City of Shadows (22 page)

what?” She said something he didn’t hear. “Who wrote it? Yusupov? Potrovskov?” He was still shouting. The mask flickered; she was shaking her head.

“Jesus,” he said. “You’re still going to tell me you don’t know.”

“I don’t,” she said.

He pushed past her, out into the living room, and took up a posi
tion by the window to listen to Willi’s questions and Potrovskov’s answers.

In the courtyard below, he could just see the shape of a wreath laid on the snow. Somebody in the tenement was marking the anniversary of a war death. In his own building, he and Hannelore and the rest of the tenants had contributed to a wreath like that in remembrance of their landlord’s son who’d died on the Somme. At one time there’d been a wreath in nearly every courtyard in Berlin, but they were rarer now; people were forgetting. Or couldn’t afford them.

Potrovskov was talking rapidly: what a shock, what a crime, so young, so pretty, so good a performer. “Everyone love her.”

The man worked hard at his German, which was not as exact as Solomonova’s but fluent, and with a twang of American. Everything about Potrovskov was nearly perfect—but not quite. The smooth hair was a little too brilliantined, his suiting cut too close to his slim body, the diamond cravat pin too big, the spats over his shoes too white— everything just the wrong side of the line separating sophistication from ostentation.

“. . . the reason for the party, sir?”

“Noblesse oblige, Sergeant, noblesse oblige. What would you? Once the second-richest man in Russia, now poor Felix needs my charity.”

“She have any enemies?”

“No, no, everybody love Natalya. Everybody.” He called down the room to Solomonova. “That’s right, Esther, uh? We all love Natalya. A popular girl.”

Schmidt raised his voice. “I want a full account of her background. And Anna Anderson’s.”

“Anna’s?” Potrovskov was unfazed. “But we don’t know it. She has no memory. I rescue her from an asylum. Before that her past . . .” He spread his hands. “A blank.”

Schmidt was sick of it; they were wasting his goddamn time. “That’ll do for now, Willi. All three of you to report to Alexanderplatz tomorrow.”

Potrovskov, it appeared, was staying. He bade them good-bye, smil
ing, with one arm around Solomonova’s shoulders. He’d been declaring ownership of the apartment and everything in it since he came in.

Solomonova broke away to show them downstairs to the front door, and while Willi scraped ice off the car’s windshield, Schmidt lingered in the hallway, watching her. He was reminded of a soldier. She had the detachment of an army veteran, the apartness he’d seen in men who’d survived the war. As if, at some time in her life, she’d looked on hell.

In which case we both have, he thought. For him the partition be
tween ordinary life and what he’d seen at the front had taken years to melt; he’d watched people on the other side of it busying themselves with trivialities, worrying about what was proper, what was not, whether our Gretchen behaved herself, opening their mouths and mak
ing no sense. Some survivors adapted quickly, others had gone mad and were still finding better company in the lunatic asylums.

He said, “He’s out there, still breathing and, for all I know, getting ready to do it again. Why don’t you mind?”

“Give me until tomorrow,” she said.

The Ludendorff woman with her hair in curling papers came out of the ground-floor flat, the smell of cabbage soup emerging with her. “Is that you, Fräulein Solomonova? This is terrible about Fräulein Natalya. This is a respectable house— Oh.” She’d caught sight of Schmidt. “Well...please to shut that door. Are we to freeze to death?”

Schmidt shut the door and stayed inside it as staccato grumbling, in which the word “Jew” was audible, faded back into the apartment. He looked at Solomonova for a reaction; there wasn’t one. She’s used to it, he thought.

On impulse he said, “What happened to you?”

She pointed to her face. “This?”

“That,” he said. “Everything.”

“It was a pogrom,” she said.

She opened the door for him. On the front steps, he paused again, angry. “Why the hell are you with a man like Potrovskov?”

Her head went up, and he expected her to make a defense, tell him how hard it was for women like her to make a living in today’s Germany.

“Because every now and again he fucks me,” she said, and shut the door.

