Winds of Change (Empires Lost Book 2)

by Charles S. Jackson

  “Where are my manners, Harry?” Stahl began pleasantly as he turned to glance at the new arrival. “I’ve not introduced everyone yet. This is my commanding officer, Colonel Franz Bauer. We’ve been working together at the London Office for… oh… about a year now… and so far we’ve been doing a wonderful job, if I do dare to say so myself. You and I were having such an interesting conversation that I almost forgot we weren’t alone.”

  “Anything else, Franz…?” He asked as he turned back to Bauer momentarily, all pretence disappearing from his features and tone as both hardened to ice.

  “Nein, Pieter… nothing more,” Bauer replied with a shrug. Although both spoke excellent English, his accent was less pronounced than Stahl’s. “I wasn’t expecting anything, in all honesty: those two fools are little better than mindless, hired muscle at best.” He cast a malevolent glare in Harry’s direction. “From what they have told me however, I’m more than confident we can get something useful out of Herr Jenkins here.”

  “Oh, I don’t doubt that at all,” Stahl agreed as Harry’s stomach lurched, and he almost threw up as he recognised the implied threat of torture that lay beneath that simple statement. “Standartenführer Bauer’s looking forward to having his own ‘chat’ with you in the back room there, Harry,” he continued, turning back to Jenkins with a terrible gleam in his eyes. “I have to admit that coming from a combat background as I do, I’m a bit of a novice when it comes to interrogation… Franz however is a true master at the game and in that sense it’s so wonderful we ‘found’ each other, as I’ve learned so much in the last twelve months! Better that he take over from here, although I’m certainly going to come in and watch!”

  “What – what’re you gonna do to me…?” Harry stammered in terror, trying to take a step back now but finding himself held fast as the pair of troopers by the door moved quickly forward and secured his arms.

  “Harry, my friend, I don’t think mere words could truly do justice to what you’re about to experience,” Stahl hissed breathlessly, and Harry realised for the first time that the young officer was actually shaking with an almost sexual excitement. Tears began to stream down the cabbie’s cheeks in that moment as he realised what they were about to do to him was as much for their own enjoyment as for any interest in information, and that it didn’t really matter any more what he did or didn’t tell them: they were going to hurt him either way.

  “Please, don’t do this! I don’t know anything, I swear…!” Harry was struggling now, pleading desperately as powerful arms encircled his throat and his shoulders, making any movement impossible.

  “He was a tough one, that Arthur,” Bauer continued in almost grudging recognition, oblivious to Harry’s pleas as he recalled the torture of Rowe earlier that morning. “He lasted almost two hours and he still gave us nothing in the end, although I suspect that was probably because he was too stupid to actually know anything.” He shrugged. “Made it a lot easier to break Nobbs when he saw what we’d done to his friend, and he told us a few interesting things as a result, but not much we can really use.” For the first time, Bauer stepped close enough for Harry to see the rest of his upper body, and he realised in horror that during the entire time since he’d left that dark room, the SS officer had been daintily wiping his blood-stained hands on a cloth that might once have been white. “He only lasted twenty minutes or so, but most of that wasn’t much more than practice, really, considering we got everything worthwhile out of him in the first five…” Bauer gave a snort of derision, almost managing a hint of a smile for the first time. “Practice makes perfect, Pieter, as they say, and I believe Mister Jenkins here has his mother at home also… I wonder if she might have any light to shed on our little problem…?”

  “What an excellent thought, Franz! What do you think, Harry? Should we have the local Gestapo bring Elsie in for a chat too?”

