A SMALL TOWN IN GERMANY by John le Carré

Hearing some sound she turned her head sharply and stared back along the path. The tree trunks were black against the low horizon; the wind had dropped; a night dew had damped their clothes.

‘He won’t come. You said so yourself. Get on with it. Hurry.’

‘We sat on a stair and he started talking about himself again. He didn’t need any prompting. It just came out… it was fascinating. About Germany in the early days after the war. “Only the rivers were whole.” I never knew whether he was translating German or using his imagination or just repeating what he’d picked up.’ She hesitated, and again glanced down the path. ‘How at night the women built by arclight… passing stones as if they were putting out a fire… How he learnt to sleep in a fifteen hundredweight using a fire extinguisher as a pillow. He did a little act, putting his head on one side and twisting his mouth to show his stiff neck. Bedroom games.’ She stood up abruptly. ‘I’m going back. If he finds the car empty, he’ll run away; he’s as nervous as a kitten.’

He followed her to the timber track, but the plateau was deserted except for the Opel Rekord parked in the lay-by with its lights out.

‘Sit in the car,’ she said. ‘Never mind them.’ For the first time she really noticed the marks on his face by the interior light and she drew in her breath sharply.

‘Who did that?’

‘They’ll do it to Leo if they find him first.’

She was leaning back in the seat, her eyes closed. Someone had torn the cloth on the roof and it hung down in beggar’s shreds. There was a child’s driving wheel on the floor with a plastic tube attached to it and Turner pushed it out of the way with his foot.

‘Sometimes I thought: “You’re empty. You’re just imitating life.” But you daren’t think that ofa lover. He was a negotiator, an actor, I suppose. He was caught between all those worlds: Germany and England, Königswinter and Bonn, Chapel and the discounts, the first floor and the ground floor. You can’t expect anyone to fight all those battles and stay alive. Some­times he just served us,’ she explained simply. ‘Or me. Like a headwaiter. We were all his customers; whatever he wanted. He didn’t live, he survived. He’s always survived. Till now.’ She lit another cigarette. The car was very cold. She tried to start the engine and put the heater on, but the ignition failed.

‘After that first evening it was all over bar bed. Rawley came and found me and we were the last to go. He’d been having a row with Lésère about something and he was pleased at having come off best. Leo and I were sitting on the stairs, drinking coffee, and Rawley just came over and kissed me on the cheek. What was that?’

‘Nothing.’

‘I saw a light down the hill.’

‘It was a bicycle crossing the road. It’s gone now.’

‘I hate him kissing me in public; he knows I can’t stop him. He never does it in private. “Come on, my dear, it’s time to go.” Leo stood up when he saw him coming, but Rawley didn’t even notice him. He took me over to Lésère. “This is the person you should really apologise to,” he said. “She’s been sitting alone on the stairs all evening.” We were going out of the door and Rawley stopped to collect his coat, and there was Leo, holding it for him.’ She smiled, and it was the smile of real love, rejoicing at the memory. ‘He didn’t seem to notice me any more. Rawley turned his back on him and put his arms into the sleeves and I actually saw Leo’s own arms stiffen and his fingers curl. Mind you, I was glad. I wanted Rawley to behave like that.’ She shrugged. ‘I was hooked,’ she said. ‘I’d been looking for a fly and now I’d got one, feathers and all. Next day I looked him up in the Red Book. You know what that is by now: nothing. I rang up Mary Crabbe and asked her about him. Just for fun. ‘ ‘I ran into an extraordinary little man last night,” I said. Mary had a fit. “My dear, he’s poison. Keep right away from him. He dragged Mickie to a night club once and got him into awful trouble. Mercifully,” she said, “his contract’s running out in December and he’ll be gone.” I tried Sally Askew, she’s terrifically worthy. I could have died’ – she broke out laughing, then drew her chin down into her chest to copy the sonorous tones of the Economic Minister’s wife: ‘ “A useful bachelor, if Huns are in short sup­ply.” They often are here, you know; there are more of us than them. Too many diplomats chasing too few Germans: that’s Bonn. The trouble was, Sally said, the Germans were getting rather old school again about Leo’s kind, so she and Aubrey had reluctantly given him up. “He’s an unconscious irritant, my dear, if you know what I mean.” I was absolutely thrilled. I put down the receiver and I shot into the drawing ­room and I wrote him a great long letter about absolutely nothing.’

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