by Alan Furst
At 8:20, a proper twenty minutes late, Anna Szarbek arrived in a taxi—she’d declined Mercier’s offer to pick her up—and knocked at the street door. Mercier rushed to let her in, and they embraced—tentatively, a faint apprehension on both sides. But then, following her up the staircase, the sway and shift within her soft skirt so intoxicated him that, by the time he reached the landing, he was more than prepared to skip the preliminaries altogether. Nonetheless, after a tour of the apartment, he started the fire, lit the candles, and poured champagne. On the sofa, she looped her arm through his and rested her head on his shoulder. “I hope you weren’t disturbed,” she said, “that I called so late, last night.”
“Not at all.”
“You sounded—absorbed.”
“Too much excitement. Some of my work showed up here, two people, and had to be dealt with. A—how to say—a fugitive situation.”
“They came to your apartment?”
“They weren’t invited, my love. They needed refuge, and they knew where I lived, so . . .”
“Did you have the police?”
“No, thank God. I managed without them.”
“You are actually brave, aren’t you?”
“Not if I can help it.”
“Oh, I don’t think you can help it, Jean-François, I think it’s in your blood, from what you said in Belgrade.”
At the hotel in Belgrade, they had told their growing-up stories and exchanged family histories, Mercier’s reaching back to the Crusades. “All those warrior ancestors,” she said. She took his hand, studied the signet ring, and said, “It’s this.” She slipped it off, put it on her finger, then spread her hand to admire it. “Now you may address me as countess.”
“I’m not anything like a count, countess, just a lowly chevalier, a knight in service to the king.”
“Still, a noble.” She put the ring back on his finger. “The only one I’ve ever known.”
“Ever?” This was more than unlikely.
“I mean, as I know you.” She took off her boots, tucked her feet up beneath her, and slid her hand between the buttons of his shirt. “I’m just a Polish girl from Paris.”
“Oh poor you,” he said. “Poor lawyer.”
“Good in school, love. With hardheaded parents—parents with no sons. So, somebody had to do something.” They were silent for a time, and he became aware of her hair, silky against his skin, and her fragrance. “I find it warm in here,” she said, undoing a button on his shirt, then another. “Don’t you?”
The cook, perfectly aware of what was planned for the evening, had done her best—a roasted chicken and boiled carrots left in a warm oven—and later that night, Anna in Mercier’s shirt, he in the bathrobe, they ate—it was a sin to waste food—what they could.
3 February. All courtesy, the noble Mercier had telephoned Anna and invited her to his next obligation, a dinner party given by the Portuguese consul. “I appreciate your asking me,” she’d said, “but I suspect you are reluctant and, honestly, so am I.” This was, and they both knew it, the social reality of diplomatic Warsaw. Some courageous souls insisted on bringing their “fiancées” to balls and dinner parties, and nobody ever said a word about it, but . . . Mercier was frankly relieved, and, on the evening of the third, he was accompanied to the consulate by Madame Dupin.
In the library, joining the men for cigars after dinner, Mercier found himself in the company of one Dr. Lapp, believed, by a certain level of local society, to be the senior Abwehr—German military intelligence—man in Warsaw. Officially, he worked as the commercial representative of a Frankfurt pharmaceutical company, but nobody had ever known him to sell a pill. Very much an old-fashioned gentle-man, Dr. Lapp—the honorific referred to a university degree; he was not a medical doctor—of slight stature, in middle age, and bearing some resemblance to the sad-faced comedian Buster Keaton. And, like the comedian, he was often to be seen in a natty bow tie, though tonight he wore traditional dinner-party uniform. They had met before, on various occasions, but had never actually spoken at length. “Life going well, for you?” he said to Mercier.
“Not too badly. Yourself?”
“One mustn’t complain. Were you in Paris, for the holidays?”
“I was, then I went down to the south.”
“I envy you that, colonel.”
“The south?”
“Paris. A magnificent city. Would that be your preference, if your career took you there?”
“I like Warsaw well enough, but I wouldn’t mind. And for you, Dr. Lapp, would you prefer Berlin?”
