her provision of temporary sanctuary for those in desperate need.
'And Erik will warn us if things have gone wrong,' she added.
'If he's not the first one they arrest,' Ali protested, but without too much conviction.
Years earlier, Effi had listened to a conversation between John and his ex-wife's brother Thomas about their times in the trenches. There were some men, they agreed, whom everyone knew would remain unscathed. The Swede, she realised, had that sort of aura.
Of course, Russell had added at the time, the intuition was sometimes mistaken, and when one of the certain survivors was killed everyone else became twice as depressed.
'So how was internment?' Russell asked Joseph Kenyon that evening. Like all the American diplomats and journalists marooned in Berlin when the Japanese carrier fleet hit Pearl Harbor, Kenyon had endured five long months of 'protective custody' at Bad Nauheim's Grand Hotel. Russell had been on the run by then, or he would shared the same fate.
'It was probably a decent hotel before the war,' Kenyon said. 'But by the time we arrived the staff were all gone, and the heating and electricity had both packed up. Things got better, I suppose. After we kicked up a fuss, we probably ate better than the local Germans, but that wasn't saying much.'
'I can't say I'm sorry to have missed that,' Russell admitted. He reached for his drink and took in their surroundings. The bar of the National Hotel bar was large and almost deserted; there were a couple of Swedish journalists sharing a bottle of wine on the far side of the room, and an obvious NKVD snoop at a table close to the door. He kept checking his watch as if expecting relief.
'And how did you get out of Germany?' Kenyon asked.
Russell gave the diplomat the expurgated version, which had him passed, like a parcel in the children's game, from one group of selfless anti-Nazis to another, until Sweden loomed on the horizon.
Kenyon wasn't fooled for a second. 'The communists got you out.'
'I suppose most of them were Party members,' Russell admitted ingenuously.
'And once you got to Stockholm?'
'I got passage on one of the neutral sailings the Swedes had arranged with the Germans. Got dropped off in Havana, took a flight to Miami, arrived just in time for my mother's funeral, which was really sad – I hadn't seen her since 1939. I spent the next six months trying to tell America what was happening to the Jews, but no one wanted to hear it. Would you believe the New York Times has only had two lead editorials on the Jewish question since the war started? Lots of short pieces on page 11 or page 19 – 19,000 Jews killed in Kharkov, how Treblinka operated, etc etc – but no one would spell it all out in capital letters. It became a minor running story.'
Kenyon lit a cigarette. 'Did you work out why they wouldn't?'
'Not really. Several of the editors were Jews, so you couldn't put it all down to anti-Semitism. I think some of them convinced themselves that a war for the Jews would be harder to sell than a war against tyranny. Some journalists told me the stories were exaggerated, but their only reason for thinking so was that most of the atrocity stories from the First War had turned out to be fakes.' Russell grimaced. 'When it came down to it, they couldn't bring themselves to believe that the Nazis were murdering every Jew they could get their hands on. Apart from being inconvenient, it was just too much to take in.' He took a swig from his glass. 'Anyway, I tried. You can only go on flogging an unwilling horse for so long. After that, well, I was feeling a long way away from the people I loved.'
'They're still in Berlin?'
'As far as I know. My wife – she's my girlfriend really, but people take a wife much more seriously – anyway, she was on the run with me, but things went wrong, and she had to stay behind. If the Gestapo caught her, they never let on, and I'm praying that she's been in hiding all this time. My son was only fourteen when I left, and he's more German than English. There was no way I would have put him at risk, even if his mother – my first wife – would have let me.'
'And you haven't heard from either of them since '41?'
'No. The Swedes got their Berlin embassy to let Paul know I was safe. He thanked them for letting him know, but he had no message for me. He must have been furious with me, and I can't say as I blame him. When I got to London at the end of '42 I tried to persuade the BBC to broadcast a message that only Effi would understand, but the bastards refused.'
'Three years is a long time,' Kenyon mused.
'I'd noticed,' Russell said wryly.
'So you left the States,' Kenyon prompted.
'I was lucky. The San Francisco Chronicle 's London correspondent wanted to come home – family reasons of some sort – and my old editor asked if I was interested. I jumped at it.' He smiled at Kenyon. 'I'm afraid having an American passport hasn't made me feel any less English.'
'It'll come.'
'I doubt it. There's a lot I love about America, and a lot I loathe about England and Germany, but Europe still feels like home.'
'Try Moscow for a few years. But how was London?'
'Okay. In any other circumstances I'd have probably loved it, but all I did was sit around and wait. I began to think that the Second Front was never going to happen. When it did, I managed to convince my editor that a year in the trenches qualified me as a war correspondent, and I've been trailing after the troops since Normandy. Until now, that is.'
'They're making a huge mistake,' Kenyon said.
'Who is?'
'Well, Ike, to start with. But the president as well, for not overruling him.'
'Word is, Roosevelt's not long for this world.'
'I know, but there must be someone at the wheel. Ike's telling everyone that his business is winning the war as quickly and cheaply as he can, and that winning the peace is down to the politicians. If he doesn't get the connection, then someone should be getting it for him.'
'Career soldiers rarely do. But if the occupation zones are already decided, what's the point?
'The point,' Kenyon insisted, tapping the ash from the end of his cigarette, 'is to show some resolve, give the Russians something to think about. If the Red Army takes Berlin, the Soviets will come away with the impression that they've won the war on their own.'
'They damn near have.'
'With a hell of a lot of help. Who built the trucks their soldiers are riding on? Who supplied the cans they're eating from? Who just surrounded three hundred thousand of the bastards in the Ruhr Pocket?'
'Yes, but…'
'Take it from me, the Russians will go from friend to foe in the time to takes to say 'Hitler's dead'. They've already got their hands on half of Europe, and they'll be eyeing the rest. They might not be as nasty as the Nazis, but they'll be a damn sight harder to shift.'
He was probably right, Russell thought. But if the Americans had been through what the Russians had, they'd also be looking for payback.
'What are you going to do when they say no?' Kenyon asked, changing the subject.
'I've no idea,' Russell admitted.
He was still pondering that question as he walked back up Okhotnyy Ryad to Sverdlov Square and the Metropol. He seemed stuck in what bomber pilots called a holding pattern; he couldn't 'land' until he knew what had happened to Effi and Paul. One or both could be dead, which would change everything. But even if both were alive… Paul was eighteen now, and more than ready to strike out on his own. Effi might have fallen in love with someone else. Three years, as Kenyon had said, was an awfully long time.
And if she still loved him, well, where would they live?
In the ruins of Berlin? She might be longing to leave the city behind. She might feel more tied to the place than ever.
He had no idea where he wanted to be. Living in hotel rooms and lodgings for three years had left him with an abiding sense of root-lessness. This war had set millions in motion, and some would have trouble stopping.
