Angel in Red

by Christopher Nicole

  ‘We must be absolutely sure,’ he insisted, and without warning drove his fingers into the scar. Anna gave a squeal and sat up. ‘There. You see?’

  Anna glared at him. ‘I would have reacted the same, Herr Doctor, had you done that on my other side.’

  ‘But I have never seen you react like that. I thought for a moment you were going to hit me.’

  ‘If I had hit you, Herr Doctor, the course would be over. Unless you have a replacement waiting.’

  He chuckled. ‘You are a treasure. One day you and I must get together.’

  Over my dead body, Anna thought. But she would prefer it to be his.

  *

  Needless to say, the other girls were in a twitter in the barracks that evening. Or at least Lena was. Marlene continued to say little and stare at Anna.

  ‘She worships you,’ Lena whispered when Marlene went to the bathroom.

  ‘I do not believe that,’ Anna said, brushing her hair. ‘She is just finding it a bit overwhelming. That is not surprising. I know I was completely overwhelmed on my first day here. Don’t tell me you are not affected?’

  ‘Oooh! He was so big. Are all men that big?’

  ‘Thankfully, no,’ Anna said, remembering her husband.

  ‘What does it feel like to have a man inside you?’

  ‘It can feel very nice, if it’s the right man. Unfortunately, we do not select our partners. Have you never had a boyfriend?’

  ‘Well, I was in the Youth, you know. We had some fun when camping in the woods.’

  ‘But you’re still a virgin. Or you wouldn’t be here.’

  ‘Well, yes. But isn’t it strange, that they want only virgins, when they are training us to seduce men?’

  Anna shrugged. ‘It is part of their determination to be in total control. You will lose your virginity when it is considered best for the Reich. Not for you.’

  ‘You speak so badly of the Reich. Yet you work for them. They say there is no more dedicated female agent in the service.’

  Anna’s mouth twisted. ‘I do what has to be done. That is the only way to survive.’

  By this time Marlene had returned and had overheard the end of the conversation. ‘My mother told me you do not like sex at all, either with men or with women. She said that you first came to her attention when you nearly killed a girl who made advances to you at the training school.’

  ‘I broke her arm in two places,’ Anna said quietly, wondering just what else Hannah had confided to her daughter. That was something she certainly needed to find out.

  ‘What do we have to do tomorrow?’ Lena asked, anxious to defuse the incipient conflict.

  ‘Tomorrow,’ Anna said, ‘you will be taught how to hurt a man.’

  *

  For this lesson Anna was required to remain with the girls. Cleiner beamed at them. ‘Yesterday was amusing, was it not?’

  Lena and Marlene stared at him, uncertain what response he was seeking.

  ‘What did you enjoy more – playing with him or having him play with you? Come along now.’

  Lena licked her lips. ‘Playing with him, Herr Doctor.’

  ‘You would like to have one of your very own, eh? Perhaps even if it was not attached to a body. Ha! And you, Marlene?’

  ‘I did not like him at all, Herr Doctor.’ She drew a sharp breath, as if wondering if she had said the wrong thing, and cast a quick glance at Anna, seeking support.

  Cleiner gave one of his chuckles. ‘Oh, Anna would agree with you. But she has the ability, which you must learn, to make any man feel she desires him more than anything else in the world. This is the secret of her success. As it must become your secret as well. Do you not agree, Anna?’

  ‘As you say, Herr Doctor.’

  ‘But at the same time you must always remember that the man you are told to deal with will be an enemy of the Reich, and therefore an enemy of you. And thus there will be occasions when you must be, shall I say, rid of him, perhaps immediately. This means that while learning to love the man, you must also learn how to destroy him, when required.’ He smiled at Anna. ‘Anna is an expert at this.’

  Anna’s feelings of discontent were growing all the time. She did not like being depicted as a monster when it was men like Cleiner who had created that monster, just as it was a man like Clive Bartley who had reminded her of both her humanity and her femininity. But the act had to be maintained, whatever her own simmering anger at her position, until exactly the right moment. So she merely smiled.

