“Oh, those,” her mother replied. “Just a moment, dear.” Posie went over to the gramophone and put on a record. The music was earthshaking.
Posie Winfield began to speak in a low voice. “So the wolf trap badge is the insignia of a new German resistance force, part of a new plan. The new force is to carry out guerrilla attacks against occupying forces.”
“Occupying?” Alice opened her eyes wide.
“The Russians aren’t falling back. They’re closer every day. Not only that, but new units are being formed. A militia, the Volkssturm. Old men and even children are being armed. Can you believe it? Children! They are sending children out there with guns and grenades. They hardly have any guns left since the Russians blew up those factories to the south.”
“But what does that symbol of the wolf trap mean?”
“It’s one of these new units, a force known as the Werewolf . . . real brutes. They make the SS look like puppy dogs.”
“But why the uniform if they’re guerrilla fighters? Guerrilla fighters, resistance fighters, don’t normally wear uniforms, right?”
“Psychological, my dear. Most likely the P of D.”
Alice instantly knew who they were referring to. The P of D, the Prince of Darkness. It was code for Joseph Goebbels, the master of propaganda. He was brilliant at the game of intimidation, through which he could manipulate a single person’s mind or that of an entire population.
So, pocketing the Reichsmarks her father gave her, an hour later Alice left the garage. She didn’t go immediately to the department store, but stopped first at Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church and the mailbox on the southeast corner of the Breitscheidplatz. There she left a chalk mark, to signal to the operative that she would be leaving a coded message at the dead drop location in the hedge of the church’s cemetery.
The message was an assessment of the Führer’s mental condition. Her report was brief. The code was a triplex—Icelandic with inverted vowels and mathematical symbols.
Physical and mental condition appear to have deteriorated noticeably in last ten days. Tremor in arm markedly worse. Sleeping only one to two hours at night, according to people close to him. Mumbles incessantly to himself. Easily distracted, except when watching scenes from his favorite operas. Irritability increased. I suggest that Starling is increasingly susceptible to reverse projection phenomena.
She had written on an old newspaper in a code where she had circled certain words. It was Rasa code four six five that she had used to encode. She dropped the message, and her contact—whoever that was—would use Rasa code five six four to decode it.
She then headed toward the department store Hermankrantz. It was the only department store, now that the Jewish one, Wertheim, had been taken over by the Reich.
But before she went to the store, she walked to the block where she first had glimpsed Louise, or the girl who she thought was Louise. She stood on the corner and scanned the throngs of people. There were several young men with the badges of the wolf trap that those motorcycle troopers had worn. But there was no sign of Louise. Alice realized that this could be a fruitless effort. There were more than three million people in Berlin. The chances of her sister’s new or old face showing up were ridiculously slim. Perhaps on some level she had subconsciously been wishing to see her sister and had willed her face to appear.
Her thoughts went back to her mission. She knew that she would not be the actual agent to pull the trigger. Or would it be poison? Or a bomb? She would be an inoperative accessory at best, as opposed to a special op. Her job was to stay alert and serve as a passive conduit. She must be able to maintain the highest level of vigilance and also absolute deniability of any knowledge.
Apparently the Allied air forces had been boosted by the invasion in Normandy that had happened only three weeks before. Their strategic bombing on Berlin had wreaked more destruction than she had thought. The central part of the city, the Mitte, was severely damaged, along with a train station, from strategic bombing on factories and supply depots. There were gouges in the street, exposing the innards of the city. Along with tangles of electrical wires, there was the stench of ruptured sewer lines. It was as if some surgeon from the sky had decided to operate and rip out a devouring cancer. But the cancer was only spreading. The air was so thick with dust that Alice had to wrap her scarf around her mouth so she would not inhale the soot and grime of war.
The department store where she had planned to buy warm clothes was almost completely demolished. A woman ran from the ruins clutching a bundle of some sort.
“Help yourself, darling! It’s drenched with water, but it will dry out.” It looked as if she was carrying blankets and possibly jackets. Was it considered looting if the goods were damaged? Alice thought she might as well try. She found no clothing, damaged or otherwise, but she did find several cans of tinned goods in the food section, similar to Harrod’s department store in London. Food would be better than blankets, at least for now. She stuffed her shopping satchel with half a dozen tins of sardines and three smaller ones of liver pate. Where’d the liver come from? she wondered. She hoped not a pig. But then again, David himself had bought the pork sausage when his father had ordered him to leave train station.
This part of the city smelled like wet ashes, but the odor diminished as she headed north and east toward the alley of the whipped-cream house. She passed Zeiberg’s Bakery, where she and her mother had first bought the bee sting cake and the baker had given her some cookies as a welcome gift to the neighborhood. Now there were no elaborate goodies in the window—just bread. Nevertheless, she went through the door. The bell tinkled. The proprietor looked up.
“Welcome. I wish I had more to offer. But just bread, child.”
“Bread will be fine.”
“You must be new to the neighborhood. Haven’t seen you around before.”
“Yes, um . . . I was evacuated during the bombings in autumn. . . .”
“Came back just in time for a second round for summer, eh?”
“Guess so.”
“Great timing.” He gave a gruff laugh. “Normally I offer a gift of our special anise cookies. But you tell me where I can find anise these days?”
“It’s okay, I’ll just take that.” She pointed at a seeded loaf of bread.
“Good choice. The healthiest bread that I make.”
“Oh, good, very good.” Alice took the reichsmarks from her pocket and paid for the bread.
Twenty-One
The Secret Garden
The whipped-cream house still stood, as elegant as ever. Alice leaned against a lamppost watching it. There was no sign of life, however. No official cars pulled up in front. The housemaids were probably inside dusting, waxing floors, and polishing silver. It seemed so odd. How could the world go on like this, with the war raging outside its walls? The house was within three quarters of a mile from the bombed-out blocks she had just left. Perhaps it was like during the German bombing campaign of London—the Blitz, it was called. There were massive air raids against the city. Many died. Buildings and homes were left in smithereens. For fifty-seven days and nights, London was pounded. But despite all, London managed to carry on.
She remembered three years before, at the beginning of the Blitz, when they were living in Eaton Square. The maids had came and dusted and polished. In this instance, her mother had posed as a war widow with distinguished ancestry. Of course, it was all set up by the Company and MI6. The cover story was their family’s aristocratic history—complete with fabricated documentation, as well as the house bought and furnished by MI6.