Sir Phillip Mildenhall is a young and energetic British Diplomat travelling through Vienna on the eve of the German invasion. Many Jews have already been taken away and their property seized. There is tension in the air and talk of Poland being invaded next, if England and France don't get involved.
Mildenhall meets in a bank Mr. Leopold Benjamin, a well known and wealthy Jew whose high connections may keep him out of trouble, for now. He invites Mildenhall to dine at his estate that night. The guests include a Princess Sophia, Baroness von Ballinstrode, Leopold's assistant Patricia, and his right hand man, Marius Blute. His home is more like a museum with priceless works of art covering the walls, and when it is asked to see the rest of the collection, it is mysteriously declined. They don't know of his meticulous plans to save the artwork from the Nazis.
Eighteen months later, Mildenhall returns to a very different Vienna under German control. Benjamin had disappeared after that dinner and his collection of priceless art is missing. He is welcomed back to his old hotel where he has left some money in the safe, and begins to search for Patricia and Blute. Weakened and starving, they tell him of their sad circumstances and he is surprised to hear they have been hiding the art collection from the Nazis. They need his diplomatic connections to help get it out of the country by the next morning, on the last train out of Vienna.
It's a tense and exciting adventure, with underground spies, cruel Nazis, heroic countrymen, and a desperate, inventive plan to transport the art from under the noses of the invaders. There is a little romance between Mildenhall and Patricia, but chaste and hesitant. There is the cunning Baroness who plays both sides as it pleases her, and a tense escape across the border to Switzerland.
E. Phillips Oppenheim was an English novelist, writing popular spy thrillers until his death in 1946. I previously read his excellent The Great Impersonation (1920).
The Last Train Out, written in 1940, is the second to last novel he wrote. It has a spare style and rips right along - a true page turner of an underground spy network. Knowing it was written when the actual events were unfolding added a sense of reality to the scenes. I found it as exciting to read now as if I was back in the day.
Finished it in two days, couldn't put it down!
1940 / Hardcover / 309 pages
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