Evony
Reinhardt steps out of the shadows, his manner ostentatiously casual as he drops his cigarette onto the ground and grinds it out with his boot. His gaze rakes me from the tips of my toes to the top of my head. But he’s not casual, or even calm. There’s fury burning in his eyes.
“How long?” he asks.
How long have I been sneaking out to spy on him. I swallow, my mouth dry. “Since you… Since we first went to bed together.”
He nods slowly, his eyes dropping to the pavement but not before I see bitterness and disappointment flash through them. He believed what I told him with my body. That I was his, always. I never wanted to look into his eyes and see the painful knowledge that I’ve betrayed him.
“How did you find me out?”
“Too many rats in the roof. Interesting patterns in the dust in apartment 12E. Anyone else would think it was the Stasi and ignored it.” He takes a casual step toward me, the white light from the streetlamp shifting over the planes of his face. “But I’m the Stasi around here.”
He holds a hand out for the car keys and I hand them over. “Danke, Liebling. Shall we go back inside?”
He grips me firmly by the upper arm, his hand like cold iron, and marches me along the street back to the apartment. For a moment he slows, peering up at the attics above the terraced apartments, tracing the path of my escape route. He nods and says to himself, “Ja, very clever.”
Inside he gestures to the sofas. I sit, hands folded in my lap while he stands before me. I remember that first night, sitting in this exact spot, cold and afraid and feeling all the horror of the unknown. I feel it again now because this isn’t me telling him I can’t love him because of the things he’s done. This is a betrayal of the first order.
“Why follow me, Evony? You know why I go out at night.”
I don’t meet his eyes. “I only know what you tell me.”
“Where did you get the car?”
“I stole it.” I don’t care what happens to me anymore but I have to be careful not to betray Peter and his group. I won’t drag them down with me just because I was too stupid not to get out while I could.
I’m not sure he believes me, but he leaves the question of the car aside and says, “If I wanted Frau Schäfer to be in prison she would be in prison. Instead she is in the West, safe and happy with her family. Why didn’t you ask for more proof if you didn’t believe me?”
“I wanted to see for myself. I had no choice.”
Anger flashes across his face. “You could have chosen to believe me.”
“Why should I? I have been your prisoner for months. You have all the power and I have none.”
“Oh, you have no power? The girl who has betrayed me, lied to me, made me think that she loves me so cunningly that I can taste it every time I kiss her even if she won’t say it. And now I find she’s creeping out to spy on me.” He crouches down on his haunches, his face close to mine as he studies me. “Have I been mistaken and you have been pretending this whole time? Do you want to spit in my face, Evony, and tell me you have enjoyed playing me for the fool?”
I look away, feeling sick, wishing I hated him. It should be so easy to hate him.
He watches me narrowly, his mind making connections. “You’ve been distant these past weeks, so pale and tired. All I saw was a woman loathing herself for wanting the man who stole her but really you were spying on me. It was the spying that you hated. It manifests so similarly. I’ll make a note for the future.”
There’s a hard, ironic edge to his voice, and I hear it in my own when I reply, “Oh, I hated myself for wanting you as well. Don’t worry, you’re not losing your edge. Not completely.”
He pulls back a little and gazes at me with speculative, calculating eyes. Reinhardt is retreating and Oberstleutnant Volker of the Staatssicherheit is coming to the fore.
“The car. I don’t believe you stole it. Is there something you want to tell me about, Evony? Or rather, someone?”
The bottom falls out of my stomach. He knows. How can he know?
His eyes light with preternatural cunning. “There is someone. But whom can you have been in contact with? You are with me, always. Ah, but you have been leaving the apartment at night. Have you been meeting with someone as well as tailing me?”
Don’t say anything. He can’t figure anything out as long as you stay silent.
“But there must have been a first meeting. Perhaps someone at—” He breaks off, alarm flashing over his face. “Liebling, please tell me it isn’t anyone at HQ.”
