The brigandshaw chronicl.., p.146
The Brigandshaw Chronicles Box Set 2, page 146
part #4 of The Brigandshaw Chronicles Series
“I don’t think so. Go on, hit me again. Only cowards hit defenceless women.”
“Where are you going, Melina?”
“None of your business. Keep your hands off me. Whatever you were, I always thought you a gentleman. The Party has twisted your mind.”
“Careful, Melina.”
“What are you going to do now? Shoot me, Cousin Henning?”
For the first time since Melina left the family estate, Henning von Lieberman was speechless. The more he tried, the less he was able to utter a word. The impediment he thought Janet Wakefield had cured before the war was back with a vengeance. His face contorted. A tic appeared in his left eye. The man now looked his age. Not the ten years younger that people congratulated him upon. The black uniform looked sinister. No longer romantic to Melina. Drawing upon every ounce of her strength not to burst into tears, she controlled her fear and let herself out of his office. Quietly. Looking back over her shoulder before closing the door, she looked into his contorted face, the larynx trying to perform its task. The eyes spoke more than any words. She doubted her cousin had ever hit a woman before. She felt sorry for him, no longer afraid of him or the Party. In that mutual look of understanding, they both knew it was the beginning of the end of the Third Reich. Of Henning von Lieberman’s dream of an ordered world without war or argument. Where the Party told the people what was good for them instead of the mess they made of running their own lives.
Two hours later, when the rail pass was put on her desk by a clerk, she heard the warning siren blaring outside the windows. Picking up the rail pass, she prepared to go down into the air-raid shelter deep under the building where they were safe from the bombs. It was almost lunchtime. Far away to the west of the city she could hear the American aircraft. The menacing sound of multiple engines. The ack-ack fired sporadically. There was the sound of distant machine gun fire as she went down the stairs. She felt much older than her twenty years.
Before the RAF came over in the night, Melina was safely on a train out of Berlin, headed for her family estate in Bavaria. They had not even said goodbye. She wondered if she would ever see him again as she sat looking at the black curtain over the window from the dim light inside the railway carriage. Her rail pass let her travel first class. In the carriage were three old men and a girl. No one said a word as the steam engine slowly pulled the line of carriages through the darkness away from Berlin. Later, Melina could hear aircraft overhead.
“Every night,” said one of the old men.
“And every day,” said one of the others.
It was cold in the carriage. Melina pulled the rug she had found on her seat up to her chin. The rug was the last expression of first class travel. She was still wearing the same clothes from the previous day. She felt dirty, the smell of her perfume too strong. Deliberately she had splashed on too much. Closing her eyes, she tried to go to sleep. Somewhere in her dreams far away she heard the bombs dropping. When she briefly woke all she could hear was the rhythmic clack of the wheels on the rails.
They would be surprised to see her. All she wanted to do was bury her head in her father’s chest. Feel his arms round her tight. Making her safe, as he always had done when she was growing up as a child. In those days people were always smiling. The little girl was asleep, rolled up in the opposite corner. Melina wondered which one of the old men in the carriage was the girl’s grandfather. They were far too old to be her father. She was hungry but did not care. She had got away. Smiling with hope, Melina went back to sleep. She slept through the night, her young body exhausted from the tension of the previous day.
When she woke there was a thin light in the carriage from the breaking dawn. One of the old men or the young girl had pulled aside the blackout curtain. Outside the fields and trees looked normal. The girl gave Melina a shy smile. Not wanting to talk, Melina looked away, out at the countryside running slowly past the train window. The wind was pushing white smoke from the engine back over the line of carriages. There were too many carriages for the one engine which was why they were going so slowly. Her mouth was dry and her stomach empty. She tried to go back to sleep.
“No luggage?” said the old man next to the girl, now awake huddled in the corner.
“Bombed out. All I have.” She moved her hands to include what she was wearing.
“You have a rail pass?”
“Yes, I have a rail pass.”
“That is all you need. Hilda is my great-niece. My name is Hillier. Hillier, not Hitler. Are you going home?”
