Within that seething hell, more than four kilometers across, nothing lived. The epicenter of the blast was a bare circle of scorched ground. At the fringes of this there were visible ruins—steel frameworks of sturdy buildings, smoldering hulks of tanks strewn haphazardly across the landscape.
Farther outward there were more ruins, the frameworks of wooden buildings, sheds and shops and shacks. All of these were burning, and the few survivors moved like zombies. Horribly burned, very few of them would survive the night.
Still farther away the murk and dust billowed onward, layering flesh, penetrating pores, soaking into noses and mouths and eyes. The radiation within that dust was invisible, and fickle. Some of these victims, poisoned, would be dead within weeks.
Others, the lucky ones, would live for another few years.
Chuck Porter was scanning the skies from the observation deck at Templehof. He had just lowered his binoculars, looking south, when he sensed a bright flash off to his right. By the time he turned, the brilliant light had passed. It left him with an eerie sensation, since it was full daylight with only a few clouds in the sky, and yet for that split second the light had been brighter than the sun.
Lifting the field glasses again, he searched along the western horizon, and immediately saw a seething cloud of black smoke interspersed by clear flashes of flame. He felt a shiver of awe, knew that he was seeing something unprecedented, and terrible. The cloud expanded upward and down, covering an immense area.
He continued to watch, and the pillar of smoke grew higher and higher until it seemed to burst from its own column, spreading out like the cap of some black, unspeakably deadly, nightshade.
Sanger joined the growing crowd on the street outside the Reichstag. He had never been in an earthquake, but the movement and sound from the explosion were what he imagined one would be like. Overhead, the mushroom cloud, emblem of a new age, was dominating the sky.
“Mein Gott,” breathed Müller, standing beside him.
“Or the devil,” replied Sanger.
“You’re right. If it’s this big standing here, there must be nothing left where it hit.” He shuddered. “I’ve seen bombs before, and missiles. If a V-2 could carry this …”
“It would mean the end of war as we know it.”
“Maybe the end of everything.” Müller watched the cloud for a moment. “I wish Günter was here.”
“We all do.”
“Yes—but specifically here. He would make sense of this; he would have the perfect quote. No one else could say it as well.”
“You’re right about that,” Sanger replied. “One of many reasons to miss him.”
Standing nearby was an Indian soldier in a British uniform, one of the paratroop divisions that had participated in Operation Eclipse. He was speaking in a musical-sounding language Sanger had never heard. When he finished, Sanger said, “Excuse me.”
“Yes, sir?” replied the soldier in accented English.
“May I ask what language that was?”
“It was Hindu, sir. It is from a holy book, the Bhagavad Gita. It means, ‘Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.’ It is the god Krishna speaking. Its theological context is rather complex, I’m afraid, but the words themselves seemed to fit that cloud rather well.”
“‘Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds,’” repeated Sanger. “Yes, I agree. Thank you. I hope I didn’t intrude.”
“Not at all, sir.” The soldier bowed quite precisely. Sanger tried to emulate it and failed.
THE KREMLIN, MOSCOW, USSR, 1701 HOURS GMT
“I want you to keep trying! There must be some line open, somewhere. Find it!”
Chairman Stalin slammed his fist down on the table, and the three colonels—communications specialists, each of them—who had been the target of his diatribe all but fell over each other in their haste to get out the door.
What was happening? He rose to his feet and stomped across the office, punching at the wall, cursing as he cracked a bone in his hand. What did it all mean?
He went back to his desk, to the sheaf of communiqués from all around Berlin.
THIRD SHOCK ARMY, NEAR TEMPELHOF AIRPORT, REPORTS HUGE MUSH-
ROOM CLOUD TO THE WEST. LOST ALL CONTACT WITH FRONT HQ, AND
WITH MARSHAL ZHUKOV AS WELL.
Their attack had come to a halt. From another army:
COMMUNICATIONS OUT; HALTED, AWAITING FURTHER ORDERS.
There were others, similar stories. Many of them made claims about this mushroom cloud. Others—and some of the same ones—reported a brilliant flash of light. But neither of his marshals could be found.
