Dominion (33 page)

Geoff said bleakly, ‘She’s right. If there’s anything here the authorities shouldn’t see, Frank would thank us for taking it.’

David went into the kitchen. His feet crunched on broken plates; there were dents in the plasterboard wall where cans had been thrown. It was hard to reconcile the pale, shrunken figure in the
hospital with this manic destruction. All the cupboards were empty, bar some battered cutlery in the drawers. Geoff appeared at his elbow. ‘Nothing in the bathroom,’ he said. ‘I
thought I’d leave the bedroom to you.’

‘Okay.’

David went into the bedroom. He searched the bed – the sheets needed washing – riffled through the socks and underwear in the chest of drawers, then the pockets of the few jackets
and trousers hanging in the wardrobe. He found nothing apart from a farthing and screwed-up bus tickets. He bent to look under the bed and saw a big brown suitcase there. He pulled it out and
slipped the clasps. Inside was a packet of some sort, wrapped in brown paper. He lifted it. Papers. His heart quickened as he undid the parcel, but it was just a collection of pornographic
magazines, naked women lying on beds or sitting astride chairs. There was a collection of film magazines from the early thirties too: Jean Harlow and Katherine Hepburn and Fay Wray in soulful
romantic poses. He made himself look through the magazines in case anything was hidden inside them but there was nothing. He rewrapped the packet and shoved the suitcase back under the bed,
stirring up a cloud of dust.

In the lounge Geoff had righted an armchair and was sitting riffling through the books and periodicals. Natalia was still poring over the papers at Frank’s desk. She looked up.

‘Anything in the bedroom?’

‘Nothing.’

‘I’m seeing if there are any papers hidden in these,’ Geoff said. ‘Nothing so far.’ He held up a copy of an American magazine,
Amazing Science Fiction
.
‘Just Frank’s cup of tea.’

David took up a magazine. ‘Better than the stuff my nephews read, war comics about the fighting in Russia.’

‘Nothing in the desk,’ Natalia said. ‘Just bills and some letters from a lawyer about his mother’s estate. Oh, and these.’ She handed David a bundle of envelopes,
neatly tied in a rubber band. David was surprised to see his own handwriting. It was the letters he had sent Frank over the years. He opened one.

Natalia was looking at him curiously. ‘He kept your letters,’ she said. ‘Almost like a lover.’

‘There was never anything pansy about Frank,’ David answered sharply. He thought of the pornography, but he wasn’t going to tell her about that.

‘Did you keep his letters to you?’

‘No. But then I had other friends.’ David looked round the dismal room. ‘Exactly what happened here? What was it all about? Edgar came to visit. He was drunk; he said something
that pushed Frank over the edge. After all these years of holding everything in.’

‘It could have been something personal,’ Geoff suggested. ‘Some family thing.’

‘Possibly,’ Natalia agreed. She replaced the papers in the desk.

David picked up the letters. ‘I think we should take these with us.’

She nodded. ‘Yes. That might be best.’ David stuffed the packet into his overcoat pocket. Natalia wiped her dusty fingers on a handkerchief. She smiled at David, her wry smile.
‘You English hold your feelings inside yourselves; it is not surprising sometimes you crack up.’

‘Sometimes there’s a lot to hold in.’

They all jumped and turned quickly at the sound of a key in the door. Natalia’s hand went to the pocket of her coat; now David knew she had a gun in there. She stood in front of the desk
as the hall door opened, and a little old man with white hair, in an old cardigan and carpet slippers, came in and stared at them. He shuffled into the lounge.

‘Thought I ’eard someone in ’ere.’ He had a high-pitched voice with a Birmingham accent. He peered at them short-sightedly, quite unafraid. ‘Who are you?’

David said, ‘We’re friends of Dr Muncaster, we’ve been to visit him in hospital.’

‘Do you live in one of the other flats?’ Geoff asked.

‘The one above. I’m Bill Brown.’ The old man looked around the room. ‘It were me called the coppers, last month. You’ll know all about it, if you’re friends
of Dr Muncaster.’

‘Yes.’

