Chapter 2
It was a short ride in the Rolls from the Ritz to the Crillon. The Crillon was full of SS officers, dining, dancing, and entertaining. The occupying forces had become very comfortable in Paris ever since the French surrendered to them four years before. Paris was a treasure trove of beautiful artwork in the museums, much of which had been personally taken by the highest-ranking officers. Some members of the Elite SS had begun to suspect that the Resistance had worked their way into the Louvre, so works were disappearing and being hidden in caves and tunnels all over France. Others had been put on trains back to Germany as the spoils of war. But the City of Light hadn’t dimmed even with enemy forces occupying it. If anything, Paris was livelier and more luminous than ever, with beautiful women on the arms of German officers. There was a constant round of parties among the upper ranks. Restaurants were full, and German soldiers filled the bistros, bars, and cafés.
There was deprivation among the French, danger and hunger, and violence, carried out in secret sometimes. The Jews had been rounded up and put on trains to labor camps in Germany, Poland, and Czechoslovakia. Many people had disappeared and lost their homes, occupations, and families. There was an underlying sadness to it, if one knew the city well. But on the surface, it was still glittering, with spectacular architecture and monuments, museums still seemingly full of priceless treasures, well-dressed, beautiful women, and collaborators who were treated well by the Germans, if not by their fellow countrymen.
None of the sorrows and agonies showed in the lobby of the Crillon as Arielle stepped inside, and young soldiers in their dress uniforms and hotel staff directed the Kommandant’s guests to the palatial suite on the top floor he used frequently to entertain. Arielle had been there before and knew where to go.
When she walked into Carl-Heinrich’s suite, she could see the view of Paris from the terrace where guests were congregating before dinner in the balmy summer night air. She was the most striking woman there in her shimmering silver dress, which clung to her in just the right way. There was nothing vulgar about her, but there was a subtle sensuality that no man could ignore. Heads turned as she walked out to the terrace, with her back straight and her head high, hoping she didn’t look as shy and uncomfortable as she felt. Carl-Heinrich noticed her immediately and hastened to her side, leaving three generals unattended who watched the commander closely as he kissed Arielle on both cheeks, a practice he had adopted as soon as he had arrived. He could smell the faint scent of her perfume, and was sorry he liked Gregor as much as he did. If that hadn’t been the case, he would have pursued her ardently, but he contented himself with a kiss on her cheek, and her languid smile. She was everything a man could want, beautiful, smart, just sexy enough to be titillating, intelligent and fun to talk to, and radiant, lit from within. Her eyes were as bright as her diamonds, and the other men watched him enviously. It was obvious that he knew her well. He spoke to her in French, which he spoke fluently without the harsh German accent of his fellow countrymen, and he had absorbed much of the French culture until it was part of him now. He loved Paris and expected to stay in France for a long time, hopefully even after the war. He couldn’t imagine living in Germany now, and the constant plundering of French treasures went against the grain with him. He stopped it whenever possible, unless he was outranked. He had subverted and destroyed many a set of papers requisitioning artifacts destined for shipment to Germany. As far as he was concerned, they belonged in France and were part of the country’s history. No one had discovered the lengths he went to in order to thwart his colleagues’ plans to remove them.
He introduced Arielle to several generals, and other men who were the same rank as Gregor, a fleet of SS officers, most of whom looked the same to her. There was a hardness and a coldness to them, even at a social event where they were trying to look pleasant. She knew how much Gregor hated them. Their cruelty was etched on their faces, although many of them were good-looking men, as was Carl-Heinrich von Stülpnagel, dignified and aristocratic. But knowing what they were capable of made her shudder in the deepest part of her while she smiled.
The party was bigger than she had expected. Some of the officers only stayed for cocktails, not having been invited to dinner. There were fifty dinner guests in all, seated at two long tables, exquisitely set with silver, crystal, and china that had been “borrowed” from the Louvre for the Kommandant’s use. It was a priceless Sèvres set made for King Louis XVI. Arielle wondered if Marie-Antoinette had dined on it, which gave her a thrill. She was flattered to realize when they took their seats that she was seated to Carl-Heinrich’s left. Arielle thanked him for her seat. She was sorry Gregor had missed the evening.
The meal was exquisite, with stunning amounts of caviar and the kind of food no one had seen in France since before the war. Arielle had no idea how they got it, but it was plentiful despite the war, with rationing and people starving all over Europe. The wines were French, from important vineyards, and the best vintages. Carl-Heinrich was lavish in the way he entertained. There was an ebullient energy to the evening as people enjoyed themselves. No one would have guessed that there was a fierce battle raging in Normandy.
