Horst leaned forward. “What’s her excuse for leaving the building?”
“Apparently, she has a husband who runs a bar,” her father said. “They’re both from Bavaria, according to the files; they have no friends or family within the city. They certainly don’t live together, but they see each other as often as they can.”
“Apparently,” Gudrun repeated.
“Reichstag staff are expected to be on call at all times,” Horst reminded her. “I’m surprised they kept her on if she was married.”
Gudrun’s father shrugged. “Her record is very good,” he said. “I imagine - officially - they didn't want to lose her.”
He leaned forward. “She has clearance to go everywhere, save for the secure rooms,” he added, slowly. “No one would question her if she supervised the maids cleaning the various bedrooms or wonder why she took a room or two to clean herself. She would be completely unnoticed as she placed a note in your room, Horst, and took your reply. And her fingerprints would be everywhere anyway.”
“And she takes the notes to her husband,” Horst mused. “He must be an SS officer too.”
“Probably,” her father said. “They were both born in Munich, according to the files, but I doubt we’ll find any traces of them.”
Gudrun nodded. Munich was the third or fourth largest city in the Reich, with well over a million citizens. A handful of records could be inserted into the files by the SS - which practically controlled the registry office - to create a convincing background, at least on paper, for Elfie Fruehauf and her husband. There would be no reason, she suspected, for anyone to remember them. They’d be average schoolchildren, average workers, average soldiers ... even a careful check of the records wouldn't turn up any red flags. It would take a thorough investigation to penetrate the cover and that would require more time than they had.
“We are running out of time,” Horst said. He looked at Gudrun. “They are demanding more and more details of your schedule.”
Gudrun shivered. Horst had made it clear, more than once, that the SS wanted her alive. It was a terrifying thought. She’d been arrested before, but then she’d just been an average citizen caught up in the middle of a riot. Now, they knew just how big a role she'd played in toppling the Reich Council. Karl Holliston wouldn't just want her dead, she knew. He’d want her to suffer.
“So we grab the bitch after she returns from the next meeting and interrogate her,” her father said, curtly. “And we raid the bar at the same time.”
Horst shook his head. “There won't be a direct connection between the bar and the commandos,” he said, flatly. “Taking out the bar will do nothing more than warn them we’re on to them.”
“They want to snatch my daughter,” her father snapped. “I’m not inclined to take chances!”
“If you snatch Elfie Fruehauf,” Horst said, “you will reveal that we know she’s a spy. And they will know that I put you on to her. Our chances of quietly isolating and destroying the commando team will go down sharply.”
“As well as make you a target,” Gudrun said, quietly.
Horst nodded. “The best we can hope for is having them think I’ve been arrested too,” he said. “But ... at that point, they will probably decide they want me dead before I can talk.”
Gudrun shook her head. “Then we don’t want to blow your cover.”
“I feel that way,” Horst said, dryly.
“I’ve had the bar under quiet surveillance,” her father injected, sharply. “There are too many people coming and going for us to have any real hope of picking out their contact.”
“And if we raid the bar, the commando team will just pull back and get on with their mission,” Horst added. He looked at Gudrun. “You really need to stay in the Reichstag.”
Gudrun scowled. There was nothing she could do for the war effort, but do her best to boost morale. Visiting hospitals and speaking to the wounded, addressing civilians ... helping families who had been blasted out of their homes by shellfire find new places to stay ... it wasn't much, yet it was the only thing she could do. Giving that up didn't sit well with her, even if she was the only one affected. And if she didn't visit the hospitals, would it suggest to the population that the provisional government no longer cared?
And if we lose the population, she thought, what happens to us then?
She felt her scowl deepen as her father and husband argued. The SS had been putting up posters everywhere, insisting that the provisional government was responsible for everything from the siege and shellfire to the atrocities the SS had committed as they swept west. And as conditions worsened within the city, people were starting to listen. Gudrun couldn't help wondering just what would happen if the SS pledged to spare everyone, but the provisional government and its collaborators. She doubted the SS would keep its word - Berlin had been infected by the desire for freedom - yet she suspected it wouldn't matter. Drowning men would clutch at straws to save their lives.
And what would I do, she asked herself, if my family was starving?
The thought tormented her for a long moment. There were few families in the Reich that didn't have at least one person - a husband, a son, a brother - in the military. Gudrun’s brother, father and grandfather had all fought for the Reich. But now, almost every military-age male in Berlin who could be spared from their work was in the military, doing everything from fighting on the front lines to transporting weapons and equipment around the city. And everyone else was watching helplessly as their children slowly starved, if they weren’t killed by shellfire or mugged by one of the criminals who had started to prowl the streets, preying on innocent civilians. Their lives had gone downhill sharply ...
... And for what?
“We need to draw this team out of hiding,” she said, interrupting their argument. “Don’t we?”
