Little Grey Mice

by Brian Freemantle

  ‘How do you do it?’ Elke was glad of the temporary seriousness, although she did not want it to last too long.

  Wait until you believe you’ve found out, thought Reimann. He said: ‘By talking to as many people as possible. Making friends with politicians, if I’m lucky. You’d be extremely surprised how much public figures are prepared to talk and disclose on a background basis, providing they’re not identified as my source.’ He hoped she recognized the inference of unofficial conduct, and picked up his careful choice of ‘my source’, indicating that he already had many influential people prepared to trust him and his integrity.

  ‘I know it happens sometimes,’ allowed Elke, generally. She felt quite comfortable, talking at this level: pleased, even, because she was transgressing no official regulations yet she was suggesting a position of awareness, of being at an echelon where she was accustomed to such indiscretions. She hoped he did not think she was boasting.

  Reimann hadn’t expected the conversation to reach this stage so quickly, and he was delighted. Vaguely mocking, to fit the earlier banter that had put her at her ease, but in reality staging a further test, he said: ‘I’d forgotten! The executive with her own private telephone at the Cabinet Office!’

  ‘How did you know it was the Cabinet Office?’ demanded Elke at once, the humour going.

  Fuck! thought Reimann, aware of the mistake: the number was private, going straight to her desk, not through the intercepting switchboard from which he could have got the information. It was an appalling mistake! Unbelievable! He smiled, with forced calmness, and said: ‘I didn’t. I mislaid the number you gave me, so I rang around the ministries, asking for you by name. They knew you at the Cabinet Secretariat, finally, although you weren’t there when I was put through.’

  ‘I didn’t get any message about a call,’ Elke persisted.

  ‘I didn’t leave one,’ said Reimann, a heavy-footed man exploring quicksands. ‘I wasn’t sure what the policy was about receiving private calls. I didn’t want to cause any problems. Then I found the number again, so there wasn’t any difficulty.’ It hadn’t been convincing. How could he have been such a fool!

  ‘It would have been all right to have left a message,’ said Elke. She was still grateful that he hadn’t. ‘Thanks for being so considerate, though.’

  Had she accepted the explanation, poor as it had been? It looked as if she had but there was no way he could be sure. How could he further convince her? By enlarging on the call he’d never made. Deliberately inquisitive he said: ‘The Cabinet Secretariat? That’s how the operator answered.’

  ‘Yes,’ confirmed Elke, tightly. She wasn’t comfortable any more. She still wasn’t transgressing any regulations but she wasn’t comfortable.

  Back off! Reimann told himself, mental alarms jangling. He’d ruined everything this time by his own ineptitude, and now he had to back off before it got any worse. ‘Why am I telling you about Bonn’s politicians? You must know them all far better than me! Make me a promise you won’t tell any of them how I see them. They’ll never talk to me again!’

  Elke loosened, slightly. ‘I promise,’ she smiled. She didn’t want the atmosphere – the fun – to have gone.

  He had to get an indication, a hint at least, to learn if the stumbling explanation had worked. The idea that came was hardly any more subtle, but he couldn’t think of anything else. He put his glass firmly upon the low coffee table and said: ‘I’m sure I’ve taken up enough of your time. Why don’t I find the book and get out of your way?’

  No! thought Elke: the word wailed in her head, as if she had spoken aloud. She did come fingertip close to making too obvious a protest, pulling back at the edge. Instead, proud of herself even as she spoke the please-yourself words, Elke said: ‘Take your time. I’m not doing anything tonight. Would you like another drink, while you’re looking?’

  Reimann calculated that if she’d been unsettled, suspicious, she would have grabbed the offered opportunity to get rid of him. He couldn’t be too sure, too soon, but it looked as if he’d got away with it. ‘I’m not doing anything either,’ he told her. ‘So I’d like another drink.’

