Cold War Trilogy - A Three Book Boxed Set: of Historical Spy Versus Spy Action Adventure Thrillers

by William Brown

“What shall we do with that one,” Paul Von Lindemann pointed toward the young sentry.

  “Bring him along,” Scanlon replied as they piled Raeder, his daughter, the sentry, and Otto Dietrich into the back seat of the car. “We’ll dump him once we get out in the country.”

  Otto Dietrich turned toward them and laughed. “Out in the country? You will never make it out of the city, my young friend.”

  “You’d better pray we do, Otto,” Scanlon pointed his pistol at the Chief Inspector’s nose again, its barrel unwavering. “If we don’t, you’ll be the first to die. Trust me.”

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  London

  Colonel George Bromley finally realized it was the ringing of the telephone on the nightstand next to his bed that had wrenched him out of a dark, fitful sleep. He was having that dream again, standing behind the counter of a small, provincial grocers shop in a badly stained clerk’s apron. The shop’s shelves were empty, picked clean by a crowd of angry housewives who now surrounded him like a band of harpies with their claws out. They pressed forward, hectoring him as if it was his fault. They leaned over the counter and shook their fists in his face, poking and picking at him, and waving their empty shopping bags in the air. They could all see that there was not a crumb to be found in the entire shop, but they refused to hear his excuses. In the far corner, his decrepit old father sat hunched over in a wheelchair, pointing a long, bony finger at him. “I told you so,” the old man giggled. “I told you so!”

  That was when Bromley realized the ringing was the telephone. He hated the damned, impersonal things and swore he would never again have one in his bedroom after this infernal war ended. The clock on the end table showed 1:00 a.m. adding to his anxiety. Few people knew his home phone number, much less him or the small joint-operations section he ran for the American OSS; fewer still would dare call him at this hour. Worried, he raised the receiver to his ear. “Bromley here,” he said tentatively.

  “Good evening, Colonel,” he heard the distinctive, gravelly voice at the other end, and suddenly found himself sitting upright in bed at rigid attention. There was not an Englishman alive who would not recognize that voice. “Is there any word on the progress of our continental venture?” Winston Churchill asked.

  "No, Prime Minister, nothing… yet." Damn, he swore to himself. It was the business with that American Scanlon again. Like a meat pie gone bad, it had not smelled right from the very beginning; leaving Bromley with a bad case of indigestion. "As best I can tell, the subject did manage to exit the aircraft and depart for the continent, roughly on schedule."

  “Harrumph!” he heard, followed by a long, painful pause. “Well, then… can we at least assume he was subsequently apprehended by the opposition?”

  “I’m afraid it is too early to tell, Sir. We dropped hints in the appropriate ears in Lisbon, of course. The Abwehr intelligence people are reasonably efficient down there, and our people said that should suffice, without leaving any of our own fingerprints.”

  There was dead silence on the line until Churchill said, “It was my profound hope that this problem would be resolved more definitively by now, Colonel.”

  “Unfortunately that did not happen yet, Sir, almost, but not quite. Scanlon is a most resourceful fellow, but in his condition, both mental and physical, it is only a matter of time before he self-destructs. After all, that is why we chose the drunken sod in the first place.”

  There was another pause at the other end of the line and Bromley heard the strike of a match and the puffs of a cigar. “Almost, but not quite, you said, Colonel. You may not be aware, but my great-uncle Edward once had an antiquated mare named Bucolic Rose. The old gentleman entered her in the Irish Derby one year, purely as a lark, mind you; after he had lost some sort of wager with her trainer.” Bromley heard him pause for another long puff on the cigar. “Well, the starting gun went off, the rope was dropped, and the old nag promptly bolted out to a two length lead! She left the rest of the field in the dust over the first quarter, and then extended her most improbable lead through the backstretch. Finally, in the far turn, the old mare began to visibly slow and the pack closed in on her. Still, she pressed forward as they entered the straightaway. Unfortunately, the poor old mare must have run her little heart out, because she collapsed and dropped as dead as a stone in the center of the track, just shy of the finish line. Poor Bucolic Rose, she lost the Derby by a neck, if you can believe it. ‘Almost but not quite’ were my great-uncle’s very words, ‘almost, but not quite.’ As for the poor old man, you ask? Well, they say his heart barely survived the strain.”

