The sun was setting as the three-engined Junkers took off, and as it turned over the great sprawl of Berlin he could see very little. The cloud was low and heavy until the plane broke through it. He sat back in his seat and closed his eyes. It was another two-hour flight, the third of the day. As a man who had never been in an aeroplane until that morning he had already had enough. He opened his eyes. Across the aisle a man in a dark suit who had just a little too much aftershave on smiled and nodded at him. His head was bald two-thirds of the way back; close-cropped hair started just before the crown. He looked at Stefan with the kind of easy assurance that meant there would be no sleep. The man would talk, even if he didn’t. In the lapel of his jacket was a Nazi buttonhole, just like the one Stefan had been given by the German Santa Claus at the Shelbourne Hotel. ‘Deutschland Erwache.’ Germany Awake. He recalled that was the day he had first met Hannah Rosen.
‘Business?’
It was an amiable question, but Stefan hadn’t really thought about the need to explain what he was doing, even in idle conversation like this. He had disposed of two curious Irish diplomats with the whiff of cow dung. It seemed something closer to the truth, if not quite the truth, begged fewer questions now. It was too much elaboration that made lies sound like lies. As a policeman he knew that.
‘Business in Danzig?’
‘A friend of mine’s on holiday there. I was in Berlin so I thought I’d catch up with her.’
It sounded ill-thought-out and unconvincing. Not that there was any reason why that should matter to a stranger he’d know for two hours on an aircraft, but it irritated him that he hadn’t thought about this before. The uncertainty of his reply, far from puzzling the man, seemed to amuse him.
‘I should probably ask no more questions, eh?’ It wasn’t a wink, but it was a smile of the you-sly-dog variety. Stefan couldn’t help laughing, both at the ease with which the assumption had been made, and also at the fact that perhaps, somewhere he hadn’t quite allowed himself to get to, it wasn’t so far from the truth. He had no idea what to expect in Danzig, but he still hoped that finding Hannah wouldn’t be difficult. Getting her to leave might be something else, but would it be such a bad thing if that took longer than Adam Rosen and Robert Briscoe anticipated? He hadn’t forgotten those two nights with Hannah. The faint smile served to confirm the assumptions of the man across the aisle. It was a feeling of comradeship, sly dog to sly dog, that Stefan was not keen to pursue for the next two hours. However, travelling companions were like relatives, you couldn’t choose them. It was some consolation that they were with you for hours and not a lifetime.
‘She’s in Zoppot?’ asked the German.
‘No, in the city.’
‘The city’s something to see, of course, very old, very German, but go to Zoppot. It’s too early for bathing, but the casino will keep you occupied.’
Stefan tried to look as if he really did have an interest in gambling.
‘But you’re visiting us at an exciting moment. These are great times.’
‘Really?’ He tried to look as if he had an interest in those great times.
‘The elections.’ The man delivered the word with a knowing look.
‘Oh yes, I was reading about them.’ Stefan gestured at the newspaper on the seat next to him. It was an exaggeration to say he had actually read it. He had made an effort to wade through the propaganda, but he’d given up.
‘It’s been hard work, what with the Poles and the League of Nations, interfering in everything. But we’ll sweep away the opposition this time.’
‘I’m afraid I’m not too well up on all that.’
‘Where are you from? You’re hard to place.’
‘I’m an Irishman.’
The man looked at him suspiciously, for no reason Stefan understood.
‘Ah, that explains it. I’m usually very good on accents.’
‘My mother’s family was originally from Stuttgart.’
‘We have an Irishman at our helm, so to speak. In Danzig. Herr Lester.’ The contempt was ill-disguised. ‘The League of Nations Commissioner.’
‘I’ve heard of him.’ Stefan had talked about him only the day before. If there was trouble, real trouble, Robert Briscoe had said he was to go to Sean Lester as a last resort.
‘He’s a man who likes to be in the news. For what, who knows? Who cares?’ The German laughed, quite loudly. Stefan sensed that that laughter would have been accompanied by a gob of spit if he hadn’t been sitting on a plane. Briscoe was right. Danzig’s Nazis didn’t like their High Commissioner. The man stretched across the aisle towards him. ‘Arthur Greiser.’ They shook.
‘Stefan Gillespie.’
‘You don’t know our Mr Lester then?’ There was a hint of suspicion in Greiser’s face again. He wasn’t trying to hide his dislike for Sean Lester.
‘We’re a small country, Herr Greiser, but not that small.’
‘Danzig is smaller. We know everyone. Warts and all! Such warts too!’
He turned abruptly and shouted along the aisle of the plane. ‘Schnapps!’ He looked back. ‘You’ll have a drink?’
Stefan didn’t want any more to drink, but he already knew Greiser would insist. He wasn’t a difficult man to read. It was easier to say yes.
‘We’ve left Germany now,’ reflected Greiser, looking out at the dark. ‘We’re over what was Germany before the end of the war, and what will be Germany again. We’re supposed to call it the Polish Corridor. German towns with Polish names. As for our Danzig Free State, it will be free again only when it is part of Germany. We all know it. The world knows it. Even the Poles must know. But you’re Irish. I don’t need to tell you. You know all about fighting for freedom, my friend?’ He raised his glass. ‘To freedom!’
As Stefan raised his glass, Greiser’s was already empty. He called out. ‘Another schnapps!’
The steward returned with the bottle. The German took it off him.
‘We have a guest to entertain!’
‘Jawohl, Herr Senatsprasident!’ The answer was delivered with a heel click, and Stefan was now aware that this was a man of some importance.
‘Where are you staying, Herr Gillespie?’
‘The Danziger Hof.’
‘Not bad. We have better. Busy but discreet, very discreet.’
He smirked and Stefan returned the man-of-the-world smile that was required. Greiser leant across and topped up Stefan’s glass. He filled his own and drained it again. The bottle would be going back to the Luft Hansa steward empty.
‘If there’s anything I can do during your stay, Herr Gillespie, I’d be delighted. Mention my name at your hotel, in a restaurant, wherever. My name is enough.’ He puffed himself up as he spoke the last words. He poured himself a third schnapps and then settled back in his seat again.
‘We have things in common after all. A common struggle, and even, one is not encouraged to say it too loudly just now, a common enemy.’ Arthur Greiser tapped his nose, then carried on, unconcerned whether his travelling companion was interested in what he was saying or not. ‘Germany had no choice about leaving the League of Nations. It’s a farce. Run by the English and paid for by the Americans. Look at Lester, our so-called High Commissioner. Everyone knows he’s too close to the English. Can’t have made him too popular in Ireland, eh? We’ll see the back of him after the elections. He’s going to find Danzig just a little too hot. And when we call on him with his train ticket to Geneva, he will be well advised to take it.’
Herr Greiser shook his head and chuckled, clearly expecting Stefan to understand. He didn’t, but he smiled politely anyway. The Free City’s Senate President poured another schnapps; he had forgotten about his guest’s glass now. These weren’t the first glasses of schnapps he’d had that day. Moments later Stefan was relieved to see the balding head thrown back in the seat. There was a faint snore too. The schnapps bottle was about to fall from Greiser’s hand. Stefan started to reach over but another hand was there first. The steward caught the bottle as he moved through the plane, with a deft assurance that made it look as if he had been waiting there for it to fall.
The plane had flown over the lights of the Free City for only minutes, out of the darkness of surrounding fields and forests. As the Junkers turned to descend, Stefan Gillespie saw where the lights of Danzig and its harbour ended abruptly. He knew that beyond it was the Baltic Sea, now just a deeper blackness in the blackness of the
