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Authors: Alex Rosenberg
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Negrin think for a minute Franco would send his German and Italian troops, their tanks, bombers, and transport planes home too? That was the moment Stalin picked to order the Spanish party to complete its liquidation of their allies on the left.
Meanwhile, for most of September, the rest of Europe was preparing for certain war over the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia. Even in the Spanish papers, British Prime Minister Chamberlain’s flights, first to Bad Godesberg, then to Munich, had pushed news of the Ebro front from the headlines.
On September 30, the day after Chamberlain had brought peace with honor, peace in our time, back to London from Germany, Gil was called down from the obstetrical ward. Marti got up as he entered.
“Shut the door, sit, joven .”
Gil complied wordlessly.
“It’s time for you to leave, my friend. The NKVD has been to see me twice looking for someone named Sommermann who had friends in the Trotskyite ICL in Paris. They said he was supposed to be with the brigades, but they completely lost track of him, till information came in from Paris. Now he’s needed by his unit. That’s what they said anyway. The brigades have to evacuate in good order, no stragglers. That includes the medical services.”
“I see.”
“You must get a Spanish passport. You won’t get out with a Polish one.”
It was still hot enough to perspire a few evenings later as Gil carried a single suitcase and a briefcase to the Barceloneta metro stop. The valise packed gynecological instruments among pieces of clothing so they would not rattle. The briefcase held medical certificates for one Guillermo Romero. Sitting in the steaming carriage, sweat pouring down his face, Gil waited out the stops on the metro line to Barcelona Santas , the main railroad station. He’d never get out the way he came in to Barcelona the first time, through the identity checks at Cerbere, on the direct line to France. He might look Catalan now, but he wouldn’t sound it to the border police checking for deserters or to the French customs agents who sent back visa-less refugees with a vengeance. His route back to France had to be indirect.
An hour later, no longer sweating, Gil sat on a wooden bench in a third-class compartment, alone but for an elderly lady. She sat beneath a poster from which shone the face of La Pasionaria , Dolores Ib á rruri, and the hammer and sickle of the Spanish Communist Party. But the woman was no republican stalwart—that was certain. All in black, under a lace mantilla, her eyes moved back and forth across the pages of a missal. Evidently she had nothing to fear from Generalissimo Franco.
With only three cars, the train slowly made its way upland, stopping at a half dozen villages around Montserrat before turning north to the Spanish Pyrenees. The railway line ended at Berga, well south of the French border. There would be no identity checks on this train.
As darkness fell, Gil began to see less of the landscape and more of his face reflected back in the dusty window glass. He liked what he saw: the slightly more defined features that long days had chiseled into his face, the jaded look of world-weary—or was it worldly wise?—sophistication in his eyes, the fashionable mustache, the off-white suit of a man who knew his way round the Ramblas. It only needed a cigarette and some smoke to complete the picture. He lit one.
Gil reflected with a certain amount of satisfaction on how foresighted he had been, making the right choice at each fork in the road. Things had worked out for him. Or at least they would work out if he could escape the net being closed by the military and political police of the Catalan rump state, now almost entirely under Soviet control.
In the dim aura of its single streetlamp clamped to the side of a building facing the station—really no more than a platform with shed—Berga was a one-lane town of drab two-story stucco houses and shuttered windows. Coming down from the
Meanwhile, for most of September, the rest of Europe was preparing for certain war over the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia. Even in the Spanish papers, British Prime Minister Chamberlain’s flights, first to Bad Godesberg, then to Munich, had pushed news of the Ebro front from the headlines.
On September 30, the day after Chamberlain had brought peace with honor, peace in our time, back to London from Germany, Gil was called down from the obstetrical ward. Marti got up as he entered.
“Shut the door, sit, joven .”
Gil complied wordlessly.
“It’s time for you to leave, my friend. The NKVD has been to see me twice looking for someone named Sommermann who had friends in the Trotskyite ICL in Paris. They said he was supposed to be with the brigades, but they completely lost track of him, till information came in from Paris. Now he’s needed by his unit. That’s what they said anyway. The brigades have to evacuate in good order, no stragglers. That includes the medical services.”
“I see.”
“You must get a Spanish passport. You won’t get out with a Polish one.”
It was still hot enough to perspire a few evenings later as Gil carried a single suitcase and a briefcase to the Barceloneta metro stop. The valise packed gynecological instruments among pieces of clothing so they would not rattle. The briefcase held medical certificates for one Guillermo Romero. Sitting in the steaming carriage, sweat pouring down his face, Gil waited out the stops on the metro line to Barcelona Santas , the main railroad station. He’d never get out the way he came in to Barcelona the first time, through the identity checks at Cerbere, on the direct line to France. He might look Catalan now, but he wouldn’t sound it to the border police checking for deserters or to the French customs agents who sent back visa-less refugees with a vengeance. His route back to France had to be indirect.
An hour later, no longer sweating, Gil sat on a wooden bench in a third-class compartment, alone but for an elderly lady. She sat beneath a poster from which shone the face of La Pasionaria , Dolores Ib á rruri, and the hammer and sickle of the Spanish Communist Party. But the woman was no republican stalwart—that was certain. All in black, under a lace mantilla, her eyes moved back and forth across the pages of a missal. Evidently she had nothing to fear from Generalissimo Franco.
With only three cars, the train slowly made its way upland, stopping at a half dozen villages around Montserrat before turning north to the Spanish Pyrenees. The railway line ended at Berga, well south of the French border. There would be no identity checks on this train.
As darkness fell, Gil began to see less of the landscape and more of his face reflected back in the dusty window glass. He liked what he saw: the slightly more defined features that long days had chiseled into his face, the jaded look of world-weary—or was it worldly wise?—sophistication in his eyes, the fashionable mustache, the off-white suit of a man who knew his way round the Ramblas. It only needed a cigarette and some smoke to complete the picture. He lit one.
Gil reflected with a certain amount of satisfaction on how foresighted he had been, making the right choice at each fork in the road. Things had worked out for him. Or at least they would work out if he could escape the net being closed by the military and political police of the Catalan rump state, now almost entirely under Soviet control.
In the dim aura of its single streetlamp clamped to the side of a building facing the station—really no more than a platform with shed—Berga was a one-lane town of drab two-story stucco houses and shuttered windows. Coming down from the
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