As the hour wore on, one or two of the group left to send over their stories to newsrooms worldwide and the bar began to empty. Georgie and Max made their excuses and left together; the Hotel Bristol was a short walk along the Unter den Linden, and Georgie especially was keen not to waste the day, eager to map the city in her mind. They walked in silence, Max clearly deep in thought, and – for the first time – a despondency in his step. Georgie’s eyes couldn’t help but be drawn upwards, at yet more of the red swathe draping each and every stone monolith – scores of Nazi flags rippling in a minor breeze, like vast ceiling-to-floor curtains upon a stage. The same thought crept into her mind from two years previously: never mind the strong rumours of Hitler’s rearmament, using Germany’s heavy industry to stockpile weapons and tanks, all in breach of worldwide conventions, Georgie Young wondered how many factories and women were now employed in making Nazi insignia, weaving and stitching the symbol of their Führer into cloth? And how many really believed in its power? Or his, for that matter?
Such lightweight notions she kept to herself, while Max closely guarded his own thoughts, his face a cloud compared to its animation at the Adlon bar. They neared the grand edifice of the Hotel Bristol, embroidered with its layers of ornate stone lacing. As with every other building, it flew the colours of its Nazi allegiance at the entrance.
‘So, would you like to look around and find some dinner, after we’ve had a rest?’ Georgie asked her reluctant companion as they checked in. Presumably, it was why they’d been booked into the same hotel by rival papers, as a way of orientating themselves, together. Truthfully, she preferred to explore alone but in the interests of diplomacy – and her command of the language – she felt obliged to offer.
‘Hmm, think I’ll grab something at the bar or in my room,’ Max replied. ‘I’m not very hungry, and I’m quite tired.’ He turned away and headed towards the stairs without another word. Suit yourself, Georgie thought. One part of her registered relief, the other felt slighted for offering an olive branch and being so quickly rebuffed. What was his issue? Still, if this is how it’s meant to be, she thought, I’d better get used to being on my own, hadn’t I?
Inside the hotel room that was at least twice the size of her poky bedsit in North London, she unpacked quickly and pinned her hair up and off her neck, changed her shoes to flat, walking brogues and stepped down into the lobby, which was slightly less grand than the Adlon but still of the luxurious ‘pinch me’ variety. Like every life challenge that she could remember in her twenty-six years, she took a deep breath and uttered under her breath: Come on, George, you can do this. Then she walked through the doors and entered an early evening Berlin that was exciting and infamously debauched, cosmopolitan and yet ultimately German – and now a city cloaked with the cloth and under the pressing heel of Adolf Hitler.
Map in hand, Georgie strode east, away from the Adlon, over the two channels of the River Spree and the ‘island’ housing some of Berlin’s grandest museums, her eyes scanning left and right, absorbing every detail. She reached the huge, rectangular Alexanderplatz and stood marvelling at the tram interchange, criss-crossing its centre like a turntable on a toy train set, Berlin’s huge six-wheeled buses trundling the outskirts, their prominent metal snouts pushing out a heavy engine throb. It was a metropolis like London, and yet the drapery of the flags seemed in some way to muffle the raw city sounds.
Hungry for more – and also craving something to eat – Georgie walked on, veering north, peering into shop windows, delighted when she could make out the German signs and odd snatches of conversations. She forged on, so enchanted she almost didn’t realise the landscape changing with each step; block by block the buildings became less ornate, ordinary and then distinctly shabbier. The people, too, slowed their step and had begun to stare, their eyes gaping as she walked past. She noted they looked different from those on the Unter den Linden – darker features, less Germanic – and she found herself tucking her own blonde hair further under her cap. Each lengthy gaze seemed to track her, though whether they were clouded by fear or suspicion it was hard to tell. Perhaps both.
Flattening herself against a wall, she consulted her map. How far had she come, and where was she? Dusk was fast approaching, the atmosphere murkier, and she was beginning to regret her enthusiastic wanderlust.
‘Fraulein?’ Georgie’s head snapped up at a gruff interruption. Two Stormtroopers looked down on her – in more ways than one, expressions as muddy as the brown of their shirts. ‘Are you lost? You shouldn’t be in this part of the city.’ It was irritation and not concern. ‘This is where … where Jews live. Do you live here?’
‘N-no,’ she stammered, tongue twisting around the language. ‘I’ve just arrived … from England.’ She smiled widely, in the hope of some return.
‘Papers?’ They were not in the mood for diplomacy, twin sets of beady eyes boring into her.
‘I … I haven’t got my press papers yet … only this.’ She scrabbled in her bag for her passport.
‘English press?’ one sneered. ‘You definitely shouldn’t be here.’
Did he mean Berlin as a whole, or this particular street? And why – was it a crime or simply an affront to them? ‘I suppose, I’ve wandered too far,’ she offered. ‘Can you point me in the right direction, the Hotel Bristol?’
The other grunted to signal his distaste – she as a British alien, sullied in the same way they viewed Jews as dirty. And rich enough to lodge at the Bristol. Short of physically turning and pushing her down the street, they pointed her firmly in the other direction. ‘Down there, keep going. And we would advise you not to come here again.’ It wasn’t an order, but neither was it an option.
Georgie’s steps were fast and furious, breath rising as she saw the lights and safety of Alexanderplatz again, then she puffed out her cheeks in relief on reaching the Bristol and its comforting lobby. There was her taste of the new Germany. Bittersweet at best.
‘Welcome to Berlin, Georgie Young,’ she sighed to herself. ‘Round one to the Reich.’
5
Hiding
Berlin, 2nd August 1938
Rubin Amsel emerged from the attic with tell-tale cobwebs in his hair, skin smudged with the dirt of neglect.
‘Well?’ Sara was standing at the bottom of the makeshift steps Rubin had fashioned with the help of his twelve-year-old son, Leon, nailing together the struts as quietly as any hammer would allow. No one – not even their trusted neighbours – should know what they were planning; better to be naive for their own sakes.
‘I’ve closed over the roof holes as best I can,’ he said, ‘and I’ve made a little area for a bed and a pee-pot. It’s cleaner at least. He’ll have to have an oil lamp for light.’ Still, he puffed out his cheeks in defeat. ‘But you’re right, Sara, he can’t live up there – it’s like a hothouse now, and he’ll freeze in winter. You wouldn’t keep a dog like that.’
‘So what do we do?’ she said in earnest. ‘You know Elias can’t move quickly these days, even if he has to. It would take at least two of us to help him up, and you’re so often out.’