“Yes. I hope so. My last stop is Ravensburg but I have to change trains. I’m not sure how many times.”
“I can help you. You were not at home when you were bombed out?” The old man was very polite. Melina kept on her guard. There was something sinister about him. The girl did not touch him with any part of her body.
“In the air-raid shelter.”
“It was during the day. They were all killed except Hilda here. She was under the stairs. I am taking her to my sister. My sister is her grandmother. She will be safe until the war is over. The Americans. They come over during the day. Where do you stay in Ravensburg?”
“Ten miles away. The von Lieberman Estate.”
“You work there? I have heard of the place. Fifty, maybe sixty miles from my sister.”
“I am a von Lieberman.”
“But you don’t have any luggage?”
“I was bombed out yesterday, as I said. Left my job with the Party. No time to buy anything.”
“Of course. The rail pass. The von Liebermans are powerful. General Werner von Lieberman. Very powerful. I am also a member of the Party. Heil Hitler.”
To Melina’s surprise the old man stood up and gave a stiff-armed salute, almost touching the naked light bulb in the ceiling of the carriage that was still burning with a soft red light. When the girl caught her eye she was giggling. Melina managed to stop herself from giggling. Hillier had a big pot belly that stuck out when he gave the Nazi salute.
“I will tell you when to change trains,” he said when he sat down. The girl instinctively gave him more room. Melina, attuned to the atmosphere in the Party Headquarters, thought the girl’s giggle had come more from fear.
“You are very kind,” said Melina.
“I am honoured. May I offer you a sandwich? That big wicker basket on the luggage rack is full of food and flasks of coffee. We are all friends in Germany. What is mine shall belong to everyone.” The old man was being magnanimous.
“You are most kind.”
“I am honoured to give food to a von Lieberman. Are you by any chance related to General Werner von Lieberman? He is a personal friend of Field Marshal Rommel.”
“So is my father. From when they were boys. General von Lieberman is my father’s uncle.”
“You will have some coffee?”
“It will be an honour.”
“Maybe now is the time for everyone to introduce themselves. If these other two gentlemen are going as far as we are we all have a long journey to complete. The dining car is not available on this train. We all have to make sacrifices for the Fatherland. Heil Hitler.”
Again, the old man stood up though he did not salute. The girl whose name was Hilda giggled out loud nervously and put her hand over her mouth. It seemed everyone was afraid of her great-uncle Werner. The girl seemed to know his name. Melina thought the old man knew she was a relation of the General right from the start. There was always a list in the new Germany. A list of everyone. On or off the train. No one was anonymous. Everyone had a name known to the Party to keep them all under control. The sandwich when it came was delicious, she was so hungry. So was the coffee. It was still hot from the flask and served by the old man in a paper cup. Melina and the young girl smiled at each other as if they were friends.
Melina was lucky the bomb had come during the night. The idea of going on to Switzerland and her schoolfriend Françoise came to mind. They could go sailing on the lake in Monsieur Montpellier’s yacht and stay at the Romanshorn Hotel. The Swiss had been sensible and stayed out of the war. She would be out of danger. Monsieur Montpellier would not mind. Most men did not mind if she stayed close to them. All three of the old men had given her the look. Each in their turn. Men did not change whatever their age.
Later, she found the small ladies toilet on the train and had a wash. Every clack of the wheels took her further from Berlin. She felt better. The fear had gone. Back in the carriage she smiled at each of the old men in turn. It was going to be a jolly journey thanks to the young girl. Together, neither of them had anything to be afraid of.
5
Melina had been in the same clothes for three days when the train pulled into Ravensburg Station. With the old man’s help the journey ended without mishap. There were taxis at the station but no petrol. Like her brother Erwin, when he stormed out of the house in 1937, she had to walk. She had been wearing her walking shoes in the air-raid shelter when the bombs hit and the sun was shining. The contrast of the birds singing and the bombs falling made her want to run home to her parents. It was better to walk in on them. Give them a surprise. She had no luggage to carry. She could see the snow on the Alps in the distance across in Switzerland.
