The Athens Assignment

by David Boyle

  She had been staggered, as they walked down the shopping streets, to find most of the shops open but almost no food on sale at all. Betty told her that the invading troops had confiscated all the canned goods and any farmyard animals. A friend of hers had a cow that was about to give birth. When the soldiers came to shoot it, they begged them to let it live until it had given birth. It gave birth that night, but the next day the soldiers were back – they shot the cow and the calf died too because it had no milk. “It really is a tragedy. The whole thing. Greece will die,” said Betty sadly.

  As they walked back through the city in the heat, they were passed by lorry after lorry, driving fresh troops down to the docks or the airfield. In the other direction, they saw large numbers of wounded troops going towards the city hospitals. One lorry was emitting groans of agony from inside. Clearly, the battle was now in full fury in Crete.

  As for the locals, those who had not been arrested still crowded into the cafés, though they had nothing to supply their customers with. Betty explained that even those who were a bit better off were also suffering because the main effect of the occupation marks was to cause rampant inflation.

  The same seemed to be true of some of the new arrivals. They saw soldiers in their uniforms, going door to door, begging for food and alcohol. They saw Austrian soldiers singing The Blue Danube, drunk on ouzo. And they saw small groups of Greek civilians, singing instead, their own satirical song, Coroido Mussolini.

  “Oh yes, I do know what it means,” said Betty. “It isn’t that inspiring, to be honest. It just means ‘Mussolini, you fool’. Infectious tune though, isn’t it? You have to try and stop yourself whistling it. It can get you into trouble, though even the German soldiers sing it these days!”

  And all the time, the sun baked them and baked the heads of the women dressed in black, praying at the shrines.

  “What is this Chicago they’re all advertising?” said Xanthe, suddenly homesick also for the Midwest.

  “Oh, it used to be ice cream, nuts and chocolate sauce. But there’s practically none left. The recipe corroded somewhat before the last hint of chocolate sauce disappeared.”

  Xanthe liked Betty enormously. She felt she could risk a question about their common profession.

  “Betty, can I ask you: how can you find anything meaningful to say in your broadcasts that won’t be censored?”

  “Well, it’s tough. I mean, you could write about Zonars, the popular bar – not so popular now, of course, now it’s full of Nazi soldiers. It used to be a gay old place, with the RAF flyers in there. Now, it’s – I don’t know – sort of humourless. Unless the locals come, but they don’t seem to… On second thoughts, you wouldn’t get that past the censor either.”

  “It’s frustrating isn’t it,” said Xanthe, sensing Betty’s rising irritation.

  “I mean, I’m supposed to be doing serious broadcasts about geopolitics, like Shirer does – or to watch the bombs falling around St Paul’s like Murrow. And I’m not allowed to do either. And even if I did, my stupid editor won’t let me read it – in case my ‘girly’ voice somehow undoes the seriousness of the subject. It’s enough to make me take up knitting.”

  They had nearly reached her flat. They were nearly at the door, but Betty held back.

  “Oh, shoot,” she said.

  Xanthe followed where she nodded.

  “What is it?”

  Up ahead was a good-looking man in a long military-style coat, waiting outside her door.

  “It’s Jurgen. I don’t trust him. He keeps coming round with flowers and other little presents. He speaks five languages and…”

  “He sounds lovely,” said Xanthe laughing.

  “Shhh, he’ll hear.”

  “Ah, Fraulein!” said a voice from up ahead. It was too late. He had seen them.

  “How delightful. You have a friend with you. Now I have brought a small gift.”

  He brandished a leg of lamb. Xanthe knew this was absolutely unobtainable in Athens for anyone except the secret police.

  “May I humbly request that I might come inside for a moment?” He shone them a winning smile. Xanthe glanced nervously at Betty, willing her to refuse.

  “Yes, come inside,” said Betty, somewhat aggressively. “I’ve been having trouble with my telephone and could do with your advice.”

  She winked quickly at Xanthe. Then she opened the door and let him in.