  The silence at the other end of the phone was deafening. “I — uh, I see your point, Prime Minister,” a badly chastised Bromley whispered.

  “Do you, Colonel? Do you, truly?”

  This time, it was his turn to pause. “Yes, absolutely, Prime Minister, you want me to assume that he just might succeed.”

  “Precisely, Colonel. What if the chap did manage to land in one piece after all? What if by God’s good grace he actually avoided the Gestapo dragnets and reached Volkenrode? You said he was resourceful. Despite the SS, the Gestapo, and all the rest of the perils he faced, what if he actually scoops up those aircraft designers and their blueprints, finds a truck, some petrol, a map, and every other blasted thing he might need; and what if your Bucolic Rose is rumbling south toward Bavaria at this very moment? What do we do then, Colonel?”

  “I take it you want this business terminated with finality, Prime Minister.”

  “I think you are finally beginning to understand.”

  Bromley swallowed hard. “If I may be so bold, Prime Minister, there is a Colonel Geoffrey Maitland, a classmate, who commands a Spitfire squadron in eastern France. If someone in a position of very high authority could place a very confidential phone call to him and tell him to expect a most important call from a certain SOE Colonel in London, I could then direct him to task those Spitfires to look for trucks heading south into Bavaria over the next few days — German trucks, with two white circles painted on the tops of their cabs — and destroy them.”

  There was another long pause on the line. “Two white circles… Yes, I see. War is never without its accidents and vagaries, is it? I shall place that call within the hour.”

  “I shall tell him to expect it. I believe that should decide this race, Prime Minister.”

  “Let us hope so,” the Prime Minister said with a hint of sadness. “These are difficult times. I was told you had the intelligence to understand your duty and the backbone to carry it out, and I am pleased to see you haven’t disappointed me.”

  George Bromley smiled as he heard the line go dead.

  Thirty minutes later, as the Prime Minister extinguished his bedroom light, he realized he had a new problem to consider. When this war finally ended, he must find an appropriate reward for this Colonel Bromley. It must be something that would get the man out of London and away from the Fleet Street press for a few years. Yes, and get him away from the prying eyes of opposition politicians as well. Perhaps a promotion and a posting overseas. Military attaché to Borneo, Kenya, or Costa Rica? A regiment of his own in Nepal or the Falkland Islands? Yes, that would provide the fellow with a modest career and income, modest, but not independent. No, independent would be most unwise.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Leipzig

  Georg Horstmann woke to a soft, insistent knock on his kitchen door. He looked at his watch and saw it was almost midnight. Knocks on doors in the middle of the night were never good in Nazi Germany. His first thought was the Gestapo; but no, the Gestapo would not knock. They would simply kick in the door, so it was not them. Perhaps it is a friend, he thought, perhaps a comrade from the underground in trouble. It must be something like that, because no one else would knock on a stranger’s door in the middle of the night, not here, not now, Horstmann groaned. It was most assuredly another of Otto Dietrich’s traps, but there was no getting around it. Someone was out there, so he screwed up
enough courage to get out of bed, press his ear to the door, and listen.

  “Georg, please,” he heard a woman’s plaintive whisper. He peeked out through the torn curtain and saw it was Hanni standing alone in the dark. “Unbelievable!” the old bookseller told himself as he quickly unbolted the door and let her in. She wore a bulky, oversized Army greatcoat that hung down to her ankles as she slipped past him into the kitchen. His anxious eyes swept the rear yard behind her, but he saw no one. Somehow, she must have escaped from Otto Dietrich’s clutches. As improbable as that seemed, there was no other way she could be out there, and that would be exceedingly dangerous for both of them. He knew Hanni was far too skilled at tradecraft to let any of them follow her here, but these days, after the way she had been acting, one never knew.

