The Hochmann Miniatures

by Fish, Robert L. ;

  Jadzia gripped his arm with a strength he had never witnessed nor suspected before. “Stop your idiotic grinning! Mietek, listen to me! You have to leave here at once, do you hear?”

  His smile faded; he shook his head as much in bafflement at her attitude as in denial of her demand. “You don’t understand, my darling. I came here to see Stefan, but he’s busy. The students have formed a defense committee, and we need money for arms. We——”

  “You are a fool!” She stared at him as if amazed he could be so youthfully naïve. “You come to a Hochmann for help? Do you know who is in the drawing room with Stefan? Wilhelm Gruber!”

  Wilhelm Gruber.… Now that he recalled, it was the first time he had heard the name, but certainly not the last. Gruber, the monster; Gruber, the unspeakable; Gruber, the animal; Gruber, the vicious, murdering …! Not now, the man in the chair instructed himself harshly; this is no time to indulge yourself in the luxury of hate.

  He locked his big fingers and squeezed with all his strength, bringing pain, and then released his grip, forcing himself to relax. Go on with the memories and get them over with. Unless André is mistaken—and I doubt it—I think I know at long last where Wilhelm Gruber is.…

  His eyebrows rose. “And who the devil is Wilhelm Gruber?”

  “He’s been appointed S.S. Oberfuehrer for this district, and he’s going to use this house as his headquarters. He’s a very big man in the Party. And handsome, too, if you want to know. His staff will be arriving at any minute. If you’re found here—” her voice hardened “—everyone will suffer.…”

  “Suffer?”

  “Mietek, don’t be a stubborn fool! The soldiers are looking for you. I heard them talking about it just now.”

  His surprise deepened into a queer sense of unreality. “Why should the soldiers be looking for me?”

  “Don’t pretend!” Jadzia was beginning to get seriously angry. “A German sergeant was shot and killed in Kielce this morning, by a civilian. Stefan heard the description of the killer; several other soldiers saw it happen. Stefan told Colonel Gruber it sounded very much like you.”

  “I don’t believe you!” The air of unreality thickened; he seemed to see her pretty face through a haze. He reached out, locking his big fingers cruelly on her shoulder, glaring down into her large eyes, amazed at his anger at her, made all the fiercer because of her very desirability. “You’re lying! You’re lying! Stefan would never say anything like that about me!”

  “You’re hurting me,” she said, almost curtly. Despite his anger his grip relaxed. She pulled herself away. “And keep your voice down! Did you kill that soldier?”

  “Of course not! I wasn’t in Kielce; and you know how I feel about weapons! But what if I had? They’re the enemy, they invaded our country!” He ran his hand through his thick hair almost in desperation. “Why would Stefan say anything like that? Why?”

  “You forget our name, Mietek.” Her voice was cold, but a touch of pride had entered it. “Hochmann is a German name, you know. And we are proud of it. Why shouldn’t he say so if you were guilty?”

  He shook his head in bewilderment. “But you’re Poles!”

  “Labels mean little today. The future means everything—and that lies with the Nazi Party.”

  He stared at her, amazed at the adult tone, at the change in her. “I can’t believe it!”

  “Whether you believe it or not, you have to leave. For everyone’s sake.” There was a peremptory tone to her voice, not the demanding request he might have expected from an imperious young girl, but the authoritative instruction of a much older person. Jadzia even looked different—older, sterner, triumphant somehow. What had happened to her in the short week since he had seen her last? What had happened to everything? The world had gone mad! He wet his lips.

  “When will I see you again?”

  Her eyes held his evenly. “I don’t know. Possibly never. Or possibly when this is all over. The Germans are going to win this war, and win it quickly. Only the fools in London think differently. In a month or less it will be over. We’re—they’re too strong; too prepared. They’ve been denied too long. Willi—Colonel Gruber says——” She caught her words, as if realizing she was wasting valuable time. “You have to leave. Now!”

  He stared at her blindly. “But you say the soldiers are looking for me. For killing somebody.…”

  “If you didn’t kill him, there’s nothing to worry about. They’ll find the one who did. Colonel Gruber’s not an unfair person, he’s simply doing a job that has to be done.” Her hand went to his arm, urging him toward the door. “Now you have to go. I’ll keep them occupied in the drawing room while you get out.”

