Shadow Of Evil: Cold War Espionage Thriller (Dragan Kelly Book 2)

by Peter Alderson Sharp

  “A few days later he again addressed us, telling us that he had received fresh orders and we were to complete one final mission. He immediately submerged the boat and we remained submerged until we reached our destination, which I recognised immediately, on going up on deck to tie the boat off, as Bergen. The captain allowed a few of the married men to leave at this point. Mostly they were the ones with Norwegian wives.

  “The following day two civilians boarded the vessel and we were underway almost immediately. The civilians took over the captain’s quarters, so they must have been important, but kept very much to themselves. We steered west to Greenland and hid in one of the fjords for a few days, submerging whenever we heard a plane.

  “The next part of the journey from Greenland was spent almost entirely submerged. We could do this because we were fitted with a snorkel system which allowed us to spend long periods underwater. All the crew had been trained for this, but even so, it was very wearing. It must have been hell for the civilians. We did surface for short intervals on some of the darker nights but often spent many days submerged.

  “When we reached Cape Verde Islands, we were able to rest for a while and take on some supplies. We stayed there for a couple of weeks, before setting sail once more, steering south-west towards South America. The captain must have felt more secure in the South Atlantic, as we spent most of the time on the surface. After sighting the continent, we steered south running parallel to the coast until we reached the Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul. At that point, we turned further out to sea away from the coast. The captain ordered us to throw away anything that could identify us: documents, ID cards and so on. A couple of armament technicians dismantled the deck gun and threw it overboard, and finally, I saw the captain throw several documents over the side. I’m fairly sure that one of them was the boat’s log.

  “We steered back towards the shoreline and again sailed parallel to it, passing the estuary of the River Plate before anchoring further south. We were just offshore from a town or village—I believe it was called Necochea or something similar—and we waited. A small launch was seen leaving from the private jetty of what appeared to be a sizable detached residence. Once it was alongside, our passengers transferred from the boat to the launch, and that was the last we saw of them.

  “We submerged and turned back north along the coast until we were near the Argentine submarine base of Mar del Plata, as close into shore as we safely could be. The captain waited until first light before he surfaced and surrendered the boat to the Argentinian Navy. Now I anticipate a few questions?” He lifted his eyebrows.

  “You’ve explained it very clearly, Uwe, thank you, but I wonder if you could describe your passengers?”

  “Of course. The man was short, quite stocky with dark hair receding at the temples, mid-forties, and he had a Bavarian accent. Oh, and steel-grey, staring eyes. He never seemed to blink, evil eyes! The woman was a little taller than the man, about average for a woman, very short black hair, glasses, rather plump.

  “Did the man have any illness, hands shaking, anything like that?” asked Sybilla.

  Voigt laughed. “Are you asking me if it was the Führer? No! It wasn’t the Führer. Wrong body shape, wrong facial features. Believe me, I would have recognised the Führer.”

  Sybilla bought Voigt another drink, thanked him profusely and, as she was leaving, slipped a further ten-mark note into his pocket. It had been worth it.

  She had two more interviews to conduct before she left Hamburg. The first of these proved to be very difficult. The interviewee had been a junior officer on the U-530 and refused point-blank to even speak to Sybilla. It had taken a little pressure from the British military to persuade the German police to bring him in for questioning. He started by denying any knowledge of the U-530. When Sybilla produced documents that proved he had been a member of the crew, he gave a little and conceded that he had been. He still refused, however, to discuss any details of the voyage and was adamant they had carried absolutely no passengers.

  Her final contact in Hamburg proved to be significantly more cooperative in terms of agreeing to an interview and being quite amiable throughout the process, but gave nothing away, also denying that the boat carried any passengers.

