The Separation
I was stiff from being cooped up in the car all day and it took me a long time to ease myself out on to the gravel surface, supporting myself with my stick. The two men I was travelling with watched with some sympathy, but I was determined to manage on my own. Sharp daggers of pain stabbed into my legs and back.
Gradually the pain eased. Group Captain Dodman was by my side as we went through the door, his hand lightly supporting the elbow of my right arm. We were met by a man wearing black trousers and a white shirt, neatly pressed, not in the least casual. He greeted all three of us by name, then asked if we would please wait a while.
We were shown to a side room: a long, dim, panelled chamber, with dark landscape paintings, trophies and bookcases lining the walls on each side. A table ran down the centre of the room, well polished, with a great number of chairs arranged neatly around it. The windows were draped with thick tapestry curtains, the dark fabric of blackout material visible behind them, covering the glass panes. The three of us stood in a nervous group just inside the door, waiting for what I at least assumed would be a summons in the next few minutes.
We were still there two hours later, having long since taken seats at one end of the table. During the time we were waiting callers to the house came and went, some merely delivering or collecting various things, others arriving on apparently urgent missions and being conducted straight away to other parts of the building. About an hour after we arrived we were brought a tray of tea and biscuits. We conversed little, all drained by the long day in the car and expecting to be called at any moment.
At about twelve-fifteen the summons finally came.
Stiffly again, I climbed to my feet. Leaving the other two in the waiting room I hobbled after the man who had come for me, feeling I should hurry so as not to keep the Prime Minister waiting, but put under no pressure to do so.
We crossed the hall where we had entered, then went along a short, darkened corridor. I was led into a room where there were four desks bearing large typewriters, with women working on two of them. The room was sparsely and cheerlessly furnished: bare floorboards, no curtains apart from the inevitable blackout screens, harsh overhead lights, a multitude of filing cabinets, telephones, in-trays, trailing wires, paper everywhere. Again, I was asked to wait. The secretarial work went on around me, with the two typists paying no attention to me at all. The clock over the door said that it was twenty minutes past twelve.
‘The Prime Minister will see you now,’ said the man who had brought me from the waiting room, holding open the door. As I limped through he said, ‘Mr Churchill, this is Group Captain J. L. Sawyer.’
After the bright unshaded lights of the office I had left, the large room I entered felt at first as if it was in darkness. Only the centrally placed desk was illuminated, by two table lamps placed at each end. In the light reflecting up from the papers I saw the famous visage of Winston Churchill leaning forward across his work. Cigar smoke shrouded the air. As I walked painfully towards the desk he did not look up but continued to read through a sheaf of papers, a thick fountain pen in one hand. He held a cigar in the other. An almost empty cut-glass tumbler was on the desk, glinting in the light – a decanter of whisky and a jug of water stood beside it. Mr Churchill was wearing half-moon reading spectacles. He read rapidly, pausing only to inscribe his initials at the bottom of each page, then turning the sheet with the hand that held the pen. On the last page he wrote a few words, signed his name and turned the sheet over.
He tossed the papers into an over-full wire basket under one of the lamps, then took another wad from his dispatch box.
‘Sawyer,’ he said, looking up at me over his spectacles. I was only a short distance away from him, but even so I wondered if he could see me properly, so deep was the shade in the room. ‘J. L. Sawyer. You’re the one named Jack, is that it?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Not the other one.’
‘Do you mean my brother, Mr Churchill?’
‘Yes. What’s happened to him? My people had the two of you muddled up for a while.’
‘My brother is dead, sir. He was killed last year during the first few weeks of the Blitz.’
Churchill looked startled. ‘I hadn’t heard that dreadful news. Words are always inadequate, but let me say how appalled I am to hear it. I can only offer you my sincerest condolences.’ The Prime Minister was staring straight at me, saying nothing. For a moment he seemed genuinely lost for words. He put down his pen. Then he said, ‘This war … this bloody war.’
‘Joe’s death happened several months ago, sir,’ I said.
