The Alice Factor Read online

“And Lev?” she asked.

  Hagen knew he couldn’t keep his feelings from showing. “I’ve got to try to convince Lev’s daughter and her husband to leave the country while they can.”

  The rain had stopped, the day was gone. Mirrored in the puddles, the wrought-iron street lamps were amber, the stepped and bell-shaped crowns of the guild houses were darkened silhouettes against the night sky.

  Arlette stood at the curbside with hands in the pockets of her mackintosh, waiting for Richard to lock the outer doors. Stray droplets fell and she heard these with a sense of alarm, startled that they should be so loud.

  Dillingham’s was on a side street, off the Pelikaanstraat, in the heart of the city’s diamond district. The tall windows of the bourses faced northward. Viewing gem diamonds required a pure, white light to avoid false colors and bring up the flaws—she knew this, had thought she’d come to know quite a bit. But in those few moments Richard had treated her as an equal.

  His steps clattered on the stone staircase. Impulsively he slid an arm under hers. “Are you still upset with me?” he asked.

  She shook her head but found she couldn’t look at him. “It is nothing. It’s just the times—that man … de Heer Wunsch … Will you really walk with me to my stop?”

  “Aren’t you hungry?”

  Startled, she hesitated, then gave a slow, soft smile as the reality of what he’d just said swept over her. “I will have to telephone Madame Hausemer. She’s very strict with us girls, but she’s nice, Richard. You would like her, I’m sure.”

  The landlady was a Walloon, from the French-speaking half of Belgium. The boardinghouse would be above a shop or a bakery. He hadn’t thought much about where Arlette lived, and realized then how little he knew about her.

  In silence they walked along the street. There wasn’t much traffic at this time of night, but soon the clubs, cafés and bars would be doing a roaring business. Antwerp had several large department stores, Europe’s first skyscraper, scads of good restaurants, the opera and the theaters, but still retained the fine old Flemish architecture of its ancestry. Balustrades of stone, bas-reliefs on every cornice, busts, statues, superb art galleries …

  And always there was the presence of the diamonds. The greatest trading and cutting center in the world.

  It was enough. It continually made him glad to be a part of it.

  They passed one of the bourses, and she saw him look up at it and knew he was thinking of the high ceilings, of a silent cough, the crackling of thin paper, the dry rattle of the stones.

  “Mazel and broche, Arlette. Luck and prosperity. Each weekday the traders sit on either side of long and virtually empty tables with thousands scattered between them in a few rough stones.”

  Much of their work was done in secret, and they spoke always in whispers that strived to echo but often produced only a collective hum.

  “Luck and prosperity,” he said again, a little sadly this time, “because so often luck is required when dealing with rough, uncut diamonds.”

  The Diamond Exchange was a club, a close-knit fraternity where one had every opportunity to prove oneself but a mistake could cost so dearly. Word traveled fast. Brother accepted brother.

  Everything was controlled by the cartel whose head offices were in London. Security was tight. The cartel held a virtual monopoly on the trade, owning the mines and controlling the distribution even to the point of once thinking, in their darkest days, of dumping diamonds into the sea just to keep the prices up.

  Dealing with Klees—even letting him into the office—carried risks that were far too great. He would leave a signed memo on Bernard’s desk. He would have done so anyway, in spite of Arlette’s warning.

  Lev’s daughter was another matter. It could only cause trouble for him and interfere with business—one had to be practical. Bernard and he had many Jewish friends, but Bernard would be forced to preach caution.

  Best not to tell him then. He’d leave that to Lev. Best to see Rachel at night. Dieter Karl might lend him the Daimler for an hour or two, no questions asked. But would Dieter be in Berlin? Would it be right to put him at risk? They’d seen so little of each other lately.

  Rebelling at the need for security in such a simple matter, Hagen asked himself what would happen here if war came?

  Virtually all the trade in diamonds was in Jewish hands. Bernard and he were among the exceptions, and he knew that a part of his success in the Reich was due to this.

  “Are you upset with me?” asked Arlette, her voice timid.

