Hitler's Peace

by Philip Kerr

  “I’ve never heard of him,” I repeated.

  “Morde’s an American who travels on a Portuguese passport. Works for the Reader’s Digest organization. The sort of fellow your mob could very easily deny. I’m sure you know the kind of thing. Anyway, this fellow Morde had a meeting with von Papen just two days ago. We’ve no idea what was said. Hélène isn’t fucking him, unfortunately. But other sources seem to indicate that afterwards, Morde gave Earle some kind of document from von Papen for Roosevelt. And that, for now, is as much as we know.”

  Throughout Philby’s discourse I felt my jaw tighten. Blunt’s information about Vasily Zubilin had been surprising enough, but this was much more disturbing, and the apparent insouciance with which Philby had delivered his bombshell, so typically English, only seemed to make matters worse.

  “And did you go straight round to the Soviet embassy and shove a note through the letterbox? Like you said?”

  “Not yet,” said Philby. “But I still might.”

  “What stopped you?”

  “You did, as a matter of fact.”

  “Me?”

  “Turning up in my office like that, out of the blue, after all these years. Not only that, but you turning out to be another of Roosevelt’s special representatives, just like old Hefty. And I thought to myself, Don’t do anything hasty, Kim. Perhaps old Willard can help you put some flesh on the story, if there is one. Stand it up, as we journalists say.”

  My initial sense of caution had given way to intrigue. If Philby was right, and Roosevelt really was negotiating a separate peace, then what was the point of the Big Three?

  “How?”

  “Oh, I dunno. Keep your ears open on Campus and around the White House, that sort of thing. A watching brief, that’s all.”

  “And suppose I do hear something. Then what?”

  “There’s a pal of mine at the British embassy in Washington. Bit of an old lefty, like you and me. Name of Childs. Stephen Childs. A good solid chap but also inclined to the view that the Russians are being given the sharp end of the stick. If you did hear anything fishy, you might give him a call. Have a drink. Talk it over. Decide between yourselves what to do about it and simply act according to what your consciences dictate. As for me . . .” Philby shrugged. “I shall have to see what more can be discovered through our agents in Ankara. But frankly I am not optimistic, and we shall have to see where your man Morde turns up next.”

  “I’m not promising anything,” I said. “But I’ll see what I can do. With Roosevelt. ‘I’ll observe his looks. I’ll tent him to the quick. If he but blench, I know my course.’ ”

  Philby was looking puzzled.

  “Hamlet,” I explained. “As a matter of fact, what did you read when you were up at Cambridge?”

  Philby grinned. “Marx and Engels, of course.”

  VI

  FRIDAY, OCTOBER 8, 1943,

  BERLIN

  “IT SOUNDS TO ME as if you’ve been reading Der Pimpf,” Himmler told Schellenberg. Der Pimpf—The Squirt—was the monthly periodical for young boys in the Hitler Youth organization. It contained a mixture of high adventure and propaganda. “Assassinate the Big Three? Are you mad? Really, Schellenberg, I’m surprised at a man of your obvious intelligence coming up with a harebrained scheme like this. What on earth made you think of such an idea?”

  “You did, Herr Reichsführer.”

  “Me?”

  “Your speech at Posen. It made quite an impression on me. You said that it’s faith that wins battles, and that you didn’t want pessimists in our ranks, or people who have lost their faith in the Fatherland. I thought to myself that if Skorzeny could pull off something like the rescue of Mussolini, then, perhaps, something even more daring might be achieved.”

  “Pessimism is one thing, Schellenberg, but reckless optimism is quite another. And so is realism. I expect realism from a man of your abilities. As we both know, Skorzeny’s mission was carried out at the Führer’s request. It was an absurd idea and achieved nothing of any practical use. Did you even hear me mention the name of Skorzeny at Posen? No. You did not. Normally, given enough time, I could have killed off Hitler’s idea of rescuing Mussolini, in the same way that I’ve killed off a lot of other idiotic schemes. But he kept on and on about this one until I could see no way of avoiding it. And, my God, whoever expected the fool to succeed?”

