Traitors' Gate (26 page)

Perhaps Grauber realised that too. Perhaps, even, he baulked at the idea of knocking out a Hungarian Police Captain and forcibly abducting a prisoner from his Station. That was very different from kidnapping some unsuspecting person, and might cause quite a lot of tiresome correspondence between the Chancelleries of Berlin and Budapest. After staring for a long moment at the Captain he switched his glance to Gregory, and said:

‘Very well, I will leave you for the night in the custody of the
Herr Hauptmann
. But don’t imagine you are going to get away with the story that you are a Frenchman. There are plenty of people in Germany who know you as Gregory Sallust, and if necessary I’ll have witnesses flown in to support my identification of you.

‘Anyway, when you are brought into court tomorrow morning, I mean to accuse you of the murder of
Obersturmbannführer
Fritz Einholtz, and others, and to apply for a warrant for your extradition. When you have been handed over to me we’ll talk again. First you’ll tell me all about this conspiracy; then I’ll take you back to Germany. In six months’ time you will still be alive, but for five months and twenty-nine days you will have been wishing that you were dead.’

Even when Grauber and his two henchmen stamped angrily from the room Gregory could not be certain that the wily
Gruppenführer
would not suddenly turn on his heel and return to try some new trick for getting possession of him. But the sound of trampling feet across the outer office faded, and after a last minute of dreadful suspense he felt that temporarily, although only temporarily, by sticking to his bluff, he had got the better of his enemy. Turning to the Hungarian, he said in the heavily accented and faulty German that he had used since being brought into the Station:

‘Captain, I cannot be sufficiently grateful to you for your protection from those thugs. It is appalling to think that in their own country they have the power to torture anyone they choose merely on suspicion. How good it is to find that here in Hungary you still maintain the same traditions of justice which we have for so long cherished in France.’

The Captain made a grimace. ‘These Germans are beasts, but the Russians would be worse; so we must put up with them. Fortunately they are not our masters; so even if it were certain that you were an English spy I would not have allowed them to torture you. But make no mistake about it, if they can prove you to be the man they think, and demand your extradition for crimes committed in Germany, we shall have to hand you over to them.’

‘God forbid that should happen! But it may.’

‘Do you mean that you are, as they say, a British agent?’ the Captain asked with a frown.

Gregory hated to have to deceive him, but in doing so lay his only chance to take advantage of the short respite that he had been granted. Throwing out his hands in a typically French gesture, he exclaimed:

‘No! No! Do not think that, I beg. I meant only that I may have difficulty in persuading your magistrates that I am Commandant Tavenier. You have been more than a friend; so I will be frank with you. When I suggested that a telegram of enquiry about me should be sent to Vichy I was seeking only
to gain time—to save myself from being tortured there and then. If one were sent it would do me no good. It would confirm that I am Tavenier but declare me to be an enemy. The truth is that I am a de Gaullist. I served with the Free French Forces in England, and landed with the British when they made their raid on St. Nazaire. I was wounded and left for dead. De Gaullist sympathisers hid me until I recovered, but I am listed by Vichy as a traitor. That is why I made my way secretly to Switzerland and then to Hungary. You see, I dare not appeal to the French Government; and how, otherwise, can I prove that I am Tavenier? The thought that I may fail to prove my identity fills me with terror; but it means that the Germans’ word will be taken that I am this man Sallust.’

The Captain nodded. ‘I see. In that case your situation is certainly a most dangerous one.’

‘If these accursed Germans once get hold of me they will tear me into little bits.’

‘I fear you are right.’

‘Yet I am innocent. My only crime is that I believed, like many thousands of my countrymen, that, for the honour of France, all of us who were able to do so should fight on.’

‘I appreciate that. It is tragic for you that a resemblance to another person should have landed you in this appalling mess.’

Having won the Hungarian’s sympathy, Gregory felt that the time had now come to play a card that might just prove a trump. After a moment he asked, ‘What exactly is the charge against me?’