And then there were the reports, just coming in, from the hospitals … .
9 JULY 1945
HQ, THIRD ARMY, REICHSTAG BUILDING, BERLIN, GERMANY, 0651 HOURS GMT
“I want to be ready to push the bastards back, all the way to the lines they had five days ago,” Patton declared. “That little firecracker yesterday bought us some time, at the very least. But by damn I want to be ready to take advantage of it.”
He paused, then looked around frankly. “The one exception to that is Potsdam. Henry, I don’t want your boys—or anyone else—going near the place. The whiz kids who built that bomb say that it’s radioactive—read: poisonous—around there.”
“That brings something up, General.” The speaker was Colonel Franzene, a surgeon and the CO of Third Army’s hospital units. “We’ve got a lot of Soviet wounded that came in. Real nasty stuff. Men with half their skin toasted off, flash burns, or tunics melted right into them. A lot of ’em we can only give some morphine, and wait. Others are different—we had fellows come in, didn’t even look hurt. But they puked all night, and died.”
“Do what you can for them,” the general declared. “Without endangering the care you can give to our own men.”
Field Marshal Rommel spoke up. “There are many places around the front where the Russians ceased their attacks, shortly after the bomb was dropped. I suggest that in those locales, we do not advance aggressively, but rather stand firm without a resumption of the hostilities.”
“Good idea, yes,” Patton said. “Where they’ve stopped shooting, we can stop shooting.”
“I have a question. What was that ‘firecracker,’ anyway, General?” asked Henry Wakefield. “I know they’re calling it an atom bomb, but I mean what the hell are we talking about here?”
Patton started to say something, then closed his mouth. “Colonel Sanger, will you field that one?”
Reid Sanger shrugged noncommittally. “It’s been a pretty well kept secret, obviously. I just learned about it two days ago, when we had to pick a target. But it seems that some of our scientists took their slide rules off into the desert—New Mexico, somewhere—for most of the war. This was the result of their work: a bomb that causes atoms to split, with the results that we saw yesterday.”
“Damn,” Wakefield said, shaking his head. “Get a few of those dropped on him, that would make a fella not too willing to fight a war.”
“Yep, Hank,” said Patton. He knew that he sounded tired, and he felt every one of his years. “That’s what we’re hoping.”
SHAEF, REIMS, FRANCE, 1031 HOURS GMT
“General Eisenhower?” Kay Summersby’s eyes were wide as she cupped the receiver of the phone with her long fingers. “This is a Russian translator. He says that Chairman Stalin is calling for you.”
“Damn.” Ike crushed out his cigarette, drew a breath, and took the phone.
“Mr. Chairman?” He decided to play it with a hearty tone.
“General Eisenhower? Is this you?”
“Yes it is, Chairman. I am glad you called. We had an unfortunate communications breakdown a few days ago—I haven’t been able to get through to you, or your marshals.”
“Yes. Ah … it truly was an unfortunate failure to communicate. In point of fact, there has been a regrettable misunderstanding in our relative positions at the city of Berlin. I am sorry to r
eport that recently one of my colonels acted impetuously, and triggered an accidental outbreak of hostilities. The matter has been addressed. But I do regret any loss of life that has occurred.”
“Do I understand you to say that you—I mean, that the error has been corrected, and that the offensive will cease?”
“Offensive? Certainly you did not mistake that for a genuine offensive?” The Soviet dictator chuckled genially. “No, I assure you, General, that was merely a few young officers acting without authority. If it had in fact been an offensive, I trust you would have known.”
“Yes, of course. Sorry for the misunderstanding.”
“Unfortunate that lives were lost, I agree. But I have given explicit orders that no further hostile action be taken.”
“I am relieved to hear that, Mr. Chairman. Know, of course, that our forces in Berlin will be only too willing to go along with this … um … cease-fire. That is, until we can get something more permanent established.”
“Indeed, yes. Permanent. Marshal Rossokovsky is now in charge of Soviet forces along the front. He will contact you directly within a day. In any event, I thank you for your time, General.”
