Читаем Fatherland полностью

Nebe nodded. “I learn from the duty office that the police stations of the Reich are even now being filled to overflowing with elderly beggars, ancient drunkards who have lost their papers, absconding geriatrics… Enough to keep Globus busy until Christmas.” He leaned back in his chair. “If I know Luther, he is far too cunning to show himself yet. He will wait a few days. That must be your hope.”

“I have a favour to ask.”

“Proceed.”

“I wish to leave the country.”

Nebe let out a shout of laughter. He pounded the desk with both hands. “Your file is compendious, March, but nowhere does it mention your sense of humour. Excellent! Who knows? You may yet survive. Some KZ commandant may adopt you as a pet.”

“I wish to go to Switzerland.”

“Of course. The scenery is spectacular.”

“I have had a call from Lufthansa. Luther flew to Zurich on Sunday afternoon, and returned to Berlin on the last flight on Monday night. I believe he had access to a numbered bank account.”

Nebe’s laughter had dwindled to an occasional snort. “On what evidence?”

March placed the envelope on Nebe’s desk. “I removed this from Stuckart’s apartment last night.”

Nebe opened it and inspected the letter through the magnifying glass. He glanced up. “Should there not be a key with this?”

March was staring at the paintings behind Nebe’s head -Schmutzler’s “Farm Girls Returning From the Fields”, Padua’s “The Fuhrer Speaks” — ghastly, orthodox muck.

“Ah. I see.” Nebe sat back again, stroking his cheek with the glass. “If I don’t allow you to go, I don’t get the key. I could of course turn you over to the Gestapo, and they could persuade you to disgorge the key — probably quite quickly. But then it would be Globus and Heydrich who would learn the contents of the deposit box, rather than me.

He was silent for a while. Then he dragged himself to his feet and hobbled across to the blinds. He opened the slats a fraction and peered out. March could see his eyes moving slowly from side to side.

At last he said: “A tempting bargain. But why is it that I have this vision of myself, waving you off with a white handkerchief from the tarmac of Hermann Goring Airport, and of you never coming back?”

“I suppose giving you my word that I would return would be of no use?”

“The suggestion demeans our intelligence.”

Nebe went back to his desk and read the letter again. He pressed a switch on his desk. “Beck.”

The adjutant appeared. “March — give him your passport. Now, Beck, get that to the Interior Ministry and have them issue an immediate twenty-four-hour exit visa, starting at six tonight and expiring at six tomorrow.”

Beck glanced at March, then slid out of the office.

Nebe said: This is my offer. The Head of the Swiss Criminal Police, Herr Streuli, is a good friend of mine. From the moment you step off the aircraft until the moment you reboard it, his people will be watching you. Do not attempt to evade them. If you fail to return tomorrow, you will be arrested and deported. If you try to make a run to Bern, to enter a foreign embassy, you will be stopped. In any case, there is nowhere for you to go. After yesterday’s happy announcement, the Americans will simply toss you back over the border to us. The British, French and Italians will do what we tell them. Australia and Canada will obey the Americans. There are the Chinese, I suppose, but if I were you I’d sooner take my chances in a KZ. And the moment you return to Berlin, you will tell me everything you have discovered. Good?”

March nodded.

“Good. The Fuhrer calls the Swiss "a nation of hotel-keepers". I recommend the Baur au Lac on Tal Strasse, overlooking the See. Most luxurious. A fine place for a condemned man to spend a night.”

Back in his office, a parody of a tourist, March booked his hotel room and reserved a plane seat. Within the hour, he had his passport back. The visa had been stamped inside: the ubiquitous eagle and garlanded swastika, the blank spaces for the dates filled in by a crabbed and bureaucratic hand.

The duration of an exit visa was in direct ratio to the applicant’s political reliability. Party bosses got ten years; Party members, five; citizens with unblemished records, one; the dregs of the camps naturally got nothing at all. March had been given a day-pass to the outside world. He was down there among the Untouchables of society — the grumblers, the parasites, the work-shy, the crypto-criminal.

He rang the Kripo’s economic investigation division and asked for the resident Swiss expert. When he mentioned Zaugg’s name and asked if the division had any information, the man at the other end laughed. “How long do you have?”

“Start at the beginning.”

“Hold, please.” The man put down the phone and went to fetch the file.