  “Wait!” He pulled back, his voice bitter. “If you feel the way you do, why not turn me in to them?”

  “Because Colonel Gruber might think we’re protesting too much.” Her voice was quite matter-of-fact. “He’s still not convinced of our beliefs. He might think we were using you as a smoke screen. No; it would be better for everyone if you just disappeared.” She studied the shocked look on his face quite impersonally. “Well, you wanted to know.… Now you’d better be going.”

  He stood numbly while she went to the door and turned the key. Her eyes came up briefly for one last enigmatic look at him. “Goodby, Mietek.…” And then she was gone.

  “Goodby Mietek.…” Today, fifteen years later, the hurt of that last meeting, the confusion of it, the bewilderment of it, had faded, although it had never completely disappeared. What had not faded, but instead had grown in intensity with each return of memory, was his consuming, passionate hatred of Wilhelm Gruber. And why didn’t he hate Jadzia equally? Or did he? Huuygens stirred restlessly in his chair, his jaw clenched tightly.

  Where had he been when he had heard the news of his family? In Volócz, actually; he had just crossed the border into Hungary, traveling on false Dutch papers the student committee had managed to arrange. Dutch, he recalled, because he spoke the language, having studied it to further his interest in the Dutch painters, and because Holland was not in the war as yet; and also because the rarity of such a passport in Poland at that time made critical examination less likely. It had proven to be a good selection.

  In any event, he had gotten as far as Volócz and was in the small café attached to the ramshackle railroad station, waiting for a train to take him to Budapest, and the radio was blaring martial music.…

  The coffee was terrible, tasting of chicory and moldy wheat; the curdled milk skimmed the grayish surface in weird and obscene swirls. The cake was stale and looked as if the mice had been at it and had rejected it. Still, one had to eat, and he preferred not to be seen unnecessarily pushing his way through the corridors of the train, or seated across from an unknown companion in the dining car, attempting to make—or avoid—conversation.

  He managed as much of the distasteful combination as he could, and came to his feet, reaching into his pocket for some change. Over the babble of voices in the smoke-filled room, he noted that the martial music had stopped, that the announcer was now speaking in Polish.

  “This is Radio Warszawa.…”

  The words were barely distinguishable above the chatter of the diners in the room and the drinkers at the bar; he heard them without conscious volition. He studied the coins in his hand, picked out the exact amount of his bill to conserve his limited funds, placed it on the counter, and was just turning toward the door when the words coming from the small box in one corner made him pause. It was a news broadcast, as most of them were, lately, and he suddenly felt homesick at hearing his native tongue spoken amid the strange jargon about him. At the moment it satisfied his needs even more than the facts from the front. In any event, as he had already bitterly learned, the news these days was so colored either by direct Nazi broadcasts, or by more-than-willing collaborators, as to be almost meaningless.

  “… in Radom. In Praga, the destruction of the oil-storage facilities, two miles from the center of this suburb of Warszawa,
continues under constant dive-bombing attacks by Stukas. Fortunately, due to the extreme accuracy of the trained pilots, civilian casualties are practically nonexistent.… In Warszawa itself, the family of terrorist Mietek Janeczek, the student who murdered a sergeant of the 88th Tank Regiment in cold blood in Kielce last week, has been seized by the authorities and shot on orders of Colonel Wilhelm Gruber, S.S. Oberfuehrer of the Warszawa district, as an example to all other assassins and saboteurs that acts of terrorism will not be tolerated by the government.

  “Colonel Gruber made it clear that this announcement is being made as a warning to all subversives, and that he is certain that all right-thinking Poles, aware of the dangers of communism and its ally, International Judaism, will recognize the justice of the act.…

  “In Poznan, the pacification of the city continues. German troops have opened their field kitchens and hospitals to women and children, and plans are under way to establish temporary housing for innocent victims of the Polish aggression.… In Berlin.…”

  He remained, half-bent to retrieve his suitcase by the door, frozen in shock and disbelief. A waiter, passing, paused to frown at the wide eyes and twisted face, and then shrugged and went on about his business; drunks were becoming more frequent with every passing day, and younger, too. Mietek forced himself to come erect, his suitcase locked in a grip of iron, and stumbled through the doorway.

