‘I have never seen Anna betray a trace of jealousy.’
‘I sometimes wonder if you know as much about women as you think you do. All right, you have my permission to sign Belinda on, but whatever happens is on your own head. Meanwhile get on to Andrews just as soon as you can. Not that it appears you can do anything about Anna plunging in tomorrow morning.’
‘I know,’ Clive said, sadly.
*
There was a scrambled wireless link between MI6 and the OSS office in Washington, and as it was only two o’clock in the eastern States, Clive did not expect any difficulty in getting hold of Joseph Andrews. But . . . ‘I’m sorry, Mr Bartley,’ the telegrapher said, ‘but Mr Andrews is out of town.’
‘Did you tell them who it is calling?’
‘Yes, sir. And they said they would inform Mr Andrews on his return, and that he would contact you.’
The bastard, Clive thought. He had no doubt that Joe was right there in his office. But he would have been told by Johannsson that the meeting with Steinberg was set up for tomorrow morning and had no intention of sharing anything with MI6 until it was a fait accompli. ‘Amy,’ he said. ‘Get hold of Miss Hoskin for me, will you.’
‘Ah . . . now, sir?’
‘Of course now. I imagine she’ll have gone home by now.’
‘Yes, sir. It’s just that . . . Well, as you instructed me to do, I called her after you left last week and told her that you would be unable to make dinner that night.’
‘I see. And she took umbrage.’
‘I won’t go into detail as to the language she used, but the gist of it was that she never wished to speak to you, or hear your name, again. Sir. And then she hung up so violently I was deaf for two days.’
‘It’s her Italian blood,’ Clive explained. ‘She doesn’t really mean it.’
‘Sir?’ Amy was clearly doubtful.
‘Believe me. Get her on the line. Tell her it’s a matter of life and death, and that I will be with her in half an hour.’
He got up, opened the wardrobe for his coat, and contemplated the bulletproof vest that hung beside it. He had not worn that vest for some time, not even when rushing to Switzerland, but he wondered if it might be necessary this evening. Then he grinned, opened his desk drawer, and took out an Official Secrets Act form instead.
*
He had to ring the doorbell several times before it opened. Belinda had clearly not been in long, for she still wore her smart business suit and her high-heeled shoes. A small, dark, intense woman with attractively sharp features and crisply cut short black hair, she could be very intense indeed, and most attractively so, when in the mood. She had first swum into Clive’s orbit seven years before. He had been entranced – so much so that he had very soon asked her to marry him.
Belinda had declined. She had just been appointed Fashion Editor of a prominent London weekly, and although giving up her job had not been an essential part of the proposal, she had felt that marriage would be a distraction. More importantly, she knew what he did for a living, even if she of course could have no idea of what it entailed. But that was the point. Belinda was a control freak, in or out of the office, and she could not contemplate a husband whose work she could never discuss and who was liable to disappear, quite without warning, for days and even weeks at a time – and be unable to explain what he had been doing. But as she had found him the most attractive man she had ever met, she had never objected to being his mistress, and their relationship had proceeded on a reasonably civilized level until the appearance of the Honourable Mrs Ballantyne Bordman.
But as he had put to Baxter, Clive had always felt that the various upheavals that had followed Anna’s involvement in his private life had been a result less of jealousy per se than of Belinda’s feeling that she was being excluded from an aspect of that life. If she had always been excluded, as long as it had been purely work, she had been prepared to accept it, if grudgingly; when it included a relationship with an utterly beautiful glamour-puss, it had been too much. Now he could only hope he was right.
For the moment, at least, she seemed in a good mood. ‘I assume you have come to apologize for standing me up,’ she remarked.
‘Of course.’ He swept her from the ground to lift her for a kiss: she only came up to his shoulder. ‘We need to talk.’
‘Oh, yes?’ she said warily. ‘Then you had better pour me a drink. And take one for yourself.’ She sat on the settee, waited until he joined her with the two tumblers of Scotch and water. ‘Talk about what?’
‘How would you like to work for MI6?’
Belinda appeared to choke on her drink.
‘On a part-time basis.’
Belinda got her breath back. ‘Have you gone mad?’
‘The fact is, I – we – the department – the country – need you, because there’s a job to be done that only you can do.’
‘What job?’
Clive drew a deep breath. ‘We will provide you with some essential training. Very briefly, but enough to ensure you do not make any mistakes. Then you will be given an Italian identity, passport, background – the lot. With that cover we will get you into Sweden and then Germany. You will be travelling in clothes, as that is your normal business. Your cover will be that you are on your way home to Italy from a business trip to Sweden, but that you are hoping to sell some new designs to a man named Luigi Bartoli, who runs a dress shop called Antoinette’s Boutique.’
‘This is the agent I would be going to see?’
‘No. As it happens, he is an agent of ours, but there is no need to contact him unless for some reason you are unable to reach the person we want you to see. I will give you the address. You will make contact, listen to what information this agent has for you, and then make your way into France. The exact route will be given to you to memorize. Your contact will be a man called Jacques. His address you will also memorize. He will see that you are safely returned here.’
‘Just like that.’
