--What´s the hook for? asked Max.
--To hoist things.
--What kind of things?
--Heavy things.
--Like what?
--Horses.
--Almost right, said Max. Guess again.
--No.
--There aren’t many horses in Amsterdam any more.
--Pianos.
--Very good, said Max, patting my arm encouragingly. Anything heavy actually. Anything anyone wants to get on the first floor. You’ll see when we get inside.
He knocked and we heard a small, far away voice say something in Dutch that might have been come in. The front room had posters on the painted wood walls and an extensive philosophical library in French, English, German and Dutch. A card table with a record player on it was opposite an old upright with empty brass candle holders. In the second room, Piam was in bed with her husband, a man with a black beard. From under the covers he looked considerably larger than she was. Like I remembered her sister, she was small, blond, with brown eyes and eyebrows. She got up immediately and got herself into a very mini red skirt with red bloomers. Her husband stayed in bed. He had said nothing except to ask Max if he was a Trotskyist.
--No, said Max.
On the way out, Max said to me that he thought it was very early in the morning for such a question. I thought it was because Irene’s husband had been a Pablist of the Trotskyist tendency, or a Trotskyist of the Pablist tendency, I forget which since at the time I did not know the terms.
Piam took us for coffee to a long whitewashed room full of workers. White coffee and cakes, fish cases and sweet cakes were for sale at the wooden bar running along one wall. Piam carried the coffee mugs over to us. She spoke very softly, mentioning that, although this was a workers’ neighborhood, the workers never had much feeling for anything political.
--You make me shudder, said Max firmly. Don’t you realize that most deserters don’t express any political feelings either? They have them all right, even those who say they leave the Army only because they don’t want to fall into a tiger trap.
Piam took us around Amsterdam for the next two days, helping us find the people on Max’s list and putting us in contact with people she knew who would be helpful. We wanted to set-up a network for deserters to get out of Germany to Holland, Belgium and other countries where they might hide and eventually find asylum. Since most countries bordering Germany, including Holland, then seemed bound by the NATO agreements to turn deserters over to the American Army, we could not just print leaflets saying All deserters come to the Sozialiste Jugendlichs on the Haarlemmeerhouittinen. Earlier leaflets had been printed giving the addresses of the War Resisters International in England and Germany, but no one that we knew had yet checked out their validity.
--We must have addresses we are sure of, said Max. So GI’s know where they can find help if they do quit the army. Besides, the War Resisters leaflet was too intellectual for most GI’s. But at least they did something, and that is certainly to their credit.
He took come copies of the War Resisters leaflet, To American Soldiers in Europe, to an old Trotskyist called Rool Franken whose address he had gotten in Paris.
--What tendency is he? I asked.
--It doesn’t make any difference. Why do you want to know?
--Because Irene’s lover was a Trotskyist of the Pablist tendency.
--Who’s Irene?
--Piam’s sister who shot herself.
--Oh yes. Sorry, I can never remember names.
--Now she’s dead, you won’t have to.
--Piam is alive, and I don’t care what her or anyone else’s positions are as long as they help with the deserters.
Rool Franken was the next one we visited. All Max knew about him was that he had been very active in the printing line all through World War 2. Piam did not know him but she had heard he was all right. She showed us where his house was and left us outside, refusing to accompany us further. Her husband’s suspicious attitude towards Trotskyites seemed to have rubbed off on her.
The Nieuwe Prinzengracht was more elegant than where Piam lived. There were gingko trees at spaced intervals growing up from the cobblestones with room for cars to park between them. Franken’s door was dark green with a brass knocker. A young girl came down the narrow steps which went almost to the inside threshold.
--You see, said Max. That’s why they all have hooks.
