“Hauptsturmfuhrer Dieter Koenig,” Reinhardt said. “After the retreat from the Falaise Gap, I tried again to have the woman sent to Brussels, but Koenig refused. I later learned that all of the prisoners in that jail were sent to Drancy.”
“Drancy?” Boeynants asked. He felt sick. He had heard rumors about the camp.
Reinhardt looked at him with a smirk. “Yes, Drancy. And from there they were all sent to Auschwitz. She’s probably ashes by now.”
Boeynants jumped to his feet and smashed his fist into Reinhardt’s face.
The next day, Whitehall attended yet another in an endless string of meetings. He looked around the room and sighed; he’d attended too many during his visit to Belgium.
This one was a briefing about German concentration camps. But it was all sketchy, mostly rumors and hearsay. Whitehall had no doubt that places like Auschwitz existed. He believed the Nazis were capable of anything. But until they had actually liberated some of these camps, what good was all this conjecture? He was about to excuse himself when something caught his attention.
A young American officer at the end of the table had just said something about the Comet Line.
“Excuse me, Captain, could you please repeat that,” Whitehall asked.
The American looked up from his notes. “Uh, yes, certainly. I was saying that the Feldgendarme keeps telling us that the woman was an agent for the Comet Line.”
Whitehall realized he hadn’t been paying attention. “I’m dreadfully sorry, but I was thinking about something else. I’m afraid I haven’t been following you. I’ve been involved with the Comet Line for a number of years. What is this about a Feldgendarme and some woman?”
The captain looked annoyed, but he deferred to Whitehall’s rank. He read from his notes. “A German Feldgendarme was captured in Belgium a few weeks ago while traveling in a car near the German border. A woman with no identification was traveling with him. Both of them are now in custody in Liege on suspicion of espionage. The Feldgendarme confessed that he had been a guard at Auschwitz during 1943, and he has offered to reveal everything he knows, including the names of the SS officers in charge while he was there.”
Whitehall was impressed. This was important information. But he still couldn’t understand how the Comet Line fit in. “Has he given us any information yet?”
“That’s what I had just started to say, sir. No, he hasn’t. He insists that before he tells us anything, we must first release Miss Laurent, or whatever her name is.”
Whitehall was stunned. Had he heard that correctly? “Excuse me, Captain, did you say Laurent? Her name is Laurent?”
The captain shrugged. “Well, that’s what she and the Feldgendarme say her name is. Undoubtedly, they’re lying. But they both insist that she was an agent for the Comet Line and that she was arrested in France.”
Whitehall stood up and leaned over the table. “Is it Jeanne Laurent? Is her first name Jeanne?”
The captain studied his notes. “Yes, that’s correct. Jeanne Laurent. Do you know this person, Colonel?”
Chapter 76
THE TRAIN FROM ANTWERP to Liege slogged through one village after another on what seemed like a never-ending journey. Jan stared out the window but saw nothing, mustering every ounce of his strength to keep his emotions under control. Was it possible, after all this time? Had they really found her, or would it turn out to be a cruel mistake, another wrong turn? He doubted he would survive that.
Sitting next to him, Whitehall chattered on about the lack of cooperation from the Americans, the confusion in command between the Allied armies now closing in on Germany. The war, he pointed out, was far from over, a fact Jan was keenly aware of as he shifted in his seat, a jolt of pain shooting through his right arm, bound tightly in a sling.
“Hope she’s still there,” Whitehall said. “The American captain I talked to kept mumbling about moving prisoners somewhere or other. Bloody hell, it was like talking with a brick.”
Jan glanced at the portly colonel then turned back to the window. A convoy of American army trucks, caked in dirt, headed east along the road that ran parallel with the tracks. Infantry troops slogged alongside. Jan sighed at the familiar sight, weary troops moving on to yet another battle. It was indeed far from over. He would be back in it, he knew, but first…there was Anna.