Willi was warming up the engine. “Fucking foreigners,” he said. “See the ring on that bloodsucker’s finger? Bastard. Feed my family for the next three years, that could. Reckon he did it, boss?”

“Afraid not, Willi.”

Somebody tapped on the window. Schmidt wound it down, and General Ludendorff ’s head inserted itself, curling papers, and the smell of cabbage soup into the car. “That letter,” it said, “now I remem
ber the name on the envelope. I thought it was for Fräulein Anderson because it was like her first name, but longer.”

“Yes?”

“It was Anastasia.”

“Thank you, madam,” Schmidt said, and meant it. “Thank you very much.”

“I always wish to help the police.”

“Thank you.” He wound the window up.

“Anastasia,” Willi said. “Mean anything to you, boss?”

“It’s beginning to.”

Upstairs, Nick had
dropped the assurance he’d assumed for the po
lice and was panicking. He was on the phone.

“Baron von Kleist, please. Tell him it’s Prince Nikolaevich Potrov
skov.” He covered the mouthpiece. “We’re getting rid of her right away, if not sooner.... Baron? Potrovskov. We met at the— . . . That’s right. I believe you hear from a Frau Clara Peuthert on a certain matter.... That’s right. Yes, oh, yes, I am convinced. You will have no doubt
.. . .
Well, tonight, if you wish. Eight o’clock? I inform Her Imperial High
ness.” He put the receiver down, laid his head back, and closed his eyes. “Thank you, God.”

“Who’s Baron von Kleist?” Esther asked.

“One of Crazy Clara’s correspondents. She’s got him interested in our princess. I’m taking her to his place tonight—with luck I’ll offload her.” He passed both hands over his smooth hair. “Murder. If the papers get hold of it . . . Holy Mary, it could ruin me.” He sat up. “Get me a drink.”

“We haven’t any. Can von Kleist protect her?”

“Sure.” He patted his pockets, brought out a hip flask, and took a deep swig from it. “Who was it, Esther? Who killed her?”

“The man at the Hat. He’s grown.” She’d thought of him as elemen
tal, some vicious, primary thing from nature that had pincered itself to them. But he’d enlarged, as if a single organism had multiplied, becom
ing complex, sophisticated. And patient.

God, the patience. Losing them, finding them again, finding
out.
He’d learned everything, written the note knowing it would tempt. Lur
ing Anna. Always Anna. Come and be authenticated. Come into my parlor, come into the snow. But Natalya had read it first and had been lured in Anna’s stead.

The scene returned to Esther, like a clip of film being replayed—her-self on the landing, Natalya down in the hall having returned from the Purple Parrot, reading something. The delay before she came upstairs and, when she
did
come upstairs, the paper she’d put in her pocket.

Damn you, Nasha. Why didn’t you show it to me? Why did you be
lieve it? I could have told you it wasn’t Yusupov—real princes don’t sign themselves “Prince.”

But Natalya, the state she was in, had believed it. Seen her chance to usurp Anna. Gone to answer it.

Why did he kill her? Why did he have to kill her?

She realized she’d spoken out loud because, Nick said, “I don’t know, do I? And I’m not getting involved. If it’s Anna he’s after, he can get her at von Kleist’s, not here.”

“Goddamn you, Nick. I want her protected.”

“She will be, she will be.”

She took the flask out of his hand, went with it to the kitchen, and poured them both a drink. As she handed him his, she said, “Tomorrow I’m going to tell the inspector the truth about Anna. Every single thing I know.”

“You can’t do that.”

“I have to. The killer knows. He’s found it out bit by bit.” Every six weeks, she thought. The patience. The persistence. The terrifying intelligence. She told Nick about the note. “It was meant for Anna. ‘I will authenticate you.’ Somebody talked. He worked it out. He knew where
to come, what to write. Somebody told him about Anastasia. The police

have got to be informed; they can trace him.” “Couldn’t have been Yusupov, could it?” “Of course it wasn’t.” She sipped the brandy, watching him figure

the odds.

