Five Past Midnight

by James Thayer

  They walked away from the concrete structure, toward the empty fountain. The British had come and gone, hitting a neighborhood somewhere upwind. Soot and smoke carried in the breeze.

  Hilfinger asked eagerly, "What's he like? The Führer."

  Dietrich stared at the framed photograph. "He almost convinced me, almost had me."

  "What?"

  Dietrich pulled at an earlobe. "I don't really know what happens in his presence, but..." His voice trailed off.

  Hilfinger stepped around a puddle on the walkway. "What do you mean?"

  "I almost fell for him, like some schoolgirl." Dietrich glowered, then tossed the framed photograph onto a pile of gravel near the concrete mixer. The glass shattered, a tiny sound by Berlin standards. "Like some goddamn swooning schoolgirl."

  4

  DIETRICH SLID HANGERS along the pole in the closet. "Cray would take a military uniform, if there was one. Anything on that? A husband or son in the military?"

  Hilfinger looked at his notes. "She was a widow Husband dead fifteen years. So even if she didn't throw his clothes away, there probably wasn't a modern uniform here, something that wouldn't stand out."

  "There's some man's trousers in here. Civilian. So maybe he's dressed again as a civilian."

  Dietrich and Hilfinger and Egon Haushofer occupied most of the small bedroom, and they picked through the old lady's belongings, looking for evidence of Jack Cray's destination. During the night Dietrich's detectives had searched city records for Katrin von Tornitz's relations, and had found that she had two sets of uncles and aunts and two adult cousins living in the city, at least at the start of the war. The detectives had driven to the addresses, and all of them had been destroyed, reduced to piles of debris. Then the policemen had dug further into the records, this time at the Berlin Graves Registration Office, and had found more evidence of Katrin von Tornitz's relations, including a great-aunt who lived in the city, information that was waiting for Dietrich and Hilfin- ger when they returned to the station at three in the morning.

  They had rushed to Dahlem, Dietrich wondering again whether the American was part of a feint, an intricate ruse designed to tie up the Reich's scarce resources. Sometimes Cray left an obvious trail. Other times he moved invisibly. Thousands of men and women were looking for him. Perhaps this was the American's only purpose.

  The great-aunt's home was a brick structure from the last century, covered with vines, and still standing. It was dark—all Berlin houses were dark—but not shuttered. Dietrich had sensed they were too late and, after spending almost an hour approaching and entering the house, the detectives covering each other, Dietrich's suspicion had been confirmed. Dietrich had found a pair of Wehrmacht uniform trousers with ash and a few spots of blood on them. Cray had been in the house, and had already gone.

  The Gestapo had told Dietrich nothing about their raid on the physician's office. He had learned of it from the precinct watch officer, who had investigated the clinic after the Gestapo had left, and had then telephoned Dietrich. Doctor Holenbein had been a casual acquaintance of Dietrich. Early in the war their wives had volunteered for bandage- packing gatherings, and had dragged their husbands to the coffee Watches afterward. The doctor had once spoken of his brother, a professor of architecture at the University of Berlin. After the watch officer had hung up, Dietrich had telephoned the doctor's brother and had told him what had happened, and that the Gestapo would undoubtedly be rushing through the professor's door at any moment, casting their net wide and gathering in many innocents, and that if the professor and his family had anywhere they could repair for hiding, they had better do so immediately. The professor had thanked Dietrich profusely, but quickly, and was frantically calling his wife to wake her before his telephone receiver was back on its cradle.

  Dietrich stuck his finger into a blue ceramic washbasin. The water was cool and stained red. Cray had tended his wounds here. So the American hadn't been treated successfully at Doctor Holenbein's office before the Gestapo arrived.

  Hilfinger rifled through a sewing basket, then the drawers of a desk. "Here's an address book." He dropped it into a canvas satchel he had brought with him. "And Christmas cards. A lot of return addresses on them. Maybe Katrin von Tornitz and her great-aunt have mutual friends, another place Cray might hide." The cards also went into the satchel.

  Haushofer fingered a miniature doll collection. "You know why I became a detective?"

  Dietrich answered, "So you can lawfully snoop around other people's bedrooms?"

