Black Cross

not exaggerating when I say that the liberation of Europe may hang upon it.”

Churchill’s eyes played over McConnell’s face for some moments. Then he took a sheet of notepaper from his desk and lifted a pen from its well. “There is bound to be loss of life during this mission,” he said, writing quickly. “I want you to know that final responsibility rests with me.”

Churchill tore off the sheet of paper and handed it to McConnell, who read it with astonishment.

On my head be these deaths.

W

“I’m half-American myself, you know,” said Churchill. “And I reckon you’re at least half-English, Doctor.”

“What?” McConnell mumbled, still looking at the remarkable note. “What do you mean?”

Churchill clamped his teeth down on his cigar and grinned. “Any man who has survived both Oxford University and Achnacarry Castle has earned his citizenship!”

McConnell heard Brigadier Smith’s feet shifting impatiently on the floor behind him. Then Stern’s German- accented voice cut the air of the study.

“What about my people?” he asked in an accusatory tone. “Is there a place for Jews in your Anglo-American paradise?”

“Hold your tongue!” bellowed Brigadier Smith.

“Let him speak, Duff,” Churchill said. “He has a right to be angry.”

Stern took a step forward. The SD uniform and German accent gave his words a chilling intensity. “I want to know if you will really support the establishment of a Jewish homeland in Palestine after the war.”

Churchill punctuated his words with his cigar, using it like a pointer. “I most certainly will, Mr. Stern. But the key phrase in your question was ‘after the war.’ There’s a damned great lot of fighting to be done yet.”

“And I’m ready to do it,” Stern said.

“Are you? Well then. When you get back from this mission, I shall personally see to it that you get a commission in the Jewish Brigade.” He smiled. “You’ll need a different uniform, of course. They wouldn’t like that swastika.”

“There is no Jewish Brigade! It’s been buried in paperwork for years.”

“Not any longer,” said Churchill. “I’ve unburied it. The Jewish Brigade will fight in the liberation. So, are you interested?”

Stern actually snapped to attention.

Churchill beamed. “This is my sort of fellow, Duff. You’ve chosen well, I think.”

“He’ll do,” Smith said grudgingly. “But I’m afraid we really must go. The schedule, you know.”

“H-Hour,” Churchill said with relish. “And right into Germany! What I wouldn’t give to go with you.” He stood up and vigorously shook both McConnell’s and Stern’s hands.

McConnell thought of something else he wanted to ask, but by then the brigadier had whisked them out of the room and along the dim corridor.

The driver of the Humber met them at the outside door.

“Follow him,” Smith said. “I’ll join you in a moment.”

As they passed outside, McConnell looked back. They were exiting from a different door, and above it he saw the words: Pro Patria Omnia. Now he realized what Duff Smith had said to his pilot over Loch Lochy. He had not said to head for “checkers” but Chequers, which was the country residence of the British prime minister. As he followed Stern back to the Lysander, McConnell wondered if Adolf Hitler knew what words were engraved above the door of that house, and what they meant.

All for the Fatherland.

Churchill was studiously smoking his cigar when Brigadier Smith returned. Smith took a chair opposite the desk and waited for the inevitable grilling the PM always gave before important operations. Churchill exhaled a great cloud of blue smoke, sniffed, then rested his cigar on the rim of the ashtray.

“This is the only operation I have ever sanctioned that goes directly against the wishes of the Americans,” he said soberly. “I’m still not sure I fancy using an American to do it. Even if he is the right man from a technical standpoint. It could cause problems later.”

“There won’t be any problems, Winston. If this mission succeeds, it succeeds in producing a negative: the nonuse of nerve gas by the Nazis. And if it fails, both Stern and McConnell will in all likelihood be dead.”

“What if it succeeds, but the good doctor decides to unburden himself afterwards? For reasons of conscience.”

Smith peered into the blue eyes, trying to read the subtext of the conversation. At length he said, “This is a dangerous mission. Even if it succeeds, it’s quite possible that McConnell and Stern might not get back alive.”

Churchill steepled his fingers and focused his eyes somewhere in the shadows beyond Smith. “Does anyone know McConnell is going on this mission? Anyone at all?”

“He left two letters with an Oxford don. For his wife and mother. The usual stuff. I confiscated them.”

Churchill sighed heavily. “If Eisenhower or Marshall learn I’ve bypassed them to make a strike of this magnitude—”

“They’ve left you no alternative, Winston! If Eisenhower’s armies fall dead after thirty seconds on the French beaches, Roosevelt and Marshall will scream to high heaven about what should have been done, and Ike will resign, but by then it will be too late.”

Churchill was nodding. “I agree, Duff. The question is, will the mission succeed? Is there a real chance?”

“Absolutely.”

“What about our gas? How long will it remain stable now?”

“It varies from lot to lot. The last two batches from Porton remained stable for ninety-seven hours.”

“What’s that? Four days?”

“Just over that.”

“And it was lethal?”

“Oh, quite, yes. Dispatched two large primates rather handily.”

Churchill winced. “Don’t tell me where you got your test subjects. I don’t want the Royal Society beating down my door. How old is the gas your Achnacarry men took in?”

Smith looked at his watch. “Twenty-six hours and counting.”

“Cutting it a bit fine, aren’t you?”

“The Raubhammer demonstration is in four days,” said Smith. “If we don’t pull it off by then, we’re probably too late anyway. If the wind is under seven miles per hour when they arrive, Stern will release the gas tonight. If not tonight, then tomorrow.”

Churchill picked up his pen and began doodling on a notepad. “That’s why you want the submarine to stand by for four days. The weather must be right for the attack?”

“That, and the exhibition for Hitler. I want to give them every possible chance to make the attack. As for weather, four miles an hour is optimal wind speed for a gas attack of this type, preferably without rain.”

“Does Stern or McConnell know the gas may not work?”

“Of course not.”

Churchill pulled the heavy pea jacket around his neck. “Duff, if you had to give me a percentage chance of success, what would you say?”

Smith ruminated. “Fifty-fifty for the attack itself. But if the attack is successful, I think there’s a ninety percent chance the bluff will work. Winston, I’m absolutely positive that this nerve gas initiative is an all-Himmler show. Everything points to it. When we hit him discreetly with his own personal ‘miracle weapon,’ we’ll knock his legs right out from under him. As far as he’ll know, we’ve got ten thousand tons of British Sarin ready to drop on Berlin. He’ll have to call off his show.”

“Will he be able to prove we were behind the attack?”