by Suninfo
Ottaway closed his eyes and thought of Anne Bradley. Descending on her parents with little warning late on Friday night had not been a very good idea, but Anne had wanted it that way and he had allowed himself to be talked into it because it was difficult to find rooms in a London hotel. He wondered if she had planned to show him off for the approval of her parents, but if that was her intention, it hadn’t worked out too well. Old friends of the family who were staying the weekend had been an embarrassment; they had teased her as if she were still a twelve-year-old schoolgirl with braces on her teeth, and after a while, he could see from the expression on her face, that the jokes had worn thin. He’d been an outsider scarcely understanding a word of their conversation, but every now and then they’d thrown a question his way out of condescending politeness. It soon became obvious that they weren’t really interested and gradually he’d lapsed into silence, disappointed that Anne hadn’t come to his rescue.
And how much time had they had together? A sightseeing tour of the cathedral and a couple of hours in the cinema watching Bogart and a dewy-eyed Ingrid Bergman acting out their hopeless love affair in Casablanca. And, on reflection, hopeless just about described that last weekend. It seemed that her parents had been determined never to leave them alone. Even when everyone else had gone to bed and they’d had the lounge to themselves for once, he’d heard them moving about upstairs like sentries on the prowl and their unseen presence had soured everything. They were old and the war had already cost them a son whose room they preserved like a shrine, and perhaps, in their loneliness, their love for Anne had become totally possessive. He wondered if she could love him enough to want to break this umbilical cord which threatened to strangle them both, but he knew only too well that it was a pretty academic question now.
The man who sat on a bench seat in the Place des Alpes pretending to read a newspaper was fast becoming a familiar sight. At first, his presence had annoyed Pierre Damon but now he was beginning to see the funny side of it. Keeping the Credit and Merchant Bank under surveillance was probably the most time-consuming and useless job which could befall anyone employed 122
by the Abwehr, and he sometimes wondered if the man himself had long since lost interest in the assignment and was merely going through the motions. It was, of course, pure speculation and in no way altered the fact that the tame watchdog would stay on his heels until, at the end of the day, he returned to his villa which overlooked the Parc de la Grange on the far side of the lake.
Baron Pierre Damon was forty but looked much younger. He was a slim and precise little man who, despite a quiet sense of humour, was inclined to be pompous. He had an attractive wife and three young children all of whom were devoted to him, but such was his interest in banking affairs that he tended to neglect them. Money was a subject which had always fascinated him and, although his title and family connections would have eventually ensured that he became a director, it was widely acknowledged that business had trebled following his appointment to the board in the spring of 1939.
A considerable amount of this capital inflow had come from Germany and stemmed from the numbered bank accounts which certain officials in the Nazi Party had opened as a hedge against the future. Perhaps not surprisingly, these monetary deposits had increased dramatically after the disaster at Stalingrad. As befitted one of a neutral country, the Credit and Merchant Bank also kept a watching brief on certain British investments in the form of factories which had been temporarily absorbed into the war economy of the Third Reich. In fulfilling the bank’s obligations to the UK parent company, Damon found it necessary to visit Germany periodically in order to estimate the current value of these sequestered assets. In doing so he frequently came into contact with businessmen and Party officials, among whom was a certain Doctor Julius Lammers.
Using their business acquaintanceship as a springboard, Lammers, in the early summer of 1943, began to use Damon as an unofficial diplomatic courier. There was nothing unusual in this, for a great many others had been similarly exploited as a means of gauging British and Allied reactions to various peace proposals which had been made from time to time. It was all rather futile because the Casablanca Conference had made it quite clear that the Allies were interested only in unconditional surrender, but the myth persisted in the minds of Himmler and others that a deal was still possible, given the right conditions.
Kaltenbrunner was known to harbour the illusion that the Western Allies would be prepared to negotiate with the SS whom he saw as the bulwark against communism. Lammers, on the other hand, while conceding that the SS might have a say in the 123
final settlement, recognised that negotiations were impossible while the present leaders of Germany remained in power.
