The Girl in Berlin (31 page)

To McGovern, Celia Black looked more German than English. She was tall and her blonde hair was pinned into an elaborate braided bun with plaits running round from the front of her head to the back. She had cold colouring, a pale skin and
very light blue eyes and her effect on McGovern was of a clear, cold glass of water. Yet her smile was welcoming enough. Her full skirts rustled as she stepped aside to let them pass into the salon. This was a high-ceilinged and once splendid octagonal room, with inset gilt mirrors, but there were cracks in the plaster of the walls and a raw wound on the ceiling where a chandelier must once have hung. The room with its heavy bourgeois furniture had seen better – much better – days.

The Major was a worried-looking man with receding hair. As they sat over drinks – a local aperitif – he spoke wearily of the immense task presented by the unending stream of refugees from the East, speaking with what seemed like genuine concern for what so many had suffered. ‘You should write about it,’ said the Major, for Jordan had suggested it would be better if McGovern became a journalist again. ‘Which paper did you say it was?’

‘The
Scottish Herald
.’

‘People at home have forgotten all about it. Since the Berlin blockade no-one thinks about all this any more. I don’t think they realise there are still thousands and thousands of DPs – displaced persons.’

The food was good, a tasty fish in wine sauce and sautéed potatoes with peas in cream, and McGovern couldn’t help wondering why he’d had more good food here in Berlin than seemed available to the victors in London. As they ate Celia Black described her work immediately after the war. She and her husband had met in Berlin where both were members of the army of occupiers and survivors trying to restore order to chaos. She was a trained nurse, employed by UNRAA in an administrative capacity. There were so many different medical problems. ‘And the children,’ she said, ‘so many had no fathers, no parents at all, surviving in whatever way they could, living in the ruins. It was a terrible problem, trying to deal with the children. Many knew they were orphans, many didn’t know
what had happened to their parents. We had to try to trace them – make every effort. It was easier in a heartrending way when the children definitely knew their parents were dead.

‘We soon became aware that there was an enormous exploitation of these children, separated from their families, who were being used and ill-treated in all sorts of ways. Some of them simply ran errands or worked with the women clearing the rubble, and that wasn’t so bad, others were messengers or couriers in the black market, others were thieves – and many, of course, were sexually exploited, made to prostitute themselves or even did it willingly.’

‘In one sense it wasn’t surprising,’ said Major Black with a painful smile. ‘If everything else, then why not that? If you think about it, why wouldn’t children be sexually exploited?’

‘Mr Roberts is trying to get an angle on all this,’ put in Jordan. ‘Isn’t that so, Roberts?’

This was McGovern’s cue. ‘I’ve met someone, a woman called Frieda Schröder. It’s complicated to explain, but it could be an important story. Her father worked in a concentration camp, but although he was interrogated he never came to trial.’

‘I’m afraid that’s happened in a lot of cases,’ said the Major. ‘So many people were involved, it simply wasn’t possible. Even those involved with the camps – with the Jews – I’m afraid there are many Germans who got away with it, whatever they did. And of course some of them did nothing, nothing wrong, that is.’

‘This man, the woman’s father, seems to have been involved in something after the war, probably the black market. He seemed to be settled in the British sector and his daughter had a relationship with a British officer, but then they suddenly moved East. I think it was after her sister died.’

Husband and wife exchanged glances. ‘Her sister died? What did she die of?’

‘Fräulein Schröder just said she was ill. I suppose they were semi-starving.’

‘Probably not, if her father was involved in the black market,’ said the Major, ‘but many children died. Terrible things went on, bodies would be found and some of those deaths were not accidental. It was impossible to investigate every case. It was often just a matter of another body found among the ruins, impossible even to tell why they’d died. There were some incidents that caused more of a stir, when it was quite clearly murder. Once or twice people in the district thought they knew how it had happened and who had done it and pointed the finger. I remember one case at least. Some neighbours denounced a local man who was very unpopular in the district. The little girl had been violated. I don’t remember the man’s name, though, but there was certainly some talk about him. I think the authorities thought there might be grounds for an investigation, all the talk and gossip.’

‘Now the West German judicial system is up and running,’ said Jordan, ‘do you think there’s any possibility they could open an investigation on this sort of case? Following their triumph with Hoffmann? I’ve heard a rumour they’re reopening some of these cases. Or rather, investigating. Because the cases never were opened in the first place.’

