A Night Divided

Officer Muller takes his time, looking around the space of the tunnel while Gerta and Fritz wait, wondering if they will be killed. Up on level ground, he laughs at their project, reminding them that plenty have tried this same idea before and none have made it. While Muller informs the siblings that he can kill them on the spot, no questions asked, since they were trying to escape their country, Gerta sizes Muller. She notes milk stains on his shirt, possibly from burping a baby. Not sure what else to do, Fritz and Gerta offer Muller a chance to join them in their escape via the tunnel. To their surprise, Muller volunteers that his wife wants to leave the county. He may join them, he says, so Fritz agrees to leave a shovel in the dirt outside as a signal when the tunnel is complete. Muller tells them he may change his mind and arrest them at any time.

The two decide that their run-in with Officer Muller went as well as it could and even celebrate by enjoying some bread they purchase with their very lean funds. After that, it’s right back to work. A complication ensues that nearly ruins all their progress. The tunnel floods when Fritz nicks a pipeline with the edge of his shovel. He tells Gerta she has to keep the crack plugged with her own body until he returns with some kind of solution. Gerta is forced to stand in soaking-wet clothes in the dark of the tunnel until her brother reappears. He has with him a clamp and an empty bike tire tube, both gleaned from their neighbor. It will not hold for long, Fritz tells Gerta, but maybe, just maybe, it will hold for long enough.

Deciding the tunnel is too wet and muddy to get much work done, the siblings head home. They are surprised to find their mother waiting for them there. She is appalled at their outward appearance, as they are dirty, thin, and look exhausted. She sends Gerta up to take a bath and begins to make a meal for the three of them. After they eat, Fritz and Gerta lead their mother outside, where no hidden microphones are listening, and tell her about the tunnel. She is upset, saying, “What have you done? […] Oh, my children, why would you do this?” (213). Gerta is upset by her mother’s reaction and blames her mother for abandoning her father’s goals and convictions. Gerta’s mother admits she was not brave enough to criticize the government and that she feels the life they have at present is good enough. She calls the tunnel nonsense and tells Fritz to find a respectable job until it’s time to join the military. While they are disagreeing, they hear screams next door, and their neighbor, Herr Krause, is wheeled out of his apartment on a gurney. A woman, the same one Gerta met while hiding from the guards, is dragged out alongside him.

As the siblings still need to find out the exact location of the Death Strip in relation to their tunnel, Gerta has to get a closer view, which can only be attained from inside Anna’s apartment. Though it’s awkward and nerve-wracking, she has no choice but to knock on Anna’s door, pretending to be paying a friendly visit.

Things are awkward from the start. Anna tells Gerta that she’s changed, that she seems unhappy all the time. She asks Gerta if there is anything that she wants to confide, anything that might explain how she behaves. Gerta wants to get Anna out of the room so she can get a better look at the window at the Death Strip. When Anna offers her food, Gerta takes her up on it, thinking that it will take Anna some time, time Gerta can use to fulfill the purpose of the visit.

As it turns out, she learns more than the location of the Death Strip in relation to the tunnel on this visit. After Anna returns with food, she proceeds to also offer Gerta some hand-me-down clothes. As she is getting the clothes from the closet, Gerta notices fresh dirt on Anna’s shoes, the exact shade and consistency of the mud in their tunnel. It is clear to Gerta that Anna has been in the tunnel very recently. Anna obviously was only there to spy.

Fritz is disappointed to learn about Anna but not surprised. He thinks his sister should’ve confronted Anna about the mud to make sure that Gerta’s hunch is right. There isn’t enough time, though, to debate about what should’ve been done. They have several meters further to go and as they look up ahead, they see a spot where the roof of the tunnel dips down lower than anywhere else. They go outside and scan the street, to see if they can explain it from that vantage point. It makes no sense to them. All they can do is try and find ways to keep the roof of the tunnel from caving in.

While Fritz and Gerta are trying to determine how to support the roof of the tunnel, they have another surprise visitor. This time it’s their mother. She has changed her mind about finishing the tunnel. She was demoted at work, which partly inspired her change of heart. Her loyalties were questioned, and she was asked to divorce her husband. When she refused, she was reassigned to a position that would not pay for rent and groceries. With no other option, she agrees to help her children.

Their mother goes home for the day to supply needed sounds of life in their apartment for those who are listening in on them. She kisses her children goodbye and promises to bring them more food in the morning. Meanwhile, Fritz and Gerta hatch a plan to haul an old door down from the top floor of the Welcome building. They intend to use this as structural support inside the tunnel. The risky part is moving around in the building, especially on a higher level, without the guards inside the watchtower taking notice. Gerta performs the job because her brother is too tall and is likely to attract unwanted attention. Gerta is terrified but manages to haul the door down, making them ready to continue work on their escape.

The next door, their mother brings them fresh fruit to enjoy. Gerta is delighted but wonders where it came from. Their mother confesses she got it from Herr Krause’s house, as no one has been in it since the police took him away. While Gerta is confessing about stealing a pulley, Fritz opens a letter that has arrived at home for him. Inside is devastating news: He is to report for military duty in two days. This means they need to work quickly, though it’s unlikely they’ll get as far as they need in two days.

While they are despairing, wondering what to do, they hear other sounds and voices inside the ground space adjacent to the tunnel. It could be the Stasi, tunneling to find them, their mother warns. Fritz wonders if it isn’t other East Germans working on the same thing as them, tunneling to freedom. Gerta feels she knows what the answer is—it is their father, tunneling out from the West to help them and reunite them.

