Katrine stretched lazily in her seat. The train connection at Zlobin had amazingly been on time, and one of the car porters had promptly handed down her cases through a window to a leather aproned baggage handler, who placed them on a stout wooden cart with large iron wheels, and, armed with the car number and private compartment of the train to Kiev, sped ahead to pass the cases up to the waiting attendant there to be carefully stowed in her reserved room. Katrine tipped the conductor and car porter liberally, and was fussily handed down the train steps to the platform. With seeming indifference, she walked over to the waiting train, but from the moment the luggage was taken from her room, lazy appearing, but sharp glances had followed the movements of the cases to their new destination. Only when she had been graciously handed up the steps by the new conductor, led to her compartment by one of the car porters, and swiftly counted the number of pieces of luggage, did she let herself relax.
But the compartment! It was for only two people! She had ordered one for four. Her exasperation was promptly relayed to the car conductor, who rushed to her room, and apologetically explained that all compartments had been reserved before her request had been received, and that a very important chemical manufacturer and his wife had been removed to another car to make this one available.
To mollify her, he had asked if the Countess would please accept an espresso while she was getting settled. The conductor had personally supervised its making, dipping a finger into the brew and then to his lips to ascertain that it had the precise degree of sharpness that aficionados savored, then brought along a container of finely ground sugar kept only for those of Katrine’s rank and present disposition. He had thoughtfully placed on the tray two petits fours, baked by a French pastry cook in Zlobin.
Appeased by the coffee and the sweet cakes, she gave herself over to the unexpected developments with Hershel. The thought of marriage to him was consuming her every thought, and as hard as she tried, she could not bring herself down to solid earth. From the moment she realized that she was completely in love with him, almost six months ago, she knew one, unalterable fact; that marriage with Hershel would be for life. Among her peers, divorce was not uncommon, and many of her social order, if ardor waned and divorce was not practical, sought solace elsewhere, either in the arms of a lover or with a hobby or by having children. But that would not go with Hershel. He would work at the marriage as if it was the only thing that existed, and if it did not work out, he would not accept it like the others, for it would destroy him. In his eyes, the marriage would be sacred, and any woman who got him should light a candle each morning with thanksgiving.
Sharing Hershel’s life would not be a bed of roses, she acknowledged. Fortunately, there would be no financial problems. Her grandmother had left her a small fortune, which her father, a thick, tough, landholder of huge estates three days ride northeast of Moscow, had invested in properties in various cities outside of Russia.
Hershel had been cool to the idea of meeting her family. “Later,” he had said. This she also understood. His viewpoints on life would conflict harshly with those of her people; that is Judaism, socialism, philosophy.
“Reasoning,” he had once commented with conviction, as if it were a sore tooth that must be tongued constantly. “That’s the only thing that counts. There is an ocean of mental giants swirling about, who know every leaf that grows, and every shadow cast by a flying bird. But in most cases they are merely overloaded card files. Someday, one of their kind will invent a machine that has a card file larger than mankind itself and can come up with an answer more quickly than a Chinese abacus. We now know that a clock is part of a dimension visible only to the naked eye and that there might be other dimensions that our senses cannot perceive. Also that God Himself has a female counterpart.”
She suddenly began laughing, and he leaned back in bed and stared at her with pretended severity. “I’m beginning to suspect that you have a degenerate mind,” he observed.
She laughed harder. “I can’t help it,” she said. “All I can see is this female pumping away at God’s leg.” The glee abruptly fled, and she turned a worried face towards his. “I’ve said something awful, haven’t I?”, she said tightly.
Hershel exploded in mirth. “Lord, how did you ever conjure up such a picture.” He drew her closer and kissed the top of her head. “Certainly not. What you said was precisely what we were talking about. Male, female, man God, woman God, ergo love and gratification. It can all be reasoned. Science explains that everything in existence, perhaps even rocks, is male-female. Why is God different? Maybe God is a woman and Her counterpart is male.”
