The Saboteur

by Andrew Gross

  He wanted to tell her these things—things he had never had the chance to say to Anna-Lisette or even Hella—though he knew it was foolish and far too risky. And though he felt he knew what was in her heart as well, he also knew she and her grandfather were still the guests of the SS.

  Still … A beat of doubt persisted inside him. He realized he wanted to tell her what he felt almost as much as he wanted the mission to succeed.

  “Eric,” he whispered, hearing the Yank turn. “Are you awake?”

  “This wooden floor isn’t exactly meant for sleeping. I’m embarrassed to say I’ve gotten used to mattresses over the past months.”

  “Tomorrow I have to go into town. Before our work. There’s someone I have to see.”

  “Who?” Gutterson pushed up on an elbow. Ox snored.

  “A friend.”

  “A friend…?”

  “Yes.”

  By his inflection, it was almost as if the Yank instinctively knew what sort of friend he meant. “Do you think that’s wise?”

  “You know me. I’ll be careful.”

  “If you have to, I suppose. But just remember what’s at stake.”

  “Yes,” Nordstrum agreed, vaguely.

  “Yes, there’s a lot at stake…?” the American asked after a pause.

  Nordstrum put his head back down. He wrapped himself in his blanket. “Yes, I have to.”

  69

  Friday night, in the glare of the klieglights, Dieter Lund walked the length of the train that would carry the heavy water down to Rjukan the next morning.

  Thirty-nine metal drums marked POTASH LYE, loaded onto two flatcars pulled by an engine. There, they would spend the day garrisoned in Rjukan under heavy guard. The following morning at eight o’clock they would proceed to the ferry landing at Mael where they would be put aboard the Hydro for the final journey across the lake.

  Lund’s handprint was on every aspect of the security. By any scrutiny, it was tight as a drum. Still, rumors were flying that something was afoot. An Allied bombing raid in Rjukan. A commando sabotage of the train. He and Gestapo chief Muggenthaler had gone over every step in great detail, shoring up every possible point of vulnerability. Once the shipment left the region, Lund knew his own importance would be diminished. The “golden goose,” as his Gestapo colleague liked to call it, would be gone. Rjukan would go back to being the remote, sleepy village it had always been, without its vital treasure. His Nazi overseer had promised that if all went well, a promotion would be in the works. Perhaps to major. Perhaps over the entire Telemark region. With that kind of title there was influence to peddle no matter who won the war. That was why it was vital no mistakes were made at the end. If this was the last point where the “golden goose” could shape his destiny, Lund would make sure it got to where it was going without a single drop being lost.

  There were one hundred elite SS troops who would line the railcars and, to much fanfare, accompany the heavy water drums on their trip down to Rjukan. Lund had pointed out that the tracks went right past the Norsk Hydro explosives bin, where two tons of dynamite were stored. They stationed ten men to stand guard over it for the next day and night.

  They also decided to send a trial train, a single engine, down the track an hour before the heavy water shipment, just to be certain no explosives had been laid. Fieseler Storch reconnaissance planes would patrol the skies above them, scanning for suspicious activity on the ground, and coastal watchers along the North Sea were on high alert for the first sign of Allied bombers. In Rjukan, where the cargo would be garrisoned Saturday night, the exact location of where it would rest had not been revealed—only Lund and Muggenthaler knew for sure—and it would be guarded by the full detachment of a hundred SS troops. To try something there would be suicide, for not only would it take a substantial force to even get close to their target, but individual charges would need to be set to destroy each of the drums—thirty-nine in total. The next morning, the procession would make the journey to the ferry port of Mael, where it would be quickly loaded onto the ferry. Even the ferry dock had guards stationed on it that night.

  Lund had also decided that he and five of his most trusted men would accompany the cargo across the lake. It was important to make a show that he was fully in control. What happened after, he could not vouch for, but nothing would interfere with the shipment while it was entrusted in his hands.

  Yet there were always rumors, rumors that something might be happening. In the plant, there were workers, scared of reprisals, who said there was an attempt in the works to sabotage the shipment. He couldn’t prove it, of course. The work had slowed a bit and the entire transfer process had been delayed a day to Sunday. Lund didn’t like that. And he didn’t trust that wormy chief engineer a bit. He’d had the man watched twenty-four hours a day. And if something was up, he knew who it was who was likely behind it. Though it had been months since he had actually seen him, Lund knew he was still here somewhere.

  Nordstrum.

  The man’s face was like a picture indelibly etched in Lund’s mind. If he was there, he would be spotted. There would be no risk acceptable, no margin for error tolerable, until the shipment crossed the lake to Tinnoset. Every base was covered.

  To this day, Lund still had no idea of the exact importance this “golden goose” bore. Only that it had the highest military value to the Germans. And that his own future had now become inextricably tied to it. Major. He imagined how it would feel. The rank suited him. He thought of the leaves on his jacket. Trudi would be pleased. He would show all the gossiping housewives and petty civil servants his schoolmates had become just who had made the right choices and who held the true power now.

  On Sunday, he would be on the train and the ferry himself.

  If Nordstrum showed his face, Lund would be there.

