The Leader And The Damned Page 9

  Jodl had time to communicate with the German High Command in Tunis - whose forces faced those of General Alexander. What would the verdict be? The Englishman was becoming aware there was something devious in Alfred Jodl's expression and nature. It would take an agile mind to survive the domestic warfare of the Wolf's Lair.

  'I have communicated the contents of these plans to Tunis. I have further had their reaction to what you say purports to be the Allied order of battle..'

  Jodl paused, tapping a pencil gently on his desk. A naked bulb shed a harsh light over the military documents. It was early in the evening, as black as pitch in the compound outside, where dense mist blotted out the masked lights. Jodl was playing with him - Lindsay could sense it as he was careful to resist the overwhelming temptation to say something - anything - to break the loaded silence.

  'In a way these documents are a dile as to your bona fides - is that not so?' Jodl enquired eventually.

  Lindsay shrugged, a gesture of complete indifference. 'That is for others to decide. I simply await my interview with the Fuhrer

  'You may have to wait a long time, the German said sharply.

  Lindsay's stomach revolved. God, something was wrong with the bloody documents. He wanted to reach for the pack of cigarettes in his pocket. Again he resisted temptation since Jodl, he felt certain, was waiting for the slightest sign of nerves.

  The pencil continued tapping its tattoo. Lindsay could have wrenched it out of Jodl's hands and snapped the thing in two. Instead, he leaned back further in his chair and clasped his hands lightly in his lap.

  'You may have to wait a long time,' Jodl repeated. 'You see, I happen to know the Fuhrer has a list of appointments as long as your arm.'

  Lindsay nodded, no particular expression showing in his reaction as he concealed the shock of relief. Jodl's manner, his choice of words, had convinced him he was about to be arrested and interrogated.

  'Tunis,' Jodl said suddenly, still staring hard at Lindsay, 'tells me all the present data as to the Allied dispositions on the African front coincides with the documents you brought us..'

  For the second time the Englishman forced himself to hide his relief. This really was a tricky bastard - he was convinced Jodl had been testing him. He watched while the German arranged the documents tidily, returned them to the thick envelope and pushed the package across the desk.

  'Your passport to the Wolf's Lair. Guard them well.'

  His expression was ironic and even when he left the but Lindsay was uncertain whether he had gained the man's confidence - or at least his neutrality. An enigmatic personality, Colonel-General Alfred Jodl.

  He closed the door behind him and stopped. Dense fog was rolling into the compound, an icy fog which penetrated his greatcoat and reached for his bones. The leaden silence - no, it was the complete absence of sound - bothered him.

  Then he realized it was not the atmosphere which had alerted him. A shoe or boot had squeaked nearby. Standing quite still in the grey blanket of vapour he knew he was not alone. A hand grasped his arm.

  'Don't make a sound!'

  It was the soft, sleepy voice of Christa Lundt - he had already guessed her identity from the smallness of the hand which gripped his arm.

  'I want to talk to you,' she went on, 'but we must not be seen. You know you are being watched? Don't let's go into that now - just concentrate on not making a noise. We'll go to my quarters.'

  Still holding on to him, she led the way across the compound. Lindsay was disturbed by the way she drifted through the fog like a wraith. Only a professional could move so silently. Who was Christa Lundt?'

  'We're here. Wait while I open the door.

  He listened and watched. Not a hint of a sound as she inserted a key inside the lock, turned and withdrew it. Recently she must have oiled the lock for it to operate so noiselessly. She gently pulled him inside the darkness of the interior and asked him to stay still.

  Again the door was closed with great skill, the lock turned, a light switched on. They were standing in a narrow corridor. No carpet on the bare floorboards. She ushered him inside a room, switched on another light and went immediately to check the curtain drawn over the window.

  'Coffee?'

  'Maybe later, thank you.' He sat in an armchair she indicated with a graceful gesture. 'You said something about my being watched..'

