The van crossed a patch of concrete. The gunfire ceased. Walli saw a street with shops, advertisements for Lucky Strike and Coca-Cola, shiny new cars, and, best of all, a small group of startled soldiers in American uniforms. He took his foot off the accelerator and tried to brake. Suddenly the pain was too much. His leg felt paralyzed, and he was unable to press down on the brake pedal. In desperation he steered the van into a lamppost.
The soldiers rushed to the van and one threw open the door. "Well done, kid, you made it!" he said.
I made it, Walli thought. I'm alive, and I'm free. But without Karolin.
"Hell of a ride," the soldier said admiringly. He was not much older than Walli.
As Walli relaxed, the pain became overwhelming. "My leg hurts," he managed to say.
The soldier looked down. "Jeez, look at all that blood." He turned and spoke to someone behind him. "Hey, call an ambulance."
Walli passed out.
*
Walli got his bullet wound stitched up and was discharged from hospital the next day with bruised ribs and a bandage around the calf of his right leg.
According to the newspapers, the border guard he had run over had died.
Limping, Walli went to the Franck television factory and told his story to the Danish accountant, Enok Andersen, who undertook to tell Werner and Carla that he was all right. Enok gave Walli some West German deutschmarks, and Walli got a room at the YMCA.
His ribs hurt every time he turned over in bed, and he slept badly.
Next day he retrieved his guitar from the van. The instrument had survived the crossing without damage, unlike Walli. However, the vehicle was a write-off.
Walli applied for a West German passport, granted automatically to escapers.
He was free. He had escaped from the suffocating puritanism of Walter Ulbricht's Communist regime. He could play and sing anything he chose.
And he was miserable.
He missed Karolin. He felt as if he had lost a hand. He kept thinking of things he would tell her or ask her tonight or tomorrow, then suddenly remembering that he could not speak to her; and the dreadful recollection hit him every time like a kick in the stomach. He would see a pretty girl on the street, and think about what he and Karolin might do next Saturday in the back of Joe's van; then he would realize that there would be no more evenings in the back of the van, and he would feel stricken by grief. He walked past clubs where he might get a gig, then wondered if he could bear to perform without Karolin at his side.
He spoke on the phone to his sister Rebecca, who urged him to come and live in Hamburg with her and her husband; but he thanked her and declined. He could not bring himself to leave Berlin while Karolin was still in the East.
Missing her grievously, he took his guitar a week later to the Minnesanger folk club, where he had met her two years ago. A sign outside said it was not open on Mondays, but the door stood ajar, so he went in anyway.
Sitting at the bar, adding up figures in a ledger, was the club's young compere and owner, Danni Hausmann. "I remember you," said Danni. "The Bobbsey Twins. You were great. Why did you never come back?"
"The Vopos smashed up my guitar," Walli explained.
"But now you have another, I see."
Walli nodded. "But I've lost Karolin."
"That was careless. She was a pretty girl."
"We both lived in the East. She's still there, but I escaped."
"How?"
"I drove a van through the barrier."
"That was you? I read about it in the newspapers. Hey, man, cool! But why didn't you bring the chick?"
"She didn't show up at the rendezvous."
"Too bad. Want a drink?" Danni went behind the bar.
"Thanks. I'd like to go back for her, but I'm wanted for murder there now."
Danni pumped two glasses of draft beer. "The Communists made a huge fuss about that. They're calling you a violent criminal."
They had also demanded Walli's extradition. The government of West Germany had refused, saying that the guard had shot at a German citizen who merely wanted to go from one Berlin street to the next, and responsibility for his death lay with the unelected East German regime that illegally imprisoned its population.
In his head Walli did not believe that he had done wrong, but in his heart he could not get used to the idea that he had killed a man.
He said to Danni: "If I crossed the border they would arrest me."
"Man, you're fucked."
"And I still don't know why Karolin didn't come."
"And you can't go back to ask her. Unless . . ."