The old man shook his head. ‘I’ve never heard anything like it, screaming and shouting then that window going. I looked out and there was that poor man lying on the ground, I thought
he were a goner.’ He stared at them, bright-eyed. ‘And Dr Muncaster yelling and raving, smashing things up. Thank God me daughter got me to have the phone put in, I dialled 999 straight
off. I can do without things like that at my age. I’m eighty, y’know,’ he added proudly.

‘Who boarded the window up?’ David asked.

‘I got the freeholder to do it. He’s a spare key to all the flats. He left one with me.’ Bill stared at him with watery eyes that still had a sharpness to them. ‘A house
with a broken window’s a magnet for burglars. How is Dr Muncaster? Is he coming back?’

‘Not in the near future.’

The old man nodded. ‘Are you family?’ He looked round at them.

‘My friend and I were at school with him.’ David didn’t give their names. ‘We’ve come up from London to see him. We heard what happened through someone at the
university. We came over to check everything was all right here.’

‘’Ow’s Dr Muncaster’s brother?’

‘He’s safely back in America,’ Natalia said,

‘Broken arm, the police said.’ Bill looked round the chaos again. ‘’E were always very quiet, Dr Muncaster. Polite. Never thought he’d go off his head like
that.’

‘No,’ David said. He added conversationally, ‘Apparently he was shouting about the end of the world.’

‘He were that. Never ’eard anything like it. This has always been a quiet house, I’ve lived here since my wife died. Fifteen years. Gor, the way he was raving, yelling. How the
world was ending.’ Bill looked at Natalia. ‘Are you German, miss?’ he asked suddenly.

‘No.’

He held her gaze for a moment, then asked, ‘What are they saying at the hospital?’

David answered. ‘They don’t seem to know much. When we saw Frank he was very quiet.’

‘Bartley Green loony-bin, isn’t it? A man I worked with had a sister in there once. Said it was a miserable place. Of course once you’re in somewhere like that often
you’re there till they bring you out in a box.’ Nobody replied. ‘Like I said, I’d nothing against him. Though that funny grin of his used to give me the willies.’ Bill
looked at the photograph of Frank’s father. ‘That his dad?’

‘Yes.’

‘Doesn’t half look like him. I lost me son at Passchendaele.’

‘I’m sorry,’ Geoff said.

Bill turned to him. ‘We were fighting the wrong enemy then.’ His eyes brightened. ‘Have you ’eard about the Jews?’

‘What about them?’ David asked.

The old man smiled. ‘They’re being rounded up, all over the country. It was on the news: Mosley’s to broadcast on TV about it later. They were all taken away this
morning.’

‘Where to?’ David asked.

‘No idea. Isle of Man, Isle of Wight? I think it’s best to turn ’em over to the Germans.’

‘Are you sure about this?’ Geoff asked.

‘’Course I am. I told you, it was on the news. Surprise, innit? I never realized how many Jews there were in Brum till they made ’em wear those yellow badges. Good riddance.
Glad I won’t be seeing them badges any more, they gave me the creeps.’ Bill looked between the three of them, then said sarcastically, ‘Still, you sound like educated people,
mebbe you don’t see it that way. Well, I’ll leave you to it.’ He glanced around the flat again. ‘If ’e’s not coming back, maybe this place should go on the
market.’ He nodded at them, smiled maliciously, then shuffled out, shutting the door behind him.

David turned to Natalia. He said, trying to keep the shock from his voice, ‘Looks like you were right. About the Jews having no future.’

She didn’t answer. Geoff said, ‘It’ll be part of some deal with the Germans, Beaverbrook will have got something in return.’

Natalia said, ‘I think we should leave. There’s nothing here.’ She frowned. ‘The end of the world. What did he mean by that?’ She looked around the room again, took
a deep breath. ‘Come on, we should find a telephone box, ring Mr Jackson.’

G
UNTHER AND
S
YME DROVE ON TO
Birmingham, the windscreen wipers working against the misty rain. Syme looked preoccupied, lighting
cigarettes one-handed. He was suspicious, Gunther guessed; having seen Muncaster he couldn’t believe he could be a man with dangerous political contacts. He knew something else was going
on.

‘How long since you visited Berlin?’ Gunther asked, to begin a conversation.

‘Five years. I bet it’s changed a lot. They hope to have all those huge new buildings ready for the 1960 Olympics, don’t they?’