Without being recognised by the staff at the station she began her walk through the countryside. The war was far away. Like Henning von Lieberman. They had finished the food in the picnic basket the night before. It was too early for blackberries in the hedgerows. She had bought a small meat pie in the village. The pie was freshly baked and delicious. She began to sing. The birds sang back. She was not going to die. Whatever happened to Germany, she was not going to die. If he hadn’t slapped her face and seen what he had done she would not have been given the rail pass.
When she saw the old house through the trees she began to run, skipping as she went. One of the farm workers in the field by the road recognised her and waved. Melina waved back. Her feet hurt. The pain was pleasant.
At the front door, Strauss stood with a look of surprise. He was a Nazi as she knew his instructions came from Henning to report on her father.
“Mr Henning von Lieberman sends his regards,” she said with a smirk to let him know what was happening. Servants spying, or ‘looking after’ as General von Lieberman preferred, stuck in her craw.
“Your mother’s in the garden.”
“Who is it?” came her mother’s voice, drifting lazily through the old house. The house was quiet, letting her mother’s voice travel.
“It’s me, Mama. Melina. I’m home.”
When Klaus von Lieberman rode back from the fields an hour before sunset they were sitting by the fire. A cold wind had come up from the direction of the snow-capped mountains. All the windows in the house were closed. He had rubbed down the horse and left her eating hay in the stall, the soft brown eyes watching him with love. They had known each other a long time.
In the small room with the log fire Melina jumped up and ran to him, putting her head on his chest. She had not buried her head in his chest since she was twelve. The last time he had seen his eldest daughter was at the railway station when he drove her there in the trap on her way to secretarial college in Berlin. Klaus put his arms round his daughter and held her tight. Gabby, his second daughter, was watching them. It was difficult to tell as a father which was the prettiest of the two girls. Keeping his arm over her shoulder they walked towards the warmth of the fire.
“It’s damn cold for the end of May. They’ve finished ploughing the ten-acre field. Tomorrow we plant it out with cabbages. I’m quite the farmer,” he said looking at his daughter. “To what do we owe this privilege, Melina? How did you get from the station?”
“I walked. Took us three days in the train from Berlin. My flat’s been bombed out. These are Mama’s clothes. Lost everything in the bombing.”
“Did the Party let you go? I am surprised.”
“Cousin Henning got me a rail pass.”
“Good for Cousin Henning.” In better times, Klaus would have had more than words with his Cousin Henning for seducing his daughter. An old friend from the war had written him a letter congratulating him on his daughter’s luck on having a boyfriend so high up in the Party. In case his letter was read and reported to the Nazis, he had suggested no criticism. “Your mother’s clothes suit you. Your mother was younger than Gabby when I married her.”
“I’m not exactly on the shelf, Daddy,” said Gabby. “Melina says an old man on the train had a basket of food. There wasn’t a dining car. What has first class rail travel come to in the brave new Germany?”
“There was a blanket,” said Melina. “At least there was a blanket.”
“Did you find out this old man’s name?” asked her father.
“He gave me sandwiches and hot coffee from the flasks. There were four of them. He was coming to his sister’s with his great-niece. Her parents had been killed in the bombing with her brothers and sisters. We parted at Neuberg. He was very helpful but gave me the creeps. I don’t think the girl was really his relative. His name was Hillier.”
“Did he say Hillier not Hitler?”
“How did you know?”
“He was making sure you went where you said you were going, Melina. Hillier not Hitler shopped young Horatio Wakefield in 1934 when Harry Brigandshaw asked me for help. He’s a diehard Nazi.”
“Did the stiff-armed salute in the carriage.”
“He’s an associate of Cousin Henning, I should think. And Uncle Werner. They don’t let us out of their sight in case we get up to mischief.”
Taking his arm off his daughter’s shoulder, Klaus strode back to the door. When he opened the door and looked into the hall there was no one there.
“Don’t mention him again.”