Walli pricked up his ears. "Unless what?"
Danni hesitated. "Nothing."
Walli put down his glass. He was not going to let a thing like that pass him by. "Come on, man--what?"
Danni said thoughtfully: "Of all the people in Berlin, I guess the one I could trust is a guy who killed an East German border guard."
This was maddening. "What are you talking about?"
Danni made up his mind. "Oh, just something I heard."
If it were just something he had heard, he would not be so secretive about it, Walli thought. "What did you hear?"
"There might be a way to go back without passing through a checkpoint."
"How?"
"I can't tell you."
Walli was angered. Danni seemed to be toying with him. "Then why the fuck did you say it?"
"Take it easy, okay? I can't tell you, but I could take you to see someone."
"When?"
Danni thought for a minute, then answered the question with a question. "Are you willing to go back today? Like, now?"
Walli was scared, but he did not hesitate. "Yes. But why the rush?"
"So that you have no chance to tell anyone. They're not exactly professional about security, but they're not completely stupid either."
He was talking about an organized group. It sounded promising. Walli got off his stool. "Can I leave my guitar here?"
"I'll put it in the store." Danni picked up the instrument in its case and locked it in a cupboard with several other instruments and some amplification gear. "Let's go," he said.
The club was just off the Ku'damm. Danni closed up and they walked to the nearest subway station. Danni noticed his limp. "You were shot in the leg, according to the newspapers."
"Yeah. Hurts like fuck."
"I guess I can trust you. A Stasi undercover agent wouldn't go so far as to wound himself."
Walli did not know whether to be thrilled or terrified. Might he really be able to return to East Berlin--today? It seemed too much to hope for. Yet it also filled him with dread. East Germany still had the death penalty. If he were caught, he would probably be executed by guillotine.
Walli and Danni took the subway across the city. It occurred to Walli that this could be a trap. The Stasi probably had agents in West Berlin, and the owner of the Minnesanger could be one. Would they go to so much trouble to catch Walli? It was a stretch; but, knowing how vengeful Hans Hoffmann was, Walli thought it was possible.
He studied Danni covertly as they rode the underground train. Could he be a Stasi agent? It was hard to imagine. Danni was about twenty-five, and had longish hair combed forward in the latest style. He wore elastic-sided boots with pointed toes. He had a successful club. He was too cool to be a cop.
On the other hand, he was perfectly placed to spy on West Berlin's young anti-Communists. Most of them probably came to his club. He must know just about every student leader in West Berlin. Did the Stasi care about what such young people were doing?
Of course they did. They were obsessed, like medieval priests hunting witches.
Yet Walli could not pass up this opportunity, if it meant he might speak to Karolin just one more time.
He vowed to be alert.
The sun was going down when they came out of the subway in the district called Wedding. They walked south, and Walli quickly realized they were heading for Bernauer Strasse, whe
re Rebecca had escaped.
The street had changed, he saw in the fading daylight. On the south side, in place of the barbed-wire fence, there was now a concrete wall; and the buildings on the Communist side were in the process of being demolished. On the free side, where Walli and Danni were, the street seemed blighted. The ground-floor shops in the apartment buildings looked run-down. Walli guessed that nobody wanted to live so close to the Wall, repellent to the eye and to the heart.
Danni led him to the back of a building and they went in by the rear entrance of a disused shop. It seemed to have been a grocery store, for on the walls were enamel advertisements for canned salmon and cocoa. However, the shop and the rooms around it were full of loose earth, piled high, leaving only a narrow passage through; and Walli began to guess what was going on here.
Danni opened a door and went down a concrete stair lit by an electric bulb. Walli followed. Danni called out a phrase that might have been code: "Submariners coming in!" At the foot of the stairs was a large cellar, undoubtedly used by the grocer for storage. Now there was a hole a yard square in the floor, and a surprisingly professional-looking hoist over it.
They had dug a tunnel.
