In The Presence Of My Enemies

And Willi Dorsch, canny political creature that he was, suddenly became quiet as a mouse. If he could have wiggled his ears, he would have swung them toward the table full of SS men. Heinrich felt the same way. The blackshirts weren't talking about just any goddamn son of a bitch. They were talking about Heinz Buckliger, newly chosen Fuhrer and the most powerful man on the planet.

"Sure as hell, we'll hear more crap about the first edition," another SS man predicted gloomily. "If we'd hadour way, we'd've knocked that stinking nonsense over the head once and for all."

"That's about the size of it," the Sturmbannfuhrer -the most senior man at the table-agreed. "But the Wehrmacht wouldn't play ball with us, and so we got stuck with this asshole."

A fragment of Latin went through Heinrich's head.Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? Whowould watch the watchmen? The SS was and always had been a law unto itself. Maybe, between them, the rest of the Party and the Wehrmacht could keep it in check. And, by all the signs, the SS itself had split on a candidate to replace Kurt Haldweim. That seemed promising. If no one else could, maybe some of the watchmen would keep an eye on the rest.

"He's young, too." The bruiser sounded depressed at the prospect.

"Well, maybe-" But the Sturmbannfuhrer broke off. Whathad he been about to say?Maybe he won't live to get old? No, that wasn't the sort of thing to blurt out in a crowded restaurant. Had Heinrich wanted to say it, he couldn't imagine anyone but Lise whom he trusted enough to hear it. Even as things were, the blackshirts had run their mouths far more than he thought wise.

He looked at his watch. "Getting on towards one o'clock," he said. "We'd better head back to the office." Willi looked at him as if he'd lost his mind, or possibly started speaking Chinese. He wanted to hang around and listen to the SS men. That was exactly why Heinrich wanted to leave. He kicked his friend in the ankle under the table. Reluctantly, Willi left his chair. Heinrich paid the bill. They left the restaurant together.

Once out on the sidewalk, Willi practically exploded with excitement. "Did you hear them?" he demanded. "Did youhear them? Practically talking treason, right there in Admiral Yamamoto's!"

"Don't be silly. How can SS men talk treason?" Heinrich said. "What they want is what the state wants. And if you don't believe me, just ask them."

"Ha!" Willi said. "I didn't know you were such a funny fellow."

"I wasn't joking."

"I know. That only makes it funnier, but you have to look at it the right way to see it." Willi walked along for a while, whistling a tune from the new show about a theater owner who wanted an excuse to close down his firetrap of a house, booked a dreadful play about the evil machinations of Churchill and Stalin, and found to his horror that it was bad enough to become a comedy smash. The show itself was a comedy smash in Berlin, too, and had already spawned several companies touring the rest of the Reich. After a block or so, Willi stopped whistling-a mercy, because he was flat. He said, "Well, I hate to admit it, but you were right."

"About what? Getting out of Yamamoto's? You bet I was."

"No, no, no." Willi impatiently shook his head. "About that piece in the Beobachter this morning. If those bastards don't like it, there's got to be more to it than I thought. Buckliger does need to take a good long look at our underpinnings after all." A girl with nice legs came toward them. Willi said not a word about her underpinnings. Heinrich knew then that his friend was serious. After a few more steps, Willi added, "You may have been right about something else, too."

"What, twice in one day?" Heinrich said. "Such compliments you pay me. I've caught up with a stopped clock."

"No, you haven't, because this other one was a while ago." Willi waited to make sure Heinrich was suitably chastened, then went on, "If our lovely luncheon companions don't care for the first edition, it's probably got something going for it, too."

"You never said anything like that before." Heinrich didn't try to hide his surprise.

"That's because I thought it was a load of garbage before," Willi answered. "But if those Schweinehunde think the same thing…then they're wrong, and that means I must be wrong, too."

Heinrich made as if to feel his forehead. "You must be feverish, is what you must be. Saying I'm right? Saying you're wrong? Delirium, if you ask me."

"Get away from me." Willi sidestepped to escape Heinrich, and almost bumped into a man wearing the light blue of a Luftwaffe official. They made mutual apologies. The Luftwaffe man kept going up the street, towards Admiral Yamamoto's. Willi looked back over his shoulder. "Iam in a state. I can't help wondering if that fellow's on his way to plot with the thugs in black shirts."

That hadn't even occurred to Heinrich. "If you see plotters behind every potted plant, they're going to put you in a rubber room, you know."