Nazi Magician: Inventor

by Ward Wagher

“You already did.”

  Some of the leftover sausage from the New Year’s meal formed a part of the breakfast. The Beckers were masters at taking nothing much and turning it into a decent meal. Although Dieter was not particularly hungry after the huge buffet at the hotel, this seemed tastier, and he dug in.

  As they completed breakfast, Dieter caught Frau Hohltaube’s eye.

  “Do you have a moment for a question, Frau Hohltaube?”

  “Of course, Herr Faust.”

  The rooming house had a small sitting room near the front of the building, and she drew him into its slight privacy. She looked at him expectantly.

  “Rolf Kaaden and a couple of Gestapo goons visited me in the middle of the night. They took me to his hotel room. He remembered seeing me when he was outside the deli and then nothing until he was back at his hotel.”

  The old lady tilted her head slightly. “He is more perceptive than I thought. That is dangerous.”

  “But he also handed me a packet of cash as a bonus and gave me breakfast.”

  “This is perplexing,” she said. “We must be cautious, Herr Faust.”

  “Oh, I am. I had thought to use the cash to support our escape, but I wonder if it would be of any use in America.”

  “Likely not. Please give it to me, and I will see if I can do something for you.”

  He pulled the envelope out of his pocket and handed it to her. She seemed to slip it out of his hand without his feeling it gone.

  “How are your preparations to leave?”

  “I think we are just about ready. Some of the devices must be mounted in the car, but we can do that along the road if it becomes necessary.”

  “Then, we should discuss a good time to arrange your escape.”

  Florian stopped in front of the door to the sitting room. “Are you ready to go, Dieter.”

  He turned back to her. “Thank you, Frau Hohltaube.”

  “Events are in play, Herr Faust. Now is the time to be very careful.”

  “I understand.”

  And Dieter left the room.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  January 2, 1940

  Dieter remained nervous during the day. The early morning visit with Rolf had rattled him. Things did not make sense. He doodled idly in his laboratory notebook and waited for the muse to strike. He wondered how many devices it was possible to build using the magical approach he had discovered. What would happen when he could no longer deliver on Rolf’s wishes or the Führer’s demands for that matter.

  He failed to notice as Rolf walked into the lab then into Ignatz’s office. A few minutes later, the two walked out and over to Dieter’s bench. It was then he looked up and noticed them. He slid off his stool and stood.

  “Good afternoon, Dieter,” Rolf said. “I have a proposal, and I needed to get Ignatz’s agreement first.”

  “What is it you would like?”

  “I would like you, Florian and Karl, to travel to where the Magician Corps is bivouacked outside of Paris. You will review the combat experiences with the corps members and make notes on how we can improve the equipment.”

  “I would be happy to go,” Dieter nodded. “I serve the Reich.”

  Rolf smiled. “Excellent, Dieter. I have always appreciated your willing attitude. I know you are at a bit of a lull right now, so I thought it would be a good time to do this. Griping soldiers are something that dates back before recorded history, but I think it would be a good chance to improve on things.”

  Florian, having heard the conversation, drifted over. “And you need me to travel with Dieter?”

  “Yes, Florian. You two make a great team, and I do not want to break that up. And Karl works well with you too.”

  “When would we do this?” Dieter asked.

  “There is no time like the present. Can you be ready to leave in the morning? You should plan to stay there for several days. I think you would return by the end of the week.”

  “We can be ready.”

  “Fine. I have arranged for a JU52 to depart from the airstrip here on base at seven in the morning. You can park your automobile at flight operations. It will be safe enough there.”

  “I guess we will see you in the morning, then,” Florian said.

  “No. I won’t be going with you,” Rolf said. “Captain Boetzl will meet you when you land. He has been tasked with your transportation and lodging when you arrive. He is currently working on a roster of magicians for you to interview.”

