They laughed at each other, and the Berber walked to where the horses were being held. He swung easily into a tooled leather saddle, then called out the names of half a dozen men, who trotted to the horses and mounted. They rode out of the courtyard as the German prisoners were led inside.
The Germans appeared terrified.
What the hell, Fulmar thought, I’d be terrified too if I was being led with a rope around my neck into a King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table palace by a bunch of guys with blue faces and submachine guns.
He turned to another Berber.
“The stocky one,” he said. “The one without the leather equipment. Take him inside to the small room or the library. Leave someone with him and make sure that no one else goes into the room with him.”
“And the others?”
“Take them into the main room and get them something to eat and drink. They are not to be bothered.”
“Not even their boots?”
“Not even their boots,” Fulmar said. “They fought well. They deserve honorable treatment.”
When the French arrived and had been herded into the courtyard, Fulmar walked up to them.
“On behalf of His Excellency Sidi Hassan el Ferruch, Pasha of Ksar es Souk, I welcome you to his home. You will be fed and cared for, and when it is time, you will be taken behind American lines.”
He spoke in French. They seemed to accept him as a French-speaking Berber. At least he got no surprised, wary looks.
He was a little puzzled at the lack of excitement. No joy. No cries of pleasure. Then he realized that these people had expected to be taken somewhere in the desert and shot to death by the SS. They were in shock. They hadn’t quite understood yet that they would live.
One of them, a wiry, intense little man, pulled himself together enough to start questioning Fulmar.
But Fulmar turned and walked off without letting him finish. He went into the palace to the small room off the library.
There was a Berber outside the door, and another inside. The German officer was sitting awkwardly on a three-legged stool, his hands still tied behind him.
Fulmar walked over to him, took a curved blade knife from a jewel-encrusted scabbard on the gold cords around his waist, and cut him free.
“Have someone bring my cognac,” Fulmar ordered. “And coffee and oranges and some meat.”
“Sprechen Sie Deutsch?” the German officer asked as he rubbed his wrists.
"Absolutely,” Fulmar said in flawless German. “I’m an Alt-Marburger, you know—an alumnus of Philips University, Marburg an der Lahn.”
"You’re Fulmar?” the German asked, genuinely surprised.
“At your service, Herr Obersturmbannführer,” Fulmar said. “Where the hell did that armored car come from? That could have sent this whole operation down the toilet!”
“What was I supposed to say? ‘Thank you, I don’t need an armored car’?”
“It could have fucked things up,” Fulmar repeated, repressing a smile.
They looked at each other.
“This is a little strange, isn’t it?” Fulmar asked.
There had been a brief moment’s emotion. But as quickly as it had come up, both seemed anxious to restrain it.
"Are you going to live up to your end of the bargain? ” the German asked.
“As soon as we get everybody safely out of sight, I’ll take you back to your car,” Fulmar said.
“And what happens between there and Ourzazate?”
“You’re safe between here and there,” Fulmar said. “If I were you, I’d be worried about getting from Ourzazate to Rabat.”
The game was over, Fulmar thought. And the pawns had not been swept from the board.
He wondered why he had no feeling of exultation, and the answer came immediately: A new game had already begun.
[THREE]
The Franco-German Armistice Commission Rabat, Morocco 10 November 1942
Helmut von Heurten-Mitnitz was not in his office when Obersturmbannführer SS-SD Johann Müller went there looking for him. But Müller found him calmly packing his luggage in his apartment, a high-ceilinged well-furnished suite overlooking a palm-lined boulevard in the center of town.
Von Heurten-Mitnitz was a tall, sharp-featured Pomeranian aristocrat, the younger brother of the Graf von Heurten-Mitnitz. He was the sixth generation of his family to serve his country as a diplomat.
"Good afternoon, Obersturmbannführer,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said dryly as he placed a shirt in his suitcase. “You have doubtless come to tell me that our courageous French allies have driven the Americans into the sea?”
