Danzig Passage

  ***

  Haj Amin Husseini, exiled Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, defender of Islam and herald of Jihad, advanced majestically to meet Adolf Hitler. Haj Amin was dressed in a flowing blue cape over an expensive white silk robe. His perfectly starched white tarboosh sat poised above his red-bearded face like a crown of state. Of the two men, Haj Amin looked more like the monarch of an Aryan nation than did the dark-haired, drably uniformed Hitler. Even so, Haj Amin was coming to beg favors of the German Führer, and both men knew the reality of the relationship.

  Haj Amin touched his fingertips to his forehead, his lips, and his heart in a sweeping gesture of salaam. Hitler bowed in acknowledgment, then extended his hands in welcome. The Führer directed the Grand Mufti to a pair of formal chairs drawn up before a stone fireplace. Haj Amin’s retainers had not been permitted to enter with him, and with a short wave of his hand, Hitler dismissed his own aides as well.

  Haj Amin spoke first, in excellent German. “Herr Hitler, how it pleases me to meet you at last. Your assistance to our struggle is such clear evidence of your far-seeing wisdom.”

  “And how is that struggle progressing?” inquired Hitler quietly, even though he already knew the answer.

  “Well, extremely well! Of course you know my poor troops have neither the equipment nor the training to even compare with your legions, whom we strive to imitate. But with additional funds—”

  Hitler interrupted. “It has come to my attention that the efforts in the north of Palestine have suffered some setbacks. Even some of our . . . advisors . . . to your cause have disappeared. Can you explain this?”

  “It is the perfidious British,” replied Haj Amin, bristling. “They say they will not tolerate these Jewish murderers, but they wink at this man Orde and his gang and commandos.”

  “So because of one man your campaign falters?” asked Hitler, fixing his gaze on Haj Amin’s eyes.

  The Mufti shifted uncomfortably in his chair. He had noticed that the Führer had not said “our campaign.” “We have placed a price on his head. It is only a matter of time until—”

  The Führer answered kindly, but his firmness admitted no further argument. “You are in error. No Jews, no British must be allowed to think that resistance is profitable, or even possible. They must be allowed no time to reflect on what one man can do.”

  “But how can we stop him immediately?”

  “Isolate him. Have your envoy tell the British that the sole reason for the Arab riots is their wayward officer. Tell them that there can be no peace until he is removed, that there cannot even be peace talks until he is out of the way.” The Führer’s voice was patient, instructive.

  Haj Amin blinked. “But we have used the peace talk issue to prevent further Jewish immigration to Palestine.”

  “Exactly,” Hitler confirmed, as if recognizing a bright pupil. “They have met one demand. Now is the precise time to escalate those demands. Tell them it is not enough.”

  “I see, I see,” nodded Haj Amin. “And if they refuse to discuss the matter?”

  “Promise them unending demonstrations, riots, and bloodshed, and then have your representative walk out of the room!”

  “And will the British sacrifice one of their own, their best fighter?”

  “My friend,” said Hitler jovially, “you must study the lessons of the history of your own region more thoroughly. The British are in the precise spot to bring you his head on a platter, if you know how to ask for it.”

  Later that evening the Führer of the Third Reich and the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem appeared together publicly. They spoke of mutual admiration and cooperation in overcoming mutual problems. The Führer and the Grand Mufti posed for photographs together as Herr Hitler presented a personal token of friendship to Haj Amin. It was a bulletproof vest.

  ***

  It had been a discouraging week for Otto. His notebook carefully hidden away, he had taken all the names and facts from John Murphy’s broadcast with him to the offices of the secret police.

  Claudia, the thick-trunked, surly secretary in his outer office, scowled at him reproachfully when he gave her two names to look up in the cross files.

  Returning an hour later, she smiled at him and tossed the folders onto the IN basket.

  “These priests,” she said. “Somebody twists an arm, and they howl they didn’t mean to offend the Führer! Ach! They are neither one with us nor steadfast in what they are supposed to be. Not worth the bullet to kill them nor the food to feed them, eh?”

