Authors: Pierre Frei

Berlin: A Novel (50 page)

She bought bread and butter; their rations were generous, and there was a special allocation of coffee and chocolate from looted stocks. The British had abandoned all their supplies of food in their headlong flight to the Atlantic coast.

Outside the shop, someone asked her quietly, 'Can I speak to you?' The woman was about fifty, simply dressed, holding her small handbag close to her breast. In her other hand she carried a brown paper shopping bag. She looked careworn and sick. You could only guess at the beauty that had once been hers.

'Speak to me? Why?'

'You're the commandant's wife. My name is Mascha Raab. My husband is in your camp.'

'Raab?' Marlene remembered the name. 'He had something the matter with his circulation. Dr Engel treated him.'

'He's a diabetic. They take good care of him so that he'll last a long time. Pure philanthropy.' There was no mistaking the irony in her voice.

'You are very incautious, Frau Raab. Don't forget, I'm Obersturm- bannfiihrer Neubert's wife.'

Mascha Raab lowered her handbag. A yellow Star of David with the word JEW on it came into view. 'People like me are perceptive. It's a matter of survival. I sense that I have nothing to fear from you.'

'But suppose your feelings deceive you?'

'Then you can have me imprisoned or killed. That's all. Forgive me, I didn't mean to alarm you. They won't do anything to deprive Georg of hope.' She raised her shopping bag. The neck of a bottle stuck out of it. A 1934 Chablis. Very dry, suitable for diabetics. A luxury - Jews aren't allowed such things. But the wine merchant knows us from the old days. Georg loves French wines, and today is our thirtieth wedding anniversary. Would you give him the bottle?'

'I'll ask my husband to let you have a visitor's permit as a special case.'

'No, just take Georg the bottle. Lie to him for me - say I'm looking young and healthy, tell him I'm confident that he'll soon be back with me. My train leaves in ten minutes. You're a good woman, I know you are. Goodbye.'

Fredie sat down to lunch in very good spirits. 'The Frogs are as good as done for. Now for the Tommies. What's new in the village?'

'Just imagine, a woman called Frau Raab approached me. Out of the blue! What a nerve those Jews have! Said her husband was here in the camp, and could I take him a bottle of wine for their thirtieth wedding anniversary? Well, I brought the wine back with me. What do you think?'

She had struck the right note. Fredie nodded.

'Raab is a special case. What's for lunch?'

'Veal schnitzel au naturel with cream sauce and rice. And green beans on the side.'

'Schafer can take you to Raab when we've eaten. Incidentally, I have to go away for a couple of days, to compare notes with my colleague at Buchenwald. Not a very inviting prospect, they say his wife is a terrible cook. Hurry up, Jana. I'm ravenous.'

Oberscharfiihrer Schafer was waiting for Marlene at the door beyond the yew hedge. He had taken off his peaked cap and was mopping his brow. A hot day, isn't it?' The bristly-headed man attempted a smile. He looked like the doorman of a second-class hotel hoping for a tip. He did not look like a murderer. That was the thing that made the executioners of Blumenau so terrible: they were ordinary men and women who smiled, perspired, made love, went to the lavatory and looked forward to pay day.

Schafer hit the corrugated iron with his stick. It made a hollow sound like a drum in the African bush announcing some misfortune. The guard opened the door at once and stood to attention. 'That's all right, my boy,' the Oberscharfiihrer thanked him jovially. 'This way, Frau Neubert.' He trudged towards a bungalow that stood outside the camp itself, like the office and infirmary buildings. Here too, gravel paths and well-tended flower beds would give visitors the impression that the atmosphere was one of calm and beauty. Inside, the bungalow was clean and cool. Polished, pale-grey linoleum muted the sound of Schafer's hobnailed boots. There was a door at the end of a corridor. 'Visitor for you, Raab. In you go. Frau Neubert.'

A room flooded with light, a cross between a workshop and a laboratory. A chubby little man with a white coat over the coarse, cotton uniform worn by inmates. He was wearing a Helmholtz mirror on a band around his forehead. He folded the mirror up, revealing intelligent brown eyes, and stood stiffly to attention, which looked rather comic. 'Prisoner 48659, Heil Hitler,' he said in a quiet and friendly voice.

Are you Herr Raab?'

'In an earlier life I was Dr Raab. Professor Georg Raab.'

'I'm Frau Neubert.'

'I know, madame.'

'My congratulations on your thirtieth wedding anniversary, and greetings from your wife.' Marlene handed him the bag with the bottle in it.