‘In the case of the little girl who was murdered,’ said the Major, ‘in the end nothing was done, or could be done, because he’d spirited himself away.’

The story made McGovern very thoughtful. He must see Frieda again. There was so much he must ask her. A dark suspicion was beginning to unfold.

thirty-one

‘Y
OU CERTAINLY BELIEVE IN
taking the initiative, don’t you, Jarrell. Who told you to go charging off in search of this Ukrainian?’

‘I thought, sir—’

‘It wasn’t me, was it, Jarrell. Have you somehow been in contact with DI McGovern?’

‘No, sir.’

‘Well, who the fuck gave you permission to set up your own investigation? Which is what it more or less amounts to. If Monkhouse hadn’t driven like a bloody maniac and got suspended, this wouldn’t have happened. I wouldn’t have been saddled with you, God help me. I thought he was a pain, but you’re a frigging nightmare. Now I’ve got another fucking maniac on my hands. He was a maniac for doing things by the book and you’re the bloody opposite. And the result is this individual you’ve decided is a suspect knows all about you. And how’s that helping the so-called bloody enquiry?’

‘I’ve done some research on Mihaili Kozko, sir. I’ve followed him up. He’s got form. GBH, assault. He’s not that popular in Yorkshire, even among his own. That’s why he’s moved down here.’

‘So why isn’t he banged up? What’s he doing down here, if he’s a convicted criminal?’

‘The conviction was quashed on appeal, sir.’

‘Oh, really.’

‘I followed him, sir. I know where he lives. We could bring him in for questioning.’

‘On what grounds, may I ask?’

‘We could think of something. You can always think of something, can’t you, sir.’

Jarrell thought the inspector was going to hit him. Instead he took a step backwards. ‘What makes you so certain he killed the Biermann kid anyway?’

‘Just a hunch, sir. But Biermann was investigating him because there were allegations he’d been in the Waffen SS, that he’s a war criminal. He’s an obvious suspect.’

‘Biermann was a commie. More likely
he
was up to something.’

‘If you say so, sir. But this isn’t like the old man, is it. I mean – a body in the canal. Happens all the time. But a shooting, even in Hackney, we have to get a result sir, don’t you think? I mean, it was almost more like a gangland killing. We don’t want any more of those, sir.’

‘Stupid of Biermann to have got involved. I can’t stand amateur sleuthing. He had it coming to him.’

Slater was red in the face. Jarrell was well aware he was playing with fire, but he couldn’t resist taunting the man who’d so often sneered at him. Particularly as what he said was true, and Slater knew it. He needed to get a result.

What Jarrell didn’t mention was the man whom Kozko had met in the pub on the Jamaica Road. That was the shocking link that could explain everything, but Slater wouldn’t understand and anyway couldn’t be allowed to know. The person who should know was McGovern, but Jarrell didn’t know how to get in touch with him. He was on his own.

thirty-two

T
HERE WERE TWO PEOPLE
McGovern had to see before he left Berlin. He tracked down Feierabend at the Eldorado. ‘I want an explanation.’

Feierabend was perfectly friendly. He was working now, he pointed out, but they could meet the following morning in the gardens of the Charlottenburg Schloss.

Next morning Feierabend was sunny as ever. ‘Wonderful weather. It’s always hot at this time of year.’

‘It certainly is hot.’ Lily would have loved it, for like her father she missed the heat of India in the perennially rain-streaked streets of Glasgow. But there was no time to miss Lily now. He gestured towards a seat beneath a tree.

‘Sit down. There’s some things we need to get straight. You set me up, didn’t you. It was deliberate. You sent me to Hoffmann’s office again, where I was meant to be got rid of. You were never working for us, for the British. You were always on the other side.’

Feierabend looked genuinely horrified. ‘This is not true. This was not what I thought was meant to happen. It wasn’t my job. To hand you over to be killed.’

‘Well, what exactly
is
your job? I thought you were one of our informers, a go-between, a useful contact.’

‘But precisely that is what I am. It was I who put you in
touch with Hoffmann, for example, so that you could meet the Englishman, Mr Harris.’

‘But the second time was a trap.’

