Berlin Blind

by Alan Scholefield

  He was staring at the gun.

  ‘Ask!’

  ‘Will you come in?’

  ‘Thank you.’ He turned to go in first and she stopped him. ‘Where are your manners? You English are supposed to have manners.’ He paused and let her pass him. Even in his confusion he realized that they were playing out a charade for any watching neighbours. ‘Now close the door.’ He did as she ordered. She threw down the paper and held the gun.

  ‘Put out the light.’

  ‘Who are you?’

  ‘Put out the light.’

  He switched off the outside light and the hall was plunged into darkness.

  She went to a narrow window by the side of the door and looked out. ‘Keep back against the wall,’ she said. He heard the sound of footsteps on the path. She opened the door, keeping well out of sight and Muller and Tellier, carrying a third man between them as though he were drunk, came in the door. In their free hands each carried a flight bag.

  ‘What happened?’ the woman asked.

  ‘Tellier was too strong,’ Muller said.

  ‘He was killing you,’ Tellier said.

  ‘We have a problem with him.’ Droplets of water still clung to Muller’s beard.

  ‘Take him in here,’ the woman said.

  They went into the drawing-room on the left side of the hall. Wait.’ She crossed and closed the heavy velvet curtains. ‘All right, put the light on.’ The men lowered Riemeck into one of the big, chintz-covered armchairs and Spencer, standing in the doorway, could see that he was unconscious, his head lolling to one side. Muller said something to the woman in German and Tellier turned swiftly. ‘Hey, in English only.’

  The girl shrugged. ‘All right.’ She looked at their sopping clothing and said again, What happened?’

  ‘Riemeck tried to get away in the lake,’ Muller said.

  ‘Maybe he could drown you,’ Tellier said viciously.

  For the first time they seemed to notice Spencer standing inside the drawing-room door.

  ‘What do you want?’ Spencer said.

  Tellier went into the hall. ‘Is this the only telephone?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘If you lie...’

  ‘There are three extensions,’ Spencer said, trying to keep calm, to control his rage, ‘but this is the only outside line.’ Tellier took a small pair of pliers from his flight bag and cut the wire.

  Muller crossed the floor and stood in front of Spencer. ‘I have a message: Bruno sends his love.’

  Spencer stared at him.

  ‘He sent you a little gift.’

  ‘I have it.’

  ‘How do you say it in English: a memory?’

  The girl laughed, a short harsh sound. ‘A memento.’

  ‘Ja,’ Muller said. ‘A memento. Inge speaks good English. She was a teacher. She taught here in...’

  ‘That’s enough!’ Inge said.

  Spencer looked at her closely for the first time. She had a thin, sallow face and a thin body, with surprisingly heavy breasts. Her blonde hair was crimped and he guessed it might be a wig. She exuded a quality of dominant sexuality.

  ‘Don’t talk to me like that,’ Muller said.

  ‘Stop bitching!’ Tellier said.

  ‘She’s in heat,’ Muller said, smiling. ‘Don’t worry, liebchen, I’ll give it to you soon.’

  The girl looked at him in distaste. ‘You’re crude,’ she said. ‘Maybe I was not brought up like you,’ Muller said, suddenly angry. ‘Maybe my father was not a famous architect. I’ve still got something you want, though.’

  There was a groan from the chair. Muller stared down at Rie-meck. ‘Werner!’ he said. ‘Werner!’ Riemeck’s head did not move. Muller slapped him lighdy on the cheek but he did not flinch. Muller turned to Tellier: ‘Only a gorilla would have hit so hard!’

  Tellier had been standing at the window and now he turned. ‘There is someone in the house next door. The window facing this.’

  Muller moved to the curtain, then turned. ‘I don’t like it here,’ he said to Inge. What about the back?’

  ‘I’ll see.’ She went into the hall.

  ‘You,’ Muller said to Spencer. ‘Come here.’

  Spencer took three steps towards him, then said again, ‘What are you going to do?’

  ‘That is not your business. Your business is to be silent. All we want from you is your house. You keep your mouth shut and everything is all right.’

  Inge came in. ‘There is a room at the back on the next floor.’

  ‘Let’s move him.’

