When the Doves Disappeared (20 page)

Juudit didn’t take the paper from me. I shoved it into her purse. She laid a wadded handkerchief down beside me and stared out at the sea.

“Roland, you have to leave the city immediately.”

She spoke quickly, her gaze fixed on the water. The Feldgendarmerie knew that there were fugitives and draft dodgers at the harbor. They were going to use that as a pretense to get into the factories there and search for someone behind a recent attack. Hellmuth Hertz had learned that there were such men hiding among the dockworkers.

“The target was Alfred Rosenberg, his train, when it arrived at the station. It wasn’t you, was it?” she said, her mouth snapping shut.

I looked at her. She was serious.

“You have to leave,” she said. “Rosalie would have wanted you to. Take this money.”

She got up, leaving the handkerchief bundle on the bench, and marched away. That’s what she had to tell me? That’s why she’d come? I was disappointed, but at the same time suddenly alert. I hadn’t heard about a failed assassination attempt, but if Juudit had been serious when she asked if I was involved, someone else might be wondering the same thing, and the plot would no doubt lead the Germans to tighten their security protocols. I wouldn’t be going to the harbor in the mornings anymore.

Although papers were often inspected on the tram, I got on the next one to save some time—I had to get back to my room and pack in a hurry. Up until that point my new documents had worked perfectly and the altered birth date had never been noticed. I kept them in my breast pocket, where I used to keep Rosalie’s picture, and as I rode the jam-packed, rattling tram I realized that my hand hadn’t reached to touch it in a long time. Although I’d shredded the photo long ago, for the first time I felt that it was really gone and I’d never get it back again, not even in my imagination. In place of Rosalie’s face were forged identity papers, and in my ears the echo of Juudit’s retreating high heels. Her steps made the wrong sound as she left—real leather soles and the clack of metal heels—and her hips made her skirt swirl against her legs. I had almost thrown the wad of money after her. For a moment I regretted that I hadn’t used the opportunity to hurt her. I hadn’t told her what Richard had learned at B4: her brother Johan had been taken to the Kawe factory cellar by the Bolsheviks, and although the jail was supposed to be a temporary housing facility, his trail ended there. There was no information about his wife. I hadn’t told her because I’m bad at consoling women. And because Juudit was extremely volatile. If she didn’t want to work with me when I returned to Tallinn, then I could let her know what Richard had seen when he walked into that cellar, Johan’s last known location. The cellar was empty, but the walls were stained with blood. This wouldn’t turn Juudit against the Germans—quite the opposite—but maybe it would take some of the champagne bubbles out of her head and make her wonder why the Germans hadn’t informed Johan’s family of his fate. Maybe it would remind her of the importance of what we were doing. I needed
weapons like that, even despicable ones, because it wouldn’t be easy to find another source like her. Juudit warmed in the company of those men, which was a reason to keep an eye on her. I knew that she wanted to stay with her Jerry; I could see that she’d fallen in love with him, that she was walking on rose petals. That was her weakness. I had to learn to use it.

JUUDIT’S HEAD WAS
lowered as she went up the stairs. Roland’s painful questions had stripped away what little honor she’d once had. Didn’t he understand that not everyone could find love through honorable means? As she stepped onto the soft carpet of Hellmuth’s entryway, her head was already held high, and she handed her hat and her shopping to the maid as if she’d been raised that way, with servants to meet her when she came home. She marched to the buffet cabinet to squeeze some lemon, lit a cigarette to go with her cocktail, and burned the phone number Roland had given her while she was at it. The world was different now and Juudit had a different future, a better life than she’d ever had before, and she wasn’t going to let Roland, who’d lost everything, ruin it. No, Roland wasn’t going to pull her down with him, take away what she’d managed to achieve—she had waited so long for someone to love her, someone to want her completely, someone she suited, a man like Hellmuth, waited all her life for a chance to be sick with love from one day and night to the next, to taste milk and honey under her tongue instead of sulphur and rust. Hellmuth wasn’t even bothered by her marriage. Juudit had told him just what kind of marriage it was, how it wasn’t a union at all. And he hadn’t left her, just caressed her ear, and when his tongue found some sugar there from her beauty scrub the night before, he told her she was the sweetest girl in the Empire.

Hellmuth didn’t torment her with constant demands to tell him what the Estonians were saying about the Germans. They had conversations, not interrogations, and Hellmuth respected her opinions, even on political subjects. That morning the two of them had pondered the reasons why the Propagandastaffel’s photography exhibitions hadn’t attracted as many visitors as expected. The empty galleries had been embarrassing. She said it was hardly fitting to the prestige of the Reich to organize exhibitions
that didn’t draw an audience. It might give the impression that the people didn’t support the Germans!

Hellmuth laughed. “You’re clever,” he said. “But the Propagandastaffel’s projects are part of the Wehrmacht. The military always messes things up. But perhaps these matters are a bit boring for you, my love.”

Juudit had shaken her head vehemently. The more Hellmuth listened to her opinions, the more responsibility he gave her, the more fervently she loved him. And he did give her responsibility: she’d become his secretary, a job that involved translating, interpreting, and stenography, as well as giving presentations on Estonian folk traditions and religion to visiting scholars from Berlin and arranging séances for the officers who wanted them. Because of his busy schedule, Hellmuth left certain visitors entirely in her care, and Juudit managed them easily—she simply contacted Mrs. Vaik, who arranged sittings with Lydia Bartels. Hellmuth thanked her vociferously, said she was positively Germanic in her efficiency, and gave her a hatpin with agate roses as a gift. He trusted her, and she could never betray that trust; she worked ever more diligently, organized parties ever more masterfully, pored over German women’s magazines that Gerda recommended, even retrieved the
Housewife’s Handbook
from home and studied the instructions for seating charts and place settings. She tried to train the maid to fold the napkins better, searched for the best staff for dinner parties. With the help of the cook she created a recipe for squab that was unrivaled, happily shared it with anyone who asked, and enjoyed every moment, because by taking great care in all these domestic matters she was finally living the life that she’d prepared for through her whole girlhood, she was making use of her education and her social skills, and she was busy—she didn’t have time for Roland. That’s why she had invented the story of assassins hiding among the dockworkers. She’d learned to lie better than some might have thought—her marriage had taught her that.

