He had their attention. They thought he was opening up. Maybe they’d get something out of him after all. The tour guide offered him a cigarette.
‘What do you mean?’ asked Rothe.
‘I had some business in Berlin. We arranged to meet up, you know. A bit of fun, no strings. I don’t know what she was doing in Danzig, but it seemed as good a place as any. I liked the sound of Zoppot too. And if you’re going to fuck a man’s wife, well, the further away the better.’
‘She was waiting for you here, is that what you’re saying?’
‘Yes.’
‘Did she know anyone in Danzig?’
‘No idea. I’ve only been seeing her a couple of months. Mostly in England. It’s a night here, a night there. That’s how these things go.’
‘But it seems she didn’t wait.’ Rothe wasn’t entirely convinced yet.
‘Her husband’s been a bit suspicious. Maybe she changed her mind.’
The tour guide grinned. The Kriminaloberassistent was less amused.
‘You fuck a lot of Jewesses?’
‘It’s not illegal, is it?’
‘It will be,’ he barked, looking at Stefan with disgust.
‘It’s just a fuck. What’s his problem?’ He winked at the tour guide. That was when the slap came. It was only a slap, but it was hard enough.
‘Jesus!’
‘Filthy bastard.’ Rothe was in the mood for more.
‘I don’t know what she did to you, but it looks like she’s dumped me now, the bitch.’ Stefan shrugged as if to say it was a pain in the arse but only a woman. ‘Doesn’t look like I’ll make it to Zoppot after all. Pity after what Herr Greiser told me on the plane.’ He laughed a sly-dog, boys-will-be-boys laugh that was a fair stab at the Senate President’s style. ‘What did he say? A place not to be missed or a great place to get pissed?’ He sniggered. And now he really had their attention. ‘We’d had a couple. You know Greiser!’
He stopped. No need to overdo it.
The tour guide chuckled. Rothe was frowning. He regretted the slap.
‘You know the Senatsprasident?’ he asked.
‘We were on the plane from Berlin. He dropped me at the hotel.’
It wasn’t exactly an answer but it was the detail that mattered. The tour guide looked at the Kriminaloberassistent. He expected him to know more about the movements of senior Party officials than he did. As long as he didn’t step on anyone’s toes he couldn’t care less. He definitely didn’t want to tread on Greiser’s. The nod from Rothe was barely perceptible. Yes, he did know Greiser had been in Berlin. The silence was uneasy now. The tour guide lit a cigarette. It was all over as far as he was concerned. Klaus Rothe had decided it was over too, but he still had some face to save.
‘How much longer do you intend to stay in Danzig, Herr Gillespie?’
‘I might try the casino after all. A little bit of culture goes a long way.’
‘You think Frau Harvey, Fraulein Rosen, has left the city then?’
‘If her old man got the scent she wouldn’t want to cross him. Too much dough. Well, he’s a Jew. Still, if you can’t screw them one way, you can screw them another.’
The tour guide liked the joke. Rothe didn’t. Sexual intercourse with a Jewess was the abomination of abominations. He couldn’t approve of what Stefan was doing, but at least he was doing it with the proper degree of contempt. If he’d been a local he would have taught him a lesson about racial purity he wouldn’t forget in a hurry. But this was a waste of time. He had better things to do. He looked at his watch. The rally would have started. Josef Goebbels, the Reich Propaganda Minister, had just flown in from Berlin to wind up the faithful for the election. He didn’t want to miss it.
As the two Gestapo men walked to the front desk with Stefan, a door from an office opened ahead of them. He recognised Hugo Keller again. He was in the suit he’d been wearing in Merrion Square, but it hung on him like something from a second-hand clothes stall. He was thinner, greyer. His skin was pale. He wasn’t the same man now that Stefan was close to him. He laughed as he stepped into the corridor, calling back into the room, ‘I’m counting up those fucking drinks you owe me. Make sure you can afford it!’
The moment he saw the Kriminaloberassistent his face was more serious.
‘Were you coming to see me, Hugo?’ asked the Gestapo officer.
‘I just needed some money, Herr Rothe.’ His voice was deferential.
‘Whatever you need, you ask me. I thought that was clear.’
‘You were busy, Kriminaloberassistent.’
‘Then you should have waited till I wasn’t. You only talk to me.’ There was irritation in his voice and behind that there was contempt.
Hugo Keller may have been about to say more, but he wasn’t looking at the Gestapo man now, he was looking straight at Stefan Gillespie. The surprise on Keller’s face was entirely genuine. And he didn’t know what to do about it. Stefan could read the thought process in the abortionist’s eyes. He needed time. He needed to know what this was about. The two men looked at each other warily. Then, quite unexpectedly, Rothe laughed.
‘Perhaps you know our friend here, Hugo. He’s an Irishman.’
Keller was recovering his composure. He smiled at Stefan.
‘I don’t think so, Kriminaloberassistent.’
Stefan’s eyes widened.
‘There were a few people I didn’t get round to meeting,’ continued Keller, his gaze fixed firmly on Stefan. The two Gestapo men were unaware of the intensity of that gaze, but Stefan understood what it was telling him: ‘Shut up!’ He couldn’t make any sense of it, yet he had no choice but to be grateful for the lifeline he had been thrown. Hugo Keller could have driven a coach and horses through the story he had just given to Klaus Rothe.
‘I lived in Dublin for several years, Mr — ’ Keller spoke in English.
‘Gillespie. I’m in Dublin myself.’
‘Have we met then? I didn’t think — ’
‘No.’ It seemed to be what Keller wanted him to say.
‘Where are you staying?’
‘The Danziger Hof.’
‘He speaks good German, Hugo. Don’t give us all that English crap.’
‘We must have a drink, Mr Gillespie.’ Keller still spoke in English.
‘A word, Hugo, now please!’ The Kriminaloberassistent turned back along the corridor, walking slowly; the Austrian followed him obediently.
The tour guide walked on with Stefan to the front desk. Moments later he was in Weidengasse, walking back to the river and the old town, wondering why Hugo Keller had saved him from the beating the Gestapo officers only needed an excuse to deliver. It was all the more odd because despite the fear that had risen in his throat when he saw the Austrian in the police station, he had sensed that Keller’s fear went deeper than his own. Yet even though he was obviously working for the Gestapo, he had lied to them.
As Stefan turned into Langgarten, towards the Mottlau and the stone tower that Danzigers called the Milk Can, he heard his name being shouted.
‘Mr Gillespie!’ He stopped and waited as Keller hurried towards him.
‘Let’s have that drink.’
‘Why?’
‘One reason would be that Kriminaloberassistent Rothe told me to.’
‘So that we could talk about old times in Dublin?’
‘So that I could tell him whether I think you’re lying about anything.’
‘But we’re both lying, aren’t we?’
Stefan smiled. There was no answering smile.
‘You’ve got no idea what you’re sticking your nose into, Sergeant. But if you end up back in a Gestapo cell again, you just might not come out.’
The bar was dark and full of smoke. There was the smell of tobacco and beer and somewhere the sourness
