The Hunter From the Woods (33 page)

“Horst, you’re going to live to see all this.” Franziska put a hand on his chest, over his British and Russian heart. “God will not let a man like you be lost to the future. I know this like I know my own soul.”

Michael made some kind of noise of assent, he wasn’t sure what.

She stretched out upon him, her arms going around his body and her ear pressed down as if to count the heartbeats of such a noble beast. “You’ve seen so much death, I know,” she said. “I can feel that in you. I think you’ve known very much pain. But you hide it from the world. You see, we’re alike in this way. My parents were too busy for me, too busy adventuring. I was raised by a succession of nannies and thrown out of a succession of schools. I loved a man who died. In a racing accident, right in front of me. We were going to be married, but…you know, such things happen. I was a girl.” An element in her voice was quickly effervescent, and then gone. “I think…maybe all of me never came back from that. I’m sorry,” she said suddenly, “I wasn’t meaning to talk so much about myself.”

Michael’s right hand had moved to poise over the black waves of her hair. He let his hand drift upon her head. He stroked his fingers gently through her hair and down along the back of her neck. “I like to listen,” he invited.

She didn’t speak for a length of time. The light faded more and more, to less and less.

When Franziska did speak, it was in a quiet voice that was tight with emotion. “Sometimes I feel…as if no one knows me, or can ever know me. I feel as if…no one hears music as I do, or sees color, or appreciates…just
living
, every day. I feel…I’m in a world of shadows, and where are the real people? Am I the sleepwalker, or are they? Because if I learned anything from watching Kurt die, it was that one must be
prepared
to die, at any moment. But that doesn’t mean being afraid, or locking yourself into a room and sealing off the world. Oh, no…it’s the opposite. It means going out with courage into what you fear the most, and looking it right in the face. And if you live, you laugh, because you have won the fight for another day.
That
is how you prepare for death. By embracing life, not hiding from it. Oh,
listen
to me!” She glanced quickly up at him and then returned her head to the position it had been in. Michael knew she was enjoying having her head and neck rubbed. “Lecturing about life and death to a soldier!”

“I understand what you mean,” Michael said.

“I knew you would. And I knew, the moment you approached me at Herr Rittenkrett’s party, that you were different. I looked at you and took you in, and I thought… Franziska, you must be with this man. You must not only go to bed with him, but you must
be
with him. Why? Because I’m a selfish slut dressed up in silks and furs, and I want my pleasure. But also…because to you I want to
give
pleasure, and I haven’t felt that way…since I was a girl,” she finished.

Michael said, “I’m honored,” and he meant it.

Her hand slid down between his thighs.

“Now,” she said, “I’m going to get up and go fetch from a drawer a paper pistol target and a floorstand to mount it on. I’m going to set the target up within an interesting distance. Then I’m going to give you the cocksucking of your life, and even though you think you
might
be tired, I’m going to use your gun to hit a bull’s-eye. Do you understand that?”

An
expert marksman
, Mallory had said.

Michael would have to judge for himself.

“Yes,” he told her, and heard in his own voice the nearly giddy excitement of…a boy? “I very much understand.”

There would be no shooting of blanks in this contest.

Sometime when the evening had closed in and they had showered together, she remarked on how fast his beard seemed to grow, and what kind of razor did he use? He said he owned a French Thiers-Izzard, and she gave him an expression of horror and said the beauty of his face should only be trusted to German steel.

He wound up shaving with her razor, and afterward he watched as she sat on the edge of the tub and shaved her magnificent legs.

“Do you like my bush?” she asked, with a dimpled half-smile he found devastating. “It’s getting a little full, I think.”

He just had to look down at the floor tiles and shake his head at her earthiness, and when Franziska laughed at this unbelievable and until now unknown moment of shyness in the life of Michael Gallatin he thought he would pick this woman up in his arms and press her so close that Eve would return the rib.

“Dinner?” he asked her, when he’d recovered himself. “Someplace with music?”

A frown surfaced. “Oh…I have an appointment tonight. Something I can’t put off. As a matter of fact, I was supposed to call Herr Rittenkrett by now. He’ll be waiting to hear from me.” Without the need for a towel, she walked in her glorious lithesome nakedness to the telephone in the other room.

Michael hated to play his next card, but it was time to show the East Front Jack Of Hearts. He sighed as she picked up the receiver. “I’m sorry we can’t spend all our time together. The time left, I mean.”

She put the receiver to her ear and started dialing.

“If I get my orders tomorrow,” he continued, “I might not have a chance to see you again.”
Careful
, he thought. She mustn’t smell the lie.

“Franziska Luxe for Herr Rittenkrett,” she said to whomever answered on the other side.

“Well,” he said, “do you have a suggestion for where I should eat?”

She gave him a look over her shoulder that of itself was worthy of more target practice.

“Hello, Axel,” she said into the mouthpiece. “I wanted you to know…” She paused, still staring fixedly at Michael. “I’m not feeling very well tonight,” she went on. “We’ll need to postpone our plans. What? My condition? My throat is a little sore. Yes, I think I’ll feel better tomorrow. Definitely tomorrow. I’ll swallow something for it. Yes, I do know.” She paused, listening to the Gestapo’s ‘Ice Man’. “That’s right, Major Jaeger
is
here. I’ve been taking his pictures this afternoon. Yes, I’m aware it’s evening, thank you.” She gave a quick nod as if standing in Rittenkrett’s presence. “I’m also aware of
that
,” she replied. Then, after a silence, “I’ll give him your regards, and I’ll call you tomorrow.”

Franziska returned the receiver to its cradle.