“I only wish I could.”
“Really? Why is that?”
“Frankly, I find the situation in the capital not much to my taste.”
This was flagrant, and Mercier showed the edge of surprise. “You don’t care for the present regime?”
“Mostly I don’t. I am a loyal German, of course, and surely a patriot, but that can mean many things.”
“I suppose it can. You are, perhaps, a traditionalist?”
“And why not? The culture of old Europe, civility, stability, was not such a bad thing for Germany. But it’s all gone now, and the people who are in power these days will presently have us at war, and you know what that meant in 1918.”
“Not so much better for us. We called it victory, and marched through the streets in 1918, but victory is a curious word for what happened in France.”
Dr. Lapp nodded, and said, “Yes, I know. Where were you, on that day?”
“In fact I was a prisoner of war at Ingolstadt, Fort Nine.”
“Our most illustrious prison, at any rate. For our most eminent prisoners—the Russian Colonel Tukhachevsky, now sadly executed by his government; your Captain de Gaulle, lately a colonel; France’s most prominent airman, Roland Garros; and plenty of others. So you were, at least, in good company. How many escape attempts, colonel?”
“Four. All of which failed.”
“Of course I would have done the same thing. Honor demands it.”
“And where were you, on the day of the armistice?”
“At my desk, faithful to the last, at the naval General Staff office in Kiel. My section concerned itself with the submarine service.” Dr. Lapp paused, then said, “Tell me, are you still in touch with Colonel de Gaulle?”
Mercier hesitated, unsure where Dr. Lapp was leading him, but more than conscious of being led. Toward some variety of treason, he sensed. But to France? Or Germany? Finally, he could think of nothing to say but the truth; it would have to do. “From time to time, a letter,” he said. “We are more colleagues than friends.”
“And do you subscribe to his theories of warfare? I’ve read his book.”
“I’ve read it as well, and I believe it should be taken seriously. I suspect, the next time around, it will not be trenches and wire.”
From Dr. Lapp, a gracious smile: success. What success was that? “I agree,” he said. “But better, far better, if there is no next time around. I wonder if, sometime, we could speak in a more private setting?”
To this, Mercier had to say yes.
“Some people I know may not be so much the enemies of France as you would think. Do I need to elaborate?”
“No, Dr. Lapp. I believe I perfectly understand you.”
Without speaking, Dr. Lapp acknowledged this understanding. Did he bow? Did his heels come together? Not overtly, yet something in his demeanor implied such gestures without the actual performance.
Mercier left the library, collected Madame Dupin, and hurried her out to the car. “Did something happen?” she said.
“It did.” Before Marek could pull away from the curb, Mercier took a pad from his pocket and feverishly made notes, trying to reproduce the conversation with Dr. Lapp.
“Something good, I hope.”
“Maybe,” Mercier said. “It won’t be up to me.”
•
The following morning, he was in Jourdain’s office as the second secretary was hanging up his coa
t. When they were settled at the table, Mercier read from his notes. “Astonishing,” Jourdain said. “It sounds like he wants to open some sort of secret channel between us and the Abwehr.”
“Shall I report the contact?”
Jourdain drummed his fingers on his desk. “You’re taking a chance either way. If you report immediately, they may say no. But, if you don’t do it now, eventually you will, and then they’ll have a tantrum.”
“Why on earth would they say no?”
“Caution. Fear of provocation, false information, trickery. Or some variety of internal politics.”
“That would be foolish, Armand.”
“Yes, wouldn’t it though. Because I suspect this contact was carefully planned and could lead to important information. First of all, what was Dr. Lapp even doing there? Surely he wasn’t invited as a stray German businessman. No, he was invited as an Abwehr officer. So, he asked the consul—or someone above him asked someone above the consul—to arrange for both of you to attend the dinner. Don’t forget that Salazar, the Portuguese dictator, is an ally of Germany. May I see the notes?” Mercier handed the pad to Jourdain, who turned a page and said, “Yes, here it is. He manages the conversation in such a way that he makes a seemingly spontaneous reference to the submarine service in Kiel. And that means he’s referring to Admiral Canaris, head of the Abwehr and captain of a submarine in the Great War. Better, if he truly served in Kiel, he is likely a friend of Canaris—a friend for twenty years. So, he is more than reliable.”
