The Diplomat's Wife Part 18

"Yes. It's self-interest, really. Your getting to Marcelitis is good for American interests, as well." He sounds as though he is trying to convince himself. "And I can report back fully on your activities," he adds.

I do not respond. He's trying to protect me, I understand, studying his face. Part of me is glad. Finding Paul again, seeing he is alive, is like standing near a warm fire in winter. I am not ready to go out into the cold again. At the same time, I am hesitant. This is my mission. I do not need him rescuing me, not again. But he's right. I need his help. "Fine," I relent. "So what now?"

"First, let me finish taping your ankle." His hand is warm against my skin as he wraps the bandage several times around my ankle, securing the end and fitting my shoe back over my toes. "Can you walk?"

I stand up, take a painful step. "Yes, it feels much better now," I lie.

"Okay, but you still shouldn't use it too much." He comes to my side, then takes my arm and puts it around his shoulder. "There's a village on the edge of the forest," he says as we make our way slowly from the cave. "We need to get there and find some transportation."

Neither of us speak as Paul leads me through the forest. Only the branches beneath our feet break the silence. As we walk, I stare at Paul, fearful that if I look away he will disappear. Soon, the trees begin to thin and I see footprints where others have walked, smell smoke from a nearby chimney. We reach a path that leads us to the outskirts of a village. Paul stops at the end of a tall hedge. "What are we doing?" I whisper.

"Shh." He stops at a break in the in the hedge, gesturing toward it with his hand. "In there."

"You want me to hide in the bushes?" He nods. I step into the hedge. "This better be good."

"Wait here," he says, disappearing around the corner before I can respond. Anxiety rises in me. I do not want to be separated from him again, even for a few minutes. I stare out from the bushes at the empty street. My mind struggles to reconcile all that has happened. Paul is here. Alive. But this is not two years ago. This is not Salzburg or Paris. You have Rachel, I remind myself. And Simon.

Paul reappears, pus.h.i.+ng a two-wheeled vehicle of some sort. As he gets closer, I step from the bushes. I look from him to the bike, then back again. "Really? A motorcycle?"

"Don't worry, I used to ride all the time back home."

"But..."

"Look, do you want to get to Berlin or don't you? We can't take the train again and we don't have a car. This is the best way."

I can't argue with his logic. "Where did you get it?"

"I borrowed it from a farmhouse down the road. I suspect the farmer will be very pleased to find the money I left, which is about three times what this thing is worth."

Like the boat in Salzburg, I cannot help but think. I take a step toward the bike, then stop. "Paul, there's something I have to tell you. I'm married now."

"I know."

I stare at him, surprised. "You do? But how?"

"American intelligence," he replies stiffly. "Once we found out about your mission, we made it a point to learn all about you."

"Oh." I had hoped he knew because he cared enough to check. "I just wanted to let you know, in case you were helping me, well, because..."

"I'm helping you because it's good for my country. That's all." He clears his throat. "Though I couldn't believe your husband would let you go on such a dangerous mission," he adds.

"He didn't let me go," I retort. "I insisted. It was my choice."

He looks over his shoulder. "We need to go."

I touch the seat of the motorcycle. "Does it run?"

"We're about to find out. I didn't want to start it back in town for fear of attracting attention." He straddles the bike and steps on the kickstand. The engine splutters then revs noisily to life. "Come on." He pats the seat behind him. "There's no sidecar, like in the movies. You'll just have to hold on tight. Now hurry, before someone hears us." I hike up my skirt and straddle the bike clumsily. Paul reaches back and hands me a helmet. "Put this on." When I have the strap fastened under my chin, he takes my hands and places them around his midsection. I tighten my grip, feeling his torso beneath his coat. As we start to move, I lean forward, resting my cheek on the smooth, cool expanse of his back, trying not to think, grateful for the excuse to be this close to him once more.

CHAPTER 21.