‘I’m not going to pretend that there isn’t a certain element of risk involved. But it is minimal, as long as you remember to keep calm, remember your training, and not do or say anything stupid. I mean, you are an Italian. That you happen to be a naturalized British citizen cannot possibly be known to anyone in Germany.’
‘Is this how you normally recruit people?’
‘No, it is not. But our usual channel of communication has broken down, and while we are setting up a fresh channel, it is imperative that we contact this agent. And,’ he added winningly, ‘you would be working for – I mean, with me.’
‘I see. And if by any chance I am found out, what happens then?’
‘Ah. In our business, the secret is not to get caught out. There is no reason why you should, as I have said, as long as you keep your head.’
‘You haven’t answered my question. Suppose something does go wrong, and I am arrested.’
‘Just keep cool and they’ll have to let you go. They’ll have nothing to hold you for. You will be carrying nothing incriminating, and Bartoli is a well-respected couturier.’
‘So I keep cool while having electrodes pushed up my fundament and turned on.’
‘You are at liberty to decline.’
‘Don’t you give your agents a suicide capsule, to be bitten if they’re taken?’
‘We do, where their capture might endanger other agents or release secret information, or indeed, involve them in an unacceptably unpleasant situation. But as I have said, we do not believe that you will be in any danger, providing you simply remember that you are in Germany on business, that you are going to see our contact and listen to what you are told, and then leave again immediately. However, if you would like a capsule you can have one. But Belinda, my darling Belinda, I would hate to think of you using it.’
She got up, went to the sideboard and poured herself another whisky. ‘If all this is so top secret, no one will ever know about it, so I will get no kudos.’
‘You will get
all the kudos you can stand, once the war is over.’
She drank, and mused, still standing at the sideboard. ‘If I agree to help, would you say that I would be striking a blow at Musso?’
‘Absolutely. He is tied to Hitler. When Hitler goes, he goes with him.’
‘And this will help Hitler to go?’
‘Absolutely.’
Belinda looked into her glass for a moment, then raised her head. ‘OK. Who am I going to meet?’
Clive took another very deep breath. ‘Anna Fehrbach.’
Belinda threw the whisky decanter at him.
*
Anna was up early, had a cup of ersatz coffee, dressed in shorts, a singlet and running shoes, tied her hair in a ponytail, and left the apartment. Birgit watched her with her usual anxious expression.
At six in the morning there were few people about, but those who were all clearly enjoyed the view of those strikingly long legs, and even more the splendours that lay beneath the thin material, exposed to the casual gaze as she walked the few blocks to the park and began to run, not very fast, but covering the ground with long, even strides, her hair flopping up and down on her back. She had actually done a complete circuit, sweat trickling down her neck and dampening her vest, and was just deciding that she would do one more before going home, when she became aware of a man running beside her. ‘You are late, Count,’ she remarked.
‘I have been here for some time, watching you, Countess. Making sure that you were not being followed.’
‘Or that I had not brought along a couple of SD heavies to arrest you?’
‘What have I done to be arrested for?’ he countered. ‘It is a privilege to train beside a beautiful woman. But do you think we could sit down? I am not as fit as you.’
He was certainly panting. Anna indicated a bench beside the path, and he sank on to it, continuing to breathe heavily for some moments. ‘I think we need to be brief,’ Anna suggested, studying him; although she had seen him before, and had indeed met him at SS receptions, she had never actually taken much notice of him. He was a young man, about thirty, she estimated, not as tall as her but with a well-developed body which, like hers, was displayed by his singlet and shorts; he had muscular legs. With his close-cropped hair and chunky features he was quite attractive . . . and she knew that, unlike her, he was a genuine aristocrat.
‘It is a difficult subject,’ he remarked.
‘So I gathered. But you requested this meeting.’
‘You were recommended to me, as someone who might be sympathetic to what I have to say.’
‘By Herr Johannsson. Do you know him well?’
‘We have been acquaintances for some time. He belongs to a . . . discussion group, in which I share.’
‘I see.’ She still could not be certain that Johannsson had not confided that he worked for the Americans. ‘What do you discuss, in this group?’
‘The state of affairs.’
‘You work for the government,’ Anna reminded him, ‘as do I. I do not think it is our business to discuss the state of affairs – merely to do our jobs. Do you know what my job is?’
‘You are the Reichsführer’s Personal Assistant. I understand that I am taking a grave risk in approaching you, but Herr Johannsson said . . .’
‘That I might be sympathetic to whatever matter is concerning you. I should tell you that Herr Johannsson is only a slight acquaintance of mine. He is not in a position to determine to what, or what not, I might be sympathetic.’
Steinberg’s face was contorted with apprehension. ‘You mean you will have me arrested?’
‘As you have pointed out, there is nothing criminal in wishing to talk with me, Count. Or in what you have so far said.’ Now she was almost certain that he knew nothing about her real purpose, Anna felt in command of the situation, as she liked to be.
‘But you do not wish to continue the conversation. I understand, Countess. I will leave you now, and will not trouble you again. Thank you for your time.’
