The Night of the Generals

by Hans Hellmut Kirst

  “Seven o’clock, sir.”

  “Seven o’clock and thirty-seven seconds, Hartmann. Always try to be as accurate as possible in your statements.”

  Tanz looked as though he had enjoyed a long and refreshing night’s sleep. His short white-blond hair was carefully combed and his eyes sparkled with the cold fire of cut diamonds.

  “My bath, Hartmann. Thirty-one degrees.”

  Hartmann disappeared into the bathroom, noting as he went that the General’s bed had been stripped and tidied. The pillow bore traces of saliva but looked smooth and virtually unused. Warm summer air streamed in through the wide open windows. It was as though the preceding day and night had never been.

  Hartmann ran a mixture of hot and cold water, gauging the temperature by means of a thermometer which he found lying on the edge of the bath. He put out a new piece of soap, checked the hand-towels and bath-towel, straightened the bath-mat and satisfied himself that the mirror above the basin was free from splash-marks. As he did so he saw the reflection of General Tanz standing motionless in the doorway, watching him.

  “Have you anything to tell me, Hartmann?” There was a hint of urgency in the General’s tone.

  “No, sir.”

  “All’s well, then?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Tanz detached himself from the door-frame and took two paces towards Hartmann. He halted in the middle of the bathroom. The noise of running water robbed his voice of none of its incisive clarity.

  “I insist on absolute frankness, Hartmann.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Well?”

  “You’re a man, sir. All men have certain things in common.”

  “Go on.”

  “Well, in the General’s place I shouldn’t have hesitated to visit places of entertainment either. After all, we’re in Paris, and the General is on leave.”

  “That has nothing to do with you, Hartmann.”

  “No, sir.”

  “Your job is to carry out orders. Nothing else matters. Watch the bath.”

  Hartmann brought the bath water to a temperature of thirty-three degrees—two degrees above the required level-calculating that it would have dropped by the time Tanz had disrobed and climbed in. Tanz registered his every move like a time-and-motion expert.

  “In the meantime, see to my breakfast,” he commanded. “Black coffee without sugar, five raw eggs in a glass with salt and pepper, two slices of ham, one cooked, one raw, and a treble measure of cognac—my favourite brand.”

  While Hartmann waited next door the General bathed and dressed. Then, with Hartmann stationed against the wall by the door, immobile as a piece of furniture, he began his breakfast. He did not speak again until he had drained his first cup of coffee.

  “We shall be leaving at nine, Hartmann. In the meanwhile you can check the condition of the car—and don’t forget to replenish the contents of my briefcase.”

  Hartmann produced a stereotyped “Yes, sir,” judging it inexpedient to say more. He would have welcomed any opportunity to leave the room, but Tanz made no final gesture of dismissal.

  “Hartmann,” he said, stirring his glass of raw egg, “I’m not wholly dissatisfied with your performance so far. You possess certain qualifications, and I only hope that you continue to live up to them. How does your programme for today look?”

  Thanks to Sandauer, Hartmann had worked out his schedule with due attention to detail. “My suggestions are as follows, sir. This morning, the Greek and Egyptian Collections in the Louvre. This afternoon, the Military Museum, the Palais Chaillot and possibly the Balzac and Rodin Museums as well, depending on the amount of time available.”

  “That doesn’t sound bad.” Tanz rose to his feet, slender-hipped as a dancer, and leaving his eggs and coffee vanished into the bedroom. He returned carrying a bunch of postcards, which he tossed on to the table. They spread out like a fan.

  “What do you think of those, Hartmann?”

  Hartmann didn’t know what to think of them. They were the cards which Tanz himself had selected during his visit to the collection of Impressionists in the Jeu de Paume the day before. They were all reproductions of paintings which he had personally examined with a certain degree of interest.

  Hartmann remarked diffidently: “Of course, sir, they’re nothing compared with the originals.”

  General Tanz gave a nod of assent, as though his deepest suspicions had been confirmed. “I don’t know how they turned up in my bedroom,” he mused. “Presumably the hall porter obtained them for me. He must have been told to draw my attention to items of particular interest.”