"How long has this been here?" Walli asked. If his sister had known about it last year she might have escaped this way, and avoided Bernd's crippling injury.
"Too long," said Danni. "We finished it a week ago."
"Oh." That was too late to have been any use to Rebecca.
Danni added: "We only use it in twilight. In daytime we would be too visible, and at night we would have to use flashlights, which might call attention to us. All the same, the risk of discovery increases every time we bring people across."
A young man in jeans came up a ladder out of the hole: presumably one of the student tunnelers. He looked hard at Walli, then said: "Who's this, Danni?"
"I vouch for him, Becker," said Danni. "I've known him since before the Wall went up."
"Why is he here?" Becker was hostile and suspicious.
"To go across."
"He wants to go to the East?"
Walli explained: "I escaped last week, but I need to go back for my girlfriend. I can't cross by a regular checkpoint because I killed a border guard, so I'm wanted for murder."
"You're that guy?" Becker looked at him again. "Yeah, I recognize you from the photograph in the paper." His attitude changed. "You can go, but you haven't got much time." He looked at his watch. "They'll start coming through from the East in ten minutes exactly. There's hardly room to pass someone in the tunnel, and I don't want you to cause a traffic jam and slow down the escapers."
Walli was scared, but he did not want to lose this chance. "I'll go right away," he said, concealing his fear.
"Okay, go."
He shook Danni's hand. "Thanks," he said. "I'll be back for my guitar."
"Good luck with your girl."
Walli scrambled down the ladder.
The shaft was three yards deep. At the bottom was the entrance to a tunnel about a yard square. It was neatly built, Walli saw immediately. There was a plank floor, and the roof was propped at intervals. He dropped to his hands and knees and began to crawl.
After a few seconds he realized there were no lights. He kept crawling as it became completely dark. He felt viscerally scared. He knew that the real danger would come when he emerged into East Germany at the other end of the tunnel, but his animal instincts told him to be frightened now, as he crawled forward unable to see an inch in front of his face.
To distract himself, he tried to picture the streetscape above. He was passing beneath the road, then the Wall, then the half-demolished houses on the Communist side; but he did not know how much farther the tunnel went, nor where it terminated.
He was breathing hard with the effort, his hands and knees were sore from crawling on planks, and the bullet wound in his calf was burning with pain; but all he could do was grit his teeth and go on.
The tunnel could not be infinite. It must end eventually. He just had to keep crawling. The sense that he was lost in endless darkness was just childish panic. He had to stay calm. He could do that. Karolin was at the end of this tunnel--not literally, but all the same the thought of her sexy wide-mouthed smile gave him strength to combat his fear.
Was there a glimmer ahead, or did he imagine it? For a long time it remained too faint to be sure of; but at last it strengthened, and a couple of seconds later he emerged into electric light.
There was another shaft above his head. He went up a ladder and found himself in another basement. Three people stood staring at him. Two had luggage: he guessed they were escapers. The third, presumably one of the student organizers, looked at him and said: "I don't know you!"
"Danni brought me," he said. "I'm Walli Franck."
"Too many people know about this tunnel!" the man said. His voice was shrill with anxiety.
Well, of course, Walli thought; everyone who escapes through it obviously knows the secret. He understood why Danni had said that the danger increased every time it was used. He wondered whether it would still be open when he wanted to return. The thought of being trapped in East Germany again almost made him want to turn around and crawl all the way back.
The man turned to the two with bags. "Go," he said. They went down the shaft. Returning his attention to Walli, he pointed to a flight of stone steps. "Go to the top and wait," he said. "When the coast is clear, Cristina will open the hatch from the outside. You get out. Then you're on your own."
"Thanks." Walli went up the steps until his head came up against an iron trapdoor in the ceiling. This had originally been used for deliveries of some kind, he guessed. He crouched on the steps and forced himself to be patient. Lucky for him there was someone keeping watch on the outside, otherwise he might be seen leaving.