  The brisk, fall breeze blowing across the railroad platform did nothing to revive him. A choking sensation and a dangerous buzzing in his ears made him realize he was near to fainting; he let his suitcase slip from his hand and slumped upon it, bending his head in his hands, locking his fingers in his thick hair. They could not be dead! It was impossible! The man on the radio was lying—it was a trap to bring him back to Warsaw! Dead? His father? Impossible! And even more impossible, his mother and younger sister.

  It was all a mistake; he had misunderstood; he had heard the radio incorrectly. Who would possibly want to harm any of them? Riesek Janeczek, gentle scholar, retired from his medical practice to dabble in his laboratory, always sitting as far back as possible in his easy chair, looking at the foibles of the world with a faint smile on his face as he calmly puffed his pipe.… Frania Janeczek, nee Lochner, mother, teacher, confidante; always bustling about on one friendly errand or another, always cheerful, so proud of her family, and pretty in a way he had never realized until this moment.… Little Marysia—little? Almost fifteen.… He groaned and swallowed the bile in his throat, and then raised his head to stare blindly along the deserted tracks.

  Return? Even as the thought flared up in him of getting back to Warsaw somehow, some way, to strike down the vicious criminals who had done this monstrous thing, he rejected it coldly and firmly. Those few moments on that railroad platform had transformed him from an adventurous boy into a dedicated man; a man prepared to play the murderous game by the rules established by the enemy. Revenge? There would be revenge! But it would be on his terms, and not those of Colonel Wilhelm Gruber, S.S. Qberfuehrer of Warsaw. And at a time and place of his choosing.

  His jaw locked painfully as he thought of his parents and sister. Exactly where had they been killed? In that large, airy apartment he had always loved so much? Immediately after the sharp rap on the door? In the street below, with the neighbors watching in horror, a few minutes later? In a prison, lined up against a wall, blindfolded, handcuffed? Had his father kept his calm smile throughout, taking it as only one more frailty of a world sick with madness? Had any of them begged for a life taken without any justification? Had Marysia cried for all the lost things she would never see, never know, never experience? And when they had fallen, had anyone taken a revolver and walked over, thrusting it down, brutally pressing the trigger? First on one, and then the second, and then the last? He turned swiftly and vomited violently over the edge of the platform and then leaned back, his face ghastly, wiping his lips convulsively, shuddering, trying to erase the gruesome image from his mind.

  Of what great crime had they been guilty? Of gentleness, perhaps; of goodness—illicit qualities in this new world dominated by murder and destruction. Of innocence, certainly; a far greater and more dangerous crime. As innocent as Jadzia, who saw in the war only the possible aggrandizement of Germany and the Nazis. What would be her reaction now? She had always been so fond of his parents, even as they loved her and had looked forward with eagerness to her becoming their daughter-in-law. How would she justify this murderous crime? Or would it make her open her eyes to the monster headquartered in her home?

  In the distance a train wailed; the rusting rails before him began to hum. He came to his feet slowly, numbly, automatically dragging his battered suitcase to a safer margin from the platform’s edge, and then stood mute and drugged among the chattering cluster of passengers and well-wishers as the hissing engine crept into the station spitting steam. He waited until only the stragglers had not been accommodated, managed his way into an overloaded compartment, slid his suitcase into the overhead luggage rack on top of somebody’s poorly tied bundle of clothing, and then edged to the comparative freedom of the narrow corridor. The train had finally ingested its human cargo and was straining to be off; one last exhortation by the uniformed guards to the couples locked in a final embrace across the compartment sills, and the engine started up asthmatically, tugging at itself with groans and clanks.

