LESLIE EPSTEIN
131
a single breath .
"But it was too late. My moment has passed. Does he care? He is
indifferent. He is gone. So now, my lamb, you know why I came to this
little room. No? Can't you guess? Of course you can guess! Because only
a half hour ago his hand - " and here she indicated the cool metal lever
of the controls: "was on this piece of brass."
***
Mission to Munich: who would have thought, at such a terrible
moment, it would end in success? Certainly the last thing I imagined was
that Magdalena would pick up the incriminating photograph and slip it,
as had been requested, under her bodice; or that the two of us would have
been able to walk unmolested across the polished stone lobby of 16
Prinzregentenstrasse and make our way to the steamer that was waiting at
Marseille. Indeed, immediately after Magda had completed her heart–
stopping confession, I was sure that she would not even attempt to depart
the Third Reich. For a another brief moment the two of us remained in
that stifling cabin, like animals caught in an animal trap; while on the stair–
ways, and down the corridors of the six-story building, the sound of the
jackboots grew steadily louder. Then the former Loewenstein-Lorre, the
lambkin, watched as a single tear furrowed through the pancake powder
on Magda's cheek. A copycat tear wobbled down the side of my nose.
"Listen, lambie, don't misunderstand me. I am not weeping. You must
not either. Look. A blink of the eye. The tear is gone."
And so it was. That's when Magdalena seized the photograph and
slipped it under her blouse. Then we walked, with old man Granite beside
us, unmolested from the building. Four days later we sailed away. Even
then Moto was wary. All the way through the Mediterranean, past
Gibraltar, and across the broad Atlantic I was certain as certain could be
that each moment would be my last. By day I scoured the horizon for the
periscope of the
U-boat
that must be following in our wake; and through
the night, during my fitful and dream-filled sleep, my arms were crossed
over my body, reassuringly, like the hug of a life- preserver.
