Chris sagged to the cot and mumbled that he was sorry.
“What’s really bothering you, Chris?”
“Don’t you know?”
“Perhaps we’d better talk about it.”
“I don’t want to.” He shook his head slowly. “I just don’t want to.” They were at a dead end. In a few days Gabriela would find a route for him to take out of the country. Deborah would be left behind. There was no way for her to leave the children or Rachael or Stephan. There was no way for her to take them. He had to go and she had to stay. Simple and absolute.
“I never felt sorry for those poor bastards I preyed upon for my bread and butter. The generals, the admirals, the heads of state. The great doers. Many of them looked upon themselves as pawns of fate. Not me. I said to myself: They deserve everything they get. They really crave this destiny bit. They beg for martyrdom. So, now I feel sorry for them. Look at me, Christopher de Monti, the great white hope of the battered tribes of Israel. I am the voice beyond death which must not be stilled.”
“None of us has a choice, Chris. Be grateful you may be able to walk in the sun again.”
“Without you ... Deborah ... All I want is to come home at the end of a day to you. I’m not made of the sterner stuff of Andrei and Alex and Rabbi Solomon.”
“You’ll find it when the time comes.”
“I cannot reconcile myself to what I have given you, Deborah. Torment. Love in the catacombs. I can’t make peace with it.”
“Chris, listen to me. When I die—”
“Stop it!”
“When I die, Chris, dying will be very painful. I will want to live because I have known what ecstasy is. If we had never met, there would be no regrets. How lonely and empty it would be never to know giving and receiving love and, yes, all the pain it brings.”
Deborah knelt beside him. He lifted her face in his hands and smiled. “And on flows the Vistula,” he said.
“For these moments we can make it stand still. You and I have the magic power to transcend the flowing river and the guns and the cries. Right now love ... they are all far away ... far away.”
Chapter Eleven
ALFRED FUNK LOOKED DOWN at a blown-up map of the ghetto and rubbed his hands together with childlike glee and anticipation. He lifted a magnifying glass and moved it about, stopping at the displacement of troops, armor, and artillery marked with various colored pins. He changed a pair of pins indicating high-powered searchlight batteries.
He was honored that Berlin was forgiving enough to give him the chance to vindicate himself. This time there would not be failure.
His plan was simple. Every seven meters around the wall he would alternate a “foreign racial watchman” with a Polish Blue policeman. An SS officer would patrol each section of two hundred meters behind the Ukrainians to make certain their weapons could not be purchased by the Jews. The circle of soldiers around the ghetto wall would make a breakthrough impossible and reduce the possibility of a single man sneaking through.
The city engineers as well as army engineers advised him against blowing up the sewers. The huge Kanal pipes could cave in parts of the city as well as wreck the drainage to the Vistula. Instead, every manhole leading out of the ghetto would be under watch. Accordions of barbed wire would be dropped down the manholes. This would not impede the flow of sewage but would trap the Jews trying to escape through the sewers. Poison-gas smoke candles would be used both in the sewers and the bunkers inside the ghetto.
With all exits blocked, Funk would then move in the Reinhard Corps, Wehrmacht, and Waffen SS with armored pools held in readiness. Most of the forty thousand Jews were in the factory compounds. He would nip these off quickly and get them on the way to Treblinka.
The magnifying glass stopped at a bank of searchlight positions pinned on the map on the Aryan side near Muranowski Place. Master stroke, Funk complimented himself on the night lights. By working two shifts of troops day and night, the Jews would not have a chance to rest or alternate their positions. Once the factory workers were gone, he’d move in the dogs and special sound detectors to flush out the bunkers with dynamite, flame throwers, or poison gas.
Water and electricity would be shut off the same night his troops moved into position.
It was a marvelous, simple, and efficient foolproof plan.
Everything was ready at Treblinka to give “special treatment.” The entire process would take three to four days. Five at the absolute most.
Now, about the Jewish Forces, he thought. He wanted them to open fire first and commit themselves to combat. This way he could clean them out in a few hours. Once they were gone, the liquidation of the rest would be much easier. But would they fire at heavily armed troops? Damn it, no—they’d cower.
If these Jews did open fire it would cost him troops. Ten or twenty casualties. Should he send in Ukrainians the first day and let them take the casualties? No. The honor had to go to the Reinhard Corps! Shame to risk blooding the Elite Corps, but such were the fortunes of war. They would be insulted if they did not enter the ghetto first.
He ran over the map again, replaced his tanks for reserve, and set his artillery in positions to effect better cross fire, then set the magnifying glass and picked up the roster of troops being placed at his disposal.
SS UNITS
SS staff and officers, Warsaw
Reinhard Corps, Warsaw
Special Waffen SS, Trawniki and Poniatow
SS Panzer Grenadier Battalion
SS Mobilized Cavalry Battalion
SS Police Regiment, Lublin
SS Dog Company, Belzec
All Gestapo units, Warsaw
WEHRMACHT UNITS
Battalion, Infantry
Engineer companies, detached
Flame-throwing companies, detached
Battalion plus battery, artillery
Special detachment anti-aircraft searchlight units
Medical Corps company
LOCAL UNITS
All companies, Polish Blue Police
All companies, Polish fire brigades
FOREIGN RACIAL GUARDS
One battalion mixed, Baltic guards
One battalion, Ukrainian guards
Alfred Funk sighed with contentment. His special brigade of eight thousand men was being assembled rapidly. Those from outside the Warsaw district were en route. It was a nicely rounded force. He muttered his unhappiness at having to expose SS people to the first fire, but ... no choice ... simply no choice.
Horst von Epp returned from his regular four-day monthly trip to Krakow with the knowledge that Oberführer Funk had been in Warsaw for three days. The instant he entered Funk’s office the Oberführer snapped up from his desk. “Aha!” Funk cried with obvious delight. “Aha! Enter Neville Chamberlain, the great negotiator. The great appeaser!”
“From the tremors of joy in your voice, I should say that you have come on a mission of annihilation.”
“Look!” Funk said, proudly pointing to the map. “I am grateful for this chance to vindicate myself.” He clasped his hands behind his back snappily and paced with a jaunty step. “The instant I returned from Denmark, Himmler called me in. ‘Enough of this nonsense,’ Himmler told me. ‘Der Führer commands you to obliterate the Warsaw ghetto immediately. This symbol of Jewry must be wiped off the earth. You, Alfred, have priority on all troops in the General Government Area.’ ”
Horst von Epp grimaced and swung open the liquor cabinet.
Funk had his knuckles on the desk and bent forward rigidly, his blue eyes alive with vehemence. “You know, Horst, you actually had me fooled for a moment with your silly talk. Negotiate with the Jews, indeed! I was a fool to listen to you. I should have carried out my orders to the letter in January.”