VII
Lanny had put up the price; and now, would he get what he wanted? As a rule he got less from Kurt than from others, for Kurt was naturally a reticent man, and years as a secret agent had taught him distrust of nearly everyone. But he was fond of Lanny, and thought of him as a pupil; though only a year and a half older, Kurt had always taken that attitude. When Lanny said: “I am worried sick over this war; it is going to be a long one, and that is surely not what the Führer wanted,” the Wehrmacht man replied: “The Führer didn’t want any war; but since it was forced upon him, be sure that he isn’t going to fail. Our scientists have devised weapons that will knock the British off their pins.”
“New weapons take a long time to get into production, Kurt.”
“Don’t worry; we are further along than anybody guesses. You can take my word that I have sources of information.”
“I don’t doubt that. What worries me is my own country going into mass production.”
“It will be all over before America can do anything much. Your productive system is a chaos, everybody going his own way and seeking his own profit. And remember, the goods have to cross the sea. Our U-boats have new devices to operate in the dark, and this winter our blockade is more complete than the world has any idea of.”
Lanny wouldn’t ask questions about these crucial matters; he would keep quiet and let his friend expound so long as the spirit moved him. In the old days Kurt had expounded the subtleties of Kantian metaphysics and the esoteric intricacies of Beethoven’s later string quartets. Now his mind was on the maze of European diplomacy and the broad outlines of military strategy, the movements of armies and supplies, and the economic advantages to be gained in one place as compared to another. The young Kurt had been gravely concerned with moral questions, but now morals no longer had anything to do with the affairs of nations; what helped Germany was right, and what hindered her was wrong.
Whatever it was Kurt discussed, he always spoke with authority. At the age of thirteen Lanny had been enormously impressed by this manner, and by the long abstract German words he had never heard before. Now, at the age of forty, he pretended to have the same attitude; but he could never feel entirely certain about Kurt’s attitude toward him. Could it be that Kurt saw through Lanny as clearly as Lanny saw through Kurt? Was their continued intimacy due to the fact that Kurt set a higher value on what he got from Lanny than on what he gave? Hitler had used Lanny as an errand boy to take messages to the right people in Paris and London and New York, and no doubt he had taken precautions to check up and make sure that the messages were delivered properly. Kurt had no knowledge of anything else that Lanny had done, and as long as Hitler was satisfied with him, Kurt would of course play along.
Making things easier, Lanny inquired: “Do you suppose the Führer would want to see me these days?”
“Why not? He has always wanted to see you, when he wasn’t too busy.”
“I know he won’t hold me responsible for Roosevelt’s warmongering, but it seems to me it would be hard for him to endure the sight of any American.”
“I don’t think he has any such feeling. The Führer’s doctrine is for all mankind, and any man who accepts it is his friend. The next time I see him I will mention the matter.”
Lanny said: “Thank you,” and at the same time made note that Kurt didn’t say: “You can write him a letter and I will mail it for you in Paris.” Could it be that Kurt was slightly jealous of the favor his great hero had shown to Kurt’s American disciple? So many things to wonder about!
Lanny went on: “Don’t think that I am trying to thrust myself forward. You know I have never asked a favor of the Führer, and I am thinking only of the cause. More than once he has told me what he wants me to say about his policies and purposes; and some of those who question me are people of great influence, as you know.”
“Yes, indeed, Lanny. You can say that neither his policies nor his purposes have changed.”
“That doesn’t satisfy them. They say: ‘Yes, but it’s been seven or eight months since you saw him, and a lot of water has flowed over the dam. What does he want now? What are his terms?’”
“He set them forth in his great speech last month, Lanny.”
“I know; but people of importance never take it for granted that a statesman means exactly what he says. They want something confidential, something personal. I have said to them: ‘This is what the Führer said to me with his own lips’; and that impresses them more than I can tell you. For example, Hearst; the thing he wanted to know more than any other was whether the Führer really meant to put down Bolshevism all over Europe. Just a few days ago one of the most important; persons in our United States officialdom put the pointblank question to me: ‘If we succeed in getting Britain off Hitler’s back, can we count upon it that he will go after Stalin?’—or words to that effect. This is one of the men who may be helping to depose Roosevelt at any time. His decision to act or not to act might depend upon what I tell him when I go back.”
This was fishing in deep waters. Kurt demanded: “What can such a person expect of the Führer, more definite than he has put into his speeches, of his utter loathing for the Reds and everything they stand for? But you must remember, we have a treaty of mutual non-aggression with Russia, and we have trade agreements also.”
“My understanding is that you’re not getting very much out of the trading.”
“That is true, and we raise rows about it, but that is a different matter from going to war. Even if the Führer had such a purpose, his generals would hardly permit him to announce it in advance.”
“Of course not, Kurt. But if he had the idea to whisper it to one discreet person, who would take it directly to one of the most influential men in London, and then to one or two in New York and Washington—that might be just enough to turn the scales in the struggles over policy now going on.”
