The Soul of a Thief

by Steven Hartov

  Thus, you can well imagine that when only one month later, as Himmel’s hardened gaze was trapped by the beauty of Gabrielle upon that bridge near Avignon, I immediately imagined him shortly pummeling her in our new quarters astride the ville of Le Pontet. Once again, we had occupied a countryman’s former estate, although this trio of mansion, carriage house and stables was almost completely intact. It had once been the country residence of a local French prefect, and had subsequently been occupied by three Nazi administrators. However, with the beginning of 1944 and the Allied armies sure to pounce upon France within the half year, the bureaucrats had fled to Berlin, leaving their accommodations to the combat officers.

  Yet my master, whose pattern of sexual pursuit most often resulted in a “quick kill,” surprised both myself and Edward with his digression. Upon spotting Gabrielle driving her caisson of wounded across the bridge, he ordered Edward to halt the staff car, and we held up there on the left bank of the river, watching the crowded and pitiable procession. I did not at first understand his reason for halting there, for in most such cases he was of little patience and would order the way cleared. But at last I turned round to him, and found him gazing with an unfamiliar and gentle ardor, and he raised a gloved finger and pointed.

  “Look at that magnificent creature, Shtefan,” he said.

  I took her in then as well, her golden hair, glowing skin and perfectly regal posture, and I felt for her the pity reserved for a beautiful doe in hunting season. Yet Himmel produced no apples here, nor did he invent some pretext to have Edward order the girl to his quarters. He simply sat there, breathing and watching, and almost immediately I understood that he was not going to rape her, but to court her.

  “Look at her very carefully, Shtefan,” he instructed, and then, after a moment, “Will you remember her?”

  “She would be difficult to forget, Sir.”

  “Exactly. This afternoon, I want you to return to the town and find her.”

  This would not be complex, as she was clearly in the employ of the local Wehrmacht field hospital.

  “Yes, Sir. And then?”

  “Just find out who she is and where she lives, and report back to me.”

  I wondered, then, if Himmel’s uncharacteristically delicate approach was the result of the recent visit to France of his wife and daughters. Upon our occupation of the French country estate, he had almost immediately sent for them, realizing that such accommodations would unlikely present themselves again in the near future. Thus, he and his family enjoyed a private week in the main mansion, while those of us in support staff were quite comfortable in the carriage house, and the commandos were, as usual, satisfied in the barn. I thought now that perhaps the master’s wife had quite sated his lust during that familial lull. On the other hand, her brittle and cold demeanor certainly did not conjure images of carnal passion. Perhaps, with her leave-taking, he was waxing nostalgic for the romantic courtship long departed?

  That afternoon, I did not impose upon Edward to drive me into Le Pontet, but instead saddled a horse from the barn. There had been two healthy stallions still residing on the estate, yet one had since escaped, and as I blanketed and leathered the larger chestnut, Captain Friedrich and his crew of noncommissioned officers gathered about me and attempted to shred my ego.

  “Fish!” Friedrich began the chorus of catcalls. “What are you going to do with that animal?”

  “Ja! Fishes are supposed to swim, Brandt, not ride!” the giant Sergeant Meyer chimed in.

  “I think he’s going to bring it to Mutti and cook it up for the Colonel!” someone else yelled out.

  I continued to dress the horse, smiling slightly and ignoring their taunts.

  “He’s going to throw you, Brandt,” Friedrich warned. “And then you’ll wind up facedown in the mud, as always!”

  Of course, I was unoffended that the commandos assumed me to be less than a novice horseman. They could not know that as an integral part of the extracurricular requirements of my former Gymnasium in Vienna, we were required to provide services to the Spanish Riding School.

  As I lifted my left boot into the stirrup and quickly mounted the steed, someone from behind decided to amuse himself and the troop by slapping the horse on his rump. The stallion jerked the bridle then and leaped forward, but I quickly reined him close, turned him in a tight circle, and raised his pummeling hooves into the air, which caused half a dozen of the SS to fall back on themselves in alarm. Then, I quickly turned him again for the open barn doors and heeled his flanks.

