The Romanian Question

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All that day the train travelled at high speed westwards, through Roumania. It did not stop, but slackened speed slightly as it passed through the larger towns en route. Only the higher officials of the Roumanian main railway line knew of the passage of the special, heavily-screened train, its destination or its passengers. Towards midnight, the Yugoslav frontier lay only a few miles ahead. As the lights of Timisoara, capital city of Banat, the rich wheat province of Western Roumania, began to glow through the darkness, the driver sounded the engine whistle to warn the station of his approach. The train slowed down to pass through. Just as it left the station platform and was again gathering speed, sharp flashes and the staccato cracks of rifle fire burst from the thick undergrowth of the steep embankments by the side of the railway track. Bullets spattered sharply against the steel framework of the carriages and crackled against the reinforced glass of the windows. The driver quickly accelerated and the train shot forward at full speed towards Yugoslavia - and safety. The would-be assas-sins, it was discovered later, were members of the Iron Guard, the Fascist terrorists of Roumania who, at the behest of Adolf Hitler, had brought about the downfall of King Carol, brought his realm to ruin and degraded it to the level of a province of Nazi Germany.

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