Heroes

by David Hagberg

  “Why am I being a traitor to my country?”

  Dulles nodded..

  “This is a very important bomb. It will end the war for whoever possesses it. My country is morally … bankrupt.”

  Dulles’ eyes widened. “Strange of you to say such a thing.”

  Canaris ignored the slur, incredible considering the circumstances.

  “This information was sent to me by one of my people in the States. He has worked at the Tennessee plant.”

  “Yes?”

  “His name is Dieter Schey. There he was known as Robert Mordley. He was an engineer. Married, with one child. A son.”

  “We will arrest him.”

  Canaris shook his head. “It will be difficult. He is no longer there, in Tennessee. From what we understand he has fled.”

  “Our FBI …”

  “Your FBI is not good enough. Our man is very good. He will not stop with this material. He will gather more. The next time it comes across, I may not be in a position to intercept it.”

  “What are you saying to me?”

  Canaris looked away. This was the part he dreaded most.

  Schey wouldn’t have a chance. “In the package are photographs of Schey. He has a contact in Washington, a woman with money and ration books and identification. Her name and description are there as well.”

  Both men were silent for a long time. Dulles finally broke in.

  “What do you want, Admiral? I don’t know if I can give it to you.”

  “No, you cannot. I want peace. I want happiness …”

  “We all do.”

  “Your agents in Germany …”

  “I will not betray them,” Dulles said.

  “I knew the procedure for contacting your man in Berlin.”

  “By now he is long gone.”

  “I cannot believe he or the others have left the city. They will remain. But very soon now, the purges will begin. Anyone with knowledge will pose a serious threat to you.”

  Dulles stepped close. “Kill him,” he hissed.

  Canaris was rocked back by the nearly physical impact of the words. “Kill whom?”

  “Hitler. Assassinate him. You have the people dedicated to such an end. We know you do.”

  Canaris shook his head, aghast. He had not thought it would come to this. “I have handed you your atom-smashing bomb on a platter.”

  “Once Hitler is dead, your general staff will listen to reason.

  Your soldiers will lay down their weapons. The war will be over.”

  Canaris stepped back. “No,” he said. “What do you take me for?”

  “That has already been established, my dear admiral,” Dulles said without sensitivity. “We will make it known what you have done here this morning, if necessary.”

  “How do you know I was not lying, Dulles? How do you know I don’t have a copy of the bomb documents?”

  “You would not have come here.”

  “Don’t be so smug. If our positions were reversed, could you do for your country what I have done for mine?”

  “The war will be over sooner or later. Why prolong the suffering?”

  “Why do you think I have come here?”

  Dulles said nothing. “Could you return to Washington and assassinate Roosevelt after coming here and turning over the greatest secret your country could possess?”

  Dulles reached in his coat pocket and pulled out a pistol. “I cannot let you go away from here, Admiral. Not with what you know.”

  Canaris found that he was no longer frightened. The thing he had dreaded most, he had already done. Nothing else was threatening. “So you will shoot me now?” He shook his head.

  “If need be.”

  “Then perhaps my pilot will manage to kill both you and your pilot, and like a good, loyal German soldier, he will return with the package I have given you. And then what?”

  “You are in an enemy country at the moment.” *

  “You are in an occupied country,” Canaris snapped. “I have given you your guaranteed victory in Japan. That’s all I came for.” He looked deeply into Dulles’ eyes. “You are a good man.

  Capable at your job. But I do not believe you will shoot me.”

  For a long time they stood there in tableau. Finally Dulles lowered the pistol. He shook his head. “No, I cannot shoot you, even though you are the enemy.” He put the pistol back in his pocket. “Where do you go now?”

  “Back to Berlin.”

  “It must be … very difficult there now.”

  “It is. For my people as well as yours.”

  “How much longer will you be able to hold on?”

  “As chief of the Abwehr?”

  “Yes.”