  Without comment, Otto leafed through the records. Both men, painted so sympathetically by Murphy, had confessed the error of their ways and recanted their foolish stubbornness against the Reich. Blessed saints for the Nazi cause now, they were both being restored to their pulpits. No doubt they would soon be making public statements that would make the newsman look like a fool around the world.

  He shuddered at what the Ministry of Propaganda could do with this. The people in England and America would have to choose their martyrs carefully. Many men would gladly praise the devil and go free than suffer even a small discomfort. Otto knew this to be true from personal experience. Tragically, it seemed to be the most self-righteous men who yielded first when proper pressure was applied. Somehow they convinced themselves that they could still serve God and the Reich at the same time. Claudia’s cynicism about the clergy was correct. The only ones they fooled were themselves.

  Three more from the original list had recanted by the end of the week. Two elderly priests had died within days of their imprisonment. This left three men unaccounted for, somewhere within the vast prison system of the police state.

  On Wednesday morning Otto called the Berlin Gestapo headquarters with the rumor that two children matching the description of Karl Ibsen’s son and daughter were reported in the Vienna area. Would a complete file be forwarded immediately in the event the two were captured? His fabrication worked. The file was sent by air. By noon a thick folder lay on Otto’s desk.

  IBSEN, KARL HENRY. Doctor of Theology. Age 41 years. Married 1924 to MERSER, HELEN IRENE—deceased, Ravensbrück, November 28, 1938.

  The file provided pictures of the couple and their children, facts, and data going back to 1933. The information painted a portrait of integrity and courage. Otto read it throughout the afternoon. It was also a record of suffering and tragedy.

  29

  Ivory Palaces

  The wind blew hard again, shaking the radio antennas high atop the BBC in London. Murphy paced nervously, raising his eyes at the sound of the wind. Would the Vienna broadcast penetrate the weather closing in over Europe?

  The performance was supposed to be recorded and rebroadcast to the States at a later time. If the American public was deprived of their weekly jazz ration, there was no telling what sort of backlash might come to the advertising sponsors. These European performances had made a smash hit back home. Billed as D’ FAT LADY TRIO IN IVORY PALACES, BROUGHT TO YOU BY IVORY SOAP, the official figures showed that sales of the floating soap had jumped by 50 percent since the tour began. No other jazz trio would do. Americans wanted the music straight from Europe’s ivory palaces.

  The American radio listeners were not the only ones praying for a clear connection to Vienna tonight. In the studio with Murphy sat Winston Churchill and the head of the British Secret Service. Anna, Elisa, and Theo lined one side of a long table opposite a small, mousy-looking telegrapher who had come with the intelligence chief.

  The questions asked by Winston Churchill on his own radio broadcast were about to be answered, entirely in the syncopated rhythm of D’ Fat Lady. These questions had been carefully formulated by members of the Foreign Office as well as British intelligence, the plan conceived by Anna Lindheim and a certain piano student who preferred sending coded messages to practicing her scales.

  The great recital was about to begin.

  “He will be sending the signals entirely in the bass,” Anna explained patiently to the telegrapher, who could not imag
ine that this system would work. No uncensored news had come out of Germany for years, and he did not believe that an American black man at the piano could break that barrier.

  “I told you,” he said dryly, “I am no musician. If it is in the bass or the basement or the attic, I still cannot tell one note from another. Just write down the little dots and dashes as you hear them, and I will translate the code for you.”

  “It will be recorded, Anna. If we miss anything, we can play it back,” Murphy explained. “You can do this.”

  Elisa came along as a backup musician. She also had a notebook open. Provided Philbert could play the rhythm of short dots and sustained dashes as the German contact wrote them down, there seemed to be little chance of a foul-up. Of course, there was this matter of the weather. Now that Timmons had been arrested by the Gestapo in Berlin, it seemed more important than ever that this work.

  The phone rang. Murphy snatched it from its cradle. His face reflected relief, then delight. “The connection is through!”