I had forgotten about the hooks. Max never dropped that kind of information and elaborated on how practical they were in Amsterdam where so many houses had narrow stairs. The young girl opened a door on a miniscule landing, told us she would go and get her father, and continued up another narrow flight of stairs. The room she showed us into was a good size, taking up the whole first floor. At the far end, a series of paneled glass windows looked out on the canal. A grey carpet, modern furniture, a mobile in one corner, and two conscientiously placed abstractions traced an austere and elegant setting, seemingly appropriate for the man who shortly the man joined us. He was tall, bony, a lined face and thin grey hair, conservatively dressed, in his fifties. After some polite chit-chat, Max showed him the War Resisters leaflet, To American Soldiers in Europe, and said he was working with Kurilla in Paris. This seemed to reassure Franken, who then told us about his experience in underground work when they had been trying to save some of the Jewish community and protect the Dutch railway workers who were working in the underground against the Nazi terror. I wondered if there was also a statue to a railway worker somewhere, like the dock workers on the Dam where Max had first seen the provos. Both dock and railway workers seemed to have worked with the Trotskyites, or at least with Rool Franken, contradicting Piam’s statement that workers did not have political feelings. Rool Franken, anyway, said he was willing to help under certain conditions, and the conversation then turned to underground printing presses, false passports, pseudonyms, rendezvous points and other security precautions.
--Are we really going to go through all that? I asked Max when we got outside again.
--Maybe later. Maybe we’ll have to, said Max. But not yet. This guy is first wave. Okay, so am I, but he’s older and more set in his ways. They probably had to use all this paraphernalia during the Second World War when the Nazis were here, but the young people don’t react to it today. You saw how Piam stayed outside. They probably think he’s crazy. The provos just go up to a guy, ask him if he’s a deserter. And the deserters are even worse. Look at Manfred and Buster--they spend all their time on Saint Michel. Maybe that’s why Piam’s sister shot herself--no, I take that back, she was a provo too. Suicide doesn’t go with their way of seeing the world. Let’s leave the secrecy routine for the time being.
--Maybe they just don’t like Trotskyites.
--Maybe. We used to push them off bridges when I was in the AYD.
--What’s the AYD?
--You’re kidding?
--Why should I be kidding?
--You were old enough to vote in 1948?
--Oh I voted. For the only time in my life. For Henry Wallace.
--You voted for Henry Wallace, but you never heard of American Youth for Democracy? Well, well, I’ve seen everything.
Twenty years earlier, I would have found this attitude insufferable. At forty I was more tolerant.
--What were you doing all that time?
--I was married and had a child. I went to the theater a lot.
Piam was standing on a bridge and we picked her up and started to drive back through the crowded streets. The Citroen did not move for minutes at a time. Piam said the provos had started a system of white bikes to banish cars from the center of Amsterdam. White for purity because gasoline fumes poisoned the air. As part of the plan, they had left white-painted bikes all over town, the idea being that you took one wherever you wanted to go and left it there for the next person. This had worked until the newspapers began publicizing it, and the cops then collected all the white bikes.
--Darned nice of them, said Max.
--Nice? repeated Piam.
- --Sure, said Max. It pushed all you provos into a more political position. You had an innocent and practical scheme for solving the traffic problem, but the police stopped it, and so you got mad at the police.
--I guess, said Piam.
--Radicalization of youth, wave four, said Max. Freedom for fantasy.
I had not connected Max much with fantasy. In which I was wrong. His whole handling of the deserter support network became progressively individualistic and fantastic. This first became evident in Amsterdam when he decided to work with the individualistic and fantastic provos rather than taking up the tried and true underground methods of Rool Franken. He never consulted with me on this decision--or anyone else as far as I knew--and certainly never officially informed Piam that we preferred her to Franken and Kurilla, whoever he was, but she understood that we did. This is a good illustration of the personal and political sensitivity that made Max attractive to most of the people he worked with. His analysis of the non-political hippies of the third wave becoming increasingly radicalized and important in the political spectrum turned out to be quite correct. Even the Dutch establishment recognized them and in 1976, five provos were elected to Parliament, including Piam’s husband. The provos themselves felt this was too much and offered to five two of their seats away. But back in 1967, the provos phenomenon was new, and to most people with twenty years of political experience like Max, the underground methods of Rool Franken were preferable.
--The SJ have already printed some leaflets, said Piam the next morning. If you would like to see them? They’re about Vietnam. We could give them to American soldiers.
