The Rhinemann Exchange: A Novel

by Robert Ludlum

Alan Swanson then added the subtle confirmation of their worst projections: whoever was chosen to go to Geneva, it could not be anyone known to him. Or to any War Department liaison with any of their companies. That was paramount.

  The Geneva meeting was exploratory. Whoever went to Switzerland should be knowledgeable and, if possible, capable of spotting deception. Obviously a man who practiced deception.

  That shouldn’t be difficult for them; not in the circles they traveled. Surely they knew such a man.

  They did. An accountant named Walter Kendall.

  Swanson looked up at the clock on the mantel. It was twenty minutes past six.

  Why did the time go so slowly? On the other hand, why didn’t it stop? Why didn’t everything stop but the sunlight? Why did there have to be the nights to go through?

  In another hour he would go to his office and quietly make arrangements for one Walter Kendall to be flown on neutral routes to Geneva, Switzerland. He would bury the orders in a blue pouch along with scores of other transport directives and clearances. There would be no signature on the orders, only the official stamp of Field Division, Fairfax; standard procedure with conduits.

  Oh, Christ! thought Swanson. If there could be control … without participation.

  But he knew that was not possible. Sooner or later he would have to face the reality of what he had done.

  8

  DECEMBER 6, 1943, BASQUE COUNTRY, SPAIN

  He had been in the north country for eight days. He had not expected it to be this long, but Spaulding knew it was necessary … an unexpected dividend. What had begun as a routine escape involving two defecting scientists from the Ruhr Valley had turned into something else.

  The scientists were throwaway bait. Gestapo bait. The runner who had made their escape possible out of the Ruhr was not a member of the German underground. He was Gestapo.

  It had taken Spaulding three days to be absolutely sure. The Gestapo man was one of the best he had ever encountered, but his mistakes fell into a pattern: he was not an experienced runner. When David was sure, he knew exactly what had to be done.

  For five days he led his “underground” companion through the hills and mountain passes to the east as far as Sierra de Guara, nearly a hundred miles from the clandestine escape routes. He entered remote villages and held “conferences” with men he knew were Falangists—but who did not know him—and then told the Gestapo man they were partisans. He traveled over primitive roads and down the Guayardo River and explained that these routes were the avenues of escape.… Contrary to what the Germans believed, the routes were to the east, into the Mediterranean, not the Atlantic. This confusion was the prime reason for the success of the Pyrenees network. On two occasions he sent the Nazi into towns for supplies—both times he followed and observed the Gestapo man entering buildings that had thick telephone wires sagging into the roofs.

  The information was being transmitted back to Germany. That was reason enough for the investment of five additional days. The German interceptors would be tied up for months concentrating on the eastern “routes”; the network to the west would be relatively unencumbered.

  But now the game was coming to an end. It was just as well, thought David; he had work to do in Ortegal, on the Biscay coast.

  The small campfire was reduced to embers, the night air cold. Spaulding looked at his watch. It was two in the morning. He had ordered the “runner” to stay on guard quite far from the campsite … out of the glow of the fire. In darkness. He had given the Gestapo man enough time and isolation to make his move, but the German had not made his move; he had remained at his post.

  So be it, thought David. Perhaps the man wasn’t as expert as he thought he was. Or perhaps the information his own men in the hills had given him was not accurate. There was no squad of German soldiers—suspected Alpine troops—heading down from the mountain borders to take out the Gestapo agent.

  And him.

  He approached the rock on which the German sat. “Get some rest. I’ll take over.”

  “Danke,” said the man, getting to his feet. “First, nature calls; I must relieve my bowels. I’ll take a spade into the field.”

  “Use the woods. Animals graze here. The winds carry.”

  “Of course. You’re thorough.”

  “I try to be,” said David.

