‘No thanks.’
‘Want to do anything else?’
‘No thanks, but I appreciate the offer. I’m Charlie, by the way. I’ll buy you a drink if you like.’
The barman must have been able to lip-read: he was over with a bottle of pretendy champagne. She waved that away. ‘Scotch,’ she told him, and then asked me, ‘That all right by you?’
We drank scotch. A quick one each, followed by a slow one. It was the real thing. She said, ‘Don’t mind me asking, but why did you say No? I don’t make those offers every day.’ Then she laughed, and added, ‘Shit, that’s a lie. Of course I do . . . you catch something?’
‘No, nothing like that. I’ve just never been with a black woman before . . .’
‘Ah. I see . . . you’re one of those.’
‘One of what?’
‘You have prejudice, don’t you?’
Laughing was probably the wrong thing to do. I did it anyway, and used the words I’d said a few seconds earlier.
‘No, nothing like that. I’ll just keep you for later. You’re a pleasure I’m holding back for another few years. Cheers.’
She took minutes to digest that, and spent it sipping whisky. Then she said, ‘What if you get yours just this very minute? Blam! Just like that? You step out of the club, a truck gets you and you’re absolutely dead. What then?’
‘Then I go to my maker with the knowledge that I stayed true to my principles until the very end. What’s your name?’
‘Lucy. I’m a nurse with a black outfit. I don’t know why I started doing this.’
‘So you could meet nice people like me, and make money.’
She laughed this time. She sounded as if she meant it.
‘I’ll never understand you English.’
I stretched over and touched her shoulder just to see what she felt like. She felt smooth and dry and cool. I waved the waiter for another couple of drinks.
‘You should put some clothes on,’ I told her. ‘Winter’s here: you’ll catch your death.’
Tommo had the strangest house I’d ever seen. He lived in a couple of railway carriages on rails in a forest clearing. It took us an hour to get out to them. His girl slept in the back seat of his Horch limousine for most of the journey.
‘Private train to a general in da war,’ he told me. ‘Makes a nice home.’
‘Unusual anyway.’
‘Stay here while I make us safe won’t ya.’ Then he looked at the girl and said, ‘You too. Don’t move.’ She yawned and smiled and nodded. I don’t want to be cruel – because she was an exquisitely beautiful, nice-natured girl – but I was beginning to suspect that we’d almost reached the limit of her vocabulary. Tommo was halfway across the clearing, in the car’s headlights, before a large black bear hurled itself out of the forest and attacked him – rearing up on its hind legs. That’s what it looked like anyway. I grabbed for the door handle but the girl pulled me back.
It was actually a huge shaggy German shepherd dog that was happy to see him. When it stood up it could place its forepaws on his shoulders. I thought that Tommo was going to put his head in its mouth, like lion tamers do. The dog seemed to think that Tommo’s face needed a lot of licking. He chained the animal up to a boxlike kennel by a carriage, and then beckoned us over. The dog had orange eyes and looked at me as if I was supper. Tommo bent below the carriage and came out with the end of a stout electrical cable with a bayonet junction. ‘I got eight Kraut Teller mines under these babies, an’ a pressure pad under my big chair. Anyone who breaks in an’ sits down uninvited goes into orbit: one-way trip.’
‘But they’re safe for now?’ I asked him.
‘You wanna live for ever, Charlie?’ He’d asked me that before, hadn’t he? The woman obviously knew her way around, because as soon as we climbed up into the carriages she started to fire up a large wood stove: I hoped it wasn’t above the mines. Tommo opened a couple of bottles of wine, and she produced some shaped pieces of toasted bread topped off with smoked cheese and a fishy paste. They were like an old married couple. She kissed him on the forehead before she left us, and gravely wished me a peaceful night in laboured English. Tommo asked, ‘Fancy a game of chess before we turn in?’ He never failed to surprise me.
‘If we can keep our clothes on.’
He won. I think he cheated.