Obersturmbannführer Johann Müller snorted.
“In a pig’s ass they have,” he said.
"What is the situation?” von Heurten-Mitnitz asked.
Müller told him what had taken place just outside Ksar es Souk and of his meeting with Fulmar.
“Finally, face-to-face, eh?” Helmut von Heurten-Mitnitz said. “What’s he like?”
“I thought he was an Arab at first,” Müller said. Von Heurten-Mitnitz looked at him, waiting for him to go on. “And somehow I expected him to be older,” Müller said. “Good-looking kid. Well set up. Smart. Sure of himself. ”
Von Heurten-Mitnitz nodded thoughtfully. The description was more or less what he had expected.
“And what of the other Americans?” von Heurten-Mitnitz asked dryly.
“I think the Americans will be here in Rabat in twenty-four hours,” Müller said.
“Something is slowing them down?” von Heurten-Mitnitz asked.
“There’s a reliable rumor going around that they had to waste two hours sinking the invincible French North African fleet,” Müller replied.
“Well, it appears that you and I are to be preserved from the Americans in order to assist in the future victory of the Fatherland. Passage has been arranged for you and me, and not more than one hundred kilos of official papers, et cetera, aboard a Junkers at half past eight,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said. “There is a fifty-kilo allowance for personal luggage.”
"Why so late?” Müller asked.
“The Americans also wasted several hours sweeping the invincible French Service de l’aire from the skies,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said. “It was a choice between a U-boat and the Junkers at night.”
Müller walked to a table and picked up a bottle of Steinhager.
“May I?” he asked, already pouring some of the liquor into a glass.
“Of course,” Helmut von Heurten-Mitnitz said. “And would you be good enough to pour one for me?”
When Müller handed von Heurten-Mitnitz the small, stemmed glass, he asked,“Did you know what the Americans had in mind?”
Helmut von Heurten-Mitnitz met his eyes.
“Not in the way I think you mean,” he said. “I knew they were coming. It was the logical thing for them to do, and I knew they were capable of mounting a transatlantic invasion force. But they didn’t tell me about it. Murphy, in fact, went out of his way to lead me to believe the Americans intended to reinforce the British from Cairo.”
“Then they didn’t trust you,” Müller said simply. “So why trust them?”
Helmut von Heurten-Mitnitz sipped at his Steinhager before replying.
“The simple answer to that, Johann,” he said,“is that I have—we have— no choice but to trust them. Do you understand? I didn’t expect them to tell me details of their invasion.”
“We could arrange to be captured here,” Müller went on doggedly. “Have you thought about that? We just don’t show up at the airport.”
“That would work for you,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said. “If you want, you can do just that.”
“It wouldn’t work for you? Why not?”
“You would be considered a soldier and become a POW,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said. “I have a diplomatic passport. I’m quite sure they would put me on a plane to Lisbon for return to Germany.”
“Not if you said you didn’t want
to go,” Müller said.
“But I have to go, Johnny,” von Heurten-Mitnitz, said. “You understand that.”
Müller snorted, drained his Steinhager, and poured another.
“You have to put things in perspective,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said. “Although it just began, the invasion of North Africa is already history. What they want me for is the future.”
Müller grunted again.
“What they want us for, you mean.” He paused, frowning. “And aren’t you afraid that you—and, for that matter, me—that we’ll look bad in Berlin for not having done more than we did here?”
“Are we going to be blamed, you mean? Or regarded with suspicion?” von Heurten-Mitnitz asked and went on without waiting for a reply. “I don’t think so. I think what happened here will be regarded as yet another manifestation of French perfidy and ineptitude in battle. And with the Americans in Morocco, I think the Führer and his entourage will want to put the unpleasant subject out of mind. Until, of course, the Führer in his good time decides to take Morocco back.”
Müller snorted derisively.
“And have the Americans told you what they want from us in Germany?”
“To a degree,” Helmut von Heurten-Mitnitz said. “But I think the less you know about that now, the better.”
