31
A Walk in the Park
The feel of the cold, nickel plated steel of his Webley gave Jones a measure of comfort, but nonetheless a hidden bead of sweat formed on his forehead beneath the band of his fedora. He was on enemy turf now, and there were more than a few of the border guards on and around the train. If any shooting started there probably wasn't much chance of it turning out in his and Vadoma's favor.
Jones swallowed and then said in his most nonchalant voice, "What do you mean fool you? I don't know what you're talking about."
The guard's eyes narrowed as he spoke, "Oh I think you do Mr..... excuse me, Professor...Marshall."
In the span of a few seconds Jones went over several plans of action in his mind. All of them however seemed doomed to failure, and in fact the best plan he could come up with was to just grab Vadoma's hand and run like hell. He swallowed hard again and began to mentally count down in his mind...5...4...3...
The guard leaned his large frame down closer to the archaeologist, "You don't strike me as the scholarly type Mr. Marshall...and I know who you are and why you are here."
That did it for Indy, and he prepared to put his plan into action.
"You are a skier!" The guard said suddenly, pointing his finger at Jones and smiling broadly, "You can not fool me. Maybe you can fool your boss at the university, but you can't fool me. You are not going to spend your holiday in some dusty old museum. You are going skiing," he grinned, "ha! I knew it!"
"Yeah, you got me!" Like the air rushing out of a balloon, Indiana Jones' anxiety dissipated in an instant. "Yup... going skiing...can't wait to hit those slopes!" he said as he smiled back, "You figured it out alright."
"Ach!" The guard said with friendly disdain, "You Americans," he laughed again, then said, "but you must go to Innsbruck while you are in Austria. The best skiing in all of the Alps...and my brother he runs the best chalet in the whole country; it is called the Oosterhaus," the man then pulled a small card out of his pocket with the map and address of his brother's establishment and handed it to Jones.
"I'll make a point of it," Jones held up the card, smiled and nodded his head.
When the guard, and apparently part-time travel agent, finally moved on Indiana Jones at last released the Webley and pulled his hand back out of his pocket. He closed his eyes for a moment and breathed another long sigh of relief....and then yet another when the train finally began moving again...moving deeper into the German Reich.
Not long after the train started moving again and things had settled down, both Indy and Vadoma fell asleep. They slept through the night, waking only as the train stopped at each of the major cities that it passed through as it headed south on its parallel course with the Rhine river. Brief stops in Essen, Dusseldorf, Cologne, Bonn, and a few others were the only interruptions as the train traveled on through the night.
Finally at close to dawn they arrived in Wiesbaden where they had to change trains to a different line that would carry them into southern Germany. This train was faster than the first, and by the time the sun was full up they had already passed Heidelberg and were streaking southward through some of the most beautiful countryside in all of Germany; presently dressed in its winter best.
By the early morning light Indiana Jones studied his rail map of Europe that he'd purchased in Amsterdam. He traced his finger along the route they'd already taken, and then further down the map along the route that he planned to take to get to Switzerland and then Italy.
They would pass down through Stuttgart, and then to the southern German rail center of Ulm. There they would change trains again. Rather than travel east towards Austria, they would instead get another south bound train destined for Friedrichshafen, on the shores of Lake Constance. An eight mile ferry ride across the cold waters of the alpine lake would land them in Switzerland.
Jones looked up from his map and over at Vadoma. She gazed out at the passing countryside. There was no mistaking the pained and worried expression that she wore. Jones knew why, but he felt powerless to help her. He knew that Vadoma was thinking of her sister Pesha. Indy firmly believed that her sister was already dead, but he could not bring himself to say so to Vadoma. But Jones also knew that Vadoma, deep in her own heart, knew the same thing anyway.
But truly what could they do? Outside of storming the Gestapo headquarters where Pesha was being held, and breaking her out, there wasn't much. Indiana Jones had pulled off some unlikely successes in his lifetime, but suicide missions just weren't in his repertoire.
