_ _ _
Back in the office, I test my voice. An octave too high.
I try again.
‘Frezl!’
He appears at once.
‘Yes, Herr Oberleutnant.’
‘Did you send that report to Kindler?’
‘I’m waiting for the messenger.’
‘Cancel it, then get me the telephone directories for Göttingen, Frankfurt and Hamburg.’
‘Göttingen, Frankfurt, Hamburg …’
‘Yes. They’ve got them over at the civil commission, you know where that is?’
‘Over by the park, yes?’
‘Right. While you’re over there I want you to find a telegraphist and bring her back with you. She sits on the second row, second from the window. It has to be her, no one else will do.’
‘Second from the window on the second row. Have you got a name?’
‘No.’
‘No?’
‘She’s small … blonde, I don’t know. She may have a slight injury, above her eyebrow. Can you manage that?’
He nods, but is visibly perplexed. I open the cupboard and take out my old travel bag, black, crinkled leather with my father’s hiking patches on it from Tyrol, but then I change my mind.
‘On second thoughts, just bring the telephone directories in a bag. Don’t let anyone see them. And I want the telegraphist here in an hour, on the dot.’
Escape plan
The gun is a prototype, StG 44, Sturmgewehr 44, from the locked arms cabinet by the firing range in the basement of police headquarters, brand new, straight from the factory of Haenel GmbH, firearms and bicycle manufacturers. It is heavy, some five kilos, a metre in length, a colossus of chambers and clicking catches, glistening with gun oil, a model aeroplane, a spaceship, Fritz Lang’s Metropolis. I slam the box of ammunition down on the terrazzo table, 8mm cartridges, the Kurz ammo spills out onto the tabletop with a clatter, and I press them down into the curved magazine one by one, thirty in all.
The weapon stutters against my shoulder as the cartridges are deployed into the chamber and launched down the rifled barrel. The cardboard figure at the end of the range disintegrates into paper and dust.
The suction of the mechanics as I reload.
Another volley, howling.
The assault rifle fits in my father’s travel bag.
I throw in an extra magazine, eight for the PPK, and ten hand grenades.
I can blow that Mercedes off the road.
_ _ _
Frezl has left the six telephone directories on my desk. Individuals and companies. Göttingen and Frankfurt are consigned to the floor: whoever is in that car can look for Strehling there.
There are eight Strehlings in Hamburg, spread over the city: Heinz, Gerda, Wiltraut, Dieter, Urs, Wilhelm, Rolf and Heinrich. No, he lives in Altona. That would be a possibility too. The same goes for Kiel; Holstein too, for that matter. Christ. But Manfred is in Hamburg. His adjutant said so.
He knows the same as me. Strehling has the gold, Goga said.
I note down the addresses. I get out my code book and write a message using the code entries for the 4th of March. My former Kripo partner knows to look up that date whenever I send him a telegraph. Even if everyone knows the code, no one knows not to use today’s date in the book. I tear out the 4th of March, fold it four times, roll it hard and pin it to the inside of my collar with a safety pin. I go over to the window again. The car is still there, engine idling. I have the coded message in my pocket.
I fill in the application form for leave, for Frezl’s out tray. Under REASON I type:
Marriage
_ _ _
‘You?’
Frezl found the telegraphist.
Her make-up is overdone, but her features are still delicate.
The bruise on her cheek cannot be seen, the plaster over her eyebrow is gone too.
‘Yes,’ I say.
I push a small, stubby glass of Kirsch across the desk.
‘I want you to help me,’ I say.
‘Why should I? Remember what you did last time I tried to be nice?’
She reaches for the glass and looks at me with her green eyes, the perfect youth of her face, the wide cheekbones and garish red lips that curl around the glass, bird’s wings of lipstick left on the rim after she knocks back the contents.
‘Why did you do it, anyway?’
She tilts her head, she is a flirt, and rather nervous too.
Suddenly all I want is to kiss her, to forget everything that is about to happen. She reaches across the table and pours herself another Kirsch. At once I despise her. I could hit her again.
‘Don’t look at me like that!’ she says.
I put the application form down in front of her. Marriage automatically means three days of leave.
‘What’s this?’
‘Look and see.’
She leans forward, picks it up and skims through.
‘Marriage?!’
Her cheeks blush at once.
‘It’s important to me that you’re the one to do it,’ I carry on.
‘Me?’
‘Yes.’
She lifts up the glass and puts it to her lips, only then to think better of it.
‘And here I was thinking you were going to say sorry …’
She thrusts out her arm as I reach over the table, and jumps to her feet.
‘Don’t you touch me. You make me …’
Her eyes are a moist film.
‘You make feel me dirty … I don’t know what it is.’
I want to kiss her again. She is so young.
I take out Eline’s photograph and hand it to her.
‘Here,’ I say. ‘That’s her.’
‘Zarah Leander? You’re marrying Zarah Leander?’ she says, giggling now.
‘That’s Eline. It’s the only one I’ve got … she dyed her hair …’
She takes the picture, studies it, studies me. Her eyes are playful all of a sudden, provocative.
‘You’re mad, do you know that? You’ve got a screw loose! And now you want to go off to Hamburg and see if your fat fiancée really is Zarah Leander!’
‘Something like that.’
‘And why should I help you?’
‘Because you’re nice …’
She tilts her head again. I could drink from her green eyes.
‘You really are mad.’
I pour two more glasses of Kirsch and hand her one.
‘Cheers,’ I say. ‘Wait a minute, I don’t even know what you’re called.’
‘Greta,’ she says, picking up the
