The Gemini Agenda

by Michael McMenamin

  While openly eschewing eugenics with statements and memos, the Rockefeller Foundation in fact turned to eugenicists and race scientists throughout the biological sciences to achieve the goal of creating a superior race.

  Edwin Black, War Against the Weak

  Everywhere in life only a process of selection can prevail. In antiquity, the Spartan constitution was the only one that required and enforced a healthy selection. Today there are still states in the USA which also … support human self-selection.

  Adolf Hitler, 1931

  49.

  A True Believer

  Hotel Adlon

  Berlin

  Friday, 27 May 1932

  WESLEY Waterman grimaced when he reached for the bottle of champagne as they lingered over a late lunch in the Adlon’s dining room.

  “Are you all right, my dear?” Frau Magda Quandt asked.

  “It’s nothing,” Waterman replied. “Broken ribs. Hurt them in a riding accident the day before I sailed,” Waterman lied as he recalled the grim, black-haired, blue-eyed Irishman who had driven his heavy boots into his ribs time after time. And the bastard’s next target had been Waterman’s groin. He literally had passed out from the pain. He had not had a woman since.

  “Has your delightful schloss been in your husband’s family long?” Waterman asked.

  The blonde-haired, blue-eyed Magda Quandt smiled and laughed. “Generations, Wesley, generations,” she replied. Magda was an attractive woman. Not a classical beauty like Ingrid but more a pretty farm girl, with short blonde hair, blue eyes and, Waterman noted with anticipation, larger breasts than Ingrid’s. Magda was in her early thirties while her husband was well into his seventies. Their estate north of Berlin was a gathering place for National Socialists.

  Magda had flirted openly with him the entire weekend once she heard from Fritz von Thyssen about the extent of Waterman’s wealth. Not that Herr Quandt wasn’t wealthy but his oldest son by his marriage to his late first wife would inherit everything and Magda would be at the son’s mercy. Clearly, she was looking for another horse to ride. So was Waterman. But Waterman had another reason for cuckolding Gustav Quandt wholly apart from the joy of mounting the man’s wife. Heinrich Himmler himself had told Waterman that Magda, through her husband, was one of the National Socialists’ largest benefactors. Unlike industrialists who contributed funds to the Nazis because they had no choice but to curry favor with Germany’s second largest party, Magda Quandt did so because she was a true believer. Wesley Waterman’s kind of woman.

  Waterman already had I.C.E.’s accountants run projections on what revenue and profits would accrue to it if an entire country of over 70 million people, and not just the membership of the SS, were to have the genetic qualities of every single citizen cataloged, tracked and updated by the Hollerith calculating machines of I.C.E. going back a minimum of four generations. The profits would be enormous.

  With Ingrid out of the way in the very near future, a newly divorced Magda Quandt would be a more suitable consort for an international business leader of his stature. He didn’t need her husband’s money and she would bear him the perfect children so far denied him by his barren first wife and his adulteress second.

  “You seem preoccupied, my dear,” Magda said. “Is there anything wrong?”

  Waterman shook his head. Yes, there was something wrong but Magda could not be privy to Project Gemini, at least not until the National Socialists took power. The agent’s cable he had received on board ship advising him that the damn woman journalist for Hearst had been caught snooping at the ERO in Cold Spring Harbor was not good news. It was bad enough that they had not been able to stop her before she had broken the twins story. Even worse was that her boyfriend, that meddling lawyer for his faithless wife, had managed to rescue her and apparently killed three of their best men in the process while the bitch had made off with a key Project Gemini file. Worst of all, however, was the news that the Hearst journalist and Cockran were landing in Germany today on board the Graf Zeppelin. He hoped they would not prove to be as troublesome in Germany as they had been in America. He didn’t think they would because Project Gemini’s tests and subsequent autopsies were to be complete within the week. There was little chance they could locate the clinic that quickly nor, even if they did, that they would make it past the clinic’s SS guards. Their every move in Germany would be closely watched. Still, he was concerned that the Hearst journalist had learned as much as she had in the US. Dr. V’s carelessness coupled with a traitorous secretary in the Eugenics Record Office had made it possible. In Germany, she would have no such advantages.

