“I was.”
“They don’t know about such things there. You think you can’t do it. Then someone tells you to do it and you do it.”
Alex looked away, hearing Willy’s voice, his own panicked breathing.
“To help each other. If one stops, what does that say to the others? So you do it. And then it’s everybody shooting, not just you, you know?”
Alex looked at him, saying nothing. How old was he now? Twentysomething. Line after line, everybody shooting so nobody was shooting. He turned away.
“Try to get some sleep.”
“A few minutes. Sometimes when I sleep—” He clutched Alex’s sleeve more tightly. “So what should I have done? Somebody had to do it. They said so.”
Alex stood up. “Go to sleep. I’ll be here.”
“Yes, from America,” Erich said, still a puzzle piece to him, but he did finally close his eyes, his shallow breathing slowing, getting easier. Alex stood for a few minutes, watching him drift off, Fritz again, a boy’s smoothness spreading over his features.
* * *
He was still asleep when Irene got there.
“What did Gustav say?” she said, wiping his brow, barely touching it, not wanting to wake him.
“He needs medicine he can’t get here. He needs to get to the West.”
“The West? How? The border’s—”
“I know.”
“Maybe Sasha will help.”
“He can’t. You know that.”
“But it’s only one man. A boy. And you know Sasha’s—” She stopped, an awkward pause. “He’s very fond of me.”
“He’s not going to help you.”
“But if he dies here— It’s that serious? He might die?”
Alex nodded.
“Then what choice? He stays here, he dies. He goes back to Russia, another death sentence. What choice?”
“None. We have to get him out. You realize, he can’t come back. It’s a one-way trip.”
She put her hand back on Erich’s forehead, her face soft, then looked at Alex. “People come back.”
“Not always. Not this time.”
“What do you mean? Tell me.”
He started back to the other room, waiting for her to follow, then closed the door quietly.
“The only way out is by plane. That would mean military authorization. American. And somebody to take care of him on the other end. So they’d have to want to do this for him. Even break a few rules.”
“And why would they do that? For a German.” She looked up. “You mean they’d do it for you. Some favor. You know someone like that? Who would do this for you?”
“For me?” He shook his head. “I’m practically a fugitive. In contempt of Congress.”
“What does that mean?”
“Nobody in the American zone is going to do anything for me.” Hearing himself, the smoothness of it, not even a hesitation. “Unless I have something to trade, enough to pay Erich’s fare.”
“What are you thinking?” she said, looking at him closely. “You have some idea?”
“I met a man at the party from the radio. Their radio—RIAS. If Erich did an interview with them, I think Ferber would have enough clout to get him out.”
“An interview about what?”
“He hasn’t been in a POW camp. A slave labor detachment. Down in the Erzgebirge.”
“Where Sasha goes,” she said quietly. “Do you think he knew? That Erich was there?”
Alex shook his head. “Erich was just a number. Not even a name. How would he have known? He wasn’t supervising work parties. Not Maltsev’s assistant. They’re not names to him.” He paused. “Just slaves.”
“If I thought that,” Irene said, not picking up on this. “That he knew all along— And now? Does he know now? The men who escaped—”
“They’re probably just numbers too.” He looked over. “It would be something to find out.”
“When I spy on him,” she said, a wry shrug, then looked up. “And Erich would talk about that on the radio? The mines? That’s the idea?”
“A firsthand report about what it’s really like there. From a former war hero.”
“War hero.”
“If he’s alive, he’s a hero.”
She looked at him. “It’s propaganda.”
He nodded. “But in this case, also the truth. He almost died there. He might die here, if we don’t get him out. I think they’d want the interview—eyewitness, not rumors.”
“And get Erich on a plane?”
“That would be the deal. But you understand what it would mean. Right now, he’s a POW on the run. If he does this, he becomes an enemy of the state.”
For a minute she said nothing, then breathed out, a kind of sigh.
“An enemy of the state. What state?”
“Sasha’s state,” Alex said.
She raised her eyes, holding his for a second. “But he would have his life.”
“Yes.”
“The Americans want to put you in prison, but you arrange propaganda for them,” she said, a question.
“They’re Germans in the mines.”
“And if they find out here you arranged this? You’d be an enemy of the state too.”
“Probably.”
“Then you’d go to prison here.”
“Do you have another idea? We can’t just walk away from this.”
“From Erich? No. He’s all that’s left now, from that life.” She lifted her head. “And you’d do this? Hiding him, it’s one thing, but—”
“It’s a lot easier to do it if you don’t think about it. What it could mean.”
She was quiet for a second, then looked away. “Yes. That’s often how it is, isn’t it?” She moved toward the bedroom. “Is it good to sleep so long, do you think?”
They woke him to give him the scheduled medicine, but even after more tea all he wanted to do was sleep.
“Alex has an idea. To get you to the West. Would you like that?” Irene said.
“You’ll come too.”
“Ouf, how could I do that? DEFA doesn’t move for me. But I’ll come visit. They have medicine there. Things you need.”