  Hartmann stared at Tanz as if the man had suddenly grown two heads. He was utterly bewildered.

  “These,” Tanz went on, gesturing vigorously at the postcards, “might interest me. I’d like to see them. Arrange it, Hartmann.”

  Hartmann withdrew as soon as he could and ran downstairs to the porter’s desk, where he put through a call to the number Sandauer had given him. He asked to speak to the G.S.O.1 on a matter of extreme urgency, but was informal that Lieutenant-Colonel Sandauer was not available.

  It was July 19th 1944. Place: the Hotel Excelsior, Paris. Time: thirteen minutes to nine.

  Lance-Corporal Hartmann decided that he must have been labouring under a temporary delusion. The exertions of the previous night had been too much for him. It was the only possible explanation.

  Hurrying round the corner to get the Bentley, Hartmann told himself that he must have misheard Tanz. Either that, or the man wanted to test his reactions. Who could tell what went on inside a mind like that?

  With an arduous and sleepless night behind her, Frau Wilhelmine von Seydlitz-Gabler prepared to face what promised to be an equally arduous day. Too much was at stake for her to have abandoned herself to sleep.

  The stations of her nocturnal Calvary had been as follows:

  11.42 p.m. Frau Wilhelmine completes the daily entry in her journal flushed with hope for the future. She sees her husband Herbert going from strength to strength in his professional career, her daughter Ulrike married to General Tanz, and herself firmly established as the wife of a military leader and the mother-in-law of a national hero. Fired with enthusiasm at this burgeoning prospect, she feels prompted by maternal solicitude to pay her daughter a visit with a view to probing and reinforcing her moral fibre.

  11.47 p.m. Frau Wilhelmine enters her daughter’s room on the second floor. It is empty, but Frau Wilhelmine ascertains that her daughter’s absence can only be temporary. All Ulrike’s clothes seem to be there, including the sensible underclothes which she has personally selected for her. The only missing items: a pink nightie, a blue dressing-gown and Ulrike herself.

  Logical inference: Ulrike cannot be far away.

  Likeliest explanation: a call of nature.

  11.51 p.m.—12.07 a.m. Frau Wilhelmine makes her way to the second-floor ladies’ lavatory. This too is empty. What now? Frau >Wilhelmine concludes that it must have been occupied by someone else at the critical moment. If so, two other alternatives present themselves: the ladies’ lavatory on the first floor and its counterpart on the third floor. These are also vacant. Frau Wilhelmine is filled with foreboding.

  12.07—4.12 a.m. Frau Wilhelmine waits for Ulrike in her room, at first sitting in a chair, then perched on the bed and eventually—for comfort’s sake and because she feels in urgent need of sleep—lying at full length. Hours of feverish anxiety ensue. Distressing pictures conjured up by a usually inhibited imagination show Ulrike wandering through the night, trustful as a child, falling victim to some brutal assault or overpowered by some shadowy, lust-maddened figure. The only common denominator of all these pictures: Ulrike with a man. Beside him, beneath him, on top of him, entwined around him like a rope. Oh, fearful thought!

  4.13 a.m. Frau Wilhelmine emerges from an uneasy doze with a start and sits bolt upright. Ulrike has returned. As expected, she is wearing a pink nightie and a blue dressing-gown. Both garments are crumpled a
nd her hair is in disarray. Frau Wilhelmine’s opening question: “Where have you been?” elicits the reply: “That’s my business.”

  4.14—4.28 a.m. Frau Wilhelmine bombards her daughter with questions. Ulrike remains silent. Frau Wilhelmine appeals to her family loyalty, her sense of responsibility, her sense of decency, her better nature, understanding, goodwill—even her common sense. In vain. Frau Wilhelmine switches to massive threats of parental intervention, paternal power and influence. Ulrike yawns wearily and says: “If you only knew how tired I am, Mother. I’ve hardly had a wink of sleep.” Frau Wilhelmine snaps: “Neither have I!” To which Ulrike: “For entirely different reasons, I trust.”

