Last Train to Paris (28 page)

“He wouldn't have told you, R.B, nor would he have told his parents—you three were the heart of his life. You've really got to understand this. Anyway, you weren't the first person he forged documents for. Listen,” he said, and he reached across and took my hand, “when you were in Paris, he heard that Esther was in trouble because she didn't have the right papers. Leon recommended a colleague but he botched it, and he felt responsible. Stefan told me that he fixed the problems and simply kept on going.”

I moved my hand.

“It's still my fault. And how—”

“No, you're wrong,” Pete said. “He was heading in that direction anyway. Let me ask you this. If you had his talent, wouldn't you have done the same?”

“Probably not,” I said. “I don't have Leon's courage.”

“That's baloney, R.B., and you know it. Didn't you notice,” he continued, “how much happier he was in the last few months? I think he had finally got his teeth into a way of seriously helping the cause.”

“I thought it was because we were so deeply in love,” I said wryly.

I wanted to close my eyes and sink into oblivion. I had always loved tragic novels, imagining myself as the savior of someone in distress. But not this. No, this pain was beyond imagination. And—I wasn't a savior. Just as I couldn't save Stella, or Andy, I had not saved Leon.

 

Pete kept talking. “His chance of escaping went off the edge, thanks to your mother. Sorry, R.B., I don't mean to be so callous.”

“It's okay, Pete, it's the truth.”

“I think,” he continued, “that he was in the process of devising another escape plan. A few weeks ago, we ran into each other on the street. He looked terrible. He told me that his parents had been rounded up and transported to one of the camps.”

“Oh, how awful, how awful—they were so close.”

“Yes, it was terrible, but Leon had an interesting response. ‘I should have gone with them,' he told me. ‘Thrown myself in front of their train—something, anything to take away the pain and guilt that I wasn't taken too. But, honestly, as long as Rosie's alive, I'll try my best to stay alive too.' And then he said something that really struck me. ‘I had to give up Rosie for my parents, and Rosie had to give me up for her mother. And since her father was already dead, it comes out even.'

“Someone betrayed Leon. We don't know who it was, although I suspect it was his boss Gerard's wife. Anyway, I rushed to his building, thinking that with my newspaper credentials, perhaps I could stop the momentum. The front door was open and I pushed my way in. A Gestapo officer yelled: ‘You can't stay here,' and I flashed my papers without letting him read the details.

“I heard a terrible racket. Doors slamming. Glass breaking. Orders being barked. People screaming. Then all of a sudden, I looked up. It was Leon being arrested by two men. He was fighting back, kicking and trying to get his arms loose. He screamed, ‘No, Gerard. You can't do this!' They pushed him down the last flight of stairs, where he hit his head on the marble and banged into the railing. I ran to help him, but was punched in the stomach and put in a stranglehold by an SS man. Leon was alive—that I could see. But there was blood everywhere. As I was being forced out of the building, I looked back and saw Gerard. His face was blank. A zombie. Standing beside him in the doorway was a woman, whom I assumed was his wife. She was smirking.

“As I waited on the sidewalk, pretending to gather myself together so I could leave, Leon was dragged out and was being tossed into the back of a black car. He caught his foot on the running board, and for a moment was free. He began to run. ‘No! Don't shoot!' I heard Gerard scream. And, of course, he was easily caught within a couple of seconds. Leon fought furiously, but was handcuffed and driven away.

“I followed him to the Gestapo headquarters, the one across the street from Stefan's favorite watching spot. It was odd because it was the first day of sun in a couple of weeks. Yet, when I look back at the day, it was overcast and gloomy and—

“I tried, R.B. I swear to you, I tried to get him released. But there was no one left in Berlin whom I knew. Are you okay? Should I go on?”

“No, I'm not okay, but keep talking.”

“I was warned by the bureaucrat at the front desk,” Pete continued, “to leave immediately. ‘There's not a thing you can do,' he said. ‘It's over for him.'

“The next day Leon was taken to another Gestapo headquarters,” Pete said, talking to the table, not looking at my face. “I heard he was questioned and tortured—I don't know the details, I promise. Then he was sentenced to ‘death for treason and acts preparatory to high treason.'”

