“It may not be easy to spend large sums without attracting attention. Do you handle them yourself, or do you pass them on to others?”
“Mostly I pass them on.”
“And won’t these others be curious as to where you get them?”
“Naturally; but they know they are not free to ask.”
“They doubtless remember that you know me. Won’t they think of me as the possible source?”
“No, for they have read about you in the Nazi press. They’d be more apt to think of the Robin family.”
“How much money can you handle effectively at present?”
“I hadn’t expected to meet that question. Two or three thousand marks at a time, I should think.”
“And how often?”
“We could spend that every month, if we had it.”
“All right,” he said; “here is some to start things going.” He took from his pocket a package containing a couple of thousand marks and slipped it into her hand. “Don’t make the mistake of moving too fast,” he warned. “Spending money is a conspicuous thing, and the larger the sum, the greater will be your risk. I’d hate to be the cause of your having to drink the contents of that vial.”
XI
During the year and a half that Lanny Budd had been living a double life he had been troubled by the thought of what his friends in Berlin must be thinking about him. There was no help for it—except for this one comrade, and he wanted to make certain about her. “Listen, Trudi,” he said. “It may be a long time before I see you again, and there are some things I want you to have clear in your mind.”
He took her back some thirteen years, to the early days of the Nazi movement, when Kurt Meissner had introduced him to a son of the head forester of Stubendorf, a young enthusiast who had loaded him with literature of the movement, and later on had taken him to call on Hitler. He had taken him a second time a year ago; and Trudi said she had read about that visit in the papers; all the comrades knew of it.
“Of course they assume that I’m a renegade,” he remarked.
“They don’t know what to think,” she answered. “They know that you saved Freddi Robin.”
“Let them stay in uncertainty. You know how I make my money, and to do that I have to meet persons in power. I took one of the Detaze paintings to Hitler in Munich, and that fact was worth a small fortune to me in sales and in the opportunity to go where I pleased and to meet the right people in Germany. That is the world we live in. All I want to be sure is that you understand, and that no matter what I do, you will not doubt my good faith.”
“I promise that, Lanny.”
“In the course of my efforts to help the Robin family, I achieved the honor of a personal acquaintance with General Goring. He seemed to take a fancy to me—I admired his prowess, and he found pleasure in displaying it. That might be useful some day.”
“It sounds utterly fantastic, Lanny.”
“In every revolution and in every war there have been men playing a double role and dealing with both sides. It isn’t according to my taste, but I am beginning to see possibilities in it. My father is going in for the manufacture of airplanes, and he will be expecting me to be useful to him; in return I may feel justified in making him useful to me. I don’t want to say any more about this, except to be sure that whatever happens, you will not mention your connection with me or your knowledge of my role.”
“I’ll die before I do it, Lanny.”
“I have an idea which may be worth while and about which I would like your advice. You know that the fat General seized the palace of my Jewish friends, and you know the fine paintings which were a part of his loot. It happens that Zoltan Kertezsi and I selected nearly all those paintings, and it would be easy to find a market for them in America; they might bring several million dollars, and there would be a commission of ten per cent. That is one way by which I could get large sums of money for you, and it would amuse me to persuade an old-style Teutonic robber-baron to contribute to his own undoing.”
“Knorke!” exclaimed the woman.
“There is this drawback, that Goring would be getting nine marks for every one that I got. Thus I might be strengthening the Nazi cause far more than I was hurting it. What if he used the money to buy my father’s airplanes?”
Trudi thought before answering. “He will buy the planes with the money of the German people, never with his own. For himself he is building a grand estate on a peninsula up in the North Sea. He is a greedy hog, and I do not believe he would give a pfennig to the government, but rather take away all that he dares.”
“Then it wouldn’t be a mistake to offer to sell his pictures?”
“If he wishes to sell them he could do it without your help—isn’t that true?”
“Yes, no doubt.”
