'The arrival of the Englishman with Hitler at the Berghof is my greatest anxiety,' Stalin confided to Beria as the two men sat alone in his office inside the Kremlin. 'It is a pity the first attempt to kill him came to nothing..'
'I understood from earlier Woodpecker reports this Lindsay does not officially represent Churchill,' Beria responded cautiously.
Stalin stared at the secret police chief contemptuously, puffed at his pipe and then rested it inside an ashtray. He sat back in his chair and clasped both hands before speaking.
'If Hitler can find a way to bring the forty German divisions now guarding Western Europe to our front we are finished! You understand, Beria? Finished,' he repeated bitterly. 'And now I learn that Englishman is alive and well and has journeyed with Hitler to the Berghof. Quite obviously he has gained the Fuhrer's confidence. At this very moment he may be negotiating terms for a separate peace. Whatever happens he must be killed before he can return to England. Killed! I am handing over the responsibility for his fate to you..'
Stalin also was – waiting…
Chapter Eighteen
Five days had passed since the arrival of the Fuhrer at the Berghof. It was Saturday, which, Lindsay thought grimly, would be succeeded by Sunday and Monday. And still he had no plan for escaping to keep the Munich rendezvous with Paco. Escape was vital. Reaching London was urgent. What a weapon for Churchill – if he could broadcast to the world that a pseudo-Hitler had been installed…
'These will be your quarters,' Bormann had told him brusquely when they reached the Berghof. 'The Fuhrer has agreed you are to undergo intensive interrogation…'
On this encouraging note the Reichsleiter had left the Englishman alone. The first surprise was the quarters allocated to him. They included the large room at the foot of a flight of stairs where Lindsay had witnessed a nightmare scene on his earlier visit.
Inside this room he had seen through a half-open door the mirror image of the Fuhrer practising a speech – a Fuhrer surrounded by a circle of mirrors as he thundered at the top of his voice, studying the effect of his body language while he gestured violently. All the mirrors had vanished.
As soon as he was on his own, Lindsay had examined the highly polished floor carefully. The mirrors had been heavy cheval glasses. The supporting legs should have left traces on the woodblock floor. He found nothing. Someone had gone to considerable trouble to remove all traces.
There was a faint aroma of, fresh polish. The surface of the woodblocks gleamed. He suspected the floor had first been stripped. He opened a drawer at the base of a heavy wardrobe. It contained books by Clausewitz, von Moltke and Schlieffen – all the classic military authorities. Many had the corners of pages turned down, passages underlined. He found an unused 1943 diary. On impulse he pocketed it.
Christa Lundt had come to see him soon after he had unpacked his few things. She had entered without knocking, closed the door and placed a finger over her lips to stop him greeting her. She had then spent a quarter of an hour checking the apartment.
'No microphones,' she pronounced eventually. 'So we can talk.'
'You've been to the Berghof before, of course? I imagined so. Have you ever been down here?'
'Never! It was closely guarded – sealed off from the rest of the Berghof. Access was under the personal control of the previous commandant, the one who committed suicide…'
' Committed suicide? How long ago was this, Christa?'
'About two weeks ago. It must have been just after you flew to the Wolf's Lair. I'm talking about Commandant Muller
'Muller!' Lindsay was pacing the room, frowning. 'I met Muller when I was here before – that man never committed suicide. What the hell is going on here?' He stopped pacing and faced Christa. 'How did he commit suicide?'
'Well.. Christa hesitated and the Englishman waited silently. 'The first report was he had an accident. He fell four hundred feet from the outer platform of the Kehlstein. That's the Eagle's Nest, the eyrie the Fuhrer had built at the peak of the mountain. You get up there by a lift which ascends inside the rock face..'
'Go on,' Lindsay urged as she paused.
'Commandant Muller was supposed to have slipped on the ice and plunged over the wall when he went up there by himself…'
'Why would he do that – at this time of the year?'
'I never heard of him going there before. Afterwards we heard rumours that the accident story was to cover up the fact that he had killed himself..'
'And who was appointed in his place? Who did appoint his successor, by the way?'
'Colonel Jaeger, whose responsibility was the SS detachment here, was appointed in Muller's place.' Her expression softened. 'The Colonel is a tough, professional soldier. But underneath he's a decent man. As to who appointed Jaeger, Martin Bormann himself handled the whole affair..
'How do you know that?'
'Am I in the witness box? Are you cross-examining me?' Christa lashed out sarcastically.
She sat down on a hard-backed chair, crossed her legs and looked at her fingernails Lindsay pulled up a similar chair, swung it round, straddled the chair and leaned his arms along the top so he faced her directly. She made a great show of looking anywhere except at him, her chin set.
There's a complicated jigsaw of intrigue – maybe murder – which I'm trying to put together,' he said quietly. 'So, I'm asking you again. How do you know? '
'Because I transmitted Bormann's message to the Berghof confirming Jaeger's temporary bloody appointment as Commandant,' she flared.
'And that instruction was purely Bormann's? Not by order of the Fuhrer..'
'It was!' she said through clenched teeth. 'He added the words 'by order of the Fuhrer' himself. At that time Hitler was still on his way back from the Russian front. It was the time when he was delayed and landed at another airfield. Anything else you'd care to know, Wing Commander?'
'I doubt if you have any other worthwhile information,' Lindsay replied in an off-hand tone calculated to get under her skin.
'Except that there's something very odd about the Fuhrer ever since he did get back from Russia! If I told you that was pure feminine instinct you'd laugh at me..'
'No,' he commented eventually, 'I wouldn't laugh. You're his chief secretary, you're intelligent – I'm simply stating a fact. So I'd consider your instinctive reactions very seriously – and they happen to coincide with things I've experienced which don't add up…'
He chose his next words very carefully.
'I'm wondering if we're witnessing one of the greatest confidence tricks in history..'
Her eyes warned him. She was in a position to see the door into the room which he couldn't because it was behind him. Lindsay continued to puff at his cigarette. He had not heard the door opening but he did hear it close.
'I always seem to find you two together – which is pleasant when the world is at war. To find a German girl striking up, a friendship with an Englishman..
The familiar voice was that of Major Gustav Hartmann of the Abwehr.
'One of the greatest confidence tricks in history, I believe you said,' commented Hartmann. 'Care to enlighten me on your extremely intriguing assertion?' Christa had left the room and Lindsay was alone with Hartmann who had sat down and was lighting his pipe, watching the Englishman as he puffed out clouds of blue smoke which formed a veil between the two men.
'This is an official interrogation?' Lindsay asked.
'Just call it a chat between two individuals whom the chances of war have brought together for a brief time.'
'The Soviet spy you're searching for,' the Englishman replied and said no more, forcing the German to give
