A Kiss for the Enemy (50 page)

‘You know the possibilities,' said Brauer, ‘and you know when I have to be at Plötzensee. Attend to it.' The driver said no more.

It was on 27th January that Lise caught Marcia's arm as they walked away from the hospital in the evening up the icy village street – caught her upper arm and held it, fingers pressing so hard that even through thickness of overcoat Marcia felt pain and looked at her in surprise. Lise was avoiding her face, controlling herself with the utmost difficulty. It had been an even harder day than usual. The broken fragments of men from the ever-nearing Eastern Front, bleeding remnants of so-called Armies outnumbered by more than twenty to one, had been pouring throughout the day into the hospital. The girls had been working well beyond even the extended stints which had now become normal. Eventually Sister Brigitta had said, grimly, ‘Off you go, till five o'clock tomorrow morning. Have something to eat, sleep all you can.'

‘There's so much to do – we –'

‘Off you go,' said their superior, fixing Marcia in particular with a cold eye. ‘It's an order. You will do no good working in your present state. You will make mistakes.'

They walked off through the snow. It was possible to hear the sound of gunfire if the wind was in the east, as it had been for most of the past two months: a cruel, incessant wind.

Lise said tonelessly, ‘I've had word. They've done it.'

‘Frido?'

‘They've killed him. Executed him. Two days ago in Berlin.' She was trembling violently.

‘The Director told me. He had received notification, to be communicated to me.'

Marcia put her arms around Lise standing in the snow, the evening air freezing about them.

‘It was happening, it must have been happening when we were being interviewed by that pig –'

‘Sh, sh!'

‘By that pig, who wanted to know when we'd heard from him last and so forth. Who tried to frighten you, Marcia. About Frido.'

The member of the Gestapo, grey, bored, inscrutable, menacing, who had questioned Marcia two days earlier had, indeed, asked about ‘her relations with Captain Frido von Arzfeld'. Marcia had referred to him as a dear friend, brother of the man she had been engaged to marry.

The grey man had looked at her. ‘He has not spoken of marrying you himself?'

‘No.' It was not important, Marcia thought, but Frido had taken trouble to send his letter of love privately, by Hoffmann's hand, and she saw no reason to betray it to a stranger.

‘No!'

‘Nor talked, written to you about political matters? About the progress of the war, perhaps?'

‘Never!'

‘Family matters, eh? You know that Captain von Arzfeld has been arrested on a very serious charge?'

‘I do.' So the brute must have known, while he put that question, that Frido, trousers sagging, unshaven because deprived of a razor, Frido prison-pallid, followed only by greedy, hate-filled eyes, had been, perhaps at that very moment, pushed towards the executioner's sword, axe or noose in some bleak slaughter-shed.

The interrogation had continued.

‘What is your reaction to his arrest?'

‘His father, Colonel von Arzfeld, told us, told his sister and me. We are, naturally, deeply upset – horrified – that someone we – I include myself, as you know, in that family – loved and admired as a gallant officer should fall under such terrible suspicion. We find it difficult to believe. Incredible.'

The man was writing without looking up, as if Marcia's words were so predictable that he hardly needed to listen.

He murmured, ‘Incredible, yes. You are English, Fraülein
Marvell. Yet you have not been interned. What do you think of that?'

‘I am grateful. I have been able to train and to work as a nurse. It is work of humanity in which I deeply believe.'

‘So in your own way you have been able to serve the Reich.'

‘Exactly.'

The man finished writing. There was, Marcia had thought, nothing to damage Frido. The Gestapo man seemed to be of the same mind, since he changed the subject and in a slightly less disagreeable tone said,

‘I believe you know Frau Anna Langenbach? Can you help me a little there, I wonder? You see, I have to investigate serious questions of legality and they have many aspects.'

‘I don't understand.'

‘Well, this is a friendly talk, Fraülein Marvell, so let me explain a little. You have a brother, Anthony Marvell. He is in the English Army?'

‘You must understand, Herr –'

‘Müller,'

‘– Herr Müller, that I haven't seen my brother since before this war began, that I don't know if he's alive or dead. If he's alive and well, I presume he's in the Army, yes.'

