The Soul of a Thief

by Steven Hartov

I dropped my work, and I went to him. He was in his quarters, thrusting photographs of his family into a map case. I stood in the open doorway.

  “Herr Standartenführer,” I said.

  “Finish your work, Brandt,” he snapped without turning.

  “Yes, Sir. But I did not complete my report.”

  Himmel said nothing.

  “Gabrielle had a message for you, Sir.”

  “I know. She is under the weather...”

  “Not that, Sir.”

  “...well, she shall soon be under the earth.”

  “She said to tell you, that she promises that when we get to Paris, she will give you a night you shall never forget.”

  Himmel stopped packing. He raised his head and he turned to me.

  “She said that?”

  “Yes, Sir. I’m sure she did not realize that we would be leaving so soon. After all, I did not realize it either, or I would have insisted that she pack and return here with me at once.”

  “Mmm.” The Colonel rubbed his jaw.

  “Shall I fetch her again, Sir?” I strove to avoid summoning the images of another frantic adventure with her.

  “No. I need you here.”

  The Colonel strode past me, his heavy shoulder brushing mine so that I felt his curled strength in the way I’d felt threats on the soccer pitch.

  “Edward!” he called out to his driver. “Stop what you’re doing, and go and fetch the girl.”

  I stood there, feeling suddenly faint, a long silent sigh hissing from my lips.

  “Yes, Sir,” Edward replied.

  “And if she makes you any excuses,” Himmel added, “feel free to shoot her.”

  * * *

  We worked in silence, my master and I. He with his thoughts, and I with mine. Edward had departed in the Kübelwagen for the town, and Mutti had retreated to the carriage house to assemble his personal effects for our departure. From behind the mansion, the murmured chorus of the troop at work gave some relief to the atmosphere of tension within, and I was grateful that occasionally a junior officer would appear to consult with the Colonel on some matter of order and transport. Yet between those brief respites, my master was sullen and within himself, and I sensed his embarrassment for his recent outburst of emotion. I pitied him his uncontrollable divulgence, for I understood too well the nature of his obsession now. Heretofore, he had been a man who truly loved only his uniform, his men, and his mission. Now, he was lost in an unfamiliar wilderness, stumbling through a labyrinth of his soul he had never imagined to enter.

  For many minutes, Himmel’s eye would not meet mine. I remembered the first and only time that my father had openly wept before me. His mother, my paternal grandmother, had died, and he had gripped the mantel of the fireplace as his shoulders shuddered and the tears coursed down his cheeks. It had frightened me, and surged pity from within me, but I could not touch him or comfort him, and we had both been mortified by it.

  Perhaps only thirty minutes had passed since Edward’s departure, and I prayed that Gabrielle would be found by him and respond quickly and affirmatively to his appearance. I had completed my tasks and was sealing up the mortar and ammunition crates when Himmel suddenly appeared behind me, his hand on my shoulder.

  “Your horse, Shtefan,” he said.

  I straightened up, turning to him. “Yes, Colonel?”

  “Blitzkrieg, correct?” He smiled thinly.

  “Yes, Sir.”

  “There is no way to take him with us, you know.”

  It struck me like a hammer blow. My God, in all the rush of preparations and my fevered plotting and images of Gabrielle, I had completely forgotten about Blitzkrieg. I know that my face fell, my expression crashing, and I could feel the tears well in my eyes and Himmel’s head cocked a bit with sympathy. My mind raced for a solution, but Himmel sadly shook his head.

  “No, you cannot ride him. You could not keep up with the trucks. He’s a fine animal, but he cannot gallop from here to Paris.”

  My lips trembled, and I covered my mouth with my hand as I desperately searched for a way. Himmel’s fingers squeezed my shoulder, and he looked off toward the rear of the mansion and out into the meadows and the barn.

  “It is also not fair to leave him here alone, Shtefan.”

  I could not believe that my master, a man whom I wished so desperately to find satanic, was thinking of my adoration for an animal at this juncture. I had to hold myself in check with every muscle of my heart, so that I would not sob.

