The Swiss Courier

by Tricia Goyer

  “Maybe I’ll have something before I go.” Though Dieter’s stomach growled, his physical needs weren’t important at the moment.

  “Very good.” The six-foot, two-inch American spymaster, of medium build and impeccably groomed gray hair parted to his right, stretched his arms as he stepped up to a window overlooking a small courtyard. “Mr. Baumann, our cryptologists in the basement are having a devil of a time cracking intercepts from German operatives inside Switzerland these days. After four days of no matches, they’ve abandoned those prefix codes that Miss Mueller pinched from the safe last week. Disinformation, I’m afraid.”

  Dieter had been told to expect this by his Nazi contact. “I’m sure you’re right, Mr. Dulles. We had to leave the apartment in a hurry, so maybe there was something we missed. You recall how—”

  Dulles interrupted him with a wave of the hand. “I read the report. I know the mission was botched.”

  “Well, I wouldn’t go that far, sir. But, perhaps in the rush to escape, Fräulein Mueller may have inadvertently overlooked an indicator sheet to launch the real codes.” Best to blame her.

  Dulles sighed and rubbed his forehead. “As you say. I may come back to that, but for now, let’s move on to other things.” The spymaster consulted a yellow legal-size pad, and for the next thirty minutes, peppered Dieter with inquiries about various field agents, what his contacts in the Swiss Army were saying, and the flow of refugees sneaking into Switzerland. The Basel station chief answered diligently, knowing his responses satisfied the curious cat.

  Precisely at 2:30 p.m., a knock interrupted their meeting. Mrs. Taylor entered with a sterling silver set and a pair of chocolate éclairs. “Time for afternoon tea,” she sang out as she set the service on a wooden side table.

  “Where did you find the éclairs?” Dulles asked. “You must have paid a king’s ransom for them.”

  “Actually, the bakery around the corner exhausted its monthly ration of chocolate. It’s Swiss National Day, remember?” She winked at Dieter. “Please enjoy them, sir.” Then she offered a slight curtsy.

  Dieter accepted a chocolate éclair while Mrs. Taylor poured him a peppermint tea. Then, as abruptly as she arrived, she exited.

  With her out of earshot, Dieter thought about his next sentence very carefully before uttering it.

  “I heard on the BBC shortwave last night that Patton’s Third Army broke out of the Normandy hedgerows and is moving east.” Dieter casually dropped a cube of sugar into his tea.

  “Yes, very good news,” Dulles said. “If anyone can kick the Germans’ rear ends all the way to Berlin, it would be General George S. Patton and those pearl-handed pistols of his.”

  “Is Patton meeting much resistance?” Dieter probed, but ever so slightly.

  Dulles pursed his lips, as if he was thinking how to word his reply. “The word from London is that two Panzer divisions have stalled the advance in the St. Lô region, but I’m confident ol’ Blood and Guts will drive a stake through their lines. Patton doesn’t stand still very often.” Dulles sipped his tea before setting the hand-painted cup on a saucer. “I’m certain that Operation Cobra will be successful. In fact, I wouldn’t put it past Patton to maneuver around the southern flank and surround the German defenses, which have bottled up Monty and the British Expeditionary Force near Caen.”

  Operation Cobra? Dieter hadn’t heard that before. That meant Patton’s Third Army wasn’t racing for Paris but would come back around and strike German forces from the rear. A classic pincer movement.

  “Is the Resistance helping out?”

  Dulles finished chewing a mouthful of pastry. “I had forgotten how good the Swiss are with chocolate. To answer your question, yes. The French underground are bothering the Krauts like a nest of mosquitoes. Blowing up bridges, sniper attacks, that sort of thing.”

  Dulles seemed unusually chatty. This meant Dieter knew he had to reciprocate in some way. “Some of my contacts in the Swiss Air Force say that American pilots are dropping from the sky like unexpected drops of rain. Just in the last week, a dozen B-17 bomb crews limped into Swiss airspace after getting shot up over Germany.”

  Dulles didn’t seem impressed. “Colonel Harris of the American Military Legation—he’s on the second floor—has been keeping me briefed.”

  Dieter expected the American spymaster to say that. “Has the Colonel told you that Swiss Me-109s and anti-aircraft guns shot down four U.S. bombers last month?”

