by Alex Gerlis
Gunter Reinhart had developed a habit of leaving the enormous complex through different exits on different days. Had someone been observing him, which they would have no cause to do, they might be suspicious. But he did not vary his routine for reasons of security; the truth was far more prosaic than that. It afforded him the opportunity to take different routes home and on each of those routes lay various bars, where he could further delay his arrival there. At least it gave him something to think about during the afternoon.
There was no point in leaving through the Unterwasserstrasse exit because beyond that was the canal. He liked the anonymity and slightly rougher edge to the bars round Leipzigerstrasse, but that was further from home. Leaving through Französischestrasse meant heading towards the Unter den Linden, which one could never accuse of offering anonymity. He would, he decided, leave through Kurstrasse and find somewhere to stop off around Jägerstrasse.
These days, stepping out into the street after dark was like descending into a tunnel. Reinhart had mixed feelings about the blackout that descended upon Berlin at dusk. On the one hand, it conferred an atmosphere of privacy on the city. You felt you were in your own world. On the other, there was no question it made life more difficult. There were no street lights, buildings were dark and the trams moved around like ghost trains. Cars had just a small strip of paper over their headlights. Any lights that were allowed were covered in blue paper, while low-level red lamps marked danger spots such as roadworks. Then there was the phosphorous paint: gallons of the stuff liberally sloshed on the pavements and road surfaces to give pedestrians and drivers some chance of knowing where they were. The effect was quite eerie and unsettling. Berlin at night looked as if it was deserted. There were reports of numerous traffic accidents and people being killed from walking into things or falling over in the blackout. The sister of one of the secretaries in his office had died when she stepped off the platform at Kaiserhof station. And then there were the rumours. Berlin thrived on rumours anyway; they had been part an essential part of its pre-war diet. Now, rumours were disseminated in more hushed and guarded tones. The latest was that a murderer was taking advantage of the blackout and had already killed a dozen young women. There had even been oblique references to it in the newspapers. Naturally, the police said they suspected the person responsible was Jewish; or Polish; or both.
The few people who moved around the city at night did so tentatively, as if wading through water. Some had taken to whistling or coughing constantly so as to alert others to their proximity and thus avoid bumping into them. But that was something of a forlorn hope: it was impossible to avoid other people.
Even though this was a route he knew very well, on nights like this, when there was no moonlight, Gunter Reinhart could not find his bearings. Just after the intersection with Friedrichstrasse, he came across a group of men silently beating up a man on the ground. He paused for a moment, taking in the surreal nature of what he was witnessing before he decided to cross the road. He had learned to keep well away from trouble. Suddenly, a long black car swept passed him and stopped. Very quickly, the man who was being attacked was bundled in.
Six months previously he would have been shaken to the core by what he had seen, but now it was quickly forgotten. He was more concerned with finding somewhere to drink. Looming out of the dark, he spotted the dim blue-covered sign for Das Potsdamer Taverne, a bar he used to visit at least twice a week, though recently it had become something of a favourite haunt for a group of young SS officers. Given that the whole point of going to the bar was to relax, they were the last people he’d want to find in there.
He walked slowly down the steep steps to the basement, clutching on to the iron railings and keeping a careful eye on the dabs of phosphorous paint on the steps. The bar had a low ceiling which caused him to stoop. Through the blue-brown cigarette smoke he could see perhaps half a dozen other customers spread out: all alone, all smoking, all drinking quietly, all sitting as far as they could manage from each other. Like him, they were avoiding going home. There was no sign of the SS, or indeed anyone else in uniform.
The barmaid caught his eye as he waited to order a drink.
‘How are you?’ she asked. ‘I haven’t seen you for a while.’
‘A week perhaps? No more than that. I was in here last week.’
The kind of conversation repeated in bars around the world, between barmaids and husbands who would rather not go home.
