Stattin Station (17 page)
'These days any good meal is a surprise,' Effi interjected diplomatically.
As they ate, the conversation meandered through the current Berlin topics - the sudden shortage of shoes, the irritating air raids, the recent avalanche of leaflets criticising the government, the errant behaviour of youth. 'Two boys were caught throwing stones at the trains last week,' Zarah said. 'Near Halensee Station, I think it was. They were on their way home from a
Hitlerjugend
meeting.'
Jens said little, and even then only when his wife appealed to him directly. He seemed distracted, Russell thought. He was drinking steadily, and had sunk well over a bottle of wine before they turned to the brandy.
'How's work?' Russell asked, more out of politeness than from any hope of learning anything useful.
'Hard,' Jens said, and smiled rather bleakly. 'Hard,' he echoed himself. 'Just between us,' he said, waving a hand to embrace them all, 'the job is becoming impossible.'
Russell couldn't resist asking: 'Which job?'
'Feeding everyone,' Jens said simply. 'In peacetime it was a challenge, but one we could meet. In wartime - well, you can imagine. There are fewer men available for farm work, so production has suffered...'
'Aren't there enough Land Girls?' his wife asked.
'A lot of them are getting married just to avoid farm work,' Effi offered.
'We can feed our cities and countryside,' Jens went on, as if no one else had spoken. 'But the Wehrmacht is more of a problem. We now have almost four million soldiers and half a million horses to feed, and most of them are more than eight hundred kilometres from the old borders of the Reich.'
'And there aren't enough trains,' Russell murmured. He was, he realised, about to learn something.
'Exactly. So they must live off the Russian countryside. They will consume the agricultural surplus that used to feed the Russian towns.' 'And the Russian towns?' Effi asked.
'As I said, it is hard. We must be hard.'
He looked anything but, Russell thought. In fact, he might be imagining it, but there seemed to be a glint of tears in Jens's eyes.
There was a sudden silence around the table.
Russell thought through the implications. Most of the Russian peasantry would survive - they'd been hiding food from invaders and governments since time began. The towns would indeed suffer, but not as badly as the millions of Soviet prisoners. What would they be fed with? And then there were the Jews, trainload after trainload travelling east, into this man-made famine. What would they eat? They wouldn't.
'You can only do your best,' Zarah was telling her husband.
He looked furious, but only for an instant. 'Of course. The men at the front are the ones who really suffer. I just work in an office.' He got up. 'Excuse me for a moment. I thought I heard Lothar.'
'He worries about the boy,' Zarah said.
He should worry about himself, Effi thought. He was as close to a breakdown as any of her soldiers in their hospital beds. 'He's a good father,' was all she said.
'That's something, isn't it?' Zarah replied. 'I was thinking the other day - so many boys are going to be without their fathers when all this is over.'
There was no air raid that night, but Russell was woken by the sound of Effi crying. He found her wrapped in her old fur coat, curled up on the sofa with her knees up under her chin. 'I'm sorry,' she sobbed. 'I didn't want to wake you.'
He took her in his arms, and asked what the matter was.
'It just gets worse and worse,' she said.
He knew what she meant.
They woke later than usual, and Effi cooked the eggs that Zarah had insisted on giving them. 'What time are you meeting Paul?' she asked.
'I'm not,' Russell said, realising he hadn't told her about the
Hitlerjugend
shooting tournament.
'Don't they allow fathers?'
'If they do, Paul forgot to tell me.'
'Oh well, you can come shopping with me. I need some new boots.'
'You'll be lucky.'
'Ah, I've been told about an old man in Friedrichshain who still makes them. He must get the leather on the black market.'
'Wouldn't it be simpler to borrow some from the studio wardrobe department?'
'Of course, but not half as much fun.'
It occurred to Russell that he hadn't mentioned his rendezvous with Sullivan either. 'I've got a meeting at noon,' he told her, 'but it won't take long. We could meet after that. Two o'clock at the stop in Alexander Platz?'