He made to rise, and Anna placed her hand on his arm to encourage him to remain seated. ‘I do not think you can just walk away. I think you have to tell me what your group discusses.’
He stared at her. ‘So that you can arrest me?’
‘You are beginning to sound paranoid. I would prefer to think that I may be able to advise you.’ She had a sudden inspiration. If he had no idea that she worked for the OSS, much less MI6, and knew only that she was Himmler’s aide, there could be only one reason for him to approach her, even if encouraged to do so by Johannsson. ‘And so that I may consider whether or not what you have to say should be conveyed to Herr Himmler.’
He swallowed. ‘I am placing my life in your hands.’
‘Yes, you are. But it was your decision to do so.’
‘Will you hear me out?’
‘Of course. But as I have already said, be brief.’
He took a deep breath. ‘The war is lost, militarily. You must realize this. We can do no more than hold the Russians in the east. The Allies are in Sicily. And we know, from the reports of the immense build-up of American troops in England that a landing in France can only be months away. And in addition, the Allied air forces are pounding our cities. You know about Hamburg?’
‘Certainly. Are you proposing that the Reich should surrender?’
‘Of course I am not. But we must seek a negotiated peace.’
‘Ah.’
‘Only the Führer will never do that.’
‘You mean that the Allies would never deal with him.’
Steinberg snapped his fingers. ‘You understand.’
‘I would like to hear your solution to the problem.’
‘It is very simple. If the Führer were to be replaced by somebody else, somebody acceptable to the Allies . . .’
Anna felt breathless. ‘When you say replaced . . .?’
‘Deposed. There would have to be a coup d’état.’
‘Deposed,’ Anna said thoughtfully. ‘And replaced by whom? The Reichsmarschall is generally regarded as second in the Party hierarchy, but I don’t think he would be acceptable to the Allies either.’
‘In any event, Göring would be quite impossible. He is a drug addict.’
‘So?’
‘Well . . . the Reichsführer is the obvious choice. He already controls nearly all the essential departments of state.’
And you seriously suppose, Anna thought, that Himmler could ever be acceptable to the Allies, especially after the reports I have been filing for the past two years? ‘That is an enormous concept,’ she said. ‘Tell me: you have discussed this . . . project, in your group?’
‘Of course.’
‘And how many are in this group?’
‘There are a dozen of us.’
‘I see. You do realize that what you have just told me is treason?’
His jaw sagged open.
‘I have promised that I will not betray you, in the present circumstances. But can you be certain none of these twelve men—’
‘Four are women,’ he muttered.
‘That is worse. Can you be certain that all of them are utterly reliable?’
‘I would stake my life on it.’
‘My dear Count, you have already done that. Now, if I understand the situation, you would like me to approach the Reichsführer and ascertain if he would be willing to take over the government in the event that the Führer were to be deposed. Is this your idea, or the idea of your group?’
‘It was suggested by Johannsson.’
‘Before the group?’
‘No. He thought it would be best if I took the risk of contacting you before revealing it to the others. But the group is unanimous in agreeing that something needs to be done.’
‘So that the other members are not as yet actually involved. But you do realize that once the Gestapo got you into one of their cells you would very rapidly reveal all of their names.’
Steinberg licked his lips. ‘Johannsson gave me to un
derstand that you would be sympathetic.’
The crunch. ‘Did he give you a reason why I should be sympathetic?’
‘Well . . . he gave the impression that he knew you very well.’
‘I see.’ Johannsson at least appeared to be behaving responsibly. ‘But as I have said, he was not telling the truth.’
‘But will you help us?’ Steinberg asked, anxiously. ‘It would be helping Germany,’ he added ingenuously.
Given her recent conversations with Himmler, Anna knew that to raise the subject of his replacing Hitler, even legitimately, and whether or not he would be prepared to negotiate with the Allies or they with him, would be futile and could well be fatal. On the other hand, the existence of such a movement in the heart of Germany and, indeed, the government, was too potentially important not to be reported. How that was going to be done was merely another problem to be solved. Meanwhile . . .
‘Tell me about this group. I am not seeking their names, but are they people of influence?’
‘I think so. They are all intellectuals.’
‘That is hardly a recommendation when it comes to decisive action. Are any of them soldiers?’
‘One of us is a colonel.’
‘A colonel. With a command in Berlin?’
‘Well . . . no.’
‘Do you suppose that if this idea of yours comes to fruition, it will simply be a matter of entering the Führer’s office and saying, “Sorry, old man, but it is time to go”? In the first place, how will you gain access to him? He is constantly surrounded by SS guards. Anyone who wishes to see him, and is accepted, is rigorously searched before being allowed into his presence. And several relative strangers would never be admitted at the same time.’
‘Well . . .’
‘You would have to use considerable force. That almost certainly means bloodshed. Are you and your friends prepared for this?’
‘Well . . .’
‘And to be successful, you will need military back-up. That means you must have some senior officers on your side, if possible from the SS, but failing that from the Wehrmacht, and stationed here in Germany, preferably close to Berlin. Have you considered these points?’
‘I will do so now.’
Angel in Jeopardy_The thrilling sequel to Angel of Vengeance Page 8
