the structures of national administration. This had begun-and the
Reading the list, his thumb running down the margin, he wondered who these people were. G455, A. M. Kruger, at the
“Herr Weisz? It is Herr Doktor Martz, sir. An urgent call for you.”
Weisz jumped, Gerda was standing in the doorway, had apparently called out to him and received no response. Had she seen the list? Certainly she had, and it was all Weisz could do not to clap his hand over it like a kid in school.
The press conference was addressed by the mighty von Ribbentrop himself. A former champagne salesman, he had, as foreign minister, inflated himself to an astonishing stature, his face beaming with pomposity and
Weisz made furious notes, and rushed to cable as the conference ended. REUTERS PARIS MARCH TWELVE DATE BERLIN WEISZ VON RIBBENTROP THREATENS REPRISAL AGAINST CZECHS FOR DEPOSING FATHER TISO AS PREMIER SLOVAKIA AND DECLARING MARTIAL LAW END. He then hurried to the office and wrote the dispatch, while Gerda obtained a line from the international operator and held it open, chatting with her counterpart in Paris.
By the time he was done dictating, it was after six. He returned to the Adlon, stripped off his sweaty clothes, and had a quick bath. Christa arrived at seven-twenty. “I was here earlier,” she said, “but they told me at the desk that you were away.”
“Sorry, I was. The Czechs have thrown the Nazis out of Slovakia.”
“Yes, I heard it on the radio. What will happen now?”
“Germany sends troops, France and England declare war. I am interned, to spend the next ten years reading Tolstoy and playing bridge.”
“You, play bridge?”
“I’ll learn.”
“I thought you were angry.”
He sighed. “No, I’m not angry.”
Her mouth was set hard, her look determined, close to defiant. “I would hope not.” Clearly, she’d spent some time, wherever she’d gone earlier, preparing to answer his anger with her own, and she wasn’t quite ready to give that up. “Would you prefer that I go away?”
“Christa.”
“Would you?”
“
She sat on the edge of a chaise longue angled into a corner. “I asked you to help us because you were here. And because I thought you would. Would want to.”
“That’s true. I’ve looked at the papers, they’re important.”
“And I suspect, my sweet, that you, in Paris, are no angel.”
He laughed. “Well, maybe a fallen angel, but Paris isn’t Berlin, not yet it isn’t, and I don’t talk about it because it’s better not to. No? Makes sense?”
“Yes, I suppose it does.”
“It does, believe me.”
She relaxed, made a sour face, and shook her head.
He knew what she meant. “For me it’s the same, love.” The sentence in German, except for the last word,
“What did you think of my friend?”
He paused, then said, “An idealist, certainly.”
“A saint.”
“Close to it. Doing what he believes in.”
“It’s only the very best, now, who will do anything. Here, in this, monstrosity.”
“I only worry, well, it’s that the lives of the saints usually end in martyrdom. And I care for you, Christa. And more.”
“Yes,” she said. “I know.” Then, softly: “Also for me, more.”
“And I think I should mention that hotel rooms, where journalists stay, are sometimes…” He cupped his hand around his ear. “Yes?”
By this, she was slightly ruffled. “I hadn’t thought of that,” she said.
“Nor did I, not immediately.”
For a time, they were silent. Neither one of them looked at a watch, but Christa said, “Whatever else goes on with this room, it is also very warm.” She stood and took off her jacket and skirt, then her shirt, stockings, and garter belt, and folded them over the top of the chaise longue. Usually, she wore expensive cotton underwear, white or ivory, and soft to the touch, but tonight she was in plum-colored silk, the bra with a lace trim, the panties low at the waist, high at the hip, and tight, a style called, Veronique had once told him, French-cut. They were new, he suspected, and bought for him, maybe bought that afternoon.
“Very appealing,” he said, a certain look in his eyes.
“You like them?” She turned this way and that.
“Very much,” he said.
She walked over to the desk, opened her purse, and took out a cigarette. Her walk was as always, like her, sensible and straightforward, simply a way to get from here to there, but, even so, the plum-colored panties made a difference, and maybe it took her a little longer, at that moment, to go from here to there. As she returned to the chaise longue, Weisz left his chair and, ashtray in hand, settled on the bed. “Come sit with me,” he said.
“I like it over here,” she said. “On this furniture, one can be languid.” She lay back, crossed her ankles, cupped an elbow with one hand, while the other, with the cigarette, was held by her ear-a movie siren’s pose. “But perhaps,” she said, with a voice and smile that matched the pose, “you’ll join me.”
The following day, 13 March, the Czechoslovakian situation deteriorated. Father Tiso had been summoned to Berlin, to meet personally with Hitler, and Slovakia, by noon, was on the way to declaring itself independent. Thus the nation, pasted together at Versailles, then torn apart at Munich, was in its final hours. At the Reuters bureau, Carlo Weisz was fully engaged-the telephones never stopped ringing, and the teleprinter bell chimed as it issued communiques from the Reich ministries. Central Europe was, once again, about to explode.
In the middle of it, Gerda, with a certain knowing tenderness, called out, “Herr Weisz, it is Fraulein Schmidt.” The conversation with Christa was difficult, darkened by approaching separation. Sunday, the seventeenth, would be his last day in Berlin, Eric Wolf was due back in the office on Monday, and Weisz was expected in Paris. This meant that Friday, the fifteenth, would be the last time they could be together.
“I can see you this afternoon,” she said. “Tomorrow I cannot, and Friday, I don’t know, I don’t want to think about it, maybe we can meet, but I don’t want, I don’t want to say goodby. Carlo? Hello? Are you there?”