This assessment was, in Damon’s view, quite realistic and throughout the winter months of 1943 he entered into a series of informal talks with officials at the British Consulate in Geneva in the naïve belief that he was dealing with diplomatic staff. He would have been shocked and affronted had he known that he was, in fact, being debriefed and manipulated by MI6. Until recently, he had been convinced that the British were merely feigning an interest in the overtures made by Lammers but then, quite suddenly, they became very keen to meet face to face with the man known as ‘Rudi’. Nothing could have given Damon greater pride and pleasure than the idea that he was helping to bring about a peaceful settlement, and nothing could have been farther from the truth. He was just the bait in the trap.
The phone trilled and, picking it up, Damon heard a cheerful voice say, ‘Good morning, my dear Baron. I’ve some splendid news for you.’
Damon’s heart began to beat a little faster. ‘Oh yes?’ he said quickly.
‘I’ve just been informed that the Embassy has heard from London. It seems that our people are on the way and they will be in Geneva this evening. Now what do you think of that?’
‘I think that’s wonderful.’
‘I knew you’d be pleased. We’ll send a car for you at nine if that’s convenient? We’re rather anxious to hold a preliminary discussion as soon as possible.’
Damon glanced towards the window which overlooked the square. ‘Do you think that’s wise?’ he said. ‘I’m being watched.’
‘Chap in the Place des Alpes reading a newspaper?’
‘Yes. How did you know?’
Laughter boomed in his ear. ‘Oh, we get around. You don’t want to worry about him, he’s working for the Abwehr. As a matter of fact, you’re meant to see him; it makes life much easier for the other two who are also watching your every move.’
‘Why all this sudden interest in me?’
‘Perhaps they think you’re a spy, but after tonight they’ll know different, won’t they? I suppose nine o’clock is convenient?’
‘Yes, that will be all right,’ Damon said reluctantly. ‘I’m quite free this evening.’
He hung up and walked over to the window again. The man was still reading his newspaper.
On the night of the raid Gartenstrasse had collected more than just one blockbuster. A two-thousand-pound HE bomb, one of a 124
stick of four, had cratered the road at the junction with Dolandweg severing the mains and flooding the cellars of the houses near by. Now, some forty-eight hours later, the hard-pressed city fire brigade had managed to provide a single tender which was slowly pumping out the flooded crater. A gang of workmen, waiting to replace the shattered pipe, stood back from the lip of the crater smoking and talking among themselves.
By taking the Volkswagen up on to the pavement, Kastner managed to squeeze past the fire appliance and the crater, but farther up a barrier across the road eventually forced him to stop and get out. He walked forward, ignoring the notice chalked on a piece of wood, and stepped over a red and white striped pole which was supported at either end by a knife rest. A shrill voice shouted a warning but in his dazed condition he was quite unaware that anything was wrong until someone running after him, grabbed hold of an arm and tried to pull him back.
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Instinctively, he turned round and lashed out.
The boy caught a glancing blow on his shoulder, staggered backwards and, tripping over a lump of masonry, sat down heavily.
Behind the thick pebble lenses, tears of anger welled in his eyes.
‘I’ll report you for that,’ he said in a high shrill voice.
Kastner stooped and held out his hand. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, ‘I didn’t mean to strike a member of the Hitler Youth.’
The boy pushed Kastner’s hand to one side, scrambled to his feet and brushed the dirt off his trousers. ‘You’ll get into serious trouble for ignoring that warning notice.’
‘What notice?’
‘The one back there which says there are unexploded bombs in the area.’
‘So?’
‘So I’m in the messenger service and it’s my job to see that no one goes past the barrier.’
Kastner stared at the boy with loathing. ‘It’s all right,’ he said grimly, ‘I’m in the SS. Take a look at my identity card if you don’t believe me.’
