‘Your German is much improved.’ Georgie’s smile was teasing.
‘So rude!’ He kept up the look of allure. ‘I’ll have you know I ordered a full meal in German the other night, and not once did the waitress ask me to repeat myself.’
‘And were you pointing to the menu at the time?’
He frowned good-humouredly. ‘Smug, Georgie Young – that’s what you are. Just you wait until we’re in Paris and I am regaling you with my fluent French tones.’
‘We’re going to Paris, are we?’ She was amused, lightened, if only for a few minutes, and even with the heavy approach of troopers outside. Where once the conversation might have halted on hearing the trudge of jackboots advancing, now the café dwellers simply raised their voices as they passed by. The echoes of war had already become part of the German soundtrack.
He lowered his face, words spoken into the tabletop. ‘Well, when we get kicked out of Germany for crimes against the Reich, I – for one – am not going back to dreary old London.’ His eyes went up suddenly; to an older man who walked in and swept by, bumping his chair and muttering ‘sorry’, then shuffling up to the bar.
‘Same again?’ Max offered and stood up.
The two men exchanged several words of greeting at the bar, as strangers often do, and Max brought the drinks back to the table, then disappeared in the direction of the toilets. The man followed him a minute later. The café clientele carried on oblivious while Georgie looked on, in semi-disbelief. This really was a scene out of a film noir, something the Gestapo would delight on discovering. She felt uneasy, and yet strangely excited, at the same time knowing that she would never make it as a spy – the charade was just too exhausting.
Max returned after a short time, and they picked up their pseudo love talk, sipping and smiling for a good quarter of an hour, while the man sat alone at the bar.
‘Shall we get dinner?’ Max said at last, and they walked out into the late-afternoon sunshine, he reaching for her hand to complete the façade. He was undoubtedly better at the ploy, but his hands were as sweaty as hers, with the heat and their joint purpose. Still, Georgie was surprised that it didn’t feel odd, or uncomfortable, their fingers meeting. And that felt odd too, an unexpected popping inside her chest.
‘Back to mine?’ he said, nudging into her shoulder.
She guessed he had some sort of envelope tucked under his jacket – the weather was hot enough that some men were in shirtsleeves, but enough wore suits for him not to stand out. He was sweating under his light jacket, and she could feel his muscles trying not to hold the precious envelope into his body too forcefully, sensed the effort in his fingers of appearing happy-go-lucky.
They took a tram to Max’s apartment in the Wilmersdorf district, going one extra stop when they both sensed one traveller looking a little too long and hard, Max taking Georgie’s hand and hopping off suddenly, leaving the startled observer on the tram. To be certain, they took a small detour through a local park, checking they had no other tail. Max lived in a large, unassuming residential block, with an entrance that led into a leafy courtyard, though scorched brown with the summer sun. Georgie had never visited before, and he led her by the hand up a stairwell onto the second floor. For such a large building, there were few people around, only an older woman who appeared at the landing door opposite, a white cat weaving around her ankles.
‘Evening, Frau Sommer,’ Max trilled, employing his best, charmed smile.
‘Evening.’ She jerked up her chin to Max, and frowned at Georgie. Was she surprised to see a woman, or just someone who wasn’t Simone? The cat mewed noisily, and Frau Sommer shushed it inside without a backward glance.
‘Is she all right?’ Georgie whispered.
‘I think so – moans endlessly about the Nazis. At least from what I can catch – she talks very fast. I just smile and nod, comment on the weather.’
Checking left and right, Max stopped short of putting his key in the door. Instead, he reached up to swipe away what appeared to be thin air, but was actually a piece of sewing thread hitched across the doorjamb. Satisfied it was intact, he unlocked the door.
‘Expecting company?’ Georgie said. Maybe she wasn’t being careful enough herself. Did they have cause to be wary?
‘Never underestimate those lovely boys in the Gestapo,’ he said, ‘especially after what happened to Rod.’
