Part 41 (1/2)

Biruta had been beaten close to death, but she still walked proudly, almost defiantly. Madame Bukowska was old and tired and nearly worn out, but she still displayed that inner radiance which comes only from a life actively spent in defense of purposeful ideals.

When they stood face to face, Marjorie leaned forward like a village busybody to inspect with her right forefinger Biruta's scarred cheeks, but with her left hand, so that none could see, she delivered the fatal list of names.

'Kill them all,' she whispered, and when Biruta gasped at such a message, Marjorie took her by the shoulders and turned her sideways so that light could fall upon her damaged face, as if she wished to see it more accurately. 'They are the traitors. Kill them all.'

Abruptly she dismissed the peasant girl as if she, Bukowska, were still gentry from the great house and Biruta the serf, and then resumed her pa.s.sage about the square, but as she reached one of the corners she half-stumbled sideways, as if struck by a cart no one could see. Then she staggered twice, reached out for a handhold that was not there, and died in the sunlight.

When the apparently distraught son was told that his mother was dead, he could not prevent himself from thinking: G.o.d's mercy.

Because Poland continued to play such a vital role in the eastern theater of war, the attention of its patriots had to focus on what was happening along the battle lines in Russia, and every inch of territory regained by Soviet troops was greeted joyously by those partisans who saw in Communism the path that Poland must take when peace came, and with growing apprehension by those more conservative men who had begun to hear rumors of how the Russians were behaving in towns they recaptured.

At first Jan Buk sided with the pro-Communists, cheering the Russian victories, but when rumors of a ma.s.sacre of Polish officers at a place called Katyn Forest began seeping in, he had to wonder: Hundreds, maybe thousands, murdered by the Soviets. Shot in the back of the head. He found it difficult to believe such accusations, and when the radical partisans explained that Germans had really done the killing, he accepted their version.

But then he heard the pro-Russians describing the way they wanted the new Poland to be, and he was not pleased with the prospect of surrendering his farm to the management of others, and he was downright displeased with their proposal to outlaw the Catholic church.

The debate took a sharp turn when the radicals started abusing the Allies for accomplis.h.i.+ng so little in the west when the Soviets were fighting so valiantly in the east: 'Cowardly Allies! Hiding behind their Channel. Afraid to tackle Hitler. Leaving the Russians to fight the war alone.' Such speakers held the efforts of the English and especially the Americans in contempt, but on several occasions Jan heard others argue differently: 'Watch! When the great push comes, those Americans are going to hammer Hitler.' He could not make up his mind who was right.

However, at midnight on 17 August 1943 the British had performed an act in their western theater which bore no apparent relations.h.i.+p to the war in Poland but which did subsequently alter the whole complex of warfare along the Vistula, plunging Jan Buk into the very heart of the wider conflict of which he had previously been ignorant.

An immense formation of heavy British bombers from various air bases in England and Scotland had flown across the North Sea, crossed Denmark in darkness, and dropped down low over the inconspicuous village of Peenemnde at the edge of the Baltic Sea. Here they had dropped a tremendous freight of high explosives upon laboratories, manufacturing centers and barracks in which Adolf Hitler's most formidable secret weapon was being readied for the destruction of London. Damage caused by the mighty bombs was immense, fires started by the smaller incendiaries completed the damage, and although the German air force retaliated, the lumbering British bombers made their escape, bomb racks empty.

The raid did not obliterate Peenemnde, for its installations had been strongly built and cleverly camouflaged, but it did cause great anxiety, for if the bombers had come once with such striking success, they could come again. So a two-part decision was made: move the manufacturing elements for the secret weapon to underground sites deep inside Germany and move the testing of the weapon to some relatively unoccupied corner of Poland, from which the weapon could be fired onto empty land, Russian or Polish.

The site chosen by the German high command for the a.s.sembly and testing of the weapon occupied a polygon, one base of which was formed by a line between Castle Gorka and the Bukowski palace. Since test firings of the secret weapon might carry it far toward Przemysl and empty lands beyond, the experts who had been working at Peenemnde said: 'An ideal location.'

And now everything changed. Bukowo became a major battleground in the war. Where there had been one German soldier, twenty appeared to guard this vital secret. Where there had been two Gestapo men checking on the citizenry, there were now six. Railroad spurs were built overnight. Buildings appeared mysteriously, their roofs covered with forest branches to prevent detection from the air. Truckloads of workmen came from remote Polish villages and trainloads of technicians from Germany.

