The Children's War (150 page)

He decided to let it stand as it was. Zosia would probably never even see the letter, and even if she did, she would probably skim its contents in her always rushed way. Deciding to explore his thoughts without worrying about Zosia’s reaction, he continued, “Would you want me to be more like him? I think he might have reminded you of Adam. I don’t know whether that would have been good or not. I’m sure that he’d never have matched up to”

He hesitated, realizing he had written himself into a corner. The first words that came to mind were “your super husband,” but that sounded far too bitter, albeit an accurate reflection of his feelings. He constructed Zosia’s thoughts on the subject: Adam would never have let Joanna get taken, Adam would never have copulated with a Nazi-ette, Adam would never have . . . Peter snorted his derision. He would probably have liked the guy if he had known him, would probably have respected him as well, but this competing with his ghost—that was pure folly. He had known it would happen, had warned both Zosia and himself, but still it was worse than he had expected. It seemed unwinnable. Turning his attention back to the paragraph he had been writing, he tried to construct a tactful exit. He decided on “some of your expectations though,” and left it at that.

He then turned to a description of their first several days in London, the
weather, the people, the changes that he had noted. He wrote about how he had taken Barbara to one of his favorite pubs on their first night in town to get a meal, but realized just as they approached the door that as Germans they would probably be made to feel extremely uncomfortable inside. He had led her away, and they had found a quiet German-friendly establishment close to their new home.

“It’s strange,” he wrote, “but I never experienced it from that angle and it made me feel irrationally angry at them all. I just wanted to have a nice meal yet I knew that we’d probably get beer spilled on us or someone would vomit in our direction or do something else unpleasant. There could have even been a stupid fight if anyone was feeling brave enough to risk police intervention. I wonder if there are any places where Brits and Krauts mix freely. I didn’t know of any before, but after all these years, perhaps things have changed. I’d like to mix in with them but I’m afraid it’s just not going to happen.”

The words looked strange. He had said
them
in reference to the English and he had clearly written it as if he were a German living in London. How odd! Still, the way they were treated defined to a great extent who they were, and they were treated as Germans—there would be no way around that fact. With all the privileges, with all the jealousies, with all the suffused hatred that would involve. It was ironic and unfair, and it pushed him toward sympathies that would otherwise have been abhorrent. It was, he realized, exactly what he had hoped to avoid when he had argued with the Underground leadership so long ago.

He wrote for several hours more, digressing into whatever topic crossed his mind—the way the mountain wildflowers bloomed in a profusion of color, the sound of the pine needles underfoot, the glistening of diamond-scattered sunlight on the fast-flowing streams. He told Zosia how beautiful she was, how he missed her, and asked how everyone was doing—each by name. He realized he missed more than Zosia, he missed the entire place and the people there.

He also realized, quite suddenly, that he had spent the time free of nightmares or visions. He felt tired and relaxed and somewhat sure that he would fall into a restful sleep. And he had not drunk a drop! Pleased with his discovery, he got up, stretched, and returned to the bed. Barbara had confiscated his side of the bed. Gently lifting her up and back onto her side, he lay down and fell into a peaceful sleep that lasted the rest of the night.

18

“S
O, KARL,
LET’S SEE WHAT YOU’RE GOING TO SAY
to the American public,” Richard offered in his most friendly voice, atoning for the previous day’s snub in his office.

“I’m not so sure I should address the public directly. It’s so low class.”

“No, you must! The American government has no control over its people. They’re a bunch of impotent fools—that’s what comes of democracy. The entire place is run by opinion polls of the voters’ preferences, and those opinions are manufactured by their Jewish-controlled media. It’s pointless defending our interests to their government—they’re toothless. We must win over the American populace!”

“But if the media are controlled by Jews, how can we possibly get a fair hearing?” Karl moaned.

Richard smiled knowingly. “We have some friends there. I’m sure I can arrange something for you if you want.”

“You could?” Karl sounded stunned by his friend’s reach and power.

“Yes. And I’ll make sure you get credit for everything you do! My role will simply be to facilitate whatever you choose to present,” Richard offered magnanimously.

“But what should I present?” Karl wailed. “The boys in Propaganda had no luck, and the Führer’s office couldn’t get a good response either. What can I possibly do?”