And just like that, sleek, predatory Volker is gone and I see Reinhardt again. He takes my hands between his, engulfing them and squeezing tightly. When he speaks his voice is soft and urgent, as if he’s trying not to frighten a child or a cornered animal. “Evony, have you been spying on me for someone at HQ? I won’t be angry with you if you say yes. I just need to know.”
I don’t understand why he’s acting like this. Is it some sort of trick? I shake my head, trying to look sincere. “No, I told you there’s no one. I’ve been doing this by myself.”
He takes a deep breath and asks me again, and the first tendrils of fear spread through my belly because I know my lover very well by now and this isn’t what his trickery looks like. What is he afraid of? “I promise, there’s no one HQ.”
He stands up, a hand to his mouth. “Scheisse. It’s someone at HQ.”
Panic thuds through me. How does he know this? “Reinhardt, there’s no one. I stole the car and—”
But he’s not listening to me. “I should have told you about him. I should have made you understand the danger but I didn’t think he would be so brazen. Right under my nose.”
He? Does he mean Peter? Why would someone who works in the mail room be of any danger to me or Reinhardt? If he knows about Peter then why isn’t Peter in prison?
The firelight is flickering in Reinhardt’s eyes. “Does he know who you really are, or are you useful to him merely because you are close to me?” He studies my face, his eyes fixing on the faint scar on my lip that hasn’t quite healed. “Does he think that I hit you? Did you let him think that? Yes, you’re clever enough not to correct such a misapprehension if it worked in your favor.” He takes a deep, calming breath. “That is good, Evony. Good. You are just an opportunity to him. All is perhaps not lost.”
I watch him thinking out loud, not understanding anything he’s saying.
“So, he approached you at HQ after the car accident, and when I took you to bed you agreed.”
How does he know all this? It’s as if he’s reading my mind.
He crouches down in front of me again, his hands on my knees, his eyes probing my face. “Tell me, is your contact a man or a woman? Another secretary perhaps, who promised you passage to the West in exchange for spying on me? Are you worried for your little friend? Don’t be, Liebling. They’re well protected.”
Relief surges through me—he doesn’t know about Peter. But then who was the “he” he was referring to, and how can Reinhardt not have the power to root out a traitor at Stasi HQ?
He’s silent for a moment, watching me closely. “Did you tell them that I got Frau Schäfer out of East Berlin? No, you didn’t, otherwise I would already have been arrested. You know the truth but you have kept it to yourself.” A smile warms his face and he reaches out to touch my cheek, but I pull away.
“I didn’t do it for you.” But that’s a lie. I didn’t want the price of my freedom to be his imprisonment, even after everything he’s done to me.
His hand drops back to his side. “I see you’re confused, Liebling. Let me explain to you what has happened. I have an enemy at HQ and he has been using you to get to me. No, don’t shake your head. It might be disappointing, but it’s true. This friend of yours has been lying to you.”
He lets that sink in a moment, and then continues. “There’s something I need to know.”
“I won’t tell you anything.”
“Your loyalty is admirable, if misplaced. But put it aside for a moment as I need you to tell me this. Does this person know who you are? Did you give them your real name, or could they have discovered your true identity?”
I search his face for cold cunning but see only concern. For me? Or for himself? “Why does that matter?”
He brushes the backs of his fingers over my cheek, his voice gentle. “Please trust me. Who do they think you are? Did you tell them you were caught in the bakery raid? Did you give them your real name?”
Tears fill my eyes, because when he talks like this I want so dearly to confide in him. I want Reinhardt, even as I hate and fear Oberstleutnant Volker. Voice cracking, I say, “I can’t tell you anything. You’re my enemy and you always will be, no matter how I feel about you.” I feel as bereft as when Ulrich turned on me, only worse this time because this was my last chance to escape and it’s my own fault I let it slip through my fingers.
“Evony, I am not asking as a Stasi officer. I am asking as Reinhardt. I need to know what steps to take to protect you from him. Does your contact know who you really are?”
Protect me? From what? I don’t understand any of what he’s saying.
Reinhardt sees my confusion. “I will explain in a moment. Just answer me, please.”