Just then Vadoma turned her gaze from the window and on to Indiana Jones. She gestured out the window at the passing, snowy countryside, "My kumpania, we have traveled through these places many times."
Jones looked out the window, "Where is your kumpania now?"
She looked back out the window and was silent. Indiana Jones knew what she was thinking.
"You want to find them don't you?" He said.
Vadoma continued to gaze out the window for a moment, and then turned to him and nodded, "You may not understand Indiana Jones, but I can feel them; I can feel my kumpania is close by." She smiled wanly as a tear formed in her eye, "You are a gadje, and so you cannot understand that we gypsies can feel such things."
"I believe you, and I think I understand," Jones said.
"I need to see my people Indy. I need to find out about Pesha."
Jones stared out the window for a moment, "You know the danger," he said.
"I must see my people Indy," she said with a quiet determination and finality.
Indiana Jones said nothing. Eventually he sat back and began to study his map again. He knew that there was probably nothing he could say to Vadoma right now. He only hoped that between now and the Swiss border she would think better of the idea. He felt that for her to return to her kumpania in Germany would be suicide; and he needed her to help him find Malboury and clear his name with Scotland Yard. So Jones simply sat back and studied the map in silence. After a time he closed his eyes, and tried to catch a little more sleep before they arrived in Ulm.
Vadoma remained wide awake and continued to stare out the train's window at the increasingly familiar countryside. In her own mind she feared the worst for Pesha. If the Nazis had tried to kill her in England then it was obvious that they had deemed her to be no longer of any value. So why should they continue to hold Pesha, which was the only reason that they'd been able to force Vadoma to work for them in England? And Vadoma knew that they wouldn't release Pesha; she knew that the filthy murderers had either killed her already, or worse, sent her to a concentration camp. She sniffed and suppressed another tear as the train continued to rumble southward.
A couple of hours later the train pulled into the major rail center of Ulm. Indiana Jones and Vadoma Maniskelko stepped off the train, and consulted the posted schedule. It would be nearly two hours before the train for Friedrichshafen would leave.
"Good," Vadoma exclaimed wearily, "I am tired of trains anyway. Let's go for a walk Indy."
Jones was hesitant, "Look Vadoma maybe we should just stay here in the station. The sooner we get out of Germany the better, and I wasn't planning any sightseeing on the way."
"Please come walk with me in the park," she pleaded, "I have been here before. There is a beautiful little park not too far from the station."
Jones thought for a moment, and then decided that he needed a break too. Besides, things had gone smoothly, and it seemed that the only trouble they would have might come at the border, when they crossed over to Switzerland. In the meantime he didn't see any harm in taking a walk in the park; as long as they didn't stray too far from the station.
"Alright," he agreed.
A few minutes later they walked through the small park near the train station. There were few other people around at this hour; just a few pensioners feeding the birds. The weather was cold but there was no snow on the ground here as they walked along the well groomed paths between the strategically planted trees. Everything in Germany, Jones thought, seemed to be regimented and orderly, even the trees.
They walked in silence for a little while. Eventually though, the beauty and quiet serenity of the little park caused Jones to wax philosophically, "How can such a beautiful country be taken over by such an evil?" He stated the rhetorical and unanswerable question.
"You know Indy, the gypsies have a saying: Jekh dilo kerel but dile hai but dile keren dilimata."
"And what does that mean?"
"It means: One madman makes many madmen, and many madmen make madness."
Jones thought about what she said, "I guess that sums it up as well as anything, doesn't it."
Vadoma stopped suddenly. Then Jones observed as she walked over to a public trash bin. There was an intense expression on her face as she approached, and then actually thrust her hand down into the rubbish inside.
"Vadoma? What are you doing?" Jones was mystified as he watched her reach her hand into the trash bin and retrieve a small object.
She held it up and smiled excitedly, "Look! A patrin!"
"A what?"
"A patrin...a leaf," She said.
