Mission to Paris (2 page)

‘I should think so,’ Lothar said. ‘Otherwise people will throw things.’

The one-eyed monster brought fresh mastika, the shouts grew louder, the accordion played on. At last, the horse found its courage and, having galloped around the girl a few times, stood behind her on its hind legs with its hooves on her shoulders. The girl never missed a beat but then, when the horse covered her breasts with its hooves, and to the absolute delight of the audience, she blushed, her face turning pink, her eyes closing. As the horse began to move in a rhythmic manner familiar to all.

A little after ten o’clock, a white-haired man with a skull for a face entered the nightclub and peered around the room. When Herbert beckoned to him he approached the table and stood there a moment while the attentive one-eyed monster brought a chair and an extra glass. ‘You would be Aleksey?’ Herbert said. ‘The Russian?’

‘That’s right.’ German was the second language of eastern Europe and Aleksey seemed comfortable speaking it.

‘General Aleksey?’

‘So I’m called – there are many other Alekseys. How did you recognize me?’

‘My associate in Belgrade sent me a photograph.’

‘I don’t remember him taking a photograph.’

Herbert’s shrug was eloquent, they did what they wanted to do. ‘In security work,’ he said, ‘it’s important to take precautions.’

‘Yes, of course it is,’ Aleksey said, letting them know he wasn’t intimidated.

‘Your contract with us calls for payment in Swiss francs, once you’ve done your job, is that right?’

‘Yes. Two thousand Swiss francs.’

‘If I may ask,’ Herbert said, ‘of what army a general?’

‘The Russian army, the Czar’s army. Not the Bolsheviks.’

‘So, after 1917, you emigrated to Belgrade.’

‘“Emigrated” is barely the word. But, yes, I went to Belgrade, to the émigré community there. Fellow Slavs, the Serbians, all that.’

‘Do you have with you … what you’ll need?’

‘Yes. Small but dependable.’

‘With silencer?’

‘As you ordered.’

‘Good. My colleague and I are going out for a while, when we return it will be time for you to do your work. You’ve done it before, we’re told.’

‘I’ve done many things, as I don’t care to sweep floors, and Belgrade has more than enough émigré taxi drivers.’ He paused a moment, then said, ‘So …’

From Herbert, a nod of approval. To the question he’d asked, an oblique answer was apparently the preferred answer. As General Aleksey poured himself some mastika, Herbert met Lothar’s eyes and gestured towards the door. To Aleksey he said, ‘We have an errand to run, when we return we’ll tell you where to go. Meanwhile, the floor show should start up again any time now, you may find it amusing.’

‘How long will you be gone?’

‘Not too long,’ Herbert said, rising to leave.

Prideaux had packed in a hurry, forgetting his pyjama bottoms, and now wore the top and his underdrawers. Alone in a foreign city, he was terribly bored, by ten in the evening had read, for the third time, his last French newspaper. He was also hungry – the desk clerk had brought him a plate of something that couldn’t be eaten – so smoked the last of his Gitanes followed by the first of a packet he’d bought at the Varna railway station. Surely he couldn’t go anywhere; a night-time tour of the Varna waterfront with a million francs in a valise was an invitation to disaster. Stretching out on the bed, he stared at the ceiling, tried not to recall his former life, and fantasized about his new one.
Rich and mysterious, he drew the attention of women
…

A reverie interrupted by two hesitant taps on the door.
Now what?
Somebody from the hotel; if he remained quiet, perhaps they would go away. They didn’t. Thirty seconds later, more taps. He rose from the bed and considered putting on his trousers but thought,
who cares what servants see?
and stayed as he was. Standing at the door, he said, ‘Who is it?’

‘The desk clerk, sir.’

‘What do you want?’

No answer. Out in the harbour, a ship sounded its horn. From the room above, the floorboards creaked as somebody moved about. Finally, whoever was in the hall again tapped on the door. Prideaux opened it. The man in the hallway was slim and well dressed and not a desk clerk. Gently but firmly, the man pushed the door open, then closed it behind him as he entered the room. ‘Monsieur Prideaux?’ he said. ‘May we speak for a moment?’ His French was correct, his accent barbaric. He looked around for a chair but there was no such thing to be found, not in this room, so he settled at the foot of the bed while Prideaux sat by the headboard.

Prideaux’s heart was beating hard, and he hoped desperately that this was something other than what he suspected. ‘You’re not the desk clerk, sir.’