“Their mistake was they protested to the government to suppress the whole affair. That won’t work. We’ve got to fight fire with fire. We’ve got to give our side of the story directly to the American people, and we’ve got to make it attractive so that they listen to it. That’s why we need you—you’ve got the presence we need!” Richard tutored Karl yet again. How many times did he have to explain to the moron!

Karl’s hand went impulsively to smoothing his naturally blond hair. “So what should I say?”

“What I would do is deny the whole thing. It’s all a plot. They—that is, the American Jewish media—hired some actor and had him fake the whole damn thing. Every word of it. Then, they faked the video as well. It’s all a fake and there is no way they can prove otherwise.”

“No way,” Karl repeated, entranced. He had not thought of that, but, yes, they had no way to prove any of it. All a fake. Every last word! What a brilliant idea.

“But I’m sure that’s what you had in mind already.” Richard blew a stream of smoke into the air and watched it dissipate. “Wasn’t it?”

“Oh. Yes, yes,” Karl hastily answered. “I was just thinking along those lines. How very disconcerting that you should have so accurately reflected my thoughts!”

“I was just building on something you mentioned the other day. It must have come to you in a flash, but of course, it took me several days to understand what you were saying.”

Karl grinned. It was clever of him, wasn’t it! If only he could remember what he had said and if anyone else had heard it. He wouldn’t want someone else taking credit for his idea, after all!

“Tell you what,” Richard continued. “I’ll lay out a script for you and you find a translator.” Best for Karl to organize the translation—there was a good chance he’d screw it up and that would only make their reply to the Halifax video all the more ridiculous.

“A translator?”

Richard dug a fingernail into the back of his skull to distract himself for a moment. When he had located his patience again, he explained, “Yes, as you noted, they don’t speak German there and we could hardly hope to get a sympathetic translation from those gangsters who run their media.”

“Oh, yes, I, um . . .”

“Organize the filming for next week—that will be plenty of time. Don’t you think?”

Richard spent the rest of the workday creating a script for Karl, and then to say that he had officially accomplished something, he randomly picked four files from the stack of folders on his desk and handed them to an underling, saying, “I’ve studied these and found their behavior extremely suspicious. I want them put under round-the-clock surveillance, and I want you to determine why they are acting suspiciously.” Laughing to himself at the grand idiocy of it all, he then went home.

In the taxi on the way home, he mused about the possibility of having some evidence planted against two or three of the four. It would look good if he had once again managed to spot wreckers or saboteurs or infiltrators among the most loyal and patriotic segment of the population. Of course, he would have to get clearance, and that was always a nuisance; the other organizations were terrible about sharing information as they naturally wanted to protect their operatives’ identities. He would have to put in a request to HQ this week, but once the suspects were cleared, he could have some fun with them. He laughed hoarsely, his laughter dissolving into a coughing fit before it ceased altogether. Then he lit another cigarette.

His thoughts turned to his genuine work. He would have to get those documents and negatives and an outline of the plan off to his father quickly. Maybe he and Kasia could stop by the bookstore on Saturday morning. A family outing. Should he show Kasia the negatives first? There was no particular reason to do so, but he knew she would be interested, and she might have some good ideas about how to time everything. She had a real knack for that sort of thing. Yeah, he’d show her. Of course, that would mean he’d have to explain the contents of the videotape. He did not like the thought of doing that, but he could not really leave her in the dark about it. He should have told her long before, when he was forcing his sons out of the house. She was not ignorant of the danger they were all in, and he was stupid to think he was shielding her by not telling her about the videotape. He started coughing again, but this time it dissolved not into laughter but into sobs. Poor little girl. Poor sweet, happy, lively little girl.

As Ryszard walked up the path, he pulled out his packet of cigarettes, but it was empty. Somehow that infuriated him, and as Leszek opened the door for him, he walked in fuming. He reached for the cigarette box, but Leszek preempted him, picking up the box, opening it, and offering it to him.

“Enough of this shit, already,” Ryszard snapped. “The surveillance is off for now, so would you just stop with all this crap?”

“Look,” Leszek said, lapsing into familiar speech, “mine and my wife’s life are just as dependent on this little charade never being detected as your family’s. If you can’t handle it, why don’t you just pull out?” And get us out of this hellhole assignment as well, he did not need to add.

“Who the hell do you think you are!” Ryszard yelled in reply, raising his fist threateningly. Kasia stepped into the entryway; she motioned with her head toward the sitting room, and Ryszard sheepishly went in.

