One Clear Call I

by Upton Sinclair

  IV

  The trembling of the earth ceased and the company climbed the stairs. But the evening was spoiled; the Führer went to the telephone to learn what the damage had been, and the guests retired silently to their rooms. “It is like that all the time now,” deplored the mournful Kannenberg. “For four years he has had to work all day and nearly all night. There will be dispatches from the front, and they will be bad. Ach! Du lieber Gott!”

  Lanny Budd did not see his Führer again; he was never to see him again in this life—though he had no means of knowing that in advance. The P.A. would carry with him the image of a half-insane man pacing up and down in a room, and some nineteen or twenty months later he would read that the same man had paced that same room and then had shot himself in the head, while the onetime photographer’s assistant had swallowed cyanide in her little bedroom adjoining. And was Lanny to believe this—or was he to suppose that it was one more trick which Loki, god of lies, was playing upon mankind?

  In the morning the polite Major Feldmann came to Lanny’s room and said that the Führer had instructed him to find out what Herr Budd wished to have done for him. Lanny said that on a previous visit to Berlin the Führer had been kind enough to provide him with a letter of permission to stay in the city for two or three weeks, and he had got along quite well with that letter. He had a half-sister living near Berlin and several old friends in the city whom he would like to see. A week would be sufficient, if that would be agreeable, and then Lanny would ask to be flown back to Stockholm. He had some Swedish money which he would like to have changed for German, and he would ask permission to take out what he had left when he was ready to depart. The polite staff officer came back to say that all this could be arranged, and a couple of hours later the much-traveled art expert walked out of the New Chancellery with a pocketful of marks, food cards, and a police permit entitling him to sojourn within the limits of the Province of Brandenburg for a period of ten days.

  There were columns of smoke rising from various parts of the city, but Lanny had witnessed many bombings and the sight aroused no curiosity in his mind. He strolled around the corner to the official Residenz of Hermann Göring, his friend and his father’s friend, whom it was his duty to see next after the Führer. The secretary, who knew him, told him that the Reichsmarschall was at the Air Force headquarters, a place to which Lanny had once been taken blindfolded, and which he guessed to be in Belgium. The secretary offered to get him on the telephone, and this took only a few seconds, for there was no place in the world that had quicker communications.

  Once more Lanny listened to that bellowing voice, which made the receiver rattle. But no surprise this time, for Der Dicke had learned that Lanny was the Führer’s messenger boy. Having himself lost his position at the right hand of the throne, he clutched eagerly at one who still had the entree. Now he said, “I’ll be in town in a couple of days. You will spend the week-end with me at Karinhall.” It was a command, and the other replied, “Ausgezeichnet! Besten Dank!”

  The visitor went out to the Wilhelmstrasse, carrying his suitcase. He did not care to register at one of the fashionable hotels because his presence would be bound to attract attention. He took a streetcar to the Dahlem district in the southwest, where the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute was situated. To his surprise, he found this was the worst-bombed part of the capital, almost completely wiped out. But the Institute had not been hit, and not far away Lanny found an obscure hostelry where no one would know him. He showed his police permit, secured his room, and left his bag unlocked. He would check out in the morning and thus avoid having to register with the police—for the regulation said “within twenty-four hours.” He had to bear in mind that Himmler’s men might be following his every move, or trying to, and he didn’t want to give them more aid than necessary.

  V

  The Physics Building of the Institute is a large, homely structure, with a rounded entrance on the corner, a tall tower above, and a row of small dormer windows all along the top. There were semibasement windows along the bottom, all with steel bars, and SS men with tommy guns walked in front of the building watching every passer-by. One followed Lanny inside and waited while he gave his name at the window of the booking-room and asked to see Herr Professor Doktor Salzmann. Lanny’s name and address—the obscure hotel—were entered in the book, and when the message came for the visitor to be admitted, the guard followed him to the proper room to make sure he did not wander to some other.

  Lanny had been here the previous winter at Hitler’s request, because he had told the Führer he had picked up in his father’s home and elsewhere some information as to what the Americans were doing with jet propulsion and atomic research, two of the most important subjects in the world. His real hope had been that Salzmann might inadvertently reveal something to him. He hadn’t got much, and didn’t expect to get much this time, but he was there because he had promised, and more important yet, because it would serve as camouflage to cover the visit he planned to make to Professor Schilling. In case the Gestapo were to make note of that visit and ask questions, Lanny could say, “The Führer asked me to meet Salzmann and Plötzen, and one of them mentioned Schilling to me last winter, as a person I ought to talk to.”

  So now the P.A. sat in the office of this Prussian Gelehrte of the old school, with white military mustaches and hair closely cut where he still had it; he wore black broadcloth, beginning to turn green at the seams because you couldn’t get that good stuff any more; also gold-rimmed pince-nez, and a double chin and thick neck in spite of food rationing—no doubt the scientists were in a special category. Salzmann had been puzzled to receive a visit from an enemy alien, but by now had got used to the idea; he was cordial and encouraged Lanny to talk about jet propulsion and what the Americans and British were doing with it. Lanny’s orders were to say that they were making progress, but he had to be cautious in this because it would make him the bearer of bad tidings, and it had been the custom of kings to order the death of heralds who committed that indiscretion. Adi Schicklgruber had gone back to so many ancient customs!