  Muller and Tellier picked up Riemeck, carried him upstairs to Spencer’s study and placed him on the buttoned leather Chesterfield. As they did so Spencer could see the angry red welt high up on his neck where a blow had landed,

  ‘Get some water,’ Muller said to Tellier.

  ‘Where?’

  ‘I don’t know where. Find some.’

  ‘There’s a kitchen downstairs,’ Spencer said.

  Muller went to the window, opened it, satisfied himself that the room was not overlooked, closed it and drew the curtains. Inge was looking at the stereo equipment and cameras. ‘Our newspapers tell us England is a poor country. But this...’ She waved a hand at the gleaming array. ‘This is like the raspberry Reich.’

  Muller picked up one of the Nikons. ‘Japanese,’ he said. ‘German Leicas are better.’

  ‘Better not to have it at all,’ Inge said. ‘Better to learn consumption abstinence.’

  ‘Consumption abstinence!’ Muller laughed. ‘Remember that lecture at the Free University? Consumption abstinence and praxis!’ He spoke in German again. She nodded warningly in Spencer’s direction but Muller said, ‘He probably can’t understand and even if he could, what can he do?’

  Spencer’s German was rusty, but good enough to follow the the exchanges. ‘Who are you?’ he said.

  Muller put down the camera and began to play with the stereo equipment. ‘You have heard of the RAF?’ At first the letters only meant one thing to Spencer, then his mind made the adjustment ‘Something to do with a Red Army,’ he said.

  ‘The Red Army Fraktion,’ Muller said. ‘We are Kommando Fritz Meinhardt.’

  ‘But what do you want with me?’

  ‘I told you, we only want your house.’

  Tellier came in with a pot of water. Muller took it from him and poured it on the unconscious man’s face. He groaned, but did not wake.

  ‘He needs a doctor,’ Spencer said.

  The four of them stared down in silence at Riemeck. Just then there were the clear sounds of footsteps from the room above. Guns appeared. Muller took a machine-pistol from his flight bag. ‘Who is that?’ he said.

  Spencer said, ‘My wife.’

  Muller turned to Inge. ‘You forgot the wife.’

  ‘You were late. I thought something had gone wrong. I’m sorry.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Muller mimicked her.

  He turned to Spencer. ‘Fetch her.’

  ‘She’s ill.’

  ‘Fetch her!’

  ‘Look, there’s nothing she can do. I’ve cooperated, haven’t I?’ Muller pushed past him and made for the door. Spencer said ‘All right, I’ll...’

  ‘Wait here!’ Muller pointed the gun at him. ‘I say things only once.’

  Spencer, Tellier and Inge heard his footsteps on the staircase, then a stifled scream. Spencer said, ‘For God’s sake!’ and made for the door. Tellier held his pistol to his chest. ‘You want this?’ A few moments later Muller appeared with Susan. Her face was ashen. Spencer pushed past Tellier and took her hand. ‘Has he hurt you?’ She shook her head. He noticed that her lips were white.

  ‘Ill!’ Muller said, and laughed. ‘Ill from too much — ’ He made obscene motions with his right hand. He was holding the machine-pistol slackly in his left hand and Spencer saw a chance. Pretending to put his arm about Sue’s shoulders he struck down with the sharp side of his hand on Muller’s forearm. The big man gave a grunt of pain as his
arm became paralysed. The gun dangled for a moment, then fell. Spencer swooped on it, gathering it in his hands. He flung himself against the wall and turned so that he could cover them all. He stopped dead. Tellier had acted with as much speed as Spencer himself. He had grabbed Susan’s arm, twisting it up under her shoulder blades. Her gasp of pain was softer than Muller’s had been, but Spencer heard it just as well. He also saw Tellier’s gun. It was pointed at the back of her head.

  ‘Put it down,’ Tellier said. ‘With this — ’ He pronounced it ‘wiz zis’, and it might have been comic at any other time. ‘-I can blow away her face.’

  Slowly, Spencer laid the machine-pistol on the floor. Muller stood rubbing his forearm, trying to bring back feeling in his fingers. Abruptly he let fly with his right hand, catching Spencer across the face with the back of it. ‘You wish it so,’ he said. Spencer took most of the blow on his nose. His eyes began to water and he could feel the blood drip down onto his lips and chin. Tellier pushed Susan towards him and she would have fallen had he not caught her.

