He decided to get more information first.

  “You’re right, that’s quite an unusual request and you will forgive me for having to ask some questions first.” The secret dossier he had on Böhm depicted the man as reasonable and humane, but a loyal Russian operative. Many defectors had become spies and Harris had to be careful since such an incident might cause friction in both the Kommandatura and the Allied Control Council.

  Böhm nodded. “Anything you want.”

  Dean couldn’t help but smile at the other man who was so obviously desperate. “You must know that there’s no way back, ever. So, what made you take this decision?”

  “I have come to the conclusion that Stalin and his cronies have perverted the idea of communism to such a point that I can’t shoulder the responsibility of being part of these crimes against humanity.” Böhm straightened his shoulders and his eyes locked with Dean’s. “You will understand that I need to keep some of my knowledge as a pledge to make sure you get me safely out of Berlin and into the American zone in Germany. But I promise to tell your people everything I know, including…” Böhm looked around the room as if to make sure nobody was present to overhear them. “…the truth about the student leaders Tauber and Berger.”

  Dean suppressed a gasp. Böhm had just validated his suspicions about the sudden confessions of the student leaders who fought for more democracy and less indoctrination. But he thought it wiser not to react to the bait.

  “I understand your need to keep an ace up your sleeve, but I will need something with more substance to believe you. Smuggling a man of your position out of Berlin isn’t an easy undertaking and we risk the wrath of your Soviet masters.”

  Böhm visibly flinched when Dean mentioned his Soviet masters, which led him to believe Böhm was telling the truth. More than ever Dean wished to have one of his experienced interrogators by his side. But since he’d promised the other man absolute confidentiality, he had to rely on his own instincts.

  “I can’t divulge anything right now, because if I do, and the Soviets somehow find out…” Böhm didn’t finish his sentence. “Please, you must believe me. I will answer any and all questions as soon as I’m in a safe place.” Böhm’s pleading face shook Dean to the core. Having fought his way from Normandy all the way across the Rhine, he knew a desperate man when he saw one.

  “All right. Walk from the Brandenburger Tor in the direction Tiergarten at 8 a.m. tomorrow morning. Someone will ask you for directions to Alexanderplatz. Follow this person,” he instructed Böhm, while his mind fervently tried to come up with a plan to take it from there. “Don’t take anything with you, except for a briefcase with your dearest things.”

  Böhm nodded and made to get up.

  “One more thing. If you’re not alone or are followed, we scrub the entire operation, and there won’t be a second chance,” Dean said.

  “Understood. And, thank you.” Böhm hesitated for a split second, but then turned around and left the room, leaving Dean frantically thinking about a way to get the defector out of Berlin.

  By air, obviously, but how to get him safely to Tempelhof airport? And whom should he send to the meeting point? It had to be a civilian, someone entirely innocuous. A woman.

  He picked up the phone to dial the number of his deputy and organize Böhm’s escape from the Soviet sphere of influence.

  Chapter 35

  July 1947

  On his way home, Werner was plagued with doubts. For one thing, he didn’t have anything but Dean Harris’ word. What if the American turned on him and called Sokolov? Cold sweat broke out and ran in rivulets down his back.

  He balled his trembling hands into fists and hid them in the pockets of his coat. He had no option but to trust Harris, since he’d gambled his life on the premise that an American promise had more substance than a Russian one. What if he had misjudged the American Kommandant?

  Suddenly he began to see NKVD police at every corner, ready to pounce on him. Completely shaken and exhausted he arrived at his office in the Haus der Einheit .

  “Hey, Böhm, running late today?”

  His head snapped in the direction of the caller, instinctively raising his hands to parry an attack. “Oh, good morning Comrade, the bus had to stop because of an accident.”

  Renk shook his head, “I really don’t understand why you insist on using public transport when your position comes with the availability of a driver.”

  “Because it gives me a glimpse into the minds of the Berliners, which is useful for my propaganda work,” Werner said and hurried into his office, before he could give Renk a piece of his mind.

  What was more non-communist than the political elites driving by car, while the highly praised workers had to use public transport? Didn’t his colleagues notice the irony of it all? Didn’t anybody question whether all these spoils and privileges were compatible with Marx’s theories? The cars, the food, the pajoks , the villas, the trips to spe
cial recreation homes for party functionaries…the list went on and on.