  He shook his head. “It’s this trip that’s coming up. I’ve got to go on thinking things are normal when I know they aren’t.”

  “Will there be war?”

  “I don’t know, Arlette. I really don’t.”

  “De Heer Wunsch says you are much better at selling than he is. He says that you understand the trade in industrial diamonds far better than anyone else in Antwerp and that you are also much more able to handle the Germans. I think, too, that he knew I could not stop de Heer Klees and that you would deal with him properly.”

  She still couldn’t leave it alone, was haunted by the thought that he might fail them. Ever since he’d been given a seat in one of the bourses people had been watching out for him. Trust … the whole business was based on mutual trust. Yet the Dutchman was proof of what was happening.

  To distract her he asked, “Will you go home for the holidays?” Dillingham’s would be shut down for the first two weeks of August. Holidays were a religion to the Belgians.

  Glad that he had changed the subject, she tossed her head and answered eagerly, “Yes, to Ostend, to the shop of my father. I will help him a little, and my mother, too, with the house. Maybe Willi will take me sailing in his new boat. Yes, I’m sure he will. Then we’ll go to the beach for a picnic. And you?” she asked, as they paused in the middle of the street to let the traffic go by.

  “I haven’t thought about it. London maybe. I really don’t know.”

  Willi … Why had she mentioned Willi de Menten’s name to him? A butcher’s son …

  Hagen took her by the hand, helping her across a puddle next to the curb and catching her when she jumped. Together, they rode a tramcar along the Meir toward the Grote Markt and the cathedral. It seemed the most natural of things to do with Richard, seemed as if they really did belong together. But then he led her away from the cafes and theaters to a little place around a corner.

  There was music—American jazz—beer, students, tobacco smoke, much talk and sin. Sin everywhere.

  As he headed for the back of the place, he shouted over his shoulder, “I come here sometimes.”

  “Oh?” It was all she could find to say. And then, she shouting too, “Richard, how am I going to telephone Madame Hausemer from a place like this?”

  He gave a sheepish grin and then that shrug. “I’ll ask Cecile to let you use the one in her office.”

  Cecile Verheyden was absolutely gorgeous, shockingly so, and straight out of the films. A tall, slim, bare-shouldered blonde with striking deep blue eyes and a loose and easy smile.

  Leaving a lingering touch on Richard’s arm, the woman led the way upstairs to her cluttered office, then closed the door and pointed to the telephone.

  Arlette had never been in a place like this before and knew it must show. As she put through her call, she tried not to throw worried glances at Cecile and Richard but failed.

  This was a side of him she hadn’t really expected. They were laughing, the two of them—the woman confiding little things, teasing and flirting until … Her cheeks growing hot in a rush, she was forced to turn away and stammer, “Madame, it … it is me, Arlette. Yes. Yes, I’m through work. No … no, I’m all right. I have not missed the tram. Madame, I’m sorry I haven’t called you sooner. I had to work late. Yes … Yes, there was some trouble but it’s all right now. No, I will not come home alone. Yes, Richard”—she flung a desperate look his way to see him pause—“Richard Hagen, Monsieur Wunsch’s assistant,
will see me home. Madame, I know you have not met him. It was an emergency. We thought some of the diamonds were missing. We have had to go through all of the logbooks but everything is fine now. Please do not worry. No, nothing was stolen. Nothing!”

  Dear God forgive her the lies. They had tumbled from her so easily. Now what would happen? There would have to be more explanations. Once a person lied, they had to do so again and again until everything came crashing down on them. Everything!

  Cecile Verheyden was in her early thirties. That she loved or had loved Richard Hagen was all too clear.

  “So you are their receptionist and secretary?”

  “Yes.”

  The woman burst into laughter. “Richard, how could you? She’s just a child!”

  “Cecile, lay off it, will you? Come on, we’re hungry. Where’s that famous hospitality?”

  The blue eyes flicked to him, to Arlette and back again. “My God, you’re serious. Forgive me, please.”

