The Pathfinder (30 page)

‘Much better, thank you. Please come in.' He followed her into the living room. Dirk was out and she was thankful, because of how he might behave in his present mood and what he might say. ‘I'm sorry, it's just as cold as ever in here.'

‘I don't notice it.'

‘Will you have some hot coffee – in the English teacups?'

‘Only if you have some to spare.'

She set the pan of water on the stove and waited for it to heat up. ‘I've had a letter from the hospital in Hamburg where Rudi is. I was afraid they would say he had tuberculosis but he hasn't. They are giving him treatment for malnutrition, then he will go to stay with a family nearby.'

‘And your grandfather?'

‘He's in a nursing home. They are taking care of him.'

‘Everything will get better. Winter will soon be over and the blockade won't last for ever.'

‘How much longer, do you think?'

He frowned. ‘It's hard to say. As long as it takes the Russians to realize that we can go on with the airlift indefinitely, I suppose. That could be just a few months away.'

‘Then you'll have won.'

He smiled faintly. ‘I'm not sure I'd use those words exactly. It might be truer to say that at least we won't have lost – lost Berlin, that is.' He groped in his coat pocket. ‘I've brought you something. I hope you like it.' He put it on the table. The orange wrapper had the words CRUNCHIE in large white letters. ‘It's chocolate outside with a sort of honeycomb inside. Rather good, actually.'

‘Thank you. You're very kind.'

‘How are you managing with food and things?'

‘All right, thank you.'

‘Is Dirk well?'

‘Oh, yes.' It was better not to talk about Dirk. Better not to mention that he was no longer working at Tempelhof. Better to say nothing.

She measured out the coffee and poured on the hot water. He carried the primrose cups and saucers to the table for her and, as before, they sat on each side. He offered her a cigarette and lit it and, as he did so, his hand brushed accidentally against hers. On Christmas Eve he had taken hold of her hand and kissed it. Perhaps she had read too much into that? Perhaps he was not in love with her at all? Perhaps it had only been pity or kindness or sympathy?

He put the lighter away in a top pocket under his overcoat, buttoning the flap. ‘I had a spot of bother with the Russians on my way back the last time I saw you. The east sector police stopped me and marched me off at gunpoint. I was locked up in a cell and it took a hell of a time to get out of there.'

She was horrified. ‘I'm so sorry that this should happen. You must always be very careful with them. They are dangerous people.'

‘They thought I was up to some kind of black-marketeering – or at least that's what they pretended to think. It was probably just an excuse to cause trouble.'

‘How did you persuade them to let you go?'

‘I didn't. Nico Kocharian did. They searched me and found his business card in my wallet. He seemed to have quite a bit of influence with them. He's a pretty odd sort of chap, isn't he? What do you know about him?'

‘Very little. He met Dirk one day in Alexander Platz and bought a watch from him, and later Dirk brought him home here. He is a publisher of school books, so he told us, and I think he has been in Berlin for about two years. He comes here from time to time and brings us things.' She shivered. ‘To tell the truth, he frightens me. He is . . .
unheimlich. Ein unheimlicher Man.
I don't know how to say this in English.'

‘Creepy? Sinister?'

She nodded. ‘Yet he has never done us any harm. Only tried to help.'

‘I think you should be careful of him.'

‘You don't like him either, do you? He knows that. He told me so himself. But he also said that you were good to him at the school in England. You stopped the other boys mistreating him.'

‘I can't honestly remember, but he certainly wasn't awfully popular and probably came in for a fair bit of bullying. He was an awful show-off, you know, and that never goes down terribly well. I'm afraid English boarding schools can be pretty tough places, if you don't really fit in.'

‘It is very important to do that in England? Fit in?'

He said slowly, ‘I was talking about schools and schoolboys.'

‘He told me a little about your family too,' she said. ‘About your parents. Your father is a general in the British army.'

‘He's retired now, actually.'

‘Was he a good general?'

‘Yes, he was rather.'

‘And he must be very proud of you, of course. Your mother as well.'

He smiled. Whenever he did so his face lost its stern look and softened. ‘Well, I don't know about that.'

‘I am sure they are.' How differently her mother and father would feel if they could see what had become of Dirk and of herself. Not proud at all. Ashamed. ‘Where do they live in England?'

‘In a village in Surrey – that's in the south of England. It's nice countryside around. Hills and woods . . . rather beautiful, in fact.'

‘My father used to say what a beautiful country England was.'

‘Well, it is, in parts. Not all of it, of course. Some bits are quite ugly.'

‘It's the same in Germany, too. Some of it is beautiful and some is very ugly – like Berlin now.'

‘One day it will be rebuilt.'

‘Yes, one day. And London? Is there much destroyed there?'

‘Quite a bit. Nothing like here, but I expect it'll take years to get it all done.'

‘My father thought London was a wonderful city. Very historic.'

‘It's not very wonderful at the moment,' he said. ‘But I love it. I have a flat there – an apartment.'

‘I hope it's better than this one.'

He smiled again at her feeble little joke. ‘It's not very big – just two bedrooms – but it suits me. It makes a good base when I'm home.'

‘You have a kitchen?'

‘Yes. Quite small, but it's got everything one needs.'

‘And a bathroom?'

‘Yes.'

‘With hot water?'

He nodded.

She sighed. ‘And central heating?'

‘Yes, that too. Mind you, fuel's still scarce in England so it's not always at full chat, but the place keeps quite warm. There's a pretty good-sized sitting room and a dining room. I haven't bothered too much with the decoration and furnishing, being just me, but it could be made jolly nice.'

She thought wistfully of the apartment in London: a proper kitchen, proper bedrooms, proper bathroom, sitting room and dining room, no holes in the ceilings, no rats, no leaks, no horrible flies. Warmth. Comfort. Safety. And him.