He closed his suitcase and buckled its leather straps.
“Are you packed?”
“I packed right after Fulmar telephoned me,” Müller said.
“Well, then, let’s collect your luggage and go out to the airfield,” von Heurten-Mitnitz said. He looked at Müller. “Johnny, if you want to stay and be captured, I’ll understand. I can also come up with a convincing story to explain it back home. You know, devotion to duty and all the rest of it.”
“Jesus Christ, don’t make it easy for me,” Müller said. “I’ve almost talked myself into staying. Almost, shit! When I walked in here, I was going to tell you I was staying. And then I remember what those swine did in Russia. What they’re doing in Germany, to Germans. . . .”
“Yes,”von Heurten-Mitnitz said, understanding.
He looked around the room. “I rather hate to be leaving,” he said. “There’s much about Morocco I really like.”
Müller looked at him.
"I wish we were going someplace besides Germany,” he said.
[FOUR]
Washington, D.C. 12 November 1942
OPERATIONAL IMMEDIATE
SUPREME HEADQUARTERS ALLIED EXPEDITIONARY FORCE
GIBRALTAR 1015 HOURS I2 NOV 42
JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF PENTAGON WASH DC
FOR COL W J DONOVAN OLD FRIENDS SAFE STOP NEW
FRIENDS GOING HOME STOP SIGNED MURPHY STOP END
The radio message was received and logged in at the Pentagon Message Center at 0515 hours, Washington time. Since it had been transmitted in the clear, no decryption was necessary. It was placed in Box G at 0517 hours.
Box G was emptied at 0528 hours, and its contents carried by armed messenger to the National Institutes of Health building, where it was logged in at 0605 hours. At 0615, the message was placed in a box marked DIRECTOR, by which time it had a red tag stapled to it, identifying it as an “Operational Immediate” message deserving the Director’s immediate attention.
At 0619 hours, the messages in the Director’s box were picked up by Chief Boatswain’s Mate J. R. Ellis, USN, a ruddy-faced, heavyset man of thirty-eight whose unbuttoned uniform jacket revealed a Colt .45 semiautomatic pistol carried high on his hip in a “skeleton” holster.
Ellis read the sheaf of messages, then put them into a briefcase. He buttoned his uniform jacket and went to the parking lot, where a white hat sailor, a torpedoman second class, sat behind the wheel of a Buick Roadmaster sedan. Ellis got into the front seat beside him.
“How they hanging, Chief?” the torpedoman asked, and then, without waiting for a reply, asked,“Georgetown?”
“Georgetown,” Ellis confirmed.
When Chief Ellis had joined the OSS—so early on that it was then the “Office of the Coordinator of Information”—he was a bosun’s mate first class just back from the Yangtze River Patrol, and he had been the driver of the Director’s Buick Roadmaster. His duties were different now, if somewhat vaguely defined. Newcomers to the OSS, particularly senior military officers who might naturally tend to assume a chief petty officer was available to do their bidding, were told two things about Chief Ellis: Only the Colonel and the Captain (which meant Colonel William J. Donovan, the Director of the OSS, and Captain Peter Douglass, USN, his deputy) gave orders to Chief Ellis.
More important, if the Chief asked that something be done, it was wise to presume he was speaking with the authority of at least the Captain.
When the Buick pulled to the curb before a Georgetown town house, a burly man in civilian clothing suddenly appeared from an alley. It was clearly his intention to keep whoever got out of the Buick from reaching the door of the town house.
And then he recognized Ellis, and the hand that had been inside his jacket reaching for his pistol, came out and was raised in a wave.
“What do you say, Chief?” he asked as Ellis stepped out of the car and walked toward the red-painted door of the building.
“I thought you got off at six,” Ellis said.
“So did I. Those sonsofbitches are late again,” the burly man said.
Colonel William J. Donovan opened his own front door. He was stocky and silver-haired, and he was dressed in a sleeveless undershirt. Shaving cream was still on his face.
