negotiated peace, the longer they could stave off an invasion of
Britain. And the nearer would draw the date when Hitler would have to
redeploy the bulk of his armies eastward. If Hitler could be fooled
long enough, England would be spared.
But had those 'pro-Nazi' Englishmen understood that in 1941?
Natten-nan wondered. Were they altruistic patriots who had lured Rudolf
Hess to Britain on a fool's errand, and thus saved their homeland from
the Nazis? Or were they traitors who had decided Adolf Hitler was a man
they could deal with-a bit of a boor, perhaps, but with sound policies
vis-A-vis the communists and Jews? The answer seemed simple enough: If
a group of powerful Englishmen had merely pretended to treat with Hitler
in order to save Britain, they would be heroes and would require no
protection from public scrutiny, especially fifty years after the fact.
However, the well-documented efforts of the British government to
suppress the details of the Hess case tended to reinforce the opposite
theory: that those Englishmen really had been admirers of Hitler and
fascism.
The variable that confused this logic was a human wild card-Edward VIII,
Duke of Windsor, former Prince of Wales and abdicated King of England.
The duke's proGerman sympathies and contact with the Nazis-both before
and during the war-were documented and very embarrassing facts' At the
very least Windsor had made a fool of himself by visiting Hitler and all
the top Nazis in Germany, then trumpeting the Fuhrer's 'achievements' to
a shocked world.
At worst he had committed treason against the country he was born to
rule. After his stormy abdication, the duke, living in neutral Spain,
had pined away for the throne he had so lightly abandoned.
Startling evidence unearthed in 1983
indicated that in July of 1940 Windsor had slipped secretly into neutral
Lisbon to meet a top Nazi, where they explored the option of Windsor's
return to the English throne. And that, Natterman thought excitedly,
was the core of it all! Because according to British historian Peter
Allen, the Nazi whom Windsor had sneaked into Portugal to meet had been
none other than Rudolf Hess!
Natterman gripped the wheel tighter. A clear picture had begun to
emerge from the blurred background of speculation. He could see it now:
while Hitler's 'British sympathizers' may have been feigning sympathy
for the Nazis in order to save England, the Duke of Windsor most
definitely was not. And if Windsor had committed treason@r even come
close-that was the kind of royal 'peccadillo' that the British secret
service would be forced to conceal, suppressing the entire Hess story,
the heroism as well as the treason.
Natterman felt his heart thump. A fourth and stunning possibility had
just occurred to him. What if the British 'traitors' really were
pro-Nazi, but had been allowed to pursue their treachery by an even more
devious British Intelligence? That way the Nazis could not possibly
have picked up on any deception, because the conspirators themselves
would not have been aware that they were part of one!
Natterman's mind reeled at the implications. He tried to focus on that
uncertain time-the spring of 1941-but his memories seemed foggy, misted
at the edges somehow. His brain contained so many fragments of history
that he was no longer sure what he had merely read about and what he had
actually lived through. He had lived through so much.
More books, he thought. That's what I need now. Documentation.
I'll have Ilse stop at the university library on her way here.
I'll make a list as soon as I get to the house.
Churchill's memoirs, Speer's book, copies of Reich documents, a sample
of Hess's handwriting ... I'll need all that for even a preliminary
study of the document. And eventually the ink, the paper
itselfNatterman hit the brakes, bringing the Audi to a sliding stop.
He had reached the cabin. He turned slowly onto the narrow, snow-packed
lane that wound through the forest to the cabin. When the familiar
flicker of a lantern appeared in the darkness ahead, he smiled and
watched it wink in and out of sight as he negotiated the last few
curves.
As he pulled the car into the small turnaround beside the cabin, he
decided to invite Karl Riemeck up for a schnapps tomorrow. The old
caretaker had obviously taken the trouble to drive out here and light a
lamp for him, and Natterman suspected he would also find a good supply
of firewood laid by for his convenience. Deciding to retrieve his
suitcase later, he halted his heavy book satchel over his shoulder and
climbed out of the Audi- The cold practically pushed him up onto the
cabin porch, where he found a week's supply of oak logs stacked on a low
iron rack.
'Thank you, Karl,' he murmured; 'This is no night for old men like us to
go without heat.' On impulse he tried the knob; the door swung open
soundlessly. 'You think of everything, old friend,' he said, shivering.
'I come to the door with a burden, and must I search for my key? No.
All, is prepared for me.'
Switching on the electric lights-which the cabin had done without until
1982-he saw that the main room looked just as it always had. Not too
small, but cozy, lived in.
Natterman's father had liked it that way. No false opulence, just rough
comfort in the old ways. Built of birch and native oak, the cabin felt
more solid today than it had when Natterman was a boy. He tossed his
satchel on a worn leather chair and walked back out to the porch.
Adjusting his eyes to the darkness, he stared out through the& forest,
up the dark access road, searching for the glimmer of headlights, but he
saw none.
He gathered as much wood as he could hold, carried it into the cabin,
and stacked it carefully in the rack beside the fireplace. Then he
placed two well-split logs on the cast-iron rack, dropped to his knees,
and began to build a small pyramid of twigs beneath them, just as his
father had taught him to do six decades before. Though his brain still
simmered in anticipation of uninterrupted study of the Spandau papers,
the familiar ritual calmed him.
When his pyramid stood ready to be lit, he searched the hearth for
matches, but found none. Rising with a groan, he padded over to the
woodstove that occupied an entire alcove in the rear of the front room.