Her eyes had gone a little chilly. “He knows I’m lying, of course. It wouldn’t do to lie a second time, about your not being here.” She examined her fingernails for a moment, and then when she lifted her gaze to his again her eyes had warmed. “I
am
free for dinner, after all. And I do know a place with music.”

“And dancing?” he prodded.

“I’ll dance you into the ground,” she promised.

“We’ll see about that.” He hoped he wouldn’t be dancing on a grave; either his own, or hers. The Ice Man might look coldly upon this interference in the Gestapo’s plans, even if from a major who ought to be a colonel. Michael decided from here on out he should take care to pay attention to anyone coming up behind him.

But, for the moment, there was life to be lived.

Eight

This Particular Wolftrap

Over the next few days—as the air raid sirens shrieked at night, bombs fell on Berlin, troop trains passed through carrying more meat to feed the Russians and yet the parties went on at a pace meant to satisfy all human appetites and destroy all remaining inhibitions—the major with wary green eyes and the female photojournalist with an interesting reputation were seen in several restaurants, the cinema, and a few nightclubs that still had glass in the windows and not boards.

Michael thought that for a person who felt she was known by no one, Franziska had an army of acquaintances. At lunch or dinner their table was bound to be approached by at least two or three people. Of course Franziska would introduce him and—most of these visitors being civilians—Michael would listen politely to their comments about the war being won soon, and Berlin getting back to normal and the world paying its heavy debt to Germany. Even Franziska, who could herself go on at length about the future of the Thousand-Year-Reich, was bored within one minute of the proclamations of some of these overstuffed blowhards. Michael didn’t fail to notice that several of the married men, their mummified wives in tow, gazed upon Franziska with the eyes of those who have for a short space of time seen what lay beneath the gown and the manners, and their nervous movements from side-to-side showed they hoped someday to repeat that viewing. She dashed their hopes and broke their hearts with a quick sidelong smile and a turning away of the face that said
Your day is done
.

Of more concern to Michael were the officers who occasionally ambled up, their pathetic attempts at charm not quite up to the hard reality of a missing limb, and above the fixed smiles the glazed expressions of actors no longer sure they remember their lines. They steered clear of actual war talk, movements of troops and tanks and so forth, which suited Michael fine, but what made him dodge a bit were the questions of did he know Colonel der von Glockenspiel or Major Hamminibus or some such name thrown at him like a fat piece of oily pork. He always said the name was familiar but, no, he had never met the man. He knew the name of his own supposed divisional commander, Burmeister, so he couldn’t be tripped up for that mistake.

The officers always said it was a pleasure, good luck in his forthcoming struggle, may God protect Germany, and
Heil Hitler
.

Then, when the major and the photojournalist sitting at their table had seen that sharp hunger in the eyes of the other, the rising of the heated flame that no liquid outburst could extinguish for very long, either he or she reached for a knee and in his case winnowed his hand beneath her skirt and moved along a silken thigh, or in her case placed a firm hand of ownership upon what she wished to command, and one of them— or both at the same time, as had happened—would ask the question: “Are you ready?”

They were always ready.

He didn’t know exactly what she was doing. If she was gathering information for the Gestapo by seduction, or by following and photographing the comings and goings of suspected Inner Ring members, or some of both. He didn’t think she was doing only mundane investigation, she was far too talented for that alone. He understood how within a few minutes of being with her, a man would cast aside all caution and self-preservation and start to jabber about things to make himself sound important, until a slip of the jabber made her hone in on some remark and work it like she worked in the sheets on a man’s most valued companion. If, as Michael understood, the majority of the Inner Ring’s members were office clerks, military aides, pencil pushers and scientists who might be brilliant but sometimes forgot what shoe went on which foot, Franziska’s work was nearly accomplished just by walking into the room.

One evening at midweek, before going to a late-night
Signal
party that she’d invited him to, they went to dinner in one of the very few fine restaurants still open, and they sat before a picture window overlooking a lamplit park. They’d just gotten their food when the air raid sirens went off, and instantly the few other patrons started for the cellar.

“No,” Franziska said when he started to stand up. She was radiant tonight, absolutely gorgeous in a dark blue dress with a strand of pearls around her neck. She took his hand. “We’ll be all right.” Then she’d continued eating her dinner and drinking her wine, and though the manager came and implored them to leave their table and come down with everyone else she shook her head with a wry smile, and at last they were alone in the restaurant.

The flak guns began firing, the sounds like pillows being whacked with cricket bats. Michael heard the distant thunder of the bombs. Through the window he could see the blue-white flashes, like whips of lightning, and then the faraway red flames curling up. She was staring at him across the table. He had lost his appetite, but he lifted his glass and said, “
Prost
!”

“
Prost
!” she answered with pleasure, and they drank.

A bomb fell closer. Michael felt its power in the floor. Multicolored lanterns at the ceiling shivered.

Her fingers entwined with his. She said softly, “I am safe with you. And you are safe with me. As long as we’re together…nothing can hurt us.”

“I’m glad you believe that.”

She shook her head. “More than believe. I
know
.”

But he wondered: do the bombs know?

One fell very close, an explosion perhaps a street or two beyond the park. The wineglasses and gold-edged plates jumped on the table. Tree limbs came flying at the window and made a noise like clattering claws.

She just smiled.

Michael looked at her. Really looked, as if he’d never seen her before.

At the birthday party, he’d said something to the Ice Man that wasn’t exactly true:
I don’t fear
. The truth was, he wasn’t
afraid
. He was cautious, and he was prepared, and so he was not afraid.