Ingrid picked up the message and put her notebook down.
Bloem stood up from his desk, his nervousness on display, and walked over to a cabinet at the side of the room. “It’s difficult to know how one should proceed in situations like these, Herr von Sturm, because the chain of command within the party is complicated,” he said. He opened the cabinet to reveal a couple bottles of liquor. “May I offer you some schnapps?” Sturm shook his head no and the detective proceeded to pour one out for himself.
“Earlier this year, all V-Men in Bavaria were placed under strict orders to identify any twins who registered in hotels with a foreign passport and report them to Dr. Otmar von Verschuer at his biological clinic, fifteen miles north of Passau in the Bavarian National Forest.”
The detective glanced at Ingrid who raised her eyebrows perceptably at the name Verschuer. “Frankly, I’m still not sure if I’m supposed to be telling you any of this, let alone in the presence of your secretary,” he said and sat back down with his drink in hand. “We were under strict orders not to reveal this surveillance to anybody, so you must forgive my reluctance to divulge it to you. I don’t understand to what party member level I am allowed to reveal this information, but I want to make myself clear. I want to help the Party if I can.”
Sturm nodded slowly. “I appreciate your candor. I was aware of Dr. Verschuer’s activities,” Sturm said, the lie coming easily, “but not of the details. This should probably clear matters up, so you were right to tell me. Do you know why he is so interested in twins?”
The man shook his head. “I don’t understand why Dr. Verschuer is on the lookout for twins, but perhaps he has simply recruited these American students for his studies?”
“Yes, I expect that is so,” Sturm said. “Thank you, Kapitän Bloem, for your help.”
“You will be sure to mention this to Herr Himmler when you see him next?”
“Of course,” Sturm lied once more as he had no intention of ever seeing the odious SS chief again.
After they had left the police station and were back on the empty afternoon streets of Regensburg, Ingrid reverted back to English. “What happened? What did he tell you?”
Sturm ignored her question. “You did well in there. But you tipped your hand at one point. You must learn to conceal your reactions.”
“What do you mean?”
“Verschuer,” he said. “There, see? You reacted again. You’ve heard of this man?”
“Yes,” Ingrid said, turning to look away from him. Sturm often had that effect on people when they realized how easily he could read them. “I met him once at a charity ball in New York to benefit the American Eugenics Society. My husband introduced us. He’s one of the leading racial hygiene scientists in Germany. And his specialty is the study of twins.” She turned back to look at Sturm. “What did Bloem tell you about Verschuer?”
“He gave me the name, and the approximate location of his clinic in Passau. Party members have been under strict orders since earlier this year to report to Verschuer any foreign twins staying at hotels in Bavaria. I fear your brother and sister may be at this clinic.”
“Then we must go to Passau!”
“No, we return to Munich.”
“Why?”
“To visit the Brown House, the headquarters for the National Socialist Workers Party.”
“The Nazis? Why?” Ingrid asked.
“Verschuer is undoubtedly a Nazi. I need to know for sure. If he is, there may be a way to make our visit to Passau easier.”
“You mean anyone can just walk into Nazi headquarters and find out if someone is a member?” Ingrid asked, her voice incredulous.
“Not exactly.”
“But you can?”
“I can.”
“I’m impressed but I’m not especially pleased to know that you have such influence.”
Sturm smiled but said nothing. He had much more than influence with the Nazis. He had a friend. A very important friend. And very soon, he would have the exact location of the good Herr Doktor von Verschuer’s Bavarian clinic.
56.
Where Is Verschuer’s Clinic?
Munich
Monday, 30 May 1932
BOBBY Sullivan leaned hard on the walking stick in his left hand and looked down at the thick tape surrounding his left ankle and foot and swore silently. The bräus they had entered was smoke-filled and crowded but the dark beer was good. Not Guinness, of course, but good. He had been injured before, even shot once or twice, but never before a broken bone except for his nose which wasn’t exactly a bone. It may have been only two small bones in his foot, fractured by the grinding hobnail boots of one of Erich Boldt’s thugs but, for Sullivan, it was a professional embarrassment. And it hurt like hell. But at least he was still mobile. Barely.