After a couple of minutes, the hatch opened. In the evening light, Walli saw a young woman in a gray head scarf. He scrambled out, and two more people with bags hurried down the steps. The young woman called Cristina closed the hatch. She had a pistol stuffed into her belt, he saw with surprise.
Walli looked around. He was in a small walled yard at the back of a derelict apartment building. Cristina pointed to a wooden door in the wall. "Go that way," she said.
"Thank you."
"Get lost," she said. "Fast."
They were all too stressed to be polite.
Walli opened the door and passed through to the street. To his left, a few yards away, was the Wall. He turned right and started walking.
At first he looked around constantly, expecting to see a police car screech up. Then he tried to act normally and saunter along the pavement as he had used to. No matter how he tried, he could not lose the limp: his leg hurt too much.
His first impulse was to go straight to Karolin's house. But he could not knock on her door. Her father would call the police.
He had not thought this out.
Perhaps it would be better if he met her leaving class tomorrow afternoon. There was nothing suspicious about a boy waiting outside the college for his girlfriend, and Walli had done it often. Somehow he would have to make sure none of her classmates saw his face. He was agonizingly impatient to see her, but he would be mad not to take precautions.
What would he do in the meantime?
The tunnel had come out in Strelitzer Strasse, which ran southward into the old city center, Berlin-Mitte, where his family lived. He was only a few blocks from his parents' house. He could go home.
They might even be pleased to see him.
As he approached their street, he wondered whether the house might be under surveillance. If that was so, he could not go there. He thought again about changing his appearance, but he had nothing with which to disguise himself: when he left his room at the YMCA this morning he had not dreamed he might be back in East Berlin by nightfall. At his family home there would be hats and scarves and other useful items of attire--but first he had to get there safely.
Happily it wa
s now dark. He walked along his parents' street on the opposite side, scanning for people who might be Stasi snoops. He saw no loiterers, no one sitting in a parked car, no one stationed at a window. All the same he went to the end of the street and walked around the block. Coming back, he ducked down the alley that led to the backyards. He opened a gate, crossed his parents' yard, and came to the kitchen entrance. It was nine thirty: his father had not yet locked up the house. Walli opened the door and stepped inside.
The light was on but the kitchen was empty. Dinner was long over and his family would be upstairs in the drawing room. Walli crossed the hall and went up. The drawing room door was open, and he stepped inside. His mother, father, sister, and grandmother were watching television. Walli said: "Hello, everyone."
Lili screamed.
Grandmother Maud said in English: "Oh, my goodness!"
Carla went pale and her hands flew to her mouth.
Werner stood up. "My boy," he said. In two strides he crossed the room and folded Walli into his arms. "My boy, thank God."
In Walli's heart a dam of pent-up feeling burst, and he wept.
His mother hugged him next, tears flowing freely. Then Lili, then Grandmother Maud. Walli wiped his eyes with the sleeve of his denim shirt, but more kept coming. His overwhelming emotion had taken him by surprise. He had thought himself hardened, at the age of seventeen, to being alone and separated from his family. Now he saw that he had only been postponing the tears.
At last they all calmed down and dried their eyes. Mother rebandaged Walli's bullet wound, which had bled while he was in the tunnel. Then she made coffee and brought some cake, and Walli realized he was starving. When he had eaten and drunk his fill, he told them the story. Then, when they had asked all their questions, he went to bed.
*
Next day at half past three he was leaning against a wall across the street from Karolin's college, wearing a cap and sunglasses. He was early: the girls came out at four.
The sun was shining optimistically on Berlin. The city was a mixture of grand old buildings, hard-edged modern concrete, and slowly disappearing vacant lots where bombs had fallen during the war.
Walli's heart was full of longing. In a few minutes he would see Karolin's face, framed by long curtains of fair hair, the wide mouth smiling. He would kiss her hello, and feel the soft roundness of her lips on his. Perhaps they would lie down together, before the night was over, and make love.