I lift my cheek from Paul's back, looking up as he slows the motorcycle, then pulls over to the side of the road. We have been on back roads like this for hours, single lanes winding through rolling, snow-covered hills. Except for the occasional house or car pa.s.sing in the opposite direction, we have seen no one. "What's wrong?" I ask now, straightening.

He puts one foot on the ground, then turns to face me. "Nothing. We're just outside Berlin, but it's only six and I'd like it to be a little darker before we make our way into the city. Hungry?" I nod. I have not eaten anything since the roll in my Prague hotel room the previous day. "We pa.s.sed a pub a few miles back, so I thought we'd stop and get something to eat."

Paul turns the bike around and begins to drive slowly in the direction from which we came. He stopped the bike only once before, pulling off the road before the Czech-German border to bypa.s.s the official crossing. My heart pounded as we walked the bike through the woods, branches crackling beneath our feet, expecting that we would be apprehended at any moment. I was so terrified that I barely noticed the throbbing pain in my ankle. But thirty minutes later, we emerged on the German side of the border, pus.h.i.+ng the bike up to the road and riding away once more.

For hours as we have ridden, I have clung to Paul, sheltering myself from the wind behind his broad torso. The questions and disbelief keep rising up, threatening to overwhelm me. I have grieved Paul's death for years, the loss immutably woven into the tapestry of my life. How could I have woken and breathed each day, not knowing that he was out there somewhere, alive? How is it possible that he is here again, in this most improbable of times and places? But I push the thoughts down, reveling in the chance to be close to him again, fearful that at any moment the mirage will disappear.

We pull up in front of a small tavern, smoke rising from the chimney. Paul helps me off the bike, his hand lingering longer than is necessary on my shoulder. I s.h.i.+ver, my reaction to his touch even stronger than it was years ago. "Sorry," he mumbles, pulling back. I nod and start for the door. He follows closely, a half step behind, as if he is afraid that I will disappear.

Inside, a dozen or so tables fill the small room, empty except for one where a small group of men in hunting garb are gathered. "I'll be right back," I say, spotting a sign for the water closet. When I return, Paul is seated at a table in the corner, close to the fireplace but as far from the hunters as possible. Two mugs of dark beer sit before him.

"I ordered us some food, too."

"But how? You don't speak German."

He winks. "I've picked up a thing or two these past few years." He hands me a mug, then raises the other. "A toast," he proposes.

"To what? The success of our mission?"

"No," he replies quickly. "That's bad luck. One of the guys in my unit, a replacement for a man we lost at Bastogne, toasted the unit on our last night in Paris. And look what happened." A shadow crosses his eyes.

"I'm sorry."

He shakes his head. "To your happiness," he says instead.

Happiness. Happiness would have been finding you years ago, I want to say. Instead, I touch my mug to his, then swallow the rich, dark beer. "Thank you. But what about your happiness?"

He shrugs. "I don't know what that means anymore really. I mean, I'm fine. I'm not going to wallow in self-pity." He winks. "Seems some girl in Salzburg taught me better. It's a miracle I'm alive, and I've got my work. But happiness? I left that behind on a September morning in Paris about two years ago."

Suddenly it feels as if a hand is squeezing hard around my heart. If I meant so much to you, why didn't you come for me? But before I can speak, a stout woman appears and sets down two large bowls in front of us. The food is simple peasant fare: a hearty beef stew, thick hunks of bread. When the waitress has gone again, I look at Paul, hesitating. Perhaps, I realize, the answer is not one I want to hear.

A loud burst of laughter erupts from the table of hunters, jarring me from my thoughts. A chill runs up my spine. In my desperation to get across the border, I had almost forgotten where I was going. I am in Germany, and not just pa.s.sing through, as I had with Renata after arriving at the airport in Munich. This time, I am going to Berlin, which had been the very heart of n.a.z.i power. I study the hunters, wondering where they had been during the war. Had they fought for Germany, killed Jews in the camps?