  'Martin Bormann. It would be, of course. He has allocated an SS man to follow you and report all your movements. I met the SS chap - who'd lost you.' She sounded amused as she sat close to him, crossed her shapely legs and used both hands to loosen her glossy hair. 'He was in a bit of a panic. I told him I was sure I'd seen you going to see Keitel. So now he's freezing outside our respected Field Marshal's hut. With a bit of luck he should be there all night...'

  'Why would it be Bormann who set the dogs on me? "Of course", I think you said..

  'Because he's suspicious of everyone.' She grinned. 'Sometimes I think he wonders about himself. He thinks you're a British spy - he's furious that the Fuhrer has agreed to see you.' She had gone to the kitchen area. She was boiling water for the coffee on a stove. As she spoke she glanced at Lindsay as though to assess his reaction. He turned the direction of the conversation away from himself.

  'There certainly seems to be a case of spy mania,' Lindsay observed. 'I recall you said there was a Soviet agent inside the Wolf's Lair..

  'I said the Fuhrer is convinced a Soviet agent has penetrated the security system,' she corrected him. 'Someone at the very top..

  'You get that sort of thing in wartime.'

  The Englishman introduced a hint of disbelief into his assertion and it provoked a reaction. She began straining the coffee as she replied.

  'He does have grounds for thinking that way. Every time the Wehrmacht launches an offensive the Russians have troops ready to meet it. The curious thing is they don't launch offensives themselves. If they did know our order of battle, you'd think they would take us by surprise. Here you are — real coffee. Not that acorn muck we drank in the canteen..

  `Who exactly does know the order of battle?'

  She perched on the arm of a chair and sipped at her coffee as though she hadn't heard the question. Had he probed too far? The girl puzzled him and he was irked that he couldn't weigh her up. The obvious explanation was that she had been instructed to find out all she could about him and then report back to... Bormann? The Fuhrer himself? She surprised him again by replying.

  'Only a very few people know the daily order of battle - the Fuhrer himself, of course, since he takes all the major operational decisions. Field Marshal Keitel is another. Martin Bormann is present at every conference. Then there's Colonel-General Jodl.' The latter seemed to be an afterthought. 'That's about it.'

  'The short list of suspects is a trio, then. Bormann, Keitel and Jodl.' Lindsay leaned his head against the back of the arm chair and appeared to relax completely as he stretched out his legs and crossed his ankles. 'This coffee is very good.'

  'And your trio is ridiculous. All of them are so high up they are above suspicion..

  'The most successful spies in history have always been so high they had access to really vital information - and were, as you say, above suspicion. In the old Austro-Hungarian Empire their chief of counter-espionage, Colonel Raedl, was eventually caught passing secrets to the other side by the trainload.'

  'Why have you flown to Germany, Ian?'

  'I like to travel. I was getting a hemmed-in feeling back in Britain..

  'Oh, you flew direct from Britain to Africa and then on to the Berghof?'

  He didn't reply to the question. He was beginning to change his mind about Christa being a pawn sent to find out all she could and then report back her findings to Bormann or someone else. He sensed that she was in a nervy, jumpy mood, that she was deeply concerned about her own safety.

  Christa Lundt attended all the military conferences. Christa Lundt recorded all the Fuhrer's instructions - she had said.so earlier in the canteen
. She was the ideal person to provide the answer to the second question which had brought him to Germany. He decided to take the gamble.

  'One thing intrigues me,' he began. 'Is the Fuhrer really the military genius he poses as? Or is there some brilliant general directing the armies? Keitel? Jodl?'

  'You're joking, I assume.' Her tone was full of contempt. 'I thought you would have spotted those two are Hitler's obedient satellites. The Fuhrer alone is in command. Throughout the war so far he has taken all the crucial decisions which brought us so many victories. He is his own mastermind..'

  'You admire him?' he suggested.

  'We all do. And not only for his genius. He's considerate - especially with women. He can be very gentle and understanding. And it's fascinating to watch the way he manipulates his generals, all of whom are highly educated while he rose from the bottom..'

  Lindsay was still leaning back in his chair when he threw the question at her. 'What are you so nervous about? Don't deny it - you crept about like a phantom on the way back here from Jodl's quarters. You kidded me it was all for my sake - it was for your own. You weren't scared someone would spot me - you were scared someone would spot you! Why?'

