Throughout this period the prisoners woke every day in darkness. By the light of half a dozen oil lamps they wolfed their Linden tea and thin porridge, then were marched out to the building site. Their only protection from the cold was torn and bloodstained Army greatcoats, taken from casualties, with which they had been issued; their faces became a greyish blue and their hands and feet throbbed madly from chilblains. When frost and snow made bricklaying no longer possible they were put on to carting heavy tree trunks and sawing them into logs; but whatever the labour the days seemed interminable.
When darkness fell they were marched back to the hut and huddled round two small woodburning stoves, which was all the heating provided. Then, at seven o’clock, the oil lamps were put out and, suffering the pangs of hunger, coughing and spitting from colds and sometimes moaning from the pains of frost-bite, they somehow got through another long, miserable night. Every week one or more of them was taken to the hospital to die, and those who survived had become gaunt from privation and hardship.
Yet they were infinitely better off than the political prisoners; for these had no lamps to give them a little light during a few of the long hours of darkness and no stoves to give them any heat at all. Even in summer, owing to starvation and brutality, few of them survived life in the camp for more than six months, and now a thousand or more of them were dying every week. And Sachsenhausen was only one of the Nazi murder camps. Auschwitz was much larger. There were also Buchenwald, Dachau, Belsen and some twenty others in which the Devil-inspired Hitler had decreed a terrible death for so many men, women and children that, had their corpses been stacked in a pile, they would have made a mound higher than St. Paul’s Cathedral.
The grim life Gregory led had made him leaner than ever, but his wiry frame was extraordinarily tough and he took all the care of himself he could; so, although he suffered severely from the cold, he managed to keep in good health and he endeavoured to buoy up his spirits with Malacou’s prediction that his chances of living out the war were good.
It was on December 17th that there occurred the new break for them that Malacou had so confidently predicted. To their surprise, at half past seven that evening their Blockführer roused them from their bunks and said that the Commandant had sent for them. As they slept in all their clothes they were already dressed, so at once left the hut and were marched to the Headquarters building. Since discipline up to any punishment short of death could be inflicted on the prisoners by the S.S. Lieutenants in charge of each section, it seemed obvious that Malacou had been summoned in connection with his occult activities; but Gregory had never been sent for by the previous Commandant, so why he had been included in the order he could not imagine.
Standartenführer Kaindl was still in his office. Having run his sharp grey eyes over them he said, ‘When Oberführer Loehritz handed over to me, he happened to mention that among the convicts in E Section there were a couple of mystics.’
Fixing his glance on Malacou he went on. ‘I gather that you, No. 875, told him about his past with surprising accuracy. I also understand that with the aid of No. 1076 you give sort of séances, during which you predict the course the war will take. Personally, I do not believe in such nonsense, and am convinced that it is done by some form of trickery. But on Christmas night I am giving a party and it occurred to me that it would be amusing to have you over as a cabaret turn. You have ten days to polish up your way of putting your stuff over, and I shall expect a good show or it will be the worse for you.’
It was Gregory who replied at once. ‘Herr Standartenführer, we shall be honoured to entertain your guests; but permit me to remark that the predictions made by my friend No. 875 are not nonsense. For example, he foretold the defeat of the British airborne landings at Arnhem several days before it occurred; and if you can spare a few minutes now I am confident that we can convince you of our bona fides.’
The chubby-faced Commandant suddenly smiled. ‘All right. Go ahead then.’
Malacou sat down in a chair, Gregory made passes at him, he closed his eyes, his head fell forward on his chest and, after a short period of silence he began to mutter. As they had come unprepared for this session Gregory could only hope for the best and concentrate with all his might on reading Malacou’s thoughts. To his surprise and consternation, for he could not believe it to be the least likely, the occultist conveyed to him particulars of a great German victory in the coming week. Yet while he was still hesitating whether to risk announcing it, Malacou confirmed the thoughts he had sent out by a few phrases in Turkish.
Seeing nothing else for it, Gregory turned to the Commandant and said, ‘Great news, Herr Standartenführer. The Wehrmacht is about to launch a major offensive. It will break through the Allied front in Belgium and inflict great losses on the Americans.’
The Commandant grinned. ‘That seems highly improbable; but I hope you are right. Anyway you have committed yourselves. If you are wrong I’ll have you put on special fatigues for a month; but if you are right you shall enjoy as good a dinner on Christmas Day as I have myself.’
Swiftly, Gregory seized on the possibility of reward. He said that they would be able to give a far more interesting demonstration on Christmas night if they were given the names and birth dates of several of the guests, and that time to make a study of their astrological significance was essential. He added that Malacou and he were half starved and half frozen, so could not possibly give of their best unless they had better food and a warm place in which to work.
At that the Commandant laughed and said that they were a typical pair of confidence men with wits trained to seize on every chance of getting something for nothing. But apparently it amused him to humour them. He said that he would provide them with certain information and that he would have them put in a heated prison cell where, for the next eight days, they could work things out. Decent food would be sent in to them, but if on Christmas night they failed to produce the goods woe betide them.