  Cleiner rang the bell on his desk, and immediately the two guards opened the door to admit a man who had been standing outside, also with a guard. A push had him stumbling into the room, trying to maintain his balance; his hands were cuffed behind his back. He seemed just like the man Anna had been given to work on two years before – of medium height but burly, unshaven, and shabbily dressed in shirt and pants and rope-soled shoes. Having got his balance back he blinked at the doctor and then at the three young women, who were as usual wearing only singlets and shorts.

  ‘This is Boris,’ Cleiner announced. ‘He is a Polish Jew and speaks no German. So he will not interrupt our conversation, eh? Ha ha.’

  The girls looked petrified; Anna presumed that the man they had been introduced to the previous day had been young and reasonably attractive. This man was not.

  The guard pushed Boris forward to stand in the open space beside the desks at which the girls were seated.

  ‘Now,’ Cleiner said. ‘This fellow is at least twice the weight of any of you, and I can assure you he is very strong. But there is no man who can withstand an educated and determined attack. The question is to get in your delivery before he gets in his. Now, Lena, supposing you had to completely disable this man, what would you do?’

  Lena again licked her lips and glanced at Anna, who remained impassive as usual. ‘Well,’ she said, ‘I suppose I should kick him there.’ She pointed at Boris’s crotch.

  ‘Anna?’ Cleiner asked.

  ‘That would hurt him but not disable him,’ Anna said quietly. ‘Assuming he did not catch your leg before you could reach him. It would certainly make him very angry.’

  ‘Exactly. When you hit it must be to disable, if only for a few seconds. You go for the pressure points, from which emanate the vital functions of the human body.’ He went up to Boris and began touching him with his wand. ‘Here. And here. And here. A blow to any one of these places will at least momentarily paralyse his ability to function. Of course, in most cases – certainly with a man like Boris – he will recover quickly enough, so the destruction must be completed during the short time he is incapacitated. Then, for example, if he is down, you may stamp on his neck, or on his genitals. But you must be absolutely certain that he is unable to use his hands, as if he manages to catch hold of you it could turn out very badly. So come along, Marlene. We will start with you.’ He stood behind Boris. ‘These are the kidneys. A properly delivered blow here will cause the most severe agony. Hit him. Remember that it must be with all the strength you can command.’

  Marlene also looked at Anna for a moment, then got up and stepped behind the man and swung her arm. Anna knew that the girl would already have learned the rudiments of unarmed combat and the correct way to deliver a blow, but she did not seem to have any great effect upon Boris. Clearly he was hurt. He grunted and staggered but did not fall, while he looked from one to the other of the people around him with aggrieved eyes.

  ‘No, no!’ Cleiner said. ‘That was no good at all. You must hit with your full strength. You must get every ounce of your weight into the blow.’

  Marlene was massaging her arm and breathing heavily, while Boris, having somewhat recovered, looked around himself in angry bewilderment.

  ‘Anna,’ Cleiner said, ‘show them how it should be done.’

  Anna sighed, but she had known it would come to this. She stood up and took a couple of deep breaths. When something had to be done, it had to be done to the exclusion of everything else. Every tho
ught, every emotion, every hope, every fear, every memory, and any pity had to be entirely excluded. She stepped forward behind Boris and in the same movement swung her arm, delivering all her weight into the edge of her palm. Boris uttered a shriek, fell to his knees, and then over on to his side, moaning and writhing.

  ‘Gosh!’ Lena gasped.

  Marlene stared at the stricken man.

  Cleiner smiled. ‘There, you see? I do not expect you to be as good as Anna right away, but you must become so. Get him up,’ he told the guards.

  It took two of them to set Boris on his feet and he remained unsteady while panting, but the pain was wearing off.

  ‘He may well have suffered permanent damage,’ Cleiner pointed out. ‘Anna has killed with that right hand. Not with a kidney punch, of course. But there are certain places where a properly delivered blow can be fatal. Illustrate, Anna.’

  Anna turned her head sharply.