  "Precisely"

  "You don't follow orders, do you, Inspector?" A new voice, abrupt and coarse.

  Dietrich turned to find Heinrich Müller at the bedroom door, with Agent Rudolf Koder at his elbow.

  The Gestapo chief stepped into the room. "How long have you known about this address?"

  Dietrich feared this man, but he would not let Hilfinger and Haushofer see it. In a level voice, he replied evenly, "About an hour. Rather than spend time contacting whomever at your office, I thought it best to rush over here. We were still too late, as it turns out. The American has been here, and gone." Koder entered the room.

  Müller rose on his toes, a bucking motion, his hands behind his back. "I specifically ordered you to report all your leads to me."

  Dietrich sucked on a tooth before answering. "With Himmler's letter, I unordered myself."

  Hilfinger smiled at his boss's dangerous impudence. So did Heinrich Müller, but narrowly, meanly. "It is a lack of respect, isn't it, Inspector? You simply do not respect my organization, and this leads to a lack of cooperation." Dietrich idly rubbed his jaw.

  Müller bit down with such pressure that his lips paled. A signal must have passed, but Dietrich did not see it. Nor did he see the pistol in Koder's hand.

  Koder took one step toward Peter Hilfinger, placed the muzzle of the pistol against Hilfinger's temple, and pulled the trigger.

  Hilfinger collapsed to the floor. Blood and bits of his brain dribbled down the wall above the desk. Koder swung the pistol toward Haushofer, freezing the detective's hand as it reached under his coat for his weapon. Hilfinger's perpetually bemused grin was still on his dead face. Blood snaked across the floor toward the window curtain.

  "Perhaps you won't forget to report next time, Inspector," Müller said pleasantly. He walked out of the old woman's bedroom.

  Koder shrugged and put his palms up, perhaps a gesture seeking understanding, the pistol still in one hand, then backed out of the room, following Müller.

  5

  "IT IS JUST like cloth, isn't it?" the old lady asked. "Just poke and pull."

  "Take it easy, will you?" Cray spoke through clenched teeth. "This isn't as much fun as it looks."

  "Do you want me to sew you up?" The lady was cheery. "Or are you going to walk around with holes in your arm?" She pricked his skin again, then pulled the needle through, the thread trailing behind.

  Cray grimaced. He was sitting at the woman's feet, leaning back against her overstuffed chair. She was bent over him, legs to one side, the needle gleaming in her hand. The bulb of a gooseneck lamp was bent almost to Cray's shoulder. She worked quickly, professionally.

  "Are you going to tell me how you got these holes in your arm?" She tugged at the thread, closing the wound. "A bayonet."

  "Didn't your mother ever tell you not to play with bayonets?" Cray glanced over his shoulder at her. She smiled with strong yellow teeth. The skin of her face was sallow, and was wrinkled like an elephant's leg. Her hair was too black — badly dyed — and pulled into a bun at the nape of her neck and secured by a red ribbon. She wore a shawl over a red print dress with ruffles at the neck. Her eyes were daylight blue and bright with humor. She was enjoying her work. On a lamp table next to the woman was a black Bakelite radio from which came a Deutschlandsender broadcast of Wagner.

  The American said, "You're pretty good with a needle, ma'am."

  "I don't want you to think I was always a seamstress, young man." She again sli
d the needle into his skin. "I didn't always make my living sewing the Klamotten."

  "I don't know that word, ma'am."

  "It's Berlin slang for clothes." She narrowed her eyes at her needle, wiping off a drop of blood between her fingers. "I once had a home on the Graf Spec Strasse, and I was a friend of the Casardis and Fürsten- bergs, the della Portas and Meinsdorps."

  "Never heard of them." Cray winced. "Take it easy, will you? You're killing me here."

  "But when the bombs came, my friends all boarded up their windows and left the city. Some to Rome, some to country villas. Our family has been a bit embarrassed for a generation, if I may say, and I don't own a country retreat." Her words were becoming clipped as anger rose at the unfairness of it all. "When my house was destroyed—it was sucked off its foundation by a bomb blast — I found this apartment in Bleibtreustrasse. And now I take in alterations and repairs." She yanked the thread through Cray's skin.

