Avenging Steel: The First Collection

by Hall, Ian

  And hence me.

  I swerved lightly and carried on past the street opening. Damn! I had lost the ladies, yes, but I’d not been caught by the stooge in the garden. I’d know better next time.

  I also now knew that there was a cell operating in my own area.

  Bruntsfield.

  I wondered how many more were in Edinburgh.

  The Unveiling of Marta Fulkes

  The next morning I didn’t say a thing to Alice about her meeting. We shared porridge, and finished it with lightly-browned toast. At seven forty we swept down the hallway to work as a bleary-eyed Frances roused for school.

  The tram-ride was hardly the place for secret talk, so I made light chat. We spoke of a new radio station the Germans had started a few days before. The presenters were Scottish, but the message was clear; be a good boy, listen to superior German occupiers, do not talk subversive subjects, work for the good of Europe.

  I’d never considered myself a European; I don’t know many Scots who did. I was British, yes, even though the King and Queen now lived in Canada. I was Scottish, obviously, years of history classes had taught me that. But European? That was a new one to consider. I thought of what I held Europe to be; the French had been beaten, the Poles too, and the Italians were a culture all to themselves. Even the few Italian soldiers I’d seen in Edinburgh were ill-disciplined, ill-mannered and arrogant, way beyond their stature as allies of the Third Reich.

  We soon alighted on the Bridges, walked up the short hill, and across the road to the office. I could feel the soft air on my face, a wind from the south, perhaps the first of the year. The fleeting Scottish summer was only a month or two away, and I wondered if we’d see any real sun this year.

  Once inside the office, Alice opened up. “We have to get our stories done in rapid order this morning.”

  “Oh, yes?”

  She grinned at me not asking why. “I’m taking you out to lunch.”

  “Oh you are, are you?” I said in comic falsetto.

  “My treat,”

  I still had a fair bit of cash left over from the Troon operation, but I didn’t mind it being my own secret; I was sure it would come in handy one day.

  “Can I ask where we’re going?”

  She shook her head as she busied herself. “Nein. Es ist ein wenig privat, sehr gehobenen Klasse.”

  Ooh. Kind of private, very high-class; upper class. I wondered what she could have gotten us tickets to.

  I handed my stories to Möller’s office as usual, and got a folder in return. “The glorious Third Reich has yesterday accepted the capitulation of the Baltic States. The information is there for a story.”

  Yup, there was no way I could hide my ignorance. “Baltic States?”

  “Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia; they are all now German territory. It is only a matter of time before we control the whole of Europe.”

  “Of course,”

  His left eyebrow rose questioningly. “Do you doubt it?”

  I felt unsure if he wanted the truth or my version of his propaganda. “Well, Leutnant Möller, I feel I would be remiss to allow my own personal feelings to sway my judgement.”

  “Ah, your precious soldaten?”

  Well, we are still fighting you, sir.”

  “There is a distinction.” He gave me a cocky grin. “You fight the Italians in the desert; they are drittklassigen.” His face searched for the English term, and to be honest, I almost gave the game away; I almost finished his sentence for him. “Third-rate! You do not fight the mighty German soldiers; you have fought them twice already and found yourselves running away both times.”

  Despite wanting to wipe the smug smile from his lips, I even resisted a sneer. Truth be told, the British Army had faced Hitler’s Panzers twice in four months, and twice been given a bloody nose. I hoped Churchill would add to his weekly rhetoric and throw some muscle into the war along with his weighty words. The morale wasn’t bad here in Edinburgh, but we could use a boost at some point soon. “Yes, Leutnant Möller, in recent history, we have fallen rather short.”

  “Ha, you yearn for another Waterloo, like your father’s regiment.”

  “Perhaps, Leutnant Möller, perhaps.” I swear I almost clicked my heels together, mimicking their crisp step to attention. “If you will excuse me, I have a lecture to attend.”

  “Yes, Herr Baird, you go to your little lecture, leave the running of your country to me.”

  The little shit.