‘Did you know that he once had an intimate relationship, a sexual relationship, with Frau Anna Langenbach?'

‘No – I – when do you mean? He never spoke to me of such a thing! Nor she!'

‘But you both – you and your brother – knew the von Arzfelds and the Langenbachs before the War began between England and Germany, I think.'

‘Certainly. But I don't know of the – matter you speak of. Frau Langenbach is a respected friend of mine.' Marcia did her best to sound outraged. A young, delicately-nurtured and defenceless girl to have such suggestions put to her by a strange man! Müller gave something like a grin.

‘Well,' he said, ‘if that's all, Fraülein Marvell, we'd better say goodbye for the time being. I hope you've not forgotten to tell me anything. And I hope everything you have told me is exactly true.'

And so, while this gruesome and inconclusive encounter had been played out, while Marcia had felt herself shaking with a
fear she fought a brave, private battle to conceal, they had been doing Frido to death, hanging him from a noose like a carcase, or hacking him, head from body. She shuddered, hugging Lise close, heart beating violently, ghastly images before her eyes.

On Sunday, 28th January, Anna said as she brought Anthony his daily supplies, tm going to church in Kranenberg. i'll be away two hours, no more.' Anthony was, they had agreed, to leave at the end of the next week. Every hour was precious.

‘I'll be back by mid-day, my darling.' She whispered, ‘I want to commit you to God's keeping in the place where I found you after so long.'

Anthony held her tight. He muttered,

‘Frido?'

‘We must think of him as dead.' She spoke flatly, releasing herself and turning her head away. ‘I've no word yet from Kaspar. We must think of Frido as dead.'

The affairs of Party and State were at a critical stage in the Christmastide of 1944. Despite the angry pain that stabbed periodically at his heart, despite the consequential impatience to pursue the enemies of the Reich in Lower Saxony, it was not until 29th January, 1945 that Egon Schwede assumed his new responsibilities. These included a far-reaching mission to snuff out treachery and defeatism in an area which included his old home. He had been promoted. His rank was high in the home-based SS. He lost no time in enquiring about the situation in Kreis Kranenberg, which now incorporated Langenbach.

His heart beat a little faster when he called at the local Kranenberg Party Office, that office he had formerly occupied with such distinction, that office wherein he had once dreamed romantic, entrancing dreams, dreams cruelly shattered by that evil, unprincipled woman! He sat down heavily and stared at the man now filling what had once been his chair. The fellow was an outsider, from Hanover. He looked overweight, pudgy.
Schwede, wearing the uniform of
Obersturmbannführer SS
, expected and received deference. He fixed the present incumbent of NSDAP BURO Kranenberg with that eye which had brought sweat to the brow of many an inadequate Party official or backsliding citizen. They talked for a little, exchanging a few devoutly uttered sentiments of loyalty.

‘What about the family at Langenbach? They were connected to some pretty unsound people, I remember.' Were there to be the slightest hint of a knowing look on the other's face when he spoke of Langenbach, Schwede thought, any remote indication that a sniggering tale about him, Schwede, had taken root in Kranenberg, then God help the fellow! But his stout companion looked serious and respectful.

‘The old man died. His widow still lives there. Bedridden.'

‘Anyone else?'

‘Yes, the village school is housed in the Schloss now. An excellent woman, Maria Wendel, is in charge, a most loyal enthusiastic person, always prepared to do extra for the Party. Very hardworking. As a matter of fact, I've asked her and one or two others to join us at a small reception for you this evening,
Herr Obersturmbannführer
, I hope you don't mind. We wanted to celebrate your return to these parts with a small gathering, there are plenty who'd be most disappointed if they missed the chance to shake your hand again.'

Schwede acknowledged it. He had been touched at the invitation. And that evening toasts were drunk to Führer, Reich, Party, and, of course, to Victory: while the Red Army was already battering its way into East Prussia itself, while in the west the British and Americans were finally destroying the remnants of the German Ardennes offensive, and while, overhead, Allied bombers paid their terrible nightly visits to the towns and cities of western and central Germany.

