ANGEL OF DESTRUCTION
Christopher Nicole
© Christopher Nicole 2009
Christopher Nicole has asserted his rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.
First published in 2009 by Severn House Publishers Ltd.
This edition published in 2018 by Endeavour Media Ltd.
I am become as death, the destroyer of worlds.
The Bhagavadgita
Table of Contents
PROLOGUE
PRELUDE TO AN EXECUTION
INCIDENT IN MEXICO
PARADISE
THE INTRUDERS
THE PROPOSITION
CRITICAL MATTERS
INCIDENT AT SEA
UNWELCOME COMPANY
INCIDENT IN ARGENTINA
GONE FISHING
INCIDENT IN THE STORM
EPILOGUE
PROLOGUE
‘It is such a lovely day,’ Anna Fehrbach said. ‘Would you like to swim with me?’ Her voice was soft, with a delightful Irish lilt.
I was completely taken aback. Although over the last few weeks I had enjoyed a considerable mental intimacy with this remarkable woman, Anna Fehrbach, Countess von Widerstand, alias Mrs the Honourable Ballantine Bordman, alias Anna O’Brien, alias Anna O’Flaherty, alias Anna O’Donovan, alias Anna O’Rourke, alias Anna O’Reilly, alias Anna Fitzjohn, she had always maintained a physical aloofness between us, allowing herself nothing more than an occasional touch of my hand.
Now we sat on the naya of her home, high on the mountain known as Montgo, which rises above the little seaport and burgeoning tourist resort of Javea on the Spanish Costa Blanca. The house itself, cut six hundred feet up into the mountainside, was exquisite, the view, looking down on the Jalon Valley with its patchwork of multi-coloured fields, breathtaking.
Immediately beneath where we were sitting was the large pool, its water sparkling in the morning sunlight. But all of this beauty with which I was surrounded was eclipsed by the beauty seated beside me, sipping champagne as she smiled at me. Anna Fehrbach was eighty-nine years old! And yet so much remained of the young girl who had been called the most beautiful woman of her time, just as those who knew her secrets had called her the most deadly woman of any time. But after so many years, there were not many of those left; Anna had seen to that.
Having come across her name in a book I was researching on the Hitler war I had immediately been fascinated. References to her were scanty, again because most of the people who had known who and what she was were dead. She was a name here, a suspicion there, a whisper stealing through some of the darkest pages of recent history, who had disappeared without trace only a few years after the war had ended, while still in her prime and still pursuing her deadly purpose. It had seemed obvious that she must have died herself, murdered in some dark alley, finally overtaken by one of her many enemies. That is, supposing she had ever really lived, and not been a figment of frightened men’s imaginations.
Inspired by the very idea of her, I had refused to admit that so evocative a personality could never have been, or that if she were now dead, there could be no trace of how and when and where it had happened. And so I had embarked on a hunt, whenever I could spare the time from earning a living, collecting every vestige of information I could discover about either her or the world in which she had lived, and fought . . . and survived?
My search had received a huge boost when, in an old and tattered copy of the Tatler glossy magazine, printed in early 1939, and depicting, amongst other celebrities at a race meeting in England, the Honourable Ballantine Bordman and his new and stunningly beautiful German bride, as had been her then persona; Anna was actually the daughter of an Irish journalist – which explained her brogue, certainly when speaking English – and an Austrian newspaper editor, born in Vienna in 1920. But by 1938, although she was only eighteen, the Nazis had already got hold of her, and quickly recognizing her enormous potential – in addition to her looks she had an IQ of 173 and was already a top athlete – had blackmailed her, by imprisoning her family as hostages for her cooperation, into working for them.
The photo was a poor one, in black and white, taken from a distance, and somewhat blurred. But the tall, slender, so elegant figure in the sable coat and hat, from which her straight pale golden hair had drifted down to the small of her back, restrained only by a clasp on the nape of her neck had created an unforgettable image. That hair had alone made her stand out in a world of bobs and permanent waves.
And that alone had truly changed with age. It was now white and cut short. But the rest of her, the classic, slightly aquiline features, so poorly depicted in the photo, the so powerful but still compellingly shaped body, just under six feet tall, the long legs, the swelling bust, had hardly changed in seventy years. The only aspect of her not indicated by the photo, as she smiled charmingly at the man with whom she was speaking, was the ice-cold, lightning fast, and, when it was necessary, utterly ruthless brain, which had carried her, triumphantly, through so many potentially fatal situations, leaving behind her a trail of death and destruction . . . when last we had spoken her body count had been ninety-four, and I knew that she had not yet completed her amazing story.
But from the beginning I had had no doubts that the legends of her deadly expertise with either gun, knife, or her bare hands were based on fact, and thus when my hunt had ended at the wrought-iron gates on the drive beneath the pool, and I had asked if I could see the reclusive widow who lived here, I equally could have had no doubt that I was taking my life in my hands.