  ‘Oh,’ Cleiner said, ‘he is of no more use to us now. Show these young ladies how you disposed of Fraulein Mayers, Anna. I know that General Heydrich was most impressed.’

  Anna realized that this was the opportunity she had been waiting for. It was a very high-risk strategy, but if it reduced the later risk of condemnation by Heydrich it would be worth it. ‘I did not kill Fraulein Mayers in cold blood, Herr Doctor,’ she said in a low voice.

  ‘Come now, Anna. Your blood is always cold, is it not?’ He turned to the girls. ‘The blow is delivered here.’ He touched where Boris’s neck joined his shoulder. ‘Under there is the carotid artery. It conveys the blood to the brain, and as I am sure you know, when the brain is robbed of blood it cannot function. For how long it cannot function depends on how long the artery is closed, but a blow of sufficient strength will stop the blood flow long enough for death to follow. Anna!’

  Anna looked at him, then at the two girls, then acted with tremendous speed, hitting Boris at the indicated place, but pulling the blow at the last moment. It was still completely effective. Boris went down without a sound.

  ‘There, you see? It is really very simple. Take him out.’

  The two soldiers stooped to grasp Boris’s body, and one looked up. ‘You wish him brought back, Herr Doctor?’

  ‘What are we supposed to do with a corpse?’ Cleiner enquired.

  ‘But he is alive, Herr Doctor.’

  ‘What?’ Cleiner stooped and took Boris’s pulse. Then he looked up at Anna. ‘What happened?’

  ‘You wished a demonstration of what could be accomplished with that blow, Herr Doctor. I have given that demonstration. You know I could have killed him had I wished, but I did not see the necessity for it.’

  Cleiner slowly stood up. His face was red. ‘Come into my office,’ he snapped.

  Anna glanced at the two girls, who were even more petrified than before. Then she followed the doctor from the room.

  *

  Anna sat on her bed, for the moment alone. She could not prevent herself being frightened; she remembered too well that session in the SD’s torture chamber. It was not so much the caning or even the electrodes being thrust into her body that got to her, but the utter humiliation of being at the mercy of so many unpleasant human beings, one of whom had been Hannah Gehrig. She wondered if Hannah had told her daughter about that incident, and had a sudden disturbing thought: was Marlene Hannah’s only daughter?

  How simple it would have been to avoid this new crisis by simply killing that man. Could his death, which was certain to happen in this camp anyway, be of the least importance beside the other seven people she had on her conscience? Even her dear Clive Bartley would probably have advised her to do as Cleiner commanded and avoid the confrontation. But I am not a monster, she told herself savagely. So now I must face the consequences. And what she had done had been a deliberate stratagem; it was too late to change her plans now.

  The door opened and the two girls came in. ‘Anna!’ Lena cried. ‘What has happened to you?’

  ‘Nothing has happened to me.’ Yet, she thought.

  ‘But when you did not come back . . .’

  ‘The doctor seemed to be very angry,’ Marlene suggested.

  ‘Oh, he is always very angry about something or other. Listen, I do not know what is going to happen to me, or whether I will be here for the rest of the course. But if you wish to survive, do not fail him. He will ask you to shoot at a living target. Do so, and kill, and live.’

  *

  Despite everything, she knew she had an ace up her sleeve. When she had returned from England, a master spy fleeing one step ahead of the British police, General Heydrich had welcomed her with open arms. Although he had lost a beautifully placed agent, the publicity given to her escape – and to her activities in England, a ploy devised by Clive to save her reputation with the Nazis – had been such valuable propaganda as to be sufficient compensation. It was as if he had seen her as a woman, rather than a thing, for the first time.

  She had in fact been afraid that he was going to appropriate her entirely as his mistress. But they had only slept together a few times. To Reinhard Heydrich sex, even with a beautiful and compliant woman, was secondary to his desire for power, for the manipulation of other human beings.

  Clive was not aware of that relationship as it had only occurred after her return from England, and he had not been in contact with her since. She thought it possible that he would have liked the situation to continue. Heydrich was as potent a source of secret information as anyone in Germany, save perhaps Hitler himself. But she had been happy not to be called upon over the past few weeks. Of all the men she had ever met she hated her commanding officer the most. But now she had to carry out the seduction of her life.