  70

  Saturday afternoon, Nordstrum asked a boy in town to drop a note at the front desk at the King Olaf Hotel in Rjukan, addressed to Fraulein N. Ritter. Natalie, if you are free, please meet me at the Mintzner Café on Prinzregent Street for coffee at 3:00 P.M. It is important that I see you. He signed it, One who maintains a keen interest in your hats.

  The Mintzner was a small, Austrian style café on a narrow street near the stock pens, where Germans were not known to go. Nordstrum prayed the letter had made it into her hands and that the time was all right for her. Just before three, he waited across the street, in the entrance of a small curio shop that closed Saturday afternoons. In case of any problem, he had his Colt tucked into his belt. It had begun to snow. By three, Natalie hadn’t arrived, and every passing minute convinced Nordstrum all the more she would not come. Why would she? Why would she even think of him? He had not contacted her all week.

  Yet at 3:09, just as he had begun to lose hope, he saw her come up the street and his heart brightened. She was dressed in her hooded wool shawl, a long skirt, and her boots in the snow, and she stood in front of the café to make sure it was the right place and then opened the door and went inside. Nordstrum waited two or three more minutes to be certain she had not been followed. When he was convinced everything was all right, he crossed the street, and after another look up and down, went in also.

  He saw her at a table in the corner. Her shawl was off, her hood down; she wore a pretty red sweater and her hair was in a bun. If she was angry at all at him for not being in touch, she did not show it. Her face grew pleased as she saw him come in. It was clear she felt the same as him. A few other tables were occupied, mostly couples talking. Coffee was a luxury in Norway these days, so what they served was watered-down beans, brewed multiple times.

  “Tea would be better,” he said as he sat across from her. “The coffee’s terrible. At least for us.”

  “I was happy to hear from you,” she said, ignoring the inference that perhaps the coffee shared by the Germans was fresher. “I had hoped it would be a bit sooner. I wasn’t sure.”

  “I’m sorry. I had to go away for a few days,” he lied. “Some bu
siness matters. And the reason it was important I see you today is that I’m afraid I have to go away again tonight as well. I am sorry to have to miss your concert again.”

  “Tonight? Again?” She seemed disappointed. “Just that sudden?”

  “Yes, very sudden, I’m afraid.”

  “Where do you go?”

  “Up north,” he lied again. “Trondheim.”

  “Trondheim? You have a building project up there?” she asked. But something in her eyes said she was just being coy with him.

  “In a way.”

  “You’re always rushing somewhere, Knut. And always so secretively. Here we are … having to meet in such an out-of-the-way place when the café at the hotel would have been fine. Not that I mind. I’m happy to see you under any setting. But you are very wary, if you do not mind me saying it.”

  “Wary?”

  She lowered her voice. “Of Germans, it appears. The way you rushed away last time from the hotel and declined to have dinner. The way you shied away on the dock when we left the ferry. How we are meeting now. There is a part of me that doubts very much you are even an engineer, if you don’t mind me saying it.”

  “Then why do you even meet me,” he asked, “if you believe I am not being truthful with you?”

  She looked at him a while. He was sure his feelings were transparent, that she could see right through him. “And why do you keep waiting in the shadows to see me?” she answered with a question of her own. “Do you think I don’t notice?”

  He didn’t reply.

  She smiled. “Perhaps it’s that in spite of your actions you have trusting eyes.”

  “I do, do I?” He laughed. “Someone else once told me that.”

  “I suppose all that intrigue to avoid attention has made me curious about you. You’ve managed to pique a lot of interest from one ill-advised hat.”

  Inside, he was filled with desire for her. It was only a spark of something, something that might grow, that if the situation were only different might easily turn into something, something he wanted, but now was fated to yield only longing and sadness.

  She reached across and took his hand. His knuckles were rough. “You do not have the hands of someone who spends his day with pencils and rulers.”

  “I’m a structural engineer,” he said. “I’m generally in the field.”

  “The field…” She raised an eye to him, doubtful. “Ah, that explains it. But sadly I have unpleasant news for you also. My grandfather and I, we have to leave abruptly as well. My aunt has taken ill. My grandfather’s sister. It came up only this morning. We’ve actually had to cancel the concert tomorrow night. A plane has been arranged. From Oslo. For tomorrow afternoon.”

  “Tomorrow…?” Nordstrum said, eyes wide. The route to Oslo was clear.

  “Yes.” She let his hand go. “We are taking the first ferry back in the morning.”

  The words hit him like a brick hurled through the pane of glass that was his heart, shattering. “The Hydro…?”

  “Yes, I think that is the one. The German cultural legation has handled all the details. Are you all right? You’ve lost color.”

  “I’m fine,” he lied, though inside, dread and indecision took hold of him, as cold as a slab of ice. “Your aunt,” he said, doing his best to regain his composure, “I hope she will be all right. But there are faster ways to get to Oslo if you are in a hurry. The ferry is actually indirect and sometimes unreliable. I’m afraid you’ve only seen it at its very best. Perhaps I could arrange something privately. Some other means of transit?”

  “Thank you, Knut, but it has already been arranged. We would have left today if they could have located a plane for us this afternoon. I’m afraid it would be impossible to change it now.”

