The Swiss Courier

by Tricia Goyer

  “The church!” Gabi pressed against the back of her seat.

  “I see it,” Bill said through clenched teeth. A medieval church and its steeple, fully five stories tall, anchored the end of the downtown district. They had driven by the church an hour earlier, but this time around, Bill didn’t have enough airspeed to risk swinging right or left of the steeple—

  “We won’t make it!” Gabi squeezed the armrests.

  “Hang on!” Bill kept the nose down, eased back on the control column ever so slightly to squeeze a little more altitude without losing airspeed, then wound down another quarter of flap. The Junkers bounded up thirty more feet of elevation, just avoiding the cross atop the church’s statuesque steeple.

  “That was close!” Gabi exhaled.

  The landscape quickly gave away to pastureland, and Bill breathed for the first time in a minute. He watched the airspeed dial slowly rise to 130 kph . . . 145 kph, allowing him to wind in the flaps and turn her north. Bill decided to stay low in case a flight duty officer back at the Dübendorf airfield scrambled a Swiss fighter to chase him.

  Bill’s intuition proved correct. Within five minutes, a bright tracer flew past their cockpit, leaving a reddish flare afterglow.

  “What’s that?” Gabi pointed at the tracer leaving its mark.

  “We have company.” Bill looked to his left—and was startled to see an ME-109 so close that he could practically pass a cup of sugar to the other pilot.

  The Swiss Air Force airman, his youthful face illuminated by his instrument panel, held up a radio microphone and mimicked a conversation.

  “He wants to talk to us,” Bill said. “No doubt to get us to turn around. You see the leather helmet hooked on your chair? Put it on like this—” He slipped on his leather helmet and listened in.

  “. . . and our Gracious Benefactor sends you his best regards and has asked me to escort you on this lovely evening,” the voice said in excellent schoolboy English. “Do you copy, Roger?”

  Bill’s face registered surprise—not from the coded phrases but from the offer to help. He keyed his microphone. “Roger, hear you loud and clear.”

  “How much fuel do you have for tonight’s spin around the park?” the Swiss pilot asked.

  Bill scanned the fuel gauge, where the needle rested midway between the 6 and the 7. “Around 650 liters. A bit more than half a tank.”

  “You should have enough fuel,” his aviator colleague said. “Our Gracious Benefactor had asked for more petrol, but there was a problem getting the fuel truck to the plane on time. He sends his regrets.”

  Easy for the Swiss pilot to say that he’ll have enough fuel. Still, a thoughtful gesture by General Guisan. “Tell the Gen— Gracious Benefactor—thank you and not to worry. After we collect some Edelweiss, I’ll bring his nice plane home in one piece. You’ll escort us back into Dübendorf upon our return, right?”

  The transmission turned to static, and Bill never received an answer.

  He hoped that wasn’t an omen.

  30

  Outside Leimen, Germany

  Friday, August 4, 1944

  12:50 a.m.

  “I’m losing my patience, Becker!” Sturmbannführer Bruno Kassler slammed the leather bench seat with his left fist. “We’ve been driving around in circles for nearly an hour! Can’t you find this place?” Kassler cursed under his breath.

  “The Leimen Polizei fouled up, sir. According to their map, the Ulrich farm has to be on Landstrasse, somewhere around here.” The corporal steered the Mercedes sedan along a narrow dirt lane flanked by boxwood hedges that hadn’t been trimmed since Nazi columns marched on the Champs-Élysées.

  “Turn into this driveway!”

  Becker did as he was told, and the two-car caravan swung into a gravel driveway that led to a weather-beaten farmhouse with an attached barn. The corporal slowed the Mercedes to a crawl and extinguished the headlamps. On this cloudless night, bright moonshine lit the farmstead, but inside the main house not a single incandescent light or kerosene lamp shown.

  “I’ll go and see if anyone is home, sir.” Becker killed the engine and set the parking brake.

  “No, this time I’ll take care of it.” Kassler didn’t wait for the corporal to open the car door. He charged out of the Mercedes and marched in double-time to the front porch. Becker hustled after his commanding officer, and the five soldiers in the second Mercedes scurried to catch up.