  Cray yelped, "Kindly don't take it out on me."

  "Before my society disintegrated, I was known for my table and my wit. Now I'm known for my sewing." She stabbed him again.

  Cray sucked wind through his teeth.

  "What are all these purple punctures? Must be a hundred of them. And these stitch scars?"

  "A dog."

  "Just one dog made all these teeth marks ? Did you just stand there and let the dog eat you?"

  "It was three dogs. The stitches are where they tore away the skin. I've got more on my buttocks, not that I'm likely to show you."

  "Not that I'm likely to ask."

  "You probably were going to ask," Cray said. "I've heard things about you countesses."

  She giggled. "And I've heard things about you young Americans."

  "They are all true."

  After a moment she said, "You must despise dogs now."

  "Not at all," he replied. "Those long little dogs you have around here, the ones that look like sausages."

  "They are called Tekels. The British call them 'dachshunds.'"

  "Little salt and pepper. They wouldn't be too bad. Served with some rice or potatoes."

  "Oh, you." She slapped his shoulder

  The small room was cluttered with mementos from her prior station and evidence of her new one. In one corner was a Louis Quinze armchair. On a fern stand near the chair was a bronze bust of the Roi Soleil. Four Dresden china parrots lined the top of a bookshelf, and on a pedestal table were two Augsburg silver candleholders and a candle- snuffer. These suggestions of the Grande Epoque were surrounded by the more common paraphernalia of the seamstress. A treadle sewing machine was under a framed portrait of Martin Luther hammering his ninety-five theses on the door of the Wittenberg church. Cloth scraps were scattered about the floor near the sewing machine. Colorful snips of fabric filled three woven baskets. A pincushion was on the armchair and another on the woman's lap and another on the table with the candlesticks. Bolts of cloth leaned here and there, some brightly dyed, but many were of the somber colors of the uniformed services. A sewing basket rested on the lady's lap, scissors handles showing above the rim. When she jerked the thread, thimbles in the basket clinked together, and Cray bared his teeth.

  An ironing board was in front of the windows, which were hidden by blackout curtains. Under the board was an open box of spools of thread, arranged by color, light to dark. A pile of patterns lay on a chair. Beads of different sizes and shapes were displayed in two dozen small bottles. A headless wood mannequin stood at the end of the ironing board, a tape measure draped over a shoulder. KARSTADT'S DEFT. STORE was stenciled on the mannequin's belly.

  Cray looked at a pole suspended horizontally from two wires. Perhaps twenty outfits including Wehrmacht and SS uniforms hung from the bar on hangers.

  She followed his gaze. "Senior officers come to me to tailor their uniforms. Sometimes they never come back to collect them. Killed in action, I suppose. I've got a nice collection. You are welcome to them."

  "I might take you up on that. Nothing less than a captain, though. I have certain standards."

  She laughed, pushing her needle through his skin again. "But most of my work is taking in women's dresses and men's pants. There's no food in Berlin, and so my customers are losing weight. Pleats in the skirts, darts in the pants. That's most of my business now." She guided the needle into his skin again. "Just a couple more stitches. This is going to leave a scar. You won't mind, judging from the looks of you."

  "Ma'am..."

  "I'm properly called 'Countess.' Countess Gabriella Hohenberg."

  "Countess, how is it you know Katrin?"

  "Her mother and I were friends since childhood. We used to ride together."

  Cray said, "Katrin calls you 'Auntie.' "

  "Just a nickname."

  "You aren't related?"

  "No, but Katrin has known me all her life." She reached for a pair of scissors. "It's unlikely anyone would make the connection between her and me, if that's what you are wondering."

  "Are you still in touch with Katrin's mother?"

  "She died several years ago. Didn't Katrin tell you?"

  "She doesn't tell me much." Cray looked again at his shoulder. "I'm surprised you didn't use some fancy double stitch, make me suffer a little more."

  She cackled, and clipped the thread. "You're a nice young man. I'm glad to see Katrin has found someone."

  "She didn't find me. I found her. And I'm none to her liking." After a moment Cray added, "I don't know why."