  What Lanny did was to plead the inadequacy of an amateur. He had listened to technical men talking and had done his best to remember what he heard for the benefit of his German friends. He knew that the Americans were badly scared on the subject and were working hard and spending a lot of money; perhaps they were cautious in talking in Lanny’s presence because his National Socialist sympathies had been well known before the war. Lanny watched this stern old-fashioned martinet and wondered what was going on inside that round head with the pink scalp and short white hair. Quite possibly he regarded his visitor as a combination of rascal and crackpot; anyhow, he guarded his words and revealed none of the Fatherland’s hard-won secrets.

  From his office Lanny was escorted to another, occupied by Professor Plötzen, as different a type as you could imagine: urbane and somewhat cynical, a Weltmann and darling of fortune, keeping his position in the smart world even while he worked hard at an exacting specialty. He and Lanny had liked each other from the start and talked about various mutual friends. Lanny could not get away from the thought: Does this man suspect where my sympathies are? And where are his own?

  They chatted about atomic research, which was Plötzen’s Fach. He was saddened because he and his colleagues hadn’t been given funds enough for a real job, and of course he was eager for the smallest hint as to what was going on in the outside world. Lanny’s talk, which seemed casual, had been carefully discussed with Alston and men at OSS headquarters. Lanny would come right up to an important revelation and then fail to make it because he didn’t understand the subject and couldn’t be sure what he had heard; very tantalizing, but not the fault of a mere Kunstsachverständiger. Plötzen wouldn’t give him anything positive, but he did confirm that Germany’s atomic research was in the doldrums and that its one effort at nuclear fission was pathetically inadequate.

  VI

  When the American went out from that world-fam
ous building—oddly enough, constructed with Rockefeller money—he felt that he was established as a teller of Allied secrets on the subject of physical science. If now he were discovered to have paid a visit to the possibly suspected and closely watched Ernst Schilling, he could refer to his activities for the rest of that day as being all of one piece and in accord with the Führer’s instructions. Even if his talk were to be overheard he could say that he was posing as an Allied sympathizer in accordance with the program laid out by Herr Güntelen of the Gestapo. “To all intents and purposes I am one of you, meine Herren!”

  Lanny thought these matters out while enjoying the sunshine in a little park, with children playing all around him and nursemaids watching the children and not overlooking the elegant but inattentive Herr. He strolled to a café and got a dinner on his food card; a miserable meal of potato soup, ersatz sausage, warmed-over potatoes, and a dessert made of synthetics and referred to by smart Berliners as “genuine I. G. Farben.” From there he walked to the modest home of the scientist, the address of whom Monck had given him. Fortunately it was in a detached house, so that there was no need to deal with a bellboy or telephone operator. Lanny rang, and when an elderly servant answered he inquired if the Herr Professor was at home and then asked to see him.

  The scientist proved to be a small-sized elderly man with gray goatee and mustache, horn-rimmed spectacles, and a suit of clothes which looked as if he had slept in it. His manner was timid and his voice gentle. He looked at his visitor inquiringly, and the visitor rose respectfully and explained, “I am an art expert, especially concerned with fine paintings, and I called on you because I was told of your interest in the subject.”

  “In paintings?” said the man in surprise; and Lanny didn’t give him time to go further. “It happens, Professor, that I have come upon an especially fine Raffaelli.”

  It was no coincidence that this eminent physicist had a code name that had to do with old masters; two years back, when Lanny had taken the assignment of getting into Germany and memorizing and bringing out his atomic secrets, he had suggested that name and it had been accepted by the OSS and presumably passed on to the old gentleman by some secret route. Anyhow, he knew it, and paled so obviously that Lanny could see it by the dim light of the room. “Ja … ja!” he stammered. “Ja … gewiss.”

  The visitor continued quickly, “It happens that the painting is not far from here, and I am sure you would not wish to miss a chance of seeing it. The evening is pleasant and you might enjoy a stroll.”

  “Sicher, es wird mich freuen.” The scientist hastened to put on his black soft hat and his light overcoat, which looked as if he had been carrying scientific reports in it for the last ten or twenty years. He was a typical German scholar, serious, kindly, and no doubt absent-minded—but he hadn’t forgotten the name that identified this stranger as an enemy agent.

  VII

  For walking at night in blacked-out Berlin you carried, if you could afford the price, a tiny electric torch. You kept it in your hand and, batteries being unobtainable, you generated electricity by working it like a pair of scissors. It sent a pale beam of blue light down to the pavement in front of you. But tonight there was a half-moon, so the professor put the torch into one of his badly stretched pockets. The pair walked close together and spoke in low tones, and when any other passer-by approached they fell silent. When they came to the little park where Lanny had sat with the children and nursemaids, he suggested going in; but the old gentleman led him away, explaining that the habit of people to resort to the parks for political conversations had become known to the police. They walked on streets which were lined with ghostly ruins, the silver half-moon shining through broken beams and rafters without coverings.