  Moments later, recording technicians in a glass booth in another part of the building began to record the thunderous applause that greeted the trio as they stepped onto the stage of Ronacher’s in Vienna. The technicians did not know how important their efforts would be tonight. Like the telegrapher, the rest of the world would hear the music they had come to recognize and love. But Anna heard the first staccato message of the piano even before the applause died away.

  “Four dots. Break. Two dots.” The telegrapher read over her shoulder.

  “That spells Hi,” said the man sourly.

  As the tinkling keys continued in the background, D’ Fat Lady greeted her listeners. “Well, hello-o-o-o-, my babies! And hello-o-o-o, Charlie and Louis, wherever you is! D’ Fat Lady gonna sing ever’ song fo’ you tonight!”

  More applause. Anna, as well as Elisa, could hear the tuneless background music of the piano continue to tap out a constant, unwavering code. No matter that the notes might be played from one octave to another, it was there! Unmistakable. Half note. Half note. Quarter note. Break. Half note. Half note. Half note. Break.

  “From the ivory palaces of Vienna, Ivory soap presents . . . ”

  Quarter. Half. Half. Quarter. Break. Quarter. Half. Quarter . . .

  “And here’s a song that’ll tell the folks back home jest what we is a feelin’ . . . ” At that, the full rich voice of Delpha Mae broke into the familiar tune of “Ain’t Misbehavin’.”

  The piano never missed a beat. Half. Half. Break. Quarter. Half . . . The date March 15 was spelled out. And then the name Prague. Followed by Invasion.

  Churchill had asked what had been gained by the sacrifice of Czechoslovakia. The answer that was relayed from German High Command: S-C-O-R-N.

  And was this destruction of the one central European haven for minorities a blessing or a curse?

  C-U-R-S-E.

  Could peace, goodwill, and confidence be built upon submission to wrongdoing backed by Nazi force?

  N-O. Y-O-U M-U-S-T F-I-G-H-T O-R D-I-E.

  And so the messages came, clearly more troubling than any that had come out of the darkness of the Reich until now. Prague would fall on March 15. All the sacrifice of Munich meant nothing. More suffering was yet to come. Hitler intended war. No matter what he said publicly, there was always one more reason for him to march forward, one more manufactured injustice that he would right with his iron fist.

  “Puttin’ on the Ritz” mentioned other players in the drama whom Churchill had not named in his broadcast. H-A-J A-M-I-N . P-A-L-E-S-T-I-N-E A-T-T-A-C-K.

  How far was far enough for the Führer? After Prague, what would come upon the world? Then Poland. The excuse would be Danzig. Then Russia. Then France. Belgium. Holland.

  A-L-L W-O-R-L-D.

  Twenty minutes of doom was passed through the light joyful music of D’ Fat Lady. In between every telegraphed announcement of Nazi intentions of conquest and terror, the audience applauded. The message was clearly in the air, filling their heads, but nobody heard it!

  At last the name of Karl Ibsen was tapped out in the sweet melody of “Taking a Chance On Love.” Before the song was finished, the pen had fallen from Anna’s hand. She leaned her head on Theo’s shoulder and cried as word of her sister’s death in prison reached her for the first time.

  ***

  Tiny drops of wax on the floor. Jacob picked at them absently while they listened to the syncopated rhythm of D’ Fat Lady Trio over the radio in Vienna.

  He could not catch the strange lyrics, but the beat made him tap his toe and think of England and America and child transport ships leaving for freedom from Danzig.

  Lori had been strangely preoccupied all day long. She seemed not to hear the music. Perhaps she was still considering making a phone call to that reporter.

  He dug his thumb into the wax, scraping it off the floor. Candle wax?

  Jacob looked toward Lori, studying her profile. Her eyes were downcast, her mouth in a tight line. She had not looked him in the eyes all day. Why?

  “There is candle wax on the floor,” he blurted out.

  She jerked her head up. A moment of fear and guilt crossed her face before she mastered it. Yes, it was guilt. No use trying to pretend. “So?”

  “What did you do?” He sprang to his feet and looked at the desktop. Drops of wax. And then at the dial of the telephone. One tiny drip.

