by Wilbur Smith
A number of other army and R.A.F. officers had been on the plane and there was a scrum of people at the foot of the steps, waiting for heavy baggage to be handed out, or looking for the drivers who were meeting them. Saffron was doing the same when she heard a voice beside her say, “Afternoon, ma’am.”
The man who addressed her was a sergeant. He was tall and broad-shouldered, with strong, bony features and the healthy, ruddy complexion of a countryman who has spent his whole life outdoors.
“Sergeant Dunnigan, ma’am. Cumberland Fusiliers. I’ll be taking you to divisional HQ.”
“Is it far?” she asked as Dunnigan led her to his Jeep.
“Depends, ma’am,” he replied. “Could take an hour, could take all day. You know what they say: there’s a war on.” There was a regimental badge on his beret and Saffron recognized it at once.
“The Cumberland Fusiliers,” she said, smiling at the memory of the trip to South Africa.
“That’s right, ma’am. I was on the Capetown Castle, that’s how I recognized you, though I wasn’t one of the lucky beggars that saw you give your talk. I had to listen to it over the ship’s tannoy. Those were the days, eh?”
In the end the journey lasted a little over two hours. The landscape was battered and pockmarked with shell holes, smoke drifted from burning vehicles, buildings and scorched vegetation, sometimes they passed forests of evergreens rising majestically and untouched. And then they would round a corner and what used to be homes were rubble; schools, churches, shops and playgrounds were smashed and destroyed; and people were standing, immobilized by shock. It was a vision of ruined humanity, failure on an epic scale.
As Dunnigan drove, he told Saffron about his wife, his daughter and the young son, born after his last home leave, whom he’d never seen. He talked about his sheep farm in the hills near Keswick and, most passionately of all, about his love of hound racing.
“Ten miles the dogs run, over hill and dale, jumping over walls—nothing’ll stop the little beggars. All the bookies are there make a bloody fortune, they do. You should see it, ma’am.”
“I’d like that,” Saffron said, meaning it, and then described the Kenyan hills where she had grown up and the herdsmen whose cattle roamed across them.
She was interrupted by Dunnigan saying, “Here we are,” as he turned off the road and through a gate on which there was a painted sign. Saffron caught the word “Akademie” and then they were pulling into a courtyard in front of a red-brick building. Trucks and motorbikes and Jeeps were lined up across a large open tarmac space to one side that Saffron realized must have once been a playground.
Dunnigan jumped out of the open Jeep, lifted Saffron’s rucksack from the back and hefted it over his shoulder as he led her toward the door. “Oh, I forgot to mention, ma’am. The general sends his compliments, but he won’t be able to see you today. Major Farrell, his ADC, will be looking after you instead.”
They walked into the old school hall that was now the division’s nerve center. Saffron saw an officer with rosy cheeks and a boyish shock of fair hair calmly issuing orders amidst an atmosphere of frantic activity. Though he barely looked old enough to have passed out of Sandhurst, Dunnigan led Saffron toward him and said, “Captain Courtney for you, sir.”
Standing opposite him, Saffron could see that Farrell’s youthful appearance was tempered by the lines and dark shadows printed on his face by war. But he smiled and his face lit up as he said, “What a delightful surprise. They told us to expect a Captain Courtney, attached to the War Office. I assumed it would be some ghastly desk-wallah, come to check we were using the correct number of paper-clips, or something.”
“Well, here I am, sir.”
“So, what can we do for you?”
Saffron explained her mission, and then handed Farrell the letter from Downing Street.
“Well, if Winnie is on your side, who am I to argue? Where is this Sachsenhausen place, exactly?”
“Oranienburg, twenty-five miles northwest of Berlin. I expect it’s in Russian hands by now.”
“Ah . . . so near and yet so far. We’re getting closer to the Russkis every minute that passes, as they are to us. But there’s a fair number of Germans caught between the two advancing armies, most of them trying to surrender to us before Uncle Joe gathers them into his arms . . . Actually, that gives me an idea. Come with me . . .”