  “The thing is,” said Betty, as they filed up her stairs to the flat, “it keeps ringing and there is nobody there. It is almost as if there was somebody listening in.”

  “I understand, Fraulein. I have a little influence and will ask to have the line tested. In the meantime, I have bought you a bottle of ouzo. Tonight, we will party and make merry.”

  Betty was immediately apologetic.

  “Oh, Jurgen, I am sorry. My friend and I both have articles to write tonight, to take to the censor tomorrow. What a pity. Another time perhaps.”

  Jurgen’s eyes lit up.

  “Ah yes, your friend. Tell me about yourself, Fraulein – um, Shirley?”

  Xanthe coloured for a moment. She had not prepared herself for questioning. Or lying.

  “Well, I have been here, and stuck on Aegina, for weeks now, writing for the New Yorker. I don’t have the kind of responsibilities that Betty has here. I just write colour pieces.”

  “Colour pieces by a colourful lady,” said Jurgen, with a little bow. “Ah yes, the New Yorker. I am surprised that it has the resources to send a young girl out to cover a war that is no longer happening. You have an interest in military operations perhaps? We have had great difficulties here with the fifth columnists. I would hate to feel that you had any – let me say it like this – had any sympathy with them…”

  “I’m just a writer,” said Xanthe simply, looking him full in the face. “I’ve always wanted to write about the world. There were few enough volunteers for this job. It narrowed the field and I was then lucky enough to get chosen.”

  “I’m so sorry we have to see you out,” said Betty with determination.

  “That is understandable,” said Jurgen, recovering something of his savoir-faire and allowing himself to be herded towards the door. They could hear his metal-tipped shoes clicking down the street outside the window.

  “Ugh, that man gives me the creeps,” whispered Betty as soon as he had gone.

  Xanthe burst into giggles again.

  “Shhh, Shirley! He’ll be listening outside. The man can’t see a keyhole without putting his ear to it.”

  “What do you think he’s after?”

  “I’ll give you one guess,” said Betty. “What do you think? He’s just highly sexed and has a thing about American women. I’m very sorry I introduced you.”

  *

  Xanthe had experienced London under attack. She had experienced wartime Berlin. But somehow the picture of the Greek capital city, down but not out, invaded physically but not mentally conquered, was moving and instructive. She knew now what she would write, if and when she got home; it was not something that the censor would pass here.

  The trouble was that she had already been gone a week – a week away from Indigo at such an important time – and all she had managed to do so far was find herself bundled into a safe house, only to find she had to wait two whole days for the wireless operator. Time must be running out and there were still at least thirty-six hours before Robin was due to arrive. That was thirty-six hours before the occupying forces began to cotton on about who and what she really was doing in Athens.

  Added to which, the Bismarck would not wait in harbour forever. For all she knew, those fifteen-inch guns she had not really read enough about on the flight would even now be battering British and allied shipping in mid-Atlantic, with all the death and destruction, the burnings and drownings, that would happen as a result.

  There was her new friendship with Betty, which was a plus. Betty knew Sigrid Schultz from the Chicago Tribune, as it turned out – still reporti
ng from Berlin, though Xanthe did not explain why her name was familiar. Also, somewhere in Athens, were George Weller from the Chicago Daily News and Wes Gallagher from Associated Press. Both of them, experienced hard news reporters. What was a feature writer from the New Yorker, the gentle magazine that employed James Thurber, supposed to be doing in quite such peril in the war zone? They were bound to ask the question and wonder why she was supposed to have been on a small island, so far from the action, throughout the three weeks of the German blitzkrieg on Greece. She was just going to have to stick close to Betty and keep a low profile.

  She reminded herself of this as they wandered rather aimlessly though the back streets of Athens, seeking breakfast, the next morning. Betty’s broadcast had been cancelled again, and the unforgiving sun was rising in the sky, indicating another sultry day. Just one more night to go and she could do the job and go home. As long as Mr Brown had done his job and got her Enigma components to the right place – and in the same number of pieces that she had given to him.

