Meike slowly dragged her thumb across Helen’s lip. “Morning will be here soon. As you said, the time for talking is over. I, too, want to show you how I feel about you.”
When Meike placed her hand on Helen’s leg and gave it a gentle squeeze, Helen felt desire flow through her like a river. “Do you have any idea how much I want you?”
Meike flashed a coquettish smile. “You can show me when we return to Rheinsteifel.”
“How soon can we leave?”
Friedrich laughed as he sat across from them. “I’m so glad to see you looking this happy, Meike. You deserve it.”
“What about me?” Helen asked.
“The jury, as they say, is still out.”
They laughed at the joke and reminisced for a while about their shared history. Several minutes passed as they told stories that began with “Do you remember the time” and ended in raucous laughter. But the levity ended when Hans came into the room, a troubled expression on his face.
“What is it?” Friedrich rose from his seat so fast his chair tipped and fell over. “What’s wrong?”
Helen felt fear—real fear—for the first time since she’d arrived in Europe. The warm welcome she had received from Meike’s family and the laughs she had shared with Meike and Friedrich had filled her with a false sense of security. She had thought they were safe here in the warm kitchen of a quaint little house filled with love. But the look on Meike’s and Friedrich’s faces revealed the truth: in this day and age, no part of the continent was safe.
“Granted, my grasp of English isn’t as good as I would like it to be,” Hans said hesitantly in German, “but I think I have found some things you should see.”
He placed a pistol and several wrinkled sheets of paper on the table. Helen realized with a sinking heart that, while cleaning her coat, Hans had stumbled across the report she had written for Agent Lanier. The report that detailed her surveillance of Meike and her family. The report that uncovered the truth she had hoped to keep hidden. The report that revealed her identity as a spy.
“I brought the gun for protection and the pages are just some ideas I was putting down on paper for my next newspaper column. Nothing to concern yourselves over.”
She reached for the pages, but Friedrich grasped them before she could close her fingers around them. His face fell after he read no more than a few sentences. “It doesn’t seem like ‘nothing’ to me.” He pursed his lips in disapproval—and what looked like disappointment. “Meike, I think you should read this.”
“Don’t,” Helen said, making one last desperate grab for the report. “Meike, please don’t.”
Meike pulled the pages out of Helen’s reach, then lowered her eyes to read what Helen had written. When Meike looked up again, her eyes were filled with tears. “You were spying on me? On my family?”
“I can explain,” Helen said, but she had no clue how to begin.
“You thought I was a Nazi? You thought I was capable of committing the atrocities attributed to those animals?”
“No, I—You don’t understand, Meike.”
“You’re right. I don’t understand. I don’t understand how you could look me in the face and lie to me. I don’t understand how you could take advantage of my family’s hospitality the way you have. I don’t understand how you could tell me you love me—how you could make love to me—when you’re only in my life because you’ve been ordered to be. In that respect, you’re no different than Oskar Henkel.” Helen flinched at the all-too-apt comparison. “He was ordered to be in my life, too, but at least he was honest about his feelings for me. With him, I know exactly where I stand. With you, I’m lost.”
“I was honest about my feelings for you. I’m with you tonight because I want to be, not because of what I was asked to do. That’s how it was at the beginning, but it isn’t like that anymore.” Helen struggled to find the right words to say. The ones that would convince Meike she had been deceitful because she had to be, not because she wanted to be. Eventually, she found not only the right words to say but the only ones. The only words that would make a difference. The only words that mattered. “I love you, Meike.” She reached for her, but Meike pulled away. “Darling, please listen to—”
“Stop, Helen. I don’t want to hear any more of your lies. I just want you to go.”
“Meike, you don’t mean that. Just give me a chance to explain.”
“There is nothing to explain. You have taken the time to write it in great detail, leaving nothing to the imagination. I commend you on your hidden talent. I had no idea you were such an accomplished author.” Meike tossed the report into the fire. Helen watched the pages curl along the edges, then blacken and burst into flame. “Please leave.”
“Where do you expect me to go?” Helen asked hollowly. “I’m not even supposed to be here. How am I supposed to get out of the country when there’s no record of me entering it in the first place?”
“I don’t know and I don’t care.”
Helen had never heard Meike sound so cold. When Meike had ended their affair two years before, there had been warmth in her voice, a tenderness that had softened the blow. Helen felt none of that warmth now. And the pain she felt was infinitely worse. Because this time she had only herself to blame. “You don’t mean that.”
“Yes, I do.” Meike’s voice trembled, but her resolve was firm. “I never want to see you again.”
There was no denying the finality Helen heard in Meike’s words. She had lost Meike again. This time not just as a lover but as a friend as well.
Her vision clouded by tears, she ran out of the house and stumbled through the city streets in search of what she could never hope to find: her way home.
Chapter Nine
May 1938
Rheinsteifel, Germany
Meike felt numb. And this time it had nothing to do with the cold. Helen had betrayed her. Helen, a woman she had thought she could trust. Helen, a woman who had professed to love her. She had been wrong to trust Helen and even more misguided to think her feelings were genuine. Based on her actions, Helen had felt nothing for her except curiosity and, perhaps, contempt.
