The Girl Behind the Wall

by Mandy Robotham

  ‘I’m just thinking about a nice weekend,’ she says.

  ‘Any reason for that?’ he asks. There’s an edge to his tone which makes her turn, and his smile switches to include a hint of something darker.

  ‘No, it was just pleasant, that’s all. Busy.’ She’s trying not to sound guarded or defensive, but his manner and approach have already set off a dozen alarm bells inside Jutta’s head.

  ‘And how is your sister?’ Axel delivers the leaden query with an upbeat innocence.

  ‘I wouldn’t know, since she’s in East Berlin.’ Keep walking. Don’t stop. Don’t face him. ‘Surely, you know that?’

  This time, he pulls at her arm, not forcibly but enough for her to stop and face him.

  ‘Then I wonder why she was in West Berlin on Saturday, at your mother’s house. Pretending to be you.’ His brown eyes look straight into her, heavy brows crinkled. Waiting. Then a twitch, prodding for a response.

  ‘You’re mistaken,’ Jutta says flatly. Regardless of Karin’s praise on Saturday, this is way beyond her skills at subterfuge, but she presses her point: ‘We’re identical – we were always being mistaken for one another. You know full well she’s trapped behind the Wall.’

  Instantly, it’s plain to see Axel has something else up his sleeve – he’s not simply fishing. ‘I would believe you, had I not seen with my own eyes the two of you popping in and out like a couple of jack-in-a-boxes,’ he says finally.

  No amount of self-control can quell the gasp escaping from Jutta’s lips. Automatically, she scans left and right, calculating for the half-second it gives her, feeling a plug being pulled somewhere in her body and every ounce of her being, along with Karin, draining away. There’s no point denying it; the best she can hope for is collusion, for them not to be betrayed. But she can’t fathom Axel’s motives from his expression – he’s a perfect fluchthelfer, showing little on his face. A consummate liar.

  ‘I’ll be late for work,’ she says irritably. ‘I’ll meet you at lunchtime, twelve fifteen, in the gardens behind the library.’

  He nods, though doesn’t smile. ‘I look forward to it.’

  A Monday morning has never seemed so sluggish. Every student querying a title or stopping her to ask a question is like someone poking at a raw wound, and once or twice she flashes irritation, then remembers it’s not their fault. It’s she who has been caught, been somehow slapdash. It’s she and Karin, and Mama and Gerda, who will suffer now, at the very least with their precious contact being severed. She tries to stop herself thinking of the worst. What could be Axel’s purpose? Isn’t he supposed to be on their side? The possibilities circle her head like tumbleweed in slow motion.

  By lunchtime, she’s already swallowed two aspirin and is in need of more. As she walks towards the gardens, the summer breeze is of little comfort and only pushes strands of hair into her eyes, scratching at her raw patience. Axel is sitting on a bench backing onto the library, looking out on the student traffic passing to and fro.

  ‘Busy morning?’ he asks casually, as she sits at the furthest end.

  Jutta’s throbbing head means she is in no mood to tolerate any polite preamble.

  ‘What is it you want, Axel?’ she snaps, only just refraining from barking the words. ‘I have no money, and neither does my family, if that’s what you’re looking for? Or are you paid by the Stasi for such information?’

  He shuffles sideways quickly and lays a hand on her arm – Jutta is stopped from snatching it away only by those walking by.

  ‘Hey, that’s not it,’ he replies, his face contorted with hurt. ‘I am not a Stasi informant.’

  ‘And I’m supposed to believe that?’

  ‘If I were, do you think we’d be sitting here now?’ Axel says. ‘They have a track record of acting swiftly. Even on the West side.’

  He has a point, but then Jutta has little experience of how the GDR secret police work, other than what she’s heard. It could be a double bluff. How am I supposed to react now? This is not me, or my life. The thought rattling around Jutta’s head over the weekend returns in large, red letters: IT WAS ALL TOO EASY. This is the payback.

  ‘So what do you want?’ she presses.

  ‘Only your access.’

  She feels her heart fall away from her body – it’s over. The portal for contact with her beloved sister snaps shut in an instant. It’s followed quickly by a scarlet mist of anger, that the entryway she discovered and risked with each trip is so easily snatched from them, and yet Jutta is deflated enough that she has no zeal to argue. Only the line of her mouth shows the fury inside.

