The Good German by Joseph Kanon Page B

had to move.”
    “Where did she go?”
    “She had a friend from the hospital. After that, I don’t know. It was hit too, I heard. A hospital. They bombed even the sick.” She shook her head.
    “But she didn’t leave an address?”
    “With me? I was already gone. You know, there wasn’t time for addresses. You found whatever you could. Perhaps she had relatives, I don’t know. She never said. You can’t imagine what it was like. The noise . But do you know the strange thing? The telephones worked right to the end. That’s the thing I remember about Pariserstrasse. The bombs and everybody running and there was a telephone ringing. Even then.”
    “And her husband?”
    “Away somewhere. In the war.” She waved her hand. “They left the women for the Russians. Oh, that was terrible. Thank God I—” She glanced toward her daughter-in-law. “I was lucky.”
    “But she must be somewhere,” Jake said.
    “I don’t know. I told your friend.”
    “What friend?”
    “The soldier yesterday. I didn’t know what to think. Now I see. You didn’t want to come yourself, that explains it. You were always careful, I remember. In case Emil—” She leaned forward and put her hand on his arm, an unexpected confidante. “But you know, none of that matters anymore. So many years.”
    “I didn’t send anybody here.”
    She withdrew her hand. “No? Well, then, I don’t know.”
    “Who was he?”
    She shrugged. “He didn’t say. They don’t, you know. Just, how many are living here? Do you have milk cards for the children? Where did you work in the war? It’s worse than the Nazis. Maybe he was counting the dead. They do that, so you can’t use the name for the ration cards.”
    “What did he say?”
    “Did I know where she was living, had I seen Emil, that’s all. Like you.” She looked at him. “Is something wrong? We’re good people here. I have children to—”
    “No, no. Nothing. I’m not here for the police. I just want to find Lena. We were friends.”
    She smiled faintly. “Yes. I always thought so. Not a word from her ,” she said, as if she still hoped for a chat over coffee. “So proper, always. Well, what does it matter now? I’m sorry I can’t help. Perhaps the hospital would know.”
    He took out his notepad and wrote down the Gelferstrasse address. “If you do hear from her—”
    “Of course. It’s not likely, you know. Many people left Berlin before the end. Many people. It was hard to find a place. Even like this. You see how we live now.”
    Jake looked around the shabby room, then stood. “I didn’t know about the children. I would have brought some chocolate. Perhaps you can use these?” He offered her a pack of cigarettes.
    She widened her eyes, then grabbed his hand and shook it with both of hers. “Thank you. You see,” she said to her daughter-in-law, “I always said it wasn’t the Amis. You can see how kind they are. It’s the British who wanted the bombing. That Churchill.” She turned back to Jake. “I remember you were always polite. I wish we were back in the American zone, not here with the British.”
    Jake headed for the door, then turned. “The soldier yesterday—he was British?”
    “No, American.”
    He stood for a second, puzzled. Not an official, then.
    “If he comes back, you will let me know? ”
    She nodded, clutching the cigarettes, nervous again. “You’re sure there’s nothing wrong?”
    Jake shook his head. “Maybe just another old friend. He might know something.”
    “No,” she said, answering something else. “There was only you.”
    A hospital would have records, Jake thought, but when he got there he saw that a fire had swept through that stretch of Liitzowstrasse, taking the Elisabeth and all its paper with it. Only a few walls were left, black and open to the sky, one of Ron’s decayed molars. A work brigade of women was clearing the site, handing pails of bricks along a line that snaked over the heaps of fallen beams and