The two lads with him on his flight to Germany, Sean O’Driscoll and Barry Ryan, were both former members of Michael Collins’ squad of assassins nicknamed “the Apostles” in 1921 when their number reached twelve. Their chartered flight was paid for by Hearst and they had arrived early in the afternoon, four hours before Cockran had said his train would arrive.
Sullivan had called on an old friend, Rolf Heyden, the concierge at the Bayerische Hof whose acquaintance he had made the summer before. Rolf was not a professional, by any means. He was an ordinary German who harbored a deep grudge against Nazi Brownshirt thugs for what they had done to his sister’s boyfriend. He had been easy to enlist back then — hatred was the best recruitment tool there was — but this time around, Bobby had not been sure that Rolf would even be in Germany. When last he had seen Rolf, he had said he was going to take his family and leave the country for good. Something, however, must have caused Rolf to change his mind. Fortunate it was for Sullivan since Rolf still held the same post as concierge and still possessed his position’s required breadth of local knowledge.
Sullivan knew he was there to protect Mattie but he had wanted to impress his friend Cockran by being the first to find that mysterious clinic. He figured Rolf might know who to talk to. He was right and that knowledge had led him to Erich Boldt whom Bobby had badly underestimated. That was a mistake. Still, they now had a list of highranking SS members at least one of whom, Boldt assured him, was bound to have knowledge of the clinic’s location.
Sean and Barry as well as Rolf were with him tonight to follow up on that list. Their order of salzbrezeln and white sausage arrived and they tucked in with gusto. The list had only four names, the top two for himself and Rolf, the less likely two for Sean and Barry. Cockran would not be with them. He was a good friend, perhaps Sullivan’s only friend in America. But Cockran believed in civilized limits during interrogation. Bobby Sullivan did not.
Besides, in his own way, Sullivan was concerned for his friend’s safety. What he had done last night had been foolhardy. Entering a warehouse alone against eight armed men without creating a diversion could have been suicide. Sullivan shook his head. The Bourke Cockran he knew was deadly but a hell of a lot more careful. He didn’t know what to make of this new one.
“Let’s go, Rolf,” Sullivan said and slipped an iron pipe up the sleeve of his blue coat.
THE first man on the list knew nothing. Sullivan had shattered the man’s kneecap anyway, savoring the satisfying crunch of broken bone. Sullivan really didn’t like Nazis.
The second name on the list, Dietrich Wenger, proved more pliable than the first. As Wenger walked down a nearly deserted street, Rolf drove their Opel sedan up onto the sidewalk and blocked his path. Bobby swung the rear door out and pointed the ugly black snout of a silenced Luger automatic at him.
“Gutentag, Herr Wenger,” Sullivan said, leaning on his cane. He gestured with the weapon to get into the Opel. Wenger didn’t argue.
Rolf had arranged for access to a shipping office near the rail yards and the area was deserted when they parked the Opel and hustled Wenger into the building. Wenger had thinning brown hair in a pronounced widow’s peak and close-set blue eyes. He w
as no more than five foot eight inches tall with a slender build. He was placed in a chair and Rolf tied his hands.
When Wenger refused to answer any questions, Sullivan went to work and when he stopped, Wenger’s face was a bloody mess. He motioned for Rolf to come over.
Rolf stepped forward and spoke quietly to the man in German, asking questions that Sullivan had given him. “Where is Verschuer’s clinic?” Sullivan knew that Rolf was repulsed by violence and it seemed as if he were pleading with the Nazi to answer and make it stop.
Sullivan was irritated when Wenger shook his head defiantly. The Nazi bastard was making Rolf sit through too much of this ugly business. He’d have to hurt him more.
“Step back Rolf,” Sullivan said, as he once more approached Wenger, the lead pipe now in his hand. Rolf stepped away, turning his back to avoid watching any further violence.
Sullivan leaned on his good foot, braced himself on his cane and swung down with the lead pipe on the man’s upper arm, connecting with that space between the biceps and elbow that exposes the bone. Wenger howled and Bobby swung again to keep the pain fresh.