‘Even so.’ He shook his head slightly and pressed his hands flat on the desk. ‘Let me at least tell you why I have asked to see you. I’m in need of an aide-de-camp from the RAF, and your name was put forward. You won’t have much to do for a while, but I might have a more interesting job coming up for you later. For now, when we go anywhere I would require you to walk behind me, stay visible and keep your trap shut. I see you’re on a stick. You can walk, can’t you?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘The staff here will give you the passes you need. Be at Admiralty House first thing tomorrow morning, if you will.’
‘Yes, sir,’ I said again. Mr Churchill had returned to browsing through his papers, the hand and the pen moving steadily down the margin. After a few seconds of indecision I realized that the interview had ended, so I turned round painfully and went as quickly as I could towards the door.
‘Group Captain Sawyer!’
I paused and looked back. The Prime Minister had put down the papers and was now sitting more erect behind his desk. He added whisky and water to his glass, more of the former than of the latter.
‘They tell me you and your brother went to the Berlin Olympics and won a medal.’
‘A bronze, sir. We were in the coxless pairs.’
‘Well done. They also tell me you were introduced to Rudolf Hess afterwards.’
‘Yes, I was.’
‘Was that you alone, or was your brother there too?’
‘Just me, sir.’
‘Did your brother ever meet him?’
‘Only briefly. Hess handed us our medals at the ceremony.’
‘But I gather you spent some time with him after that. Did you form any kind of impression of the man?’
‘It was a few years ago, Mr Churchill. I met Herr Hess at a reception at the British Embassy. I didn’t spend long with him, but I would say that I didn’t like him.’
‘I didn’t ask if you liked him. I’m told you speak fluent German and held a long conversation with the man. What did you make of him?’
I thought before answering, because since that evening so long ago I had not dwelt on my memories of what happened. Larger and more interesting events had followed.
Mr Churchill took a sip from his glass of whisky, watching me steadily.
‘From the way he was acting I would have thought him drunk, but he was not drinking alcohol. I came to the conclusion he was used to getting his way by bullying people. He was with a crowd of other Nazis and he seemed to be showing off in front of them. It would be difficult for me to say what I really learned about him.’
‘All right. Would you recognize him again if you saw him now?’
‘Yes, sir. I’ll never forget him.’
‘Good. That could be invaluable to me. As you possibly know, Herr Hess has acquired a certain notoriety in recent weeks.’
I had no idea what Mr Churchill meant by that last remark. The news of Hess’s sensational arrival in Scotland had apparently been overtaken by events. I was stunned by the realization that the Germans were seeking peace, but after the first blaze of publicity there was no follow-up in the papers and Hess was never mentioned on the wireless. I had discussed it with some of the other patients at the convalescent hospital, but none of them knew any more about it than I did.
Mr Churchill put down the drink, took up his pen and returned to the papers. I waited for a few seconds but once again it was cle
ar that he had finished with me. I opened the door behind me and returned to the outer office. One of the secretaries was waiting and she handed me a folder containing several pieces of paper and card. She explained what they were, where I should sign them and when I would be expected to show them.
A few minutes later, reunited with Group Captain Dodman and Mr Strathy, I went back to the car waiting on the gravel drive outside the house. The WAAF driver was asleep, hunched forward uncomfortably over the steering wheel.
15
Joe was tense and silent as he drove away from Berlin. He checked the rear-view mirror constantly and reacted nervously if any other vehicle overtook us. Of course I asked him what the matter was. As before, he would say nothing.
We left the huge sprawl of the city behind us and were driving along the autobahn through the dark countryside when I heard a muffled knocking from the back of the van. It sounded like a mechanical problem to me, but Joe shrugged it off.
‘Hold on, will you?’ he said to me harshly.
A few minutes later we approached a turn-off, signposted to a place called Kremmen, and after further checking in the mirror Joe slowed the van. There was no traffic around. We left the autobahn and joined a narrow road, leading across hilly country and through tall trees. Joe drove for another two or three minutes before he spotted a narrow lane that led off to the side. He pulled into it, switched off the engine and doused all lights.