“After all,” he said eventually, “what can you tell him? What have I done wrong? I hear Grand Duchess Anastasia Romanov is in a loony bin, and I rescue her. I’ve supported her cause—in which I most
com
pletely
believe, by the way. Fed the woman, clothed her, provided her with companions.”

She nodded. “You’ve done all that.”
“I come well out of it, don’t I?”
“You do.”
“A fact you’ll point out to the inspector?”
“Yes.”
He began tapping his teeth. “Is she word-perfect yet?”
“As much as she’ll ever be.”
“I
do
believe in her, you know. And others will. The good baron’s lap

ping it up already. By God, she’ll owe me when she claims her fortune.” The tooth tapping increased. “Trouble is, she might forget. ...I need insurance. We don’t want the lady overlooking my contribution when she comes into her own.”

Esther thought, He’s still going to go on with it. The brandy was making her head swim; she realized she hadn’t eaten all day, and nei
ther had Anna. “You promise she’ll be safe with the von Kleists?”

“Sure, they got money, servants, bodyguards. Important people. Friends with the Grand Duke of Hesse. I’ll tell them she’s a Cheka target—they’ll be thrilled.” He wiped his hands on his handkerchief. “She couldn’t be safer in Fort Knox.”

As long as they believe she’s Anastasia, Esther thought. Nick said, “Maybe I should get her to sign a contract before I hand her over. What d’you think?”

Esther hauled herself to her feet. “I think she should have some
thing to eat before she goes.” She turned around. “Did you get her a dog?”

“Sure, I got her a dog. It’s in the car.” He went downstairs to fetch it.

Esther put potato soup on to warm, then went to Anna’s room and told her about the von Kleists.

“Good family,” Anna said calmly. “They are in the Almanack.”

“Yes. Listen, Anna, they know the Grand Duke of Hesse.”

“My uncle Ernest Ludwig,” Anna said obediently.

“Yes. There’s something you can say about Uncle Ernest. ...Anna, if you feel safe with the Kleists, you must stay with them. Try not to be awkward.”

It had come to this. Until the maniac was caught, it was imperative that Anna should prove her credentials as the grand duchess. She could retain the interest and therefore the protection of those dazzled by royalty only while they believed her to be Anastasia. If they didn’t, difficult as she was, they’d drop her—and leave her vulnerable to the killer. Providing her with special information to help her imposture, what Nick called “a clincher,” might be dubious morally, but it would keep her alive.

“During the war Uncle Ernest of Hesse— Are you listening to me, Anna?”

“Yes.”

“In 1916 he made a secret visit to Russia, to try to get his sister and the czar to leave Russia or at least negotiate a separate peace with the kaiser.”

“In 1916?” Anna frowned. “Russia and Germany at war with each other.”

“Exactly. It’s not something he would want known, but he did it—and the imperial family met him. It’ll make him believe you are Anastasia.”

“You know this?”

Esther patted her head. “Jews are international. They know a lot of things.”

Nick was in the doorway. “Look what Uncle Nicky’s brought his Anastasia.” He had something in his arms.

“Good God,” Esther said. “Is that the best you can do?” It was a Pekingese, one of the smallest she’d ever seen.

“The town’s out of wolfhounds,” he said. “It was short notice.”

“It’s a short dog.”

“Costs like a wolfhound,” Nick said. “Pisses like one. All over my up
holstery.”

Anna was transported. She opened her arms to take the dog, and for the first time Esther saw her happy.

When they’d packed for her, she was driven away into the night, too absorbed to lift her face from the dog’s fur to wave.

“God bless you, Anna.” Esther stood on the steps, watching until the car’s taillight had disappeared.

Turning back into the hallway, she thought of the words with which she’d seen the police inspector off the premises. She knew why she’d said them; he was the man she’d dreaded meeting all her life, the in
truder, the sweet last straw under which she’d sink. Get away from me. I can’t afford to love you, and you most certainly can’t afford to love me.