--They’re in Dutch, said Max. If you want to persuade American GI’s to oppose the war, you ain’t gonna do it in Dutch.
Piam smiled.
--Or in Swedish or French. You have to have an English leaflet--an American leaflet I should say--because what you are learning in school as English usually has little relation to the language spoken by GI’s.
--I’ll take you to the office, said Piam. And you can speak with them about it.
--The provo office?
She smiled again. and said she meant the Vietnam Committee office.
--Yes, I know, said Max. Provos don’t have offices.
--We have a boat, said Piam. And a cellar.
The Vietnam committee was located in another narrow street up a flight of stairs even steeper than usual which gave a final twist to its tail and turned into a small room plastered with Cuban and Vietnamese posters and pictures. Stacked in the corner and piled on small tables were piles of printed leaflets.
--The fourth wave, said Max, gesturing towards the piles of papers. New Left. I’m surprised you find anything.
--New Left?
--You, began Max addressing Piam and the young man behind the desk. You are the New Left. The provos. And the Vietnam Committee, I suppose, though I don’t know much about you. Just the opposite of our Trotskyist friend, Rool. Yes, I know your husband doesn’t approve of his politics. I don’t give a dam. The only politics I care about in this thing is that someone works against the Vietnam War. Now the provos work very efficiently. They go up to the soldiers and ask them if they are deserters. That’s good. That’s great. I’m all for it. Now, about leaflets? Would provos give out leaflets if you had some printed in American? Not English, that’s another language.
--You said that already, said Piam gently.
--I can’t say it too much, said Max. The GI’s speak American. Now, is getting out leaflets in American too organized for the New Left?
Piam looked at the Vietnam Committee rep.
--We could distribute them, she said tentatively.
--What’s your name? Max asked.
--Piotr.
--I’m sorry. Do you speak English?
--Yes, of course, said Piotr.
--Of course, you heard me ask you what your name was. I’m sorry, I don’t know Dutch. I know a little: danke well, dag, meer, bet beste, hardly enough to carry on a conversation, but since you speak English--you understand about the necessity for the leaflet to be in American, don’t you?
Piotr smiled and nodded. He answered slowly that he would have to ask other people, but he did not see anything against it. Most of the SJ knew English, some of them quite well. They could certainly write something.
--Have it checked by an American, said Max. Does this sound chauvinistic? Perhaps. But don’t forget, you’re writing for an audience of tenth grade dropouts. And encore une fois, have it checked, if possible, by a GI.
--Perhaps you should write it? suggested Piotr.
--We’ll see. It may be impractical to get the leaflet shipped here from Paris, said Max. What about distribution?
Piam said she would come by the Vietnam Committee office in about two weeks to see if they were ready, and then the provos could distribute them.
--How many provos are there? asked Max.
--Not too many, said Piam. Actually, almost all of us are in Amsterdam. But for a big project like this, we could get 300 people to distribute.
--What about other cities?
--Rotterdam maybe, said Piam.
--How many?
--Maybe about thirty.
Our next and last stop was to be the leader of the SJ, but before this, Piam took us back to her house for lunch.
“The babies are my business.”
The lunch, which was supposed to be a typical Dutch dish, was burnt because Piam had put it on the stove before going out to meet us that morning. The atmosphere in the house was very tense but not because of the burnt food. Robert van Duff was glaring at a young American that Piam had met in Italy that summer and who had stopped in to see her on his way to Zagreb where he was studying. Since Amsterdam was a detour of over a thousand kilometers, Robert van Duff took this homage to his wife very badly. Not only Trotskyites seemed to incur his displeasure, so when we left, lunchless, the young man went with us.
--I don’t understand at all, he said over a rice taffel near the Langenizel. I thought provos were very detached from bourgeois institutions.
--Maybe he feels insecure, said Max. All that beard must hide something.
The young man’s name was John, and he was an American draft resister studying in Zagreb. For Max he was next best to being a deserter, and when he said he was going to Paris in the spring, Max gave him my address and telephone number. I didn’t mind, but later I asked why he had not given his.