Talk at the Party reception at Kranenberg for
Obersturmbannführer
Schwede, however, focused not on these calamities but on the weakness and folly of many of the German people themselves. Tales were exchanged in hushed tones of lack of enthusiasm, of obstruction of Party work: above all, of defeatism. Schwede found himself talking to a plain young woman with wire-framed spectacles, straight, dark hair and
a narrow, uncompromising mouth. It was Fraülein Maria Wendel, the schoolmistress, the tenant of Schloss Langenbach.

Schwede knew in his guts how such a woman must hate Anna Langenbach, Anna the beautiful, the silk-skinned, the aloof, Anna the enchantress, the deceiver, Anna the viciously immoral!

‘Well,' he said affably, ‘how are things at Schloss Langenbach? You can talk frankly to me, I've known the family a long time. I don't expect it's always easy for you, holding your responsible position, in that atmosphere!'

Maria Wendel smiled at him. ‘God, she's hideous!' he thought.

‘Not always easy, Herr Schwede, you have expressed it perfectly. Of course, I won't say a word against young Frau Langenbach, she took the school in straight away when we were bombed, she's worked hard for the children in many ways. But there's a sense – I don't know how to put it –'

‘A lack of inner sympathy?'

‘Exactly! And Frau Anna Langenbach is very, shall we say, independent? Of course the old lady is – well, very old. But I don't personally like to see a woman assume so much of a man's role. I know Frau Anna has the responsibility – but her attitude, her way of life –'

‘Way of life?'

‘Yes, of course it means nothing, she simply isn't concerned. For instance, there's some Colonel, she says it's a cousin of hers, who's coming to stay with her next week. I don't say it's not correct, I believe he's not young, but a young widow in her situation, you understand me – you see the children take everything in, ask questions.'

Schwede looked at her attentively, encouragingly, and said nothing.

‘Then yesterday, again it's nothing, the school is shut on Sunday, we never go there, it was Sunday. The place is locked up, only I and Frau Anna have keys. Well, yesterday, it's never happened before, I had to go to the Schloss. I wanted to change some of the children's lesson books before the week started and I only found out on Saturday that it hadn't been done. So I walked up to the Schloss.'

‘You walked up to the Schloss,' said Schwede. ‘So?' He held out his glass for an old waiter to refill.

‘I knew Frau Anna wouldn't mind, as a matter of fact she was away, I saw the gardener and he told me she'd got the pony and trap and gone to church. I let myself in and went upstairs – the school rooms are on the first floor, you see – and coming round the corner of a passage I nearly bumped into a strange young man, believe it or not! Yet the house doors were locked. It frightened me. It might have been a criminal! But just before I came up to him – it was dark in the passage – he said “Anna!” So I supposed it was a friend. I said, “Excuse me” and he muttered something and walked on. Well, it's her business of course, not mine, but –'

‘Did you speak of this encounter to Frau Langenbach?' enquired Schwede sternly.

‘Yes, only this morning I mentioned it to her. I said I'd met a stranger in the Schloss and had quite a shock. She said, “Oh, that was a cousin of mine, visiting for the day. He left yesterday evening.” And why not? It's just one never knows, with her, you understand me? It's nothing to do with me, I wasn't interested.'

Schwede considered her, silently.

‘I said to Hans – that's the gardener – “I see Frau Anna had a young cousin calling on her yesterday!” And he said, “I don't know what you mean. Nobody's been here!” One never knows, you see! She's mysterious! But such a talented woman.'

Fraülein Wendel gave a tinkling, disagreeable laugh. Schwede said in a low voice,

‘You are right to be vigilant,' and moved away. A young cousin indeed! And then a Colonel! So she was up to her tricks again, the whore, the adultress, the traitress! Traitress to her husband, to her German blood, to her country! There must be a settlement of accounts. As to exactly when and on what terms he, Schwede, would have a hand in the matter of deciding.

Next day he called at the local Police station. He had heard at the Party office that the Police were not what they had been. There was slackness. They complained of being understaffed. Ostensibly this was a courtesy call, but Schwede was alert for signs of indifference. He would know in what quarters to speak
a word which would send the officer in charge on a journey he wouldn't relish. He accepted a glass of beer and said conversationally,