Fatherland

Jaeger muttered something and collapsed into a chair. March could think of nothing adequate to say so he looked out of the window. It commanded a clear view of the palace grounds running behind the Gestapo building — the dark clumps of the bushes, the ink-pool of the lawn, the skeletal branches of the limes raised in claws against the sky. Away to the right, lit up through the bare trees, was the concrete and glass cube of the Europa-Haus, built in the 1920s by the Jewish architect Mendelsohn. The Party had allowed it to stand as a monument to his “pygmy imagination’: dropped among Speer’s granite monoliths, it was just a toy. March could remember a Sunday afternoon tea with Pili in its roof-garden restaurant. Ginger beer and Obsttorte mit Sahne, the little brass band playing-what else? -selections from The Merry Widow, the elderly women with their elaborate Sunday hats, their little fingers crooked over the bone china.

Most were careful not to look at the black buildings beyond the trees. For others, the proximity of Prinz-Albrecht Strasse seemed to provide a frisson of excitement, like picnicking next to a prison. Down in the cellar the Gestapo was licensed to practise what the Ministry of Justice called “heightened interrogation”. The rules had been drawn up by civilised men in warm offices and they stipulated the presence of a doctor. There had been a conversation in Werderscher Markt a few weeks ago. Someone had heard a rumour about the torturers” latest trick: a thin glass catheter inserted into the suspect’s penis, then snapped.

Strings are playing

Hear them saying

“I love you…”

He shook his head, pinched the bridge of his nose, tried to clear his mind. Think. He had left a paper-trail of clues, any one of which would have been enough to lead the Gestapo to Stuckart’s apartment. He had requested Stuckart’s file. He had discussed the case with Fiebes. He had rung Luther’s home. He had gone looking for Charlotte Maguire.

He worried about the American woman. Even if she had managed to get clear of Fritz-Todt Platz, the Gestapo could pull her in tomorrow. “Routine questions, Fraulein… What is this envelope, please?… How did you come by it?… Describe the man who opened the safe…” She was tough, with an actressy self-confidence, but in their hands she would not last five minutes.

March rested his forehead against the cold pane of glass. The window was bolted shut. There was a sheer drop of fifteen metres to the ground.

Behind him, the door opened. A swarthy man in shirt sleeves, stinking of sweat, came in and set two mugs of coffee on the table.

Jaeger, who had been sitting with his arms folded, looking at his boots, asked: “How much longer?”

The man shrugged — an hour? a night? a week? — and left. Jaeger tasted the coffee and pulled a face. “Pig’s piss.” He lit a cigar, swilling the smoke around his mouth, before sending it billowing across the room.

He and March stared at one another. After a while, Max said: “You know, you could have got out.”

“And left you to it? Hardly fair.” March tried the coffee. It was lukewarm. The neon light was flickering, fizzing, making his head throb. This was what they did to you. Left you until two or three in the morning, until your body was at its weakest, your defences at their most vulnerable. He knew this part of the game as well as they did.

He swallowed the filthy coffee and lit a cigarette. Anything to keep awake. Guilt about the woman, guilt about his friend.

“I’m a fool. I shouldn’t have involved you. I’m sorry.”

“Forget it.” Jaeger waved away the smoke. He leaned forward and spoke softly. “You have to let me carry my share of the blame, Zavi. Good Party Comrade Jaeger, here. Brownshirt. Blackshirt. Every goddamn shirt. Twenty years dedicated to the sacred cause of keeping my arse clean.” He grasped March’s knee. “I have favours to call in. I’m owed.”

His head was bent. He was whispering. “They have you marked down, my friend. A loner. Divorced. They’ll flay you alive. Me, on the other hand? The great conformer Jaeger. Married to a holder of the Cross of German Motherhood. Bronze Class, no less. Not so good at the job, maybe -”

That’s not true.”

“ — but safe. Suppose I didn’t tell you yesterday morning the Gestapo had taken over the Buhler case. Then when you got back I said let’s check out Stuckart. They look at my record. They might buy that, coming from me.”

“It’s good of you.”

“Christ, man — forget that.”

“But it won’t work.”

“Why not?”

“Because this is beyond favours and clean sheets, don’t you see? What about Buhler and Stuckart? They were in the Party before we were even born. And where were the favours when they needed them?”

“You really think the Gestapo killed them?” Jaeger looked scared.

March put his fingers to his lips and gestured to the picture. “Say nothing to me you wouldn’t say to Heydrich,” he whispered.