‘Yes. But there are problems with building such huge structures on sandy soil. They are still digging the foundations. They will be finished in time, they hope.’ He smiled at Syme.
‘The centre of Berlin is always so dusty. Lots of people have chest problems these days.’

‘Do you have a house there?’

‘Just a flat. My wife and I had a house but it was sold in the divorce.’

‘Maybe if I do a spell in the North I can earn enough for a mortgage on a decent-sized house. Then I might look round for a nice girl who doesn’t mind the hours.’

‘Yes. There is nothing like a house and family.’ Gunther spoke regretfully. ‘I hope to visit my son in the spring. In Krimea.’

‘Any problems with Russian terrorists there?’

‘Not in Krimea. We cleared the natives out of the peninsula ten years ago. There are only German settlers there now. So it is safe, though there have been attacks on the trains coming from
Germany. Fewer now, we’re concentrating more on protecting the lines.’ He paused. ‘Russia is vast; I think it will be another generation before we control it completely. This is
the greatest war of conquest in history.’

Syme turned to look at him. ‘They say Speer and the army would like to do a deal with the Russians, let them keep the country east of Moscow. Goebbels too, I’ve heard.’

‘No,’ Gunther said firmly. ‘What we have started we will finish. Squash Jewish Bolshevism for ever.’

Syme laughed, his good humour restored. ‘Well, we’re doing our bit here now, with what’s happening today. What times to live in. Bleedin’ exciting, eh?’ He slipped
back into Cockney for a moment.

Gunther thought, yes, I know, you like your bit of excitement, while I am starting to feel old and tired before my time.

As they drove through the countryside there was little sign that this was anything other than a normal Sunday. Once, though, they passed near a railway line where a freight
train of closed boxcars was moving slowly south. For a moment Gunther thought he heard faint cries coming from inside, but he wasn’t sure and Syme didn’t seem to notice anything.

It was mainly quiet on the outskirts of Birmingham, too, although Black Marias, their klaxons shrilling, occasionally sped past. Once, looking down a suburban street, Gunther saw two parked
outside a house where some sort of struggle seemed to be going on. But he couldn’t see clearly; it was too misty.

They drove into the city centre, full of big Victorian Gothic buildings dark with soot. There weren’t many people around but quite a few Auxiliaries were on patrol; Gunther noticed several
outside the closed doors of a church, arguing with a little group of people, one in a white clerical collar.

‘I told you the churchy types would be a nuisance,’ Syme observed. ‘Not far now, Birmingham Special Branch HQ’s just round the corner, in Corporation Street.’

They turned into a wide commercial street and pulled up beside a door with a blue lamp above it. Several other cars were parked there. Gunther saw a queue of people straggling down the steps of
the building and along the street. Two Auxiliaries stood by the door and two more walked up and down keeping an eye on the queue. As Gunther and Syme got out one of the Auxies in the doorway came
over. He was very large, but young, a rash of pimples round his mouth. His expression was hostile until Syme showed his warrant card.

‘Is Inspector Blake in?’ he asked.

‘I think so, sir. He’s very busy, though, you know what’s been happening today?’

‘We heard.’

Gunther looked along the waiting queue. No-one seemed to be wearing the yellow badge, though many looked anxious and some angry. One young man had grabbed the arm of an Auxiliary and was
pleading with him, almost in tears. ‘It’s my wife’s brother. I need to know where they’ve taken him.’

‘Just wait your turn, sir,’ the policeman replied, his voice bored. ‘They’ll tell you at the desk.’ An elderly couple, faces rigid with grief, came through the
swing doors of the police station and walked down the steps, holding each other tightly.

‘These are friends of the Jews?’ Gunther asked the Auxiliary.

Catching his accent, the man looked at him with interest. ‘Are you from Germany, sir? An observer?’

‘Just a visitor. I am in the Gestapo, though.’ He nodded towards the young man in the queue who had asked about his wife’s brother. ‘You are exempting Jews who have
married Gentiles?’

‘I’m not sure quite what the rules are, sir.’ The boy looked embarrassed. ‘We were just given the names and addresses of those to be picked up.’

Gunther looked at the sad queue, the rain pattering down on them. ‘We made some exemptions at the beginning. Too many: it just causes trouble for everyone later.’