I said into the sudden silence, ‘Joe, what’s going on?’
‘I sometimes think you must be blind, when so much occurs around you that you don’t see. Come and give me a hand.’
Outside the van we were in almost total darkness. Whatever light there might have been from what remained of the dusk was blotted out by the canopy of trees. There were no sounds of traffic, no lights from houses, no sign of anything happening anywhere. A warm, piny smell embraced us. Over our heads we could hear the branches brushing lightly against each other as the breeze soughed through the forest. Our feet crunched on dried needles. Joe opened the rear double doors of the van. He reached in, felt around for a moment, then located what he was looking for. It was our torch, which he switched on and passed to me.
‘Hold it steady,’ he said.
He clambered up into the van compartment, bending double, and pushed our bags of kit away from the side where they were piled up. There seemed to be several more cases and boxes than I remembered bringing with us when we left home.
‘Over here!’ he said, waving his hand with an annoyed gesture. ‘Don’t point the light at me.’
A mattress had been placed on the floor of the van, concealed until now by the bags and cases Joe had stacked alongside it. The mattress itself was covered by a wooden board of some kind, leaning at a forty-five-degree angle against the wall of the van to make a cramped, triangular space beneath. Joe was kneeling on the edge of the mattress, pulling the board away. As soon as he did so I realized that there was someone lying underneath it. The figure exclaimed loudly in German and made an irate movement, pushing at the board from below and sitting upright as soon as there was enough space to do so.
It was a young woman, but because of the angle of the torch beam I did not recognize her at first. Joe took her hands and helped her out, and as soon as I was able to see her properly I realized it was Birgit, the daughter of the family we had been staying with in Berlin.
Joe tried to embrace her but she pushed him away angrily.
‘[Why have you taken so long?]’ she cried. ‘[I’ve been trapped for hours! I couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe, I’m dying of thirst!]’
‘[I stopped as soon as I thought it would be safe,]’ Joe said. ‘[I was held up in Berlin, waiting for him.]’
He jabbed his thumb in my direction. At least some of Joe’s earlier impatience was explained, but many other questions remained glaringly unanswered. For a few minutes there was a noisy scene between the three of us, there under the darkness of the trees, with Birgit angry and Joe defensive, while I was thoroughly confused and unable to get replies to the string of questions I felt had to be asked.
Birgit’s unexpected appearance caused an explosion of feelings in me that I could never explain to Joe. I had never discussed her with him, so I assumed, partly because it suited me to assume, that he had no interest in her. However, thoughts of her had haunted my every moment since we had arrived in Berlin. She was the most beautiful young woman I had ever seen or met. Her lively, amusing personality had smitten me, provoking wild fantasies which I reluctantly suppressed. When she picked up the violin and became absorbed in her music I simply doted on her. I managed a few short conversations with her, but most of our contact had been during the family meals. I had not been able to take my eyes off her. She ravished me with her looks, her laugh, her sensitive intelligence. When I was away from that apartment in Goethestrasse I could hardly dare think of her, so turbulent were my feelings about her, yet I could barely think of anything or anyone else.
Things eventually quietened down. My eyes began to adjust to the gloom so that it was no longer so profoundly dark around us. I could see that Joe and Birgit were standing side by side, leaning back against the van.
I said, ‘Would you mind telling me what’s been going on, Joe?’
‘[Speak in German so Birgit can follow what we’re saying.]’
‘She speaks English well enough,’ I said, sulkily.
‘[We’re still in her country. Let’s make it as easy for her as possible.]’
‘[All right, Joe. What’s happening?]’
‘[Birgit is going to travel back to England with us. She has to leave Germany as soon as possible.]’
‘[Why?]’
Joe said to Birgit, ‘[It is exactly as I was telling you. People like JL haven’t the faintest idea what Hitler has been doing to the Jews in this country.]’