“What you say is truly important, Lanny,” replied the Komponist. “I can’t give the answer, but I’ll see that the Führer has a chance to consider it.”
VIII
These two cronies spent the rest of the day and evening together. Kurt had recently been in Stubendorf, where Lanny had spent half a dozen Christmases in his boyhood and youth. Kurt talked about his family, to whom the American in happier times had always sent gifts; he was “Onkel Lanny” to the children. Kurt told about the General Graf Stubendorf, who had been host to Lanny and Irma; he had been badly hurt by an artillery shell and was home at the castle. And then Kurt’s older brother, General Emil Meissner, also home for the holidays; he had come through the campaign of the Argonne with flying colors and had been promoted to command an army Korps. Emil, Lanny knew, had been studying mass slaughter from his days in the nursery, when he had wiped out a whole Korps with a sweep of his tiny hand; he still did it on sheets of paper with little oblongs which he drew with colored crayons. He was considered one of the greatest authorities on logistics in the Wehrmacht, and he was known as one of the “Nazi Generals,” since he shared Kurt’s admiration for the greatest political genius the German race had ever produced.
Did the Führer’s favorite musician, moved by all these family reminiscences, fail to realize what he was saying? Or had he thought it over and decided that Lanny was entitled to share a few of the Wehrmacht’s secrets? Anyhow, Kurt told about discussions with his brother concerning the grave questions of strategy now up for decision. Kurt didn’t say: “We are engaged in undermining the governments of Hungary, Rumania, and Yugoslavia, and soon we shall be able to move into those lands without serious fighting.” He took this for granted, and talked about the next move, balancing various forces involved. Mussolini—“dieser verdammte Esel”—had got himself into a mess in Greece, and of course the Führer would have to get him out. The question was, when you had Greece, where would you go from there?
Lanny said: “You could take Crete with paratroopers, and that would put you in position to bomb the Suez Canal full of sand. At any rate, that is
what the British are expecting.”
“They may get it. The question is Turkey; how much she can resist, and how much she will.”
“Usually with the Turks it’s a question of money, Kurt.”
“Unfortunately the British have more gold than we. The main problem with us is to reach oil; and we have to decide between Mesopotamia and the Caucasus.”
This was after they had had dinner, and Kurt had absorbed the greater part of a liter of Burgundy. Lanny had never seen Kurt drink too much, but he had seen him become mellow and eloquent, and this was one of the times. It is always a pleasure to talk to somebody who knows almost as much about a subject as yourself, and can appreciate every nuance of your instructed disquisitions. When Lanny exclaimed: “But you can’t go into Turkey with your left flank exposed to the Russians for a thousand miles!” Kurt knew that he was talking to someone who had been looking at maps and at least hearing about the principles of the great Clausewitz.
“Don’t worry too much,” he answered. “I am quite sure that before this year is over you will see the Bolshevik menace eliminated from Europe.”
This caused Lanny to look with his friend straight in the eyes. “Listen, Kurt,” he said earnestly. “I want you to get this exactly right. You know that I have never once asked you any question about confidential matters. That is true, is it not?”
“Yes, that is true.”
“If you were to ask the Führer, he would tell you the same thing about me. I want to know only what he wants me to know, and what he is willing for me to pass on to others. Every time he has told me anything about his plans and purposes, he has said: ‘Tell that to your friends abroad.’ You have heard him say it.”
“Yes, Lanny.”
“All right. And make note of this: I didn’t ask you anything about Russia. I wouldn’t feel that, as your friend, I had a right to do so. But you have just told me something of great importance, and you haven’t said: ‘That is strictly between us.’ What I want to make clear is, if I could say I knew that, if I could say I had it on the highest authority, I might be able to render a very great service to National Socialism. If I could say it to Ceddy Wickthorpe, it might be the means of overthrowing the Churchill Cabinet.”
“You think Wickthorpe has such power as that?”
“Surely not, but he is one of a group that has great power—how much is something they couldn’t say until they try to use it. They know that life in England is horrible, and that the people cannot stand it much longer. What Ceddy and his friends want is for Germany to fight Russia instead of Britain; they would be willing to help Germany in that, if necessary. Their political careers have been based upon such a program; and in the days before the war, as you know, I carried messages to them for both the Führer and Rudi Hess. But now my information is out-of-date. I can’t say that I know what the Führer intends to do, and on my last trip to London and New York I was handicapped by that fact.”
“I see your point clearly enough.”
“Once more I repeat, I’m not asking you to tell me. It may be that you haven’t the right to do it, and if you say so, I’ll understand. All I’m explaining is what I would do with the information if I had it. The men I am in contact with in Newcastle and New York and Washington and Detroit and Chicago are making the goods which are being shipped to Britain, and they might be able to stop the procedure if they could feel certain what the consequences would be. They want the assurance that Germany will not use the breathing spell to go on arming against the West, but will carry out the program which Hess has explained to me so many times: that Germany will make a real settlement with the British Empire, and be content with what she can find to the east of her—as far as she wants to go.”
