"I'll be back in a few minutes," said Thomas, hurrying out of the room. He was wrong there.
For twenty minutes after he had left the house in the rue Chevalier Rose to buy grapes Thomas Lieven, alias Jean Le-blanc, alias Pierre Hunebelle,- found himself in the hands of the Gestapo.
[16]
It's funny, thought Thomas, how used I have got to living with Chantal, I can't imagine living without her now. Her crazy moods, her tigerish behavior, like that of a prowling man-eater, positively enthrall me. So do her pluck and her intuitions. And she doesn't tell lies. Or at least hardly ever ... Thomas Lieven crossed the deserted Place Jules Guesde,
with its asphalt pavement shining under-the rain, and turned into the narrow rue Bernard du Bois. The small, old-fashioned Serviette Cinema, which he often visited with Chantal, was situated in that street.
A black Peugeot was parked in front of the cinema. But Thomas did not notice it. He walked on, followed by two shadowy figures. As they passed the black Peugeot one of them tapped briefly on its nearside window. Immediately the car's headlights flashed on, though only for an instant. Then they were extinguished again. At the further end of the narrow, badly lit street two other shadowy figures got into motion.
Thomas did not notice them. He saw neither the men who were coming toward him nor those who were following him. He was thinking, I must have a quiet talk with Chantal soon. I've heard from reliable sources that American troops will be landing in North Africa this year. The French underground movement is giving the Nazis more and more trouble. It's based in southern France. The Germans will undoubtedly soon occupy the rest of the country. So Chantal and I ought to be off to Switzerland as soon as possible. In Switzerland there are no Nazis, no war. We can live in peace there . ..
The two shadows ahead of him drew nearer. So did the tW9 behind him. The engine of the black Peugeot started. The car moved forward at a walking pace, without lights. And still Thomas Lieven did not notice anything.
Poor Thomas! He was intelligent, fair-minded, good-natured, charming and obliging. But he w&s no Leatherstock-ing, Napoleon or male Mata Hari, no sort of a superman. He was not the kind of hero one reads of, who is never frightened and always victorious, a heroic hero of heroes. He was only a man perpetually on the run from pillar to post, never left alone and always forced to try to make the best of a bad job, as we all must
Consequently, he did not perceive the danger that was threatening him. He was not in the least perturbed when two men suddenly confronted him. They wore raincoats and were obviously French.
One of them said: "Good evening, monsieur. Would you be good enough to tell us the time?"
"With pleasure," answered Thomas. With one hand he was holding up his umbrella. With the other he extracted his beloved repeater from his waistcoat pocket. He touched the
spring of the lid. As he did so the two shadowy figures which had been following him reached the group.
"It is now precisely eight ..." Thomas began. Then a stunning blow descended on the nape of his neck.
His umbrella went flying. His repeater—luckily it was attached to a chain—dropped from his hand. He fell to his knees with a groan. He was just opening his mouth to call for help when a hand holding a huge wad of cotton wool struck his face. Nausea surged in his throat at the sickly sweet stench in his nostrils. It was only too familiar. He had had a similar experience in Lisbon. Then things had turned out all right in the end. But now, he thought, in his last flash of consciousness, now it wasn't going to turn out that way.
After he had fainted his abductors encountered only technical difficulties in stowing him away in the Peugeot. It was a mere furniture mover's problem.
abductors had handed him over to two Gestapo agents at Chalon-sur-Saone. They had taken him to Fresnes. Since then he had been waiting for someone to come and question him. But in vain. He was beginning to lose his reason under the strain of the delay.
Attempts to make contact with the German warders had proved useless. So had the exercise of charm and bribery in the interests of obtaining better food. There was nothing to eat but thin cabbage soup, day after day. He had tried also to smuggle a note through to Chantal, but in vain.
Why didn't they come, after all this time, and put him up against a wall? Every morning about four o'clock they came and took men from the cells. He heard the tramp of heavy boots, ringing words of command and the feeble cries and whimpering of those marched off. And the shots when they were executed by shooting. But nothing when they were hanged. Generally one heard nothing.
