The Interrogator (14 page)

‘Your friend works at Trent Park?’

‘Works?’ said Lindsay. ‘No. He’s a prisoner.’

Mary leant back in her chair.

‘His name’s Helmut. Helmut Lange.’

She glanced at Lange. He was watching the ‘Swingtet’ prepare for its next set, fingers drumming excitedly on the table.

‘Herr Lange is very fond of jazz,’ said Lindsay.

‘Herr Lange, perhaps you will excuse us for a moment,’ said Mary stiffly and she got to her feet. ‘Douglas is going to dance with me.’

‘What do you think you’re doing bringing a prisoner here?’ she asked crossly as they made their way to the dance floor. ‘Does anyone know he’s out?’

Lindsay squeezed her waist a little tighter. ‘I didn’t want to bring him but when the Military Police didn’t show, it was that or leave you sitting here alone. And yes, we take prisoners out all the time. Lange’s very grateful.’

‘Yes, but you don’t bring Germans to meet people like me.’

‘Why ever not?’

Mary stopped and shook her hand free.

‘Because, you idiot, I work at the Citadel.’

Lindsay took her hand and pushed her forward again: ‘It’s fine. Trust me. It’s our secret. Lange doesn’t even know your name.’

‘I should go.’

They swayed about the crowded floor in silence. For a time, Mary was caught up in the music and the movement and the pressure of Lindsay’s body against hers. When the dance ended she allowed him to lead her back to the table. Lange was on his feet applauding politely.

‘Helmut thinks we make a handsome couple,’ said Lindsay, smiling broadly.

At first Lange looked uncomfortable and spoke in little more than a whisper but no one seemed to care that he was speaking German. He was soon talking with boyish enthusiasm of his jazz heroes and of the visit he would make to New York when the war was over.

‘I’ve just told him jazz is decadent and played by coloureds,’ said Lindsay. Lange smiled weakly and said in faltering English: ‘I like things that are decadent. I’m from the south.’ Then they spoke of Lange’s home in Munich, of the city’s baroque churches, of skiing and hill-walking.

Mary felt a little more at ease too. Lange was very engaging and either commendably discreet or just plain incurious, for he made no effort to ask her anything about herself. Lindsay was soon too busy translating their conversation to play a full part himself.

‘And did you enjoy
The Great Dictator
, Herr Lange?’ Mary asked after a time.

Lange smiled thoughtfully, leant forward a little and in broken English said: ‘We can laugh at the Führer in Germany but we don’t because he is a good man.’ Mary glanced at Lindsay. There was a small, enigmatic smile on his face, a restaurant smile, as if he was waiting to be served an interesting dish. He asked Lange a question in German, then said to Mary: ‘He means “great” not “good”. Hitler is a great man not a good one.’

‘Is he a member of the Nazi Party?’ she asked.

Lindsay shook his head but translated her question anyway and Lange’s reply: ‘He says all Germans love and admire their Führer.’ Lindsay paused, then said: ‘But he doesn’t believe that. Propaganda is a bad habit, like biting your nails – not easy to stop once you’ve started.’ He translated this too and Lange chuckled, rocking his chair backwards and forwards.

‘He’d like to believe it, of course’, Lindsay said to Mary, ‘but he can’t quite.’

And he explained that Lange had served as a despatch rider during the invasion of Poland in ’39 but had hated the iconoclasm and easy brutality of the Army: ‘He wanted to be a journalist so he volunteered for the Navy’s propaganda service.’

Mary gave a short disbelieving laugh. ‘He wanted to work for Goebbels. It was a career move?’

‘Is that so strange?’ asked Lindsay.

‘What does he write in his pieces about the invasion of Poland and France and Yugoslavia and Greece?’

Lindsay clucked sceptically.

‘Well?’

‘Well, he’ll only talk of the defence of the Fatherland. Why don’t you ask him about his visit to a concentration camp?’

‘He’s been to one?’

‘Yes, I have,’ said Lange in English and his face twitched with irritation. ‘You want your friend to interrogate me, Lieutenant?’

Lindsay shook his head and said in German: ‘No, Helmut, but I told her you were a Christian and I think she’d like to hear you explain how a Christian justifies the camps. I’d like to know too.’