I felt as if I were going to faint and vomit at the same time. I reached across for Pete's whiskey and took a gulp—and waited for it to settle me down.

Pete waited, too.

I nodded for him to continue. “And I might as well get it all out,” he said. “There's more bad news. Two days ago Stefan and Esther were murdered by the Gestapo—they were also charged with treason.” The bar was so quiet. The radio had been turned off. We were speaking almost in whispers. But everyone was listening. Poor Stefan. Esther. My grief was physical. I grabbed Pete's hand, desperate for an anchor.

“Are you positive about Leon?” I managed to say.

‘There are so many killings now,' Pete said, ‘that everyone seems to have lost track, even the meticulous Germans. Sometimes they post the names of the accused and their dates of execution on the gates of the prisons. But I didn't see Leon's name. So no, I'm not positive. I'm so sorry, R.B. Let me buy you a–'

“Thanks, Pete, but I have to go.”

“Okay. I understand. But I have to tell you that I leave in the morning for Paris.”

I staggered out of the bar as if I were drunk. I wasn't drunk, but I felt a cold, knifelike fury at myself. And I finally realized that I had nowhere to go. No one to go to. My good friends were covering stories all over the world. I was truly on my own.

As I was walking down those dismal streets, all I could think of was how frightened he must have been—and then I imagined his handsome head rolling into a basket. If I hadn't observed Vosberg's beheading, I would have been able to avoid the image. But no, I saw it all in my mind, second by second. I would never be able to forgive myself for perching like a vulture to watch Vosberg's death.

 

More than five decades later and my memory is still keen. I need to go to my office and find Pete's last dispatch from Paris. I know where it is. I kept it in a folder along with other pieces he had written, which I thought special. I remember it because he wrote it in my journalistic style. It was his way of saying good-bye.

 

Berlin. Friday, June 14, 1940. I was at the press office listening to the invasion of France on the BBC. The following cable from Pete arrived in the midst of the chaos:
My last article for the last edition in a free France. For the first time imitating your literary style—hope you don't mind. Ta-ta, R.B. See you in London. Pete.

 

The Country of France Will Be No More

By Pete Grogan

PARIS, June 14, 1940—
On this unusually chilly morning, a thin and piercing sound gripped the city. Threatening planes swept in, swooped toward their targets, faded away, and lunged again. The populace of Paris held its breath. Unopposed Luftwaffe dive-bombers pounded France from above while some two thousand panzers roared across the countryside, scattering the disorganized French army. The Germans destroyed everything in their path.
La drôle de guerre
, the Phony War, has turned real.

Today's invasion ended the publishing of all bona fide French newspapers. Even the famous
Paris-Soir
has become a Nazi sheet. All news, from now on, will be controlled by the conquerors.

The exodus has begun. Three of the five million citizens living in Paris, feeling unprepared, lied to by their government, and driven by panic, are moving toward the south in retreat. I wandered the city, walking through the waves of fleeing citizens. The noise is unbearable—a nerve-racking cacophony of honking horns and screaming from people who have been separated from their families in the rush forward. The streets are jammed with refugees carrying suitcases. Hanging off these fleeing citizens' backs are bedrolls, mattresses, pots and pans. Anything with wheels is piled with belongings—children and the elderly and the infirm, chickens and pet birds are balanced on top. Cars creep along, stalling by the wayside when they run out of gas or have simply broken down. There is such a putrid smell of death and fear hanging over the avenues of escape that I often gagged. France's roads are littered with corpses—littered with people, too weary to continue—littered with wounded and starving human beings—littered with animals, mainly dead—everything soaked with human waste. Everyone looks old, including the children. Everyone is overwhelmed with sadness. The dreaded end of France has begun.

 

There's a small wood bench outside, right in the center of my herb garden. Coleman built it many years ago, and although it's a bit lopsided, I can still sit among the aromas of my plants, my face reaching for the sun. I have to remind myself, though, that each time I stand I must be careful—I could easily fall. These “elderly rules” drive me nuts.

