In the politically ill-conceived idea, however, was the seed of a good one: Since the Führer blamed the successful invasion on high-level French perfidy, there was obviously no one better qualified than Helmut von Heurten-Mitnitz to prepare for the Führer a detailed report. He would work closely, of course, with Obersturmbannführer Johann Müller, and between them they could come up with a detailed and balanced assessment that would lay the blame where it belonged. With Müller involved, the report could of course in no way be called a whitewash of Foreign Ministry failures or a condemnation of SS ineptitude.
Helmut von Heurten-Mitnitz was provided with an office overlooking the interior garden of the Foreign Ministry, a small staff, authorization for a personal automobile, and other perquisites befitting his rank as Minister. Talk of his too hasty departure from Morocco quickly dissipated. He was, after all, a member of the club, and gentlemen do not speak ill of their peers.
That left but one problem still to be resolved: his military status.
After graduation from the Gymnasium in Königsberg in East Prussia, Helmut von Heurten-Mitnitz served six months as an officer-cadet with the 127th Pomeranian Infantry Regiment. This was expected of him. The 127th Pomeranian Infantry traced its roots back to the Graf von Heurten’s Regiment of Foot (1582). After his six months of cadet service, Helmut received a reserve commission as a lieutenant.
Two months later, he matriculated at Harvard, from which he graduated in 1927. From 1931 until 1933, he was attached to the German Embassy in Washington, first as a cultural attaché and later as a consular officer. From 1936 until 1938, he was the consul in New Orleans.
On his return from New Orleans to Berlin, by then already a medium-level diplomatic official destined for greater responsibilities in the Foreign Ministry, von Heurten-Mitnitz was courted by both Military Intelligence and the Sicherheitsdienst of the SS, each of which were as much interested in the internal operations of the Foreign Ministry as they were in any external threats to Germany.
Military Intelligence offered him a reserve commission as a major, with the subtle understanding that since he would be of more value to the Army where he was, there was little chance he would ever be called up. He politely declined the honor.
And the SS offered him a commission as Sturmbannführer (Major) in the Honorary SS. He declined this honor, too, mainly because he was well aware that the Honorary SS consisted of nothing more than those who did favors for or made substantial financial contributions to the SS. While the holders of honorary SS rank were entitled to wear the black uniform with the lightning-bolt runes and the death’s-head, that really signified nothing.
His hope was to keep out of the military altogether and to continue serving his country in the diplomatic service. This required some fancy footwork, however, especially after his return from Morocco; for there were new regulations eliminating many military service exemptions, including those for members of the Foreign Service. It was finally resolved at the highest levels.
Still, it didn’t hurt to be a member of the club: He was offered and accepted a reserve commission in the SS—not the honorary SS—as a Brigadeführer -SD, the secret service of the SS, with the understanding that he would not be called to active service and would remain with the Foreign Ministry.
Attired in a quickly tailored black SS uniform, he took the oath of personal allegiance to Adolf Hitler in a ceremony presided over by Reichsführer -SS Heinrich Himmler himself. Afterward, his brother was kind enough to hold a small reception for the new Brigadeführer at a home maintained by the family at 44-46 Beerenstrasse in Zehlendorf. Reichsführer-SS and Frau Himmler put in a brief appearance en route to the symphony, which the Graf von Heurten-Mitnitz told Helmut was an unusual honor.
Helmut von Heurten-Mitnitz considered asking Müller to be present at either the swearing in or the reception, but decided against it. If they appeared too chummy, that might provoke suspicion. After the reception, he took off the SS uniform and hoped that he would never have to wear it again.
After settling into his new work, he labored industriously on the report for the Führer without actually completing it. The point was to keep it on the burner until it was forgotten and they found something else for him to do.
His name almost immediately appeared on guest lists of allied and neutral embassies, and he dined out nearly every night. He was a bachelor and thereby in demand on that account: There were many widows in Germany. That satisfied what he thought of as bodily demands, but he took care not to form anything approaching an emotional relationship.