  Dulles straightened up in his chair. “Why would the Swiss shoot down our bombers? Surely they know better than that.”

  Dieter shrugged. “Depends on your point of view. They see themselves as Swiss, defending national airspace. And remember, the Schaffhausen was bombed last month by the Americans—”

  “Clearly an accident. The crew got confused. Schaffhausen is north of the Rhine—”

  “Twenty Swiss, including women and children, were killed. That’s why some of the Swiss”—Dieter barely caught himself from saying our—“flight crews have been, how you say, trigger-happy.” He kept his voice matter-of-fact and unemotional. He knew whom he was dealing with.

  “I see. What about the Swiss authorities handing Jews back over to the Germans—is that still happening?”

  Dieter was relieved to change the subject. “Jews escaping into Switzerland, if caught by the border patrol or local police, are being escorted immediately to the Basel frontier. That’s the official policy coming out of Bern. The Jews will do anything not to be put into German custody. I’ve heard about it all—bribes, sex, whatever. Yesterday a young Jewish couple and their baby jumped off the Mittlere Brücke rather than be handed over to the Germans.”

  “Ghastly. Did they escape?”

  Dieter shook his head. “Their bodies were pulled out of the Rhine by firemen.”

  A buzzer sounded on Dulles’s desk, followed by the entrance of Miss Taylor. “Your next appointment has arrived, sir.”

  Dieter took that as his cue to exit. He rose, and Dulles extended a hand.

  “Mr. Baumann, thank you for coming to Bern on what should be a holiday for you.”

  “It’s no big deal. Besides, the Germans aren’t taking off today.” Dieter shot a glance at Frau Taylor. He noted the smallest hint of a smile on her face, and he couldn’t help but return a slight smile, understanding how even the most stoic often crumbled under his charm.

  Allen Dulles watched Baumann exit his office as a strange uneasiness settled over him. He tapped a plug of West Virginia tobacco into his cherrywood pipe. “Miss Taylor, do you trust him?”

  His secretary hesitated for a moment. “Mr. Baumann’s operational skills have been excellent, and he can be quite charming. He must be agreeable if he’s cajoling that much information from the Swiss and German operatives here in Switzerland. But there’s something ‘off’ about him, like he’s trying too hard.”

  “Hmmm,” Dulles muttered. He’d seen plenty of men like Baumann in his day.

  When Allen Welsh Dulles joined the Secret Intelligence Branch (SI) following America’s entrance into the war, he was taught to train case officers, run agent operations, and process intelligence reports. In the fall of 1942, Washington asked Dulles to set up shop in Switzerland because the neutral country was fertile ground for intelligence gathering—smack in the middle of Europe and surrounded by Axis countries. Since the Germans, Russians, and British were using landlocked Switzerland to spy on each other following the invasion of Poland, Dulles’s nascent network was playing catch-up. He found that sending Allied agents into Germany had scant hope of eluding the Gestapo, but travel between the Reich and neutral Switzerland was free enough to bring certain Germans to him. Hence the need for field agents with mother-tongue ability to speak German. Men like Dieter Baumann.

  Dulles struck a wooden match and drew a puff. “He was curious about General Patton today—a little too curious.” A wisp of smoke rose in the air. “Send a message to Jean-Pierre. Tell him I want Dieter Baumann put under surveillance. V
ery discreet. No reason to spook him.”

  Priscilla Taylor scribbled on her notepad, then looked up. “There’s one more thing, sir. Our contact from Heidelberg sent this eyes-only message while you were meeting with Mr. Baumann.”

  Dulles opened the sealed envelope and scanned its contents.

  “I have to contact Washington on this.” Dulles felt the knot in his gut tighten. “Something must be done immediately.”

  11

  Gestapo Regional Headquarters

  Heidelberg, Germany

  2:45 p.m.

  “Are you sure Sergeant Frisch hasn’t reported?” Kassler, back at Regional Headquarters, knew his question sounded accusatory, but this was important.

  Corporal Becker, standing before his desk, deflected the critical tone. “I’ve yet to locate him, sir. His bunkmate said he slept until noon and then left on a walk.”

  Kassler exhaled. “When’s Frisch due to report?”

  “Six o’clock for dinner, unless we can locate him beforehand.”

  “Very well.”

