A Man Lies Dreaming (16 page)

‘Do you know where she is?’

The girl lowered her voice. ‘If you let me out, my father is a rich man, he could pay you, whatever you asked. Just let me go.’

‘Who is your father?’

The girl said a name. Wolf shrugged. The affairs of Jews did not interest him. ‘Tell me about Judith.’

‘We went to school together in Berlin.’

‘Before the Fall?’

‘Before, during.’ The girl shrugged. ‘Her daddy wanted to leave. So did my daddy but he couldn’t get us out. And the Party confiscated everything he had. We were poor.’

At least she was being honest now, Wolf thought. ‘And Judith?’

‘She wouldn’t leave. She wanted to be a revolutionary.’ The girl laughed. It was a terrible sound, in that room. ‘The stupid cow,’ she said.

‘But you were still friends.’

‘Sure. And she still had money. Her daddy kept her safe. He had contacts, people high up. I joined the Party too. We all did. We had to, after the Fall. I remember once our Youth Group was sent to Unter den Linden, some squat hellhole in a crumbling old building that used to be a nice hotel. It was full of Brownshirts, you know, ex-Nazi boys. They’d formed into gangs after the Fall, ran wild, robbed and killed to stay alive. We went to school with some of them.’ There was a bitter sort of wonder in the girl’s voice. ‘They had a man on watch but he was only one and the rest of them were asleep. Judith was scout. She went up to the watchman as quiet as a
fledermaus
. He never saw a thing. Didn’t even see her when she pulled out her knife and cut his throat. We went inside then and killed them. Every single one of them boys lying there asleep. We shot them, just went through twenty, thirty boys it must have been, a bullet in the head, in the chest, some of them woke up and tried to flee but how do you outrun a bullet?’ She stared at Wolf through the bars and her eyes – he didn’t want to look into her eyes. ‘Yes, Judith was dedicated,’ she said. ‘The rest of us just went along with it but she did it for herself. I never wanted to kill nobody.’

Wolf was aware of the pressure of time, but it was so quiet down there, and all the girls were silent, listening. Perhaps they all had the same story. ‘What happened to Judith?’ Wolf said.

‘She fell in love.’ The girl laughed again. This time her laughter rose and threatened to escalate out of control. Wolf tapped the bars again and she stopped, as abruptly as she’d started. ‘She fell in love with a nice Jewish boy.’

‘A Zionist?’

‘I don’t even think that he was, that’s the funny thing. He was a good comrade, even. Worked at the Ministry of Public Enlightenment.’

‘So what happened?’

The girl shrugged. ‘He got shot. Everyone said it was Brownshirts who did it, but how many were left by then? Judith was convinced it was an execution. Someone at the Ministry, or a different branch of the Party. She said that even the communists hated Jews. She started talking about Palestine, as if anyone would ever want to go to Palestine. I heard there’s nothing there but camels and desert. I wouldn’t want to go there. I wanted to go to America. I wanted to be a movie star.’

All the girls were quiet. Wolf waited. The girl said, ‘She got her daddy to pay a smuggler to take her out of the country. She told me and I begged her to let me come. She couldn’t get the money from her daddy, he said he wasn’t a charity. But she took me anyway. Everyone knows the smugglers are Brownshirts, what’s left of them. Ex-Nazis. The organisation is still there, only instead of killing people for politics they do it for money. On the border the man who took us made me go on my knees and he put his cock in my mouth. Judith was asleep in the next room, she didn’t even know. He said I’d have to work off the debt. When we crossed the border they took all of our papers and drove us in a closed truck with a lot of other people. I thought we would die; we had no air. We drove for hours and hours. Then we were on a boat. We only stopped once, when we came off the boat. I remember smelling the ocean. I think we were in England by then but I can’t be sure. A man came and we all got out and lined up in rows and he went and checked each of us against a list. Some of us went away. Some of us went back in the truck. I went in the truck. Judith went away. The truck drove for another long time and then we came here.’

‘You don’t know where she went?’

‘She went to her daddy.’

‘I don’t think she did.’

‘Then I’m sure I don’t know.’

Wolf stared at the girl. The case was becoming bewildering – if Judith had been paid for and delivered, then where was she? And if she had been added to the tally of the lost, then why wasn’t she here? Had she already been resold? He said, ‘That will be all.’

‘Don’t you want to know my name? My name!’ She was close to tears. ‘This is my number,’ she said. She raised her arm. He could see a number tattooed on her wrist. ‘They did that here. He did that here. Do you want to know my name?’

‘No,’ Wolf said. ‘But you can have the God damned keys.’

He tossed them to her, through the bars, and turned away. There was silence behind him. He climbed up the stairs again and stood looking down at the girls’ jailer. The man groaned and tried to crawl away. Wolf smiled. He didn’t care what happened to the girls but he liked the thought of them coming up the stairs and finding themselves face to face with Klaus Barbie. What was left of his face, anyway.

‘Have fun, sweetheart,’ he said. He went back through the hatch and closed it neatly behind him and then he left the shop and closed the door softly, so as not to disturb the neighbours.

Wolf’s Diary, 7th November 1939 –
contd
.

When I stepped outside the air was cold and the sun was gone. Barbie was a lapdog, a man of no consequence. I left him the way I had as a message to his unseen employer. I rather thought that would get his attention. Somebody ruthless and meticulously organised was behind the trafficking ring, someone I could not help but feel a touch of admiration for. I admired efficiency. And I wondered which of my old comrades it could be.

