Adam shook his head. “London, buzz-bomb explosion, lost part of my hearing as well.”
Meinerz nodded, though Adam guessed he wasn’t completely convinced. “The dossier also said you’re fluent in German as well as English and Polish. And you studied law at Jagiellonian University in Krakow.”
“I returned to Poland in ’36, following my discharge from the army.”
“So, are you up to speed on what we’re doing here and the doctrine of ‘crimes against humanity’?”
“That was part of my course work at Jagiellonian.”
“Though I guess the operative term now is genocide, isn’t it?” Meinerz paused for a moment then added, “By the way, wasn’t it some Polish fellow who coined that term?”
Adam set his beer on a glass-topped table and looked Meinerz in the eye. “Are you testing me, Colonel?”
Meinerz was about to respond, but Adam held up his hand, stopping him. “The man’s name was Lemkin, Raphael Lemkin, a Polish legal scholar who is now an adviser to the U.S. Army. You may have read his book, Axis Rule in Occupied Europe. And, you’re correct; he did coin the term, ‘genocide,’ based on his studies of the slaughter of Armenians by the Ottoman Turks. It seems he agreed with Churchilclass="underline" ‘the world has come face-to-face with a crime that has no name.’”
Meinerz finished his beer. “No offense, Mr. Nowak—”
“You can call me Adam.”
“No, offense, Adam, but this mission is likely to get pretty dicey. I don’t like surprises.”
“I don’t either. And you may as well know: while I’m here to help you if I can, I represent the Polish Government-in-Exile, and their main concern is to determine the fate of a number of specific individuals.”
“I see. You have a list?”
“I do. Would you like to see it?”
Meinerz shook his head. “Let’s wait and see how cooperative our Russian allies are first. It may take some doing to get into Sachsenhausen. Another beer?”
Twenty-Seven
ADAM WAS UP EARLY the next morning, woken first by the usual dream, then by sounds of an idling engine and voices from outside. He pulled back the curtain and looked out the window. A U.S. Army truck stood on the cobblestone drive, and two soldiers were unloading crates from the back. A gray-haired civilian wearing a tweed suit coat waited nearby.
After he’d washed up and shaved, Adam put on the new navy-blue suit provided by SOE. He left his second-floor bedroom and made his way along the hallway to the main staircase. Amidst the ruins of Berlin it was hard to comprehend the elegance that now surrounded him. He descended the broad oak staircase, glancing at oil paintings of German landscapes lit with wall sconces, powered by a generator Meinerz said was located on the premises. At the bottom he made his way through a richly decorated parlor with a cavernous stone fireplace flanked by floor-to-ceiling bookshelves.
He paused at one of the bookshelves and scanned the titles. They were mostly German, but included a smattering of English and French, even some Polish. He noticed an entire shelf of German legal volumes: maritime law, taxes, labor law. He skimmed through the volume on labor law, shaking his head at the sections dealing with fair pay and penalties for discrimination. He shoved it back on the shelf, guessing it was written before the Nazis took over, and headed for the kitchen.
Adam stepped through the swinging door, just as the gray-haired man in the tweed coat dragged a crate filled with vegetables and fresh bread through the kitchen. He stopped abruptly and straightened up, to stand stiffly, staring at Adam. “Guten Morgen,” Adam said.
The man nodded. “Guten Morgen.” He appeared to be in his sixties, thin and tired-looking. The tweed coat was well-worn but clean. The man fidgeted, his eyes darting around as though he were trying to decide what to say next. Before he could respond, a woman stepped into the kitchen from the same back door.
She bowed her head to Adam and said in fractured English, “Good morning. I Frau Hetzler. This is husband.” She wore a crisp white apron over a flower print dress, her gray hair knotted in a tight bun. She shot a sharp glance at her husband, who bent down and dragged the crate into a large pantry. Then she bowed again and stepped through a second set of swinging doors, beckoning Adam to follow.
They entered a room Adam had not seen the night before. It was apparently a breakfast room with floor-to ceiling leaded glass windows, half of them boarded up, overlooking the terrace. A massive oak table dominated the center. On a sideboard stood a coffee urn, cups and saucers; a cream and sugar service; and a platter of dark bread and cheese. Frau Hetzler served coffee, then gestured toward the cream and sugar, and the platter of bread and cheese.
Still having trouble adjusting to this sudden abundance of food, Adam settled for coffee, holding the cup under his nose for a moment, savoring the sweet aroma. He was stirring in the cream when a man’s voice from behind said, “The coffee is real and so is the cream.”
Adam turned and saw Colonel Meinerz standing in the doorway. Frau Hetzler had disappeared. “Good morning,” Adam said, and took a sip of the first real coffee he’d had in years. “How is it possible?”
Meinerz stepped over to the sideboard and poured a cup for himself. “The owner had a pile of ten-kilo sacks of coffee beans squirreled away in the cellar along with a dozen blocks of cheese, some bags of sugar and a case of French cognac. As for the cream, the Hetzler’s keep a cow locked in a garage in back of the house.”
“The Hetzler’s are the caretakers?”
Meinerz nodded as he carved a slice of cheese. “Yes. We’re all amazed the cow is still here.”
“That’s because Ivan cares more about drinking than eating,” said a new voice from the doorway. A stocky crew-cut American officer entered the room and stepped up to Adam. “Major Mark Thompson.”
Adam shook the officer’s hand and introduced himself.
“According to Herr Hetzler,” Thompson said with a laugh, “there was a lot more than one case of cognac in that cellar before the Russians got here. They probably got so plastered they couldn’t even see the cow, let alone try to shoot it.”
“Mark was the first one here,” Meinerz said, “so he got all the inside dope from Herr Hetzler.”
Thompson had poured himself a cup of coffee and was stirring in a third spoonful of sugar. “Yeah, it was just the old man and me for the first two days. Frau Hetzler was so terrified of being raped by the Russians that she locked herself in the garage.”
Frau Hetzler returned with boiled eggs and sausages, then backed out of the room again as Colonel Meinerz pulled out a chair. “Well, gentlemen, shall we have breakfast?”
When they were seated, Thompson immediately began to spread strawberry jam on a slice of bread. “So, you’re the chap representing the Polish Government?” he said to Adam. “And you’re American?”
“An American with special ties to Poland,” Adam replied.
“You’ve spent time in Poland, then?”
“I was born there.”
Meinerz cut in. “I’ll explain it all later.” Then he turned to Adam. “I’m not sure I mentioned it last night, but we’re the only ones staying here at the moment. Since we don’t have clearance from the Russians to visit Sachsenhausen yet, the rest of the team has gone down to Dachau. At least that’s in the American sector, and we don’t need their fuckin’ permission. Mark will be joining them later today. You’ll go with me to visit the Russians here in Berlin and see what we can get done.”