Finally, he was finished. “That’s what happened, as best as I can tell you.”
Stalin nodded. “Thank you, Alyosha. I believe you. You told me exactly what I wanted to know, and it’s all right now. Everything is all right. You don’t need to worry. I understand. Get some rest now.” Krigoff nodded and stayed sitting in his chair.
As he stood up to leave, Stalin nodded at the guard. When Stalin had pulled the door shut before him, the guard took his pistol from its holster.
Krigoff looked at the guard. He smiled; he understood everything now. As the pistol fired, in the millisecond before the bullet tore through Krigoff’s brain, he was at peace.
He loved Josef Stalin.
21 JULY 1945
SURVIVORS’ CAMP #10, SOUTH OF POTSDAM, GERMANY, 1711 HOURS GMT
Heinrich Himmler woke up as the truck lurched to a stop. It took him a moment to recover his bearings, and he was about to order his men to be more gentle. Then he saw the rounded, flat-bottomed helmets, and knew that he was still a prisoner of the Americans. Day after day he had awoken, thinking that his imprisonment was merely a bad dream, that he would find himself once again master of Germany.
For months of interrogations he had strung his captors along, especially the young, guilt-ridden Sanger, with his pitiful sympathy for the Jews. His weakness had been so easy to exploit, so easy to manipulate. The Allies were now willing to settle for “truth,” as they termed it, and so his life would be spared. He could plan and wait, and look for an opportunity, a crack in their defenses, the inevitable moment when their attention would be focused on the threat from the East, and then he would be free once again.
Calm, he told himself. They are inferior mongrels, almost as bad as Jews—they must not see his fear. But where had they brought him? Why had they come to a halt?
He was confused. For more than a day he had been driven along by these American captors, and he didn’t understand why they had not yet delivered him to some higher headquarters, some special prison. And he was in the hands of relatively low-ranking soldiers with only a few vehicles in his escort—an insult for a man of his stature. If he had only known they would be this stupid, he could already have had his rescue waiting for him.
“Why are we stopping?” he demanded, when he saw Sanger—it was always Sanger—getting down from the truck cab. The sergeant who had been riding with him—a black man, posted, he was certain, as an intentional indignity—took his time releasing the handcuffs, then pushed him none too gently toward the dim light at the back of the truck.
“There’s some people here we’d like you to meet,” Sanger replied cheerfully. “Why don’t you come along this way?”
It was daylight, Himmler saw. Although he wouldn’t admit it to Sanger, he was grateful for the chance to get out and stretch. He needed to relieve the pressure on his bladder, perhaps even coax something to eat from his captors.
He stepped awkwardly to the ground and walked around the side of the truck, then froze as he saw the tall gates, the guard towers, the barbed wire fences stretching to the right and left. The fence was lined with gaunt people, unshaven and filthy, staring at him in eerie silence.
“I accompanied Field Marshal Rommel into Buchenwald. I stopped him from shooting a couple of your Totenkopf-SS guards, though I was tempted to shoot them myself. I wanted their testimony. The story of what you and yours did will shame humanity for all time,” Sanger said as he walked.
“Yes, yes, yes,” said Himmler. “You’ve told me that story already. You’ve told me again and again and again. Do you think I’m the Pope and I’m going to canonize you or something?” He laughed at his own wit. “I did what I did because it was right for Germany, and nothing you can do can undo a single act of mine. That’s what strength is, by the way. You’ll never understand that, Sanger, not if you live to be a hundred. You’ll never know what it’s like to be a man. You ran out on us Germans like a little crybaby the first time you gave some old Jew ein awah—” Himmler’s mocking use of the baby term for an injury, a “boo-boo,” was the sort of insult he regularly used to belittle Sanger’s sentimentality and weakness, as he saw it. “—and you expect me to be impressed by that? Or by these rag-tag old Jews you’ve got locked up over there? I’ve seen Jews in cages before, Sanger. Remember? I put them there.”