The second carriage had been split into two bedrooms with a bathroom between them, so I suppose that I slept about thirty feet away from them. I could still hear them through the two walls between us; maybe they were actually more like a newly married couple. The dog heard them too and set up a mournful howl. I pulled the pillows over my ears and went to sleep.
In the morning the early sunshine didn’t lift the frost from the grass. The floor of the clearing was like a multi-faceted mirror. Tommo never did breakfast at home; we sat at a rustic table twelve feet from the carriages and drank terrific coffee. I asked him, ‘Was I sleeping over one of those . . . what did you call them? . . . Teller mines last night?’
He laughed. I always liked the sound of Tommo laughing. It made you feel as if someone was actually in charge of the world.
‘Two actually. Freak ya?’
‘I don’t know. How much is it in explosive terms?’
‘Each one would do the same as a 250lb bomb. Y’d never feel a thing.’
‘Why are they there?’
‘I got some stuff stashed here that shouldn’t fall into other hands. Know what I mean?’
‘No. Just tell your dog to stop looking at me like that.’ It hadn’t taken its eyes off me since we’d reappeared. It lay with its head on the ground between its paws and watched my every move. ‘What do you call it?’
‘Magda, after that Goebbels woman who poisoned all her kids – Magda’s got a bad attitude.’ We didn’t say we knew a Magda in Berlin.
‘Like your snake.’
‘Alice: yeah. I’m gonna take Alice back to the States with me.’
‘When will that be?’
‘Next month; month after maybe . . . that’s what I wanna talk to you about.’
I gave an exaggerated sigh but we were both still smiling.
‘OK, Tommo. What do you want me to do now?’ It was good to be back.
What he wanted me to do was take a bag of diamonds back to Berlin for him. It was an old sugar sack: he said it only weighed a quarter of a kilo – say ten ounces – and, naturally, he’d prefer it if I told no one else about it. When I asked him why he could bear to have it out of his sight for a minute, he told me it was something to do with not putting all of his eggs in one basket. That reminded me that I had been with him when he closed a black market deal for fresh eggs. A year later he was doing diamonds. People move on I guess.
That was what we talked about on the way to the Urdenvald, which was another hour away. I already told you I had a house there that I’d never seen, and Tommo had been rather insistent of late that I inspect my German responsibilities.
I liked the country I saw when we turned off the main road and onto a straight narrow way lined by pines. After half a mile we met a couple of iron gates with a couple of white-tops behind them. The MPs seemed to know Tommo – I shouldn’t have been surprised by that by now – and opened up for us. There was a gingerbread house just the other side. It was a nice house, but Tommo didn’t stop to let me see it.
‘Why can’t I stop and see my house, Tommo? Isn’t this why we came here?’
‘It’s the gatehouse, dummy.’
‘But it’s mine?’
‘’course it is. Ev’rythin’ you seen since we left the main road is yours.’
‘Even that?’ A big block loomed on our right.
‘That’s the stables, Charlie.’ He sounded a bit tired of me. ‘You gotta start thinkin’ big.’
‘How big?’
We drove out of the end of the straight avenue of trees and I saw a mad red-brick castle in front of us. It was as big as St Pancras station, and could have suffered from the same b
loody architect.
‘That big,’ Tommo said.
My brain told me that I was having a heart attack. I said, ‘Stop the car.’
‘Why?’
‘Stop the car: you’ll see.’
He stopped the car, and I got out and threw up on the verge. You’ll laugh at this, because you’ve probably dreamed of winning the Pools all your life, but what I could see scared the living daylights out of me. When I got back in the car I whispered, ‘Stop messing around, Tommo. Turn the car round. This can’t be mine.’
‘’course it is. Relax: you’ll get used to it. I got three like this. Quarter a Germany belongs to the Yanks these days.’
‘Please can we turn round, and go back?’
‘Nope. A bunch of folk over there has turned up to see you. You can’t disappoint them now.’ There was a small mixed group, including a couple of kids, waiting by a detached coach block. Tommo knew what I was going to ask when I nodded at it. He beat me to the draw – ‘Yep, that’s yourn too.’ He looked supremely pleased with himself, and lit one of his cigars. ‘Come and meet your subjects.’