  Later that afternoon, Dieter drove Florian and Jette back to the rooming house. The sun was low on the western horizon, and he held up one hand to block the sun and steered with the other.

  “Rolf must like you,” Florian commented.

  “He is an evil man,” Jette immediately said.

  “Oh, he is all of that.”

  “He steals from the Jews that the Gestapo pick up,” Dieter said. “And yet he thinks he’s a nice guy. He keeps giving me things.”

  “And he must trust us if he is sending us to Paris,” Florian added. “Ignatz seemed pleased Rolf was entrusting us with this mission.”

  “Ignatz worries a lot,” Jette said. “He is frightened of the Gestapo.”

  “We are all frightened of the Gestapo,” Florian stated forcefully. “Especially now that we are planning to escape Germany. If they find out about it, we will end up in the camps.”

  “More likely, we will die,” Dieter said. “They have got to know what we are capable of creating. No matter where we run to, the Nazis will do whatever they can to hunt us down. If they pull us in, it will not be pleasant.”

  Jette shivered. “I will not allow them to catch me. I will die first. All Nazis are animals.”

  “We will not allow them to catch you,” Florian said, turning to smile at her as she huddled in the back seat. “What should we do with the equipment in the car, Dieter? You probably do not want to leave this parked on base with it all packed in here.”

  “Do you suppose Frau Hohltaube would store it in her room?”

  “We can ask,” Dieter said. “Actually, you can ask since you suggested it.”

  “What’s the matter, Dieter, still afraid of the old woman?”

  “Now that you mention it, yes.”

  “You two are cowards,” Jette spat. “I will speak with Frau Hohltaube. She is a wonderful lady.”

  “If you say so,” Florian replied.

  She leaned forward and cuffed him on the back of the head. “You aren’t helping matters.”

  “I think you’ve been corrected, Florian,” Dieter said with a smile.

  Then, Jette cuffed Dieter on the back of the head. “And you need to be more respectful as well. So, are we ready to leave Frankfort?”

  “I think we are probably as ready as we can be. We still need to mount some of the devices in the car. But we can do that anywhere. So yes, I think we could leave anytime. Have you gotten the foodstuffs prepared?”

  “I have a list of items. Frau Hohltaube said they would be ready when we leave.”

  “How does she know when we will leave?” Florian asked.

  “I asked her that. She repeated that things would be ready for us. If she said so, it will be so.”

  Dieter and Florian looked at each other.

  “I saw that. Listen, hasn’t Frau Hohltaube done everything she said she would? And remember what happened at the delicatessen last night.”

  “And you think Frau Hohltaube did that?” Dieter asked.

  “What do you think? Do you have any other explanation?”

  “Okay, okay. Let’s get inside. I don’t want to be late for dinner.”

  “Always worried about your stomach, Dieter?” Florian grinned.

  “Considering you usually get to the table ahead of me, there’s an inconsistent element there.”

  As the corrugated metal tri-motor thrashed its way across the early morning skies from Frankfort, Dieter and Florian gazed out their respective windows. It was hard to see the ground below and ahead
of them because of the early morning haze. Neither had flown before and were excited about being in an aircraft.

  Karl worked hard to give the appearance of relaxed indifference, as did the fourteen other passengers. He sat in the row ahead of them and read the morning’s newspaper. Dieter thought he spotted the man sneaking curious looks outside the plane. He was a decent travel companion, despite his rabid Nazism, and had given them suggestions on what to pack and what to expect.

  Florian and Dieter had an intense discussion on the way to the base that morning. Florian was nervous about leaving Jette behind. Dieter was more inclined to believe that Frau Hohltaube would keep an eye on things. He was more worried about how they would proceed after leaving Frankfort. He wasn’t sure how they would pass through the numerous checkpoints the Gestapo had set up along the roads. Once into France, the German occupation force would be even more prevalent and aggressive.