I had been welcomed! I now knew that it had been a colossal stroke of good fortune, that I should appear at the very moment that Anna, for all her on-going good health, had been realizing that the end of her amazing life had to be in sight. The actually amazing part of that life had ended more than fifty years ago. Then circumstances had dictated that she should call a halt to her career: her two most long-standing and dangerous enemies were both dead, and so were too many of those she had counted as friends, and even lovers. Besides, by then she had accumulated the immense fortune that had enabled her to go where she chose, and live as she chose, with whom she chose.
So for fifty years she had disappeared from that world stage across which she had flitted so tantalizingly. But now, just to vanish forever without trace into a remote Spanish grave with only her faithful companion Encarna to mourn her, would have made a nonsense of her life, and left her no more than an unsubstantiated legend. And then, while she had been brooding on this, even, she had confessed, contemplating writing her memoirs herself without any idea of what she would do with them when she was finished, who should turn up on her doorstep but an author-cum-journalist who had spent so much of his own life looking for her, almost like the answer to a prayer.
With a background such as hers, Anna was conditioned to suspicion of any itinerant stranger who might ring her bell. But after only a few minutes in my company, during which I had been uncomfortably aware that for all her age she yet possessed both the mental and physical ability to destroy me in seconds – even if she had only once revealed the pistol that was never far from her right hand – she had, with her acute powers of perception and understanding, been able to ascertain that I was no more than what I claimed, and warmed to me accordingly.
But yet, there had always been that suggestion of, this close but no closer. Until now! ‘I would love to swim with you, Anna, but unfortunately—’
‘You do not have a swim suit? Is that so important? I never wear one.’
Again I could not believe my ears. ‘You mean—?’
Anna stood up. ‘You have never struck me as being a prude. Or do you have some dreadfu
l physical defect to be kept hidden?’
I could feel myself flushing. ‘Well, no, but . . .’
She went to the head of the stairs and down to the pool level. ‘This pool is absolutely private,’ she said over her shoulder. ‘It is above the level of the road beneath the house, and therefore cannot be overlooked from down there, and it is protected by the house itself from anywhere further up the mountain, and so cannot be overlooked from up there either.’
There was a table with a multi-coloured shade umbrella over it and two metal chairs. Anna took off her shirt and laid it on the table. Following her down the steps, I caught my breath. I had not known what to expect, what I dared expect of a woman who was eighty-nine years old. But she still wore no bra, and the breasts were still full, and if they sagged, it was only slightly, and were the more entrancing for that.
Now she released her belt and slipped her pants down to her ankles before stepping out of them. Her legs, so long, so slender, and yet so clearly strong, were no less breathtaking. And there, nestling into her groin on top of the silk knickers was the thin leather belt and the holstered Walther PPK automatic pistol that she had used to such deadly effect over the years. I had to ask, ‘Do you always wear that?’
‘It became a way of life. I put it on every morning when I dress.’
‘Is it the same gun given you by Joe Andrews in 1946?’
‘No. I told you, remember, that I lost that one in that mud-stained shoot-out in Brazil.’
‘Four Russian operatives, all killed,’ I recalled, ‘with a single shot to the head.’
‘Well,’ she said, defensively, ‘they had come to take me back to Moscow to stand trial for my attempt on the life of Stalin. Was I to walk meekly back into the Lubianka and then a hangman’s noose? I had been there before. As for there being four of them, they made the usual mistake, even if they knew who I was, of supposing they were dealing only with a rather gorgeous and innocent young woman.’
She spoke in such a matter of fact, almost ingenuous, fashion of an incident that would have left most young women, whether gorgeous and innocent or not, in a traumatized state for the rest of their lives. But then that had been only one of a score of similar incidents, all with the same outcome. I remembered that she had often compared herself to a wartime fighter pilot, who dispassionately accepted being scrambled and required to fly into danger, almost daily, and who, equally dispassionately, shot down his enemies whenever they crossed his path . . . and did so without remorse or regret.
‘Anyway,’ she added, ‘There were only three single shots to the head. Owing to circumstances, I had to shoot the fourth man twice. But then I had to get rid of the gun. But I realized how useful a weapon it was. I mean, I preferred the Luger I had used in the SD, but that was difficult to conceal. This little thing, as you can see, fits into every nook and cranny. So I’ve used one ever since.’
She took off the gun belt and laid it also on the table, then dropped the knickers. More entrancement, but I was already staring at the blue stain on the pale flesh, some inches above either the silk or the belt or the pale pubic hair. As she observed, ‘That was where Hannah Gehrig shot me, remember?’ she said. ‘In 1939.’
‘Seconds before you broke her neck.’
Anna gave one of her entrancing moues. ‘If I had not done that, she would have shot me again.’ She walked down the steps into the water, without, to my surprise, taking off any of her exquisite jewellery, the little gold bar earrings, dangling from gold clips, the gold crucifix hanging between her breasts – a reminder of her Catholic background and upbringing – the huge ruby solitaire on the forefinger of her right hand, not even the gold Rolex on her wrist, but this was obviously waterproof. I recalled that, the watch apart, the jewellery had been loaned to her by her Nazi masters to enhance the image they had wanted, that of a wealthy aristocrat, but being Anna, when the Third Reich had collapsed, she had made sure that the jewellery survived, along with herself.