The apartment was not what she expected for a man living alone. It was certainly big enough to share, but it was also tidy – the living room had no debris from the kitchen, or shirts hung over the chairs. Nor the ashtray full of cigarettes that was a feature at Frida’s, or the remnants from her wardrobe draped across the floor. Although stuffy from heat, it had a pleasant smell to it. She wondered, too, how many times Simone had been there, felt her eyes scouting for any exotic residue. Any perfume odour? And then she told herself firmly to stop.
‘The perfect bachelor pad,’ she said. ‘Do you like living alone?’
‘I love it,’ he said. ‘After sharing a dorm with twenty other boys and then rooms at university, I am a blissfully happy lone tenant.’ Despite the heat outside, he was already pulling the curtains on the closed windows, creating an oven effect. He took off his jacket at last to reveal sweat patches on his shirt, puffing out his cheeks with relief.
He slapped a large envelope on the coffee table. ‘Let’s see what we’ve got,’ Max said decisively.
They each took ten sheets to scrutinise. The quality wasn’t good, as some frames had been enlarged, blurring the script.
‘There’s a letter here written from Major Schenk to Doctor Graf,’ Max added. ‘It’s a bit difficult to read but seems to be talking about finalising their “initiative” and commencing in the very near future – at Sachsenhausen.’
He looked at Georgie, face drawn. Neither was naive enough to think Doctor Graf was bent on improvements to the camp’s medical care; his speciality as a doctor lay elsewhere. Paul really had been onto something big.
‘I’ve also got a list of names,’ he went on, ‘with some sort of code by them – an “A” or a “D”. What do you think that means?’
‘Same type of thing here,’ Georgie agreed, ‘though some are handwritten by Kasper.’
Any file compiled by the Nazis had to be worrying for those listed, and this was proof of Kasper’s involvement in the Reich’s unsavoury politics, his position as a true follower laid bare on paper.
‘The names are all Jewish from what I can tell,’ Georgie said. Her mind calculated for a minute, arriving at an unhealthy conclusion. ‘Do you think “D” might mean deportation, and “A” is for arrest?’
Max looked up, his heat-flushed face suddenly drained. Ghostly white.
‘What? Max? What have you found?’
His sigh was long and his voice thin. ‘I really hope you’re wrong, George, because if you’re not, we really are in trouble.’
‘Look at it! It’s there in black and white,’ Max urged. ‘You can’t deny it. We need to do something. And quickly.’ He blew out his cheeks in frustration, hopping from foot to foot.
They’d taken a taxi across the city, straight to the Amsels’ and found only Rubin at home.
The older man was in denial, despite the shake of his fingers as he held the photographic sheet in his own living room and read his own name next to his brother-in-law’s. And his wife’s. The letter next to it meant the Nazis would not be helping the Amsels leave Germany with their possessions and dignity intact, in a timely fashion. It was ‘A’ for arrest. And a guess as to what else might follow. If the Amsels were to avoid it, they would need to flee. Quickly.
‘How do I tell Sara, persuade her to leave Elias, and our home?’ Rubin’s already lined face was creased with anguish. ‘Can you be sure this is what it means?’
Max peeled away with exasperation towards the kitchen, but Georgie’s voice was measured, hopefully persuasive. ‘No, but do you really want to take that chance? It’s the best guess we have. The fact that
you’re even on that list – in their sights – is not good news. You know that, Rubin. Especially when they’ve come once before for Elias.’ She gripped his hand, while his large fingers curled around hers for reassurance, some grounding that his entire world hadn’t been pulled from under him. Again.
Georgie knew only too well that Rubin had seen families torn apart over the past year, people he’d known for decades. He didn’t need reminding of the report in her own paper just a month or so previously warning that 24,000 Jews would be deported or thrown into concentration camps; he could visualise the scene where he and Sara were led away from their home, separated from each other, possibly for eternity. Second only to the scenario of Sara being forced to break the bond with her own brother – their survival or his? Either way, the choice for him – for them both – was agonising. Again.
