Lise snorted. "You know our children too well to say anything silly like that. Francesca likes to sleep in, but Alicia and Roxane will be up at the crack of dawn."
"Ghastly habit," Willi said. "Our two like to lie in bed, the lazy good-for-nothings." He stuck out a finger in Heinrich's direction. "Meant to ask you:are the Americans going to make their assessment this fiscal year?"
"I'm…not sure," Heinrich answered cautiously. He knew the Americans were unlikely to, but didn't want to say so in front of Lise and Erika, neither of whom had the security clearance to hear such things.
Willi's wave said he understood why his friend was being so cagey. It also said he thought Heinrich was being a wet blanket. He asked, "Are we gearing up to wallop the Americans if they don't meet the assessment?"
"Not that I've heard," Heinrich said, which combined caution and truth.
"I haven't, either," Willi said. "You know how I was complaining a while ago about not living in glorious times?" He waited for Heinrich to nod, then went on, "I didn't think we were gettingthis soft when I grumbled, I'll tell you that."
"I don't think we're soft," Heinrich said. "Germany rules the biggest empire the world has ever seen. Ruling and conquering are different businesses. A ruler can forgive things a conqueror would have to step on."
"Not if he wants to keep on ruling, he can't," Willi said, going red in the face.
"No, Heinrich's right," Erika said, which made Lise raise an eyebrow and made Willi turn even redder. Erika went on, "If you want to hold a country down without a rebellion every other year, you-"
"Kill the first two or three batches of rebels and everybody who's related to them," Willi broke in. "After a while, the people who are left-if there are any-get the idea and settle down. That's what finally worked for us in England."
In a way, he was right; England hadn't risen against the Reich since the mid-1970s. Even so…Heinrich said, "'Finally' is a word with a lot of bodies behind it. When we can, we ought to run things more…more efficiently. That's the word I want." It was, he hoped, a word that wouldn't rouse the interest, let alone the anger, of the Security Police.
"We ought to run, period," Lise said. "Kathe's going to be impatient with us." She didn't want any sort of political argument, even with friends. In that, she was undoubtedly wise. When she rose to her feet, Heinrich followed suit as automatically as he would have in the bridge game.
"I'll get your coats out of the closet," Erika said, which meant she thought the evening was at an end. Willi walked out to the front hall with them, but he didn't say anything. Heinrich hoped his friend wasn't fuming about being contradicted. It wouldn't have been so bad had Heinrich been the only one to disagree with him. But when Erika did, too, that must have felt like a stab in the back. Willi managed a smile and a bad joke when the Gimpels headed for the bus stop. That eased Heinrich's mind. But, after the door closed behind Lise and him, Willi's voice rose angrily-and so did Erika's.
"What's that all about?" Lise pointed back toward the Dorsches' house.
"I think Willi thinks he ought to be jealous of me," Heinrich said unhappily.
"Jealous? Jealous how?" his wife asked. He didn't answer. His wife walked on for a couple of paces before stopping short. "Jealous likethat?" Even more unhappily, Heinrich nodded. "And does he have reason to be jealous like that?" Lise inquired ominously.
"Not on account of me," Heinrich said. That covered the most important part of the question. Not quite all of it, though; he felt he had to add, "I'm not so sure about Erika."
They got to the brightly lit bus stop. Lise tapped her toe on the cement of the sidewalk. "I can't fault her taste, but I did see you first, you know. Kindly remember it."
"I will. For all sorts of reasons, I will," Heinrich said.
"She's pretty. You'd better," Lise said. The bus rolled up just then, which saved him from having to answer: a small mercy, but he took what he could get.
II
FRANZ OPPENHOFF LOOKED AT SUSANNA WEISS THROUGH spectacles that grotesquely magnified his bloodshot blue eyes. "I fail to see the necessity for this journey," he said, and scratched at the bottom edge of a white muttonchop sideburn.
Susanna looked back at the department chairman with a loathing she tried to conceal. "But,Herr Doktor Professor, it is the annual meeting of the Medieval English Association-and only the third time it's metin England since the war."
Oppenhoff paused to light a cigar. It was a fine Havana, but the smoke still put Susanna, who didn't use tobacco, in mind of burning long johns. She coughed, not too ostentatiously. After a puff, he said, "Many-even most-of these meetings are a waste of time, a waste of effort, and a waste of our travel budget."
"Oh?" Somehow, Susanna made one syllable sound dangerous. "Is that what you said when Professor Lutze asked to attend?"
"I didn't…" Professor Oppenhoff paused, evidently deciding he couldn't get away with the lie direct. He tried again: "I thought the conference would enhance his professional development, he being-"
"A man?" Susanna finished for him.
"That is not what I was going to say." The chairman sounded offended.
Susanna Weisswas offended. "What were you going to say, then,Herr Doktor Professor? That Professor Lutze is junior to me? He is. That he has published less than half of what I have? He has. That what hehas published is superficial compared to my work? It is, as any specialist will tell you." She smiled with poisonous sweetness. "There. You see? We agree completely."
Professor Oppenhoff tried to draw on the cigar again, but choked on the smoke. Susanna held the poisoned smile till his coughs subsided into wheezes. He wagged a shaky forefinger at her. "You have not the attitude of a proper National Socialist woman," he said severely.
"Do I have the attitude of a proper National Socialist scholar?" No matter how offended, no matter how angry Susanna was, she took care to throw back the Party's name as if she were returning a lob in a game of tennis. "Don't you think that is how you ought to judge me?"
"You should be turning out babies, not articles," Oppenhoff said.
That she remained unwed, that she had no children, was a private grief for Susanna. Her back stiffened. Her private griefs were none of Oppenhoff's damned business. "If Professor Lutze's work is good enough to let him deserve to go to London for the Medieval English Association meeting, what part of mine disqualifies me from going, too?" She didn't say Lutze didn't deserve to go, no matter what she thought. That would have got her another enemy. Academic politics were nasty enough without trying to make them worse.
"The travel budget…" the chairman said portentously.
This time, Susanna's smile was pure carnivore. "I've spoken with the accountants. We have plenty. In fact, they recommend that we spend more before the end of the fiscal year in June. If we have unexpended funds, people are liable to decide we don't need so much next year."
Franz Oppenhoff went gray with horror. A budget cut was every department chairman's nightmare. He threw his hands in the air. Cigar ash fluttered down onto his desk like snow. "Go to London,Fraulein Doktor Professor Weiss! Go! Uphold the reputation of the university!" Not quite inaudibly, he added, "And get the devil out of my hair."
Susanna pretended not to hear that. Having got what she wanted, she could afford to be gracious. "Thank you very much, Professor Oppenhoff. I'll make my travel arrangements right away." In fact, she'd already made them. If she hadn't been able to browbeat Oppenhoff into letting her go, she would have had to cancel. She could easily have afforded the plane ticket and hotel, but she couldn't have gone during the semester without leave from on high. Now she had it.
"Is there anything else?" Professor Oppenhoff inquired.
She was tempted to complain that her office was smaller and had a worse view than those of male professors less senior than she-she seldom did things by half. Here, though, she judged she'd pushed the chairman about as far as she could. "Not today, thanks," she said grandly, like a snooty shopper declining a salesgirl's assistance. Small, straight nose tilted high, she strode out of Oppenhoff's office.