“The damned alarm didn’t go off,” he said. “How much time do we have?”
“Enough,” Ellis said.
“You didn’t have to come here, Chief,” Donovan said. “I was going by the office anyway.”
He turned and motioned for Ellis to follow him inside.
“Something important in there?” Donovan asked, indicating the briefcase.
Ellis opened it and handed Donovan the sheaf of red tagged messages. Donovan read them, carefully, and then handed them back.
“Douglass see these yet?” he asked.
“No, sir, I thought I would send them back with the driver,” Ellis said.
“You saw Murphy’s radio?”
“Yes, sir.”
“There never was any doubt in your mind about that, was there, Chief?”
"Not about Fulmar,” Ellis said. "I wasn’t too sure about the Krauts.”
Donovan chuckled.
“Well, it worked,” Donovan said. “And just between you and me, there was more to it than appears.”
“I had sort of figured that out,” Ellis said. “I haven’t figured out what yet.”
It was a subtle request to be told. Donovan, as subtly, turned him down. “Have you had breakfast?”
Ellis hesitated.
“There’s a coffee shop at Anacostia,” he said.
“Which means you haven’t,” Donovan said. “Which means that you’ve been up all night, too. Am I right?”
“I figured I’d better stick around.”
“The cook’s not up,” Donovan said. “But I started the coffee. Do you think you could make us some ham and eggs without burning the kitchen down?”
“Yes, sir,” Ellis said.
“I’ll go put a shirt on,” Donovan said,“and grab my bags. I won’t be long.”
He started up the stairs, then turned.
“Ellis, maybe you’d better check with Anacostia. I’d hate to go all the way out there only to find we can’t fly out today.”
“I checked just before I came over here,” Ellis said.
“Yes, of course you would have,” Donovan said. “What would I do without you, Ellis?”
“I don’t know,” Ellis said seriously. “Without one man who knows what he’s doing, this outfit would be even more fucked up than it already is.”
It took Donovan a moment to realize that Ellis, in his own way, was making a joke.
Then he laughed, a hearty, deep lau
gh in his belly.
“Sunny-side up, Ellis, please,” he said. “And try not to burn the toast.” And then he continued up the stairs.
Ellis turned to a telephone on a small table against the wall and dialed a number.
“Ellis,” he said when the call was answered. “I’m at the Boss’s. We should leave here in thirty minutes. If you don’t hear from me again in two hours, tell the Captain that we’re on our way.”
Then he hung up, went into the kitchen, removed his uniform blouse, and, wearing an apron, he made breakfast for the two of them.
Ellis had learned to cook from a Chinese boy aboard the USS Panay of the Yangtze River Patrol. He often thought of that when he was pressed into cook service. That had been a long time ago. He’d seen a twenty-one-year-old seaman first striking for bosun third. Seventeen years ago.
But he’d only been back from China a short time. Just before the war started, they’d closed down the Yangtze Patrol and sailed what gunboats were left to the Philippines. They’d wanted to keep him in the Philippines, but his enlistment was up, and he didn’t think he wanted to serve in the Philippines, so he told them he wanted out, and they’d sent him home.
They’d been pissed, of course. Everybody knew the war was coming, and they didn’t want to let him out. But there was nothing they could do about it (enlistments had not yet been frozen). So they’d sent him back as unpleasantly as they could, making him work his way as supercargo on an old and tired coastal freighter headed for overhaul at San Diego. He’d thought then that since he would never see China again (he loved China), the best thing he could hope for was to keep his nose clean so he could get his twenty years in and retire with his rating.
That was not quite two years ago.
He had fallen into the shit and come up smelling like roses. The orders that were soon sending him back to China (and to Burma, and India, and Egypt, and England) described him as “the administrative assistant to the Director of the Office of Strategic Services.” Which meant that he was going to travel with the Colonel to all those places and take care of whatever he needed taken care of.
Soldier Spies Page 3