  He exploded from the barn like a Thoroughbred, and hearing the commandos rushing out behind us, I chose to give them a bit of a show before my departure. I galloped him at breakneck speed, and leaning hard to the left, we thundered a perfect circle around the entire circumference of the barn. When again we rounded the forward corner, Friedrich and his men were standing there openmouthed, in a clownish clump, and I raced right for them until they split into perfect parts and leaped for safety. I admit that I grinned from ear to ear as I bent over the stallion’s neck and raced away for the town, the shouts and applause of the commandos echoing behind.

  It was nearly dusk when my mount and I approached the large Wehrmacht field hospital on the outskirts of Le Pontet. South of the town, rumbling Junkers transports delivered wounded from northern Italy and other Mediterranean catastrophes to the aerodrome at Châteaublanc, who were then tumbreled to the sprawling facility. The hospital was situated in a wide pasture, intentionally distant from any major crossroads, as such always provided enemy bombers with convenient map coordinates. Thus, there was no facile access for vehicles or wagons, and the former grazing field had been churned into a sea of mud.

  Central to the hospital stood an enormous surgery tent, bordered by smaller tents for triage, support, equipment, kitchens and the like. Then, there was an outer ring of half tents, merely canvas roofs upon staked poles, and each of them crowded with flank-to-flank cots, occupied by freshly sutured soldiers and moaning amputees. Throughout the grid of narrow, muddy lanes laid out between the tents, bandaged soldiers hobbled upon makeshift crutches, local women in bloody aprons hurried to and fro with pots of medicines, and caissons of all sorts trundled. The steamy breaths of the pained and frightened rose into the January air, and from the main surgery tent could be heard the shouted orders of overworked and exhausted physicians, as the blanketed evidences of their failures were carried off on stretchers to the nearby graveyard.

  I dismounted at the perimeter of this hellish circus and, wrinkling my nose from the stench of gangrene and alcohol, tied the steed to a broken post. I began to walk along a wide lane toward the surgery tent, focusing my eyes on the way ahead and trying to take in as little of the suffering as I could, when a captain of the medical corps suddenly appeared before me, and I automatically saluted. He did not bother to return the gesture.

  “We have no SS here, Corporal,” he snapped. “And if you’re complaining of gout, go back to your troop.”

  “I have no complaints, Herr Doktor,” I replied. “I have been sent by my Colonel to seek out a French orderly.”

  “We have none to spare.” The doctor was wearing a long woolen coat over his bloody whites, and he rubbed his bruised and exhausted eyes.

  “No, Sir,” I continued as politely as I could, feeling genuine sympathy and no envy for his profession. I had worked for physicians in a much more pristine environment and could not imagine functioning in this miasma of unquenchable suffering. “This is a young woman I must locate only for the purpose of passing a message.”

  “Oh, don’t tell me.” The doctor threw up his hands in disgust. “Another officer who wants to fuck Gabrielle.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “She’s a small blonde beauty with blue eyes and the carriage of a princess, correct?”

  “Y...yes, Sir.”

  “Well, every officer who spots her comes
round here wanting a piece, but you can tell your Colonel it’s not on. She’s integral to this hospital and much more important to my wounded than to some Schutzstaffel strutter with a lonely prick. You can tell him she’s our amulet, a gift from the Nazi Party, and she’s not for plucking.”

  I was more than a bit stunned by this doctor’s ire, and although it was instantly clear that Himmel would not likely be a more successful suitor than the myriad who had gone before, I still had my orders.

  “Herr Doktor,” I responded in as soothing a tone as I could. “I am only required to confirm her whereabouts. Thereafter, our commanders can dispute the results as they wish.”

  The doctor sighed, realizing that he had been firing at the messenger.

  “Gabrielle Belmont. She lives in the old mayor’s residence in Le Pontet, by the clock tower of Notre Dame de Bon Secours.”

