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“You don’t need to know what he called us,” he said bleakly. “I dare say your German didn’t extend to the gutter…or the brothels. We should leave. Which way are you going?”
She dared not tell him she was going into the embassy. The police would have guessed that was where she would go, in order to get new papers to leave. Unless she intended to remain in Germany? Disappear into the countryside? But now she must answer this man. She started to name the street where the Hubermanns lived, then stopped. How easily she had let her guard down. She should not even go in the opposite direction, but neither could she afford to get lost.
“It doesn’t matter,” he dismissed it easily. “We can go down that way.” He gestured in the direction she had come, and then before she could complain, he took her arm and began to walk at a gentle pace along the footpath.
She was angry. He had no right to do this, but she couldn’t afford to draw police attention to herself by resisting him.
“Stop looking like that,” he warned with a rueful smile. “People will think I’m abducting you. Do you want to be rescued by them?” It was as if he had read her thoughts, or perhaps anticipated them. He looked at another group of young men sauntering toward them.
Elena forced herself to smile and held on to his arm a little more tightly.
“Talk to me,” he said quietly. “We should look natural.”
“What about? I don’t know you,” she said angrily.
“You’re perfectly capable of talking easily to strangers,” he said. “?‘Of shoes—and ships—and sealing wax—’?” he quoted. “?‘Of cabbages—and kings.’ Whatever you like.”
She had loved Alice, both Through the Looking-Glass and Adventures in Wonderland. “?‘And why the sea is boiling hot—And whether pigs have wings,’?” she said tartly. “I know mos
t of it. Do you know it all? Perhaps you had better not discuss kings or Führers.”
He was smiling. It softened his face.
Elena regarded him without emotion. He seemed to be in his early forties, his hair a little gray at his temples, not so noticeable because it was not dark. There was nothing remarkable about him at all. Then she noticed shadows in his face. The war had cost him, too.
“What sort of opinions do you want?” He was suddenly completely serious.
“What do you have?” She kept her voice light. “Comfortable ones? No, of course not. We learned the cost of that with the Great War. We won’t make all those mistakes again.”
“That’s naïve,” he retorted. “We make the same mistakes all the time. All right, yes, there probably will be another war. Or more accurately, a continuation of the same one, after a decent interval when there’s a new generation to sacrifice, and new people in government who think that somehow they will do it differently this time.”
“Isn’t that awfully cynical?” she asked. “Or is that only you saying it? You think that world-weariness and wisdom are the same thing?”
“That’s harsh,” he observed. They were still walking away from the embassy, and he was still holding her arm too tightly for her to break away.
“Don’t pretend you’re hurt,” she replied. “Did you expect me to swallow that whole?” She was very aware of being younger than he was, and comparatively naïve. Margot thought Elena was waiting for tomorrow to have fun, to do all the dancing and wild things young people should do, except that there was not going to be a tomorrow. The difference between them was that Elena was not interested in pretending.
“I expected you to argue,” the man said quite genuinely. “If I agreed with you, it would put you in an untenable position of having to contradict yourself. No gentleman should do that to a lady.”
She was not sure whether to laugh or to be angry. Was he deliberately baiting her? Yes. She was quite certain that he was. A wave of anger rose in her. She didn’t have to be polite to this man. For once, she could say what she thought.
Then she saw a couple of Brownshirts walking toward them, more or less in the middle of the path. She and this man would have to step aside and let them pass. Would this Englishman have the sense to do that? He was graceful, casual, but he had the arrogance of one used to privilege. He would not be accustomed to the idea of stepping out of the way of bullies, just because they were in uniform. If he had been in Berlin any length of time, he must know their power, surely? Or maybe he was going to hand her over to them? She tensed her whole body in an effort to break free, but he seemed to be expecting it, and he was far too strong for her.
She looked around. There were students coming the other way, a degree of expectation in their faces.
The Brownshirts were only yards from them.
Elena stepped toward the curb and the Englishman kept his grip on her arm. “Don’t cause trouble!” she said to him sharply, but in so low a voice she hoped not to be overheard. “We can’t afford to annoy them!” Please God, he had no idea how much she could not afford it.
The students, if that was what they were, had stopped and were eagerly awaiting the coming test of strength. There was a sickening excitement in them, eyes glittering, bodies tense. Like a sliver of last night’s madness sharply piercing the body.
The Brownshirts stopped, as if Elena and the Englishman were in their way. One of them put out his hand and closed it roughly on Elena’s wrist.
The Englishman stood absolutely still, his eyebrows slightly raised. “Your name and rank?” he asked the Brownshirt, his voice crisp. He spoke German again now, but with a slightly different accent from the Brownshirt, and he stood very straight, back stiff, chin high.
The Brownshirt was taken by surprise. “Johann Hartwig. Who are you?”
“Did Herr Doktor Goebbels send you?” the Englishman asked, ignoring the question.