  In the kitchen Elke saw that the dog had already gnawed the toy into an elongated strip that looked slimy: she decided to throw it away, after Otto had gone. The idea of it being dragged around the apartment revolted her. She could always … The reflection stopped, braked to a halt. She was automatically thinking of him as Otto all the time, as if she’d known him forever. So what? She thought of Günther Werle as Günther, so why shouldn’t she think of this man by his given name? She actually felt that she had known Reimann for a long period: longer than Werle, although that clearly didn’t make sense. Knew him better then. That made even less sense. She didn’t know Otto Reimann at all. She saw, surprised, that she had already drunk more than half the white wine, by herself. She didn’t feel any effect. She’d had to open the new whisky bottle to top up his glass on the previous occasion, and she added generously now. Otto – Reimann, she corrected – remained absolutely sober. Another word came to her mind, joining the others she had sought to describe him to herself. He was sophisticated: sophisticated men could drink a great deal and stay in complete command of themselves.

  Reimann quickly found the Graham Greene anthology, knowing from his earlier identification exactly where to look, and located other books he could ask for, if necessary. He was still disturbed by his gaffe. Too confident, he thought, critically. Then corrected himself. Not critical enough. Arrogant was more appropriate: far more accurate. It had all seemed to be unfolding as he’d expected. And he’d sat back, like an actor (which was another appropriately accurate word) watching himself perform a rehearsed role. Quickly the balance between optimism and pessimism adjusted itself. So it had been a salutary lesson. He’d been stupid but he’d recovered (he hoped) and now he knew better than to become complacent again. A complete fool suffers from his mistakes, an occasional one learns not to repeat them. It sounded like an attempt at a wise quotation, but he didn’t recognize it. Whatever, he wouldn’t allow arrogant complacency again. Couldn’t allow it. Fool, he thought, still not able fully to forgive himself.

  He was away from the shelves, the book in his hand, when Elke reentered the room. ‘I found it,’ he announced, unnecessarily.

  ‘Just that one?’

  ‘I don’t really feel I should help myself, to too many, although there are others I’d like to read,’ said Reimann, clumsy by intent now.

  ‘Borrow them whenever you like,’ said Elke. Not completely sophisticated, she thought, with growing disbelief. She isolated the painful obviousness at once – the ploy for a further visit beyond even the return of what he was borrowing tonight – and felt her mind and her stomach, everything, in turmoil at the unthinkable absurdity of someone wanting to see her on a second or a third occasion. Her, Elke Meyer, an unmarried mother who could never find anything to talk about and who always felt uncertain and lost and lonely. Surely this man who made her laugh more than she could remember laughing for years and was attractive despite the jagged tooth, and who had been so truthful and so frank over the incident that had brought them together – surely he couldn’t be interested in continuing an acquaintanceship, although newly arrived and possibly lonely, too!

  ‘I will,’ said Reimann, appreciatively. He held the book up. ‘Like I said, I’ll take very good care.’

  ‘I know you will.’

  ‘Can I call, to arrange when to bring it back?’

  ‘Of course.’ He was building up to go and she didn’t want him to, but it would be wrong to press him into staying longer. He’d put himself in the position of pursuer, so let him pursue. She hoped she was making the right decision. Ida would know.

  She went with him to the door of the apartment, unsure what to expect. He turned, still inside the hallway, and said: ‘Goodnight.’

  ‘Goodnight.’

  Reimann reached out, for her right hand, bringing it briefly to his lips: there was h
ardly any contact. ‘I’ll call,’ he promised.

  ‘Please,’ she said.

  That night Elke filled the entire page for the day in her diary, describing everything that had happened and her fears of mistakes or misunderstandings she might have allowed. Wonderful, she concluded. It was utterly wonderful. She smiled down at the word. After it she wrote: I mustn’t use wonderful any more. I mustn’t do anything to bore him.

  The following morning, walking Poppi, she discarded the slimy, chewed-up dog’s toy in a public litter-bin. She’d carefully put it in a plastic bag and secured the top to avoid offending anyone else who might use the bin afterwards.

  ‘So you’ve established the relationship?’ Jutta demanded.

  ‘I’m sure now,’ agreed Reimann, at last permitting the increased commitment.

  ‘With no problems?’

  ‘None,’ he assured her. None that anyone would ever know about, he thought. He still couldn’t believe the mistake.

