27

Hilka stood beside the portable bar. She took a cigarette and lit it. “Would you care for a drink?” she asked.

“I don’t drink.”

“Neither do I,” Hilka said, pouring half a glass of vodka. “Or, more correctly, neither should I.” She took a deep swallow. “Well, what do you think of my apartment? You haven’t told me.”

Spangler glanced around. He saw Hilka’s reflection in the wall of floor-to-ceiling mirrors. She was loosening the bodice of her brocade dressing gown. “Is that why you asked me here, to get my opinion of your apartment?”

“No, I’m sorry. That wasn’t what I meant to say at all. There are other things. Important things.”

“I told you before, I’m not interested, lady.”

“Hilka! My name is Hilka!” she shouted. “And you have to be interested. You must be interested. You are responsible for me!”

“My responsibility ended when I brought you out.”

“No it didn’t. It began then. I didn’t ask to be freed. I didn’t want to be freed. When the camp underground offered me an escape I refused. I was better off inside and I knew it. But you changed all that without thinking twice, without even asking me. Well, here I am, and you are responsible, so where shall we begin?”

Hilka began to drink, then thought the better of it. “Do you like my hair braided like this?”

“It looks all right.”

“Is that all? Do you think I’m pretty?”

“Yes.”

“How pretty?”

“Very pretty.”

“As pretty as a motion-picture star? In fact, I’ve played in a picture or two myself, but I don’t imagine you have seen them. I used to remind people of Jean Arthur. Do you think I’m as pretty as she is?”

“I have no way of knowing. I don’t go to movies.”

Hilka laid aside her drink and leaned back against the bar. “What do you intend to do about my situation?”

“What situation?”

“My rehabilitation. You brought me back to the conventional world. Now you must teach me to adjust to it. You understand what I’m saying, don’t you?”

“More or less.”

“How nice,” Hilka replied, smoothing her gown. “How flattering to be understood. But that’s one of your virtues, isn’t it—understanding? You knew immediately when I lied to you about Belsen and Mauthausen. And you were quite correct—I’ve never been at either. I was somewhere else. Have you ever heard of Salon Kitty?”

“The place in Berlin?”

“The bordello in Berlin. The unofficial Gestapo listening point. Every room had hidden microphones so that they could learn more about the distinguished clientele, especially the foreign diplomats.

“Yes, Salon Kitty,” she said in a musing tone. “It was the creation of Reinhard Heydrich, and Uncle Reini had no more enthusiastic admirer than my father. So when it became the patriotic and fashionable thing for young and beautiful Berlin girls to volunteer to take the places of the common prostitutes who originally staffed the establishment, my father felt it expedient for me to be included. That I was barely seventeen and still a virgin mattered little. I was taken from private school and sent to the establishment as a ‘personal ward’ of Uncle Reini. I ran away twice, but not because I disliked it. I was beginning to like it too much. You know how impressionable schoolchildren can be.

“Then one evening when several other girls and I were performing the ‘spectacular,’ I was discovered by a certain Obergruppenfuehrer von Schleiben. Even Heydrich feared this man, so I was given to him. He became a most ingenious mentor. Like all great artists he eventually tired of me, but at least my life was spared. I was sent to Oranienburg, where I could cause no future embarrassment. When the SS guards reviewed my exceptional qualifications I was immediately assigned to their private bordello—where my figure was not jeopardized by the ordinary camp fare.

“I was content in the bordello, because that’s all I really knew. But you have taken me from it.” Hilka moved around the couch and leaned against the chair next to Spangler. “Now what am I expected to do? I am accustomed to having six to ten men or women a day. Will that be supplied among the expensive clothes and furnishings here? My own pleasure is derived from more extreme activity. Will that be provided, too?”

“I’m sorry,” Spangler mumbled.

“Don’t be sorry, be useful,” Hilka said, letting her gown fall open. “Did you bring me back to be the whore or to portray a presentable woman? I have always lived under masters—so be my master! By your thoughtless action you have said, ‘Forget the past, live in the polite world.’ Well, then, show me how. Take me into the bedroom and show me how one man can effect the transition.”

“When it’s time for the bedroom, I’ll make the decision, not you.”

“No, no,” she cried desperately. “We mustn’t wait. There isn’t time. Don’t you see, nothing will be left if we wait.”

She moved forward and stood before him. Her gown fell to the floor. “Well, is it in the bedroom or here? I really don’t know where proper people perform the ritual. Forgive my abruptness, but it’s all I am accustomed to. How do we begin? How do nice people begin? Would you like to whip me? Or do you prefer it the other way around?

“Don’t look away, damn you. Show me! I am twisted. I am a freak. Cleanse me of all of that. Change me,” she pleaded, dropping to her knees and clasping Spangler’s hand.

Spangler reached down and touched her head. He raised her chin, wiped away a tear and gently pulled her to him. He stroked her forehead. Suddenly he pushed her away and jumped up. He shuddered involuntarily, raising his hand as if in a blessing, his lips moving as if in prayer. Tears came to his eyes.

“What is it?” she asked in bewilderment. “What have I done?”

Spangler turned and walked quickly to the door.

Kittermaster sat alone among the movie cameras and the recording equipment in the red-lighted secret observation corridor between Suites Seven and Eight. He watched Hilka stare after Spangler as he left the room. She went to the bar, nervously lit a cigarette and put it out after one puff. She picked up another and struck a match. She moved the flame close to her face and studied it hypnotically. She blew it out and entered the bathroom.

Kittermaster moved down to sit in front of a floor-to-ceiling, oneway bathroom mirror. Hilka stood facing him as she examined the reflection of her angular body. He could see the small round scars on the firm breasts and around her lower stomach.

She turned both taps on full blast, climbed into the tub and swung her legs up around the faucet. Water jetted down into her open thighs as her body arched and began to tremble. Her teeth clenched and her neck strained back in tension. Her body continued to struggle. Nothing was resolved.

Hilka rose from the tub and stood dripping in front of the mirror. Water and tears streamed down her face.

Her fingers clawed tentatively at the mount at the base of the abdomen. She reached for a cigarette and lit it. The first two puffs seemed to bring relaxation. She began to tremble again. Her arms dropped limply to her sides. Her head shook slowly and helplessly. She stared down at the cigarette. In one rapid motion she spread her legs and plunged the burning tip up between her thighs. Her scream was low and guttural; her body shook uncontrollably. The explosion came. Hilka fell forward against the mirror. Her arms moved slowly down the surface as she slipped to the floor. She curled up into a tight ball on the bath mat. Relaxation had arrived. So had hysteria.

Kittermaster silently made his way to the end of the observation room, opened the floor hatch and descended the circular metal staircase. He unlocked the door leading out into the fourth-floor corridor. He pulled back the knob. Two helmeted security guards sprawled motionless on the floor. He was starting to bend down over them when a hand clamped on his throat and lifted him from his feet. He gasped for breath and tried to break the grip. The single hand was too powerful. His head jerked forward and he stared down into Spangler’s face.

“Never, never let me catch you watching me again,” Spangler told Kittermaster, and released his hold.