"So what's the plan?" Paul asks. I look back at him, his question a welcome distraction. "Once we get into Berlin, I mean."

I hesitate. In my hurry to flee Prague, I hadn't thought much about it. "I don't know," I admit. "Go to Oranienburger Stra.s.se, try to find Marcelitis's apartment, persuade him to talk to us."

"You know that Oranienburger Stra.s.se is in east Berlin?" I nod. I know from my work at the Foreign Office that the sector is controlled by the Soviets. "And if he's not there?" Paul asks. "Or if it's not even his apartment? Or what if he is there but won't talk to you?"

"I don't know," I repeat. My frustration rises. "Why are you giving me a hard time?"

"Because I want to ask you one more time to reconsider. You're a diplomat's wife, Marta, not a G.o.dd.a.m.ned spy." I turn away, too stung to respond. There is a harshness to Paul's voice I have never heard before. "I know you did some incredibly brave things during the war. But things are different now. You have a daughter." So do you, I think, wis.h.i.+ng I could tell Paul the truth about Rachel. But I cannot, not now. "You need to consider your safety, for her sake. Once we get into Berlin, there's no turning back. We might not even be able to get out if the Russians make good on their threat to blockade the city. Why don't you let me go for you instead?"

"I'm going to find Marcelitis," I insist.

Paul sc.r.a.pes the bottom of the bowl, finis.h.i.+ng his stew. "Were you always this stubborn?"

"It's almost dark," I say, draining the last of my beer. "We should go."

Outside, we walk to the bike. "Here," Paul says, handing the helmet to me. Our fingers brush, sending a jolt of electricity through me. I look up and our eyes meet. Suddenly his face is above mine, his breath warm on my forehead. "Marta," he says softly, staring down at me. He lowers his lips toward mine. Unable to control myself, I raise my face to his. Then a vision of Rachel appears in my mind.

I pull back. "Paul, stop, I can't."

He searches my eyes, his expression hurt and confused. "Do you love him?" he demands.

"What?" I ask, still fl.u.s.tered.

"Your husband-do you love him?"

That question again, I think, remembering Emma. I hesitate. "I married him."

"And me?" he presses. "I know that you still have feelings for me, Marta. I could feel it just now."

I bite my lip. "Would it change anything if I did?"

"No, of course not," he replies quickly, looking away. Neither of us speak for several seconds.

"I'm sorry if you came after me for this," I say.

He shakes his head. "I came after you because it was my job." But the pain underneath his voice tells a different story. I study his face as he stares off into the distance.

"But why..." I pause, biting my lip. "Why didn't you come after me sooner? After you recovered from the crash?"

"Does it matter?" His eyes are hollow, his face a mask of bitterness I have never seen before.

I reach out and touch his arm. "Paul, I..."

He turns, pulling away from my touch. "Let's just concentrate on finding Marcelitis," he says coldly. "Then you can go home."

As I climb on the bike behind him, I can tell that Paul is angry. Jealous. Defensiveness rises in me. It isn't fair of him to blame me for my choices. He was dead, or at least I thought so. It is not as if I chose someone else over him. I am seized once more with the urge to tell him about Rachel. But would the truth just make things worse? Before I can consider the question further, he starts the engine. The motorcycle lurches forward and I grab him quickly so as not to fall backward as we pull onto the road.

An hour later we reach the outskirts of Berlin. It is as if the war ended yesterday, I think as we pa.s.s through the residential neighborhoods. The city is a wasteland. The aftermath of the bombings is evident everywhere, street after street of once-elegant houses reduced to rubble. Paul drives more slowly here, weaving between the large craters and debris that litter the roadway. A charred smell lingers in the air. Though it is early evening, the streets are eerily silent. The few houses that still stand are dark and shuttered. Like the Jewish Quarter in Krakow after everyone had been sent away. I remember Jacob and I pa.s.sing through on our way out of the city, watching his jaw tighten as he took in the once-vibrant neighborhood where Emma had been raised, now an empty sh.e.l.l of its former self. I can still see the curtains blowing through broken windows, feel the shattered gla.s.s crunching beneath my feet.

