* * *
Hoffner drove, dirt and rock and distance ahead of them, and somewhere the darkness to come. It was hours of unbroken silence.
Finally Mila spoke. “I killed him.” She was staring out, her voice brittle like sand. Hoffner felt it on his cheek.
“No,” he said. “You didn’t.”
“The wife and the son.”
“No.”
“The girl fell and I—”
Hoffner brought the car to a sudden stop. The dust rose up, but she refused to look at him.
He had repeated the words a thousand times in his head, but still they caught in his throat: I brought her to this. I alone. She is guiltless; she will always be guiltless.
“There is nothing,” he said, “no moment you can point to and say, This is why a man is dead. Not now. Not in this Spain. This wasn’t for you.”
“No.” She continued to stare out. “You don’t understand.” At last she turned, her eyes clear and focused. “I saw the girl fall and I chose for Rivas to die. I would choose it again. The wife. The son. This isn’t guilt, Nikolai. I feel no sadness or despair. This is what it is to be in Spain; I know this now.” She stared across at him. “What I don’t know is if you can see it and choose to stay with me.”
Hoffner stared into the eyes, dry and spent. And he saw hope. Hope for himself. He had never imagined it.
“There is no choice,” he said. “I love you.”
He took her in his arms, and her face came up to his own. He knew he had given himself to her, and nothing as fleeting as doubt would ever enter his mind again. So he waited and let the unbearable sentiment of it take him. He kissed her. He felt the slenderness of her waist, the need in her hands as they pressed deep into him. And he found his breath and pulled back.
“I love you,” he said again.
She waited. “I’m glad of it.”
Hoffner clasped the wheel and took the car back onto the road.
* * *
There was a village inn for the night, and they slept, and in the morning they crossed just this side of Plasencia. It was a small platoon, papers glanced through, passage permitted. One of the soldiers asked where Hoffner had gotten the car. Stolen, he said, from a peasant using it for chickens. The men laughed and watched them drive through.
In Coria, he told her it would be better if he went to the headquarters alone: no need to explain a woman or the second Safe Conduct. It would be a German looking for Germans. She agreed, but they both knew he was doing it for her. She would sit in a church and wait.
At the headquarters Hoffner met little resistance. He was shown to a sergeant, who escorted him to a lieutenant, who finally took him to see a captain. The man was on the top floor, and when he turned from the window, he struck Hoffner across the face with such force that Hoffner went careening into the arms of the waiting lieutenant.
The captain—recently arrived from Zaragoza, and with a red mark below the eye that he wore like shame—smoothed back his hair and waited for Hoffner to regain his feet. He struck him again.
“Where is the woman?” Captain Doval said.
Hoffner straightened himself up. His mouth was full with blood. He turned and spat and said, “What woman?”
Doval struck him a third time. “Not so clever now.” He turned to the lieutenant. “Get this filth out of here and start looking for the woman.”
NINE YEARS
His cell smelled of mint. It made no sense. The walls were more mildew than stone, and the bars along the window peeled up in petals of iron and rust. There was a pot in the corner for his shit, and a cot with two chains holding it to the wall. For twenty minutes a day, a strip of sunlight crept up along the iron door, settled on the bolt, and then vanished, leaving behind a mist of heat and decay. At night there were screams, muffled cries of “¡Madre!” and “¡Socorro!” and always the sounds of a single shot and laughter.
Save for the pain from his beatings, Hoffner felt remarkably at peace. It was time now to sit and wait and die, and while Doval might have thought this a kind of torture, Hoffner lay with his back against the wall and understood that here, at the end, there was nothing to regret. He might have come up short in finding Georg, but the boy was alive.
Doval was proof of that. Hoffner had no doubt that Doval had made the second call to Berlin. He now knew what a fool he had been. If Georg were dead, Doval would have paraded the boy out, just to see Hoffner’s face. Georg was alive. As was Mila. These were pleasures Doval would never have denied himself.