  The meal was good—a fish soup that was more like a stew, fresh bread and butter, the inevitable baskets of frites but served with buttered filet of sole and fresh green vegetables whose sauce was perfect.

  Arlette ate quickly, out of nervousness, but when Richard reached across the table to still her hand, she swallowed hard and watched as that gentle smile lit his gray-blue eyes and spread to his lips.

  “Relax. Cecile’s just a friend. Don’t be put off by her manner.”

  “She is very beautiful.”

  “So are some diamonds. I ought to know. I’ve spent enough time looking for them.”

  “Since the age of seven, with your father. In the Congo—Mbuji-Mayi and Tshikapa …”

  She dropped her eyes, felt awful now, waited tensely for him to rebuke her.

  “What else did the firm’s file on me tell you?” he asked quietly.

  “That … that your parents, they were American. That … that you still travel on an American passport even though you were brought up here and in England, even though you speak Dutch and German very well, English, too, and … and French.”

  “What else?”

  “That … that your passport might be useful to the firm. That … your father, he was killed in the war.”

  “He was a sniper, a sharpshooter. Another one got him.”

  “That your mother, she has married again and lives in England on an estate, a very nice estate, but that you … you do not get along with her and … and think of yourself as one of us.”

  “A man for the times. A sucker.”

  “No! Richard, please. Do not do this to me. I shouldn’t have read your file. I know it was wrong of me but …”

  She couldn’t say it and lowered her eyes in shame. “Please take me home.”

  “Hey, come on, Arlette. I’m not angry with you. I’m not about to tell de Heer Wunsch you’ve been reading the company’s personnel files.”

  “Only yours,” she blurted.

  Up, down, up, down. One minute she would think that maybe, just maybe he might care a little for her; the next, she felt despair. And now? Hope again.

  She managed a weak, apologetic smile.

  Richard was thirty-four years old—eleven years older than she—a mining engineer, a geologist, a prospector, so many things. He was tall, and boyish still, a superb dancer, Lev had once said. The thick, sandy hair was always flopping over his brow. Sometimes it made her secretly laugh to see him irritably push it away; at other times she longed to cut it for him.

  He had a good, strong face—pleasant and disarmingly handsome, with high cheekbones and a broad brow that would normally have been burnished by the sun. The scar beneath his lower lip and to the left revealed a cut that had never been stitched, and she knew that it had happened when he was out in the bush.

  There were other scars, one on his brow above the right eye, another on the bridge of his nose, which had been broken but did not show too much.

  “Do you really know how to handle explosives?” she asked suddenly.

  For just a second his expression darkened and she saw him look down at his left hand. There were only three fingers there: the thumb, the first and second ones. No others. Dear God, what had she done?

  The fuse had been too short, too fast, the sun … the sun … but that was a long, long time ago and the vultures had flown away.

  “Come on, let’s get out of here. I haven’t touched dynamite in years, and I hope I never have to again, because I don’t in all honesty know what I’d do.”

  The boardinghouse was down by the river, near the quays and beyond the Cathedral of Our Lady.

  Hagen found his thoughts confused. Though very young, Arlette had upset him in an unexpected way. It had been good to be with her and yet it hadn’t been. Too close for comfort. Besides, with the news, it was no time to be mixed up with anyone.

  He didn’t want to see her hurt. “Arlette …”

  “Please, I know what you are going to say. It’s not the time, not the place. If you were to take up with me it might affect your work and then, why then de Heer Wunsch would not think so highly of you.”

  Her smile was very brave—resigned to things now. Hagen walked her up the steps, but when Madame Hausemer went to open the door Arlette held it shut and fiercely said, “Madame, please! Just a minute.”

  Then she did what she had never done before, even with Willi de Menten. She looked steadily into Richard’s eyes and bravely said, “Please kiss me. Just once, so that I will know what it’s like.”

  Her lips were warm, hesitant at first and trembling, but when he put his arms around her she moved in closely, couldn’t stop herself. Nor could he leave her yet. Damn!

  “Arlette …”

  “Shh! Now you know how much I love you.”