  “No…!” Harry howled instantly, any last vestige of resistance leaving him at the threat of violence against his mother. “No…no, please!” His body sagged against the guards behind him, all strength gone now as he stared sullenly at the floor in total defeat. “Scotland… they said they were heading to Scotland… and then on to Ireland to try to make it to somewhere safe. I don’t know how they were getting across the water, but the Irish bugger said they were driving north. There were three of them I picked up just like you said: one adult, grey hair but balding – maybe in his sixties – and a boy and a girl, neither of ‘em more than twelve or thirteen. The boy looked Jewish, maybe, but the others sounded British.” Harry Jenkins couldn’t make the leap of logic required that might enable him to consider the possibility someone of Jewish faith might look or sound ‘British’. “Dunno what yer talking about, sayin’ you’ve been chasin’ this bloke around France – the one I picked up sounded as British as I do. Spoke with some toffee-nosed accent, like Oxford or Cambridge or somethin’. They were in a black Ford Model A – one of those Tudor models.”

  “You said there was an Irishman?” Bauer asked quickly, his curiosity piqued. “Northern Irish or Republican…?”

  “Only know him by the name of ‘Michaels – heard him called ‘captain’ a coupla times we’ve met. Made it clear he was IRA – made it clear he weren’t from Belfast…”

  “Probably from the south then, but that means nothing in itself – those bloody Republican volunteers come from all over to cause trouble.” Bauer mused, mostly talking to himself as he moved across to stand beside Stahl. He’d given up trying to remove the last few streaks of drying blood from his hands – in the end, the towel he was holding was so stained and damp that the whole exercise had become counter-productive. “Was he alone?”

  “No...” Jenkins admitted slowly, shame in his voice. “He had some bloody Yank with him… spoke like he was outta one of those Gangster movies,” he added, not experienced enough in American accents to differentiate between a Chicago or New Jersey dialect. Right hard bugger he was – tough as nails – and bloody tall too; have to be at least six-five, maybe more…” That last piece of information caused both SS officers to do a double-take.

  “Six feet and five inches, you say?” Stahl repeated, excited but not prepared to hope it could be true. “You’re sure he was that tall?”

  “At least that tall – coulda been taller, but it was getting dark. All I can say is, he towered over poor bloody Arthur, and Arthur weren’t short himself.”

  “You think it could be him, Franz?” Stahl asked Bauer softly in German, turning his back to Harry momentarily. Six-foot-five equated to a height of just over two metres, something that was a long way from common. A man of that height would be hard to miss and very had to mistake – particularly one who already stood out because of an American accent. By nature of their profession as hunters of racial ‘undesirables’, higher ranking members of the Germanische-SS were trained in other languages and dialects and Bauer was one of the best in their department. Through his work chasing down Jews in Germany and right across Europe over the years, he’d learned a great deal about their heritage, history and their culture and no knowledge of Jewish culture or history could be complete without an understanding of Judaism in the United States of America.

  “This man sounded like he was a ‘gangster’,” Bauer shrugged, thinking carefully. The one they’re calling ‘The Journalist’ is supposed to be from New Jersey, but how different does that accent sound from a native of Chicago or New York anyway? Hard to imagine it’s purely a coincidence, but if it is Richard Kransky, then what is the most wanted man in Grossbritannien doing risking his own neck by trying to smuggle a couple of Jewish refugees out of the country?” Another thought occurred to him. “More to the point: what does this fellow from France we’re chasing have that’s so important it requires such a risk? And now it appears he’s British… if this is the same fellow, what was he doing in France to begin with?”

  “Excellent questions,” Stahl nodded slowly. “I think we need to find out more about the background of this Jew
. The Abwehr haven’t been very forthcoming with any real information. I might need to call in a few favours from some old friends and see if we can’t come up with a few more details.”

  “I knew there was a reason I keep you around, Pieter,” Bauer grinned broadly for the first time, liking his partner’s line of thinking. “If you could get on that as soon as we’re back in the office; I’d very much like to know more about this elusive fellow that suddenly seems so important.”

  “What about this one, here?” Stahl changed the subject entirely, bringing it right back to the subject at hand and still speaking in German. “Think he knows anything else?”

  “Unlikely – he’s little more than a paid stooge, after all, and I doubt that the IRA or Melbourne would provide any detailed plans to such a man for reasons exactly like the situation we have here this morning.” Bauer paused for a moment, as if giving what he’d said some serious thought. “One can never be too sure though, on the other hand. I don’t think he’s bluffing, but he may be a good enough actor to fool us all the same – it’s happened before.”

