Silesian Station (2008) jr-2

by David Downing

  Around ten another troop train steamed in from the south, but this one took the line heading east towards Poprad. If the Germans were sending troops to every border crossing between Slovakia and Poland, Russell realized, the chances of civilians getting across seemed depressingly remote. He had a horrible feeling his next journey would be back to Bratislava.

  He tried to sleep, but only managed the occasional doze before the hard awkwardness of the bench woke him up again. A marked drop in the temperature compounded his discomfort - he hadn't been this cold since his last night stroll on the deck of the Europa. Only four weeks had passed since then, but it felt like months. He lay there wondering if he could have man-aged things better, but no obvious alternatives suggested themselves.

  At Russell's umpteenth time of waking a thin ribbon of light was silhouetting the eastern hills, and a few minutes later the first sounds of activity were audible in the hotel across the road. He went in search of a hot drink, and found the early kitchen staff seated round a happily boiling samovar. His American status gained him a warm welcome, a large mug of tea and as much bread and jam as he could eat.

  One grey-haired old Slovak had a smattering of German, and his summary of local opinion was short and to the point. The Germans were even worse than the Czechs, and the Slovaks just wished they would all bugger off. If he was thirty years younger, he would get the hell out of Europe as soon as he could, and head for New Zealand. He didn't know much about the place, but it had hills and sheep, and it was a wonderfully long way from anywhere else.

  The sound of an arriving train penetrated the hotel kitchen. It was the Orava valley train, sent on from Kralovany with some stranded southbound passengers. The Zilina Junction night shift - a pair of middle-aged Slovaks with cheery smiles and not much else - seemed bemused by the train's appearance off its usual route and were unprepared to forecast its future movements. The locomotive driver, on the other hand, was quite sure where he was going, and that was back where he had come from. And yes, he told Russell, the Orava valley route into Poland was open. Or at least it had been on the previous afternoon.

  The tank locomotive ran round its train, took on water, and backed onto the other end of the three wooden coaches. Russell decided he might just as well be stranded high in the mountains as where he was, particularly when the chances of returning to Bratislava seemed so remote. And there was always the chance the border would still be open.

  He took his seat and watched as others arrived from the station hotel. The Jewish family from Bratislava brought up the rear, laden with belongings and sleeping infants.

  The little train set off at a sedate pace, and only changed speed thereafter when a particularly steep gradient slowed it still further. The sun slid down the valley sides, and was sparkling on the river when they reached Kralovany soon after eight. German troops milled around boxcars in the nearby sidings and a line of vehicles in the station yard, causing Russell to fear further delays, but their train only stopped for a few minutes before setting out on its usual run to Szuchahora.

  The Orava valley was more dramatic, slopes soaring on either side of the tracks as they climbed towards Poland. The border, much to Russell's relief, was open. He and his fellow travellers walked past an untended hut on the Slovak side and along a pair of rusted tracks towards a small modern building on the Polish side. Inside, a couple of young soldiers with antique-looking rifles looked on as a single customs officer meticulously examined and stamped each arrival's passport. His entry granted, Russell stood outside the waiting Polish train and admired the view of the Tatra Mountains, rising like a wall into the southern sky.

  The train left with admirable promptness, and rattled down through the pines to the junction at Nowytarg. A connection arrived from Zakopane half an hour later, and spent the next three hours, twisting and turning its way out of the foothills, reaching Krakow's Plaszow Station soon after two. Russell had spent the final hour of this journey dreaming of a slap-up lunch in Krakow's Rynek G3owny, but the imminent departure of the day's last Luxtorpeda express to Warsaw changed his mind. He bought some Polish currency at the station bureau de change and climbed aboard. Advancing to the restaurant car, he was relieved to find a long and mouth-watering menu.

  After his last few trains, this one seemed to fly along, as if its wheels were barely touching the rails. One hour to Kielce, another to Radom, and they were sweeping down onto the plain of the Vistula. As the wide sluggish river appeared on their right, a long line of barges struggling downstream, the locomotive whistled a welcome to the outskirts of the Polish capital. Ten minutes later it was hissing to a halt in Central Station.