Isolation, then, and the sometime wailing of a distant voice were all the solace that Hoffner needed. He was having trouble closing his left eye, and his hands were swollen, but such was the price for a quiet mind.
To be fair, it had taken him a day or so to get to this point. The first night had been a struggle not to lose himself. They had marched him out three times to a wall, set him against the wet bricks, and placed a blindfold over his eyes. Someone had fired a shot. Standing there, Hoffner had waited for the pain. Surely there was pain, he thought, and yet, could it be this quick, this deliberate? A guard had laughed and said, “You’re not dead, not yet,” and a hand had gripped his arm and taken him back to his cell. There, two others had spent a good hour battering his face.
“Now you’re ready,” one of them had said, and out to the wall again, the blindfold but no shot. Hoffner had waited for hours, his legs buckling, his eyes wet with tears, and he had heard the guards laugh, and again the rough grip on his arm as he was pulled back to his cell so they could work on the hands.
The third time, with the sun just coming up, there had been no blindfold, no guards. They had placed him across from the entrance gate, opened it, and left him there alone, twenty meters from the outside. Staring through, Hoffner had seen two women move across the square, a cart rolled into place. A man had filled a bucket with water. And Hoffner had looked up to see the figure of Doval in a window, staring down. Hoffner had kept himself perfectly still. When his legs finally gave out, the guards returned and dragged him back to his cell.
It was only on the third or fourth day that Hoffner realized they never asked any questions. The beatings were silent but no less vicious for it. There was nothing they hoped to learn from him, save perhaps for the time it took a man to sit and wait to be cracked across the face before begging to be killed. Hoffner decided to leave that choice in their hands. He respected the silence, everything beyond his own groans and the sound of his vomiting.
He thought of Mila—of course—and Georg, and little Mendy with his picture of the badge and the scrawl. These were obvious thoughts. Hoffner expected others to follow, the ones where a man sets his life in order before he knows he will die, but such things never came. Instead, it was brief images of Martha and Sascha, the water of Wannsee in the late summer, and the bludgeoned face of a man he had caught in the act of raping a woman nearly thirty years ago. There was nothing to them, no coherence. Hoffner wondered if perhaps this was the way a life settles itself, not with meaning or purpose but with memories recalled despite themselves. A beckoning to God might have brought some sense to it, but Hoffner knew there was nothing for him there.
Instead, he kept his mind on Mila. She had come at the end. She had been better than anything he had ever known. There had to be something in that. He pictured her back in Barcelona, and it was enough.
The bolt to his cell released, and the hinges creaked as the door opened. Hoffner sat patiently waiting for the order to stand. He had gotten up on his own two days ago and had received a fist to the groin. Better to wait.
The man barked, and Hoffner stood. Hoffner then stepped out into the hall and fell in behind the second guard.
Hoffner was now familiar with the curve of the wall, the number of paces between each cell, and the sounds of weeping and prayers behind each door. He thought, Shouldn’t the praying make it all right, not for the soul but for the soldiers passing by: the echo of a prayer, confirmation of a good Catholic waiting inside? Was
n’t that enough for a fascist to set a man free?
They came to the steps that led down to the large courtyard, where the wall awaited him. A light shone from a wire high above, and another was fixed to the wall. Hoffner placed it at somewhere between three and four in the morning. There had been rain and no moon, and the lights spread out in two wide ovals across the mud and tufts of wild grass. The air still smelled of rain and brought a welcome moistness to his lips.
The guards placed him by the wall and stepped to their positions across from him, rifles held at their chests. They waited. Minutes passed before a door in the distance opened and a man emerged. It was difficult to see him through the glare, but Hoffner knew it was Doval.
Doval stepped across to the main gate, opened it, and began to make his way back. He was in full uniform, his boots high to the knee. Hoffner hadn’t seen him this close since that first afternoon. Doval moved past the soldiers and up to Hoffner. He had been drinking.
“You’re dismissed,” Doval said to the two soldiers, as he stared at Hoffner.