It was quite a time before Lange spoke again and when he did Mary sensed that he was struggling for the right words: ‘Our priest at home was arrested and taken to a camp. They accused him of abusing children. It wasn’t true. He spoke out against this racial purity. This is worrying but we are at war. When it’s over, all this will stop, but until then we have a duty to protect the Fatherland.’

Mary held the edge of the table tightly as Lindsay translated Lange’s words, a frown of concentration on her face, then she said: ‘So your priest put God before his duty to the Nazi state?’

‘Christians do not make revolution,’ said Lange flatly.

Mary leant forward and, placing her hand on his, said quietly: ‘Christians can’t shelter behind their country’s laws.’ And she looked intently at him as Lindsay translated her words.

Lange shook his head slowly, then almost as an afterthought added, ‘The Führer has done many good things.’

Mary sighed and sat back in her chair. No one spoke for a few seconds. The band was thumping out a sugary little love song and the dance floor was busier than ever. Then Lange leant across the
table, took Mary’s hand and squeezed it gently. ‘You are right about some things, yes, I agree with some things,’ he said hesitantly. ‘Please understand; I think of these things too.’

She felt a little embarrassed: ‘It’s easy to preach in London.’

No more mention was made of the war, the Church or the Party and for the rest of the evening the conversation was warm and relaxed. At a little after ten, Lindsay announced that it was time to leave.

‘Yes, but first Helmut must ask me to dance,’ said Mary. Before Lindsay could begin to translate, Lange was on his feet. How strange, Mary thought as he guided her around the floor, she was in the arms of a Nazi propagandist and she liked him very much.

18

L

indsay woke at dawn the following morning after a restless night on a camp bed and as he lay there under the rough army blankets his first half-conscious thoughts were of Mary. He could see her sweeping round the dance floor, cat-green eyes bright with pleasure, more beautiful, more graceful in her sensible skirt than all those women who had made so much effort to please. He tried to cling to this warm, sleepy memory of her, caught up in the dance too, but it began to slip away. It was replaced by an image of Mohr’s clever, confident smile, and it was this that finally drove him from his bed.

One hour and a greasy canteen breakfast later, Lindsay was perched on the balustrade of the Trent Park terrace, the sun warm on his back, in one hand a cigarette, in the other his ‘bible’ – the notes he used to prepare for an interrogation. It was always a little pantomime of sympathy, impatience, rage, and it needed to be structured carefully. So absorbed was he in this task that he did not hear the footsteps approaching from the front of the house.

‘Enjoying the sunshine?’ It was James Henderson. Lindsay turned to acknowledge him, slipping from the balustrade to his feet.

‘Preparing for another crack at Jürgen Mohr.’

‘Ah,’ said Henderson a little sheepishly, ‘I wanted to talk to you about Mohr.’

‘Oh?’

‘You won’t be able to interrogate him today. He isn’t here.’

Lindsay frowned: ‘I have him in solitary.’

‘No you don’t.’ Henderson was inspecting a crack in a broken flagstone. ‘A car’s waiting to take him to the Admiralty. The First Sea Lord, in his wisdom, has decided he wants to meet Mohr.’

‘Does he think he can do a better job than me?’

Henderson shook his head. ‘He wants to meet a famous U-boat commander.’

Lindsay gave a short, harsh laugh: ‘I thought we were fighting a war.’

Henderson looked a little crestfallen; for once authority had let him down: ‘Professional curiosity.’

Lindsay shook his head in disbelief. God save us from ‘professional’ officers and their fellowship of the sea, he thought. The captain of HMS
White
had been the same and they were still picking up the pieces.

‘How’s Sister Mary?’ Henderson was anxious to change the subject.

‘Fine, fine,’ said Lindsay.

‘You’re still seeing each other then?’

Lindsay smiled. Henderson had done well to keep the disappointment from his voice: ‘When we can, she’s very busy.’

‘Yes.’

For a while, they stood in silence. Lindsay wanted to say something for Mary’s sake but could think of nothing. It was difficult to feel warm about a man who made no secret of his distaste for you.

‘All right, I must get on,’ said Henderson awkwardly.

‘I’ll follow you in.’

He left Henderson in the entrance hall and made his way into the west wing of the house. The naval interrogators had turned the old billiard room into an office and crammed it with files and ugly furniture. A couple of assistants were typing up SR transcripts. Lieutenant Charlie Samuels was the only one of the interrogators at his desk. Bent beneath an anglepoise lamp, he was scribbling frantically in what Lindsay took to be his interrogation bible.