“And Canaris is, potentially, disloyal?”
“Maybe. One hears things, wisps, straws in the wind, but who knows. What is certain is that the Abwehr loathes the SD: Hitler, the Nazis, the whole nasty business. It’s as much social as it is political, the Abwehr see themselves as gentlemen, while the Nazis are simply gangsters. And the Abwehr, as part of the General Staff of the Wehrmacht, does not want to go to war.”
“Why me, Armand?”
“Why not you? This all came about because your spy lost his nerve on a train. And then word got around that it was a French officer who fought off an SD abduction up on Gesia street. So Dr. Lapp wonders, Who is this Colonel Mercier? Looks up your Abwehr file, sees that you served with de Gaulle, sees that you’re progressive and not part of the old Pétain crowd. Then he goes back to his boss and says, ‘Let’s approach Mercier, we think he can be trusted.’ ”
“Trusted?”
“His balls are in your hand, Jean-François—he has to assume you won’t squeeze.”
“Why would I?”
“Exactly. They have you figured out.”
“I mean, what could I make them tell me? I was up half the night, thinking about what happened, and I finally realized that the information I most want, from the Guderian bureau, the I.N. Six, is the one thing I’ll never get, not from the Bendlerstrasse—they won’t betray their own.”
“Correct.”
“He certainly knew my history, prison camp and so forth. Recited the names of my fellow prisoners.”
“Of course he knew. He spent a lot of time, preparing for his chance meeting, which is plain old good intelligence work. Really, it’s too bad about the Nazis—if Dr. Lapp and his friends ever took power, Germany would be a very useful ally.” Jourdain extended his index finger and pointed east, toward Russia.
“Is there any chance of that?”
“None. Blood will flow, then we’ll see.”
11 MARCH, 1938. IN WARSAW, ONE LATELY HEARD THE EXPRESSION przedwiosnie; an ancient term for this time of year, it meant “prior to spring.” The streets were white with snow, but sometimes, early in the morning or toward evening, there was a certain gentle breeze in the air—the season wasn’t turning yet, but it would. The softening of winter was not so different in Saint-Germain-en-Laye, an aristocratic village at the edge of Paris where, in centuries past, the French had stored royal fugitives from across the Channel, in expectation of the ascent of Catholic monarchy to the English throne. They’d given that up, more or less, by March of 1938, and now used one of the former exile mansions to hide the two Russian spies from Warsaw.
Separately and together, the Rozens had been interrogated. First the handwritten autobiography, then the questions, and the answers, and the new questions suggested by the answers. The Rozens told them everything, revealed a treasure trove of secrets going back to 1917, when, young and idealistic, they’d given themselves to the Russian revolution that would change the world. Which it certainly had—producing counterrevolutionary fascist regimes in Hungary, Italy, Roumania, Bulgaria, Spain, Portugal, and Germany. Fine work, Comrade Lenin!
And so, in cities across the continent, quite a number of individuals sipped their coffee on the morning of the eleventh, blissfully unaware that their names and indiscretions were filling the pages of Deuxième Bureau files and that this information would presently, in some cases anyhow, be forwarded to the security service of whatever nation they called home. Therefore, again in some cases, tomorrow would not be a better day.
For instance, the émigré Maxim Mostov, a literary journalist in Warsaw. At dawn, as the przedwiosnie breeze brushed tenderly against his bedroom window, he slept peacefully with a proprietary arm thrown over his new mistress, a sexy Polish girl who worked as a clerk at the Warsaw telephone exchange. Sexy and young, this one—the loss of his previous girlfriend had bruised his self-esteem, so here in bed with him was some exceptionally succulent compensation.
The four men from the Dwojka certainly thought so, giving one another a meaningful glance or two as she struggled into a bathrobe. Leaving the bedroom door open—please, no jumping out the window, not this morning—they permitted the couple to get dressed, then escorted Maxim back to the Citadel. And if he’d been frightened by the knock on the door and the appearance of the security service, the march through the chill stone hallways of the Citadel did nothing to soothe his nerves. Nor did the two men across the table, military officers who wore eyeglasses; for Maxim, an intimidating combination.
