Solitaire

by Jane Thynne

  She slipped and fell.

  Staggering to her feet she ran across the road, but her slip had allowed the man to gain ground so now he was at most fifty yards behind. Ahead of her lay the greasy waters of the Landwehrkanal, the moon splintered in its oily surface, a flight of steps leading down. The towpath was liquefying in the worsening rain, the mud glittering like pulverized diamonds. Even in normal times there was no lighting along the canal bank, but now the shadow was massed and bulky, the willows above shuddering in the wind.

  Blood rushed in her ears and, swifter than any human speed, a succession of images sped through her mind. Herself and the ten-year-old Erich on the roundabout swings at Luna Park, spinning faster and faster, and in the process spinning her own life out of its orbit. How would Erich survive? She hoped Emmy Goering’s intervention would spare him from the worst of any action and keep him out of the clutches of Goebbels. From what she knew of her godson he would detest being stuck in an office away from the fighting, but his obedience and sense of duty to the Fatherland was stronger than any other sentiment within him. Stronger, she felt sometimes, than love.

  Then came the faces of the people back home. Angela and Kenneth. Her father. The journalist Rupert Allingham, who had first suggested she try her luck in Berlin. Her old acting friend Ida McCloud, who had long since given up the stage for the job of vicar’s wife, an occupation that perfectly matched her deportment.

  And Ned Russell.

  That conversation they had, the morning in Lisbon, looking out at the harbour and waiting for the Windsors to board their ship. His large hand entirely enclosing her own. His talk about migratory terns, compelled by instinct to cross the globe, from wintering to breeding grounds, ending up at the same place each time. The crystal compass in their beaks guiding them through the invisible magnetic fields, connecting to magnetic north.

  You know you have someone to return to.

  Ned said he felt serene when he thought he would die, but there was no such serenity for Clara. She picked up her pace, but the path was slippery with darkness and her steps were sludgy, fenced in by railings blooming with rust. The way was narrower now, veering in towards the bank. The canal was clogged with weeds and smelled of rotting wood and dank slime. She was aware of the murk of movement and debris floating past, the surface arrowed with trails from half-submerged planks and other discarded objects. Suicides, perhaps, pecked by fish. This grim spot was a favourite for those Berliners desperate to end their lives. An image of herself flailing, sinking, flashed through her brain and galvanized her.

  She was in a horror film, a pathway of jagged shadows and tilted perspectives, the way ahead fraught with uncertainty. Then, suddenly, a crust of mud gave way beneath her and she skidded, costing her precious seconds, and before she knew it the man behind had gained ground and in the next second he was standing over her.

  The universe condensed around her so that it was just the two of them. A man and a woman. A scream froze in her throat. She saw nothing but the wild white of his eyes. She hit him with her fist once, in the windpipe, and he grunted and stepped back, then staggered forward again towards her. Another thrust, straight to his chest, pushed him dangerously close to the slow darkness of the canal, but he sidestepped and recovered himself.

  As if from far away she heard the man’s voice raised in protest, but she was locked in a cocoon of survival, her mind focused only on self-preservation. As he advanced again, she recalled their last encounter. This time she had no heavy bag to defend herself, but digging in her pocket she found something else. Ian Fleming’s pen.

  It’s useful in emergencies but be careful how you handle it. It emits a large amount of tear gas if you press the clip.

  Grappling with it, she reached up and pressed the clip hard, releasing a burst of vapour in the direction of his face. The man reeled and reached out a hand to his eyes, then lurched forward, clamping a hand over her mouth.

  ‘For God’s sake, stop! Listen to me! It’s not what you think.’

  It was an English voice. A voice that carried in its ether a world deeply known to her and, in the subconscious split second that she heard it, a tumult of images attached themselves; of London squares and pubs and parks. Of terraces and teashops and Victorian churches of hearty brick. Of grammar school, and the 5.15 from Waterloo to somewhere in the suburbs. The very sound of it silenced her.

  ‘I didn’t mean to scare you, Miss Vine.’

  The use of her name shocked her into speech. She sucked in a deep breath.