“And you too, Mr. Chairman,” Ike replied. “I appreciate the call.” He set the receiver back in its cradle, and looked up at Summersby.
“It’s amazing how much he didn’t talk about,” noted the Supreme Commander.
LONDON, ENGLAND, 1219 HOURS GMT
The world had changed, a new force had been unleashed, and the fires of Hell were in the possession of the Americans. None of that, however, would stop an Englishman from his daily routine. Kim Philby had been invited to lunch at the Metropolitan Club with a friend, a minor official in the Admiralty.
Philby well understood that lunch was an action, and he had a regular schedule of lunches that was all part of keeping himself connected and in the know. It was a particularly charming springtime day, the flowers were in bloom and the air was fresh, the sun shone brightly, and even Kim Philby had to put his cares aside and simply bask in the pleasure of the moment. For the first time in a long while, he felt completely off duty, able to relax, get a little drunk, and not worry.
The Metropolitan Club was redolent of cigar and pipe smoke, some likely centuries old, with accents of old leather and varnished wood. It was an odor that reminded him somewhat of his father, which was odd—he had not thought of his father in ages.
He hadn’t waited for more than a few minutes when his luncheon host arrived. “Ah, Kim, old chap. Frightfully good to see you.”
“And you, Sir James.” Admiral Sir James Parsons was some twenty years Philby’s senior, but Philby had great fondness for him nonetheless, fondness that he usually did not grant to members of the British establishment. But Sir James Parsons, though regrettably retrograde in his social outlook in certain respects, had commendable wisdom, a wide and rich view of the world, exceptional gossip, and a taste for young men—of whom Philby had been one, back in his Westminster School days. He had had quite a schoolboy’s crush on the once handsome and debonair Naval officer, which had been quite torridly reciprocated, and although both were older now and their mutual passion had long since cooled, their friendship had remained solid for these many years.
They started in the bar with Peter Dawson wetted down with a few cubes of ice, and when their table was ready ordered a mixed broil and a bottle of a rather good Beaujolais, then a second bottle, and Sir James told a perfectly scandalous story about a Lord of the Admiralty who had been caught en flagrante in the brig of a destroyer with an ordinary seaman, all hushed up, of course, as these things were. They switched to port with the cheese course, a Stilton, and Philby shared a few stories that were not quite as good, but they were all he had.
“And what do you think about the new super bomb?” asked Sir James. His face had gone rather ruddy.
“I-I can’t s-say,” Philby replied. “It’s r-rather large, isn’t it?”
Sir James put a finger aside his nose and leaned forward. “I can tell you something, but it’s really telling tales out of school. You’ll have to keep it under your hat.”
Philby leaned forward as well. He was a bit unsteady. “You can trust me. You can always t-trust me.”
“Good fellow. Of course I can. Never doubted it. Here it is. They’ve picked up on a Soviet mole.”
Philby blinked. “A Soviet mole? Where?”
“Here.”
“In the Metropolitan Club? Pre-preposterous!”
“No, no, no. Not in the Metropolitan Club, in the Government. In the SIS, to be precise. Your outfit.”
“Really? Do you know w-who it is?” Everything seemed somewhat distant to Philby. He poured himself another glass of port to steady the room a bit.
“No idea. Perhaps you can finger the chap. Evidently reasonably high up. But the joke is, they haven’t arrested him, they fooled him.”
“Fooled him? How?”
Sir James smiled. “Made him think there are lots and lots and lots of bombs. Filled a warehouse with them. Fakes. All of them. Well, all but one, anyway. There’s just one.”
Suddenly everything in the room stopped moving for Philby. “Just one, you say?”
“Just the one. And that was a prototype.” Sir James pronounced “pro-to-type” very carefully. “They were crossing their fingers as they flew, putting the thing together with tape and string, you know. Americans! Can’t get it right for anything!”
“There aren’t any others?” Philby asked. His voice was slow. The room was spinning.
“I gather there are one or two others back in the States, but they aren’t finished. They can still make more, you know, but not quickly. Maybe a few months before there are any more. But you know what’s so funny?” He snorted with laughter.