Kasia asked Leszek to bring them drinks, then joined her husband in the sitting room. She didn’t say anything for a long moment, then tenderly she advised, “Ryszard, my love, you must relax a bit.”

Ryszard looked ready to reply but Leszek came in with their drinks. After he had set them down and left the room, Ryszard said quietly, “I despise that man.”

“But why, dear?”

“He thinks he knows this job better than me.”

“He’s a good man.”

“My sweet wife, you think that about everyone.”

“He wants to expand his contacts here. He thinks he can organize something among the workers.”

“What?
No! I don’t like that you let the two of them out and about as much as you do.”

“Ryszard, you have no idea what it’s like here for us! We wait, day in and day out, with virtually nothing to do. It’s both dangerous and boring. You’ve got to let them have some diversion. Something to make them feel useful.”

“They’re useful here, doing their job. That’s enough.”

“Darling, please. They might be able to—”

“I said no,” Ryszard growled. “It’s dangerous and we can’t afford that sort of risk. I won’t have it.”

“But—”

“I said no!”

Kasia sighed. “So how was your day at work?”

Ryszard pulled out the envelope of negatives and documents, explained about the contents of the videotape, and outlined his plan to Kasia.

“Yes, I think it will work. It looks well laid out.” Kasia sounded reassuring. She squinted at the negatives. “I can’t really make much out. Do you have a magnifying glass?”

“Yeah, here.”

Kasia accepted the glass and looked at the pictures. “Oh, that’s a nasty one. He
looks awful here, too.” She looked up at Ryszard and smiled. “Yes, I think it will all work well.”

He was surprised that she did not show more emotion. “I thought you liked your brother-in-law. Don’t those pictures bother you?”

Kasia tilted her head in surprise. “Not really,” she finally answered. “It’s all so long in the past.”

“Yeah, I guess it’s all over and done with,” Ryszard said without conviction. It bothered him that Kasia was less perturbed by the photographs than he had been. Was he losing his cool? Perhaps, he consoled himself, it was actually seeing that videotape. Simply describing it did not do it justice. Or perhaps it was fear. He identified with Peter in the videotape. It was the sort of revenge they would take on him. They would use his family’s deaths to torment him. They might even let him live a good long time as they murdered each member of his family one by one in front of him. They would rape Kasia, repeatedly and brutally, just so he could see it. His tongue probed back to his tooth. Could he expect his family to kill themselves? Would his children do that? Could he kill himself immediately and abandon them to their fates, hoping that his death would preempt any action against them? Or would he, like Peter, suspect that only his long and tortured death would satisfy them? It was clear Peter had guessed that if he stayed alive they might leave Joanna alone. It was clear he had guessed wrong, but who was to have known? Would he know when the time came?

“You need an eyewitness,” Kasia said, interrupting his morbid thoughts.

“What?”

“Well, they can claim the pictures and document copies are fake as well.”

“They’re negatives,” Ryszard pointed out.

“Even so,” Kasia replied.

“I won’t write that into Karl’s scripts.”

“Still, he might take the initiative. Or someone else might suggest it. You need a living witness.”

“To what?”

“To anything. Any indication that Peter was genuine.” Kasia paused. “Didn’t he say there was a daughter who was rebellious? Maybe she could be suborned.”

“Too young. Besides it’s not really feasible. We’d have to convert her and spirit her out of the country and . . . I just don’t think that would work. And they could say she’s an actress as well.”

“Yeah. It needs to be somebody already known.”

“I just don’t see that as being possible.”

“What about a diplomat?”

“Hmm?”

“Well,” Kasia explained, “didn’t Peter say he served at diplomatic functions sometimes? And they’re always kept under surveillance. Maybe there would be a diplomat who was at one of those and would remember him.”

Ryszard shook his head. “Even if we could somehow trace the parties he worked . . .”

“I’m sure you could get that information directly from Karl.”

“How would he remember?”

“His accounts. He must have them from that far back. He’ll have been paid for Peter’s labor.”

“If it wasn’t done as a favor.”

“You can be sure he kept track of those as well.”

“Yeah, I might be able to get the information from him. Okay, say I can locate a list of functions—so what? Nobody remembers servants. Who’d remember him? And what good would it do?”