Spies of the Balkans A Novel Alan Furst

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.""What can we do, meine Frau?"You poor thing.It went on, but not for long, and Hauser's exterior never showed the slightestfissure--he was, certainly, beyond courteous.Still, there he was, in her living room, thecoffee cup of the fugitive Ostrova sitting on the kitchen counter.He hadn't come inuniform, with three fellow officers, he hadn't kicked down the door, he hadn't smackedher face.Yet, nonetheless, there he was.And, as he prepared to leave, her hands shook sohard she had to clasp them behind her back."I wish you a good day, Frau Krebs.I hope I have not intruded."He closed the door behind him, it clicked shut, she called an office at the GeneralStaff headquarters, and Hugo was home twenty minutes later.It was the worstconversation they ever had.Because they had to part.She was obviously a suspect, soobviously under surveillance but, as long as he stayed where he was, she was safe, shecould leave Germany.If they were to attempt to leave together, they would both bearrested.She took the train to Frankfurt that afternoon.Was she watched? Impossible toknow, but she assumed she was.At the grand house in which she'd been raised, she spokewith her grandfather, and together they made their plans.If, he said, it was time for her toleave, then it was also time for him.Since the rise of Hitler in 1933 he'd hoped for thesort of catastrophe that always, sooner or later, brought such people down, but it hadn'thappened.Instead, triumph followed triumph.So now came the moment to abandon suchfolly, as Emilia's grandfather put it, "and leave these people to their madness." The nextmorning, with a single telephone call, he procured exit visas for a week-long vacation inBasel.He did not have to visit an office, he simply sent a clerk over for the papers."Thegeneral's aide asked that I convey the general's warmest wishes for a pleasant stay inSwitzerland," said the clerk, as he handed Adler a manila envelope.No more thanexpected, from this general, for Adler had made him a very wealthy general indeed.It was a long drive, ten hours, from Frankfurt to the Swiss border, but EmiliaKrebs and her grandfather were comfortable in the luxurious Mercedes automobile.Thecook, saddened because she suspected she would never see them again, had made up alarge packet of sandwiches, smoked liverwurst and breast of chicken, and filled a largethermos with coffee.The cook knew what they knew: that even traveling in a chauffeur-driven Mercedes, and looking like powerful and protected people, it was better not tostop.There were Nazi luminaries everywhere along the way and when they drank, whichwas often, they were liable to forget their manners.The chauffeur drove steadily throughthe gusty March weather, Emilia Krebs and her grandfather watched the towns go by and,even though the glass partition assured them privacy, only conversed now and then."How many did you save, Emmi?" the elder Adler asked."I believe it was forty, at least that.We lost one man who was arrested at theHungarian border, we never learned why, and a pair of sisters, the Rosenblum sisters,who simply vanished.They were librarians, older women; God only knows whathappened to them.But that was in the early days, we managed better later on.""I am proud of you, Emmi, do you know that? Forty people.""We did our best," she said.And then, for a time, they did not speak, lost in their own thoughts.Emilia didn'tcry, mostly she didn't, she held it in, and kept a handkerchief in her hand for theoccasional lapse.Her grandfather was, in his way, also brokenhearted.Seven hundredyears of family history in Germany, gone.Finally he said, some minutes later, "It was thehonorable thing to do."She nodded, in effect thanking him for kind words.But we pay a price for honor,she thought.So now she paid, so did her husband, so did her grandfather, and, for that matter,so would the Yugoslavs, and the Greeks.Such a cruel price.Was it always thus? Perhaps,it was something she couldn't calculate, life had somehow grown darker, at times it did.Perhaps that was what people meant by the phrase the world is coming apart.But mostlyyou couldn't question what they meant, because mostly they said it to themselves.Hours later, they reached the Swiss border.The German customs officer glancedat their papers, put two fingers to the brim of his cap, and waved them through.TheSwiss officer, as the striped barrier bar was lowered behind them, did much the same.And then they drove on, a few minutes more, into the city of Basel.29 March.There was little to do in the office--only Sibylla and Zannis there now,and Saltiel's bare desk, his photographs gone.The telephone rang now and then, theSalonika detective units continuing to work because they might as well, while they werewaiting [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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