"That's not a leaf, it looks like a bundle of sticks tied with a rag," Jones said.
"We gypsies call this a patrin. It is a sign, for other gypsies; it marks the way that a kumpania has traveled," she seemed very excited as she looked at the patrin, "this cloth, it is....my kumpania Indy."
"What is it doing in the trash?" Jones asked, "Do they always put them in the trash."
"Of course not!" Vadoma said, "Usually they are placed at cross roads, or some other important place. This one must have been picked up nearby and placed in the trash by someone."
"Some German cleaning up," Jones said, and then couldn't help thinking of the irony of the 'patrin' as a metaphor for the whole of the gypsy people in Nazi Germany.
"But now I am sure of it Indy. I am sure that my kumpania are near." Then she looked thoughtful for a moment, "And I think I know where."
"Listen Vadoma, you know we need to get through Germany as quickly as possible, and we've got to get to Egypt, find Richard Malboury and...."
"And I've got to know what has become of my sister, Indiana Jones!" Vadoma nearly shouted at him.
Jones turned away. Once again with Vadoma he found himself at a loss for words. And so he simply looked down at his watch, "Come on, let's get back to the station before we miss our train."
As expected, the train left exactly on time, to the minute, and they were once again on their way south. It was only about sixty or so miles from Ulm to Friedrichshafen, but this train was not quite as fast as the last one, and Jones estimated that it would be at least ninety minutes before they would reach that far southern German town on the shores of Lake Constance.
Vadoma seemed more tense and agitated than at any time since they'd left England. As Indy sat back and gazed out the window at the passing countryside he was beginning to wonder if her feelings for her sister and her kumpania would outweigh her sensibility; and for the first time since they'd gotten away from the Scotland Yard policemen Jones wondered if she might bolt on him.
Behind them, in the train station at Ulm, a middle aged German man with a good memory, an eye for detail, and connections to the Gestapo, watched as the train grew smaller in the distance, and then went to a telephone and placed a call.
A Walk in the Park
The feel of the cold, nickel plated steel of his Webley gave Jones a measure of comfort, but nonetheless a hidden bead of sweat formed on his forehead beneath the band of his fedora. He was on enemy turf now, and there were more than a few of the border guards on and around the train. If any shooting started there probably wasn't much chance of it turning out in his and Vadoma's favor.
Jones swallowed and then said in his most nonchalant voice, "What do you mean fool you? I don't know what you're talking about."
The guard's eyes narrowed as he spoke, "Oh I think you do Mr..... excuse me, Professor...Marshall."
In the span of a few seconds Jones went over several plans of action in his mind. All of them however seemed doomed to failure, and in fact the best plan he could come up with was to just grab Vadoma's hand and run like hell. He swallowed hard again and began to mentally count down in his mind...5...4...3...
The guard leaned his large frame down closer to the archaeologist, "You don't strike me as the scholarly type Mr. Marshall...and I know who you are and why you are here."
That did it for Indy, and he prepared to put his plan into action.
"You are a skier!" The guard said suddenly, pointing his finger at Jones and smiling broadly, "You can not fool me. Maybe you can fool your boss at the university, but you can't fool me. You are not going to spend your holiday in some dusty old museum. You are going skiing," he grinned, "ha! I knew it!"
"Yeah, you got me!" Like the air rushing out of a balloon, Indiana Jones' anxiety dissipated in an instant. "Yup... going skiing...can't wait to hit those slopes!" he said as he smiled back, "You figured it out alright."
"Ach!" The guard said with friendly disdain, "You Americans," he laughed again, then said, "but you must go to Innsbruck while you are in Austria. The best skiing in all of the Alps...and my brother he runs the best chalet in the whole country; it is called the Oosterhaus," the man then pulled a small card out of his pocket with the map and address of his brother's establishment and handed it to Jones.
"I'll make a point of it," Jones held up the card, smiled and nodded his head.