  ‘I . . . don’t . . . believe . . . you.’

  Her chest was heaving. She could feel the blood pulse in her throat. The words came out as gasps.

  ‘It’s the truth.’

  ‘Who are you?’

  ‘My name is Kolchev. Ljubo Kolchev. I work at the Romanian Embassy.’

  The Romanian Embassy? What had Hans Reuber said? A British agent. He’s posing as a press attaché at the Romanian Embassy.

  ‘Real name Wilson. Roger Wilson.’

  ‘What do you want?’

  ‘I’ll tell you. Only please, let’s keep walking. It’s less conspicuous that way.’

  They stumbled on through the rutted mud, then he led the way up from the towpath and she saw no option but to follow. He had dragged a handkerchief from his pocket and was rubbing at his eyes, trying to dissipate the tear gas.

  ‘Bloody hell. Where did you get that stuff? I’m half blind.’

  She gave no reply, so he added, ‘I mean you no harm. You must trust me.’

  ‘I have no intention of trusting you.’

  ‘For God’s sake.’

  His face was beaded with sweat, his voice at once urgent and aggrieved.

  ‘How can I convince you?’

  ‘You’d better make it good.’

  ‘I know where you work.’

  ‘Like anyone who visits the cinema.’

  ‘I know your address.’

  ‘So does everyone with a telephone directory.’

  ‘I know your code name.’

  That mystified her.

  ‘I don’t have a code name.’

  ‘But you do. You must know. It’s been in place for years. I heard you mentioned by your code name long before I knew it was you.’

  ‘What is it then?’

  ‘Solitaire.’

  Solitaire. In a flash she was back in 1933, and Leo Quinn was preparing to return to his work with the British secret service. Ten minutes earlier she had refused his proposal of marriage in order to stay in Berlin. She heard his protest. Do you really want to be a solitary? On your own? Because that’s what staying in Germany will mean, Clara. You’ll be a solitary. A solitary. What harsh, ungilded truth that name contained. It was the word they used for a lone operative, an isolated agent in the field. For years the word had burned in her as though it was written in fire, but now, hearing it spoken out loud, she wanted to cry because it was the last gift he had given her. Solitaire. Leo had made a name for her because she wouldn’t take his own.

  They were walking northwards up Hermann-Goering-Strasse. To the left lay the crepuscular gloom of the Tiergarten and to the right slumbered the long back gardens of the ministerial palaces. Wilson was still panting from the chase. Ruefully he rubbed the place on his throat where she had hit him.

  ‘Christ. I’d rather go ten rounds with Max Schmeling. You winded me pretty effectively before. I should have remembered what you were like.’

  ‘So it was you that night. In the street. I thought you were that man who has been attacking women on the S-Bahn.’

  ‘I suppose your caution does you credit.’ There was a resentful note to his voice. ‘It’s not been easy. I’ve been frantic at work, so there hasn’t been much opportunity to track you down. I’ve been trying to get in touch for weeks. I found you on the train, but we were interrupted. Then I approached you in the street, but you left me pretty much doubled up in pain. By the time I tried again you’d disappeared to Paris.’

  ‘How
did you know I was in Paris?’

  He was brushing the mud off his lapels.

  ‘I had a message from Hans Reuber. He was worried. He’d been told to expect you in Paris and assumed you were somebody’s spy. I couldn’t give anything away. I couldn’t tell him your precise status – I wouldn’t do that, Miss Vine. But I did my best to allay his fears.’

  So that was how Reuber had known that Clara was not working for the Nazis. It was not an unguarded slip on her part. Not carelessness or intuition. He had already been reassured about Clara’s allegiances.

  ‘Then before I knew it, you’d vanished.’

  Despite everything, she was not prepared to lower her guard. She would not tell him she had been in Lisbon, or what had happened there.

  ‘You’d better tell me what you wanted me for.’

  ‘To warn you, firstly.’

  ‘About the two agents captured at Venlo?’

  ‘So you heard.’

  ‘Are they still alive?’