A sense of sick satisfaction rises inside me. So the Germans suffered, too. Good, I think, wrapping my arms more tightly around Paul. We stop at a red light. On the corner sits a house completely destroyed except for the garage. Through the half-open garage door, I see a woman and three small children sitting around an open fire. Nearby stands a man, breaking a wooden chair into pieces for kindling. The smallest child, no older than five, looks out into the street and, noticing us, stands and takes a few steps forward, eyes widening as he takes in the motorcycle, our strange clothes. He is nearly as thin as I had been in prison. For a moment I wonder if he is going to run into the street and beg us for money. But the man hurries forward and pulls him back, scolding him in words I cannot hear. I notice then the rags wrapped around the child's feet where shoes should have been. Children, like those we had seen so long ago through the window in Paris, those on the boat when I came to England. Like Emma's children. These were not the Germans I had imagined. My satisfaction disappears, replaced by a lump in my throat.

It is nearly dark now as we near the city center. Here there is new construction, identical concrete houses set too close together, tall apartment blocks being crudely erected amid the grand architecture of old Berlin. The sidewalks are thick with pedestrians making their way home from work, but the streets are strangely empty except for some buses. "Not many cars," I observe.

"Not many people here can afford to own them now," Paul replies. "But you make a good point. We should lose the bike so as not to attract attention." He pulls over to the curb, helps me dismount. "Wait here," he says, disappearing around the corner with the bike. I stand on the street, watching the people as they pa.s.s, thin, pale and silent. They walk by sh.e.l.ls of former buildings matter-of-factly, not looking up. "Ready?" Paul asks, walking up behind me. He leads me expertly through the streets, turning right, then left.

"Do you know where we're going?" I ask in a low voice.

He nods. "I've been here a few times in recent months for my work."

"The devastation..." I gesture upward with my head. "I had no idea."

"You should have seen it a year ago," he replies. "At least now, with money pumping in from the West, they are starting to rebuild. But it's going to take a long time." We turn another corner. "This is it. Oranienburger Stra.s.se." The right side of the street is dominated by a ma.s.sive domed building. "That's the New Synagogue," he adds as we approach. I look up, not answering. In our village, the synagogue was a single room, no larger than our house, with a lace curtain separating the area in the back where the women sat. Our synagogue in London is larger than that, of course, but even it is dwarfed by the cathedral-size one now before me. The brown-brick facade climbs high into the air, topped by a wide dome. Two narrower towers, identical in design, flank the main structure. But the building is in a horrible state of disrepair. The entire eastern wall of the synagogue is missing. The arched stained-gla.s.s windows have been shattered, reduced to jagged shards. Soot blackens the front doorway of the synagogue, as though there had been a fire.

It is Friday night, I realize. Before the war, the synagogue would have been filled with hundreds, even thousands of Jews, chanting the Sabbath prayers. Instead, the synagogue lies silent, a ghost of its former self. Are there any Jews left in Berlin? I wonder. Sadness rises up in me. "We should keep moving," Paul says in a low voice, looking furtively over his shoulder. Following his gaze, I see a man walking a dog on the far side of the street watching us curiously. Have we been followed? No, I realize quickly. The man is simply puzzled by the fact that we are interested in the synagogue. Berlin does not have tourists now. We walk farther down the street past the synagogue. "He's gone," Paul says.

I turn back. Across the street, as Emma said, is a tiny used bookstore in front of an apartment building. "There it is."

We cross the street. As we approach the bookshop, Paul grabs my arm. "This way," he mouths, pulling me into a narrow pa.s.sageway beside the bookshop, separating it from the adjacent building. At the back of the pa.s.sage, there is a wood door with a high gla.s.s window. Paul stands on his toes, peering through. "Looks like a lobby of some kind. The apartment must be upstairs."

