Prague Counterpoint

  This time she took the elevator up to the third-floor corridor. The hall was silent, as if the shrieks of victims had driven away all sounds for a time. The floors were highly polished marble. Elisa imagined that she could see traces of blood in the swirling pattern of the stone.

  Ahead of her, Otto stepped from his office and stood watching her with his arms crossed as she approached. She tried to smile even now, but his expression was anything but pleased at the sight of her. He stepped back and let her pass into the small cluttered cubicle. He shut the door behind her but did not move to sit or offer her a chair.

  “I thought you were through with us,” he said in a hushed voice.

  “You heard?”

  “Enough. You’re better off out of it. It was a bad idea, anyway.” He looked away and then back at her face as though he wanted to say something else. As if he wanted to ask her if she understood what it had all been about.

  “Your idea, Otto?”

  He nodded. “You said you were going to Prague. The night of the Anschluss, at the border. Your American passport! All of it. It seemed like a good idea at the time.”

  “And you wanted me to know, didn’t you?” She suddenly understood. He had not given her name and description to the men in Prague only because he thought she would make a good courier. He wanted her to know what he had sacrificed. What he was really doing in the thick of it.

  “Maybe that was part of it,” he agreed. For a moment great sorrow reflected in his eyes.

  How lonely he must be in this outpost of darkness, Elisa thought. How difficult it must be to live a lie that causes your own family to reject you!

  “You perform well, Otto. I cannot play the role. I know that much about myself. That is why I have come to you for help.”

  Before she could say more, he put a hand to his head and groaned. He brushed past her and sat down. “Don’t.” He could barely speak. “Don’t ask me, Elisa. I know what you want, and I can’t help you. Not today.”

  Elisa waited for a long moment, then quietly asked, “Why, Otto?”

  He turned to her, his face tortured. Maybe it was easier to pretend when no one else knew. “Not now. There is something . . . today . . . I can’t say. But I dare not jeopardize myself now. If you understood!”

  “I don’t understand, Otto. How can anything be more important than . . . ”

  “Those boys,” he finished lamely.

  Elisa stared hard at him. How could he know what she wanted to ask him? “Boys?”

  “Kronenberger. I saw them the night of the Anschluss. It was after curfew, and they were with your friend. I had gone to your apartment; I was thinking about what you had said. I had been working to stop all this.” He waved his hand toward the stacks of files. “Passing along what I heard. Hoping it would make some difference. Maybe stop the worst from coming to Austria. Then it all happened so fast. I don’t know why I walked to your place that night—just feeling what you said, and feeling my own failure. I made no difference at all. It happened. I couldn’t do anything to stop it. I gave up my life. My family. And in the end it made no difference.”

  “Then help us! Help them, Otto!”

  “I can’t. Not now. Not now,” he finished lamely as the crisp clacking of heels sounded in the corridor outside. Elisa and Otto looked at one another; then, as if to fix the proper expression on his face, Otto rubbed his hand over his mouth, and when he pulled it away he was smiling.

  “Otto!” a voice shouted from behind the heavy door. “Helga says you’ve got a woman in there! Can I have a little bit of her too? You don’t share with your friend Sporer? Come on, Priest, open up!”

  Elisa went pale and turned quickly away, wishing there was a place to hide. Otto straightened his tie and managed a hearty laugh. “Come in, you great clown,” he called. The act was perfect. Everything was once again under control.

  The door was flung back wide and Albert Sporer strutted in. His eyes immediately traced the lines of Elisa’s body. He did not attempt to disguise his appreciation. “And who are you? Has our priest been keeping you satisfied, darling?” He walked behind her and peered over her shoulder, ogling her throat as if he wanted to bite her.

  Elisa raised her hand instinctively and managed a nervous laugh as she stepped back almost against the window. “Who is this, Otto? You should have warned me; I would have worn my nun’s habit.” The words sounded playful enough. She congratulated herself on the performance as Sporer laughed with appreciation.