'Fine. But I thought you'd given up on Ribbentrop's press conferences.'
'I have. It's something else. I'll tell you later,' he added, touching his ear to indicate that they might be overheard. It was several weeks since their last hunt for listening devices.
'Nothing too dangerous, I hope,' she said lightly.
'I can't see why it would be,' he told her, but half an hour later, standing on the Zoo Station platform, he didn't feel quite so sure. The way Kenyon had presented it, Russell was just meeting Sullivan for a friendly chat and a peek at the latter's
bona fides
. The latter might be corporate secrets rather than state secrets, but was the Gestapo bright enough to know the difference? Although to be fair to the leather-coated brigade, he wasn't sure there was much of a difference anymore. The industrial corporations hadn't been nationalised in any official sense, but they were, to all intents and purposes, controlled by the state. And poring over documentation of their darkest secrets in the Stettin Station buffet might well be considered a crime.
Russell was reasonably certain that he wasn't being followed, and it wouldn't be hard to make absolutely sure. In any case, it seemed much more likely that Sullivan would be followed, since any doubts about the Radio Berlin broadcaster's continuing loyalty to the Reich would have stemmed from his own behaviour. The man had to know that, and would be taking the necessary precautions.
Or would he? Sullivan was intelligent, but in Russell's experience intelligent people just had bigger blind spots.
How could he be sure that Sullivan wasn't being followed? He couldn't trail the man from his home because he didn't know where he lived. He could hope to watch him arrive at Stettin Station, but the number of entrances - at least three from the street and one from the U-Bahn - made missing him much more likely. There were even two entrances to the buffet, although the street one was little used. His best bet was to find a spot on the concourse with a good view of the buffet, hope Sullivan used that entrance, and watch for anyone following him in.
But first things first. He left the Stadtbahn train at Lehrter Station, and remained for several minutes on the elevated platform, staring down with apparent interest at the throat of the terminus below. All but two of the other alighting passengers took the steps down to the mainline platforms, and those two were already out of sight when Russell followed them down the walkway to Invaliden Strasse. Reaching the main road, he could see the man walking west past the old guards' barracks, the woman crossing the road to his right, with the apparent intention of entering the District Court building. She disappeared through the doorway.
Russell walked eastward, turning once or twice to check that the woman hadn't re-emerged. It was about a kilometre to Stettin Station, and he had over half an hour to spare. Crossing the Hohenzollern Canal he could see the Invalidenfriedhof Cemetery stretched out along the eastern bank, a conveniently short journey from the huge military hospital which rose behind it. A steam barge was disappearing into the grey distance, the rust-coloured water rippling in the breeze.
Ten minutes later, he was walking in through the western side entrance of Stettin Station. It was one of Berlin's older and smaller termini, with half a dozen platforms hosting services to Stettin, Rostock and Danzig, and local trains serving Pankow and the outlying suburbs beyond. A spacious glass-roofed concourse lay between the buffers and the booking office, with the buffet and other facilities lining the sides. After buying a newspaper at the kiosk, Russell took up position near the entrance to platform 1, where the steady stream of passengers looking to board the Stettin express offered a modicum of anonymity. He had a clear view of all three street exits, the steps down to the U-Bahn, and the concourse entrance to the buffet. It was eleven forty-five.
The minutes ticked by. Two young women in black walked past him, heading for the Stettin train, and following them with his eyes Russell saw one of several waiting coffins being loaded into a luggage van. Outside it had begun to rain - with some abandon if the loud drumming on the station roof was any guide. A local train pulled in on the far side with a squeal of tired brakes, and soon a procession of arrivals were crossing the concourse towards the various exits. Sullivan was not among them.
It was five to twelve, and Russell wondered when he should check the buffet - the outside entrance was only really convenient for railwaymen coming from the goods yard, but there was always a chance that Sullivan had slinked in that way. He would give it another ten minutes.