I notice a b.u.t.ton beside the door. "Here goes nothing," I say, pressing it. There is no response. "Maybe it's broken." I push it again.

Paul presses his ear against the door. "It definitely works. I can hear it. Well, no one's answering. What do you want to do?"

I hesitate. "We can't give up. We have to find him." I turn the doork.n.o.b and the door opens. Inside, a single bare bulb casts dim light across the tiny foyer. Paint peels from the walls. "h.e.l.lo," I call, stepping through the doorway. My voice echoes back at us. Paul points toward a narrow metal staircase leading upward. The stairs groan beneath us as we climb them. At the top, there is a short corridor, leading to an open door. "h.e.l.lo," I call again. As we near the doorway, I see that the frame is splintered, one of its hinges ripped away. An uneasy feeling rises in me. Someone has broken in.

Paul grabs me by the shoulder, pulling me behind him. I notice for the first time that he has pulled out his gun, holding it low to his waist. "Wait here," he mouths, stepping forward. He enters the apartment, then disappears from view around a corner. "No..."

"What is it?" Unable to wait any longer, I race through the door. "Oh, my goodness..." The apartment is in complete disarray. A brown sofa lies toppled backward, its cus.h.i.+ons ripped open. In the small kitchen off to the right, shattered gla.s.s and dishes litter the floor.

Paul walks to a desk in the corner of the room. The roller top is open and papers are strewn across the desktop, chair and floor. "This is Marcelitis's apartment," he says, picking up a piece of paper and scanning it. "My guess is that Marcelitis had a visit from the police."

I walk to the kitchen table, where a cup of coffee lies spilled. "Still warm," I say, touching the liquid. "You think he's been arrested?" Paul nods. An uneasy tingle crawls up my spine. I turn back toward him. "Do you think it was because of..." I begin, then stop again. Paul has opened the desk drawer and begun rummaging through it. Then he drops to his hands and knees and starts tapping on the hardwood floor by the desk, his ear close to the ground. "What are you doing?"

"Looking for the cipher," he replies, sliding away from the desk and tapping on the floor again.

"You really think he would leave it here?"

"I think I want to make..." He stops, then pulls a small pocketknife from his coat and begins to pry at one of the floorboards. I walk toward him as he raises the board, revealing a hollow compartment. "Aha!" he exclaims, pulling several sheets of folded paper from the ground. Setting the papers aside, he reaches into the hole once more. His face falls.

"No cipher?" He shakes his head. Picking up the papers, he unfolds them and scans the top sheet. He replaces the floorboard, tapping the nails back into place with the handle of the pocketknife. Then he stands, still holding the papers.

"What are you doing with those?"

"Taking them, of course. We can't leave them here. They contain key information about Marcelitis's work. I don't want the police finding these if they decide to come back and search more thoroughly."

"But I don't understand. Why would they...?" He thinks they may come back after us, I realize. Goose b.u.mps form on my arms.

Paul tucks the papers into his jacket and starts toward me. "Let's discuss this outside, shall-" A shuffling sound comes from the doorway on the far side of the room. Both of our heads snap toward the sound. Someone is here. The noise comes again, louder this time. I hold my breath as Paul takes a step toward the doorway, raising his gun. An orange cat meanders into view, looking at us with disinterest.

I lean against the table, relieved. "Just a cat."

"For now," Paul replies. He bends over and scoops up the scrawny animal, his face softening. "She looks hungry." I cannot help but think of Delia's well-fed cat, Ruff. He walks to the kitchen and opens one cupboard, then another. "Nothing..." Then he opens the refrigerator and pulls out a bottle of milk. He pulls a bowl from the sink and pours some milk into it, then sets the cat gently down. "Poor thing," he says, watching the animal drink greedily. "Let's go."

"I didn't know you liked cats," I remark in a low voice as we make our way back down the stairs.