“They won’t show themselves on our terms,” Horst said, shortly. “Gudrun, I know how these people think.”
Gudrun smiled. “So we give them a target they can't resist,” she said. “We give them me.”
Horst stared at her. “Out of the question!”
Her father echoed him a moment later. “Are you mad?”
Gudrun held up a hand. “We need to lure them into a trap,” she said. “And to do that, we need something that will draw them out of hiding. And we know they want me, correct?”
Horst took a long breath. “Do you have any idea just how many things could go wrong?”
“You could die,” her father said. “Gudrun ...”
“I owe it to my conscience to take some risks,” Gudrun said. “I ...”
“So you have said,” Horst snapped. “And they’ll engrave it on your tombstone!”
“We tell them where I will be at a specific time,” Gudrun said, ignoring him. “And we have a team of our own in place. When they turn up, we snatch them.”
“Kill them,” Horst corrected. “They won’t surrender and they’ll be damn hard to capture.”
“There’s a major push coming,” Gudrun said. She’d read the briefing notes with growing alarm. American high-attitude recon aircraft had noted the steady build-up of forces around Berlin, the Waffen-SS mustering its power for a final lunge into the city. “We cannot afford to have a commando team running around in the city. Going after me is relatively harmless ...”
“No, it isn't,” Horst said.
“... But going after a power plant or the defence lines is far more dangerous,” Gudrun added, trying hard to keep her voice calm. “We need to deal with them before it’s too late.”
“By using you as bait,” her father said. His voice was very even, very calm. “Gudrun, I forbid it.”
“I’m a married woman,” Gudrun snapped. It wasn't a tone she would have dared to use earlier, but she was no longer under his authority. “Horst ...”
Horst sighed. “It could work,” he conceded, reluctantly. “But Gudrun ... the risks alone are terrifying. You could die or be snatched.”
“Or they mi
ght realise it was a trap and fall back, abandoning any plans to snatch you,” her father added, angrily. “Gudrun, this is madness.”
“We can make it work,” Gudrun insisted. She looked at Horst. “Can’t we?”
“Maybe,” Horst said, He closed his eyes for a long moment. “Too many people would have to be involved. A single leak would be enough to doom the entire operation. And there are far too many moving parts.”
“But it could work,” Gudrun said.
“Yeah, it could work,” Horst said. He ignored her father’s glare. “But you’d have to do precisely what you’re told to do.”
Her father snorted, rudely. “That will be the day.”
Gudrun looked at him. “Father, I’m already a target,” she said, gently. “This is a chance to turn that into an advantage.”
“Or a chance to get a bullet through the head,” her father snapped. “You’re in quite enough danger without walking straight into a gunfight!”
“They have orders to take her alive,” Horst said. He didn't sound as though he believed himself. “I don’t think they’ll kill her deliberately.”
“Accidents happen,” her father said. He sighed, heavily. “I should never have let you go to that damned university.”
Gudrun heard the pain - and fear - under his words and bit down, hard, to keep from mustering a sharp response. Her father might be stern, her father might expect her to be more of a traditional girl than she wanted to be, but she’d never doubted her father loved her. Boys were expected to go into danger, to put their bodies between the Reich and all harm; girls were expected to remain at home, safe and warm. And yet, she had started the ball rolling that had eventually brought down the Reich. She was very far from a traditional girl.
“I will be fine,” she said, softly. “Horst is looking after me.”
“Too much can go wrong,” Horst said, sharply. “There is no way we can guarantee your safety.”
Gudrun swallowed, but refused to back down. “Start drawing up the plans,” she said. She’d challenged the Reich at the height of its power. She was damned if she was backing down now. “And then we will make them work.”
Chapter Thirty-Six
Berlin, Germany Prime
25 October 1985
“All is in readiness, Herr Hauptsturmfuehrer,” Strumscharfuehrer Brandt said, as the sun started to peep over the horizon. “We are just waiting on the order to move.”
“Yeah, we must wait for the order to attack before attacking,” Hauptsturmfuehrer Hennecke Schwerk mused. “To launch without support would be disastrous.”
He smiled as he inspected the men. Four days of rest and recuperation - and intercourse and intoxication - had done wonders for morale. The men had been able to sleep in comfortable beds for two nights, often sharing them with girls eager to show the Waffen-SS stormtroopers that black uniforms were still the very height of fashion for young men. Hennecke himself had spent two days in bed with a blonde girl who might have been a boring conversationalist, but knew precisely what to do with her mouth and breasts to give a man a very good time indeed. By the time he’d headed back to the lines - and sent the girl to the next stormtrooper who required servicing - he felt so much better that he was tempted to lead the charge into Berlin himself.
And that girl wants to regain her racial certificate, he thought, nastily. And the only way to do that is to carry an Aryan child to term.
