Spies of the Balkans

Matzig, waited behind the wheel of a Mercedes automobile. He had to work with Matzig, formerly a detective in Ulm, but didn’t much care for him, a man who took his membership in the Nazi party quite seriously, reading, in fact studying, certain books and going endlessly to meetings. Oh well, to each his own, and he didn’t see all that much of Matzig, working mostly by himself. But today they were going to make an arrest, a couple called Gruen, a lawyer and his wife, Jews, suspected of affiliation with Communists. His department in the Gestapo had a long list of such people, wealthy Berlin intellectuals for the most part, and was, at a steady pace, arresting and jailing them for interrogation, so that they might be persuaded to confess to their crimes, provide names of others, be tried, and imprisoned.

Matzig drove cautiously, much too slowly for Hauser’s taste-the little shrimp was irritating in so many little ways-but soon enough they were in the garden district of Dahlem, one of Berlin’s finest neighborhoods, where many on Hauser’s list were resident. Matzig parked the car and, as they walked up the path to the Gruen doorway, Hauser instinctively made sure of his sidearm, a Walther PPK, the smaller version of the standard police pistol. Not that he’d need it. These arrests were easy, you had only to open the back door of the car and the criminals climbed in. Not like the old days: much calmer and, important to a family man like Hauser, much safer.

Matzig pressed the button by the door and they heard, from within the house, the sound of a chime.

A FRENCH KING

Storms, in January. Snow covered the mountain villages. Down in Salonika, windswept rain came sheeting across the corniche, where the locals staggered along, struggling with their umbrellas and scowling each time a gust hit them. When, after work, Zannis returned to Santaroza Lane, a welcoming Melissa shook off a great spray that decorated the wall of the vestibule and the apartment was filled with the musky aroma of wet dog. Lately, Zannis was often alone there-Tasia Loukas didn’t visit very often. She sensed in him a certain distraction and she was right. For, again and again, his imagination replayed the scene on the street in front of the Club de Salonique. Behind the window of a white Rolls-Royce, a vision, olive skin and golden hair, then, from perfect composure, the smile of an actress.

Idiot, he called himself. For indulging in such fantasies. But nothing new, he thought. Down through the endless halls of time, forever, there wasn’t a man in the world who hadn’t wanted what he’d never have. “Do you know Vasilou?” he asked Tasia. “And his wife, what’s-her- name?”

“Demetria, you mean? The goddess?”

“Yes.”

“I know him by sight, he doesn’t mix with people like me. What do you want with him?”

“I was just wondering.”

“Not about her. Were you, little boy?”

“No.”

“Better not.”

So, he thought, Demetria.

And schemed. Absurdly-Oh no, the house is on fire, I’ll have to carry you out. Or, not so absurdly-A cocktail party? I’d love to.

Meanwhile, much realer schemes absorbed his day, schemes involving the Balkan railways and Turkish documents. As the Gruens left for Istanbul, six new refugees-a couple, a single man, a family of three-appeared at Salonika railway station. For reasons of economy, and because the management was sympathetic, Zannis housed them in the Tobacco Hotel, a weary but functional relic of the nineteenth century. There, gray and exhausted, they tried to recover from long days and nights on the escape route. Tried to recover from the slow brutal succession of torments experienced as Jews living in Nazi Germany. Seven years of it.

As for the final link in the chain, Ahmet Celebi had had his fill of the indifferent food at the Club de Salonique, and now Zannis dealt exclusively with Madam Urglu, nominally a deputy to the commercial attache, in fact the Turkish legation’s intelligence officer. An intimidating presence, Madam Urglu, with her opaque, puffy face, her eyeglasses on a chain, and her-well, inquisitive nature. They met at a taverna owned by Greek refugees who’d come to Salonika in the great population exchange, thus called Smyrna Betrayed, where, in the winter damp, Madam Urglu was partial to the fish stew.

“So,” she said, “this turns out to be an ongoing, um, project. One might as well call it an ‘operation,’ no?”

“It is,” Zannis said. “Someone has to help these people.”

“Can they not remain in Salonika?”

“They would be welcome, this city has always taken in refugees.” Zannis tore a piece of bread in half. “But the Wehrmacht is in Roumania-maybe it won’t stop there.”

“We hope they don’t go into Bulgaria. That puts them on our border.”

“Only tourists in Bulgaria, right now,” Zannis said. “Very fit young men, in pairs, with expensive cameras. Tourists with a passion for the ancient Bulgar culture, like airfields, and port facilities.”

Madam Urglu smiled. “Such finesse,” she said. “Our Teutonic friends.” She retrieved a mussel from her stew, open perhaps a third of the way, stared at it for a moment, then set it beside her bowl. “But at least they’re not in Greece. And the English are doing what they can.” There were now sixty thousand British Commonwealth troops, divisions from Australia and New Zealand, on the island of Crete.

“We’re grateful,” Zannis said. “But we can’t be sure how Hitler sees it. Provocation? Deterrent? And Mussolini must be screaming at him, because the RAF is bombing the Italians in Albania.”

“Which we applaud. Unofficially, of course. And it isn’t just a feint, I see they’ve put shore artillery in Salonika.” She gestured with her head toward the waterfront, where long cannon were now facing the Aegean.

“They have.”

“One wonders if more is coming.”

“It’s possible,” Zannis said, preparing for the attack.

“Perhaps more guns. Or, even, an RAF squadron.”

“We’d be happy to have them,” Zannis said.

“You haven’t heard?”

“I’m not told such things, Madam Urglu. I’m only a policeman.”

“Oh, please. Don’t go being coy, not with me.”

“Truly, I don’t know.”

“But I’m sure you could find out. If you cared to.”

“Not even that. I expect the military would be informed, but they’re known to be secretive.”

For just a bare instant, a look of irritation, compressed lips, darkened Madam Urglu’s face. Then she said, “Naturally,” and with some resignation added, “they are. Still, it would be something of an achievement, for me, to learn of such plans. One always wants to do well in one’s job.”

“And who doesn’t?” Zannis said, meaning no offense taken.

“You would like to see me do well, wouldn’t you?”

“You know I would.”

“Then, maybe sometime, if you should discover …”

“Understood,” Zannis said. “It’s not impossible.”

“Ah me,” Madam Urglu said, gently rueful, how the world goes around.

Zannis smiled, yes, it does. Then he said, “I’ll need six visas, this time.”

“Six!”

“Yes, it’s more desperate every day, up north.”

“My, my. Would five help you?”

“Madam Urglu, please.”

“All right then, six. It’s five hundred dollars each. I trust you have the money with you.”

“It was four apiece, the last time.”