  ‘I hope so. They’re in Sachsenhausen. Schellenberg was responsible for interrogating them. He wanted as many names as possible.’

  The leaden confirmation of her fears resounded within her.

  ‘And they gave him mine?”

  ‘We can’t be sure.’

  ‘What do you think?’

  ‘We have no proof.’ Wilson shook his head. ‘What we do know is that the damage inflicted on Britain’s espionage network in Europe has been immense. Disastrous. That’s why they want to contact you so urgently.’

  ‘Who does?’

  ‘London. They want you over there.’

  ‘What for?’

  ‘They need to reactivate you.’

  She was silent a while.

  ‘I don’t know. I need time to think about it.’

  ‘Time? There’s no time. Besides, you’ve had all the time you need, surely. You’ve been shutting yourself up in that apartment for months, going to work every day like a good citizen, keeping your head down. You must have done your thinking by now. You must have worked out what drives you.’

  Wilson was right, she could no longer stay still. The forces that drove her were the same as they had always been; friends murdered, forced into hiding or exile, the comfortable laughter of their persecutors, England, and a father who would rather appease a regime of murderers than stand up to them. Erich in a Luftwaffe uniform. A man who loved Latin and another who told her there was someone to return to.

  ‘Who exactly wants to see me?’

  Wilson’s voice, already quiet, lowered further.

  ‘Winston Churchill.’

  That silenced her. Eyes widened, she turned and stared at him but he carried on walking, a faceless mass with a luminous swastika bobbing in the dark.

  ‘Are you saying the Prime Minister has a message for me?’

  ‘A direct request. He wants to meet you.’

  Shock caught the breath in her throat.

  ‘What for?’

  ‘He’s establishing a new agency. They’re calling it the Special Operations Executive. And they want you to join them.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘They believe you have exceptional access. They’ll never be able to insert another agent with the connections that you have in Berlin. It’s not that we won’t get people in – there’ll be foreign workers sent to Germany for forced labour and we’ll be able to place some agents in that way to sabotage railways, power lines, telephone networks. To organize supply lines and link up resistance groups. But those are all low-level. To have a woman like you in the upper echelons, who’s been there from the beginning. That’s invaluable.’

  Clara felt unsteady on her feet, as if the paving stones of Hermann-Goering-Strasse had tipped and tilted beneath her.

  ‘So . . . what exactly will they want of me?’

  ‘If, as seems to be the case, the German counter-espionage services are suspicious of you, then you’re highly vulnerable, Miss Vine. You may be able to duck and dive for some time, God knows you’ve managed so far, but it might be that you find yourself in situations that are somewhat more challenging than a ministerial drinks party. So the SIS want you properly trained. They have a place out in Hertfordshire, at Knebworth.’

  ‘What would I learn?

  ‘How to kill with a single blow. Forge papers, make skeleton keys, pick locks. Morse code. Break into properties. Use a weapon. There are various psychological tests too. They get their people to walk along the tracks of the London Underground in the face of an approaching train.’

  ‘Did you do that yourself, Mr Wilson?’

  He shrugged, his face professionally deadened, blank enough to resist a Nazi interrogator, let alone an actress on a Berlin street. Roger Wilson was far too well versed in reserve to give away secrets. She wondered how old he was, and with what psychic blows that composure had been hammered into him.

  ‘The idea is to test your control under stress, but from what I’ve seen tonight, I think you might be able to handle that.’

  ‘How would you get me out?’

  ‘Not sure yet. I warn you, you may not have much notice. You need to be ready to leave immediately.’

  ‘Not immediately. I still have some matters here to settle.’

  ‘Does that mean you’ll come?’