“Well, then, let him spend what he pleases upon his own glory, and we will use our share to tell the German people what lives their false leaders are living.”
“O.K.,” said the American—a phrase which is understood wherever the movies go. “I may have the honor of being invited to that estate, which he is calling Karinhall in honor of his deceased wife. If I succeed in becoming his art adviser, I will appear in the next few days at our rendezvous wearing a feather in my hat!”
“Not too large a feather!” said the anxious woman outlaw.
6
ON TOP OF THE WORLD
I
Lanny went dutifully to the Salon, and then, returning to the hotel, reported to his wife that he had found a new painter who impressed him greatly. She for her part was full of news about the doings of important personalities in Berlin, a lot of it scandalous; but repeating it wasn’t regarded as anti-Nazi activity—you did that in whatever world capital you were visiting. Human nature was the same everywhere, only worse the farther you came toward the east; now, somewhat alarmingly, the east appeared to be coming westward.
Lanny said: “A bright idea has hit me: all those pictures that Goring got from Johannes, he probably doesn’t care about them and might like to have them sold.”
“Do you suppose he would let you?” exclaimed the wife. She realized that this would keep her charge out of mischief for a long while.
“It can’t do any harm to offer. I thought I’d call up Furtwaengler.”
“Don’t mention what you have in mind,” said the cautious wife.
He called the official residence of the Minister-Prasident of Prussia, and found the young staff officer disengaged. He and Lanny always outdid each other in politeness, almost like two Japanese, and now they went to it over the telephone. The Oberleutnant said that he had read of Lanny’s arrival and intended to call him up; Lanny said: “I have got the better of you.” He asked after the officer’s family, and about his health, and that of Seine Exzellenz the Minister-Prasident General—he had a long string of titles, but four were enough for ordinary conversation. Furtwaengler replied: “Er sitzt auf der Spitze der Welt,” and added: “I believe that is good American.” Lanny guessed that this was another case of movie influence.
“If you are free this evening why don’t you run over to dinner?” said the subtle intriguer. “Bring your wife, if you think she would enjoy it.”
Irma dressed herself in raiment fine but scanty, and Lanny in tails; the staff officer appeared in his black and silver dress uniform with the white skull and crossbones, and his tall and angular country wife in a low-cut gown which revealed her shoulder-bones both front and back. A good couturier would not have let her make these disclosures, but she was the daughter of a cheese-manufacturer from Pomerania and didn’t yet know her way about die grosse Welt. In Prussia wives have to pay for their husbands, and then for the most part they stay at home and devote themselves to their three K’s, which in English are three C’s: Cooking, Children, Church.
II
In that large and elegant hotel dining-room, with obsequious waiters bowing around them and exposing dishes of steaming-hot foods, Irma presented an expurgated vers
ion of the conversation of the Furstin Donnerstein, while Lanny mentioned casually his intimacy with French financiers and revealed himself living next door to an English castle and dropping in informally upon staff members of the Foreign Office. When the four were alone in the drawing-room of the Budd suite, the two ladies sat in one corner and talked about ladies’ affairs, while Lanny expatiated upon the menace of French foreign policy and the untrustworthiness of French political careerists.
The Oberleutnant in his turn talked about the one and only party and its plans and hopes. A strange thing, to which Lanny could never entirely adjust his mind: the young S.S. man knew that his American host had penetrated to the very heart of the party’s treachery and cruelty, had witnessed soul-shaking sights and lost one of his dearest friends to the Nazi terror; but the fat General, Furtwaengler’s boss, had seen fit to take it all as a joke, and the staff officer had apparently decided that it had been a joke to Lanny as well. A curious quirk in their psychology, which an outsider had to try hard to understand: their collective egotism was such that they were rendered incapable of understanding other people’s minds, and in spite of their utmost cunning they remained naive and vulnerable; as if a man should put on heavy armor for battle, but leave a large opening over his solar plexus.