  In a flash Jacob knew: She had gotten up and come down here in the night. She had found the number and called. For a moment he wanted to grab her and shake her. Instead he towered over her. Why did she not look at him?

  “Tell me,” he said in a quiet voice as the music played in the background and Mark and Jamie gawked at them without understanding any of it.

  “All right!” she replied defiantly. She jerked her face up. “I called. So what? I called, and the Gestapo did not come! Jamie and I are going to meet him at the Brandenburg Gate. Come if you want. Or don’t come. But you are not telling us what to do anymore!”

  Jacob stepped back from her. His arms hung limp with fear and resignation. “There is not one newsman in the whole Reich who does not have a tapped telephone. If you go to meet this man, you condemn yourself . . . Jamie . . . and your parents to defeat—maybe death.”

  The look on her face was adamant. She knew he would say these things. But the plan was all worked out. She was going, and he would not stop her!

  D’ Fat Lady crooned something gentle—an American love song, Jacob supposed, but it was lost on the listeners of New Church. He was certain that if she left, it would be the end of her. He would never see her again. Pastor Ibsen would end up leading a Nazi congregation in the praises of the holy Führer.

  “When are you leaving?” he asked.

  Momentary surprise flashed in her eyes. She had not expected him to give in so easily. “Tonight.”

  Jacob glanced at Jamie, her accomplice by birth. Jamie shrugged as if to indicate he had no choice.

  “What time do you meet this fellow?”

  “Midnight.”

  “Very cloak and dagger, Lori. Commendable. You think the police won’t notice a young woman getting into a man’s car at the Brandenburg Gate at midnight?”

  “Well, I didn’t want to say where we were! I knew you would do this. If you and Mark don’t want to go, then fine. I respect that. I did not give away our hiding place.”

  Jacob sighed with exasperation. He glanced around the room and fixed his gaze on the closet. The lock was conveniently on the outside.

  “Jamie!” Jacob ordered. “I am the leader. You are not going.”

  Jamie nodded agreeably. He never wanted to cross Jacob. “Sure,” he said, too quickly.

  Lori shot him a venomous look. “Traitor!”

  “No.” Jacob reached down and grasped her wrist. “He is smart. And so am I.” He yanked her to her feet and in one quick motion threw her into the closet and locked the door.

  She screamed at him and pounded her fists against it.
“You can’t! Let me out! Let me go! I will call him again!”

  Jacob jerked the phone line out of the wall. He crossed his arms and stared at the door. “You can come out for breakfast. We have been through too much, Lori Ibsen, for me to let you get hurt now. Whether you like it or not, I am your father and your brother for the time being.”

  “I hate you!” she screamed. “Let me out!” The shouts dissolved into tears.

  Jamie smiled at Jacob. “A smart move. Papa would have done the same.”

  ***

  “The apple does not fall far from the tree,” Officer Hess remarked to the commandant of Nameless camp. He brushed his finger across the pictures of Lori and Jamie Ibsen and then touched the picture of their father. “They look very much like him, don’t you think?”

  The commandant smiled sourly. “In such a place as this, one’s appearance changes drastically.”

  “As should one’s state of mind. But you have not been able to alter the state of mind of this pastor,” remarked Hess in an accusing tone. “So, the Führer has asked me to take charge of the situation here as well.”

  “I thought you were on the job of finding the little apples from Karl Ibsen’s tree.” The commandant took offense at the accusation of failure in Hess’s words. Hess had not yet met Ibsen and so did not know what he was up against. “Found them yet, have you?”

  “It is a matter of time. But we don’t need them. Not now. Ibsen is just a man like any other. Soon he will be marching in step, singing in tune.”

  “So you think?” The commandant scratched his scabby head. “He is your patient, Herr Doktor.”

  ***

  Karl’s arm and two of his fingers were broken. He wrapped them the best he could in strips of cloth torn from his blanket. Still, the ache was unending. It kept his mind focused. “Fear not those who can kill the body. Fear not those who can kill.”