“Herr Sullivan!” Rolf shouted. “That’s enough. Let me try again.” Sullivan deferred to his young friend and limped away to give him room. Rolf and Wenger spoke again in German and the Nazi seemed to be more pliant, conversing as best he could with Rolf, trying to catch his breath from the screaming. Finally Rolf leaned back. “Passau,” he said. “Dr. Verschuer has a clinic ten miles north of Passau in the Bavarian National Forest.”
Sullivan looked at him and smiled.
“DID you tell Herr Wenger we would leave him right where we found him?” Sullivan asked once they were back in the Opel.
“Yes, I told him that. He asked me if it were true and I assured him it was,” Rolf said over his shoulder to Sullivan who was in the back seat with Wenger.
“Oh, it’s true alright. It’s true,” Sullivan said softly.
The street where they had picked up Wenger was still deserted. Rolf pulled the Opel to a stop and Sullivan reached over Wenger to open the door. He grabbed the Nazi roughly and pushed him out. Wenger landed on his face and gingerly sat up, facing the open car door. The black snout of Bobby Sullivan’s silenced Luger coughed once and a third eye appeared in the Nazi’s face, centered above the other two. He fell back, his head splashing into a puddle of water which rapidly grew darker.
Sullivan saw the shocked look on Rolf’s face and reached over the seat to pat his shoulder reassuringly. “Lad, he was a Nazi. I had no choice. Too many lives are at stake. Wouldn’t it be a shame now if the bastards knew we were coming?”
Hotel Continental
Munich
CAPTAIN David Baker looked into the dining room of the Hotel Continental and saw in one corner a round table where Bobby Sullivan had just taken a seat beside Cockran, the female Hearst journalist and a pink-faced cherubic-looking man with thinning red hair whom the head waiter had assured him was the British statesman Winston Churchill. Baker stepped into a nearby telephone booth and placed a long-distance call to the American Embassy in Berlin. It took a few moments but at last the person he was calling was put on the phone.
“Major? Baker here. I followed the Irishman as you requested. At 10:15 this evening he shot and killed a German national named Dietrich Wenger. According to the police report, Wenger is a member of the SS. The police are attributing the shooting to Communist violence.”
“Yes, sir. Of course I’ve bribed the waiter at their table. The head waiter also. I’ll have a full report of their conversation for you by morning.”
“Yes, sir. I’ll meet your train when it arrives tomorrow. Don’t worry. No, the pleasure is all mine. I’m looking forward to working with you, Major Hudson.”
Baker couldn’t wait to actually meet Major Ted Hudson. He was a living legend among MID agents, the scourge of Bolsheviks everywhere. And here he was, David Baker, trailing Nazis and IRA terrorists, all at the great man’s bidding. He remembered one story he had heard about Hudson. After an interrogation where he had broken all the fingers in both hands of a Bolshevik agent who was posing as a baker in Brooklyn, Hudson had sliced off the man’s ear. “Let us know if you hear anything more” Hudson had joked as he stuffed the Bolshevik’s bloody ear firmly into his mouth. What a great story.
Hudson hadn’t told him what this new assignment was all about but Baker didn’t care. He’d learn about that soon enough. What was more important was that he was working with Ted Hudson and America’s enemies better be afraid.
57.
Other Undesirables
The Brown House
Munich
Tuesday, 31 May 1932
THE Barlow palace, now known as the Brown House, beckoned across the Königsplatz, its khaki-colored exterior standing out against the white buildings in the square. It was a large, four-story rectangle, the blood red swastika flag of the party atop it all flying high in the breeze.
Kurt von Sturm ascended the short steps alone. He had left Ingrid safe in his apartment where they went upon their arrival in Munich late last night. She wasn’t happy to be left behind but Sturm had persuaded her that he would get more done, more quickly if he did this alone.
