The Fuehrermaster

by Daniel Wyatt

  “Schubert!” Hess was stunned, but quickly found his tongue. “What are you doing here?”

  Schubert held out his left hand, his right clinging to the Luger that was pointed at Hess. “I came for the papers. Give them to me.”

  “Who got you out of jail this time?”

  “I want the papers.”

  “Who was it?” Hess persisted. “Hitler, the Austrian vagrant who never worked a day in his life? Or was it that fat cow, Goering?”

  “Shut up, Hess.”

  “Or was it Himmler? That’s who it was, wasn’t it? I can read your face. Do you know he used to be a chicken farmer? Our illustrious Gestapo leader used to be a chicken farmer. What about you Schubert? Back to drinking? Still wallowing with the mud-sucking pigs?”

  “The briefcase, Herr Reichsfuehrer.”

  Hess threw the briefcase at the imposter’s boots. “What are your orders, Schubert? Take the papers? Act on my behalf? The British would spot you as a phony in a minute. Himmler is an idiot to send you. You don’t stand a chance. You may be able to imitate me at a podium, but you are no negotiator.”

  “I’ll do fine. At least my superiors will reward me.”

  “Reward you?” Hess laughed. “Himmler doesn’t reward people. He does away with them once he uses them up. That will be your reward. I see what happened now. The Gestapo tried to get rid of me by planting a bomb in my airplane, set to go off over the North Sea. But I switched planes. While this was going on, Himmler sent you over to represent me as the Deputy Fuehrer during peace negotiations. Trouble was, I got away.”

  “I’m supposed to kill you.”

  “I thought so. But what then? They — Himmler and the Gestapo — won’t let you live long. You’re a dead man, Schubert. You go back, you’re a dead man.”

  Schubert began to think twice about his mission. “How do you know that?”

  “Because I know Himmler. I know his motives. I know his new plans for the Third Reich. Now if I was the Fuehrer, things would be different. I was the one who shared Hitler’s cell for a year after the Munich uprising. Did Himmler or Goering help the Fuehrer write Mein Kampf like I did? No! Did they help me create and organize the Nazi Party?” Hess pounded his chest with his fist. “I’m the leader of the Nazi Party. I’ve been Hitler’s adviser for twenty years. How dare he make Goering number two in the regime. My Deputy Fuehrer title is only a name. Goering! That fat buffoon. That idiot! He never did anything right in his life. He botched the Battle of Britain. His Luftwaffe was supposed to knock off the Royal Air Force in a few weeks. Bah! Mark my words, Goering will botch Barbarossa, too.”

  “Barbarossa? What is that?”

  “You don’t know, do you? The attack on Russia, of course.”

  Schubert was spellbound. “Hitler is going to attack Russia?”

  “Yes. Have you ever heard of anything so insane? Another two-front war! Unless I do something to prevent it. What do you hope to accomplish by killing me, Schubert? What? You’d be playing right into Himmler’s hands. He’ll eventually try to get rid of you too. That’s if you return safely to Germany. Do you think he’ll let you play me again? Are you going to take over my identity?”

  Schubert hadn’t thought about it before. What would happen if he was to kill Hess and return to Germany? “Yes, I would,” he said, half-heartedly.

  “You fool. You won’t get away with it. Another thing, how do you propose to leave here? The Brits will track you down. The same Brits who are scheduled to meet me here. They are waiting for me. They must be late.” Hess then took two steps closer to his impostor.

  “Stand back,” Schubert ordered, the Luger pointed at Hess’s chest.

  “Well?”

  Schubert could see that maybe Hess was making sense. “I ... I don’t believe you, Hess.”

  “I think you do.” Hess’s arms spread wide. “Go ahead and shoot me. Where will it get you? You’ve no place to go.”

  * * * *

  Hollinger came to on the other side of the ME-110. He looked over at the aircraft, where two men stood on the far side of the nose. He felt his aching head. He couldn’t have been out longer than a few minutes, he determined, because it was nearly dark now. Did the passenger knock him unconscious? He must have. Still groggy, Hollinger slipped out of the car without making a sound and fished for the flashlight under the seat. Grabbing it with one hand, he reached for his gun with the other, and began to quietly approach the two men. Ducking under the wing and out the other side, he flicked the light on and shone it at the two men, who were only four feet apart.