He meant my tenants.
His laugh at me was almost a giggle; as if he had played a silly joke.
‘Do you think they saw me being sick?’
‘Don’t matter. You’re in charge: sooner they get used to yo’ mucky little ways the better.’
Tommo’s German was suddenly astonishingly good, because I’d never seen him as a linguist before. The local pastor had come to act as intermediary between me and my people, and was pleased he didn’t have to. After an initial bit of awkwardness I squatted down to shake hands with a couple of kids: one of each. The little boy asked me a question, and I didn’t get it the first time round, because he mumbled. A man went red in the face and stepped forward, but the pastor pulled him back. I explained to the children that I was still learning to speak German, and asked the boy to repeat his question slowly. His hands were shaking, so I held one of them. He said, ‘May we stay on our farm? Please.’ Bitte.
Pin-drop time.
‘Of course you can. Why would you want to leave?’
‘We do not want to go. My Mama and Poppa think you might want it for yourself.’
I shook my head. ‘You must all stay. I need children I can trust to live here.’
There was just a slight pause before he made his response. His chin came up. ‘Sie können uns vertrauen.’ You can trust us.
‘I know I can. You and your family can live there for ever if you want.’ He threw himself forward and hugged me; I hope that he didn’t notice the residual odour of vomit. When I stood up everyone was smiling, and wanted to shake my hand. Fergal had a phrase for moments like that: he used to say, God Bless Ireland!
I had to visit two farms and admire their livestock and fields. I had no idea what I was looking at. We were given a tour of my ersatz castle by a chatty Administration lieutenant with a stores branch somewhere – his two star general, who was the temporary resident, was temporarily back in the USA so everyone was relaxed and stood down. He explained that it had once been a hunting lodge enlarged by some important Nazi. Moving rapidly from room to room of my German residence took me more than an hour . . . I couldn’t wait to bring my dad over and show him. We stopped at the gatehouse, where an old lady too frail to move far hugged me and told me the estate now had the master it had waited for. They were good people: there wasn’t a Nazi among them of course. I had to keep reminding myself of that.
I drove us back to Frankfurt because Tommo had drunk too liberally at each of our stops: as soon as they learned that their current rent arrangement was to be continued indefinitely, and that I was prepared to give them squatters’ rights, a bottle came out. For some reason they seemed to like us.
‘What are their current rents?’ I asked Tommo in the car afterwards.
‘Zilch. Nozz-ing. They don’ pay. The rent you get for the big house more than makes up for it, and the service wants that until 1960 they say . . . you bought yerself a money tree. The Army’ll pressurize you to sell: make sure you say No.’
‘I don’t know what to say, Tommo. I’m a bit overwhelmed.’
‘Say Bravo, Charlie.’
I said, ‘Bravo,’ and Tommo tossed the end of his cigar out of the window, closed his eyes and went to sleep.
Spartacus was so pleased to see me that he pissed himself. I’ll bet you’ve never had that effect on animals. Luckily I’d met Hardisty outside at a coffee kiosk at the railway station, which was less ruined, I guessed, than when the Allies arrived. I couldn’t believe that we’d left it standing. Spartacus’s corrosive-smelling urine ran across the cracked cobbles and into the gutter. A plain woman in her forties, wearing a fine fur coat, stepped delicately over it. To hang on to a coat like that she must have been an officer’s lady: an American officer’s lady I mean. She smiled at us, and I smiled back. It seemed like a civilized thing to do.
‘Is the Scarecrow feeling any better?’ I asked him.
‘No: we can’t get the gaskets. Avro’s are flying some out to us today with some spares for the Flight Refuelling people. They won’t get down here until Wednesday or Thursday.’
‘Bollocks!’
‘Giz did his best.’
‘I know. It’s still bollocks.’
‘I got you on a flight to Tempelhof this afternoon. That was the best I could do.’
‘What will you do?’
‘Wait for Scarecrow with Gizzy. Someone will have to fly her out.’
‘What about the cargo she was supposed to be hauling?’