  He wondered if they should simply use the anti-gravity device immediately and fly across eastern Germany and all of France and then across the Atlantic. The invisibility cloak that they had just recently perfected would protect them from curious eyes. But, he wasn’t sure how fast they would be able to fly and how long it would take them to make the trip.

  The enforced idleness of the trip allowed Dieter to ponder the aspects of the upcoming… he wasn’t sure what to call it. It was a trip, an adventure, and a grand roll of the dice. They had been so focused on planning for the escape; they had not given much thought to where they should plan to arrive in the United States and who they would contact.

  Thus far, Germany was not at war with the United States, so he thought the Germans could logically demand the return of the magician equipment, and possibly the three of them. Considering the strategic value of the magical devices he had created, he thought the Americans would work out a way to avoid publicizing their arrival. As a result, he thought they would be wise to land at the first military base they encountered. The chain of command would ensure the right people would hear about them rapidly. But America was a big land. It might be hard to locate military facilities.

  Dieter began swallowing to equalize the pressure in his ears. He guessed they were descending. The pilot told them they were flying to St. Denis, which was on the north side of Paris. The SS Magician Corps had established their French headquarters there, and it would, therefore, be a good working base for the trip.

  The JU 52 landed smoothly on the grass runway and taxied to a rudimentary operations building. A graying middle-aged man in the uniform of an SS Captain stood outside the building and watched as the pilots shut the engines down. A Luftwaffe corporal walked over to the plane and opened the cargo hatch, then began tossing luggage out on the ground.

  “Not as refined as our base in Frankfort,” Florian murmured as they climbed down the ladder from the airplane.

  “This was enemy territory until just a few days ago,” Dieter commented. “I’m surprised they have something like this up and running already.”

  The SS captain walked up to them, so he apparently knew who to look for.

  “Fritz Boetzl, meine Herren,” he said softly.

  The three from Frankfort introduced themselves.

  “I have a car waiting,” Boetzl said. “I left the guards there. There is no real danger to us here; however, the car can be stolen the moment you look the other direction. I will take you to the hotel we have coopted for now.”

  “Is the hotel just for guests?” Karl asked

  “No, we have the magician corps quartered there. Since the corps won the war for us, nobody is disposed to argue about giving them first-class lodgings. Plus, you won’t have to wander around the town. We haven’t had any incidents of the locals sticking a knife in our people, but I wanted to be safe.”

  “Sounds good to me,” Florian said. “I think getting stuck with a knife would hurt.”

  “Indeed,” Boetzl said with a smile. “Shall we go?”

  Once they were had checked in and visited their rooms, they met the captain again in the hotel dining room for dinner. He spent the time in innocuous conversation, and Dieter was puzzled as to the man’s actual role. There were no complaints about the food, however. Dieter worked hard to maintain his usual visage, even though his planned escape from Germany was continually on his mind.

  The various members of the Magicians Corps wandered in at different times and ordered their dinner from the menu. The wait staff seemed to have no trouble understanding German.

  “Our Supply Corps allows the hotel to shop from our supplies. Since we appropriated the hotel, it was hardly fair to force them to purchase foodstuffs and serve them to us gratis.”

  “So, they are working for us?” Karl asked.

  “That may be a bit of an exaggeration. The hotel management is naturally not happy about us overrunning their country, but they have been cooperative. It is worse in Paris proper.”

  After completing a very satisfying meal, Boetzl suggested they return to their rooms for the evening. He planned to start the reviews right after breakfast. The captain seemed to be a mild man, but he was business-like as well as pleasant. Dieter fell into a dreamless sleep that night. Air travel was more tiring than he thought it would be. And the rest of the week promised to be busy.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  January 3, 1940

  “The suits are uncomfortable and are either too warm or too cool. The equipment weighs too much for marching. And besides, we look foolish in the suits.”

  “What do you mean, look foolish?” Karl asked.

  “War is a serious business, meine Herren. It is not a joke. And we are out there putting our lives on the line for the Führer and the Fatherland dressed like the comic opera.”

