The Runner

by Christopher Reich

  In March 1942, Donovan had taken over the club and turned it into a top-secret training center for agents of the OSS. Hearing Honey speaking German with one of the landscapers, he’d pulled him aside and begun questioning him about his background. The OSS needed native German speakers, he’d said, and Honey, the son of German-Czech immigrants, whose real name was Darius Honnecker, qualified as one. A month later, Honey was back at Congressional, not as a gardener but as an agent in training.

  “Maybe the rumors are true, sir. You know, that General Patton took too many spills playing polo, one too many bumps to the noggin.”

  “You think George is crazy?” Donovan laughed off the suggestion. “People have been saying the same thing since he graduated from West Point. That wasn’t one lunatic talking to another we heard. It was two old war horses plotting their final campaign. Besides, does it really matter?”

  “No, sir, I guess it doesn’t.”

  “I’m every bit as keen as Patton to stop the Russians where they are,” said Donovan, “but another war is hardly the answer. Right now, our attention has to stay focused on the Pacific. We’ve got to finish off those damned Japs before we do another goddammed thing. You hear what Patton said about ‘them starting it’? What does that rascal have in mind?”

  Honey recounted Seyss’s desire for Russian uniforms, weapons, and transportation, his mention of “a last mission for Germany,” and Bauer’s statement that Seyss was leading his men to Babelsberg. “If Seyss is going to Potsdam, it can only be one thing, can’t it?”

  Instead of being shocked at the news, though, Donovan appeared pleasantly surprised. “He’s a clever goose, I’ll grant him that. Patton always did want to take Berlin.”

  Honey shook his head, his disbelief mixed with contempt and horror. “Will you warn the president’s security detail?”

  “Right away, but unfortunately, security in Potsdam proper is being handled by Stalin’s boys. He’s got five thousand thugs in the woods surrounding the area. I doubt he’ll let our men lend a hand.”

  Honey envisioned the countryside swarming with uniformed Russian soldiers. To someone accustomed to passing himself off as the enemy, their presence would be a godsend. “I don’t think they’ll stop Seyss,” he said. “The man is very resourceful. He spent two years on and behind the Russian front. If Stalin’s got five thousand of his men up there, he’ll take that as an invitation to join them.”

  Donovan took to pacing again. “Problem is, Georgie’s got his cards mixed up. It’s Stalin who’s holding all the aces. He has over three million men within fifty miles of the Elbe. Over a million pieces of artillery, too. Meanwhile, we’ve been hightailing our boys out of the European theater of operations as quickly as we can. We pick a fight with Uncle Joe, we could end up back at Dunkirk in sixty days.”

  Honey didn’t like Donovan’s brooding. “Even if we couldn’t defeat the Russians, we could hold them in check.”

  “Could we? They outnumber us three to one. Their tanks are superior to ours and they have an unlimited supply of manpower.”

  “But you’re forgetting something, General.”

  “Am I?”

  “Our scientists, sir. I mean, they’ve been working on a device for a few years now. You can’t help but pay attention to the scuttlebutt.”

  “You don’t miss much, I’ll grant you that.” Donovan pulled a crumpled yellow paper from his jacket pocket that Honey recognized as an intercept of a top-secret diplomatic wire traffic. “Secretary of War Stimson received this yesterday.”

  Honey read the intercept.

  “‘Operated on this morning. Diagnosis not complete but results seem satisfactory and already exceed expectations.’” And skipping ahead, “‘Dr. Groves pleased.’”

  “I’m not sure I understand.”

  “One of those devices you’ve heard about is ‘operational.’ A single bomb the equivalent of twenty thousand tons of TNT. The damned thing works!”

  Honey tried to figure out what twenty thousand tons of TNT could do. The biggest raids on Berlin and Dresden and Stuttgart, the ones involving two or three hundred bombers, had dropped no more than a hundred fifty tons of high explosives on a target. Donovan was talking about a single bomb capable of delivering more than a hundred times that amount. “Jesus Christ,” he whispered.