When the guard, and apparently part-time travel agent, finally moved on Indiana Jones at last released the Webley and pulled his hand back out of his pocket. He closed his eyes for a moment and breathed another long sigh of relief....and then yet another when the train finally began moving again...moving deeper into the German Reich.
Not long after the train started moving again and things had settled down, both Indy and Vadoma fell asleep. They slept through the night, waking only as the train stopped at each of the major cities that it passed through as it headed south on its parallel course with the Rhine river. Brief stops in Essen, Dusseldorf, Cologne, Bonn, and a few others were the only interruptions as the train traveled on through the night.
Finally at close to dawn they arrived in Wiesbaden where they had to change trains to a different line that would carry them into southern Germany. This train was faster than the first, and by the time the sun was full up they had already passed Heidelberg and were streaking southward through some of the most beautiful countryside in all of Germany; presently dressed in its winter best.
By the early morning light Indiana Jones studied his rail map of Europe that he'd purchased in Amsterdam. He traced his finger along the route they'd already taken, and then further down the map along the route that he planned to take to get to Switzerland and then Italy.
They would pass down through Stuttgart, and then to the southern German rail center of Ulm. There they would change trains again. Rather than travel east towards Austria, they would instead get another south bound train destined for Friedrichshafen, on the shores of Lake Constance. An eight mile ferry ride across the cold waters of the alpine lake would land them in Switzerland.
Jones looked up from his map and over at Vadoma. She gazed out at the passing countryside. There was no mistaking the pained and worried expression that she wore. Jones knew why, but he felt powerless to help her. He knew that Vadoma was thinking of her sister Pesha. Indy firmly believed that her sister was already dead, but he could not bring himself to say so to Vadoma. But Jones also knew that Vadoma, deep in her own heart, knew the same thing anyway.
But truly what could they do? Outside of storming the Gestapo headquarters where Pesha was being held, and breaking her out, there wasn't much. Indiana Jones had pulled off some unlikely successes in his lifetime, but suicide missions just weren't in his repertoire.
Just then Vadoma turned her gaze from the window and on to Indiana Jones. She gestured out the window at the passing, snowy countryside, "My kumpania, we have traveled through these places many times."
Jones looked out the window, "Where is your kumpania now?"
She looked back out the window and was silent. Indiana Jones knew what she was thinking.
"You want to find them don't you?" He said.
Vadoma continued to gaze out the window for a moment, and then turned to him and nodded, "You may not understand Indiana Jones, but I can feel them; I can feel my kumpania is close by." She smiled wanly as a tear formed in her eye, "You are a gadje, and so you cannot understand that we gypsies can feel such things."
"I believe you, and I think I understand," Jones said.
"I need to see my people Indy. I need to find out about Pesha."
Jones stared out the window for a moment, "You know the danger," he said.
"I must see my people Indy," she said with a quiet determination and finality.
Indiana Jones said nothing. Eventually he sat back and began to study his map again. He knew that there was probably nothing he could say to Vadoma right now. He only hoped that between now and the Swiss border she would think better of the idea. He felt that for her to return to her kumpania in Germany would be suicide; and he needed her to help him find Malboury and clear his name with Scotland Yard. So Jones simply sat back and studied the map in silence. After a time he closed his eyes, and tried to catch a little more sleep before they arrived in Ulm.
Vadoma remained wide awake and continued to stare out the train's window at the increasingly familiar countryside. In her own mind she feared the worst for Pesha. If the Nazis had tried to kill her in England then it was obvious that they had deemed her to be no longer of any value. So why should they continue to hold Pesha, which was the only reason that they'd been able to force Vadoma to work for them in England? And Vadoma knew that they wouldn't release Pesha; she knew that the filthy murderers had either killed her already, or worse, sent her to a concentration camp. She sniffed and suppressed another tear as the train continued to rumble southward.
A couple of hours later the train pulled into the major rail center of Ulm. Indiana Jones and Vadoma Maniskelko stepped off the train, and consulted the posted schedule. It would be nearly two hours before the train for Friedrichshafen would leave.