She was a friendly girl with broad shoulders and hair that looked as if it had been dyed yellow. His wife, in her usual waspish manner, would describe her in the unlikely event of her ever meeting her by saying that she had seen better days, but she had friendly eyes and a seductive voice, with a distinctive Bavarian accent. She kept glancing at him as she pulled the beer, her eyes darting around. He started to move away, hoping to find a seat on his own. She held up her hand. Wait a moment.
When she had finished serving another customer she leaned over to talk quietly to him.
‘A man was in here asking about you.’
Eight words no-one wanted to hear in Berlin in 1940.
‘What man?’
‘I don’t know, I’ve never seen him here before. He was very polite and well-spoken. A Berliner definitely: wore a nice coat.’
‘When was this?’
She leant back as if trying to calculate the answer.
‘Last Thursday, I think: and then again yesterday – Monday.’
Gunter Reinhart pulled up the stool next to him and sat on it. This was bad news. Who could possibly be coming into a bar to ask about him? People knew where he worked and where he lived.
‘And what did you say?’
‘He seemed like a nice man, but I didn’t want to say much. On the other hand, I didn’t want to lie. I just said you come in here every so often: about once a week these days. Was that alright?’
Not really.
‘Did he say anything else?’
‘Wait’. The barmaid knelt down and emerged with her handbag, which she rummaged through. ‘Here, I’ve found it. He said that if you come in, I’m to give this to you.’ She handed him a book of matches with Das Potsdamer Taverne on the front. He looked at it for a while, puzzled.
‘Open it.’
Neatly written inside were two dates.
Den 8 Juni 1901
Den 4 Oktober 1929
‘Are you alright?’
Gunter Reinhart was evidently not alright. The hand holding the book of matches was shaking and the other was gripping the bar tightly. Beads of sweat had formed on his forehead. He could feel his chest tightening.
‘Pardon?’
‘Are you alright? You look shaken.’
He put the matches in his top pocket and drank most of the glass of beer in one go. He pushed the empty glass towards her and nodded for her to refill it.
‘I’m fine, thank you. Did this man say how I could contact him?’
‘He said he’d be here at six o’clock every Thursday and Monday night until he was able to meet up with you.’
Reinhart stayed in the bar for another hour and three more beers before he decided to walk all the way home to Charlottenburg. It was a long walk, but he needed the time to compose himself. He crossed Hermann Goring Strasse, which people would quietly joke was almost as wide as the man himself, and into Charlottenburger Chaussee, the Tiergarten an enormous void on his left.
Despite the brisk night air and absence of British bombers, he found himself becoming increasingly tense rather than composed. He had continuously checked the dates before leaving the bar. There was no question about them.
Why on earth would someone write the down the birth dates of his first wife and his eldest son, especially now they were no longer in Berlin?
***
The following morning, Reinhart took extra care on his journey into work to ensure he wasn’t being followed, not that he was sure what he was meant to do. He was a banker: his knowledge of subterfuge was limited to the
world of finance. He could move funds from one bank account to another without leaving a trace, but he had no idea how to walk from one place to another without being spotted and, in any case, he towered above most other people. It wouldn’t be hard to follow him. When he arrived at the Reichsbank he casually enquired of his secretary – maybe a bit too casually – whether anyone had been asking for him: perhaps over the past few days? His secretary assured him that no-one had been asking after him. She looked appalled at the very thought that someone might have enquired of him and she would not have passed the information on.
His head of department informed him that Funk wanted to see them both the next morning: he wanted an urgent and up-to-date report on some of the new Swiss bank accounts. ‘You’re not to worry,’ he assured his head of department. ‘The information will be ready.’ Pulling it all together was at least a distraction for Reinhart, but it did mean his head of department fussed around him for the rest of the day. He was a rotund man whose suit was always too tight, with bad breath and clothes that reeked of mothballs. He had been promoted from his natural level as an assistant bank manager somewhere near Magdeburg simply due to a longstanding loyalty to the Nazi Party and as a consequence was now utterly out of his depth.