  They were in Himmler’s new office at the Ministry of the Interior on Unter den Linden, next to the old Greek embassy. From the double-height first-floor windows, recently made bombproof, Schellenberg could see the Adlon Hotel and the very window of the room where he had made love to Lina the previous Saturday.

  “Realism demands that we pursue peace with the Allies, not try to assassinate their leaders.”

  Schellenberg nodded but quietly marveled at the many contradictions that were evident in Himmler’s character and conduct. The Himmler now talking peace was the very same Himmler who, on August 25, the day he had taken over from Wilhelm Frick as minister of the interior, had sentenced a government councillor to the guillotine for “defeatist talk.” The councillor’s execution could only have been for show, thought Schellenberg; to encourage the others. The Reichsführer’s remark seemed to confirm what he had learned from the two Gestapo men he’d been obliged to murder: that Himmler was indeed conducting some kind of private peace negotiations that might leave him at the head of a post-Hitler government.

  “No,” said the Reichsführer. “I don’t think they would take kindly to that. Not while we’re trying to talk peace.”

  So there it was, thought Schellenberg. He’d admitted it. Of course in Himmler’s arrogance it would probably never have crossed his mind that the Gestapo might properly regard this as treason. That they would actually have the audacity to spy on him, the Reichsführer-SS, would be quite unthinkable.

  “You don’t look surprised, Schellenberg,” observed Himmler.

  “That we’re trying to talk peace? If you recall, Herr Reichsführer, it was I who suggested the need for an alternative strategy to end the war in August last year. At the time, I believe you told me I was being defeatist.”

  Schellenberg could see that Himmler hardly cared to be reminded of this. “So what’s this, then?” Himmler said, brandishing the dossier containing details of Operation Long Jump, irritably. “Another alternative?”

  “Exactly that, Herr Reichsführer. Another alternative. I’m afraid I wasn’t aware of your own peace initiative.”

  “You are now. As a matter of fact, that’s why I summoned you here this morning.”

  “I see. And is Felix Kersten involved?”

  “Yes. How did you know?”

  “It was a guess.”

  “Well, it’s a damned good one.” Himmler sounded irritated again.

  Schellenberg shrugged apologetically, but inside he felt his stomach sink. He was all for talking peace with the Allies, but he had hardly supposed that the Gestapo could have been right about Felix Kersten: that a Finnish masseur should have been entrusted with negotiating Germany’s fate seemed beyond all common sense. He didn’t disagree with Gestapo Müller in that regard, anyway.

  “I don’t know what plans you’ve made for the evening,” said Himmler, “but I’m afraid you’ll have to cancel them. I’m sending you to Stockholm right away. My personal plane is waiting for you at Tempelhof. You’ll be in Sweden by lunchtime. There’s a suite booked for you at the Grand Hotel, which is where Felix will meet you.”

  Himmler produced a key chain from his trouser pocket and rose from his chair; he unlocked a wall-mounted Stockinger safe from which he removed a thin-looking official briefcase with a pair of handcuffs attached to the handle. “You’ll have full diplomatic status, so there should be no reason for the Swedes to ask you to open this briefcase. But I’m opening it now in order to impress on you the need for absolute secrecy. There are only five people who know about this mission: the Führer, myself, von Ribbentrop, Felix Kersten, and now you. You’ll need
to change out of uniform, of course. You can do that when you return home to collect your passport and some clothes for your stay. Oberleutnant Wagner will escort you to the cash office, where you can collect some Swedish money.” Himmler handcuffed the briefcase to Schellenberg’s wrist, handed him the key, and then unbuckled the flap to reveal three white envelopes, each of them protected by several sheets of cellophane plastic, and a cigarette lighter. Schellenberg guessed that the purpose of the cellophane sheets was not to stop the envelopes from getting dirty but to enable them to burn more quickly if he needed to destroy them.

  “Each letter has been written by the Führer himself,” explained Himmler. “One is addressed to President Roosevelt, another to Joseph Stalin, and the third to Prime Minister Churchill. You will hand this bag to Dr. Kersten, who will put each letter into the hands of the appropriate person in Stockholm, during which time you will offer him any assistance he might require. Is that clear?”