‘[You needn’t patronize me,]’ I said, stung by his words, but more so by the way he tried to belittle me in front of Birgit. ‘[I can read the newspapers.]’
‘[Yes, but you don’t act on what you read.]’
‘[How can you say that?]’ I retorted. ‘[If you felt as strongly as that, you wouldn’t have come to Germany for the Games.]’
‘[I couldn’t tell you before,]’ Joe said quietly. ‘[I was going to try to convince you we should stay away. After all the training we’ve done I wasn’t sure how I could tell you, or what I could say to persuade you, but that’s how I was feeling. Then Mum told me about Birgit, how desperate the situation had become in Berlin for Jews, and that she was desperate to help. You know she and Hanna Sattmann were brought up together. The truth is that the main reason I came to Germany was not to race, but to try to bring Birgit out with us.]’
‘[JL, he’s right about the situation,]’ said Birgit, her head turning from one of us to the other. ‘[You can’t know what it’s been like for us. But neither can you, Joe. No more than any of the visitors who have come from abroad for the Games. The Nazis have been pulling down their banners, cleaning slogans off the walls, allowing Jewish shops and restaurants to open up again, to make foreigners think that what they’ve been told about the persecution of Jews is untrue. As soon as the Games are over, they’ll start up on us again.]’
She gulped, then fell silent. In the darkness I could see she was pressing her hands over her eyes. Joe leaned towards her, apparently trying to console her, but she pushed him aside. In the gloom I saw her move away from the van, stepping into the darker area beneath the nearest trees. I could hear her crying.
My heart impelled me to run across to her, hold her, comfort her, but in the last few minutes I had started to realize how little I really knew about her or her life. For that matter, too, how little I understood about what the Nazis had been doing to the Jews in Germany.
Here again, the time I am describing seems an age ago. Post-war hindsight threatens the accuracy of my memories, in particular the reliability of my remembered sensibilities. This was 1936. The concentration camps and the e
xtermination camps, Himmler’s Einsatzgruppen, the vile medical experiments on prisoners, the forced labour and starvation, the gas chambers, all these lay years ahead. To say that Joe and I could not have known about the growing persecution would be facile, but even had we been blessed or cursed with foresight, who could have believed how it would in reality grow?
Yet the clues were in place. They were nakedly exposed in the speeches of Adolf Hitler, there for anyone to understand them, if they took the trouble. Rudolf Hess was no better, but he was not so well known at that time outside Germany. Although it was Hitler who announced the Nuremberg Laws, the series of measures that removed all civil, legal and humanitarian rights from the Jews, and which Birgit was in effect beginning to tell us about, it was Hess who had enacted them and it was Hess’s signature on the orders.
Again, Joe and I were two naïve young men from a relatively sheltered background, whose principal interest was sport. Perhaps I was more naïve than Joe, but it was true of us both. We were not untypical. Even those who should have known better, the politicians and diplomats of the Western democracies, clearly did not realize the enormity of what was happening in Germany. Perhaps they suspected more than they admitted, but they have claimed since that they did not. There was some mitigation: nothing like it had ever happened before, or not on such a scale, so it was easier to try to believe something else, to hope for the best. But those few minutes, in the hush of the silent forest, turned out to be the beginning of an education for me.
I sat down on the carpet of pine needles, away from the other two, thinking that my presence was only adding to the confusion. I certainly realized that the turbulence of my feelings and wishes meant that I was likely to say or do something I would quickly regret. I watched the indistinct dark shapes of the other two, visible against the white-painted background of the van. Birgit was sobbing quietly; Joe was talking to her. Either I could not hear what they were saying, or I closed my mind to it. Gradually she calmed.
A little later I went to the rear compartment of the van and found the Primus picnic-stove that Joe and I had brought with us from England. I set it up with some difficulty and managed to light the burner and heat up water from our canteen. I made coffee for all three of us, dark and strong, the way we knew the Germans liked it. Birgit sat on the van’s floor, between the open doors, cradling her cup and sipping the hot drink. Joe and I stood before her.