Funeral in Berlin (18 page)

‘Makes me curious about the locked room,’ said the young SB man. He took off his roll-brim hat and put it on a chair. I said, ‘I’ll want a copy of the phone bill and the phone agreement and
anything else you can think of—this flat and number four.’

‘We usually do the whole block in these sort of cases,’ said the cop.

‘Fine,’ I said.

‘We’ve got some Elastoplast in the squad car,’ he said. ‘You’d better get something on that cut.’

‘What, Dave?’ said the young SB man.

‘I said I don’t like the look of his head,’ said Dave.

‘No, nor do I,’ said the young SB man. Then they both looked at me quizzically for a couple of minutes. Finally the young man went and gazed at the steel padlock with the same forensic dispassion. There was a little glass pea set in the fresh black paintwork at eye level. When Dave had decided that he was trying to see through it the wrong way he said, ‘Well this won’t do,’ to the young man, who produced a large screwdriver from his raincoat pocket.

It took him only two minutes to rip the hasp out of the shoddy cardboard panels of the door. ‘Landlords who rent places like this,’ said the young SB man rapping the door, ‘that’s who we should be locking up.’ He raised his foot and gave the door a great superfluous smash of his boot that caved in one panel. The older SB man stepped inside and switched on the lights. He whistled very softly to himself.

It was a semi-basement room. It got any daylight that could be spared by the architect and God
between them through four small slots set high along one wall. There was some cheap lino of large black and white squares carefully cut to shape but not nailed down. Across the long side of the room was a low bench with two Anglepoise lamps and a gramophone. Draped over the bench was a huge red flag with a white circle and a black swastika in it. Upon the very centre of the swastika was a plaster cast of a rather idealized head of Hitler; around it were a few books, including a signed copy of
Mein Kampf,
some ceremonial daggers and a box of medals and badges. There were a few travel brochures and a notice that said: ‘Hameln in Lower Saxony. Waffen SS Rally. Organized by the Welfare Association of former Waffen SS members. Members wishing to attend give in their names by next week. Friday 6.30
P.M.
to 7.30
A.M.
Monday. Comfortable hotel, all meals, a visit to a nightclub and attendance at the rally: by air both ways £30 inclusive.’

Behind the gramophone there were some records put out by an American company which gave the connoisseur a chance to hear Hitler speeches and Nazi bands in hi-fi, even if they couldn’t afford the thirty quid for the SS weekend. There were well-framed official portraits of the Nazi leaders on the wall, including one of the American Führer in his home-made uniform. There was army surplus seating stacked around the walls and a large very well-cleaned blackboard on an easel. Propped on the mantelpiece
there was a piece of wrapping-paper with a message pencilled on it: ‘Tell Mrs Wilkinson there will be a big turn-out Thursday. Please order extra pint milk.’

‘Very nice,’ said the Special Branch man. ‘Did you expect that something like this was going on?’

From the next room I heard the telly shout gaily, ‘No, I’m afraid that it’s a writing-desk with pigeon-holes for keeping papers, but thank you, Mrs Dugdale of Wolverhampton, for coming along and being such a good sport…’

I said, ‘I heard him say, “Take that, Yid,” when he hit me.’ The Special Branch man nodded. The telly gave a great fanfare of trumpets and a descending series of chords on an electric organ.

A player who uses two moves to do something
possible in one is said to have ‘lost tempo’.

Sunday, October 27th

‘Very pretty that plaster looks,’ said Jean.

‘You have the flat well covered?’ I asked.

‘Policemen are standing on top of policemen,’ said Jean.

‘And the white Alpine?’

‘Give them a chance,’ said Jean. ‘The police have got plenty of things to attend to without interfering with the march of Crime.’

‘Didn’t you tell them it was urgent?’

‘So is the Armistice Sunday rehearsal.’

‘But if they do stumble over anything, put it on the teleprinter,’ I said. ‘It could be important.’

Jean smiled.

‘I’m serious,’ I said.

‘I know you are,’ said Jean and she smiled
again. It was so difficult getting even the simplest things done.

‘Keightley says you don’t want any D notices
¹
sent out,’ said Jean.

‘Keightley,’ I said. ‘He loves them, doesn’t he? Sometimes they do more harm than good—they can attract attention when no one would have bothered.’

‘It’s probably getting quite a splash—Nazis and all that—it’s good circulation-building stuff,’ said Jean.

‘Sometimes you talk like a Press Officer,’ I said. ‘Just as long as I’m left out of it, they can have their swastikas across the front page. It could even help in the long run.’

‘You mean catching the man who socked you on the head.’

‘Socked is a good word,’ I said.

‘Special Branch are throwing a Section 6
²
at him.’