  “He might survive for a while, yes,” said Himmel. “But you know, as this war goes on, he will be more appealing to the French peasants as food than as a fine runner.”

  My shoulders slumped. I knew that my master was right. I could not expect him to allow me to ride Blitzkrieg from the south of the country to the north. It would take days upon days. And we had no facility, no boarding truck in which my horse could be moved like a racing steed.

  “You should take him out to the meadows,” Himmel suggested in a sympathetic murmur. “You should finish him, rather than leave him to his fate. He would be miserable at any rate, without you.”

  My guilt crashed upon me like a tidal wave. This man, who had taken me in and ignored my past and treated me like a son, this man whom I had betrayed this very night, was concerned for my affections for a simple beast. I could hardly bear it.

  “Is there some other way, Colonel Himmel?” I croaked through a throat thick with liquid.

  Himmel moved away from me, staring out the kitchen window at the troop working over their equipment. After a moment he turned, glanced at the watch on his wrist and looked at me.

  “Your work is completed here?”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  “And your personal gear?”

  “I have little. It would take me moments to prepare it.”

  “Fine. I’ll give you one hour. Take your horse and find someone who will care for him.”

  I leaped for my cap and strapped my pistol belt about my waist. Himmel moved closer, pointing a finger at me.

  “One hour, Shtefan,” he warned. “We must move well before first light.”

  “Yes, Sir!” I saluted him smartly, clicking my heels, and he suppressed a laugh as I snatched out for his hand and shook it very hard, and I was off...

  * * *

  Somewhere between the mansion and the wounded church of Le Pontet, it began to rain. The sky turned starless and black, with a thick mist enshrouding those few homes that still had lanterns lit at this late hour, and both Blitzkrieg and I stretched our necks far forward, our eyes squinted to focus on the meadows and our teeth bared as the thick, cold drops pelted our cheeks. He was unhappy with me, my tolerant steed. A single jaunt in an evening was a pleasure, but twice in one night, especially in this storm, was a trial. He had whinnied in protest when I pulled him again from the barn. And once, halfway to the town, as a gnarled hand of lightning struck the horizon and a wide sheet of rain thundered down a lane, Blitzkrieg halted hard and reared back, and I was forced to heel him in until he began to run again. I whispered apologies he could not understand, for behaving like a cruel master, for taking him I knew not where, for repaying his loyalty with abandonment.

  We pulled up before the house of Gabrielle, and I vaulted from the saddle and strapped Blitzkrieg quickly to the fence post. The Kübelwagen was parked at a strange angle to the garden, as if Edward was reluctant to take on Himmel’s task. I was soaked to the skin as I pushed through the gate, and there was the corporal, standing on the walk before the open front door. Just inside the foyer stood Gabrielle, and silhouetted by the kitchen lanterns I could see her dressed in her long coat, her hair pulled up beneath a woolen cap. By each of her small feet rested a meager valise, and as I approached in the utter darkness, I could hear Edward’s entreating voice.

  “Be wise, young woman! No harm wil
l come to you if you do as I say.”

  She saw me then, as I loomed from the darkness, and she flew from the house and nearly toppled Edward as she ran to me. She threw her small arms about my neck and held me so tightly that I could not breathe, and she kissed both sides of my face and muttered something I could not hear for the pelting of the rain. I saw Edward spin from us in disgust, hurling a cigarette into a puddle on the walk and stomping upon its hiss.

  “Gott im Himmel, you’re both mad!” he spit. “Absolutely mad!”

  “He is trying to get me to stay here.” Gabrielle leaned back from me, holding my face in her hands and searching my eyes.

  “What?” I had been certain that he’d been coaxing her into the Kübelwagen, insisting that her resistance might indeed bring about a pistol shot.

  “Yes. He says I shall be safer here.”

  I looked over at the driver. He refused to face us, his back hunched and his fists conducting an invisible choir as he nodded and called out.

  “Yes! You should stay here, young foolish woman!”

  “Edward?” I could not believe what I heard.

  “You are both fools! Damned fools. You have no idea what might befall her if she comes to Paris.”

  “But your orders, Edward. Himmel’s orders...”