--After all, you’re head of the network.
--We don’t have a network yet, said Max. That’s why we’re here.
--Yes, but anyway, you will be head of it.
--Exactly why no one must know where my place is. One of the main rules of underground work: the people in the network do not put people up.
--Well, I’m in the network and you gave out my phone number, so I’ll be putting people up. And look at the provos. All of them do everything--leaflet distribution included.
--I have to be careful, said Max. Don’t forget, I’m not French.
I thought he was much more like Rool Franken than he wanted to admit. After all, he had files for addresses, Hungarian thermoses for car trips, and he gave orders to his--I almost wrote subordinates, which is how he thought of me, I am sure--colleagues.
That afternoon Piam took us, minus John, to see Hans Brinker, one of the heads of the SJ, the Socialist Youth organization who had already been involved with deserters. He was a young theologian with a Van Dyke beard and Delft blue eyes. Very good copy for journalists when, some years later, he became Mayor of Amsterdam. His wife was an orientalist in the sense that she was studying oriental languages.
--We have two new deserters, announced Max to Hans. Did Piam tell you?
Hans looked at her sadly.
--I know your sister died, he said.
-- I do not think the deserters had anything to do with it, she said. Irene had many problems.
I thought again of Robert van Duff and his prejudice against Trotskyites. Maybe it was personal rather than political, and he held it against all Trotskyites that Piam’s sister had shot herself while living with one.
--I did not see the last two deserters, said Hans. I just know Sandy.
Max and Piam smiled. It was a reaction I noticed whenever Sandy’s name was mentioned.
--What finally happened to him? asked Hans.
--A lot, said Max.
I never had anything to do with Sandy personally. At first I was not really interested, and after this trip, Max decided I was a key figure in the baby business, as we were starting to call it, and should not be used for housing deserters. He had, therefore, taken my question seriously about why he could give out my phone number while keeping his secret. No phone number, no babysitting. He seemed to place me somewhere between himself at the top of the pyramid, remaining secret and apart, and the provos and Young Socialists who were to leaflet soldiers in Holland, put up deserters, and eventually bring them to Paris. The two groups divided the work as they saw fit, but I got the impression that it was the provos who leafleted, mostly at the train station where every weekend lots of American soldiers came into Amsterdam from the local or German bases ready for all the fun, girls and hash, that the city offered.
I have gotten deviated from Sandy here, a very common reaction. No one liked Sandy, and his reaction to this was to do everything he could to acerbate their dislike. He was the first deserter in Paris, although, as Max remarked, there had doubtless been American deserters in Paris before Sandy, but the Vietnam War movement had not known about them.
--Before coming to France, Sandy had spent three months with you people, began Max. He was shunted about between Amsterdam, Rotterdam, and Breda, Antwerp and return.
--He did not go to Breda and Antwerp, said Hans Brinker.
--That was a joke, said Max. Never mind. The point is that the low countries, small, densely populated, are poor places for permanent illegal residence. The cops were close on his tail and the Dutch groups, still poorly organized--no offence intended, but you were poorly organized. That’s why I’m here. Okay?
Hans Brinker nodded.
--Where was I?
--The cops were on his tail.
--Thank you. The cops were on his tail, and you or some other group sent him to France and dumped him there.
--We didn’t dump him, said Hans. He was left with some French students who were in PAW.
--That’s a pacifist group, right?
--Pacifists against Atomic War.
--Very laudable, said Max. But they didn’t know what to do with him either and telephoned an English Quaker group who contacted PACS, Paris Americans to Stopwar, where June is located.
Located seemed to me a bit much, but I let it pass.
--Three of the PACS, upper middle class Americans to a man, met Sandy at a cafe and didn’t like him. First, he was lower class, and though America is supposed to be a classless society, Baby A was not a respectable middle class draft resister--and PACS supported draft resisters--he was from an orphanage in Waco, Texas, who had joined the Army at seventeen. Their sons did not join the army at seventeen, and they would have thought them nuts if they had.
--What happened to him? repeated Hans.
