Schlegel took several drafts until he had a report innocuous enough for no one to bother with. The fire had not been mentioned in the newspapers, either being censored or too late for morning editions. Any awkward aspects he ignored – such as the gas board having no record of leaks in the area of evacuation. A cursory search had revealed nothing on the clinic. Its telephone number was ex-directory – if anyone wanted to check, he could do so through the companies register or the health inspectorate.
Nor did he mention any falling body.
He cursed his luck. Were it not for a coincidence of geography and had he not gone to check on his stepfather, he would know nothing of the fire.
His final report offered a terse summary of location, circumstances, evacuated building, tardiness of the fire department, possible arson for insurance purposes (surmise; no proof), names and addresses of the three bicycle brats and the late arrival of uncooperative authorities who did not say what they were.
File and forget.
*
He remained preoccupied by the puzzle of his father’s Mein Kampf. The night before, he had laid everything out on the table in his apartment: the book, the guide to Munich, the bus ticket, the photograph of the bright young girl, the smart photograph of his stepfather, and the list. On the bus ticket someone had written ‘Room 202’. A hotel room? A room to report to? In the map part of the guide one of the streets, Nussbaumstrasse, had been underscored in ink. He couldn’t get it out of his head that all these components were trying to tell him something. He looked at the two photographs: his stepfather, more central than usual, with the man in Party uniform; and the torn one, offering a glimpse perhaps of his missing father, appropriately removed. Complicated histories to both, Schlegel suspected, thinking he was bound to try and find out.
*
He sloped off early from work, telling himself he was just going back to his stepfather’s, which he did, briefly, to find it the same. All the while he was wondering about the clinic. Don’t pick the scab, he had been warned as a child, and he always had.
The gutted building, with its scorched brickwork, already looked neglected and forlorn, with the roof since collapsed. The municipal authorities, usually efficient at sealing off damaged property, had done nothing, leaving Schlegel free to walk down the drive, under what was left of the modern wing. He could still feel the heat from the ashes. The ambulance was a shell, its back doors blown off to reveal a deep bed of soft grey ash in which the remains of any dead body were not apparent. He didn’t have to be there, Schlegel kept telling himself, checking automatically over his shoulder as he passed through the clinic’s missing back door and stepped inside, conscious of his footprints in the virgin ash.
The building unnerved with its creaks and groans, as though making a last effort to transmit the trauma of its destruction. The air was still acrid. The fire had swept everything before it. The ceiling had collapsed in several rooms and was still smouldering. He looked back at his wavering footprints that told him no one else had been in the building.
*
He didn’t expect a cellar. The fire hadn’t reached down there. There was less damage towards the front where corridors and rooms remained more intact.
Schlegel presumed the door was a cupboard until he found himself looking at descending steps. Turning to go, he saw the narrow shelf with a lantern and matches for power cuts.
He held the lit lamp tentatively in front of him as he made his way down. At the bottom was a bare space, with benches. The cellar served as a bomb shelter. The low ceiling forced him to stoop.
A second space revealed the same. On the threshold of a smaller annex he saw a solitary female shoe, turned sideways in the dirt. A practical shoe, for the sort of person who spent a lot of the day on her feet.
Some minutes later he left the building in a state of composed shock, scuffing his footprints in an effort to disguise his trail. At the doorway he paused and saw it looked like someone had tried to pretend he hadn’t been there, with good reason.
Eight bodies in the cellar, two male, six female, shot in the back of the head, execution-stye. White coats. Clinic staff.
*
On the train back, Schlegel looked at the tired passengers, trying to guess which ones informed and decided he may as well go out, get drunk and look for Gerda. The rest could wait. What he had just discovered put him way out of his depth. The question was did he report what he had found? And to whom? There were no off-record conversations. No doubt a demolition crew would come and the bodies would be buried in the rubble, and that would be that, Schlegel thought, so leave it.
He found Gerda in one of the illicit clubs out near Wollankstrasse. The venue was a dive, full of smoke and sweat. She wasn’t there at first, then she was, just as he was about to give up. They shouted meaningless pleasantries in the din and hopped to the music. The syncopated, scratchy rhythms compounded the tension in his body as he kept thinking of white coats and executed corpses.
When they left they groped around in a doorway, but in a perfunctory manner. It felt easier, walking in step, their sleeves occasionally brushing, than it had fumbling with her.
They walked on in silence until he asked how she knew about the cellar clubs.
‘Wild fliers. Luftwaffe boys,’ she said; a crowd on leave, most of them dead now. One with a rebellious kid brother introduced them to the scene.
He warned her it might not be safe to carry on going to the clubs.
‘How do you know?’
‘A friend in the Gestapo.’
‘A reliable friend?’ she asked, carefully.
‘Most of the time.’
‘Are you going to report me?’ she asked, sounding worried.
‘I would have already if I was going to.’
‘Perhaps we could go out on a date instead.’
They both laughed to show it was meant as a joke.
A street or so later, she said, ‘As in two people doing something together.’
‘Haven’t we rather got beyond that?’
He found her disconcerting.
‘I am curious to see where you live,’ she said.
Now that he was being offered, he wasn’t sure. What would they talk about? He barely knew what she looked like. Their relationship had been confined to dark cellars and street blackouts. He was more familiar with her body in a blind way than he was with her.
‘Don’t worry,’ she said. ‘I’m not going to stay.’
She had read his mind, Schlegel thought.
‘Ninety-six steps,’ he said. ‘It’s right up in the roof.’
She was his first guest. He listened to her softly counting off the steps as he followed the soft moves of her legs.
She wandered around inspecting his meagre possessions. The Mein Kampf was open on the table. She read the dedication and the effect was electric. ‘The Führer!’ she gasped.
Schlegel suspected she was 120 per cent Nazi. He looked at her properly for the first time in the dawn light and couldn’t decide if he would have been attracted had they met normally. She had a big-boned girl’s forced cheerfulness. Quite sporty. Pleasingly fair hair, flawless skin and a tan. She shone with rude health. A tiny misalignment in one eye gave her an askance, seductive look.