The last few passengers for Stettin hurried by, the whistle sounded, and the distant locomotive went into a momentary fit, blasting steam in all directions before finding its feet and easing its load away. The drumming on the roof seemed louder in the subsequent silence, and Russell blessed the fact that the U-Bahn would take him to Alexanderplatz. By the time he met Effi the rain might have stopped.
Suddenly he saw Sullivan, cutting across the concourse from the same direction as the arriving local passengers some ten minutes earlier. Had he been on that train? It seemed unlikely that he would have chosen to live north of the city when Radio Berlin was situated thirty kilometres to the south. And if he had, where had he been for the last ten minutes? In a toilet?
Not that it mattered. Russell watched Sullivan walk into the buffet without a backward glance - the broadcaster clearly had no qualms about a possible tail. He would give it a minute, he decided, and only set himself in motion once the second hand of the station clock had stuttered its way around the dial. He was about ten metres from the buffet doors when two young men hurried in through the main station entrance, eyes flashing in all directions, clearly searching for someone or something. They were wearing neither leather coats nor formal uniforms, but Russell was willing to bet they knew people who did. He adjusted his route and speed accordingly, walking slowly past the open buffet doors towards the main entrance. As he passed the doors he caught a glimpse of the two men bearing down on an unsuspecting Sullivan.
Russell walked on through the wide archway of the main entrance, and stopped among the people waiting for the rain to slacken or stop. There was a Mercedes 260 parked in front, its busy windscreen wiper offering pulsatory glimpses of the man behind the wheel. He seemed to be studying his manicure. When several footfalls sounded behind Russell, he didn't turn his head, just waited until the three men were past him, splashing their way across to the parked car. He only saw Sullivan's face as one of the young men hustled him into the back seat. The broadcaster looked more angry than frightened.
The car pulled away and, as it turned towards the forecourt exit on Invalidenstrasse, Russell had a clear view of the rear numberplate. Stepping further back into the archway, he jotted it down in his notebook.
It was still raining when he emerged from the U-Bahn at Alexanderplatz, still raining when Effi's tram arrived at the stop twenty minutes later. Russell made to get on, but she urged him back off again. 'I've lost the boot-maker's address,' she said. 'I know which street he lives on, but this doesn't seem like a day for knocking on lots of doors.'
'No,' he agreed.
'I've also lost my umbrella,' she added plaintively. 'I thought you could take me somewhere nice for lunch instead.'
'How about the Adlon? I have to call in at the Consulate.' As they waited for a tram back up Konigstrasse he told her about Sullivan, the arranged meeting and the events at Stettin Station.
'Thank God they didn't catch you with him,' was her first reaction. 'But what if he tells them he was there to meet you?'
'Why should he? He'd only incriminate himself. No, I'm safe enough. They'd have had to catch us in the act, flash bulbs popping as the documents were handed over.'
'Yes?' she half asked, as if not quite convinced.
'Yes,' he insisted, hiding the fact that he wasn't either.
The tram arrived and dropped them a few minutes later on Behrenstrasse, several hundred very wet metres from the Adlon. A waiter fan of Effi's insisted on bringing towels for their hair, and took their coats away to be dried while they ate. 'I thought you said this place had gone downhill,' Effi whispered.
'Look around you,' Russell told her. There were only about twenty people in the huge dining room, and most of them were in uniform.
'And the food is somewhat variable.'
But today was one of the better days, and being there with Effi brought back fond memories of pre-war times, when the Adlon had still functioned as a cosmopolitan island in a cheerless German sea.
After eating they moved into the bar, where some of Russell's colleagues were already ensconced. The Foreign Ministry press conference had yielded fresh news of Soviet reverses, with Tula supposedly surrounded and Moscow threatened from the south. By contrast, the latest releases on the situation in North Africa had seemed less confident, as if the authorities were preparing the ground for possible failure. Dr Schmidt had spent most of the briefing rubbishing British claims that the allied delegations now departing Berlin were mere 'puppets' of the Germans, but in vain. 'You could see that part of him really liked the idea of their being puppets,' one of the Americans explained, 'so his denials weren't that convincing.'