‘Good,’ I said. ‘That’ll learn him to sub-let.’

‘Who is he?’ asked Jean.

‘No idea,’ I said, ‘but he’s certainly not fussy who he rents his rooms to.’

‘What do you know about him?’ she coaxed.

‘An agent for the United Arab Republic who carries a flick-knife.’

‘How do you know that?’

‘He had to use something to spread the marge on his processed cheese sandwiches,’ I said.

‘I mean the UAR,’ said Jean.

‘I’m guessing,’ I admitted, ‘but Samantha Steel is undoubtedly on the payroll of Israeli Intelligence, whatever private shenanigan she may be up to with Vulkan. This character downstairs had done a neat job of tapping her phone right where it did the most good, so I’m guessing that he’s a conscientious anti-Semite and maybe Egyptian Intelligence.’

‘It’s a terrible over-simplification,’ Jean said.

‘You’re right,’ I agreed, ‘but it’s all I’ve got.’

‘What about the neo-Nazis?’

‘I’m no expert,’ I said, ‘but I don’t see those boys running away without their baubles.’

‘That’s ingenious,’ she said. ‘You are probably right,’ and gave me one of her rare admiring looks.

In Burma and Japan a general is the piece we
call a queen, but in China and Korea a
general is the piece we call a king.

Saturday, November 2nd

Pankow is a sort of Hampstead of East Berlin, comfortable and bourgeois; the dogs wear little overcoats and the kids play without shouting. Fistsized shrapnel holes pockmarked the grey face of number 238 and as I mounted the wide stone staircase, the smell of
Eisbein
and fried onion walked alongside me.

Apartment number 20 was on the top floor. The small brass plate said ‘Borg’ in the Gothic script. Ex-Wehrmacht General Borg lived here.

A young girl answered the door. She wore one of those short frilly-edged aprons that maids wore in the ‘thirties. The room she showed me into was over-decorated but under-furnished. A fiercelooking woman with her hair drawn tightly back
into a bun glared out of a plain oval frame like a tiger leaping through a hoop. Under the large photo sat Colonel-General Erich Borg, Commander Panzer Group ‘Borg’.

General Borg was a tall thin man. Sitting low in the ancient armchair, all knees and elbows, he looked as delicate as a stick insect. His face was very white and very wrinkled like a big ball of string, loose to form eyes and mouth. Under his right hand was a pad of paper and an ancient fountain pen. With his left hand, he raised a tall glass of lemon tea to his face and sipped secretively at the almost transparent liquid.

At Borg’s feet there was a large tray of sand in which the contours of central Belgium had been carefully moulded. Tiny strips of coloured wood and bright drawing pins were meticulously arranged in neat rows. I walked across to the sand tray and studied it. ‘Four-fifteen
P.M.
,’ I said.

‘Good,’ said Borg. The girl was watching us both.

‘Just before the British artillery start to fire double-shotted charges.’

‘You hear that, Heidi,’ said Borg. He prodded the sand around the rectangle of Hougoumont with a thin length of cane. ‘Ney’s cavalry are cantering up there towards the British guns, five thousand horsemen and not a grain of intelligence between them. Just shouting “Vive l’Empereur!” and hoping for the best. When they reach the guns, they don’t know what to do, do they?’

The General stared up at me. I said, ‘You can’t spike guns without spikes or drag them away without horses and harness.’

‘They were stupid,’ said Borg. ‘Hammers and nails would have done it.’

I shrugged. ‘They could have smashed the sponge staves,’ I said.

Borg beamed. ‘You hear that, Heidi?’ He nodded. ‘The sponge staves, yes, that would have been something.’

‘I learned about the battle from an artilleryman,’ I explained.

‘No better way,’ said Borg. ‘Artillery was the key to the battle. Read
War and Peace.
Tolstoy knew it.’

‘Napoleon should have known it too. He was an artilleryman.’

‘Napoleon,’ said Borg. He prodded deep into Rossome Farm until the cane bent and flipped a small red cube across the room in a spray of sand. ‘Vollidiot,’ snarled Borg as the Emperor disappeared under the sideboard.

‘I’m glad he was,’ I said, ‘or Waterloo Station would be in Paris.’

‘What would you care?’ said Borg.

‘I live behind Waterloo Station,’ I said.

Borg rapped me across the ankle with his cane. I cowered back to avoid the next blow. Borg smiled icily. It was a Prussian gesture of friendship. The girl made a seat for me by moving a map of central Poland, a book of medieval armour
and
Der Deutsche Soldatenkalender
for 1956. I sat down.

‘Droll men, you French,’ said Borg.