  “The Savior indeed,” said Donovan. “This time I think we can safely say God is on our side. Problem is we only have two of them and they’re both headed to Japan. Anything comes up with Stalin in the next ninety days, we’re out of pocket.” Sighing, he rose from his desk and joined Honey at the window. “Which brings us to our last complication, your friend Major Judge. Last we’ve heard, he’s gone under. Disappeared with Ingrid Bach twenty-four hours ago, after calling Third Army Headquarters and asking Paul Harkins for Patton. What do you think he’s up to?”

  “That’s easy,” responded Honey. “The same thing we are.”

  “Is he capable?”

  Honey imagined the determined brow, the quick temper. “Of what? Getting to Berlin? I’d say yes. Of finding Seyss once he’s there? Maybe.”

  Donovan mulled over his answer. “Judge certainly discovered that Seyss was still alive quickly enough. You were right guessing he’d try and use von Luck to identify the body, but you didn’t foresee that he’d bring Ingrid Bach into this. You said he wouldn’t expose the girl to anything dangerous. Why do you suppose he didn’t come to us instead?”

  It was an annoying habit of Donovan’s to dissect his men’s thinking, expose their faults, then go right back and ask them for another opinion. “I don’t know,” answered Honey. “Seems he doesn’t trust us.”

  “‘Us’? Who’s ‘us’? ‘Us’ doesn’t exist. ‘You,’ I think, would be more accurate.” Donovan stared at the afternoon sky, wagging a finger at an invisible adversary. “What I really need to know, then, is if Devlin Judge is capable of killing Seyss?”

  Honey paused before answering, knowing he was treading on very thin ice. “I’m not sure. Either he’s not as strong as he believes himself to be or he’s holding part of himself in check.”

  “So, he might be, but it wouldn’t come easily. He’d hesitate.”

  “Yessir. That’s correct.”

  Donovan’s eyes had taken on a dreamy cast. Once he’d told Honey that his job was not to see the world as it was but to see it as it would be in an hour’s time. “Hmm,” he whispered. “Maybe that’s good.”

  “Sir?”

  “Just thinking. Patton wasn’t all wrong, you know.”

  And then the reverie was broken. Donovan wrapped an arm around Honey’s shoulder and guided him to the door. “We’ve got a plane standing by to fly you to Berlin. There’s no train running that way, so maybe you’ll gain some time on Seyss. Al Dulles will pick you up and show you around town, introduce you to some of our contacts. You’re cleared to attend the conference, but don’t expect to get into the actual negotiating sessions. You know where Seyss needs to go to do his job. Keep an eye peeled and it shouldn’t be too hard to spot him. And if you run into Judge, you might want to enlist his help in this thing.”

  Honey halted in midstride. “You sure? I thought we didn’t want him involved in this any further.”

  “We didn’t.” Donovan smiled mischievously and Honey knew he was busy weaving some intricate plot. “But things are different now. Remember, Captain Honnecker, the only constant in our business is change.”

  Honey frowned inwardly, wondering when their work had become a business. “And what do I tell him?”

  “Why, the truth. It’s nothing he doesn’t know already. Just make sure he keeps his mouth shut afterward.”

  Honey cocked his head, not sure he’d heard correctly. “Sir?”

  Donovan responded to the pained expression on Honey’s face. “Don’t look so upset. We can’t have anyone besmirching Georgie Patton’s reputation. America does love its heroes.”

  CHAPTER

  41

  SOMETIME TOWARD
DAWN, INGRID and Judge left the main road and navigated a series of dirt lanes, ending up in a small wood where they parked the jeep in a copse of birch trees. The night was silent, the air warm and misted with a fragrant dew. Ingrid was happy for the rest. Her bottom was sore from three hours of hard driving over untended farm roads. They’d stopped twice already, laying up for a quarter of an hour in torn-up barns, watching for any sight of Patton’s thugs. An hour ago, they’d crossed a paved thoroughfare and they’d been on it ever since, passing through the towns of Hochheim and Walldorf.

  Shifting in her seat, Ingrid faced her self-appointed savior. She was ready to inform him that she was leaving here and now, that whatever wild intentions he harbored, he could no longer count on her participation, that she missed her son very much, and finally, that she was tired, hungry, and in a most unpleasant mood altogether. But before she could manage a word, he was leaning toward her, one arm beckoning her to come close, his commanding brown eyes imploring her to solve some unspoken misunderstanding.

