Len Deighton 3-Book War Collection Volume 1: Bomber, XPD, Goodbye Mickey Mouse. Len Deighton
the tailoring business?’
‘Yes, Herr Bürgermeister,’ said Voss. ‘I still have one cutter downstairs and there are certain lining materials which can be obtained only from Jewish concerns in the Netherlands. Now take this lining in your tunic …’
‘I don’t wish to know about it,’ said the Burgomaster hurriedly. ‘I was asking in case you have heard of a person named Meyer: Hans-Willy Meyer.’
‘I don’t recall the name, Herr Bürgermeister, but my cutter Jakob might know. Shall I fetch him?’
‘Yes,’ said the Burgomaster.
Poor Jakob; he came into the room in answer to old Mr Voss’ call and found the Burgomaster in his full Party uniform. For a moment he completely forgot that this was the very garment he had been handling only an hour before and went white with horror.
‘There’s nothing to fear, Jakob,’ said Voss. ‘There’s nothing to fear, Herr Bürgermeister, is there?’ he added.
‘Nothing,’ said the Burgomaster. ‘I merely wondered whether you knew a young man named Hans-Willy Meyer. He lives in Florastrasse.’
‘No, Herr Bürgermeister,’ said Jakob.
‘It will not mean trouble for him,’ promised the Burgomaster. ‘I promise it upon my word as a German officer.’
‘You are sure, sir?’
Voss said, ‘Of course, Jakob.’ All these Jews were suspicious; why couldn’t they behave like patriots.
‘The fellow has been denounced,’ declared the Burgomaster dramatically. ‘Tell me what you know of him; it can only help.’
There were so few Jewish families left in Altgarten that it was foolish to deny that he knew young Meyer.
‘He is a fine young man,’ said Jakob. ‘His family comes from Lübeck. He works on a farm. It means catching a bus at five-thirty AM.’
‘When did you first know him?’ The Burgomaster offered Jakob a cigarette. The Jews didn’t get a tobacco ration – or a meat ration either – and Jakob dearly loved to smoke.
‘I lived near his parents in Lübeck,’ said the old tailor. He took a cigarette but stored it carefully away.
‘His father’s parents were Jewish?’
‘No, both his father’s parents were Aryan. It was just his mother’s mother who was Jewish.’
‘Are you quite sure?’
‘I am quite sure, Herr Bürgermeister. There was so much talk about it.’ Jakob gave a short laugh. ‘His father was one of the most prosperous pork butchers in Lübeck.’
Ryessman smiled. ‘So this fellow Meyer is only one-third Jewish.’
‘For you perhaps, Herr Bürgermeister,’ said the old tailor. ‘For me, he is not Jewish at all.’
The thing that still puzzled the Burgomaster was the way in which this Jewish fool Meyer had signed the reclassification form. It was almost as if he wanted to be down-classified.
‘See the shoulder, Jakob: high when the Herr Bürgermeister is seated, but straight when he stands.’
Ryessman was irritated that they should talk of him as though he was deformed. Like surgeons rather than tailors, and that’s the way they looked at him too.
‘Are you finished?’
‘Yes, thank you, Herr Bürgermeister. The day after tomorrow for another fitting. We must have it exactly right.’
‘My secretary will phone,’ said Ryessman.
‘Is he well?’ asked Voss.
‘Niels?’ said Ryessman. He smiled. ‘He was when I left him an hour ago.’
‘I thought I saw him going into the front entrance of the hospital,’ said Voss. ‘I wondered whether he was sick or just visiting.’
‘You were mistaken,’ said the Burgomaster, but his voice lacked conviction. Young Niels had not been his usual self today, and there was the strange business of the hidden dossier. Perhaps he was sick, perhaps he was in hospital. From the window of Voss’ office he could see the grey-brick St Antonius Hospital and beyond it the flat roof of the Annex building. For a moment he was tempted to use the phone and ask the reception if they had admitted Niels, but he decided that if Niels was in hospital the Rathaus would have phoned him here at the tailors to report it.
The Burgomaster was wrong on both items. At that moment Andi Niels, personal secretary to the Burgomaster of Altgarten, was occupying a bed in Room 28 on the top floor of the silent Annex building.
Originally the Annex had been intended as an overflow for St Antonius solely to cater for Altgarten’s increased population, but under the new hospital zoning arrangements it was used to receive air-raid casualties from badly bombed cities in the Ruhr. From here they were dispersed as soon as possible and the beds made ready for the next contingent of casualties. It was a stroke of genius to build the Training Centre for Samariter nursing assistants between the hospital and the amputee camp. The poor little girls worked until they dropped. Especially on those awful days when convoys of the new bus-like ambulances were jammed along Joachimstrasse so that air-raid victims from the Ruhr were lying in corridors for want of bed-space. Samariter with only a couple of weeks’ training found themselves working in the operating rooms or casualty wards. On the days when there were no RAF raids the Samariter worked almost as hard in the Amputee Centre across the road. At any time of day or night the nurses’ accommodation wing of the Training Centre was dark with a silence marred only by the snores and nightmares of the exhausted girls.
There were many young girls in Altgarten: Red Cross nurses, Frei sisters, Brown sisters and Samariter. The tearooms and hairdressers vibrated with their chatter and the inhabitants of Altgarten were never at loss for a story about their shameless activities. Once a month there were dances at the Training Centre. TENO officers, SS men from the Wald Hotel training camp and certain local residents received neatly penned invitations and displayed them like honours. All three of the town’s hairdressers could be certain of one ticket; so could the haberdasher and an old man named Drews who regularly obtained bolts of silk and linen from some secret source over the border. For obvious reasons the senior staff at Kessel’s brewery were asked and the Burgomaster’s office received a ticket as a matter of courtesy. Andi Niels used that ticket.
Tonight there was to be a dance at the Training Centre. The girls had decorated the assembly hall with coloured papers and cardboard representations of Mount Fuji. On the tickets it had hopefully said ‘fancy dress with a theme of old Japan’ but only the most enthusiastic girls had sewn together a costume.
‘The old fool invited me to his birthday dinner,’ said Andi Niels. ‘What the devil can I do?’
‘Couldn’t you get away early?’ said the nurse. She was a short plump sexy girl who giggled readily at any situation. She giggled now.
‘There’ll be toasts to his father, the regiment, officers who fell in the first war. Then we’ll listen to speeches and sing old war songs. You’ve no idea what it’s like.’
‘There’ll be food at the dance. The girls have been saving their rations for three weeks.’
‘No matter,’ said Niels sadly. ‘We’ll go to Düsseldorf this weekend and stay in a fine hotel.’
‘And share a room?’ said the nurse. She giggled. ‘They will ask for our papers.’
‘I can fix that.’
‘Have you inherited some money?’
‘As a matter of fact, I have,’ said Niels. He turned over in bed and reached down to her. ‘You’ve left your stockings on,’ he accused.
‘Just in case.’
‘The door’s locked, and