  “A nun’s habit, eh? I find nuns particularly tasty!”

  “That has seldom stopped Albert, Elisa,” Otto said flippantly, but Elisa was almost sure he was not joking.

  “That’s right. I am a man who gets what he wants.” His eyes ran down the buttons of Elisa’s blouse. “Every time.”

  This time she found it impossible to laugh. A chill coursed through her. She looked pleadingly at Otto. “I have to go now.”

  “What’s your hurry?” Sporer grabbed her hand. He did not seem to notice her uneasiness. “Ask her to have lunch with us, Otto. Tell her I promise not to pinch or bite.” Then he held up her hand and touched the wedding ring.

  “I’m already taken, anyway,” Elisa said, grateful for the ring, grateful for Murphy, wherever he was.

  “A married woman.” Otto shrugged.

  “Well, that never stopped me, either.” Sporer kissed her hand and Elisa felt ill. She remembered his hideous grin that night he accosted her in the Judenplatz. She imagined him issuing the orders that had ended Rudy Dorbransky’s life. She could see him clearly at the border between Austria and Czechoslovakia as he had stripped the Jewish woman and beaten her husband. “There are plenty of beautiful Aryan women who have joined the Lebensborn program to provide the Führer with a baby . . . with or without the help of their husbands.” Sporer laughed suggestively and raised an eyebrow in Otto’s direction. “Perhaps that is what you two are doing? I hear that two Jewish obstetrics clinics near Vienna have been taken over. Already the beds are full of candidates.”

  Otto frowned in disapproval. Everyone knew about the establishment of these SS stud farms for the sake of production of the master race. “Elisa is not––” He was not allowed to finish.

  Sporer interrupted as he gazed at Elisa with renewed interest. “When you tire of Otto, Frau Elisa, please remember that there are other men who would enjoy fulfilling your desire to provide a racially pure child for the Fatherland.” Sporer moved a step nearer to her. “I myself have always longed for fatherhood.”

  “Thank you, anyway,” she managed to say. “You’ll have to get permission from Otto, however.” She smiled and winked at Otto, then slipped out the door as a startled Sporer teased Otto.

  “Well, there’s one I would not have guessed from you, Priest!” Sporer’s voice followed her down the corridor as the shrieks of the Nazi prisoner had done. Elisa did not wait for the elevator. She ran down the narrow curving steps, then past the long bench in the lobby and out into the sunlight.

  Otto had told her the truth. He was much too near to the ultimate evil to find a way to help her now. He had known about the boys and Leah all along. His gift to them had been silence. He could do no more. There was something terrible at stake here, and he could not say what it was.

  ***

  Jubilation lit Albert Sporer’s face as he sat across the table from Otto at a little village café outside Vienna. He had already consumed half a bottle of wine, which was unusual for Sporer, but today he had cause to celebrate.

  He leaned forward and said in a low voice, “You see how easy it was, Otto? And you missed it all! A few dead Germans in Czechoslovakia for the sake of propaganda, some very nice news photos of the Czech police beating innocent civilians over the head, and now the British prime minister is declaring that Prague should give up her military positions in the Sudeten territory and hand it over to the Führer! Our mission is a success.”

  Otto raised his glass in a toast. “Congratulations, Sporer. No doubt you wi
ll be awarded . . . something . . . ” He took a cheerful swig of the wine. “Remember me when you are a field marshal, will you?”

  Sporer laughed, causing heads in the tiny restaurant to turn and stare. “Remember you? My fine fellow, if you would be more willing, I would drag you to the top with me!” He downed his wine and poured another round. “And when I am the Gauleiter of Sudetenland”—he lowered his voice again—“trundling all those filthy little Slavs off to summer camp, and their Jews with them, we will have our choice of women! Of good wine and food and maybe even art, like Göring? Ja? Have you ever seen Göring’s cigars?” He laughed drunkenly now.