  Canaris managed a very slight, wry smile. “The Abwehr as an independent service is finished. The SD will take it over very soon. I suspect I will be fired as soon as I return.”

  “And then what?”

  Canaris thought a moment. “Whatever fate brings me will be better than the Abwehr,” he said, and he really meant it.

  He and Dulles shook hands again, and Canaris turned and headed back to Hewel and their plane. He did not turn around until he got to the end of the field. Dulles had already reached his own plane, and he and the pilot were climbing in.

  Hewel had his Luger out. Canaris smiled. “That won’t be necessary, Erich. The meeting went well. They swallowed everything I had to tell them.”

  “Now what, Herr Admiral?”

  “Now we return to Lyon for the rest of the crew and then back to Berlin in time for lunch.”

  The Piper Cub’s engine started, warmed up, and then the tiny plane taxied up to the end of the runway, opposite where Canaris and Hewel stood watching.

  Dulles waved, and then the American plane was bumping slowly down the runway, gathering speed, and easing up into the night sky.

  The jeep bearing the high command devices on both front fenders stopped at the security gate leading into Maybach II at Zossen. The guard commander approached the jeep, but when he saw who the two officers were in the back, he came to ramrod straight attention and saluted. The barrier came up, and the two officers mechanically returned the salute as their vehicle continued into the compound.

  Neither of them had spoken very much on the trip out from the Fiihrer bunker near the Tiergarten in the city.

  They did not like what they were about to do, but they were good soldiers, and they would follow their orders.

  The jeep pulled around to one of the bunkers and stopped.

  First out was Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel, who strode up the walk, his tall boots gleaming. Colonel General Alfred Jodl, who was head of the armed forces operations staff, followed closely behind.

  Inside, they were immediately escorted into Canaris’ office.

  The admiral stood.

  “Wilhelm,” he said pleasantly. “Alfred.” He knew what was coming. |

  Captain Meitner closed the door on them. ‘

  “Hello, Willi,” Keitel said. “Did you have a good trip to Biarritz?”

  “Tolerable,” Canaris said. “At least the weather was fine.”

  They all shook hands. Canaris poured drinks. They sat down.

  “We have some … disturbing news, Willi,” Keitel began. Jodl sat forward. “Our Fuhrer sent us. The military situation is, as you well know, at the moment, critical. There is talk …”

  “The Fuhrer wants to streamline our intelligence services,” Keitel said.

  “By abolishing the Abwehr?” Canaris asked, his voice surprisingly strong.

  “No, not by that. But by merging the Abwehr and the SD under the command of the Reichsfuhrer-SS.”

  “There has been too much duplication of effort,” Jodl tried to explain, but Keitel had opened his briefcase. He extracted a single document which he handed over to Canaris.

  It was stamped, top and bottom, Geheime Reichssache (secret Reichs document), and was signed by the Fuhrer himself.

  It read simply:

&nbs
p; Fuhrer Headquarters February 12, 1944

  I direct:

  1. A unified German secret intelligence service is to be created.

  2. I appoint the Reichsfiihrer-SS to command this German intelligence service. Insofar as this affects the German military intelligence and counterespionage service, the Reichsfuhrer-SS and the head of the OKW shall take all requisite steps by mutual agreement.

  Adolph Hitler Canaris looked up. “And me?”

  Jodl looked away. But Keitel did not. “Our Fiihrer sends his regards. He will decide your future employment in due course.”

  “And in the meantime?”

  “You’re to leave within the hour for Burg Lauenstein, where you will hold yourself in readiness.”

  “House arrest,” Canaris said. “I see. May I take Kasper and Sabine?”

  “Of course,” Keitel said, flustered. “Of course.”

  —That’s lyrical. I mean, fucking far out!

  The older man didn’t know whether the kid was referring to his story so far or to the young woman up on the tiny stage. They had turned off the jukebox, and instead, a stereo system was blaring a brassy melody by Herb Alpert or someone like that, while a young, bony woman took off her clothes. There weren’t many people in the place paying attention to her.

