Warburg in Rome (11 page)

“I will be expected to know what your government’s interest is.”

“Jews.”

The word hung in the air.

“Jews?” Sundberg asked. His eyes glazed in a way that made his thought plain:
Warburg, Jews—of course
.

“Yes, Jews,” Warburg said. “Since the German occupation of Budapest two months ago, Jews are being transported. Since one month ago, between ten and fourteen thousand Jews have been transported each day. You know the contemporary meaning of the English verb ‘transport,’ perhaps.” Warburg let the silence gather for a moment before adding, “In Budapest the new special envoy will be in a position to issue the
Schutz-Pass
to Jews, identifying the bearers as Swedish citizens. He will rent buildings and authorize those buildings as Swedish extraterritorial properties—libraries, schools, cultural organizations where the Swedish flag will fly. In those buildings, Jews will be immune.”

“With respect, Mr. Warburg, no one will believe the Jews are Swedes. The Hungarian police will not be fooled by flags.”

“They will be paid to believe. They will be paid to be fooled. Handsomely paid. That brings me to point two. I want the name of the Budapest bank licensed for Swedish diplomatic transactions. I want a numbered account from which a Swedish envoy can draw unrestricted funds. Once I have that bank name and number, I will see to a sizable deposit in that account. The first of whatever sum is required to sow belief and foolishness throughout Hungarian officialdom.”

Sundberg looked over at Mates. The American colonel was staring at him. Sundberg looked back at Warburg. “Yes,” the Swede said, aware of what was required. “My country received thousands of Jews from Denmark less than a year ago.”

Warburg said nothing.

There was a faint rap on the door, which was then pushed open by a servant in gray trousers and morning coat, carrying a tray laden with a silver coffee set. Ambassador Sundberg barked at him in Swedish. The man put the tray on the table and quickly left the room.

Warburg joined Sundberg in ignoring the coffee. “And point three,” Warburg said. “Convey to the ministry, if you will, that the United States, taking into account Sweden’s cooperation on this matter, will not pursue its inquiry under the terms of the Hague Convention.”

“Inquiry, Sir?”

“The Hague, 1907. Concerning neutrality.”

“Sweden’s neutrality has been scrupulous, the very word you used a moment ago.” Sundberg’s face darkened with the sudden recognition that Warburg had been speaking sarcastically.

“
Permittenttrafiken
,” Warburg said. “More than one hundred thousand troop-carrying Wehrmacht railroad cars through Sweden to Norway from 1941 into this year.”

“The transit agreement is suspended.”

“Yes, now that the Nazis no longer need Swedish rail, but when they needed it, they had it. Additionally, the Treasury Department inquiry extends to various Swedish commercial enterprises that have, in violation of neutrality laws, entered into contracts with belligerent powers, including Rome.”

“Commercial enterprises, Sir?”

“Including yours. Fines. Requisition. Prison. Those are the penalties.”

Sundberg’s mouth opened to speak, but no sound came out.

“I am expressly authorized to inform you, and the Foreign Policy Council of Sweden, that the U.S. Office of Foreign Asset Control is taking steps to freeze certain Swedish accounts in American banks, and in Swedish banks doing business in the United States, pending the outcome of procedures.”

“Procedures?”

“Nominating procedures for the special Swedish envoy, a Mr. Raoul Wallenberg.” Warburg stood up, and so did Mates. “I suggest you start composing your cable, Mr. Ambassador. Dispatch it. Each day, Sir, between ten and fourteen thousand souls perish.”

Sundberg’s expression of helpless surprise slowly gave way to a look of open hostility, which prompted Warburg to add, uncharacteristically, “If they have souls. What do you think?”

“Jesus, Warburg, what was that?” Mates asked outside, as they took the stairs down from the Swedish palazzo. The sun was already high in the sky, a canopy of glare.

“A little one-on-one, Peter.” On the sidewalk, Warburg stopped and faced the other man, who, remaining elevated by a pair of steps, looked him in the eye. “Dribbling. Head feint. Lay-up. Did you play basketball?” Mates did not answer. Warburg said, “Sundberg and his ilk backed the losers. We have to give them a way to join the winners—and that way is Jews.”

“But these rumors about Jews,” Mates said. “I’m old enough to remember the Great War propaganda, the Hun roasting babies on spits, all that.”