Farrell led her down a corridor lined with cork boards to which children’s drawings were still pinned, knocked on a door and let himself in without waiting for a reply. Saffron found herself in what must once have been a classroom. There were maps tacked to the walls and spread over a long trestle table that had been set up in the middle of the room. In one corner two operators sat at another table covered in radio gear. Two NCOs were sitting at school desks, typing out reports. A bespectacled man with a high forehead, thin sandy hair and round spectacles got up from his desk and walked toward them.
“Andy,” said Farrell, “may I introduce Captain Saffron Courtney of the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry? Saffron, this is Captain Andrew Halsey of the Intelligence Corps. He’s one of those rare creatures for whom the phrase ‘military intelligence’ is not a contradiction in terms. He was a don at Cambridge before the war.”
“How interesting,” said Saffron as they shook hands. “What was your subject?”
“German political history,” Halsey replied. “And here I am seeing it made before my very eyes.” He looked at Farrell. “So, what can I do for you, sir?”
“It’s more what you can do for Miss Courtney,” Farrell replied. “As you’ve probably deduced by now, she’s not here to take your temperature or soothe your fevered brow. She’s on a mission to track down a few of our chaps who were taken to a camp called Sachsenhausen. Have you heard of the place?”
“Yes, it was one of the first camps the Nazis established for political prisoners, after they took power.”
“Well, it occurs to me that there may be personnel from Sachsenhausen hidden away among the Jerries we’ve captured. Put the word out among the other intelligence chaps that we’re looking for anyone who has reliable information about the British prisoners at the camp. Let it be known that we’ll look favorably on anyone who helps us.”
“Everyone’s pretty busy, sir. I’m not sure whether they’ll have time to do this right away.”
“Then tell them to make time. This is important. Churchill’s taking a personal interest.” He glanced at Saffron. “Show him the letter.”
Halsey scanned the document, whistled softly and said, “Ah, right, that does cast a rather different light on things. I’ll get down to work right away. I doubt we’ll have anything for you today. Perhaps we could reconvene tomorrow morning and I’ll report anything that’s come to light.”
“Fine. We’ll meet here at oh-nine-hundred. And you can let your chums know that Twelve Corps HQ will be seriously unimpressed if they don’t have some answers for us. Clear?”
“Crystal.”
“Good man. Now, Captain Courtney, you look as though you could use a spot to eat. I’m afraid our catering is pretty basic, but if you’ve wondered how many ways a man can cook bully-beef, you’re in for a treat.”
•••
As the first light of dawn washed over the Meerbach Motor Works, Berndt Sperling stood on the concrete apron in front of the main hangar, looked up at the menacing, ebony outline of the jet-powered Arado AR234 P-1 bomber that he was about to fly and asked himself: How did we lose another war, when we can produce something like this?
“Beautiful, isn’t she?” said the chief mechanic in charge of the plane’s maintenance.
“If only we’d had a thousand of these in forty-one or forty-two. The Ivans wouldn’t have stood a chance.”
“Well, it’s a bit late now, eh? Still, you’ve got to hand it to the Count. He’s got himself a plane even the Luftwaffe don’t have.”
Von Meerbach had spotted the potential of the Arado when the first models rolled off the pro
duction line a year earlier. There was one problem: the plane was designed for a single-man crew. But a few months later, over a business lunch with some senior staff at Arado, he discovered that the company had plans for a two-man version and had gone so far as building the bodies for a few prototypes. They’d even taken delivery of the engines they planned to use. But the way things were, there was no chance of them ever being completed.
“Tell you what, I’ll buy one of those prototypes, and four engines off you,” von Meerbach had said. “I’ll see what my lads can do. We’ll assemble the thing, and tweak the engines, see if we can’t get some more performance out of them . . .”
There was no point putting any Reichsmarks in anyone’s pocket. Everyone knew they would soon be worthless. But that only made the gold that von Meerbach could offer even more desirable.