Herbert, his expression on the mournful side, shook his head slowly. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I am not.’

‘Then who are you?’ But for the whine in his voice, this would have been indignant.

Herbert said, ‘Think of me as a courier.’

‘A what?’

‘A courier. I’ve come here to recover something that belongs to us – it certainly doesn’t belong to you.’

Prideaux looked puzzled. ‘What are you talking about?’

Herbert, no more than slightly irritated, simply said, ‘Please.’

‘I don’t know what you want, sir, I simply got fed up with life in Paris and came down here. How does that concern you, whoever you are?’

Herbert turned towards the window – this was growing tiresome. ‘I hope there’s no need for violence, Monsieur Prideaux, my associates are downstairs but please don’t force me to bring them up here. Better that way, believe me. I am, as I said, a courier, and my instructions are to take the money you’ve stolen back to Berlin. After that, we don’t care what you do or where you go, it doesn’t concern us.’

Prideaux collapsed very slowly; the hauteur in his expression drained away, his shoulders slumped, and finally his head lowered so that he stared at the floor.

Herbert took no pleasure in this – a show of humiliation was, to him, unbearable weakness. And what might come next, he wondered. Tears? Hysterics?
Aggression?
Whatever it might be, he didn’t want to see it. ‘I’m sure,’ he said, his voice reaching for sympathy, ‘there was a reason. There’s always a reason.’

Prideaux started to rise, but Herbert stood up quickly, raised a hand like a traffic policeman stopping a car, and a defeated Prideaux sat obediently back down on the bed. Herbert stayed on his feet, stared at Prideaux for a moment, then said, ‘Monsieur Prideaux, I think it will be easier for both of us if you simply tell me where the money is. Really, much easier.’

It took a few seconds – Prideaux had to get control of himself – then he said, so quietly that Herbert could only just hear the words, ‘Under the bed.’

Herbert slid the valise from beneath the bed, undid the buckles, and peered inside. ‘Where are your personal things?’ he said.

Prideaux gestured towards another valise, standing open at the foot of the bed.

‘Did you put any of the money in there? Have you spent some of it? Or is it all, every franc of it, in here? Best now to be truthful.’

‘It’s all there,’ Prideaux said.

Herbert closed the valise and pulled the straps tight. ‘Well, we’ll see. I’m going to take this money away and count it and, if you’ve been honest with me I’ll be back, and I’ll give you a few hundred francs – at least something for wherever you’re going next. Shall I tell you why?’

Prideaux, staring at the floor, didn’t answer.

‘It’s because people like you can be useful, in certain situations, and people like you never have enough money. So, when such people help us out, with whatever we might need, we are always generous. Very generous indeed.’

Herbert let this sink in. It took some time, but Prideaux eventually said, ‘What if I’m … far away?’

Herbert smiled. Prideaux’s eyes were cast down so he didn’t see the smile, which was just as well. ‘Monsieur Prideaux,’ Herbert said, as though he were saying
poor Monsieur Prideaux
, ‘there is no such thing as far away.’ Then he stepped into the hall and drew the door shut behind him.

Herbert left Lothar to watch the hotel, likely unnecessary but why take chances. Prideaux, he thought, had taken the bait and would remain where he was. Herbert then returned to the nightclub, told General Aleksey where to find Prideaux and described him, in his pyjama top and underdrawers. Thirty minutes later, as the canvas horse capered and danced to the music of the accordion, Lothar and the Russian returned. Herbert counted out two thousand Swiss francs, General Aleksey put the money in his pocket, wished them a pleasant evening, and walked out the door.

10 September, 1938. In Berlin, the Ribbentropburo – the political warfare department named for Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop – had its offices in the Reich Foreign Ministry at 3, Wilhelmstrasse. Senior bureaucrats from the ministry liked to take a morning coffee in the dining room of the vast and luxurious Hotel Kaiserhof, on the nearby Wilhelmplatz. This was especially true of the Deputy Director of the Ribbentropburo, who could be found, at seven in the morning, at his customary table in the corner, his sombre blue suit vivid against the background of shining white tablecloths.

The Deputy Director, an SS major, had formerly been a junior professor of social sciences, particularly anthropology, at the University of Dresden. He was an exceptionally bright fellow, with sharp black eyes and sharp features – it was sometimes said of him, privately, that he had a face like an axe. This feature did him no harm, it made him look smart, and you had to be smart to succeed in the political warfare business; you had to understand your enemy’s history, his culture, and, most of all, his psychology.