  But I had new information. Thanks to Möller, a new column of The War through German Eyes would soon write itself.

  As I exited the German Headquarters building, I recalled my role in the Troon operation with some satisfaction. I remembered snapping the traitor Charlie Peacock’s neck with my own hands, wishing right now it were Möller’s. As I stepped quickly down the cobbled wynd towards the huge parade ground, I remember Ivanhoe’s words just a few days after my return.

  ‘Our commandoes hit seventeen bombers that night, James. And we got every single man back onto the landing craft and off to safety.’

  Yes, I had played my part. Yes, Leutnant Möller, may your neck be in my hands one day, and I will add to my own feeling of fulfillment by sending you to hell.

  “Gehen direkt in die Hölle,” I muttered as I passed the usual rows of vehicles, visualizing poor Leutnant Möller floating down the road to Hell.

  One of Edinburgh’s endearing properties is that it is small. So many buildings, so many people, yet the whole of the midsection is barely three miles square. With Alice holding my hand, I found nothing out of the ordinary in us walking to our destination. Up the Royal Mile, along George IV Bridge, turning along Forest Road, heck it was almost as if she was taking me to the University Union bar.

  When we turned along Lauriston Place, however, we slowed. Lines of German trucks blocked the road. “What’s going on?” I asked.

  Alice shook her head, her expression worried. “I don’t know.”

  We paused, Alice pulling back on my hand, obviously confused. “Where are we going?” I asked. “I can help. Just tell me.”

  “The hospital,” she was craning her neck to see along the road. I couldn’t detect any roadblock, just a line of trucks.

  I tugged at her hand. “Come on, we’ve done nothing wrong.” I pulled her along the road. A hundred yards along, I could see the problem. “They’re being directed into George Heriot’s School.”

  “I don’t know it.” She said, her face still showing concern to our proximity to the German trucks.

  “Big private school; the best in Edinburgh. I almost got in, but had to settle for George Watson’s.”

  Alice was all for leaving, but she braved the idling German trucks. Once past, she yanked me away from my observations and down the slip road to the Hospital.

  Edinburgh Royal Maternity Hospital and Simpson Memorial Maternity Pavilion.

  Man that was a heck of a title.

  I had visited a few relatives here, but could remember nothing of France’s birth, her being just six years younger.

  Alice knew where she was going, slipping through a small red-painted door, and along corridors and up tight spiral staircases. Before long I knew we were high in the building, looking out small windows hatched with lead diamond-shaped strips. The glass was old, probably original, and that put it as maybe a couple of hundred years.

  At the top of the stairs, a corridor led to the left, a door on the right, marked ‘Storeroom’.

  Alice opened the door, and we walked inside to racks of papers, dusty folders and cardboard boxes. To my surprise she took hold of a small hand brush, and tapped the wooden handle on the metal shelf, three times, replacing it when she was done. Just when the question ‘what are you doing?’ was on the tip of my tongue, the shelf slid inward, along with the wall behind it; a most unsettling sight.

  Behind the wall lay an office, and a young man in a brown caretaker’s dustcoat. “You’re late.”

  “There’s a line of German tr
ucks outside, I almost scrubbed coming.”

  The man nodded, stepping to the side to let us in. “We would have understood. But it’s not us they’re interested in; it seems they’re taking over George Heriots as a headquarters.” His accent was Scottish, maybe Lanark, maybe more central.

  “They can’t do that!” I snapped. “It’s a privately owned school!”

  He pushed the wall back into place, and I could see it moving on silent rubber rollers. “They can do whatever they damn-well please, old boy.” He said, taking particular care in fixing the wall carefully. “They’re the conquering nation.”

  I thought of the years of history, the thousand or so rich kids who would suddenly be out on the street, school-less. I gave a wry smile, they were always smug little shits anyway.

  We were led into a small ante-room, then into an office where a middle-aged man rose from a plain table. We shook hands, and he nodded to Alice. “No names here, we know you, you don’t need to know us.” His voice was clearly English, very clipped, very educated, I put him at London or somewhere close.