The interview resulted in their spending the following week in what was, for them, unbelievable luxury. They were taken to be deloused then given a cell in the headquarters used for S.S. officers who, having committed some misdemeanour, had been placed under arrest. There were iron beds with mattresses to sleep on, a table at which to work and meals were brought to them which, although plain, were of the sort that during the past months they had spent hours dreaming about.
On the third day the Commandant paid them a visit. He regarded them with curiosity and a new respect as he said, ‘You were right. General von Rundstedt launched an offensive in the Ardennes the day before I sent for you; but you could not have known that by any normal means. His Panzers are through to Dinant now and the Americans are running like hares or surrendering by the thousand. It is a great victory. Ask for anything you want, wine included. And I’ll send you some decent clothes to come to my party on Christmas night.’
The party proved to be the strangest that Gregory had ever attended. Himmler had long since ruled that no junior S.S. officer should marry. The obsession which governed his every thought was the elimination of the Jewish race and the preservation of a pure Teutonic stock. Only Germans with a proved descent of three generations on both sides had qualified for admission into the original S.S., and Himmler never tired of proclaiming to them their duty, in which he was heartily supported by Hitler. It was that every S.S. man should beget children by as many girls as possible who were of the Aryan type. To facilitate this racial project the girls were encouraged to bear bastards willingly by appeals to their patriotism, the provision of luxurious maternity homes, State support for their children, lavish payments and the promise that they would be held in honour above all other German women.
In consequence, in the concentration camps there were no married quarters for the S.S. guards. Instead, there was a brothel for the officers and another for the other ranks. So all the women at the Commandant’s Christmas party were the inmates of the officers’ brothel.
Not more
than a quarter of them were German girls; the rest were French, Poles, Hungarians, Czechs, Dutch, Belgians; and all of them had been picked, on account of their good looks, for this form of slavery from the many thousands of women who, for one reason or another, had been interned by the Nazis. Many of them had been only too glad to exchange hard labour and starvation for it; and all of them knew that unless they showed eagerness to please their many masters they would promptly be returned to the miserable existence of which they had at first had a sample. In consequence there were no holds barred at the party.
Soon after it started Gregory and Malacou did their act, which proved a great success, as they foretold peace in the spring, that the Russians would be restrained by the Anglo-Americans from occupying any but a small part of Germany, and clement treatment of the German people by their late enemies. Afterwards they told individual fortunes for a while by palmistry, but not for long. There was an abundance of good food, and champagne from stocks looted out of France during the German occupation.
Despite Malacou’s optimistic prophecies, all the S.S. officers knew that Germany stood on the brink of catastrophe and that this might be the last Christmas they would enjoy. So it was a case of ‘eat, drink and be merry and tomorrow be damned’. Everyone got drunk, no-one had any more time to have their fortunes told. By ten o’clock the men were pulling the women’s clothes off while the latter giggled or egged them on with ribald jests and shouts of laughter. By eleven nearly everyone present was half naked and leching unashamedly on the sofas and armchairs in the big mess room. Girls danced nude on the tables, drunks of both sexes writhed in heaps on the floor and blond giants who did not care for girls were making love together. It was an orgy that might even have for a while amused the bored Emperor Tiberius. At about four o’clock in the morning Gregory and Malacou staggered back to their comfortable cell, unescorted.
The following evening the Commandant, looking distinctly part-worn and bleary-eyed, came to see them. They congratulated him on his party and he agreed that it had been a great success. It transpired that he was in a talkative mood, for he sat down on the edge of one of the beds and asked them about their lives and why they had been given prison sentences. Malacou said that he was a doctor and in for embezzling funds; Gregory maintained his role as the Lübeck lawyer Protze.
Their visitor then began to talk about himself. He said that he did not like his job. His conscience was troubled by the thousands of slaves working in his charge who were dying and, although he could do nothing about it, he felt certain that when the Allies had defeated Germany he would be called on to account for the deaths of his prisoners.
They agreed with him and, since he had treated them so handsomely, against their own interests they strongly advised him to get a transfer to some less vulnerable position before the war ended. Malacou offered to read his hand; but he refused, saying that he preferred to rely on his own judgement about how to protect his future.
Before leaving them he said, ‘Well, you two seem to be good fellows, so at least I can chalk up one small decent act by letting you stay on here instead of sending you back to one of those lice-ridden huts.’
They thanked him effusively, then he shook hands with them and took himself off. Somewhat to their surprise he did not pay them another visit and for another three weeks they enjoyed the amenities he had granted them. Then, in the second week of January, to their acute distress the guard who looked after them informed them one morning that Standartenführer Kaindl had been posted elsewhere and had left the camp the previous evening. They were then marched back to their old hut with no benefit remaining from the easy time they had had except the respectable clothes with which they had been provided for the Christmas party.