  The German crossed back toward the fire, to his pack. He removed a camp shovel and started for the woods bordering the field. Spaulding watched him, now aware that his first impression was the correct one. The Gestapo agent was expert. The Nazi had not forgotten that six days ago the two Ruhr scientists had disappeared during the night—at a moment of the night when he had dozed. David had seen the fury in the German’s eyes and knew the Nazi was now remembering the incident.

  If Spaulding assessed the current situation accurately, the Gestapo man would wait at least an hour into his watch, to be sure he, David, was not making contact with unseen partisans in the darkness. Only then would the German give the signal that would bring the Alpine troops out of the forest. With rifles leveled.

  But the Gestapo man had made a mistake. He had accepted too readily—without comment—Spaulding’s statement about the field and the wind and the suggestion that he relieve himself in the woods.

  They had reached the field during late daylight; it was barren, the grass was sour, the slope rocky. Nothing would graze here, not even goats.

  And there was no wind at all. The night air was cold, but dead.

  An experienced runner would have objected, no doubt humorously, and say he’d be damned if he’d take a crap in the pitch-black woods. But the Gestapo agent could not resist the gratuitous opportunity to make his own contact.

  If there was such a contact to be made, thought Spaulding. He would know in a few minutes.

  David waited thirty seconds after the man had disappeared into the forest. Then he swiftly, silently threw himself to the ground and began rolling his body over and over again, away from the rock, at a sharp angle from the point where the runner had entered the forest.

  When he had progressed thirty-five to forty feet into the grass, he stood up, crouching, and raced to the border of the woods, judging himself to be about sixty yards away from the German.

  He entered the dense foliage and noiselessly closed the distance between them. He could not see the man but he knew he would soon find him.

  Then he saw it. The German’s signal. A match was struck, cupped, and extinguished swiftly.

  Another. This one allowed to burn for several seconds, then snuffed out with a short spit of breath.

  From deep in the woods came two separate, brief replies. Two matches struck. In opposite directions.

  David estimated the distance to be, perhaps, a hundred feet. The German, unfamiliar with the Basque forest, stayed close to the edge of the field. The men he had signaled were approaching. Spaulding—making no sound that disturbed the hum of the woods—crawled closer.

  He heard the voices whispering. Only isolated words were distinguishable. But they were enough.

  He made his way rapidly back through the overgrowth to his original point of entry. He raced to his sentry post, the rock. He removed a small flashlight from his field jacket, clamped separated fingers over the glass and aimed it southwest. He pressed the switch five times in rapid succession. He then replaced the instrument in his pocket and waited.

  It wouldn’t be long now.

  It wasn’t.

  The German came out of the woods carrying the shovel, smoking a cigarette. The night was black, the moon breaking only intermittently through the thick cover of clouds; the darkness was nearly total. David got up from the rock and signaled the German with a short whistle. He approached him.

  “What is it, Lisbon?”

  Spaulding spoke quietly. Two words.

  “Heil Hitler.”

  And plunged his short bayonet into the Nazi’s stomach, ripping it downward, killing the man instantly.

  The body fell to th
e ground, the face contorted; the only sound was a swallow of air, the start of a scream, blocked by rigid fingers thrust into the dead man’s mouth, yanked downward, as the knife had been, shorting out the passage of breath.

  David raced across the grass to the edge of the woods, to the left of his previous entry. Nearer, but not much, to the point where the Nazi had spoken in whispers to his two confederates. He dove into a cluster of winter fern as the moon suddenly broke through the clouds. He remained immobile for several seconds, listening for sounds of alarm.

  There were none. The moon was hidden again, the darkness returned. The corpse in the field had not been spotted in the brief illumination. And that fact revealed to David a very important bit of knowledge.

  Whatever Alpine troops were in the woods, they were not on the edge of the woods. Or if they were, they were not concentrating on the field.

  They were waiting. Concentrating in other directions.

  Or just waiting.

  He rose to his knees and scrambled rapidly west through the dense underbrush, flexing his body and limbs to every bend in the foliage, making sounds compatible to the forest’s tones. He reached the point where the three men had conferred but minutes ago, feeling no presence, seeing nothing.