The boy glanced at it quickly and then drew himself up like a soldier on parade. ‘How can I help the Oberführer?’ he said parrot fashion.
‘I’m looking for my wife, she was visiting friends who lived at Number 64.’
A thin arm pointed up the street. ‘I think that’s the house you’re looking for.’
Beyond the outstretched arm he could see a vast pyramid of rubble which had spewed out into the road, and in that instant he knew that the search had ended. Somewhere beneath the 125
heap of masonry, Gerda lay dead in the arms of her lover.
‘You bloody whore,’ he said viciously.
The boy stepped back a pace and blinked up at him. ‘We have a list of names at the post,’ he said helpfully.
‘Did anyone get out of there?’
The boy shook his head. ‘They’re still in the cellar. The Tenos said there was no point in digging them out.’
‘Then your list is no damn good to me, is it?’ He pushed the boy out of the way and walked back to the car.
No one would dare to say it openly but a lot of people would take pleasure in knowing that Gerda had been unfaithful to him. He’d refused all offers to help in the search for her when he found out that Gerda had left the hospital at her usual time and had been seen to meet Tresckow outside. Obviously, word had got around.
And Kaltenbrunner had known all right and enjoyed watching him squirm. ‘Take all the time you need,’ he’d said, ‘Wollweber can do the spade work in Münster until you’ve got everything sorted out.’
He supposed he had Frau Bungert to thank for that.
He tried taking his anger out on the car but punishing an inanimate object gave him little satisfaction, the tolerances were too high; the engine might scream but it would survive his rough treatment and driving the Volkswagen at speed over the wet cobbled roads only invited an accident. He decided that what he really needed was a drink, several drinks in fact.
Werner’s bar, near the Innsbrucker Platz, looked seedy and rundown, but as soon as he entered the dimly lit cellar beneath the S Bahn, Kastner knew that he had found exactly the right place in which to get quietly drunk. Nobody from Headquarters would have been seen dead in it and that suited his purpose.
The last thing he wanted was sympathy from that two-faced crowd.
He sat down at a table in a dark corner of the room and ordered a Schnapps with a beer to chase it.
A woman seated on a stool at the bar smiled in his direction and then brushed an imaginary speck of fluff from her tight, short skirt. A tramp on the make, he thought, a tramp with dyed red hair, plucked eyebrows and too much make-up on her face. Even on a dark night any man would think twice before picking her up.
He watched her open the cracked patent leather handbag and take out a packet of cigarettes and then lean forward to catch a light from the candle on the bar. In the space of the next hour she showed everyone present what she had to offer but no one, not even the sailor who looked as though he was just out of High School, was interested.
The Schnapps and beer chasers following one on top of the 126
other warmed his belly and, for the first time in two days, he began to see things in a new perspective. Gerda was a stinking little bitch and he was well shot of her, for it was pretty obvious to him now that this fellow Tresckow wasn’t the only man she’d slept with. He’d been away from home so often, that probably half the male population of Berlin had shared her bed at one time or another and then boasted about it afterwards.
‘Cheer up, Liebling, the world hasn’t come to an end yet.’ He looked up and saw her there, smiling at him across the table and smelling of cheap scent.
‘Who invited you over?’ he said thickly.
A hand with long red nails reached out and covered his wrist.
‘You’re lonely,’ she said, ‘and so am I.’
‘I don’t need you.’
‘You need someone, you’ve been drinking steadily all afternoon—
I’ve been watching you.’
She was wearing a black satin blouse which was stained under the armpits and he could tell from the way it clung to her that she hadn’t got a damn thing on underneath it.
‘Let’s have one more drink,’ he said aggressively, ‘and then we can decide whether to go to your place or mine.’
She leaned back and patted her hair modestly as if shocked at the suggestion. The charms on the bracelet which hung loosely about her wrist jangled with the movement of her hand. ‘You’ve got a nerve,’ she said. ‘What do you take me for?’
‘A whore—correct me if I’m wrong.’
‘I’m not sure I like you.’