When six of Konrad Krumpf's villages were overrun by the new demands for secure s.p.a.ce, so that every Pole had to be evacuated to find such quarters as he might, there was protest, and Krumpf personally warned that this must cease: 'We must all make sacrifices for the Fatherland.'

But the forced evacuation was so brutally carried out that serious objection had to be voiced; peasants were being treated worse than animals, and they said so. One village in particular, with the grandiose name of Nowa Polska, the New Poland, was especially abused, and its three leading farmers went to see Krumpf, who had always been attentive when the continued production of foodstuffs was involved.

This time the protesters met a man much different from their familiar, b.u.mbling Konrad Krumpf. The high command, recognizing the supreme importance of the weapon which now dominated the Gorka-Bukowo polygon, had sent to supervise the operation a man with a brilliant record of administration and a ruthless determination to succeed once more. He was Falk von Eschl, forty-seven years old, scion of a family whose forebear had fought with the Teutonic Knights at Grunwald in 1410, Rhodes scholar at Oxford University in the 1920s, and diplomat in various capitals of Europe.

Tall, slim, a fine tennis player who had once been Baron von Cramm's doubles partner at Wimbledon, he was a man of unusual talents, especially that of self-preservation. Not a n.a.z.i and often contemptuous of their grosser acts, he saw them as the only agency that had the power to lead Germany to a position of world dominance. His years at Oxford had satisfied him that Great Britain could provide no leaders.h.i.+p at all, and the Americans he had met there, most of them Rhodes scholars like himself, were beneath contempt: 'Country boors who know nothing, lack all character, and have no insights whatever.'

The n.a.z.is did not like him or trust him, but they did need him, for he had an uncanny perception of what steps ought to be taken to achieve sought-for results, as he now proved when the three farmers appeared before him to protest the destruction of their village.

'We will go there and see,' he said in broken Polish, acquired by dint of forced study in the brief time since his appointment, and he allowed the farmers to lead him to their village. When he reached there, he indicated to his accompanying soldiers that they were to line the protesters against a wall and shoot them, and this happened within four minutes.

His troops then rousted all the villagers from their cottages, and every man was shot dead as he appeared. Six women who came screaming at Von Eschl were also pinioned, stood against the wall and gunned down. By this time the other women and the children were pacified through sheer terror, and in this condition they were expelled from the village while their homes were razed.

Falk von Eschl had the designated area cleared and ready for tests two weeks earlier than expected, and he spent this grace period training his personnel in their new duties: 'Any Pole who trespa.s.ses into a restricted area without a signed pa.s.s is to be shot at the moment he is apprehended, and without further consultation. Anyone smuggling food is to be shot. For any sabotage, you are to execute six hostages. And if any Pole so much as touches a German soldier or workman in anger, appropriate steps will be taken. And you can a.s.sure the natives that such steps will become increasingly severe. The Third Reich is nearing victory, and what you accomplish here will make that victory possible.

'You are here to protect the most precious secret our nation has today. It must be defended with your life. If any one of you betrays even one word of what you see, you will be shot. And if any Pole or any member of the so-called underground is allowed to catch even a fleeting glimpse of what we're doing, he is to be shot instantly.'

While these draconian measures were being fine-tuned, Von Eschl had an opportunity to inspect the civilian areas bordering on the secret range and to give some attention as to where he might live during the extended period of his command. Naturally, he visited the Bukowski palace, but saw at once that it was too pretentious, and already occupied by Konrad Krumpf, for whom he had only contempt, and by the weak and silly owner, Ludwik Bukowski, whom the advance reports had described as worthless and to be ignored.

With the methodical and judicious approach for which he was famous, he decided quickly that the logical place for his headquarters was Castle Gorka; it was clean and strong and not exhibitionistic like the palace; it was well situated in relation to where the work would be done; and its owner, even though a Pole, was a person deserving of respect, for he had traveled widely, he spoke both German and English, and he had a well-matured understanding of the world. He was probably also a secret supporter of the Polish underground; that made the relations.h.i.+p more exciting and in the long run it might be profitable, for if he could unmask a man like Lubonski, he would strengthen his claim to significant promotions when Russia and the Allies were finally defeated.

