The Winter Garden (2014) (34 page)

He pursed his lips.

‘We buried him in the churchyard next to the villa at Wannsee. People find it strange, but we put no headstone to mark his grave. My father said Harro was a free spirit and should have
nothing above him but the patter of deers’ hooves.’

He blinked, and took another gulp of his drink.

‘There. Now you have my sad story. Make of it what you will.’

Clara focused on her drink as a familiar, sick feeling rose in her gullet. It was a conflict that tore at the heart of her, and threatened to overwhelm her with self-loathing. She knew she was a
honeytrap. A
femme galante
, as the French called them. A Mata Hari. However shadowy and double-dealing the life of a male spy, the female spy’s life involved an extra layer of
deception. Eking out confidences like this, faking closeness, pretending intimacy, coaxing a man to strip the layers off himself. Somehow it seemed even more deceptive than stripping off his
clothes. Whenever this feeling threatened to engulf her she reminded herself what was at stake. The information she could get from Arno Strauss was valuable. Thousands of lives might depend on it.
If deceiving him was the price, it was well worth paying.

‘Some people might be surprised, Arno, that you never stopped flying.’

‘Quite the reverse. You have two choices when it happens. Either your nerve gives out, or you get back in the cockpit. I joined up in the war.’

‘And you went to Spain.’

His head rose sharply, detecting an undercurrent in her voice.

‘Yes, I volunteered for Spain. And I’m glad of it. I was motivated by the chance to prevent the spread of Bolshevism. It’s a rot that’s spreading through Europe. A
cancer. What’s happening in Spain will soon be happening in Germany if we don’t help stop it. Germany will never recognize a red Spain.’

‘Who says Spain would go red?’

He snorted. ‘You haven’t seen it. The country is packed with agents of Moscow. They’re not just sending arms and aid. They’re sending spies. The Soviets exert huge
control over the Republicans. They have secret prisons around Madrid where they torture and kill Nationalists and Catholics. The spies aren’t easy to spot. They’re not always Russian,
they’re German and Spanish too. Nearly all Jews of course. There’s a Ukrainian Jew called General Kléber – at least that’s his nom de guerre – who advises the
International Brigades. In reality he’s a senior member of the NKVD, hotfoot from Moscow, real name Manfred Stern. Some of them are English too. You should take heed. It’s the declared
aim of Bolsheviks to overthrow the leadership of Great Britain too. If the British aren’t careful the hammer and sickle will soon be flying over Buckingham Palace.’

‘The way you speak about them, it’s like they’re not human.’

He shrugged. ‘Bolsheviks, Jews. They’re different from us. It’s not that I think they’re dull-witted animals. Quite the contrary. I think they’re dangerous. They
stand for the destruction of everything we believe in. Have you heard what’s going on in Moscow right now? Stalin’s purges?’

Clara said nothing. It was astonishing to hear Strauss talking about the terror being perpetrated by Stalin when illegal executions, show trials and arbitrary arrests at dawn were a fact of
daily life in Hitler’s Germany.

‘But what about you, Arno? What did you do in Spain?’

‘Are you asking me what goes on in a war?’

‘Just generally.’

‘I flew with the Legion Condor. My commander was Lieutenant Colonel Wolfram von Richthofen. A relation of the Red Baron, you know? The overall commander was a man called Hugo Sperrle.
Perhaps you’ve heard of him?’

Clara had seen the pictures of Generalmajor Sperrle in the newspapers. A human bulldog, with a monocle and a savage, downturned mouth.

‘I think so.’

‘We flew on missions against the Communists.’

‘So all the people you bombed, then, were Communists?’

Strauss’s voice turned to ice.

‘What’s this about Clara?’

‘It’s not about anything. I’m interested in the war.’

‘You’re interested, are you? That’s why you’re asking all these questions. Are you going to ask me what I’ve seen? What I’ve done? Do you expect me to recount
it here, over a pleasant meal, for your entertainment? Are you one of those women who like to hear how many we killed and what they looked like when we bombed them? Do you want to know whether they
were burned or buried alive in rubble?’