She snuggled closer, her body tingling with pleasure at being part of a union so full of values that it burnished the mere physical act of sex. Under different circumstances, she would have felt lust surging through her loins. But Hershel took you whirling past that to other fulfillments, like the subject at hand.
“You will probably be able to prove it,” she said.
“At the risk of being excommunicated by the Jewish authorities, I refer you to the Septuagint, a Greek translation of the Old Testament, which contains a reference to a female with whom God found pleasure before making the universe.”
She sat up abruptly and looked at him with astonishment. “Is that really true?”
“The existence of the Septuagint and the reference is true. Whether God had a female companion is another matter.”
“That’s not reasoning,” she said carefully. “That is evidence.”
With another man, she would have expected a compliment for having responded in such fashion, but Hershel never looked up at, or, for that matter, never looked down on a person. He would respect an unschooled farmer discussing his crops with the same esteem as he would a professional expounding his vocation.
“You’re right, it is proof, of a sort. But philosophy relies upon more than one piece of information to reach truth. Many of us had reasoned long before this information came to light that evidence is illusional. What we see or hear or feel is not always what we think we see or hear or feel. Some of the charlatans who read a page or two of philosophy come to the conclusion that since one thing may be illusional, everything is unreal. Reasoning is the power to look beyond those nincompoops and dissect truth to a palatable point.”
“I thought truth could never be dissected.”
Hershel smiled that crooked grin, which caught at her heart and snuffed out a cigarette he had forgotten was burning in his hand. “You are absolutely right, my darling.” Then his eyes grew wistful. “The question is, do we really want the truth?”
Oh, Hershel, Hershel, she thought, reaching inside her purse and slipping out a cigarette. As the pungent Turkish tobacco was drawn into her lungs, she turned her mind to more mundane things. She would shop furiously. She did not want a single stitch of underclothing, outerwear, shoes, hats, and so forth that she now owned to be taken to Austria for her meeting with Hershel. All must be new, not belonging to another time or place. As she herself would be coming to him.
With that, she leaned back into her velvet-corded seat, closed her eyes, and thought of the coming years.
The telegram to Julijonas came at mid-afternoon. The color fled from his florid face, and he lowered himself heavily to a chair. He read it a second time, the few words burning like molten steel in his gut. Nervously, he got up and placed a bridle with a Pelham bit in the left hand corner of his shop’s window, returned to his office at the rear of the building, took a bottle of vodka from a drawer of his desk, and quickly downed a couple of drinks. Only when the fiery liquor took hold, did he relax and begin breathing normally. He read the telegram a third time, and then he glanced at his pocket watch. There was still an hour or two until Hershel was scheduled to come.
Hershel rode by an hour later, spied the signal in the window that a problem existed, and kept on going to the end of the street. He dismounted in front of a tobacco shop, looked about carefully, and then walked leisurely down a back alley to the rear of Julijonas’ shop. The door opened at the first tap. He stepped inside.
“What’s the matter?” he asked at once.
Julijonas held out the telegram. “My contact did not see those bags come off the train at Vilnius,” he said tightly. Hershel read the coded message and his mouth grew hard. “What the shit happened?” asked the portly man.
“I’m not certain,” said Hershel, a chill going down his spine.
Julijonas flopped back onto his chair, his beard bristling with nervousness. “You sure as hell have an idea.”
Hershel nodded. “You’ve got a right to know. The courier is a woman I know quite well. I think she is taking the direct route to Kiev.”
The relief that flooded over Julijonas’ face was almost audible. He sat back in his chair and let out a sigh. “Jesus Christ, you can scare a man to death.” He motioned to the bottle. “Want a drink?”
“Yes.”
The fat man poured a generous amount into two glasses and passed one over. Hershel rolled the glass about in his hands before taking a sip, as if he wanted to gulp it down but decided to delay the action.
