“You gave me purpose when I had none. You were exactly what I needed when I needed it.”
“As you were for me.”
The fire spat and popped, and John reached down to toss some more dry wood onto it.
“Would you consider coming to America with me? It’s different than here, I realize, and it’s quite a distance, but you might like it.”
“To Philadelphia?”
“Why not?” he said. “Philadelphia’s a great town, but you’d be free to go wherever you pleased.”
She picked up a stick and took a few seconds to poke the fire before she answered. “Let’s just concentrate on surviving the next day or so, shall we? Then we can start thinking about the future.”
“Yes,” he said. “Perhaps I got a little carried away.” He put an arm around her shoulders. “Get some sleep. We hit the trail again in three hours.”
Franka took the sleeping bag from her backpack and laid it out on the floor of the cave, which proved to be softer and more comfortable than she’d imagined. John remained seated, staring out the mouth of the cave into the dark of the night beyond. Her last thought before she descended into a deep sleep was when he would lie down too.
Berkel came to her dreams again, but this time with hundreds of soldiers thrusting pikes, swords, and flaming torches into the air as they chanted the songs she’d sung as a member of the League of German Girls as a teenager. Berkel was bloodied and torn, showing the marks of the bullets she’d fired into him. An Alsatian strained against the iron leash he held around its throat. The horde of mad berserkers chased her into the forest, the torches they carried illuminating the night as she trod on her own shadow.
Her heart was thumping as she awoke to the brightness of the fire. John didn’t seem to have moved since she’d fallen asleep.
“It’s three in the morning,” he said. “Time to go.”
Chapter 14
Vogel rubbed the tiredness from his eyes as the car pulled up. It had been years since he’d stayed up like this. Responsibilities that would require an agent to work through the night were generally reserved for youth, not for a man of his experience. This was different. The thirst for revenge was fueling him. He greeted the dawn and the chance to question the old man with relish. Sleep could come later. The night had been spent combing the roadways for any sign of Gerber, and it was just after six when her car had been found on an overgrown trail near the hamlet of Bürchau—the same hamlet he was pulling into now with his armed escort. The local Wehrmacht had offered seventy-five men. There was a time when he could have expected hundreds. With little love lost between the local Wehrmacht officers and the Gestapo, he would have to settle for the seventy-five men they’d claimed they were able to spare at the last minute. Together with the hundred or so police and Gestapo men, it would be more than enough to find a little girl wandering in the woods.
Vogel knocked on the door himself, eager to see the look on the old man’s face as he answered. The Gestapo officer introduced himself with a salute, ignoring the old man’s bewilderment as he invited himself inside along with the five soldiers accompanying him. Vogel took a seat at the kitchen table, opposite where the old man had been sitting drinking his coffee, the mug still steaming. The old man offered Vogel a cup. Vogel refused and gestured for him to sit down. Time was a diminishing asset.
“What can I help you with, Herr Vogel?”
“I heard a report you had a visitor yesterday.”
“My neighbor, Karoline, comes to see me most days. She helps me—”
“Don’t toy with me, old man,” Vogel said, each word an implicit threat. “I’m looking for Franka Gerber. I heard she was here yesterday. She murdered one of my colleagues, a good man with children. Your niece shot him down in cold blood.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’ve not seen Franka in years.”
“Don’t waste my time, Gerber. We know she was here. Your false demeanor doesn’t fool me. What did she say? Did she tell you where she was going? Was she alone?” Vogel smacked the coffee cup with an open hand. It hurtled off the table and broke on the tile floor.
“Do you think I’m scared of you?”
“I think you should be. You have no one to turn to here.” He looked around the table at the five soldiers in full uniform with their rifles pressed to their chests. “I could take you outside and shoot you in the middle of the street, and no court in this Reich would convict me. I could lock you up in a cell and starve you to death or maybe just torture you for my own amusement. Now, I ask again. Where did that whore of a grand-niece of yours tell you she was going?”
“You watch your language! I remember when this country was great, when we were a bastion of industry and the arts, when bullyboys like you skulked in the shadows where you belonged. But now you wear that armband and that pin, and you think that gives you power over me?”
Vogel took out his pistol and aimed it at Hermann.
The old man didn’t flinch or waver.
“I haven’t killed a man in many years. Don’t make me do that today. Tell me where Franka is. I already told you she murdered my partner. Was she alone, or with someone else?”
“And I already told you I haven’t seen her in years.”
Vogel cocked the hammer on his gun and pointed it at Hermann’s forehead.
“I’m an old man, Vogel. Death comes for us all sooner or later. I’m not afraid of it, and I’m not afraid of you. So go ahead and shoot, because I’ll die before I betray my own blood to the likes of some jumped-up Nazi puppet like you.”
“Have it your way, then.” Vogel pulled the trigger.
The aching was numbed by the sheer cold. Frostbite was now a constant worry in Franka’s mind. Hours of wading through snow had left her feet little more than concrete blocks to balance upon. She greeted the stop for breakfast with massive relief. There could be no fire now. They spoke in whispers.
“What do we do if they find us, John?”
“We make sure that doesn’t happen.”