  She stood up and began walking round the room slowly, interlacing her fingers, kneading them restlessly. She gave the impression of a woman struggling to take a major decision. She stopped in front of Lindsay and looked down at him through her lashes.

  'Bormann is going to make me his scapegoat. I know it! The Fuhrer keeps on and on about this hidden traitor at the Wolf's Lair - Bormann always provides the Fuhrer with what he wants - that's how he got where he is. He's going to denounce me as the Soviet spy. It's just a question of when. I need an escape route.'

  'You know something?' Lindsay adopted her own tactic of talking very slowly. 'You're good - you're very good, indeed. I'll give you that..'

  'What the hell do you mean?'

  Her face was white with anger. She clenched her knuckles and he sensed she was on the verge of attacking him. He remained still, silent. She couldn't stand the silence.

  'I said what the hell do you mean?'

  'That stuff about Bormann making you a scapegoat is a load of rubbish. He'd need evidence. And you know it. But the second part intrigues me - the escape route bit, that you feel you're going to need. And soon. Why?'

  Christa Lundt had cracked up. She sat on the sofa shuddering. It was an unnerving, pathetic sight. She sat very erect, staring in front of her, like a person under hypnosis. From her hips upward her body quivered like a sick person with the fever. In her lap she clenched her hands tightly, the knuckles white and bloodless. For a whole minute she uttered no sound.

  At the other end of the sofa Lindsay sat without reacting, his face expressionless. He watched her closely. He could hear Colonel Browne giving the warning in faraway Ryder Street.

  'It may all go wrong. You may never reach the Fuhrer. Then you will be subjected to every trick in the book - and they have a very big book. Torture cannot be ruled out. But they can be more subtle. They may use a woman to undermine your defences..'

  Still gazing fixedly ahead, she gripped her graceful hands as though fighting for control. A tear appeared at the corner of her right eye, rolled down her cheek. He waited for the handkerchief to appear. She opened her trembling lips, closed them and then the words came through teeth clenched as tightly as the fingers.

  'Bormann, Jodl, Keitel - they know they have to be suspects. I take down the Fuhrer's bloody minutes for his military directives. I'm made to order for the scapegoat. I have to get away from this place, for Christ's sake..'

  'Why consult me?'

  Her voice was low, little more than a whisper. So quiet he had to lean an arm across the top of the sofa and bend closer to hear her next words.

  'Because I'm convinced you've come here to find out something. When you've found it out you'll leave. Oh, yes, you'll escape. You're that sort of man, I can sense it...'

  For the first time since the paroxysm had begun she looked at him. She had spoken the last sentence calmly. The fever of fear - if that was what it had been passed as swiftly as it had appeared. She produced a handkerchief from somewhere - he was too intent on studying her to notice from where - and wiped her face. That was when someone tapped gently on the outer door.

  'I am Major Gustav Hartmann of the Abwehr. May I come inside. The weather is rather inclement tonight...'

  Lindsay froze. A whole chain of events had been stage-managed. First, Christa Lundt had waited for him outside Jodl's but to coax him back to her own quarters. She had then tried to trap him - to throw him off balance by creating an extreme, emotional atmosphere. He had not reacted to that. Now the Abwehr had arrived.

  Lindsay was certain that someone was desperate to discredit him before he ever talked to the Fuhrer. The question he needed an answer to was the identity of the stage-manager of the series of events he was being subjected to. Bormann, Keitel - or Jodl?

  Hartmann was a large man. Over six feet tall, well built, he wore a military greatcoat with wide lapels. In his late thirties he had a well-shaped head, a small, trim moustache, strong features and watchful eyes. He removed his peaked cap, still waiting in the open doorway. The aroma of fog mingled with damp pine-woods lingered about him.

  'You want to see me, Major?' Christa demanded.

  'I have a routine mission - to interrogate your guest...'

  'You have papers? And how did you know he was here?'

  She was giving a convincing demonstration that she had never met Hartmann before. The Abwehr man produced a folder, showed it to her while he studied the Englishman. She returned the folder after checking it.