The cellar room was damp and cold. A thin shaft of sunlight drifted through the only window, which was too small for even her head to pass through. The glass was long gone, allowing free access to the rodents Anna heard scraping and rooting around in the night. She sat on a bench next to the cot and stared at the tiny window and the angle of the sunlight. It was close to noon, she guessed. Soon the American soldier would pull open the creaking door, exchange the bucket that served as her chamber pot, and place a bowl of soup and a plate of bread on the dirt floor.
Anna looked down at yesterday’s soup bowl, overturned with a frustrated kick during her outburst at the soldier who never spoke. “I demand to see the officer in charge!” she had screamed at him. It hadn’t been the first of her tirades, and it had produced the same result. Nothing. The taciturn soldier barely glanced at her, set the bowl on the ground and turned to leave. It was only when she kicked the bowl across the room and it clattered against the stone wall, splattering thick lentil soup in every direction, that he reacted. He stopped, looked at the mess, then turned to her and said, “I hope you’re not hungry. That’s all you get.”
She was hungry. She was cold and dirty—and beside herself with frustration. They had made it out of Germany. Otto had saved her life. Why wouldn’t they listen? What had they done with Otto? Was he in the barbed wire stockade across the road where they were stockpiling German prisoners?
She stood up, ran a hand through her sticky mat of hair and paced the small room to warm up. At least the silent soldier had found a sweater for her to wear over the flimsy dress from Koenig’s obscene wardrobe. She tried to think. How long had she been here? She hadn’t bothered to keep track. Everywhere else she had kept track: in the jail in the unknown town in France, in the hideous bedroom at Koenig’s house, even at Drancy where she had scratched marks on the wall every morning. But here she hadn’t kept track. These were Americans. Belgium was liberated. What was she doing in another prison?
The shelling started again, thumping claps of thunder that shook the ground beneath her. It seemed closer than yesterday. Or perhaps it was her imagination. Who was shelling whom, she wondered? What if the Americans had to pull back? Would they leave her?
The door creaked open, and a soldier stepped into the dank room. It was a different soldier, an officer with an armband emblazoned with the letters “MP.”
He nodded and waved a hand at her. “Follow me. Someone here to see you.”
Anna followed the officer up the stone steps into a room that appeared to be a kitchen. It was the only time she had been out of the cellar, and the light caused her to squint. The MP motioned for her to wait while he stepped into an adjoining room.
Shielding her eyes from the sun, Anna looked out the window at the stockade across the road, hoping to catch a glimpse of Otto. The stockade was nothing more than a farmyard enclosed by wood posts, wire fencing and rolls of barbed wire. American soldiers patrolled the perimeter while, behind the fencing, hundreds of German soldiers milled about, eyes downcast, uniforms filthy and torn. No sign of Otto.
The MP came back and led her into the adjoining room, which appeared to have been a parlor. Now there was just a single table and two or three wooden chairs. A heavyset man stood in front of the table. He nodded as she entered. “Miss Laurent, I am Colonel Stanley Whitehall of the British SOE.”
Anna looked at him, wondering if she should know him. She glanced at the other man in the room standing at the far end of the table. He was tall and blond, his right arm bound in a sling. She looked at his face, and their eyes met.
She stared at him, her mind struggling to process what she was seeing.
He ste
pped forward. “Anna?”
She stumbled back, grasping for the wall.
“Anna…it’s me.”
The room seemed to move, closing in around her. She was still staring at him when her knees gave out and she slid to the floor.
They sat at the table in silence. Anna gripped the glass with both hands and took another sip of water. She set it down carefully, picked up the damp cloth and wiped her forehead. Clutching the borrowed sweater around her shoulders, she flinched as she felt his hand on her arm. His hand fell away, and she turned to look at him.
He was thinner. His blond hair was flecked with gray. There were lines around his eyes she didn’t remember. She looked at his arm bound in the sling. “Is it…” her voice faltered, “…broken?”
He shook his head. “I was shot. It’s healing.”
She nodded and looked away. “How did you…I don’t…?” It wouldn’t come. Her mind was submerged in a fog, as though she had been suddenly transported to another place, another time.
Whitehall cleared his throat. “Perhaps it would be best if I began. Would that be all right, Anna?”