The National Socialist. German Workingmen’s party had achieved in the past two years such triumphs as had never before been known in history. They knew they were going on to fresh triumphs; they had it in their hearts and were full of the elan which it gave them, the “strength through joy.” They sang exultant songs about the future, they dressed themselves in fine uniforms and paraded with banners celebrating it, they organized colossal and magnificent pageants to tell all the world; they were quite literally intoxicated with their own grandeur. “Germany belongs to us today, tomorrow the whole world”—and how can the world fail to enjoy the prospect as much as we?
Here came these two Americans—rich, to be sure, but what is mere wealth compared with titles and honors, fame and glory vision and Geist? Wealth is an incidental, one of the rewards of courage and daring; all the wealth of the world lay exposed before the Nazis, as Pizarro had found it in Peru and Clive in India. This American pair had the wit to see what was coming and to climb onto the Aryan bandwagon. They enjoyed the privilege of meeting Seine Exzellenz the Minister-President of Prussia, Reichsminister of the German Empire, Air Minister, Commander-in-Chief of the German Air Force, Chief Forester of the Reich, Reich Commissioner, and so on and on; they were permitted to address him informally, to joke with him and share some of his confidences. How could they fail to be overwhelmed by the honor, and to march in spirit in his triumphal progress?
Lanny had ordered the best champagne for dinner, and afterward he served brandy and liqueurs, and while sipping them lightly himself he kept his guest’s glasses full. So the blond young Aryan’s face became rosier than ever and his talk more naive. He revealed the fact that Germany was going to win the Saar plebiscite; the matter had been arranged with German thoroughness and everything would go through planmassig. He didn’t go so far as to say that the murder of Barthou had been arranged, but he remarked with a smile that it was certainly most convenient, and that in future French politicians would be more cautious in their policy of Einkreisung. He expatiated at length upon the wonders of the last Partyday, and became lyrical in describing the ecstatic state of mind of the rank and file. Sieg heil! Sieg heil!
So at last, when Lanny Budd, associate of noble lords and multimillionaires, thought it safe to remark: “I have some information which might be of interest to Seine Exzellenz,” the Oberleutnant did not hesitate for a moment, but said: “Herrlich, Herr Budd! I will speak to him the first thing in the morning.”
Afterward, when Herr Budd told his fashionable lady about this success, she remarked: “My God, we certainly paid a price for it! Can you imagine anything duller than that poor country gawk he drags along with him?”
III
The old-style Teutonic robber-baron sat in the sumptuous private apartment of his official residence, the room with the large black table and the gold curtains of his own designing; however, the lion cub had been banished, having grown too big for play-acting. The vast bulk of the Minister-Prasident General was covered in one of those gorgeous uniforms, to the designing and construction of which so large a share of the clothing industry of the Reich was now devoted. This one was of pale blue with a darker blue stripe, and insignia of which Lanny did not know the meaning. Whatever the uniform, the wide sash was never omitted, and the large gold star with eight points hanging from two white ribbons.
“Ja, Lanny!” bellowed the fat man when he saw his guest. His broad face with heavy jowls, usually sullen, lighted up with pleasure, and he seized the American with a large moist hand—but not flabby—grab it hard to protect yourself! It pleased his whim to be genial in the presence of this favorite of fortune, of whom he had made use in an especially successful coup, the plundering of one of the richest Judschweine in Germany. Surely it couldn’t be that Hermann Wilhelm Goring laughed loudly in order to conceal embarrassment!
“Gruss Gott, Hermann!” responded Lanny, seeing that he had been advanced in social status.
“Also!” exclaimed the fat warrior. “You are on the way to becoming a crown prince of the air lanes!”
Lanny was taken aback and showed it. “You have indeed a good secret service,” he remarked.
“Did you ever doubt it?” queried the host. Then, more seriously: “Your father should come to see me; it might be to our mutual advantage.”
“Na, na!” smiled Lanny. “You are not financing any airplane factories outside the Reich.”