  After a siesta, Betty left the flat in the afternoon, to continue what she called her “clandestine activity” – which she defined as asking any Nazi officials she could find how she could get hold of an exit permit. Betty was afraid that there was now no way out for her and her American press colleagues and was terrified of being stranded in Athens, without access to broadcasting equipment, for the rest of her life.

  So far, she explained to Xanthe, she had put most of the gentler Nazi bureaucrats into a panic – the whole question of an exit visa had never been asked before.

  “It really would be funny if it wasn’t quite so depressing,” said Betty when she returned. “One of them asked me today whether I was British. Apparently, the only conceivable excuse they can think of for wanting to leave is if I would otherwise be interned as a prisoner of war. I’m not sure it is going to get any easier. Relations between the Nazis and us Yanks are plummeting further with every day that goes by. They’re soon going to give us an exit permit to some kind of camp…”

  A shiver went down Xanthe’s spine. She could not but apply the problem to her own situation. She had assumed, as Fleming had, that leaving would be relatively simple.

  “The only thing going for me is that my damned editor is complaining to the authorities too. The last thing he wants is to have to pay me for not working for the rest of the war. Though, knowing him, he probably has some kind of insurance against that.”

  *

  It was now dark outside. Evening seemed to fall with a sudden thump in Athens and the nightlife seemed to be shared by little more than a handful of rather humourless Nazi officers, who stomped by below the balcony of Betty’s flat – on their way to Maxim’s, the only place in the city still with steak on the menu.

  About an hour after nightfall, a strange wailing siren disturbed the conversation. Could it really be an air raid?

  “What?” said Betty. “How can it be? What’s going on? It can’t be the RAF – can it?”

  They hurried back out onto the balcony. It was a perfect night, warm and still, with bright moonlight everywhere and a great canopy of stars, so much more visible in the blackout. The whole of Athens seemed as if they were on the roofs or balconies. Soon the streets began to fill. Within ten minutes of the sirens sounding, the streets below them were packed. There was a strange, hysterical, carnival atmosphere, except that the crowd was as close to silent as a crowd could be – listening for the slightest sound. Xanthe also knew they were hungry. She could almost feel their stomachs rumbling.

  “Come on, let’s go down, shall we?” said Betty.

  “Shouldn’t we go to the shelters?”

  “Shelters? What shelters? No, if this is the RAF, they’ll never bomb the historic centre of Athens, I betcha. And I can’t think who else it is.”

  The sound of approaching planes was apparent as they made for the door and Xanthe grabbed her notebook and pencil as they swung out. The moment they reached the street, a huge cheer went up. The bombers were completely visible in the sky, with the distinctive RAF roundels on their wings. There were fewer than ten of them and they were clearly making for the airfield.

  Xanthe took out the notebook and asked if any of the people around her spoke English. An old lady tapped her arm:

  “We don’t care if they drop bombs on us,” she said, crossing herself. “But, dear God, protect the British aviators. Let no harm come to them!”

  “That is some quote,” said Betty, who had been listening in. “Did you get it down?”

  “Yup.”

  “Cos if you don’t use it, I will. I may do anyway!”

  The planes were circling around again, and now the anti-aircraft guns by the Acropolis were coming into action. They could see the explosions in the air, some way from the raiders.

  Xanthe looked around her and saw more than a few women fingering orthodox crosses and also appearing to be praying, not for their own safety, but for the safety of the young men so many hundreds of feet above – who had maybe even been based in Athens themselves, and had flown off from the same airport a few weeks before.

  “Where do they come from, do you think?”

  “Can they reach here from Egypt?” said Betty. “I don’t know. Otherwise, I suppose from Cyprus. They certainly didn’t come from Crete. In fact, I’m sure they would have been better employed in Crete, where there is actually a battle going on. I suppose they wanted to show they were still in the game.”