At the end of the dinner, the guests went out to the terrace to watch the fireworks show lighting up the night sky, then came back inside to dance. Arielle realized that it was her chance to slip away before the dancing started. She didn’t want to dance with a battalion of SS officers or ancient generals all night. One of them had introduced himself earlier during cocktails, and he had mentioned several times that he couldn’t wait to dance with her. Their host saw her carefully edging through the crowd, and before she could escape, he claimed her for the first dance. The Windsors had just left, but she wasn’t as lucky. The Kommandant led her onto the dance floor, as the other guests cleared a path for them, and he executed a flawless waltz with her. Arielle was more than equal to the task. She kept up with him without missing a step, while he held her in his powerful arms, and the other guests held back from the dance floor just for the pleasure of watching them.
“You’re a marvelous dancer, my dear. Gregor is a lucky man. I’m not entirely sure he deserves you,” he said with a tinge of envy. “I have the feeling you’re going to slip away shortly,” he added, looking deep into her eyes, which made her slightly uncomfortable. Although she’d had an exciting evening among his very interesting guests, she was ready to go back to the hotel. But she didn’t want to offend her host. He had invited her to another dinner party as well, the following week before Gregor arrived, and she didn’t want to encourage the Kommandant to be overly friendly or flirt with her. Getting too close to a man like him would be dangerous, no matter how socially adept he was. He was very smooth.
“I normally never go to parties without Gregor,” she said, and he smiled at her. “But he wanted me to come and see you,” she said generously.
“Then I’m doubly honored. I believe you’re coming to dinner again before you leave Paris. And before you do, Gregor wanted me to give you a list of some of my favorite places here, a few restaurants, some wonderful shops, and galleries I think you’ll love. You should keep the list with you at all times, so you can refer to it. You never know when it will come in handy. Just mention my name and you’ll get the kind of service you deserve. I hope it will be useful to you.” He smiled at her, and had spoken in an easily audible voice, and didn’t care who heard him. Something about the way he said it made her wonder why he would give her a list, since he knew that she knew Paris so well and was half French. But it seemed like a kind gesture well meant. She folded the envelope he’d given her and slipped it into her evening bag. There was something stiff in it which she didn’t question. She just thanked him, and he kissed her on both cheeks again, and held her just a little tighter than he had when he greeted her at the beginning of the evening. Most of the other guests were dancing by then. The orchestra hired for the evening had played several waltzes, which were his favorites, but she couldn’t fault him for it, since Gregor liked to waltz too. Carl-Heinrich was more mechanical in his gestures, but Arielle had followed him with ease.
After she said good night to Carl-Heinrich, she made her way past the other tables, most of them empty now. The waiters had cleared away the dishes, and were serving champagne, and brandy and cigars to the men. Arielle went down to the lobby in the elevator reserved for the Kommandant’s use and crossed the lobby quickly to find her car outside. The doorman at the Crillon signaled to her driver immediately. He rolled the car up to where she was standing and she got in, and a few minutes later they were back in the Place Vend?me with the Napoleonic monument towering above them.
Arielle disappeared into the Ritz and back up to her suite. She was surprised by how tired she was. It had been a long evening and in circumstances like that, she was always very careful about what she said and did, in case she would say something that could be misconstrued and play out unfairly for her and Gregor. You couldn’t be too careful these days. Everyone was itching to denounce someone, and Arielle didn’t want to make a mistake, nor did Gregor. She knew he was careful too. People heard things and reported them to the authorities, not always accurately. It was dangerous to speak too freely.
Monika helped her undress and went back to her room down the hall. Arielle was already in her nightgown and ready to get into bed when she remembered the envelope Carl-Heinrich had handed her. It seemed silly to give her a list of introductions to Paris when she knew the city so well, but the idea amused her, and she wanted to see what was on the list, out of curiosity. She went to get her evening bag from the dresser where she had left it. He had written her name on the envelope himself in his precise military hand. She tore it open, and a French passport fell into her lap. It looked used, and she wondered who it belonged to. She opened it and saw her own first name and middle name, Arielle Elise, and the last name was her mother’s maiden name, de Villier. The date of birth was Arielle’s own. It was an odd combination and wasn’t her actual maiden name. The list of “suggestions” he had mentioned was actually a set of travel papers, with which she could go anywhere, using the same last name, and they had his official stamp as the commander of all France. She had no idea why he had given them to her, or why she’d need them. She had her own German passport and travel papers in the correct name, von Auspeck, her married name. She was seeing Carl-Heinrich at another of his dinner parties in six days, and was going to ask him discreetly why he had given her an alias of sorts. She couldn’t imagine a circumstance in which she’d need a French passport and travel papers in another name, but she put them back in the envelope, and tucked them into an inside pocket of her travel purse. She could get in trouble just for having false documents if someone saw them, so she was careful to put them away. She didn’t even put them in the safe in the room with her jewelry, in case someone broke into it. She lay in bed thinking about it, and wanted to ask Gregor about it too, but they were never entirely sure if their home phone line was secure, so she’d have to wait until he got to Paris, and she’d have seen Carl-Heinrich again by then. It was a mystery to her. She fell asleep, thinking about it. It made her uncomfortable just knowing she had them.