  Russell had not been to Warsaw since 1924, and then only for a night. He and Ilse had been travelling from Moscow to Berlin, and, in the manner of those times, had spent the night on a comrade's floor. He did, however, remember a recent conversation with a German journalist just back from the city: there were two good hotels, the Europejski, which prided itself on being the most expensive in Europe, and the Bristol, which was cheaper and better.

  The Bristol was full to the brim. Russell walked on to the Europejski, reasoning that his enforced frugality at Zilina Junction more than made up for a touch of extravagance in Warsaw.

  There were rooms available. He looked at three of them, realized they weren't going to get any better, and took the third, a vast space under a distant ceiling with windows overlooking the inner courtyard. The bath was stained an attractive green, the toilet a complementary brown. Flies had drawn in-tricate patterns on the huge gold-framed mirror with their own waste. The furniture and fittings had been at their peak a century earlier, but at least the bed was softer than the bench at Zilina Junction. Too soft, in fact - as Russell stretched out, the mattress curled around him like a frankfurter roll. He lay there for several moments, laughing like a lunatic.

  In the bathroom the water coughed, spat and coughed again, before finally running hot. Working on the assumption that the miracle might not repeat itself, Russell shaved, washed his hair and took a long and very pleasant bath. By the time he emerged the light outside was fading, and ominous noises from the courtyard below suggested an orchestra in the process of tuning up.

  The Europejski's restaurant had a higher reputation than its rooms. He walked downstairs and found a table in the open courtyard, just as the band swung into a better-than-expected version of Louis Armstrong's 'Potato Head Blues'. Not the sort of the music you could hear in Germany any more, and sitting there in the warm Warsaw evening, working his way through a very acceptable bottle of French wine, he realized how much he had missed it these past few years. His fellow-diners, most of whom looked like rich Poles, seemed to take it all for granted - there was nothing in their faces or behaviour to suggest that a war might be imminent. Every now and then another couple would wend their way between the tables to the small dance floor in front of the orchestra, and glide around the floor in each other's arms, as if life was just a happy procession of songs.

  After dinner Russell went, rather reluctantly, in search of his fellow jour-nalists. In the Bristol bar he found a clutch of Brits earnestly debating the coming football season with one bemused American, and pulled the latter aside. Connie Goldstein was an Irish Jew from New York City who had spent most of the 1930s tracking the rise of anti-Semitism in central and eastern Europe. He was a good journalist and even better writer, but the big agencies he freelanced for were always begging him to write about something else for a change.

  Russell had known him quite well during Hitler's early years in power, but the American's reporting of the Nuremberg Laws had got him expelled from Germany, and they hadn't met again until the previous month, when Gold-stein had joined the Europa at Southampton on its voyage to New York.

  'You're back, then,' Russell said, as they waited to be served at the bar.

  'For the last time, I expect,' Goldstein said. 'The proverbial's about to hit the fan.'

  'Why Warsaw?'

  'I don't know, really
. It feels almost voyeuristic, like watching a bull in its pen before it goes out to die.'

  'Nice.'

  Goldstein grimaced. 'You think that's strange. I've been in Lublin the last few days, visiting some long-lost relatives. They live in a large block of flats in the Jewish quarter, and I made a list of everyone in the block. I took down their names and ages. Eighty-seven people, all of them Jews.'

  'Why?'

  'I wanted a record, just in case.'

  'In case of what?' Russell asked, though he knew what Goldstein feared.

  'In case they disappear.'

  Russell looked at Goldstein, wondering if the man was letting his hatred warp his judgement.

  'It's not just the Nazis, you know,' Goldstein said. 'Hungary, Romania, Slovakia, Ukraine, Lithuania, here in Poland...if the Nazis start murdering Jews they'll have plenty of helpers.'

  'No doubt about that.'