I followed her into the water, watching her perfectly rounded buttocks moving gently against each other. Perhaps the most attractive thing about her was the complete absence of either self-consciousness or coquetry. ‘May I ask . . .?’
‘Of course you may. It is not a miracle, although of course I have been lucky. Every day of my life that I have been able, that is, when I have not been travelling or under restraint, or –’ she smiled as she turned to face me and touched the bullet mark – ‘in hospital, I have exercised, quite severely. I do it still, every morning. Just as I practise with my pistol, several days a week. But apart from Hannah Gehrig’s bullet, I have never received a more serious injury than a sprained ankle, and while I know that for all the care I take of my health I could easily have been struck down by or suffered a serious illness, I still have my appendix, and such things as diabetes or hypertension have passed me by, so far at least.’ She gave one of her delightful girlish giggles. ‘I even still have my tonsils.’
I supposed the fact that her blood pressure should never have got out of control, had to be the true miracle of her life, when one considered the events of that life.
‘I sometimes feel,’ she went on, ‘that I can claim that perhaps my good health stems from the way I always kept myself so fit. But then I wonder if it is not because neither God nor the Devil are in a hurry to have to deal with my soul.’
‘You have kept yourself fighting fit even though you are retired, have been retired, for so many years? I would have thought, after you escaped from Germany in 1946, with ten million dollars’ worth of Nazi gold—’
‘That I would be able immediately to turn my back on my past?’ She began to swim, with slow, luxurious overarm strokes. I followed her, and we gained the far end, where she rested her arms on the coronation, breathing as evenly as ever, nipples just touching the stone with every breath, while I was panting, not entirely with exertion. ‘I knew then,’ she said, ‘that I had the physical means to retire. But to retire, and have to spend the rest of one’s life running, or looking over one’s shoulder, is hardly to enjoy that life. Even today, as you see, although it hardly seems necessary, I go armed. Lifelong habits are hard to break. And besides, do you know, I had got into a way of living. So I was a monster. But as long as I could justify, at least to myself, what I had to do, from time to time, what I was required to do, I had no real wish to end it. Besides, I still had too many enemies, men, and the odd woman, who wanted me dead. So . . .’
‘When you say, things you were required to do, this was under the contract you still had with the CIA, right?’
‘It wasn’t a written document, if that is what you mean. But Joe Andrews, and that meant the CIA, had helped me get my money out of the Soviet Zone in Germany. I could not have done it without them, just as I could not have done it without Clive Bartley and MI6. Equally, I could not have survived the war without the support of both those organizations.’
‘Even if the OSS once tried to have you assassinated?’
‘They convinced me that was a mistake.’ She swam back to the steps and left the water, which continued to roll down her back and legs. She towelled herself dry, and sat beneath the umbrella. Encarna, her maid and long-time companion, although a lifetime younger than her mistress, had thoughtfully brought down the ice bucket and glasses, and Anna filled two of these as I sat opposite her, feeling a delicious warmth spreading through my body. ‘So I realized that even if I had the money, I was not yet in a position to reject them. To have had both the CIA and the MGB out for my blood would have made life intolerable.’
‘And as you say, you were doing what you had always done, throughout your adult life.’
Anna gazed at me, and as on the few previous occasions that I had dared even by implication to question her ethics, my warmth dissipated in a sudden chill.
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I continued to dispose of certain people who I was persuaded had no right to clutter up this earth and who could not be reached by conventional justice.’
‘Forg
ive me,’ I said. ‘I find you so fascinating I cannot resist exploring every aspect of your personality.’
Her eyes softened. ‘I will forgive you, Christopher, because, I suppose, being a woman, I am susceptible to flattery.’
‘And all the time the Soviets were still breathing down your neck.’
Anna drank champagne. ‘I was their Public Enemy Number One. Well, I suppose, I had killed more than fifty of their so-called best operatives.’
‘And, despite all these distractions, did you ever get around to marrying Clive Bartley?’
Anna Fehrbach smiled.
PRELUDE TO AN EXECUTION
‘So there it is.’ Josef Stalin struck a match and lit his pipe, then puffed, but it was not a contented puff. It expressed frustration, which, to the master of all Russia and most of Eastern Europe, was an emotional rarity, and could easily lead to the utmost fury.
Not that he revealed any sign of this. His eyes remained sleepy, his huge moustache so shrouded his lips that even the pipe revealed no perceptible expression of discontent. But Lavrenty Beria, seated opposite him in his private office in the Kremlin, had known his master long enough, and closely enough, to be uneasy. He took off his pince-nez to polish them, thus leaving his huge, bland face which merged into his equally huge totally hairless head without a single point of reference. ‘Are you sure we are not being premature, Josef?’ he ventured.
‘No. We are being made to look foolish. Molotov assured me that if we closed Berlin to all road and rail traffic the democracies would have to pull out and surrender their half of the city to us. So what has happened? They are flying in seven thousand tons of food and fuel every day. Every day, Lavrenty. They are displaying an air capacity that is light years beyond anything we could do in similar circumstances. And the world is watching, and laughing at our futility. Now, I am sure you have read this report that they are having meetings to form a vast alliance of all the Western nations to resist any aggression by us. Ha!’
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