Belevski was sure that the police and the Gestapo patrolling the train station were looking for him. He prayed that his filthy clothes and face made them think he was just another displaced refugee trying to sleep. For the hundredth time in the last twenty-four hours, he begged God for forgiveness and stayed where he was, thankful that the police and soldiers had walked the other way.
Belevski wiped the tears from his eyes and instinctively checked his coat pocket for the knife and blackjack and what little money he had. Milev had promised to come back Sunday night, so at least the doctor had a head start. That was a small consolation, given that the Gestapo was probably after him in full force. To be honest, however, given the choice between the head of the Gestapo in Bulgaria—Lopié called him “Lupus”—and Milev, Belevski thought in this instance, he actually preferred to be in the hands of the German.
Jean Lopié told him that although Lupus was cruel and ruthless, he was also smart and practical. At this point, Belevski was convinced that George Milev was untrustworthy and probably wanted him dead to save his own skin.
“Perhaps if I offered this Lupus fellow some interesting information about Bulgaria’s Chief of the Secret Police, he would let me and my family live. Then again …”
As Belevski watched people wander aimlessly about the train station, he wondered who he could trust enough to ask for help. His brother-in-law had already agreed to take care of his wife and children, so he couldn’t ask him to do any more than that. The doctor hoped that his mess had not caused his wife’s brother any problems with the police or the Gestapo, although the Bulgarian general could take care of himself.
Belevski knew that none of his colleagues at the hospital would lift a finger for him. In fact, several would be thrilled if the doctor’s career took a turn for the worse. And his pro-German relatives wouldn’t offer him any help, either. On the contrary, if they found out that Belevski was a fugitive, they’d probably be the first to call the police. He felt so alone and lost, as helpless as an infant. The doctor’s only hope lay in the one person in Sophia who might be able to still help him—the woman in black.
As the morning hours slowly slipped away and the station became more crowded and noisy, Belevski found it ever more difficult to think clearly. It seemed as if all he could do was watch. From his shadowy corner, he observed a young mother wrapped in a ragged blanket nurse her newborn baby. An old man gnawed on black bread between long swigs from a wineskin. Bulgarian soldiers played cards, flirted with girls, or slept. Menacing German soldiers with machine guns strapped over their shoulders asked everyone for their identification papers. The doctor watched in horror as they questioned one man and then, for no apparent reason, dragged him outside screaming into a waiting truck.
A young woman with long black hair stirred among the band of sleeping gypsies. She looked up at Belevski with her huge brown eyes to see what the fuss was all about, and then seeing that the disturbance had nothing to do with her, promptly dropped her head back onto her companion’s shoulder. Another German soldier across the station glanced over in the doctor’s direction, and Dr. Belevski drew back deeper into the shadows, hoping to remain invisible. He guessed that it was only a matter of time before the soldiers would reach this side of the station and bark, “Papers, hurry up!” Belevski was about to start weeping again when the soldier’s companion called to his partner, and they walked the other way. The train station clock said it was nearly 8:00 a.m., and he was thankful he had survived the night.
Dr. Belevski again considered a rescue plan that had occurred to him during his long night in the train station.
“Every Saturday I am to deliver my envelope with the weekly code word to the post office for Lopié. But I can’t do that this Saturday because it’s too dangerous—the Gestapo are sure to be watching for me here. Now if I don’t put the envelope in the box, Lopié will know something is wrong. If he thinks that I have been killed or arrested, what can he do? Nothing. But if I can get him another message, maybe, just maybe, he can help me. The courier…the old woman in black who collected my envelope each Saturday evening …she’s my only hope.”
Belevski’s spirits rose a little with the slim hope that this idea might work. He thanked God that he had satisfied his curiosity about the courier’s identity months ago. The doctor had spotted her twice before he figured out that she was the one who had keys to his mailbox and picked up the envelope. She came to the post office around 5:00 p.m., and if he was extremely careful, Belevski could pass her an emergency message to give to Lopié. When the station shadows disappeared with the morning light, the doctor decided to leave and take his chances outside.
Belevski spent the day wandering around Sofia, avoiding German soldiers and police. From the train station, he walked toward the majestic gold domes of the Alexandâr Nevski Cathedral, built to honor the Russian soldiers who were killed liberating Bulgaria from Ottoman rule.
His steps led him around the right side of the church to a small entrance where worshippers bought candles to light inside. Belevski had just stepped into the cavernous interior, still absorbed with his troubles, when he gazed up in awe at the immense main cupola. But instead of seeing the painted pious religious figures he had seen so many times before, another vision filled his mind.
Herod and his court look on with excitement as a soldier offers Salome a platter, upon which sits the severed head of John the Baptist. It is Salome’s request as a payment for her dance in honor of Herod’s birthday. Now instead of John the Baptist’s head on the platter, it is Dr. Belevski’s blood-soaked face. The soldier’s face is now George Milev. At his left on the elevated thrown sits a self-satisfied Gestapo officer. At his right, Helen Noverman offers an enigmatic smile.
