Leonhard is wrong. She cannot sleep. He lies beside her, on the outer edge of the berth, lost in the deep, contented slumber of a man who has just been soundly bedded. She spoke the truth to him earlier that day: being a good girl is not one of her talents. She has many others that he much prefers anyway.
He looks younger when he sleeps, boyish somehow. The deep lines on his brow smooth out, his mouth relaxes. She lifts the glasses gently from his face—she hadn’t noticed that he’d left them on—and sets them on the ledge beside the bed. They will be the first thing he reaches for in the morning. He turns to the side and buries his face in the pillow while Gertrud pushes the sheet away and rolls around, unable to get comfortable. It’s not that she doesn’t want to sleep; she simply can’t. Her mind is sharp and clear, every thought standing out in deeper contrast the longer she lies here. This is always what happens when she’s on deadline. When a story has piqued her interest. When there is a trail to chase. But right now there are only worries to catalogue.
Egon. She tries to push that thought away but he only becomes clearer in her mind.
Colonel Erdmann.
The bomb threats. Bomb threats, for God’s sake! And credible ones at that. How can a girl get an ounce of sleep with that on her mind? She balls her hand into a fist and pounds it against the mattress. Leonhard doesn’t stir and she frowns in the dark, resenting this singular male ability to sleep like the dead after sex.
Gertrud thinks of the fact that at this very moment they are flying over the Atlantic Ocean in an aircraft lifted by combustible gas. Of course a man would come up with this, she thinks; you’d never find a woman inventing a floating bomb.
Her press card and its current location at the bottom of a desk drawer in Frankfurt. The thought makes her wince. And then cuss. “Drecksau.” She spits the word out, not even bothering to whisper, but Leonhard doesn’t so much as stir beside her.
That was easily the single worst day of her career. Leonhard had been so calm on the surface, so unperturbed, as he’d taken her arm and turned her back down the hallway after she’d insulted not only the Kulturstaatssekret?r but the Hure fungus of a mother who brought him into the world. She regrets that last part. Gertrud hates the word, hates it entirely, and has made a point never to insult other women. For a woman who trades in words and wields them with precision, using such a word was inexcusable. And yet it came unbidden in her rage, and even Leonhard could not hide his astonishment.
The Frankfurt branch of the Ministry of Propaganda leases office space at Neue Mainzer Strasse 56. It’s on the fourth floor and has an impressive view of the city. As do all the other floors, but they are empty except for a small sublet office on the third floor. She was told it is occupied by an American advertising company. Which would make sense. Many Germans aren’t comfortable with the idea of doing business anywhere near the Ministry of Propaganda.
Something clicks in Gertrud’s mind and she sits up so quickly the blood rushes to her head. She waits for the dizziness to subside, then picks the thought up. Turns it over. Examines it closely.
Neue Mainzer Strasse.
Her press card.
Americans.
“Oh shit.”
Gertrud scrambles over Leonhard and stands stark naked in the middle of the room, thinking. She presses the heels of her hands against her temples, forcing her mind into submission. Forcing it to slow. Caution is not one of Gertrud’s greater attributes, and she throws it to the wind now. She checks the watch on Leonhard’s limp wrist. Two a.m. Her decision is made before she has time to stop and consider the consequences. She gathers her discarded clothing from the floor and dresses herself in the dark. Runs fingers through her hair. Pinches her cheeks.
Gertrud places a tender kiss on Leonhard’s cheek and quietly slips out the door. The bathrooms are open at all hours and well lit. Thank goodness. So she’s able to inspect her appearance with greater care before heading toward the bar. It will close in one hour, and she desperately needs a glass of wine and a good cigarette—something she hasn’t enjoyed since becoming pregnant with Egon. The doctors told her she needn’t quit, that smoking was a benign pleasure, but she had given it up anyway. The same way she’d given up coffee and drinking and a distinctly unladylike penchant for bicycling five miles a day.
“Oh. Back again?” the bartender asks. He takes in her wrinkled clothing, her disheveled hair with a curious tilt of his head.
Schulze. His name is Schulze, she thinks. “I couldn’t sleep.”
“And your husband?”
“That’s not something he struggles with. Unfortunately.”
“And what can I do for you, Frau…”
“Adelt.”