  ‘Well done,’ said Jutta, professionally.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Elke tried determinedly to curb any feelings, because it would have been ridiculous to invest the slightest expectation in so short an acquaintanceship, but she didn’t find it easy. Ida didn’t help towards cool objectivity. She called Kaufmannstrasse with a flurry of questions before Elke left for the Chancellery the following morning, insisting they should meet earlier than their normal mid-week lunch because there was so much to talk about, and she reached the restaurant first, which Elke couldn’t remember happening before.

  ‘Everything!’ demanded Ida, practically before they were seated. ‘I want to know everything! All of it!’

  ‘There’s nothing much to tell.’

  ‘Don’t be stupid!’ Ida rebuked her sister, grinning in anticipation. ‘Of course there is!’ She ordered impatiently, urging Elke to do the same, and as usual selected the wine without consultation. A wider grin. ‘Was he there when I called this morning?’

  ‘Certainly not! Don’t be absurd,’ said Elke. She knew, with irritation, that she had coloured, as if she had something to be embarrassed about. Maybe her sister’s accusation about stupidity was appropriate after all.

  ‘What then? Don’t keep me waiting!’

  ‘He stayed for about two hours. We talked. He made me laugh,’ said Elke, with forced simplicity.

  ‘I’m not accepting that,’ Ida protested. ‘From the beginning, from the moment you opened the door to him.’

  Elke sipped her wine, wishing it were drier, and started out as her sister instructed, enjoying once more being the person with a story to recount rather than the patient listener. She tried to repeat what she considered some of Reimann’s more hilarious anecdotes, the ones she had found most amusing, but they lost their humour in the telling so she stopped, after one or two. Ida only occasionally interrupted, refusing to allow anything to pass unexplained, otherwise sitting with her chin cupped in her hands, listening intently.

  ‘Kissed your hand!’ she exclaimed, when Elke finished.

  ‘It wasn’t like that: not like it sounds,’ said Elke. She’d thought it had been absolutely the right and fitting gesture for Reimann to have made, neither too formal nor too dismissive.

  ‘It sounds cringingly awful.’

  ‘It wasn’t!’

  ‘What else did he do?’

  ‘Do?’

  ‘You know what I mean!’ said Ida, impatient again. ‘Don’t be so naïve.’

  ‘He didn’t do anything. It was an ordinary, pleasant, enjoyable evening.’ It had been anything but an ordinary evening for her, reflected Elke. But very definitely pleasantly enjoyable.

  ‘And all he did was kiss your hand!’

  Would Ida have been better satisfied if Otto had tried putting his hand up her skirt? Elke said: ‘He was – he is – a perfect gentleman.’

  ‘Let’s hope he quickly changes.’

  ‘Let’s hope nothing of the sort!’ said Elke indignantly.

  Ida had been gently taunting her sister, pleased at Elke’s obvious happiness. But she became serious-faced, worried about that happiness, and said: ‘What about that, darling? What do you hope for?’

  ‘Nothing,’ said Elke, too quickly. At once, seeing the expression on her sister’s face, she said: ‘Well, that’s not really true, is it? It just … well I don’t know yet what to hope … no, hope isn’t the right word. I don’t know what to expect… nothing, I suppose. Why should there be anything?’

  ‘Why shouldn’t there be?’ Ida came back. ‘Don’t start running for cover: don’t really do something stupid.’

  ‘There are reasons,’ Elke pointed out.

  ‘Ursula? Why should Ursula be an obstacle?’

  ‘Don’t you think she is?’

  ‘No!’ said Ida, almost angrily. ‘So you’ve got a child who isn’t well. Who has to be cared for. Where’s the problem there?’

  ‘An illegitimate child.’

  ‘Darling!’ said the other woman. ‘What sort of era are you living in! You really think that is a factor, in this day and age?’

  ‘I think it could be, for a lot of men.’

  ‘What about this particular man?’

  Elke shook her head. ‘I don’t know. He didn’t appear to me to be the type who would judge, who would be critical, but I’ve no way of telling.’

  ‘Did he talk about himself?’

  ‘Only funny stories. About becoming established here and setting up an apartment.’

  ‘So he could be married? Separated? Divorced? Have children of his own?’