Anna took a breath and looked back at Jan, their eyes meeting, searching. “Yes,” she whispered.
“Very well,” Whitehall said, “I have just a few questions. We understand you were on a mission for the Comet Line using the name ‘Jeanne Laurent.’ Is that correct?”
Anna nodded.
“And you were arrested in France?”
She had to think. It seemed like it had happened in another lifetime. “Yes…that’s right.”
“Where were you taken?”
“I was…put on a train and…” Anna closed her eyes and folded her hands on the table. Images flitted through the fog: black-clad soldiers, barking dogs, the woman leaning against her as they shuffled through the courtyard at Drancy, the wild look in Koenig’s eyes as he squeezed her throat, If you refuse me, even once… Her heart pounded.
She flinched again when Jan placed his hand on top of hers, jolting her back to the moment. His skin was rough, the way she remembered. She glanced at him, then said to Whitehall, “We were taken to Drancy. I was there for two months. Then they sent everyone to…” Her voice trailed off.
Whitehall shifted in his chair, his voice dropped to a whisper. “How did you get to Germany?”
Anna looked down at the table, at Jan’s hand on top of hers, and for a fleeting instant it seemed as though none of it really happened. Then it all came back in a rush. She slumped in the chair and covered her face, trying to hold back the tears, but it was no use. They streamed down her face. “His name was Dieter Koenig…an SS officer.”
She felt Jan touch her shoulder and recoiled, shaking her head. “No, don’t…I’ll never get it out. He was a madman…he took me to Germany and…Oh God, I…” She sat forward and wiped her face, breathing deeply. “Otto killed him. He saved my life and brought me here.” She stared at Whitehall. “Where is Otto? What have you done with him?”
Whitehall leaned forward, speaking softly. “Otto is the reason we found you, Anna. He’s in our custody, and he’s agreed to give us information about the concentration camps. But he first insisted that you be set free.”
“Please help him. Please! He saved my life.”
Jan stood up. “Do you have what you need, Colonel?”
Whitehall nodded. “Yes, for now I’ve got enough.” He pushed his chair back from the table. “I’ll get started on the paperwork.”
• • •
They walked along the dirt road leading away from the farmhouse and the stockade. For mid-October it was warm and the sun felt good on her face, but she kept her arms wrapped around her chest. They followed the road, winding through recently harvested fields, and came to a narrow bridge over a stream. Anna leaned on the stone wall and stared down at the clear water trickling slowly over moss-covered rocks. So much time…so many things. She turned to Jan.
“I’ve seen Justyn,” he said.
She stared at him, covering her mouth with her hands. She hadn’t dared to ask. For months she hadn’t been able to think about Justyn without breaking down over the guilt of leaving him. Tears welled up in her eyes. “Where?” she whispered.
“In Antwerp. He’s safe, living with an older couple, Auguste and Elise, at their home in Merksem. Willy Boeynants helped me find him.”
“Willy?” Anna leaned back against the wall, remembering the night in the jail when Koenig spit out the names of everyone they had arrested. He hadn’t mentioned Willy Boeynants. She looked at Jan for a long time, struggling to understand. How could he be here?
Jan stepped closer. He reached into his pocket and removed the small glass hand.
Anna stared at it in disbelief. She reached out slowly and touched it, tears streaming down her cheeks. “You found it…God in heaven, you found it…and that’s how…” She took a breath. “That’s how you knew?”
Jan started to speak, but his voice caught. He stopped and looked away. Then, after a moment, he said, “Not at first. I didn’t put it all together until later—when Slomak told me about the visas.”
“Slomak? You met Slomak?”
“I was sent back to Poland last year…an undercover mission…”
Anna held up her hand and turned away. It was too much.
“He told me about your father, Anna.”
It was like a sudden cold wind, taking her breath, seizing her heart. She felt his hand on her shoulder but didn’t react, couldn’t react. She remembered the last night she was with her father, and the phone call the next morning, the phone call that had ended one lifetime and thrust her into another. “They murdered him,” she said quietly.
“Anna, Slomak didn’t know anything for sure. He could still be alive.”