He summoned Lubonski to a meeting, and was astonished at how much like himself the Pole was: several years older, hair nicely grayed while his own was still black, most of his teeth apparently, the reserved bearing of a man who rode horses well, and that mastery of languages which marked the European gentleman. But there was a deeper similarity that intrigued Falk von Eschl: Walerian Lubonski gave the appearance of a man of fierce commitment who could absorb much punishment and still keep fighting.

'I've decided to make my headquarters in your castle,' the German said. Lubonski nodded with just the right degree of deference. 'You may continue residence, but only in the upper rooms.' Again Lubonski nodded. 'My men will convert two of your barns into barracks.'

'Of course,' Lubonski said.

'This fellow Bukowski, at the palace. Is he as stupid as he seems?'

'His father, you know, was a great hero at Zamosc. In the 1920 battle against the Communists.'

'I didn't know that.'

'It has been an excellent family. For a thousand years.'

'That I did know. One of his ancestors fought at the Battle of Tannenburg in 1410.'

'What we call the Battle of Grunwald,' Lubonski said quietly.

'Where one of your ancestors fought, too.'

'And one of yours, as well. With the greatest distinction. Von Eschl is an honored name along this river, especially with my family.' When the German diplomat realized that this clever Pole had briefed himself on the Von Eschl record, it was his turn to nod graciously.

So the sparring began, and when Von Eschl had time to look into records with his customary diligence, he discovered a most disturbing fact: on several different occasions a Lubonski barn had been raided and food supplies stored there had been stolen. What attracted Von Eschl's attention was the fact that it was always the same barn, which led him to believe that there was some kind of connivance going on between the count and the partisans.

He therefore baited that particular barn with an extra supply of unground wheat and established near it a concealed bunker manned every night by men with powerful guns; but he was not able to conceal it perfectly, and one morning as Count Lubonski was leaving the castle he spotted the disturbed earth, which had been unsuccessfully smoothed down, and guessed what it meant. He alerted one of his servants, who alerted a woodsman bringing fuel to the castle for the German contingent billeted there, and this woodsman warned the Stork Commando that it could no longer obtain food from that cache.

Von Eschl, suspecting some intricate maneuver like this, drove over to the Bukowski palace to do something which irritated him immensely: he had to consult with Konrad Krumpf to learn what kind of record that stupid Gestapo underling had been able to compile on Lubonski, and for the first time he was able to inspect the remarkable card file a.s.sembled by Krumpf. It was extraordinary that this seemingly dull man had completed such a splendid work, and he ran through the purple cards with extreme care, noting every name that Krumpf had identified as potentially dangerous. Count Lubonski's name was not there.

'We've heard rumors,' Krumpf said. 'Persons who could be part of the infamous Stork Commando have been seen in the vicinity of your castle ...' Von Eschl noted the subtle introduction of the phrase your castle, as if Krumpf were now throwing the problem into his lap. Perhaps the man was more clever than he had at first supposed.

'What are those other cards, the yellow ones?' As Krumpf's acknowledged superior, he reached for the small carefully guarded file, and although the Gestapo man objected to surrendering it, Von Eschl insisted, and after he had studied the cards, he a.s.sembled them into a neat pile and started shoving them back to their owner, but as Krumpf reached out to recover them, Von Eschl kept his own hand firmly on them.

'Is it wise to have such names in a list? I mean, in a list anywhere but your own head?'

'This file is secure. Only I touch it.'

'I'm touching it, now.'

'You're my superior. In this particular operation.'

'If I were you, I would burn those cards. They're terribly dangerous. What I mean, these people are very vulnerable. Surely you see that.'

'Is that an order?'

'I would never give you an order, Major Krumpf. We're partners in protecting a secret of inestimable importance.'

'But you recommend burning?'

'I do,' and Von Eschl casually lit a match and reached for a wire basket. While he held the match, Konrad Krumpf with considerable anguish held out the first card and watched it burn. Dropping that card into the basket, he surrendered one card after another to the flame until all forty-three were consumed.

'I feel infinitely safer,' Falk von Eschl said. 'If anyone had seen those cards, even someone like me ...' He paused. If this man had been careless enough to maintain such a file, he might be stupid enough to inform others of its existence. 'Have you ever told anyone about this file?'