The professional assassin Herbert was also in Constanta, though at a much better hotel. He was, as usual, accompanied by his colleague Lothar, and that night they visited one of Constanta’s better brothels, which catered mostly to the many German visitors in the city that winter. After spending time in the rooms upstairs, Herbert and Lothar sat comfortably in the parlour, ordered schnapps, and relaxed, not having to go to work until the following day.
‘Have we been here before?’ Lothar asked.
‘No, that was last fall. We were in Varna, the Bulgarian port, taking care of some Frenchman who ran away with bribe money.’
‘Ah, that’s right. Is this man Stahl somebody I should know? The name is familiar.’
‘A movie actor, a Viennese who lives in America.’
‘That’s unusual,’ Lothar said. ‘For us.’
‘Somehow he got tangled up with the Ribbentropburo, in Paris. Then the Gestapo got involved, and there was some sort of debacle in Hungary. For which Himmler himself blamed von Ribbentrop, he had to blame somebody. So now the Ribbentrop people — you know, Emhof — want to be rid of Herr Stahl before anything else goes wrong. They’re afraid of Himmler, this operation is meant to appease him.’
‘I guess it doesn’t matter.’
‘Not to me it doesn’t, as long as somebody pays.’
‘Who’s doing the job?’
‘I found us a new Russian, Volodya he calls himself, an emigre in Bucharest. He’ll be here tomorrow, we’ll do it then.’
‘Care to go back upstairs?’ Lothar said.
‘I’m thinking about it, one’s never quite enough. Maybe that little blonde thing, whatever her name is. What about you?’
‘I’m tired, the train was miserable. But I’m happy to wait for you.’
‘Then I think I’ll indulge,’ Herbert said. ‘It’s cheap enough.’
13 January.
As was their usual practice, Herbert and Lothar were to meet their gunman at a local bar in a workers’ quarter. Their Russian, however, was late — two o’clock passed, then two-thirty. In time he showed up — through the window they could see him coming, weaving from one side of the pavement to the other, and chuckling to himself. Herbert swore — there wasn’t much more he could do. Volodya entered singing, and backed up a step when he saw his employers. Then he made his way to their table, collapsed on a chair, and said a few choice words in Russian, which neither Herbert nor Lothar understood.
Herbert was enraged, though you would have had to know him well to see that. Shaking his head, smiling away, he handed Volodya some money, far less than he was supposed to be paid, but he seemed happy enough as he staggered away from the bar. ‘And what do we do now?’ Lothar said.
‘I’ll have to handle it myself,’ Herbert said. ‘Just like the old days. There isn’t time to find somebody else — they sail tomorrow.’
‘Want company?’
‘No, you wait for me here. I won’t be long.’ From a briefcase he took an old Luger pistol and tucked it in his waistband. Then he rose, shook his head once more, and said, ‘Something always goes wrong, doesn’t it,’ and left the bar, headed for the Princess Maria Hotel.
Stahl and Renate were lying on the bed, reading their books, waiting for the hours to pass until they sailed, when someone knocked at the door. Stahl got to his feet and said, ‘Yes? Who is it?’
‘Desk clerk, open up, please.’
Stahl and Renate looked at each other. The desk clerk spoke a form of hotel German, what had been said in the corridor was the language of a Berliner. Stahl called out, ‘One moment,’ and got down on his knees, peered through the crack beneath the door and saw a pair of very well-made shoes. Standing up, he said, ‘What do you want?’
From the other side of the door: ‘Open up, sir.’
This was no desk clerk. As Renate watched, Stahl tiptoed to his open suitcase and took the automatic pistol from its holster. Then he stood in front of the door and waited for the man in the corridor to go away.
Now Herbert, who had had an irritating day, smacked the side of his fist on the thin wooden door, which made it bang against the simple lock. ‘Open up!’ the voice repeated and something surged inside Stahl. The loud report deafened him, a splintery hole appeared in the door. Renate gasped and leapt to her feet, horrified. ‘What happened?’ she said.
Listening at the door, Stahl heard only silence. He made himself wait for a full minute, then looked out into the corridor, but there was nobody there.
Later that afternoon, Stahl went downstairs to pay the bill — they had decided that it was wiser not to stay at the hotel overnight. The desk clerk said to him, ‘Did someone upstairs fire a gun?’
‘They did. A while ago. Some madman in a uniform, I think, on the floor above us. I wouldn’t go up there, if I were you.’
The clerk’s eyes went from Stahl to the staircase and back, then his Adam’s apple rose and fell, and he took the money that Stahl offered him.
The Princess Maria Hotel was on a broad avenue that faced the sea, where benches set beneath lime trees invited passersby to spend a moment. On one of the benches sat a man who was going to spend more than a moment, his head at rest against the uppermost wooden slat, one eye open, a hand inside his jacket. As people walked by, they had a brief glance, then looked away. Was a dead man sitting on a bench, in the Roumania of 1939, of no consequence? Perhaps so. In any event, the men and women in the street went about their business. As to the unpleasant sight on the bench, there was nothing they cared to do.
Someone would see to it.
It was a long voyage: fourteen days at sea, a few days waiting to embark in the ports of Istanbul and Lisbon, three weeks by the time they reached New York. There were fierce storms in the Mediterranean and heavy seas in the January Atlantic, where they sailed on a Dutch liner much favoured by students and intellectuals — a melancholy group on that leg of the voyage, sad to leave Europe to its fate, or just sad to leave Europe. Stahl and Renate spent the time together, fought and made up, made love, slept in the afternoon, sometimes just stared at the sea, hypnotized by the long swells, and got to know each other very well indeed but were, more than ever, by the time the ship entered New York Harbor, friends and lovers. Just after dawn that day, the ship blew three long blasts on its foghorn. The more seasoned travellers knew what that meant and flocked to the railing on the port side of the ship as the Statue of Liberty appeared from the morning mist. Here Stahl and Renate joined the crowd and held hands, not letting go until Renate required the use of a handkerchief, and Stahl had to touch the corners of his eyes with his fingers. And they weren’t the only ones.
France was attacked by Germany on 10 May, 1940, and surrendered on 21 June.