He had, of course, done nothing wrong.
Malka and Viktor Rozen had been—well, not really friends, more like acquaintances. That was the proper word. And did he know that they were officers of the Soviet spy service? Well, people said they were, and he’d suspected that people might be right—but such rumors often went around, in a city like Warsaw. And what had he told them? No more than gossip, the very things he wrote about, quite publicly, in his feuilletons.
So then, had he accepted money?
Maybe once or twice, small loans when he found himself in difficult circumstances.
And had the loans been paid back?
Some of them, he thought, as best he could remember, possibly not others; his life was chaotic, money came and went, he was always busy, going about, finding stories, writing them, this and that and the other thing.
And did he have family in the USSR?
He did, one surviving parent, two sisters, uncles and aunts.
Perhaps the Rozens mentioned them, now and again.
In fact they had. Asked after their health, in the normal way of people from the same country.
Did they say, for example, that they were worried about them—their health, their jobs?
No, not that he could remember. Maybe once, a long time ago.
At that point, the two officers paused. One of them left the room and returned with a third, this one rather formidable, tall and thinlipped, with pale brush-cut hair, who wore the boots of a cavalry officer and was, from their deference toward him, senior to the interrogators. He stood to one side of Maxim, hands clasped behind his back.
“We will continue,” the lead interrogator said. “We want to ask you about your friends. People you know in the city. Later, we’ll ask you for a list, but for the moment we want to know if they helped you.”
“Helped me?”
“Told you things. Gossip, as you called it, about, for example, diplomats, or anyone serving in the Polish government—the kind of peop
le you met at social events.”
“I suppose so. Of course they did—when you talk to your friends, they always tell you things: where they’ve been, who they’ve seen. It’s common human discourse. You have to talk about something besides the weather.”
“And did you pass any of this information on to the Rozens?”
“I might have. There’s so much. . . . I can’t think of anything specific, not anything . . . secret, not that I can recall.”
“Very well. Take, for example, your former friend Pana Szarbek, who I believe you intended to marry. She is employed by the League of Nations, did she tell you things about her work? Things about, say, contacts in foreign governments?”
Here Maxim paused. Evidently, the subject of his former fiancée was a painful one—he’d been hurt, was now likely angry about her leaving him for another. Which was, for Maxim, as for much of the world, quite normal, as it was also normal to feel that those who have hurt you should themselves be hurt in return, unless you were the sort of person who didn’t care for the idea of spite.
“Well?” the interrogator said. “Do you understand the question?”
“Yes.”
“And so?”
“I don’t remember her doing that. She didn’t often speak about her work, not in specific terms. If she had a troublesome case she might say it was difficult, or frustrating, but she never spoke of officials. They—for example, tax authorities—were simply part of her job.”
The interrogator looked past Maxim, at the tall officer standing to his left, then said, “Now, what contacts did you have with employees of the Polish government?”
In Warsaw, the endgame of the Rozen confessions went on for more than a week. Senior officers of a major on the Polish General Staff confronted him when he arrived for work—they were, at least technically, responsible for what he’d done, so the wretched job fell to them. They spent an hour with him, then placed a revolver on his desk, left the office, and closed the door. Fifteen minutes later he reappeared, weeping, and trying to explain. They sent him back inside and, soon enough, were rewarded with the sound of a shot. The hotel maids were visited at home—one didn’t want to go stirring up the guests—where the scenes varied: some tears, some defiance, some absolute silence, and one case where a young woman slipped out a back door and was never seen again. As for the rest, from factory workers to a company director, they were arrested, questioned, tried in secrecy, and sent to prison. Not all of them; some were actually not guilty—the Rozens, confessing for their lives, had been somewhat overzealous in the naming of informants. As for Maxim Mostov, he was, after lengthy discussions within the senior Dwojka administration, deported. Driven to the Russian frontier and put on a train.