Authors: Douglas W. Jacobson
Twenty minutes later they arrived at a dusty crossroads with a thatched-roof farmhouse on one corner and a tidy brick church on the other. Bravo turned left onto a rutted, dirt road, overgrown with grass, and headed east toward the Vistula River. After another few minutes, he rounded a curve, and the auto's headlight beams illuminated the rendezvous point.
Bravo brought the auto to a stop, and Adam leaned forward, looking through the windshield. It was an abandoned barge dock, nothing more than a cracked and buckled concrete pier extending perhaps ten meters into the river. Ancient truck tires hung from chains attached to rotted wood posts, and the rusted-out hulk of what was most likely the last barge sat mired in the muck. The night air was heavy with the odor of dead fish and rotting algae.
Bravo turned around. “Well, this is as far as I go,” he said quietly. The big man's good-natured bluster was now replaced with a note of concern. He reached over and clasped Adam's hand. “I'll be right here tomorrow night at this same time. I hope you are too.”
Adam nodded silently and stepped out of the car.
As the tail lights of the Mercedes disappeared around the bend, Adam started down the rutted road toward the barge dock, his right hand resting on the butt of the Walther P-38 strapped to his waist. Colonel Stag had assured him that the Russians knew he was an American and were prepared to receive him, but when Adam spotted the three figures emerging from the shadows, he tightened his grip on the pistol.
He stopped and watched carefully as the figures approached, trying to identify their uniforms in the moonlight. A moment later he realized they were Red Army regulars and not NKVD. He breathed a bit easier, but since two of them carried submachine guns leveled directly at his chest, he kept his hand on his pistol.
The trio stopped three meters away and stood silently for a moment. The one in the middle between two Red Army troopers was an officer. He was tall and very thin with a patch over his left eye. After another moment of silence he finally asked,
“Amyerikanyets?”
Adam nodded. “Yes.”
“GavaÅit pa rúski?”
“No. Do you speak English?”
The officer took a step forward and asked in perfect English, “Are you looking for the bridge?”
It was the question he'd been told to expect, and Adam answered, “I'm told the bridge is unsafe. But I require passage to Praga.”
The officer eyed him carefully, then said something in Russian to one of the submachine-gun-toting troopers, who stepped up, relieved Adam of the Walther and searched him thoroughly. The Russian trooper slipped the pistol into his own pocket, then motioned for Adam to proceed toward the water's edge where a rowboat was beached.
Adam climbed into the boat and sat in the prow while the officer took a seat aft with one of the Red Army troopers, who continued to point the submachine gun at him. The other trooper sat in the middle and took up the oars.
Without another word they rowed across the Vistula River under a dark sky, illuminated only by a half moon and the glow of fires from Warsaw.
Toward evening of the following day, General Kovalenko sat at a metal table in his sparsely furnished field command tent. His tank corps commander, Colonel Roskov, was on his left and Captain Andreyev on his right. Across the table sat his visitor, the American emissary from Warsaw. They had kept him isolated and under guard since his arrival the previous night. He was a scrawny man with thin hair and the wire-rimmed spectacles of a schoolteacher. Yet, as Kovalenko studied him, there was a hard look in the man's eyes and a bearing about him that suggested he was not what he seemed.
The four of them sat in silence for a few moments, the visitor with his hands folded on the table in front of him, his eyes on Kovalenko. Finally, the general nodded, and Captain Andreyev, who'd brought the visitor across the river, spoke first. “You are an American and an emissary of the Polish Government-in-Exile in London?” he asked, in English.
“Yes, that is correct,” the visitor replied.
“You've been in Warsaw?”
“Since the beginning of the Rising.”
“And what is the situation there?”
The visitor glanced first at Kovalenko, then looked back at Captain Andreyev. “The AK have thirty thousand armed men and women in the streets of Warsaw. They have seized the City Center and Old Town, and areas of the Jolibord District in the north, as well as several sections of Mokotow in the south.”