“I remember,” Sanger said.
“So you’ve got a few leftovers that didn’t make it into the gas chambers in time. The sad thing is that they’ll breed like vermin and Germans of the future will just have to finish the job we started. That’s the only thing I really regret, Sanger. I didn’t get to finish the job.”
Sanger looked at the camp inmates. “This is a survivors’ camp,” Sanger said to Himmler. “Not like your camps, of course—we actually are feeding these people, giving them coal and clothing against the elements, and providing medical treatment. But they know what it was like in your camps. Many of these came from Buchenwald, others from camps in the East. This is one of the areas where we’re actually successfully cooperating with the Soviets, you know.”
“How wonderful.” Himmler laughed. “The Slavs are sending you some leftover Jews. Even they don’t want them.”
One of the Americans, a short major with murderous eyes, snarled something at the führer.
“Oh—pardon my manners,” said Sanger. “This is Major Smiggs of the U.S. Nineteenth Armored Division. He particularly wanted to be introduced. He was one of the officers of the task force that captured you.”
“How nice for him. He got a medal, I presume?”
“Oh, yes, and a promotion, though I suspect neither of us will be keeping our military rank much longer.”
For the first time, Himmler felt a momentary shiver as he looked up into Sanger’s face. Sanger was calm and smiling as he looked toward the camp. “As you know, the Western Allies have created a new organization called the United Nations, and one of their first official roles will be taking custody of international criminals such as yourself. Transfer arrangements have been made, and you are to be remanded to them.”
“Yes, yes, I know all that,” Himmler said impatiently.
“They’ve been notified to pick you up here.”
“And where are they?”
“They’ll be here first thing tomorrow morning.” Sanger’s smile widened slightly. “There seems to have been a slight mixup in the paperwork.” He nodded toward the major.
Himmler started to fight then, turning to run for the woods until Major Smiggs took his arm in a grip like a vise. Himmler shrieked and squirmed in that grip, but the American—who was not large, but was very determined—simply dragged him over to the camp’s main entry. Sanger motioned the MPs out of the way and opened the gates himself so that no one else participated in the act.
Pushing the second and final Führer of the Third Reich forward, Smiggs said something in English, something Himmler couldn’t understand.
“Smiggs wants you to know that this is for the children of Buchenwald,” Sanger said, as the major pushed Heinrich Himmler through the gates to sprawl on the muddy ground. The gates slammed shut, and the prisoners moved forward.
“Wait!” cried Himmler, scrambling to his knees in the cold mud. “Sanger, be reasonable! You can’t do this! You’ll be court-martialed! Listen, we can work something out! I have a lot of information—I can tell you things—don’t walk away like that—come back! You can’t! Sanger, please! Don’t do this! I’ll make it worth your while! Turn around, Sanger! Talk to me!”
As the prisoners closed in on him, Himmler started to scream.
It was a noise that went on for a very long time.
27 JULY 1945
BRANDENBURG GATE, BERLIN, GERMANY, 1302 HOURS GMT
General Dwight D. Eisenhower would of course be hosted at a formal gala in the Reichstag Building in the evening, a fête suitable for his five-star rank. But first there would be a display of marching and drill that would give Third Army and the German Republican Army each the cha
nce to strut before the Supreme Commander. Patton and Rommel had suggested the Charlotten-berger Chaussée as the route of the parade, and had posted themselves and Ike on a reviewing stand in the shadow of the historic gate.
Henry Wakefield was here with them. Though Patton had asked him to have the Nineteenth Armored join the parade, Wakefield had refused outright, declaring that his men had been through too much real war to get spruced up for any damned parade. He had glared at his army CO, ready to make a fight of it, and had been surprised to the point of astonishment when Patton had simply nodded, and moved on to order a different division to take part in the festivities.
Which meant that Hank Wakefield got a front-row seat—actually second-row, since he was behind Patton and Ike, with Rommel just off to the side—and a perfect chance to eavesdrop on the great men.