  4.30—8.47 a.m. Back in her room once more, Frau Wilhelmine throws herself on to her bed and stares heavenwards, seeking inspiration but conscious only of the ceiling above her with its scattering of plaster ornamentation—roses issuing from four cornucopias, one at each corner of the room—now greyish-white in the light of early dawn. After four hours Frau Wilhelmine closes her eyes.

  8.48 a.m. One minute later Frau Wilhelmine’s slumbers are cut short by a knock at the door. It is the day porter, a man with wide experience in the ways of the world. After listening politely to Frau Wilhelmine’s opening remarks he diverts the storm which is threatening to break over his head on to the night porter. Only the latter, he assures her, would have any information on the subject under discussion.

  The night porter, who is on the point of signing off, finds himself summoned to Frau Wilhelmine’s suite. He stands there respectfully, also a man with long experience of awkward guests and equally confident of his ability to handle any situation.

  “A porter sits at his desk, Madame,” he says patiently. “He sees and notes everyone who comes in or goes out, but he has no idea what goes on upstairs. It’s not his job.”

  “Whose is it, then?”

  “No one’s, Madame. From midnight onwards there are no floor waiters or chambermaids on duty.”

  “And whatever happens on the upper floors—no one worries about it?”

  “Why should they, Madame?”

  “But that means anyone can walk into any room in the hotel!”

  “Always providing he has a key to it or the room in question is unlocked—which usually means in practice that it’s been left open on purpose.”

  Frau Wilhelmine dismisses the porter, who retires thankfully. She puts a call through to the Moulin Noir and asks to speak to her husband. “Please come at once, Herbert! I have something to discuss with you—urgently. No, don’t try to dodge the issue. There’s a scandal in the offing.”

  “A Monsieur Prévert to see you,” Otto announced.

  General Kahlenberge leafed through some routine reports submitted by lower echelons, noting as he did so that Lieutenant-Colonel Sandauer’s requests for replacements on behalf of the Nibelungen Division would, if granted, drain the Corps of all its effective reserves.

  “What does he want?” Kahlenberge was glad of any distraction these days. He was so impatient for the crucial moment to arrive that routine work was beginning to get on his nerves.

  “He wants a chat with you,” Otto said. “At least, that’s what he says.”

  “All right, I’ll see him.” Otto opened the door and ushered Prévert in. Kahlenberge offered his visitor a chair.

  Prévert introduced himself without preamble, his tone that of a tramp regally dismissing the suspicion that he may be after the price of a drink.

  “I’m by way of being a link between the German and French authorities in Paris. I’m also a police officer, and I have reason to believe that you may be interested in my activities.”

  He was right. Kahlenberge scented at once that Prévert was one of those people who were simply “there,” who couldn’t be by-passed and were a factor to be reckoned with.

  Prévert concealed the sly glint of anticipation which shone in his eyes by gazing at his lap as though lost in thought. Then he said:

  “Sometimes I think of my department as a refuse dump, General. You wouldn’t believe how much garbage it accumulates.”

  Kahlenberge did not reply immediately. He had lowered the shiny dome of his head and was contemplating the endless columns of figures on the desk before him, repelled by the thought that they were his staple form of “intellectual diet. He looked up abruptly.

  “And what have I got to do with your refuse collection?”

  “Most of the material I collect consists of so-called confidential reports, each of them associated with a particular name. Your own name has turned up on more than one occasion, General.”

  Kahlenberge leant back in his chair. “What do you want, Monsieur Prévert?”

  “Just to see you. I wanted to see what you looked like.”

  “Why?”

  I’m the inquisitive type. I wanted to see a man I had sold without getting to know him too well.”

  “Sold?”

  “In a manner of speaking.” Prévert might have been discussing the merits of this year’s vintage. “You’re a form of purchase price, General, a price paid for the freedom of another man with political ambitions—one of the leading members of the Marseilles Resistance, to be precise.”

  Kahlenberge’s face retained its masklike immobility. Only a slight movement of his hand expressed regret at his failure to understand what his visitor was driving at. He took care not to utter a word, fully aware that in such a situation the smallest slip could have disastrous consequences.

  Prévert stroked his almost non-existent chin.

