French Betrayal (Reich Triumphant Book 1)

by Vincent Dugan

  Drago nodded. “Iosef suffers the same.” Iosef was the youngest of eight children, five from Drago’s first wife, killed in the 1918 flu epidemic, and three from his second and much younger wife. The youngest of the children was eight, born when Drago had already passed fifty. “That is one of the reasons I stopped.” He pointed behind Ianu, to the shelves of home remedies arranged in wooden boxes: herbs collected from nearby forests, toadstools, plants, cones. Some of the collection was ground into powders, others mixed, others sold whole. Instead of the village witch offering cures, the Cohnescu family had created a pharmacopeia for those in town. “I need some of the garlic.”

  Garlic was the favorite of the Gropeanu family; it served as food, for medicinal purposes and as part of Rumanian folklore. One never knew when garlic might chase away some of the evil spirits that inhabited the superstitious country.

  Ianu retrieved Drago’s order and slid it across the small piece of marble that made up the counter. The heavy stone was the sole luxury from the Berdichev store, saved before it was burned; Saloman dragging the marble through a war zone as a reminder of home. Drago slid a few coins across the marble then took the herbs and sniffed at the bag. He watched Ianu, who carefully counted the coins as his father had taught him. “There was another reason I came. I wanted to tell you father some of the things I have heard. He was asking about the war.”

  Ianu leaned forward eager to hear Drago’s stories. The older man had friends and family throughout Europe. As the official telegraph operator for the village and the owner of the sole wireless Drago knew more than anyone else outside of Iasi.

  “The war is going very badly for the Poles,” he said solemnly. The German invasion was just over three weeks old and there was little information on the battles or casualties. The Rumanian government was friendly with the Nazis, but not too friendly according to Drago so as not to offend the communists, a hundred and fifty kilometers east of Iasi.

  “The Germans have tanks, the Poles have horses,” Drago continued. “The Germans have many planes, the Poles have very few planes. Poland cannot defeat Germany.”

  Ianu did not react to the pronouncement. When Drago had visited the store to tell Ianu and his father of the war it seemed so distant and unimportant. All he knew was that Germany was expelling Jews and those who could not leave were being herded into camps. He was glad to be living in Rumania, where such things could not happen.

  “My friends in Poland are leaving, coming here from Krakow.” Drago shuddered. “They will not live under the Nazis.”

  The Nazis were much discussed in Letcani and Iasi. The Jews in eastern Rumania were familiar with the pogroms and the savagery of once friendly neighbors turned loose by a government determined to find a scapegoat during a crisis. The same stories filtered in from Germany; the Kristallnacht pogrom intended to scare off the Jews who had refused to leave Germany. The very mention of Nazis revived Drago and the others’ memories of nights filled with rampaging peasants, fires and near escapes. For Ianu the fear in Drago’s eyes were enough to convince him the Nazis were dangerous.

  “England declared war on the Germans,” Drago revealed. “England has sunk German ships, they are flying planes over the Germans.”

  England. The very word conjured up hope for Ianu. There was freedom in England, a land without pogroms or a Pale of Settlement. England had defeated the Germans in the Great War and they could do it again.

  “It is bad news, Ianu.” His lower lip, scarred by a Cossack’s whip in Berdichev, quivered, beads of saliva mounting and preparing to drop onto his chin. “The Iron Guard, they are like the Nazis, maybe worse.”

  Ianu barely heard him, distracted by the entry of Brena Steflea, a Jew from nearby Bogonos. Ianu had her goods prepared, a regular weekly supply with monthly payment which just happened to be this day. The transaction consumed his attention for several minutes as coins were counted with the deliberateness that came with poor eyesight and a faulty memory. Standing back Drago watched the head scarfed old woman with the ragged cloth coat and worn coin purse. Brena Steflea was a far cry from the prosperous, grasping Jew imagined by the Iron Guard.

  Eventually the change was counted. Steflea left the store carrying her goods past Drago who greeted her but went unrecognized. Amused, Drago returned to the counter and Ianu raised up on his toes, waiting for more stories. He knew Drago had seen the Iron Guard and their leader Horia Sima marching about Iasi with their fascist salute, green uniforms and denunciation of Jews, domestic and foreign.