I turn the question over in my mind. Does Peter know who I am? I thought I was clever giving him Dad’s name but calling him “my friend”. A resistance group would be unlikely to connect Heinrich Daumler, lowly mechanic, with Evony Dittmar, Volker’s cosseted Stasi secretary.
I moisten my lips, giving myself time to think. “What will you do if my friend does know who I am?”
His eyes darken with anger. I know that look. It’s the expression I saw in his eyes as he tore Ulrich off me. I shake his arm, making him focus on me. “Reinhardt, I don’t understand. Who is this enemy of yours and why does he hate you so much?”
Reinhardt gets up and goes to sit on the sofa opposite me. “I should have told you about him so you would be on your guard. The night you all tried to escape through the bakery tunnel I should have been there to stop you, but another Stasi officer ran the raid himself, and botched it. His name is Hauptmann Heydrich.”
Heydrich. I remember his cold, assessing eyes as he sat on the edge of my desk in HQ. His false smile. His sharp interest that made me so uncomfortable. I thought it was the instincts of a Stasi officer that made him examine me so closely, but if Reinhardt is telling the truth he was assessing me for my usefulness.
And—oh god. Peter is working for him? Is that what Reinhardt is saying? Peter approached me not long after Heydrich. Why did that never strike me as suspicious? A resistance member working within Stasi HQ that just found me and told me he could get me out? It was too good to be true because it was.
Reinhardt is looking at me with sympathy. “Liebling, I’m sorry.”
I realize I’m crying again and wipe the tears away. “Why are you sorry?”
“Because it is painful to be betrayed.”
“As I have betrayed you?”
He merely smiles, a small, regretful smile. I wonder if he’s deciding what to do with me. I don’t believe him when he says he’s going to protect me. I know how he feels about traitors.
Blinking away fresh tears I ask, “Why does Heydrich hate you so much?”
“Professional jealousy. Impatience. I may not always have been…” He gives me an eloquent half-shrug that I take to mean that he’s made the younger officer’s life hard in the past, but he doesn’t much care. I can easily believe that Reinhardt looks upon Heydrich as an upstart and a sneak, and perhaps he is if he really went behind Reinhardt’s back over the bakery raid. To Reinhardt, Heydrich is an annoyance. A nobody. But look what nearly happened. I was on the verge of handing the young captain everything he needed to put Reinhardt in prison. Heydrich is dangerous.
“For him, the quick way up is preferable to the hard, slow way. I’ve always preferred the hard, slow way. It yields better results.” Reinhardt’s eyes narrow on my face and then he stands up, straightening his jacket. “So, do you believe what I’m telling you? That your contact is not your friend, but your enemy and mine, and that they’re working for Heydrich?”
I consider this for several minutes. “I don’t know. It’s occurred to me that telling me my contact is lying to me is your way of preventing my escape.”
“A little elaborate, isn’t it? How long do you suppose it would take for me to ascertain your daily movements from Fräulein Hoffman and the other secretaries who work on our floor? There can’t be many people at HQ whom you come into contact with.”
There’s something in that. He could probably find Peter quite easily if he wanted to. I’m still chewing my lip when he continues.
“Here’s what’s going to happen. You will continue to tail me and feed your contact empty reports. I talk to the border guards, I drive about the city. They will eventually lose interest.”
I stare up at him, not able to believe what I’m hearing. Just like that, as if nothing happened tonight?
“You will not tell me who your contact is. It’s better I don’t know. That way I can’t be tempted to strangle him or her in the corridors as they pass by.”
I believe that he would, too. I watch him light a cigarette with an assured air, comfortable in the knowledge that the danger has passed. “The important thing is that they don’t find out who you really are.”
But I don’t feel as confident as Reinhardt. In fact I’m certain, deadly certain, that Peter is going to figure out who I am. If he works for the Stasi then he’ll have access to files, identification papers, official photographs. My father’s file. My file. My photograph will be in Evony Daumler’s records.
I take a deep breath. “Reinhardt, I don’t think it’s going to be as easy as that. I gave my contact my father’s name. They’re going to find out who I am. In fact, if they are who you say they are, they probably know who I am already.”