That was all very well, but it remained for me to find a safe place to hide the document, for the woman who did my housekeeping and maintained by clothing and linen had to belong, like all the domestics, to the police spying on my movements and actions.
After long reflection I made a decision. The floor of my room was tiled, not, as in France, with octagonal tiles but with small flagstones about twenty-five centimeters by twenty, of a very pale terracotta. With extreme care, I succeeded, with the aid of a simple pen-knife, in lifting one of them, behind a curtain making a cloakroom. Then I slowly hollowed out the plaster that fixed it in place and collected the debris in a handkerchief; then I replaced everything, satisfied with my work, certain that no one would be able to discover my hiding place, so perfect did the joints seem, with the aid of the plaster dust with which I filled them.
That journal, written day by day, still exists; it is under the flagstone, in the place where I left it when I quit my room for the last time, for I am convinced that it has not been discovered.
For the sake of prudence, even though the weather was favorable, I let two Sundays go by without visiting my favorite spot—which, it will be remembered, overlooked the ravine. In any case, I had resolved no longer to go there by day, but by night. I was waiting for a plausible reason to absent myself one evening, when the passage of a French dramatic company through Neustadt furnished me with the opportunity I sought. I warned my household staff that, my intention being to go to hear them, I would be back late, or not at all. That gave me my night.
At six o’clock I did indeed go to Neustadt, in a suit, but I had put an ample waxed greatcoat over it, and I took rubber gloves.
On arriving at the theater the first person I saw was Karl, the so-called Pole. That thwarted al my plans, reducing them to nothing. The individual bought a stalls ticket, and I stood there stupidly, wondering what I was going to do. They were performing Le Petit Duc. I took a program and, as I scanned it, an idea occurred to me.
The artistes were French; they were compatriots; nothing was therefore more natural than that I should go to talk to them. I could thus invite one of them, male or female, to supper, or at least say so, and that would render me my liberty. The plan was simple; it only remained to carry it through.
I contrived an encounter with Karl in a corridor a few minutes before the commencement and said to him: “I’m delighted to have come. I used to know Georgette d’Antraygues, who is singing the role of the little Duc, and I’m thinking of asking her to supper. Can you recommend one or two restaurants?”
He gave me two addresses, which I noted down, and the play began.
At the entr’acte, taking Karl with me, I had flowers and my card sent to the artiste and, at the next entr’acte, I went into the wings.
Georgette d’Antraygues received me amicably. I solicited a moment’s conversation with her, which I obtained, and I said to her: “Mademoiselle. I’m French, as you must suspect; but you don’t know that I’m presently charged with an important mission that requires my freedom of action tonight. Now, I’m followed and under surveillance; it’s necessary that I leave the theater without being seen. Can you help me?”
Somewhat surprised, the young woman looked at me for a long moment, and then, doubtless won over by my frank expression, asked: “Which way did you come?”
“Through the iron door that leads to the auditorium, which was opened to me without any comment.”
“In that case, you can leave by the artistes’ entrance. Come on—I’ll show you where it is.”
She went ahead of me; the scenery was being shifted. She walked every elegantly, young and pretty, with a bold attitude, in her breastplate and her powdered wig.
When we arrived at a little door, she held out her hand. “Au revoir,” she said, “and good luck.”
There were three steps to go down, a fairly long corridor, and then the street. I waited momentarily; then, when I judged that the act had begun I went to the cloakroom and collected my coat and hat. No one had seen me.
A quarter of an hour later, I left the city and, cutting across the fields, I reached the bridge over the ravine before midnight without having been followed.
There was no moon; the obscurity was profound; I would be able to operate in complete darkness.
I acquired the conviction that by going from tree to tree along the side of the ravine, not only would I be in no danger of falling, but I would easily be able to escape a surveillance that the inoffensive character of my actions ought to have relaxed.
I was taking a big risk, I knew, but I was prey to such a fever of curiosity, and was so ardently desirous of unmasking the actions of which my homeland might sooner or later by the victim, in violation of the treaties signed in 1918, that I did not hesitate.
I laid flat on the ground, face down, in order to reach the edge of the ravine; my waxed topcoat was carefully buttoned and the rubber gloves were covering my hand. I could thus avoid soiling my inner garments too much, which was the important thing.
I arrived promptly enough at the network of barbed wire; as I expected, it was electrified; I was certain of that because I had a stake supporting insulators directly in front of me. It was necessary not to think of climbing over the obstacle, and I searched for a tree whose branches extended above the wire. I found one and climbed it; then, following a broad branch, I passed over the network and let myself down without raising any alarm.
It only remained for me to act with extreme prudence.
I slid smoothly from tree to tree, under a rather abundant rain that had begun to fall, and thus reached, not the bottom of the ravine, but the crest of a wall that was absolutely sheer. At the bottom, some distance away to my left, a little red lamp was lit, under which motionless reflections extended in parallel.
What could that be?