Suddenly he sprang to his feet. Footsteps were approaching. The door flew open. A German sergeant-major stood on the threshold. Beside him were two huge fellows in Security Service uniform.
"Hunebelle?"
"Yes."
"You're wanted for examination/'
At last, Thomas thought, at last!
He was handcuffed and taken down to the courtyard. A big, windowless bus was waiting there. One of the Security men pushed Thomas into a -dark, narrow passage which ran down the middle of the bus and had many doors on each side. Behind the doors were tiny cells in which one could only sit huddled up.
Thomas was showed into one of them. The door was banged and locked. He could hear that all the other cells were also occupied. The whole vehicle stank of sweat and terror.
It clattered off along a street full of potholes. The journey lasted half an hour. When the bus stopped Thomas could hear voices, footsteps and curses. Then his cell door was flung open. "Outside, you!"
Thomas, giddy with weakness, stumbled into the open air behind a Security man. He immediately recognized the magnificent Avenue Foch in Paris. Several of its buildings, he knew, had been confiscated by the Security Service.
His escort led Thomas through the hall of No. 84 into a library which had been refurnished as an office.
Two men were sitting there, both in uniform. One was short, jovial and red-faced, the other looked unhealthily pale. The first was Sturmbannfuhrer Walter Eicher and the second his adjutant Fritz Winter.
Thomas halted before them in silence.
His escort announced him and left the room.
The Sturmbannfuhrer roared in execrable French: "Well, Hunebelle, what do you say to a cognac?"
Thomas felt very sick. But he answered: "No, thank you-I'm afraid I haven't got the right digestive foundation for it."
Sturmbannfuhrer Eicher was not quite sure what Thomas had said, since he had spoken French. His adjutant, therefore, translated it. Eicher laughed loudly. Winter continued in a prim tone: "I believe we can speak German to this gentleman, can we not?"
Thomas had seen a file marked hunebelle lying on a side table as he came in. There was no point in lying. "Yes, I can also speak German."
"Ah, wonderful, wonderful! Perhaps you're even a countryman of ours, eh?" The Sturmbannfuhrer shook a playfully threatening finger at him. "Come on, you little rascal! You may as well confess!"
He blew a cloud of cigar smoke into Thomas's face. Thomas remained silent
The Sturmbannfuhrer grew serious. "Look here, Hunebelle, or whatever you like to call yourself, I daresay you think we enjoy locking you up and examining you. No doubt you've heard a lot of atrocity stories about us, haven't you? But we don't like the difficult job we have to do, I can assure you. It goes against the German grain, Hunebelle." He nodded sadly. "But the country demands it. We have taken an oath to the Fiihrer. After final victory our people will have to take over the leadership of all the nations of the earth. That sort of thing has to be prepared for. Everyone will be needed then."
"Even you," added Winter, the adjutant
"I beg your pardon?"
"We know how you've swindled us, Hunebelle. At Marseilles. That business with the gold and jewelry and currency." The Sturmbannfuhrer chuckled. "Don't contradict me. We know all about it. I must say it was a clever trick. You've got brains, my boy."
"And because you're such a brainy boy you're now going to tell us w
hat your real name is and where all that stuff de Lesseps and Bergier had has got to," Winter added quietly.
"And who was in it with you," said Eicher. "We have to know that too, of course. We've already occupied Marseilles. We can put your colleagues in our pockets right away."
Thomas said nothing.
"Well?" asked Eicher.
Thomas shook his head. He had been expecting this.
"You won't talk?"
"No."
"Everyone talks here sooner or later." Eicher's jovial good-humor and the grin on his face vanished abruptly. His voice grew hoarse. "You filthy rogue! You little skunk! I've wasted enough time with you!" He stood up, bending and straightening his knees, threw his cigar into the fireplace and said to Winter: "Carry on. Put him through it."
Winter took Thomas down into an overheated cellar, where he gave orders to two men in plainclothes. They tied him to the boiler of the central heating system. Then they "put him through it."
This process continued for three days in succession. First came the bus journey from Fresnes to Paris. Then came the examination, followed by putting the prisoner "through it" in the cellar. Then he would be taken back to his unheated cell.
