“And nobody says anything?”
“Oh, plenty. But you can’t court-martial a man for being stupid. Not when he thinks he’s doing one of the guests a favor. Best you can do is transfer him out. I’d lay you even money it was just a matter of time before those papers were in the works again. But then he went to Potsdam. Which is where you came in.”
Jake had flipped open the folder and was staring at the photograph stapled to the top sheet. Young, not bloated from a night of drifting in the Jungfernsee. He tried to picture Tully striding through a Hessian village with a riding crop, but the face was bland and open, the kind of kid you found on a soda fountain stool in Natick, Mass. But the war had changed everybody.
“I still don’t get it,” he said finally. “If it was that loose, why pay to get out? From the sound of it, he could have jumped out a window and run. Couldn’t he?”
“Theoretically. Look, nobody’s trying to escape from Kransberg- it doesn’t occur to them. They’re scientists, not POWs. They’re trying to get a ticket to the promised land, not run away. Maybe he wanted the pass-you know what they’re like about documents. So officially he wouldn’t be AWOL.”
“It’s a hell of a lot to pay for a pass. Anyway, where did the money come from?”
“I don’t know. Ask him. Isn’t that what you wanted to know in the first place?”
Jake looked up from the picture. “No, I wanted to know why Tully was killed. From the sound of it, there could have been a hundred reasons.”
“Maybe,” Bernie said slowly. “And maybe just one.”
“Just because a man signed a piece of paper?”
Bernie spread his hands again. “Maybe a coincidence. Maybe a connection. A man gets out of Kransberg and heads for Berlin. A week later the man who gets him out comes to Berlin and ends up killed. I don’t believe in coincidence. It has to connect somewhere. You add two and two-”
“I know this man. He didn’t kill anybody.”
“No? Well, I’d sure like to hear it from him. Ask him about the SS medal while you’re at it, since you know him so well.” He went over to the piano. “Anyway, he’s your lead. You won’t even have to go looking. He’s coming to you.”
“He hasn’t turned up yet.”
“Does he know where you are?” Bernie said to Lena.
She had slumped onto the bench again, staring at the floor. “His father, maybe. His father knows.”
“Then sit tight. He’ll show up. Or maybe you’d rather he didn’t,” he said to Jake. “A little inconvenient, all things considered.”
“What’s gotten into you?” Jake said, surprised at his tone.
“I don’t like putting Nazis in hotels, that’s all.”
“He didn’t do it,” Jake said.
“Maybe. Maybe you don’t want to do the math anymore. Add it up. Two and two.” He gathered the other folders off the piano. “I’m late. Frau Brandt,” he said, a courtesy nod that became a parting shot. He turned to Jake. “It connects.”
He was halfway across the room before Jake stopped him.
“Bernie? Try this one. Two and two. Tully comes to Berlin. But the only one we know he was coming to see was you.”
Bernie stood quietly for a moment. “Meaning?”
“Numbers lie.”
When Bernie left, the room seemed as still and airless as a vacuum tube, the only movement the ticking of the hall clock.
“Don’t mind him,” Jake said finally. “He just talks tough. He likes to be mad.”
Lena said nothing, then got up and went over to the window, folding her arms over her chest and staring out. “So now we’re all Nazis.”
“That’s just Bernie. Everybody’s a Nazi to him.”
“And it’s better in America? Your German girlfriend. Was she a Nazi too? That’s how he looks at me. And he’s your friend. Frau Brandt,” she said, imitating Bernie.
“That’s just him.”
“No, I am Frau Brandt. I forgot, for a little while.” She turned to him. “Now it’s really like before. There are three of us.”
“No. Two.”
She smiled weakly. “Yes, it was nice. We should go now. The rain’s finished.”
“You don’t love him,” he said, a question.
“Love,” she said, dismissing it. She turned to the piano. “I’ve scarcely seen him. He was away. And after Peter, everything changed It was easier not to see each other.” She looked back. “But I won’t send him to prison either. You can’t ask me to do that.”
“I’m not.”
“Yes. I’m the bait-isn’t that what he said? I saw your face-like a policeman. All those questions.”
“He’s not going to prison. He didn’t kill anybody.”
“How do you know? I did.”
“That was different.”
“Maybe it was different for him too.”
He looked at her. “Lena, what is it? You know he didn’t.”
“And you think that matters to them? A German? They blame us for everything.” She stopped and looked away. “I won’t send him to prison.”
He went over to her, turning her face with his finger. “Do you really think I’d ask you to do that?”
She looked at him, then moved away. “Oh, I don’t know anything anymore. Why can’t we leave things as they are?”
“This is the way they are,” he said quietly. “Now stop worrying. Everything’s going to be all right. But we have to find him. Before the others do. You see that.”
She nodded.
“Would he really go to his father? You said they didn’t speak.”