  “The back room…?”

  “The back room,” Bauer confirmed with a faint smile that was positively evil.

  “I’d like to think you’ve been honest with us, Harry,” Pieter Stahl returned to English once more as he turned back to the terrified cabbie, an incredibly unsettling smile spreading across the man’s scarred face. “For your own sake, I’d really like to think you’ve told us everything you know…”

  “Everything, I swear,” Jenkins nodded desperately, his face coated in a fine layer of sweat that had nothing to do with the temperature and everything to do with the level of fear coursing through his body. “I’m a nobody… why would they tell me anything?” He was concerned about the conversation the pair had just had in German – he understood none of it, but for some reason, Harry had the uncanny sensation that some of it at least had been referring to him, and not in a good way. “The Irishman – Michaels – is the only one I’ve ever met before, and even then it was only ever for a few minutes at a time. Never seen the Yank before last Thursday night, nor the three they charged me to pick up for ‘em.” The level of desperation in his voice grew as he spoke, and although neither Bauer nor Stahl gave any overt indication of displeasure, somehow, Harry instinctively understood that he was pleading for his life in that moment. “There was only s’posed to be the bloke – the one that sounded like a toff – but when I turned up he had the kids with ‘im. Said he wouldn’t go anywhere without ‘em, and that was that. The Irishman weren’t too happy about it either – was a real surprise to him too – but the ‘toff’ pulled out some letter to show him that said it was okay for him to bring the kids too… said the letter was signed for by some bugger called ‘Thorne’ or somethin’.”

  “Thorne…?” Stahl snapped instantly, cutting Harry off. “Max Thorne…?”

  “Yeah – I think that was it… Max Thorne. As soon as the Yank heard that name, he got all excited and agreed about letting him take the kids – talked the Irishman into it. Said he’d worked with this Thorne and recognised the bloke’s moniker scrawled there.”

  That was a name every intelligence officer in Nazi Germany knew, and that Australian’s involvement muddied the waters significantly with regard to their investigation. If it was true, what Jenkins had said about the American knowing Thorne personally, then he had to be the deadly sniper wanted by Axis forces right across Europe and Asia – the man they knew of as Richard Kransky who was to be terminated on sight, should anyone be able to get close enough and survive long enough to carry out the execution order.

  “Harry, you have been an absolute wealth of information!” Stahl declared with a broad smile that almost bordered on being genuine. “You’ve given us so much to work on!” He paused just long enough to give the man the faintest glimmer of false hope before letting the hammer fall. “It’s just… well… we have to be certain you’re being honest with us…”

  “What…?” Harry blurted in shock, his mind unable to accept the implication of what Stahl had just said. “What… no…! I’ve told you everything, I swear to you! I swear on my mother’s life… you must believe me…!”

  “Oh, we will believe you, Harry… I’ve no doubt we will…” Stahl said in a dismissive, emotionless tone as he gave an imperceptible nod to the guards at Jenkins’ back.

  “Watch how you step as you take him in, boys,” Bauer remarked casually, ignoring Jenkins’ desperate pleas as the troopers gripped the cabbie tightly once more and began to slowly push him toward the open doorway to the back room. “…Don’t slip as you go in – there’s blood all over the floor in there. I’ll be in shortly…”

  Already gripped completely by abject terror, it never occurred to Harry that there’d been no reason for Bauer to issue that last remark in English, other than to add to the man’s level of torment in some small way.

  “Please… please don’t do this… I’m begging you… please don’t hurt me…”

  “Try not to think about it in terms of the pain,” Stahl suggested, sounding to all the world like a kindly older brother and patting the struggling man on the shoulder as the guards pushed him past. “It’ll be over much quicker if you look at it as a learning experience!”

  Stahl paused for a moment, staring out through the open doorway at the reddening horizon beyond. He suspected Jenkins hadn’t heard his advice, honestly intentioned as it had been in Stahl’s own way. No matter, he thought, with little real sadness or disappointment. He didn’t blame the man for not listening; he had other things on his mind at that moment, after all.

