Prague Counterpoint

by Bodie Thoene

  Elisa’s replacement raised her bow to comment. “That is not how it is played in Berlin. In Berlin we play it with the strength that the Führer enjoys in such a work!”

  The conductor glowered at her. “This, Frau . . . ” He rolled his hands as if he were trying to remember her name.

  “Frau Schönheim,” she obliged.

  “Frau Schönheim, as in beautiful?” The words were patronizing, and it was clear that he thought the name was totally inappropriate for the creature who now challenged him. The rage of the conductor escalated to fortissimo. “This is not Berlinnnnn! This is Viennaaaaa! The skull of Haydn is right downstairs in a glass case! Last I saw of the dear composer, he was grinning! But now, I am quite certain that the smile on his skull has vanished! If I but look—if I dare to look at the skull of Franz Joseph Haydn—he will not be grinning unless it is over the hideous, odious laws that forced us to replace the finest musicians in the world with imports from Berlin who cannot even pronounce the name of Haydn correctly, let alone read his music!”

  “Good for him!” Murphy muttered as the matronly violinist rose nose first and exited stage right. She was followed moments later by a bevy of new faces, all of whom, Murphy noticed for the first time, wore Nazi Party badges and armbands.

  The conductor glared after them, and when the last member of the invading tribe disappeared through the curtains across the stage from Murphy, the man raised his baton. “Now, children,” he said gently to the remaining members of his orchestra, “remember, Haydn was thinking of toy soldiers when he wrote this. Perfect for our departing guests, I think. A caricature of a military march! Light!”

  Murphy laughed as the music began. It was, indeed, a caricature of the Nazis who stamped around the Imperial City. The old man at the kettledrums had not left with the others. Murphy remembered that he had substituted once for Shimon. A broad smile covered his face as well. Despite the vacant chairs, the unity of the orchestra was easily discernable, even to Murphy’s untrained ear.

  “Good! Good! Yes! Can you feel the pulse!” The conductor roared his approval over the music. Only Murphy seemed to notice the angry curses of the expelled musicians as they swept behind the curtain and then out the door of the auditorium. The music seemed to mock their anger. Now Murphy recognized the piece. The orchestra had played it once when he had sat in the audience for no other purpose than to gaze at Elisa. “Yes, children!” The conductor shouted encouragement.

  After a moment he put the baton down on his stand. His musicians were still smiling at him. Then, in a show of approval, they began tapping their feet against the stage. Murphy applauded also, though he could not help but wonder what would happen to the brave conductor who had ousted Nazi substitutes from his orchestra. At last the thumping died away. The conductor bowed slightly and said, “Haydn is certainly smiling again!”

  ***

  In the maestro’s small, cluttered office, Murphy gazed mutely at photographs showing the conductor standing with men like the now-arrested Chancellor Schuschnigg, Churchill, King George, and a host of other dignitaries who were definitely not on Hitler’s guest list. The kindly conductor now read Elisa’s note from Prague.

  “Thank God!” He sighed, carefully folding the note. “I was afraid I had lost the best violinist in my first-violin section! Thought perhaps she had been dragged away with the others.” His face showed the strain of the last few days.

  “When you say others––” Murphy felt the dread of Leah’s fate even before her name was said.

  “Leah Feldstein and Elisa have been inseparable; certainly you know that.”

  “I have tried to locate Leah.”

  “She and her husband have been arrested, I am told.” He shook his head sadly. “Why is, of course, the question of the hour here in Vienna! I thought that Elisa’s closeness might have brought her to the same fate.”

  Murphy leaned forward in his chair. “You are sure, Maestro?” He could hardly speak.

  The tousled head nodded as he looked toward a group photo of the orchestra. “We can come to no other conclusion. Shimon was seen being beaten and then placed onto one of the prisoner lorries. Leah left the Judenplatz carrying her violoncello, but, to our knowledge, she never arrived here at the Musikverein. The Nazis were pulling Jews off the street—men, women. It didn’t make any difference. She probably did not make it two blocks before they picked her up. I am afraid, Herr Murphy.”

  Murphy studied the old gentleman, who now had tears brimming in his eyes. “Elisa will need to stay in Prague until the first waves of violence stop.”

  “Of course. Although she is the perfect physical specimen of their ideal Aryan woman,” the maestro spat angrily, “this connection with the Feldsteins might place her in danger.”

  Murphy thought of this morning’s expulsion of Nazi musicians. “And what about you? Are you concerned at all for yourself, after this morning?”

  The maestro dismissed the thought of his own safety with a wave of his hand. “They may search my pedigree. It is perfect. A conductor has the right to dismiss inferior, idiotic imposters who call themselves musicians, and I doubt that the Germans will have much to say about it. After all, the Reich cannot have music played in a shoddy fashion, now can it?”

  Murphy grinned with admiration. “Is there anything to be done about Leah and Shimon and the others?”