--Actually you might say Baby A, Sandy Garvin, was nuts. When I took him on, I took him to a Communist Party lawyer called Nicole Dreyfus (no relation to the Captain, but who knows?) who said he was caractériel . Nuts to you in French. The Americans gave him 100 francs and told him to go back to the French, and from then on, he was shunted about from international work camps to Protestant farmers, even to a psychiatric clinic--not as patient but as odd job man—and the Communist Party run theater in Ville Juif where I live. He arrived in October and by now I can’t count how many places he’s been. Please note that during all this time he has been perfectly clandestine and has to be kept away from the police, social security, traffic cops, and unions. That’s why the Communist Party got him thrown out of the theater where he was perfectly happy for once as an electrician’s helper.
--Where is he now?
This time I asked.
--Kurilla`s group took him on and sent him down to Nimes to get him out of Paris.
This was the second time I had heard the name of Kurilla. Hans did not react to the name Kurilla Neither did Piam. Then I remembered Max had mentioned him to Rool Franken, the Trotskyist whom Piam had said was okay, but she had not come with us to meet him.
--I forgot, Rool Franken is the one who knows him. Sorry, Piam, but we work with everybody. Our relations with that group have sort of deteriorated, and we don’t want to ask about Baby A because we’re afraid they might give him back.
I wondered who we were. Unless it was just Max’s way of talking about himself.
--And the two new deserters you mention? asked Hans. What about them?
--Baby B and C.
--B and C?
--Manfred and Buster. I classify them alphabetically, said Max. Well, you know about Irene and how we had to get them out of town when she was found--
He stopped and didn’t look at Piam.
--Right now they are at a sort of co-operative farm run by a Protestant philanthropist organization.
--Like Baby A? asked Hans.
--Sandy? Oh no. Once Baby A was somewhere, that place was usually burned forever. This is a group called the Compagnons Batisseurs. They have French conscientious objectors, an American draft resister, two Italians, and, at the moment, or at least when we left Paris two days ago, Manfred and Buster.
--Would either of them work for a test case? asked Hans.
Max sadly shook his head.
--No question, he said. When they came, we had great hopes of Manfred, the black man. He had the makings of a second Malcolm X, but--
Max sighed theatrically.
--It would have been so good, he said and paused again.
Hans and his wife and Piam waited to hear what was wrong with Manfred.
--Manfred’s being black made him ideal material for a test case until he took off his dark glasses.
Max looked around.
--Does that mean anything to any of you?
Piam nodded.
--You, June?
I said no.
--Drugs? asked Hans.
--Yeah, said Max. I saw as soon as he took off his dark glasses. And you know what he said? “I’m sorry to let a fly fall in the milk.”
--He knew you wanted a test case?
--Oh yes. We had already talked about it. They both realized they could not live underground forever. Particularly after Irene killed herself--Sorry, Piam, I keep forgetting you were sisters.
Piam gave a little shrug.
--How about the other one, Buster? asked Hans.
--Buster’s a nice guy, said Max. But no test case. He’s like a young GI in a war movie who gets blown up and everyone is sorry because they liked him even though he was a brat.
--No drugs?
--Oh, I suppose he smokes hash with Manfred, said Max. When they can get it. Frankly, I don’t go looking for that sort of information unless it is going to affect a decision, like choosing a test case. What do you think, Piam? Does he smoke hash?
--We smoke, said Piam.
--I know, said Max. And I don’t like it. But that’s your business. The babies are my business.
--We get it for them because if we don’t, then they’ll get it from someone who’s bad politically, said Piam.
--I’m first wave, said Max. Old Left. I never have understood the drug syndrome. Of course, you’re all third wave. Have I told you my theory of the four waves?
--I would first like to get something practical set up, said Hans.
He was not one of the heads of the SJ for nothing. For the rest of our time there they discussed where the deserter was to be brought, how we were to be notified, and other practical problems.
The Trip Back
The next day we drove home over the dikes under a bright winter sun. Max was mad at me because I had not slept with him and started to lecture me about it.