  Sybilla had managed to locate four more crew members: two in Bremerhaven, one in Münster and one in Dortmund. The two in Bremerhaven added nothing to Sybilla’s knowledge of the U-530’s final voyage, and the interview in Münster proved difficult and unproductive. However, having travelled down to Dortmund feeling anything but optimistic, she was pleasantly surprised by her final interviewee. The man had been the equivalent of a leading seaman and appeared very nervous when she told him she was working with the British military. It was almost as if he was afraid of the British authorities. Perhaps he, or some other member of his family, had something they needed to hide. After Sybilla had managed to reassure and calm him with the help of a strong coffee, he became very cooperative and opened up to her, answering all her questions frankly and without hesitation. In particular, he confirmed that two passengers had travelled on the boat all the way to Argentina. In addition, his description of the passengers matched very closely that given by Uwe Voigt. It was sufficient for Sybilla. She had the corroboration she needed to be fairly sure of her facts.

  It was with mixed feelings that she returned to Berlin. She could now confidently report to McFarlane that two fugitives had escaped by submarine to Argentina, just as he had suspected, but now she was equally convinced that it wasn’t Hitler and Eva Braun.

  That said, there was something about that description of the man. Sybilla felt certain that the two seamen were describing Heinrich Müller!

  McFarlane Plans

  Brigadier Robert McFarlane slumped uncomfortably in the captain’s chair at the head of an oblong table in a borrowed conference room in Lancaster House, the headquarters of the Berlin Area Troops, his face stern and his brow furrowed. He had flown to Berlin after reading the reports from two of his agents, which had caused him some concern.

  Sitting at the side of the table to his right was his Chief of Staff, Major James Farquharson, former Scots Dragoon. Farquharson was referred to in military circles as a ‘Mayfair Highlander’, an officer in a Scottish regiment, born and brought up in the home counties. This was not strictly true of Farquharson, in that he was, in fact, a Scot, but years of education in Eton and later Oxford had all but eliminated his Edinburgh accent. Farquharson was tall and slender with fair skin and sandy hair. His attempt at a moustache was, by his own admission, a disaster. It would have been easy to underestimate James Farquharson. He was industrious, tenacious, shrewd and highly intelligent. It was this mix of characteristics that had come to the attention of McFarlane and led to his recruitment into MI5.

  To the right of Farquharson, further down the table, was Sybilla Thorstaadt—code name Skadi—one of the few but increasing number of civilian agents in the service. Directly across from Sybilla was Lieutenant Colonel Dragan ‘Dan’ Kelly.

  Suddenly McFarlane sat bolt upright, his round face beaming, eyes bright and a huge, open-mouthed smile. “Well, gentlepeople”—unlike Farquharson, his broad Hebridean accent had not faded over time— “this is a fine kettle filled with very interesting fish you’ve presented me with this time! I confess myself to be completely befuddled!”

  It is doubtful if anything ever had, or ever could, ‘befuddle’ McFarlane, but he liked to throw in comments like this to encourage his staff to contribute.

  “Let me make my position clear,” he continued. “I have never subscribed to the idea that Hitler survived the bunker. I believe that he and Braun committed suicide. That said, I have always had a little niggle chewing away at the back of my mind, but more of that later. For now, what I’d like to do is examine a few of the issues raised in your very thought-provoking reports. Oh, and by the way, thank you for those.

  “First off,” he said, looking at Sybilla, “Billa, how certain are you that the passeng
ers on the U-530 were not Hitler and Braun?”

  “Very!” answered Sybilla. “That said, the man matched the description of Müller to a tee. I’ve no idea who the woman was.”

  “That damn man Müller is becoming the bane of our lives,” growled McFarlane. “What about the other submarine that crossed the big pond?”

  “U-977,” said Sybilla. “I tracked down some of the crew. Most were uncommunicative, but a couple opened up. They said they were carrying a large number of wooden crates, small but very heavy, possibly gold. The crates were off-loaded and transported away before the skipper surrendered.”

  “But no passengers?” queried McFarlane.

  “No passengers,” confirmed Sybilla.

  “Jamie,”—this to Farquharson— “do we have any persons of interest, still missing, who match the description of the man on the U-530?”