  The young man was smoking a joint. He offered it to the older man, who declined. But he ordered another beer.

  —I mean, Nam wasn’t so elegant, man. Half the time the guys were trying to figure out how to frag one of the officers.

  —How about your heroes?

  —You mean Terry, and Major Fisher, and guys like that?

  The older man nodded. He was very tired, although it wasn’t terribly late yet. In fact, it was on the early side for a Friday night. But the week had been a pure, unadulterated bitch. And all the while, somewhere at the back of his mind, he kept thinking that he knew the guy across from him. I mean, really knew him from someplace. Like they had lived together, or fought together, or something. But that was impossible.

  The kid took another hit and shrugged. He glanced up at the stage and at the thin woman whose tiny breasts were sad.

  —They were always in another platoon. Up the road somewhere, you know.

  —You read about them?

  —Hell, no. They were there, all right. As big as life. Bigggr than life. We all knew about them. Everybody talked about them.

  —But you didn’t know them. Personally. The older man didn’t know why he was pressing the kid.

  —What the fuck are you trying to do here, call me a motherfucking liar?

  —I’m trying to understand.

  —Understand, shit. What the fuck do you know?

  —Not a lot. I never was in combat.

  —You weren’t even in the service, you cock sucker.

  The older man shook his head. He could feel tears coming to his eyes. It was as if the entire world was dumping on him.

  He clearly remembered going out to Truax Air Force Base, outside Madison, Wisconsin … it was back in the mid-sixties, before the base had been closed. It was an open house.

  The University of Wisconsin was just across town, with better than thirty thousand kids, most of them rebels who went around in those years throwing rocks, draping themselves with the U.S. flag, and chanting: WAR, WAR, FUCK THE WAR.

  The base commander decided to have what he naively called “Friendship Day.” The entire town was invited out to the base to look around, to meet the officers and men.

  The entire exercise was aimed at the college kids. Show them we were the good guys, not some bug-eyed monsters who loved to napalm babies.

  It backfired, of course. There was a huge demonstration by late afternoon, and the military police, along with the civilian cops, had a hell of a time clearing them out.

  —Hey, look, man, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to fuck with your head.

  He decided that the kid sitting across from him wouldn’t understand the story. Wouldn’t understand how he had managed to remain hidden until retreat was sounded from all the speakers and the base flag came down.

  All across the base GI’s were turning toward the flag, coming to attention and saluting.

  Christ, but it gave him goose bumps thinking about it now. Those guys were the real heroes that day. Not some son-of a-bitch climbing to the top of Bascomb Hall, ripping the American flag off its staff, and then tossing it down to his spaced-out friends.

  Yet the kid across from him had been in Vietnam. He had met the enemy on the battlefield.

  —I want to know what happened next. Son-of-a-bitch, don’t leave me hanging.

  The older man sipped his beer. For all he knew, the kid himself was a hero. But if that was so, he guessed he didn’t really know what the word meant.

  PART TWO.

  HEROES

  July 1944

  Wilhelm Canaris showed up for his new job at Eiche, in Potsdam, on Saturday, July 1st. It had been a warm, almost sultry evening. This morning the atmosphere smelled of a combination of moist growing things and the ever-present plaster dust. The Allies had come through again during the night on a bombing raid. There were many fires across the city to the southwest of Berlin proper.

  It had been strange for him to get back to the city after his four months above the Loquitz Valley in Burg Lauenstein. There, he had had Kasper and Sabine, as well as a driver, Hans Liidecke.

  There, he had had no worries, no concerns, no duties. The war had gone on without him. The dismantlement of the Abwehr had happened without him as a witness.

