Traitor's Gate (8 page)

But Lord Oakford, as he had become on the death of Conrad’s banker grandfather in 1931, had been desperately disappointed in his son when he had gone to Spain. For Conrad it had been an agonizing dilemma. Like his father he believed that killing people was wrong, even in a just war. But he also came to believe that fascism was evil, and that unless it was stopped it was an evil that would swallow the whole continent of Europe. It fell to the idealists of the world, young men like Conrad, to stop it, to draw a line in the sand. Conrad wasn’t alone; many of the Oxford undergraduates who had voted against King and Country in 1933 set off with him to fight and die for Spain three years later. But for Lord Oakford, the case was much clearer. War was wrong and Conrad was wrong to go and fight in one.

It hadn’t seemed like that at first. When he had first arrived in Spain, Conrad had been invigorated by the spirit of comradeship and egalitarianism he had found in the International Brigade, indeed throughout the whole Republican Army. Trade union­ists, socialists, communists, anarchists, professional soldiers, peas­ants, students and even schoolchildren from all over Europe and from every corner of Spain had joined together to fight fascism. And over the winter of 1936–7 they had succeeded, defending Madrid heroically. It was a heroism of spirit as much as a heroism of military prowess and Conrad was proud to be a part of it. Conrad came from a background of extreme privilege and had spent half his life feeling extreme guilt about it. Now, fighting shoulder to shoulder with some of the poorest and most generous people he had ever met, he felt fulfilled for perhaps the first time in his life. He was good at it too.

But things had changed. War took these young idealists and corrupted their humanity: the incident Conrad had witnessed of the rape of the nuns was but one tiny event among thousands. The Republican Army was ill-disciplined and ill-organized and facing defeat, so the Soviet-backed communists took matters in hand. The improvements in military training and discipline were no doubt necessary. But as the spring of 1937 turned to summer, the Republic fought its own civil war. A new secret police force threw men of doubtful political allegiance into prison, many foreign volunteers among them. The commissars thrived on talk of a fifth column of fascist-inspired traitors and a new category of enemy they invented, the ‘Trotskyist-Fascists’ who were everywhere, all in the pay of General Franco. When they found them, the commissars shot them, even when, like David and Harry and Conrad, they were attacking the enemy at the time.

Conrad knew now his father had been right. But Conrad still hated fascism, and in leaving Spain he felt he had left a job undone. The epidemic of collective insanity had started in Italy, spread to Germany and Spain, and was threatening France and even Britain.

That was why he had come to Berlin: he couldn’t bear sitting in England, kicking his heels, while the Nazis ran amok in Central Europe. Here the epidemic was at its most virulent; here he could observe it at close quarters. But he was beginning to think that perhaps he should do more than simply watch it and write about it. Maybe he should do something to restrain it. Exactly what that something might be, he had no idea, at least not yet.

But he wasn’t spying for His Majesty’s bloody Government, that was for sure.

That evening Conrad telephoned Theo from his hotel. Captain Foley’s interest in his friend had aroused his own suspicions. There were too many unanswered questions surrounding Joa­chim’s death, questions that only Theo could answer.

Theo sounded wary on the telephone.

‘I need to speak to you,’ Conrad said. ‘Can we meet this evening?’

‘I’m afraid that will be a little difficult. I am giving a small dinner party tonight.’ Still wary.

‘Oh come on, Theo. I can look in afterwards. It’s important.’

Conrad could sense Theo’s hesitation. But then his tone became more welcoming. ‘I tell you what, why don’t you come to dinner? It would be good to introduce you to some of my friends. Eight o’clock at my apartment.’

There were eight for dinner, including Conrad. In addition to Theo there was a lawyer, an officer in the cavalry, and four women, one of whom was clearly Theo’s girlfriend, a pretty blonde girl named Sophie. The food was good: Theo’s cook obvi­ously knew not only how to prepare food, but also how to procure it, an increasing problem in Germany in 1938 as the nation’s resources were concentrated more on guns than butter. A couple of excellent bottles of hock soon got the conversa­tion flowing. Conrad found himself seated next to another blonde, just on the heavy side of statuesque, named Maria von Tiefenfeld. She declared herself an Anglophile and insisted on speaking in English, although her English was much worse than Conrad’s German.

‘I love English gentlemen,’ she said. ‘They are so much more cultured and well-mannered than the Germans. German men are so brutish, with their duels and their drinking.’