  “Not really, Brigadier.” Farquharson always referred to McFarlane as Brigadier. Every other agent simply called him ‘Bob’. “We’re still looking for Bormann, but he doesn’t fit the description; Eichmann, but we think he went down the ratline a few years later; likewise, Mengele, so we’re left with Müller. I agree with Billa, he fits the description very well. I’m afraid we’ve drawn a complete blank on the woman.”

  “Dan!” said McFarlane, turning to Kelly. “Your man Manteufel believes that the good Frau Hitler was with child?”

  “It was actually his son who suggested it, but it does make sense. All the signs are there: the snatched conversation with Müller, the woman-to-woman chat with Constanze Manziarly and indeed, literally, the writing on the wall. If it were the case, then that would provide a huge incentive to get out of the bunker.” Farquharson was nodding in agreement as Kelly made this last point.

  “Have we spoken to this Constanze Manziarly?” asked McFarlane.

  “Last seen on 2 May 1945, but never seen again.”

  “Wonderful!” said McFarlane, with a hint of exasperation in his voice. “What about the people who saw Hitler’s dead body? You mentioned in your report that there were four of them.”

  “That’s right,” confirmed Kelly. “Bormann we’ve already spoken about, missing believed dead. Heinz Linge, the chauffeur, captured by the Soviets and still in captivity. Otto Günsche, an adjutant, also captured by the Soviets and still in captivity. Then there was the sergeant, Rochus Misch. According to Manteufel, he only had a glimpse of the bodies, so it’s unlikely that he would prove a reliable witness one way or the other. In any case, it’s academic, he was captur—”

  “Captured by the Soviets and still in captivity.” McFarlane finished the sentence for him, sounding thoroughly fed up.

  “Fine!” said McFarlane, folding his hands together and resting on the table. “Let me put in my two penneth. I told you earlier that I had a little niggle. Your reports have turned that niggle into a gnawing doubt, and let me tell you why. Dan alluded to it in his report. It’s the pictures, or rather the lack of them. If the Russians had found Hitler’s body—burnt, charred or otherwise—they would have hung it up from the Brandenburg Gate, taken thousands of pictures and distributed them to every newspaper and magazine in the world. They would have filmed it and sent a copy to every newsreel company. No pictures, no newsreel. Why?

  “I’m also puzzled by the behaviour of our friend Müller. If he was the mysterious man in the submarine, dropped off in Argentina, how and why did he suddenly reappear in Berlin five years later? If he could get into Berlin that easily, sitting as it does in the centre of a communist country, why did he need Manteufel’s help to get out again? He obviously wanted to go down the East German ratline. Why? Furthermore, I believe Müller is somehow tied into the apparent suicide in the bunker. Where was he on 30 April? Manteufel claims he wasn’t seen at all that day. The Führer is dead, and the head of the Gestapo is nowhere to be found? What on earth was going on? Yet we have reports that he was in the bunker on 1 May—in fact, he is thought to have been one of the last, if not the last, to leave—so where did he go on 30 April and why on that particular day?

  “There are an awful lot of questions relating to the behaviour of Müller, and we need some answers. If Hitler did survive the bunker, it’s a solid bet that Müller was involved in his escape. We have to find him and bring him in again. Dan, you mentioned in your report that there might be a way of getting down the East German ratline. Can you fill us in on that?”

  Kelly nodded. “Certainly. However there are some issues that need exploring. Manteufel is central to this. I asked him if he could make contact with his former associates in the Thule organisation to sound out if they would be willing to send a fugitive down the ratline. That fugitive would, of course, be me. My cover would be as a senior Ustase officer, wanted for war crimes and stranded in East Germany, but with a lot of money and valuables squirrelled away.

  “It was a big ask. Manteufel was taking a hell of a risk, but he agreed and went into East Berlin in a battered old truck that the RASC had found for me from somewhere, complete with ladders, bricks, sand and bags of cement. He said it reminded him of old times. When he returned, it wasn’t entirely good news. Yes, if the price was right, they might help, but they were wary of dealing with the Ustase with whom they had no previous experience. The normal escape route for the Ustase was across the Adriatic direct to Italy. They specified they would help if, and only if, the fugitive had a ‘minder’ for the duration of his transit through Germany and Austria. The fugitive would be on his own once in Italy.