  Dieter, Florian, and Karl sat across the table from the Magician corporal and looked at each other. Captain Boetzl was in the room as well, but sat in the corner and said nothing, only listening.

  “Do you know why you are dressed like that?” Florian asked softly.

  “That it is a way to deceive the enemy? That is so lächerlich. Ridiculous. No rational person believes in magic. Perhaps if I had a cap with a bell on it like a court jester, the enemy would die laughing. We would need the magical weapons, though.”

  “You don’t believe the weapons are magical, then?” Florian asked.

  The corporal gave him an old-fashioned look. “With all due respect, meine Herren, I did not fall off the turnip truck.” He waved a hand. “Oh, I freely admit I don’t understand how these things work. But it’s 1940. Nobody believes in magic anymore.”

  “Do you feel the weapons are effective?” Dieter asked.

  “Mein Gott, yes! Do you take me for a fool? There is nothing that can stand up before us on the field.”

  “Are you more comfortable than the Wehrmacht soldiers?” Karl asked.

  “Hey,” the corporal replied, “you asked me what I thought, so I told you. The weapons are amazing. And I suppose I would prefer being a little too warm in my suit than marching through the mud and snow, waiting for a frog to put a bullet in my head. But things could be so much better.”

  “Let’s talk about the weapons for a few moments,” Florian suggested.

  “Who are you?”

  “I am Florian Goldstein. I work in a lab with Dieter and Karl.”

  “Isn’t Goldstein a Jewish name?”

  “And that is just about enough!” Karl shouted. “I am prepared to accept a certain amount of informality in these interviews, but I will not tolerate such insinuations. Is that clear?”

  The corporal seemed to jump to attention, even while sitting in his chair. “Jawohl, Herr Helmholz. I apologize if I was out of line.”

  “You were out of line, and I accept your apology.”

  The room remained quiet after the outburst, and finally, Dieter spoke again.

  “Was there anything else you wanted to add to your comments?”

  “No, Herr Faust. I thank you for your time.”

  After
the corporal left, Karl leaned forward so he could see Florian. “You have my apologies. I have seen this repeatedly in the Magicians Corps. These weapons give them god-like powers, and they get cocky. I don’t want you to think we believe that you are one of those verdammte Jews.”

  “Of course, Karl,” Florian said. “I appreciate your consideration.”

  “You and Dieter are the most valuable team in the Reich. If it weren’t for the work you two have done, we all would be carrying rifles right now,”

  Karl nodded, then turned before shouting, “Send in the next interviewee.”

  This time a middle-aged sergeant walked in and seemed more respectful.

  “We love our new weapons, meine Herren,” he said. “To be able to pour fire upon the French without worrying about even a scratch is amazing. These youngsters do not understand what a hell the last war was for those of us in the trenches. The new weapons have saved tens of thousands of lives. Even the level of casualties for the French was low. Perhaps they will not hate us so much.”

  “What would you change if you could?” Karl asked.

  “Very little. True, the gear is a bit heavy, but it is no worse than what the average soldier carries. I wonder if the magician outfit is even necessary.” He grinned. “But it is hard to argue with success.”

  The three men gathered around the table in the hotel restaurant for their evening meal. They were also discussing the day’s interviews.

  “Any thoughts on how we might organize a report?” Karl asked. “I am just about hopeless with my writing.”

  Dieter shrugged. “I usually leave that up to Florian. He has a fine hand.”

  “Oh, thank you very much,” Florian replied. “I have begun roughing in an outline and some of the text. We will need to decide what we want to recommend. I assume we can have somebody back at the lab type up the report.”

  “And what are your thoughts, meine Herren?” Captain Boetzl asked. “It seemed to me like we had a good variety of opinions represented today.”

  “The younger soldiers were far more critical,” Florian said. “I wonder if we made a mistake by not having them go through the same training as the Wehrmacht.”