Water? No—the reflections, as I said, were absolutely immobile. In order to find out, I started crawling along the top of the wall, and had scarcely covered ten meters when my hand discovered a piece of iron describing a curve whose two extremities were embedded in the stone. By groping along the wall, I discovered another. It was an iron ladder, like those in dry docks and the flanks of jetties. I ventured on to it and immediately went down fifteen rungs, which finally took me to the floor of the ravine. I set foot on it, and soon had the explanation of the immobility of the reflections.
I had before me an electric railway.
V. The Mysterious Factories
I was in the densest shadow one could wish for in the course of such an adventure; that assured me of an almost complete impunity, and further affirmed my resolution. I straightened up and continued my route along the track, toward the red light that was scintillating in the distance like a ruby.
I went hesitantly, at a prudent pace, but that did not prevent me from observing carefully; it was thus that I encountered, in a siding, three connected trucks, on which was resting the hull of a submarine of an absolutely new construction, so far as I could judge. Error was impossible by reason of the special, truly characteristic form that such vessels offer.
The submarine, which might have been a river submarine or designed to operate within a limited range in shallow waters, seemed to be complete, save for its deck armament, as I was able to assure myself by climbing on to one of the trucks. It was undoubtedly waiting there for the time to arrive to take to its element.
Further away, on three more trucks, lay a long slender form that had to be a cannon.
I continued my route, and soon understood. The red light was nothing but a signal planted at the entrance to a tunnel that extended underground and from which I saw coming toward me two white headlights that were reminiscent of the eyes of a monstrous beast silently charging toward my poor and paltry person. I only just had time to throw myself into the depths of a gutter, and saw a long train pass by soundlessly. I could not, alas, make out what it was carrying, but I knew enough, at least about that side of things. I hesitated to go further into the tu
nnel; that might be dangerous, and time was limited,
I retraced my steps. The success of my enterprise had given me a pleasure that still astonishes me. Hastening my stride, I went back along the route I had just followed. I found he iron ladder that I had come down, went past it, and continued advancing.
Three or four hundred paces beyond the ladder, there was a sharp bend in the track. I crawled toward the bend, but at one moment I was in grave danger of being discovered; a motorail99 mounted by two men, both armed with short electric rifles, passed so close to me that the wheels of their machine almost brushed my hands.
The night was pitch-black and the watchmen were doubtless only accomplishing a mechanical task; otherwise, I would have been doomed. I let the motorail continue on its way toward the tunnel and, scarcely raising myself on my elbows. I took a long look ahead of me.
I had before me a tangle of tracks that converged toward embarkation platforms. In spite of the obscurity and thanks to curious beacons that seemed to be circling in the air as a satellite orbits its planet, I glimpsed forms that were familiar to me: lifting-tackle, cranes, platforms, trucks and apparatus of all kinds, in usage in great maritime depots as well as metallurgical factories; all of it raised slender or squat silhouettes toward the black sky; further away, large iron doors were yawning. I thought I had noticed similar ones at the entrance to the tunnel but had abandoned the supposition; what I saw now confirmed my initial hypothesis; the tunnel could be closed as well.
Yes, there were high iron doors, on each side of which were red, green or violet beacons only as large as a fist, burning quite brightly, although they were all orientated in such a fashion that they could only be seen from a certain angle—from the tracks, presumably, and only beyond the bend that they followed. From the top of the slope the beacons were completely invisible.
I was able to advance, still crawling for a hundred meters, and convinced myself that I had before me the entrances to underground factories, from which the sounds of the steel industry reached me.
Then, at a stroke, everything was explained: the ventilation shafts whose quantity had astonished me; the multitude of workers who went every morning toward a mysterious location and returned in the evening; the prohibition on penetrating into the ravine; the quantities of raw materials out of all proportion to the work that was carried out overtly. It was more than enough to convince the most incredulous mind.
But all of that was also hidden, clandestine; all of it, I understood quite clearly, could disappear at the wave of a wand, at an order or a gesture. That order given, that gesture made, the doors of the factory and the tunnel would close; the thousands of workers, abandoning the usual tools for the pick and shovel, could, in less than twenty-four hours, throw the earth of the banks into the ravine and fill the space between the two walls, cut the trees at ground level and flatten everything, at least sufficiently to hide from all eyes, even the most alert, the existence of the clandestine factories, whose work would be temporarily suspended.
On reflection, I acquired the conviction that the railways snaked underground like the Paris Metro, all the way to some city, a river, a port, where other precautions, analogous or different, had been taken—and thus, with the maximum of security, Germany was pursuing its dream of domination by secretly forging the weapons necessary to its realization.
All the surrounding populations, composed of steelworkers, were in possession of that secret, and there was not a single traitor among them. That caused me to shudder.
I had seen enough. In any case, every passing minute might bring a complication and lose me the benefit of my nocturnal expedition. I retraced the route I had followed, took the iron ladder, traversed the electrified wires by the same means and finally found myself, without incident, outside the terrain to which access was prohibited.
Day was about to dawn, but it was still raining. That ensured the almost complete security of my return. I set off across the fields, and, going in through a back door, was at home at the moment that six o’clock chimed.