  Waterman took a sip of champagne. The only good news he had received lately was that the SS had finally managed to track down his dear wife’s brother and sister. Himmler assured him that the twins would arrive at the clinic this evening. He smiled. He was looking forward to letting his wife know before she was killed that her adultery had led to the extinction of what remained of her miserable family—her twin siblings.

  “I was only thinking of you, my dear,” he said to Magda, “and all the pleasures that await us upstairs in my suite.”

  Waterman stood up and grimaced once more as a sharp pain shot through the left side of his chest. Magda definitely would have to be on top this afternoon but all the better to see those big beautiful breasts in action.

  50.

  I Will Find Them

  Norden, Germany

  Friday, 27 May 1932

  TWINS?” Sturm asked..

  “Yes. They’re twins. My brother and sister mean the world to me. Everything I’ve done with Wesley was for them. Now they’re missing,” she had said. She looked up at him, her eyes red and swollen. “I don’t understand. How could this have happened?”

  Sturm did not have an answer. He turned his back on Ingrid and looked out at the North Sea. Street violence was always a possibility. Caught up in a fight between Nazi and Communist thugs. But their separate disappearances made that unlikely. Kidnapping? It seemed likely given that the hostile hotel clerk obviously had been paid off. But who could have kidnapped them? It wasn’t Bruno. He was still in Hamburg this morning.

  Had Manhattan hired someone else to kidnap her siblings and lure her out of hiding? Possibly. Likely even. His corporation, International Calculating Equipment, had a growing presence in Bavaria and Waterman himself had great personal wealth. Who would he hire in Germany? The man’s money plus his sympathy for the Nazis might give him access to common thugs like the SA. Possibly the SS. But to no one in Sturm’s league. Few were.

  Ingrid still held her face in her hands. He knelt in front of her and gently pried her hands away, her tears reflected in the afternoon sun. “I will find them. I will find your brother and your sister,” he had said. “You have my word.”

  She smiled weakly. “What will you do?”

  “I will travel to Regensburg and make inquiries,” he said. “I have some connections.”

  “Won’t you draw attention to yourself?”

  “I will be discreet.”

  Ingrid brushed at her cheeks, wiping away the tears. “Take me with you,” she said.

  “No,” Sturm said firmly. “I work best alone.”

  “But you need me.”

  “I will be traveling where my agents will be searching for you,” he said. “People in Regensburg will notice a beautiful blonde American. Your risk of being discovered is too high.”

  “You don’t even know what my brother and sister look like,” she said. “What makes you think they will trust you? Or follow you?”

  She had a good point but Sturm said nothing.

  “And if you won’t take me, I’ll go to Regensburg and look for them myself.”

  Sturm saw the determination in her eyes. She meant every word. And if she tried to go on her own, making inquiries in English, Bruno inevitably would find her. She’d be dead within days. He had no choice. They were her siblings after all. To keep her safe, he would not be working alone.

/>   51.

  We’re Going to Need More Guns

  On board the Graf Zeppelin

  Friedrichschafen

  Saturday, 28 May 1932

  COCKRAN was mesmerized by the view as they approached low, less than three hundred feet above the waters of Lake Constance at the intersection of Germany, Switzerland and Austria. He and Mattie were sitting at their customary table in the grand salon. He squeezed her hand. “You were right about zeppelins. They’re faster than a ship and better than a train because there are no stops. Equally as elegant and, unlike airplanes, there’s no noise.”

  Mattie smiled and squeezed his hand back.

  Cockran heard a commotion behind him when the airship was barely a hundred feet from the ground. Multiple ropes had dropped from each side of the great ship and Cockran could see below as many as forty men grasping the ropes and pulling the zeppelin lower still.

  Cockran turned and saw that Herr Verschuer was standing at the exit leading from the grand salon into the passageway through which all the passengers would debark. His valet was standing behind him, clutching two large suitcases, one in each hand.

  Cockran leaned over and whispered to Mattie. “Our boy intends to make a quick exit.”