Conrad smiled in a way that was, he hoped, both cultured and well-mannered.

‘You remind me of Mr Alec Linaro, the racing driver,’ Maria said. ‘Have you heard of him? Perhaps you know him?’

The smile that had been flickering on Conrad’s lips disap­peared. ‘Yes. Yes, I do, actually. The resemblance has been pointed out before.’

‘Now he is a fine English gentleman,’ Maria said. ‘I met him at the Nürburgring Grand Prix last year. You must be very brave to drive a car so fast around the racetrack, is it not so? But he is charming at the same time. Do you think not?’

‘I suppose so.’ Maria had a point. Conrad had first met Alec Linaro at a dinner party two years before. He was indeed brave, charm­ing and very good-looking. He was married to the daughter of an earl, but that hadn’t stopped him from pay­ing great attention to Veronica. They had bumped into him on a number of occasions over the following year, during which time his charm had increased.

Maria then began to tell a long story about going with Linaro to visit the Rhine valley after the race. Conrad didn’t follow it, beyond getting the strong impression that Maria had spent at least one night, and probably several, with the dashing racing driver. His mind was tumbling, spinning in its own painfully familiar vortex.

‘I prefer jockeys, myself,’ said a voice on Conrad’s right in German.

In relief, Conrad turned to the woman sitting on his other side, a friend of Sophie’s named Anneliese. ‘And why is that?’

‘They must have empathy with an animal, not just a machine. That seems a greater skill.’

Maria snorted in disagreement, and turned to Theo.

‘That’s a very good point,’ said Conrad, unable to keep the gratitude out of his voice.

‘I take it you and Mr Linaro don’t get on,’ said the woman, with a smile in her eyes. She was dark with short curly hair, a snub nose and a pretty, lively face.

‘Very perceptive.’

‘Not so very. You would have to be blind not to see the dis­comfort you were in.’ Her eyes flicked towards Maria and back to Conrad. They were green, intelligent, ironic. ‘Despite your great culture and perfect manners you couldn’t quite hide it.’

Conrad smiled. ‘Was it that obvious?’

‘So what did he do? Crash your car? Get your sister pregnant? Steal your last bottle of whisky?’

‘He did steal something, actually.’

‘Oh,’ said the woman, understanding. ‘Wife or girlfriend?’

‘Wife.’

‘Oh.’ A look of genuine sympathy flashed across her face. ‘That’s not much fun.’

‘No.’

Conrad had the impression that Anneliese was examining him. It was a sensation he rather enjoyed, especially since she seemed to like what she saw – although a hint of mischief flick­ered in her eyes, so he could not be sure.

‘You’re not really English, are you?’

Conrad laughed. ‘I am, actually.’

‘What do you mean? You speak German without an accent and de Lancey sounds French to me.’

‘Huguenot. My ancestors left France a couple of hundred years ago. And I am pretty good at languages. But I can assure you I am English.’

‘Well, you
look
German. An Aryan
Übermensch
if ever I saw one.’

Conrad looked for irony in her eyes and found it. It was true: he did look German. He was tall, square-shouldered with fair hair, although his eyes were grey rather than blue.

‘My mother is German,’ Conrad admitted. ‘And I was born in Germany, although I only lived here a couple of years. But I don’t think I’m exactly what Nietzsche had in mind.’

‘What did I tell you?’ Anneliese said. ‘You’re German.’

Conrad was needled. He felt English. He
was
English. He opened his mouth and then closed it, suddenly infuriated by the way she was enjoying his discomfort. She smiled and touched his arm.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘You would probably be better off speak­ing to Fräulein von Tiefenfeld.’ She sipped her wine, sud­denly serious. ‘Theo told me what happened to your friend Herr Mühlen­dorf. I’m sorry.’

‘Cousin.’

‘Was he your cousin? Oh, yes, Theo did tell me that. Appar­ently he had a heart attack in Gestapo custody.’

‘I’m sure his heart didn’t stop unaided,’ Conrad said bitterly.

‘I’m sure it didn’t,’ said Anneliese. Her expression was full of sympathy, so much sympathy that Conrad suddenly felt uncom­fortable. He hadn’t lost all of his English reticence. ‘I met him only a couple of nights before.’

‘At the Kakadu?’

‘That’s right. He seemed very nice. But he was a bit drunk.’