'Mascha came here?'

'I saw her down in the village. I'm afraid it wasn't possible for her to get a visitor's permit. She's looking fine, she's in good health. A beautiful woman.'

'Oh yes, she is indeed beautiful.' An expression of reverie appeared on his face. He took the bottle out of the bag. 'Wonderful, a 1934 Chablis. To think such things still exist! I shall allow myself a glass at supper. It would be better in company, but I mustn't ask too much.'

'Don't you have to go back to the huts at night?'

'I have a comfortable little bedroom here, my own bathroom with a lavatory, and the same meals as the guards.'

As an inmate of the camp?'

'They need me. Please sit down, madame.' He pulled out a chair for her. 'Your husband has let you visit me, so he obviously has no objection to your knowing what I'm doing here, even though it's top secret.'

'That sounds intriguing, Professor!' A touch of the old Berlin accent crept back into her voice.

A genuine Berliner, and a particularly pretty one too!' Raab rubbed his hands, delighted. 'We live in Kopenick, in the Wendenschloss district, if you happen to know it.'

'Sorry, no.'

A pretty place. You should visit us there some time.' He bowed his head and added quietly, 'They've let Mascha stay on in a little room in our house.'

He picked up a sheet of white paper, put it in the printer's block by the window, and turned the handle of the wooden spindle until its leather pad pressed the paper down on the plate. He took the paper out and held it up. 'Would you like to see?' Marlene could make out ornate black lettering on a white background.

A banknote for twenty pounds sterling. The paper and the watermark will stand up to any examination, it's almost as well printed as the original There's a tiny flourish on the C of the words "Chief Cashier" still missing. I'm about to add it. Well, what do you think?' There was a touch of pride in Raab's voice.

'Forgeries?'

'Forgeries that even the Bank of England will take for the real thing. Once they're put into circulation in their millions, they're expected to wreck the British currency. A project devised by the SS Office of Economic Affairs, at Himmler's instigation.'

'You're a forger?'

'Oh, a dedicated forger. Also former professor of art history at Berlin University, now dismissed, and a former member of the Prussian Academy of Arts. In addition I'm a trained engraver, both copperplate and woodcuts. Even eminent international art experts have fallen for my Diirers and Piranesis. Until recently I pursued my hobby for fun and never made any money out of it. Now it's paying off. They let me stay alive a little longer, and they spare my Mascha.'

'You're very frank with me, professor.'

'Mascha trusts you, that's enough for me. And furthermore, they need me. So long as Himmler's pince-nez look kindly on me, I have nothing to fear...'

And when you've finished your work?'

'Oh, there's plenty more to be forged yet. We're working on dollars and Swiss francs, for buying armaments. Passports of all countries are in preparation for the secret services, ID papers, military marching orders, certificates of appointment ... I have originals of all those documents here in my wall safe. They're already combing the prisons for capable people to work with me. Oh, there you are, Herr Siebert.'

The young Untersturmfuhrer wore a laboratory coat over his uniform. 'Hello, Frau Neubert. What an honour for our witches' kitchen! Professor, we've raised the nickel content of the security thread by 0.03 milligrams. I hope that was right.' She was surprised to hear the SS man speaking to a prisoner with such respect.

'Thank you, Herr Siebert. Excuse me, madame, I want to get back to that flourish. Will you visit me again?'

And me too?' Siebert was clearly always eager for a little flirtation.

Marlene ignored him. 'Yes, indeed, Professor. Good day, Herr Siebert.'

'I'll find you a cushion to make you more comfortable, Professor,' she heard Siebert say as she left. A thought went through her head: in other circumstances, would the SS man kill Raab out of hand?

A one-pot dish, the kind of thing the Fi hrer wants to see on every German lunch table once a week. With water from our well. And as dessert, fruit bottled from our own harvest. We are proud of our simple, nourishing food.'

'Oh, don't talk such garbage!'

Fredie was nervous. Reichsfuhrer Himmler had announced a visit. He wanted to inspect the forgery project personally. It went under the cover name of Needle and Thread; the Bank of England was in Threadneedle Street.

A beef, pork or mutton one-pot dish?' inquired Marlene.

Fredie's old bent for sarcasm surfaced. 'Chicken. After all, the man used to be a chicken farmer.'

'I'll tell Jana.'

'Good German women make their own one-pot dishes. Help in the kitchen in this second year of the war is a luxury the nation can't allow itself. Oh, and remember that good German women don't smoke. No lipstick either.'