  He took out a box of waterproof matches from his pocket and removed two. He struck the first one, and the instant it flared, he blew it out. He then struck the second match and allowed it to burn for a moment or two before he extinguished it.

  About forty feet in the woods there was a responding flash of a match. Directly north.

  Almost simultaneously came a second response. This one to the west, perhaps fifty or sixty feet away.

  No more.

  But enough.

  Spaulding quickly crawled into the forest at an angle. Northeast. He went no more than fifteen feet and crouched against the truck of an ant-ridden ceiba tree.

  He waited. And while he waited, he removed a thin, short, flexible coil of wire from his field jacket pocket. At each end of the wire was a wooden handle, notched for the human hand.

  The German soldier made too much noise for an Alpiner, thought David. He was actually hurrying, anxious to accommodate the unexpected command for rendezvous. That told Spaulding something else; the Gestapo agent he had killed was a demanding man. That meant the remaining troops would stay in position, awaiting orders. There would be a minimum of individual initiative.

  There was no time to think of them now. The German soldier was passing the ceiba tree.

  David sprang up silently, the coil held high with both hands. The loop fell over the soldier’s helmet, the reverse pull so swift and brutally sudden that the wire sliced into the flesh of the neck with complete finality.

  There was no sound but the expunging of air again.

  David Spaulding had heard that sound so often it no longer mesmerized him. As it once had done.

  Silence.

  And then the unmistakable breaking of branches; footsteps crushing the ground cover of an unfamiliar path. Rushing, impatient; as the dead man at his foot had been impatient.

  Spaulding put the bloody coil of wire back into his pocket and removed the shortened carbine bayonet from the scabbard on his belt. He knew there was no reason to hurry; the third man would be waiting. Confused, frightened perhaps … but probably not, if he was an Alpiner. The Alpine troops were rougher than the Gestapo. The rumors were that the Alpiners were chosen primarily for streaks of sadism. Robots who could live in mountain passes and nurture their hostilities in freezing isolation until the orders for attack were given.

  There was no question about it, thought David. There was a certain pleasure in killing Alpiners.

  The treadmill.

  He edged his way forward, his knife leveled.

  “Wer?… Wer ist dort?” The figure in darkness whispered in agitation.

  “Hier, mein Soldat,” replied David. His carbine bayonet slashed into the German’s chest.

  The partisans came down from the hills. There were five men, four Basque and one Catalonian. The leader was a Basque, heavyset and blunt.

  “You gave us a wild trip, Lisbon. There were times we thought you were loco. Mother of God! We’ve traveled a hundred miles.”

  “The Germans will travel many times that, I assure you. What’s north?”

  “A string of Alpiners. Perhaps twenty. Eveiy six kilometers, right to the border. Shall we let them sit in their wastes?”

  “No,” said Spaulding thoughtfully. “Kill them.… All but the last three; harass them back. They’ll confirm what we want the Gestapo to believe.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “You don’t have to.” David walked to the dying fire and kicked at the coals. He had to get to Ortegal. It was all he could think about.

  Suddenly he realized that the heavyset Basque had followed him. The man stood across the diminished campfire; he wanted to say something. He looked hard at David and spoke over the glow.

  “We thought you should know now. We learned how the pigs made the contact. Eight days ago.”

  “What are you talking about?” Spaulding was irritated. Chains of command in the north country were at best a calculated risk. He would get the written reports; he did not want conversation. He wanted to sleep, wake up, and get to Ortegal. But the Basque seemed hurt; there was no point in that. “Go on, amigo.”

  “We did not tell you before. We thought your anger would cause you to act rashly.”

  “How so? Why?”

  “It was Bergeron.”

  “I don’t believe that.…”

  “It is so. They took him in San Sebastián. He did not break easily, but they broke him. Ten days of torture … wires in the genitals, among other devices, including hypodermics of the drug. We are told he died spitting at them.”