  “Hanni?” he asked as he bolted the door and turned to face her, stunned. After their last acrimonious meeting in Gestapo Headquarters, he never thought he would see her alive again, much less standing in his shop. “How? How did you get out?” he asked, until he saw the bloody rag wrapped around her left hand. “My God, what happened?”

  “I cut it going out a window,” she answered bravely, biting her lower lip to mask the pain. “I hate to disappoint you, Georg, no bullets, just broken glass.”

  “You are insane, girl. Here, let me see it,” he said as he helped her into a rickety chair. He laid her hand on the table and gently unwrapped the makeshift bandage. Despite the cool night air, sweat was rolling down her face and she looked pale. No wonder, Horstmann thought as he saw the long, deep gash. It went through the meaty part of the palm and opened her hand down to the bone. He whistled softly. “This needs stitches, Hannelore.”

  “Then get a needle and thread and start sewing, old man,” she replied as she set her jaw and glared up at him, “and stop calling me that!”

  “It is the name your mother gave you,” he smiled as he rummaged through a cabinet and pulled out an old first aid kit. “She was quite a woman, you know — dignified, quiet, and very pretty. She was nothing like your father.”

  “Or like me?” she asked through clenched teeth

  “You are the very image of her. As for all the rest — well, your mother was a real lady and a very smart one. She was much smarter than your father, although neither of them would ever admit it. You have her beautiful face, her golden hair and her bright blue eyes,” he said fondly. “That is why I think of her whenever I see you, and why I call you Hannelore; because that was the name she gave you. In Hebrew, it means ‘grace’; you are the child of grace. If she had left it up to your father, your name would have been Jacob, or Barnaby, or Ebenezer, or something.”

  “It sounds like you should have married her.”

  “Oh, I would have; but the lady turned me down… several times,” he laughed with an embarrassed smile. “Unfortunately, she was set on your father, and the poor kerl never stood a chance.” Horstmann found his sewing kit and turned to look at her hand once more. “Your mother would be very proud of you, Hannelore, but she would not be proud of such a terrible cut. How did you come by it?”

  “A rear window in Gestapo headquarters.”

  “You mean you broke out?” he shook his head. “You know this is the first place Dietrich will come looking. We must get you out of here to somewhere safe.”

  “Do not worry. The Chief Inspector will not be coming after me or anyone else, not for a long time. Edward has him.”

  “Scanlon has Dietrich?” Horstmann’s jaw fell open. “Oh, my! Pity poor Otto.”

  “No, pity poor us. He also has Raeder and all the rest of them, too. If he gets away and delivers them to the Americans, everything is lost — you, me, my father, everything. Can you not see that?”

  “Yes, but what can we do about it?”

  “Do? We must stop him.”

  “That is insane.”

  “Insane? I will show you insane! Sew up this hand, old man.”

  “Then what? Look at yourself, girl; you are in no condition to go anywhere. You are pale and exhausted, and you have lost too much blood. You must rest. Besides, how can we stop him? We do not even have a three-legged horse between us.”

  “I did not come here empty-handed, Georg, or empty-headed,” she snapped. “I have the Luftwaffe Major’s automobile. They took Dietrich’s big car and left the Major’s parked out back, so I stole it before anyone else could. The guards were gone too, so I went back in and cleaned out Dietrich’s office. I took some Gestapo travel permits and I found these,” she said as she opened her bulky coat. There was a Schmeisser submachine-gun hanging around her neck, four long magazines full of bullets tucked in a side pocket, two Luger pistols, and a German “potato masher” hand grenade jammed in her belt. “As I said, I did not come empty-handed.”

  He stared at the collection of weapons and frowned. “There was a time when I would have leaped at the opportunity to take another whack at those bastards. Now?” The old man slowly shook his head. “Look at us, Hannelore, we are only kidding ourselves.”

  “Georg, we are all there is,” she said as she grabbed his shirtsleeve and pulled him close, her eyes desperate to make him understand. “We are all there is.”

  “How are we going to even find them?” he asked in frustration.

