Berlin: A Novel

Marlene was understanding. 'Jana is a pretty girl, though not very communicative, I'm afraid. I asked where she'd been before, and couldn't get anything out of her except "Everywhere".'

Engel smiled. 'Well, of course Jana has been everywhere, up hill and down dale with her people in their caravan. My dear lady, the girl's a gypsy, didn't you know?' Jana served the main course. Engel raised a piece of meat from the platter with his fork and examined it critically from all sides. 'I do hope you haven't palmed us off with roast hedgehog.' Everyone laughed.

'No, Herr Sturmbannfuhrer.'

'This is roast duck from our own farm. Like the vegetables and the cream for the sauce. We are self-sufficient here, Dr Engel,' a tall woman of around forty answered him. She had penetrating blue eyes and heavy fair hair worn in a chignon, and she alone hadn't joined in the merriment.

Marlene had noted down the names of the guests on her napkin, so she knew that this woman, seated opposite her, was Gertrud Werner. Frau Werner had high cheekbones and regular features, very much in line with the new Germanic ideal of womanhood. She was wearing a long, dark-blue velvet dress with a white collar fastened high at the neck, and her healthy complexion showed that she spent a good deal of time out of doors. She had glanced disapprovingly at her hostess's fashionable make-up and modish Berlin outfit. Marlene instinctively disliked the woman, but she didn't show it. 'You really must show me round, dear Frau Werner. Perhaps I can even help a little on the farm?' she asked, feigning interest.

'My women do that themselves,' said Gertrud Werner coolly.

'Now, don't be stern with our city girl, Frau Hauptsturmfdhrerin; said Dr Noack, smoothing things over. So Frau Werner held SS rank in her own right. Noack had arrived only a few minutes earlier from Berlin, with a large bouquet of tea roses for Marlene and a bottle of cognac for Fredie.

'I'd be happy to show you round, Frau Neubert,' the guest to her right offered.

Marlene consulted her napkin. 'That's very kind of you, Herr Schafer.'

'Nothing here works without Oberscharfahrer Schafer. He's our real boss.' announced Fredie good-humouredly, eliciting an awkward grin from the heavy-set man with bristly grey hair.

'Don't let his better half hear that,' the young man next to Frau Werner joked.

'Untersturmfdhrer Siebert runs our laboratory,' Fredie told his wife. Marlene's head was swimming with all these elaborate ranks and titles; the napkin was no help there. 'Siebert is a bachelor and very popular with the girls.'

'How interesting.'

'That I'm a bachelor or that I run the laboratory?' Siebert winked at her.

As a happily married woman, I mean the latter. What delicious things do you brew up in your witches' kitchen, Herr Siebert?'

'We're doing research work.'

The telephone rang. Fredie picked it up and listened briefly. 'Doctor, it's Raab. His circulation is going crazy.'

Engel leaped to his feet. 'I'll see to him at once.'

'Don't let anything go wrong,' Noack told him. 'Reichsfiihrer Himmler takes a personal interest in him.'

The doctor returned during the dessert course. 'His circulation has stabilized. Would you excuse me, ladies and gentleman? I have to be up quite early tomorrow.'

'Time we all went our separate ways,' Noack said. 'Thank you very much, dear Frau Marlene, a delicious meal. It deserves a special reward.' She knew what he meant.

Fredie and Noack were waiting for her in the drawing room. Fredie seized her and took her on the floor, while Noack watched avidly. Then Fredie forced her down between his mentor's knees.

Years earlier, just once, she had said it out loud. Now she repeated it over and over in her mind. One of these days I'll kill you, Fredie.

Her husband had already left by the time Marlene woke. She took a bath and dressed. Jana was waiting for her in the kitchen with steaming white coffee and fresh croissants. The sun filtered through the leaves of the fruit trees, casting bright patterns on the table. The world was all right again.

'Sit down, have a coffee with me. Would you like a croissant?' The girl shook her head vigorously, making her short black hair fly. 'Oh well, if you don't want to… You've been here eighteen months, you said? Wouldn't you rather be with your family?'

That silent shake of the head again, a gesture that might mean no, or denote fear or incomprehension. Marlene couldn't make the girl out. Perhaps gypsies just reacted differently from normal people. Although gypsies were really normal people too — only a little different from normal people.

'Is there a basket around?' She shook off these complicated thoughts. 'We'll go and ask Frau Werner for some vegetables. I'm sure you'll know where we can find her.'

Jana found a large basket in the larder. They went from the kitchen to the garden, and crossed the forecourt to the yew hedge. A green tunnel led through it to a corrugated iron door at the far end. Jana pulled the bell beside the door. It clanged, and a flap in the door was raised. 'Open up for the Frau Commandant.' Jana obviously enjoyed giving an order.

The guard let the flap drop into place and opened the door. 'Sorry, Frau Obersturmbannfuhrer, didn't recognize you.'

'Look, I don't want to be called Frau Commandant or Frau Obersturmbannfiihrer. I'm Marlene Neubert. Would you please repeat that?'

'Certainly, Frau Neubert.' The guard went a few steps with them.

She pointed to the low, wooden building at the end of a well-tended gravel path. 'Is that where my husband works?'

'Yes, Frau Neubert, that's the office building.'

Jana bent over the rose bed at the entrance and smelled a flower. 'Pretty roses.'

'You like roses?'

'Yes, I like them very much.'

Marlene turned a few leaves over. 'Greenfly. The bushes need spraying. Soap solution would do it.' She'd learned that from the woman next door to them at the Kleiner Wannsee house.

'I'll tell the trustee.' The guard went back to his post.

'We'll visit my husband later — let's go and find those vegetables. Come on, Jana.' The gravel crunched under their feet. Are your parents around here somewhere?'

Jana put the basket down. 'Mama over in women's camp. Papa at fence, wanted talk Mama a little, like used to. Frau Hauptsturmfiihrerin see. Call Oberscharfiihrer. Oberscharfiihrer come with big stick.'

'What, that nice Herr Schafer? He surely didn't…?'

'Did,' was the laconic answer.

'I expect he lost his temper for a moment. As far as I know the supervisory staff aren't allowed to use violence. Your father should complain.'

'Oberscharfiihrer hit Papa with big stick till Papa dead,' was the matterof-fact reply.

Marlene felt paralysed. It took her a long, long time to react. 'It must have been an accident. I'm sure Herr Schafer didn't mean to hit so hard,' she said, trying to retrieve her view of the world as it ought to be. 'What about your mother?'

'Mama seven days in cellar with rats. When she come out, three toes gone.'

'Three toes?' Marlene was horrified.

'First you not want sleep. Then you must sleep. Rats wait till you sleep.' The gypsy girl picked the basket up again. Marlene followed her — and froze. Ahead of her, a tall barbed-wire fence clawed its way up to the sky. The wooden watchtowers at its four corners seemed to have been borrowed from a chess set for giants. A guard with a dog was on duty at the gate. Huts of a dirty grey hue lay beyond it, in rows of five. Not even weeds grew on the perfectly straight clinker paths between them.

Before they arrived, Fredie had explained to her, 'Blumenau is where they put people who don't belong in our society. Jews, homosexuals, Communists, gypsies and so on. Those who really want to prove their worth can do it by working. As camp commandant I'm responsible for discipline and order.'