Alan Furst: The Spies of Warsaw

“Have the last one,” Vyborg said, refilling Mercier’s coffee cup.

“For you, Anton.”

“No, I must insist.”

Gracefully, Mercier acceded to diplomacy.

Breakfast over, Vyborg lit one of his miniature cigars, and Mercier a Mewa-a Seagull-one of the better Polish cigarettes.

“So,” Vyborg said, “the Renault people will be here the day after tomorrow.” A delegation of executives and engineers was scheduled to visit Warsaw, a step in the process of selling Renault tanks to the Polish army.

“Yes,” Mercier said, “we are ready for them. They’re bringing a senator.”

“You’ll be at the dinner?”

From Mercier, a rather grim smile: no escape .

Their eyes met, they had in common a distaste for the obligatory social engagements required for their work. “It will be very boring,” Vyborg said. “In case you were concerned.”

“I was counting on it.”

“You’ll be accompanied?”

Mercier nodded. With no wife or fiancee, he would be with the deputy director of protocol at the embassy, who served as table partner to Mercier, and one other bachelor diplomat, when the need arose. “You’ve met Madame Dupin?”

“I’ve had the pleasure,” Vyborg said.

“Where is it?”

“We sent a note to your office,” Vyborg said, one eyebrow arched. Don’t you read your mail? “A private dining room at the Europejski,” Vyborg said. “They’re going to watch a field maneuver earlier in the day, so they’re sure to be exhausted, which will make the evening even more amusing. Then we’re going on to a nightclub-the Adria, of course-for dancing until dawn.”

“I can’t wait,” Mercier said.

“It’s obligatory. When the purchasing delegation went to Renault in Paris, they were taken to some naughty cancan place-they’re still talking about it-so …”

“Will you buy anything?”

“We shouldn’t, but there’s always a possibility. They want to sell us the R Thirty-five, which was demonstrated when the delegation visited the factory. This visit is supposed to close the deal.”

“The R Thirty-five isn’t so bad.” Mercier, officially loyal to the national industries, had to say that and Vyborg knew it. “For infantry support.”

Vyborg shrugged. “A thirty-seven-millimeter cannon, one machine gun. And they only go twelve miles an hour, with a range of eighty miles. The armour’s thick enough, but you don’t get much machine for the money. Truthfully, if it wasn’t French, we wouldn’t bother, but this is up to Smigly-Rydz’s office.” He meant the inspector general of the Polish army. “And they may have to bow to political pressure, so, potentially, our tank crews will die for the cancan.”

“What do you have now? The last figure I heard was two hundred.”

“That’s about right, unfortunately. The Russians have two thousand, best we know, and the same for the Germans. The Ursus factory is working on the Seven TP, our own model, under license from Vickers, but Ursus has to make farm tractors as well, and we need those. In the end, it’s always the same problem: money. You’ve been out to the Ursus factory?”

“I was. At the end of the summer.”

“Maybe that’s the answer, maybe not. It really depends on how much time we have until the next war starts.”

Mercier finished his coffee, then refilled both their cups. “Hitler loves his tanks,” he said.

“Yes, we heard that story. ‘These are wonderful! Make more of them!’ An infantry soldier in the war, he knows what the British did at Cambrai, a hundred tanks, all at once. The Germans broke and ran.”

“Not like them.”

“No, but they did that day.”

For a moment, they were both in the past.

“Who else is coming to the dinner?” Mercier said.

“Well, they have a senator, so we’ll have somebody from the Sejm. Then a few people from the French community: the ubiquitous Monsieur Travas, the Pathe agency manager, is coming, with some gorgeous girlfriend, no doubt, and we’ve asked your ambassador, of course, but he’s declined. We may get the charge d’affaires.”

“Who’s the senator?”

“Bernand? Bertrand? Something like that. I have it back at the office. One of the Popular Front politicians. Somebody from Beck’s office will talk with him, though we doubt he’ll have anything new to say.”

Josef Beck was the Polish foreign minister, and Vyborg now referred to the issue that stood between him and Mercier, between France and Poland. Treaties aside, would France come to Poland’s aid if Poland were attacked?

“Likely he won’t,” Mercier said.

“We think not,” Vyborg agreed. “But we must try.”

France’s political condition-strikes, communist pressure, a right wing divided into fascists and conservatives, failure to aid the Spanish Republic-continued to deteriorate. The most absurd views were held sacred, and there was too much deal-making, though all of this was seen by a tolerant world as a kind of amiable chaos-a British politician had said that a map of French political opinion would look like Einstein’s hair. But, to Mercier, it wasn’t so amusing. “You know what I think, Anton. If the worst happens, and it starts again, you must be prepared to stand alone. A map of Europe tells the story. It’s that, or alliance with Russia-which we favor but Poland will never do-or alliance with Germany, which we certainly don’t favor, and you won’t do that either.”

“I know,” Vyborg said. “We all know.” He paused, then brightened. “But, nevertheless, we’ll see you at the Renault dinner.”

“And then at the Adria.”

“You will ask my wife to dance?”

“I shall. And you, Madame Dupin.”

“Naturally,” Vyborg said. “More coffee?”

At eleven, Mercier was back at the embassy for the daily political meeting. The ambassador presided, touched on political events of the last twenty-four hours, and looked ahead to the Renault visit-special care here, don’t bother there. Then LeBeau, the charge d’affaires and first officer, reported on unrest, potential anti-Jewish demonstrations in Danzig, and a border incident in Silesia. Then the ambassador moved on to the topic of electricity consumption at the embassy. How difficult was it, really, to turn off the lights when not in use?

Mercier had a bowl of soup for lunch at a nearby restaurant; half a bowl-Polish chicken soup was rich and powerful, laden with heavy, twisted noodles-because the ponczkis had finished his appetite for the day. He did paperwork in his office until two-thirty, then returned to his apartment, changed from uniform back into civilian clothes-gray flannel trousers, dark wool jacket, subdued striped tie-and set out for his third cafe of the day. This time on Marszalkowska avenue, a lively and elegant street with trees, awnings, nightclubs, and smart shops.

At midafternoon, the Cafe Cleo was a perfect sanctuary: marble tables, black-and-white tiled floor, a bow window looking out on the avenue, where a less-favored world hurried by. The small room was almost full; the customers chattered away, read the papers, played chess, drank foamy cups of hot chocolate with whipped cream; their dogs, mostly beagles, lay attentive under the tables, waiting for cake crumbs. In a corner at the back, Hana Musser, spectacles pushed down on her pert nose, worked at a crossword puzzle, lost in concentration, tapping her teeth with a pencil.

Mercier liked Hana Musser, a half-Czech, half-German woman of uncertain age, who, two years earlier, had fled the fulminous Nazi politics of the Sudetenland and settled in Warsaw, where she worked at whatever she could but found the economic life of the city more than difficult. She had fine skin and fine features, a mass of brass-colored hair drawn back in a clip, and wore a bulky, home-knit cardigan sweater of a dreadful pea-green shade. How Colonel Bruner had discovered her-to play the part of Countess Sczelenska-Mercier did not know, but he had his suspicions. Was she a prostitute? Never a true professional, he guessed, but perhaps a woman who, from time to time, might meet a man at a cafe, with some kind of gift to follow an afternoon spent in a hotel room. And, if the man had money, the affair might continue.