‘How soon do you think we need to go?’ Rubin sounded defeated.
Realistically, there was no way of knowing; the lists could have been in Kasper’s possession for some time – a couple were dated the week before. It was anyone’s guess how quickly they would be acted on, but the mood on the streets and the pace at which Europe appeared to be hurtling towards war instilled a sense of urgency in Georgie and Max. Every day was another risk taken, more time for Rubin and Sara’s names to be circulated. Already a heavy presence of border guards at Berlin’s main stations made travel difficult, eyes crawling over passports and identity cards.
‘I know someone who might be able to get us forged papers – we’ve been saving for some time,’ Rubin said. ‘But it’ll take a few days at least.’
‘You can’t stay here – just in case,’ Max said. ‘You and Sara can have my apartment. The Times reporter is out of town for a few days and I have his keys – I’ll bunk there.’
‘Tonight we’ll take our chances,’ Rubin said, voice measured and calm. His stance, too, was unmoving. ‘Sara is at a neighbour’s. I’ll break it to her myself when she comes in. But we need one last night in our home.’
They left the Amsels’ apartment with a minor relief that Rubin had agreed to leave – and that they only had a single night of unease to get through. The days after they would tackle later.
‘I don’t know about you, but I’m starving,’ Max said. ‘With all that, we missed dinner, and I would love nothing more than a plate of Frau Lehmann’s pasta. And some decent conversation.’
It was ten p.m., and one half of Georgie was exhausted, with another day of intense work promised. But like Max, she was too restless to head home and chose company over sleep.
The press table at La Taverne was almost full – the more news to report, the more it seemed the pack needed to restore and refuel with their own kind, chewing over the good food and the world at large. Unusually, Sam Blundon was there with another reporter, pleased to see them both. Georgie gave him scant details of their most recent discovery; he pressed his lips together and said, diplomatically: ‘Get them out if you can. And as soon as you can – the walls are closing in.’ Clearly, he couldn’t say any more, but the raise of his red eyebrows endorsed the urgency.
The talk, as usual, was on Hitler’s continued pawing at areas of Poland and its effect on Berliners – jittery in some quarters, assured of victory in others – and the news that correspondents in neighbouring Warsaw had been issued with gas masks.
English papers were full of conjecture, but progress from the politicians on all sides was slow. Only Hitler appeared to sit poised, like a coiled snake awaiting its prey, despite rumours elsewhere that he was already moving troops into position.
Bill blew in within half an hour, face as red as his hair, and he slapped a day-old copy of his own paper on the table and announced: ‘Well, I have the story of the day, folks! It’s a complete disaster, and sure-fire proof we will be at war very soon.’
Alarmed faces looked up. ‘What to gods have you unearthed?’ someone said. ‘Is Hitler moving now?’
‘Hitler?!’ Bill huffed, his face solemn. ‘No, not him. Although he’s surely to blame for this bloody rationing. It’s worse that that – there’s no damn oranges at the Adlon. Not a single orange fruit to juice in the entire building. A travesty. Give me war any day.’
50
Departure
10th August 1939
The daylight hours until Rubin and Sara could be moved might have dragged, if it weren’t for the demands of news gathering: a constant toing and froing from chancellery to embassy, ping-pong comment gained from ambassadors and the Reich mouthpieces, either Bauer in his official capacity or muttered in corridors via Goebbels’s carefully planted ‘sources’. Sitting at her desk in the late afternoon, it felt to Georgie like unpicking a giant mass of impossibly tangled wool, only to arrive at a hole in the middle where the truth was supposed to be. Whatever words people uttered, it was their body language, facial expressions and general pessimism that pointed to the inevitable – that British and American reporters would soon be on the ‘other side’. The enemy.
