Alan Furst - The Spies of Warsaw

There followed a moment of appreciative applause, and someone turned on the lights. “Well done,” said a man with a beard, squatting down to examine the locomotive at eye level. Others agreed. “Quite perfect.” “A good run.”

Johannes Elter said nothing. Only stared, wide-eyed, at the apparition in the doorway, which searched the room, then waved to him. The weekly meeting of the Kreuzberg Model Railway Club, in the basement of a local church, was one of the few pleasures in his humdrum existence, but now, even here, his past had returned to haunt him. “A former acquaintance,” he explained to the man beside him, a stockbroker with an estate in the Charlottenburg district.

Halbach circled the trestle tables, then offered his hand. “Good evening, Johannes. Your wife said I would find you here.”

Elter returned the greeting, a smile frozen on his face.

“Can we speak for a moment?” There was no conspiracy in Halbach’s voice, but, in a pleasant way, he meant privately.

“We can go upstairs,” Elter said.

“Don’t be too long,” the stockbroker said. “We are electing officers tonight.”

“I’ll be right back,” Elter said. Coming directly from work, he wore the uniform of a Wehrmacht corporal.

Halbach, heart pounding, followed Elter up the stairs to the vestibule. The church beyond was empty, the altar bare. It had been Lutheran once but now, in line with the dictates of the Nazi regime, was home to a rather secular denomination known as “German Christian.” Elter waited until Halbach climbed the last step, then, his voice low and strained, said, “What are you doing ? Coming here like this.”

“Forgive me,” Halbach said. “I had to come.”

“Has something changed? Are you now free to go anywhere?”

“No, they are after me still.”

“You could ruin me, Julius. Don’t you know that?” Elter’s face was ashen, his hands trembling.

“It was Otto who sent me to see you,” Halbach said.

Elter was stunned. “He’s alive?”

“He is,” Halbach said. “For the time being.”

“Where …?”

“I mustn’t say, but what’s happened is that he’s fallen into the hands of foreign agents.”

Silence. Finally Elter said, “Then that’s it.”

“It need not be. But they will turn him over to the Gestapo and, if they do, he’ll be forced to tell what he knows. And that will be the end, for me, for you, for all of us who are still alive.” Halbach let that sink in, then said, “Unless …”

Elter’s voice broke as he said, “Unless what ?”

“It depends on you. On you alone.”

“What could I do?”

“They want information, from the office where you work.”

“That’s espionage! Who are they?”

“They are Swiss, or so they say. And they offer you two things if you comply: a Swiss passport, in a new name, and five hundred thousand Swiss francs. So you must choose, Johannes, between that and the Gestapo cellars.”

Elter put a hand on his heart and said, “I don’t feel well.” Down below, the lights went out and another train began its run, the locomotive tooting its whistle.

Halbach reached out and rested his hand on Elter’s arm. “This was inevitable,” he said, not unkindly. “If not today, tomorrow.”

“My God, Julius, why do you do this to me? I was always a faithful friend.”

“Because of that, I do it.”

“But I don’t have information. I know nothing.”

“Trash. That’s what they want. Papers thrown away in the waste-baskets.”

“It’s burned! Every bit of it, by the janitors.”

“When?”

“At nine in the evening, when they come in to clean the offices.”

“You must do it before nine.”

“But there’s too much; how would I carry it out of the building?”

“They want only the material from the section that works on plans for war with France: three days of it. Leave the rest for the janitors.”

“I thought you said they were Swiss.”

Halbach grew impatient. “Oh who knows what these people are up to, they have their own reasons. But the money is real, I know that personally, and so is the passport. Here, have a look.” Halbach reached into his jacket and handed Elter the Braun passport.

Elter looked at it, then gave it back. “I don’t want to leave Germany, I have a family.”

“That’s up to you. Your money will be in an account in Zurich. You’ll be given the number and the passport on Friday. You’ll have to put in a photograph, but they will tell you how to manage that.”

Elter looked suddenly weary. “I don’t know what to do.”

“Do you want to die, Johannes?”

Elter’s voice was barely audible. “No.”

Halbach waited. Finally, Elter shook his head, slowly, sickened by what life had done to him. “Friday, you said?”

“At the Hotel Excelsior. In the Birdcage Bar. Come in civilian clothing, put the papers in a briefcase. Seven-thirty in the evening. Can you remember?”

“Seven-thirty. The Birdcage Bar.”

Halbach looked at his watch. “Walk me out, Johannes.”

They left the vestibule and stood for a moment in the doorway of the church. Across the street, Mercier was sitting behind the wheel of the Renault, clearly visible with the driver’s window rolled down.

“Is that one of them?” Elter said.

Halbach nodded. “Old friend,” he said, “will you still shake hands with me?”

Elter sighed as he took Halbach’s hand. “I never imagined …” he said.

“I know. None of us did. It’s the wisdom of the gods-to keep the future dark.”

In the car, Mercier watched the two men in the doorway. The one in uniform turned, and stared into his eyes with a look of pure hatred. Mercier was holding the camera below the window; now he raised it, looked through the viewfinder, and pressed the button.

Mercier wasted no time. His valise and Halbach’s suitcase were already in the trunk of the Renault. Now he wound his way out of Kreuzberg and onto the road that ran north to Neustrelitz. Beside him, Halbach leaned his head back on the seat and closed his eyes. “Not very far, is it?”

“Three hours, no more than that.”

“Will he be at the bar?”

“I trust he will. Do you agree?”

“I’m not sure. He’ll think about it, try to find a way out. And then … well, you’ll see, won’t you.”

A fine spring night. The road was dark and deserted and Mercier drove fast. It was 11:30 when they reached the city of Rostock and, a few minutes later, the port of Warnemunde. At the dock, the ferry-a ferry from a cartoon; its tall stack would pump out puffs of smoke in time to a calliope-was already taking on passengers, headed across the Baltic to the Danish port of Gedser. Just up the street, at the edge of the dock, a customs shed held the border kontrol, where two passengers waited at the door, then entered the shed.

“Shall I walk you through the kontrol ?” Mercier said.

“No, I’ll manage.”

“There’s one last train for Copenhagen tonight, on the other side. Of course, once you’re in Denmark, you may do whatever you like.”

“I suppose I can. I’d almost forgotten, that sort of life.”

“Will you fly to Zurich?”

“Perhaps tomorrow. The funds will be there?”

“We are true to our word,” Mercier said. “It’s all in the account.”

Halbach looked out the window; the two passengers left the customs shed. “And will this,” he said, “all this, make any difference, in the long run?”

“It may. Who knows?”

Halbach climbed out of the car, retrieved his suitcase from the trunk, returned to the passenger side, and looked in at Mercier, who leaned over and rolled the window down. “Likely I won’t see you again,” Halbach said.