Russell left Effi with a colleague and a bilious-looking cocktail, and made a dash through the rain to the adjacent Consulate.
Kenyon came down to meet him, and invited him back out into the shelter of the portico. 'I can't see any suspicious wires,' he said, examining the column-supported roof. 'Can you?'
'Not even one,' Russell agreed. The rain was still falling steadily, running in sheets down the side of the Brandenburg Gate.
'So?' Kenyon asked, one hand emerging from one pocket with a packet of cigarettes, the other from the other pocket with the silver lighter.
'He was arrested,' Russell said. 'At least I assume so.' He went through the sequence of events. 'I didn't see them show him any identification, but that would have happened in the buffet. There was no struggle of any kind, no guns. Sullivan looked furious, but he went with them willingly enough.' Kenyon exhaled a lungful of smoke, and thought for a few moments. 'Was he carrying anything?' he eventually asked.
'Only a newspaper. He must have had the documents in an inside pocket.'
'Whatever they were,' Kenyon murmured, apparently to himself. 'And I don't expect we'll ever find out now. Which sticks in my craw. If American businesses really are planning on supplying the enemy after an official declaration then I'd happily see their bosses taken out and shot.'
'Those guys always survive.'
Kenyon stubbed out his cigarette and stared out at the rain. 'They do, don't they? But let me dream. If Sullivan does get back in touch, and if by some miracle he still has those proofs he was talking about, I'll fix up another meeting.'
'Okay,' Russell said, shaking his hand. Back at the Adlon he found Effi deep in conversation with the waiter who'd provided the towels. They were talking about the film she'd been making when Russell first met her. 'They don't seem to write such good stories these days,' the waiter admitted. 'Too much politics,' he added in a whisper.
The telephone rang at six in the morning, which was rather early for a Sunday. Russell decided to ignore it, but Effi was worried it might be Zarah, and leapt out of bed to answer. Much to her disgust, it was for him. Rainer Duhnke was a German journalist whom Russell had known since the early thirties, and the two of them had made a habit of passing on stories which suited their own national readerships.
'I've just had a tip-off from a friend at the Alex,' Duhnke said, 'and you seemed like the right person to tell. They've just found Patrick Sullivan's body in the Tiergarten.'
Russell felt a momentary pang of sadness. 'Do you know where exactly?'
'Between the Neuer See and the Landwehrkanal. It's still there - nothing can happen until it gets light. So if you get down there now...'
'Thanks, Rainer.'
'What is it?' Effi wanted to know.
He told her as he dressed.
'Be careful,' she said.
'No need. I'm only wearing my journalist hat.'
It still seemed very dark outside, but as he turned onto Hardenberg Strasse a pale grey glow was noticeable in the eastern sky, and by the time he reached the bridge over Landwehrkanal the world was taking visible shape once more. Three black cars were already lined up on the Tiergartenufer, with one uniformed policeman standing guard. As Russell walked towards them he heard the sound of other cars approaching from the west. Turning, he saw headlights cleaving their way through the dawn twilight with the sort of abandon that only high-ranking officials could afford. And as the leading car materialised into a swish limousine generously bedecked with swastikas, it became apparent that Joseph Goebbels himself had come to examine the corpse.
Hoping to escape attention, Russell stayed where he was on the canal side of the road. Goebbels emerged from the limousine, straightened the large peaked cap that always made him look even shorter than he was, and strode energetically off across the grass in the direction indicated by the uniformed officer. In the meantime, the other cars in Goebbels' convoy had begun discharging their passengers, and these, Russell delightedly realised, were colleagues. Most seemed to be German, but he recognised at least one Swede. The press had clearly been invited.