  Lanny said, “I want you to know that two years ago I was assigned to visit you and ask about atomic fission; but on the way I met with an airplane accident which laid me up. I have since been told that someone else interviewed you. Now I have been sent to ask you about rockets and jet planes.”

  “But that is not my subject.”

  “I know that; but it is one which concerns us greatly, and it is our hope that you may know someone from whom you can get the information we need.” Lanny did not say “Herr Professor,” and not once did they speak any name.

  “That would be an extremely dangerous thing to attempt,” said this “Austrian coin.” “It might well involve the heaviest penalty imaginable.”

  “I know,” replied the P.A. “That applies equally to what I myself am doing. I put it to you as a matter of conscience. There is a clear possibility that one of our allies might be knocked out, and the consequences of that would be serious, possibly even fatal. Think it over, and see if there is not someone from whom you might get information on some pretext or by some device.”

  They walked for a while in silence. Then the old gentleman began, “Suppose that I were to get what you ask for, how would you handle it?”

  “Physically, you mean? There would be nothing to handle. I never carry papers. You would meet me again, and tell me the facts, and I would learn them.”

  “You are an expert on this subject?”

  “Unfortunately not; but I have studied it for this interview. I will tell you what we need to know, and when we meet again, you will tell me what you have found out, and I will carry it in my head.”

  “The subject is extremely technical and complicated.”

  “I have been well coached and have had considerable practice. Before I set out to ask you about nuclear physics I spent two months in learning what I was to ask you.”

  “We should say that it was characteristic of your countrymen to imagine that a man could come to understand that subject in two months.”

  “I did not make such a claim, lieber Herr. I said that I learned certain things by heart. My teacher was one of the greatest of living physicists, a man whom you know well. I recited my lessons to him and he gave me a passing mark. Thereafter I made a practice of reciting the lessons over to myself every night before I went to sleep and again before I got out of bed in the morning. I have done that with several different subjects, and so far I have managed to give satisfaction.”

  “All that is interesting and shows what the mind can do under the pressure of necessity. Tell me what you wish to know, and I will see if my memory will be equal to yours.”

  So the P.A. went through the lesson he had learned, and then, because there was a lot of it, he went through it again. He did not ask this learned gentleman to recite, but waited for him to ask questions. Lanny explained that he had got some elementary information about the V-1, and wanted especially to know about the V-2, which was a true rocket, larger and faster and therefore more dangerous. When he had finished his recital, the professor complimented him upon the mental feat he had performed and said, “Come to my home three nights from now, and if I can get anything I will give it to you.”

  Lanny replied, “I will try to come that night, but I have an engagement that will take me out of town, and it may be one or two nights later before I can get to you.” He couldn’t help smiling in the darkness as he thought what a tumult would have been caused in that professorial bosom if he had added, “My invitation is to Karinhall.”

  VIII

  In the morning the traveler went to an outside telephone and called his half-sister. He asked, “Could I see that painting if I came now?” The answer was, “Yes, surely,” and that was all. He went back to the hotel, paid the bill, and departed. He had no SS car to take him this time, so he would travel by a local train and learn more about what war meant to the German Volk. He found the Charlottenburg Station badly damaged, and on the train he stood for an hour, packed like a sardine with people who had done their best to keep clean in spite of the scarcity of soap. Some of the women still wore the finery which their husbands and brothers had taken from the French three years ago. Many talked about their troubles, but others kept their lips tightly shut, and Lanny was one of these because he did not wish t
o be spotted for a foreigner. He was far too well dressed for safety.

  Leaving the train, he found a horse-drawn vehicle to take him to the Garnison-lazarett. He sank back and surveyed the well-tended fields and hedges of the Province of Brandenburg. Cherry trees had been planted along this road, and that was evidence of the trust reposed in the population. In front of the farmhouses the shade trees were taking on their autumn colors. The trees drew the precious green chlorophyll back into the stems for winter storage; the leaves turned, first yellow, then red, then brown, until at last the trees rejected them as worthless. Lanny had been reminded of how Hitler had treated his old comrade Gregor Strasser, and how he had treated Lanny’s friend Hugo Behr; thousands of others had met the same treatment during the past decade, and the P.A. reflected upon the way in which patterns of nature repeat themselves.

  Marceline was waiting for him, seated under a tree in the garden, reading a German translation of Gone With the Wind; it antedated the war, and the Regierung found nothing in it to object to. The pair could talk quietly here, and she told him the situation regarding Oskar. She had thought it safe to say that while Lanny had never shown any interest in politics, she was sure that in his heart he was not a Nazi; he had important connections in America and could carry messages for the conspirators and perhaps bring a reply.

  Marceline went into the cottage and summoned her lover. His health was coming back, and he had more color, but he still walked slowly and with care. His left sleeve hung empty, and Lanny was careful not to glance at it. They did not sit close together, because that might have looked suspicious; but there is no law forbidding gentlefolk to have soft voices, and a group of three is able to keep the entire surroundings in view and make certain that no one is getting close enough to overhear.