  "It's probably your looks."

  He smiled. "That's it."

  "Would you like some coffee?"

  "What's it made of?" he asked.

  "Acorns."

  "I'll pass."

  "I've got the cloth to make you a new shirt. Or, better yet, I'll alter one of the uniforms belonging to a dead customer. Won't take me longer. You can borrow another shirt from that pile."

  Cray found a blue flannel shirt that had long sleeves. While he was buttoning it, the sound of footfalls came from the outside hallway. His hand touched the pistol in his belt.

  A key sounded in the lock, then Katrin entered the apartment. Her coat was cinched tightly around her waist, and the shoulders were damp from rain. She was using both hands to carry a burlap bag, and was breathing quickly from hauling it up the stairs. She lowered the bag in front of Cray, brushed drops of rain from her shoulders, then pulled an envelope from under her coat. Katrin had received a coded message on her pack radio, an address on Kordt Street, where she was to find an envelope in a milk box, and a burlap sack near the box.

  From the bag Cray pulled out three Tellermines, German antitank mines each containing twelve pounds of the explosive amatol. They were olive-green, about a foot in diameter, with carrying handles. On the underside of the mines were antilifting switches so they would explode when disturbed. Also in the burlap bag was a canvas pouch, which Cray opened to reveal three blasting caps, a roll of electrical wire, and a battery.

  "Just what I ordered," he said.

  Cray then used the countess's pinking shears to slit open the envelope. He pulled out the envelope's contents: three typed pages and several photographs. "It's coded. More work for you." He passed the typed pages back to her, retaining the photographs.

  He sat back down on the floor to share the lamplight. He studied the photographs. One was an aerial shot of Berlin, taken from perhaps three thousand feet, showing the center of the city from the Spree River on the north to Tempelhof Airport on the south. The runway was cratered. The second photo, taken at a much lower altitude, was of the Reich Chancellery—some of it open to the sky—and the garden behind it. A square blockhouse with two guards standing at each side of its en- tryway was clearly visible. The remaining photographs were of POWs, three of them. Each of these photographs showed a prisoner standing next to a camp guard. The prisoners wore Wehrmacht uniforms stripped of insignia. Judging from the guards' uniforms, two of the photos were taken in an American POW camp while the third one was from a Soviet ca
mp. All three POWs looked confused and vulnerable.

  Katrin pulled off her coat. "Auntie, may I heat some water? I found a little tea at the market. I think it's real."

  "I've got the water, but not the heat."

  Katrin stepped around a basket of yarn and entered the small kitchen.

  The countess didn't look up from her work. "You look like her husband. Did she tell you that?"

  Cray lowered the photos to look fully at the old woman. "No. She didn't."

  "He was more handsome than you, of course."

  "Of course."

  "But he had the same size, same hair color. Same wicked smile." She glanced hopefully at the American. "I'll bet you had a way with the ladies, over there in America."

  "Not really." Cray ran his finger along his chin.

  "I'd guess you've some stories to tell about the American ladies," she tried again. "A fairly handsome young man like you."

  "I'll never tell. And don't try to break me. I'm too tough for that." Cray returned to the photographs. The one taken from the greatest height had numbers printed along the top and letters along one side.

  Katrin came in from the kitchen with three glasses of cold water, each with a sprinkling of loose tea leaves floating in it. The pages were under her arm. She handed a glass to the countess and one to Cray, then pushed a hassock into the circle of light near the old lady. She dug into the scraps in a basket near the countess's feet and retrieved the one-time pad. She sipped the cold tea, then began the transcription.

  "I visited Philadelphia once, over in America," the countess said. "Did Katrin tell you?"

  He glanced at Katrin. "As I said, she doesn't tell me much."

  "This was in 1912. I was younger back then. Had fewer wrinkles."

  "I haven't seen a single wrinkle."

  She playfully tapped his arm. "You do have a way with the ladies, just as I suspected." She reached for her scissors. "Your country does not have nobility, and so I was entirely uncomfortable there. No one with titles and, worse, no one who understood titles. I don't think I was called 'Countess' once in all the time I was there."