Juan Gomez-Jurado - The Traitor's emblem

The baron took a step toward Ilse. Paul’s mother moved back against the wall as Otto brought his face up close to hers.

“Now, listen carefully, Ilse. You’re the only link there is to that night. If you don’t stop him before it’s too late, I shall have to break that link.”

“Go on, then, Otto, kill me,” said Ilse, feigning a bravery she didn’t feel. “But you should know I’ve written a letter revealing the whole affair. All of it. If anything happens to me, Paul will receive it.”

“But… you can’t be serious! You can’t write that down! What if it falls into the wrong hands?”

Ilse didn’t reply. All she did was stare at him. Otto tried to hold her stare, a tall, solid, well-dressed man facing down a fragile woman in ragged clothes who clung to her broom to stop herself from falling.

Finally the baron gave up.

“It doesn’t end here,” said Otto, turning and rushing out.

“You called for me, Father?”

Otto glanced at Jurgen with misgiving. It had been weeks since he’d last seen him, and he still found it hard to identify the uniformed figure standing in his dining room as his son. He was suddenly aware of how Jurgen’s shoulders filled the brown shirt, how the red armband with the twisted cross framed his thick biceps, how the black boots increased the young man’s stature to the point where he had to duck slightly to go under the door frame. He felt a hint of pride, but at the same time he was overwhelmed by a wave of self-pity. He couldn’t help but draw comparisons to himself: Otto was fifty-two, and he felt old and tired.

“You haven’t been home for a long time, Jurgen.”

“I’ve had important things to do.”

The baron didn’t reply. Though he did understand the Nazis’ ideals, he had never really believed in them. Like the great majority of Munich’s high society, he considered them to be a party with little promise, condemned to become extinct. If they’d come so far, it was only because they were benefiting from a social situation that was so dramatic, the underprivileged would believe any extremist prepared to make them wild promises. But at that moment he did not have time for subtleties.

“So much so that you neglect your mother? She’s been worried about you. Might we know where you’ve been sleeping?”

“In SA quarters.”

“This year you were meant to have begun your university studies, two years late!” said Otto, shaking his head. “It’s already November, and you still haven’t shown up for a single class.”

“I’m in a position of responsibility.”

Otto watched as the pieces of the image he’d preserved of this ill-mannered adolescent-who not long ago would have hurled a cup onto the floor because the tea was too sweet for him-finally disintegrated. He wondered what the best way of approaching him would be. A lot was riding on Jurgen’s doing as he was told.

He’d lain awake for several nights, tossing and turning on his mattress, before deciding to call on his son.

“A position of responsibility, you say?”

“I protect the most important man in Germany.”

“‘The most important man in Germany,’” mimicked his father. “You, the future Baron von Schroeder, hired thug to an obscure Austrian corporal with delusions of grandeur. You must be proud.”

Jurgen flinched as though he’d just been struck.

“You don’t understand…”

“Enough! I want you to do something important. You’re the only person I can trust to do it.”

Jurgen was confused by the change of tack. His reply died on his lips as his curiosity took over.

“What is it?”

“I’ve found your aunt and your cousin.”

Jurgen didn’t respond. He sat down next to his father and took the patch from his eye, revealing the unnatural void beneath the wrinkled skin of his eyelid. He stroked the skin slowly.

“Where?” he asked, his voice cold and distant.

“In a boardinghouse in Schwabing. But I forbid you even to think about revenge. We have something much more important to deal with. I want you to go to your aunt’s room, search it from top to bottom, and bring me any papers you find. Especially any that are handwritten. Letters, notes-anything.”

“Why?”

“I can’t tell you that.”

“You can’t tell me? You bring me here, you ask for my help after you’ve denied me the chance to go after the person who did this to me-the same person who gave my sick brother a pistol so he could blow his brains out. You forbid me all this, and then you expect me to obey you without any explanation?” Jurgen was shouting now.

“You’ll do what I tell you to do, unless you want me to cut you off!”

“Go ahead, Father. I’ve never much cared for debts. There’s only one thing left of value, and you can’t take that away from me. I’ll inherit your title whether you like it or not.” Jurgen went out of the dining room, slamming the door shut behind him. He was about to go out into the street, when a voice stopped him.

“Son, wait.”

He turned. Brunhilda was coming down the stairs.

“Mother.”

She went up to him and kissed his cheek. She had to stand on tiptoe to do it. She straightened his black tie and with her fingertips she caressed the place where his right eye had once been. Jurgen drew back and pulled down the patch.

“You have to do as your father asks.”

“I…”

“You have to do what you’re told, Jurgen. He’ll be proud of you if you do. And so will I.”

Brunhilda kept talking for some time. Her voice was sweet and to Jurgen it conjured up images and feelings he hadn’t experienced for a long time. He had always been her favorite. She had always treated him differently, never denied him anything. He wanted to curl up in her lap, as he did when he was a child and summer seemed never-ending.

“When?”

“Tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow’s the eighth of November, Mother. I can’t-”

“It has to be tomorrow afternoon. Your father’s been watching the boardinghouse, and Paul’s never there at that time.”

“But I already have plans!”

“Are they more important than your own family, Jurgen?”

Brunhilda brought her hand to his face once more. This time Jurgen didn’t recoil.

“I suppose I could do it, if I’m quick.”

“Good boy. And when you’ve got the papers,” she said, lowering her voice to a whisper, “bring them to me first. Don’t say a word to your father.”

From the corner, Alys watched Manfred alighting from the trolley. She had taken up her position close to her old house, as she had done every week for the past two years, in order to see her brother for a few moments. Never before had she so powerfully felt the need to approach him, to speak to him, to give up once and for all and return home. She wondered what her father would do if she appeared.

I can’t do it, especially like… like this. It would be like finally admitting he’s right. It would be like dying.

Her gaze followed Manfred, who was turning into a good-looking young man. Unruly hair stuck out from under his cap, his hands were in his pockets, and there was sheet music tucked under his arm.

I bet he’s still terrible at the piano, thought Alys with a mixture of irritation and regret.

Manfred walked along the pavement and, before reaching the gate to his house, stopped at the sweetshop. Alys smiled. She’d seen him do this the first time two years ago, when she’d discovered by chance that on Thursdays her brother came back from his piano lessons on public transport instead of in their father’s chauffeur-driven Mercedes. Half an hour later Alys had gone into the sweetshop and bribed a shop assistant to give Manfred a packet of toffees with a note inside when he came the following week. She’d hastily scribbled It’s me. Come every Thursday, I’ll leave you a note. Ask for Ingrid, give her your reply. Love you-A.