Stattin Station

Strohm the details.

'And what name are you using?'

Russell's mind blanked for a moment. 'Rolf Vollmar,' he said eventually.

They went their separate ways. Now that the efficacy of his disguise had been proven, Russell felt confident enough to lengthen his walk home in search of an early evening paper. He found one on Mullerstrasse. Thumbing through it, he came upon a most unflattering picture of himself, along with the information that he was armed, dangerous and urgently wanted for questioning on matters 'vital to the security of the Reich'. Though American by birth, 'Mister' John Russell had learned to speak German like a native, presumably with espionage in mind.

More disturbingly, a recent studio photo of Effi accompanied his own. She had gone missing in suspicious circumstances, the writer claimed, before dropping a few heavy hints to the effect that she had been kidnapped by the American villain.

As Russell walked back, he found himself wondering how the portierfrau at his old digs in Hallesches Tor would be taking the news of his treachery. He could just see Frau Heidegger skulking in her doorway, newspaper in hand, waiting to discuss the story with any passing tenant. Would she believe the worst of him? Probably not. They'd always got on pretty well, and no one with half a brain trusted official stories any more.

Effi was not pleased with the photo - she thought it made her look like a simpering idiot - and the notion that she'd been abducted was laughable. 'No one who knows us would believe that you've carried me off against my will,' she said incredulously. 'And I can't imagine anyone else believing it - it all sounds like one of those white slaver romances they used to make in the twenties.'

'Goebbels' kind of film,' Russell murmured. He was rather pleased by the newspaper story - they were clearly offering Effi a possible alibi, if only to preserve appearances.

Over an early supper he told her how it had gone with Strohm and the comrades. She agreed that they had little to lose by approaching Knieriem, but still felt queasy at the prospect. 'What do you really know about him?' she asked.

'He's a forty-three-year-old Berliner with a high-placed job at the Air Ministry. He was a Social Democrat until 1933 and, according to one of his old friends who now lives in America, he always despised the Nazis. He married in the twenties, divorced in the early thirties. His older brother Kurt was sent to Dachau in 1933 after one of the round-ups in Neukolln, and died there a few days later, supposedly in a fight with other inmates. The Americans found nothing to suggest that Franz was hungry for revenge, but he has access to really important information, so they thought he was worth a shot. Particularly since it was my head they were raising above the parapet.'

'If I had to guess,' Effi said, 'I'd say his brother's death scared him into permanent submission.'

'It's not unlikely.'

'So what if he says no?'

'Then I beat a hasty retreat.'

'How big is he?'

'Big, but in the fat sense. I don't think I'll have any trouble getting away from him.'

'He might recognise you.'

'Strohm didn't. And what if he does?'

'He'll have the police swarming all over the place.'

'They'd be lucky to catch me in the blackout. But we shouldn't assume the worst - Knieriem may welcome the chance to betray his bosses. He was a Social Democrat once.'

Effi snorted. 'Wasn't it you who used to say that Mussolini was a communist once?'

'He was.'

'I rest my case.'

She might be right, Russell thought later as he lay there unable to sleep. Perhaps they were being foolish in trusting to Knieriem's former allegiances. And asking for information was not the only way of obtaining it.

Lying there, listening to Effi's breathing and the faint hum of the city outside, a plan began to take shape.

The next three days were spent in waiting. Neither of them was used to spending much of the day at home, let alone a home with so few possibilities for diversion. There was only uninspiring food, the radio, the jigsaw and each other, and by Wednesday the picture of Rugen Island had been completed. Effi insisted that it was her turn to go out for a newspaper, and overrode Russell's argument that she was more likely to be recognised. 'The neighbours know I'm here,' she said, 'and it would be suspicious if I never went out.'

She returned with a Volkischer Beobachter which contained fresh pictures of them both, along with news from the family. The well-known industrialist Thomas Schade had expressed his 'astonishment' at the charges facing his former brother-in-law, and earnestly entreated him to give himself up. Russell smiled at that, but not at the mention of his 'equally astonished' son, an exemplary member of the Hitlerjugend. Paul really would be shocked, if only at the seriousness of the alleged crime. He didn't like to think what else the boy might be feeling.

Zarah, too, had been interviewed. She was 'sick with worry' for her sister, and refused to believe that Effi had done anything wrong.

Effi, Russell noticed, was fighting off tears. 'We can't afford to waste the make-up,' she said angrily.

That evening the sirens sounded. They had debated the pros and cons of going down to the shelter, and decided that incurring the wrath of the block warden would be more dangerous than testing their disguises. The thought of being bombed didn't come into it - if they lost the bolthole, they were doomed in any case.

In the event, the three hours spent with the rest of the building's inhabitants passed uneventfully. The block warden seemed suspicious of them, but only, they quickly realised, because he was suspicious of everyone. Most people dozed or fussed over their children, and the light was dim enough to hide a circumcision ceremony, let alone their brilliant disguises. Watching the way Effi climbed the stairs after the all-clear sounded, Russell was almost convinced that she had aged twenty years in a couple of days. He was also quite pleased with his own simulation until she put him right. 'You're walking like an eighty-year-old with gout,' she told him once they were back in their room. 'I'll have to give you some lessons.'

The Fuhrer's return to Berlin had been announced the previous day, and on Thursday afternoon he spoke to the Reichstag. The whole nation was obliged to listen: turning their own radio off for a few seconds, they could still hear the voice in the distance, emanating from so many street and factory loudspeakers that it seemed to be seeping out of the earth and sky. The speech lasted for an hour and a half. Hitler began with a long, triumphalist report on how the war was going, though details of the current position were noticeably sparse. He claimed that the German war dead now amounted to 160,000, a figure which astonished and appalled Effi, but which Russell thought was probably an under-estimate. The second half of the speech was a long diatribe against Roosevelt, a man backed by the 'entire satanic insidiousness' of the Jews, a man bent only on destroying Germany on their behalf. It ended, predictably enough, with a list of the provocations that Germany had been forced to endure, and their necessary corollary, a formal declaration of war on the United States.

'He's done it,' Russell murmured with deep satisfaction. If ever the prospect of another nation entering a war was cause for celebration, then this was that moment. It was all over bar the dying, he thought.

Next morning a letter arrived for Rolf Vollmar. Its message was short and extremely sweet - 'The Kaiser Bar, Schwedter Strasse, 7pm on December 13. Ask for Rainer.'

Russell took a deep breath. Perhaps they would get out after all.

'That's tomorrow,' Effi pointed out.

'I'll go to Knieriem this evening. Just after dark.'

'Tell me if I'm being stupid,' Effi said, 'but surely the best you can get from this man is information. I mean, he's not going to have official documents at his home, is he? So there'll be nothing to show the comrades. You might just as well make something up.'

'That had occurred to me,' Russell admitted. 'If the worst comes to the worst, and Knieriem won't cooperate, that's what I'll have to do. But the real facts will come out eventually, and if it turns out that I've given false information to the Soviets there will be consequences. If Hitler loses this war, then Stalin will win it, and the NKVD will be settling a lot of old scores. I don't want us to be one of them. So while there's a chance of getting them the right information I think we should take it.'

'I suppose that makes sense,' she agreed reluctantly.