  ‘Hiding escapees in cars and trucks is becoming more and more dangerous,’ Axel explains. ‘For every tunnel dug, the Stasi discovers another. So we need to find alternative ways to get information and false papers across. Then, the Easterners can simply walk across the border in plain sight.’

  Jutta lets out an extended sigh of defeat. ‘Who saw us? Were we that obvious?’

  A smile creeps across Axel’s wiry face for the first time. ‘Not at all,’ he says. ‘In fact, quite the opposite.’

  ‘So how?’

  ‘It was a complete fluke. I happened to be over in that part of town visiting a friend, and I saw you walking towards Harzer Strasse. Doing what I do makes me naturally curious, so I followed you.’

  ‘For how long?’ Jutta shudders at the thought of Axel’s eyes not being the only ones to spy. Of her and Karin being blissfully – and dangerously – naive, and under surveillance the whole time.

  ‘Only that day, two days ago. Imagine my surprise when you popped back out a short time later. It did take me a little while to work it out, though: that it was your sister I was following then, dressed as you.’

  ‘And how did you work it out? We were careful.’

  ‘You were,’ Axel agrees. ‘The attention to detail was good. But another fluke – I’m a twin myself, identical. Takes one to know one, and my brother and I played the same trick many a time.’

  Exasperated, Jutta pushes her head back and stares at the blue sky above. Any other day she might be out here eating her lunch and thinking life was good, what with Karin and Danny. Prospects. Except the puffy clouds dotted about seem threatening, sinister as they scud with the breeze.

  ‘Will you allow me one more trip?’ she says. ‘I have to warn Karin. Surely you wouldn’t want her to be in danger? If what you say is true?’ If you’re not Stasi.

  Axel pulls himself up. ‘Oh no, you misunderstand, Jutta,’ he says. ‘I don’t want to stop you going through. Far from it. The opening is needed long-term – if we push people through in bulk, it will be discovered in no time. For now, it has a much more useful purpose.’

  ‘Then what?’

  ‘You can use your doorway to the East as much as you like, and we won’t interfere, I promise,’ he states plainly. His pause is intentional and carefully timed. ‘In return for something.’

  ‘Yes?’ Her eyes narrow with suspicion. Of course, there has to be a forfeit for anything good in this world. How could she be so stupid to think otherwise?

  ‘You act as the go-between. Be our messenger across the Wall.’

  It feels as if Jutta’s entire body calcifies. ‘And if I refuse?’ she barely manages.

  Axel shrugs. ‘You lose the access, of course.’ For one half-second, his thinned lips and narrow eyes signal there could be more of a penalty. Much more. Then, his face reverts to the blank of a perfect, practised liar.

  48

  A Father’s Concern

  5th August 1963, East Berlin

  Karin hums as she swirls the mop around the hospital floor, only the strength of the bleach mixture in her bucket keeping her from sinking completely into her thoughts. Nothing, though, can tarnish her mood today, not after the weekend and the promises of life ahead. She and Otto had spent Sunday shopping at a few market stalls that were trading, then headed with their picnic to the lake at Rummelsburger, swimming, eating and snoozing, and then doing the same
all over again until the sun dipped out of sight. He drew lines in the sand, laying out his latest idea for the Leipzig project, his eyes alive with promise. Her only regret was in not being able to tell Otto the basis for her own bright mood, how it was so good to see Mama, to feel the instant flood of freedom in the West. She knew, too, that lying across his warm body beside the water was the perfect time to float the prospect of a different life together, over there. But it was too perfect a day. Karin recognised her own fear: Otto loves her for sure, but still, she can’t help feeling that years of loving his home counts for a great deal too. And she has months left to gently sway his mind.

  ‘You look miles away.’

  ‘Sorry?’ Karin is startled out of her daydream and stands almost to attention with her mop, recognising the voice half a second later. ‘Oh, Walter – you surprised me. How are you?’

  ‘I’m fine,’ he says, ‘and unusually free for lunch. Are you due a break soon? My treat.’

