To Catch a King

by Jack Higgins

  “Undoubtedly.” Himmler leaned back. “General Schellenberg has all the qualities. A brilliant intellect, gallant soldier, cultured, witty. Humane by nature. In the field of counterespionage, one of the most able minds in Europe. He is also a romantic fool.”

  “But his record, Reichsführer, is impeccable. A good party member.”

  “Which means nothing. Anyone can pay that kind of lip service. Frankly, I doubt his devotion to National Socialism considerably.” He raised a hand. “Don't worry, Reinhard. He's too good a man to discard—yet,” he added. “Now let's have him back in.”

  A moment later, Schellenberg was once again in front of the desk. “I've decided you will start for Spain tomorrow,” Himmler said. “Under the circumstances, you will hand all relevant information concerning the Winter affair to Obergruppenführer Heydrich.”

  “As you say, Reichsführer.”

  “Good. You may go.”

  Back in his office, Schellenberg stood at the window, smoking a cigarette, trying to control his anger. But the truth was, however unpalatable it might be, that he could not do anything for Hannah Winter now.

  He turned and noticed a box on his desk. When he opened it he found it contained the Mauser he had asked the armorer for, plus the additional ammunition. There was also a requisition slip for him to sign. As he slipped a round into the magazine, the door opened and Heydrich came in.

  He paused on seeing the Mauser. “I suppose you'd like to use that on me?”

  “She's clean,” Schellenberg said. “I'm certain of it.”

  “Then she's got nothing to worry about. Good God, man, I've done you a favor, don't you see that? I knew we were in trouble when I heard you actually left her at the door of her apartment last night. Walks through the streets in the rain in the early morning. Like something out of one of those absurd films UFA are always churning out. What were you trying to do—commit suicide?”

  Schellenberg put the Mauser back in the box. “All right. What now?”

  “You'll fly to Spain tomorrow by special courier plane. Paris, San Sebastian, Madrid. All fixed up. Your Gestapo bully boys will be provided later today.”

  “Thanks very much.”

  “And now I must interrogate Irene Neumann. Only don't interfere, Walter, promise me that?” He sounded almost plaintive. “It really would be something of an improvement if you started doing as you were told for a change.”

  Irene Neumann sat on a chair in front of Heydrich's desk, her hands folded firmly in her lap, her face expressionless. Two SS men guarded the door.

  She was not afraid. The shock effect of her sudden arrest had had a numbing effect so that she was not really capable of taking anything in. This was a moment she had always known might come—and yet, now that it was here …

  Heydrich entered. He sat down behind the desk, opened her file, and sat there reading it, totally ignoring her.

  “So—Fräulein Irene Neumann?”

  “Yes, Obergruppenführer.”

  “You know why you are here?”

  “I have no idea. If there has been some mistake in my work …”

  He pushed the surveillance photos across the desk. “You, coming out of the Garden Room last night.”

  For a moment only, her iron reserve failed and what she felt showed on her face.

  “Yes, you might well look dismayed. This is the day your chickens come home to roost. The day you've dreaded the thought of all these years.” He got up and stood at the window, looking out, his back to her. “The copy of the Windsor report which you stole. You showed it to Winter, of course. That was the object of your rather injudicious visit, but was his niece with him at the time?”

  “I have nothing to say.”

  “It doesn't matter. They'll be joining you shortly, both of them.”

  She made no reply.

  He came around the desk and took her chin gently in one hand tilting her face. “You will tell me, Fräulein, in the end. I promise you.”

  Hannah went shopping during the morning and had her hair done. When she returned to the apartment, the porter had a telephone message for her asking her to meet Uncle Max at the club, which surprised her, for during the day it was locked up tight. There was seldom anyone there before six o'clock in the evening.

  She found the stage door open. As she went in his voice called, “Is that you, Hannah?” and he looked out of his office. “Close the door and lock it, will you?”

  She did as she was told, then followed him into the office. “What did you want to see me about?”

  “Arrangements for your trip. What have you done with the report?”

  She patted the top of her thigh. “Still in my stocking. I didn't like to leave it at the apartment. I spent a couple of hours memorizing it during the night. Do you want me to destroy it?”

  “I don't know,” he said. “It's the sensible thing to do, but on the other hand such a story might not be taken seriously without the evidence. Let me think about it some more.”

  “Have you got my passport?”

  “Of course.” He took a large envelope from his inside breast pocket and produced a passport. “There. You'd better check it.”

  “But this is French,” she said. “There must be some mistake.”

  “Take a look.”

  She opened it. The usual photo stared out at her, the personal details were as always, except in two important respects. Her name was given as Rose Lenoir, born in Paris. She was still described as a singer.

  “I don't understand.”

  “I had it made up for you. If you have any trouble trying to cross into Spain or Portugal as Hannah Winter, you switch identities. Your French is good enough if you keep it short, the conversations, I mean. I have a friend who specializes in such things. It's a real work of art. Dozens of immigration stamps, see? German, Belgian, French, Spanish, Portuguese. Some nice and clear, some carefully smudged so you can't make out the date properly. It's okay. Your real passport is in here as well, plus contingency money in francs and pesos. Enough to get by on and a letter of credit for two thousand dollars on American Express at Lisbon.”