Juudit made sure that the maid was in the kitchen—she could hear the girl giggling with the handyman—and went into the bedroom. She pulled open the closet, her head defiantly thrown back and her spine ramrod straight. The felt boots in the back of the closet were made with good leather, their soles and seams carefully greased, their surface polished with
a wool cloth. Used with galoshes they would get her through any kind of weather. When Leonida had sent two pairs, Juudit had thought she would set one aside for Roland, but his demands had grown even darker and more threatening than the man himself. In the morning she would throw them to the soldiers in the street. No. Why wait? She opened the window and tossed them out in a great arc. They would make someone a very good pair of boots—she’d had enough. Soon Hellmuth would be home, and they would go out with Gerda and Walter, and they would have fun, more fun than she’d had in years, and in the meantime she would have one more sidecar, and style her hair into gentle waves, and she wouldn’t feel the slightest bit guilty. Just one drink and then she could darken her eyelashes with mascara without any fear of it running.

After her third drink Juudit was ready to sit at her vanity table and pick up her hand mirror, but her hair refused to obey her and she threw the curling iron down on the table. Her gown for the evening—tulle and violet—was on a hanger, and in the dresser drawer lay a new one for the following evening, crêpe de chine, tucked inside tissue paper. But her mood hadn’t lightened, and it was because of the mice. Or rather their absence. She had set traps in the corners of every room and every closet, but the traps were still empty. Sometimes she woke up at night, imagining she heard a squeak, and she was always wrong. The mice never failed to come to warn of the death of a relative, so Juudit was certain her husband was still alive. The last time the mice had warned her was when Rosalie died, although at the time she had hoped it was a portent of her liberation.

Reval, Estland General Commissariat, Ostland National Commissariat

W
HEN THE TRUCK
full of foresters left Tallinn in the morning, I intended to slip in among them. Before leaving I’d packed up all my things in the attic of the Merivälja villa. The house was deserted, which made it perfect, but I felt uneasy there, like I always did in places where life had vanished. The Germans have eaten all the doves from here, too; you no longer hear their cooing behind the barn. Stray cats have taken over the rooms and verandas, making a racket. I spent the last night in the barn just to be safe. At the front door of the house I noticed that the board I’d set up as a trap had been moved. Carefully moved, but moved nevertheless. It may have been only a cat, but I loaded my Walther and listened. I crept across the veranda, across the drawing room. I could see that someone had stumbled into the sheet-covered armchair. As I climbed the stairs, I stepped over the squeaky steps. I stood next to the attic door, opened it a crack, and almost shot Richard, who was waiting inside.

“How did you know where to find me?”

I was holding my pistol against his temple. Richard was speechless with shock and could only manage to stutter that he was alone. He knew the password. I lowered the gun.

“I was ordered to come here,” Richard said. “I have to leave the country.”

“Judging by the trail you left, you wouldn’t have noticed if you were followed.”

“Two officials of the Internal Directorate have disappeared,” he said. “They’re starting to give me funny looks. You have to help. I brought forged travel permits for you.”

I quickly gathered up my things and told him to follow me. There was no time to lose—I was certain that he had been tailed. We would leave over the roof.

THE MAIL GIRL FOUND
me some German armor and a couple of bottles of cartridges from a stash in the forest. I asked her to take care of Richard while I arranged a place for him on a ship or motorboat. Richard put a folder on the table and said he’d taken as many B4 files as he could. I gave him the money Juudit had given me. As I opened the folder he put the money in his pocket and warned me that I wouldn’t like what it said.

“It’s a political police report, all originals.”

“Dorpat is a surprisingly European city in spite of the misfortunes of recent years. According to Reichsminister Rosenberg, the Baltic countries have a European character. Unfortunately, the Reichsminister’s excellent racial theories are unknown here, since the Bolsheviks have kept the country isolated from the civilized world.

“The measures we recommend are to attempt to apply the research findings of the Reich’s new Historical Institute to Estland, and perhaps it would be advisable to establish a separate Referentur here. Otherwise the Estonians won’t understand how important the Jewish question is. During Estland’s independence the Jews had cultural autonomy. For that reason it would be wise to investigate how much damage was done to Estland under conditions in which there were no restrictions on Jews, and how much the treachery peculiar to the Jews has advanced in such a social environment. The criminalization of anti-Semitism in 1933 was doubtless the result of Jewish machinations, from which we can deduce that the government is very weak or the Estonian race of particularly
low intelligence. The race, however, is quite hybridized, so this characteristic would be surprising. It’s also possible that the government has degenerated to an exceptional extent or that Jews have even taken part in government. Research is needed into how such a negligent regime has held together at all. Perhaps it would be best to make Estland the largest reserve for Jews in Reichskommissariat Ostland. On the other hand, Commander Sandberger has stressed that pogroms would not be suitable for Estland because of the country’s unusually pro-Jewish history. The country has been saved from complete destruction by the influence of its citizens of German heritage. There is also an unusually small number of Jews, much fewer than in Latvia or Lithuania. Perhaps they know how to disguise themselves well enough that the original population takes no notice of them.