  Kassler pounded on a wooden door, as if each blow of his gloved fist would release the frustration building within his veins. How many fruitless roads had they followed in the last hour? Too many. If he didn’t bring in Engel tonight, he might as well sign his own death warrant. Himmler’s reputation for executing irritants who failed to perform stretched from Berlin to Baden-Wurtemburg.

  A minute later, a disheveled man in his sixties answered the door dressed in a soiled nightshirt. Gray stubble covered his gaunt face. After rubbing sleep from his eyes, his mouth gaped when he noted the black leather trench coat of a Gestapo chief and the half-dozen soldiers circled behind him.

  “What’s the matter with you?” Kassler bellowed. “Lost your tongue?”

  “Sir, I . . . was asleep . . . What—”

  “I don’t have time for this!” Kassler unsheathed his Luger pistol. “I must find the Ulrich farm immediately. You know the Ulriches?”

  The old farmer nodded.

  “Then where can I find them?”

  “Simple. Go . . . go . . . go . . . out the driveway, take a left, and stay on this road for two . . . two . . . two-and-a-half kilometers.” The man hugged his arms tight to his chest to stay warm. “You . . . you will see a driveway on your left . . . and a wooden sign posted on a tree. The sign says Bethanien Haus. The main farmhouse is 200 meters back.”

  Kassler turned on his heels. Anger seethed through his veins with every beat of his heart. “Did you hear that, Becker? We passed the Ulrich farm a half hour ago!”

  The corporal held up his hands. “Sir, it’s dark, and I didn’t know about this sign.”

  “Los jetzt! We’re losing time!” Kassler waved Becker and the soldiers back to the cars.

  Kassler paused at the car’s door. Then he turned and directed his attention back to the quivering farmer standing in the doorway. “If it turns out that you gave me the wrong directions”— he waved his Luger—“I will return and personally shoot you between the eyes.” Kassler returned the pistol to his leather holster and patted his sidearm for emphasis.

  And it would serve the peasant right. No one would betray him and live.

  Bill Palmer pointed the flashlight at the U.S. Army Air Corps Aeronautical Chart resting in his lap. Gabi had handed him the official U.S. air map for Southern Germany and Switzerland shortly after their chatty Swiss fighter escort had led them to the German border.

  Mr. Dulles had used a ruler and pencil to indicate an air route to the Ulrich farm. He’d also provided a sheet of written directions and notes. To fly precisely, Bill was instructed to use the radio beacon at Basel. From Dübendorf, it was 120 kilometers to the beacon intercept point east of Strasbourg. From there, another 130 kilometers to the landing field outside of Heidelberg, but a note in the margin said this was an estimate. From his reading of the aeronautical chart, he was to track northwest toward Strasbourg on a heading of 200° magnetic, then turn right and fly north-northeast at 020° until they visually picked up a flare-lit strip south of Leimen. A hit-or-miss effort to be sure, since the Germans turned off their radio beacons at night to avoid helping Allied bombers.

  “We’re officially over Germany. See the Rhine River to my left?” Bill pointed out his window, and Gabi half stood out of her seat to grab a view. She was dressed in khaki dungarees and flight jacket to ward off the chill inside the unpressurized cabin.

  “Pretty how the moon reflects off the river,” she ventured.

  Bill noticed Gabi shiver and hug her arms tight to her. From the look on her face, the shivering was as much from worry ab
out their mission as from the coolness in the cockpit. “That’s one of the advantages of being in the air—the great views,” he said. “But I sure wouldn’t mind a few clouds up here. I feel as if we have a bull’s-eye painted on the fuselage.”

  Bill rechecked his instrument panel and reduced the manifold pressure for each engine as they leveled out at 1,800 meters above sea level, close to the Junkers’ optimal altitude of 1,900 meters.

  “Soon we can descend to 1,300 meters. That’ll make our profile harder to pick out of the sky. Let’s see that this mission doesn’t include target practice for German anti-aircraft crews.”

  After sweeping past the church in Dübendorf, Bill had clicked the stopwatch button on his chronometer wristwatch. At an economy cruising speed of 200 kilometers per hour, it should take them forty minutes to reach the first beacon point outside of Strasbourg. From there, he figured another forty-three minutes to the landing strip.