“I assume the reservists kept prodding the defenders,” he said. “Did they actually learn anything useful?”
“Very little,” Brandt said. “They confirm that the enemy has dug in over there” - he smiled as he jabbed a finger towards Berlin - “but very little else.”
Hennecke shrugged. The stormtroopers might have been pulled out of the line, but the shooting had never actually stopped. Intelligence kept insisting that the enemy was on the verge of running out of bullets and, for once, Hennecke was inclined to believe they were right. He'd heard enough rumours about ammunition shortages confronting the Waffen-SS to make it easy to believe that the enemy would have the same problem. And Berlin was completely sealed off from the rest of the Reich. They didn't have a hope of shipping more ammunition into the city.
They could try to fly it in, he thought. But we have enough air defences surrounding the city to make it very difficult.
He glanced at Brandt. “Did you hear anything about the timing?”
“No, Herr Hauptsturmfuehrer,” Brandt said. “There’s no set time for the offensive.”
“Odd,” Hennecke mused. Taking advantage of a fluid battleground was one thing, but preparing an offensive without setting a start time was odd. If nothing else, some units could practically be relied upon not to get the word and sit on their asses while everyone else engaged the enemy. “But I'm sure they have their reasons.”
He sighed, then turned to look towards Berlin. The battleground was a wasteland, countless buildings knocked down by gunfire or blown up by emplaced IEDs. Hennecke knew just how lucky he had been to escape being wounded or killed in any one of a dozen traps he’d stumbled across during the endless battle. And yet, one final push might just be enough to destroy the enemy defences and carry the stormtroopers into Berlin itself.
And then we can put an end to the war, he thought.
***
Horst hated to admit it, but he was terrified.
Not terrified for himself, he knew. He’d long since grown used to the idea of putting his fragile body at risk. Growing up in Germany East - where one might have to fight at any time - had shaped his mindset, reassuring him that it was better to die in battle than watch helplessly as his family were ravished or murdered by Untermenschen. But putting Gudrun in danger was something else. The thought of losing her was terrifying.
He was her husband. He had a right - he knew he had a right - to tell her what to do. And yet he also knew that trying to enforce that right would destroy their relationship. No one could object - legally - if he laid down the law to her and enforced it with his fists, but Gudrun would never tolerate it. He’d never be able to sleep next to her again, not without having her slit his throat while he was sleeping. And yet, it was almost worth it just to know she would survive.
But she’s right, the coolly pragmatic part of his mind observed. There’s no other way to lure the cell into the open.
He cursed under his breath as he led the way down to the car. He’d done everything he could to guarantee success, placing trustworthy soldiers in position to intercept the commandos when they finally showed themselves. And if everything went according to plan, Gudrun would never be in any real danger. A volunteer, wearing a blonde wig, would play her role long enough to lure the commandos into the open. Gudrun should be safe and sound in the bunker when all hell was let loose.
And yet he knew, all too well, that too many things could go badly wrong.
Gudrun looked nervous, he noted, as they stopped by the car. The driver didn't look much better. He’d been trained in evasive driving - Horst had read his record very carefully before authorising him to work as Gudrun’s driver - but deliberately leading someone into a trap was new. And using the person he was supposed to protect as bait ... Horst was surprised the man hadn't objected more forcefully. No close-protection team worthy of the name would want anything to do with the plan.
“This is your last chance to change your mind,” he muttered. The driver opened the door, then turned and headed back to the front seat. “You can back out now and no one will think any less of you.”
“Because I’m a woman,” Gudrun said, crossly. They’d argued for hours as the plan came together, Horst trying to talk her out of it while Gudrun insisting they went ahead. He still found it hard to believe that she’d come up with the plan, then forced it though despite opposition from both her father and husband. “No one expects much from me either.”
“Seems a better deal than we get,” Horst said. He’d seen how pride could keep a man fighting when a tactical withdrawal to a s
uperior position would probably have worked better, in the long run. “A man who backed out now would be branded a coward.”
Gudrun gave him a sharp look, then settled into the car. She’d insisted on wearing trousers, rather than a dress. Horst was torn between admiring her insistence on practicality and worrying about soldiers admiring his wife’s shapely legs. But at least they would let her move quickly if there was an emergency. She’d even spent the last few nights in the shooting range, mastering the small pistol he’d given her. Maybe allowing her to burn through so much ammunition was wasteful, but at least it meant she could defend herself, if necessary.
Unless she loses the pistol, Horst thought. Gudrun was fit - the BDM had made sure of that, if nothing else - but she was no match for a grown man, particularly one who had had intensive combat training. Stormtroopers who had their asses kicked by women only existed in bad American propaganda. If she loses the pistol, she’s in deep shit.
Chosen of the Valkyries (Twilight Of The Gods Book 2) Page 36