  “Manteufel asked if they had someone who would act in the role of minder, and his contacts were quite unequivocal. Yes, they told him, Horst Manteufel! It seems that the organisation holds him in quite some degree of respect. Ex-Fallschirmjäger with whom they had successfully dealt previously, and the fact that he had spent time in prison only added to his credibility.

  “I told Manteufel in no uncertain terms that it wasn’t going to happen, but he insisted that he owed me. I don’t see it that way—I believe I owe him. I have no doubt he saved my life during the incident when we first arrested Müller. He assured me he had talked it over with his wife and that she was in agreement, and in any case, he needed a break from driving three-ton trucks for the RASC!”

  The others smiled at this.

  “However,” continued Kelly, “he did specify two conditions. That his old job would be available when he returned, and that if anything happened to him, his wife and two children would be taken care of.”

  “I have to say, Dan,” said McFarlane rubbing his chin, “that despite your misgivings, this sounds to me an altogether good option. Apart from the reservations you’ve already expressed, do you have any other reasons why you should not accept Manteufel’s offer?”

  Kelly shrugged his shoulders and shook his head. “No, Bob. He’s tough, resourceful, entirely dependable and can be utterly ruthless when he needs to be. I can think of no one better.”

  “What do you two think of using Manteufel in this way?” asked McFarlane, looking round. “Billa?”

  “I’ve only met him in a social context, but I would trust Dan’s judgement on this.”

  “Jamie?”

  “It strikes me, Brigadier, that Manteufel is probably Dan’s only chance of getting down that ratline.”

  “That’s my feeling too. Who’s his commanding officer at the RASC squadron, Dan?”

  “Major Jack Hemmings, really good man. He has, in the past, bent over backwards to give Horst time off when I’ve needed to talk to him. He’s an old warrior, served during the last war. He knows we’re up to something, but he’s too long in the tooth to ask questions.”

  “I’ll speak to Major Hemmings,” said McFarlane. “I’m sure we can come to some sort of accommodation in respect of Manteufel returning to his job on completion of the mission, but what about pay, Jamie? We can’t expect Hemmings to pay his wages while he’s away.”

  “We’ll have to take him on temporarily as an agent, Brigadier,” Farquharson replied. “I’ll see t
o it as soon as we return to London. Oh, and that would also meet his other condition. As one of ours, his family would be looked after if anything happened.”

  McFarlane looked thoughtfully at Dragan Kelly. He was, of course, fully aware of Kelly’s background; they had served together in the past. Kelly was born in Wales of an Irish father and Serbian mother, hence his given name. Before the war, he had won a scholarship to Cambridge where he gained a first in Balkan languages, helped no doubt by the fact that he had been taught to speak Serbian from birth. One of his memories brought a smile to his face.

  “Something amusing, Brigadier?” asked Farquharson.

  “I was just remembering, Jamie, when Dan and I first met in the Caribbean on his first assignment. I remember saying to him that he spoke every dialect in the Balkans as well as German, and that I spoke every Slavic language and could get by in Mandarin, and where do MI5 send us? The Bahamas!”

  They all laughed and nodded. “Yes, I remember it,” said Kelly.

  “I’ve no doubt, Dan, that to anyone who is not a Croatian national, you can carry this off without a problem,” said McFarlane, “but what if you bump into a Croatian?”

  “Then quite simply, they will find me out! You know better than anyone, Bob, that no matter how good you are at a language, if you speak to any national they’ll pick up on any slight intonation, mannerism or mispronunciation and they will know that you’re not a fellow national.”

  “Then if you haven’t found Müller by the time you get to Italy, you’ll have to abort and crash out of the mission, because once in Italy you’ll be funnelled towards the seminary of San Girolamo in Rome. Head man is Father Krimoslav Draganovic, and he is a Croatian.