  ‘What do they want, John?’ she said.

  ‘I don’t know.’ He took out his handkerchief and dabbed at his nose.

  She sat down on his office chair. Riemeck groaned and stirred. He moved his legs and tried to sit up but the effort was too much for him and he fell back on the Chesterfield. Spencer noticed that a little blood was oozing from his right ear. ‘Werner’ Mul-said, standing over him. ‘Raus!’

  ‘There is no help shouting at him,’ Tellier said.

  ‘You wake him, you hit him.’

  ‘He would have drowned you!’

  ‘You think so. My foot slipped, that’s all.’

  ‘Stop it!’ Inge said.

  ‘What are they saying, John?’ Sue asked.

  ‘It’s about something that happened to him.’ He pointed to Riemeck.

  ‘Is he badly hurt?’

  ‘One of them hit him.’

  ‘But why bring him here?’

  ‘I’ve no idea.’

  ‘Shut up,’ Muller said. ‘No talking.’

  ‘I only asked if he was badly hurt.’ There was anger in her voice and Spencer heard it with alarm. This was no situation for anger, it had to be played as cool as ice.

  ‘It’s not your business,’ Muller said.

  ‘I took a nursing course once.’

  ‘A nurse?’ Muller’s tone was disbelieving.

  ‘If he was hit on the head he’s got concussion,’ she said. ‘Brilliant. So what do we do?’

  ‘You don’t throw water on him.’

  What then?’

  ‘You need to keep him warm. There’s an eiderdown upstairs and a hot water-bottle in the bathroom.’

  They wrapped Riemeck in the eiderdown and put a hot water-bottle at his back. His face was white and cold.

  ‘How long will it take before he can talk?’ Muller said.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘I want a drink.’ He turned to Inge. ‘You too?’

  She hesitated. ‘All right.’

  ‘I too,’ Tellier said.

  ‘You get them. Where are they?’ He turned to Spencer.

  ‘In the drawing-room.’

  Tellier came back a few minutes later with three large whiskies. ‘That’s better,’ Muller said, swallowing half his drink. ‘I’m hungry.’

  ‘Too much swimming,’ Tellier said.

  ‘You are funny. Let her make something.’ He pointed at Susan.

  Spencer shook his head grimly. ‘Leave my wife alone. I’ll do it.’

  Muller opened his mouth to speak but Inge said, ‘Let her look after Werner. She’s a nurse.’

  ‘You nurse him,’ Muller said to Sue. ‘If he wakes, you tell us, understand?’ He cupped her chin in his hands. ‘Verstehen Sie?’

  ‘Yes I understand.’

  They left her alone with Riemeck and when she was sure they had all gone downstairs she lifted the phone on Spencer’s desk. The line was dead. She stood in the middle of the floor, uncertain and confused.

  She was also very frightened. She had been dozing with the TV on when the big bearded man had come into the room. Her heart had almost stopped. He had told her to get up and numbly she had put on her dressing-gown and come down. With every step she took she became more and more frightened. And then she had seen John and the fear had lessened because John would cope. John always coped. She had known him first as an employer — she had been his secretary — and then as a lover and finally as a husband. At no time in any of the three roles had she ever doubted him. She had seen him cope with the affairs of his companies with a certain ruthlessness, but she had been in business herself for long enough to know that some ruthlessness was necessary. And she had been his mistress in the last year of Margaret’s life and she had watched him cope with that problem. What had meant so much to her then was that he never lied to her. He was frank about Margaret’s drinking and the cause of it and she knew, because he told her, that he would never leave Margaret. It was not an ideal arrangement for either of them but it was one she could arrange her life around. He never whined, he never promised more than he could make good. She knew exactly where she was at all times and when Margaret died and he asked her to marry him she never hesitated. The fact that he was more than twenty years older than she was hardly entered her mind.