Julijonas eyed him closely. “You’re on edge, Hershel,” he said carefully. “There must be more to the story, such as why the shit she didn’t get off at Vilnius.”
Hershel took another sip. He was on the horns of a dilemma, one that he had sworn never to mount, and he was furious at himself for having allowed the situation to arise. Every inclination pointed to this being a time to gloss over the truth, and every bit of intelligence training supported this disposition. Regardless of the fact that he had known Julijonas for well over a year, and they had shared many dangers and successes together, the bottom line, first and last, was the mission, and that was getting those three cases of subversive material to Kiev. A month ago, Julijonas would have been more important, since the pipeline through Lithuania was crucial. But he had now served his purpose in this operation. If he told the portly man that Katrine was a Russian noblewoman, related to the Tzar himself, his accomplice might instantly dismantle all links to himself, and coded telegrams to Kiev and Moscow would scatter the network to which these cases were destined. Hershel must buy time.
He took another sip of his drink while he pondered how to reply to the comment. “She did not get off at Vilnius,” he finally said, “because she did not want two more days of traveling.”
“Isn’t she paid to do what she’s told?” growled Julijonas. Then understanding came, and his face clouded with anger. “Holy Mary!” he exploded. “It’s personal between you two.”
It has come to this, Hershel reflected. I am now putting Julijonas’ safety right on the table. Because he will believe me. “It’s not that at all. She likes me, but there is no personal affair involved. She is wealthy, adventurous–the finest kind of courier you can have. It’s just that she does not like the inconvenience.”
Julijonas pursed his lips. “All right, Hershel, I’ll accept that. But why this trip? It’s the last one we’ll be using your people on. Why this specific trip?”
“I don’t know. But let’s not become upset. Can you place one of your men on the train from Zlobin–at Minsk or Bobrujsk? That’s the route she might be taking. He could telegraph whether she was aboard, then follow her up until the delivery.”
“Impossible. I don’t know anyone at those stops. But I’ll alert my man at Kiev. What’s her name?”
“Katrine Borodin.” It was no time to hold back everything.
“Jesus Christ!” said Julijonas, still furious. “If she does go straight to Kiev, she’ll have to keep the cases an extra day until the drop at the station.” Hershel said nothing, for that was quite correct, and it increased the danger.
There was some additional little talk, then Hershel left the harness shop, walked cautiously to his horse, and started back to Gremai at a trot. He arrived there before dusk, and during supper, tried to keep up his usual good humor with the others, but his reticence must have shown through, for Jakob looked at him curiously now and then. Directly after eating, he went to his room and lay down on the bed, thinking, the window wide open and insects occasionally exploring the reclining figure.
As hard as he tried, he could not determine why Katrine had disobeyed him. Something in their relationship must give him a clue, and he went over every detail of their months together. Could it be possible that she had a secret lover, or a child born out of wedlock, somewhere along the route she was taking and wanted to visit there before going on to Kiev? Perhaps the unknown person was in Kiev itself. He tried not to venture the supposition that she was actually working with the Russian government, but it must be taken into account. Could her love for him be a fantastic sham? He faced it squarely, since he himself had used sex freely to open doors and pave his way during a mission. He had to admit that he had done everything wrong on this assignment. He had fallen in love with a network member, and, not only that, but fallen deeply enough to propose marriage. What was most dangerous, though, was that he had told Katrine it was her last mission. If the Russian counterintelligence agents were aware of his operation, they would move only if they had enough of the network in their grasp or learned that a key figure was about to move beyond their clutches. It was crucial that he make one of the most important decisions of his life; to stay in position and hope that Katrine’s action was not a dangerous one, or to flee as fast as he could back to the German border. Even now, there could be gendarmes or soldiers on their way here, and to be cornered in a rural area like Gremai was being the proverbial grounded fox.