  Nobody expected Norbert Gentner to live in a rotten basement with twelve other comrades like the industrial workers had to, but did he have to reside in a twenty-five-room villa with an old stock of trees in Pankow?

  Werner shrugged and settled at his desk to read the headlines of several newspapers, including the Soviet Tägliche Rundschau , the American Neue Zeitung and the British Die Welt .

  The usual bickering. Nothing of substance. He turned to the correspondence on his desk and diligently worked through it until the phone rang. He stared at the black apparatus and then at the watch on his desk. Way past noon. He’d forgotten to go for lunch.

  “Werner Böhm, SED headquarters, department for media and…”

  “Comrade Böhm, you’re requested at SMAD immediately,” a Russian voice barked into the phone.

  Hot and cold shivers attacked Werner and he stammered, “Yes, Comrade, I’ll take a car this very instant and will arrive within the hour. The other person hung up, leaving Werner frozen into place with fright.

  The only explanation for this was that Harris had broken his promise and alerted the Soviets. He pondered whether he should run, try to flee from Berlin on his own. But how, and where to? Or maybe it wasn’t Harris who’d talked, but they’d been observing him and now wanted to find out the reason for his visit with the American Kommandant.

  Werner clung to this notion like a lifeline. He would play for time, trust that the American hadn’t sold him out. He had only twenty more hours to endure. Putting on a confident smile, he told his secretary that he was needed in Karlshorst and might not return in the afternoon.

  Sweating like a decathlete his nerves were strung tight as he arrived Karlshorst, where he’d been not long before for the celebrations of the anniversary of Germany’s unconditional surrender. What a different setting it had been back then.

  Today the sentry looked grim and beckoned him to enter the huge ballroom. The room was crowded with mostly men in uniform and Werner gave a silent sigh of relief. They surely hadn’t called half of the garrison just to expose him as a dissenter. He nodded at familiar faces and finally found Norbert in the crowd.

  “Comrade Norbert, what’s going on?” he asked his boss.

  “An awful thing happened. Sokolov will speak in a few minutes,” Gentner said.

  When Sokolov climbed the podium twenty minutes later and told the crowd that France and Britain had had the guts to invite twenty-two European countries to the so-called Marshall Conference in Paris, Werner wanted to weep with joy.

  “This is a direct affront against the first socialist state, the Soviet Union, and all our brother countries in the world. The imperialist warmongers and enemies of the people are finally showing their real faces. They have succumbed to the American capitalists’ intent on destroying the world and flung the gauntlet against the peace-loving people’s democracies.” Sokolov droned on and on about the perceived impudence of the Americans wanting to help war-ravaged Europe and even include the socialist Eastern European states. It was a vile plan for interference in the domestic affairs of other countries and showed once again the American quest for economic imperialism and domination.

  Werner stopped listening. In reality, the Soviets objected the Marshall Plan for more petty reasons. They didn’t want to tolerate economic aid to Germany, because this nation had greatly devastated the Soviet Union just a few years earlier and should pay the price for decades to come.

  When the British and French representatives wouldn’t agree to the Soviet’s demands of having complete control over any aid given to Germany plus the knowledge which nation was given how much money by the Americans, the Soviet Foreign minister stormed out of the meeting. And now he was offended, that the other Allies pursued the plan without him?

  Distortion of facts and fear-based reporting had become such an ingrained part of the Soviet-style communism, that he wanted to puke. Any doubts whether it was the right thing to defect instead of trying to reform the system from within vanished not only with Sokolov’s words, but also with the subsequent unanimous condemnation of the American effort to actually help starving people.

  There was no way Werner could stand behind this cruel system one moment longer. He anxiously awaited the next morning when he’d leave all of this behind and start a new life.

  After lengthy discussions and dinner, he didn’t return to his office, but told the driver to take him directly to the apartment in Pankow he shared with Horst. Much to his relief, his roommate wasn’t home, which gave him the time to say goodbye. He wandered through the apartment, impressing every detail upon his memory.

  Then he packed his briefcase, taking only the most precious things with him. His identity documents, money, a picture of his parents, a small booklet his first politics teacher had given him back in Moscow.

  His fingers caressed the heavy paperweight Marlene had given him. Memories of her saddened his soul. He’d never see her again, and he couldn’t even take her gift with him. In case he was stopped and searched, he could only take things that wouldn’t awaken suspicion.