Earlier that morning, Sturm had gone to the main reading room of Munich’s public library where he had reviewed books, monographs and articles by Dr. Otmar Verschuer. Sturm had been astonished to find that three-quarters of the periodicals were in English. The Biological Bulletin, Eugenical News, American Breeders Magazine, Eugenics Review, and The Journal of Heredity, all published in the United States. Sturm was no scientist but Verschuer’s monographs had seemed unremarkable, written in dense scientific jargon with charts and learned conclusions.
Sturm’s opinion of the good Herr Doktor had abruptly changed, however, when he picked up a bound volume of The Journal of the American Eugenics Society and began to read Verschuer’s monograph on involuntary sterilization as a practical method for improving Germany’s racial stock by eliminating the ability of the feeble-minded, the criminal class and other undesirables to have children. His blood ran cold when he read the passage in one monograph that made clear Verschuer included blind people among the “other undesirables”:
For the good of all mankind and in the interests of strengthening the race, we must ruthlessly implement the involuntary sterilization of all fertile blind people in order to eliminate hereditary blindness. There should be no exceptions because even those whose blindness is supposedly the result of an illness or accident may not be telling the truth.
The old Germany whose greatness Sturm sought to restore would never have stopped his sister Franka from having children. Verschuer’s new Germany apparently had other plans.
Inside the corridors of the Brown House, Sturm gave his name to a young man dressed smartly in the khaki uniform of Ernst Rohm’s SA — the “brownshirts.” Unlike Regensburg, he was immediately ushered in to see Friedrich Heinz, Hitler’s appointments secretary, who gave him a stiff-armed Roman salute followed by “Heil, Hitler!” and a warm handshake.
“Kurt, how good to see you again,” Heinz said. He was a young man in his late twenties with neatly combed blond hair and a mustache to match. “The Fuhrer is in Berlin, I’m sorry to say. He will be disappointed to have missed you.”
“That’s fine, Friedrich,” Sturm said. “I did not wish to impose on his busy schedule.”
“What brings you to Munich?”
“A personal matter. I need to look at party records,” Sturm said. “As you know, my sister Franka was blinded in a horse riding accident. I’ve just read of a new surgical procedure that may be able to cure her, but it is impossible to secure an appointment with the physician who pioneered the technique. He is primarily a research doctor and does not see patients. But he may be a party member, and if so, he may give preference to me and agree to an appointment.”
“Of course, Kurt,” Heinz said. “Anything for an old friend of the Fuhrer. You’re welcome to look at part
y records anytime you like, even if all you need is the name of a good dentist! Come, I’ll escort you myself.”
Sturm was guided by Heinz through long marbled hallways lit by sunlight pouring through floor-length windows to a staircase to the basement. There, he was led through tight bunker-like corridors with low ceilings until they reached the door to the records room.
Heinz stopped at the entrance. “Take as long as you need, Kurt.”
“Thank you, Friedrich.”
The records room was a cavern of row upon row of filing cabinets, each holding three-by-five-inch file cards. Sturm made his way towards the back of the room, searching for the file cards under letter “V”. Within moments, he found it: “Verschuer, Otmar.” Verschuer had been a party member since 1923 also but he had joined before Sturm. His badge number was lower. 43,487. Sturm noted further down on the card that Verschuer was a member of Himmler’s SS, having joined in 1928. That meant Dr. Verschuer was an old fighter like Sturm and, as an SS member, a fanatic as well.
Sturm shook his head in disgust. He knew Hitler had to appeal to all Germans for the good of the Fatherland. But people like this Verschuer? Or Himmler? Surely the party could do without the likes of them.
“Did you find what you were looking for?” Heinz asked upon his return.
“Yes, thank you, Friedrich. Dr. Verschuer is a longtime member of the party. I wonder if I could impose on you further,” Sturm continued. “Would you mind giving me a letter of introduction to Dr. Verschuer? Something that could attest to my own party membership? Perhaps with a reference to the high regard in which I am held by the Fuhrer?”
“Of course,” Heinz said. Within minutes, Heinz returned from his office and handed Sturm an embossed heavy sheet of cream stationery bearing the swastika in the upper right-hand corner and Adolf Hitler’s name on the bottom, signed by his private secretary, Friedrich Heinz.
The Gemini Agenda Page 30