As I got undressed I saw that I had torn my waxed coat; one of the belt-loops that served to tighten the garment about the waist was missing. That tormented me immeasurably, because I thought it more than likely that it would be found—and then, would I be doomed? I cleaned my shoes carefully. Similarly, I made everything disappear that might reveal my excursion; then I went to bed. By a fortunate chance, my expedition had taken place on a Saturday night, extending into Sunday; that permitted me to take the rest I needed, and also to make a few notes on the little pad that I always carried on my person rather than confiding it to my hiding place—because I wanted to know, first of all, whether that hiding place was absolutely secure...
There, the houses had eyes and ears.
When I woke up, I went over all my memories of the night, and none of the hypotheses I had formed seemed improbable to me. All the equipment disposed on the embarkation platforms had to be mounted on rails; they also had to be easily dismantled or reduced in dimensions, and, departing, would disappear either behind the doors of the tunnel or those of the factory. It was marvelously designed, and from that moment on Germany appeared to me in its entirety as a vast secret arsenal in which the program it had traced was being slowly, patiently but surely elaborated.
At midday, in the restaurant, I saw Karl again.
“Where the devil did you get to yesterday?” he asked.
“Ah, there you go,” I said, mysteriously.
“At any rate, you don’t go to either of the restaurants I’d identified for you.”
“Neither of them, indeed. You were looking for me, then?”
“No, of course not, but as I wanted to have supper myself, I went to the first, which was full, and then to the second; that’s how I can say that I didn’t see you there.”
I did not reply. We separated, arranging to meet again that evening.
When I got home, the housekeeper said to me: “Give me the loop from your waxed overcoat and I’ll sew it back on.
“What loop?” I said, feigning ignorance.
Without a word, the woman brought my waxed topcoat and showed me the damage.
“Why, that’s curious,” I said, “I must have done it boarding the train.”
The woman made no response; she headed for my bedroom, where she repaired the damage as best she could, and then left. When I was certain that her departure would not involve any unexpected return, I went up to my bedroom in my turn and carried out a careful inspection of the room. The waxed coat was extended neatly over a chair, and nothing revealed the slightest disquieting fact to my attentive examination.
I had extended a piece of white thread, gummed at both ends, across the little flagstone that I had lifted up in order to hollow out my hiding place; it was intact. That proved to me two things by which I was delighted: the little redoubt had not been discovered, and the housekeeper did not sweep in the corners.
When evening came I got dressed, confided my notes to the hiding-place and went to meet Karl, with my mind singularly tranquil and light. As soon as we arrived at the theater I went up to see Mademoiselle d’Antraygues, who received me very amiably and told me that the previous evening, at the exit from the theater, she had been followed by a man who had emerged from the threshold of a nearby building.
“What did he look like?”
“So far as I could tell, he was tall, dressed neatly but without luxury.”
“An overcoat with a touch of yellow?”
“Yes, it seemed so to me.”
That was Karl. I expected as much.
But one thing troubled me; if the artiste were interrogated—as might be anticipated—what would she say? I asked her.
“Don’t worry about that,” she replied. “We’re leaving immediately after the performance for Warsaw. The receipts are insufficient and the director has decided not to put on the third performance tomorrow. From Warsaw we go to Petrograd, and then to Sweden, Norway and Holland, all in less than a
month. Afterwards, we return to France. So, you see, if they take it into their heads to question me, they’ll have to decide now.”
“How can I thank you for what you’ve done for me, and what you might still be called on to do?”
“Let it go. I’m helping a compatriot, and that’s neither difficult nor, I imagine, dangerous.”
“Does one ever know?”
“I’m not afraid. If I’m asked whether I’ve seen you, I’ll naturally say yes; as for the rest, I’m a woman and it’s easy for me not to give myself away.”
I shook the worthy young woman’s hand, and took my leave of her, but I must say that Mademoiselle d’Antraygues could never have been applauded as I applauded her that evening.
I rejoined Karl in the auditorium.
“Are you going home?” he asked.
“Certainly—why wouldn’t I?”
On Monday morning, Karl accosted me at the factory gate. “Well, she’s gone, your chanteuse. You didn’t know?”
“No idea.”
“It’s bizarre.”
“Listen,” I said, “I don’t know what reason you have for questioning me like this, but I can tell you that the person in question doesn’t have to account to me for her actions, and that if she’s gone, it’s doubtless because her director estimated that a longer presence was unnecessary. Are you satisfied?”
By the way that he looked at me, I understood many things that I pretended not to, but I did not give him time to say anything more and went into the factory.
When I arrived at my studio I was summoned to the director’s office. That happened too frequently for me to conceive an anxiety regarding the invitation; it probably concerned work in progress.
The director of the group to which I belonged was a fat man whose gaze was veiled completely by a pair of dark lenses. His voice was soft, full of unction. I had a profound aversion for him, without being able to explain why—a repulsion such as one experiences for a large spider or a snake.
The Mirror of Present Events Page 26