  “If King Carol was here,” Drago lamented. “His mother Marie was English; she brought dignity to Rumania.”

  Ianu nodded, familiar with Drago’s love of Queen Marie.

  “Michael is not the same,” Drago said. Carol’s son Michael, the same age as Ianu, had replaced his father on the throne with the help of the Rumanian military. “He will not protect us.

  “The Nazis will never invade Rumania,” Ianu declared with the naiveté of youth.

  Drago smiled. “I may come back when your father is here.” He took his bag and waved at the young man. As the door closed, Ianu faced an empty store with little to do. Usually his younger brother and sister were present. The youngest of the Cohnescu family, Joni and Manu, were Ianu’s responsibility. With his parents’ time consumed by the farm, the animals, the crops, the lumber, Ianu was expected to oversee and train his younger siblings in making change, in selling, and in greeting people. The store was a family business with Joni and Manu expected to run the store but this day the weather kept his younger siblings at home.

  With the dusty street outside turned into muddy tracks, few customers would dare the morass. Letcani was known for its mud sinkholes, people dragged down to their knees before they could react. Some had to be pulled out by horse, a messy and embarrassing scene, which usually produced giggling among the village children. It was wiser to retrieve supplies on a dry day than become the topic of a ridiculous legend. Unfortunately this caution left Ianu bored and lonely on muddy days.

  Sitting at the counter with his chin cupped in his hands he watched the nothingness through the shop windows. Ianu could not ignore the smudges on the glass, some produced by water dripping from eaves into the mud puddles and splashing onto the glass. Others were produced by the mud thrown from the churning wooden wheels of the wagons.

  Ianu sighed. Dirty windows were unacceptable to Saloman, who had been lashed by his father for the sin of allowing them. Saloman was gentler with his son, though at times Ianu wished for a physical lashing rather than the verbal ones he received. With his father’s words ringing in his ears, he pushed through the curtained doorway leading to the rear of the shop.

  He began his search for the old wooden bucket with the leaky bottom, an incentive to work faster as the water dribbled from it. The town well was a fair distance away and usually manned by a group of territorial women enforcing strict rules of access. Waiting then fighting for a place in line was too unpleasant to repeat frequently. Fortunately, the Cohnescus had a water tank in the rear of the shop, requiring filling only once a week at most and after seven or eight trips to the well, if one did not trip on the road ruts while carrying pails of water, the tank was full. It was a job held by Ianu but once Manu became strong enough to carry the water and battle the harpies, it would be assigned to him.

  Ianu hated the old bucket; he wished his father would replace it but knew better than make the suggestion. Saloman had used a wooden pail when running the shop in Berdichev and for him there was little need for progress or change. Ianu’s search for the pail then for the rags needed for window cleaning, distracted him from the front of the store. He did not hear the door open as the clatter of metal against wood drowned out most sounds including footsteps. Even the smack of a palm against the marble counter did not register, but the sudden sound of a jovial voice, taunting him from the front, forced him to end the search.

  “There is no service, where is the storekeeper, I demand service.” Another smack of the cou
nter drew Ianu through the ragged curtain.

  He stopped, staring at the uniform: the red and black, the pistol strapped to the belt, the hat pulled low over the forehead but not hiding the coal black eyes, a family trait that was also reflected in his tribe.

  “Milosh,” Ianu murmured.

  “Ianu,” the uniformed boy, barely twenty, pointed to his neighbor. “Where were you?”

  Ianu stared at the uniform markings. It was too colorful to belong to an ordinary soldier. “What are you?”

  Milosh Stavescu patted his shoulder. “A corporal.” He beamed, dark skin, full lips and Roman nose, another family feature.

  Ianu’s eyes widened. “A sergeant-.” Before he could finish Ianu found him being lifted above the counter then set on the wooden planked floor. The six foot two Milosh Stavescu moved his friend effortlessly. Ianu was a bare five foot seven and one hundred forty even when he toted two water pails from the town well.