  “Major,” she said, crushing her back against the seat. “I beg your pardon.”

  Judge eyed her queerly. “The map,” he said. “I’m sorry, but I can’t reach it. Do you mind?”

  Ingrid averted her gaze, embarrassed at her misperception, though not as relieved as she’d expected. Reaching beneath her seat, she found a well-creased map. Judge unfolded it, using her lap as well as his own as a table. Damn him for not asking, she cursed silently. There were numbers scribbled everywhere: this army, that corps, compass headings, phone numbers, she couldn’t tell what. The only legible marks on the whole bloody thing were the fat black lines dividing her country into four pieces.

  “We’ve got to get to Berlin as quickly as possible,” he said, finger already tracing some imaginary course. “That’s where he’s headed.”

  “Go,” she said. “But don’t expect me to come with you. I have a family. Pauli must be worried sick about me.”

  “Pauli has Herbert and your sister. He’ll manage fine until you get back.”

  “It’s not a question of managing,” Ingrid responded tartly. “Everyone in our country has been ‘managing’ for the last three years. Managing without enough sleep, without enough food. Managing without a husband or a brother or a sister. I am his mother. I will not allow him to manage without me.”

  “If you go home, that’s exactly what he’ll be doing. And not for a day or a week but for the rest of his life.”

  Frightened by his strident tone, Ingrid chose for her own one of a measured reserve. The clear-minded skeptic. Reason before emotion. Kant over Nietzsche. “You’re being a bit dramatic, aren’t you?”

  “Am I?” Judge shrugged his shoulders, but his voice guarded its urgency. “You’re my only proof that Seyss is alive. Whoever strung that concertina wire across the road knows it. It wasn’t me they were after. It was you.”

  She’d been privy to facts and suppositions. She’d borne terrified witness as his suspicions were proven correct, first in Heidelberg, then Griesheim. Still, she was unwilling to accept his conclusions, even if deep down she knew they were true.

  “Are you saying they’ll be watching Sonnenbrücke? Don’t forget we already have our own bodyguard, Father’s personal jailers.”

  Judge fixed her with his gaze, his brow knit in earnest disbelief. “You just don’t get it, do you?”

  “How can you be sure he’s going to Berlin? Maybe he’s up and left the country?”

  Judge shook his head as if he’d delivered the coming rejoinder a hundred times. “If he wanted to leave the country, he never would have gone to Munich, or to Heidelberg, or to Wiesbaden. Whatever his plan is, he’s stuck to it despite knowing we’re looking for him. Why should he quit now?”

  “Guessing. Guessing. Guessing.”

  “Then why are we hiding here? If Erich Seyss had left the country, no one would give a damn if you were alive or dead. No one would have killed von Luck. Those poor nurses would still be alive right now.”

  “Erich has caused me enough pain,” she said. “I won’t allow him to interfere with my life any further.”

  “Then why do you still care about him?”

  “I don’t,” she parried reflexively. “Not a wink.”

  “I see how you light up every time you talk about him,” Judge said. “How you sit a little straighter, how your voice jumps a notch.”

  “Nonsense!” she said, and catching the accusatory cast to his eyes, saw she’d struck a jealous chord. She recalled his words on the drive up to Heidelberg. That he could believe for a moment that she still had feelings for Seyss enraged her. “Do you know why we never married? Do you?”

  “No.” It was a whisper. He had offended. He was sorry.

  “When an SS man wishes to marry, he must submit his intended spouse’s name to the SS Office of Race and Resettlement. There the woman’s genealogy is laid out on a family tree going back five generations. In my case, three was enough. My great-grandmother was a Jew. That makes my blood one-eighth Semitic—enough for the SS to classify me as a Jew. They refused to grant Erich’s request to marry me on the grounds that our offspring would tarnish the racial purity of the Thousand-Year Reich and he obeyed. Rather than transfer to a regular army unit where an officer is permitted to marry anyone he chooses, he obeyed. That’s what he does, Major. He obeys.”