And then, on the nineteenth of December, the Americans sent him a message.
On the morning of the twentieth, when his secretary Fräulein Ingebord Schermann came into his office, his desk was piled high with dossiers “borrowed” from the French Deuxième Bureau (analogous to the FBI). These were to assist him in preparing his report to the Führer on French perfidy. What he was actually doing was reading a novel by the Viennese novelist Franz Schiller about a romance between an Austrian nobleman and a tubercular widow.
Helmut von Heurten-Mitnitz’s secretary made him uncomfortable. She was intense. Worse, fanatical.
Ingebord Schermann’s blond hair was parted in the middle, brushed tight against her skull, and then brought together in a tight bun at the base of her neck. What few words she uttered were delivered like orders, in a Hessian dialect even harsher than Obersturmbannführer SS-SD Johann Müller’s.
Von Heurten-Mitnitz regarded Müller as the archetypal Hessian peasant: blunt, phlegmatic, practical, and dull. Like most Northern and Eastern Germans von Heurten-Mitnitz was convinced he spoke German, and that Middle—Hesse and the Ruhr—and Southern (Bavarian and Swabian) Germans spoke a vulgar patois only loosely based on that language.
Fräulein Schermann was a not unattractive woman of, he guessed, thirty or thirty-two. Her calves and ankles were a little thick—another Hessian peasant characteristic, von Heurten-Mitnitz thought—but she was not fat and really didn’t need the “foundation garment” that encased her body from just above her knees to just below her neck.
It was difficult for von Heurten-Mitnitz to imagine Fräulein Schermann in the throes of carnal passion, although he had caught himself more than once thinking about her breasts. As a young man, he had once had a fling with a peasant girl, a Silesian, whose breasts had been nearly as firm as her tail.
He suspected that in the unlikely event some young man got his hands on Fräulein Schermann’s breasts, he would find much the same thing.
Von Heurten-Mitnitz had not chosen Fräulein Schermann; she was thrust upon him.
“And I have just the girl for you, Helmut,” the Chief of the Foreign Responsibilities Division had told him. “Very efficient. Very dedicated.”
There were three reasons why Fräulein Schermann was assigned to von Heurten-Mitnitz. The first was innocent coincidence: She was available for assignment when his need came up. Second, Fräulein Schermann’s dedication translated to mean she was an informer for the Gestapo or the SD. There was no reason he should be under suspicion, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t being watched on general principles. Third, Fräulein Schermann had made someone else in the Foreign Ministry as uncomfortable as she made him, and she had been gotten rid of as tactfully as possible.
Von Heurten-Mitnitz looked up from his carefully hidden behind paperwork novel while Fräulein Schermann delivered in the tones of a Feldwebel (Sergeant) with two long service medals the announcement that “Obersturmbannführer SS-SD Johann Müller wishes to see the Herr Minister.”
“Would you ask the Obersturmbannführer to come in, please, Fräulein Schermann?”
Fräulein Schermann nodded her head, just once, an almost mechanical movement.
“Jawohl, Herr Minister,” she said.
Müller marched into the office. He was wearing a black overcoat that reached almost to his ankles. There was a leather belt around the coat, from which hung a closed pistol holster.
“Heil H
itler!” Müller barked and gave the straight-armed salute.
“Heil Hitler!” von Heurten-Mitnitz said. “I’m pleased that you could fit me into your schedule, Obersturmbannführer.”
“It is my honor, Herr Minister,” Müller said.
“I have taken the liberty of reserving a table at the Adlon,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said. “Is that all right with you?”
“The Herr Minister is most kind,” Müller said.
“It was good of you to give me a ride,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said. “Just let me get my coat and hat.”
He had not quite reached the bentwood coat rack when Fräulein Schermann appeared, snatched the coat from the hook, and held it out for him. As he was shrugging into it, she handed him his hat.
“Obersturmbannführer Müller and I will be taking lunch at the Adlon, Fräulein Schermann,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said. “If there are any important calls for the Obersturmbannführer or myself, please be good enough to transfer them.”