The first time they made the mistake of thrashing him too fast and hard, whereupon he fainted.
The second time they were more careful. So they were the third time. After the third session Thomas had lost two teeth and had many open wounds on his body. He was then transferred to the prison hospital # at Fresnes for a fortnight
After that the whole thing started all over again.
When the windowless bus brought him once more to Paris on December 12, Thomas Lieven had reached the end of his resistance. He couldn't stand the torture any more. He thought, FU jump out of the window on that third floor where Eicher always examines me now. Yes, 111 jump out of that window. With any luck 111 kill myself. Oh, Chantal, Bastian, I would so much like to have seen you again ...
Just before ten o'clock in the morning of December 12, 1942, he was escorted to Herr Eicher's office. A man Thomas had never seen before stood next to the Sturmbannfuhrer. He was tall, lean and white-haired. He wore the uniform of a colonel of the German Army, with many rows of ribbons. Under his arm he a carried a thick file on which Thomas Lieven could decipher the letters gekados.
Eicher looked angry.
"There's your man, Colonel," he said sulkily, coughing.
"Ill take him with me right away," said the much decorated colonel. •
"Well, if it's a gekados case I can't stop you, Colonel. Sign the receipt, if you please."
Thomas felt as if everything was whirling around him, the room, the men and everything else in it. He stood there in his pitiable convict's dress, hardly able to keep on his feet, choking and gasping for breath. He thought of a sentence he had once read in a book by Bertrand Russell. "In our century it is only the unexpected that happens."
[2]
Thomas Lieven, handcuffed, sat beside the white-haired colonel in an army limousine. They drove through the Cit£ quarter of Paris, which did not seem to have altered much since the German occupation. France, apparently, was ignore ing that event. The streets were very animated. Thomas saw smart women and hurrying men. The German soldiers mingling with them looked curiously embarrassed and bewildered.
The colonel remained silent until they had reached the residential suburb of St. Cloud. Then he said; "I hear you like cooking, Hen* Lieven."
Thomas stiffened at the mention of his real name. Rendered nervous and ultra-suspicious by the torture he had undergone during the last few weeks, he wondered what was behind this remark, what new trap might be in store for him. He stole a side glance at the officer. The colonel's features pleased him by their shrewd and skeptical cast. The eyebrows were bushy, the nose aquiline, the mouth sensitive. So what? In Germany, Thomas reflected, many murderers play Bach in their spare time.
He said: "I don't know what you are talking about."
"Oh, yes, you do," said the colonel. "My name is Werthe and I belong to the Paris branch of Military Intelligence. I can save your life. But whether I do so or not depends on you."
The car stopped beside a high wall surrounding a large estate. The driver sounded his horn three times. A massive gate opened, apparently of its own accord. The car drove through the gateway and up a graveled avenue leading to a villa of yellow brick, with f rench windows and green shutters.
"Raise your hands," said the colonel who had called himself Werthe. "Why?"
"So that I can unlock your handcuffs. You can't very well cook with those on. I should like a Cordon Bleu if that's all right with you. With Crepes Suzette. I'm going to take you to the kitchen, where Nanette, the maid, will help you."
"Cordon Bleu," Thomas repeated in a faint voice. His head again began to whirl as Colonel Werthe unlocked the steel handcuffs.
"If you please."
Now I'm alive, thought Thomas. I'm breathing again. I wonder what's going to come of it this time. Feeling his normal interests stirring, so to speak, in their sleep, he replied: "Good. Then perhaps we might have stuffed aubergines as a first course."
Half an hour later Thomas was explaining to Nanette, the maid, how to prepare aubergines. She was an uncommonly attractive brunette, wearing a white apron over her uncommonly close-fitting black woolen dress. Thomas sat beside her at the kitchen table. Colonel Werthe had gone away. There were bars, however, on the kitchen window.
Nanette repeatedly came quite close to Thomas. Once her bare arm touched his cheek. Once her rounded hip brushed his arm.
