He was on the telephone and in a bad mood. From what I could gather, Hitler had decided to award a posthumous Knight’s Cross with Oak-Leaf Cluster and Swords to the chief of the Japanese Navy; the only trouble was that it seemed the Japanese emperor had raised some objections to the idea of a Japanese officer being decorated by “barbarians,” by which I assume he meant us.
“But it’s a great honor,” Goebbels said. “The first time a foreign military officer has been awarded this decoration. Please impress upon Tojo and his Imperial Majesty that the leader merely wishes to acknowledge the respect in which the admiral was held by him and that this is in no way intended as a way of trumping your own Order of the Chrysanthemum. Yes. I understand. Thank you.”
Goebbels banged down the telephone receiver and stared at me balefully.
“Well? What do you want?”
“I can come back if you like, Herr Doctor,” I said.
Goebbels shook his head. “No, no. Tell me what you think.” He pointed to a chair and I sat down.
Finally he smiled. “Beautiful, isn’t she?”
“Yes, I suppose she is,” I said with teasing skepticism; and then: “Astonishingly so. She’s beautiful in a fantastic, unearthly, in-your-dreams sort of way.”
“That’s right. And her face. Did you notice how it has a very luminous quality? Like it has its own key light.” Seeing me look baffled, Goebbels added, “That’s a technical, film-lighting name for a stage light that shines only on one person. Usually the star of the picture.”
“Yes, I did.” Under the circumstances I thought it best not to say anything more about how attractive I thought Dalia Dresner was. I’d already said too much. “I can go to Yugoslavia as soon as you like, provided I can get into the Esplanade Hotel,” I said. “But first I’d like to take a run out to Brandenburg and speak to a detachment of Bosnian Muslim SS about the situation in their country. If I’m going to travel to Banja Luka, I want to make sure that I’m fully aware of the local situation. Which, by all accounts I’ve had so far, is uncertain, to say the least. From what I’ve heard, I’m going to earn every pfennig of what you’ve paid me, Herr Doctor.”
“Yes, yes, of course. Well, please do that. And I’ll have someone make the arrangements for you to travel down to Zagreb on the next available plane.”
“It’s just that Brandenburg is sixty kilometers away and I’m going to need a car to get me there and back.”
“Of course. And yes, you may borrow the roadster until tomorrow. Just have it back here before ten. I’m planning a picnic at Schwanenwerder tomorrow.”
I got up to leave and began the long journey toward the door.
Halfway there, he said, “What you were saying just now about Fräulein Dresner. I liked it. I liked it very much. She is, as you say, beautiful in a fantastic, unearthly, in-your-dreams sort of way. But that’s all it can ever be for someone like you, Gunther. She can exist only in your dreams, Herr Gunther. And only ever in your dreams. Do we understand each other?”
“As always, Herr Doctor, you make your meaning very clear.”
Seventeen
It wasn’t unusual for Germans to have the words of Dr. Goebbels ringing in their ears as they went about their daily business. He was often on the radio, of course, making some important speech from the Sportpalast or the Radio House. Everyone still remembered with a shudder the speech he’d made in February when he called for “total war,” which somehow managed to seem even more frightening than the war with which we had already become wearily familiar. Mostly we’d learned not to pay much attention to what Joey said. But the speech he’d made as I left his city mansion was different; this particular speech was just for me. A speech that ought to have scared me as much as the one about total war.
After I’d been home and put on a clean shirt and my best lounge suit I jumped back in the car, shooed away some boys who were staring at it as if it had arrived from another planet, and started the engine. And now thinking it best that Goebbels didn’t know I wasn’t going to Brandenburg at all but to dinner with the woman he loved, I decided to take a few detours along the way, just in case I was being followed. But mostly I just put my foot on the gas when I had my ticket for the AVUS speedway because the 540K could outrun almost any other car on the road.
I got back to the house on Griebnitzsee just a little before eight and parked the car several streets away, just in case anyone noticed that there were two identical red roadsters on the driveway. I checked the street for cars but it was empty; if Goebbels was having her watched it could only have been from the window of one of those other enormous houses. Without those pips on the lapel of my uniform I figured I was harder to identify but I pulled the brim of my hat down over my eyes anyway, just in case. When you’re trying your best to steal the minister’s girl it’s as well to be a little careful. I’d bought some flowers from Harry Lehmann’s on Friedrichstrasse and, holding these like some lovesick young suitor, I cranked the doorbell again. This time the maid answered. She gave me a slow up-and-down like I was something the cat had brought to the door, and then pulled a face.
“So you’re it,” she said. “The reason my day off had to be cut short in order that her royal highness can play Arsène Avignon in the kitchen.”
“Who’s he?” I asked, advancing into the hall.
“You wouldn’t know him. He’s a French chef. Cooks at the Ritz. That’s an expensive hotel, in case you didn’t know that, either. What’s this you’re holding? Some kind of cheap umbrella?”
“Pour votre maîtresse,” I said.
“I thought all the cemeteries were closed at this time of night. Kind of small, aren’t they?”
Dalia appeared behind her maid’s shoulder. She was wearing an iridescent navy taffeta evening gown with a quilted collar and hem, cut very close to the line of her hips, which was where my eyes lingered for more than a moment or two.
“Are those for me?” she asked. “Oh, Harry Lehmann. How lovely. And how thoughtful.”
“I’d have brought a nice juicy bone if I’d known you had such a fierce dog looking out for you.”
Dalia took the flowers from me and handed them to her maid.
“Agnes, put these in some water, will you please?”
“I thought you said he was handsome,” Agnes said sourly. “And an officer, to boot. Did you check his teeth? This one looks kind of old for that beef you’ve cooked, princess.”
I took Dalia’s hand and kissed it.
“Take my advice with this one, princess,” said Agnes. “Look before you leap. For snakes among sweet flowers do creep.”
Agnes went one way along the corridor, Dalia and I went the other.
“Is she always this friendly?”
“As a matter of fact, she likes you.”
“How can you tell?”
“Telepathy. I warned you I was clever, didn’t I? You should hear her when Joey turns up at the door. You would think she was talking to the coal man.”
“I’d like a front seat for the next time that happens.”
“She told Veit Harlan that he should write a suicide scene with himself as the star.”