by Tom Gabbay
That’s what they mean by the horror of war.
Along with her note, I found a new passport, a letter of transit, and a second-class train ticket back to Lisbon, courtesy of Roman Popov, aka Bicycle. I spent a lot of time thinking about the rat from Belgrade, who turned out to be not such a rat after all. He was no John Wayne, either, of course, and that, I figured, was the point. Just because the bad guys wear hats that are blacker than black, that doesn’t mean that the good guys are wearing pure white. I don’t know what Popov’s motives were for doing what he did, but I’m not sure it matters. He came out of the war a very wealthy man, but few did more to consign the Nazis to history than he. Popov was what he was—a rat and a hero, who wore a decidedly gray hat.
Abrielle married a doctor, had three children, seven grandchildren, and, recently, two great-grandchildren. Her husband died in 1987, and she’s since lived a quiet, contented life in Montmartre, with who knows how many cats. I always let her know where I am in the world, and I get a hand-painted Christmas card every year.
Gérard became leader of the Resistance movement in Paris. He was killed in 1944 when he and his party were surprised by a German patrol as they attempted to sabotage a rail line. Claude served honorably in the Resistance, too. After the war ended, he got a motorized milk wagon, found a lovely wife, and fathered eight kids. One Sunday in the spring of 1957, when I was passing through Paris, the three of us—Claude, Abrielle, and myself—went to visit the Père Lachaise cemetery, where there is a memorial to the fallen heroes of the Resistance. The first two names carved into the stone monument where we laid our flowers were Raymond Fournier and Christien Delacroix.
In Lisbon, I took a room in a small hotel in the Alfama, preferring not to make an appearance back at the Palacio—not that I could afford it, anyway, having left the remains of Lili’s envelope with Abrielle. I did head out to Estoril one afternoon and found Harry Thompson at his favorite watering hole. He seemed happy to see me, and pretended to pump me for information, while I pretended to give him some. We had a few drinks and a few laughs, then we wished each other luck and went our separate ways. I liked Harry. I don’t know what became of him, but I felt kind of sad as we parted. He was the kind of guy who’d die alone and be quickly forgotten.
I made my way back to Hollywood, getting passage on the steamer Excalibur, which, coincidentally, was carrying the duke and duchess to their new posting as governor and first lady of the Bahamas. I had to stay locked in my cabin for four days to avoid seeing them or Madame Moulichon, who Popov had sent back to Lisbon with the phony documents. I assumed that Espírito Santo arranged to get the papers to Berlin, and over the next three months, I enjoyed reading the story of the RAF’s unlikely victory over the Luftwaffe in the Battle of Britain.
I drifted around Los Angeles for a while, picking up a bit of stunt work here and there, drinking too much, and losing at cards. One of the guys I played with was Julius Epstein, the screenwriter. They used to call him Julie. I didn’t know him too well, but he ended up driving me home one night when I couldn’t manage it myself. We stopped for coffee at some out-of-the-way diner in the San Fernando Valley, and for some reason I told him the whole story of Lili and Eva and me, and what happened in Lisbon and Paris. I don’t know why I decided to tell him. I guess I just needed to tell someone.
I’m not sure if he believed me, but I remember him saying that it might make a pretty good movie. With a few changes, of course.
Acknowledgments
I’d like to thank Henry Ferris, at William Morrow, for his continuing faith, his abilities as an editor, and for being such a pleasure to work with. There are many others at Morrow who have worked hard and contributed their talents, among them Eryn Wade and Lynn Grady.
My agent, Bill Contardi of Brandt and Hochman, is always a reliable counselor, and takes care of business with an ease and directness that is much appreciated.
Others who have made valuable contributions to the book along the way are Francie Gabbay, Ian Howe, Susan Schulman, Susan Gabbay, Harry Von Feilitzsch, and as always, my wife, Julia, who continues to tolerate a husband with a very odd job.
About the Author
TOM GABBAY is the author of The Berlin Conspiracy. He was NBC's director of comedy programming, supervising the production of sitcoms such as Cheers and Family Ties. Since leaving NBC, he has written several screenplays for film and television. He lives in Europe.
www.tomgabbay.com
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Also by Tom Gabbay
The Berlin Conspiracy
Credits
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Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
THE LISBON CROSSING. Copyright © 2007 by Tom Gabbay. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub Edition © MARCH 2007 ISBN: 9780061868283
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