Feierabend stopped in his tracks and turned to face McGovern. ‘Absolutely not. I still do not understand it. In the first place, I did not then know that Hoffmann had actually been arrested. Secondly, I could not see any reason for your ill-treatment. Someone had an interest in your being given a warning – or even murdered, although …’ He shook his head. ‘No, I really can’t see how the East Germans gained anything from that. If Hoffmann set it up, it wasn’t to please them. But I don’t think it could have been him, because he was already arrested. You have other enemies, perhaps.’

‘Well, it’s perfectly obvious I do, do you nae think, seeing I was nearly murdered. But who they might be I have no idea.’

‘I have certainly not been told to harm you. Look, it all started originally when someone made contact with me. It wasn’t someone I knew here in Berlin. The story was you were concerned with Mr Harris. Hoffmann knew Harris through Schröder, so that seemed a good way to set things up. That was the end of the matter, so far as I was concerned. I have contacts with the East German police, yes, you shouldn’t look so surprised – and I heard nothing about them wanting to see you, arrest you, anything like that.’

‘I don’t understand what game you’re playing,’ said McGovern. ‘Do you play both sides against the middle, like everyone else in this city?’

Feierabend laughed. ‘Why should you think that? I’ve played straight with you, Herr Kommissar McGovern. My job was to put you in touch with Harris, and I did that through Hoffmann.’

‘But you know my real name.’

‘Of course. The truth is, there are many people like me in Berlin. For me and many of us there are no sides. There is only survival.’

‘So you knew Hoffmann.’

‘I know many people, and so did Herr Dr Hoffmann. In both East and West. In the German Democratic Republic they were rightly concerned once they suspected that Hoffmann was spying on their uranium production. They were trying to use your friend Harris, but I don’t think they’d worked out quite how he could be useful. Perhaps they first of all have the idea to get him to go back to England, but what could he have done when he got there? He wouldn’t have had access to any useful information. Then they thought he might spy on Schröder, but unfortunately when he discovered the situation in Thuringia his idealistic soul was wounded and now he has probably ended up making more trouble for himself and everyone else. I expect he went down there with Schröder in good faith. Of course he isn’t a Western agent and perhaps – probably – he doesn’t realise that Schröder is.’

‘Schröder works for the West?’

‘Perhaps only in the sense that he has been working with Herr Dr Hoffmann. But they, the East Germans, who may in any case believe Harris is some kind of double agent, will of course be able to use his presence in Thuringia in any way they wish. Or even if they don’t think that, it will suit them to say they do. So what he’s doing is very risky and stupid. I expect that like so many of you in the West he wants a better socialism. He is shocked when he hears that conditions for the workers aren’t quite what he expected. But idealists like him are not realistic. These are difficult times, you understand. Here in Germany we recognise the freedom of necessity. The East Germans aren’t trying to do what the West is doing here, create a consumer society. They want to build an equal society, in which there are jobs, housing, free education and health for all. They truly want that. They may even believe it will be an equal society, though of course it won’t really be if only because their leadership is so hierarchical. Most of their leaders spent the
war in Moscow and unfortunately they are thwarted by their own experiences and assumptions. They are completely out of touch. And what is worse, they do not trust the people.
Das Volk
, Herr Kommissar, has done so many terrible things that they cannot be trusted any more. They have to be told what to do and how to think and they have to be watched very closely. But it’s possible things will improve in that direction too, when the foundations of a socialist society are in place. I am enough of a progressive socialist to believe that.’

‘Or so you tell yourself,’ said McGovern nastily.

‘Oh, that’s unfair, Herr Kommissar.’

‘So what’s going to happen to Harris?’

‘He will go to prison, I’m afraid. Unless your government gets him out. But I doubt if they’ll do much about it. They have enough problems with Burgess and Maclean, they can’t afford another international embarrassment. And it won’t be so easy to explain what he’s done, back in England, do you think? A known communist who’s been living in the Soviet sector for several years – and then suddenly he sides with the strikers, if that
is
what he did. Well, perhaps it is not so difficult to explain. If it can be made to seem he has been working for the British government, there might be a surge of support. In the meantime I imagine he’s probably already been arrested. And you know what the East German government will do, don’t you? They will buy off the workers, or some of them, and crack down on anyone who can be portrayed as anti-socialist, against the state and all the rest of it. And Mr Harris will fit very well into that category.’