Dark Star

The Baumann wire mill proved hard to find. High, brown brick walls, name announced by a small, faded sign, as though anybody who mattered should know where it was. Szara was amused by the driver, whose face twisted with near-sighted effort as he looked for the entry gate.

A business-day Baumann awaited him in a cluttered office that looked out on the production lines. Szara found him edgy, over-active, eyes everywhere at once, and not at all stylish in a green V-neck sweater worn beneath a sober suit to keep out the chill of the factory. The narrative of the tour was delivered in a shout that was barely audible above the noise of the machinery.

Szara was a little dazed by it all. He’d arrived still in a lover’s state of being, sensual, high strung, and the roaring hearth fires and clattering belt drives pounded at his temples. Steel was really the last thing in the world he wanted to think about.

One bad moment: he was introduced to Herr Haecht, a dour man in a smock, distracted from tally sheets on a clipboard when Baumann yelled an introduction. Szara managed a smile and a limp handshake.

Chicken sandwiches and scalding coffee were served in the office. When Baumann slammed the glass- paneled door, the racket of the place diminished sufficiently that a conversation could be held in almost normal tones.

“What do you think of it?” said Baumann, eager for his visitor to be impressed.

Szara did his best. “So many workers …”

“One hundred and eight.”

“And truly on a grand scale.”

“In my father’s day, may he rest in peace, no more than a workshop. What he didn’t make wasn’t worth mentioning-ornamental fence palings, frying pans, toy soldiers.” Szara followed Baumann’s eyes to a portrait on the wall, a stern man with a tiny mustache. “And everything by hand, work you don’t see anymore.”

“I can only imagine.”

“One naturally cannot compare systems,” Baumann said diplomatically. “Even our largest mills are not so grand as the Soviet steel works at Magnitogorsk. Ten thousand men, it’s said. Extraordinary. “

“Each nation has its own approach,” Szara said.

“Of course here we specialize. We are all nichtrostend.”

“Pardon?”

“One says it best in English-austenitic. What is known as stainless steel.”

“Ah.”

“When you finish your sandwich, the best is yet to come.” Baumann smiled conspiratorially.

The best was reached by way of two massive doors guarded by an elderly man seated on a kitchen chair.

“Ernest is our most senior man,” Baumann said. “From my father’s time.” Ernest nodded respectfully.

They stood in a large room where a few workers were busy at two production lines. It was much quieter and colder than the other part of the factory. “No forging here,” Baumann explained, grinning at the chill overtaking Szara. “Here we make swage wire only.”

Szara nodded, drew a pencil and a notebook from his pocket. Baumann spelled the word for him. “It’s a die process, steel bars forced through a swage, a grooved block, under enormous pressure, which produces a cold- worked wire.”

Baumann took him closer to one of the production lines. From a table he selected a brief length of wire. “See? Go ahead, take it.” Szara held it in his hand. “That’s 302 you’ve got there-just about the best there is. Resists atmosphere, doesn’t corrode, much stronger than wire made from molten steel, this is. Won’t melt until around twenty-five hundred degrees Fahrenheit, and its tensile strength is greater than that of annealed wire by a factor of approximately one third. Hardness can be figured at two hundred and forty on the Brinnell scale as opposed to eighty-five. Quite a difference all ‘round, you’ll agree.”

“Oh yes.”

“And it won’t stretch-that’s the really crucial thing.”

“What is it for?”

“We ship it to the Rheinmetall company as multiple strands twisted into cable, which increases its strength by a considerable factor but it remains flexible, to pass under or around various barriers, yet extremely responsive, even at great length. That’s what you need in control cable.”

“Control cable?”

“Yes, for aircraft. For instance, the pilot sets his flaps by controls in his cockpit, but it’s Baumann swage wire that actually makes the flaps go down. Also the high-speed rudder on the tail, and the ailerons on the wings. These are warplanes! They must bank and dip, dive suddenly. Response is everything, and response depends on the finest control cables.”

“So you are very much a factor in Luftwaffe rearmament.”

“In our own specialty, one could say preeminent. Our contract with Rheinmetall, which installs control cable on all heavy bombers, the Dornier 17, the Heinkel 111, and the Junkers 86, is exclusive.”

“All the swage wire.”

“That’s true. A third production line is contemplated here. Something around four hundred and eighty feet per aircraft-well, it’s quite a heavy demand.”

Szara hesitated. They were on the brink now; it was like sensing the tension of a diver at the instant preceding a leap into empty air. Baumann remained supremely energetic, expansive, a businessman proud of what he’d accomplished. Did he understand what was about to happen? He had to. He had almost certainly contrived this meeting, so he knew what he was doing. “It’s quite a story,” Szara said, stepping back from the edge. “Any journalist would be delighted, of course. But can it be told? ” A door, he thought. Will you walk through it?

“In the newspaper?” Baumann was puzzled.

“Yes.”

“I hardly think so.” He laughed good-naturedly.

Amen. “My editor in Moscow misinformed me. I’m normally not so dense.”

Baumann clucked. “Not so, Herr Szara, you are not anything like dense. Of Soviet citizens who might turn up in Germany, outside diplomatic staffs or trade missions, your presence is quite unremarkable. Surely not liked by the Nazis, but not unusual.”

Szara was a little stung at this. So you know about clandestine life, do you? “Well, one could hardly expect your monthly production figures to be published in trade magazines.”

“Unlikely.”

“It would be considerable.”

“Yes it would. In October, for example, we shipped to Rheinmetall approximately sixteen thousand eight hundred feet of 302 swage wire.”

Divide by four hundred and eighty, Szara calculated, and you have the monthly bomber production of the Reich. Though tanks would be of great interest, no number could so well inform Soviet military planners of German strategic intentions and capabilities.

Szara jotted down the number as though he were making notes for a feature story-our motto has always been excellence, Baumann claims. “Substantial,” he said, tapping his pencil against the number on the page. “Your efforts must surely be appreciated.”

“In certain ministries, that’s true.”

But not in others. Szara put the notebook and pencil in his pocket. “We journalists don’t often meet with such candor.”

“There are times when candor is called for.”

“Perhaps we’ll be meeting again,” Szara said.

Baumann nodded his assent, a stiff little bow: a man of dignity and culture had made a decision, taken honor into account, determined that greater considerations prevailed.

They went back to the office and chatted for a time. Szara restated his gratitude for a delightful evening. Baumann was gracious, saw him to his taxi when it arrived, smiled, shook hands, wished him safe journey home.

The taxi rattled along past brown factory walls. Szara closed his eyes. She stood at the center of the room,