She closed the entrance to the secret passageway behind her, shed her damp kerchief and coat, and lit a fire in the fireplace. She stared at her bedroom door while she warmed her hands on the flickering flames. Had Helen made it back to Rheinsteifel safely or was she still wandering the streets of Rorschach looking for the entrance to the tunnel?
“Forget about her.” She turned away from the door and poured herself a healthy glass of whiskey. “Her well-being isn’t your concern. She doesn’t care about you. She never cared about you. She was only pretending in order to protect her cover.”
Her anger swelled as she remembered how Helen had invaded her family’s home and privacy under the guise of friendship in order to further her cause. In order to spy on her and her supposed Nazi allies.
Helen had asked her more questions over the past few weeks than she had in the entire time they had known each other. Meike had thought Helen was trying to get to know her better. To get closer to her. She had been right about that, though not for the reason she had hoped. Helen had only been interested in gathering information, not crafting a relationship.
“Keep your friends close and your enemies closer,” Meike said bitterly.
She winced as the alcohol seared its way down her throat. But the whiskey’s burn paled in comparison to the scorching heat she had felt when Helen’s lips had met hers in the tunnel. She closed her eyes as she remembered the feverish way Helen had made love to her. With one touch, Helen had torched her soul. Branded her heart. How could something that had felt so real have proven to be so false?
Meike set her empty highball glass down and crossed the hall. She simultaneously dreaded and anticipated the confrontation she was about to have, but she needed answers. And only Helen could provide them.
As the morning sun began to chase away the dawn, Meike knocked lightly on the guest
room door and waited for a response. “Helen?” she asked when she didn’t hear a reply. She waited another beat, then pushed the door open and tentatively ventured inside. “Helen?”
The bed was freshly made and the trunks and suitcases that had recently littered the floor had disappeared. The room was empty. Meike opened the dresser, cabinet, and closet. Each proved as empty as the last. Helen was gone.
Almuth stuck her head into the open doorway as she paused on her way to the kitchen. Meike’s parents were early risers and would be expecting breakfast soon. “May I help you with something, Miss von Bismarck?” Almuth asked as she tightened the strings of the white apron covering her gray uniform.
“I was looking for Miss Wheeler. Have you seen her this morning?”
“No. Barbara said she left hours ago.”
“In the middle of the night?” Helen had managed to make it out of Switzerland, but she was still missing. And possibly in danger. Meike told herself she shouldn’t care what happened to Helen, especially after everything she had discovered about her the night before, but she couldn’t help being concerned. “Do you know where she went?”
“She woke Rainer and asked him to drive her to the train station. He tried to tell her the trains don’t run at that time of night and she should wait until morning, but she was rather insistent. You know how Americans are. Always in a rush to get somewhere. I’m sorry you didn’t get a chance to say good-bye to her, but I am sure she will be fine. If you don’t need anything else, I had better get to work. Your father has requested potato pancakes today and the potatoes aren’t going to grate themselves.”
“Yes, of course, Almuth. Thank you.”
Meike had felt betrayed in Rorschach. In Rheinsteifel, she felt abandoned. And she couldn’t tell which was worse. Unsure where to turn, she returned to her bedroom and crawled into bed. Mental and physical fatigue had left her feeling exhausted. She closed her eyes, hoping to get a few hours’ rest, but her mother’s agonized wail shattered the early morning silence.
Fearing something dreadful had happened to her father or brother, Meike leaped out of bed and threw the door open. “Mother, what is it?” she asked as she ran down the stairs.
“Save yourself, Meike! They have come for you!”
Meike’s mother threw her weight against the front door, but Oskar Henkel and three other SS agents wouldn’t be denied entrance.
“Pack a bag, Miss von Bismarck,” Oskar said. “You’re coming with us.”
“Let me guess,” Meike said. “The Führer wants to see me.”
Oskar’s malicious smile sent a chill down Meike’s spine. “Not today. Today, our leader has something else in mind.” He snapped his fingers. “Peter, Lukas.” Two baby-faced agents stepped forward and saluted. The third guarded the open door, preventing anyone from passing through it. “Go with her. Make sure she doesn’t take anything she doesn’t need.”
“Yes, sir.”
“She hasn’t done anything wrong.” Meike’s mother clutched at Oskar’s arm. “You can’t take her.”
“You’re probably unaccustomed to having anyone disagree with you, Countess, but the uniform I’m wearing allows me to do anything I want.” Oskar roughly shook Meike’s mother’s hand off his arm and shoved her to the floor.
Meike’s father helped her mother to her feet and turned on Oskar. “This is the second time you have come in my house and disrespected my family, Lt. Henkel. I won’t have it. Do you hear me? I won’t have it.”
When Meike’s father took a step toward him, Oskar drew his gun and cocked the hammer. “Stop where you are, Count von Bismarck, or I will kill you where you stand. Your daughter is coming with me.”
Despite the gun pointed at his head, Meike’s father didn’t halt his progress. He took another step toward Oskar. “The only way you are taking her is over my dead body.”