‘I think you'd like it there, Lili,' he said quietly, as though he knew just what she was imagining. ‘And I'd take care of you. For always.'

His left arm rested on the table, close enough to see that there was a crown and eagle on each of the three shiny Royal Air Force buttons on the thick cuff of his overcoat.

‘Lili?'

She put out her hand and touched his sleeve. She thought, I know this is wrong. I know it, but I can't help it. The next moment he was at her side, pulling her to her feet and into his arms.

Fourteen

Dirk had brought back something wrapped in newspaper. He dumped it on the table. ‘Don't go and throw
that
in the river.'

There was blood oozing through the paper – dark red, almost black. The sight and the smell turned her stomach. ‘What is it?'

‘What does it look like? Meat. Part of a cow. The backside. It was slaughtered a couple of days ago.'

‘Where did you get it?'

‘You always ask that, Lili. From the country. There aren't any cows wandering round Berlin, in case you haven't noticed. Do you want it, or not?'

‘Yes, of course. I'll cut it up and cook it.' She carried the disgusting parcel over to the table by the stove and started to unwrap it. The hunk of raw flesh looked horrible and a lot more than two days dead. She started to saw at it with the carving knife. Dirk lit one of his American cigarettes.

‘So, have you made up your mind yet?'

‘Don't keep asking that.'

‘Well, the squadron leader wants you to marry him, doesn't he? From what I saw the other night it looks like you've well and truly landed him.'

Neither of them had heard Dirk come into the room – not until he had coughed loudly. Far from being embarrassed, Michael had said easily, ‘I've asked your sister to marry me, Dirk. I hope you don't mind.'

Her brother had grinned. He was slightly tipsy, she could tell, but not so much that it really showed. ‘Not at all, sir. I hope she's said yes.'

‘Lili has asked for some time to think about it. She wants to be sure.' Michael had smiled down at her. ‘See what you can do to persuade her to take me on.'

The stink of the meat was almost making her retch. She went on cutting into it doggedly.

‘Supposing that I
did
go to England, Dirk, would you come with me?'

‘Me? Go and live in stuffy old England? No, thanks. I don't think it would suit me at all, do you? Can you see me settling down quietly, behaving like an English gentleman? Playing by their rules? Fitting in with the squadron leader's respectable English family? Sipping tea out of little china cups like he gave you? Making polite conversation? After all we've been through?' He cocked his head on one side, looking at her. ‘No, I didn't think you would see it.'

‘You might go to university there. Study law – like you were always meant to do.'

‘You've overlooked something, Lili. A small point. I haven't studied a thing for nearly five years. I've forgotten everything I learned at school. It's too late now.'

‘It's not too late. Not if you don't want it to be. You could catch up, Dirk. You're very clever. You always got such good marks.'

He stood with one hand thrust in the pocket of his raincoat, the other holding his cigarette, shoulders hunched. Like a Chicago gangster. ‘I was nine, ten, eleven, then. I'm not that kid any more. I'm past sitting in class and doing what teacher tells me. Or anybody else. If I went anywhere it'd be to America. The new world, not the old one.'

‘Anyway, I couldn't leave Grandfather and Rudi. That's impossible.'

‘You wouldn't have to. They could go to England too. The squadron leader would arrange it. He arranged things for them once, so he'll do it again. He'd do anything for you. Rudi could go to school in England – it's not too late for him. He'd grow up an English gentleman. And Grandfather probably wouldn't know or care where he was.' Dirk picked up his case. ‘I've got to go out again now. Don't ask me where, Lili, because I'm not going to tell you.'

He went, banging the front door loudly behind him. She went on cutting, her hands crimson and sticky with blood.

If any one single thing could be said, in future years, to have saved the city, Harrison reflected soberly, it would not be the airlift itself, nor the morale of the citizens, but the weather. The records showed that average winters in Berlin consisted of months of extreme cold, with bitter winds from Russia and Poland. Prolonged severe frost could have iced up engines, torn up runways, and burned up fuel stocks faster than they could possibly have been replenished. But General Winter had been on their side, after all. In the month of January there had been mainly clear skies and no bad frost, and more tons of supplies had been flown in than in any previous month. February was proving equally obliging. With spring and summer lying not so very far ahead, the Russians had lost their chance to take the city at its weakest time – in the darkest, coldest months with food and fuel so scarce.

At the very beginning, the airlift had been seen as a desperate and temporary measure until some craven agreement could be made with the Russians. Now all that had changed. It had been shown that the city could be supplied from the air for as long as it was necessary. Now the question was not how long the western sectors could hold out, but how long it would take the Soviet Union to give way, and on Allied terms. The talk was now not just of keeping western Berliners alive but of improving their lives with better food, more medical supplies, more coal, more fuel and more raw materials and machinery so that more things could be made for export, and there was even talk of flying in some consumer goods to brighten everyone's dreary existence.

Tubby, who was still quite convinced of God's Hand intervening, kept referring pointedly to the calm seas at Dunkirk.

‘Same thing then. The Channel's usually appallingly rough and what happened when they were taking off the troops? Calm as a millpond for a week. A miracle.'

‘I'd no idea you were so religious, Tubby.'

‘Nor had I, dear boy. Perhaps it's a symptom of old age. The nearer one gets to meeting one's Maker, the more one starts to think about things one never thought about before – if you follow me.'

‘I'm not sure I do.'

‘No need to worry your handsome head about it. You've a long way to go before you get to that stage. They'll be retiring me soon, you know. Putting me out to grass.'

‘What'll you do then?'

‘God knows. I've been in the RAF since I was eighteen, so it's going to be a bit of a wrench.'

‘Gardening? Golf?'

‘Can't stand either. Don't know what I'll do. Life's going to be jolly dull, one way and another. Lonely, too.'