As a patriotic Frenchwoman she guessed where he had come from. And Thomas, despite all the torture and deprivation he had endured, still looked a useful sort of fellow.
"Oh, Nanette," he sighed at last
"Yes, monsieur?"
"I really ought to apologize to you. You are so young and pretty that under normal circumstances I wouldn't be sitting here so quietly. But I'm done for. I'm a wreck ..."
"Poor monsieur," whispered Nanette. Then she gave him a very quick, very light kiss, blushing as she did so.
The meal took place in a large, darkly paneled room with windows opening on a park. The colonel had changed his uniform for a very well-cut flannel suit.
MENU
Stuffed CAuber&ines
Cordon
Crepes Suzette
PARIS, 12 DECEMBER 1942
A preliminary to Thomas's pact with the "Devil's Admiral."
Stuffed Aubergines
Large firm aubergines are peeled thinly and halved lengthways. The pulp is carefully removed and put through the mincer with beef, pork, one onion and a soaked crustless roll. An egg, salt, pepper, paprika and a little anchovy paste are added, well mixed to a forcemeat and the aubergines stuffed with the mixture. A little stock is poured into the bottom of a well-buttered casserole. The stuffed aubergines are placed in it, well sprinkled with grated cheese and butter flakes and baked at medium heat for half an hour.
Cordon Bleu with Small Garden Peas
Tender fillets of veal are well beaten and half of each is covered with a slice of ham, on top of which is placed a thin slice of Gruyere cheese so as to leave half an inch uncovered round the edge. The edges are then brushed with white of egg and the uncovered half of each fillet is folded over the covered half, the edges being well pressed together. Then each turnover is first rolled in flour, next in lightly salted and peppered egg yolk and lastly in bread crumbs. It is fried in deep hot butter until golden-brown. The fillets are served with small garden peas previously sprinkled with salt and chopped parsley.
Crepes Suzette
Plenty of wafer-thin pancakes, prepared with water instead of milk, are fried. At table, on a chafing dish over a spirit flame, a fair-sized portion of butter is heated, but must not get brown. The juice of an orange or tangerine together with its finely chopped peel are added to the butter. A small quantity
of kirsch and maraschino, with eithe
r curacao or Cointreau and a little sugar are added and heated. One pancake at a time is laid in the liquid and heated quickly. It is then removed to a heated plate, rolled up and served immediately.
Nanette was in attendance. Her pitying glances fell again and again on the man in the crumpled, dirty prison garb, who nevertheless behaved like an English aristocrat. He was obliged to eat with his left hand, two fingers of his right hand being bandaged.
Colonel Werthe waited until Nanette had served the aubergines. Then he said: "Delicate, really delicate, Herr Lieven. What top dressing did you use, may I ask?"
"Grated cheese, Colonel. Why have you brought me here?" Thomas ate little. He felt that he ought not to overload his stomach after the weeks of starvation he had undergone.
Colonel Werthe ate with relish. "You are a man of principle, I hear. You would prefer to be thrashed to death rather than reveal any information to the Security Service, let alone work for those—ahem—for that organization."
"Yes."
"What about the Canaris organization?" The colonel helped himself to another aubergine.
Thomas asked quietly: "How were you able to get me away from Eicher?"
"Oh, that was quite easy. We've a good man in Intelligence here, a Captain Brenner. He's been watching your career for some time. You've been putting on quite a show, Herr Lieven." Thomas bent his head. "Oh, you needn't be so modest. When Brenner discovered that the Security people had arrested you and taken you to Fresnes, we put on a little show of our own."
"A little show?"
Werthe pointed to the file marked gekados, which lay on a side table under the window. "We get people out of the hands of the Security Service by means of files like that. We take a number of old espionage cases and cook up a new one, purely imaginary, out of them, adding a few fresh pieces of entirely fabricated evidence. We cover the whole file with all sorts of signatures and stamps to make it look impressive. In this particular instance we've included statements by various witnesses to the effect that one Pierre Hunebelle was involved in the perpetration of a series of attacks with explosives in the neighborhood of Nantes."
The Monte Cristo Cover-Up Page 30