“I’m not talking about propaganda,” Warburg said. “Nor about rumors. Maybe you didn’t hear me, Colonel.” Warburg could not stifle his feelings. “Between ten and fourteen thousand every day.”

“Yes, ‘transport.’ But to what? Concentration camps are bad, but they’re all over German-occupied Europe, in Italy, too. You believe that ovens-and-gas-chambers stuff?”

“You don’t?”

“Why don’t I hear about it on Voice of America then? Why not on the BBC? Or Murrow from London?”

“You tell me, Colonel. Answer your own question. Why don’t you hear about it?” Warburg faced away from Mates, to contain himself. On the broad Via XX Settembre, traffic was breasting around a stalled trolley, a tangled clot of vehicles—autos, horse wagons, and pushcarts. Pealing church bells sounded from near and far. A loudspeaker truck was passing slowly by, its amplified voice enthusiastically wailing words Warburg did not understand, although he made out “
Grazie
” and “
Il Papa
.” At the nearby curb sat the jeep, the driver lounging with a cigarette.

Mates grasped Warburg’s shoulder from behind. “Look, I’m trying to understand. I don’t get it. So Sweden goes to bat for you in Budapest.”

“Not for me.”

“But in Budapest? You get Jews in Swedish custody? Then what?”

“Find a way to get them here to Rome,” Warburg said. “Then to Naples. Get them on empty troopships heading back to the U.S.”

“You’re serious.”

“We have people working on a route through Romania, down to Istanbul. We have refugee camps being built in Algeria. We have people working on this in Portugal. But the priority—
my
priority—is getting refugees to the States. Roosevelt has authorized it. He sent the WRB here to get Jews to America, the one place we know for sure where they will be safe.” Warburg stared at Mates, openly assessing him. Then he said quietly, “I could use your help, Peter.”

“Impossible. You’re dreaming. No way to get troopships.”

“Not for Jews, you mean.”

“No. That’s not what I mean.”

“So, you think I should just pray for the Red Army to hurry up, moving west?”

“If you think the Reds would be better,” Mates said. Then, as an afterthought, “Pray? Do you pray?”

“No.” Warburg turned and led the way to the curb, where the jeep waited. The driver, a stocky, acne-faced NCO, snapped his cigarette butt away. Warburg opened the door and started to climb into the back seat, but Mates stopped him. “Wait a minute, David.” Instead, Mates mounted the jeep first, taking the rear seat, gesturing at the one in front, the commander’s seat. “The jeep is yours. And say hello to Sergeant Rossini, your new driver and translator.”

The formidable walls ringing Vatican City left no doubt as to the enclave’s status as a separate principality, its ruler’s status as a man apart. To Kevin Deane, inveterate Bronx Irishman, the sweetest fact about the world’s smallest sovereign state had always been its size: at barely more than a hundred acres, eight Vatican Cities would fit nicely inside New York’s Central Park.

Frederick Law Olmsted’s New York greensward was, in fact, a fitting comparison, since two-thirds of the papal territory in the heart of Rome was given over to gardens, this central one of which, beginning in an hour and for the rest of the afternoon, would be reserved exclusively for the Holy Father.

Deane, now a properly cassocked prelate himself, hurried through the lavish green lawns, shaped hedges, and flower beds. He’d have preferred a more leisurely stroll, especially in the heat, but he feared being late. A distracting knot of anxiety tightened in his chest. It was less than an hour past high noon, and the light was piercing—no such light in New York City. This was Old World light, he thought, aware of his bareheadedness, and why shouldn’t Roman priests wear the broad-brimmed clerical hat that made them look as if they were balancing the ringed planet Saturn on their heads?

Perfumes of nectar and pollen filled the air, trumping the cologne he’d slapped on his cheeks moments before in his cramped apartment in the wing behind him. Because of Spellman, Deane had been offered a large suite of rooms atop the Palace of the Congregations, on Via della Conciliazione, the boulevard sloping from St. Peter’s Square down to the Tiber, just outside the Vatican’s perimeter. But, also because of Spellman, Deane had known to display his humility, requesting more modest quarters adjacent to his office—quarters
inside
the Holy See. Where you stand in the hierarchy depends on where you sit on the toilet. Thus Deane’s three small rooms were in the so-called Apostolic Palace itself, a mammoth complex of linked buildings, the grandest of which held the papal apartments and fronted on St. Peter’s Square. Toward that building’s garden entrance Deane strode now, the place where the Pope and his chief aides—and
their
chief aides—lived and worked.