  ‘Yes, I’d love to. I can get off at twelve.’ She looks past him to the window and the summer sun streaming through. ‘But can we go outside? I could do with some air.’

  He looks at the bucket below, catches the acrid odour and her drift. ‘Good idea. I’ll see you in reception.’

  They walk just outside the Charité’s grounds, Karin wearing a cardigan over her drab uniform and Walter having shed his white coat. Predictably, he leads her to a slightly downbeat café serving meatballs that he loves and others are forced to tolerate, but Karin doesn’t mind the potato salad and bread. She’s pleased just to sit outside, bathed by the sun’s rays; it’s pleasantly warm rather than hot. Even the smell of traffic and Trabis pushing out exhaust fumes along Schlegel Strasse is preferable to the stench of her bleach bucket.

  ‘So, busy weekend?’ Walter says, sipping at the coffee, which is superior to the food, in Karin’s eyes at least.

  ‘Yes, very good,’ she nods, and her mind drifts away. ‘Very good.’

  ‘Any particular reason? Did you see your sister perhaps?’

  She flicks up her lashes with alarm. ‘Why would you say that?’

  ‘No reason, other than that I know it makes you happy,’ he shrugs, though his tone marks that he’s noted her anguish.

  Karin groans. The act of seeing her family brought untold happiness, but stifling such a secret is causing her to feel like a frantically shaken bottle of Coca-Cola – ready to pop.

  ‘Karin? Is everything all right?’ Walters probes.

  It’s the tiny prompt she needs to tell him everything. Jutta he’s met, of course, and likely guessed that Karin’s twin has been through the Wall more than once. But their recent swap clearly surprises even Walter, and Karin cannot fathom if it’s his naturally cautious nature, or because it was blatantly foolish.

  ‘Just be very, very careful,’ he says, uneasy enough that his meatballs are in danger of going cold. He doesn’t need to say more – the word Stasi is left unsaid, hovering on his lips like a foul curse.

  ‘I will. Oh, but Walter, it was so lovely to hug Mama and everyone else.’ It’s the memory she can’t, and doesn’t want to, quash.

  ‘I’m sure it was. But you came back. How was that?’

  ‘Hard,’ she admits. ‘In some ways. Not so much after seeing Otto.’

  ‘And does he know of your trip?’ Walter’s eyebrows are almost knitted together with concern, his grey eyes focused.

  ‘No, he still knows nothing. And you can’t tell him either, Walter. Please.’

  ‘It’s not my business to,’ he replies. ‘But I wonder how long it can go on’ – he hides his words in a forkful of food – ‘before the breach in the Wall is discovered. Or worse.’

  ‘I know, I know,’ she moans. ‘I will tell him in the right moment. Just not yet.’ Yet she daren’t tell Walter of her pledge to Jutta, since it feels like a betrayal of the man who’s only ever been loyal to her.

  ‘And you’ll carry on in the meantime?’ he says. ‘I’m just concerned, Karin, that’s all. You know how much Christel and I think of you. Almost like a daughter. If we lose you it means your family has lost too. And for a long time.’

  Again, she can only agree with this sensible, giving man. It is foolhardy to risk capture, and her liberty. Jutta’s too. And in moments alone she wonders if it can endure for months – but when she’s with Jutta, or Mama, forever seems possible. Then back in the East, there are Vopos on every corner, Stasi unseen and floating everywhere. How much longer can their courage hold out? How long will the Wall stand? How long is a piece of string?

  ‘I will work it out. I promise, Walter.’

  Arm in arm, they thread back through the string of hospital staff taking their own lunches in the shadow of the grandiose building. Nervously, Karin observes a Vopo who’s been shadowing one or two steps behind almost since they left the café. She unhooks her arm from Walter’s and makes as if to tie her shoelace, noting as she gazes upwards that the grey-green uniform stops too, hovering. Walter has met a colleague in passing and is deep in conversation a few feet away, and Karin rises and turns slowly, pretending that something has caught her eye in the distance.

  He’s young, almost pubescent under the bowl of his smooth helmet, with unblemished cheeks and chin. Her eyes skate over him and make a hair’s breadth of contact with his – he seems to grasp at it, raising a smile along with an arm, though luckily not the one holding a gun.

