Fritzi Jordan walked into the dark café and spotted Bliss sitting alone at their corner table. There were dark circles under his eyes and his smile wasn’t as sunny as usual. She felt sorry for him. Then he pulled down that damned book and asked her that damned question again, and her sympathy vanished.
What was it with him? Sooner or later he always found a way to ask if she ever thought of going to Poland to see where those mathematicians she was so interested in had lived, and she had to scramble to avoid answering.
Today of all days she didn’t feel like playing Bliss’ silly game.
Splashed in two-inch white capitals on the bottom of her own traitorous TV that morning had been a name from her Washington past, Jan Pawlowski, the new Polish Minister for the Environment. His appointment came on the heels of two years as Sports Minister, a job he was given after his predecessor was gunned down leaving a Warsaw disco.
Why was she still so mesmerized by him? She had been unable to turn off the TV. Charismatic, intelligent, handsome; she watched him walking down a Warsaw street surrounded by reporters. Was there any doubt he was going places? Or that he would leave his mark on European politics?
Now her new friend with the omnipresent smile was asking, again, if she wanted to go to Poland. None of your business, Bliss.
Behind that sunny smile, Bliss kept secrets. His claim to be working out of Berlin because he was sick of Washington left plenty unsaid. It was as close to a confession as any spy was likely to make.
She should run, but she missed America and Americans with their friendly, relaxed manners.
“Hello?” Bliss said. “You still here?” Concern showed in his tired blue eyes. “We could go there together,” he offered. “Lay bare the hotbeds of mathematics in the world’s travel rags.”
Did he know how hard his very American smile made it to say no?
She wondered for a few reckless seconds what it would be like, going there with a friend to keep her from thinking of Jan. It would never work. “I can find everything I need in the Humboldt Library,” she said.
“You can’t say that until you’ve actually stood on the aula steps in Wrocław and breathed in the same air as Kronecker.”
“Mathematics isn’t architecture. It happens in your head. I don’t have to go anywhere. Besides, except for the broken down German dialect when the coalminers’ rehearse with their brass bands, they don’t even speak the same language. It’s all Polish now.”
He just smiled his tempting smile. “Let’s go and see.”
Why did she feel like she would be hurting his feelings by turning him down?
He wasn’t like Jan. Would it hurt to take a little trip to help him with his article?
She put her hand on the Schreiber book. “Even if the names still appear in books, there’s nothing left to see. Not even for a travel article. Look, I’m sorry if it hurts your feelings, but it’s a dumb idea. Whoever heard of math tourists?”
“You can’t just ‘think’ history into being. Not even math history.” Bliss went on. “Research is more than reading books. Just ask Schultzi.”
Who was this man? Why had he invited her for coffee?
Schultzi would be ecstatic. He would want her to find the homes, the schools, even the classroom desks that the area’s mathematicians had used, if they hadn’t been bombed to smithereens. And what if she stumbled across an original manuscript?
“Travel is expensive.” Bliss provided her with an out.
“No.’ She sipped her coffee. “Look, I just don’t want to go to Poland, okay?” She didn’t have to explain.
But Bliss was a terrier who didn’t quit. “Have you ever thought of applying for a grant?” he asked. “You could get funding…”
She fought to hide her feelings, and was mortified to realize she wasn’t succeeding. “I don’t need money,” she told him. “I live simply.”
The irresistible smile returned. “You could help your government out at the same time.”
At last she understood.
Friend? How could she have been so stupid?
Someone closer to her own age? Schultzi was a naive fool.
Here was the real reason Bliss had befriended her.
Years spent at NSA made her glance around the café before continuing. “Perhaps I’m wrong, but…Are you asking me to spy?”
She took in his chagrined smile. Was he really embarrassed, or just a good actor?
“I’m not interested,” she said.
“Not interested in serving your country?”
She felt slapped in the face by his words, just as he intended, she realized. How could she have let him get so close? Would she never learn?
“I love my country, and I’ve put in my time.” She spoke softly, but furiously. “No doubt you already know all about that.”
His easy, breezy smile came out, like the sun emerging from behind a cloud, and turned his insulting words into a teasing joke.
How dare he!
She pulled her wallet from her backpack and looked for coins to pay for the coffee. “I don’t know who you are, or who sent you, but I want you to leave me alone. Tell your puppetmasters back in Washington, ‘No. Never again.’ They’re doing a good enough job screwing up the world without my help.”
She threw euros onto the table and put her wallet away. “And if you see me on campus again, do me a favor. Walk the other way.”
Before she could stand, his hand reached across the table and grabbed her wrist. “No, no. It’s not like that. You’ve got me all wrong.” His smile pleaded. “Let me finish.”
She wasn’t strong enough to keep her hand from being pulled down onto the table.
The other patrons of the café watched, thinking lover’s spat.
She felt her face flush and vowed never to let her need for friendship embarrass her again. But even now that need held her seated with more strength than Bliss’ hand.
“Why aren’t you studying mathematics?” he asked. “They say you were one of the best.”
None of his business.
“Professor Schultz says you want to make sure mathematics gets used for the right stuff.”
Not Schultzi! Had the spooks gone after her only real friend? She felt tears form.
Christ! How embarrassing.
She listened heartbroken, as her words to Schultzi were quoted back at her. ‘Mathematics should be used to make peace. To build. To do science and medicine. To feed people. To grind eyeglasses. Not to calculate missile trajectories or build landmine factories and cluster bombs or to encrypt and keep secrets.’
Had the spooks actually interviewed Schultzi or just bugged his apartment?
Why was Bliss keeping her here? He must see how she felt.
Her wrist hurt. He pulled her hand under the table and signaled for fresh coffee. As soon as the waiter left, he continued, “You’re right. I’m a spy. But you can’t hold that against me. You used to be one too. What if I could fix it, so you could do real math again?
“I like math history.”
“Right.”
This wasn’t about a travel article, she realized. This was about Jan. She tried tugging her hand away again.
He tightened his grip. “Two minutes more, Fritzi. Please.”
She was feeling sick to her stomach. This couldn’t be happening.
“A train loaded with plutonium has been hijacked in Poland. Jan Pawlowski is involved.”
“Jan wouldn’t…” But he would. She knew he would. She stopped talking and listened, as Bliss outlined the plan.
“I’ll go with you,” he promised. “You’ll never be alone. A whole team of operations specialists will back us up and keep you safe.
“You’ll be back in school in a week, two tops,” he promised, releasing her hand.
She stared at the candle while he made his final promise. “When we’re done, Fritzi, you will get your mathematics back. Your real mathematics.”
Startled, she looked back into his eyes, wondering if he meant w
hat she thought he did.
“Trust me Fritzi?”
If he could do that…Her eyes moistened. She saw candle flame refract inside the tears filling her eyes. She didn’t care if he saw them. To do mathematics again; real world, cutting-edge mathematics…Could Bliss really make that happen?
“You help me, Fritzi, and I’ll help you. Those papers you signed at NSA will disappear.”
12 Berlin