  Lieutenant Colonel Albrecht Focke had been a formal but not unkind jailer, allowing his honored guest the full run of the castle and its grounds—inside the walls, unless an escort accompanied him. __

  There were a few official letters and communiques during the first weeks, the most brutal coming on March 10th—from Donitz himself. The Commander-in-Chief of the Navy informed Canaris that as of June 30th, he would be removed from the active list of Naval personnel. On March 21st, the Navy Personnel Office sent him a brief notice that he would be placed at the Navy’s disposal as of that date, but that no reemployment was contemplated.

  He had gone into a funk then. It was over. He would not be participating in Germany’s downfall or her rescue. He’d spend the remainder of the war as a prisoner in a gilded cage. It was bitter, after all that had gone on since the days of Valparaiso so many years ago.

  Burg Lauenstein, in its secluded spot, housed the experts who forged passports and other documents, as well as the scientists and technicians who developed secret inks, microdot techniques, and other equipment. Canaris was the only prisoner.

  For weeks on end he saw no one, spoke with no one, and did little more than roam the extensive grounds with the dogs, or sleep.

  During those times he was not at peace. Instead, his mind ranged over his career, forwards and backwards, and most painfully, over the future of Germany.

  He wondered then, too, about Dieter Schey, if he had been caught, or if he had been killed, and what the outcome of the contact with Dulles had produced.

  Erika came down to visit him, but he went through the visit in a daze. For a week afterwards he had fallen deeper into his depression.

  Canaris showed his papers to the guards at the door before he entered, then went down the long corridor where he stopped at a tall door with a frosted glass window that bore the officious title: Handelskrieg und Wirtshaftliche Kampfmassnahmen (Mercantile Warfare and Economic Combat Measures). The Hwk, it was called.

  He smiled wanly. From the Abwehr to this. He shrugged. It was better than Burg Lauenstein. Anything was better than isolation.

  He reached for the doorknob, but the door suddenly opened, and he found himself staring into the eyes of a much taller, but very old man, wearing an out-of-date threadbare uniform, his eyes bloodshot, broken veins crisscrossing his cheeks. He was a second lieutenant. For several long seconds he stood rooted to his spot, staring into Canaris’ eyes, but then he blinked several
times, swallowed hard, and snapped to attention, raising his right hand in salute.

  “Heil Hitler!” he screamed, spittle flying everywhere.

  Canaris started to raise his hand in salute, when the lieutenant bellowed: “Admiral on the deck! The Admiral is here!” He shuffled aside.

  With a sinking heart, Canaris stepped into the large office. A dozen old desks had been stuffed into the room. Behind each was an old man in about the same condition as the one who stood more or less at attention now. All of them had gotten up and were holding out a salute.

  Canaris returned it.

  The office was in shambles. Nothing was new. Nothing was even in good repair. The windows were cracked and dirty, several of them boarded over. And it looked as if the floor had not been swept since before the war.

  Canaris stood there for a long time, taking in the scene. The cracked plaster walls. The section of ceiling that had fallen, laying bare the plaster lath. The faded maps on the walls. The incredible litter everywhere.

  He could have the senior man present sweep the floor.

  Immediately. In front of the others. It would put them all in their places and would instantly establish his authority.

  But there was no use, actually. By tomorrow the floor would be dirty again. And these men no longer cared about such things as authority. Had they cared in the first place, none of them would be here now, like this. These were the dregs. Worse than the dregs; these men, he realized, were not even fit to be used as cannon fodder. Young boys and very old men were on the battlefields these days. But not these men. And he was their leader.

  “If you would be so good as to show me my office, Lieutenant …” Canaris peered at the lieutenant’s nametag. “… Bender.”

  “Jawhol, Herr Admiral,’” the lieutenant shouted.

  “And please, Bender, I am not deaf. Do not shout.”

  Several doors led off the main office. One of them opened now, and an officer, his tunic open, charged out. He was fuming.

  “What in God’s name is all the commotion out here …” he began, but then he stopped.

  Canaris was thunderstruck. It was Meitner. Hans Meitner.

  “Gott in Himmel,” Meitner breathed. “Meiner Admiral.”