  “I have already lodged my most extreme protest with the new Reich officials, indicating that such arrests will cause the quality of music in the German Reich to diminish. The problem, of course, is that the Feldsteins were planning on leaving Austria anyway. The Gestapo indicated that their visas to Palestine had been confiscated. I don’t know how much more I can do for them since they had a fixed date for emigration. The Germans have all records of that sort in their hands now.” He bit his lip and continued to gaze at the photo. “I am not sure how far my influence will go. Or even if I still have influence.”

  He glanced to Murphy. “But, please, when you see my little Elisa, tell her I am doing all I can. Tell her that she may come back when she feels it is opportune to do so. As long as I am maestro of the Vienna Philharmonic, she will always have a chair among my children.”

  He carefully folded her note and opened his file drawer to slip it in among a mix of musical scores and correspondence. “There! If the Germans should question her whereabouts—and they will—then I shall simply produce this note from her in Prague and tell them that she is on leave for important family matters.”

  “Thank you. She told me you would be willing––”

  “Of course. A violinist like Elisa Linder comes into the life of a conductor only once.” He smiled knowingly. “But then, you already know her worth; do you not, Herr Murphy?” He narrowed his eyes and peered up at the ceiling. “Ah yes! She is not Linder anymore! I shall have to have her name changed on the program notes. Murphy. Murphy.” He repeated the name several times. “Perfectly dreadful sound to it. Murphy. It sounds so . . . ”

  Murphy laughed and stood to go. “American?”

  “That’s it! It sounds perfectly American. And what we all wouldn’t give for an American-sounding name these days.”

  The conductor was joking, but the thought of Elisa marrying him for an American passport struck Murphy to the core again. “Y-yes,” he stammered, suddenly uncomfortable. “I’ll tell her . . . tell her you’re changing her name on the program. Thanks.” Then he shook the conductor’s hand and walked out past the darkened stage. Memories of Elisa’s laughter as Rudy had clowned and Leah had teased her into accepting a dinner date with Murphy overwhelmed him. How melancholy the stage was without all of them! How dark and empty!

  ***

  Thomas von Kleistmann left the Vienna bookshop with a thin paper-wrapped volume in his hand. Within the pages was the reply of the German High Command to certain British questions.

  Although everything appeared quiet now, the earth beneath Czech-Sudetenland would soon begin to tremble. Already the agents of the Reich
moved quietly among the Germans within the borders of Czechoslovakia. The riots would begin soon. By the middle of May the Führer hoped to annex the Sudetenland—by force, by sheer intimidation! The pitiful showing of the German Wehrmacht in the invasion of Austria proved that the Nazi forces were still not ready to fight. A show of strength by Britain and France, therefore, would keep the German divisions on their own side by the border. Of this, the generals of the High Command were certain.

  Hitler had taken Austria by a bully’s bluff. He planned on the same tactics in Czechoslovakia. “Stand firm!” This was the message of Canaris and the others who opposed Hitler. “Do not believe the illusion of force the madman displays to the world!”

  Thomas felt as though he carried the hope of all the world in his pocket as he walked quickly away from Fiori’s shop. And with that hope he carried the burden of fear within himself.

  Once again he turned the corner of Elisa’s street. His eyes swept upward to the lacy curtains of her apartment. Is she there? he wondered. He slowed his pace as though some unseen hand held him back. He imagined himself climbing the stairs, knocking on the door of her apartment. He could almost see the surprise on her face as she threw open the door and pulled him into the warmth of the place that was so very much her own.

  Then he turned his face away from the building as the roar of a German bomber passed over the city. The shadow of the plane swept toward him, touching him, and he remembered the face of Le Morthomme. “We are all dead men,” Thomas whispered under his breath as his eyes fixed on the swastikas painted on the wings of the plane.

  22

  A Futile Risk

  The photograph of Hitler, his arms outstretched over the multitudes in the Heldenplatz, took up nearly the entire front page of Der Führer, the official Nazi newspaper. Headlines in forty-eight-point type proclaimed “TRIUMPHANT WELCOME IN VIENNA!”

  This and Der Stürmer were the worst of the propaganda sheets put out by Goebbels and his Ministry of Propaganda. Newsboys with swastika armbands were handing copies of each newspaper out freely on every street corner in Vienna.

  A half dozen issues were spread out on the floor of Bill Skies’ flat this evening. Murphy stared down at the multiple images of the Führer greeting his cheering masses.

  “He looks like the pope or something,” Murphy said.

  “Haven’t you noticed?” Timmons drawled. “He thinks he is the pope!”

  Skies blew his nose thoughtfully, then peered down at the identical front pages. “All the same,” he remarked, “Murphy’s right. It’s perfect! Perfect! There’s not one of those goons tearing through luggage at Alpern Airport who would dare lay a finger on a victorious front page photo of their precious Führer.”

  Murphy grinned. “You can bet anybody who tore up a picture like that would be shot immediately.”