  “Not so fast, you two. You there, let go of the gun!” Hollinger shouted in English. When the man dropped the pistol, Hollinger’s already unsteady knees almost buckled on him. Was he seeing things? Both men looked the same. Both looked like Rudolf Hess. The one on the left wore a flight suit. He had to be the pilot. The other one was taller, in a trench coat. Was he the one hiding in the car? Was he the real Hess or was the pilot? There was one way to find out.

  “Give me the codename for the mission?” Hollinger said, eyeing both faces.

  “Operation Night Eagle,” Schubert snapped ahead of Hess. “I’m Rudolf Hess. I’m Falcon.”

  “No he’s not,” Hess exclaimed. “I’m the one. And you must be a representative for Lion. You are not Lion, I know that much. Where is he?”

  Now Hollinger was thoroughly confused. Both knew the proper codenames for the operation.

  “Shoot this impostor before he escapes,” Hess continued. “I can prove who the real Deputy Fuehrer is?”

  “How?” Hollinger asked.

  “I have top secret papers and photographs that will make you hair stand on end, material that only a person of my stature would have possession of.”

  Schubert had to do something. He withdrew his stiletto and lunged at Hess. But the Deputy Fuehrer anticipated the move and caught Schubert’s arm. They wrestled to the concrete and turned over and over, locked together.

  “OK, you two, stop it!” Hollinger yelled.

  They ignored Hollinger. He knew he couldn’t shoot. He didn’t know who was who. Then the one in the trench coat knifed the pilot and slowly crawled to his feet.

  “Now, we can finally get down to business,” Schubert said, brushing himself off and calmly walking over to the Luger lying on the concrete. His neck was gashed and sweat poured off his face. He held the gun loosely, barrel down. “Rudolf Hess at your service. The other was sent to foil this peace negotiation.”

  Hollinger didn’t know what to think. The man who had been in his car was Hess? “I need more proof,” Hollinger said.

  “Put the gun away, please.” Schubert waited for Hollinger to relax, then he flipped the gun up and fired twice before Hollinger could react. The American fell backwards to the ground. Schubert looked at the aircraft, then at Hess, then across the field. A truck with its headlights on had moved out from the hangars a mile away and was heading in his direction. Schubert turned to Hess and stripped him of all his flight gear, throwing it over his own body, and throwing the trench coat and hat loosely on Hess. Then he picked up Hess’s briefcase and shoved Himmler’s proposals inside. He took a step towards the fighter, then realized that he couldn’t leave Hess there, yet he couldn’t drag him aboard either. There could only be one Hess now. He — Felix Schubert — had to be the Hitler’s Deputy Fuehrer. With no remorse, he stood over the body and fired the Luger in rapid succession into Hess’s face until the chamber emptied. He glanced down at the blood on his boots, dazed for a moment. If Hess’s body was going to stay behind, then no one would recognize it.

  Schubert climbed onto the wing of the fighter. Stumbling to the cockpit seat, he hit the button for the port engine. The engine wound and caught. He looked out the broken Plexiglas at the truck racing to the end of the runway. Schubert hadn’t flown in years, not since he had been washed out of the Luftwaffe. Would he remember how to get this thing off the ground? Worse, this would be a one-engine takeoff.

  Hess was
right. Schubert couldn’t go back to Germany. He would fly his way to neutral Ireland. He was a Luftwaffe pilot now. If he had any trouble, he’d be Captain Alfred Horn, as the letter on his person stated. He spun the ME-110 around and faced the truck coming straight for him.

  * * * *

  Group Captain Walker was watching through his binoculars as best he could, despite the setting sun and oncoming darkness. At the distance of a mile, he couldn’t distinguish the figures at all. When he saw the flash of gunfire, he was forced to move, fearing the worst. He jogged down the hall and flew out of the door to one of the refuelling trucks, motioning for two of the Secret Service men to follow him. “Come on, let’s go!” he screamed at the driver, as the other two men jumped in the truck.