  ‘I thought it was you,’ he says, striding towards her in a friendly manner.

  Karin seizes control of her face, forcing it to be blank, though inside confusion reigns. Who the hell is he? Do I know him?

  ‘How is your book going? Have you finished it yet?’ But he’s smiling instead of hectoring.

  Out of uniform, Karin might think him either mad, drunk or making an awkward pass, but his uniform looks real. She’s always avoided Vopos, for obvious reasons. And now she just wants to escape this one’s attentions as soon as possible.

  ‘Uh, yes, almost done,’ she lies. ‘It’s not bad, just a bit slow.’ Isn’t that what people often say about books? Something general?

  ‘I’ll ask my sister what she thought of it, she’s nearly finished too,’ he comes back.

  People are beginning to look, curious as to how and why she’s engaging in friendly banter with a Vopo. Mercifully, there’s a shout from across the street, some men arguing outside a bar, and his head swings towards them.

  ‘Well, see you around,’ he says and turns tail.

  Walter peels away from his colleague and joins her, wearing a quizzical look. ‘Someone you know?’

  Karin shakes her head. ‘Never met him before in my life.’

  49

  A One-Way Street

  5th August 1963, West Berlin

  Jutta is sweating as she strides out of the library at the day’s end, despite a sudden chill nudging into the air while the sun dips low. The afternoon had gone … well, she doesn’t know where it went, because her mind was entirely elsewhere, battling a horrific quandary while her body and her mouth performed tasks like a robot.

  Bloody Axel! How dare he pretend to be so selfless in helping escapees across the Wall, and yet so heartless in his blackmail. Because that’s what it amounts to – pure coercion using her precious access to Karin as bait, dressed up as a small sacrifice to help others. Except it’s her damn sacrifice, and not his. Jutta seethes as she walks, the chill cooling her skin but the furnace inside ever more stoked. And yet, she thinks: not once did he ask her why Karin hadn’t escaped the East when she’d had the opportunity, why she hadn’t just skipped away from the portal and her life in East Berlin. Can he know about Otto? Or does he simply not care?

  She’s seen Axel in the refectory and around campus; his status on the escape committee is a poorly kept secret, affording him a kudos among the others in the group, and women who seem to hover around a glow of his own making. How much peril does Axel actually put himself in? she wonders. Why doesn’t he want to simply take over the rabbi
t hole and run the messages himself? It’s a question she would love to confront him with, spitting her anger. And yet, Jutta knows she won’t. Because, as Axel so shrewdly observes, the gateway to her sister is too prized for Jutta to forego. If she refuses to run messages, access to Karin is cut to zero, along with the possibility of her sister’s eventual, permanent return home. And can she trust that a quiet word in the Stasi’s ear from Axel won’t also see her arrested? Or Karin too?

  Jutta weighs up her options, a perilous set of scales: carrying messages is dangerous, but it means she does get to see Karin. Crucially, it keeps the portal ajar in time for Karin to work her magic on Otto.

  Jutta has got one day to decide; that’s how she and Axel had left the exchange. In her own mind, she’s made her choice, though is in need of a confidant, someone to tell her the decision is not utterly insane. And as much as she wants to share her dilemma – and her trust – with Danny, she can’t. It will be the death knell for a relationship only just beginning.

  She finds a phone booth and dials the number for Hugo’s radio station, thankful to hear his cheery voice.

  ‘Hugo, it’s me. I need a drink.’

  Her tone must be fraught because he’s quick to answer, ‘Fifteen minutes,’ and gives her the name of a bar in Charlottenburg where they’ve met before.

  She’s already seated in the window when Hugo parks up his bike and strides through the door, a renewed confidence about him these days. He orders a drink and sits opposite.

  ‘All right, the psychologist is in session,’ he says, grinning as he sips his beer.

  ‘Oh Hugo, don’t be like that.’

  ‘Like what?’ he queries. ‘I’m just saying. I always know that when you call me, it’s because you need a sounding board for something.’

  Jutta sighs. ‘You’re my cousin. More than that. I love you.’

  ‘And I love you, which is why I’m here.’ He holds his hands aloft in surrender, displaying his palms theatrically. And he’s smiling. ‘So shoot.’