A deal was done, the aircraft’s components were delivered to an area of the Meerbach Motor Works that was still intact. And here she was, as swift and sleek as a black panther waiting to be let off her leash.
“Here he comes,” the mechanic said as von Meerbach’s limousine purred into the hangar. “Best be off to do those final checks.”
“I’ll just say hello to him, then I’ll run through them with you,” Sperling replied.
He went to greet his boss. Von Meerbach seemed remarkably calm, under the circumstances, but purposeful.
“Have you set the course?” he asked.
“Yes, my lord. We’ll be flying almost due south over Switzerland and northwest Italy, most of which is still in our hands, crossing the Mediterranean coast between Genoa and San Remo, before we change course to the west. From there on we will be in Allied airspace. But we will be flying so high and so fast that even if they spot this aircraft on their radar, they won’t be able to do anything about it.”
Von Meerbach nodded his approval. He was kitted out in a flying suit, leather helmet, goggles and mask. He clambered into the glazed nose and was strapped into his seat, with his briefcase shoved onto the cockpit floor beneath his feet. Sperling checked that his passenger was comfortable and then fired up the engines.
They responded with a deafening roar, overlaid by a frenzied, high-pitched whine, a sound produced by no other craft in the history of aviation, for no other four-engine jet had ever taken to the skies.
Von Meerbach felt a jolt of excitement and trepidation at the thought of the flight ahead of him. The Arado started moving, taxiing to the end of the runway, turning, pausing and, as Sperling opened the engines up to full power and the noise became even more shattering, it rolled down the runway, picking up speed at an astonishing rate until the world on either side of the runway was little more than a blur. On and on they went, hurtling to the very limit of the runway before the aircraft leaped into the sky.
Von Meerbach was pushed back into his seat and there seemed to be a huge weight pressing down on him as the Arado made its vertiginous ascent. Up and up they climbed, until Sperling flattened out. His voice came crackling over von Meerbach’s headphones, barely audible over the noise of the jets.
“We’ve reached an altitude of ten thousand meters. We could fly right over Mount Everest! And we’ll be cruising at eight hundred kilometers an hour.”
He paused to let that sink in and then added, “Congratulations, sir, you have successfully made your escape.”
•••
“We’re in luck,” Halsey told Saffron and Farrell when they met again in the requisitioned classroom. “One of the chaps at the holding camp on Lüneburg Heath drove round the place yesterday evening with a loudhailer, asking for anyone who’d been at Sachsenhausen. He said that whoever had information could count on fair treatment. More than fifty men came forward. It took all night to interview them and of course they were almost all bogus, trying it on in the hope of wangling a soft deal.
“But there was one man who sounded promising, man by the name of Mikhail Shevchenko. According to his story, he was a Russian POW, though he made a point of saying he was Ukrainian and hated the Russians. He was taken to Sachsenhausen because his original camp was about to be overrun by the Red Army. Most of the men he was with were killed when they got to their new place, but he was given the chance to avoid execution by becoming one of the trusties who were put in charge of the other prisoners. Apparently you’ll understand why the Jerries chose him the moment you clap eyes on him.
“Shevchenko says he knows about a group of special prisoners, who were taken from the camp about two weeks ago. He says he thinks there were some British among them. But he won’t say any more unless he’s speaking to someone who can make a deal with him. I think that means you, Miss Courtney.”
“How far is the camp from here?” Saffron asked.
“About fifteen miles.”
“Could take you a while to get there,” Farrell said. “If you meet an armored division coming in the other direction, you’ll find they have the right of way.”
“Then the sooner we start the better,” Saffron said. “I wonder if I could ask you formally for a favor, Major? Could I have the use of your sergeant and his Jeep?”
“By all means, be my guest.”