  Otto put a finger to his lips. “We aren’t in Czechoslovakia yet, Albert,” he chided.

  Albert Sporer sat straight and widened his eyes in mock indignation. “As good as done, and you know it! You read what Chamberlain said. France and Russia won’t raise a finger to help, so neither will Britain. The Czech army won’t even get out of bed without them.” Now his face became serious and he dropped his voice to a whisper. “I tell you, Otto, look out your window in two days. You will not see an SS soldier or Wehrmacht man anywhere on the street. In two days we march into the Sudetenland, and no one will be there to stop us! Just like the Rhineland. Just like Austria. And if they knew!” He peered through his wine as if it were a crystal ball. “If the idiots knew how the generals grumble . . . and how the Führer trembles at the thought of the resistance of the Czech divisions! Thirty-five divisions, and they could put up a fight on the high ground, too. But they won’t. Frankly, if they had the courage, we wouldn’t march.”

  “We could beat them easily,” Otto scoffed.

  Sporer shook his head. “I have seen their fortifications. They are better equipped than the French. I tell you, Otto, the issue would be in doubt if courage entered in. But the little Czech pygmies have no courage without the British and the French to back them up.” He laughed again, satisfied that the Czech territories were as good as in Nazi hands. “So, in two days, my friend, when everyone asks where the soldiers from Vienna have gone, don’t tell them!” He snorted and spilled a drop of wine on the tablecloth. “Military secret.” He put a finger to his lips. “Nobody’s supposed to know until after. I’ll lose my promotion, see. If I tell anybody . . . ” Sporer was plainly drunk.

  Otto looked nervously around the room, but no one seemed to notice. “Shut up, or you’ll get us both hanged.”

  Sporer winked broadly. “The fools don’t know. They didn’t know in Austria, did they? Panzer units broken down all over the place. At least we’re bringing mechanics into the Sudetenland! But we’re not any better prepared.” He stuck out his lower lip thoughtfully. “In six months we could crush them. But the Führer was right. He’s always right. Always right about such things. We’re moving in like lions, but we’re really just little foxes, you know.”

  Otto rose and took his companion by the arm, pulling him out into the fresh air. “I know one little fox who has had too many grapes from the vineyard.” He laughed, giving Sporer a playful shove into the car. “And if all this is going to happen as soon as you say—”

  “Two days.”

  “Then you’d better sleep this off. Such a jovial mood does not suit you, Albert.” He slammed the door. “Sober with a splitting headache is the way you must be to shed the blood of the Czechs, I think.”

  ***

  Albert Sporer talked on in detail as Otto drove slowly back to Vienna. The coming takeover of Czechoslovakia by the Nazis was to be predictably ruthless. Now, as Sporer’s head lolled drunkenly from side to side, he revealed the exact elements of the plan.

  “Everybody in Prague knows that President Beneš has ordered a performance of the opera Die Judin. Jewish Drivel!” He shouted the last sentence as they passed a housewife hanging her wash on the line.

  Otto looked in the rearview mirror as the woman stared after the car. “So what, Albert? Let the little monkey have his Jewish composers and Jewish operas. What are you talking about?”

  Sporer laughed and plucked his glasses off his face. He closed his eyes in contented relaxation. “The opening performance is tomorrow night. The little Slavic pygmy will attend it! He will mingle with every Jew in Prague! They have bought out the whole auditorium, the Jews have! And we,” he declared, thumping his chest, “have recruited one Jew in particular to perform a little job for us! Only he doesn’t know it is for us! He thinks he is acting on behalf of the Communists!”

  Otto was now certain of the plan, but still he pressed for details. “And this Jew will murder the president of Czechoslovakia? Correct? Am I right, Sporer?”

  Sporer nodded sleepily. “Like the American president Lincoln. Rather poetic, I thought. I myself came up with the plan after Beneš expressed that he was an admirer of the American president Lincoln.” He opened one eye and peered at Otto. “Did you hear that speech?”