The next day – Thursday – followed a sleepless night. The meeting with Walther Funk proved to be but a two-hour distraction, even something of an amusement. The President of the Reichsbank, who doubled as Hitler’s Minister of Economics, was someone else who’d been promoted because of service to the Nazi Party rather than any kind of financial competence or knowledge. Reinhart produced a series of complicated balance sheets and lengthy lists of transactions. Funk was impressed and confused in equal measure, but unable to own up to the latter.
The afternoon went slowly and, as the sun disappeared over Berlin, Reinhart wondered whether he was being led into a trap. Maybe he had been a bit too clever by half. Maybe he’d upset one too many of the Nazi Party bosses at the top of the Reichsbank, who felt they had cause to distrust him. Gunter Reinhart, the man who knows everything about the Swiss accounts: time to put him in his place.
Das Potsdamer Taverne was as quiet as the previous night. He nodded at the barmaid and she smiled, slightly shaking her head: not yet.
There was a tiny table wedged into a corner behind the bar, and Reinhart took a seat there. He waited as the bar became quieter and was just wondering how long he should stay when he caught sight of a man who looked vaguely familiar and seemed to be glancing in his direction. The man remained at the bar, toying with a glass of beer. A few minutes later he appeared at Reinhart’s table.
‘Do you mind if I sit here?’
Reinhart was almost certain this man was a friend of his first wife’s family, a lawyer – specialising in banking and finance, rather intelligent and a bit too liberal for his liking: Catholic. First name Franz, if he remembered correctly. He doubted, though, this was the man who had gone to such lengths to meet him. After all, bumping into an acquaintance in the centre of Berlin was hardly the most remarkable of coincidences. The man produced a packet of cigarettes, took one out and placed it in Reinhart’s hand.
‘Would you like a light?’
Reinhart hesitated. The man reached into his pocket and found a book of matches, one with Das Potsdamer Taverne on the front. As he opened it he casually angled the packet so that Reinhart could clearly see it. Again, two dates were handwritten on the inside of the packet.
Den 8 Juni 1901
Den 4 Oktober 1929
This time it was in the unmistakably familiar handwriting of his first wife. The man shifted his chair even closer to Reinhart and when he spoke again it was in a quieter voice.
‘You remember me, Gunter? Franz Hermann. Just act normally, don’t speak too loud or too quietly. Smile occasionally.’
‘I remember you Franz. I guess it was you who’s been asking about me here?’
Hermann nodded.
‘What’s it all about? You’ve given me a couple of sleepless nights.’
‘I fear I’m about to give you many more. You see…’
He paused. A couple of Luftwaffe officers had come into the bar and moved noisily towards them, looking for somewhere to sit. Franz waited until they moved away.
‘Good, this is not a conversation we’d want them to overhear. Stop looking so worried Gunter; you’ll draw attention to yourself. Just relax and smile: we’re friends who’ve met in a bar. Don’t look like you’re being interrogated by the Gestapo. When did you last hear from Rosa?’
Gunter frowned, trying to remember.
‘There was a letter from Paris in October. She sent it at the beginning of October but I didn’t receive it until the end of the month: it came via a friend of hers in Switzerland and then through my brother.
‘How come?’
‘I don’t know if you’re aware, but I remarried soon after Rosa and I divorced. Far too soon, as it’s turned out. But we have children and it’s a situation I’m stuck with. Gudrun won’t tolerate me having any contact whatsoever with either Rosa or Alfred. As far as she’s concerned, I have nothing to do with them. It’s safer she thinks that: she’s become a devoted Nazi, like the rest of her family. The fact I was once married to a Jew and had a son with her is a terrible thing in Gudrun’s eyes. I’ve had to promise her I have no contact whatsoever with Rosa and Alfred, that I’ve disowned them. Have you heard from her Franz: is everything alright? What about Alfred?’