  I nodded. “Sounds fair.” I looked around. I could not see one piece of paper anywhere in the room, totally sterile.

  “You’ve been vetted to the highest degree, that’s why you’re here.” I sat down, Alice beside me. The younger man closed the door behind us, remaining outside. “We have a mission for you both. It’s been sanctioned by your lot,” he looked at me, “And our lot.” He obviously meant him and Alice.

  Yes, for the first time, it had been admitted that Alice and I worked for two differing ‘lots’.

  “Thanks to you two, we’ve established that Major Dieter Kahn is one of the true centre-line Nazis in town.”

  “Centre-line?” I asked. I didn’t expect explanation.

  “The core; more Nazi Party than Army.” He said, and I nodded understanding. “We think he’s got a copy of the list, and because he’s outside the main Army security cordon, we think he’s open to infiltration.” He shifted in his seat, wringing his hands together. “This is not going to be easy, but we’ve got a plan that might work. Alice here has regional German off to a T, so we’re setting her up as a Party Operative; Marta Fulkes. Marta’s cover story is that she’s just off a plane from Germany, arrived in Edinburgh, and it’s her job to help entice some of the more difficult people on the list into the open.”

  “And me?” I asked. I couldn’t help but ask.

  “You’re her Edinburgh contact; you’ve been a plant here for years.”

  I laughed. “I’m only twenty.”

  “Yes, you’ll be getting a bit of an overhaul, I’m afraid. After our make-up girls are done, you’ll look ten years older, maybe more; your own mother won’t recognize you.”

  Oh boy. I gave a shiver; this was more in-depth than I had ever been.

  “You’ll have the necessary documentation, of course. We’ve already sent the paperwork to Kahn, he’ll be expecting you.” He gave us both a hard stare. “We’ve set you up to see the list; he’s expecting to liaise with you on it. The first man you’ll target is, of course, Max Born.”

  “Who has already been taken out of the game,” I said, half a question; I didn’t know the current circumstances.

  “Yes, he’s safe, but it’s a good ploy to push Kahn back on his heels a bit, make him nervous. Kahn has to be given his pace, yes, but he must also feel that you, Marta, are the main player, the ranking official sent from Germany to ensure nothing goes wrong. You have clout in Germany, you’re a rising star. You can hit Kahn hard, he won’t retaliate.”

  “Do the German’s know Born has already shot-the-crow?” I asked.

  The man shook his head. “We don’t exactly know for sure. If he doesn’t know anything about it, Alice can play the card that she knows, Kahn doesn’t. If it turns out he does know, she can castigate him for his inefficiency.”

  I nodded. It all seemed perfectly plausible.

  “The mission criteria? First, you must see the list. Second, you must photograph the list; you’ll be given a small camera for such a purpose. Third, get out without Kahn being suspicious. If we get away with this, we can use the Marta character again. Our main objective is to get you two out unharmed. However, if anything goes wrong, your orders are clear. You’ll both be armed, you need to silence Kahn, and copy the list. Now, we need to leave the list on the premises; if the German’s arrive at the scene and find their precious list gone, our advantage is lost. They’ll raid the country, snatching everyone. Their resources are far greater than our own; we need time to get these people out of harm’s way, and out of the country. And we’ve got to do it safely; that takes time and preparation. The Nazis just have to eliminate them; that’s much easier to accomplish.”

  He sat back on his chair. I felt he had completed his briefing. “So when do we do this?”

  “Why, tonight, old boy,” he leaned forward, grinning at my obvious discomfort. “The meeting’s set up for eight o’clock tonight.”

  Crap.

  Biggles Collects Papers

  Dieter Kahn lived in a mansion on Grange Road. I wasn’t sure who the house originally was owned by, but I got the immediate feeling that the German officer hadn’t procured it by strictly legal means. Two soldiers stood outside, roused to attention by our sudden presence. “Papiere, bitte,” A request, not an instruction.

  I stood back, letting Alice/Marta play the lead, settling back to a more people-watching mood. The soldier looking at her papers suddenly came to attention, his arm shooting out a stiff 45 degree salute. “Heil Hitler!”