The doctor saw all his enemies—the people who were responsible for his misery. A curtain had opened, and his future was laid out before him. He slowly touched three fingers to his forehead, down to the center of his chest, to his left shoulder, then to this right, finally stopping over his heart. A moment after he finished crossing himself, the morbid vision disappeared. Afraid and astounded by what he had imagined, Belevski quickly turned around and left the church.
He looked up into the cloudy sky and tried to forget the bloody prophecy, because the doctor wanted to believe that he could escape a similar fate. He zigzagged westward through narrow streets of rutted cobblestone and low houses built around courtyards, stopping every few minutes to glance over his shoulder. He ducked in and out of cheap shops and restaurants, avoiding any real or imagined pursuers.
Changing direction yet again, this time Belevski moved north of the square toward the ancient Banya Banshi mosque and the Turkish baths. A mixture of dilapidated buildings and relics from recent and bygone eastern and western cultures littered the crumbling street. He edged his way past the large dome and single minaret of the ancient mosque to the derelict baths, whose broken tile roof sprouted large clumps of grass. A few old men stood by and gossiped, spitting sunflower seeds, while women filled jugs with mineral water from rusty taps. At that moment, Belevski felt that although he had lived his entire life in Sofia, he was seeing it for the first time.
Around 4:30 p.m., Belevski drifted into the Theater Garden in front of the Central Post Office to look over the area for police or Gestapo and to keep an eye on the building’s entrance. Jean Lopié warned him that Gestapo agents were highly skilled at surveillance. The doctor looked around the square and wondered if he recognized that man waiting by the building. What about the woman walking her dog? Was she an agent, too? Were those two lovers strolling arm in arm under their umbrella really Bulgarian secret police assigned to follow him?
There were several police and German patrols, but Belevski managed to avoid them. A few minutes before 5:00 p.m., he moved to sit on a park bench that the woman in black always walked past after leaving the post office. Stuffed deep in his pocket was a small piece of paper wrapped in a handkerchief that held the doctor�
�s desperate plea for help.
“Thank God, there she is,” he thought to himself as he spotted her. The long black coat covered the length of her body. A black hat and a silk veil shielded her face. Her gait was steady and confident.
He watched her disappear into the crowd walking into the building and imagined her shock when she opened box 174, looked inside, and found no envelope. Maybe she wasn’t all that surprised. Jean Lopié told him that most agents eventually get caught. A minute later, she left the post office and walked toward the park bench where he sat.
If the doctor was going to contact her, he had to do it now. As she walked by, Belevski stood up.
“Excuse me, Madam but I believe you dropped this.” He held out his trembling hand and the handkerchief with the note tucked inside.
She froze, looking at Dr. Belevski and his outstretched hand. The terror of a frightened animal filled her eyes.
“Don’t be afraid. I am the one who puts the envelopes in box 174. But I am in great danger, Madam, and only you can help me. You must send this note to our friends in Istanbul. I don’t have much time. The Gestapo …”
“I have no idea what you are talking about. Go away.” When she started to walk off, Belevski grabbed her wrist.
“I beg you! Please! You’re my only hope!”
The desperation in his voice must have convinced her that he was telling the truth. Like a lady, she gracefully took the handkerchief from his hand, dabbed a few beads of sweat from her brow, and silently went along her way, not even thanking him for his trouble.
A soft rain cast a gloomy pall over Sofia. It reminded Belevski of the day he flew to Istanbul for the first time to treat the Vice President’s son. “Manol, don’t let them fool you,” he heard his wife’s voice, as though she stood right in front of him now.
“I’m sorry, my dear Spasia, but I am a fool.”
Tears rolled down his cheeks and mixed with the steady rain that filled the gaps of the stones in the street. From Saturday evening until Sunday night, Belevski wandered the streets, sleeping in doorways and running the other way whenever he saw soldiers or the police. When he awoke Monday morning to find his picture on the front page of every major newspaper in Sofia, the doctor was amazed that he was still alive.
Part VII
May 1941
CHAPTER 37
“Holy Mother of God! Someone must be punishing me for all my sins!” Helen Noverman sat with Jean Lopié in her Istanbul hotel room as she read the headline of The Morning, Sofia’s daily newspaper.
Sofia, Bulgaria; Monday, May 19. “Hero Doctor Disappeared!” Dr. Manol Belevski, internationally acclaimed surgeon and Professor of Medicine at the General Military Hospital, has not been seen in Sofia for several days, according to hospital authorities. He was last seen wearing a light brown suit, a white dress shirt, and a dark tie. Dr. Belevski is 52 years old, stocky build, average height, gray hair.
Jean Lopié looked up from his folder with the latest top secret dispatches from British Intelligence. From the grimace on his face, Helen could tell that the reports they had sent him weren’t good. She held up the front page of the newspaper so Jean could see the photograph of Dr. Manol Belevski. Then she read aloud.
Dr. Belevski was recently described in several newspapers as “Europe’s Best Surgeon” because he saved the life of the son of the Turkish Vice President. The Bulgarian Police have no clues to his whereabouts, but cannot rule out the possibility of kidnapping. His wife was not available for comment. The police are asking the public for any information that may lead to his safe return.
