Berlin: A Novel

'Not us, darling, our countries.' She could have shouted out loud for joy, but she pulled herself together, saying casually, 'Grilled prawns with fresh figs sound good, and they'll be a first for me. We don't have those at home even in peacetime. David, what are you doing here?'

'I'll tell you later.'

In his suite, they fell on each other like two people dying of thirst. Later, lying side by side as the shutters kept out the blazing afternoon sun, blissfully exhausted, they talked.

'I was sent here at my own request. The alternative was Rio, but naturally I wanted to be near you. I'm vice-consul here, just like you, running the press department.'

She ought to have asked him how he knew that she was the German viceconsul in Barcelona, but the aftermath of their stormy love-making was like a state of pleasant intoxication, clouding her ability to think clearly. She looked at her watch. 'Oh heavens, I should have been back at the consulate ages ago.'

'You're not the only one. Shall we see each other this evening?'

'I don't know, David. You said yourself that we have to be careful.'

'We'll find a solution, far away from this bloody war,' he promised.

The solution was offered by a romantic painter's studio that they found on one of their walks down by the old fishing harbour. Its tenant, a fiery young artist, had gone to banned Republican meetings and amused himself by caricaturing the new Fascist masters. He escaped the garrotte because his sister was mistress of the military commandant of Barcelona. But she couldn't get him spared the stone quarry, so the studio was to rent. A notice on the door of the building had drawn the lovers' attention to it.

Detta was enchanted by the view of the picturesque harbour, and immediately went down to buy fish — fresh giltheads — from a cutter that had just come in. Cool red Rioja from the harbour bar completed their simple meal. For dessert they made love again. They hadn't seen each other for a whole year.

'How are your parents?' he asked as she decked the studio with flowers.

'Thanks for asking. Mother's packing parcels of smoked sausage and cigarettes for all our friends and relations in uniform.'

And the lieutenant-general?'

Yet again, Detta should have been on the alert. David knew her father as a country gentleman: how had he learned that Papa had been recalled to service and promoted? The Baron had ended the Great War as a colonel commanding his regiment. But she was too deeply in love to pick up such nuances.

'Father is putting in petition after petition to High Command to be transferred to the troops, but he's getting nowhere,' she informed him, and went on rearranging the furniture. The young artist's narrow couch had been replaced by a large double bed. 'Our first apartment of our own,' she said happily.

'Your apartment, darling. No one must know about me,' David warned her. 'Don't forget we're at war.'

'We'll leave the war outside,' said Detta firmly. She took mischievous pleasure in inventing a Spanish lover called Carlos, who soon became a familiar name in the consulate, thanks to the talkative driver, Pedro. When Pedro came to her apartment to fetch urgent files, she would call into the next room, 'Carlos, darling, put the wine to chill!' A few telephone conversations with Carlos, which she interrupted when someone looked into her office, completed the little deception. Soon the whole consulate knew about 'Don Carlos' and her love nest down by the harbour.

David grinned. 'Mine's called Conchita. A fiery creature with black eyes who leaves me no time for the club and playing cricket. Most of them have swallowed it. There's only little Jenny from the Coding Department, who keeps batting her eyelashes when she crosses my path — and she crosses my path remarkably often.'

Detta laughed. 'Don't make me jealous.' But she mounted a counterattack just in case. On their next evening together she was wearing her wonderfully sinful Parisian underwear, bought from Madame Solange on the Rambla, when she let him in. But he failed to notice her seductive appearance.

'What's the matter, David?'

He was frowning. 'Your Luftwaffe — it's bombing London day and night. They say that's a certain sign of the landings soon to come. Detta, you must help me. When does Sealion start?'

'Sealion?'

'The code name for the German invasion of the British Isles. Our nanny Ruth is of Jewish descent, and if the rumours are true my parents want to send her to Canada in good time. You're flying home next week, aren't you? Just ask your father.'

Ask him to tell me a military secret? You can't be serious, David.'

'Oh, come on!' he said casually. 'I expect even the Berlin sparrows are chirping it from the rooftops. But never mind, forget it.' He drew her close. His lips passed over her cheeks, his damp tongue licked her ear, sending a thousand volts thrilling through her body and making her weak at the knees. She cried out loud as he made love to her on the raffia mat under the big window.

A man called Gleim came to see Detta in her office. She had seen him in the building several times, but he was not a member of the consulate staff. His Panama hat and bamboo cane gave him the look of a Cuban tobacco planter. He came straight to the point. 'Fraulein von Aichborn, it's come to our knowledge that you are meeting the Englishman David Floyd-Orr. We know that this is a private relationship dating back to before the war, and no one holds it against you.'

She did not let her surprise show. 'How am I supposed to take that?'

'Your friend wasn't posted to Barcelona just by chance, as he let you think. His meeting you was even less of a coincidence. Captain Floyd-Orr is a member of the British Intelligence Service.'

Everything went round in circles. All of a sudden, the fact that David knew about her appointment as vice-consul and Papa's military rank made terrible, logical sense. He had been sent to get information out of her, and she, poor unsuspecting lamb, was so in love that she hadn't suspected.

She remained calm. 'Thank you for telling me, Herr Gleim.'

'Lieutenant-Colonel Gleim, Counter-Intelligence, if I may. Have you and your friend discussed any subject that might be of significance to the other side? In all innocence, obviously.'

'No. But Captain Floyd-Orr made a harmless excuse for taking an interest in the date of Sealion. He wants me to ask my father about it when I'm in Berlin next week.'

The lieutenant-colonel nodded, pleased. 'Excellent. You will take your friend the information he wants.'

'I'm not a traitor, and I won't even pretend to be. Please don't count on me to do it.'

Her visitor stood up. 'Well, it's a pity if you won't help us, but I understand your motives. I will just ask for one thing — your silence.'

Detta retained her aristocratic Prussian poise. As I have said already, I am not a traitor. Goodbye, Herr Gleim.' The lieutenant-colonel left the room. When he had closed the door, she collapsed in sobs.

'I'm afraid Carlos isn't an invention after all,' she told David that evening.

'Nor is Conchita.'

'Goodbye, David.'

'This damned war will destroy us all,' he said in a flat voice, and left.

Detta suppressed all thoughts of David, immersing herself in work. She turned the entire filing system of her passport department upside down and set about reorganizing it, a job as unnecessary as it was boring. In her free time she tried her hand at a translation of Calderon's The Lady Phantom and went to Frau Kessler's bridge parties. Tom Glaser called regularly when he was in Barcelona, and they went out to eat together. She went to Madrid to visit Uncle Juan and the rest of the Alvarez de Toledo family, who wanted to marry her off to a Spanish grandee. The young man concerned told her tearfully about his love for the gardener at his palace. Lady Chatterley in reverse, thought Detta.