Night seemed forever coming, and at full dark, he descended quietly to the kitchen, slipped by the sleeping family to the yard, then made his way guardedly to Thomas’ well-tended house. As before, a light tap brought the Lithuanian to the door with the lamp turned low, his tall, slender form standing back in the shadows. He recognized Hershel at once, and opened wide the door. Hershel stepped inside, and Thomas made a check of the area before following him up.
“You are back early,” he said.
Hershel shrugged. “Did you get the pamphlets?”
“Yes. They came through exactly as you said. We’ve had a second delivery since. We are grateful.”
“Are you still picking up the material at the drop near Smalininkai?”
“Yes. Why do you ask?”
“For information. Once the procedure works smoothly, my job is done.”
Thomas had been pouring vodka into glasses and handed one over.
“Thanks,” said Hershel, saluting. “Have you been running into patrols on the way?”
“Frequently. There are several military garrisons stationed near the frontier.”
“How do you get there?”
“By wagon. We decided that going by boat would be riskier.”
“Your wagon?”
Thomas cocked his head at the question. “No. One of the people involved provides the wagon.”
Hershel chose his words carefully, for no matter how he phrased the question, the meaning would be clear. What he must avoid was the urgency. “Would the wagon be available in the event someone had to leave in a hurry?”
The slim man leaned back into his chair, his brow creasing at the unexpected request. He had been surprised and a little disturbed by the visit of Hershel. At first, he thought with apprehension that the supplies were being cut off. The news that it was another matter worried him even more. He knew that Hershel was residing in the village. It was so small that any newcomer would be noted at once. What he did not understand was why the German would choose such an obvious place, since it was so much easier to lose oneself in a large city like Kaunas or Vilnius. There must be a reason beyond his ken. Perhaps, the evident exposure demonstrated innocence. Whatever it was, the meaning of the question was quite clear. It indicated that trouble was brewing.
He shook his head. “I don’t think so.” He sat up straighter in his chair. “Look, Hershel. What my friends and I are doing is dangerous enough without becoming involved in one of your other…projects. If you think there might be a problem coming up, why don’t you get out at once?”
“There may not be trouble.”
“Just mentioning the possibility implies that something has gone wrong. I hope you understand me.”
“I do.”
“We do not want any part of it. We are buying pamphlets, and paying quite dearly for them, I must say. We do not want any part of a situation that does not concern us. Actually, I think it might be better for us to stop all transactions for the time being.”
Hershel shrugged. This was not going at all well. Instead of dealing with conspirators, he had run upon moralizers. “If you stop the deliveries, it might be difficult, perhaps impossible, to start them again,” he pointed out. He would know soon enough how desperate they were to get the material.
Thomas shook his head sadly. “It took us some time to make contact with a person like you, but we would rather start looking again than take unnecessary chances.”
That was it. Hershel said his goodbye at once and left the house. Another miscalculation, he mused, as he made his way back to the Barlaks. That left his horse or a boat as the way out in case things exploded. He had no illusions about the possible danger, for he had been thoroughly trained to expect the worst in any situation, regardless of how well everything was going, and caution is always better overcooked than raw.
A thought made him slow down. Katrine did not know her bags were being watched by Julijonas’ agents along the route. If the Russians suspected her, or if she was cooperating with them, their security police would be tempted to wait until she dropped off the cases at Kiev before making a roundup, for if they knew the identities of the people involved on that side, they would have apprehended them long before now. His walk slowed even more as he studied this idea from all sides, and he had to force himself to tamp down his elation at what seemed a plausible hedge against immediate action. The more he considered it, the more he became convinced that he was on the right track. But standing over his shoulder was his insurance policy –caution.
Back at the house, he quietly packed a few items, saddled his horse, then led it down the street until they were away from the village. He swung into the saddle and rode two or three versts towards Slabodka to a small woods, set back off the road. Once out of sight, he tied his horse to a tree with a slip knot, and then sat amid a clump of bushes where he could observe traffic coming towards Gremai.