  It was hardly Xanthe’s first experience of bombing, after the London Blitz earlier in the year. But it was her first experience of being bombed by her own side – the RAF had only managed to drop leaflets on Berlin while she had been there. It was a peculiar feeling, which she realised was shared by the crowd, cheering the bombers on.

  Another great roar went up, and someone began singing Coroido Mussolini again, and then the Greek national anthem:

  From the ancient Greeks who died

  And set both life and spirit free,

  Now with ancient courage rising

  We will hail you, Liberty!

  It was intoxicating, on this tropical night, the two women strolled arm in arm with the warm night air on their legs, with the cheering and singing all around them. It was almost as if Athens had been liberated. May 23 1941 – she would remember the date. She noted it at the top of her open page. She felt like she would remember it her whole life. She would tell Indigo about it when he was old enough to understand, how she had fought the Nazis on his behalf and ended up walking down the streets of Athens while it was being bombed by her own side.

  It was at this moment of elation that Xanthe heard the whistles. It was dark, and it was hard to see what was happening up ahead, except that suddenly there was screaming, and the crowd surged backwards and past her. Xanthe could hear the familiar, spine-chilling sound of boots on cobblestones up the side street next to them, and a squad of soldiers emerged from behind a truck, which drove ahead at speed towards the road junction.

  The truck screeched to a halt, the back went down and it revealed a large machine gun, manned by two soldiers in field grey, pointing it at the seething mass of Athenians.

  “Oh, God,” said Betty under her breath, flattening herself and Xanthe against the wall. There was more screaming and what remained of the crowd dispersed in the opposite direction.

  They reached the safety of their front door, without breathing, waiting for the shooting to begin. Nothing happened. The soldiers stood to attention and the trucks began to drive away. Almost nobody was left in the street. But as Xanthe began to breathe more freely, she saw a familiar figure in the blackout gloom up ahead, making in their direction.

  “Come on, let’s get inside quicketty quick,” said Betty, reaching inside her handbag.

  “Excuse me, please don’t abandon us, ladies,” said the figure. Moments later, there was Jurgen and with him was another German soldier.

  “Hi there, Jurgen. What brings you out here so late?”

 
; “Miss Wason and Miss Johnson. I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to come with me.”

  The soldier next to him drew his pistol to enforce the message.

  “Really, honey? Why is that?” said Betty mildly.

  For a moment, Xanthe calculated her chances of slipping away into the back streets and heading back to the cathedral. But in the seconds she took to consider it, it was already too late to run. It would also have made her a wanted woman, whereas – she told herself – if she could bluff her way through the next hour or so, then there was no reason why she should not complete the operation as planned. She had, after all, come all this way with a purpose. Her heart was beating faster than it should have been. She deliberately looked innocent and unconcerned.

  “Of course,” she said. “Why do you need us?”

  *

  The room where they were held was a small reception room, apparently in the basement of the Hotel Grande Bretagne, where – as both women knew – all the Nazi leaders in Greece and in charge of the Crete operation were staying. They were not alone. As they waited for Jurgen to arrive, through the early hours, they slouched across the old upturned tables and piles of chairs with about ten others. They were, it transpired, a number of leading Greeks from the city, a poet and a handful of retailers. They sat bored, more irritated than frightened, in the stark electric light, surrounded by the smell of stale cigarettes and piles of old table cloths, in great heaps, in the shadowy corners.

  “How long has it been, do you think?” asked Xanthe.

  “I don’t know; two hours, three hours? They’ll come. I’ve been here before. Unfortunately.”

  “I need to drink something.”

  “Funny that. There’s a well-stocked bar upstairs.”

  “Oh, ha ha,” said Xanthe sarcastically. “I meant a drink of water.”

  Xanthe got up from the chairs she had been trying to sleep on, under a tablecloth and went towards the door.

  The soldier gathered himself together and barred the way. Then there was a flurry of activity behind her.

  “No, no, Miss Johnson, we are in fact ready to talk to you, if Miss Wason cares to join us.”