  David looked at the man. He found himself accepting the information without feeling. Without feeling. And that lack of feeling warned him … to be on guard. He had trained the man named Bergeron, lived in the hills with him, talked for hours on end about things only isolation produces between men. Bergeron had fought with him, sacrificed for him. Bergeron was the closest friend he had in the north country.

  Two years ago such news would have sent him into furious anger. He would have pounded the earth and called for a strike somewhere across the borders, demanding that retribution be made.

  A year ago he would have walked away from the bearer of such news and demanded a few minutes to be by himself. A brief silence to consider … by himself … the whole of the man who had given his life, and the memories that man conjured up.

  Yet now he felt nothing.

  Nothing at all.

  And it was a terrible feeling to feel nothing at all.

  “Don’t make that mistake again,” he said to the Basque. “Tell me next time. I don’t act rashly.”

  9

  DECEMBER 13, 1943, BERLIN, GERMANY

  Johann Dietricht shifted his immense soft bulk in the leather chair in front of Altmüller’s desk. It was ten thirty at night and he had not had dinner; there had been no time. The Messerschmitt flight from Geneva had been cramped, petrifying; and all things considered, Dietricht was in a state of aggravated exhaustion. A fact he conveyed a number of times to the Unterstaatssekretär.

  “We appreciate everything you’ve been through, Herr Dietricht. And the extraordinary service you’ve rendered to your country.” Altmüller spoke solicitously. “This will take only a few minutes longer, and then I’ll have you driven anywhere you like.”

  “A decent restaurant, if you can find one open at this hour,” said Dietricht petulantly.

  “We apologize for rushing you away. Perhaps a pleasant evening; a really good meal. Schnapps, good company. Heaven knows you deserve it.… There’s an inn several miles outside the city. Its patronage is restricted; mostly young flight lieutenants, graduates in training. The kitchen is really excellent.”

  There was no need for Johann Dietricht to return Altmüller’
s smiling look; he accepted certain things as indigenous to his life-style. He had been catered to for years. He was a very important man, and other men were invariably trying to please him. As Herr Altmüller was trying to please him now.

  “That might be most relaxing. It’s been a dreadful day. Days, really.”

  “Of course, if you’ve some other …”

  “No, no. I’ll accept your recommendation.… Let’s get on with it, shall we?”

  “Very well. Going back over several points so there’s no room for error.… The American was not upset with regard to Buenos Aires?”

  “He jumped at it. Revolting man; couldn’t look you in the eye, but he meant what he said. Simply revolting, though. His clothes, even his fingernails. Dirty fellow!”

  “Yes, of course. But you couldn’t have misinterpreted?”

  “My English is fluent. I understand even the nuances. He was very pleased. I gathered that it served a dual purpose: far removed—thousands of miles away—and in a city nominally controlled by American interests.”

  “Yes, we anticipated that reaction. Did he have the authority to confirm it?”

  “Indeed, yes. There was no question. For all his uncouth manner, he’s obviously highly placed, very decisive. Unquestionably devious, but most anxious to make the exchange.”

  “Did you discuss—even peripherally—either’s motives?”

  “My word, it was unavoidable! This Kendall was most direct. It was a financial matter, pure and simple. There were no other considerations. And I believe him totally; he talks only figures. He reduces everything to numbers. I doubt he has capacities for anything else. I’m extremely perceptive.”

  “We counted on that. And Rhinemann? He, too, was acceptable?”

  “Immaterial. I pointed out the calculated risk we were taking in an effort to allay suspicions; that Rhinemann was in forced exile. This Kendall was impressed only by Rhinemann’s wealth.”

  “And the time element; we must be thoroughly accurate. Let’s go over the projected dates. It would be disastrous if I made any mistake. As I understand you, the American had graduated estimates of carbonado and bortz shipping requirements.…”