Strangely, now that I've come to the end of reading my papers, looking at my garden makes me sad. Will I live to plant the wildflower seeds I've collected all summer? Will I be here to see them bloom? I can't bear the thought of not seeing how the garden drama plays out in the next season. Every year there are surprises. One year, an enormous sunflower plant grew at the edge of the field. I didn't plant it. So where did it come from? A visiting bird, I presume.

Many of my lessons about growing older are learned from tending my garden. I know that even though I plant my seeds, not every seedcase will burst and give birth to a new plant. But that's how it's meant to be. One day my body will shatter, and I, a used-up seed, will return to the earth too—but never to bloom again.

 

* * *

 

Fifty-two years ago, I left Paris. Reading these old notes has forced me to remember things that I would rather forget—and also things that I'm delighted to be reminded of. Yes, today, some illusions have been shattered; some are surprisingly honest.

I'm going to take a break. Make a cup of tea. While waiting for the water to boil, I turn on the radio and out comes an exaggerated waltz—Strauss, of course. With a red pillow as my partner, I waltz around the kitchen table, gliding to the music on my old polished wood floors.

I fill the emptiness with memories.

I dance.

I try to remember the truth.

I dance.

I try to avoid the reality of my age.

I dance.

I am afraid of death.

I dance and weep.

 

It had been six months since Leon had disappeared and I still wasn't ready to accept his fate. I was aware that searching for a missing Jewish person in Germany was a macabre joke. There was no agency for displaced people, no government bureau to assist me. Even if I were to find an empathic human being, he or she would be taking an enormous chance. One side of me, the tough newspaperwoman, would need to overcome the woman-in-love's apprehension. I decided that I had to go to the source.

I arrived at the address. Nervous. Come on, Rosie, I said to myself, you've asked questions of far more important and frightening people. Pretend this is an interview for the
Courier
. I climbed the dramatic, sweeping marble staircase, trying not to look for bloodstains. Gerard's door had a sparkling brass nameplate:
Gerard von Schmitt
.

“What do you want?” asked a tall, blonde, very pregnant woman who opened the door.

“Mr. von Schmitt, please,” I said in my best, most formal German.

Without saying another word, she ushered me in.

“Mrs. von Schmitt?” I asked. “My name's Rose Manon. How do you do,” I said, and I put out my hand to shake.

She ignored me.

“Wait here,” she commanded, pointing to a stiff-backed, armless chair. She waddled out of the room, resting her hands on top of her stomach. So, I thought, this is the woman who was behind Leon's arrest. Until that day, I had never met an ugly pregnant woman.

The room, a large vestibule, was stuffed with dark, chunky furniture. I recognized a chair from Leon's apartment. But hanging on the walls were a number of appealing landscapes. They reminded me of the painters of the Hudson River School that I had seen at a museum in New York many years before. Warm, musty, as if it had rained the night before—the pictures were muted pastoral scenes of rivers and trees in full bloom. Leon was right. Gerard was a good artist.

And then there he was, with his wife looming behind him. I remembered what Leon had said about his looks. He was handsome, in a Teutonic way, and had a pleasant, open face.

“Mr. von Schmitt,” I said, standing and shaking his hand. “My name's Rose Manon from the
Paris Courier
and I'm looking for Leon Wolff.”

“I know who you are,” he said. “Leon told me about you.”

“Did you not receive my letters from Paris, asking about Leon?”

‘No, I didn't,' he said, and he turned and looked questioningly at his wife. ‘Helene?'

“She's a Jew!” his wife said. “I returned them all. Now I'll call the police.”

“No you won't,” he said firmly. “Please go into the other room and close the door.”

She turned with a huff, walked through the door, and slammed it.

“Have a seat, Miss Manon. I apologize about Helene—her vehemence still surprises me. But you have to know that she didn't turn Leon in. All the artisans who were working for the government were rounded up at the same time. The officials wanted them all kept in the same place, rather than scattered throughout the country. Even though Helene's harsh with her opinions, this event wasn't her fault. Now, you want to know what happened to Leon? Am I correct?”