  Alice returned it with a very limp version of the gesture, I almost grinned at her impertinence.

  We were shown inside, and our coats taken by a nervous-looking maid. My fake beard and mustache felt tickly on my face, and I swear a hair was trying to crawl up my nose. The world looked slightly blurred through my new glasses; my hair had fine talcum powder swept through it. I’d seen the results in the mirror; I looked almost forty.

  It came as little surprise that Dieter Kahn was an unassuming man, thin, with a wan, almost pasty complexion. He wore his wire-rimmed glasses on the end of his nose, looking over them constantly. Basically, he was a thirty-year old child trying very hard to look sixty.

  “You are here direct from Germany?” Kahn’s voice was as gratingly annoying as his appearance. His German was precise, clipped, almost as if reading a script. I looked on as if I did not understand a word.

  Alice gave him a smile, but it was veneer thin. “I flew in today.”

  “And I am your first call?”

  “The matter is of the utmost importance to the Fatherland.” Alice said. Her tone was cutting in contempt, almost a slap in the face. “Do not think we take the list lightly.”

  He offered us cognac, which we both accepted. He called the maid to pour, and if I thought she was nervous before, she was positively skittish whilst around Kahn; I suspected he was abusing her on some level. I wished he’d make a play for Alice so I could kill him. Kahn announced the brandy as French, poured from a crystal decanter. I’m pretty sure the crystal was local, Edinburgh being famous for it. The thick liquid swam heavily in the glass, but it tasted smooth on the way down.

  “Who on the list concerns you?” Kahn asked.

  “It all concerns me, Herr Kahn.” I’m sure Alice dropped his rank on purpose. “But the men at the University; they warrant our immediate attention.”

  “I had not been informed…”

  “You have, now!” Alice slurred her German in annoyance. “Bring me the list, we must make plans.” She snapped her fingers, and I could see Kahn’s smooth demeanor ruffling; he resented her presence, and that emotion played into our hands.

  Kahn crossed the room and opened a small drawer under a table, hardly the place to keep a top-secret document. I could hardly have been more excited by the papers he handed over, but the appearance was a disappointment; maybe six or seven pages of dirty, well-thumbed sheets, held together with three staples down
one side.

  Alice took it, and sat down, despite the comfort not being offered by our host.

  Kahn looked at me, but I stared resolutely at Alice. I could not show him any chink for him to question me. I was the body-guard, nothing more.

  “Max Born.” She looked up from the list. “Tell me about him.”

  He flustered, he stuttered, then reluctantly, his shoulders fell. “I regret to inform you, Frau Fulkes, I have not studied the list.”

  Alice flashed him a look of reprimand. “Then why do you think you have it?”

  Again that reluctance to admit his ineffectuality. “I do not know…”

  “Silence!” she sat up, almost ready to stand, then relaxed again. Then she looked at me. “Water.”

  I nodded, and walked out, only to tumble into the maid, probably ear-wigging in the hallway. “What are you doing?” I hissed, shooing her away from me.

  “Es tut mir leid , Sir , das habe ich nicht…” her German apology sounded Mid European, Polish, perhaps more Slavic.

  I grabbed her by the arm. “Where’s the kitchen?” I said, only to see her eyes cloud in bewilderment. “Wo ist die Küche? Mein Chef will ein Glas Wasser trinken.”

  The poor girl was so tense, I could feel her body shake, but I knew I could not console her; I could not drop my serious persona for a second. The kitchen was larger than my sitting room, with a central table and six chairs. A whole cupboard of tumblers sat behind a glass door.

  I returned to Alice with a cold glass of water, straight from the tap.

  “… and we expect a higher level of vigilance.” Alice was now standing, still brow-beating poor Kahn. “When Berlin selects those to rise in the Party, we do not take kindly to our choices letting us down.” She drank some of the water, and passed the rest back to me with a look of disgust. “I need some fresh air. Herr Kahn, show me the garden.”