“Jawohl, Herr Minister.”
Müller’s car, an unmarked Opel Kapitän, was parked in front of the Foreign Ministry. There were both uniformed Berlin municipal policemen and plainclothes SD men stationed there, walking slowly back and forth in front of the sandbags stacked against the building. None was willing to remind an Obersturmbannführer SS-SD that parking was prohibited in front of the Foreign Ministry.
Müller got behind the wheel, and they drove off.
“Drive by my house, will you, Müller?” von Heurten-Mitnitz said. “I have to go inside for a moment.”
Müller nodded.
Going to Zehlendorf and then back downtown would give them a few minutes to talk in privacy. There was nothing suspicious in a man going home on his way to lunch to pick up something he had forgotten.
Müller drove past the Zoological Gardens and then down the Kurfürstendamm to Brandenburgischestrasse. Two blocks into it, the street was blocked by a mountain of rubble and two wholly unnecessary policemen waving directional signs to order them onto a detour. Von Heurten-Mitnitz saw the shell of a department store where he had once bought underwear.
A lane just a car wide had been cleared through the rubble on the side street, and Müller’s Opel bounced over loose bricks and masonry. And then, as suddenly as it began, the destroyed area gave way to a neighborhood that, save for blacked-out windows and signs indicating air-raid shelters, seemed untouched by the war.
They’ll be back, von Heurten-Mitnitz thought, sooner or later, but inevitably. And this neighborhood, too, will be a mound of smoldering rubble.
“The Russians have stopped von Manstein,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said.
On 23 November, the German Sixth Army, which had reached the suburbs of Stalingrad, had been encircled by the Russian 1st Guards and 61st Armies. On Göring’s assurance that the Sixth Army could be supplied by air, Hitler had forbidden any attempt to break out of the encirclement. When it became apparent that the Luftwaffe could not supply the Sixth Army, Hitler had ordered General Erich von Manstein to assume command of Army Group Don at Rostov, and to break through the Russian forces. Von Manstein had attacked with an armored corps from Kotelnikovo on 12 December. After suffering severe losses, the German attack had been stopped twenty miles short of Stalingrad on 19 December.
“Oh?” Müller responded, not very surprised. “Now what?”
“Now nothing,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said. “Von Manstein has nothing more with which to attempt a relief. Von Paulus is doomed.”
General Fredrich von Paulus was the Sixth Army’s commander.
“So there goes another quarter of a million men,” Müller said.
"Yes, that’s true,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said. It was almost a minute before he spoke again.
“There is some good news,” he said. “You may now call me ‘sir.’ I have been appointed Brigadeführer (Brigadier General) in the SS reserve.”
“I saw your picture in Die Sturmer,” Müller said dryly. “How did you manage to pull that off?”
“Under the new compulsory service regulations, I was about to be ordered to join my regiment as Hauptmann von Heurten-Mitnitz.”
“You may wish you were a captain in the Pomeranian Infantry,” Müller said.
“I believe they are now part of Von Paulus’s Sixth Army in Fortress Stalingrad, ” von Heurten-Mitnitz said, and then abruptly changed the subject: “We have heard, I think, from our friend Eric.”
“What do you mean,‘think’?”
“I have received a postcard from Bad Ems,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said. “I want you to have a look at it and let me know what you make of it.”
Müller nodded his head and didn’t say a word until, as he pulled to the curb before the small mansion in Zehlendorf, he said, “Bad Ems? What the hell is there in Bad Ems?”
“It is argued by some historians that a telegram sent from Bad Ems triggered the Franco-Prussian War,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said. He handed Müller the postcard. “Here, you figure it out.”
"Why is it in this?” Müller asked, indicating a glassine envelope.
“I thought perhaps there might be a fingerprint on it,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said. “Or am I letting my imagination run away with me?”
Müller shrugged.