I began to walk down Whitechapel Road. Soon I had the feeling of being followed again. I stopped. It seemed to me two shadows moved in the distance but it was hard to tell with the bad illumination of the streetlights. I had had enough of shadows, then. My anger and hatred were all the illumination I needed. I faced up to the dark, defiantly. I raised my arms, daring them to come. ‘I’m here!’ I screamed. ‘Come and get it if you think you’re tough enough!’

The darkness did not reply and after a moment I dropped my arms and continued walking, feeling deflated. They were out there, nearby, and they were watching, but that was all. Well, let them watch.

I was walking aimlessly. The brown envelope I had taken from Barbie’s safe was heavy in my coat pocket. When I came to London Wall I stood there for a moment admiring the ancient Roman architecture. Had I still been painting I would have wanted an easel and brush at that moment. The dying light cast a gloom over the ancient stones and I thought of all that had come before, and of the Greek and Roman emperors I had so admired. Sometimes it occurred to me I had been born into the wrong era. I was Alexander, without a world to conquer.

I was sunk in melancholy thought. Architecture affects me that way.
Too late I heard the soft purr of a car behind me. I turned. It was a black Mercedes-Benz without headlights. It was a marvel of German engineering.

Behind the car came dark shadows: my two men in black.

They came and stood before me. I recognised one as the man from the Charing Cross Road, the one who had claimed to be an American tourist.

‘Mr Wolf.’

‘Do I know you,’ I said.

The American smiled, a little embarrassed, with those even white teeth. ‘We ran into each other the other day.’

‘That’s right,’ I said. ‘Were you trying to make sure that I saw you, or were you just being sloppy?’

‘He was being sloppy. He’s since been disciplined.’

The voice that spoke was older, graver. I turned. A rear window had been rolled down. For a moment a stray beam of light caught the speaker’s face. He had a well-maintained beard, black woven with a tapestry of white and silver. His eyes were clear and strangely innocent, like a child’s. He had a hook nose and a scar under one eye that trailed down like a long tear and finally disappeared under his beard.

‘Who the hell are you?’ I said.

‘You can call me Virgil,’ he said.

‘Like the poet?’

‘If you like.’

‘I don’t think that I do.’

‘Mr Wolf, I mean you no harm.’

‘Then why are you following me?’

‘Because I have a great interest in the well-being of Germany, Mr Wolf. Please. Let me give you a ride.’

‘I’d rather walk.’

The two men took a step forward each. I stood my ground.

‘Who do you work for?’ I said.

Virgil said, ‘The President of the United States of America,’ and I laughed. ‘America is a racial cesspit,’ I said. ‘It is a land fit only for dogs and Jews.’

One of the men in black made to move towards me then but his companion grabbed him by the arm. ‘Stand back, Pitt.’

I glanced again at the man in the car, this Virgil. ‘I can smell spooks a mile off,’ I said. ‘You give off a special smell, the stench of rats.’

He laughed. He had a rich, deep laugh, the sort a man makes when he thinks how easy it would be to kill you. ‘Get in the car, Wolf.’ He moved down the seat, his face disappearing from view. ‘Pitt, open the door for Mr Wolf.’

‘Sir, yes, sir.’

The one called Pitt went and opened the door like a servant. There was resentment in his eyes. I went up to the car. I put my hand on Pitt’s shoulder, gently. My other hand reached down and grabbed his balls and squeezed. ‘Next time I see you, sunshine,’ I said, ‘it won’t be just your balls you’d need to worry about.’

His companion laughed and made no move to help him. I released Pitt and watched him sink to the ground, his hands covering his testicles. There were tears in his eyes but he never made a sound. It made me feel I may have been wrong about him.

I got into the car. Waited with the door open until the second man came over and closed it. I smiled at him through the rolled-down window. ‘Look after your girlfriend for me,’ I said.

‘Let’s go,’ Virgil said, beside me. The driver in the front of the car was a shadow in a black peaked cap. He pressed on the accelerator and the car pushed forward as soft as a thief in the night. He was a big man, Virgil, spread out against the seat. He looked like an old tomcat, one who was brought up in the streets and took his punches, but seldom lost a fight.

‘Mr Wolf.’

‘Virgil.’

He smiled. We were heading south. I could smell the river. The old Roman wall was left behind. The Tower of London lay ahead, with its lame ravens. They reminded me of the soldiers who had returned home broken from the Great War.

‘I’d like your opinion of the current situation in Austro-Germany,’ Virgil said.

I looked out of the window. ‘And what is the American interest in the region?’ I said, politely.

‘Do you always answer a question with a question?’ he laughed. ‘You answer questions like a Jew,’ he said.

‘Are you trying to insult me?’

‘Just making conversation.’

‘You didn’t answer my question,’ I said.

He sighed. ‘Mr Wolf,’ he said. ‘My government is
acutely
concerned over the rise of communism in Germany and its neighbours. The German government may pretend it is independent, but you and I both know the decisions come from Moscow.’

‘Yes.’

‘What is your take on it?’

‘I believe war is coming,’ I said. He was silent beside me. I knew that I had his attention, then. ‘I believe Russia is building up to drastically alter the map of Europe, and beyond. Its neighbours are already under threat. The purpose of communism is nothing less than world domination. A global revolution. They will not sit on their laurels having won the German election. Once communism takes hold it never relinquishes power.’

‘A world war,’ Virgil said.

‘Yes.’

‘That is something my government is acutely concerned about.’

‘So you said.’

‘How would one go about …
counteracting
the communists in Germany?’ he said.