‘Borland has switched the others around. They’re being overflown, but he says he’s coping. You can see for yourself tonight.’
My people seemed to be managing OK in my absence. It’s the sort of thing that can make you feel unappreciated.
‘OK. What time am I out of here?’
‘14.00 local. We could run over there now, and catch a free lunch.’ He held up his hand without looking, and a taxi from the station cab stand sidled over. You’ve got to hand it to the Americans: whenever they move into an area the first thing that happens is the sanitation systems start working again, and then, miraculously, there are cabs everywhere.
We shared a table with a couple of Yankee air accident investigators who had come in for the C-54. They sat at a big table and it was noticeable that none of the regular aircrew would sit with them: they would rather double up on crowded tables or miss lunch altogether.
‘They think we bring them bad luck,’ the older of the two told me. He was soft-spoken, wore thick-rimmed spectacles and was losing his fair hair: tough for a thirty-year-old.
I asked him, ‘Do you know what happened yet?’
‘Officially no. There’s a lot of sifting to be done. Unofficially, the last two we looked at crashed because the pilots went to sleep. People are getting tired. They fly straight into the ground.’
‘So what do your reports say?’
The other one was small and dark, maybe my age. Even although he was close-shaved his chin was dark. He spat out, ‘Pilot error. What else?’
Hardisty pushed a hamburger around his plate, suddenly not hungry I guess.
‘Why don’t you point out that the schedules they’re flying are pushing them into the errors that are killing them?’
‘Blame the colonels who sign the orders? Nope, son; not our business. They can work that out for themselves if they care.’ It was the way things were then; nobody would put up with it today. An hour later I walked out onto the tarmac for a reunion with an old friend. Camel Caravan to Berlin stood there with her inadequate-looking props just turning over. She still looked brand-new. Inside she still smelt it.
Things must have hardened up in the week I was away, because when we were in the corridor to Tempelhof I counted three patrolling pairs of Russian fighters prowling along the boundaries. It wasn’t going to make what I planned to do any easier. Camel felt good: when an aircraft is new it feels tight – nothing ratt
les. You felt that she wouldn’t think twice about doing anything her pilot asked of her. Unless he fell asleep that is. Spartacus slept the whole trip: he had no such worries.
Bozey drove up to the Camel to meet me in a jeep. It was khaki, but had old RAF serials.
‘We have a jeep?’ I asked him as I flung my kitbag in the back and climbed in.
‘I won it in a card game. It’s good for moving around off-station. Better than your Merc.’
‘How’s that?’
‘Anyone in a jeep is one of the gallant Allies these days: feeding a beleaguered city. They leave us alone. Anyone in a private car is either a rich hoarder or a racketeer: sometimes they throw stones at you. The back window of your Merc is cracked.’
‘Doesn’t take long for things to change, does it? There were Red fighters all over the corridor.’
‘It’s not as bad in ours. The Russians seem to have taken a very personal dislike to Uncle Sam. They’re giving him a very hard time.’
‘Stands to reason, doesn’t it? Although they put up a good scrap at Stalingrad, and smashed the Wehrmacht to smithereens in the East, the truth is that without American weapons and supplies the Russians couldn’t have fought off the Jerry for another five minutes. America saved Russia, so naturally the Russians hate the Americans.’
‘I’m not sure that I understand that, boss.’
‘Mr Truman does. That’s the important thing.’
The flying and maintenance schedules on our office walls at Gatow were now on blackboards freshly painted up with aircraft, crews, destinations and cargoes. I made a decision: it was time that Bozey’s administration skills were recognized, but I wouldn’t tell him yet. I asked, ‘Is any other private airline allowed its own office around here?’
‘Shouldn’t think so, boss; the military is really pushed for space – and the other airlines are bloody awful with the cards, the lot of them, they couldn’t win at snap.’
‘What do you play?’
‘Anything. Bridge, chaser . . . poker of course. If you can bet on it I can play it.’
‘I never played poker.’
‘Technically it’s a bit tedious, but the tension really gets at you.’
The Hidden War Page 36