  “You know, Harry,” he added finally, turning back toward the guards as they continued pushing the wailing man toward the room at the rear of the office, “I don’t believe those old sayings of ‘red sky at morning, sailors’ warning’” Stahl smiled broadly as he moved to Bauer’s side and the pair began to follow the guards toward the dreaded room. “…I think it’s going to be a wonderful day after all…!”

  Island of Soay, St Kilda Archipelago

  Atlantic Ocean, west of Scotland

  Reich-Protektorat Grossbritannien

  September 23, 1942

  Wednesday

  Edward Whittaker wrapped his arms tightly about the nearest steel support and hung on for dear life as a exceptionally savage gust of wind suddenly howled past, threatening to tear him from his perch and cast him violently against the rocky ground thirty metres below. The wind was usually blowing a gale – something that made working at the top of the steel tower particularly difficult and dangerous – and it carried with it the chill of the Arctic as it swept down from the pack ice and spread out across the far upper reaches of the North Atlantic.

  The small islet of Soay would’ve been completely uninhabited were it not for their forced-labour work gang, a platoon of Wehrmacht Heeres engineers and a brace of overseeing scientists. Soay was the westernmost point of land in the entire St Kilda Archipelago and also – save for the long-disputed islet of Rockall that lay 300km deeper into the North Atlantic – further west than any other piece of Scotland overall. A unique breed of Neolithic sheep called its rocky outcrops home as did numerous colonies of seabirds that included such species as gannets, fulmars, petrels and puffins.

  The summit of Cnoc Glas towered high above the ocean at the centre of Soay, rising to a height of 378 metres and surpassed only by the equally impressive Conachair on the main island of Hirta. Just four kilometres to the southeast, its taller colleague was quite clearly visible save for its summit, which was currently hidden beneath a mantle of dark grey cloud. As Whittaker glanced warily upward at the faint drops of threatening rain, the overcast blanket above his head seemed so close he could almost reach up his hand and touch it. Considering his position (height of the tower itself included) stood just twenty-two metres lower than the distant, cloud-wrapped summit of Conachair, there was every likelihood he could do exactly that were he foolhardy enough to release his grip for eve
n a moment – which he most certainly wasn’t.

  Whittaker was heartily relieved when the faint call ordering the tower crew to climb down came from below moments later. He and two others on the opposite side of the structure had been clinging precariously near the steel platform at its very top for close to an hour now – just one of several shifts sent up unwillingly in a vain hope the persistent cloud cover would either clear or at least lift sufficiently to allow helicopter pilots on standby over at Hirta to safely place their precious, waiting cargo atop the platform. The tower crew’s job was to guide the cargo down during the last metre or so, secure it, and wire it up to control and power supplies once it arrived. With the call to stand down however it appeared the execrable weather had resulted in the cancellation of work for the third day running.

  He chose his steps carefully as he began to lower himself, cautiously unclipping and reattaching his flimsy safety line frequently as he painstakingly made his way back toward the rocky ground below. Two men had been severely injured earlier that morning after losing their grip in the heavy winds, but there’d been no deaths so far that day and Edward Whittaker had no intention of becoming the first. They’d already lost three men over as many days in similar accidents and there’d been four times as many seriously injured.

  It also had to be said that it wasn’t just POW work gangs who’d suffered loss of life. As he took a moment to look away from the tower framework and throw a glance off to the south west side of the summit, he could clearly see the shattered wreckage of a Luftwaffe MH-16 utility helicopter, lying where it had burst into flames on impact with the ground a week earlier. Little was left of the aircraft save for a large, blackened stain burned into the low grass. The pilot had lost control while attempting to lift the top section of the tower into position in similar high wind conditions, smashing himself and the rest of his five-man crew to pieces against the rocky summit in the process. The project had continued regardless, and the pressure was heavy on Germans and POWs alike to have work completed. Whittaker’s limited understanding of the situation suggested everything was already well behind schedule.