‘Gunter, unless you keep your voice down and act normally, we’re going to have a serious problem. Do you understand? Drink some of your beer. Try to look relaxed.’
Gunter nodded and composed himself. ‘I understand, but is there any news?’
‘For the time being, they’re safe.’
‘And they’re still in Paris?’
Hermann lowered his head and talked a little more quietly.
‘A smile please Gunter, you need to smile. We’re old friends meeting for a relaxed drink. Good, that’s better. You need to prepare yourself for what I’m about to say. They’re safe, for the time being: Rosa, Alfred and little Sophia. But I don’t know for how long. They’re in hiding you see. Here in Berlin.’
***
Gunter Reinhart had to wait three days before he could see his son and his ex-wife, along with her young daughter. Having to wait that long was bad enough, but visiting them on a Sunday presented added problems. Sunday was the day his wife demanded his undivided attention, but he insisted he had work commitments that were none of her business and he was able to slip out of the house once they returned from church.
‘They’re living with my mother in Dahlem: near the Botanischer Garten,’ Hermann had told him at the bar. ‘My mother has become quite unwell, unable to look after herself. She insists on staying in the old family home. She needed someone to live in and look after her and, luckily, with her qualifications and experience, Rosa is ideal. She’ll tell you the full story. On Sundays, my brother-in-law drives over from Brandenburg and takes her back to their house for lunch. She leaves at 11 in the morning and they bring her back around four, so that doesn’t leave much time.’
Not much time.
‘There’s no reason to think anyone will suspect what you are up to, Gunter,’ Franz had warned him, ‘but be careful. Assume you’re being followed and take basic precautions: walk at an even pace, don’t keep looking behind you – that kind of thing.’
So he walked at an even pace across Spandauer Strasse and caught the S-Bahn at Westend. He did as Hermann had advised: making sure he got onto the busiest carriage and watching out for anyone getting on at the same time as him. The train worked its way south at a Sunday pace. At Schmargendorf, he changed to the U-Bahn then headed south again, getting off at Podbielski Allee.
He wasn’t far now: he had not seen his son or Rosa for nearly six months. He had assumed they were out of the country. His excitement at seeing them was mixed with the shock they were still in Germany.
From Podbiels
ki Allee, he headed down Peter Lenne Strasse towards the Botanischer Garten. He had memorised Hermann’s instructions. ‘Write nothing down.’
At the end of the road, he turned left into Königin-Luise-Strasse, across the square then continued along Grunewald Strasse. ‘You know Kaiser Wilhelm Strasse, Gunter? Runs off Grunewald Strasse. Turn into there: first right is Arno-Holz Strasse. The white house on the corner is where my mother lives. I’ll be there from 12. If the curtains are drawn in window directly above the front door, it’s safe to approach, but please only do so if you believe you’ve not been followed. Otherwise, head down to the Botanischer Garten at a leisurely pace.’
He did as instructed. In other circumstances he would have enjoyed his walk on what had turned out to be an unseasonably warm afternoon. The house was as Hermann had described it, the front garden deep and heavy with trees, the walls white and in need of repainting and above the front door, a window. The curtains were drawn.
He looked around him once more, but the streets were deserted. He had not been followed. He unlatched a noisy iron gate and walked down the path. As he approached the porch, the front door opened and behind it he could see Franz Hermann, silently ushering him in.
They stood together in the dark hall of a silent house.
‘Are they here Franz?’
‘Upstairs. Take your shoes off.’
Gunter ran up the stairs. On the landing, waiting for him in the gloom, was his ex-wife and their son. Behind them, peering out from behind a door was Sophia, Rosa’s daughter from her second marriage.
Alfred flung himself at his father, holding him tight and burying his face in his chest. Gunter could feel the warm tears seeping through his shirt and vest. Rosa came up to him and held his face, kissing him tenderly on each cheek, her hand cupping the back of his neck. He could feel tears welling in his eyes. Little Sophia waved at him. He waved back.