  Riemeck moaned again. She looked down at him. There was grey in his hair but with his eyes closed and his face deathly pale, he looked young and terribly vulnerable. What did they want with him? Was he one of them? If so why had they hurt him? Perhaps he wasn’t one of them, perhaps he was an innocent member of the public like John and herself mixed up in something she did not understand? Or perhaps he was a hostage. Perhaps they were all hostages If that were so then she must care for him as best she could. She had said she’d taken a nursing course; it was a St John’s first aid course really and she could remember very little. She leant over Riemeck and touched his forehead. Some slight colour was coming back into his cheeks and he felt less clammy.

  Suddenly his eyes opened and he stared up at her. ‘Wer sind Sie? Wo bin ich?’

  ‘I don’t speak German,’ she said.

  He reached back and felt the ridge of red flesh where he had been hit.

  ‘Do you understand English?’ she said.

  ‘Ach, ja, Englisch,’ He raised himself and sat for a moment, his head on his hands, then turned to her and said, ‘Where am I?’

  ‘You’re in a house in Hampstead in London.’

  ‘How did I get here? How did I get wet?’ The one certain thing about concussion, she knew, was the inability to recall recent events.

  ‘I don’t know. I think you were brought.’

  ‘Who brought me?’

  ‘Your friends.’

  ‘I have no friends here.’

  ‘Ach, so, Werner.’ The door had opened silently and Muller was there. When did he wake?’

  ‘Just now.’ She could feel a change in the man sitting next to her. He seemed to have tightened like a fist.

  ‘I told you to tell me.’

  ‘It’s only been a few seconds.’

  What has he said?’

  ‘He spoke German. I didn’t understand.’

  ‘All right, out.’ He turned and called, ‘Inge! Tellier! Werner is with us.’

  The others joined him. They were both holding glasses. Susan went down the stairs and joined her husband in the sitting-room. ‘The phone doesn’t work,’ she said.

  ‘I know. They cut it.’

  Who are they?’

  ‘Terrorists.’

  ‘Why us?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  What are we going to do?’

  He walked over to the window, drew the curtain aside and looked out on to the quiet London street. The trees still bore their autumn leaves, the street lamps spread a cosy glow, the houses opposite, with their drawn curtains and chinks of light, looked safe and normal. He could even see the disc on the wall of an opposite house w
hich marked the fact that the Egyptologist, Sir Flinders Petrie, had once lived there. It was so ordinary, so everyday.

  He took her in his arms and held her as tight as he dared. ‘Listen,’ he said, ‘I don’t know who these people are, and I don’t know what they want. I don’t care what they want. But they’re armed and they’re dangerous. They say they’re a commando from the Red Army Fraktion.’ She looked mystified. ‘It’s a German left-wing terrorist organization. I think it has links with terrorist groups in Japan and France. They don’t play about. They’ve left a trail of killings all over Europe.’

  ‘Is that what they’re here for?’ She thought of the damp hair, the pale, vulnerable face. ‘Have they come to kill him?’

  ‘God knows.’

  ‘Are we just going to let them?’

  ‘Can you tell me how to stop them!’

  ‘You’ve got a gun.’

  ‘Forget it. You saw what happened when I tried.’

  ‘But we can’t just let them.’

  ‘Don’t you understand: They can do as they like.’

  ‘Here? In our house?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘And we can’t do anything?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘But they’re not guarding us. We could run. Get help. Why aren’t they guarding us? Why?’

  He had been waiting for this. How could he tell her about Berlin now? About Bruno? About the leopards? Even if he had wanted to there was no time to make her understand. ‘Look at yourself,’ he said. ‘Do you think you could run for it? How far do you think you’d get?’

  She seemed to accept that her unwieldiness might preclude that idea, but then she said, ‘But you could go, John.’

  ‘And leave you? What do you think they’d do to you?’

  ‘Oh my God, John, there must be something!’

  ‘It’s not our business, Sue. They’ve come to do something. I don’t know what. Out of all the houses in London, in Britain, they’ve chosen ours to do it in. There’s no use asking me why, I don’t know. I say let them kill each other, that makes one less terrorist in the world.’

  ‘He didn’t look like a terrorist to me.’

  ‘What does a terrorist look like?’

  ‘Not like him anyway. John, he was frightened and confused. He didn’t know where he was or who we were or anything. And then the big bearded man came in and I could feel the terror. We can’t allow...’