  He put the false passport back into the envelope.

  “You seem to have thought of everything,” she said.

  There was a knock at the stage door. Uncle Max slipped the envelope back in his breast pocket, opened the desk drawer, and took out a Walther automatic pistol. He moved to the window and peered out. A young man wearing a tweed cap and blue overalls stood there whistling cheerfully. He was carrying a bulging leather Gladstone bag of the type used by tradesmen.

  Max slipped the Walther into his pocket and went out into the passage. “Who is it?” he called.

  “Herr Vogel?”

  Uncle Max opened the door, leaving the security chain in place. “He isn't here. What is it?”

  “Mansteins—plumbers. Something wrong with the hot water supply in the number two kitchen, wherever that is. I wouldn't know. Haven't been before. Herr Vogel rang this morning.”

  Max undid the chain and let him in. “First door on your left is the main kitchen. Straight on through and you'll find the number two.”

  “All right, leave it to me.” The young man had very bright blue eyes. He winked impudently at Hannah and disappeared into the kitchen.

  Max followed her back into the office. There was the sudden roar of an engine outside in the alley, the squeal of brakes, pounding feet.

  “Oh, dear God,” he said and grabbed her by the shoulders. “If anything happens, if we get separated, I'll be at a firm of monumental masons called Hoffer Brothers in Rehdenstrasse. It's close to the zoo. Now follow me and do everything I say.”

  As they went into the passage the young man with the bright blue eyes emerged from the kitchen. He was holding an Erma police submachine gun.

  “All right, Dad, against the wall, nice and slowly. Nothing foolish.”

  Pounding started on the door, he glanced briefly toward it, and Uncle Max flung himself at him. The yo
ung man reversed the Erma and struck him under the ribs and Max went down with a cry of pain.

  The young man stood over him, back turned to Hannah. “You know, I'd kick your head in for that if you weren't so valuable.”

  There was a heavy porcelain lamp on top of the filing cabinet by the door. Hannah picked it up in both hands and brought it down with all her strength. It smashed across his head and he went down on his knees.

  The battering on the door had risen to a crescendo. As her uncle looked up at her, face still twisted in pain, she said desperately, “Uncle Max, what are we going to do?”

  He was breathing with some difficulty. “The wine cellar. Help me to the wine cellar, and bring that thing with you.”

  He nodded to the Erma and she picked it up gingerly and helped him to his feet. They reached the end of the corridor, and he started to unbolt the grill leading to the wine cellar steps. Behind them, the stage door fell from its hinges, and the entrance suddenly seemed jammed with SS.

  Hannah turned and swung up the Erma instinctively, her finger tightening on the trigger. She had never fired any kind of weapon in her life before, and the Erma was like a living thing in her hands, ripping plaster from the passageway walls, driving the men in the doorway into the alley.

  She kept on firing convulsively, the Erma bucking so violently that she fell back against Uncle Max as he got the grill open. He lost his balance and slid down the wooden stairs to the cellar below.

  Hannah had dropped the Erma. She was on her knees now and screamed, “Uncle Max—are you all right?”

  She saw him get to his feet. “Quickly!” he called.

  A hand grabbed her right ankle as she tried to get up. She half turned and found the young man with those bright blue eyes crawling toward her, his blond hair sticky with blood.

  “Oh, no you don't, you bitch.” He punched her in the stomach. Behind him, other SS men poured into the passage and ran to help him.

  As for Max, there was nothing he could do except turn and stagger into the next cellar, thankful to be able to walk. He closed the stout oaken door and rammed home two steel bolts, then moved on between rows of wine bottles.

  Behind him, a furious pounding sounded on the door, but they were too late, for he had anticipated this situation for some time and had made every preparation.

  Against the end wall of the third cellar, there was a wooden cupboard. Inside were a hat, a raincoat, a large flashlight, and a briefcase containing various false documents and a supply of money in several currencies.

  He put on the coat and hat, then pushed the cupboard to one side, disclosing a neat hole in the brickwork. He picked up the flashlight and the briefcase and clambered through, turned, and pulled the cupboard back into place.

  He was in the cellars of a disused warehouse at the rear of the club, which had been standing empty, ready for demolition for three years now.

  A couple of minutes later he was unbolting a door revealing a flight of steps leading up into a small yard, crammed with the rubbish of years.

  He opened the gate and peered out. The alley outside was completely deserted. He closed the gate behind him and walked rapidly away.

  At that same moment in Estoril, the Duke and Duchess of Windsor were entertaining Miguel Primo de Rivera, the Marques de Estella, who had driven over from Madrid especially to see them.

  As the servants cleared the remains of luncheon from the table beside the pool, De Rivera took out his watch.

  “Time passes so quickly in good company, but I'm afraid I must leave soon. I must start back for Madrid today. I've an important official engagement tomorrow.”

  “What a shame,” the Duchess said.

  De Rivera smiled and said to the Duke, “I wonder whether Your Royal Highness could spare me a few moments' conversation before I go? In private.”

