unsold copies of the previous edition so that these could be pulped and used again. And it was among these that I hid when we were crossing from one zone of occupation into another. The rest of the time I sat in the cab with Timmermann and listened as he talked, which, he said, he liked to do because most of the time he was driving he was usually on his own, and it could get a bit lonely on the road at times. That suited me just fine as I had little or nothing to say to anyone. He had served in the Luftwaffe during the war, at Griesheim, which was how he had come to be there when the war ended. And how he had come to start driving for the Amis some two years earlier.
'They're not so bad to work for,' he said. 'Once you get to know them. Most of them just want to get home. Of the four powers, they're the best people to work for. But probably the worst soldiers. Seriously. They don't give a damn about anything. If the Russians ever attack they'll walk right on through Germany. The security on the bases is nonexistent. Which is how I get away with so much. All those Amis have some kind of racket going. Booze, cigarettes, dirty books, medicines, women's hosiery, you name it, I've hauled it for them. Believe me, you're not the only illicit cargo this truck is moving.'
He didn't say what the truck's illicit cargo was on this occasion, and I didn't ask. But I did ask him about Father Lajolo.
'I'm a Roman Catholic, see?' he said. 'And the father, he married me and my wife when he was at a different parish, during the war. Saint Ulrich's, in the Seventh District. My wife, Giovanna, she's half Italian, too, see? Half Austrian, half Italian. Her brother was in the SS, and Father Lajolo helped get him out of Austria after the war. He's living in Scotland now. Can you believe it? Scotland. Plays golf all the time, he says. The Comradeship got him a new name, a home, a job. He's a mining engineer in Edinburgh. No one will ever think of looking for him in Edinburgh. So, ever since then, I've helped the father out when he wanted to move an old comrade somewhere those Reds can't get their bloody hands on him. You ask me, Vienna's finished. It'll go the same way as Berlin. You mark my words. One day, they'll just roll their tanks in and nobody will do a thing to stop them. The Amis think it won't ever happen. Either that or they just don't care. None of this would have happened if they'd made a peace with Hitler. If they hadn't forced that unconditional surrender on us. We'd still have a Europe that looked like Europe, not next week's Soviet republic.'
It was a long journey. On the road from Vienna to Salzburg there was a speed limit of only forty miles an hour. But in the villages and small towns it was as low as ten miles an hour. By the time I had endured several hours of listening to Timmermann's opinions of the Reds and the Amis, I was ready to ram a copy of
At Salzburg we got on the Munich autobahn and our speed increased. Soon we were across the German border. We drove north and then west, through Munich. There seemed little point in getting out of the truck in Munich. I didn't doubt that Jacobs would make sure the police were waiting for me there. And until the Comradeship was able to provide me with a new identity and passport, my best course of action seemed to be to stay where I was being taken. We drove on through Landsberg before turning south to Kempten, which nestles in the foothills of the Alps, in the Allgau region of southwest Bavaria. My journey finally ended at an old Benedictine monastery in the hills outside Kempten. This was temptingly close to Garmisch-Partenkirchen, which, Timmermann told me, was just sixty-five miles to the west of Kempten, and I knew it would not be long before I was tempted.
The monastery was a fine Gothic building with pink brick walls and two high pagoda-like bell towers that dominated the snow-covered landscape for miles around. But it was only when you drove through the main gate that you perceived the true size of the place and, as a corollary, the wealth and power of the Roman Catholic Church. That there should be such a huge Catholic monastery in such a small and out-of-the-way place like Kempten made me aware of just what resources and manpower were at the command of the Vatican and, by extension, the Comradeship. And I wondered what was in it for the Church, providing a ratline for old Nazis and escaping war criminals like myself.
The truck stopped and I got out. I was in an inner court that was as big as a military parade ground. Timmermann led me into a doorway, through a basilica the size of an aircraft hangar, with an altar that only a Holy Roman Emperor might have thought modest. I thought it looked as gaudy as a Polish Christmas cake. Someone was playing the organ and a choir of local boys was singing sweetly. But for an overpowering smell of beer that filled the air, the atmosphere seemed predictably holy. I followed Timmermann into a small office, where we were met by a monk. He had the look of someone who enjoyed a glass of beer. Father Bandolini was a big man with a large stomach and the hands of a good butcher. His hair was short and silver-colored, which seemed to match the gray in his eyes. He had a face as strong as anything I had seen carved on a totem pole. He met us with bread, cheese, cold meats, pickles, a glass of the beer brewed in the monastery, and some warm words of welcome. Shooing me closer to the fire, he asked if our journey had been difficult.
'No problems at all, Father,' said Timmermann, who soon excused himself as he wanted to get back to Griesheim that night.
'Father Lajolo tells me that you're a doctor,' said Father Bandolini, after Timmermann had left. 'Is that right?'
'Yes,' I said, dreading the possibility that I might be asked to perform some medical procedure that would reveal me as a fraud. 'But I haven't practiced medicine since before the war.'
'But you are a Roman Catholic,' he said.
'Of course,' I said, thinking it best that I seemed to agree with the creed of the people who were helping me. 'Although not a very good one.'
Father Bandolini shrugged. 'Whatever that is,' he said.
I shrugged back. 'Somehow I always imagined that monks were probably good Catholics,' I said.
'It's easy to be a good Catholic when you live in a monastery,' he said. 'That's why most of us do it. There's not much temptation in a place like this.'
'I don't know,' I said. 'The beer is excellent.'
'Isn't it?' He grinned. 'It's been brewed here to the same recipe for hundreds of years. Perhaps that's why many of us stay.'
His voice was quiet and he was well-spoken, which made me think I might have misheard him when, after I finished eating, he explained that the monastery--and, in particular, the St. Raphael Community that was based there--had been helping German Catholic emigres since 1871, and that many of these had been non-Aryan Catholics.
'Did you say 'non-Aryan Catholics'?'
He nodded.
'Is that just a fancy Church term for an Italian?' I asked.
'No, no. That's what we used to call the Jews we helped. Many of them became Catholics, of course. But some others we just called Catholics in order to persuade countries like Brazil and Argentina to take them.'
'Wasn't that rather dangerous?' I said.
'Oh yes. Very. The Gestapo in Kempten had us under surveillance for almost a decade. One of our brethren even died in a concentration camp for helping Jews.'
I wondered if the irony of his helping Eric Gruen, the vilest of war criminals, was apparent to him. I soon learned that it was.
'It is the will of God that the Saint Raphael Community should help those who once organized its persecution,' he said. 'Besides, it's a different enemy now, but one no less dangerous. An enemy that regards religion as an opiate poisoning the minds of people.'
But none of this was as surprising as what was to follow.
I was to be accommodated not in the cloister, with the rest of the monks, but in the infirmary, where, Father Bandolini assured me, I would be much more comfortable. 'For one thing,' he said, leading me across the huge quadrangle, 'it's a lot warmer there. Fires are permitted in the rooms. There are comfortable armchairs and the bathroom facilities are superior to anything in the cloister. Your meals will be brought to you, but you're free to join us for Mass in the basilica. And let me know if you seek absolution. I'll send a priest to you.' He opened a heavy wooden door and led me through a chapter house into the infirmary. 'You won't be on your own,' he added. 'We have two other guests staying with us at the moment. Gentlemen like yourself. They'll probably show you the ropes. Both of them are waiting to emigrate to South America. I'll introduce you. But don't worry. We don't encourage the use of old names here, for obvious reasons. If you don't mind I'll use your new name. The name that will be in your passport when eventually it arrives from Vienna.'