—
The day after Carl-Heinrich’s dinner party, Arielle sent him a note thanking him for the honor of being invited, and spent the rest of the day at appointments at the best dress houses to see their collections and decide if there was anything she wanted to order. She found two dresses and a suit that she loved, and three evening gowns. The samples fit her perfectly when she tried them. She was the same size as the models, and she ordered everything she liked with matching hats and shoes. She knew that Gregor was going to love them.
She called Gregor to tell him about them when she got back to the hotel, but Erik, the butler, told her Gregor was out, and going to his club for dinner. She knew he’d get home late so she left him a message and had dinner in her room again. She didn’t go to restaurants alone, even in the hotel. That didn’t seem respectable to her, and she knew Gregor wouldn’t like it.
She went to the Louvre the day after, and thought the exhibition seemed a little more sparse than usual. She had another fashion house appointment, but she didn’t see anything she wanted. She went to a milliner she’d always liked, and the shop was gone and boarded up, and she realized that Madame Cohen was Jewish and had disappeared, or been sent away, or was hiding somewhere. It made Arielle sad to think about it. It was a reality in all the countries Hitler controlled now. Familiar suppliers had disappeared in Berlin too, as well as her dentist, her doctor, and an accountant Gregor used. They’d had to find new ones to replace them in the past few years. It was a common occurrence now. People vanished into thin air, like smoke, and no one knew where they had gone. And it was too dangerous to ask. The disappearances were one of the many things Gregor and his friends deplored about Hitler, his treatment of the Jews, which was shameful. They were all good citizens and respectable people, many of them professionals, like doctors and lawyers.
She was finally able to reach Gregor the next day, and didn’t mention the mysterious French passport and travel papers. She preferred to ask him in person when she saw him.
Gregor said he was busy, he was going away for a few days, and he couldn’t wait to see her in Paris. He told her he loved her and sounded rushed, and he promised to call her from his brief trip. He was very happy that she’d ordered clothes she liked and said he was excited to see them on her.
Arielle was thinking about him the night she dressed to go to the commander’s second dinner. She didn’t like going to parties alone. This one was going to be smaller, and there was no orchestra, so there wouldn’t be dancing. Maybe a piano and a singer for entertainment after dinner. Monika had left to return to Berlin earlier that day, so Arielle dressed herself. She didn’t want her maid hovering once Gregor arrived the next day. It was more romantic being alone, and she could manage without her.
Arielle wore a simple black faille evening gown that night with a matching jacket. She wore her blond hair in a bun and wondered who would be there. She looked more serious and less sexy than she had the first night in the silver dress. She had done some serious shopping since she’d arrived, and loved what she had bought, and hoped Gregor would too.
Since she didn’t get to speak to Gregor, she called Marianna and they chatted for a few minutes, and she described to her what she’d bought.
“I want to borrow all of them,” Marianna said, and they both laughed. She told Marianna she loved her, and then hurried out of the suite after the call. She didn’t want to be late for the dinner, and she already was, but not by much. It had taken her a little longer to dress without Monika’s assistance. The driver got her to the Crillon quickly, and she followed the familiar route upstairs to the commander’s penthouse apartment with the terrace.
She wasn’t sitting next to him that night, since he had invited several foreign dignitaries, so she never got to ask him about the passport, and forgot about it. Gregor was arriving the next day, and she could ask him. She was excited about seeing him, she had missed him. She still had butterflies in her stomach when she thought about him, even after all their years of married life.