  Somewhere along the way she’d lost her reserve. Emotion had won out over reason. She’d been foolish to believe her heart could harness her head. And when Judge spoke next his voice had assumed the calm she’d abandoned. This is what he does, she thought. He’s a lawyer. He persuades people.

  “Tell you the truth, I don’t want to go to Berlin either,” he said. “Five hours ago, I went officially absent without leave. Patton doesn’t have to make up a reason to have me arrested anymore. I’ve done it myself. Any chance I have for returning to the IMT is shot, and so is my job back home. Attorneys with an arrest record aren’t generally welcomed before the bar. You don’t like Seyss. Fine. I hate him. But it’s beyond that now.”

  Ingrid railed at his self-control, feeling her own slip another notch. “You can’t hate him. He’s done you no harm. To you, he’s just a shadow.”

  “No,” said Judge, all emotion drained from his voice. “He’s hardly a shadow. Erich Seyss killed my brother.”

  Ingrid stared at him, a floodtide of hate and disbelief and terror burning her cheeks. “I don’t believe you.”

  “When I told you about the crimes Seyss was wanted for, I left out one detail: My brother was among the men he had killed. My brother was a priest, Ingrid.”

  Eyes locked on Judge, Ingrid felt her stomach climb inside her chest, her breath leave her. The world shrank around her until she heard only the panoply of arguments desperately jockeying for position inside her mind. She needed to believe that the man she had loved was a soldier, not a murderer. Things happened in war. Terrible things. He was only following orders. There had to be an explanation. Hurriedly, she tried to scrape some words together on his behalf. The jilted lover would not be made a fool of a second time. But any defense she hoped to offer died stillborn in her throat, slain by the ice in Judge’s voice. Her chin trembled, then fell. “I’m sorry.”

  Judge raised his face to the night sky and blew out an exaggerated sigh. “Don’t be. He ruined your life, too. Hell, he’s still doing it.”

  “I’m not apologizing for Erich. I’m apologizing for myself. For my country.”

  He looked at her, puzzled. “But you didn’t do anything.”

  The words stung more than she’d expected. “That’s the point, isn’t it?”

  Judge’s silence granted her the sense of guilt she’d been longing for. “Is that why you’re going to Berlin?” she asked. “For your brother?”

  “No,” said Judge. “It’s not about Francis. Not anymore, at least. I’m going because I don’t have any other choice. Hell, even if I wanted to stop, I’d be arrested as soon as I showed by face at my billet. Bu
t it’s not a question of that either. Offer me the chance to go back to Paris, no questions asked, I’d turn you down flat.” He laughed a little, the moonlight casting a melancholy pall across his attractive features. “What I always liked best about the law was the black and white of it. You either did something wrong or you didn’t. You broke the law or you didn’t. Same thing now. If I don’t do anything, it would be like committing a crime.” He raised his head and Ingrid felt the power of his gaze. “Seyss is going to Berlin. I know it. Don’t you see? I can’t not do anything.”

  “I suppose not.”

  “But I need you to come, too. I don’t have time to learn my way around Berlin. You know Seyss, where he might go, where he might hide. You have a house there, don’t you?”

  “Two. One in the city, one on the lake in Babelsberg.”

  “And I imagine you spent some time there with him?”

  “Yes.” The admission left her feeling dirty, the more so because of the respect with which Judge treated her. God, how he was different from Erich and Bobby. Neither of them would have asked her to go to Berlin, they would have bloody well ordered her. The comparison to her former lovers coupled with his close physical proximity made Ingrid see Judge in a new light, and she found herself wondering what a future with someone like him might be like. All she’d had to look forward to with Bobby was a role as loving wife and doting mother, a life no different from the one her mother had lived, and her mother before that. It was an existence built on her family’s wealth, standing, and service to the country—none of which counted for a damn any longer.

  Feeling a desire to touch him, Ingrid leaned over and kissed his unshaven cheek. “I haven’t thanked you for saving my life.”

  Judge brushed the spot, the hint of a smile lightening his anxious mien. “Does that mean you’ll go to Berlin?”