There was a silence as he finished his drink, slammed down the glass and rose to pay the bill. Bitterly Clara chided herself. God knows why but she had introduced politics, which was the last
subject she should have risked, and ruined the confidential mood between them. She had probably aroused Strauss’s suspicions about her own motives, but even if she hadn’t, it was almost
certainly too late to retrieve the situation. Great work, Clara. Mission unaccomplished.

They walked in silence back through the village. A slanting, late-afternoon sun burnished the red roofs and lit up orange and gold chrysanthemums leaning over the garden walls. Above them, a
flock of migrating geese formed a hooting black arrow across the sky and beneath, on the grass, a scatter of hens pecked. Gradually the beauty of the countryside must have had its effect on
Strauss, because he relaxed, the lowering frown left his face and she sensed his previous anger dissipate.

They entered the cool, verdant light of the wood, where there was no sound but the shift of branches and the rush of a distant stream. After a while Strauss stopped, obliging her to come to a
halt beside him, and pressed her against the trunk of a tree that was peeling with lichen like an ancient plaster statue. The light filtered down through the leaves above them, sifting sun and
shadow.

‘Why did you come here today?’

‘I told you. It’s useful for my research. It helps me understand the character I’m playing, Gretchen. I’m supposed to know how she would be without having to think about
it. So I can inhabit her.’

‘What does this Gretchen do?’

‘She flies into enemy territory to rescue her husband.’

‘And the husband is Ernst?’

‘Yes.’

‘He’s a lucky man.’

She realized the drink had had its effect. She laughed lightly.

‘I’m seeing him this week. We’re doing the publicity shots for the film.’

‘Is that so? I would like to have one of those pictures. My walls are pretty bare.’

‘I’ll get them to send you one.’

‘And what about me? Am I part of your research?’

His hand reached down to hers and grasped her fingers with his. She tried hard to prevent herself withdrawing her hand.

‘You know, Clara, I find you fascinating.’

He ran his fingers lightly over her face, as though he were a blind man, or a lover. Feeling out her features, his fingers gliding over her skin, as though searching for something her features
might say, across the temples, then down the cheekbones, stroking the planes of her face.

‘We have something in common, you and me. I don’t show my feelings because I can’t. This thing on my face prevents me. You conceal your thoughts behind a façade. Which
is why I wonder at your interest in me. There are not a lot of pretty actresses who throw themselves at me. What are you hiding?’

‘Who says I have anything to hide?’

‘Sunlight and cloud. That’s what I see in your eyes.’

The arch of trees above threw shifting patterns on his face as he smiled down at her. For a moment she thought, if Strauss was not a National Socialist, if he didn’t believe what he
believed, could she possibly become involved with him? In some ways he was not so different from Ralph. Ralph’s easy charm was a deterrent just as effective as Strauss’s damaged face.
But then she reminded herself: Strauss was a senior officer of the Luftwaffe. He kept company with thugs like Goering and Himmler, ruthless, violent men who regarded anyone who disagreed with them
as degenerate or Bolshevik or in some other way undeserving of walking in German woods or breathing the fresh, green German air. Strauss might lack the sadism of his masters and their more vicious
beliefs, yet he had chosen, hadn’t he, to serve the regime? Like them, he despised Jews. He had elected to work in Goering’s ministry, and fly his bomber under the Nazi flag.

Strauss reached his crumpled face down and made to kiss her. Instinctively she ducked away. His mouth hardened into a thin line.

‘You find me repulsive. Well, it’s not a surprise. I should be used to it by now.’

His face was stiff with anger and annoyance. ‘Women always avoid me. They don’t want to get too close to this monstrosity. They give the boys in the Arbeitsdienst a teaspoon of
bicarbonate of soda every day for that problem. Perhaps I should take their advice.’

‘Your face has nothing to do with it.’

A flash of his bitter, grey eyes. ‘You don’t need to say any more, Fräulein. Thank you for your candour.’

‘I mean it.’

‘I spent years training in the boxing ring, so that men would hesitate before they said anything they would regret, but it doesn’t work with women. I disgust them. They can’t
see beyond this thing, and who can blame them. No girl wants to be seen out with a freak show. When I march in parades and the BDM girls come to give flowers, they always shy away from
me.’

‘Oh, for God’s sake!’