  'And think about Poland. The Nazis inherited about half a million German Jews, and six years later they've still got 200,000. If there's a war with Poland they'll win it, and then they'll have three million more Jews to deal with. Where will they send them? Where could they send them?'

  The logic was compelling, as logic often was. If Goldstein was right, they were heading into something like hell, and Russell felt more than a little reluctant to accept the inevitability of such a denouement. He clutched for a straw. 'I don't suppose the Germans have re-opened the Beuthen frontier?'

  'No, and the Poles have shut down the entire Silesian frontier in retaliation.'

  'Wonderful.'

  'Gestures have their place. And it's surprising how much both of them seem to enjoy their mutual stupidities. You've heard about the latest postal row?'

  'No.' Russell explained that he'd been out of touch for forty-eight hours.

  'Ah, well, that idiot Frick has ruled that Polish addresses on letters originating in Germany have to be spelt in the German way, or they won't be allowed out. The Poles have retaliated by saying that all letters with such spelling will simply be returned to the sender. So no one will get any mail from Germany.'

  'When's the next press briefing?'

  'They're at ten every morning at the Foreign Office press department. It's on the other side of the Square. But don't expect to learn anything new.'

  'I don't suppose there's any good news from Moscow?'

  'Only bad. The talks with the British and French have been adjourned, and they won't be resumed until the Poles agree to the presence of Soviet troops. Which no one believes they will. Everyone's expecting some hapless British or French diplomat to arrive here in the next day or so, and be told as much by the government. Meantime, rumour has it that the Germans are pushing really hard for a non-aggression pact, and receiving more than a little encouragement. Ribbentrop's just waiting for an invitation to Moscow.' Goldstein looked at his watch. 'I'm headed that way myself, and I ought to be getting to the station.'

  'You think a deal's that imminent?'

  'Who knows? But the crucial decisions are being taken there, not here.'

  Russell watched him walk away, and experienced a momentary feeling of panic. He had gotten used to war being a few weeks away, not a few days. Across the room, the laughter of his fellow journalists seemed almost ghoulish.

  Abandoning his drink, he strode the short distance to Pidsulski Square in search of...what? People who hadn't yet heard the bad news, or showed no sign that they had? They were there all right - the prostitutes lingering by the ornate lampposts, the droshky drivers dozing on their seats behind shuffling horses. A couple walked across in front of him, the young man full of enthusiasm for something, the girl sharing it with her smile.

  Lambs to the slaughter.

  Russell trudged back to the Europejski and took the lift up to his floor. The band in the courtyard below was playing loud enough to keep Europe awake, and the small dance floor was a scrum of swaying bodies. He undressed and lay on the bed, enjoying the cool breeze and the joyous blaring of the horn section. Sleep seemed unlikely but he woke a few hours later, sweat streaming off his body. He had dreamt that the walls were closing in, but it was only the mattress.

  Over breakfast the next morning Russell needed a few moments to work out which day it was: Thursday, which gave him less than thirty-six hours to get back to Berlin for his appointment at Silesian Station.

  In Pidsulski Square the droshky drivers were standing around smoking, the prostitutes nowhere to be seen. The Foreign Ministry press briefing was well attended, and as uninformative as Goldstein had predicted. A silver-haired Pole wearing spats and a wingtip collar obligingly invited questions about his country's willingness to allow Soviet troops on her soil, then suavely refused to answer them. The only point of substance was provided by another official, who gravely announced that the foreign press corps would shortly be issued with gasmasks.

  Russell was still digesting this piece of news when an incongruous sight met his eyes. As he descended the steps outside, a troop of Polish cavalry clip-clopped into the square, pennants fluttering from their lances, scabbards and helmets glinting in the morning sunshine. And all courtesy of H.G. Wells' time machine, Russell mused, as the troop trotted off towards the old royal palace. 'The wave of the past' a familiar voice said behind him, precisely echoing his thought.