The heat made it impossible to keep the office windows closed, the constant growl of military engines and the trump-trump of troops rising up from the main streets, adding to general feeling that Berlin city was on the move, those shifting grains of sand below an ever-changing tide.
At last, darkness descended and offered Rubin and Sara’s cloak of safety. There was no great removal; they slipped from their apartment building with one piece of luggage each, lives reduced to a single suitcase. Georgie’s heart reeled for Sara, having to leave behind memories of family life, discarding precious trinkets in favour of more valuable objects they could trade for their passage onward. She looked pale and wan as she climbed into the back seat of the car, yet was quick to voice her gratitude. ‘Thank you’ for being wrenched from everything that was rightfully hers, theirs, as native Germans. The injustice sat heavy among them all they drove towards Max’s home.
The transition appeared easy, as few people in Max’s neighbourhood were out late; the sound of their lives pushed out through open windows – dinner talk and a tinny chatter of the radio – and the Amsels stepped noiselessly towards their temporary home. Georgie was relieved when Frau Sommer did not make an appearance at her door, sniffing out anything untoward.
Georgie made tea while Max settled them into the house. It was agreed they would not leave the apartment, at least until the false papers arrived – Max would bring home groceries, to keep up his pretence of living there. There was no telephone, so they worked out a system of signals in case of any alarms, either in the windows or near to the front door. There was a young lad Max had befriended, a Jewish boy of ten or so called Aron, whom he would use to pass messages – Aron’s father owned a pawnbroker’s a few blocks down, with a telephone. The old man had nodded his understanding to Max. The plan was for the Amsels to use their papers to drive as far as they could towards a small border town, taking their chances where the sentry posts were poorly staffed. Then into France, and eventually towards England, armed with letters of introduction from Max and Georgie, and one Sam Blundon had pledged. No one dared imagine the dream scenario where they would be reunited with Ester and Leon, and the joy that would bring. One thing at a time.
The days following were a whirlwind of reporting, blended with the static of summer heat; real life and politics on parallel rail tracks and moving at different speeds. People plodded slowly along the scorching pavements, while the world spun on its axis at an alarming rate: Göring and Heydrich – head of the security service – had joined Hitler at his Bavarian mountain retreat, still plotting Danzig’s ‘peaceful and unconditional’ return to Germany. In Britain, the Chronicle published a helpful visual guide for readers on British war planes likely to be flying over the English countryside. And yet, to Georgie, there still seemed that widespread illusion it would never actually happen. It was like putting a low flame under a large pot of soup and only ever expecting it to simmer. Except the heat was being turned up. And they’d already seen how it could boil.
The press conference overran by half an hour, and Georgie walked rapidly in the heat towards Kranzler’s. The tables under the awning were full, but there was no sign of Max, and he wasn’t inside either. She scanned over the green and grey uniforms, beads of sweat forming, imagination running riot. With forced smiles, she ordered a cool drink and strudel – nothing out of the ordinary. And then she waited. Agonisingly.
Max blew in almost forty minutes after the agreed time, all smiles himself and weaving through the tables of uniforms. Did he not have the papers? He looked far too relaxed.
He sat opposite, virtually expressionless.
‘You’re late?’ Georgie’s eyebrows were fully arched.
‘Blasted army vehicle broken down, right across a tram line,’ he said.
‘All good, though?’
‘Perfect.’ He smiled. ‘Any strudel for me?’
He’s too good at this by half.
They should have known it was too simple; those more experienced at this kind of deception would have been wary of its ease. Only when Max spotted Aron’s bobbing form outside Kranzler’s window, peering in like some form of Dickensian waif, did he feel a spike of alarm. Outside, he exchanged words with the boy, who’d courted danger just by coming into the city centre. Max’s form visibly stiffened. He walked back in, maintaining what composure he could, pulling out a bill of Reichsmarks as he approached. ‘We have to go,’ he said. This time, his smile wasn’t in the least convincing.
The Berlin Girl Page 28