IX
Kurt sat for a while in thought. It may well have been the weightiest decision he had ever been called upon to make. At last he said: “I understand your position, and I think you are right. I had a talk with the Führer in Berlin just before Christmas. I played for him a couple of hours in the New Chancellery. He did not state that what he told me was confidential, but of course he knew he didn’t have to say that. I am sure that if he were here now and heard your statement, he would tell you the facts. I am sure that Rudi knows them, and he would tell you. Anyhow, it could hardly do harm from the military point of view, because the Russians are so mistrustful of everybody that they never know what to believe. I have no doubt they get a dozen rumors every day as to the Führer’s intentions, and they wouldn’t pay much heed to reports from American sources.”
Tense as Lanny was, he permitted himself a smile. “How well you know them, Kurt!”
“Be sure that we get reports about them, also. But here is the point: the Führer told me that his mind was made up, we can no longer carry on a war while having that menace along our eastern border. He intends to eliminate it this spring, certainly not later than June, depending upon how quickly the Balkan affairs go.”
“It is a colossal undertaking, Kurt.”
“Our Oberkommando does not think so. Russia is a flat land, and we shall encounter none of the obstacles we found in the Ardennes and the Argonne. Our Panzer divisions will roll with speed that will astound you.”
“But the Soviets have many fortresses, have they not?”
“We shall by-pass them. We shall roll around their armies and slaughter them like flocks of sheep. We are confident that we can finish the job in six weeks; Emil thinks even less.”
“Well, Kurt, that is the most important secret I have ever been entrusted with, and I appreciate the honor you have done me.”
“You understand, Lanny, I cannot afford to be named as the source of it.”
“Oh, surely not! All I need to be able to say is that I have it on authority. The people I deal with are old friends, like Ceddy, and they have had time to learn that I don’t indulge in idle gossip. I will put the information to work as quickly as possible.” Lanny didn’t say any more than that, because he never lied unnecessarily.
The two friends parted with every expression of affection and trust; and Lanny went back to his unheated room, set up his little portable, wrapped himself in the blankets, blew on his chilled fingers, and wrote:
“Hitler has decided to attack Russia this spring, not later than June. This is positive, as of this date. He expects to finish the job in six weeks.”
This he double-sealed in the usual way, always using a different kind of stationery. He addressed it to Admiral Leahy, and though it was late at night he found a messenger and stood in the shadows where he could see the letter delivered to the man who answered the bell. That was all for the moment, but before the P.A. left Vichy he took the precaution to write a second note and have it delivered in the same way. Perhaps the two would go in the same diplomatic pouch and by the same plane, but F.D.R. would understand and appreciate the care being taken.
X
The visiting art expert paid another call upon Admiral Darlan, and after making himself agreeable over the Pernod, remarked: “Mon Amiral, I have a mother living in Juan-les-Pins whom I have not seen for a long time, and, as you know, travel is extremely difficult. I have the necessary permit, but it is a question of transportation, and it occurred to me to wonder whether your Marine might have a camion or other vehicle traveling to the coast on which I might stow away.”
“Sapristi!” replied the old seadog. “We do not ship our friends as freight. We have planes flying every day, and sooner or later there will be a vacant seat. When do you wish to go?”
“The sooner the better, mon Amiral.”
“Bien, I will see what can be done for you. Call my secretary in a couple of hours.”
“One thing more,” ventured Lanny. “As you know, my business is with paintings, and I have learned of a collection in Toulon which might be of interest to some of my American clients. Perhaps you may know the old gentleman, M. d’Avrienne.” Lanny Budd had been collecting names and addresses of picture owners throughout France over a period of almost
two decades, and he had a list always with him.
“I know him by reputation,” replied Darlan.
The other hastened to add: “I am not seeking an introduction, only the entrée to the town. I know that in wartime a stranger does not just walk into a naval fortress.”
“I will give you a letter to the commandant of the port,” said the Admiral. “He will be interested in what you have to tell about both our friends and our enemies.”
Yes, it was a pleasant world to live in if you had the good fortune to know the right people. It was a temptation to forget the existence of other people and enjoy the good things that were available. Lanny called the secretary and learned that he could have a seat in a plane flying to Marseille the next day; so he bade farewell to his Vichy friends, telling them, strictly entre nous, that he believed things were going to be better soon. Since they could not well be worse, this was possible to believe.
XI
The Massif Central of France, barren and snow-covered, unrolled like a carpet below the traveler; and then the mountains and the fertile valleys with vineyards and olive groves of the Midi. By Lanny’s side rode a naval lieutenant, and they chatted freely, so that when they came down in the great Marseille airport they were friends. It developed that the young officer was proceeding to the Italian border on some official errand, and he was interested in this American gentleman who enjoyed the favor of an amiral and who spoke French so eloquently. Three other officers were traveling in the staff car, and it would be crowded, but they offered to squeeze Lanny in; a great favor at a time when essence was practically non-existent.
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