Helmut von Heurten-Mitnitz stepped out of the Opel Kapitän into the snow-covered street and walked up to the gate in the fence in front of his house. Inside, he told his housekeeper that he’d stepped into slush and soaked his feet. Then he changed his shoes and socks and went back to the car.
"’Willi von K’?” Müller said as they drove off. “And you don’t even know this is for you! The name got wet; all you can read is the street number.”
“Eric von Fulmar is the Baron Kolbe,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said.
“That’s reaching for it,” Müller said.
“Not if you can find his fingerprint on it,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said. “His father, obviously, could be his father. Professor Dyer? Is there a Professor Dyer at Philips University in Marburg? Did Fulmar know him?”
“I’m reasonably sure there’s a set of Fulmar’s prints in Berlin,” Müller said. “I’m not sure I can get at them without raising questions.”
“I think we have to take that risk,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said.
“Okay. For the sake of argument, I dust this postcard, find a print, and match it with Fulmar. And it turns out there is a Professor Dyer at Marburg. Then what?”
“Then we do what it says,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said. “We give his regards to his father and this Professor Dyer, presuming we can find him.”
“Germans,” Müller said,“people I know, are freezing to death right now in Russia. And we’re…”
“We can’t help the people in Russia,”von Heurten-Mitnitz said. “The best we can hope for is to do what we can to end this insanity. I think of it as cutting off a gangrenous hand to save the arm.”
“You have the advantage on me,” Müller said. “You can think of this in philosophical terms. I’m just a simple policeman. I think of it in terms of being hung on piano wire to strangle in the basement of the Prinz Albrecht Strasse prison.”
“I feel like saying I’m sorry,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said.
There was the sound of a police siren behind them. They were by then back on the Avus, a perfectly straight, four-lane Autobahn. Müller looked down at his speedometer. He was well over the speed limit.
He slowed enough for the motorcycle policeman to draw abreast. The policeman looked just long enough to see the uniform cap with the death’s-head insignia and the insignia of an Obersturmbannführer on Müller’s overcoat. Then the whooping of his siren died suddenly, and he fell behind.
Their lunch at the Hotel Adlon was very nice. There was roast loin of boar as an off-the-ration bonus. Stapled to the menu was a card printed in gold saying the roast boar was provided through the courtesy of Master Hunter of the Reich Hermann Göring.
It wasn’t free, of course, but Göring wanted the upper class of Berli
n to know that he was sharing the bounty of his East Prussian hunting grounds, not keeping it all for himself.
Chapter TWO
Atcham U.S. Army Air Corps Base
Staffordshire, England
20 December 1942
It was Major Doug Douglass’s prerogative as commanding officer to conduct the final briefing before his P-38s attacked the sub pens at Saint-Lazare, but he passed on that one. So the briefing was given by a light colonel from Eighth Air Force G-3 (Plans and Training), the sonofabitch who had thought up the operation. The idiot was so happy with it that he actually had the balls to tell Douglass he wished he was checked out in P-38s so he could make the mission.
The light bird was a pilot, but he was a bomber pilot. And now he had come up with an operation in which fighter planes were supposed to do what the bombers had been unable to do, take out the German submarine pens at Saint-Lazare.
There were a number of reasons the bombers had failed, including the Big One: Where the sub pens weren’t under thirty feet of granite, they were under that much reinforced concrete. Conventional 500-pound aerial bombs chipped the granite and the concrete, but they didn’t crack it, much less penetrate it.
During his initial briefing, Douglass was told that superbombs—weighing up to ten tons—were “in development,” and that they would certainly take out the pens. But the pens had to be taken out now; the subs they protected while they were being fueled and supplied were sinking an “un-acceptable” amount of shipping tonnage.
There were other reasons the B-17s and the B-24s had failed. The pens were ringed with 88mm Flakkanonen manned by the best gunners the Germans had available. These were effective at any altitude the B-17s could reach. And there were four fighter fields, capable of sending aloft as many squadrons of very capable pilots flying Messerschmidts.
The Soldier Spies Page 10