The men turned at once and headed for the door. Doval waited for the sound of the latch before stepping closer.
“No one to stop you from going,” Doval said, his words loose. “Look around. No one.”
Hoffner stared ahead and said nothing.
Doval stepped back and pulled his pistol from his belt. He waved it toward the gate.
“Go,” he said. Hoffner continued to stare ahead, and Doval shouted, “Go!”
Hoffner began to walk, and thought, So this was how it was to be. A bullet to the head, quick and painless. Doval was too good a shot not to have the first find its mark. Hoffner kept his eyes on the gate. He felt his legs move. He tasted the rain on his lips, but he heard no sound. It was an odd sensation, the gate closer and closer, and all he wanted was to hear something—anything. Even his feet seemed to drag along the ground in perfect silence. His legs began to pitch, the anticipation of death like the ache of first love, but still he moved. It would come at the gate. This he knew. He needed only to make it to the gate.
He drew closer, and the square beyond widened in front of him. Hoffner saw a fountain off to the side. The back of his neck lifted, and the hairs rose as if they knew it was time. He thought to close his eyes, but why not take it all in?
Beyond him, out in the square, he saw a figure move from the shadows. Hoffner felt a moment’s hitch in his step. He heard the trickle of the fountain. The certainty of only moments ago slipped away, and Hoffner forced his mind to focus. The figure remained obscured, and still Hoffner drew closer.
He was at the gate. He was through it and into the square, and the figure was now in front of him. There was a glare on the face, a man, tall and narrow.
“Hallo, Inspector,” said the voice.
Hoffner stared. He saw the pale blue eyes of Anthony Wilson. Wilson was wearing short pants and climbing boots, and Hoffner felt his legs drop out from under him.
* * *
It was English whiskey.
They had patched his eye, and there was liniment on his knuckles and wrists. The right hand was wrapped, but it had been a quick job, the gauze already peeling up from his palm.
“Rough go of it, I imagine,” said Wilson.
Wilson was standing over Hoffner, holding the glass. The room was small, a bed and a desk and a few oil lamps keeping the shadows low. Hoffner was on the bed. He could feel the springs through the mattress. Wilson leaned in, and Hoffner took another sip.
He heard a rag being wrung out and looked beyond Wilson. Mila stood at a basin by the window. She stepped over and brought the rag to his head. She had a welt under her eye, and her lower lip was cracked. Hoffner reached up to touch it, and Wilson said, “An overeager guard yesterday. Just before we got here. I think the doctor is fine.”
Mila continued to press the rag against Hoffner’s head, and he ran his thumb along her cheek.
“Yes,” she said, “the doctor is fine.”
Hoffner kept his hand on her skin. She was warm and alive, and there was nothing that could have moved his fingers from her.
Wilson said, “Doval’s a nice piece of work.”
Hoffner continued to stare at her. She was concentrating on the cuts and bruises, and a large bump that had come courtesy of a pistol to the side of his head. He winced and she looked at him. She leaned in and kissed his mouth. It was only a moment, but it brought him upright, and Mila went back to the basin. Wilson had stepped over to the table, and Hoffner said, “What are you doing here, Wilson?”
Wilson poured another whiskey. “I don’t think they would have shot you.”
“What are you doing here?”
Wilson stepped over and handed Hoffner the glass. He retreated to the desk and poured one for himself. “I hear it was quite a performance in Zaragoza. Obviously you still have a few tricks left.”
Mila was back at his head with the rag, and Hoffner gently pushed her hand away. She tossed the rag onto the table and sat next to him. He took her hand and said, “Any chance I might find out why you’re here?”
Wilson took a sip. “Saving your life, I think.”
“I thought they weren’t going to shoot me.”
“Then saving the doctor’s.” Wilson took the bottle and pulled over a chair. He sat. “They found her yesterday morning, in a church of all places. Hell of a time convincing them to let her go. God it’s hot.” He drank.
Hoffner wanted to ask her, but not with Wilson in the room. He felt her thumb across his hand, and he drank.