  Mattie nodded. “Let’s do our best to follow him. If he goes anywhere except Berlin, I vote we take the same train and hope he’s headed for the clinic”.

  “Agreed.” Cockran said. He looked out the window and could see the mooring mast as the men below steered the ship toward it. Beside the mast was a long black Mercedes sedan.

  Once the ship was securely locked into the mooring mast, Verschuer and his valet were the first through the door, making a bee line for the sedan. Cockran and Mattie were close behind, the third couple down the six wooden steps from the passenger gondola to the ground.

  Cockran and Mattie quickly sidestepped the older couple in front of them and were close behind Verschuer, hoping to get a glance at the Mercedes’ license plate. Verschuer’s valet had a different idea. He turned, as if he had forgotten something in the zeppelin and started back toward the Graf. But when he came abreast of Cockran and Mattie, he swung the suitcase in his right hand and caught Mattie squarely in the stomach. She cried out and fell to the ground.

  The valet dropped the suitcase and knelt to offer her a hand, apologizing in a stream of German. Cockran wasn’t buying it. He shoved the man hard but the valet was a rock. He regarded Cockran with indifference, rising to his feet and stepping back to give them some room.

  Cockran helped Mattie to her feet. She brushed off the dirt. The valet was still jabbering in German when he leaned close to Mattie as though to apologize. He switched into accented English: “Be more careful, Fraulein,” the valet said. “Germany can be a dangerous place.”

  With that, the valet picked up the suitcase and walked away from the zeppelin. Enraged, Cockran moved to follow, but Mattie put a hand on his arm to stop him. “Let it go,” she said.

  The diversion had been what Verschuer needed for the Mercedes had turned and sped across the landing field toward the road. Cockran couldn’t make out the license plate at that distance but what he could see on the right front fender was chilling. A small, familiar flag whose red background surrounded a white circle inside of which was a jet black swastika.

  Cockran turned to Mattie. “That figures. If Waterman’s involved, so are the Nazis. They’re old friends.”

  COCKRAN and Mattie checked into the Hotel Rose in Friedrichschafen. They had a small suite which overlooked Lake Constance and the white sails of boats in the distance. They ordered an early room service supper of wienerschnitzel and a bottle of Gewürztraminer.

  “It’s still afternoon in Ireland,” Cockran said. “After supper I’ll call the phone number of a pub in Donegal where Bobby said I could leave messages for him. I thought we’d have a few days in Germany incognito until the Apostles arrived to provide you around the clock protection. Given Verschuer’s threat, however, I’d feel better if we had more firepower as soon as we can.”

  “You’ll get no argument from me,” Mattie said.

  The telephone rang and Cockran picked it up. “Yes. That’s fine. Send him right up.”

  “Who was that?” Mattie asked.

  “The front desk. Captain David Baker from the American Embassy in Berlin.”

  Moments later, David Baker was in their room. Introductions and handshakes were exchanged. Baker was a compact, good-looking man, five foot eight, his golden hair slicked back. What was it with MID and blond hair? Cockran wondered. This guy could be Ted Hudson’s younger brother, minus a few inches.

  “I received Major Hudson’s cable yesterday telling me to meet the zeppelin and tail a silver haired man named Dr. Verschuer. I came here as fast as I could. Unfortunately, the only automobile I was able to lease was a small Opel. It was no match for Dr. Verschuer’s Mercedes. I lost track of him about five miles outside of Friedrichschafen. Major Hudson said I was to stay with Verschuer as long as possible and then come back and report to you where he went.”

  “Do you know Major Hudson,” Mattie asked.

  “Not personally, no, Ma’am. But everyone in MID knows who he is,” Baker said in a voice tinged with admiration and awe.

  Just great, Cockran thought. The bastard probably had his own fan club of bright eyed, bushy tailed young acolytes like this puppy dog Baker. “Did you get the license plate?”

  “No, Sir,” Baker replied. “But the Major asked that I deliver this to you, Miss McGary,” as he handed a thick manila envelope to Mattie.

  “What’s this?” Mattie asked.

  “It’s MID’s dossier on Dr. Verschuer. I updated it myself yesterday afternoon.”