"Good," Vadoma exclaimed wearily, "I am tired of trains anyway. Let's go for a walk Indy."
Jones was hesitant, "Look Vadoma maybe we should just stay here in the station. The sooner we get out of Germany the better, and I wasn't planning any sightseeing on the way."
"Please come walk with me in the park," she pleaded, "I have been here before. There is a beautiful little park not too far from the station."
Jones thought for a moment, and then decided that he needed a break too. Besides, things had gone smoothly, and it seemed that the only trouble they would have might come at the border, when they crossed over to Switzerland. In the meantime he didn't see any harm in taking a walk in the park; as long as they didn't stray too far from the station.
"Alright," he agreed.
A few minutes later they walked through the small park near the train station. There were few other people around at this hour; just a few pensioners feeding the birds. The weather was cold but there was no snow on the ground here as they walked along the well groomed paths between the strategically planted trees. Everything in Germany, Jones thought, seemed to be regimented and orderly, even the trees.
They walked in silence for a little while. Eventually though, the beauty and quiet serenity of the little park caused Jones to wax philosophically, "How can such a beautiful country be taken over by such an evil?" He stated the rhetorical and unanswerable question.
"You know Indy, the gypsies have a saying: Jekh dilo kerel but dile hai but dile keren dilimata."
"And what does that mean?"
"It means: One madman makes many madmen, and many madmen make madness."
Jones thought about what she said, "I guess that sums it up as well as anything, doesn't it."
Vadoma stopped suddenly. Then Jones observed as she walked over to a public trash bin. There was an intense expression on her face as she approached, and then actually thrust her hand down into the rubbish inside.
"Vadoma? What are you doing?" Jones was mystified as he watched her reach her hand into the trash bin and retrieve a small object.
She held it up and smiled excitedly, "Look! A patrin!"
"A what?"
"A patrin...a leaf," She said.
"That's not a leaf, it looks like a bundle of sticks tied with a rag," Jones said.
"We gypsies call this a patrin. It is a sign, for other gypsies; it marks the way that a kumpania has traveled," she seemed very excited as she looked at the patrin, "this cloth, it is....my kumpania Indy."
"What is it doing in the trash?" Jones asked, "Do they always put them in the trash."
"Of course not!" Vadoma said, "Usually they are placed at cross roads, or some other important place. This one must have been picked up nearby and placed in the trash by someone."
"Some German cleaning up," Jones said, and then couldn't help thinking of the irony of the 'patrin' as a metaphor for the whole of the gypsy people in Nazi Germany.
"But now I am sure of it Indy. I am sure that my kumpania are near." Then she looked thoughtful for a moment, "And I think I know where."
"Listen Vadoma, you know we need to get through Germany as quickly as possible, and we've got to get to Egypt, find Richard Malboury and...."
"And I've got to know what has become of my sister, Indiana Jones!" Vadoma nearly shouted at him.
Jones turned away. Once again with Vadoma he found himself at a loss for words. And so he simply looked down at his watch, "Come on, let's get back to the station before we miss our train."
As expected, the train left exactly on time, to the minute, and they were once again on their way south. It was only about sixty or so miles from Ulm to Friedrichshafen, but this train was not quite as fast as the last one, and Jones estimated that it would be at least ninety minutes before they would reach that far southern German town on the shores of Lake Constance.
Vadoma seemed more tense and agitated than at any time since they'd left England. As Indy sat back and gazed out the window at the passing countryside he was beginning to wonder if her feelings for her sister and her kumpania would outweigh her sensibility; and for the first time since they'd gotten away from the Scotland Yard policemen Jones wondered if she might bolt on him.
Behind them, in the train station at Ulm, a middle aged German man with a good memory, an eye for detail, and connections to the Gestapo, watched as the train grew smaller in the distance, and then went to a telephone and placed a call.