  “Okay, Gabi. Time to go to work.” He took his left hand off the control yoke and pointed over his right shoulder. “Behind you, overhead, is a folding crank handle. To make sure we’re on the correct heading, we have to set the frequency to the radio beacon at Basel. On my direction, turn that handle. Stand by—”

  Bill held up his right hand and listened intently to the faint Morse code signals coming through his helmet earphones . . . da dit dit dit. . . . that was the letter B . . . followed by da dit, which was the letter N. Put them together, and you had the two-letter designation for the Basel Nord beacon—BN.

  “Now slowly turn the handle.”

  Gabi did as she was told and turned the handle to the right.

  “Nope . . . getting fainter. Try the other way.”

  Gabi turned the folding crank handle slightly to the left.

  “Good. Getting stronger . . . more . . . more . . . back a bit—stop!” When the Morse code signals reached full volume, Bill checked the relative bearing on the dial. They were still tracking 200° on the BN beacon from Basel, but would wind-age blow them off course? Bill performed a radio compass check and saw that they were drifting right. He steered the Junkers ten degrees left.

  “Are we okay?” Gabi returned to her seat.

  “We’re doing fine.” Bill nodded. “Don’t want to end up in Stuttgart, that’s all.”

  The minutes ticked by without incident. After another glance at his chronometer, Bill turned to Gabi. “We’re coming up to the 020° heading that will direct us toward the farm outside Heidelberg. Can you slowly crank the handle to the left?”

  Bill swung the plane into a right-hand turn that set them on a heading of 020° magnetic. Then he restarted his stopwatch for the forty-three-minute stretch to the Ulrich landing strip. He strained to listen, but he could hardly make out the beacon on his earphones.

  “We’re too low to get the signal,” he called out. “I’m going to climb.” When he eased the Junkers past 1,800 meters, the signal came in strong again. “Okay, to the left a bit . . . left more . . . stop!”

  “How will we find the Ulrich landing strip?” Gabi asked.

  Bill straightened in his seat. “I’m afraid we’re going back to the days of the barnstormers. This radio compass will steer us in the right direction, but it will be up to us to find the actual landing strip. Could be the proverbial needle in a haystack, unless they light it up well.”

  “I know that some type of spotter flares will be used.” Gabi shrugged. “At least, that’s what Mr. Dulles told me. When do we start looking?”

  “According to the chronometer, I’d say thirty-five minutes from now.”

  Those flares better be visible right on the dot, Bill thought. They didn’t have the fuel to futz around in the air.

  Kassler breathed a sigh of relief as the two black Mercedes sedans inched up the dirt driveway without headlights. Spotting something, Becker stopped their car. He stepped out and inspected a homemade wooden sign fastened to a leafy oak. Becker’s flashlight revealed the etched words Bethanien Haus.

  Kassler lightly punched the gloved fist of his right hand into the palm of his left. “We found him—and Engel is ours.”

  “What do you suggest from here, sir?” Becker switched off the flashlight as the Gestapo detail alighted from their four-door sedan.

  “Leave the cars here. We’ll spread out, cover the house, and make the arrest.” Kassler unbuttoned his leather holster. “Remember, Engel must be taken alive at all costs.”

  The Sturmbannführer guided the group along a dirt road that eventually led to a circular driveway. The farmhouse, he noticed, was lit up like a Christmas tree. Every lamp in the house had to be turned on, and a floodlight illuminated the grassy patch between the farmhouse and the barn. The brightness obscured his view of the fields beyond the buildings. Kassler hand-directed the troupe to proceed behind the foliage, concealing themselves from view. They followed his directions silently, without question.

  Kassler neared the house, shielding his eyes from the brightness, then stopped. Was he seeing what he thought he saw? He turned to Becker and pointed toward a grassy field beyond the main house.

  The corporal stepped out from behind a tree and squinted into the distance. “Looks like a bunch of watering cans burning oil—and some sort of bonfire. I’m not sure what to make—”

  “Let me fill in the blanks for you, Becker. That’s a signal fire, and those burning flares are lining a landing strip! A plane is flying in tonight to spirit Engel away.” Kassler regarded the faces of the men around him—and saw signs of disbelief, anger. No one could believe the audacity of the escape attempt. Not in the middle of wartime Germany!