The Deputy Director’s morning ritual made him accessible to junior staff, of the courageous and ambitious sort, who dared to approach him at his table. This was dangerous, because the Deputy Director did not suffer fools gladly, but it could be done and, if done successfully, might move the underling one rung up the very steep ladder of advancement within the bureau. On the morning of the tenth, a fresh-faced young man carrying a briefcase presented himself to the Deputy Director and was invited to sit down and have a cup of coffee.

After they’d spent a few minutes on the weather and the state of the world, the young man said, ‘A most interesting document has found its way to my desk.’

‘Oh?’

‘Yes, sir. I thought it worth bringing to your attention.’

‘And it is …?’

The young man reached into his briefcase and brought out a press clipping. ‘I have it here, with a translation – the document is in English.’

‘I read English,’ said the Deputy Director. He then snapped his fingers and extended a hand to receive the interesting document.

‘It’s taken from the Hollywood newspaper called
Variety
,’ the young man said as the Deputy Director glanced at the clipping. ‘And reports that the movie actor Fredric Stahl is coming to Paris to make a film.’

‘He is influential? In America?’

‘Not really, he’s just an actor, but I believe we can make use of him once he gets to Paris. He will surely receive attention from the French newspapers and the radio.’

The Deputy Director finished reading the release and handed it back to the young man. ‘What do you propose?’

‘To put him on the list maintained by our French section.’

‘Very well, you may add him to the list, and make sure that what’s-his-name who runs the section does something about it.’

‘You mean Herr Hoff, sir.’

‘Yes, Hoff. Have him work up a background study, all the usual items.’

‘I’ll do that, sir, as soon as I return to the office.’

14 September. After midnight, the liner
Ile de France
rising and falling on the mid-Atlantic swell, a light sea breeze, the stars a million diamonds spread across a black sky.
And
, Stahl thought,
a woman in my arms
. Or at least by his side. They lay together on a deck chair, she in formal gown, he in tuxedo, the warmth of her body welcome on the chilly night, the soft weight of her breast, resting gently against him, a promise that wouldn’t be kept but a sweet promise just the same.
Edith
, he thought. Or was it Edna? He wasn’t sure so would avoid using her name, perhaps call her … what? Well, not
my dear
, anything was better than that, which he found stilted and pretentious though God knew he’d said it a few times. Said it because he’d
had
to, it was written so in the script and he was Fredric Stahl, yes, the Hollywood movie star, that Fredric Stahl, and he’d made a fortune using phrases like
my dear
, which melted the hearts of women from coast to coast when spoken in his faintly foreign accent.

Thus Warner Bros. ‘Why not Fredric Stahl, hunh? With that European accent?’ And just how hard he’d worked to get that accent right they’d never know. He certainly wasn’t alone in this; the English Archie Leach had become Cary Grant by sounding like a sophisticated gent from the east coast, while the Hungarian Peter Lorre developed a voice – insinuating, oily, and menacing – that suggested vaguely Continental origin.

‘Penny for your thoughts,’ the woman said.

‘Such a beautiful night,’ he said.

She moved closer to him, the gin on her breath strong in his nostrils. ‘Who would’ve thought you’d be so nice?’ she said. ‘I mean, in person.’ In response, he put his arm around her shoulders and hugged her a little.

They’d met on the night the
Ile de France
sailed from New York, at the captain’s table in the first-class dining room. A long-suffering, pretty wife she was, her husband three sheets to the wind when they appeared for dinner. Soon he announced, in the middle of someone else’s story, that he owned a Cadillac dealership in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. ‘That’s on the Main Line, in case you don’t know.’ By the third night his table companions knew very well indeed, because he kept repeating it, and at last his wife, Edith, maybe Edna, dealt with the situation by taking him back to their cabin. She then reappeared and when, after dessert, Stahl said he was going for a walk on deck, she caught up to him at the portholed doors to the dining room and said, ‘Can I come along for the walk, Mr. Stahl?’ They walked, smoked, leaned on the rail, sometimes she held her hair back to keep it from blowing around. Finally he found a deck chair – the sling in French Line colours, the footrest polished teak – and they snuggled down together to enjoy the night at sea.