“As you wish.” Oskar’s knuckles turned white as he began to squeeze the trigger.
“No!” Meike stepped in before the standoff got out of hand. “Papa, please calm down,” she said, trying to sound as reassuring as she could. “Oskar, put the gun away. I will go with you and your men.”
“But what if you don’t come back?” her mother asked.
Meike glanced at Oskar, but she couldn’t tell by his expression if her absence from her family home would be temporary or permanent. She took her parents’ hands in hers. “Everything will be fine. You shall see.”
“Thank you for finally being reasonable, Miss von Bismarck. For your sake, I hope it isn’t too late.” Oskar holstered his gun and jerked his head toward the second floor. “You have five minutes to gather your things. Don’t keep me waiting.”
Peter and Lukas accompanied Meike to her room. They stood guard while she shoved some of her personal belongings and several days’ worth of clothes into a suitcase. After she secured the latches on the suitcase, she sat down hard. Should she slip into the secret passageway and attempt to escape through the tunnel or should she go downstairs and face her fate, whatever it might turn out to be? Her options were limited. If she refused to go with Oskar and his men, her parents would be forced to pay the ultimate price.
She picked up her suitcase, went downstairs, and hugged her parents good-bye. She tried to keep her emotions in check as her father sobbed on her shoulder.
“It’s okay, Papa,” she said, drying his tears. “Please don’t cry.”
Her mother was slightly more resolute. “Don’t worry about what might happen to your father and me as a consequence,” she whispered in Meike’s ear as she held her tight. “Do whatever you have to do to survive. Your father and I have lived our lives. We want you to be able to live yours.”
“Yes, Mother.”
Oskar impatiently drummed his fingers against the leather holster strapped to his side. “I hate to interrupt such a touching scene, but we really must be going.”
He nodded to Peter and Lukas, who each took Meike by the arm and marched her to the car waiting in the driveway. They directed her to climb in the backseat, then squeezed in next to her. The third agent slid behind the wheel and Oskar joined him in the passenger seat.
“Make yourself comfortable,” Oskar said. “We’re going for a nice, long drive.”
“Where are you taking me?”
“You’ll find out when we get there.” He turned to look at her. “How long did you think you could defy the regime before we decided to exact punishment?”
“I have no idea. But I will continue to defy you as long as I draw breath.”
Oskar shared a look with his fellow agents before turning his gaze back on her. “We will see if you are still singing the same tune in a few hours. I have a hunch you shall soon be more amenable to my requests.”
The car headed east toward Munich. Several hours later, the driver maneuvered the car through a set of iron gates emblazoned with the motto “Work will make you free.” Gaunt men and women with shaved heads, hollow eyes, and sallow cheeks watched from behind several rows of barbed wire fences as the car slowly drove past them.
“Where are we?” Meike asked.
“Welcome to Dachau,” Oskar said almost gleefully.
Meike recognized the name. Dachau was Germany’s first concentration camp. Opened on the grounds of an abandoned munitions factory, the camp had initially housed only political prisoners, but its numbers had recently begun to swell with detainees of all types. Meike assumed the prisoners’ “crimes” were represented by the various colored symbols that had been sewn to their uniforms.
“What do the colors mean?”
“Political prisoners wear red badges, professional criminals wear green, Jehovah’s Witnesses wear violet, emigrants wear blue, homosexuals like you wear the pink triangle, and Jews, of course, wear the yellow star. There are many more designations, but I won’t bother to list them. After you get settled in with the rest of your fellow prisoners, you can ask them yourself. Take her to the Schubraum.”
Peter and Lukas dragged her out of
the car and took her to a building that looked like a warehouse. Inside, she was forced to stand in front of a long, rectangular table and hand over her suitcase to a stone-faced guard who immediately began sifting through her belongings. She watched as, one by one, her possessions joined the piles of like items on the floor.
“Remove your jewelry and take off your clothes.” Thinking she must have misheard him, Meike didn’t move. The guard slapped his palm on the table so hard the sound was louder than a gunshot. “Now!”
Despite the chill in the cavernous room, Meike felt her face warm. The guards leered at her as she removed her clothes and placed them on the table.
“It is a pity such beauty is wasted on a deviant,” Oskar said as she stood naked before him.
Meike placed an arm across her breasts and a hand over her pubis in a vain attempt to regain some of her lost dignity. Making love to Helen in a filthy tunnel, she had felt beautiful. Standing in a pristine warehouse with the uncaring eyes of strangers on her, she felt unimaginably dirty.
Oskar turned to one of the few female guards. “Take her to the showers and give her a uniform. One with a pink badge so everyone knows why she belongs here.”
“Would you like me to shave her head first?”
“No.” Oskar ran his fingers through Meike’s hair. Even though he had her life in his hands, she recoiled from his touch. In return, Oskar fisted his hand in her hair to hold her still. “Do I have your attention now?” He tightened his grip when she didn’t respond. She felt droplets of blood form on her scalp and gasped from the pain. “There. That’s better.”
Break Point Page 14