  “It’s quite simple. Firstly, although words are intended for certain ears they sometimes reach ears for which they are not intended. Secondly, microphones are easily concealed. Thirdly, some people have an overwhelming urge to confide in others. Fourthly, even conspirators gossip occasionally. Need I say more?”

  Kahlenberge shook his head, his face the colour of ashes.

  “No doubt you’ll want to know who I’ve sold you to, General—sold you without knowing you. I must confess that I did so without too much heart-searching. The only reason why I made the deal was that it seemed a particularly advantageous one, not only for me and my cause, but also for the object of the transaction—that’s to say, you.”

  A change came over Kahlenberge’s strained expression. It did not exactly relax, but it betrayed a glimmer of surprise. As gingerly as if he were disarming a time-bomb, he said: “May I inquire what you mean by advantageous?”

  “Just that, my dear sir. I look on this operation as a form of insurance policy. Allow me to explain. Every system based on brute force has its determined opponents as well as its fanatical adherents. History—French history too, of course—is crammed with examples of such opposition. But you Germans seem to have evolved a completely new species of rebel—a sort of avenger of slighted honour. This individual doesn’t hate the Nazis, he merely despises them because fundamentally his attitude is conditioned by historical criteria. He feels that if the Nazis’ stooges are stupid or criminal enough to get themselves involved in mass murder they’re welcome to do so until they end up as cold meat themselves. What he can’t condone at any price is the craven ‘wait-and-see’ approach and apathetic readiness to compromise of people whose intelligence and education should have imbued them with at least a modicum of dignity and courage. In short, what may be excusable in a horse-butcher cannot be sanctioned in a general.”

  “You know Colonel Grau fairly well, don’t you? I imagine he’s one of your sources of information.”

  Prévert nodded approvingly, gratified that he was not wasting his time on someone who was unworthy of his attention. Kahlenberge evidently had a swift and sure grasp not only of circumstances but of their underlying implications.

  “That also has a bearing on the insurance policy I mentioned earlier. Grau could send you and a number of your associates to the gallows tomorrow if he wanted to, but that isn’t his intention. He’s waiting, and do you know what for? He’s waiting for what may be the G
erman officer corps’ last chance to make a clean break with an unsavoury past. But if the German officer corps shirks its last chance or botches the job, God help it! You must excuse me if I sound dramatic, General. My sole object is to give you an idea of how Grau’s mind works.”

  “Thank you for being so frank.”

  Prévert hazarded a smile. “Naturally, you will have gathered that my motive for telling you all this is not just a desire to impress you with the extent of my candour. I’m much more interested in doing business with you.” His smile deepened as though he were sniffing a glass of full-blooded burgundy.

  Kahlenberge gave a brief but incisive nod of assent. “State your terms. I presume I shan’t be able to avoid paying a high price.”

  Prévert fumbled in his breast-pocket and withdrew a small sheet of paper about the size of a visiting card. It bore three telephone numbers. “I can always be reached at one of these three numbers. Would you be good enough to note them down and keep them handy—or, better still, commit them to memory. Incidentally, do you know Alexandre Dumaine of Saulieu? He’s one of the best chefs in France and a friend of mine. It’s almost time I paid him another visit. His coq au vin is incomparable.”

  “I understand,” said Kahlenberge. He noted the telephone numbers in his diary. “You wish to be informed when the time comes. According to my information, things could happen almost hourly.” He shrugged. “All right, it’s a deal. You shall be the first to be told.”

  “Thank you,” said Prévert. He cocked his head on one side and smilingly pinched his nose. “A coq au vin certainly has its attractions, but it would be tempting to witness one of the most memorable moments in history. I really don’t know which I shall decide on, but it will be something at least if you give me a chance to make up my mind in good time.”

  “You’ll hear from me, Monsieur Prévert—in good time.”

  “And not for the last time, I trust.”

  General Tanz’s second sight-seeing tour began as punctually as the first. At nine o’clock precisely he emerged from the Hotel Excelsior dressed in his pearl-grey suit. Hartmann pulled open the near-side rear door of the Bentley. The morning sun glittered on the car’s spotless carriage-work.