This was the rear façade of the palazzo, yet it was decorated with fluted pilasters, an elaborate cornice, and a crowning balustrade. A Swiss Guard stood rigidly at attention at the doorway, pike in hand. Costumed in golden silk, the Cortés-helmeted soldier looked like a Christmas ornament. He stiffened slightly in a salute that Deane knew to ignore. Every guardsman was already briefed on the new American monsignor, his appearance and his position.

Once through the doors, Deane’s vision blurred momentarily in the shadows of the cool interior. He picked up his pace, soutane spiraling at his ankles, to hurry along an apparently endless broad corridor. Deane was entering the inner sanctum, heading for Cardinal Luigi Maglione’s rooms—luncheon at the table of the secretary of state of His Holiness the Pope.

A butler somehow knew of Deane’s approach and opened the carved oak door ahead of him. Deane entered an apartment that would have set the hearts of Park Avenue decorators aflutter, only here the marble-topped tables, gilded frames, and Murano glass chandeliers had been in place for centuries, a show of the real that was not for sale. Immediately to his left was the entrance to a darkened personal chapel, from which cool air and the aroma of incense drifted. On the right stood an intricately inlaid walnut table holding half a dozen birettas in red-trimmed black and various crimson hues. Hanging from pegs on a multibranched hatrack were three broad-brimmed
cappelli romani
—the Saturn hats. There was also a silk top hat and a pair of gray suede gloves. The butler had his hand out, and Deane realized at once that his own bareheadedness was a faux pas. He winked.

Deane strode into the palatial main room of the cardinal’s apartment as if he belonged there. This was the legendary weekly luncheon hosted by Maglione, with diplomats resident in Vatican City the featured guests. Deane knew this gathering to be the engine of the Holy See’s reputation as a purring machine of espionage, and he arrived with all antennae upright. Light streamed in from high Venetian windows through which the dome of St. Peter’s could be seen, looming like a tethered dirigible. He wheeled right, toward a dozen men, all but one in cassocks. They were standing in groups of three and four, holding apéritif glasses and cigarettes. Mostly their robes were black with red accents, like Deane’s, but three wore purple-band cinctures, and of those, two wore matching purple skullcaps—bishops, therefore. Not a screaming scarlet cassock in sight—good: Cardinal Maglione was not present yet, which meant Deane was on time.

A burst of laughter came from one of the groups, centered on a short, portly man, one of those wearing the purple sash: Domenico Tardini, the director of the Pontifical Relief Commission—Deane’s boss in Rome. Tardini was an apostolic protonotary supernumerary, a position reserved for key papal aides. Given the tenor of their last encounter, the day before, Deane was surprised when Tardini waved him over.

Tardini was standing with the short man in striped pants, waistcoat, and cutaway. Deane realized from his coal-black hair and facial features that he was Japanese. What’s this?

But then it hit him. With the liberation, the Allied diplomats who’d taken refuge from the Germans in Vatican City would have just switched places with Japs and—Deane looked around—Krauts? As Deane approached Monsignor Tardini, the Japanese man turned away to join a separate conversation. A tray-bearing waiter appeared at Deane’s elbow, remaining immobile while Deane bowed before Tardini to kiss his ring. “Most Reverend, Sir.”

Monsignor Tardini was still grinning from whatever had prompted the laughter Deane had heard, and he continued to smile as each of the other men greeted the American, fluent Italian all around. Only then did Deane turn to the waiter to take the single tulip glass. He sipped it and recognized the bitter Cinzano, a drink he had always avoided in Rome.

“We were speaking just now of your compatriot,” Tardini said in Italian, the grin growing bigger again.

“Oh, Monsignor?” Deane replied, skating over the frozen undercurrent. “And who would that be?”

“The much reported soldier, one Sergeant O’Hara, who yesterday stood on his Sherman tank at the Colosseum, gestured at the ancient ruin, and said”—Tardini paused long enough to indicate that, even in Italian, one could invoke a stage-Irish brogue—“‘Glory be to God, the Germans bombed that, too?’”

Once more, guffaws all around, including the Japanese man, though he remained half turned away, clearly avoiding Deane.

“Very interesting, Monsignor.” Deane raised the glass to his lips but did not sip. “And who reported this?”

Another prelate said, “The BBC, naturally. Who else?”