A Small Death in Lisbon

They wore suits to breakfast. Lehrer’s was single-breasted thick wool, dark blue and heavy. Felsen felt flashy in his Parisian cut, double-breasted bitter chocolate suit and a regrettable red tie.

‘Expensive?’ asked Lehrer, his mouth full of black bread and ham.

‘Not cheap.’

‘Bankers don’t believe you unless you wear dark blue.’

‘Bankers?’

‘The bankers of Basel. Who did you think we were going to see in Switzerland? You can’t buy wolfram with chips.’

‘Or Reichsmarks apparently,’ said Felsen.

‘Quite.’

‘But Swiss francs . . . dollars.’

‘Dr Salazar was a professor of economics.’

‘And that entitles him to be paid differently to everybody else?’

‘No. It just entitles him to the opinion that in wartime it’s best to have strong gold reserves.’

‘You’re sending me down to Portugal with a consignment of gold?’

‘A problem is developing. The Americans are being difficult about letting us have our dollars so we’ve started paying for what we want in Swiss francs. Our suppliers in Portugal exchange those Swiss francs for escudos. Eventually, through the local banks, the Swiss francs find their way to the Banco de Portugal. And once they’ve accumulated enough, they use them to buy gold from Switzerland.’

‘I don’t see the problem.’

‘The Swiss don’t like it. They’re worried about losing control of their gold reserves,’ said Lehrer. ‘So, we are experimenting.’

‘How do we move this gold?’

‘Trucks.’

‘What sort of trucks?’

‘Swiss trucks. There’ll be armed soldiers with you all the way. It’s taken some organization I can tell you. You don’t think I enjoy having my head in my briefcase all day, do you?’

‘I didn’t realize gold was physically moved. I thought it was accounted for on paper by national banks.’

‘Perhaps Dr Salazar likes . . . physically . . . to sit on his gold,’ said Lehrer, thinking some more, but he left it at that.

‘Whose gold is this?’

‘I don’t follow your question.’

‘Wouldn’t German gold be held in the Reichsbank?’

‘Now you’re asking me questions which I can’t . . . which I don’t have the knowledge to reply to . . . or the authority. I am merely an SS-Gruppenführer, after all.’

By 11.00 a.m. they had drawn up outside an unmarked building in Basel’s business district. There was nothing inside or out to indicate what happened in this building. There was a handsome woman in her thirties sitting behind a desk with a single telephone on it. A large marble staircase spiralled behind her. Lehrer talked to the woman quietly. Felsen only heard a single word – ‘Puhl’. The woman picked up the telephone, dialled a number and spoke briefly. She stood and set off on strong legs up the stairs. Lehrer indicated that Felsen should wait while he followed the legs.

Felsen sat in a densely packed leather armchair. The woman returned and sat at her desk without looking at him. She folded her hands and waited for the next high point in her day. It took Felsen half an hour and several cubic feet of charm to find out that he was in the lobby of the Bank of International Settlements. The name meant nothing to him.

At one o’clock Felsen and Lehrer were sitting at a table in a restaurant called Bruderholz. Only other men in dark suits ate in this place and at tables well-spaced from each other. There were four petits poussins between the two men and a flat plate of boulangère potatoes. Lehrer was holding a glass of Gewürztraminer and rolling the stem between his thumb and forefinger.

‘It’s so good to have Alsace back in the German fold, don’t you think? What magnificent country, magnificent wine. The meat of the poussin will be a little delicate for this, we should have ordered goose or pork, hearty Alsatian fare, but I can’t have too much fat, you know. Still . . . the fruits of summer in the dead of winter. Your health.’

‘Was that a particularly successful meeting, Herr Gruppenführer?’

‘Tell me what you think of the Gewürztraminer?’

‘Spicy.’

‘I’m sure you can do better than that. I was always told that you were very appreciative of the good things in life.’

‘Boldly fruity, but clean and dry. The spice holding from the top to the bottom, as long as an Atlantic cruise.’

‘Where did you get that from?’ Lehrer laughed.

‘It’s not true?’

‘It’s true . . . but not as boring or as dangerous as an Atlantic cruise,’ said Lehrer. ‘I think a heavenly brioche is called for after this.’

They ate the poussins and drank two bottles of the Gewürztraminer. The restaurant emptied. They ate the brioche with a half-bottle of Sauternes. They ordered coffee and cognac and sat in the fading light of the darkening afternoon with cigars growing inches of concertinaed ash. The staff left them and the bottle and retired. The two men were well loosened up. Lehrer’s cigar arm swung off the back of his chair and Felsen’s legs were spread wide, a foot on either side of the table legs.

‘A man,’ said Lehrer heading for some pontification, pointing Felsen up with his cigar, ash still intact, ‘must always do his important thinking alone.’

‘What’s a man’s important thinking?’ asked Felsen, licking his lips.

‘Where he wants to be, of course . . . in the future,’ he sifted through the air for some more words, ‘I mean, on your way you must gather your intelligence, you may ask opinion, but when you are determining your own place in the world . . . this is your private, your secret thinking . . . and if you are to be a man . . . a man of difference, then this thinking must be done alone.’

‘Is this the start of an essay entitled “How to become an SS-Gruppenführer”?’

Lehrer waggled his cigar in the negative.

That is my position only. A badge of the success of my thinking but it is not the ultimate purpose. A small example. You won the poker game the other night because your ultimate purpose was greater than mine. The adjutant told you to lose because I like to win. You wanted to stay in Berlin . . . ergo you win. My intelligence, as you indicated to me last night, was not good enough to have played that game with you.’

‘But you did win. I’m here. You lost a little money, that’s all.’

Lehrer smiled broadly, his eyes glistening with drink, amusement and triumph.

‘Perhaps you’re thinking now why you’re so important to me,’ he said. ‘Don’t. My ultimate purpose should be no concern of yours.’

Except that it involves me, thought Felsen, but he said: ‘Perhaps I should have one of my own.’

‘My point entirely,’ said Lehrer shrugging massively.