  'You'd better come in. You do understand security is tight at the Wolf's Lair?'

  'I have found that out since I flew in from Berlin.' There was an ironical note in the German's voice. 'I was informed that the Englishman was being interviewed by Colonel-General Jodl...'

  'You followed us here and then waited,' the girl said sharply.

  'It seemed discourteous to intrude immediately,' Hartmann replied smoothly. 'I went to the canteen and then came back..'

  Hartmann was unbuttoning his greatcoat when Lindsay decided he had had enough. This charade between Lundt and Hartmann - with the girl pretending the Abwehr officer was a stranger - had to be blown sky-high. He stood up.

  'You can keep your coat on, Hartmann. No one is interrogating me until I've seen the Fuhrer. And who the hell gave you authority to ask me questions first?'

  'I am not at liberty to reveal the identity of my superior,' the German said stiffly, but he stopped taking off his coat.

  'Then I'm not at liberty to tell you anything. If you persist I shall go straight to the top and complain...'

  Lindsay's manner was brusque, almost arrogant. He stood erect and outwardly confident as he waited to see whether his bluff had worked. Once caught up in the coils of the lower echelons there was a great danger he would never reach the Fuhrer.

  'The interrogation has to be purely voluntary, Hartmann said quietly, his dark eyes still studying the Englishman. 'So...'

  He buttoned up his coat again slowly. Christa had closed the outer door and Hartmann held his peaked cap in his hand as he took a few steps closer to both of them, his voice confidential.

  'It is very much in Wing Commander Lindsay's interest - even his safety could be involved - if neither of you say a word about my visiting you.' He bowed to Christa, put on his cap and said, 'I repeat, my presence here should remain a secret between us. Should anyone confront you with the fact of my visit you simply deny all knowledge of it..'

  'I don't understand you...' Christa began.

  'Which is my intention. Good night..'

  Lindsay waited until Christa had closed the door again and they were alone. She leaned back against the door, her brow furrowed.

  'He's Section Three of the Abwehr - counter-espionage. Creepy.'

  'I thought you'd never seen him before,' Lindsay rapped. 'Ho
w do you know what section he's attached to?'

  'Because I examined his papers, idiot!' She folded her arms and walked slowly towards the coffee pot. 'They're all around us, Wing Commander - and closing in..'

  Chapter Twelve

  'Who the devil are you?'

  'Major Hartmann. Abwehr

  The question had been arrogant, overbearing in tone. Hartmann's reply was brusque, abrupt. On leaving Fraulein Lundt's quarters he had moved across the fog-bound compound and was passing under a high overhead light beamed downwards when accosted.

  Field Marshal Keitel gripped his baton more tightly as he summoned a nearby guard to join him. The uniformed soldier came running, his rifle held ready for action in both hands. The powerful light was blurred in the swirling grey vapour as the three men faced one another, the soldier staring at the Field Marshal as he waited for the next instruction.

  'Are you carrying a weapon?' Keitel demanded.

  'Only a 9-mm. Luger,' Hartmann replied. 'And before you ask, yes, the weapon.is fully loaded. An empty pistol is rather pointless, would you not agree?'

  Keitel was almost speechless with fury. No more than the mouthpiece of the Fuhrer - 'the ventriloquist's solid wooden dummy' as one battle-weary general commented after a visit to Rastenburg, he compensated by bullying all those of inferior rank or influence.

  'Disarm him!' Keitel ordered.

  Hartmann's movement would have seemed like a conjurer's sleight of hand in broad daylight; in the murk of the night beneath the dim lamp it seemed little short of miraculous. Before the soldier had even begun to react, the Luger appeared in Hartmann's hand. It was aimed point-blank at the soldier's chest.

  'Drop the rifle!'

  In the soundless compound there was a clatter as the weapon left the soldier's nerveless fingers and fell to the ground. There had been a grim urgency in Hartmann's voice which made his action a reflex. Keitel, astounded, made several attempts before he managed coherent speech.

  'Do you realize whom you are addressing?'