“Aber,” countered the Air Minister, “we buy planes, and would buy more if they were good.”
“One for a sample?” retorted the other. He knew he was supposed to be impudent; he was the court jester.
“How can you say such a thing? Who could ever say that I took anything without paying for it?”
“Who could say it if I couldn’t?”
At this the stout General turned into a Kris Kringle, whose round belly shook when he laughed like a bowl full of jelly. It was to be doubted if anyone had had the nerve to address him in that fashion for many a long day.
“Setze dich, Lanny,” he said, in fatherly fashion. “Seriously, tell Robert Budd that if he gets that thousand-horsepower engine, I will lease his patents and he won’t have to argue about the price.”
It was quite disconcerting. Lanny felt himself enveloped in a net of espionage, and shuddered inwardly, thinking of Trudi. But then he realized that Robbie had been talking his project all over Paris and London, and of course Goring’s agents would have sent him word. But what a contrast in efficiency! Robbie had been to consult the authorities both in England and in his own country, and both had high-hatted him; but here this old German Raubtier sent for him and invited him to name his own figure! It boded ill—and especially since Lanny knew that Robbie would be apt to accept the invitation!
IV
This was a stag affair, and Irma had not been invited. They lunched at a table wheeled into the room, a meal consisting of a boiled turbot with thick rich sauce, and then of Hasenpfeffer. Apparently the great man didn’t give any heed to notions of diet; he stuffed himself in the middle of the day, and pressed quantities of food upon his guest. He talked fast and with his mouth full, so that he was more repellent even than usual; but Lanny laughed at his jokes and admired his capacities and did not let himself be shocked by sexual anecdotes. When the waiters had served the food the General growled: “’R-r-raus!” and they vanished and did not return until he pressed a button.
Now was Lanny’s opportunity to show that he could and would bring information of value to the military organizer of Naziland. He had given thought to the problem and chosen his course with care. He would never tell Hermann Wilhelm Goring anything that would be of real use to him—unless it was something that Hermann Wilhelm Goring was sure to know alr
eady. The visitor would be prodigal of information of this sort, and it would be accurate; so Seine Exzellenz might be kept on the alert, hoping for something new. If he asked directly, Lanny would say he didn’t know, but would try to ascertain. How long he could make out with such a program he couldn’t guess; Rick had said: “Not very long,” and Lanny had answered that any time the General grew tired of his society, he could find some more compliant Spitzel.
The host led the talk to France, and Lanny told him about the anti-Nazi fixation of Barthou and how greatly his fellow-plotters had been disconcerted by his death; speaking to the man whom he suspected to be the real murderer, Lanny pictured the plight of a Foreign Minister who had interposed himself in the effort to save his royal guest and had been shot through an artery of the arm; he might have been saved if any of his staff had had the wit to tie a handkerchief about the arm and turn it with a stick or a fountainpen; but no one had had such wit and he had slowly bled to death. Lanny went into the gory details, thinking he might be able to spoil the murderer’s appetite for Moselle wine; but no such effect was to be noted.
The visitor talked about the new Foreign Minister of France, whom one of his financial supporters had called a fripon mongol. The “rascal” part was true, Lanny said; and as for “Mongolian,” the innkeeper’s son had learned to joke about it himself, because of his swarthy complexion, thick lips, and strangely slanted eyes. Goring asked if he really had Mongolian blood, and Lanny said: “Who could guess? The races have been so mixed in that part of the world.” Lanny knew exactly how to please a pure-blooded blond Aryan.
The visitor told what he knew about the character of Laval, and little of it was good. He talked about the two hundred families who were reputed to rule France, and expressed the opinion that Laval had become the two hundred and first and would from now on serve their interests automatically. “Their own wealth concerns them so deeply that they have no time to think about their country. It would not trouble them too greatly if you were to bomb the rest of it, provided you would agree to spare their mines and steel mills and other valuable properties.”
Wide Is the Gate (The Lanny Budd Novels) Page 12