  Ianu and Milosh were the unlikeliest of friends; an unusual connection between one group stereotyped for their hard work and dedication to prosperity, while the other supposedly known for begging and stealing. Milosh, though, was a rebel, rejecting the family “business” and disgracing the Stavescu name by joining the Rumanian Army. A gypsy soldier was a contradiction. Milosh was a member of the very government, which harassed and abused his people, the Roma. Upon discovering his son’s decision, his father, one of the most powerful of the Roma in eastern Rumania, had immediately cast his son from the family and any of the five houses he held in the Iasi region. The rejection was followed by his father bribing everyone he knew in the Rumanian Army to make his son a corporal rather than a lowly foot soldier. Whether Milosh knew of this or not he assumed he was alone in the army, his fists and the markings on his shoulder his only defense.

  Ianu looked up at the little boy who had once been taboo. The Roma were hated, even more than the Jews in Rumania, and considered more dangerous. Ianu had received his share of whippings and scolding after being seen with Milosh, but it had not deterred him. Friends were friends, and for a lonely boy in an adopted land, he needed friends more than anything else.

  “What are you doing here?” Ianu asked, glancing up and down Milosh’s uniform. “In that?”

  “We are marching to Iasi then by train to the Polish border.”

  “Germany has invaded Rumania?”

  Milosh laughed, removing his hat to reveal a full head of curly black hair. “No, no we are going to keep people out of Rumania.”

  “It will be exciting,” he murmured. “With your men and guns and horses.”

  “You should have joined the army we could have served together.”

  Ianu frowned, imagining his father’s reaction if he had slipped on the uniform of the Rumanian Army. “You will be returning?”

  Milosh shrugged. “We are to dig in, to stop those leaving Poland because of the war. We don’t want Polacks invading our land.”

  “The Nazis, the Nazis,” Ianu murmured. “They are the ones to keep out of Rumania.”

  “They are already here.”

  Ianu felt his legs go weak. “The Nazis are here?”

  “The German soldiers trained us.”

  Ianu backed up against the counter and clutched his throat. The Nazis, the Jew killing Nazis were in Rumania. He trembled.

  “They are unpleasant,” his friend said. “They hate Rumanians; they insult my men, they insult me.”

  Ianu eyed the tough gypsy standing before him. Insulting Milosh usually meant a beating for the boy who dared speak when they were children. Insulting a grown Milosh with a gun seemed more foolish than nasty.

  Milosh’s chin went up. “They hate gypsies and Jews. They would beat any they found, tried to order me to beat my own men.”

  Corporal punishment was a normal form of discipline in the Rumanian Army. The beating of the soldiers was only a continuation of the beating of peasants by those who held power. As a corporal Milosh was expected to apply rather than receive those beatings, a reason his father had spent so much to buy his promotion to officer before he served a day.

  Ianu slowly nodded “I hope there is no war.”

  “You think too much, Ianu. Marshal Antonescu and King Michael will never allow Rumania to enter another war.” He leaned in close to his friend. “My father was here when the Germans came during the Great War.”

  In 1916 Rumania had joined the Allies, declaring war on Germany and Austria, mainly to gain Transylvania from the Hungarians. The war had not lasted long. Bucharest, the capital, was captured within six months and the Rumanian Army pushed beyond the Prut and into Russia. The inglorious defeat was tempered only by the German defeat and Austrian collapse, allowing Rumania to double its size taking land from Hungary, Russia and Bulgaria. Much of the gains were attributed to the charms of the Rumanian Queen Marie, unleashed on British Prime Minister David Lloyd George, who could not resist an Englishwoman. The lesson remained though that more could be gained in peace rather than war.

  “The Germans,” Ianu warned. “They will come.”

  Milosh waved his hand. “You worry Ianu about nothing.” He puffed out his chest. “The army will protect Rumania, you must not worry.” A smack across the shoulder nearly tumbled Ianu, his friend laughing loudly at his own strength. “I need some beetroot, to chew while on the march and the train. They do not feed us.”

  Ianu hustled behind the counter, emptied the wooden box of beetroot into a ragged sack and placing it on the counter. Milosh dug into his pocket and began to count coins but his friend closed his hand over the soldier’s. “No cost.”

  Milosh looked down at his friend. “Your father will not like it. Beetroot costs too much, he will be angry.”