  The Duke looked faintly surprised, but smiled as courteously as always. “Yes—why not. We shan't be long, Wallis.”

  It was, in fact, half an hour before they returned and then only for De Rivera to take his leave. He kissed her hand, promising to come again soon, and departed. The Duke lit a cigarette and moved to the edge of the terrace, leaning on the marble balustrade, frowning as he looked out to sea, an expression of intense preoccupation on his face.

  “And what was that all about?” she demanded.

  “I'm not sure. It was really most extraordinary. He'd heard of my Bahamas appointment from official sources in Madrid. Had even discussed it with Franco.”

  “But why, David?”

  “Do you know, Wallis, he urged me not to go. Said I could still have a decisive role to play in English affairs. He actually said we'd be better off going to stay in Spain. Would be made officially welcome.”

  “Would you rather do that?”

  “Too complicated. You see, present indications are that the Spaniards don't intend to enter the war on the side of the Nazis, but they might well use England's present plight as an excuse to demand the return of Gibraltar. I certainly don't want to become a pawn in that kind of game.”

  “So you don't trust De Rivera?”

  “I trust the Madrid Falangists no more than I would any Fascists. There could be more to this than meets the eye, Wallis. Much more.”

  His eyes crinkled in that inimitable smile and he put an arm about her waist. “There's a certain excitement to it all, though, I must admit that.”

  6

  The cell was quite small, the concrete walls whitewashed. Almost antiseptic in its cleanliness. There was a light recessed into the ceiling, a small iron cot with no mattress. A cold, white concrete womb.

  Hannah sat on the edge of the cot, her mind still so numbed by events that she was unable to take any of this in. There was a dreamlike quality to everything. It was like one of those nightmares half-remembered in the morning and fast fading. That desperate scramble in the passageway at the club, the machinegun bucking in her hands, the smell of cordite. And Uncle Max? Where was he now?

  Her stomach still hurt from the blow, and when she touched it bile rose in her throat so that she had to get up and move to the bucket quickly.

  Heydrich, watching through the spyhole, nodded to the SS guard and the Gestapo interrogation expert he usually used on such occasions, Major Berg.

  “All right,” he said to Berg. “Open up.”

  The sound of the bolts being withdrawn was of no significance to Hannah. She still sat there, staring at the wall, so that Berg had to drag her to her feet.

  Heydrich lit a cigarette and stood facing her, legs apart. He was wearing dress uniform, a devil in black, but his voice when he spoke was dispassionate.

  “You're quite a girl, aren't you? Two of my best men dead. Three more in the hospital—one on the critical list. They trained you well, your people. The fluent German. Just like a true Berliner, very convincing.”

  “I was born in Berlin. So were my mother and grandfather. You know this. We always spoke German at home in New York when I was a child.”

  He turned to Berg. “Strip her. Thorough search. I'll be back in a few minutes.”

  He went out into the corridor and along to the main guardroom, where he telephoned through to the Charite hospital to find out how the survivors of the debacle at the Garden Room were doing.

  When he returned to the cell, Hannah was standing in the center of the room, quite naked, her hands folded in front of her. Her clothes were laid out neatly on the bed.

  The purpose of such an exercise, the use of male interrogators, was part of a psychologically devised procedure designed to induce feelings of guilt and shame in the victim and to increase the alienation syndrome. Hannah, however, showed no emotion and simply stared at the wall.

  “We've struck gold, Obergruppenführer,” Berg told him. “I found this in the top of one of her stockings.”

  Heydrich unfolded the copy of the Windsor report. “Excellent. Now we're really getting somewhere.” He tapped her gently on the face with the folded report. “Didn't know what
I was talking about, eh? I've just been in touch with the hospital and you know what they told me? A third man, the one of the critical list, has just died.” He grabbed her hair savagely and swung her head from side to side. “Bitch—that's murder three times over.”

  But she felt no pain—no pain at all. It was as if this were happening to someone else—as if she were standing outside looking in.

  “Your uncle—where did he go?”

  Her voice seemed to come from a great distance away like a faint echo. “I don't know.”

  Heydrich pushed her away. “Get your clothes on,” he said harshly.

  Berg said in a low voice, “She's still in shock. I've seen it often enough before with people like her. They live with the thought of it for years—being caught, I mean. When it comes, they try to reject the fact. Pretend it isn't happening. It's a kind of withdrawal.”

  “Then we'll have to shake her out of it, won't we? You go and see how they're getting on with the Neumann woman. I'll be along in a moment.”

  Berg went out and Heydrich stood there watching as she dressed slowly and methodically, still with that strange vacant look on her face. She really did have an excellent body, he told himself. As she sat down to pull on her stockings, he felt the excitement rise in him.

  Himmler was in uniform for once when Schellenberg went into his office. The Reichsführer glanced up. “So—I did you a service by removing you from further active participation in the Winter affair.”

  “So it would appear, Reichsführer.”

  “In normal circumstances, you would almost certainly have been in charge of the special action group which went to the Garden Room. Whoever was will be severely disciplined. A deplorable business.”

  “I must agree.”

  “Three dead. Two wounded. A surprising young woman. You were obviously wrong about her.”