  Mietek stared out of the dusty window, his rigid face a mask. Beneath his feet the worn linoleum of the corridor began to throb with accelerating clatter from the uneven rails. Gru-ber! they said angrily; Gru-ber, Gru-ber, Wil-helm Gruber, Wil-helm Gru-ber, Wilhelm Gruber, Wilhelm Gruber, Wilhelmgruber, Wilhelmgruber, wilhelmgruber, wilhelmgruber, wilhelmgruberwilhelmgruberwilhelmgruberwilhelmgruber … The engine in front responded with a hoarse scream.

  Huuygens stirred restlessly in his chair and shook his head as if to clear it. The room was now completely dark; the moonlight filtering in between the curtain and the sill was lost before it reached the rug. He sighed. What memory next? The wasted eight months in Paris before the capitulation of Vichy? Wasted because they had been spent in vainly trying to contact Jadzia—or rather, in waiting for an answer? Certainly one of the letters he had managed to smuggle into Poland should have been delivered!

  A pointless consideration, then as now, he thought with wry bitterness. Forget it. Go on to that night in the cave. There’s still work to be done when we’re finished.…

  Georges was in the lead, as always; slim, intense Georges Claremont, slogging along in the thick mud, his rumpled beret pulled low, his tattered sweater buttoned to his chin, now coughing almost constantly, and suffering even greater spasms from attempting to stifle the racking sounds. November in the Auvergnes was no place to be: the upper slopes threatened snow, and the Boches were thick in the vicinity. Behind Georges came André Martins, the giant from Perpignan, his own rifle slung over his back, that of Georges in one hand, and his ever-present suitcase in the other. Both bandoliers were slung about his corded neck like grotesque necklaces. He carried the load effortlessly, swinging along easily behind Georges, softly humming a flamenco tune from one of the border gypsy tribes. Third in line he came, Kek Huuygens now, one year in the underground, attached with fierce pride to the men he worked with, even as he was attached to the killing. He cradled their precious battery radio wrapped in a bit of oil-silk recovered from an abandoned parachute; his rifle was hung carelessly from his shoulder like an afterthought. And finally, in the rear, Michel Morell, quiet, watchful Michel, a lashed pack on his back which contained their worldly possessions: two spare pair of socks per man, far too little ammunition, and even less food.

  The trail they followed lay beneath sodden trees, dripping from the late autumn storm which had passed but now threatened to return, possibly carrying sleet or snow from the summit above. Georges suddenly halted, caught in a paroxysm of coughing, doubling over, fighting uselessly against the violent attack. André moved forward at once, laying aside his burden, reaching o
ut to support the smaller man, almost raising him with his enormous hands. Georges bit his lip and then exploded in another coughing fit. André turned to the others, worried.

  “We’ll have to find someplace to spend the night.…”

  They looked about silently, their breath steaming in the cold dampness. The gray hills, mounting ever higher, were losing their outline in the growing mist and darkness. The trees, black against the gray, stood like sentries, watching. Georges fought to bring himself under control; he pulled back, straightening up, loosening André’s grip from his sweater, panting.

  “We can still make another hour tonight. Kek has to be in Mauriac tomorrow with the radio. Without fail. And we’ll be getting our instructions on the eleven o’clock broadcast tonight.”

  “So we’ll wait for our instructions,” André said harshly, and shrugged. “What difference does it make? Here or higher up? Where it’s even colder and nastier?”

  Georges shook his head stubbornly. “I’m sure we’re going to be told to meet the others in the neighborhood of Saignes. Soon, sometime in the next day or two. And the more we make tonight, the less we’ll have to do tomorrow. And the higher we go, the less chance of running into the Boches.…” The coughing fit returned, interrupting him. He bit down on it, struggling to catch his breath.

  Michel eyed him a moment and then leaned forward. “There’s a cave near here we can stay in,” he volunteered with his usual quiet levelness of tone. “I used to come up here for walks on Saturdays.…” The others regarded him with surprise; Michel had never mentioned being from this district. But then he had mentioned very little of himself in the nearly eleven months they had been assigned together. “Yes,” he added quietly, and nodded. “I used to teach grammar school in Cantal. My home is there.”

  André frowned. “Cantal? Your home is there?” He tipped his head toward Georges, lowering his voice. “Is there any chance …? He’s a lot sicker than he thinks, you know.”