The tank corps commander, Colonel Roskov, leaned forward and spoke tersely in Russian. Kovalenko nudged Andreyev, who then translated into English for the visitor. “Colonel Roskov asks what these men and women are armed with?”
The visitor replied, “Rifles, pistols, grenadesâ”
Andreyev began translating back into Russian, but Roskov broke in.
Andreyev stopped, smiled at the visitor and said, “The colonel asks if the weapons are all left over from the '39 campaign?”
Kovalenko watched silently as the visitor spread his hands on the table and locked eyes with the tank corps commander. “Not all,” the man said firmly. “There have been airdrops from Britain, and during the first week the AK captured a substantial German weapons cache in a warehouse buildingâMP-38 submachine guns, anti-tank riflesâ”
Roskov interrupted the translation again. Andreyev listened then said, with a hint of annoyance in his voice, “The colonel heard that the AK has assassinated several high-ranking SS officers. The Germans will make them pay for that.”
Kovalenko watched the visitor closely. Something flickered in the thin man's eyes, but his expression remained inscrutable as he leaned forward, glaring at Roskov. “The Poles are at
war,
sir. We all are! Against Nazi Germany, our common enemy. Isn't that correct?”
Captain Andreyev spoke up, obviously trying to lower the tension. “Does the AK have any artillery?”
The visitor continued to stare at the Russian tank corps commander for a moment, then turned to Andreyev. “They have mortars, some American bazookas that were air-droppedâ”
“Nothing larger?” Roskov asked, this time in English.
Kovalenko knew it was an old trick of Roskov's to throw an unsuspecting American off guard, but the visitor seemed unperturbed, as though he knew all along Roskov could speak English.
“A squad of your T-34 tanks would be very useful right now,” the visitor replied.
The group lapsed back into silence. Kovalenko waited a few moments then pulled a pack of Lucky Strike cigarettes from his shirt pocket and offered one to the visitor. “One of our politicians visited with some of your American generals last week,” he said, in his own fluent English. “He brought these back for me.”
The visitor took a cigarette, and the general lit it for him. He inhaled deeply, apparently enjoying the taste of prime tobacco. Then he folded his hands on the table and addressed Kovalenko. “When can the AK expect the Red Army to cross the Vistula and enter Warsaw, General?”
Roskov leaned across the table and snapped, “The AK has no military standing in thisâ”
Kovalenko cut him off with a wave of his hand. He slowly lit his own cigarette and looked at the visitor who had never even blinked during Roskov's final attempt at intimidation. “I am waiting for final orders,” he said. “You may report to General Bor that we will be there soon.”
“How soon?” the visitor asked. “The AK are fighting like hell, but casualties are mounting. They can't hold out forever.”
Kovalenko studied his cigarette, then abruptly shoved his chair back and stood up. Everyone around the table stood as well. “Tell them to keep on fighting,” he said to the visitor. “We will be there soon.”
31 A
UGUST
O
N THE LAST DAY OF
A
UGUST,
Colonel Stag transmitted a secret message to the British Special Operations Executive.
31 August 1944
From: AK Headquarters, Warsaw
To: SOE, London
Situation in Warsaw desperate. Forty percent City Center destroyed. Air bombardments and artillery shelling constant.
Hundreds of civilians killed daily. Hospitals destroyed. Thousands homeless. Burns, shrapnel wounds and disease.
Food and water critical. If no relief, all supplies gone in ten days.
Our forces reduced by half. Continuing to fight. Weapons and ammunition critical. Airdrops unsuccessful. Old Town in severe jeopardy. Evacuation imminent.
Russian forces remain idle on east side of Vistula.
When the transmission was finished, Stag wearily climbed the stairs from the cellar of the Polonia Bank building and stood on the cobblestone street to wait for Falcon. He expected the commando to bring him a report from the AK command post at the south end of the City Center. That, of course, depended on whether Falcon could make it through the rubble-filled streets in one of the few AK vehicles still operating.