•••
The holding camp was a field covering several acres, surrounded by a barbed-wire fence, within which German troops and those who had worked for them milled around like gray-coated sheep. Tents had been put up to provide field kitchens and medical treatment for the prisoners, as well as workspaces and quarters for the Allied personnel who were guarding them. Not that there were many guards. Two British soldiers met the Jeep at the gate and waved them through, but there were no guard towers, no machine guns trained on the prisoners, and the hastily built fence could have been charged down if the men inside had made a concerted effort to get out.
“Aye, but they don’t want to get out, do they?” said Sergeant Dunnigan, when Saffron mentioned the lack of security precautions. “They’ve got away from the Russkis, they’re getting fed and no one’s shooting at them. They know the war will be over any day now. Might as well stay here till it is.”
They were met at the camp administration tent by another Intelligence Corps officer, who introduced himself as Lieutenant Hart and took them to a smaller tent that was being used as a makeshift interrogation room. Two men were waiting outside the entry. One was an armed military policeman. The other was a small, mustachioed individual with black-brown eyes under intense, frowning brows.
“This is Corporal Panchewski,” Hart said. “He’s Polish, speaks Russian and even a spot of Ukrainian, isn’t that so?”
Panchewski nodded.
“Do you mind if I sit in on the interview?” Hart asked. “I’d be grateful for any information about the camps. Feel one ought to know.”
“Of course,” Saffron replied.
They went into the tent. It contained a small table with two chairs on one side, facing away from the entrance, and another chair on the other side. At least, Saffron assumed there was a chair. But none of it was visible beneath the enormous bulk of the biggest human being Saffron had ever seen.
Mikhail Shevchenko made every other person in the tent look like a small child. His shoulders were almost as broad as the table itself, his arms as thick as any normal man’s legs and his bald head was dominated by the Neanderthal ridge of his browline. His bulk was even more exaggerated by the thick sheepskin coat he was wearing, the mark of his privileged status as one of the men trusted by the SS. It had faded to gray, but there was a black rectangular spot on his left breast where the patch bearing his camp number had been sewn.
This man is as big and bone-headed and dangerous as a Cape buffalo, Saffron thought, knowing, as any African would, that an angry buffalo could be as deadly as any lion.
She sat down, with Panchewski next to her. Hart and Dunnigan stood behind them, watching proceedings. She looked at the man-mountain and asked, “Sprechen sie Deutsch?”
Shevchenko shrugged and did not speak so much as rumble, in a voice so deep and ind
istinct that she could barely make out the single word that came from his mouth: “Bisschen.” A little.
She addressed Panchewski. “Please tell him that I want us to speak in German, because I want to know what he’s said. But if he cannot find the words to answer me in German, then he should talk to you and you can translate.”
Panchewski let fly with a volley of Russian, to which Shevchenko responded by looking at Saffron and replying in German, “Why should I talk to the little girl?”
He leaned back, staring Saffron down with an arrogant, insolent defiance that came from certainty in his own physical power. She could tell how his mind was working. One thing Sachsenhausen would have taught him—if the rest of his life hadn’t done so long before he arrived there—was the difference between the small number of people he had to fear and the multitude he could bully.
In Shevchenko’s eyes Saffron would look like one of the weak. He would never tell her anything until she had persuaded him otherwise. Verbal argument wouldn’t do that. She had to prove it to him in as concrete a fashion as possible.
She stared back, holding his gaze, challenging him as she replied, “Because I am the only person here who has the authority to make a deal with you,” she replied. “And also . . .” She leaned forward, flicking her fingers to let him know he should do the same, drawing her hand back to lead him forward.
She was a beautiful young woman, encouraging a man to draw closer. Shevchenko could not help but oblige. He tilted his giant head toward her.
Saffron struck him as hard as she had ever hit anyone in her life, the same way she’d assaulted Schröder that night in The Hague: heel of the hand to the side of the chin. It felt like hitting a wall of granite, covered in the sandpaper of his stubble.
Shevchenko’s head jerked back. He fell into his chair, blinking in surprise. Then the shame of being sucker-punched by a woman turned the shock to anger and he rose to his feet, threw the table aside and looked up . . . into the barrel of Saffron’s service revolver.