Dragon Harvest I by Sinclair Upton

Author:Sinclair, Upton [Sinclair, Upton]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Historical, Classics, War
ISBN: 9781931313063
Amazon: 1931313067
Goodreads: 2311601
Publisher: Simon Publications
Published: 1942-01-01T08:00:00+00:00

18

Grasp the Nettle

I

After a breakfast of bread and butter and hot cocoa, the Touristen were speeded on their way with cheers. They started west; but soon Lanny decided that it was not the part of wisdom to get nearer to the French border, so they swung toward the south. The scenery was varied and beautiful but they failed to appreciate it; it was German scenery, and they wanted to look at any other kind of earth. It was the morning of the 22nd of August, and Lanny turned on the radio of his car, keeping it low, and heard the official announcement of the German government that a mission headed by Foreign Minister von Ribbentrop was on the point of flying to Moscow for the purpose of concluding a non-aggression pact with the Soviet Union.

He had known that this was coming, and had found that most of the people of the “great world” with whom he talked had heard the rumors; but the non-Germans hadn’t wanted to believe it, so they hadn’t, and now even Lanny was shocked when he heard it published to the world. He knew that it meant war—in three days, if the statement of “Monck was correct. It was the “green light” for the Nazis to take what they wanted from Poland, and to fight Britain and France if these nations chose to interfere. Lanny explained this to his companion, and they listened to the radio from foreign stations, turning it off when they were passing anyone on the road.

“This will make it very hard for you and me,” Lanny said. “Precautions at the border will be doubled, and there will be no planes flying into Germany unchallenged, and no motorboats approaching the shore.” The truth was, he was just about in despair as to the next step, but he didn’t put it so bluntly to his companion.

“Mr. Budd,” she responded, “you have been kind beyond belief, but there is a limit to my right to impose upon you. I think you ought to put me down at the next town and leave me.”

“To do what?”

“Go back to Berlin and put myself under the guidance of the Embassy, and take whatever comes to me.”

“I am not prepared to do anything like that—not if we have to spend a month rolling about the country camping out with the Jungvolk.”

“Tell me frankly,” persisted the woman. “What were you planning to do if you had not got my call for help?”

“I was going to Munich to attend to some picture business, not especially urgent; then I was going to telephone Rudolf Hess and offer to visit him at Berchtesgaden.”

“That is really important to you, is it not?”

“It might be and might not. You saw what I was able to do last night, just by being in position to talk about these powerful persons; and it is so everywhere I go, in Europe and America. Everybody wants to hear about Hitler, Göring, Hess, Schacht—all the Nazi great ones. It is

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