Hoffner set the glass down. “I didn’t know the English and the fascists were on such good terms.”
“The Admiralty’s on good terms with everyone.” Wilson tossed back his glass. “We’re even quite chummy with the anarchists in Barcelona, although the Communists are proving a bit much. I imagine they always do.”
Wilson refilled the glasses, and Hoffner said, “And Captain Doval was happy to hand me over to you?”
The sweat on Wilson’s head had beaded at the brow. A single drop began to make its way down to the cheek. “Did he look happy?”
“No. He looked drunk.”
“Good. He might have shot you a few days ago. We had to get General Mola himself to put in a call to save you. God, I would have loved to have seen Doval’s face during that conversation.” Wilson drank again and smiled.
“And why would General Mola have cared one way or the other about me?”
“Because we told him to.”
“And the fascists are inclined to take orders from the English these days?”
“If they want us to keep quiet about what’s going on here, yes.”
Hoffner didn’t follow. “I thought you wanted to expose the Nazis.”
Wilson lapped at the last drops in his glass. “Then you thought wrong.”
Before Hoffner could answer, there was a knock at the door. Wilson put up his hand and turned to listen. The knock repeated. It came a third time, and Wilson stood. He moved to the door and opened it. Karl Vollman stepped into the room.
Vollman was dressed in peasant clothes, loose pants and a shirt smeared in oil and grit. He smelled of pine oil and manure. He had gotten some sun in the last week, making the white hair seem whiter still.
Wilson closed the door, and Vollman set a package on the desk. Vollman then turned to Hoffner.
“Hello, Inspector. Shithole attics and used-up men. Quite a life, isn’t it?”
* * *
Vollman, as it turned out, had been the first German to reach Teruel after Georg. That was over a week ago. He had met with Alfassi. He had seen Major Sanz. He had bypassed Tarancón and Toledo. Why, he said, was unimportant. What was clear was that he and Wilson were on very friendly terms.
Hoffner said, “Nice to see the English and Russian intelligence services working so closely with each other.”
“Soviet Intelligence,” Vollman corrected.
Hoffner’s hand was stiff from holding the glass. He felt it begin
to slip, and Mila took it from him. She then took his hand.
Hoffner said, “It still doesn’t explain why General Mola would have been happy to keep an old German cop alive. Any chance you can answer that one, Vollman? Wilson here seems less than willing.”
Wilson’s bald knees had grown pinker in the heat. They stared up at Hoffner even as the man himself remained perfectly still. Finally Wilson said, “A great deal can change in twelve days.”
“A straight answer,” Hoffner said. “I think you owe me that.”
Wilson continued to stare. He glanced at Vollman before saying, “Georg was meant to get the information about the weapons and then come home. Where they were being shipped. How the Germans were planning it. He wasn’t meant to go after them.”
“You mean he wasn’t meant to stop them,” said Hoffner.
“No, he wasn’t.”
“And yet he decided to do that.”
“Nobility’s a dangerous thing in naïve hands.”
“So you’re keen to let the Nazis destroy Spain.”
“If that’s what they want, yes.”
Hoffner felt Mila’s grip tighten, and he said, “I’m not sure I like it that you’re on my side. Either of you.”
“Actually, you do,” said Wilson. “You just don’t understand why. Twelve days ago Georg was missing, Franco was losing precious time in Morocco, and the anarchists were on the verge of beating back the rebellion. The rest of us were agreeing not to get involved.”
“I’m aware of all that.”
“Good. Then you’ll know it wasn’t true. The Germans were looking to find a way to get their guns and tanks in. The Americans at Texaco were working out how they could supply oil for the fascists and make their money. The Russians were shipping over what they could to keep the Reds afloat. And the French were doing what they always do—slipping into their turtle shell and hoping no one noticed that they lie directly on the road between Berlin and Madrid.”
“So much for a straight answer,” said Hoffner. “You’ve left out your English, by the way.”
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