How could Clara make him understand? His face might be scarred but the scars in his mind were so much deeper. Those scars had silvered over and lay flat until someone touched them, and then they
rose savage and scarlet, as painful as the day they were made. How could she tell Strauss she didn’t recoil from him because of his face, but because she didn’t want to deceive him any
more than strictly necessary? Rapidly she cast around for a credible explanation.

‘It’s not what you think.’

‘Is that so?’ His expression was disgusted.

‘My response had nothing to do with your face.’

‘And what else could it be?’

‘You said I had a secret and you’re right. I do. You see, Arno, you have been consorting with a Jew.’

He stared at her for a moment then she felt the stiffening of his recoil. He took a step backwards, his voice flat with shock. ‘You should visit the anthropologist. I can’t believe
there is any Jewish blood in you.’

She had regretted the words as soon as they had left her mouth. Her heart was hammering against her ribs. What had possessed her to tell a Nazi officer that kind of secret? The secret she hid
every day. That had been so carefully covered by Leo’s false documents, made and printed by men who ran enormous personal risks. What right did she have in an unforgivable moment of emotion,
to risk all that? Not just to risk herself, but to risk the lives of all those brave men, throughout Berlin, who would undoubtedly be traced and rounded up if her false identity came to light? Just
because she wanted to stop Strauss from kissing her. She would have to pretend it was a joke.

‘Not that kind of Jew. I meant, because I’m half English. That SS newspaper,
Das Schwarz Kopf
, says we are white Jews.’

He gave a bark of laughter. ‘You should have said. There’s nothing wrong with that. Nothing at all.’

Nonetheless, he did not repeat his attempt to kiss her. As they walked on through the wood he appeared entirely detached, almost as if she was not there at all. When they came to a tangle of
ferns and mossy stones he held out an arm momentarily to support her, then removed it again. Clara’s comments about the beauty of their surroundings went unanswered. His face had frozen over
again, the currents of emotion beneath it icily suppressed. At one point he reached into a pocket and withdrew a silver hipflask which he tipped, swiftly, to his mouth. It wasn’t until they
reached the airfield and made their way to the plane that he looked at her and said, briefly, ‘Perhaps we could meet on Thursday. If you’re free.’

‘I’m so sorry, Arno. I have to be at the studio that day.’

He slid open the cockpit door and reached for the jackets.

‘Well then. There’s a lunch at Horcher’s in a few days’ time to celebrate the retirement of Sperrle from the Condor Legion. He’s been promoted to General der
Flieger. I’ll send you the details. I think you should come. It would be interesting for you to see Sperrle at close quarters. Consider it part of your research.’

‘Thank you. I will.’

The answer seemed to satisfy him.

It was dark by the time they had landed at Tempelhof and she made her way back to Winterfeldstrasse. A thin rain had polished the tarmac and emptied the street. Albert’s
red Opel was still parked where she left it outside the apartment and as she passed she caught a flash of something pale on the windscreen. It was probably a flyer distributed by a National
Socialist organization exhorting her to save crusts or mend socks. Picking it up, she saw it was a plain envelope, with no address. That was unusual. Propaganda leaflets were generally brightly and
garishly decorated. Opening it, she peered in and saw a photograph. It was a picture of a little boy smiling, in uniform, aged about six. Her hand trembled as she took it out. Erich. The photograph
that used to sit on her mantelpiece. She had never even noticed it was gone.

She glanced rapidly up and down the street but there was no one. The envelope was slightly damp, which suggested that its sender had been caught in the rain. The person who left it could only
recently have gone. If they had gone at all.

Clara felt her breath coming in fast, jagged gasps. The photograph was a threat, a direct threat by whoever it was who was stalking her. Without the need for words, the threat said that Erich
would come to harm. Erich, whom she had last seen storming off from his ill-fated birthday outing. Panicky images crowded her mind. Erich’s body lying in the road, his thin chest barely
fluttering with life, or falling out of a window, like his mother. The young boy whose life had become intertwined so unexpectedly with her own, was now at risk. Erich, whom she had grown to love,
who at times was the only thing keeping her here in Berlin. Instead of keeping him safe she had put him in danger.