  As the driver raced down the runway, the occupants were shocked to see the German fighter racing head-on at them, its red wing lights blinking. The driver had no choice but to swerve onto the grass as the aircraft roared past. Walker flung open the passenger door and hung out the side and watched the ME-110 climb into the night in one of the sloppiest take-offs he had seen in a long while. The driver then drove the rest of the way to the end of the runway, where the truck’s headlights revealed two bodies lying on the concrete. The four men ran out. The nearest was Wesley Hollinger lying face up. Walker bent down and checked the American’s pulse. Then he saw blood stains on his shoulder and chest.

  “Bloody hell, no!” Walker exclaimed. “Get him to the hospital. He’s still alive.”

  “Yes, sir,” the driver said.

  Walker trotted over to the second body, this one lying on its side, dressed in an open grey trench coat, beneath it a blue jacket, blue-grey slacks, a blue shirt and blue tie. All Luftwaffe colours. A huge puddle of crimson red blood and pieces of brain covered the concrete. Walker turned the body on its back and was sick to his stomach at the ghastly sight. The face was a horrible conglomeration of blood, bones, and raw flesh.

  Walker dropped to his knees. “Good God, what would make somebody do such a thing?”

  TWENTY-FOUR

  Firth of Forth, Scotland

  She stood on the rocks and watched the surf picking up in intensity. With the countrywide blackout enforced, she couldn’t see a light anywhere.

  “We’re coming up to low tide,” Snowden said to her. A stiff wind at their backs, he studied the water with binoculars for any sign of a conning-tower showing above the water. “It’ll be further out now, what with the low tide. Let it go.”

  Denise dug for the flashlight inside her coat. Using Morse code, she flashed her call sign several times, followed by the letters A-B-O-R-T another six times, then signed off. She turned to Snowden. “Do you think they got the message?”

  “Whether they did or not, I’ll radio the navy.”

  “And what about Hamburg?”

  “Send them your last communiqué. After that, Denise is officially retired. We can’t take any more chances. This one was horrendous enough. Despite the rendezvous foul-up, you performed quite well. Good job.”

  Denise smiled. “Thanks. But I’m glad it’s over.”

  * * * *

  Lieutenant Steider read the Morse blinks clearly through the periscope more than six hundred yards offshore. It was an abort. Hess was on his own.

  “Up scope,” he ordered, pulling away from the periscope eyepiece. “And take her out to sea!”

  “Aye, aye, sir.”

  * * * *

  Near Eaglesham, Scotland

  A tight procession of six black sedans, headlights blacked out, chugged slowly along the tarred road. A quarter mile distant, Dungavel Castle marked the foggy landscape. Overhead, the stars were out in full force.

  “Keep your eyes on the road, young man, and push on,” Colonel Lampert said to the driver across from him in the front seat of the lead vehicle.

  “I’m trying to, sir. But I can’t see a thing.”

  “Hold up here,” Lampert said, once the driver came alongside the castle gates.

  Lampert got out and waited for the occupants from the five other cars. When they assembled for last-minute instructions, he asked them to check their pistols. He then sent two of the cars ahead with orders to surround the house in case anyone tried to escape.

  “I’ll knock,” he said to those men remaining. “As soon as I say Secret Service, we rush inside and cart them off. Tally ho.”

  The estate had several cars tucked inside the gates. No sounds could he heard, even as they reached the oak front doors. Lampert knocked, waited, and knocked again. He caught the faint sound of footsteps on the other side.

  The door opened, and a tall butler in his sixties appeared. “Yes.”

  Lampert showed his pocket identification with a flick of the wrist. “Secret Service.” Then he pushed ahead, followed by the other agents. Lampert stopped and glanced down a long hall of oil paintings. At the very end was an open door with a brightly-lit room beyond, from where he heard laughter and the clinking of glasses.

  “What’s the meaning of this?” the butler asked, his voice shaky.

  “Never you mind. That way,” Lampert said, pointing to the room. “Two of you stay here at the entrance.”