  “To hell with my orders, you little idiot!” He tried to remain in his position, as if refusing to witness our embrace might save him from a fate akin to that of Lot’s wife. Yet his fury twisted his body around and his eyes were ablaze as he struck out with a finger. “If she stays here, in her home, in this town, it is far more likely that she’ll survive this war and perhaps even flourish. But if she comes with us, Shtefan. If she comes with us, she is right back in the cauldron. She’s with Himmel, and you together, nothing but a keg of powder awaiting a match flame, and you will be taking her to the shores of a front where the war is about to drown us all. You are playing Russian roulette with her life!”

  I was stunned. I looked at Gabrielle. Her small fingers were covering her mouth, and she looked up at me, and both of our hearts melted with pity for this poor man. We slowly walked to him as one, and the three of us stood beneath the hammering sky, the puddles bouncing up around our feet. I reached out my hand and touched his sleeve, but he merely looked down at the encroaching mud.

  “She is not a child, Edward,” I said.

  “That is correct,” Gabrielle agreed, yet warmly. “I am responsible for myself.”

  “You are both children.” Edward shook his head angrily. “You have no idea what you are doing.”

  “I think we do,” I said.

  “You will die from this,” he whispered, as if we had both contracted some horrible affliction. He lifted his head, and jewels of rainwater fell from his mustache. “I have seen this before, and I know you cannot help yourselves. I am trying to save you, but my warning is all I have to offer, Shtefan.”

  Neither of us answered him. He closed his coat around his neck and looked away as he sighed. “I will wait for you in the car. Be quick.” He marched off along the path. I turned to Gabrielle.

  “My horse,” I said.

  “Yes?” She looked over my shoulder, squinting off toward Blitzkrieg.

  “I cannot take him, but if I leave him at the barn, no doubt someone will make a meal of him. Himmel has given me one hour to find another way. Half of that hour is gone.”

  Gabrielle looked at me. She kissed me lightly. Then she brushed my soaking hair from my brow. She raised a finger and said, “Wait here.”

  She lifted her coat and ran quickly into the house. I looked off toward the garden fence, where Blitzkrieg was rooting his snout in some dripping weeds, and Edward sat sullenly in the car, the flicker of a cigarette flashing against the rivulets coursing down the vehicle’s flat windows.

  Gabrielle emerged from the house carrying a small leather packet, but she did not come to me. She ran quickly toward the side of the garden, and I was surprised to see her deftly vault the fence. She disappeared into the darkness, and after some moments, I saw the lamps flicker in a nearby house. I stood there in the rain, wondering, then made myself useful by carrying her valises to the car. Edward said nothing to me as I set them upon the rear seat, and as I closed the car door, I saw her again, leading a small figure along the cobbled road. She stopped beside Blitzkrieg, petting his snout as he quickly snatched a carrot from her hand. A small old man appeared at her side, and I walked to them.

  “Shtefan, this is Monsieur Almont.”

  “Avec plaisir,” I said.

  The Frenchman nodded.

  “Where are we going, Shtefan?” she asked.

  “Pardon me?” My brow furrowed. The old man was stroking Blitzkrieg’s shining flank.

  “In Paris, Shtefan.” Gabrielle pulled at my tunic. “Where are we going in Paris?”

  “A château. It’s called Montre Temps, just west of the city.”

  The old man nodded, offering a small smile for Gabrielle.

  “Monsieur Almont shall care for Blitzkrieg. And he shall bring him to Paris.”

  I opened my mouth, but I could not speak.

  “Yes.” Gabrielle touched my cheek. “He is a farmer and he has such a vehicle, for the transport of animals. Yet he does not know when this shall be. Soon, he hopes.”

  I stepped to the old man, taking his gnarled hand in my own and pressing his wet flesh and pumping his arm.

  “Merci, mon ami,” I whispered hoarsely. “Merci!”

  I took Blitzkrieg’s head in my hands, stroking his long snout and looking into his black eyes. His elegant lashes blinked once, as if to assure me that he trusted my judgment. I kissed him once alongside his nose, and I unstrapped his reins from the fence and handed them to Almont.