‘That sounds like Joachim. We were actually there together the night we were arrested.’ Conrad decided to do some gentle digging. ‘He said that he had talked to you about Johnnie von Herwarth,’ he said, stretching the truth slightly.

‘Yes. Do you know Johnnie?’

‘No. Do you?’

‘I only met him once. He’s an old friend of Theo’s. It was a couple of months ago. He was on leave from the embassy in Moscow; he works there with Herr Mühlendorf.’

‘Of course. Joachim also said that he discussed some other things with Theo?’

Anneliese frowned. ‘They did have a conversation in English,’ she said carefully. ‘I didn’t understand it.’ Conrad realized he had gone too far. This was the Third Reich after all, and he and Anneliese had only just met.

A peal of laughter came from the end of the table. Theo’s girlfriend, Sophie, was getting a little tipsy. She was small with a blonde bob and big blue eyes. Very pretty, which was not sur­prising, knowing Theo. ‘How do you know Sophie?’ Conrad asked, changing the subject.

‘We trained together,’ Anneliese replied. ‘We are both nurses.’

‘Oh?’ Conrad raised his eyebrows. ‘So Theo met her in a hos­pital? I didn’t realize he had been ill.’

Anneliese laughed. ‘No, not a hospital, a nightclub. Despite the films, hospitals aren’t very romantic places. We may be angels by day, but by night we are something quite different. Or at least Sophie is.’

‘But not you?’

‘I keep her company.’ She frowned. ‘Like you, my past is a little complicated.’ Conrad realized that unlike him she didn’t want to talk about it, and so he didn’t press her. ‘I like Sophie, although we are very different. Originally, I went to medical school. I came top of my class; I was set on becoming a doctor like my father.’

‘What went wrong?’

‘I was forced to spend some time away from university. And when I wanted to return, they wouldn’t let me back.’

‘Why not? I thought German universities were quite flexible about that sort of thing. People are always hopping from one to another.’

‘Well, it turns out that I’m Jewish.’

‘I see...’ said Conrad. ‘Actually, I don’t quite see. Didn’t you know you were Jewish?’

‘I never considered myself Jewish. In fact, I used to go to church every now and then with my mother. But my father’s family are Jewish. He’s an atheist, or he would call himself a humanist. He thinks organized religion has done more harm than good in the world. He was quite upset when my mother started taking me to church – I think it went against some agreement they made when they were married. And my grandparents, who do go to synagogue every Saturday, explained to me that I can’t be Jewish because my mother isn’t.’

She sighed. ‘But that’s not what the law says. The law says that because two of my four grandparents are non-Aryan, I am non-Aryan, and that means I can’t qualify as a doctor.’

 ‘That’s outrageous!’

‘Of course it is. But it wouldn’t be any more outrageous if I was one hundred per cent Jewish, would it? And the Nazis’ anti-Semitism is there for all the world to see. Hitler hardly keeps it a secret, does he?’

‘No. You’re right. But I suppose it’s one thing to read about anti-Semitic laws in the newspapers, it’s another thing to see them at first hand. What about your father? Is he still allowed to practise?’

Anneliese laughed, a hollow laugh.

Conrad felt the unease. ‘What?’

‘My father’s in prison. Although he tells me there is plenty of work for him to do there.’

‘My God! What is he in there for? Being a doctor?’

‘More or less. Late one evening we got a telephone call from a neighbour. There had been a car accident in front of her house and one of the drivers was seriously injured. I was living at home at the time, and I rushed out in the car with my father. The man was in a bad way; he had severed an artery in his leg and was losing a lot of blood. My father and I bound up his leg and drove him to the local hospital. He needed a blood transfusion, and the hospital was only a small one and it didn’t have any stocks of the man’s blood type. But my father’s was a match, so he donated some of his own blood to keep the patient alive until they could get some more stocks from another hospital.’

‘Did the driver survive?’

‘Yes, unfortunately.’

‘Unfortunately?’

‘He was a minor official in the local Labour Front and an ardent Nazi. When he recovered, he was shocked to discover that he had Jewish blood in his veins. So shocked that he reported my father to the authorities. Father was arrested, tried for “race defilement” and imprisoned.’

‘The swine! Would he have survived without your father’s blood?’

‘No, not a chance. I went to the trial. The man said that he would rather be dead than know he was carrying around Jewish blood in his veins for the rest of his life.’