“Who was the young girl?”
“Not his sister’s granddaughter. Hillier’s estate is in Prussia. The Nazis gave it back to him for services to the Party… Now pour your father some tea. At least we learnt to drink tea from Harry… A pawn, Melina. Hopefully you will never know who she was.”
“Her name was Hilda. She was frightened of him.”
“Had good reason, I expect. He’s a dangerous man. That kind of man only thinks of himself and the Party. Did he tell you when to change trains? Of course he did. You arrived safely. What’s for supper, Bergit?” he asked his wife.
“A goose. I asked Strauss to kill a goose.”
“Very appropriate. Hope he killed a fat one.”
“I’m very hungry,” said Melina. “All I’ve had is a pie at the station.”
“Now, tell me what really happened, Melina. You haven’t run into my arms since you were twelve. What’s the matter?”
“I want to go over to Switzerland. Stay with Françoise in Geneva.”
“I’m sure that can be arranged if you are prepared to ride a horse. You can take Gabby out of harm’s way.”
“We’re going to lose the war now the Americans are fighting.”
“I know we are. But I still have to grow the people food. Whoever is in charge of the government, the people still have to eat.”
In the morning the wind dropped and the sun came out. Sleeping in her own bed had given Melina a good night’s sleep. The depth of the sleep, without the undercurrents of worry and fear, left her refreshed and confident. Her mind was thinking clearly. She was no longer negative, caught in a trap with no way out. She hoped Henning had slept as well in his privileged, underground apartment. Something she doubted. To be ‘lucky’ to live away from natural light summed up her feeling of the war. The regression from arrogant certainty had come to them all bit by bit in Berlin, most of it unnoticed at the time. Henning was now living in a bunker whichever way he looked at it.
Her father had put his finger over her mouth when she tried to talk about Berlin in front of the fire after they dined on roast goose. There was more food in the country than she had seen for a long time. The war had not yet reached their part of Bavaria.
After a good breakfast her father suggested a walk. The two of them alone. Her mother was going off to help a sick tenant and Gabby did not like walking unless it was with a young man. Gabby found any talk of politics boring and was glad to see them go. She knew what her father wanted to talk to her sister about.
“You two go,” she said. “I’m going to play the piano. Are you going into the fields later, Father? You are becoming quite the yokel farmer riding around in old clothes on a horse.”
Father and daughter smiled at each other. Melina could see the ‘yokel’ farmer was an old joke between them.
Her father said nothing until they were far away from the house. Then he looked around at the trees and the clumps of bushes.
“Have you seen Erwin?” he asked.
“Not for months. They transferred him to fighters. Messerschmitt Bf 109s. Says they’re a match for the Spitfires and the Hurricanes any day. Why are you so cautious?
“Strauss, and a few others like him.”
“Erwin’s disillusioned. What he believed at seventeen he doesn’t believe anymore. He says it’s like being stripped naked in a crowd. Everything he had on has been taken away from him. Many of his fellow officers think the same. He mentioned his namesake General Rommel. They all think the war can’t be won. They think the Americans, if not Churchill, will do a deal. That way they’ll still be better off than under the Versailles Treaty.”
“What do you think, Melina?”
“I agree with him. Henning and I fell out. I told him we were losing the war and he shouted. The information coming into Party Intelligence is obvious to an idiot. They don’t want to believe what’s in front of their noses. Prefer to believe in Party propaganda. Unlike Erwin, they are not the ones fighting the war.”
“Don’t ever say this out loud again.”
“Don’t you believe me?”
“Of course I do.”
“They think German science will come to their rescue. The new flying bombs they’re planning will put the British on edge again just when our bomber squadrons are not flying over England. There’s also some kind of new bomb they all talk about that will win them the war in a day. Just the threat of dropping it is meant to win us the war. Then Britain and America will sue for peace. If you ask me they’re clutching at straws. Just more propaganda. They get more and more cocky at Party Headquarters, which is never a good sign. Do you think I can cross into Switzerland?”