The evening passed without incident and wasn’t as much fun as the first one, and she thought Carl-Heinrich looked distracted. Several times one of his aides entered the dining room, passed him a note, stood at attention, and waited for a response, which Carl-Heinrich gave him in a hushed whisper and then went back to talking to his guests. He winked at Arielle several times, and she smiled and nodded. She didn’t want to offend him, but she had no romantic interest in him whatsoever. He wasn’t the kind of man she would have been attracted to, and he sensed it but tried anyway, subtly, so a rebuff wouldn’t bruise his ego. It was more a game he played, flirting with his female guests. He had a great deal of power and influence, and some women loved that, just because of who he was. She had never been vulnerable to men of power who pursued her. She had Gregor.
The party broke up earlier than usual. There had been several minor interruptions, and Carl-Heinrich obviously had official business to attend to. He kissed her on both cheeks again as she left, and startled her by whispering to her so no one else could hear this time.
“If someone comes to you, believe him, do what he says, and use the passport and papers.” He moved away from her quickly then, to say good night to another guest, and Arielle had no time to respond or question him. She left the Crillon and went back to the Ritz. She had no idea what he meant, or why he had said it. She was puzzled and somewhat concerned by his cryptic message.
She was tired and went to bed as soon as she got back to her hotel. She wanted to call Gregor but it was too late, and he was arriving the next day. She was sure he was asleep by then, since he was catching an early train from Berlin.
She was sound asleep when a persistent knock on the door woke her, and she went to find out who it was. “Your friend sent me,” a voice said softly through the door, and she remembered what Carl-Heinrich had said and opened it cautiously. “The Kommandant sent me. You must leave immediately. Only bring what you can carry.” She wasn’t sure if it was some kind of trick, but she remembered his words clearly now. “Believe him.” The messenger was a young man in a bellman’s uniform from the Ritz.
“What’s wrong? What happened?” She was hesitating.
“I don’t know. There’s a car waiting for you downstairs. He said to hurry.” She wondered if Paris was about to be attacked or bombed.
“My husband is coming tomorrow. I can’t leave now.”
“You have to,” he said urgently, and she wondered how Gregor would find her if she left. But something in his demeanor and the urgency in his voice rang true, and she went to dress, and threw some basic practical things into her smallest suitcase, which was still a good size. She put on slacks, a sweater, and flat shoes, and was ready in ten minutes. She took her money and jewelry out of the safe and put them in her purse. She hadn’t brought much of either, just enough money to last a week until Gregor arrived. She had the French passport in her purse, and the travel papers, zipped into a separate pocket, and her German passport and papers. She followed the bellman out of the suite. It was still dark outside, and he led her down a service staircase and carried her bag. She had no idea where she was going, or why.
They reached a service door and he led her through, and there was a car waiting for her on the Cambon side of the hotel, a short distance away. The bellman put her bag in the trunk and spoke to the driver in a low voice as Arielle got into the car, wondering if she was being kidnapped. But Carl-Heinrich’s words “believe him” and “do what he says” were still in her head, and within seconds, the driver put the car in gear and drove away with her. He didn’t drive at a speed that would draw attention to them or cause them to be stopped. He spoke to her in French then, glancing at her in the rearview mirror.
“Where do you want to go?” he asked her, and she had no idea. She wanted to go back to her suite at the Ritz and wait for Gregor, instead of leaving in the middle of the night like a thief, abandoning all her belongings except the few things she’d brought with her. “I was told you should leave Paris and to go wherever you tell me.” Clearly she was on the run now, but from what? And to where? The only place she could think of was the family chateau where her cousins lived in Normandy. She knew that there was fighting in Normandy, but it was far enough away, and she was sure the battles wouldn’t come anywhere near her or the chateau. The ongoing battle was far up the coast.
She doubted that her cousins would be pleased to see her. They considered her the enemy now, and they’d had no contact in five years. But she had nowhere else to go while she waited to find out what had happened. She had no way to call Gregor and tell him where she was going. She wondered if he knew what was happening. But he hadn’t warned her. Only Carl-Heinrich had. She would call Gregor from the chateau when she got there. She told the driver where it was, near the little town of Brionne in Normandy. He nodded and didn’t comment, and they left Paris by the Porte de Saint-Cloud, and were on the road half an hour later. Once out of the city, the driver picked up speed. The chateau was two hours away.
Arielle sat in the back seat, wide-awake, worried about what was happening, but afraid to ask. She didn’t know the driver or what he knew, or how much she could trust him.
“We’ll have to stop somewhere along the way,” he said in a tense voice. “There are German soldiers all over Normandy, with the Allies trying to advance. We can’t just arrive in the middle of the night. We’ll stop a few villages before and wait till morning. We can say you’re going to visit your sick mother if they stop us. They told me you have valid travel papers.” She knew why she had them now. So she could flee. Carl-Heinrich had thought of everything, including papers and a passport in another name. And how would he know her mother’s maiden name? Gregor must have told him. He would know what this was about. She was desperate to talk to him.