  “Yes, of course,” he said, his heart racing inside like a timer on the fastest setting. He asked, “You’re sure that it’s the Hydro…?” Knowing of course it was the Hydro. He knew better than anyone it was the only ferry leaving tomorrow. At 10 A.M. A throbbing beat at his chest. He knew, if he pulled off what he was set to do, what he was committed to do and must follow through on, the boat would never make it to the other shore. It would sink. There would be many casualties. Her grandfather was an elderly man. He could easily be one of them. Likely. And he could see, as he looked at her, her sweetness and devotion, how she would never abandon him. Even at the risk of her own life.

  It was suddenly clear to him he had put in jeopardy the one thing in this war he felt the chance to love.

  “You mustn’t go.” He took her hand again. This time squeezing it purposefully.

  “We have to, Knut,” she said, allowing him to keep hold of it. “My grandfather and his sister are very close. Besides, if you are leaving tonight as you say, what is the difference? By tomorrow, we will both be gone.”

  “Yes. Of course, you’re right.”

  Under his collar, a sweat broke out on his neck. Inside, he was riddled with fear. A fear he had not felt even the many times when his own life had been on the line. He knew, as surely as he knew anything, he could not divulge his plans. Even if he fully trusted her, her grandfather was an Austrian, and a guest of the German Army. Who knew where his loyalties lay? In a million years he could never tell her what was ahead. Or worse, abandon it. His orders came direct from London. Destroying that cargo was one of the most crucial missions of the war. There was no way back, not now. The stakes of altering anything were too high. Einar, the Yank, they would never allow it anyway.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, placing her hand over his. “You seem sad.”

  “It’s just it’s likely I will never see you again.”

  “I know. I feel the same. But this war will not last forever.”

  “Who knows how long the war will last. Or who will win.”

  “And what you are feeling—I can see it in your eyes, Knut—I feel it too. Here, I want you to have this.…” She dug into her purse and handed him her card. Fraulein N. Ritter. Konigstrasse 17. Vienna. Fancy, raised lettering. He took the card and stared at her name, not knowing what to do. “When it is over, there is always a way to contact me. You never know, Knut. In a world that is upside-down like ours, anything is possible.”

  “You are right.” He looked at the card and forced a smile. “Anything is possible.”

  He wanted desperately to tell her. Just blurt it out: You cannot go. This ship is not safe. But he could not. Instead he just tightly squeezed her hand. There were thousands of lives on the line. Not just theirs. Tears bit at his eyes. “Promise me something then.”

  “What?”

  “That you’ll sit in the stern.”

  “The stern…?”

  “The view is the best there. I’ve ridden it many times. You’ll be pleased, Natalie.”

  “All right.” She nodded agreeably. “The stern.”

  “You and your grandfather.”

  “Yes, both of us. I promise.” She looked closely at him, as if she was sensing what was inside him. “Is everything all right?”

  “Yes, fine.” He nodded. He checked his watch. It was going on four. Einar was to meet them at Diseth’s shop. They still had to pick up their car. “I’m afraid I have to leave now.”

  “So soon, again?” Disappointment crossed her face. “You are always running off somewhere.”

  A torrent of doubt knotted in his gut, a wave of feelings he was helpless to control. It was foolish, he knew, but he was prepared to take the risk. He had to.

  “Natalie, there’s something I have to tell you.”

  “What?”

  He looked at her. “My real name isn’t Knut. It’s Kurt, actually. And my family name isn’t Holgersen. It’s Nordstrum.”

  “Kurt…?” Her eyes dimmed, not understanding. “Why would you let me believe it was—”

  “Listen to me, it’s important to me that you know that. And you’re right, I’m not an engineer. Though I did study to be one before the war. I can’t tell you any more. So please don’t ask. Just
… just know that if we should ever be lucky enough to really meet in Vienna, after … in a different way, just know I would feel it had all been worth it.”

  “That what would all be worth it, Kurt…?” She saw the turmoil etched onto his face and reached for his hand. “I’m not sure I understand what you’re talking about.”

  He shook his head. He couldn’t explain any more. “Just the war. Things I’ve had to do. Everything.”

  “What have you done? I don’t understand.”

  “I know you don’t. Just forgive me for having been deceptive with you. It was not my intent. But now I have to go.”

  He drank in the sight of her face, the liquid shimmer in her eye, the dapple of color on her cheeks. He slowly leaned toward her. He placed a kiss on her lips. Softly. With everything he felt in his heart. He lingered for a second or two, squeezing her hand.

  When he pulled back there was not pleasure in her eyes, but worry. “Kurt, you’re scaring me a little with how you sound.…”

  He got up and threw a few bills on the table. “Remember, Natalie—the stern. It’s very important to me.” He smiled. “One day when we see each other again, in Vienna, you can tell me about the view. Remember how we met, your hat; this will make us even.”

  “Even…?” She looked up at him with a question in her eyes.

  “Well, not quite even. You’ll see.”

  He got up, before his heart broke in two and he changed his mind. At the door, he took a last look at her that would have to stay in his mind forever, and went outside.

  71