  Schellenberg clicked his heels and bowed his head obediently. “Quite clear, Herr Reichsführer. Might I be allowed to inquire as to the contents of the Führer’s letters to the Big Three?”

  “Even I don’t know precisely what has been written,” said Himmler. “But I believe that the Führer has sought a clarification of the Allied declarations regarding unconditional surrender. He wishes to find out if the Allies really do not want a negotiated peace and points out that such a demand, if it is genuine, would be unprecedented in the annals of modern war.”

  “So,” said Schellenberg, “nothing very important, then.”

  Himmler smiled thinly. “I fail to see the funny side of this, Schellenberg, really I do. The future of Germany and the lives of millions of people might easily depend on the contents of this briefcase. Do you not agree?”

  “Yes, Herr Reichsführer. I am sorry.”

  Oberleutnant Wagner escorted Schellenberg to the cash office in the ministry’s basement. Not that this was necessary. Schellenberg had started his SS career at the Ministry of the Interior and knew very well where the cash office was. Fiddling his expenses had always been one of Schellenberg’s major accomplishments.

  “How’s Colonel Tschierschky, sir?” asked Wagner. “Still got that blue BMW Roadster, has he? Just the car I’d be driving if I could afford it.”

  Schellenberg, who wasn’t much interested in cars, grunted without much enthusiasm as the cashier counted a sizable wad of Swedish kronor onto the counter in front of him. Wagner eyed the money greedily as Schellenberg tossed the wads of cash into the briefcase still handcuffed to his wrist, and then locked it again. Together, he and Wagner walked to the front door of the ministry.

  “You and Tschierschky were in a special action group, weren’t you, Wagner?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And before that?”

  “I was a lawyer, sir. With the Criminal Police, in Munich.”

  Another damned lawyer. Schellenberg’s nose wrinkled with distaste as he left the ministry. It was hard to believe that he himself had given up medicine to become a lawyer, of all things. He hated lawyers. It had been a mistake to try to kill all the Jews when there were still so many lawyers.

  He drove back to his apartment and changed out of uniform. Then he threw some things into an overnight bag, collected his passport, and went outside. At Loesser and Wolff’s on the corner of Fasanenstrasse, he bought twenty Jasmatzis and some newspapers for the flight. Then he drove to Tempelhof, where Himmler’s plane was waiting. It was a Focke Wulf FW 200 Condor, the same kind of plane that Schellenberg had hoped to use in the plan to mount a bombing raid on Teheran.

  Once on board he handed the crew their sealed orders and then took his seat, avoiding the Reichsführer’s vast leather chair with its personal escape hatch—in the event of an emergency, the occupant had only to pull on a red lever and a door would be opened hydraulically beneath the seat, allowing him to slide out, still strapped into his seat, and then drop to the ground by parachute. But the very idea of sitting in a seat that might drop out of the plane was not, in Schellenberg’s opinion, conducive to a comfortable journey. So he sat in the smaller seat opposite, the one that was usually occupied by Himmler’s girlfriend, his adjutant, or his private secretary. He lit a Jasmatzi and tried to take his mind off the dangers of the flight ahead. The Reichsführer’s personal Condor was probably the nearest thing Germany had to an American flying fortress, but by late 1943 the RAF was considered much too ubiquitous in German skies to risk frequent flights in it, and Himmler usually needed several cognacs to steady his nerves. Schellenberg followed suit.

  Less than ten minutes later the Condor’s four BMW engines were driving the plane down the runway and then into the air, with Schellenberg staring through the fifty-millimeter-thick bulletproofglass window at the city below. From the air it was easier to see just how effective the RAF had become; there was hardly one neighborhood in the whole of Berlin that did not show some bomb damage. Another year of this, thought Schellenberg, and there wouldn’t be very much of a city left for the Russians to capture.

  They flew south, toward the suburb of Mariendorf, before turning west toward Zehlendorf and the Grunewald, and then north over the Olympic Stadium and the Citadel at Spandau, where some of the Reich’s most important state prisoners were incarcerated. The plane climbed steadily, and when, after about thirty minutes, it had leveled out at just over 5,000 meters, one of the four-man crew came into the passenger area to bring Schellenberg some blankets.