  “Thank you, Herr Doktor.” I clicked my heels, bowed and turned away to head for my horse, and I did not respond as I heard the doctor call after me.

  “I hope you don’t find her, Corporal. And if you do, I trust she’ll have the good sense to slam the door!”

  I wondered, as I left, if every man this Gabrielle passed had not fallen madly in love with her. Yet almost immediately, I was gripped by a profound depression that occasionally ambushed me now, as just the image of a female form would remind me that my mother had also once been young and beautiful. No, I had not forgotten that she had been taken away to Dachau, not for a moment, yet in order to survive I had been forced to embrace an unlikely optimism. I had taken to believing that this “correction facility” might be the best of the Party’s secret enclaves, and that she would in fact survive better within this environment. After all, while the Allies had taken to bombing industrial centers and civilian cities alike, they had yet to target prisoner of war or relocation camps. Vienna would certainly fall target to American or Russian ordnance, but Dachau might remain unscathed, the eye of a hurricane.

  I had very little information about the Nazi death camps, and given my ethnic background, I did not dare demonstrate curiosity, but only absorbed the occasional comments and held my peace. I did not know the whereabouts of my father, nor the true nature of my mother’s predicament, but the concept of being orphaned was just too much for me to bear, and so I swept that fate into a dormant cave of my mind, focusing instead on my own survival.

  I did so again as I mounted the stallion and trotted off for Le Pontet, maintaining my personal pact to fulfill each and every of Himmel’s assignments to perfection. I had gained the girl’s name, and now would simply confirm her address, and report back to my master.

  It was nearly dark as my horse clopped along the damp and shiny cobblestones of the town. Few of the French were about now, as they had returned to their homes to build the evening fires. The windows of the quaint houses were cracked and patched, some glowing with the flickers of oil lamps within. Tufts of snow sat upon the street corners like arctic turtles, and I shivered upon my stallion.

  I stopped as I approached the clock tower of Notre Dame de Bon Secours. It was tall and peaked, with its spire of dark wooden timbers and tiles raking upward, and the large round clock itself had ceased to keep the time. This was no surprise, as the roof of the tower had been pierced at a downward angle by some vicious spear of air ordnance, the exit hole a splintered wound of cracked wooden bones. My eyes followed the trajectory, and my mouth fell open as I spotted the unexploded aerial bomb.

  It was there in the front garden of a small stone house, its fins jutting up into the air, its trunk half buried in the frozen soil. Not four meters from the frightening projectile, a young woman in a woolen coat was turning the barren earth with a pitchfork. She wore high galoshes on her slim ankles, and her hands were encased in fingerless woolen gloves. Her long blond hair was pulled back behind her neck and tied with a dark yarn. It was Gabrielle.

  I urged the stallion forward and stopped astride the garden’s fence, a broken weave of posting. She glanced up at me with a twist of her head, then continued turning the brittle earth as she spoke.

  “Guten Abend.” She greeted me without warmth. The Germans had been in her land for years, and she was undoubtedly fluent, though the lilt of her French accent suddenly gave my harsh native language hues it did not deserve.

  “Good evening,” I replied as I removed my cap. “Is this not very dangerous?” I gestured at the bomb.

  “It fell over a month ago.” She continued her work. “It has no timing mechanism. We have come to terms. We are sharing the garden.”

  I was tempted to dismount the horse, but I somehow felt that any sort of polite gesture would be dismissed as insincere formality.

  “Why are you gardening in winter, may I ask?” I said.

  “Hope,” was all she replied.

  In mere seconds, I had assessed her. She had courage, optimism, and incredible beauty. Though she was offering only her profile in the near dark, I could well discern her very full lips, her slim nose and the ice blue of her eyes. I quickly returned to my task.

  “May I inquire, are you Gabrielle Belmont?”

  “I am she.”

  “I have been asked to obtain your name and address, mademoiselle.”

  “For which officer?”

  “My commander. SS Colonel Erich Himmel.”