  “I will pay for it, I have some money,” Ianu promised. Unfortunately, Ianu had no money but his friend did not need to know.

  Milosh scooped up the bag of beetroot and tipped his hat. “I must go, we leave Iasi tomorrow.”

  Ianu held out his hand. His friend grasped it and for a moment they were boys again. Another tip of the hat from the older boy, and the soldier strode from the shop, not looking back. Ianu remained behind the counter, tabulating the number of uniformed men who walked past the shop window. It began as a dribble, but soon pairs then groups of five, ten or more, all headed in the direction of Iasi and the Polish border to defend their country. Ianu watched, hoping his friend would return.

  II

  October 10, 1939

  SS Obertruppfuhrer Albert Reichenau cracked his knuckles beneath his gloves in frustration at the chaos that came with emptying a village of its Juden. It began with rousting men, women and children from their homes, allowed to carry a single piece of luggage. They would appear dressed in their fineries as if preparing for a celebration, dragging their bags filled with necessities and prized possessions for filling their new homes. The chattering, the call of the German guards hustling them toward the trucks or a nearby train station, the sounds of engines and the smell of exhaust overwhelmed Reichenau.

  The noises and odors followed the pitiful masses stumbling by him; the crying children, the deranged parents fearful of separation, all of them herded by SS soldiers, chosen to cleanse the new general government territory of the Untermenschen. This target was the village of Polanka Wielka just west of Krakow. A large Juden population had been identified by Polish peasants, who worked the fields for their landlords for pfennigs while, according to legend, the Juden took their daughters and sons for sacrifice. A day earlier Reichenau and two members of his staff accompanied a couple of Polish youths to the site of these sacrifices. The two boys had shook with fear as they pointed out the cave, refusing to enter and muttering about disappeared children and blood sacrifices.

  The captain and his staff discovered only stubbed out cigarettes and remains of ordinary campfires. No altars, no bones of children, and no caked blood baked into Matzos. Reichenau was displeased by the distraction and taught the Polish boys a lesson: his staff dragged them into
the cave, their screams and emptied bladders even funnier after a few beers at the local bar.

  Even with their ignorance and superstition, the Poles were helpful, their disdain of the Juden matching that of the SS. After the Germans arrived there were incidents, massacres around the countryside, and dozens of Juden executed by roving mobs determined to repay centuries’ old debts. Reichenau was cast into the unusual position of protecting some Juden from their Polish neighbors; such protection ensuring a few more months of life in the Jewish ghettos.

  Orders had come from above: the Juden were to be moved not harmed unless they resisted. There was little resistance, the countryside having become too dangerous for the Juden.

  A shot rang out, the colonel opening his eyes and watching as a tussle broke out between one of the old Jewish women and Rottenfuhrer (corporal) Ulf Strauss. Always nervous with a gun, Strauss was the sole team leader to kill a Pole during the drive from Slovakia toward Cracow. Reichenau watched Strauss fire at those struggling along the road, missing more than he struck, drawing amused looks from his comrades though never when he could see their ridicule. Few cared about Strauss’ outbursts; Reichenau cared little about Poles or Juden blood, but was concerned about allowing his squad leader to go too far.

  Reichenau gnawed at his lip as Strauss maneuvered the line of civilians away from the village. The corporal leered over the stumbling line, Walther P38 ready in his shaky hand, his high pitched “Schnell, Schnell” doing little to speed the line. A Jewess drew Strauss’s attention; the team leader snatched at the case she held and tossing her to the ground. Strauss kicked at her drawing out the venom as she gestured then spit on his uniform. The incident ended as all of Strauss’ incidents ended: forcing the line of Juden evacuating the village to plod past the woman, her eyes open, mouth twisted, shirt soaked with blood, as a reminder of the price for resistance.

  Reichenau turned from the Juden procession and looked out over the village and the knot of Poles roaming the streets, dragging goods from the houses before torching them. His orders had been to raze the buildings, preparing them for German resettlement. Instead of wasting his soldiers in mundane tasks, he allowed the Poles to take out their revenge, hopefully calming them into accepting their new German masters. Those who dared resist received Straussian brutality.