Alan Furst - The Spies of Warsaw

So, now that French bastard had really done it. With trembling hand, he snatched up the telephone receiver and called Major Meinhard Peister, his friend Meino, in Regensburg.

27 March.

Meino and Willi and Voss rode the train up to Warsaw. They’d wanted to drive in Willi’s new Mercedes, but the Polish roads in March could be more than an adventure, so they took a first-class compartment on the morning express. They weren’t alone, a young couple had the seats by the window, but something about the three men made them uncomfortable, so they got their valises down and went looking for somewhere else to sit. “That’s better,” Willi said, with a wink, once they were gone.

“We’ll need a car, up there,” Meino said. He’d put on weight, now more than ever the gross cherub.

“It’s all arranged,” Voss said. “They’ll pick us up at the station.”

From his briefcase, Meino produced a bottle of schnapps. “Something for the trip.” He pulled the cork, took a sip, and passed the bottle to Willi, who said “ Prost ” before he drank. Then he said, “What do you have in mind, Augi?”

“Give him something to remember,” Voss said. He nodded up at his valise.

“What’s in there?”

“You’ll see.”

“Been a long time since we did this,” Meino said.

“A few years,” Willi said. “But I haven’t forgotten how.”

“Remember that giant pig, up in Hamburg?” Voss said.

“Tried to run away? That one?”

“Who?” Meino said.

“The communist-the schoolteacher.”

“Screamed for his mama,” Willi said.

Meino laughed. “That one.”

“We’ll want to get him alone somewhere,” Willi said.

“Don’t worry about that,” Voss said, taking a turn with the schnapps. “My people up there have been watching him. It may take a day or two, but he’ll be alone sooner or later. Or he’ll be with his doxy.”

“Nothing like an audience,” Willi said.

“Better,” Voss said. “For what I have in mind.”

In Warsaw, they were picked up by Winckelmann, driving the Opel Admiral, and taken to a commercial hotel south of the station. “Likely he’s home for the night,” Winckelmann said. “But we’ll see about tomorrow.”

“I can’t stay here forever,” Willi said.

“He’s at the embassy a lot of the time, but he goes out to meetings. That would be the best, if you want to get him alone.”

“That’s what we want,” Voss said.

“See you in the morning,” Winckelmann said. “Eight-thirty.”

They went out that evening, to a nightclub up on Jasna street called the Caucasian Cave that Winckelmann had suggested-one of the so-called “padded nightclubs,” walls covered with heavy fabric to keep the riotous noise inside. The club was in a cellar, with a doorman who wore the big fur hat common to the Caucasus. They ate lamb on skewers, an old Jew played the violin, and a few of the girls got up to dance-girls in heavy makeup, gold earrings, and low-cut peasant blouses. One of them sat on Willi’s knees and tickled his chin with a feather. “Care to go outside?” Willi said, in German. “To the alley?”

“The alley! You must be kidding me,” she said. “You boys come over from Germany?”

“That’s right.”

“Don’t see many, in here.”

“We go where we want.”

“I guess you do. Staying at a hotel? I might come up and visit you.”

“Not tonight.”

“With your wife, Fritz?”

“Not me.”

“Well, I’m not an alley girl,” she said, hopping off. She walked away, flipping the back of her skirt up to reveal her thighs. “See you later,” she said, over her shoulder, “unless you find a cat.”

“Quite a mouth, on that one,” Meino said.

“Maybe we’ll come back here,” Willi said, “with twenty divisions. Then she’ll sing a different tune.”

They ordered another round of vodkas, told stories, and roared with laughter. This was the life! But as the evening wore on, the clientele changed, and Jews in sharp suits, with slicked-down hair, began to appear, well known in the club, greeted heartily. They looked sideways at the three Germans, and one of them whispered with the girl who’d sat on Willi’s knees.

Voss sniffed the air and said, “It’s starting not to smell so good in here.”

“Time to move on,” Meino said.

They tried one more place, the Hairych, on Nalewki street, but there they overheard the gangster types talking about them in Yiddish, so they went back to the hotel, drank for a time, and went to their rooms. The next morning they drove around with Winckelmann, got a glimpse of the Frenchman, walking to work, then spent the rest of the day in the car, bored and irritated. They stayed at the hotel on the twenty-eighth, waiting for a telephone call from Winckelmann, but it never came. Willi began to complain, he’d taken time off from work, but he couldn’t hang around Warsaw forever. “Maybe we’ll just go see him tonight,” he said. “At his apartment.”

But Voss didn’t like that idea, and neither did Meino.

A cold, mean little drizzle on the morning of the twenty-ninth, the worst weather possible for Mercier’s aching knee, and a dreary day in store. He had correspondence to answer, dispatches to write, a meeting in the morning, another in the afternoon, and then, at five, he had to go out to Wola, the factory district at the western edge of the city, to the Ursus Tractor Company on Zelazna street, which manufactured automobiles and armoured vehicles. There would be a tour of the plant; then he was to meet with the managing director in his office. Walking to work, leaning on his stick, Mercier grumbled to himself, “Fine day to visit a factory.” The dispatches took forever-information had to be looked up-and, at the meetings, he could barely force himself to concentrate. It was just the kind of day when one didn’t care about anything.

At twenty minutes to five, Marek picked him up outside the embassy and set off for Wola. It wasn’t all that far, but the drive seemed to take forever. Finally they reached the Wola district, deserted at this hour, the night shifts at the factories already at work. Set well back from Zelazna street, across a railroad track, the Ursus plant: vast buildings of soot-colored brick, beneath a low gray sky at twilight. Marek stopped the car and said, “When shall I pick you up?”

Mercier calculated. “Come back at seven. I know this will take at least two hours.”

“I can stay, colonel, if you like.”

“No, don’t bother. See you at seven.”

With a sigh in his heart, Mercier walked across the tracks, then down a brick walkway to the administration building. A senior manager was waiting for him and took him off to the production sheds. Pure industrial hell. Giant machinery, banging away to wake the dead, rattling chains, showers of sparks, and the manager shouting over the din: here the armoured cars are assembled; they weigh this much; the clearance is this high. Mercier peered at the engines while the workers, in grease-stained overalls, smiled and nodded. He dutifully made notes and was eventually shown a completed vehicle, where he sat in the turret, cranked the handle and, lo and behold, the thing swiveled. Slowly, but it worked. Still, he knew what could happen to these cars-blown over on their sides, pouring smoke and flame-if they ever went to war. He’d seen it.

They walked for what felt like miles, then he was taken to see the managing director. An amiable gentleman, in a handsome suit, anxious to impress the French visitor. Again the weight, the speed, the thickness of plate, the firing rate of the gun. Coffee was served, with a plate of dry cookies. Skillfully, Mercier played the role of honored guest, but his thoughts were elsewhere. Lately, he liked to imagine Anna Szarbek, down at his house in the Drome, dogs in front of the fireplace, everything he cared for, gathered up together, safe at night.