“Let me see that,” Jean Lopié said.
Jean’s face revealed little as he read the article, searching for additional information hidden between the lines.
“Everything we have worked for over these past months is gone, vanished, along with Dr. Manol Belevski,” Helen said. She felt like throwing up but didn’t say anything. She didn’t want Jean Lopié to know that she had personal feelings for Manol.
“Based on his final radio transmission to us last week, we know that he was okay as of Friday,” Jean said. “But if we don’t get this Saturday’s code word, then we know he is in trouble. I can think of three situations that can explain this.”
Tears welled up in Helen’s eyes.
“And … what would those three situations be, Jean?” she managed to ask.
“One possibility is that the Gestapo arrested him, in which case he is as good as dead, either from their torture or their bullets. The newspaper report could just be a cover story so the Germans don’t have to answer any embarrassing questions about the death of a famous doctor who was caught spying for the Allies.”
“And the second?” she asked, afraid to hear the answer.
“Perhaps he somehow managed to escape the Bulgarian police and Gestapo and is now on the loose, only God knows where.”
“Then only God can help him,” Helen said. “And what might the third possibility be?” Helen hoped that it was better than the first two.
“Maybe Manol has cut and run. The article said that his wife was not available for comment, so perhaps he took his family and went away—to another country maybe—somewhere that the Gestapo, the Bulgarian Police and we wouldn’t be able to find him. Then at least we won’t have to roll up our entire network.”
“Or maybe he has just run off with his latest mistress and is shacked up in some sleazy hotel,” Helen added. “We know what kind of taste Manol has in women.”
Jean looked at Helen, knowing the meaning behind her remark.
After a moment he said, “If the Germans or Bulgarians have him in custody, then Operation Scalpel is over, and our courier in Sofia has also been arrested or is in great danger. But if Belevski is on the run, then it will only be a matter of time before the Gestapo catches up with him.”
“What about Milev?” Helen asked. “Jean, you told him to go to Milev if he got into trouble. Maybe that’s what he did.”
Jean rubbed his eyes and then stroked the hair on the nape of his neck. “We’ll send a message to our courier in Sofia to see if she is still engaged. At the same time, I’ll try to make radio contact with Manol.”
“And if he still doesn’t respond, then what?”
“We wait and see, Helen. We wait and see.”
Over the next two days, Jean transmitted an emergency contact message to Belevski at several pre-established times, but no message came in response. They read every Bulgarian newspaper and listened to Bulgarian radio, but neither shed any further light onto Manol’s disappearance. The Bulgarian Police issued no additional reports, pictures, or—thank God—rumors of his arrest by the Gestapo or suggestions that he may have been a foreign agent.
“If the Gestapo had arrested him, we would have heard about it through the grapevine,” Jean said. “News like that would be almost impossible to keep a secret.”
“There is, of course, another possibility,” Helen said.
“What would that be?”
“Lupus could be using Manol to trap us.” Helen bowed her head and looked at the floor.
“But if that were the case,” Jean said, “Manol could have led them to us in Istanbul. There are plenty of Gestapo agents in Turkey.”
They both paused to consider this scenario.
“What if Manol was afraid that his cover was blown, so he went to Milev for help, as you instructed. But if he did, why haven’t we heard from our so-called double agent, the Chief of the Bulgarian Secret Police?”
Jean shrugged. He was about to offer a theory when Helen waved her hand for him to remain silent.
“Perhaps Milev has changed his mind about working for the Allies and wants to save his own skin, but he can’t let Lupus or the Gestapo find Dr. Belevski alive. Milev certainly would have extracted the name of our courier in Sofia from Manol before killing him, and as far as we know, she hasn’t been arrested. That would point to the possibility that Manol is out there on his own and our netwo
rk is still safe. That is, until either the Gestapo or Milev catch up with him.”
“Aren’t you assuming a lot, Helen?” Jean asked.
“Maybe I am, but if we want to save everything we’ve accomplished and worked so hard for, we need to get Manol out of Bulgaria. Jean, I want to go to Sofia.”
“You never got over what you did to Manol in that Istanbul hotel, did you, Helen?” Jean asked. “Do you really think that this is the way to ease your conscience?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Jean. I’m simply suggesting a way to save our network, and yes, hopefully, Manol’s life. We have done well by him, and we owe it to Manol to help, to save his life, if we can. Is there anything wrong with that?”
“Nothing, but we don’t even know if he’s still alive, for Christ’s sake! And for us to go back to Sofia at this point with all the German troops there is pure insanity.”
“Who said anything about ‘us’?”
After a long hesitation, Jean spoke.
“Helen, you’ve come a long way since I took you away from that pimp of yours in Paris. Over the last two years you’ve become an excellent agent. You think strategically, and you have genuine courage, but…” Jean paused.
“But what?” She folded her arms and waited for Jean’s argument.
“But, Helen, you are more than an agent to me. Please be sensible.”
“Jean, there’s a job to be done, and unless you can find a better person to do it than me, I want to go.”
“Let’s talk about it in the morning.”
Laugh of the Hyenas Page 26
