His latest shadow-the third so far-was lurking in the lobby, as yet unaware of the journey in store. The Kolin trains went from Masaryk Station, which in the past he had always used on his trips to and from Berlin-it was here Giminich’s goons had intercepted him seven years earlier. The Nazis had called it the Hibernerbahnhof, but the original name had been restored in 1945. As he walked in through the gabled glass front of the terminus Russell wondered if the new government would change it again, now that it served as a reminder of the son’s suspicious demise.
There was a train to Kolin in twenty-five minutes. He bought a return ticket and took a seat on the concourse. His shadow, who had followed him into the booking office, and doubtless enquired as to where he was going, now strode across to one of the public phone booths, and peered out at Russell before dialling a number. After brief conversation, he re-emerged and took a seat of his own. Head Office had apparently sanctioned their jaunt to Kolin.
The forty-mile journey took almost two hours, the train squeaking to a halt at every conceivable platform, and a few other places beside. The booking office clerk at Kolin had never heard of Karlova Street, but one of the waiting passengers had-it was out on the other side of town, a fifteen-minute walk away. Once through the centre, he should follow the smell of the brewery.
His shadow had walked straight through to the forecourt, for reasons that now became clear-he’d been met by a local colleague in a Skoda Popular. They and their car now settled into Russell’s wake, purring along behind him at walking pace as he headed across town. Once through the centre, a group of boys playing football gave him further directions to Karlova Street, and soon he was walking down a line of workers’ cottages, looking for Number 17.
A woman in her fifties or sixties answered his knock.
‘Uschi Hausmann?’ he asked, knowing it couldn’t be her.
She shut the door without a word, but gently enough to suggest she might be back.
A young man re-opened it. There was an enamel red star in his jacket lapel, and he didn’t look particularly friendly, but to Russell’s relief he spoke passable Russian. ‘What’s your business with Uschi?’ he asked aggressively.
Russell explained that he had a message from her mother.
‘What message? Her mother abandoned her.’
‘The message is for her.’
He thought about that for a few seconds, then stepped aside for Russell to enter. A girl of about twenty was waiting in the front room, looking anxious. Her wavy blonde hair framed a strikingly beautiful face. She spoke German of course, but insisted on translating everything for the young man, whom she introduced as Ladislav. ‘I thought my mother was dead,’ was the first thing she said after Russell had explained his reason for being there. ‘Where has she been all these years?’
Russell explained as best he could.
‘So she’s in Berlin. Why didn’t she come herself?’
‘The authorities won’t give her a visa. You may not know it, but your government in Prague has been restricting travel in and out of the country over the past few months.’
The boy bristled at that. ‘It’s the Western governments who have been making things difficult. They send many spies-everyone knows it.’
‘Whoever’s to blame,’ Russell told Uschi, ‘your mother can’t get to you. So she is hoping that you can come to her. I’m sure the government wouldn’t stand in the way of a family reunion,’ he added, more for the young man’s benefit than because he really believed it.
Ladislav was shaking his head. ‘This is out of the question. We are getting married in a few weeks.’
‘Ah. I understand. Would you like to write to your mother?’ he asked Uschi. ‘I could take a letter back with me.’
She looked uncertain.
‘Ladislav said that you think she abandoned you,’ Russell said. ‘I have to tell you that she believes she saved you from the Gestapo by sending you off to the mountains, and that when they came for her, she had no choice but to run. That if she hadn’t abandoned you, you would be an orphan.’
‘It’s been so long.’
‘America is a long way away, and she had a baby to look after. You have a little sister.’
She said something to Ladislav in Czech, which Russell guessed was a plea for permission. When he nodded, she turned back to Russell, and said she would write the letter. Would he like some tea while he waited?
Now that the main matter was decided, Ladislav seemed to relax, and the two of them spent the next twenty minutes discussing Czechoslovakia’s future. The lad obviously cared for his country, fellow citizens and soon-to-be wife, but Russell wouldn’t have entered him in a political perspicacity contest. He kept his own fears for Czechoslovakia to himself, and hoped that in this one instance he would be proved wrong.
Eventually Uschi emerged, her letter written and sealed. ‘I hope my mother understands,’ she told Russell. ‘That I’m grown-up now, and my place is here. I’ve included a photograph of Ladislav and me, so that she’ll know.’
‘I’m sure she’ll be happy that you’re happy,’ Russell told her. ‘And I’m sure she’ll write back, now that she knows exactly where you are. And later, when things are a bit more settled, maybe she can visit you or you can visit her.’
‘America is a long way away,’ Ladislav insisted, but Russell could see the young man was drawn by the prospect. As he turned to leave, he remembered the Skoda outside. ‘I was followed when I came here,’ he told them, ‘and I expect they’ll follow me back again. But later, someone will want to ask you what we talked about. I just thought I’d warn you, so it’s not a surprise.’
Walking back to the station, the car twenty metres behind him, he thought about Lisa Sundgren. He’d never met her of course, but they shared one terrible thing-both had been forced to choose between leaving a child and almost certain death. He had never really hesitated, because both were forms of abandonment, and the former at least held hope of eventual reunion, but he was still acutely aware of what havoc his sudden departure had wreaked on Paul’s psyche.
And now, just like his own son, Lisa’s long-lost daughter was getting married, setting the distance between them in stone. From this point forth the best either could hope for were letters full of news and strangers’ names, pictures of grandchildren, and once-in-a-blue-moon visits.
The Soviet response to Effi’s challenge-or at least its first instalment-arrived on Monday morning. The top-grade ration card given to first-rank artists was being withdrawn, on the grounds that she was no longer actively pursuing her career in Berlin. Her rejection of the DEFA script proved as much.
This was annoying, but hardly shattering. With Russell’s multiple employers and Zarah’s American connection their extended family wasn’t short on privilege, economic or otherwise.
The second instalment, which appeared at Effi’s door that afternoon, was of another order altogether. The official from City Hall looked meek enough, but the message he brought was potentially devastating. Irregularities had been discovered in their adoption of Rosa, which was now to be reviewed. There were doubts as to whether sufficient diligence had been exerted in the search for Rosa’s real father, doubts as to whether a former star of the National Socialist film industry could be considered a suitable parent.
Effi treated the official with what seemed appropriate disdain, but dissolved into tears the moment the door closed behind him. It was all absurd, but what did right or reason have to do with it? They were playing their games to win, and they didn’t care how.
The film director Jaromir Cisar was short and wiry, with longish black hair and busy eyes. His Smichov apartment had a distinctly Bohemian air, which wasn’t that common in Gottwald’s Bohemia. Shelves and tables were crowded with exotic objets d’art, walls plastered with film stills. Some of the latter were doubtless from Cisar’s own films, but others Russell recognised-the dentist’s chair scene from Horse Feathers, Dietrich wreathed in smoke on the Shanghai Express, Arletty and a love-sick Jean-Louis Barrault in Les Enfants du Paradis.