level.”
“Still, two years.”
“Oh yes, it hurt them. When the war ended, Ludendorff was headed for Baku after Caspian oil, with Turkey, Germany’s ally, trying to break in from the south. At that moment, the army had only a two-month supply, the defense industries were out of lubricants, and the navy was barely able to function.”
“It worked.”
“With Roumanian help, I emphasize that, it did. The Allies held a conference, about ten days after the armistice, where a man named Bérenger, a French senator, made a speech that we don’t, in this building, tend to forget. Oil, he said, ‘the blood of the earth,’ had become, in war, ‘the blood of victory.’”
“A dramatic image.”
“The Germans certainly thought it was. ‘Of course he’s right,’ they told each other. ‘So now we’ll find a way to make our own oil.’”
“Synthetics.”
“The hydrogenation of German coal. The process developed by Bergius in the 1920s, acquired by IG Farben in 1926. Bergius got the Nobel Prize in chemistry, Farben sold a share of the process to Standard Oil of New Jersey, and Germany had oil. Some of it, anyhow. At the present moment—and here I remind you of that man in the top hat, raising his axe—the Bergius process provides ninety-five percent of the Luftwaffe’s aviation gasoline. Still, they must have Roumanian oil. At the moment, they import a high volume from Russia but, if that should stop, they’ll need Roumania. Even with fourteen synthetic fuel plants at work, the Ploesti field would account for fifty-eight percent of the German oil supply. Thus the Blitzkrieg: rapid invasion, no long-term demand for fuel. But, even if the Russian imports end, and even if the tanks stop, down on the roads, Germany can fight the air war, can bomb Britain every night.”
Mademoiselle Dubon studied the look on Serebin’s face—it was not, apparently, unamusing. Her tone was gentle: “You may say
merde,
monsieur, if you wish.”
“Merde.”
“And I agree. For war in these times, only partial solutions, and not very satisfying. Nonetheless...”
Serebin rose, walked to the window, looked out at the cold, empty park. Before the war, he would have seen British nursemaids and two-year-old French aristocrats, but they’d gone away. When he lit a Sobranie, Mademoiselle Dubon produced an ashtray.
“Have you met the tempestuous Elsa?” she said.
“I have. But no tempests, at least not while I was around.”
“They occur, I’ve heard, but Kostyka is smitten, she can do no wrong. And, adding spice to the gossip, there are those who say she is a Russian spy.”
Serebin returned to his chair. What would
that
mean? “Is she, do you think?”
“Who knows. A man like Ivan Kostyka serves a life sentence of suspicion, he must assume that everyone he meets is trying to get to him. Sex, love, friendship, gratitude, respect, you name it—those are the tools of the trade. So, if she is a Soviet agent, he suspects it, he goes to bed with it, and worries about it in the morning.”
She paused to let that sink in, then said, “And, speaking of Russia, you should keep in mind the events of last May and June. When Roumania chose Germany over Russia as her patron state—she had to pick one or the other—Stalin became very irritated and took Roumania’s provinces of Bessarabia and the northern Bucovina. That made Hitler nervous, it put the USSR just on the doorstep of ‘his’ oil. So, don’t be surprised if Hitler goes east, maybe sooner than you think.”
“Let’s hope he does, because that will be the end of him.”
“Likely it will, but you can’t count on it. Now, you must be aware of what the British have already tried.”
“Some, certainly not everything.”
“In the fall of 1939, Britain and France offered the Roumanians money, as much as sixty million dollars, to destroy the oil fields, but they could never settle on a price. Then, that same winter, the British secret service sent a force of men
“Still, two years.”
“Oh yes, it hurt them. When the war ended, Ludendorff was headed for Baku after Caspian oil, with Turkey, Germany’s ally, trying to break in from the south. At that moment, the army had only a two-month supply, the defense industries were out of lubricants, and the navy was barely able to function.”
“It worked.”
“With Roumanian help, I emphasize that, it did. The Allies held a conference, about ten days after the armistice, where a man named Bérenger, a French senator, made a speech that we don’t, in this building, tend to forget. Oil, he said, ‘the blood of the earth,’ had become, in war, ‘the blood of victory.’”
“A dramatic image.”
“The Germans certainly thought it was. ‘Of course he’s right,’ they told each other. ‘So now we’ll find a way to make our own oil.’”
“Synthetics.”
“The hydrogenation of German coal. The process developed by Bergius in the 1920s, acquired by IG Farben in 1926. Bergius got the Nobel Prize in chemistry, Farben sold a share of the process to Standard Oil of New Jersey, and Germany had oil. Some of it, anyhow. At the present moment—and here I remind you of that man in the top hat, raising his axe—the Bergius process provides ninety-five percent of the Luftwaffe’s aviation gasoline. Still, they must have Roumanian oil. At the moment, they import a high volume from Russia but, if that should stop, they’ll need Roumania. Even with fourteen synthetic fuel plants at work, the Ploesti field would account for fifty-eight percent of the German oil supply. Thus the Blitzkrieg: rapid invasion, no long-term demand for fuel. But, even if the Russian imports end, and even if the tanks stop, down on the roads, Germany can fight the air war, can bomb Britain every night.”
Mademoiselle Dubon studied the look on Serebin’s face—it was not, apparently, unamusing. Her tone was gentle: “You may say
merde,
monsieur, if you wish.”
“Merde.”
“And I agree. For war in these times, only partial solutions, and not very satisfying. Nonetheless...”
Serebin rose, walked to the window, looked out at the cold, empty park. Before the war, he would have seen British nursemaids and two-year-old French aristocrats, but they’d gone away. When he lit a Sobranie, Mademoiselle Dubon produced an ashtray.
“Have you met the tempestuous Elsa?” she said.
“I have. But no tempests, at least not while I was around.”
“They occur, I’ve heard, but Kostyka is smitten, she can do no wrong. And, adding spice to the gossip, there are those who say she is a Russian spy.”
Serebin returned to his chair. What would
that
mean? “Is she, do you think?”
“Who knows. A man like Ivan Kostyka serves a life sentence of suspicion, he must assume that everyone he meets is trying to get to him. Sex, love, friendship, gratitude, respect, you name it—those are the tools of the trade. So, if she is a Soviet agent, he suspects it, he goes to bed with it, and worries about it in the morning.”
She paused to let that sink in, then said, “And, speaking of Russia, you should keep in mind the events of last May and June. When Roumania chose Germany over Russia as her patron state—she had to pick one or the other—Stalin became very irritated and took Roumania’s provinces of Bessarabia and the northern Bucovina. That made Hitler nervous, it put the USSR just on the doorstep of ‘his’ oil. So, don’t be surprised if Hitler goes east, maybe sooner than you think.”
“Let’s hope he does, because that will be the end of him.”
“Likely it will, but you can’t count on it. Now, you must be aware of what the British have already tried.”
“Some, certainly not everything.”
“In the fall of 1939, Britain and France offered the Roumanians money, as much as sixty million dollars, to destroy the oil fields, but they could never settle on a price. Then, that same winter, the British secret service sent a force of men
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