  Gabrielle halted her raking then. She straightened up, holding the fork with one hand, while she placed the other at the small of her back and arched a bit, as she exhaled a sigh. She faced me and looked up, and I confess that her expression chilled me further. I somehow did not want to be judged by her, yet it was too late.

  “What is your name, young man?”

  “Shtefan Brandt.” I briefly dropped my forehead.

  “And what do you suppose your Colonel Himmel wants of me?”

  I blushed deeply and looked away, playing for a moment with the reins as my horse snouted in the ground for a tuft of grass.

  “I am not at liberty to ask him. I must only follow orders.”

  “That seems to be the rallying cry of your race,” she said, and she returned to her gardening.

  She was quick, and cynical as well, and I was completely humiliated. I was only grateful that I had given her no reason to smile, because I sensed that such an expression on her face might have completely shattered what remained of my false composure.

  “Well, you have my apologies...” I began again.

  “Your apologies?” There was something of a short laugh in her exhortation. “For destroying my country? Or for interrupting my evening?”

  I said nothing.

  “Tell your commander that I am Gabrielle Belmont, and I live at Number 3 Rue Lavoisier, and I spend my days and often my nights attending to the needs of his wounded and fallen brethren. And unless he also happens to be the conductor of the Berliner Opera, I cannot be had for a song, or for anything else.”

  I nodded, and set my cap back on my head, but she was not finished with me.

  “Tell your Colonel Himmel that I am the daughter of Charles Marcel Belmont, the mayor of Le Pontet, who is no more. Tell him that my father cared for the people of this town above all else, and that when he tried to prevent the shipment of so many of our children to your murder camps, he was executed by the Gestapo.”

  At this point, I snapped the reins and turned my horse, for I could bear no more. We began to clip along the cobblestones, though I felt the young woman’s gaze upon my back, and it pierced me no less than a red-hot blacksmith’s tongs.

  “And Shtefan Brandt.” She called out to me, and I was forced to rein in the horse, and I turned in my saddle to face her, at least now comfortably at some distance.

  “You can also tell him that my mother, Monique Belmont, was executed along with my father. She was a Jewess of Paris. That should certainly quench his erotic fantasies.”

  With this, she thr
ust the pitchfork deeply into the icy garden, and she turned and strode into the house, and she did not slam the door, but closed it quietly, with utter grace. I sat there for a moment, staring at the trembling pole of the garden implement, and just beyond it, the sharp fins of the bomb.

  I rode back to the farmstead, enveloped in a cloud of my own silence, and so slowly that even my horse was impatient with my despair.

  VI

  IN FEBRUARY OF 1944, I was shamed by a woman’s courage.

  It was the undaunted and arrogant spirit of one Gabrielle Belmont of Le Pontet, Arrondissement d’Avignon, which forced my realization that heretofore, and for nearly one year, I had survived only by virtue of my own self-deception and the practical thinking of a Standartenführer of the SS. Himmel was not a man of kindnesses. He was a creature of expedience, a professional who placed the military objective above all else, and it was merely luck that the Nuremberg Laws did not at this juncture appear on his personal scale of priorities. Should the truth of my racial heritage have been somehow brought to fore by any potential enemy within the troop, my presence within my master’s ranks could well have brought the full wrath of the National Socialist German Workers’ Party crashing about his head, yet we shared this secret in a conspiracy of silence. More than once I was tempted to raise the issue, if only to demonstrate my gratitude, yet such urges I suppressed, choosing instead to endure the sensation of being a convicted felon in the employ of a police detective.

  Gabrielle Belmont’s proud rejection of Himmel’s advances then, by virtue of her open declaration of her heritage, was enough to make me regard myself as so much less than an earthworm. I reasoned that perhaps she felt well armored by her position as a nurse, or the coveting of her form, or perhaps her parents’ fate had overcome her instincts for survival. But if in fact she survived at all after taking such a bold and reckless position, I did not expect to witness a further demonstration of her striking character. Yet there was to be so much more.