The Spies of Warsaw

and a representative of UFA, the Berlin film production company, in search of locations for a new version of the Grimm brothers’ fairy tales.

Not a bad choice for a fairy tale, the older part of Schramberg: winding streets, half-timbered cottages with sloping rooves, shop signs in Gothic lettering. Adorable, really. And the townspeople were eager to talk, to praise their charming Schramberg, understanding perfectly the benefits to be had from film crews, who famously threw money about like straw. The best kind of business: they came, they annoyed everyone, but then they went away and left their money behind.

So the local dignitaries, the mayor, the councilmen, went on and on, describing the gemutlich delights of the town. Though this was, please understand, not the best moment to visit. The Wehrmacht was coming, everybody knew it, one of the roads that wound up into the hills had been closed off, all the rooms at the inn had been reserved, and a few supply trucks were already there, with more to arrive at any moment. Oh well. Still, the good gentleman could see for himself how picturesque the forest was, and, if the area up on the Rabenhugel, Raven Hill, was torn up by the army’s machines, there were plenty of other places just as scenic. More scenic! And would the company be hiring local people to perform in the film? In a crowd, perhaps? Or even, say, as a mayor? Naturally they would, said the UFA man, it was always done that way. What about those two hefty fellows, seated by the window in the Schwarzwald coffeehouse, having their second breakfast? Oh no, they weren’t local! They had just arrived, they were here to make sure that, that-um-that everything went well. Wink.

For the anniversary couple, in loden-green outfits and matching alpine hats-a vigorous yodel could not be far in the future-the same story, as they produced their touring map for the lady who’d rented them a room. No, no, not there, that was forbidden, until after the fourteenth. You cannot go east of the town, to the Rabenhugel, but to the south-ah, there it was even lovelier, the magnificent pines, the tiny red birds that stayed the winter; south, much better, and would they care to have her make a picnic to take along? They would? Ach, wunderbar! She would see to it right away.

And so for the salesman, in his Panhard automobile with sample pots and pans in the backseat, headed over to the town of Waldmossingen. Halted at a sawhorse barrier manned by three soldiers, he was told that this road was closed, he would have to go back to Schramberg, and then down to Hardt and circle around. Of course he knew the way, and only took this road for the scenery. Was this permanent, this road-closing? No, sir, only for a few days. “Heil Hitler!”

“Heil Hitler!”

13 December.

Mercier took the early LOT flight to Zurich, then the train to Basel and a taxi to the French consulate. Climbing the stairs to the consul’s office, he was his darkest self, tense and brooding and in no mood for polite conversation, a pre-combat condition he knew all too well. But the consul, a Mediterranean Frenchman with a goatee, was just what the doctor ordered. “So, colonel, a stroll in the German woods?”

Maybe the best approach, Mercier thought, irony in the face of danger. And it would be dangerous. The Wehrmacht wouldn’t care much for a foreign military attache observing maneuvers-there to discover strengths and weaknesses, what certain tanks could do in the forest and what they couldn’t. Because, if it came to war, such intelligence would lead to casualties, and could be the difference between victory and defeat.

The people at 2, bis, in receipt of reports from their German agents, had acted quickly, sending to Warsaw maps of the Schramberg district: the roads, the walking paths in the forest, the hill known as the Rabenhugel, and two nearby hills with a view of the site to be used for maneuvers. A coded wireless message from the General Staff Meteorological Service predicted a nighttime temperature of 28 degrees Fahrenheit, reaching 35 degrees by noon, and a possible light dusting of snow on the morning of the fourteenth. Mercier had his own field glasses, and the rest of his equipment, as promised in Paris, had been brought down to Basel by courier; a suitcase stood behind the consul’s office door.

The consul hefted it up onto a table, handed Mercier the key, and watched with interest as the contents were brought out: a Swiss army greatcoat-its insignia long ago removed-a peaked wool hat with earflaps, a blanket roll, a knapsack. When Mercier unwrapped a Pathe Baby, the 9.5-millimeter movie camera, the consul said, “Thought of everything, haven’t they.”

With the camera, a typed sheet of instructions. Simple enough: one cranked the handle; the action was operated by a spring. One roll of film was in the camera, ten more could be found in the knapsack; directions for reloading followed, with a diagram.

“What about distance?” the consul said.

“I would assume the lens has been refitted. Otherwise, they’ll have the march of the tiny toys. But even so, it can be enlarged at the laboratory. At least I think it can.”

“So, just aim and press the button?”

Mercier pointed the camera at the consul, who waved and smiled, then went to a closet and produced a six- foot walking staff fashioned from a tree branch. “I won’t tell you what we went through to obtain this, but Paris insisted that you have it.”

“War wound.”

“Then it will help. But please, colonel, try not to lose it,” the consul said. “Now, you’ll be leaving at dusk, your driver will arrive in an hour. If you’d like to rest until then, we’ve set aside a room for you. Care for something to eat?”

“No, thank you.”

The consul nodded. “It was always that way for me, in la derniere.” The phrase was common among people who’d been there, it meant the last one. He opened a drawer in his desk, produced a Swiss passport, and handed it to Mercier. Albert Ducasse, from Lausanne, thus a French- speaking Swiss. The photograph, applied at 2, bis, was a duplicate of the one in his dossier in Paris. The consul cleared his throat and said, “They’ve instructed me to ask you to leave your French passport with this office.”

Whose idea was that, Bruner’s? Out of uniform, on foreign ground, in covert surveillance, he was, by the rules, a spy. But out of uniform, with a false identity-that made him a real spy.

“Of course,” the consul said, “if you are caught, in that situation, you could be shot. Technically speaking, that is.”

“Yes, I know,” Mercier said. And gave the consul his passport.

In the early dusk of winter, Mercier climbed into an Opel with German plates. The young driver called himself Stefan and said he was from an emigre family that had settled in Besancon. “In ‘thirty-three,” he added. “The minute Hitler took power, my father got the suitcases down. He was a socialist politician, and he knew what was coming. Then, after we settled in France, the people you work for showed up right away, and they’ve kept me busy ever since.”

They crossed into Germany easily enough, Stefan using a German passport, and drove north on the road to Tubingen that passed through Schramberg. “About an hour and half,” Stefan said. “I’ll take you into the town and out on the forest road, where I’ll pick you up tomorrow night, so mark the spot carefully.”

“Before the roadblock.”

“Well before. It’s one-point-six miles from the Schramberg town hall.”

“And then, tomorrow night …”

“At nineteen-oh-five hours. Stay in the woods until then, I’ll be there on the minute. Is it only a one-day maneuver?”

“Likely more, but they want me out by tomorrow night.”

“A good idea,” Stefan said. “Don’t be greedy, that’s what I always say. And you’ll want to watch out for the foresters.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll keep my head down.”

“They’re always in the woods, cutting, pruning.” After a moment he said, “It’s a strange nation, when you think about it. Fussy. Rules for everything-the branches of each tree must only just touch the neighboring branches,