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Onkel Toms Hütte was located in Zehlendorf at the end of the U3 line. When it was developed, the area had been envisaged as a revolution in communal living, a Utopian society at one with nature and a way for children to escape the squalid inner-city tenements and thrive in the fresh forest air. The eccentric name was the legacy of a nineteenth-century tavern and the buildings were just as unusual: modernist constructions inspired by Mondrian and Kandinsky, interspersed with paths and parks. Woodpeckers chirped away in the trees, deer skittered in the brushwood and geese flocked to the rush-fringed lakes. On that early August day however, the bucolic tranquillity was rent with the clatter and drill of construction workers. A very different development, commissioned by Heinrich Himmler, was underway on adjacent ground: a precisely symmetrical estate of traditional rustic cottages with neat wooden shutters and gabled windows, perfect for SS families. Utopia was no longer to be the preserve of the poor, with their wretched pallor and sun-starved faces. From now on the air and beauty of the area would be devoted to the cream of Nazi children. Already a competition had been held in Berlin’s schools to select suitable names for the streets and so far the winning entries included Führerstrasse, Victory Street and Duty Way. Originality was not an option.

  Not far away, Clara and Katerina sat at a café beside Krumme Lanke under a candy-striped awning. Katerina was taking small sips from a bottle of Coca-Cola with a straw, rationing herself strictly to make the unexpected luxury last. Close by a heron, like an untidy grey umbrella, unfolded its limbs and lifted off from the crystal lake, transforming the drops into glittering prisms.

  Only two hours earlier Clara had entered the NSV home in Lichterfelde for an interview with the most senior of the Brown Sisters. After listening to Clara’s speech in silence, Frau Schneider had delivered her verdict with a deference that only thinly veneered her disdain.

  ‘Normally, Fräulein Vine, the adoption of children would be unacceptable unless by families, and preferably those of the SS. In addition, there is something I must in all conscience tell you. I wouldn’t be doing my duty if I failed to alert you and besides, it’s on her files. The girl you have selected suffers from a congenital impairment. A leg problem.’

  ‘I didn’t notice.’

  ‘I thought I should point it out. In fact, she is what we call a category four child. Technically she is not eligible for adoption. It is most irregular. But in this case, we are prepared to make an exception, especially,’ she stopped and scrutinized again the paper in front of her with a mixture of bewilderment and annoyance, ‘for someone recommended by Frau Reich Marshal Goering herself.’

  ‘I hoped that would help. My position on t
he NSV orphan committee encouraged me to think about taking in a child myself.’

  ‘Of course. But it is important that you know the implications of the disability. As it happens, arrangements were in place for her to be transferred to a special hospital. The paperwork is all complete . . .’

  ‘That won’t be necessary. I’d like the adoption to take place immediately, Frau Schneider. I have filming commitments, you understand, and I would love to spend some time with Katerina before that happens.’

  Within half an hour she had completed the formalities while Katerina’s small case was packed and then the iron gates clanged shut behind them. With almost indecent haste Clara hurried them onto the U-Bahn, as though the supervisor might have second thoughts and reel them back in, and rode as far as possible, right to the outskirts of the city, so that Katerina would feel safe.

  It was a perfect afternoon. High clouds floated like dandelion clocks and linden blossom spiralled in the scintillating air. On a weekend the lakeside would have been packed with Berliners fleeing the city to sunbathe in the sandy reaches at the water’s edge, picnicking and playing cards and relaxing from the stress of city life, but that day they were the only customers at the café.

  Katerina sat with her peculiar stillness, watching a flock of black geese lift off the blank dazzle of the lake like letters unsticking from a page.

  ‘You don’t have any children yourself, do you?’

  ‘I have a godson. Erich. Perhaps you can meet him.’

  That morning Clara had received a call from Erich. His voice had that high pitch of excitement that told her in a second that her wish had been granted.

  ‘Clara! You’ll never guess what. I’ve been conscripted. To the Luftwaffe! I’m to report to the Air Ministry next week. I don’t even have to complete my school year. I was marked out, they said.’

  ‘Erich, that’s wonderful! Will you be flying planes?’

  ‘Not at first. There’s a lot of learning to do, technical stuff.’

  He skated over the detail, anxious to play down the disappointment of being office-bound.

  ‘But Clara,’ a note of sweetness entered his voice, the sweetness that had been there from the very first time she met him, an awkward ten-year-old, brimming with affection, ‘it’s near your apartment so I’ll still be able to see you.’