Stag was beyond fatigue. He was so tired that he twitched all over as though a million ants were crawling under his skin. He lit a cigarette and leaned back against the building as the ground shook beneath his feet. The battle had surged into Old Town and degenerated into a savage street-by-street, building-by-building bloodbath that Stag knew was hopeless. German artillery bombardments and Stuka attacks continued around the clock, and the civilians still in the area huddled in their cellars like frightened rodents. Artillery shells exploded just a few streets to the west, and Stag realized that he was risking his life just standing out in the open. But he'd been suffocating in the cellar command post, and a moment in the outside air, though polluted with smoke and dust, was a relief.
Suddenly Stag heard the all-too-familiar, high-pitched scream of a Stuka dive-bomber. It was coming from his left and closing in fast. He dropped the cigarette and started for the doorway when he saw an automobile careening toward him, bouncing along the cobblestones. He waved desperately at it, warning it off, but then a shattering blast knocked him face down onto the marble foyer just inside the doors.
Stag struggled to his feet. His ears rang and his head pounded. Blood dripped from his nose. He leaned against the wall to catch his breath as the whine of the enemy aircraft receded into the distance. He waited for a moment, then stepped slowly through the doorway and peered down the block.
A three-story building had collapsed into the street. Just beyond the rubble-pile, a black, four-door auto lay on its side, the roof caved in, the left front wheel still spinning. Stag put his hand over his mouth to keep from choking on the dust, and stepped closer. Then he stopped and leaned against a broken lamp-post for support. The body of a large man hung out the driver's door of the wrecked auto. Half of his skull had been ripped away.
Stag didn't have to go any closer to know that it was Falcon.
⢠⢠â¢
The ammunition cellar was empty now. The final crates of weapons had been hauled out since Natalia had last been there the previous night. Strangely, the kerosene lantern was still lit. With her boot, Natalia nudged the five-liter metal can next to the post. It was empty, like the rest of the cellar. Barely able to keep her eyes open, she wandered to the far wall, slumped down on the earthen floor and took a bite from a half rotten potato. It was the only thing she'd had to eat all day.
The jarring explosions outside were coming closer. The cellar walls shook, cracks widened and chunks of mortar dropped from the ceiling. The Germans had pounded Old Town with unrelenting ferocity for three straight days, and in the streets above the cellar St. John's Cathedral and the Royal Castle lay mostly in ruins.
In the escalating chaos Natalia's commando unit had been decimated, and those that survived were hunkering down wherever they could. Even so, she'd managed to find a way through the rubble to come to the cellar every night, hoping he would be here. But she knew from the battle raging in the streets that time had run out. She was filthy, hungry and exhausted. And all she could think about was Wolf.
It was crazy. What did they have? A few hours of conversation, a few brief hours when they each let down their guard? She hadn't been surprised when he didn't show up that first night, but she'd come back every night since, hoping he would return. She was disappointed, perhaps even saddened, but not surprised. Anything could have happened. He could have been sent on another mission, he could be injured, he could be . . .
She shook her head. It could also be that he just decided not to come. She knew what he was.
No, that wasn't right.
She knew what he'd
become.
What the war and the killing had turned him into. She didn't have any idea what this man called Wolf had been like before, except an enthusiastic American boy who loved baseball.
The potato slipped from Natalia's hand as her eyes closed, and her head drooped to her chest. She had almost drifted off when she felt someone shake her knee. She looked up, her eyes bleary. She couldn't focus in the dim light.
He knelt in front of her, leaned close and whispered, “Natalia.”
Wolf?
“My God!” She grasped his hand. “I'm so glad to see you. I've beenâ”
“We're evacuating Old Town.”
She stood up abruptly. “Evacuating? When?”
“Tonight. I just got the word from Colonel Stag. General Bor has ordered the AK to evacuate Old Town. It's the only way to save the civilian population.”
“What? That's crazy! These Nazi bastards have been murdering civilians for five weeks. Why would they stop now?”
“Bor has made an arrangement with the German Commanders. If the AK evacuates Old Town, they'll let the civilian population leave peacefully. We can't hang on any longer; it's the only way. The entire district will be pulverized to dust in the next few days.”