  “Bonne chance,” said the old man. He was looking at Gabrielle, and with a trembling hand he stroked her cheek. Then he walked away, leading my horse behind him.

  Gabrielle took my waist, turning me away and leading me to the Kübelwagen. I stopped her at the door of the car.

  “What did you say to him?” I asked. “Why is he doing this?”

  She looked away, into her garden, at the sunken bomb whose skin had become soft with vines. She looked at the home of the Belmonts, the kitchen lamps still glowing behind the windows, beyond the door that I had closed for her.

  “I gave him the deed to this house,” she said as she opened the door of the car. “I doubt that we shall live to return to it.”

  XII

  ON THE SIXTH of June in 1944, the Commando roared for Paris.

  We swept away to the north, abandoning our relative comforts for an uncertain future, and without a hint of the events already transpiring in Normandy. Le Pontet, quaint and pale beneath the clearing dawn sun, receded from our trundling convoy, its tiny windowpanes flashing farewell glints of the unfolding light. With spirits rising in anticipation of the French capital, we hurried from these quiet pastures toward fields of fire, unaware that the skirts of distant beaches were being licked by waves of briny blood.

  Our staff car led the procession, its canvas roof folded away, an MG-42 machine gun mounted on its center post to stave off Allied fighters. Edward drove as always, with Gabrielle beside him and Himmel in the rear. Yet I was gratefully not present, as upon seeing the Kübelwagen overburdened with the Colonel’s effects, I had quickly found an excuse to volunteer to ride with the troop. And so, should some Mustang or Spitfire choose to pounce, my master would have to work the Maschinengewehr alone, though in such a contest I had no doubt who would get the better of whom.

  I sat upon a slat bench at the rear of the first of the canvas-covered lorries, gripping the wood with both hands as the bench creaked and bounced on its hinges, lifting my rump and then slamming me down, over and over again. The big wheels raced over unrepaired holes and ruts, and the tattered canvas flap whipped in the wind, reve
aling glimpses of our other vehicles straining to keep apace. The steel truck bed was piled high with ammunition crates and equipment bags, while the men were squeezed into the benches along the flanks.

  Captain Friedrich sat across the way, with dark-eyed Lieutenant Gans, now well recovered from his Russian shoulder wound, beside him. To my right flank was Corporal Noss, and next to him the huge and baby-faced Sergeant Meyer, and Private Donau was there as well, and Heinz, the armorer. Nearest to the truck’s opening, Mutti hunched over a large washbasin full of raw potatoes and carrots, and somehow despite the tumultuous ride he peeled them one by one with a flick knife and tossed them to the troops, a treat which fueled their jolly moods and raucous jokes. They chewed and smoked and passed some gas, along with a bottle of Apfelkorn, and Gans called out to me above the din.

  “So, Brandt. Have you been demoted?”

  I squinted at him, cupping one ear with a palm.

  “I said,” he shouted, “has the Colonel busted you, Brandt?”

  I shook my head, wondering at the question. I also realized that ever since Russia, no one had again referred to me as “Fish.”

  Noss leaned toward me, his green eyes mischievous. “He wants to know why you’re riding with us.”

  “Ahhhh.” I understood, and I called to Gans, “No room in the Kübel.”

  “Ja,” someone remarked. “The Colonel needs that whole back seat.”

  “Ach, Jaaaa,” someone else chimed in. “The wind in his hair...a French mouth on his cock...”

  I smiled as much as I could manage, while the laughter echoed.

  “So, this isn’t punishment for you?” Gans prodded.

  “The pleasure of your company is a reward, Lieutenant.” I saluted him and he grinned.

  “I heard you’re making sergeant,” said Meyer over Noss’s head.

  “Just a rumor,” I replied. “And I’m still stuck where I am.”

  “That’s too bad.” Private Donau feigned dismay. Our boyish similarities could well have made us brothers. “I wanted your job.”

  “Careful, all of you,” Friedrich warned. “He’s the Colonel’s spy, and he can outrank all of us with the flick of a pen.” He winked at me.