Though only Gerta believes it is her father tunneling through the same space as them, the three continue to work. They are anguishing over the possibility of neighbors or Stasi arriving at any time when Gerta hushes her mother and brother. She hears something through the walls of the tunnel, a low voice, a song. It is the song her father sang to her. It is definitely him.

Through the walls of the tunnel, the family is briefly reunited. Gerta’s parents speak to each other for the first time in years. Gerta hears the voice of her brother, Dominic. But Gerta’s father tells them it was too dangerous for them to tunnel. His goal had just been for them to get ready once he tunneled through and got them to the West. Gerta and Fritz tell him they couldn’t wait, and Fritz tells his father about his required military service, which is meant to start the next day. Their father tells Fritz, “Don’t report there […] If they get hold of you, we’ll never get you out” (258). Even as they speak through the walls of the tunnel, they spot a fissure, a serious one, on their father’s side of the tunnel. The threat of total tunnel collapse prompts their father to order them out of the tunnel. He will figure something out. In the meantime, they need to prepare to leave.

Keeping to their word that they will make their preparations to leave, Fritz, Gerta, and their mother head home for what will be their last night there. They clean their apartment because their mother wants it to be clean when the Stasi arrive and find them gone. Their mother goes to visit their grandmother, to say goodbye for good. Fritz goes out looking for Claudia and finds her. Gerta notices how crestfallen he is when he comes home; she can tell that he has asked Claudia to come with him through the tunnel and that she has refused.

Gerta and Fritz’s mother says that their grandmother’s only response is to ask why they waited this long to leave East Germany. The structure of the tunnel hasn’t collapsed but it still needs reinforcing. Their father works to reinforce his side of the tunnel and Fritz begins to use mud to make some makeshift bricks to reinforce their side. Above them, guards have noticed the dip in the ground and are beginning to investigate. They can hear guard dogs barking overhead.

When Gerta sneaks outside to fetch some more dirt to make reinforcement bricks, she is surprised and troubled to find Anna there. Anna tells her everything that she’s held back all this time. The Stasi put her up to spying, she tells Gerta. She had no choice. She had to give them information or her family would suffer more or possibly be killed. Her parents only thought that Gerta and Fritz were gardening. Anna needs to give the Stasi information to keep her parents safe. She tells Gerta that she and her brother and mother must leave tonight. Tomorrow, she will tell the Stasi all she knows. They must get out safely first.

Gerta and her mother go home to write down their goodbyes. Gerta writes a long letter to Anna, one she feels she can’t quite get right but she tries as best as she can to speak what’s in her heart. Gerta’s mother leaves the Bible in a conspicuous place with a note that it is there for the Stasi, who need it. The two are about to leave the apartment for the final time when there’s a knock at the door. They know straight away who is waiting for them on the other side. The secret police, the Grenzers, have arrived at last.

The secret police state that they are there on their doorstep because Fritz failed to report for military duty. They demand to know where he is. Gerta and her mother volunteer no information. Gerta’s mother remains calm and polite and the Grenzers leave, for the moment at least. Gerta and her mother remain quiet indoors, watching as the Grenzers linger in their car and then finally drive away. While Gerta and her mother finish up the very last of the packing, another knock arrives at the door: the Grenzers again. This time, they are fierce and threatening, telling Gerta and her mother that they will be taken into custody. Fritz will be found, Officer Viktor tells them, or they will be made to explain his whereabouts.

Viktor tells his men to first rifle around in the apartment and find whatever they can. Gerta’s mother uses this opportunity to make a daring move. She reminds Viktor that she knew him as a boy, that he and Fritz were once friends. She says she knows how much Viktor must value his family and their safety and well-being. With this, she presses her car keys into his hands, tacitly offering them as a bribe to get out safely. Gerta is astonished and nervous but knows how hard even the unreliable East German cars are to acquire and that Viktor will likely gift this to his mother. Without a word to Gerta’s mother, Viktor orders his men out of the apartment, declaring that he’s found nothing. Once the secret police are gone, Gerta and her mother hurry to the Welcome building. Fritz wonders what took them so long. He is already inside, in the company of Officer Muller and his family. Gerta can hear her father and brother still chipping away at dirt on their side of the tunnel. Then she hears a voice behind and above her. It is Anna, standing at the opening of the tunnel with her family. They have come to tunnel to freedom too.

The group begins tunneling through—a difficult, painful process in that very cramped space. As Officer Muller’s wife tunnels through, the baby begins to cry. Anna helps to comfort the child, who has made sufficient noise for them to be detected. At last, Gerta is reunited with her father, who embraces her for the first time in years. They are still not safe, though. They are just inches away from the Death Strip and before they can all even safely surface, flashlights and guns are aimed at them.

Gerta is stunned when Officer Muller puts himself between her and the gun. He grabs the weapon away from the guard but not before it fires, straight into his chest. Muller tells Gerta to run and she does, still trying to drag him along with her. Her father tells her not to, takes a quick pulse, and pronounces Muller dead. The guards chasing them fire again but they are too far away. Gerta escapes to freedom in the West, accompanied by her mother, brother, Muller’s wife and infant son, and Anna and her family. They will all be a family again now, Gerta’s father declares. They are finally united.