  “Thank you,” Mattie replied.

  “Captain, is there information here about Verschuer’s clinic in Bavaria?” Cockran asked.

  Baker seemed embarrassed. “Uh … well, no. There’s nothing in there like that. I mean, Major Hudson didn’t ask me to find anything like that. He just told me to make a photostat of all the articles in our dossier. He didn’t say anything about a clinic.”

  “Well, is there anything in these articles about any clinics in Bavaria?” Mattie asked as Cockran walked to the other side of the room to refresh his drink.

  “Well … I don’t know. I didn’t exactly read the articles myself.”

  Behind Baker’s back, Cockran rolled his eyes at Mattie. The kid probably was one of Ted’s protégés. Receiving solid intelligence from MID would be a triumph of hope over history.

  Baker turned to leave and then stopped and turned back. “Major Hudson said in his cable that he was working on his last story for Hearst and that you were assisting him. Is that true?”

  Cockran suppressed a smile as Mattie sighed and said, “Actually, Ted’s working for me.”

  Baker’s eyes grew wide. “What’s Major Hudson really like?” Baker asked.

  He’s an asshole, Cockran thought, as Mattie smiled. “He’s a nice man but I don’t think Ted would appreciate my talking about him.”

  Baker was duly chastised and began to apologize when Mattie cut him off. “No, don’t worry about it, Captain. But, if you don’t mind, we need to review the dossier.”

  Baker apologized again and left them.

  Cockran and Mattie walked over and took chairs beside a small table which looked out a pair of French doors onto Lake Constance. Three sailboats were in the far distance. Mattie took half the contents of the envelope and handed the other half to Cockran.

  Thirty minutes later, Mattie finished sorting through her pile and went over to the drinks bar in the corner of their suit where she made a small pitcher of martinis.

  “I don’t know about what you’ve read,” Mattie said, handing a martini to Cockran, “but this confirms my suspicions about American military intelligence.”

  “What’s that?” Cockran asked as he took a sip.

  “I’ll take a Hearst reporter over an MID agent any day. There was only one article in her
e that wasn’t in the Hearst report and a lot of articles that we saw there simply aren’t here.”

  Cockran smiled. “I saw nothing new in what I reviewed. What did you find that was?”

  “A 1929 article by Verschuer from a student-edited journal at Heidelberg. It’s called ‘Genetics and Race Science as the Basis for Purifying Politics,’” Mattie said. “He wrote that the most important task of Germany’s internal politics was their population problem, which he described as ‘a biological problem which can only be solved by biological-political measures.’”

  “What the hell are ‘biological-political measures?’” Cockran asked.

  Mattie shook her head.” It’s like he’s writing in a code that only the initiated understand.”

  “Well, you’re right about MID. They can’t find their asses with both hands.”

  “But that’s not the right question,” Mattie said as she stood up, came over and sat on Cockran’s lap, taking another sip of her martini.

  Cockran did the same. “What is the right question?”

  “Whether an ex-MID agent like you can find my ass with both hands.”

  “Is that an invitation?”

  “Consider it more of a challenge.”

  MATTIE lay on her side facing Cockran, a sheet pulled up to her waist.

  “I’ve been thinking, Bourke, about locating the clinic. I know Winston has the Prof looking into it, but there’s another angle I ought to try once we arrive in Munich.”

  “What’s that?” Cockran asked.

  “I’ve covered some big stories in that city over the past ten years. I’ve made good contacts, including quite a few in the criminal underworld, what you Yanks would call gangsters.”

  Cockran didn’t like the sound of this. “What kind of gangsters?”

  “Well, they’re fairly scary. Prostitution, drugs, protection, extortion, smuggling.”

  “And how could these gangsters help?” Cockran asked.

  “Two years ago this fall I was in Munich at a fairly seedy bar. The White Mouse Cabaret. I was waiting to meet a contact who was going to help me arrange interviews with some low-end people in a network which was smuggling arms into the Balkans. Anyway, my contact didn’t show and a couple of guys with too much beer and too little brains started to display unwanted attention. So when one of them tried to fondle me, I decked his buddy.”