  “They left in Dietrich’s Maybach. No one who sees that car is likely to forget it, so they will be easy to follow. Edward will head south. I am certain of it, because that is where I would go if I were him. Besides, it will not be hard,” she said. “He wants me to follow him. He thinks that is how he will get me back, so he will make it easy. He will lay a trail of bread crumbs, if that is what he has to do to get me to follow; because once he gets me in Bavaria, he thinks I will never be able to leave him.”

  “And he is right.”

  “No, he is not. He cannot be,” she slapped her good hand on the table.

  She reached into her coat pocket and pulled out the black leather wallet she also rescued from Otto Dietrich’s office. She opened it and laid the brass and red enamel NKVD officer’s badge on the table in front of him. “My orders come from Beria, Georg, from Lavrenti fucking Beria himself; and we both know what that means.”

  The old man closed his eyes and moaned. “It is a death sentence, then. Beria will have us both shot whether we catch Edward or not. Surely you know that.”

  “And he will have my father shot if I do not; so we must play his game, Georg,” she shrugged hopelessly. “We must play his game. There is no other choice. Do it for my mother, if you will not do it for me.”

  He looked into her eyes and reluctantly nodded.

  “Now, get your needle out and sew up my hand, old man,” she ordered, “there is no more time to waste.”

  PART FOUR

  BAVARIA, GERMANY

  APRIL 1945

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  The passage south out of the badly bombed city of Leipzig proved easier than Scanlon expected, to the chagrin of Otto Dietrich. Repeated Allied air attacks kept all but the most fanatical or foolhardy drivers off the roads, including the Gestapo and any roving SS patrols. Even though it was the dead of night, the roadblocks and guard posts stood empty. Whether anyone entered or left the city no longer seemed to matter as much as the prospect of a 500-pounder from a B-17 or a strafing attack from a P-51 Mustang.

  For Scanlon, the timing could not have been better. The darkness gave them cover, at least for a while, so he drove while Paul Von Lindemann sat in the front seat next to him. “Keep your gun pointed at the rear seat,” Scanlon told him, “for crowd control.” With Otto Dietrich, the two Raeders, and the young police sentry jammed elbow to elbow in the back; the task was not all that demanding. By avoiding the main roads and the worst of the bomb damage in the cities, Scanlon managed to keep the powerful car moving south through the suburbs and out into the open countryside beyond. There was a half moon, so he was able to gain speed and put as much distance as he could between them and Leipzig.

  “You should never have let he
r escape, Edward,” Dietrich finally broke his long silence. “That is a sure sign of weakness in a man. Mark my words, the lovely Fraulein Steiner will make you pay dearly for it before she is finished.”

  “I didn’t let her do anything.”

  “Edward, you never were a good liar,” Dietrich said with a sadistic smile. “You had her in your crosshairs and could have stopped her, but you did not. That marks you as an amateur. If it were I, I would never have made that mistake.”

  Scanlon felt his hands grip the steering wheel tighter and tighter as he tried not to let Dietrich get to him. “I might be an amateur, but I was good enough to bag you, Otto.”

  “True, but the lovely and talented Fraulein Steiner will bag us both before she is finished. I was watching, and you should have shot her when you had the chance.”

  “If I might suggest, Herr Dietrich, I would not aggravate Scanlon any further,” Paul Von Lindemann warned him. “It is you he would most dearly like to shoot.”

  “I deal in fact, Herr Major. If you close your eyes and listen, you can hear the pounding of her little feet coming up behind us as we speak. She will catch us, all right,” he smiled knowingly. "She will catch us, because Fraulein Steiner knows what she wants and she will stop at nothing to get it.”

  “Shut up, Otto,” Scanlon glared at him in the rear-view mirror, “or you’ll have a matching knot on the other side of your head.”

  “Moscow Center gave her no choice, you know,” Dietrich continued, ignoring the threat, knowing he was out of Scanlon’s reach for the moment. “They have a gun to her father’s head.”

  “Shut up!” the American exploded. “I swear to God, I’ll kill you right here if you don’t!” He would have done just that, if they had not run into a Gestapo roadblock around the next blind turn in the road, and this one was manned.

  “Very careless of you, Edward,” Dietrich clucked. “First you lose your sense of humor, now you lose your concentration. What is next?”