52

“Nothing has come over. Nothing! Not a single blasted word,” Anvil muttered in frustration. He rose to let Spangler begin his shift at the radio. “First the Russians are splashing in our soup, next they’re nowhere to be found. What’s going on?”

“Here, read this,” Spangler said, handing him a mimeographed sheet. “The new air-raid regulations.”

“Eh?” the cook muttered as he looked down at the page. “What does it say? I don’t read German too well.”

“From all I can make out, we have to wear white armbands if we’re out at night. They’ll tell you the rest back at the barracks.”

Spangler waited until Anvil had climbed the ladder, dropped the trapdoor after himself and begun piling potato sacks on top of it, before opening Vassili’s locker. Most of the canned goods had been requisitioned by the escape command. Only stamps, sugar, lead piping and a few watches remained. Spangler selected six sections of pipe with pinched ends and brought them back to the radio table. He removed the glass shield from the storm lantern, turned up the blue-white flame and held the pinched end of the first pipe over it. The lead began to soften. Soon the end had melted shut. Two more sections were sealed closed before Spangler had to interrupt his work and snap on the radio.

Nothing came in on the two designated wavelengths. He switched to other bands without success. After five minutes he snapped off the radio and continued the melting.

He scooped out a hole under Vassili’s locker, placed the six pipe sections in it and buried them. He took out six of the wristwatches and brought them to the table. He carefully drilled a tiny hole in the center of each crystal with a sharpened fork tine. He reached into his pocket and brought out a handful of metal slivers he had found near the repair shop. From them he fashioned tiny metal poles, which he fitted into the crystal openings until they touched the axis of the watch hands.

Spangler buried the watches with the pipe sections. He returned to the table and glanced at the clock. The scheduled listening time had been missed. He set the alarm for fifteen minutes, took out his map of Birkenau and flipped it over.

He began sketching a ground plan of the Bubel billet. He had seen the first floor, so he had no trouble with it. The second floor had to be calculated from the position of the staircase, the footsteps he had heard overhead and the arrangement of the windows. If his appraisal was correct, the second story was divided into three large rooms and one much smaller. The large room in the middle had dark window shades; this was probably where the SS slept. The rooms to the right and left had lace curtains: this was most likely where Jean-Claude and the other Bubels were kept.

The alarm clock rang. Spangler switched on the radio. Music blared from the speaker. The words were in English.

“Mairzy Doats and Dozy Doats and liddle lamzy divey,

A kiddley divey too, wouldn’t you? …”

The song faded and a voice in Polish rose above it. “… beyond Eblag to the outskirts of Danzig …” The music was gone. The voice had risen almost to a thunder. Spangler reduced the volume. “Below Eblag, Russian forces now hold Lubwawa, Brodnica, Sirpo and Plock. The corridor to Warsaw is still open, and a fresh German relief column is speeding in. Farther to the south fierce fighting still continues at Lodz. Kieclec, Tarnow and Grysbow are now in Russian—Hold, hold a moment! This just in: Warsaw has fallen. I repeat, Warsaw has fallen! An estimated one hundred and fifty thousand German troops have been captured. And this too, this too just handed to me,” the voice shouted. “Oberkommando Wehrmacht has ordered a general retreat from Plock to Nowy Sacz. The Russian Army now holds one third of Poland and is moving forward almost unopposed …”

Spangler turned down the volume, pulled the message rope and began writing as fast he could. The courier leaned into the bunker and was handed the message.

Spangler raised the volume. Warsaw was off the air. He dialed the Prague band. Again he was lucky. Reception was strong and clear.

“… Had the Wehrmacht been able to hold Warsaw another twenty-four hours,” the voice said in Czech, “the northern defense line might have been reinforced and held. Now there is little hope that the half-million troops trapped against the Baltic Sea have any alternative but surrender or total destruction. In central Poland the approaches to Cracow are said …”

The voice faded under music and static. Again the lyrics were in English.

“… east, the sun shines west,

But I know where the sun shines best.

Oh, Mammy, my liddle Ma-a-ammee,

I’d walk a million miles

For one of your smiles,

My Maaa …”

The song drifted into silence. Nothing came over the speaker but gentle static.

A hand reached under Jean-Claude’s dress. He spun away coquettishly and fled to the kitchen. The supper dishes hadn’t been done. The SS sergeant stumbled into the room after him. Jean-Claude escaped through the parlor. Bubels and SS lay drunk on the floor. Some were embracing, others already passed out. His pursuer tripped over a leg, tumbled forward and landed on a half-sober Bubel. A relationship blossomed.

Jean-Claude climbed the stairs and tiptoed into the SS bedroom. A sergeant lay on his stomach snoring. Jean-Claude quietly closed the door and locked it. He moved silently to the bed, seized the empty whiskey bottle with both hands raised it high and crashed it down onto the German’s head. The snoring stopped.

Jean-Claude took apart the emergency lamp and poured the kerosene over the bed and the drapes. He lit a match and threw it. Flames flashed up. He seated himself on the night chair and folded his hands in his lap as the fire began to spread.