“What do you make of our new boss?” Patton leaned over to ask the Supreme Commander.
“President Truman? I’ve talked to him a number of times, of course. We haven’t met yet. But he seems like a straight-shooting, no-nonsense type. I think he’ll do okay facing off with Uncle Joe. Of course, he’s pretty focused on getting ready for the big Japan invasion, now that we’ve got things settled over here.”
“Invasion, eh?” Patton said. “Any chance you could get me a command over there?”
Ike shook his head. “Those jobs are taken. And besides, we need you here, Georgie. Who else has such a great relationship with the man who’s going to be the next chancellor of Germany?”
Rommel held up his hand. “None of that has been decided. I am a soldier, not a politician.”
“Who knows?” Ike said with a wink. “Soldiers can go on to become great politicians. Why, there are those who say that I should think about politics as a new career.”
“And are you?” asked the field marshal.
The Supreme Commander waved away the question. “I have a lot of work to do as it is. I haven’t even started to think about that.”
Wakefield smiled to himself; Ike was already sounding like a politician.
“I should think that this new bomb might go a long way toward convincing the Japanese to lay down their arms,” noted the field marshal. “Indeed, it is hard to even imagine waging war against a country that possesses such destructive capabilities.”
“I’m sure that’s getting consideration,” Ike agreed. “I know we’ve sent pictures right into Tokyo, showing them what happened to Potsdam.”
“Let’s hope they see reason, then,” Rommel declared.
“Say,” Eisenhower said, turning back to Patton with a serious expression. “We’re getting a lot of flak about this Himmler business. First of all, you’re sure he’s dead?”
“Beyond a doubt,” Patton said. “Colonel Sanger identified the body—at least, what was left of it. Seems to have been a snafu in the orders. Just one of those things.”
Eisenhower looked sharply at Patton and then at Rommel. Rommel’s face was stoic and calm; Patton’s had such an exaggerated innocence that it was clear what had really happened. “Yeah. One of those things. There are reporters clamoring for the story. And I’ve had two senators call me in the last few days, demanding investigations, explanations, you know.”
“Hell, Ike.” Patton shrugged. “It’s just like the report says: We were transferring him from our control to the control of the Occupation Forces. Only some of his former guests got hold of him as we were making the transfer. They had a grudge against ol’ Heinrich, and I can’t say I blame them. They roughed him up to the point where he wasn’t breathing anymore.”
“Nobody can blame them. But rogue soldiers, officers who take the law into their own hands … people can blame them. And I’m afraid they’ll want to string somebody up.”
“Well, we’re having a little trouble establishing who was careless,” the Third Army commander said. “But I will keep you posted on the investigation.”
“You do that, Georgie. You do that. But … Georgie?”
“Yes, sir?”
“Don’t look too hard.”
17 APRIL 1946
INTERNATIONAL TRIBUNAL, NUREMBERG, GERMANY, 1500 HOURS GMT
The judge’s gavel came down, ending this session of the International Tribunal. Sepp Dietrich got laboriously to his feet, shook the hand of his lawyer, and shuffled through the crowd toward the back of the courtroom. It was, as usual, packed with a wide assortment of international journalists, military officials, lawyers representing other defendants, people with an interest in one or more cases. Rommel, whose trial had ended in acquittal several weeks earlier, was sitting a few rows back. He stood as Dietrich approached.
“How did I do?” Dietrich asked.
“You’re telling the truth. That’s all that matters,” Rommel said.
“Well, I’m an old man. There’s not much for me to be afraid of anymore. Though I don’t remember everything, you know. I’ve never been much for the past, and a lot of the older stuff I just never think about—bad and good alike. And it all seemed different then.” He shook his head. “Were we really all so evil? It didn’t feel like it at the time.”
“I suspect that how one feels is not such a reliable guide to whether one is committing evil,” Rommel said. “I remember overriding twinges of my own conscience more than once. That’s all it takes.”