“What?”
“Right now, if Stalin only knew, he could just roll right into Berlin with all his armies, and we don’t have enough wherewithal to stop him! Isn’t that funny? We’ve bid four no-trump and we don’t have a single ace in the hand!”
Philby stood up. He was slightly unsteady on his feet. He picked up the port and finished his drink. “I’m sorry, Sir James, I have to go. I have to go immediately. There is an emergency. I’m very sorry.”
“What’s the matter, Philby? You don’t look well. You don’t look well at all.”
“I’m sorry. It’s an emergency. I’ve got to go. Good-bye, Sir James.”
“Philby, old chap, wait a minute—”
Kim Philby moved as rapidly as he could through the dining room, navigating by holding onto the backs of chairs. He did not notice the gentleman at the next table who stood to follow him as he left, or his companion who also left, heading toward the manager’s office to use the telephone.
As Philby hurried down the main staircase to the entrance doors, one man followed him down as a second man waited impatiently for someone to pick up the telephone at the other end. “It’s Mowgli, sir,” he said when he heard a voice on the other end. “It looks like he’s gotten tipped off. Send units to all known drop sites. I think he’s planning to go to ground, but he’ll try to get a message through first.”
There was no line at the taxi queue, so Philby took the first one; the following man took the one behind. Now sensitized, Philby could tell he was being followed. “Where to, guv’nor?” asked the cabbie.
“Not sure of the address,” Philby said. “Turn right here, if you don’t mind. Then on down a bit—I’ll know it when we come to it.” He turned to look at his pursuer. Only one. If he’d gotten away cleanly enough, he would only have the single pursuer to shake and that should not prove too difficult. He could retrieve his emergency documents and currency from their hiding place and be gone quickly enough, get a message through to the embassy to notify the Soviets—act now! Victory could still be ours!
He shook his head. How wonderfully elaborate the trap had been, and how well they had snared him. Later he would review the operation in detail, find out where he might ha
ve slipped up, but he suspected the problem was what he had feared from the outset—this program simply had so much security around it that simply to inquire was to invite investigation. Well, it couldn’t be helped, and if this information reached Moscow in time, it would still have been worth it. And if he reached Moscow safely, then he would start his new career as an NKVD officer, open and proud, running agents aggressively against the pathetically incompetent West. It would still be all right.
Traffic up ahead. “Go left, please.” Now the crowd was thick enough. “Ah, I see where I want to be. Stop here please, and keep the change.” He slipped out of the cab, lost himself in a crowd. He knew his pursuer would follow on foot, but here he had the advantage. There was Harrods, and he was in one exit, and shortly out the other, then down into the Underground. Three transfers later, he felt relatively safe. He would not return to his office nor to his flat, but straight to his emergency drop. He took a pen and a small journalist’s notebook from his breast pocket and scrawled a brief note, tore off the note and slipped it in his pants pocket before returning pen and notebook to their home.
He got off not at his stop but one stop later, then backtracked, scanning for anything that looked like stakeout. Nothing set off his internal alarms, but then there had not been time for anyone to do much that was formal. One of his drop-off points was behind a loose brick in a wall surrounding a small park; he looked around and in a clear moment he slipped the note in place. The alert for that drop off was located not too far away, the Underground sign for the station he would normally have used had a metal ring around it. He twisted the ring so that the screw faced the stairs instead of the sidewalk. There. That was done. Now, into the park. It was relatively small, but old enough that the shrubbery was thick and dense. Behind an oak tree, however, he could crouch low and there was a virtual cave within the shrubbery, and in it a large stone. He heaved the stone aside and underneath there was a piece of oilcloth wrapped around a briefcase. He removed the briefcase, as good as new except for a slight earthy smell, and heaved the stone back on top of the oilcloth. Brushing himself off as well as possible, he waited until the path was momentarily clear, then stepped out, briefcase in hand, to saunter casually down the path in the lovely springtime air, for the Underground and freedom.
Fox at the Front (Fox on the Rhine) Page 67