Joseph Kanon - A Good German

“Three thousand linen sheets, five hundred ashtrays-what’s this?”

“Preparation for the conference. Last blowout of the war, by the size of it. Try getting a story out of that.”

“Three thousand rolls of toilet paper,” Jake said.

“All from London. Now, where’ve they been hiding it, you wonder Haven’t seen decent loo paper in years.” He took back the sheet, shaking his head. “Here’s the one, a hundred and fifty bottles of button polish. Broke, but still gleaming.”

“You’re not going to print this?”

He shrugged. “What about you? Anything?”

“Not today. I went into town. They’re still digging up bodies.”

Brian made a face. “I haven’t the stomach, I really haven’t.”

“You’re getting soft. It never bothered you in Africa.” ‹›“Well, that was the war. I don’t know what this is.” He took a sip from his glass, brooding. “Lovely to be back in Cairo, wouldn’t it? Sit on the terrace and watch the boats. Just the thing after this.” Drifting feluccas, white triangles waiting for a hint of a breeze, a million miles away.

“You’d be in London in a week.”

“I don’t think so, you know,” Brian said seriously. “It’s the boats for me now. ”

“That’s the whiskey talking. When a man’s tired of London—” Jake quoted.

Brian looked at the glass. “That’s when we were on the way up. I don’t want to see us go down. Bit by bit. It’s finished there too. Just the Russians now. There’s your story. And you’re welcome to it. I haven’t got the stomach anymore. Awful people.”

“And there’s us.”

Brian sighed. “The lucky Americans. You don’t need to count the loo paper, do you? Just streams out. What will you do, I wonder.”

“Go home.”

“No, you’ll stay. You’ll want to put things right. That’s your particular bit of foolishness. You’ll want to put things right.”

“Somebody has to.”

“Do they? Well, then, I anoint you, why not?” He put his hand on Jake’s head. “Good luck and God bless. I’m for the boats.”

“Don’t you guys ever work?” A voice coming up from behind.

“Liz, my darling,” Brian said, instantly hearty. “The lady with the lens. Come have a drink. I hear Miss Bourke-White’s on her way.”

“Up yours too.”

Brian laughed. “Ooo.” He got up from his stool. “Here, darling, have a seat. I’d better push off. Go polish my buttons. Probably the last time we get to sit at the high table, so we like to look our best.”

“What’s he talking about?” she said, watching him walk away.

“He’s just being Brian. Here.” Jake took out a match to light her cigarette.

“What have you been doing?” she said, inhaling. “Holding up the bar?”

“No, I went into town.”

“God, why?”

“Look at the message boards.” Charred bodies.

“Oh.” She glanced up at him. “Any luck?”

He shook his head and handed her a release. “The Russians are giving a banquet tonight.”

“I know. They’re also posing.” She looked at her watch. “In about an hour.”

“In Potsdam? Take me with you.”

“Can’t. They’d have my head. No press, remember?”

“I’ll carry your camera.”

“You’d never get through. Special pass,” she said, showing hers.

“Yes, I would. Just bat your baby blues. The Russians can’t read anyway. Come on, Liz.”

“She won’t be in Potsdam, Jake,” she said, looking at him.

“I can’t sit around here. It just makes it worse. Anyway, I still need to file something.”

“We’re taking pictures, that’s all.”

“But I’d be there. See it, at least. Anything’s better than this,” he said, picking up the release. “Come on. I’ll buy you that drink later.”

“I’ve had better offers.”

“How do you know?”

She laughed and got up from the stool. “Meet me outside in five. If there’s any trouble, I don’t know you. Understood? I don’t know how you got in the jeep. Serve you right if they hauled you away.”

“You’re a pal.”

“Yeah.” She handed him a camera. “They’re brown, by the way, not blue. In case you haven’t noticed.”

Another photographer was at the wheel, so Jake crammed in the back with the equipment, watching Liz’s hair flying in the wind next to the aerial flag. They drove south toward Babelsberg, the old route to the film studios, and met the first Russian sentry on the Lange Brucke. He looked at the driver’s pass, pretending to understand English, and waved them through with a machine gun.

The entire town had been cordoned off, lines of Russian soldiers posted at regular intervals up to Wilhelmplatz, which seemed to have got the worst of the bomb damage. They swung behind the square and then out the designated route along the Neuer Garten, the large villas facing the park wall looking empty but intact, lucky survivors. After Berlin, it was a haven, somewhere out of the war. Jake almost expected to see the usual old ladies in hats walking their dogs on the formal paths. Instead there were more Russians with machine guns, stretched along the lakeshore as if they were expecting an amphibious assault.

The Cecilienhof was at the end of the park, a big heap of stockbroker Tudor with brick chimneys and leaded windows, an unexpected piece of Surrey on the edge of the Jungfernsee. There were guards posted at the park gates, more menacingly correct but no more thorough than the first set on the bridge, then a long gravel drive to the palace forecourt, where MPs and British soldiers mingled with their Russian hosts. They parked near a row of official black cars. Through the opening to the inner courtyard they could see hundreds of red geraniums planted in the shape of a huge Soviet star, an ostentatious display of property rights, but before Liz could photograph it a liaison officer directed them around the building to the lawn that fronted the lake. Here, on the terrace next to a small topiary garden, three wicker chairs had been set out for the picture session. A small army of photographers and newsreel cameramen were already in place, smoking and setting up tripods and shooting uneasy glances toward the patrolling guards.

“As long as you’re here, you might as well be useful,” Liz said, handing Jake two cameras while she loaded a third. One of the guards came by to inspect the cases.

“So where are they?”

“Probably having a last-minute comb,” Liz said.

He imagined Stalin in front of a mirror, smoothing back the sides of his hair for history.

Then there was nothing to do but wait. He studied the building for details-the double-height bay windows with their view of the lake, presumably the conference room, the chimneys of patterned brick too numerous to count. But there was no story in any of it, just architecture. The lawn had been mowed, the hedges trimmed, everything as tidy as a set shipped down the road from the soundstages in Babelsberg. A few miles away, the rubble women were dumping bodies in a cart. Here a breeze was blowing in from the lake, the waves flashing in the sun like tiny reflectors. The view was lovely. He wondered if Crown Prince Wilhelm used to walk across the lawn, towel in hand, for a morning dip, but the past seemed as unlikely as Stalin’s comb. No sailboats now, just the Russian sentries standing back from the water, hands resting on their guns.

Churchill was first. He came onto the terrace in his khaki uniform, holding a cigar and talking to a group of aides. Then Truman, jaunty in a gray double-breasted suit, trading jokes with Byrnes and Admiral Leahy. Finally Stalin, in a dazzling white tunic, his short frame dwarfed by a circle of guards. There were a few informal shots as they shook hands, then a flurry of taking seats, aides crowding around to settle them in. Churchill handed a soldier his cigar. Truman tugged at his jacket so it wouldn’t ride up as he sat. Had the places been decided beforehand? Truman was in the middle, his wire-rimmed glasses catching the light each time he turned his head from one to the other. Everyone smiling, casual, as if they were posing for a group shot at a class reunion. Truman crossed his legs, revealing a pair of ribbed silk socks. The cameras clicked.