  Elke blinked at the spurt of questions. ‘Yes,’ she admitted, doubtfully. ‘He could be all, any, of those things. I don’t know.’

  ‘You didn’t ask?’

  ‘Of course not.’

  ‘Weren’t you curious?’

  ‘The opportunity didn’t arise. It wouldn’t have been right.’

  ‘Didn’t he ask about you?’

  ‘No.’ Not quite true, Elke remembered. There had been the reference to her working in the Cabinet Office, but upon reflection that didn’t amount to personal intrusion. She pushed her salad plate away half finished, no longer hungry.

  ‘Ready for the big question?’ said Ida.

  ‘What?’ It was good, being the subject of a conversation: better this time than after the crash.

  ‘How do you feel about him?’

  ‘How can I answer that? Socially, I’ve only been in his company once: I’m not counting the other times, when we met about the car.’

  ‘You can answer it honestly,’ insisted Ida. ‘I told you, stop running for cover.’

  Elke smiled, shyly. ‘He’s very nice,’ she allowed.

  ‘My butcher is very nice,’ Ida complained. ‘Let’s do better than that.’

  ‘I like him,’ admitted Elke, finally. ‘He’s nice and he’s funny and he’s quite good-looking and …’ She struggled to a stop, shrugging. ‘… he seems to be a lot of things, all of which I like.’

  ‘What about looking like Dietlef?’

  ‘I don’t think about that resemblance any more.’ She thought of Otto as himself, not as somebody else.

  ‘Could this be love!’ mocked Ida.

  ‘We met again, by accident,’ said Elke, patiently. ‘He came to my apartment for about two hours. He borrowed a book. That’s it.’

  ‘Which he’s got to bring back?’

  ‘Yes,’ agreed Elke. ‘And …’

  ‘And what?’

  ‘There are probably others he might borrow.’

  ‘Did you offer or did he ask?’

  Elke hesitated. ‘I think I offered, very generally. He said he didn’t want to take more than one at a time but there were some he’d like to read.’

  ‘This isn’t the swiftest romance that the world has ever seen,’ was Ida’s verdict. ‘But I think it’s got possibilities.’ Dear God, don’t let Elke be hurt again, she thought once more.

  ‘I’m frightened.’ The confession had begun as a thought
and emerged as words and Elke wished, having uttered them, that she hadn’t.

  ‘Step back a little!’ Ida spoke soothingly, all joking cynicism forgotten. Believing that Ursula was somehow still the worry, she said: ‘She can’t be a reason for you feeling like that: really she can’t.’

  ‘It’s not just Ursula,’ said Elke, in partial confirmation.

  ‘What then?’

  Elke shrugged, a little-girl-lost gesture. ‘I can’t put it into words, not really. I do think, despite what you say, that no man is going to be interested in me, with an illegitimate child. But then there’s me. I don’t know how to maintain a relationship: I never had a relationship, apart from Dietlef, and that wasn’t one at all, not really: not what I now imagine a proper relationship should be …’

  It became Ida’s turn to shrug, even more helplessly. ‘I don’t understand …’

  ‘… I don’t know how to behave!’ Elke spoke quietly because they were in a public place, but there was desperation in her voice.

  ‘Stop being so fucking wet!’

  Elke grimaced at the obscenity and Ida saw and said: ‘Like that was wet, as if you’ve never heard the word before and think you risk going to hell, because it’s sullied your ears. OK, you’ve had some rotten things happen to you: so have a lot of other people. But a lot of other people haven’t let it wipe out their self-confidence: haven’t wrapped themselves up in an inferiority complex, like a comfort blanket. You’ve met a man you like: maybe, with luck, he likes you. If you are going to agonize about everything, like you’re agonizing and bleating about everything now, do you know what you’re going to do?’

  ‘No,’ said Elke, dully.

  ‘You’re going to fuck it up! There, you’ve heard it twice, in one day! Snap out of it, darling! It sounds like you’ve got a chance of something good here.’

  ‘Don’t you see that’s what I’m frightened of?’ said Elke, her thoughts coalescing. ‘I really want there to be a chance; and I’m terrified of losing it. through doing something – saying something – wrong!’