He laid down a blanket for them to sit on and handed her a bottle of water. Her body longed for a sleep she could not afford.
“We need to be careful not to dehydrate ourselves,” John said. “It doesn’t seem like a natural concern among all this frozen water.”
Franka took the stale bread and cheese he handed her. She chewed three times before swallowing it down. John took out the detailed map of the Swiss frontier. Franka wondered how accurate it was, considering their lives depended on it.
“We’re probably only five miles or so from the border. How are you feeling?”
“I feel good. I feel like we’re going to be in Switzerland soon. How about you?”
“The same way.”
Franka leaned back against a tree and looked up the trunk as it ascended into the sky for thirty feet or more. The smell of morning in the woods—pine mixed with soil and snow—hung heavy in the air. The familiarity of the scent comforted her. This was her place. The Gestapo agents were the ones encroaching. The low-hung clouds looked like sheets of dirtied cotton, and an easy wind from the south was swirling around them, shaking tree branches as it went. John took a knife from his belt, sliced up the last of the cheese, and handed Franka a piece.
“What would you be doing if we weren’t at war?” she asked.
“I don’t know. I don’t think I would have taken over the company, even without the war. I’d have to find some other cause to fight for. Maybe I’d still be married. Who knows? What about you?”
“It’s not so simple for me. If this war weren’t on, we’d still have the Nazis and the war within my country would still be raging.”
“What if the Nazis weren’t in power?”
“I don’t know. They’re all I’ve known since I was a teenager.”
“You’ll never be able to live here again, not while they’re in power.”
“I’m ready. My old life died a long time ago.” She brought the piece of cheese to her
mouth. “I’m ready,” she said again. Neither spoke for a few seconds. “There’s nothing left for me here. I have no country now. No family. Only myself.”
It would be her decision to make if they made it across the border alive. If. His legs had been aching all night, and he brought his hands down to massage the worst of the pain away. His body yearned for sleep. He knew that if he lay down on this blanket now, it would come, and they would find him, and then they would both die. It was time to leave. He stood up.
“Why did you rescue me from the snow?”
“What?”
“I was in a Luftwaffe uniform. For all you knew I was part of the regime that destroyed your life and your country. Why did you rescue me?”
“Because you’re a human being, and I’m a nurse. That’s what I do.”
“But you risked your life for a stranger, and a Luftwaffe flier at that.”
“I needed something.”
“We all do,” John said, and helped her to her feet. “Now, let’s push on. We can make the border in the next hour or two.”
Vogel laid out the map on the kitchen table, making sure to avoid staining it with the spattered blood. They weren’t going to swim the Rhine. Not in January. They would make for Inzlingen, where the border between Switzerland and Germany jutted away from the freezing waters of the river. He had already dispatched fifty men there to work their way back up through the forest, and a hundred men were sweeping the area from ten miles in. Soon that whore would be caught like a rat in a trap, and slow vengeance would be his. An example needed to be made. Would it be possible to hang her body up in the middle of town like the Gestapo did in the occupied territories? That was an argument he looked forward to having with his superiors. He bundled the map back up and made for the car, his escorts in tow. It was a forty-five-minute drive to the border, and he intended to be there when they found her, to see the look on her face as she realized there was no power greater in her world than his.
Each step was a minor triumph now. The full rigor of the previous day’s walk began to bring itself to bear on their battered bodies. John dragged each leg through the snow, using trees for support, leaning all of his weight on the walking stick he’d fashioned for himself.
“This is nearly over,” he said. “You’ll be free soon, for the first time since you were a teenager.”
It was ironic that she would have to spend her days of freedom in a detention center in Switzerland, unable to gain employment, but this war would be over soon. He longed to be the one to free her. The mission had morphed into something different. He imagined delivering the microfilm to Wild Bill Donovan himself, the handshake, the flag, but her essence lingered in every thought. Every glimpse of his future contained her, and he drew comfort and reason from that.
They lumbered on through the snow. He was sure that Berkel had been found by now, and the pursuing forces of the Gestapo were close behind. They weren’t more than a mile from the stream that would lead them unmolested across the border—if indeed the map was accurate.
They came to a clearing. A road bisected their path. John motioned for Franka to stop and continued alone to poke his head out of the tree line. He peered both ways down the road. It was quiet, empty for as far as he could see before it curled off. The road was only a few feet from the tree line they were emerging from. The trees on the other side were two hundred yards or more from the roadside. They would be out in the open for several minutes as they crossed, but there was no other way. The stream that would lead them to freedom was half a mile away. There must have been listening posts close by, and this road would not be quiet for long.
She was beside him now.
“The forest is on our side. It’s the only reason we’re still alive. Outside it, we’re dead.” He pointed across the road to the clearing and the trees beyond. “The stream we’re making for is likely in that clump of forest. We need to make it across, where we’ll have cover again. I’m sure they’ve found Berkel’s body and are looking for us now. There’s nowhere else to go but where we’re headed. They know we’re not going to swim the river in winter. If they’re not here already, they will be soon, but we’re close. We can do this.”
“Who do you think left those footprints in the snow?” she said. Several pairs of footprints crisscrossed the field of snow that led to the trees on the other side of the road.