‘Well, I’ll tell you something,’ he said drunkenly, ‘I’m not sure I like you either.’
The woman started to rise and then changed her mind. It might be a long time before she found another prospective client and she was too old a hand at the game to let this one off the hook.
‘All the same,’ she said, ‘I don’t see why I should sit here and be insulted by you.’
‘I was married to a woman like you. Would you believe that?’
‘Keep your voice down,’ she hissed, ‘everyone’s staring at us.’
‘Well, let them.’ He looked across the room and tried to catch the barman’s eye. ‘What’s the matter with the bloody service in this place?’ he roared.
The woman stood up and dragged Kastner on to his feet. Her lips were set in a falsely bright smile. ‘Come on,’ she said coaxingly, ‘let’s get out of here before they call the police.’
Kastner began to laugh because the whole thing was so ridiculous. ‘Oh my God,’ he spluttered, ‘that’s rich, that’s bloody rich.’
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Her arm was about his waist and he was leaning on her shoulder and without him really being aware of it, she began to steer him towards the staircase which led up to the street above.
‘We’ll go to my place,’ she said, ‘it’s nice and cosy.’
Kastner wagged a finger under her nose. ‘I’ve got a better idea, we’ll go to mine.’ He belched loudly. ‘You’ll like it there. You know what I think?’
‘No, but you’re going to tell me just the same. Careful, Liebling, mind the last step.’
‘The world,’ Kastner said loudly, ‘the world is full of whores and lonely men who can’t afford them.’
‘Ten marks isn’t asking too much, is it?’
For no reason except that he was feeling maudlin, the tears began to stream down his face. ‘I really loved that woman,’ he said thickly, ‘but you wouldn’t understand that.’
The woman sucked on her teeth. It was, she thought, just her luck to end up with a crying drunk.
They arrived in Geneva late in the afternoon after transferring to a Swissair JU 52 in Lyon. While Gerhardt and the others faced a long journey by road to the villa outside the village of Schaffhausen close to the German border, Ashby and Ottaway were
met by Richard Holmes of the consular staff and conducted to the Hotel Beau-Rivage on the Quai du Mont Blanc. It was hoped that their meeting with Damon would help to allay the suspicions of the Swiss authorities and would provide the Abwehr with further evidence indicating that peace talks were secretly being initiated.
So far, everything had gone pretty much their way, but Ashby knew that the real test would come the following night when they crossed the Swiss frontier and entered Germany. The time was fast approaching when Gerhardt’s friends in high places would have to deliver.
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15
THE VILLA WAS more than a mile from the railway but in the stillness of the early morning, the sound of a locomotive blowing off steam as it waited in the station at Schaffhausen seemed close at hand and roused Ottaway from a fitful sleep. Other sounds began to reach him now, the cistern flushing in the lavatory across the landing, while in the adjoining room, Quilter’s radio oscillated as he searched across the waveband. He tried pulling the blankets over his head to shut out the row, but it was no use. The house was alive with the noise of banging doors, heavy footsteps on the stairs and Stack whistling off key.
Bowing to the inevitable, Ottaway sat up in bed, drew back the curtains and looked out of the window. A thin veil of ground mist swirling above the meadow created the optical illusion that the cattle grazing near the stream had been hamstrung. Through the haze he could just see the pine forest on the distant hills.
Ashby knocked and pushed open the door. ‘I thought you’d like a cup of coffee,’ he said. ‘At least, Stack assures me it is supposed to be coffee, although I have my doubts.’
Ottaway looked at the pale brown liquid in the chipped enamel mug and resisted a shudder. ‘The colour’s vaguely familiar,’ he said dubiously.
Ashby closed the door and sat down on a chair. ‘I’d like to have a chat with you before I brief the others.’
Ottaway grinned. ‘I wondered when you were going to get around to it, Colonel.’
‘Oh?’
‘Last night on the way here from Geneva, I had a feeling that you were on the point of telling me something.’