  *

  ‘General Heydrich is waiting for you,’ the secretary said.

  She did not get up from her desk to open the doors. Anna drew a deep breath, opened the doors herself and stood to attention, staring at the huge painting of Adolf Hitler that hung on the wall behind the desk. ‘Heil Hitler!’

  She was wearing one of her most flattering, form-hugging dresses, in pale green, with sufficient décolletage to be interesting, high heels, and her principal jewellery, but had left her head bare, her silky hair a golden mat below her shoulders. This was make or break.

  ‘Heil Hitler.’ Reinhard Heydrich was a tall, slim, very blond man, his pale colouring exaggerated by his black uniform. His features should have been handsome, but were spoiled by an utter coldness that particularly seemed to affect his mouth and eyes. And she had slept with this man, who held her life in the palm of his hand. ‘Close the doors.’ His voice was as lacking in warmth as his gaze, although she did not doubt that he liked what he now saw.

  Anna closed the doors and advanced to his desk. To her relief there was no one else in the large room, and very little furniture; Heydrich liked to be surrounded by space. There was however a chair before the desk. She sat down and waited, as usual in these circumstances, forcing herself to breathe normally, and to look at his face and nowhere else.

  Heydrich flicked the papers on his desk. ‘Sometimes I despair of you, Anna. This report is quite damning. You know the rules under which you – we – must operate: instant and unquestioning obedience to any command given by a superior officer.’

  ‘Instant and unreasoning obedience to any command given me in the name of the Reich or in the furtherance of the Nazi Party, Herr General. Surely not to gratify the desires of a lecher.’

  ‘Did he . . . interfere with you?’

  ‘In the pretended process of giving me a physical examination, sir. When I first attended the camp two years ago there was no physical examination. It was accepted that if I had been selected for special training as an agent for the SD, I was by definition both physically and mentally fit. On this occasion, after I think I can say two years of some success in the field, the first thing he did was command me to strip, so that he could look at me. He was quite open about this.’

  She paused, not having been able to c
ontrol her breathing as she would have liked. Heydrich studied her. ‘I agree that was uncalled for, although you must admit, Anna, you are a temptation to any man. That is why we employ you. And it appears that this uncalled-for examination turned up something of interest. Why did you tell me the mark was a birthmark instead of reporting this incident with your husband?’

  Anna had known this was coming. ‘I was too embarrassed, sir. And when Bordman shot me, Herr General, I fainted from loss of blood. I was in an intensive-care ward for several days, and then, as you know, had to remain in hospital some weeks longer. I had no means of communicating with any of our people until Celestina came to see me. By then the police and the government, in their determination to avoid a scandal which would involve Lord Bordman’s son and heir, had put out the story of my having fallen down the stairs. It seemed pointless to tell the truth at that stage, especially as it might have jeopardized my mission. I am sorry, but it was a decision I had to take on my own.’

  ‘And you did not feel you could tell Celestina? She was your superior officer.’

  ‘I am sorry, Herr General. I could not bring myself entirely to trust her when first we met.’

  ‘I take your point. Poor Celestina. She died for the Reich.’

  ‘I know,’ Anna said sadly. She died when I put two bullets into her chest.

  ‘But there is also the matter of your public disobedience of the doctor’s orders.’

  ‘Again I am sorry, Herr General. I believe you know that if you commanded me to kill someone, anyone, for the protection of the Reich, I would do so without hesitation. But I think that for me to start killing people for the amusement of others would have a derogatory influence upon both my ability and my powers of decision. Killing can never be a sport, Herr General.’

  Again Heydrich considered her for several minutes. ‘Your intellectual powers are considerable. I think, when your value as a field agent has ended, we should train you as a departmental lawyer. You would probably become a judge. But hopefully that is still some distance in the future. Very good, Anna. No more will be said of this. You know that on Monday you are to commence a crash course in Russian. I do not expect even you to become fluent in a month. But you must be able to understand what is being said around you.’