Winter of the World

Werner had proposed that, right at the start, but they had decided to begin their inquiries here in Berlin. Now Carla considered the idea afresh. ‘We’d need permits to travel.’

‘How could we manage that?’

Carla snapped her fingers. ‘We both belong to the Mercury Cycling Club. They can get permits for bicycle holidays.’ It was just the kind of thing the Nazis were keen on, healthy outdoor exercise for young people.

‘Could we get inside the hospital?’

‘We could try.’

Werner said: ‘I think you should drop the whole thing.’

Carla was startled. ‘What do you mean?’

‘Pastor Ochs has obviously been scared half to death. This is a very dangerous business. You could be imprisoned, tortured. And it won’t bring back Axel or Kurt.’

She stared at him incredulously. ‘You want us to give it up?’

‘You must give it up. You’re talking as if Germany were a free country! You’ll get yourselves killed, both of you.’

‘We have to take risks!’ Carla said angrily.

‘Leave me out of this,’ he said. ‘I’ve had a visit from the Gestapo, too.’

Carla was immediately concerned. ‘Oh, Werner – what happened?’

‘Just threats, so far. If I ask any more questions I’ll be sent to the front line.’

‘Oh, well, thank God it’s not worse.’

‘It’s bad enough.’

The girls were silent for a few moments, then Frieda said what Carla was thinking. ‘This is more important than your job, you must see that.’

‘Don’t tell me what I must see,’ Werner replied. He was superficially angry but, underneath that, Carla could tell he was in fact ashamed. ‘It’s not your career that’s at stake,’ he went on. ‘And you haven’t met the Gestapo yet.’

Carla was astonished. She thought she knew Werner. She would have been sure he would see this the way she did. ‘Actually, I have met them,’ she said. ‘They arrested my father.’

Frieda was appalled. ‘Oh, Carla!’ she said, and put her arm around Carla’s shoulders.

‘We can’t find out where he is,’ Carla added.

Werner showed no sympathy. ‘Then you should know better than to defy them!’ he said. ‘They would have arrested you, too, except that Inspector Macke thinks girls aren’t dangerous.’

Carla wanted to cry. She had been on the point of falling in love with Werner, and now he turned out to be a coward.

Frieda said: ‘Are you saying you won’t help us?’

‘Yes.’

‘Because you want to keep your job?’

‘It’s pointless – you can’t beat them!’

Carla was furious with him for his cowardice and defeatism. ‘We can’t just let this happen!’

‘Open confrontation is insane. There are other ways to oppose them.’

Carla said: ‘How, by working slowly, like those leaflets say? That won’t stop them killing handicapped children!’

‘Defying the government is suicidal!’

‘Anything else is cowardice!’

‘I refused to be judged by two girls!’ With that he stalked off.

Carla fought back tears. She could not cry in front of two hundred people standing outside the church in the sunshine. ‘I thought he was different,’ she said.

Frieda was upset, but baffled too. ‘He is different,’ she said. ‘I’ve known him all my life. Something else is going on, something he’s not telling us about.’

Carla’s mother approached. She did not notice Carla’s distress, which was unusual. ‘Nobody knows anything!’ she said despairingly. ‘I can’t find out where you father might be.’

‘We’ll keep trying,’ Carla said. ‘Didn’t he have friends at the American Embassy?’

‘Acquaintances. I’ve asked them already, but they haven’t come up with any information.’

‘We’ll ask them again tomorrow.’

‘Oh, God, I suppose there are a million German wives in the same situation as me.’

Carla nodded. ‘Let’s go home, Mother.’

They walked back slowly, not talking, each with her own thoughts. Carla was angry with Werner, the more so because she had badly mistaken his character. How could she have fallen for someone so weak?

They reached their street. ‘I shall go to the American Embassy in the morning,’ Maud said as they approached the house. ‘I’ll wait in the lobby all day if necessary. I’ll beg them to do something. If they really want to they can make a semi-official inquiry about the brother-in-law of a British government minister. Oh! Why is our front door open?’

Carla’s first thought was that the Gestapo had paid them a second visit. But there was no black car parked at the kerb. And a key was sticking out of the lock.

Maud stepped into the hall and screamed.

Carla rushed in after her.

There was a man lying on the floor covered in blood.

Carla managed to stop herself screaming. ‘Who is it?’ she said.

Maud knelt beside the man. ‘Walter,’ she said. ‘Oh, Walter, what have they done to you?’

Then Carla saw that it was her father. He was so badly injured he was almost unrecognizable. One eye was closed, his mouth was swollen into a single huge bruise, and his hair was covered with congealed blood. One arm was twisted oddly. The front of his jacket was stained with vomit.

Maud said: ‘Walter, speak to me, speak to me!’

He opened his ruined mouth and groaned.