The Hunt

Bert Rudman

GUERNICA, SPAIN, Apr. 27, 1937.. German dive bombers and fighter planes without warning swept out of the skies over this Basque city today, strafing and bombing schools, hospitals, farmhouses and the marketplace and killing thousands of innocent people.

His work was a devastating mosaic of a world gone mad. It was as if a great cloak of darkness had been draped over Europe and down into Africa. And as the darkness spread, Dachau was lost in its core, a mere spot in the center of the growing fascist empire.

Triumphant Hitler Marches into

Austria as Crowds Cheer

by

Bert Rudman

VIENNA, AUSTRIA, Mar. 14, 1938. Adolf Hitler, who left this Austrian city as a penniless yos.ith, returned in triumph today and claimed this nation as his own.

To cries of “Heil, Hitler” and “Sieg Heil,” the dictator drove through the streets of this city as crowds cheered and threw flowers in his path . .

And even more ominously . .

Germany Readies Several

New Concentration Camps

by

Bert Rudman

BERLIN, AUG. 7, 1938. The Nazis have opened three new concentration camps in Germany and have several others under construction, according to confidential sources

Keegan was struck by the fact that his estranged friend was the harbinger of his own personal despair. With each story, Jenny’s plight seemed more desperate. Was she still alive? Had she been tortured, brutalized, in that infamous Nazi cesspool?

There was one story, late in the book, that particularly touched Keegan. Laced with sadness, it had a foreboding sense of doom between every line. It was written as if Rudman had seen the future and knew his string was running out.

A Quiet New Year’s Dinner

in Barcelona

by

Bert Rudman

BARCELONA, SPAIN, Jan. 1, 1938. A few of us American correspondents got together tonight for a traditional New Year’s Eve party at our favorite bistro.

It is now only a bombed-out hole on the ground littered with the rubble of war. Around us in this beleaguered city, the smell of death hangs heavy in the air.

But we brought a lantern, some cheese and a bottle of wine and sat on broken chairs and at midnight we sang “Auld Lang Syne.” We wept for fallen friends on both sides of this bitter struggle and talked about home and family and friends we have not seen for a very long time.

As we sat there, escaping for the moment from this dreadful war I could not escape the realization that if Franco and his hordes succeed in winning this civil war, France will be trapped between Germany and a new Fascist stronghold. Thus Spain may have the nefarious distinction of being the final dress rehearsal for World War II. . .

Francis Keegan stared at the book, no longer reading, his mind tumbling through time, when the doorbell rang. He tried to ignore it, hoping whoever it was would go away. But the bell was persistent and finally he got up and answered it.

Vanessa Bromley was standing in the doorway.

“Hi, Frankie Kee,” she said softly, accompanied by a devastating smile.

He was so surprised at the sight of her, he faltered before he spoke. His mind suddenly leaped back to the Berlin train station, almost five years ago.

Vannie throwing him her beret. Walking back to the hotel alone in the rain, thinking not about her but about Jenny. Sending the flowers without any card.

She looked great, a black Chanel hat cocked over one eye, long legs sheathed in black silk, her magnificent figure flattering a gray silk suit, a black velvet choker with a single diamond in the center. She was dressed to kill and he knew he was the quarry.

Bad timing, he thought, until she said just the right thing.

“I’m truly sorry, Kee,” she said. “I just heard about Bert.”

“How’d you know I was here?”

“Oh . . . I knew,” she said, almost wistfully. “May I come in?”