‘With having created a disturbance in a public place and inflicted bodily harm upon the
Gruppenführer a
nd a Captain Cochefert who was with him.’

‘But it was the
Gruppenführer
who assaulted me.’

‘That is a matter in dispute. It will be decided on the evidence of the wash-room attendant when the case comes up before a magistrate in the morning.’

‘As I understand it, then, the
Gruppenführer
has been charged too, and will have to appear in the dock with me?’

‘Yes; and Captain Cochefert also, if after treatment in hospital the doctors consider him well enough to do so.’

‘Why, then, should you have released the
Gruppenführer
and detained me?’

The Hungarian shrugged. ‘Your circumstances are very different. He is a high official in the police force of an allied
country. His word that he will appear when summoned is sufficient. You, on the other hand, are both a foreigner and a temporary resident here. If you were allowed to go free you might take the first train in the morning out of Budapest.’

‘True, but the charge is only a civil one; surely your regulations enable you to release me against security for my appearance?’

‘Yes; normally I could do so.’

Gregory tried to still the beating of his heart as his hopes rose. ‘Then why should you not? Fortunately I have a considerable amount of money on me—in fact a very large sum, as I was too late to pay it into the bank today. I will willingly deposit the bulk of it with you as a recognisance.’

The Hungarian’s face broke into a smile. ‘You mean that, having made provision in advance against a probable fine, you would not turn up?’

‘The sum would cover a fine
and
there would be a very handsome balance which could go to your police orphanage,’ Gregory smiled back, in good hope now that his scheme for bribing the Captain to let him go was about to come off.

But the Hungarian shook his head. ‘No. It can’t be done. Ordinarily there would have been no difficulty about what you suggest; but you seem to have forgotten that the Germans believe you to be a spy.’

‘That is the whole point,’ Gregory countered. ‘If I had nothing to fear from appearing in court tomorrow, I’d be a fool to offer several thousand
pengoes
to save myself a night in a cell; but my life may depend on my becoming a free man again tonight.’

‘I realise that; but I cannot help it.’

On seeing his one chance slipping Gregory began to plead desperately. ‘But you can! You can! I am not charged with spying. You have only to go by the letter of the law and treat me as though I were an ordinary stranger in Budapest who had created a row in a night-club. If it hadn’t been for the
Gruppenführer
you wouldn’t hold me. To do so is to associate yourself with his frightful error and, perhaps, bring about my death.’

‘Not necessarily. You still have a way out.’

‘Way out? If you’ve thought of one for God’s sake tell me of it.’

To come clean with the magistrate, as you have done with me.’

‘But if I admit to having fought as one of the Free French I shall be counted an enemy and interned.’

‘Well, that is not much to worry about compared to being carried off by the Gestapo.’

‘That may be my fate just the same, unless I appeal to Vichy to substantiate my identity.’

‘Then you must do so.’

‘Admittedly that would knock the bottom out of the Germans’ case, but Vichy in their turn would at once apply for my extradition.’

‘Why should they bother? If you were interned here you could do them no further harm.’

Gregory had been aware of this weakness in the wholly academic argument he was putting up; but, short of saying that he was wanted for murder by the Vichy police—which it could be assumed would at once alienate the Hungarian’s sympathy from him—he could see no way of making it appear that should he call on Vichy he would be jumping out of the frying pan into the fire. All he could do was to adopt a middle course, and say:

‘As I have already told you, I am listed by Vichy as a traitor. You may be sure they would not be content to leave me here; and if I am sent back, God knows what will become of me. Some of these Pétainists are as bad as the Germans, and they delight in the chance to revenge themselves on officers who have shown them up to be cowards.’

‘All the same, they won’t torture you, as the Germans would.’

‘No, but they might shoot me.’

‘I see no reason why they should; unless you have done something to deserve it.’

‘You do not know these Vichy traitors as I do. They stick at nothing to curry favour with the Germans.’

The Hungarian shook his head sadly. ‘It is an evil day for any country when such things can happen in it. But it looks as if you must take your chance with Vichy as the only way of keeping out of the clutches of the
Gruppenführer!
.’