  It was Yevgeny Shchepkin, the man who had knocked on his Danzig hotel room door in the opening hour of 1939 and lit the fuse of his reluctant espionage career. Shchepkin was wearing a light cotton suit, open shirt and what seemed rather smart-looking shoes for a Soviet agent. His face looked gaunter, but the grey hair was more luxuriant, perhaps in compensation. Russell smiled at the Russian. 'I thought I'd seen the last of you.'

  Shchepkin smirked, as if mere survival was a major accomplishment.

  In his case it probably was, Russell thought.

  'A walk in the park?' the Russian suggested, indicating the entrance to the Saxon Gardens at the side of the palace.

  'Why not?'

  They strolled in silence to the gateway, as if conversation in the open was forbidden. 'I don't suppose this is a chance encounter,' Russell said as they passed through.

  'Well, yes and no. Our being in Warsaw at the same time is a matter of chance. But a meeting had already been decided on, and once one of our people at the Europejski had reported your arrival...'

  'It must be fate,' Russell said wryly. 'So why do we need a meeting?'

  'Ah, Moscow has decided that using the legation in Berlin smacks of amateurism, and they want to convince the Germans that they're taking your deliveries really seriously. So you and I will be meeting outside Germany on a regular basis - your new job offers ample justification for such trips.'

  It did, but such an arrangement would involve Russell in carrying supposedly secret information across the German border. Hauptsturmfuhrer Hirth would be party to the arrangement, of course, but the border authorities would not be. Did that really matter? Or was he still sweating over the experience in March, when his last Soviet contact had planted incriminating material in his suitcase? 'Whatever happened to Comrade Borskaya?' he wondered out loud.

  Shchepkin made a face. 'Ah, Irina. She was very keen. Her plot against you was all her own.'

  'She was very keen?'

  'I'm afraid so.'

  'What happened?'

  Shchepkin shrugged. 'She was found guilty of working for a foreign power. And I assume executed.'

  Russell pictured her exasperated expression, and remembered her telling him he would have the satisfaction of supporting world socialism in the struggle against fascism. He wondered what she'd been thinking when they led her down the last corridor in the bowels of the Lyubyanka. That someone had made a mistake?

  'You seem to have gotten yourself into something of a bind,' Shchepkin observed, as they passed a series of baroque statues symbolizing the human virtues. 'Blackmailed into working for the Gestapo, and turning to us for assistance.'

  'Turning to you with a mutually ben
eficial suggestion,' Russell corrected him. 'And if Borskaya hadn't tried to betray me, the Nazis would never have known there was anything to blackmail me for.'

  'True. How did you talk yourself out of that, by the way? Comrade Borskaya assumed it was dumb luck.'

  It had been in part, but Russell was reluctant to admit as much. He told the Russian the whole story, up to and including the donation of his Soviet fee to a German official as a wedding present. 'I'm probably the only man who ever bribed his way in to Nazi Germany.'

  'Not a pleasant epitaph,' Shchepkin muttered.

  They stopped in the shade of an old water tower, the first one in Warsaw according to the accompanying plaque. It had been built by Marconi in 1850, when the city had still belonged to the Russia of the Tsars.

  'The questions for your fake German spy are waiting in Moscow,' Shchepkin said casually, as if all Russell needed to do was nip round and collect them.

  'Moscow? You don't expect me to spend days travelling there and back for a couple of pages? If the post's good enough for Heydrich, why isn't it good enough for Beria?'

  Shchepkin grinned at that, but persevered. 'They also want to talk to you.'

  'About what?'

  'That's for them to tell you. But look, as a journalist you should be there in any case. That is where the decisions are being taken,' he went on, unconsciously repeating Connie Goldstein's line.

  'A deal's coming? In the next few days?'

  'Nothing is 100 per cent certain, you understand, but if you travel to Mos-cow I think I can guarantee you a - what do you call it in English? A scoop - that's the word. A scoop,' he repeated, enjoying the sound of it.

  'He's really going to do it - sign a pact with the devil?'

  Shchepkin sighed. 'It will buy us time. Though I agree it will be hard to explain.'