  “One more thing, sir,” the fuzzy-cheeked aide said. “It seems that Sergeant Frisch and the night brigade captured one of the Stauffenberg plotters last night. He was caught leaving a sheaf of anti-Hitler handbills at a local hofbrau. Frisch searched his apartment and found a hand-operated duplicating machine hidden in the attic.”

  “Where is the prisoner?”

  “In the basement, where information is being extracted at this moment. The lead interrogator called. Says he needs to speak with you—in person.”

  Kassler reached for his short-brim hat and leather belt, which holstered a 9mm Luger P.08. “You know where to find me if Himmler calls—or if Frisch shows up,” he said grimly to Becker.

  Kassler descended three flights of stairs, each landing pumping more adrenaline through his body. He had long ago taught himself to ignore the wide-eyed looks of outright horror and inevitable shrieks of pain from his victims. Detached, emotionally remote—that was the persona he embraced whenever he approached the basement Interrogation Center. Kassler willed himself into a state of calm because he knew enemies of the Reich would slit his throat if given half the chance. Kill or be killed.

  Still, there were always a few seconds of mental adjustment whenever he stepped inside the doors of the Interrogation Center, and this afternoon was no different. Kassler greeted the guard posted outside the entrance to the torture room. The guard acknowledged him, turned around, and looked through a peephole, then knocked twice. Sergeant Buchalter, a burly soldier in his early thirties, answered the door with a pair of pliers in his left hand. His blood-splattered gray tunic was half-unbuttoned, displaying a soiled white shirt.

  Kassler entered. A single lightbulb illuminated a room that reeked of sweat, blood, and fear. In the far corner, a bony middle-aged man had been stripped to his waist. His arms were wrapped behind a post, and his wrists were bound by rope. Blood streamed from a gash on his left temple, flowing down the side of his face onto his chest. More blood dripped from his left hand. The prisoner’s whole body quivered, as if seizures overtook him. His knees trembled the worst, and he struggled to remain standing.

  “I told him if his knees touch the ground, I’ll beat him to a pulp,” Sergeant Buchalter said.

  “So why did you call me?”

  “Because the prisoner hasn’t been giving me names. All I’ve gotten out of him is something about a church.”

  “Have you employed more persuasive techniques?”

  Buchalter shrugged. “He screamed after I yanked one of his fingernails out, but didn’t yield. There’s something different about this one. That’s why I called you.”

  “His name?”

  “Vinzent something.”

  “Let’s have a look.”

  Kassler knew from experience that interrogation sessions usually didn’t turn out this way. Most men cracked at the mere mention of things getting “rough.” Others sang like catbirds when nail-pulling pliers were produced. Sharp knives loosened tongues as well. Whatever the method, the vast majority of prisoners—under torture—blabbered everything they knew. Only a few were truly committed to keeping silent. Nothing moved them. In those rare cases, however, more stringent measures were required.

  “Do you have a copy of the leaflet?”

  “Right here.” Buchalter removed a handbill from his shirt pocket and pressed it into Kassler’s hands.

  “Appeal to All Germans!” the headline shouted. Kassler read on.

  The struggle for freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and protection of the individual citizen from the arbitrary actions of our police state is happening at this very moment in time. The tide is turning against National Socialist Germany. The Bible says, “‘Vengeance is mine,’ saith the Lord,” and His vengeful sword of retribution will destroy the totalitarian regime that launched a global war and has killed millions and imprisoned millions of others, including God’s Chosen People. Support the resistance movement!

  Kassler’s chest constricted, and he felt heat rising to his face. “He’s given you no names?”

  “Not yet, Major. He keeps mumbling something about the church of Jesus Christ.”

  Kassler balled up the leaflet and tossed it to the floor, sure he could turn this Vinzent character around. He approached the prisoner and grabbed a tuft of hair, jerking his head up. “You know what happens if you don’t give us what we want.” He tightened his grip.

  The prisoner labored to speak.

  “You want to say something?” Kassler demanded, shouting in the man’s ear. “Don’t you know what will happen to you if you don’t talk?”

  The prisoner nodded. “Yes, I know.” It was no more than a whisper.

  Kassler leaned forward.

  “Victory,” the man mouthed.

  Anger coursed through his veins. “Victory?” He slapped the man’s face. “Victory will be ours, not yours!”