‘You’re not going to believe this,’ he said as he stepped up to Samuels’ desk, ‘Mohr is taking tea with the First Sea Lord.’

Samuels looked up at him, a smile on his thin, almost colourless lips.

‘No, it’s quite true,’ said Lindsay, perching at its edge. He felt sure Samuels would share his disgust. But Samuels just looked at him then raised his eyebrows quizzically.

Lindsay was a little taken aback: ‘Well?’

‘How can you, of all people, complain if the First Sea Lord wants to make friends with a Nazi?’

Lindsay flushed with anger: ‘I’m surprised to hear you say that, Charlie.’

‘Why? You’re not fussy about the company you keep,’ said Samuels quietly.

‘I make no apologies for being friendly with some of the prisoners – that’s part of the job.’

Samuels looked down at his bible for a moment as if steadying himself, his hand covering his chin and mouth. When he looked up again Lindsay was struck by the sadness in his eyes.

‘What’s up?’ he asked.

‘Do you know what Checkland’s written in the interrogation notes he’s pulled together for the Director, for Admiral Godfrey?’ Samuel’s voice shook a little. ‘I’ve scribbled some of it down here.’ He pulled a scrap of paper from his bible and began to read from it:

Sight of Jew has adverse effect on mental attitude of prisoners . . . hardens resistance . . . mistake to employ interrogators of Jewish appearance . . . Germans have special instinct for slightest Jewish strain and this makes Jewish interrogators feel inferior
.

He picked up his spectacles and peered at the paper as if through a magnifying glass. Satisfied there was nothing more, he said as calmly as he could: ‘He is right about the prisoners but not about me. I hate most of them, despise them.’ He paused for a moment then said: ‘But Checkland would just say that proves I shouldn’t be doing this job.’

Lindsay shook his head slowly. The Jew and the German, he thought, neither of us entirely trusted.

‘You know, I loved Germany,’ Samuels said suddenly. ‘You understand, of course. I used to visit my grandfather in Berlin. He took me to the opera in Opernplatz – they burn books there now, and we haven’t heard anything from him for three years.’

‘My mother hasn’t heard from her brothers.’

‘It’s different for us, and you of all the people here should know it,’ said Samuels sharply.

‘Yes, yes it is, of course it’s different.’

Samuels pushed back his chair and stood up as if to indicate
that he had nothing more to say on the subject of his family. ‘I agree with you about the First Sea Lord; these U-boat commanders think quite enough of themselves as it is,’ he said brusquely. He picked up a file and thrust it at Lindsay: ‘Look at this – you wanted me to work on the wireless operators. The chief, the Oberfunkmaat, served on at least two U-boats before the
U-112
. I still don’t know how good his English is – he’s stubborn and unfriendly. I haven’t got anything concrete on the other one but there is this SR transcript.’ He pointed at the file in Lindsay’s hands. ‘I’ve marked it up – page four. Our man’s Prisoner 643, Funkobergefreiter Heinz Brand.’

Lindsay turned the flimsy, closely typed pages of what was obviously a long, dull conversation between Prisoner 643, wireless operator Heinz Brand, and two others, until he found the snippet Samuels had marked in bold red.

640: Our landing craft will be able to land on the English coast easily with the help of fog or a smokescreen
.

641: I don’t know how they’ll get across.

643: I don’t know what the Führer intends, but I’m sure it’ll be the right thing
.

641: I’m surprised at how good our treatment is here, for instance the treatment I had for my toothache
.

643: In my diary I’ve put, ‘Quantity and quality of food are sufficient.’ Actually it’s better than it was on my old ship
.

640: Before you joined the 112?

643: Yes
.

Samuels saw a quiet, hopeful smile appear on Lindsay’s face. ‘What do you think, is that good enough for you?’ he asked.

‘It pays to feed the prisoners well,’ said Lindsay with a short laugh and he handed the file back to Samuels. ‘So Brand was a wireless operator on a ship before the
112
. It’s something to work on. Do you think you’ll get more from him face to face?’

Samuels shrugged doubtfully: ‘I’m going to try. Want to join me? After all, Checkland thinks Aryan good looks make all the difference.’