--Everything you have done in your life has been wrong, he began. At first I was interested in you because I am always interested in the exception. From what you told me of your background and your early life, you should just have continued to stay in place and marry a young man of your own society and not worry about anything outside of it. The fact that you got here at all, even that you go as far as you do with the pacifists, surprises me. Of course I wanted you to go to bed with me in Holland; I didn’t even know if you were divorced or had a lover and don’t particularly care. You had been introduced to me as Mrs. Somebody. When you said you would come on this trip, I thought your relationship with your husband was such that he would let you go on a semi-political trip--to see about things with another man in another country--because you had a good understanding, and I didn’t want to break that up.
--There was never any question of anyone letting me do anything, I said. That is one of the reasons I am not still married. I do what I myself decide.
--Then when you said we would take the same room, I thought it would be all right. I even bought you flowers, I don’t know why. I never do that. But now I think you must be disturbed without even knowing it yourself. You are divorced, your lover is off somewhere, you share a room with me and you won’t sleep with me. Don’t you like me? I thought of that too. Probably I’m too fat and I smell bad. But I don’t think it’s that. You would have known that by the time we got to the hotel.
I said he smelt like a boat, and I liked boats.
--I think you’re spoiled. You’re getting older too, and since your divorce, no one has wanted you enough to marry you again. I don’t see why you divorced your husband in the first place. You could have made it clear that you were to lead your life and sleep with whomever you chose and that he could do the same thing. I suppose you were very pretty then--you’re still not bad--and you told me he didn’t want you to leave him. Of course the fact that you have no economic necessity to stay with someone who bothers you undoubtedly caused your decision. With inherited money you can do what you please. You don’t even have to work. This trip with me probably picks up your opinion of yourself. You know that I want you and that’s enough for you. You’re probably right. You are not the sort of girl I usually sleep with--a girl living on unearned income. It would complicate my life enormously to take you on. I’m married and I have no intention of divorcing for you. I also have another girlfriend whom I see once or twice a week. I could see you once a week, that’s about all.
--But I told you I had someone else too whom I want to be faithful to. Can’t you understand that?
--Perhaps, he said. But it’s such a waste.
--What do you mean?
--What do you think I mean?
--Nothing. I don’t know. You remind me of my brother. I hate that attitude. He was like you and used to tell me about all the girls he serviced, as he put it, during the week. Just the way you sound.
--You have twenty more minutes, said Max. To decide. Then we arrive at the auto route, and I won’t get off. So if you want, it’s your last chance.
--My last chance! It’s you who want to!
--I’ve wanted to for the last four days. My whole stomach is in knots. Oh, I guess you have more time if you want it. It will go on a little after we get back. You can still call me up for a week or so. I’ll hold out for you.
--Don’t do me any favors.
What I wanted to say was that since he had a wife and a girlfriend, what difference did it make if he was coming back from these four days unsatisfied? All he had to do on arriving in the city was to go and sleep with one of them. But it seemed bitchy to suggest it, to excite a man and then throw him off on some other woman. Like a countess and her maid.
--Maybe you don’t like to sleep with men, he said. Some girls prefer to excite them. It’s all part of the play beforehand. Like liking to be kissed.
--No.
--You don’t like that? I mean on your vagina. I’m never sure you know what I’m talking about.
--I prefer making love.
--Why haven’t you ever wanted to talk about sex with me? Last night when I started--
--Because I had no intention of sleeping with you.
He must have noticed I used the past tense because he repeated:
--You have ten minutes before we reach the auto route. And I’m being patient. Considering my stomach--do you know what lovers nuts are?
--No.
--When a man wants to make love very much and can’t, his testicles are very painful. Think about me when you go to bed tonight.
--It’s not that I don’t want to.
--Good. Maybe you’ll have a few knots in your stomach too. Good. I’m glad.
I thought of the countess and her maid again. I’d really wanted to sleep with him since the night before at Hans Brinkers.
--You’re right, I said slowly. I should sleep with you.
--You asked for this, said Max and pulled the car off the road.
To be continued...
To be continued...
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