  Just before noon the train crossed the border into Holland. All along the Albert Canal there were barges, some brightly painted, others coal dirty; some tied up, for it was Sunday, others constantly on the move.

  Lines of washing had been taken in. Geraniums in pots stood about the tidier decks along with patchworks of vegetables and herbs, even a few cages of chickens and rabbits. On one of the barges a grandfather smoked his pipe in quiet contemplation. On another, a thin waif of a blond-haired girl of eight or ten had just rescued her cat from the wheelhouse roof.

  Hagen tossed her a wave, but the child didn’t respond. Too much had happened already. Like her parents, she’d be worried.

  Continuing to stare at the train, the girl braced her bare feet and clutched the cat more possessively as the barge rocked gently.

  Just upstream of her, the guns of the Belgian fortress of Eben Emael faced the canal. Built in 1932, largely by German subcontractors, the fortress had been placed strategically at the junction of the canal, the main roads to Brussels and Antwerp, and the River Meuse. Great stock was placed in this fortress by the Belgians, but Hagen wondered about it. Not only was the field of fire sadly limited, but its guns couldn’t even cover the bridges adequately. As for the skies, eight machine guns waited patiently for the monoplanes and biplanes of the Great War to return.

  He swore, a thing he seldom did. The girl and the fortress soon passed from view. Left alone with his thoughts, he brooded. Not even lunch in the dining car, in the company of the stalwart Bürgermeister of Stolberg could distract him.

  Just before Aachen they crossed the border into Germany. A different scene, a whole new world.

  Unable to sit any longer, Hagen got up and began to pace about the room. Laid out on a table, scattered on the floor nearby, was everything he had brought with him—all his clothes; the latest high-speed cutting tools; grinding wheels and powders; diamonds, diamonds and more of them; the order books and address cards; the contents of his wallet, even those of his pockets.

  “Look, for the hundredth time will you please contact the Baron Dieter Karl Hunter in Munich? He’ll vouch for me. That letter from the Reich Ministry of the Interior entitles me to travel to Düsseldorf, Essen, Hanover, Hamburg, Kiel, the Hei
nkel factory on the Baltic and then Berlin.”

  “What is your business, please?”

  Jesus Christ Almighty! “I’ve already told you that.”

  “Then tell me again.”

  Exasperated, he sat down across the desk. Calming himself, he gave the purpose of his visit.

  A member of the Geheime Staatspolizei, the Secret State Police, the man didn’t appear interested. As he explained things anyway, Hagen tried to penetrate the reasons for the delay. He’d covered himself; he’d been very careful. They’d never bothered with him before, so why should they now?

  Otto Krantz was a Berliner, a heavy man, a beer drinker with puffy gray, unfeeling eyes, florid cheeks, pudgy fingers, a gold wedding band, state-issued wristwatch and short iron-gray hair. A squat bull of a man. Muscular in spite of the excess weight that his middle years had brought.

  Wearing a crumpled, nondescript gray business suit, he was colorless. In a crowd no one would bother to notice him.

  Krantz examined the passport. He favored his jowls in thought, crammed a stumpy finger under the collar of his shirt, tugged at it until the button Frau Krantz had sewn there must surely burst.

  Berlin had pulled him out of the obscurity of East Prussia to find a man called Richard Hagen and get to know him. Nothing else. No explanation of why he’d been chosen for such a task or of why Hagen should require such attention.

  “How is it that you travel on an American passport?”

  “Because I’m a citizen of the United States.”

  “Yet you work in Belgium?”

  Round and round it would go, the same questions, the same pedantic, plodding, excruciatingly thorough mind.

  Krantz lit a cigarette, then passed a battered, bullet-dented silver-plated case across the table, only to see Hagen shake his head. “It’s not something I do.”

  “Oh? Why is that, please?”

  Hagen grinned but made the mistake of saying it would take too long to tell him.

  “We have all night.”

  “But my train, damn it! I’ve got to be in Düsseldorf this evening. I’m due at the Gusstahlfabrik in Essen before noon tomorrow.”

  “Why?”