  With a weary heart he went to sleep, hoping he was taking the correct decision. Because once he defected, he’d never be able to return. Not to Berlin, and not to the Soviet Union. He’d never see any of his friends – and his parents, should they still be alive – again. A single tear rolled down his cheek. He wiped it away. Then he wrote a letter to Marlene, hoping the Americans would be able to give it to her.

  The next morning, he woke well before dawn, giddy with anticipation, but also full of fear. He took great care with getting dressed, shaved and combed and then left everything the same way as every other day. When his going missing would inevitably be registered, should they think he’d left for the office and perhaps gotten involved in an accident.

  He opened yesterday’s Pravda newspaper on the page of an article about the successful land reform as if he intended to continue reading after work and then left the apartment. Dawdling and taking extra precautions that nobody followed him, he arrived at the Brandenburg Gate two minutes early. As instructed, he followed the Charlottenburger Chaussee that the Nazis had included in their megalomaniac project “World Capital Germania” and renamed to East-West-Axis into the direction of the S-Bahn station Tiergarten.

  Purposely walking slowly, he soon saw a platinum-blonde woman stepping out from behind some trees lining the Chaussee, walking directly toward him. His heart missed a beat or two, while he pretended not to notice her.

  “Excuse me, mein Herr , could you please tell me how to get to Alexanderplatz?” A melodious voice trilled.

  He recognized the singer Brunhilde von Sinnen and wondered whether this was a coincidence are whether she actually worked for the Americans. But since no other person was nearby, he answered with fear gnawing at his stomach, “Certainly, Fräulein von Sinnen, I’ll show you the way.”

  “Come with me,” she said, linking her arm with his. She behaved as if they were on a romantic date and steered him toward the Tiergarten station. From there they took the train a few stations deep into the American sector and surfaced at the German Opera, where she waved down a taxi.

  Fräulein von Sinnen told him to get inside before she turned around and left. His heart stopped. Now he was sure it was a trap. Hadn’t she been Orlovski’s paramour? Had the Russians promised her to return Feodor if she turned him in?

  “Wait,” he called after her and quickly fumbled the envelope with Marlene’s name from his briefcase. “Can you please give this to your friend Fräulein Kupfer?”

  She nodded and put the letter in her purse.

  “Hop in. Fast,” the driver said with a thick American accent and Werner did just that. He was handed an American army cap and told to put it on.

  “So, this is my escape?” he asked the driver, who turned toward him with a broad grin.

  “Looks like it. Seems the bosses really want you. We’re going straight to T
empelhof.”

  Tempelhof, the American airport. They’d decided to fly him out right away. Werner knew it wasn’t his to ask any more questions, so he contented himself with thanking the driver and watching the buildings fly by at breakneck speed.

  With nothing else to occupy his mind he scrutinized his decision for the umpteenth time. Meeting with Fräulein von Sinnen had kindled his doubts. Would his defection validate Marlene’s judgement of him as a spineless coward? Should he have stayed and fought? Could he have changed a thing?

  They arrived at the Tempelhof airport and a sentry stopped the car to ask for their credentials. The driver showed his identity card and the man quickly waved them through and they drove around the building directly onto the airfield.

  Werner was impressed. The car stopped beside a plane already waiting on the field and he was relieved to recognize Dean Harris coming down the gangway.

  “Welcome on American ground,” he greeted him. ““You’ll be flying with General Clay on his private plane to Wiesbaden airport. He’ll instruct you about the further procedure.”

  “Thank you so much, Herr Kommandant,” Werner said and shook Harris’ hand. “I’ll be forever indebted to you.”

  Then he walked up the gangway to join General Clay, whom he’d seen on several formal occasions in the SMAD, but had never actually talked to. Within minutes they were airborne, and Werner soon found out that Clay wasn’t the monster the Soviet’s painted him as, but was in fact an intelligent and friendly man.

  Chapter 36

  RIAS radio was playing music when a ringing sounded. Marlene and Lotte both looked up from their homework, confused by the unfamiliar sound.

  “What was that?” Marlene asked.

  “I think the doorbell, they finally repaired it yesterday. I’ll go and have a look.” Lotte got up and opened the door. Moments later she stood in the room with Bruni in tow.

  “Bruni! What brings you here?” Marlene almost choked. Bruni rarely came to visit.