Dietrich blew his nose into a handkerchief. “I never had much of a conscience in the first place. It slowed down my drinking.” He laughed. “Speaking of drinking, I need a beer right about now. Let’s find a bar and I’ll treat. All right?”
Rommel chuckled. “All right. Just one, though. Then I have to go back to work.”
“Do you ever stop?” Dietrich asked.
“The work never stops, so I can’t either,” Rommel replied. He held the outer door for Dietrich as both men went out onto the portico. A long flight of stone steps led down to the street. As usual, there was a crowd. Photographers and reporters crowded around, there were some demonstrators with signs, and some military policemen trying to keep order. Rommel noticed a blond-haired youth coming up the steps.
Lukas Vogel had refused to surrender when the Second SS Panzer Division’s remnants pulled back from Küstrin, and he refused to surrender now. He had been walking for so long, living off scraps and seeking shelter where he could, that this seemed like normal life now. He could hardly remember what it was like to live in a house, to stay in the same place and eat regular meals and sleep in a bed. It had all gone wrong, and Lukas had figured out when and how it had all gone wrong. Everything had been all right until Rommel changed sides. It was Rommel’s treason that had destroyed Germany. It was Rommel’s treason that had destroyed Lukas Vogel’s life and mission. It was Rommel’s treason that had led to Jochen Peiper’s death. Well, Lukas knew what to do about that.
He had been moving south, slowly, day by day. From time to time he got some news, heard a bit of a radio broadcast, saw a newspaper headline. There was an International Tribunal in Nuremberg, and they were putting Nazis on trial.
Rommel would be there.
So would Lukas Vogel.
He saw the first of the crowd exiting the courthouse. Today’s session had ended. It was time to get ready. He was wearing a uniform coat several sizes too big for him. There was plenty of room in its pocket for a Luger he’d taken from a dead soldier some time back. He slipped his hand into the pocket and grabbed the pistol, and began moving up the steps. There—he saw Field Marshal Rommel leaving the courthouse, starting down the steps. He maneuvered closer, jockeying through the crowd. As he neared his target, he pulled out his Luger. He was at point-blank range. There would be no way he could miss.
Sepp Dietrich also noticed the blond-haired boy approaching them, and then looked closer. There was something familiar about him. Ah—it was the young man from Saint-Vith, the one he thought had died in Küstrin! He had something in his hand … a pistol! “Lukas, don’t do it,” the old general said, as he moved in front of the boy, his hand grabbing for t
he boy’s wrist, but it was too late. The Luger fired. Dietrich felt the impact like a punch in his stomach, felt himself bending over. His hand gripped Lukas’ wrist, pulling the Luger down with him.
There was a scream, and a military policeman began running toward him. Guns were coming out of their holsters. “Don’t shoot him!” Dietrich cried, but although he mouthed the words, no sound seemed to issue from his lips. Lukas was pulling on the Luger, trying to get it away from Dietrich, but the old man’s grip was too strong.
There were more shots now, and Dietrich saw blood spurting from a hole in the boy’s side, then more blood from his chest. “No … don’t kill him …” Dietrich pleaded, but he knew it was too late. He fell onto the steps and the boy fell next to him. He was looking directly into Lukas’ eyes, and could see that the boy recognized him. “General Dietrich,” he whimpered. “I’m sorry … I didn’t mean it … I wanted Rommel … I’m sorry …”
A shadow crossed over Dietrich’s face and he glanced up. Rommel was bent over him, his face grim. “Sepp—hang on, man. Help is coming.”
“Not for me, Rommel. The boy. Save the boy,” Dietrich whispered. “We knew better. He didn’t.”
When it was all over, the one-eyed field marshal stood up. Blood spattered his plain uniform. He watched as the bodies of the dead general and the dead youth were loaded into an ambulance and driven away. In spite of the crowd around him, he felt very much alone, as if he stood at a great distance from everyone else.
Fox at the Front (Fox on the Rhine) Page 70
