Pierre Frei - Berlin - A Novel

'Finished.' The doctor straightened up. 'You were very brave.'

Jutta laughed bitterly. Aren't we all?'

'The bleeding should stop in a few hours' time. If it doesn't, please come straight back here. And by the way — in a few days' time we'll have the Western powers in the city too. The Yanks, the British and the French are each getting a part of Berlin as what they call an occupied sector. I heard it on the radio.'

'That's the best news in a long time,' said Jutta in English.

'You know English?'

'It was one of my husband's subjects. He taught at the Arndt Gymnasium. We spoke it once a week at home.'

'I just hope they'll bring us medicaments.'

'We have the water back on already, and sometimes the power too. I'll wash some of your white coats for you. And thank you very much, doctor.'

On the first Thursday in July 1945, the armoured reconnaissance vehicles of the 1st US Airborne Division rolled from the Brandenburg Gate over Hitler's East-West Axis through the devastated Tiergarten, and symbolically took possession of its sector of the city. Few Berliners watched the spectacle. They had seen more than enough military marches and parades. In the Onkel Toms Hiitte district the new masters made their presence felt with surveying troops who drove around fast in jeeps making marks everywhere, no one knew what for.

Jutta kept her windows open all day and gave the apartment a thorough clean. The old Protos vacuum cleaner howled, there was still a little Vim scouring powder for the kitchen, and Frau Reiche's green, soft soap took care of the rest. Copies of the Volkische Beobachter containing reports of the heroic battle for Berlin were no longer the latest news, but the newsprint was excellent for cleaning windows. A couple of Red Army soldiers had drunk the last of her methylated spirits. The apartment and its furnishings were as good as intact. More than half the window panes were still there, or only cracked. She neatly stopped up the others with cardboard and painted it white. She had found a pot of paint in the cellar.

Airing, cleaning and painting were an act of liberation. You could breathe again and make plans at last. It was true that public transport was only sporadic. 'But I'll make it to Kopenick somehow,' she said with optimism.

'Do you really want to go there? Kopenick is in the Russian sector.' Frau Reiche was chewing something with concentration.

'I absolutely have to see my parents. I can't phone them now. What's that you're eating?'

'Peppermint-flavoured chewing gum. Would you like a piece? A Yank gave me a packet, nice man. Showed me pictures of his family. His name's Sergeant Backols, he said. Took me a while to work out that that's how the Americans say Buchholz. His grandfather was from Konigswusterhausen.'

Jutta tried the chewing gum. The flavour was refreshing, but the gum wasn't really satisfying because you couldn't eat it. She switched on the People's Radio and turned the tuner. Lively swing came from the loudspeaker. 'This is AFN Berlin, the American Forces Network,' said the announcer. And now "Frolic at Five" with George Houdac.'

Goodbye Otto Dobrindt, Jutta thought with satisfaction.

She went down to the shopping street. In the first few days hordes of Reds, dead drunk, had kicked in the doors and looted the interiors of the shops. Now that things had calmed down some of the owners were beginning to clear up. Thomas the watchmaker was putting a few old alarm clocks in his broken window. 'Just so it won't look so empty.' Frowein and his wife were scrubbing their shelves. 'Looking forward to the first bananas,' joked the greengrocer.

Jutta had been here only once since the end of the war, to secure the bookshop door with a padlock and chain. In spite of her efforts, many books had been torn from the shelves, but most were still in good condition. She set about sorting them out.

'You can save yourself the trouble.' A man with a hat and briefcase came in, followed by two American officers. 'Wacker, District Office,' he introduced himself.

The older officer said a polite good day. The younger man, a lieutenant, looked Jutta up and down and whistled appreciatively. 'Hello, Fraulein, wie geht's?' he asked. How's things? It was obviously the only German sentence he knew.

'What can I do for you, gentlemen?' she asked with reserve.

'Herr Wacker will explain.'

There wasn't much to be explained. The US Army had requisitioned the entire Onkel Tom quarter from the shopping street to the Fischtal. All tenants of apartments and proprietors of shops must move out within two days.

'What about the books here and my furniture at home? I live at Number 47 Wilskistrasse.'

'If you can get the books taken away by the day after tomorrow that'll be all right. You can take only your clothes and other personal items from your apartment,' Herr Wacker told her.

And mind you hurry, Fraulein,' the lieutenant snapped.

'Looks as if you're not much better than the Reds,' Jutta fired back at the two Americans.

'I'm sorry,' the older man apologized.

The District Office will find you accommodation,' Herr Wacker said, raising his hat.

Troops from the US Engineers had already begun putting up tall posts and erecting a barbed-wire fence several kilometres long around the Onkel Toms Hiitte quarter.

Jutta was upset. She had thought everything was going to be better now. A new life would begin. The word 'future' would mean something again. And now these Americans had nothing better to do than drive humiliated and starving people away from the last few things they possessed.

She went to bed to shut out the ugly truth. Warm night air moved the curtains. The sheets were cool. In her mind's eye she saw faces. Jochen, little Didi, the appalling Drechsel, old Frau Mobich. They were all dead. And what about me? she asked herself in the dark. afraid. Am I not dead too?

HEADLIGHTS CUT THROUGH the darkness. With a grunt of annoyance, the killer dropped his victim and disappeared into the night. John Ashburner jumped out of the jeep. He knelt down beside Jutta, loosened the cattle chain and put the back of his hand to her carotid artery, desperately seeking her pulse. A motorbike started up nearby.

'I was a long way off,' she murmured, her eyes closed.

'You're back now,' he said, overjoyed. Very carefully, he picked her up and carried her to the jeep.

Dr Mobius examined the purple strangulation marks on her neck. 'They won't leave any trace,' he assured her. 'You were lucky. Thirty seconds longer and you'd be on the autopsy slab like the others. I'm going to keep you in until tomorrow. Your blood pressure is right down — not surprising, with the shock you had. Nurse Dagmar will get you into bed.'

The lanky figure of John Ashburner stood in the background. He had taken her straight to the nearby Waldfrieden hospital, and spent an anxious half-hour waiting until he was called into the examination room. 'Can I talk to her, doctor?'

'Two minutes.'

'There's nothing to talk about,' said Jutta defensively as he sat down on the side of the bed. 'You can talk to your wife.'

'Ethel? Sure. About our divorce. That's why she's here. She wants to marry this Jesse Rollins. She thinks you're very nice, by the way. Maybe a bit too impulsive.'

'Like this?' she said, flinging her arms around his neck and kissing him.

Nurse Dagmar appeared in the doorway. 'Could you get your car to shut up? It's yelling its head off, disturbing the patients.'

'See you tomorrow, darling. Goodnight, nurse.'

Ashburner hurried out to his jeep. Sergeant Donovan's voice was echoing from the loudspeaker. 'Call in, boss, for God's sake! Its bloody urgent.'

He was disappointed. She'd granted him nothing but a brief rattle in the throat, and then she withdrew before he could possess her. Spoilsport, he thought, feeling injured. He leaned his motorbike up against the kerb somewhere and patted the tank as if it were a horse's flank. It had helped him to get that persistent inspector out of the way. Now it was no more use to him. Feet dragging, he made his way home. In the kitchen, he carefully peeled himself an apple and bit into it. 'Too sour,' he muttered disapprovingly.