‘Yes,’ I said. The walls of the garret room sloped like a tent and the big windows fitted into it like an awning. Along the window stood a line of potted plants, which shone in the artificial heat. Condensation dribbled down the glass, making an impressionist painting of the view across the dusty roofs.

‘Heidi,’ the general’s voice was high and clear.

His daughter brought me a small cup of strong coffee. She watched me as I tasted it and asked if I was too hot.

‘No,’ I said. I felt a trickle of sweat move down my forehead and sweep across my cheek like an errant tear.

She laughed. ‘Papa feels the cold so,’ she said.

‘I understand,’ I said. I polished the condensation from my spectacles again.

‘What’s that?’ said the general in a loud voice.

‘You feel the cold,’ I said.

‘I
am,
’ said the general.

‘What?’ I said.

‘I am old,’ he said patiently. The girl patted his shoulder and said, ‘Of course he doesn’t think you look old.’ She spoke to me. ‘Papa lip-reads; you must face him when you speak.’

‘Then he must be a fool,’ said the general.

I looked out through the dribbly glass; there was a banner on the building opposite. ‘Peace must be armed’, it said.

General Borg said, ‘The passing of time is like the passing of two trains; when you are young the other train is travelling at almost the same speed. Time hangs upon your hands. You grow older, the train gains speed slightly. Then it’s rushing by faster, faster and faster until it’s gone and you see the green countryside again.’

‘Yes,’ I said. The general gazed at me intently. ‘I’m trying,’ he said very slowly. ‘I’m trying to remember you. Were you in the war with me?’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I was on the other side.’

‘That was wise,’ he said and nodded in admiration.

‘It’s about your collection of regimental diaries,’ I said.

The general’s face brightened. ‘You are a military historian. I knew it. We have a large collection of records—are you interested in cavalry uniform—that’s my principal interest at present—I am writing an article.’

‘It’s a simple enquiry,’ I said. ‘It’s a Wehrmacht unit that was evacuating people from a concentration camp. I’d like some details of the personnel.’

‘Heidi will look it up for you,’ said the general. ‘That’s a very straightforward matter. We have a roomful of unit records. Eh, Heidi?’

‘Yes, Papa,’ she said. ‘I can hardly get in it to clean,’ she said to me. I gave her the details written on a slip of paper.

‘I’m sure you manage,’ I said. She pattered off to get the files.

The general sipped his tea and talked about nineteenth-century cavalry uniform.

‘You came on the advice of Colonel Stok?’ the general said.

‘That’s right. He said that you have one of the best collections of military records in the whole of Germany.’

The general nodded. ‘Fascinating man, Stok,’ said the general. ‘He has let me have some most interesting Red Army historical material, most interesting. Very kind. It’s rare, you know.’ I wondered whether he meant Red Army history or kindness.

‘Have you lived here very long?’ I said finally, to break the silence.

‘Born in this very building,’ said the general. ‘And I’ll die in it. Used to have the whole thing when my father was alive. Now we are just a small apartment in the roof, eh? All under Government control, the rest of the building—still people are homeless, can’t have everything, mustn’t complain.’

‘Have you ever thought of living in the West?’ I asked.

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘My mother was very keen to move to Köln. That would be about 1931, but we never went.’

‘I mean since the war. Why do you live here in East Berlin since the war?’

‘My old friends cannot visit me,’ he said.

I pursed my lips to reform the question, until
the general’s quiet simper told me he had answered it.

‘Do you do any work for Bonn?’ I asked.

‘For those ruffians—certainly not.’ He tapped the arm of his chair as though his fist was a gavel. ‘For a decade after the war, I was too much of a Nazi for any decent German to take coffee with me.’ He put the words ‘decent German’ into roughly tongued inverted commas. ‘My only conversations were with two colonels from the American Army Historical Department. We fought all the way from the Bug to the Volga together. Do you know…’ He leaned forward confidentially. ‘…every time we did it, I made less mistakes. I tell you, a couple more visits from those Historical Department colonels and I think I might have
taken
Stalingrad.’ He laughed a humourless treble laugh. ‘For a whole decade I was too much of a Nazi for the German politicians.’ He sipped his tea. ‘Now I’m not enough of a Nazi for them.’ He laughed again, without humour, as though he had made that joke and laughed at it many times before. Heidi came back with a bundle of large brown envelopes.

‘Do you know Colonel Stok?’ she asked me.

‘My girl’s rather taken with him,’ said the general and laughed as heartily as he could laugh without shattering into a million fragments.

‘She could do worse,’ I said, wondering if I had been guilty of impropriety.

‘Exactly,’ said the general.

‘Are you a colleague of Alexeyevitch?’ the girl asked.

‘I’m a business rival,’ I said.

She laughed and set before me the big envelopes that contained more details of the life of Broum.