  Kassler unbuttoned the leather holster containing his Luger pistol and brandished the gun. He inserted the tip into the prisoner’s right nostril and rammed the extended black barrel deep into his sinuses. The man—unable to resist—screamed in pain.

  “You have it all wrong!” Kassler roared. “The Third Reich will be victorious in the end!”

  “Something . . . different . . . victory . . . in Jesus.” The prisoner groaned in obvious pain. “There is victory . . . in Jesus.”

  “No, there isn’t!” Kassler’s heart pounded harder. “Death is the end. It’s over when you die!”

  Kassler removed his pistol from the sinus cavity and planted the tip between the man’s eyebrows. The prisoner strained against the ropes, but then—as if taken over by another force— he suddenly calmed.

  “I am prepared,” he said. “It is finished.”

  “Okay, we’ll do it your way,” Kassler bellowed. “At the count of three—unless you tell me who is helping you—you will find out if your Jesus is waiting.”

  “Eins . . .” Kassler toggled the Luger.

  “Knees?” the prisoner begged. “I want to kneel to meet Jesus.”

  Kassler relaxed his grip and waved the gun toward the floor. The bound prisoner crumpled to the ground in a heap. Buchalter seized the man’s arm, pulling him to his knees and adding a kick in the man’s side.

  Kassler lowered the gun to the prisoner’s forehead. “Where were we? Ja, I remember.”

  He held the pistol steady. “Zwei!”

  The prisoner raised his head. His eyes looked above Kassler, as if he were fixated on something far beyond the clammy walls.

  “You have five seconds to say more than ‘church.’ I want names!”

  The prisoner shook his head, but now his piercing eyes locked onto Kassler.

  A brave one, Kassler thought. “Auf Wiedersehen, Herr Vinzent.”

  The single shot to the forehead dropped the prisoner like a burlap sack of Alsace potatoes.

  Kassler returned the pistol to his holster and turned on his heels with a twing
e of regret. Not for killing the swine, but because the prisoner died without telling everything he knew.

  University of Heidelberg

  6:02 p.m.

  Joseph Engel heard the heavy footsteps and knew who would be rapping on his office door.

  “The door’s open, Hannes.”

  “Ach—put the Bible away.” Hannes Jäger sneered. “Or is that silly book more important than reading the papers Heisenberg sent over?”

  They’d been through this dance how many times before? Joseph’s roommate had a habit of barging into his office after five o’clock—just as he relaxed by reading the Bible. This often prompted a cagey comment or a pointed question from Jäger, and tonight appeared to be one of those occasions. Joseph had been careful not to read his Bible back at the apartment or get dragged into discussions about religion, but he wasn’t going to hide his light under a bushel, as he had read the previous day in Matthew 5:15.

  “Listen, Hannes.” Joseph beckoned his roommate to take a seat in the sparely furnished office. “You study papers by Fermi, Weizäcker, and Hahn, hoping to learn something more about the half-life of natural uranium after it’s been bombarded with neutrons. I scrutinize those papers as well, but sometimes my brain needs a break, so I pick up my Bible. So much that is written here makes sense.”

  A stunned silence filled the office. “You must be joking, Engel. There are only superstitions in that book—medieval ones at that.”

  Joseph felt his face flush from embarrassment and hoped it didn’t show. “You can blame my father.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “He read the Bible to me every night as a young boy. Father said if I read the Good Book for fifteen minutes a day—plus one chapter of Proverbs—I would become a wise young man.”

  “A wise young man,” Jäger repeated in a slightly mocking voice. “You’re a Lutheran, right?”

  “That’s correct.” Joseph considered himself a Lutheran— and a conflicted one at that. His parents complained that the Lutheran Church in the 1940s wasn’t the Lutheran Church of their youth. After Hitler came to power, the Führer attempted to establish a German Reich Church, calling on all German Protestants to unite in the hour of national need. Although his effort was rebuffed, many Lutheran pastors—as well as Roman Catholic priests—remained silent or cooperative when Hitler enacted the Nuremberg Laws in 1935 that excluded Jews from public life, government, culture, and the professions. Nor did they offer a peep of protest after roundups of Jews and other “undesirables” gained momentum following Kristallnacht in 1938.