“Hard to say. It doesn’t seem to have snowed down here for several days. They look old.”
“A farmer and his cows, perhaps?”
“Maybe. I’m sure there’s no one over there waiting for us, if that’s what you mean.”
“It seems quiet.”
“Let’s stop wasting time,” John said as he emerged from the trees, his body low to the ground as he crossed the road. Franka followed a few feet behind, mimicking his movements. John waited for her on the edge of the road as they entered the snow-covered meadow that led to the far tree line. He jogged ahead. She stumbled behind him, her backpack coming off. She reached down to slip the straps over her shoulders. He covered the ground so quickly that she fell thirty yards behind. He was just entering the tree line as the rumble of the truck came around the bend in the road.
Vogel was riding in the front, his eyes scanning both sides of the road as he saw the figure struggling through the snow toward the trees.
“Halt!” he shouted, and the driver jammed his foot down on the brakes. “There she is. Go get her!” He bashed on the tarpaulin hood to wake the troops riding in the back.
Franka turned as the truck stopped, terror flushing through her. She rose to her feet, doing her best to sprint through the sucking snow. John ducked behind a tree, drawing his gun in some kind of false hope that he could outshoot the four heavily armed Wehrmacht soldiers spilling out of the truck. One of the soldiers brought his rifle to his shoulder and began to shoot. Bullets spat around Franka as she ran, John’s desperate face willing her toward him, his hand outstretched.
Vogel followed his men into the snow, the truck abandoned as the six men ran after the figure a hundred yards in front of them. He drew his pistol to shoot just as she disappeared into the thick of the forest.
John grasped her hand and pulled her behind him.
“Come on. We’ve got to outrun them somehow. The border is close. Get rid of your backpack.”
She threw it down, remembering the photos of her family she’d stuffed into her pockets. She threw a glance backward at the soldiers and the fat officer lagging behind them as they struggled through the snow. They seemed to be gaining. John dragged her by the hand as they ran, cresting a hill and then running down, trees all around them. The soldiers were invisible behind them, the hill and the trees blocking their line of vision.
“We’re not far now,” John said as a light formed at the end of her sight. The trees ended two hundred yards in front. A great white light lay beyond them, and Franka saw immediately what the map hadn’t shown. The trees ended, and a forty-foot drop onto jagged rocks lay beyond for a mile in both directions.
John cursed. “No. No. We can climb down.”
“They’re right behind us. They’d pick us off on the way down. There’s no escape from this, not for me.”
“What?”
“They don’t know you’re with me. They won’t have noticed your footprints among the others in the snow. You were hidden in the trees as they came out of the truck. I couldn’t see you, so I know they couldn’t either. Go on without me. You can climb down and be across the border before nightfall.”
“I won’t leave you.”
“It’s useless, John. We can’t make it together. Think of your mission. You have to go now.”
“There has to be another way.”
“There isn’t. I’ll go back and draw them off.”
“No. I can’t leave you. I won’t.”
“Remember your mission. This is beyond us now. Remember what you were sent here to do. Please. We’ve only seconds.”
She could hear the sound
of the soldiers approaching through the trees, perhaps a hundred yards behind.
“Do this for me,” she said.
He grasped her against him and kissed her. She drew back after a few seconds and leaned her forehead into his.
“I can’t leave you.”
“You have to go now,” she said.
“I’m so sorry, Franka,” he said as he lowered himself over the edge of the cliff. She looked down at him one last time as he peered up at her. She retreated toward her pursuers, her arms in the air. Franka heard the soldiers shouting at her to get on the ground, to put her hands behind her head. She was miles away, years ago, with her parents in the cabin on a warm summer’s evening as the sun set over the trees.
The fat officer made a whooping sound as he caught up. “Franka Gerber? I am Kriminalinspektor Vogel of the Gestapo. You’re under arrest for the murder of Daniel Berkel, and let me say, you’re mine now. You’re going to pay for what you did to my friend. I’m enjoying those tears on your face. There will be many more.” He replaced the gun in his holster. “Where is your boyfriend?”
“Who?”
“Don’t play that way with me,” he said, slapping her across the face. “You got crutches for him. Where is he?”
“He left last week. He made his way across the border. He told me the way to come—to follow him.”
“Have a look around,” the officer said. His men spread out, taking a few minutes to search the area.
Vogel took the time to pat her down, his hands focusing on certain places, withdrawing her wallet and her father’s pistol from her pockets.
“Nothing,” one of the men said as they came back. “There’s no one else. There are footprints all over. It’s impossible to tell if there was anyone else with her.”
Her thoughts were of John now, and his escape across the border. In his escape victory was hers. She saw John strolling across the border, presenting the microfilm, receiving the acclaim he deserved, and that was enough. The agonies of the next few hours would pass. Their achievement would live on.
John lingered in the trees, knowing he had only to walk away, and the way to the border would be free now. Freedom and the glory of fulfilling his mission beckoned. The microfilm was vital. Perhaps it could even turn the tide of this war. He imagined seeing his family again, and the look of pride on his father’s face. He tried to purge Franka from his mind. The rest of his life was an easy trip across the border away.
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