This calamitous setback submerged Gregory in a new wave of depression: for, in spite of the temporary improvement in their situation that Malacou’s activities as an occultist had twice brought them, he did not see how, even should they succeed in intriguing yet another Commandant, they could hope for any permanent relief from semi-starvation and hard labour. But Malacou begged him to be patient, assuring him that they were due for an even better break quite soon. And a fortnight later he proved right.
On the 31st January they were again sent for, but this time they were not taken to the Commandant. Instead, having been ordered to collect their belongings, they were marched to the camp railway station and, accompanied by a guard, told to get into a train. It took them to Berlin and there they transferred to another train. As it chugged along, Gregory asked Malacou if he had any idea where they were being taken. The occultist shook his grizzled head and replied:
‘I know only that one of the great men of the Nazi Party has heard about my powers and that we are being taken to him. We are about to enter on the situation of which I told you soon after we met at Sachsenhausen. We shall be in great danger. I feel confident that I shall survive it. I think you will, too, but that depends on your doing the right thing at the right time; and with the help of the stars I will do my utmost to guide you.’
Half an hour later they detrained at what was evidently a private siding. They got out and waited there for some ten minutes. Then a large car drove up. Out of it stepped Standartenführer Kaindl. He smiled at them and said:
‘You see, I hadn’t forgotten you.’ Then dismissing their escort he added, ‘Jump in and I’ll take you up to the house.’
The car set off at high speed. After less than a mile it ran through impressive gates guarded by a sentry. Gregory had a vague idea that a long time ago he had passed through those gates, or a very similar pair. He had already noticed that Kaindl was wearing a different uniform and he realised now that it was that of a Colonel of the Luftwaffe. At that moment Kaindl said:
‘I managed to get out from under Himmler. In the First World War I was a fighter pilot in the Air Force and my old Chief agreed to take me back. I arranged your release from Sachsenhausen because I’m sure that the Reichsmarschall will be most interested to hear some of your prophecies.’
Gregory’s heart missed a beat, then seemed to sink to his boots. Suddenly he had realised that the car was speeding up the long drive to Karinhall. There he would soon be brought face to face with Goering, one of the very few people in Germany who knew him to be a British agent.
22
In the Lion’s Den
The drive up to Karinhall, Goering’s huge country house, was a mile long; so as the Mercedes sped through the beautiful park Gregory had several minutes in which to contemplate the ghastly trick that fate had played him. This was the second time that he had been trapped by circumstances into going to Karinhall. His first visit had been in the autumn of 1939, nearly five and a half years ago. He had then been posing as Colonel Baron von Lutz, but had taken a desperate gamble by disclosing his real identity to the Reichsmarschall because only by doing so could he discover if Erika was in the hands of the Gestapo as he feared, and if so secure her release; for he knew that Goering had in the past been a great friend of Erika’s, so would almost certainly use his power to save her.
Greatly intrigued by the fact that the loveliest woman in pre-war Berlin was in love with Gregory, Goering had asked him to dine and tell him about himself. During their long tête-à-tête it had emerged that they had certain interests in common. Russia was then allied to Germany, so a potential enemy of Britain, and was threatening to invade Finland. But as a long-term policy it was to Germany’s interest to weaken Russia; so Goering had wanted the Finns to fight. Gregory had persuaded the Reichsmarschall that if given enough information about the then weakness of the Soviet Army, and with winter coming on to aid them, the Finns would resist the Russians’ demands. Goering had agreed and supplied the information from the German Intelligence files. So instead of being shot as a confessed British spy Gregory had gone to Finland as Goering’s secret envoy.
But now he could think of no such plan to save himself by offering to perform some valuable service for the Reichsmarschall. And Goering was no
t the man to spare an enemy of his country out of sentiment, because he happened to be the lover of a woman who, in pre-war days, had been a most welcome guest at Karinhall.
Grimly, Gregory faced the fact that his only chance of surviving the coming interview was that, after five and a half years, the Reichsmarschall would fail to recognise the gaunt prisoner in ill-fitting civilian clothes, whom he had seen only once before posing as a Prussian aristocrat and dressed in the impeccable uniform of a German Colonel. Against that there was the disconcerting memory that while Goering had sent to Berlin for Intelligence summaries by the three Services and dictated from them an enormously long report for the Finns, Gregory had sat up with him the whole night, then breakfasted with him; and people are not apt to forget a face that has been within a few yards of them for the best part of twelve hours.
The car drew up at the front door of the great mansion and they got out. The sentries presented arms to Kaindl and the Mercedes drove off to park with a score of other cars that were lined up in a wide sweep at one side of the house; for when Goering was in residence he used his home as a headquarters and there were many officers coming and going.
When Gregory had last been to Karinhall the great pillared entrance hall had held a number of good statues and pictures; as they passed through it now, in spite of his anxiety about himself, he looked round with amazement. The old objets d’art had been replaced with masterpieces every one of which was worth a fortune. Goering, he knew, loved beautiful things and these priceless treasures were obviously some of the many that he had had carried off from museums and private collections in France, Belgium, Holland and other countries that the German armies had overrun. As an art thief it looked as if he had exceeded even the cupidity of Napoleon.
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