  “Tell me,” said Schellenberg, “what do you think of this plane?”

  The man pointed at Himmler’s seat. “May I?”

  “Be my guest,” said Schellenberg.

  “Best long-range airliner in Europe,” said the man, whose name was Hoffmann. He sat down and made himself comfortable. “If not the world. I never understood why we didn’t make more of these. This plane will get you to New York, nonstop, in just under twenty hours. Mind you, it’s not particularly fast. Even a Short Sutherland will catch one of these and shoot it down. And God forbid a Mosquito should ever find us. But aerodynamically speaking, at least, the Condor is outstanding.”

  “And as a long-range bomber?”

  Hoffmann shrugged dismissively. “In the beginning it was quite an effective Atlantic bomber. I sank a few ships myself before transfering to the Government Group. But as I said, it’s an easy target for a fighter, even with all the armament we’re carrying. If you have the element of surprise, then it’s okay, I suppose. Some of the later models have search radar, which gives you a useful blind-bombing capability; or they’ll have a radio-guidance installation for missiles. The range is the thing. I mean, think about it, sir. New York. This plane could bomb New York. Chances are we’d catch them napping. After all, nobody expects a bomber to come all that way. Of course it would mean getting our feet wet, but I reckon it would be worth it, don’t you? I mean, just think how many we’d kill in a densely populated place like New York. Once you’ve got the element of surprise, you’re halfway there, aren’t you?”

  The man reached inside his flying suit and took out a Walther PPK fitted with a noise eliminator on the barrel, which he pointed at Schellenberg. For half a moment Schellenberg thought Hoffmann was going to use the gun to make some sort of comparison, but instead the Walther stayed pointed at his chest.

  “I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you for that briefcase, sir,” he said.

  “Oh, I like the ‘sir,’ ” said Schellenberg. He put down his glass of cognac and held up the briefcase so that it dangled from the manacle on his wrist. “You mean this briefcase? The key is on a chain in my trouser pocket. I’ll have to stand up to retrieve it. If that’s all right with you.”

  Hoffmann nodded. “Do it very carefully.”

  Schellenberg stood up slowly, showed the man his empty hand and then slid it carefully into his trouser pocket, pulling out a long silver key chain.

  Hoffmann’s grip tightened nervously on the Walther, and he licked his lips. “Now sit down and unlo
ck the bracelet.”

  Schellenberg staggered back into his seat as the plane lurched a little in an air pocket; finding the key at last, he unlocked the manacle from his extended wrist.

  “Now hand it over.”

  Schellenberg watched patiently as the man balanced the briefcase on his lap and tried the lock on the flap. “It’s locked,” he said quietly. “There’s a different key.”

  Hoffmann flung the briefcase back at him. “Do it.” Schellenberg unlocked the briefcase and then handed it over again. Hoffmann nursed it on his lap for several seconds as if uncertain what to do, and then glanced inside to find only the cellophane sheets, the money, and the cigarette lighter.

  “Is this all?”

  “I don’t know,” said Schellenberg. “I haven’t yet looked at the contents. My orders were merely to hand the briefcase over in Stockholm, not examine the contents.”

  “There has to be something more than this,” insisted Hoffmann. “You’re an SS general. The head of Foreign Intelligence. You wouldn’t be going all the way to Stockholm aboard Himmler’s private plane just to hand over some Swedish money and a cigarette lighter. You’re a traitor. You’re planning to betray Germany to the Allies. Himmler gave you this briefcase himself. There was something in here before the money went inside it. Something connected with what’s happening in Stockholm. You must have taken it out on the way to the airport. Whatever it is, you must have it in your coat pocket or in your bag. I’ll ask you to tell me where it is, and then I’ll count to three. And if you don’t tell me I’ll shoot you. I won’t kill you. Just hurt you. Sir.”

  “You’re right, of course,” said Schellenberg. “I dislike the practice of manacling a briefcase to one’s wrist. Himmler’s crazy idea. It’s like advertising that one is carrying something valuable.” He pointed at the gray Loden coat hanging in the closet behind him. “In the pocket of my overcoat there are three letters written by the Führer, addressed to each of the Big Three, declaring Germany’s willingness to surrender.”