  Eight Secret Service men rushed down the length of the hall, pistols drawn. They made way for Lampert to enter the room first. The meeting was not what Lampert had imagined. He had pictured a great party for Hess and the peace-pact signing, not nine well-dressed men, five of them seated around a long, polished table, and the other four standing and looking on. All had drinks in their hands. What was this, a Sunday afternoon bridge club? Lampert recognized two of them from news photos as prominent politicians. One other was a high-ranking officer in the army. The sight of each one — powerful as they were in their own right — drove home the fact to Lampert that these men and others had been conspiring to overthrow someone much more powerful and smarter than they were — Winston Churchill. It was up to Lampert to show that they were taking on the wrong man and the wrong team.

  “Who the bloody hell are you!” the army man shouted. “I demand an explanation! How dare you march in—”

  “Shut up!” Lampert held out his hand and showed his ID. He glared at the faces slowly, as the MI-6 men spread out, guns pointed. “Secret Service. You are all under arrest.”

  “On what grounds?”

  “Treason,” Lampert replied. “Collaborating with the enemy, namely Rudolf Hess. You will be held at MI-6 Headquarters until Churchill himself decides what to do with the lot of you. And by the way, your friend, Brenwood, couldn’t make it. He’s ... tied up.”

  Lampert walked up to the table, poured himself an inch of red wine into a crystal glass, and downed it. “Not bad. Must have been a good year.” He thumped the glass to the table. “Get these traitors out of here.”

  * * * *

  Edinburgh, Scotland

  Wing Commander the Duke of Hamilton was flabbergasted when two different observer posts miles apart phoned RAF Turnhouse with the same information — an ME-110 was racing low over the Scottish countryside on a course southwest of Glasgow. Now Hess was in the air, again. So soon. He was supposed to land at Dunhampton, then be escorted to Dungavel. What was he doing? Did something go wrong? Whatever had transpired, Hamilton had to act to shift any suspicion away from him.

  “Alert 141 Squadron at Ary to send up a Defiant and pursue the intruder,” he barked at his controller, knowing that he had ordered that particular base on stand-down for the evening.

  * * * *

  Over Southern Scotland

  At six thousand feet, Schubert sighed at the sight of the glittering Firth of Clyde only a kilometre or two over his port wing. According to the crumpled map in his left hand, he was 160 kilometres from British-controlled Northern Ireland and over three hundred kilometres from neutral Ireland. The latter seemed the only alternative.

  He thought ahead to the landing, while he struggled to keep the fighter steady in the frigid, breezy cockpit. He gave left rudder to line up on his anticipated cour
se. He felt for the parachute under the seat. If worse came to worse, he could ditch the fighter in the water and parachute in. Then ... his cockpit Plexiglas crashed to his lap! Now both side windows had been blown out. What happened? A glance down at the gauges told him that the RPM and engine pressures were rapidly falling. An aircraft flew past and banked. Damn! He was under attack!

  Schubert banked hard to port and dove at the same time. He didn’t have a hope of making Ireland, not with a dying engine that was vibrating the entire aircraft. And a water landing was impossible at night. His only way out now was back to the mainland. He reached down and struggled with the parachute. Think. Think. Then it came to him ... Dungavel Castle. The British collaborators could get him out of this.

  Hold on. Find Dungavel Castle in a blackout? Fat chance of that.

  * * * *

  Edinburgh, Scotland

  At 2305 hours, another telephone call broke the silence at RAF Turnhouse.

  “Wing Commander?” said the controller, receiver in hand, to Hamilton who had just entered the combat room.

  “Yes, what is it?”

  “The observer post at Eaglesham Moor reports the ME-110 flying an erratic course as if the pilot is looking for something.”

  “Is the Defiant still in pursuit?” Hamilton asked another airman.

  “Not anymore, sir. He lost the intruder, but the pilot claimed some hits.”

  * * * *

  Near Eaglesham, Scotland

  Schubert took the damaged fighter up to 6,500 feet, and it strained to get there. The machine was now hanging on by a thread and a vapour, the fuel tanks reading empty. He threw the gun and the stiletto out the port opening, then reached overhead and slid back the cabin roof, his right hand on the briefcase. Bailing out of an aircraft would be a first for him. To start what he thought would be a simple procedure, he made the mistake of sticking his head too far into the open, turbulent slipstream. He was thrown back. He tried again. The slipstream pushed him back yet again. Now he was terrified he’d never get out.