  “What’s your plan of action, sir?” Becker’s eyes narrowed.

  “We’ll circle around and take positions behind the house. On my ‘go,’ we’ll storm the front door and take Engel by surprise, then round up everyone!”

  Energy surged through Kassler’s limbs. Not only would he capture Engel, but he’d also personally smash an underground spy ring that no doubt reached its tentacles deep into Switzerland.

  And his reward would be great.

  According to his stopwatch, Bill expected the Ulrich field to show up any minute. As the seconds ticked by, though, sweat beaded on his brow. The last bearing from the weak BN beacon had been barely audible. What if they had been blown off course—or had already passed the makeshift landing strip? Their fuel margin was already tight. Extra minutes in the air could prove costly.

  The Junkers’ three engines droned as he and Gabi searched the dark landscape. “Perhaps I should circle—”

  “I see it!” Gabi leapt in her seat. “To the right—over there!”

  Bill dipped the right wing, and a landing strip—unevenly lined with small dots of flame but punctuated with a generous fireball—loomed into view beyond a patch of woodlands.

  “We’re going in.” Bill banked the Junkers to the right and reduced airspeed. Normally, he would have flown over an improvised strip before attempting touchdown, but tonight’s circumstances didn’t allow that luxury. Bill decided to land toward the bonfire or whatever that fireball was.

  When the Junkers dropped down to 300 meters, he lined up his final approach. He maintained 100 kilometers per hour and set the flaps fully down. The muscles in Bill’s stomach tightened. He knew the Ju-52 was designed for short landings, but he had only one chance to get it right. He squinted his eyes to get a better view, hoping to spot the ground.

  “Strap in tight!”

  Gabi pulled the harness across her lap and shoulders.

  Bill concentrated on the smoky lights. He kept the ship on an imaginary center line and steady glide path angle. The Junkers reacted well to his constant corrections on the throttles and control column. He relaxed his feet on the rudders and only looked down into the cockpit to check his airspeed. As they came over the end of the field, he closed the throttles, and the constant thrumming of the past ninety minutes died to a whisper.

  Don’t float, he told himself as the field rose up beneat
h them. He deliberately touched the main wheels down close to the beginning of the lighted strip and raised the flaps to “load up” the airplane and significantly reduce the landing rollout. As the tail wheel settled, the heavy transport plane lumbered, bounced, and lurched along the field midway between the line of flare pots. The brakes squealed and hissed from compressed air.

  Safely on the ground, in control, Bill taxied toward the bonfire, where a half-dozen men and one woman waved their hats in appreciation.

  “Listen, we have to make this as fast as possible.” Bill tromped on the foot brakes and brought the aircraft to a full stop, then released the right brake and goosed the right engine’s throttle to swing the Junkers 180 degrees into position for an immediate getaway. “Hurry. I’ll keep the engines running. You grab Engel, then off we go.”

  Gabi unbuckled her harness and seat belt. “This should only take a minute.”

  “I’ll be counting the seconds.”

  Gabi rushed past the seven rows of leather seats and swung open the passenger door. To save precious seconds, she left the four-rung ladder stowed and jumped to the ground, then raced toward the bonfire.

  A half-dozen men scurried in her direction.

  Gabi paused before them, catching her breath. “Which one is Joseph?” she gasped.

  A skinny man with knots of gray hair approached her out of the darkness. “Fräulein, allow me to introduce myself. My name is Pastor Leo Keller, and this is Joseph Engel.”

  A gangly young man extended his right hand. “Joseph Engel. I can’t tell you what a—”

  “My pleasure too, but listen, we’ll talk once we’re in the air. We have to get over the Swiss border before dawn. One quick goodbye.”

  Joseph set down his satchel and wrapped both arms around Pastor Leo in a bear hug, then quickly embraced Adalbert and his wife, Trudi.

  Gabi grabbed Joseph’s arm. “Come on . . . we don’t have a minute to spare—”