They began to see farms after a while, and the driver picked a small village to pull off the road. He parked the car behind some trees where it wasn’t visible. The car was innocuous, a simple Renault, not the Rolls from the hotel.
When the sun came up, they drove into the village. Arielle saw a phone box and asked him to stop, so she could try to call Gregor, if he hadn’t left the house yet. If he was in danger too, she could tell him not to come, and where she was going. He would figure it out anyway. It was the only possible refuge she had in France.
She asked the driver for some coins and handed him a bill in exchange. She placed the call to Gregor in Berlin. An unfamiliar male voice answered. She asked for her husband, and the voice said harshly, “He’s not here,” and hung up. She was getting more worried by the minute, and hating to do it, she called Marianna. Arielle didn’t want to worry her. She answered on the second ring and was crying.
“Marianna, baby, what happened? What’s going on? I tried to call Papa, and a strange man answered and hung up. He said Papa isn’t there. He must be on the train to Paris by now. There’s been some kind of problem here.” Marianna’s tearful voice dissolved into sobs, and she couldn’t speak for several minutes, while Arielle tried to calm her, to no avail.
“Jürgen called me. He heard it at the base. Papa was shot by a firing squad last night, as a traitor. He and his friends tried to kill Hitler. Ludwig Beck brought a briefcase with bombs in it to the Wolf’s Lair in Poland to kill him, and they failed. I don’t know what happened. Jürgen said many people were part of it, and some military. They were all caught and shot last night, or many of them. And Papa was part of it.” As she listened in a state of shock, her heart pounding, Arielle realized it must be why he had sent her to Paris, and was going to meet her there, after they killed Hitler. And Carl-Heinrich must have been a part of it too, if he had given her the passport and travel papers, in case something went wrong. She couldn’t imagine Gregor killing anyone. But all she could think of was that Gregor was dead, shot as a traitor, and probably many of his friends had been part of it. She felt as though she was going to faint in the phone box. She hadn’t suspected anything before she left. She and Marianna were both crying. Their world had just shattered around them, and Gregor was gone forever.
When she could speak again, she told Marianna, “I can’t come home now. I have travel papers and a passport. I’m going to the chateau. Don’t tell anyone. If someone asks, you don’t know where I am. I can’t call you, in case they start watching you, or listening on your phone. I’ll come home when I can.”
“Oh, Mama…what are you going to do? What are we going to do without Papa?” Marianna was still sobbing, and Arielle was too.
“I don’t know. I’ll come back when I can,” she repeated. But it was too dangerous if Gregor had been a traitor. All of Gregor’s relatives would be closely watched and under suspicion.
“I love you, Mama,” Marianna said, sounding like a child.
“I love you too.” Arielle hung up then with trembling hands. Her whole world had turned upside down in a matter of minutes. She didn’t want this to be true, but it was. It was the worst nightmare of her life, and she felt as desperate as her daughter. They couldn’t even comfort each other and be together. Tears rolled down her cheeks, as she went back to the car and sat, waiting for a decent hour to get to the chateau. All she could think of was that Gregor was gone. He was her rock, her fortress, her strong defender, her refuge and safety, her knight in shining armor and her dream come true. All his ideals and noble motives had caused him to do this insanely foolish thing, and they had killed him for it. With a single blow, her life had been shattered, and their children’s. There would be serious repercussions from this, even beyond Gregor’s execution. And she might be next.
They began driving toward Brionne again an hour later. And what was she going to say to her cousins? That Gregor had been shot and killed as a traitor? It was unimaginable. Impossible. It couldn’t be true, but it was, and now she was on the run like a criminal. If they caught her, the SS would probably kill her too. And maybe even their daughter, and Viktor. There was no telling now what would happen next. None of them were safe. At least Marianna had Jürgen to protect her.
Two German soldiers stopped them when they got closer to the chateau. There was a barrier with two sentries. She handed them her French passport and the travel papers that matched it, as she held her breath. They looked at the papers, and at her, then nodded to the driver, and opened the barrier and let them pass.
“You can go,” they said, and stood aside. Arielle’s heart was pounding in her chest. She had the French passport and travel papers, but how was she going to live without Gregor? She didn’t even want to.
He and his friends and fellow conspirators had wanted Hitler dead, and instead they had all been killed. It was the twenty-first of July and they might as well have killed her too. She felt as dead as Gregor as they drove to the chateau.