  “Well, you can hope so, Murphy.” Timmons seemed doubtful. “Have you seen the way the Gestapo is going through stuff down there? I’m tellin’ you, pal, they’re gonna go through your shorts looking for just this kind of thing!” He jerked his thumb toward the Kronenberger documents. “And if they catch you with that, it’s gonna take a whole lot more than a word from the American Embassy and a special dispensation from the pope to get you out of a Gestapo dungeon! This is the kind of stuff that gives the SS goons the opportunity to shoot people. I saw it happen, remember? Walter Kronenberger is pushin’ up daises over this, Murph!”

  Murphy nodded. He had considered all of it, but Skies was right. The Kronenberger letter was something that deserved attention in the free press—just the kind of story that might keep the free press free a while longer. “If I get caught, promise me you’ll come visit, will you?” he joked, but Timmons and Skies did not smile.

  Skies chewed his lip nervously. “Maybe we’d better wait until things calm down a bit.”

  Murphy shook his head. “You and I both know that this isn’t going to calm down. It’s going to get worse. Just like it did in Germany. Just like Kronenberger wrote it.” He clapped his hands together to say that the discussion was finished. “Okay, Timmons, you were the pasteup man for your college paper. So get to pasting.”

  Walter Kronenberger had written his last testament on thin onion-skin paper, filling up both sides of each sheet with tiny, neat printing.

  Timmons laid the newspaper out with the photo of Hitler facedown. Then, with a worried glance at Murphy, he placed tiny dabs of paste onto the corners of the first sheet of the Kronenberger document. With all the care of a boy with a pasteup scrapbook, Timmons pasted each thin piece of stationery onto the back of the newspaper. There was room enough for six sheets on the section, and when he had finished, he picked up a second identical front page and laid it carefully over the first. Glancing up for approval he said, “It’s going to be a little thick.”

  “Go ahead,” Murphy reassured him. “I’ll chance it.”

  With a shrug, Timmons pasted the identical section over the first, concealing the onionskin pages of the document. He and Murphy examined the section carefully for any lumps or traces of glue that might give away the fact that illegal contraband was concealed between the pages of the newspaper. Except for the extra weight of the front page, it looked like any other.

  “Some sandwich,” Murphy said, pleased with the results.

  Twice more Timmons repeated the procedure, each time using pages from the newspaper that had photographs of Hitler prominently displayed. They hoped that such photographs would keep the Gestapo from looking too closely at the double-thickness of the newsprint while the precious document was hidden inside this secret envelope.

  Murphy reassembled the newspaper and laid it on the table where they studied it for effect as they shared a pot of strong coffee. The conclusion was unanimous.

  “I got a couple of awards for my pasteup,” Timmons said proudly.

  “Yep,” Skies agreed. “Looks like another one of Goebbels’ propaganda rags to me!”

  Timmons frowned slightly. “We’ll just hope the SS goons at Alpern think so too.”

  ***

  At Murphy’s request, Bill Skies drove slowly past Elisa’s apartment for one last look. Their headlights illuminated the front entrance, where yet another SS sentry stood talking to a fat man just inside the lobby.

  “No getting past those guys without a bunch of questions,” Timmons said mournfully from the backseat.

  Murphy peered up to the window of Elisa’s flat. No lights shone through the shade. Like the stage of the Musikverein, the place seemed dark and empty. “It doesn’t matter,” Murphy mumbled, regretting that he had been able to do so little in the search for Shimon and Leah. “Nobody’s there, anyway.”

  “The German army will be there soon enough, then,” Skies said with certainty. “They’ve got men billeted everywhere now. You might as well forget about it, Murphy,” he vainly attempted to console his friend. “There isn’t one of us who hasn’t seen friends disappear since those goons marched in. And what can we do about it?”

  Murphy found some comfort that the maestro had at least lodged his protests with the authorities. He would tell Elisa that much when he saw her. But the plain truth was that Murphy felt his failure to find Leah and Shimon was somehow a failure of his promise to Elisa.

  “You can’t expect to fix every mess, Murphy,” Timmons added. “The best you can do is get this Kronenberger thing into the news.”

  Skies cleared his throat. “Right. And don’t get yourself arrested in the process, will you?”

  The newspaper carrying the Kronenberger document lay innocently between them on the seat. Murphy glanced down at his “souvenir of the Anschluss” and silently whispered a prayer as they pulled into the line of official German vehicles and taxis heading for the airfield.

  Wehrmacht soldiers directed civilian traffic to the left, and Nazi vehicles to the right, toward the choicest parking places near the terminal building. Planes roared overhead, an uninterrupted line of military aircraft taking off or landing. The p
eaceful little airport had become the hub of all Nazi activity in Vienna.

  There were more soldiers and officers than civilians. The soldiers appeared cocky and self-confident. The civilians, most carrying small bags, wore worried, hunted expressions. They fell into lines outside the building, where their suitcases were torn open for inspection.

  Traffic inched forward. Murphy nervously clutched the handle of his small valise and slipped the newspaper under his arm. “Let me out here,” he instructed. “If they nab me, there’s no use you two getting tangled up in the thing as well.”

  Skies nodded and stopped the car. “Good luck, Murphy.” He licked his lips, and Murphy sensed the apprehension in his final handshake.