‘Either way the most terrible ordeals await me,’ Gregory replied with great earnestness. ‘Yet you have it in your power to save me from them. You alone can play the part of a good
angel. God would reward you for it. One word from you—the signing of a paper …’

‘No!’ The Captain held up his hand to check the flow of pleading. ‘It is useless for you to go on. I’m sorry for you, but I have to think of myself. I’ve a wife and two youngsters. I’d be only too willing to let you go if you could produce any concrete proof that you were not this English spy, Sallust. But as things are, I daren’t risk it. I’ve already earned the animosity of that
Gruppenführer
, and he is too powerful a bird to be just laughed off. If I fail to produce you in court tomorrow he will create hell with my own Chiefs, and what possible excuse could I give? I’d be out of a job, or, at the very least, suffer a reduction in rank.’

Gregory saw now that his endeavours had been in vain. He could only nod gloomily, as the Captain went on: ‘We’ve spent quite enough time in talking, and I have work to do. Come along now, and we’ll put you in a cell for the night.’

As they left the waiting-room, Gregory caught sight of himself in a small mirror. Up till that moment he had been so desperately concerned with trying to save himself that he had paid little regard to his physical condition and none to his appearance. Now he saw that the hair-oil from the half-full bottle that Cochefert had broken over his head had wrought havoc with his collar, shirt and jacket, and he became newly conscious of its oily stickiness; so he asked if he might wash.

His request was granted. He was taken to a washroom where he succeeded in getting most of the surplus oil out of his hair and off his face and neck, but about his clothes nothing could be done short of sending them to a cleaners.

He was then taken to a cell and locked in. Only a dim blue pilot light was burning in it; but that was sufficient to show him that it was clean and reasonably comfortable. It contained an iron bed with three coarse blankets, a chamber-pot, a chair and a small table. On the table there had considerately been placed a mug of steaming coffee. Having sipped it he found it to be ersatz stuff, probably made from acorns, but he was none the less grateful and, sitting down on the bed, he slowly drank it while reviewing his situation.

Whichever way he looked at it he could see no ray of comfort. From a modern police station of this kind there could be no escape, and there was no reason at all to suppose that a chance to do so would occur when the routine drill was
followed next morning of taking him from it in a black-maria to the court.

Once there, he would not have a leg to stand on. He hoped that the injury he had inflicted on Cochefert was proving extremely painful, but it could not have rendered him inarticulate. If the Frenchman had not already made a statement to the police, he would certainly do so next day. His statement would include irrefutable proof that Gregory was not Tavenier, and also disclose that he had passed himself off as Lt.-Colonel Einholtz of the S.D. If anything could add to Grauber’s vindictive rage it would be that he had posed as this favourite disciple in frightfulness of whose services he had deprived the Gestapo for good and all.

The outcome must be that by afternoon he would be in a train under heavy guard on his way to Germany, to await the
Gruppenführer’s
grim pleasure. It seemed that only one eventuality might prevent this—namely Grauber’s failure to appear in court. Yet there was not the least reason to suppose that he would fail to do so.

There had been other occasions when Gregory had fallen into Grauber’s clutches and been equally despondent about ever getting out of them. He had done so because, although the
Gruppenführer
was brave enough in other ways, he was terrified of high explosives. Once an air raid alarm had scared him into abandoning his prisoner, and another time, when they were both in a submarine, depth charges had panicked him into abandoning ship prematurely. But Budapest was hundreds of miles outside the range of Allied aircraft, and there was not the remotest possibility that bombs, shells, showers of grenades or any other form of big bang was likely to keep Grauber cowering in a cellar next morning.

Taking off his still sticky jacket, collar and tie, and shoes, Gregory spread out the blankets and lay down on the bed. As the bottle of hair-oil had struck him neither on the temple nor the base of the skull, but a little to one side of the top of his head, it had caused him no serious injury. His head still ached but now only slightly, and not sufficiently to prevent his continuing to think coherently without undue effort, although there was no longer any desperate necessity for him to do so.