  “Sorry.”

  “Beneš was going on about the Civil War. American Civil War. Holding the country together. Hoping to hold Czechoslovakia together like Lincoln. Not wanting to give up the Sudetenland.” Sporer closed his eyes again. “So I dreamed up this fitting end for Beneš. He gets shot on the opening night of the performance. The Jew lover dies like the slave lover Lincoln!” Sporer languidly put his finger to his head and pulled the imaginary trigger.

  “So what? It will be like the murder of Dollfuss in Vienna. A great funeral, and the Czechs will choose another idiot for chancellor. What’s the point?”

  “This time nothing will go wrong!” Sporer did not like the challenge. He sat upright and grasped the dashboard. “It is a Jew and a Communist who will kill the ape! Don’t you see? We have it all arranged. Riots. Fighting for the sake of our cause against the Reds! And then the army marches in to restore order and rescue the three million Germans who live within the Czech borders!”

  Sporer’s face flushed with excitement. “You see, Otto? You see what you have missed all stuffed away here in Vienna? Within two days we will have it all, and the British idiot Chamberlain has handed it to us! The British will not move to stop us! The French will not! And as for the Czechs themselves, they will have a dead president on their hands! Riots to quell! They will be crushed before they hear the first tramp of German boots over their border!”

  With all of this said, Sporer relaxrf once again. He leaned back in his seat and yawned. “Well?”

  “Inspired,” Otto replied with admiration. “And to think I might have played a part in it.” He sounded genuinely disappointed now, but Sporer had already drifted off to sleep and could not comfort him with promises of more action to come.

  44

  Honorable Treason

  Here in the study of Winston Churchill’s estate, Thomas von Kleistmann searched his meager English vocabulary for words that might convey the urgency of his message to the great man.

  Churchill glared at him from the settee. His lower lip extended angrily as he drawled, “You mean they would not see you? The prime minister? The foreign secretary? You have come here at the peril of your very life to warn them, to warn Britain of the plans drawn up in the war room of the German Chancellery by Hitler, and they refuse to admit you?” His eyes blazed.

  “I could not get past the secretary.” Thomas shook his head. “And yet I come here to Chartwell. You must be the only sensible man left in England, Herr Churchill.”

  “Sensible, perhaps. But I am powerless in the face of such negligence. The speech by the PM to the press was deplorable. I have already spoken to the Czech ambassador. He is naturally distressed by the perceived abandonment of his nation. As distressed as Herr Hitler is pleased.”

  “You cannot be powerless, Herr Churchill. Or if that is so, then I have come here for nothing. There are men in the German High Command who advise this madman at the helm of our country. These men advise him that our army is in no way ready to meet any challenge with force. They tell him that the Wehrmacht cannot fight now. He says that they will not have to fight, that the Engl
ish and the French and the Czechs are cowards. I spoke with the French minister of defense before I came here. The French look to England; what will the English do? And the English look to France to see what the French will do!”

  Churchill cleared his throat. “And all the while the world slumbers.”

  Thomas saw his own reflection in the silver teapot on the tray before them. For an instant it flashed through his mind that any man could have been sitting here, but for some reason he had been chosen for this honorable treason. Perhaps some world destruction would be stopped because he and Churchill now sipped tea together overlooking an English country garden.

  “Yes. The world sleeps, and I will tell you just how vain are the British dreams of peace!” The figures were clear in Thomas’ mind. “Day and night for four years Germany has been rearming. There has been no year in which less than 800 million pounds of sterling have been spent on war preparation. The whole manhood of the country is harnessed to war. The children are taken from church schools and forced into the Hitler Youth. Every six weeks a new army corps is added to our active forces. Every thought is turned to the assertion of race, Herr Churchill.” Thomas paused and looked out at the peaceful garden. “I come here in the hopes that you will cry from the housetops. The little nation of Czechoslovakia will perish within the week, unless . . . ”