She backed away and started walking, her mind burning with rage and frustration, blurred images of her father sitting next to her in church, of Henryk and Irene, the Leffards, the Marchals. Gone…all gone. They hadn’t talked about Stefan but she knew, she could sense it. Gone…they were all gone.
She walked for several minutes then slowed and finally stopped. Jan had followed her but hung back, giving her space. She remembered: he had been like that. She turned and looked at him, searching his eyes, studying his face. He had always been so patient with her, so gentle.
He approached her, still holding the small glass hand. She reached out and took it from him clutching it tightly, then pressed it against her chest. “It’s going to take some time, Jan.”
“We have time, Anna. We have time.”
Author’s Note
IN HIS BOOK, World Crisis, Winston Churchill wrote, “Thus when all the trumpets sounded, every class and rank had something to give…but none gave more, or gave more readily, than the common man or woman.” In these eloquent words lie the essence of the story I have endeavored to tell—a story of countless acts of nobility and courage performed by common people caught up in the catastrophe of humanity’s darkest hour. I have tried to honor the bravery of these heroic people with this work of fiction.
Night of Flames is a historical novel set in Europe during World War II. The main characters, Jan and Anna Kopernik, are fictional as are all of the secondary characters. While some of these characters may be the outgrowth of persons I have known or read about (real and fictional), there was no attempt on my part to portray any particular real person. That being said, there are a number of actual historical figures who appear in the story. Among these are the following.
General Roman Abraham, commanding officer of the Wielkopolska Cavalry Brigade: wounded during the defense of Warsaw, he survived imprisonment by the Germans and returned to Warsaw where he lived until his death in 1976. Mario Di Stefano, First Secretary of the Italian Embassy in Poland in 1939: he was compelled by the Germans to leave the country in March, 1940, just a few months after he would have issued travel visas for Anna, Irene and Justyn. Andree de Jongh, founder of the Comet Line: She was arrested by the Germans in 1943 but survive
d the concentrations camps and, after the war, worked in a leper hospital in Africa. She was eventually made a Belgian Countess. Major General Christoph Graf Stolberg, commander of the German garrison in Antwerp: He was arrested by the White Brigade during the battle for the port and turned over to the British. In his book, The Battle for Antwerp, J. L. Moulton writes that Stolberg “was indignant that the British should have arrived before he was ready for them.” General Stanislaw Maczek, commander of the Polish First Armored Division: he retired to Edinburgh, Scotland, and after the war he was decorated with the Belgian Order of the Crown, among other honors. Additionally, “Antoine,” leader of the White Brigade Resistance forces in the port of Antwerp, was closely modeled after M. Eugene Colson, a merchant navy officer who established the actual Resistance organization in the port and whose code name was “Harry.”
All of the locations in the story are real except for the Polish town of “Wiesko,” near the Berkowicz farm. All of the battles, to the best of my knowledge, happened at or near the locations indicated and during the times indicated. The military units (armies, divisions, regiments, brigades, etc.) actually existed, except for the Twenty-ninth Uhlans Regiment, which is a composite of several of the actual regiments of the Wielkopolska Cavalry Brigade. I have attempted to describe the major battles of the story—the Battle of the Bzura and the Battle for Antwerp—as accurately as possible though I occasionally employed what the noted historian R.G. Collingwood described as “imaginative construction.”
The Resistance organizations in the story—Armia Krajowa (AK) in Poland and White Brigade in Belgium—were real, though there were dozens of others operating in those countries and all over Europe during the war. These organizations were not part of any highly organized strategic scheme. Rather, they were the outgrowth of the will and determination of ordinary people who, against overwhelming odds, chose to fight back against their oppressors. The discovery and subsequent recovery of the V-2 rocket by the AK in Poland was one of the most remarkable achievements by any Resistance organization during the war. Similarly, the activities of the White Brigade during the Battle for Antwerp, including the seizure of the Kruisschans Lock and the re-routing of the British tank squadrons over the Pont van Enschodt, were crucial contributions in the liberation of this vital port.
Night of Flames: A Novel of World War II Page 39
